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 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 SANTA BARBARA 
 
 COLLEGE OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 MR. AND MRS.R.W.VAUGHAN 
 
 ^
 
 ,^; ,-^^ 
 
 ^"^^
 
 THE MERRY MEN 
 
 AND OTHER TALES AND FABLES 
 
 STRANGE CASE OF 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE
 
 THE MERRY MEN 
 
 anb (Btf)n JJTalrs anti jFalilcs 
 
 STRANGE CASE OF 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE 
 
 BY 
 
 ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 1895 
 
 [/4// rights reserved'^
 
 UNIVFr.SITY OF r.AIIFor.NTA 
 SANTA BAHJAKA COLLEGE LIBKAKY 
 
 m 
 
 31 Y DEAR Lady Taylor, 
 
 To your name, if I wrote on brass, I could add 
 nothing ; it has heen already written higher than 1 
 could dream to reach, by a strong and a dear hand ; 
 and if I now dedicate to you these tales, it is not as 
 the writer who brings you his work, but as the 
 friend ivho would remind you of his affection. 
 
 ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. 
 
 SKERItYVORE, BonltNEMOUTB.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE MERRY MEN 1 
 
 Chapter I. Eilean Aros 3 
 
 II. What the Wreck had brought to Aros. . 12 
 
 III. Land and Sea in Sandag Bay 29 
 
 IV. The Gale 44 
 
 V. A Man out of the Sea 59 
 
 WILL 0' THE MILL 77 
 
 MARKHEIM 117 
 
 THRAWN JANET 144 
 
 OLALLA 161 
 
 THE TREASURE OP FRANCHARD. 
 
 Chapter I. By the Dying Mountebank 224 
 
 II. Morning Talk 229 
 
 III. The Adoption 238 
 
 IV. The Education of a Philosopher 248 
 
 V. Treasure Trove 260 
 
 VI. A Criminal Investigation, in two Parts. . 278 
 
 VII. The Fall of the House of Desprez 292 
 
 VIIT. The Wages of Philosophy 303
 
 Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 Story of the Door 311 
 
 Search for Mr. TTyde 320 
 
 Dr. Jekyll was quite at Ease 331 
 
 The Carew Murder Case 334 
 
 Incident of the Letter 341 
 
 Remarkable Incident of Dr. liANYox 347 
 
 Incident at the Window 353 
 
 The Last Night 355 
 
 Dr. Lanyon's Narrative 372 
 
 Henry Jekyll's Full Statement of the Case 382
 
 THE MERRY MEN.
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EILEAJSr AKOS. 
 
 It was a beautiful morning in the late July when I 
 set forth on foot for the last time for Aros. A boat had 
 put me ashore the night before at Grisapol ; I had such 
 breakfast as the little inn afforded, and, leaving all my 
 baggage till I had an occasion to come round for it by 
 sea, struck right across the promontory with a cheerful 
 heart. 
 
 I was far from being a native of these parts, spring- 
 ing, as I did, from an unmixed lowland stoci\. But an 
 uncle of mine, Gordon Darnaway, after a poor, rough 
 youth, and some years at sea, had married a young wife 
 in the islands ; Mary Maclean she was called, the last 
 of her family ; and when she died in giving birth to a 
 daughter, Aros, the sea-girt farm, had remained in his 
 possession. It brought him in nothing but the means 
 of life, as I was well aware ; but he was a man whom 
 ill-fortune had pursued ; he feared, cumbered as he was 
 with the young child, to make a fresh adventure upon
 
 4 THE MEKIIY MEN. 
 
 life ; and remained in Aros, biting his nails at destiny. 
 Years passed over his head in that isolation, and brought 
 neither help nor contentment. Meantime our family 
 was dying out in the lowlands ; there is little luck for 
 any of that race ; and jiorhaps my father was the luck- 
 iest of all, for not only was he one of the last to die, but 
 he left a son to his name and a little money to support 
 it. I was a student of Edinburgh University, living well 
 enough at my own charges, but without kith or kin; when 
 some news of me found its way to Uncle Gordon on the 
 Eoss of Grisapol ; and he, as he was a man who held 
 blood thicker than water, wrote to me the day he heard 
 of my existence, and taught me to count Aros as my 
 home. Thus it was that I came to spend my vacations 
 in tbat part of the country, so far from all society ana 
 comfort, between the codfish and the moorcocks; and 
 thus it was that now, when I had done with my classes, 
 I was returning thither with so light a heart that July 
 day. 
 
 The Ross, as we call it, is a promontory neither wide 
 nor high, but as rough as God made it to this day ; the 
 deep sea on either hand of it, full of rugged isles and 
 reefs most perilous to seamen — all overlooked from the 
 eastward by some very high cliffs and the great peak of 
 Ben Kyaw. Tlic Mountain of the Mist, they say the 
 words signify in the Gaelic tongue ; and it is well named. 
 For that hill-top, which is more than three thousand 
 feet in height, catches all the clouds that come blowing
 
 THE MERKY MEN. 5 
 
 from the seaward ; and, indeed, I used often to think 
 that it must make them for itself ; since when all heaven 
 was clear to the sea level, there would ever be a streamer 
 on Ben Kyaw. It brought water, too, and was mossy * 
 to the top in consequence. I have seen us sitting in 
 broad sunshine on the Eoss, and the rain falling black 
 like crape upon the mountain. But the wetness of it 
 made it often appear more beautiful to my eyes ; for 
 when the sun struck upon the hill sides, there were 
 many wet rocks and watercourses that shone like jewels 
 even as far as Aros, fifteen miles away. 
 
 The road that I followed was a cattle-track. It 
 twisted so as nearly to double the length of my jour- 
 ney ; it went over rough boulders so that a man had 
 to leap from one to another, and through soft bottoms 
 where the moss came nearly to the knee. There was 
 no cultivation anywhere, and not one house in the 
 ten miles from Grisapol to Aros. Houses of course 
 there were — three at least ; but they lay so far on the 
 one side or the other that no stranger could have 
 found them from the track. A large part of the Eoss 
 is covered with big granite rocks, some of them larger 
 than a two-roomed house, one beside another, with 
 fern and deep heather in between them where the 
 vipers breed. Anyway the wind was, it was always 
 sea air, as salt as on a ship ; the gulls were as free as 
 moorfowl over all the Eoss ; and whenever the way 
 * Boggy.
 
 6 THE MEKEY MEN. 
 
 rose a little, your eye would kindle with the bright- 
 ness of the sea. From the very midst of the land, on 
 a day of wind and a high spring, I have heard the 
 Roost roaring like a battle where it runs by Aros, and 
 the great and fearful voices of the breakers that we 
 call the Merry Men. 
 
 Aros itself — Aros Jay, I have heard the natives 
 call it, and they say it means the House of God — Aros 
 itself was not properly a piece of the Ross, nor was it 
 quite an islet. It formed the south-west corner of the 
 land, fitted close to it, and was in one place only 
 separated from the coast by a little gat of the sea, not 
 forty feet across the narrowest. When the tide was 
 full, this was clear and still, like a pool on a land 
 river ; only there was a difference in the weeds and 
 fishes, and the water itself was green instead of brown ; 
 but when the tide went out, in the bottom of the ebb, 
 there was a day or two in every month when you could 
 pass dryshod from Aros to the mainland. There was 
 some good pasture, where my uncle fed the sheep he 
 lived on ; perhaps the feed was better because the 
 ground rose higher on the islet than the main level of 
 the Ross, but this I am not skilled enough to settle. 
 The house was a good one for that country, two storeys 
 high. It looked westward over a bay, with a pier hard 
 by for a boat, and from the door you could watch the 
 vapours blowing on Ben Kyaw. 
 
 On all this part of the coast, and especially near
 
 THE MEREY MEN". 7 
 
 Aros, these great granite rocks that I have spoken of 
 go down together in troops into the sea, like cattle on 
 a summer's day. There they stand, for all the world 
 like their neighbours ashore ; only the salt water sob- 
 bing between them instead of the quiet earth, and 
 clots of sea-pink blooming on their sides instead of 
 heather ; and the great sea conger to wreathe about 
 the base of them instead of the poisonous viper of the 
 land. On calm days you can go wandering between 
 them in a boat for hours, echoes following you about 
 the labyrinth ; but when the sea is up, Heaven help 
 the man that hears that cauldron boiling. 
 
 Off the south-west end of Arcs these blocks are very 
 many, and much greater in size. Indeed, they must 
 grow monstrously bigger out to sea, for there must be 
 ten sea miles of open water sown with them as thick as 
 a country place with houses, some standing thirty feet 
 above the tides, some covered, but all perilous to ships ; 
 so that on a clear, westerly blowing day, I have counted, 
 from the top of Aros, the great rollers breaking white 
 and heavy over as many as six-and-forty buried reefs. 
 But it is nearer in sliore that the danger is worst ; for 
 the tide, here running like a mill race, makes a long 
 belt of broken water — a Roost we call it — at the tail of 
 the land. I have often been out there in a dead calm at 
 the slack of the tide ; and a strange place it is, with the 
 sea swirling and combing up and boiling like the cauld- 
 rons of a linn, and now and again a little dancing mut-
 
 8 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 ter of sound as though the Roost were talking to itself. 
 But when the tide begins to run again, and above all in 
 heavy weather, there is no man could take a boat within 
 half a mile of it, nor a ship afloat that could either steer 
 or live in such a place. You can hear the roaring of it 
 six miles away. At the seaward end there comes the 
 strongest of the bubble ; and it's here that these big 
 breakers dance together — the dance of death, it may be 
 called — that have got the name, in these paxts, of the 
 MeiTy Men. I have heard it said that they run fifty feet 
 high ; but that must be the green water only, for the 
 spray runs twice as high as that. Whether they got the 
 name from their movements, which are swift and antic, 
 or from the shouting they make about the turn of the 
 tide, so that all Aros shakes with it, is more than I can 
 tell. 
 
 The truth is, that in a south-westerly wind, that part 
 of our archipelago is no better than a trap. If a ship 
 got through the reefs, and weathered the Merry Men, it 
 would be to come ashore on the south coast of Aros, in 
 Sandag Bay, where so many dismal things befell our 
 family, as I propose to tell. The thought of all these 
 dangers, in the place I knew so long, makes me partic- 
 ularly welcome the works now going forward to set lights 
 upon the headlands and buoys along the channels of our 
 iron-bound, inhospitable islands. 
 
 The country people had many a story about Aros, as 
 I used to hear from my uncle's man, Rorie, an old ser-
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 9 
 
 vant of the Macleans, who had transferred his services 
 without afterthought on the occasion of the marriage. 
 There was some tale of an unlucky creature, a sea-kelpie, 
 that dwelt and did business in some fearful manner of 
 his own among the boiling breakers of the Eoost. A 
 mermaid had once met a pij^er on Sandag beach, and 
 there sang to him a long, bright midsnmmer's night, so 
 that in the morning he was found stricken crazy, and 
 from thenceforward, till the day he died, said only one 
 form of words ; what they were in the original Gaelic I 
 cannot tell, but they were thus translated : '^ Ah, the 
 sweet singing out of the sea." Seals that haunted on 
 that coast have been known to speak to man in his own 
 tongue, i^resaging great disasters. It was here that a 
 certain saint first landed on his voyage out of Ireland to 
 convert the Hebrideans. And, indeed, I think he had 
 some claim to be called saint ; for, with the boats of 
 that past age, to make so rough a passage, and land on 
 such a ticklish coast, was surely not far short of the 
 miraculous. It was to him, or to some of his monkish 
 underlings who had a cell there, that the islet owes its 
 holy and beautiful name, the House of God. 
 
 Among these old wives' stories there was one which 
 I was inclined to hear with more credulity. As I was 
 told, in that tempest which scattered the ships of the 
 Invincible Armada over all the north and west of 
 Scotland, one great vessel came ashore on Aros, and 
 before the eyes of some solitary people on a hill-top,
 
 10 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 went down in a moment with all hands, her colours 
 flying even as she sank. There was some likelihood 
 in this tale ; for another of that fleet lay sunk on the 
 north side, twenty miles from Grisapol. It was told, I 
 thought, with more detail and gravity than its com- 
 panion stories, and there was one particularity which 
 went far to convince me of its truth : the name, that is, 
 of the ship was still remembered, and sounded, in my 
 ears Spanishly. The Espirito Santo they called it, a 
 great ship of many decks of guns, laden with treasure 
 and grandees of Spain, and fierce soldadoes, that now 
 lay fathom deep to all eternity, done with her wars and 
 voyages, in Sandag bay, upon the west of Aros. No 
 more salvos of ordnance for that tall ship, the "Holy 
 Spirit," no more fair winds or happj' ventures ; only to 
 rot there deep in the sea-tangle and hear the shoutings of 
 the Merry Men as the tide ran high about the island. 
 It was a strange thought to me first and last, and only 
 grew stranger as I learned the more of the way in 
 which she had set sail with so proud a company, and 
 King Philip, the wealthy king, that sent her on that 
 voyage. 
 
 And now I must tell you, as I walked from Grrisapol 
 that day, the Espirito Santo was very much in my re- 
 flections. I had been favourably remarked by our then 
 Principal in Edinburgh College, that famous writer, 
 Dr. Eobertson, and by him had been set to work on some 
 papers of an ancient date to rearrange and sift of what
 
 THE MERRY MEN. H 
 
 was worthless ; and in one of these, to my great wonder, 
 I found a note of this very ship, the Espirito Santo, 
 with her captain's name, and how slie carried a great 
 part of the Spaniard's treasure, and had been lost upon the 
 Eoss of Grisapol ; but in what particular spot, the wild 
 tribes of that place and period would give no informa- 
 tion to the king's inquiries. Putting one thing with 
 another, and taking our island tradition together with 
 this note of old King Jamie's perquisitions after wealth, 
 it had come strongly on my mind that the spot for 
 which he sought in vain could be no other than the 
 small bay of Sandag on my uncle's land ; and being a 
 fellow of a mechanical turn, I had ever since been plot- 
 ting how to weigh that good ship up again with all her 
 ingots, ounces, and doubloons, and bring back our house 
 of Darnaway to its long-forgotten dignity and wealth. 
 
 This was a design of which I soon had reason to 
 repent. My mind was sharply turned on different re- 
 flections ; and since I became the witness of a strange 
 judgment of God's, the thought of dead men's treasures 
 has been intolerable to my conscience. But even at that 
 time I must acquit myself of sordid greed ; for if I de- 
 sired riches, it was not for their own sake, but for the 
 sake of a ]3erson who was dear to my heart — my uncle's 
 daughter, Mary Ellen. Sbe had been educated well, 
 and had been a time to school upon the mainland*, 
 which, poor girl, she would have been happier without. 
 For Aros was no place for her, with old Eorie the ser-
 
 12 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 vaiit, and hor father, who was one of the unhappiest 
 men in Scotland, plainly bred up in a country place 
 among Cameronians, long a skipper sailing out of the 
 Clyde about the islands, and now, with infinite dis- 
 content, managing his sheep and a little 'long shore 
 fishing for the necessary bread. If it was sometimes 
 weariful to me, who was there but a month or two, 3'^ou 
 may fancy what it was to her who dwelt in that same 
 desert all the year round, with the sheep and flying sea- 
 gulls, and the Merry Men singing and dancing in the 
 Roost ! 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 WHAT THE WRECK HAD BROUGHT TO AROS. 
 
 It was half-flood when I got the length of Aros ; and 
 there was nothing for it but to stand on the far shore 
 and whistle for Rorie with the boat. I had no need 
 to repeat the signal. At the first sound, Mary was at 
 the door flying a handkerchief by way of answer, and 
 the old long-legged serving-man was shambling down 
 the gravel to the pier. For all his hurry, it took him 
 a long while to pull across the bay ; and I observed 
 him several times to jjause, go into the stern, and look 
 over curiously into the wake. As he came nearer, he 
 seemed to me aged and haggard, and I thought he 
 avoided my eye. The coble had been repaired, with 
 two new thwarts and several patches of some rare and 
 beautiful foreign wood, the name of it unknown to me.
 
 THE MEKRY MEN". IS 
 
 "Why, Rorie," said I, as we began the return voyage, 
 ''this is fine wood. How came youi by that ?" 
 
 *'It will be hard to cheesel," Eorie opined reluctantly; 
 and just then, dropping the oars, he made another of 
 those dives into the stern which I had remarked as he 
 came across to fetch me, and, leaning his hand on my 
 shoulder, stared with an awful look into the waters of 
 the bay. 
 
 "What is wrong ?" I asked, a good deal startled. 
 
 " It will be a great feesli," said the old man, return- 
 ing to his oars ; and nothing more could I get out of 
 him, but strange glances and an ominous nodding of 
 the head. In spite of myself, I was infected with a 
 measure of uneasiness ; I turned also, and studied the 
 wake. The water was still and transparent, but, out 
 here in the middle of the bay, exceeding deep. For 
 some time I could see naught ; but at last it did seem 
 to me as if something dark — a great fish, or perhaps 
 only a shadow — followed studiously in the track of the 
 moving coble. And then I remembered one of Rorie's 
 superstitions : how in a ferry in Moiwen, in some great, 
 exterminating feud among the clans, a fish, the like of 
 it unknown in all our waters, followed for some years 
 the passage of the ferry-boat, until no man dared to 
 make the crossing. 
 
 "He will be waiting for the right man," said 
 Eorie. 
 
 Mary met me on the beach, and led me u]d the brae
 
 14 THE MEERY MEJT. 
 
 and into the house of Aros. Outside and inside there 
 were many changes. The garden was fenced with the 
 same wood that I had noted in the boat ; there were 
 chairs in the kitchen covered with strange brocade ; 
 curtains of brocade hung from the window ; a clock 
 stood silent on the dresser ; a lamp of brass was swing- 
 ing from the roof ; the table was set for dinner with the 
 finest of linen and silver ; and all these new riches were 
 displayed in the plain old kitchen that I knew so well, 
 with the high-backed settle, and the stools, and the 
 closet bed for Eorie ; with the wide chimney the sun 
 shone into, and the clear-smouldering peats ; with the 
 pipes on the mantelshelf and the three-cornered spit- 
 toons, filled with sea-shells instead of sand, on the 
 floor ; with the bare stone walls and the bare wooden 
 floor, and the three patchwork rugs that were of yore 
 its sole adornment — poor man's patchwork, the like of 
 it unknown in cities, woven with homespun, and Sun- 
 day black, and sea-cloth polished on the bench of row- 
 ing. The room, like the house, had been a sort of 
 wonder in that country-side, it was so neat and habita- 
 ble ; and to see it now, shamed by these incongruous 
 additions, filled me with indignation and a kind of 
 anger. In view of the errand I had come upon to 
 Aros, the feeling was baseless and unjust ; but it burned 
 high, at the first moment, in my heart. 
 
 ''Mary, girl," said I, "this is the place I had learned 
 to call my home, and I do not know it."
 
 THE MEERY MEN". 15 
 
 " It is my home by nature, not by the learning," she 
 replied ; '' the place I was born and the place I'm like 
 to die in ; and I neither like these changes, nor the way 
 they came, nor that which came with them. I would 
 have liked better, under God's pleasure, they had gone 
 down into the sea, and the Merry Men were dancing on 
 them now." 
 
 Mary was always serious ; it was perhaps the only trait 
 that she shared with her father ; but the tone with which 
 she nttered these words was even graver than of custom. 
 
 '^Ay," said I, '^I feared it came by wreck, and that's 
 by death ; yet when my father died, I took his goods 
 without remorse." 
 
 "Your father died a clean strae death, as the folk 
 say," said Mary. 
 
 "True," I returned; "and a wreck is like a judg- 
 ment. What was she called ? " 
 
 " They ca'd her the CJirist-An7ia," ^oh.^ a voice be- 
 hind me ; and, turning round, I saw my uncle standing 
 in the doorway. 
 
 He was a sour, small, bilious man, with a long face 
 and very dark eyes ; fifty-six years old, sound and active 
 in body, and with an air somewhat between that of a 
 shepherd and that of a man following the sea. He 
 never laughed, that I heard ; read long at the Bible ; 
 prayeti much, like the Cameronians he had been 
 brought up among ; and indeed, in many ways, used 
 to remind me of one of the hill-preachers in the killing
 
 16 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 times before the Kevolution. But he never got much 
 comfort, nor even, as I used to think, much guidance, 
 by his piety. He had his black fits when he was afraid 
 of hell ; but he had led a rough life, to which he would 
 look back with envy, and was still a rough, cold, gloomy 
 man. 
 
 As he came in at the door out of the sunlight, with 
 his bonnet on his head and a pipe hanging in his but- 
 ton-hole, he seemed, like Eorie, to have grown older 
 and j)aler, the lines were deeplier ploughed ujjon his 
 face, and the whites of his eyes were yellow, like old 
 stained ivory, or the bones of the dead. 
 
 "Ay," he repeated, dwelling upon the first part of 
 the word, "the Christ-Anna. It's an awfu' name." 
 
 I made him my salutations, and complimented him 
 upon his look of health ; for I feared he had perhaps 
 been ill. 
 
 "I'm in the body," he replied, ungraciously enough ; 
 
 "aye in the body and the sins of the body, like your- 
 
 sel'. Denner," he said abruptly to Mary, and then ran 
 
 on to me: "They're grand braws, thir that we hae 
 
 gotten, are they no ? Yon's a bonny knock,* but it'll 
 
 no gang ; and the napery's by ordnar. Bonny, bairnly 
 
 braws ; it's for the like o' them folk sells the peace of 
 
 'rod that passeth understanding ; it's for the like o' 
 
 m, an' maybe no even sae muckle worth, folk daunt- 
 
 ^ God to His face and burn in muckle hell ; and it's 
 
 * Clock.
 
 THE MERKY MEJiT. 17 
 
 for that reason the Scripture ca's them, as I read the 
 passage, the accursed thing. Mary, ye girzie," he in- 
 terrupted himself to cry with some asperity, 'Mvhat for 
 hae ye no put out the tvva candlesticks ?" 
 
 " Why should we need them at high noon ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 But my uncle was not to be turned from his idea. 
 "We'll bruik* them while we may," he said; and so 
 two massiye candlesticks of wrought silver were added 
 to the table equipage, already so unsuited to that rough 
 sea-side farm. 
 
 ''She cam' ashore Februar' 10, about ten at nicht," 
 he went on to me. " There was nae wind, and a sair 
 ran o' sea ; and she was in the sook o' the Eoost, as I 
 jalooso. We had seen her a' day, Rorie and me, beat- 
 ing to the wind. She wasnae a handy craft, I'm think- 
 ing, that Ch7'ist-Anna ; for she would neither steer nor 
 stey wi' them. A sair day they had of it ; their hands 
 was ne'.'cr afi; the sheets, and it perishin' cauld — ower 
 cauld to snaw ; and aye they would get a bit nip o' 
 wind, and awa' again, to pit the emp'y hope into them. 
 Eh, man ! but they had a sair day for the last o't ! He 
 would have had a prood, prood heart that won ashore 
 upon the back o' that." 
 
 ''And were all lost ? " I cried. " God help them !" 
 
 " Wheesht ! " he said sternly. "JSTane shall pray for 
 the deid on my hearth -stane." 
 * Enjoy.
 
 18 THE MERRY MEK. 
 
 I disclaimed a Popish sense for my ejaculation ; and 
 he seemed to accept my disclaimer with unusual facil- 
 ity, and ran on once more upon what had evidently be- 
 come a favorite subject. 
 
 " We fand her in Sandag Bay, Eorie an' me, and a' 
 thae braws in the inside of her. There's a kittle bit, ye 
 see, about Sandag ; whiles the sook rins strong for the 
 Merry Men ; an' whiles again, when the tide's makin' 
 hard an' ye can hear the Eoost blawin' at the far-end of 
 Aros, there comes a back-spang of current straucht into 
 Sandag Bay. Weel, there's the thing that got the grip 
 on the Christ-Anna. She but to have come in ram- 
 stam an' stern forrit ; for the bows of her are aften 
 under, and the back-side of her is clear at hie-water o' 
 neaps. But, man ! the dunt that she cam doou wi' 
 when she struck ! Lord save us a' ! but it's an unco 
 life to be a sailor — a cauld, wanchaucy life. Mony's the 
 gliff I got mysel' in the great deep ; and why the Lord 
 should hae made yon unco water is mair than ever I 
 could win to understand. He made the vales and the 
 pastures, the bonny green yaird, the halesome, canty 
 land — 
 
 And now they shout and sing to Thee, 
 For Thou hast made them ghid, 
 
 as the Psalms say in the metrical version. No that I 
 would preen my faith to that clink neither ; but it's 
 bonny, and easier to mind. " Who go to sea in ships," 
 they hae't again —
 
 THE MERKY HEX. 19 
 
 And in 
 Great waters trading be, 
 Within the deep these men God's works 
 And His great wonders see. 
 
 Weel, it's easy sayin' sae. Maybe Daiivit wasnae Very 
 weel acquant wi' the sea. But troth, if it wasnae pren- 
 tit in the Bible, I wad whiles be temp'it to think it was- 
 nae the Lord, but the muckle, black deil that made the 
 sea. There's naething good conies oot o't but the fish ; 
 an' the spentacle o' God riding on the tempest, to be 
 shure, whilk would be what Dauvit was likely ettling at. 
 But, man, they were sair wonders that God showed to 
 the Christ-Anna — wonders, do I ca' them ? Judg- 
 ments, rather : judgments in the mirk nicht among the 
 draygons o' the deep. And their souls — to think o' that 
 — their souls, man, maybe no prepared ! The sea — a 
 muckle yett to hell ! '' 
 
 I observed, as my uncle spoke, that his voice was un- 
 naturally moved and his manner unwontedly demon- 
 strative. He leaned forward at these last words, for ex- 
 ample, and touched me on the knee with his spread 
 fingers, looking up into my face with a certain pallor, 
 and I could see that his eyes shone with a deep-seated 
 fire, and that the lines about his mouth were drawn and 
 tremulous. 
 
 Even the entrance of Rorie, and the beginning of our 
 meal, did not detach him from his train of thought be- 
 yond a moment. He condescended, indeed, to ask me
 
 20 THE MERRY ME2T. 
 
 some questions as to my success at college, but I 
 thought it was with half his mind ; and even in his ex- 
 tempore grace, which was, as usual, long and wander- 
 ing, I could find the trace of his preoccupation, pray- 
 ing, as he did, that God would " remember in mercy 
 fower puir, feckless, fiddling, sinful creatures here by 
 their lee-lane beside the great and dowie waters.'"' 
 
 Soon there came an interchange of speeches between 
 him and Eorie. 
 
 *' Was it there ? " asked my uncle. 
 
 " Ou, ay ! " said Eorie. 
 
 I observed that they both spoke in a manner of 
 aside, and with some show of embarrassment, and that 
 Mary herself appeared to colour, and looked down ou 
 her plate. Partly to show my knowledge, and so re- 
 lieve the party from an awkward strain, partly because I 
 ■was curious, I pursued the subject. 
 
 " You mean the fish ? " I asked. 
 
 " Whatten fish ? " cried my uncle. " Fish, quo' he ! 
 Fish ! Your een are fu' o' fatness, man ; your heid 
 dozened wi' carnal leir. Fish ! it's a bogle ! " 
 
 He spoke with great vehemence, as though angry ; and 
 perhaps I was not very willing to be put down so shortly, 
 for young men are disputatious. At least I remember I 
 retorted hotly, crying out upon childish superstitions. 
 
 "And ye come frae the College!" sneered Uncle 
 Gordon, "Gude kens what they learn folk there ; it's 
 no muckle service onyway. Do ye think, man, that
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 21 
 
 there's naething in a' yon saufc wilderness o' a world 
 cot wast there, wi' the sea grasses growin', an' the sea 
 beasts fechtin', an' the sun glintin' down into it, day 
 by day ? Na ; the sea's like the land, but fearsomer. 
 If there's folk ashore, there's folk in the sea — deid they 
 may be, but they're folk whatever ; and as for deils, 
 there's nane that's like the sea deils. There's no sae 
 muckle harm in the land deils, when a's said and done. 
 Lang syne, when I was a callant in the south country, 
 I mind there was an auld, bald bogle in the Peewie 
 Moss. I got a glisk o' him mysel', sittin' on his hunk- 
 ers in a hag, as gray's a tombstanc. An', troth, he was 
 a fearsome-like taed. But he steered naebody. Nae 
 doobt, if ane that was a reprobate, ane the Lord hated, 
 had gane by there wi' his sin still upon his stamach, 
 nae doobt the creature would hae lowped upo' the likes 
 o' him. But there's deils in the deep sea would yoke on 
 a communicant ! Eh, sirs, if ye had gane doon wi' the 
 puirlads in the Christ-Anna, ye would ken by now the 
 mei'cyo' the seas. If ye had sailed it for as lang as me, 
 ye would hate the thocht of it as I do. If ye had but 
 used the een G-od gave ye, ye would hae learned the 
 wickedness o' that fause, saut, cauld, builering creature, 
 and of a' that's in it by the Lord's permission: labsters 
 an' partans, an' sic like, howkingin the deid; muckle, 
 gutsy, blawing whales ; an' fish — the hale clan o' them 
 — cauld-wamed, blind-eed uncanny ferlies. 0, sirs," he 
 cried, ''the horror — the horror o' the sea ! "
 
 22 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 We were all somewhat staggered bj this outburst ; 
 and the speaker himself, after that last hoarse apostrophe, 
 appeared to sink gloomily into his own thoughts. But 
 Korie, who was greedy of superstitious lore, recalled 
 him to the subject by a question. 
 
 *'You will not ever have seen a teevil of the sea ?" 
 he asked. 
 
 '' No clearly," replied the other, " I raisdoobt if a 
 mere man could see ane clearly and conteenue in the 
 body. I hae sailed wi' a lad — they ca'd him Sandy 
 Gabart ; he saw ane, shiire eneuch, an' shiire eneuch 
 it was the end of him. We were seeven days oot frae 
 the Clyde — a sair wark we had had — gaun north wi' 
 seeds an' braws an' things for the Macleod. We had 
 got in ower near under the Cutchull'ns, an' had just 
 gane about by Soa, an' were off on a lang tack, we 
 thocht would maybe hauld as far's Copnahow. I mind 
 the nicht weel ; a mune smoored wi' mist ; a fine gaun 
 breeze upon the water, but no steedy ; an' — what 
 nane o' us likit to hear — anither wund gurlin' owerheid, 
 amang thae fearsome, auld stane craigs o' the Cutch- 
 ull'ns, Weel, Sandy was forrit wi' the jib sheet ; we 
 couldnae see him for the mains'l, that had just begude 
 to draw, when a' at ance he gied a skirl. I luffed for 
 my life, for I thocht we were ower near Soa ; but na, it 
 wasnae that, it was puir Sandy Gabart's deid skreigh, 
 or near hand, for he was deid in half an hour. A't he 
 could tell was that a sea .deil, or sea bogle, or sea
 
 THE MERKY MEK. 23 
 
 spenster, or sic-like, had clum up by the bowsprit, an' 
 gi'eu him ae cauld, uncanny look. An', or the life was 
 cot o' Sandy's body, we kent weel what the thing be- 
 tokened, and why the wnnd gurled in the taps o' the 
 Cutchull'ns ; for doon it cam' — a wund do I ca' it ! it 
 was the wund o' the Lord's anger — an' a' that nicht we 
 foucht like men dementit, and the niestthat we kenned 
 we ashore in Loch Uskevagh, an' the cocks were 
 era win' in Benbecula." 
 
 "It will have been a merman," Eorie said. 
 
 " A merman ! " screamed my uncle with immeasur- 
 able scorn. "Auld wives' clavers ! There's nae sic 
 things as mermen." 
 
 *' But what was the creature like ? " I asked. 
 
 "What like was it ? Gude forbid that we suld ken 
 what like it was ! It had a kind of a heid upon it — 
 man could say nae mair." 
 
 Then Eorie, smarting under the affront, told several 
 tales of mermen, mermaids, and sea-horses that had 
 come ashore upon the islands and attacked the crews 
 of boats uj)on the sea ; and my uncle, in spite of his 
 incredulity, listened with uneasy interest. 
 
 " Aweel, aweel," he said, "it may be sae ; I may be 
 wrang ; but I find nae word o' mermen in the Scrip- 
 tures." 
 
 " And you will find nae word of Aros Roost, maybe," 
 objected Eorie, and his argument appeared to carry 
 weight.
 
 24 THE MERRY MEIf. 
 
 When dinner was over, my uncle carried me forth 
 with him to a bank behind the house. It waa a very 
 hot and quiet afternoon ; scarce a ripple anywhere 
 upon the sea, nor any voice but the familiar voice of 
 sheep and gulls ; and j^erhaps in consequence of this 
 repose in nature, my kinsman showed himself more 
 rational and tranquil than before. He spoke evenly 
 and almost cheerfully of my career, with every now and 
 then a reference to the lost ship or the treasures it had 
 brought to Aros. For my part, I listened to him in a 
 sort of trance, gazing with all my heart on that remem- 
 bered scene, and drinking gladly the sea-air and the 
 smoke of peats that had been lit by Mary. 
 
 Perhaps an hour had passed when my uncle, who 
 had all the while been covertly gazing on the surface 
 of the little bay, rose to his feet and bade me follow 
 his example. Now I should say that the great run of 
 tide at the south-west end of Aros exercises a perturbing 
 influence round all the coast. In Sandag Bay, to the 
 south, a strong current runs at certain periods of the 
 flood and ebb respectively; but in this northern bay 
 — Aros Bay, as it is called — where the house stands 
 and on which my uncle was now gazing, the only sign 
 of disturbance is towards the end of the ebb, and even 
 then it is too slight to be remarkable. "When there is 
 any swell, nothing can be seen at all ; but when it is 
 calm, as it often is, there appear certain strange, un- 
 decipherable marks — sea-runes, as we may name them
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 25 
 
 — on the glassy surface of the bay. The like is com- 
 mon in a thousand places on the coast ; and many a 
 boy must have amused himself as I did, seeking to read 
 in them some reference to himself or those he loved. 
 It was to these marks that my uncle now directed my 
 attention, struggling as he did so, with an evident re- 
 luctance. 
 
 " Do ye see yon scart upo' the water ? " he in- 
 quired ; "yon an e wast the gray stane ? Ay? "Weel, 
 it'll no be like a letter, wull it ? " 
 
 "Certainly it is," I replied. "I have often re- 
 marked it. It is like a C. " 
 
 He heaved a sigh as if heavily disappointed with my 
 answer, and then" added below his breath: "Ay, for 
 the Christ-Anna." 
 
 " I used to suppose, sir, it was for myself," said I ; 
 *'for my name is Charles." 
 
 "And so ye saw't afore?" he ran on, not heeding 
 my remark. " Weel, weel, but that's unco strange. 
 Maybe, it's been there waitin', as a man wad say, 
 through a' the weary ages. Man, but that's awfu'." 
 And then, breaking ofE : "Ye'll no see anither, will 
 ye ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes," said I. "I see another very plainly, near the 
 Eoss side, where the road comes down — an M." 
 
 " An M," he repeated very low ; and then, again 
 after another pause : " An' what wad ye make o' 
 that ? " he inquired.
 
 26 THE MERRY MEX, 
 
 " I had always thought it to mean Mary, sir," I an- 
 swered, growing somewhat red, convinced as I was in 
 my own mind that I was on the threshold of a decisive 
 explanation. 
 
 But we were each following his own train of thought 
 to the exclusion of the other's. My uncle once more 
 paid no attention to my words ; only hung his head 
 and held his peace ; and I might have been led to fancy 
 that he had not heard me, if his next speech had not 
 contained a kind of echo from my own. 
 
 " I would say naething o' thae clavers to Mary," he 
 observed, and began to walk forward. 
 
 There is a belt of turf along the side of Aros Bay 
 where walking is easy ; and it was along this that I 
 silently followed my silent kinsman. I was perhaps 
 a little disapj)ointed at having lost so good an oppor- 
 tunity to declare my love ; but I was at the same time 
 far more deeply exercised at the change that had be- 
 fallen my uncle. He was never an ordinary, never, 
 in the strict sense, an amiable, man ; but there was 
 nothing in even the worst that I had known of him 
 before, to prepare me for so strange a transformation. 
 It was impossible to close the eyes against one fact ; 
 that he had, as the saying goes, something on his 
 mind ; and as I mentally ran over the different words 
 which might be represented by the letter M — misery, 
 mercy, marriage, money, and the like — I was arrested 
 with a sort of start by the word murder. I was still
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 27 
 
 considering the nglj sound and fatal meaning of the 
 word, when the direction of our walk brought us to a 
 point from which a view was to be had to either side, 
 back towards Aros Bay and homestead, and forward 
 on the ocean, dotted to the north with isles, and lying 
 to the southward blue and open to the sky. There 
 my guide came to a halt, and stood staring for awhile 
 on that expanse. Then he turned to me and laid a 
 hand on my arm. 
 
 "Ye think there's naething there ?" he said, point- 
 ing with his pipe ; and then cried out aloud, with a 
 kind of exultation : " I'll tell ye, man ! The deid are 
 down there — thick like rattons ! " 
 
 He turned at once, and, without another word, we 
 retraced our steps to the house of Aros. 
 
 I was eager to be alone with Mary ; yet it was not till 
 after supper, and then but for a short while, that I 
 could have a word with her. I lost no time beating 
 about the bush, but spoke out plainly what was on my 
 mind. 
 
 *' Mary," I said, " I have not come to Aros without a 
 hope. If that should prove well founded, we may all 
 leave and go somewhere else, secure of daily bread and 
 comfort ; secure, perhaps, of something far beyond that, 
 which it would seem extravagant in me to promise. 
 But there's a hope that lies nearer to my heart than 
 money." And at that I paused. "You can guess fine 
 what that is, Mary," I said. She looked away from me
 
 28 TH"E MEKRY MEN. 
 
 in silence, and that was small encouragement, but I was 
 not to be put off. "All my days I have thought the 
 world of you," I continued ; "the time goes on and I 
 think always the more of you ; I could not think to be 
 happy or hearty in my life without you : you are the 
 apple of my eye." Still she looked away, and said never 
 a word ; but I thought I saw that her hands shook. 
 '' Mary," I cried in fear, " do ye no like me ? " 
 
 " 0, Charlie man," she said, " is this a time to speak 
 of it ? Let me be, a while ; let me be the way I am ; 
 it'll not be you that loses by the waiting ! " 
 
 I made out by her voice that she was nearly weeping, 
 and this put me out of any thought but to compose her. 
 "Mary Ellen," I said, "say no more; I did not come 
 to trouble you : your way shall be mine, and your time 
 too ; and you have told me all I wanted. Only just this 
 one thing more : what ails you ? " 
 
 She owned it was her father, but would enter into no 
 particulars, only shook her head, and said he was not 
 well and not like himself, and it was a great pity. She 
 knew nothing of the wreck. " I havenae been near it," 
 said she. " What for would I go near it, Charlie lad ? 
 The poor souls are gone to their account long syne ; 
 and I would just have wished they had ta'en their gear 
 with them — poor souls ! " 
 
 This was scarcely any great encouragement for me to 
 tell her of the Espirito Santo j yet I did so, and at the 
 very first word she cried out in surprise. "There was a
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 29 
 
 man at Grisapol," she said, *'in the month of May — a 
 little, yellow, black-avised body, they tell me, with gold 
 rings upon his fingers, and a beard ; and he was speir- 
 ing high and low for that same ship." 
 
 It was towards the end of April that I had been given 
 these papers to sort ont by Dr. Eobertson : and it came 
 suddenly back upon my mind that they were thus pre- 
 pared for a Spanish historian, or a man calling himself 
 such, who had come with high recommendations to the 
 Principal, on a mission of inquiry as to the dispersion 
 of the great Armada. Putting one thing with another, 
 I fancied that the visitor ''with the goid rings upon his 
 fingers" might be the same with Dr. Kobertson's histor- 
 ian from Madrid. If that were so, he would be more 
 likely after treasure for himself than information for a 
 learned society. I made wp my mind, I should lose no 
 time over my undertaking ; and if the ship lay sunk in 
 Sandag Bay, as perhaps both he and I supposed, it 
 should not be for the advantage of this ringed adven- 
 turer, but for Mary and myself, and for the good, old, 
 honest, kindly family of the Damaways. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 LAND AND SEA IN SANDAG BAT. 
 
 I WAS early afoot next morning ; and as soon as I had 
 a bite to eat, set forth upon a tour of exploration.
 
 30 THE MEERY MEN". 
 
 Something in my heart distinctly told me that I should 
 find the ship of the Armada ; and although I did not 
 give way entirely to such hopeful thoughts, I was still 
 very light in spirits and walked upon air. Aros is a 
 very rough islet, its surface, strewn with great rocks 
 and shaggy with fern and heather ; and my way lay 
 almost north and south across the highest knoll ; and 
 though the whole distance was inside of two miles, it 
 took more time and exertion than four upon a level 
 road. 1Ji3on the summit, I paused. Although not 
 very high — not three hundred feet, as I think — it yet 
 outtops all the neighbouring lowlands of the Eoss, and 
 commands a great view of sea and islands. The sun, 
 which had been up some time, was already hot upon 
 my neck ; the air was listless and thundery, although 
 purely clear ; away over the north-west, where the isles 
 lie thickliest congregated, some half-a-dozen small and 
 ragged clouds hung together in a covey ; and the head 
 of Ben Kyaw wore, not merely a few streamers, but a 
 solid hood of vapour. There was a threiit in the 
 weather. The sea, it is true, was smooth like glass : 
 even the Eoost was but a seam on that wide mirror, 
 and the Merry Men no more than caps of foam ; but to 
 my eye and ear, so long familiar with these places, the 
 sea also seemed to lie uneasily ; a sound of it, like a long 
 sigh, mounted to me where I stood ; and, quiet as it 
 was, the Roost itself appeared to be revolving mischief. 
 For I ought to say that all we dwellers in these parts
 
 THE MERKY MEN". 31 
 
 attributed, if not prescience, at least a quality of warn- 
 ing, to that strange and dangerous creature of the tides. 
 
 I hurried on, then, with the greater speed, and had 
 soon descended the slope of ' Aros to the part that we 
 call San dag Bay. It is a pretty large piece of water 
 compared with the size of the isle ; well sheltered from 
 all but the prevailing wind ; sandy and shoal and 
 bounded by low sand-hills to the west, but to the east- 
 ward lying several fathoms deep along a ledge of rocks. 
 It is upon that side that, at a certain time each flood, 
 the current mentioned by my nncle sets so strong into 
 the bay ; a little later, when the Eoost begins to work 
 higher, an undertow runs still more strongly in the 
 reverse direction ; and it is the action of this last, as I 
 suppose, that has scoured that part so deep. Nothing 
 is to be seen out of Sandag Bay but one small segment 
 of the horizon and, in heavy weather, the breakers fly- 
 ing high over a deep sea reef. 
 
 From half-way down the hill, I had perceived the 
 wreck of February last, a brig of considerable tonnage, 
 lying, with her back broken, high and dry on the east 
 corner of the sands ; and I was making directly towards 
 it, and already almost on the margin of the turf, when 
 my eyes were suddenly arrested by a spot, cleared of 
 fern and heather, and marked by one of those long, 
 low, and almost human-looking mounds that we see so 
 commonly in graveyards. I stopped like a man shot. 
 Nothing had been said to me of any dead man or in-
 
 82 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 terment on the island ; Eorie, Mary, and my uncle had 
 all equally held their peace ; of her at least, I was 
 certain that she must be ignorant ; and yet here, before 
 my eyes, was proof indubitable of the fact. Here was 
 a grave ; and I had to ask myself, with a chill, what 
 manner of man lay there in his last sleep, awaiting the 
 signal of the Lord in that solitary, sea-beat resting- 
 place ? My mind supplied no answer but what I feared 
 to entertain. Shipwrecked, at least, he must have 
 been ; perhaps, like the old Armada mariners, from 
 some far and rich land over-sea ; or j^erhaps one of my 
 own race, perishing within eyesight of the smoke of 
 home. I stood awhile uncovered by his side, and I 
 could have desired that it had lain in our religion to 
 put up some j^rayer for that unhappy stranger, or, in 
 the old classic way, outwardly to honour his misfortune. 
 I knew, although his bones lay there, a part of Aros, 
 till the trumpet sounded, his imperishable soul was 
 fortli and far away, among the raptures of the ever- 
 lasting Sabbath or the pangs of hell ; and yet my mind 
 misgave me even with a fear, that perhpps he was near 
 me where I stood, guarding his sepulchre, and lingering 
 on the scene of his unhappy fate. 
 
 Certainly it was with a spirit somewhat overshadowed 
 that I turned away from the grave to the hardly less 
 melancholy spectacle of the wreck. Her stem was 
 above the first arc of the flood ; she was broken in two 
 a little abaft the foremast — though indeed she had
 
 THE MERRY ME^ST. 33 
 
 none, both masts having broken short in her disaster ; 
 and as the pitch of the beach was very sharj) and 
 sudden, and the bows lay many feet below the stem, 
 the fracture gaped widely open, and you could see right 
 through her poor hull upon the farther side. Her 
 name was much defaced, and I could not make out 
 clearly whether she was called Christiania, after the 
 Norwegian city, or Christiana, after the good woman. 
 Christian's wife, in that old book the '^ Pilgrim's 
 Progress." By her build she was a foreign ship, but 
 I was not certain of her nationality. She had been 
 painted green, but the colour was faded and weathered, 
 and the paint peeling off in strips. The wreck of the 
 mainmast lay alongside, half buried in sand. She was 
 a forlorn sight, indeed, and I could not look without 
 emotion at the bits of rope that still hung about her, 
 so often handled of yore by shouting seamen ; or the 
 little scuttle where they had passed up and down to 
 their affairs ; or that jaoor noseless angel of a figure- 
 head that had dipped into so many running billows. 
 
 I do not know whether it came most from the ship 
 or from the grave, but I fell into some melancholy 
 scruples, as I stood there, leaning with one hand 
 against the battered timbers. The homelessness of men 
 and even of inanimate vessels, cast away upon strange 
 shores, came strongly in upon my mind. To make a 
 profit of such pitiful misadventures seemed an unmanly 
 and a sordid act ; and 1 began to think of my then
 
 84 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 quest as of something sacrilegious in its nature. But 
 when I remembered Mary, I took heart again. My 
 uncle would never consent to an imprudent marriage, 
 nor would she, as I was persuaded, wed without his 
 full approval. It behoved me, then, to be up and 
 doing for my wife ; and I thought with a laugh how 
 long it was since that great sea-castle the Espirito 
 Santo, had left her bones in Sandag Bay, and how 
 weak it would be to consider rights so long extin- 
 guished and misfortunes so long forgotten in the 
 process of time. 
 
 I had my theory of where to seek for her remains. 
 The set of the current and the soundings both pointed 
 to the east side of the bay under the ledge of rocks. 
 If she had been lost in Sandag Bay, and if, after these 
 centuries, any portion of her held together, it was there 
 that I should find it. The water deepens, as I have 
 said, with great rapidity, and even close alongside the 
 rocks several fathoms may be found. As I walked 
 upon the edge I could see far and wide over the sandy 
 bottom of the bay ; the sun shone clear and green and 
 steady in the deeps ; the bay seemed rather like a great 
 transparent crystal, as one sees them in a lapidary's 
 shop ; there was naught to show that it was water but 
 an internal trembling, a hovering within of sun-glints 
 and netted shadows, and now and then a faint lap and 
 a dying bubble round the edge. The shadows of the 
 rocks lay out for some distance at their feet, so that
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 85 
 
 my own shadow, moving, jjausing, and stooping on the 
 top of that, reached sometimes half across the bay. 
 It was above all in this belt of shadows that I hunted 
 for the Espirito Santo ; since it was tliere the under- 
 tow ran strongest, whether in or out. Cool as the 
 whole water seemed this broiling day, it looked, in 
 that part, yet cooler, and had a mysterious invitation 
 for the eyes. Peer as I pleased, however, I could see 
 nothing but a few fishes or a bush of sea-tangle, and 
 here and there a lump of rock that had fallen from 
 above and now lay separate on the sandy floor. Twice 
 did I j)ass from one end to the other of the rocks, and 
 in the whole distance I could see nothing of the wreck, 
 nor any place but one where it was possible for it to 'be. 
 This was a large terrace in five fathoms of water, raised 
 off the surface of the sand to a considerable height, and 
 looking from above like a mere outgrowth of the rocks 
 on which I walked. It was one mass of great sea-tangles 
 like a grove, which prevented me judging of its nature, 
 but in shape and size it bore some likeness to a vessel's 
 hull. At least it was my best chance. If the Uspirito 
 Santo lay not there under the tangles, it lay nowhere at 
 all in Sandag Bay ; and I prepared to put the question 
 to the proof, once and for all, and either go back to Aros 
 a rich man or cured for ever of my dreams of wealth. 
 
 I stripped to the skin, and stood on the extreme 
 margin with my hands clasped, irresolute. The bay 
 at that time was utterly quiet ; there was no sound but
 
 36 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 from a school of porpoises somewhere out of sight 
 behind the point ; yet a certain fear withheld me on 
 the threshold of my venture. Sad sea-feeliugs, scraps 
 of my uncle's superstitions, thoughts of the dead, of the 
 grave, of the old broken ships, drifted through my 
 mind. But the strong sun upon my shoulders warmed 
 me to the heart, and I stooped forward and plunged 
 into the sea. 
 
 It was all that I could do to catch a trail of the 
 sea-tangle that grew so thickly on the terrace ; but 
 once so far anchored I secured myself by grasping a 
 whole armful of these thick and slimy stalks, and, 
 planting my feet against the edge, I looked around me. 
 On" all sides the clear sand stretched forth unbroken ; it 
 came to the foot of the rocks, scoured into the likeness 
 of an alley in a garden by the action of the tides ; and 
 before me, for as far as I could see, nothing was visible 
 but the same many-folded sand upon the sun-bright 
 bottom of the bay. Yet the terrace to which I was 
 then holding was as thick with strong sea-growths as a 
 tuft of heather, and the cliff from which it bulged hung 
 draped below the water-line with brown lianas. In this 
 complexity of forms, all swaying together in the cur- 
 rent, things were hard to be distinguished ; and I was 
 still uncertain whether my feet were pressed upon the 
 natural rock or upon the timbers of the Armada treas- 
 ure-ship, when the whole tuft of taugie came away in 
 my hand, and in an instant I was on the surface, and
 
 THE MEREY MEN". 37 
 
 the shores of the bay and the bright water swam before 
 my eyes in a glory of crimson. 
 
 I clambered back upon the rocks, and threw the 
 plant of tangle at my feet. Something at the same 
 moment rang sharply, like a falling coin. I stooped, 
 and there, sure enough, crusted with the red rust, there 
 lay an iron shoe-buckle. The sight of this poor human 
 relic thrilled me to the heart, but not with hope nor 
 fear, only with a desolate melancholy. I held it in my 
 hand, and the thought of its owner appeared before me 
 like the the presence of an actual man. His weatlier- 
 beaten face, his sailor's hands, his sea-voice hoarse with 
 singing at the capstan, the very foot that had once 
 worn that buckle and trod so much along the swerving 
 decks — the whole human fact of him, as a creature like 
 myself, with hair and blood and seeing eyes, haunted 
 me in that sunny, solitary place, not like a spectre, but 
 like some friend whom I had basely injured. Was the 
 great treasure ship indeed below there, with her guns 
 and chain and treasure, as she had sailed from Spain ; 
 her decks a garden for the seaweed, her cabin a breed- 
 ing place for fish, soundless but for the dredging water, 
 motionless but for the waving of the tangle upon her 
 battlements — that old, poj^ulous, sea-riding castle, now 
 a reef in Sandag Bay ? Or, as I thought it likelier, was 
 this a waif from the disaster of the foreign brig — was 
 this shoe-buckle bought but the other day and worn 
 by a man of my own period in the world's history, hear-
 
 38 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 irig the same news from day to day, thinking the same 
 thoughts, praying, perhaps, in the same temple with 
 myself ? However it was, I was assailed with dreary 
 thoughts ; my uncle's words, " the dead are down 
 there," echoed in my ears ; and though I determined 
 to dive once more, it was with a strong repugnance that 
 I stepped forward to the margin of the rocks. 
 
 * A great change passed at that moment over the 
 appearance of the bay. It was no more that clear, 
 visible interior, like a house roofed with glass, where 
 the green, submarine sunshine slept so stilly. A breeze, 
 I suppose, had flawed the surface, and a sort of trouble 
 and blackness filled its bosom, where flashes of light 
 and clouds of shadow tossed confusedly together. Even 
 the terrace below obscurely rocked and quivered. It 
 seemed a graver thing to venture on this place of am- 
 bushes ; and when I leaped into the sea the second 
 time it was with a quaking in my soul. 
 
 I secured myself as at first, and groped among the 
 ■waving tangle. All that met my touch was cold and 
 soft and gluey. The thicket was alive with crabs and 
 lobsters, trundling to and fro lopsidedly, and I had to 
 harden my heart against the horror of their carrion 
 neighbourhood. On all sides I could feel the grain 
 and the clefts of hard, living stone ; no planks, no 
 iron, not a sign of any wreck ; the Espirito Santo was 
 not there. I remember I had almost a sense of relief 
 in my disaj^pointment, and I was about ready to leave
 
 THE MERRY MEIST. 39 
 
 go, when something happened that sent me to the 
 surface with my lieart in my month. I had ah'eady 
 stayed somewhat late over my explorations ; the cur- 
 rent was freshening with the change of the tide, and 
 Sandag Bay was no longer a safe place for a single 
 swimmer. Well, Just at the last moment there came 
 a sudden flush of current, dredging through the 
 tangles like a wave. I lost one hold, was flung 
 sprawling on my side, and, instinctively grasping for 
 a fresh support, my fingers closed on something hard 
 and cold. I think I knew at that moment what it 
 was. At least I instantly left hold of the tangle, 
 leaped for the surface, and clambered out next 
 moment on the friendly rocks with the bone of a 
 man's leg in my grasp. 
 
 Mankind is a material creature, slow to think and 
 dull to perceive connections. The grave, the wreck 
 of the brig, and the rusty shoe-buckle were surely 
 plaiu advertisements. A child might have read their 
 dismal story, and yet it was not until I touched that 
 actual piece of mankind that the full horror of the 
 charnel ocean burst ui:)on my spirit. I laid the bone 
 beside the buckle, picked up my clothes, and ran as I 
 was along the rocks towards the human shore. I 
 could not be far enough from the spot ; no fortune 
 was vast enough to tempt me back again. The bones 
 of the drowned dead should henceforth roll undis- 
 turbed by me, whether on tangle or minted gold. But
 
 40 THE MEREY MEN". 
 
 as soon as I trod the good earth again, and had 
 covered my nakedness against the sun, I knelt down 
 over against the ruins of the brig, and out of the 
 fulness of my heart prayed long and passionately for 
 all poor souls upon the sea. A generous jorayer is 
 never presented in vain ; the petition may be refused, 
 but the petitioner is always, I believe, rewarded by 
 sonic gracious visitation. The horror, at least, was 
 lifted from my mind ; I could look with calm of spirit 
 on that great bright creature, God's ocean ; and as I 
 set off homeward up the rough sides of Aros, nothing 
 remained of any concern beyond a deep determination 
 to meddle no more with the spoils of wrecked vessels 
 or the treasures of the dead. 
 
 1 was already some way up the hill before I paused 
 to breathe and look behind me. The sight that met 
 my eyes was doubly strange. 
 
 For, first, the storm that I had foreseen was now ad- 
 vancing with almost tropical rapidity. The whole sur- 
 face of the sea had been dulled from its conspicuous 
 brightness to an ugly hue of corrugated lead ; already 
 in the distance the white waves, the "skipper's daugh- 
 ters," had begun to flee before a breeze that was still 
 insensible on Aros ; and already along the curve of San- 
 dag Bay there was a splashing run of sea that I could 
 hear from where I stood. The change upon the sky 
 was even more remarkable. There had begun to arise 
 out of the south-west a huge and solid continent of
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 41 
 
 scowling cloud ; here and there, through rents in its 
 contexture, the sun still poured a sheaf of sjsreading 
 rays ; and here and there, from all its edges, vast inky 
 streamers lay forth along the yet unclouded sky. The 
 menace was express and imminent. Even as I gazed, 
 the sun was blotted out. At any moment the tempest 
 might fall upon Aros in its might. 
 
 The suddenness of this change of weather so fixed 
 my eyes on heaven that it was some seconds before they 
 alighted on the bay, mapped out below my feet, and 
 robbed a moment later of tlie sun. The knoll which I 
 had Just surmounted overflanked a little amphitheatre 
 of lower hillocks sloping towards the sea, and beyond 
 that the yellow arc of beach and the whole extent of 
 Sandag Bay. It was a scene on which I had often 
 looked down, but where I had never before beheld a 
 human figure. I had but just turned my back upon it 
 and left it empty, and my wonder may be fancied when 
 I saw a boat and several men in that deserted spot. 
 The boat was lying by the rocks. A pair of fellows, 
 bareheaded, with their sleeves rolled up, and one with a 
 boathook, kept her with difficulty to her moorings, for 
 the current was growing brisker every moment. A lit- 
 tle way off upon the ledge two men in black clothes, 
 whom I judged to be superior in rank, laid their heads 
 together over some task which at first I did not under- 
 stand, but a second after I had made it out — they were 
 taking bearings with the compass ; and just then I saw
 
 42 THE MERRY MEIf. 
 
 one of them unroll a sheet of paper and lay his finger 
 down, as though identifying features in a map. ]\Iean- 
 Avhile a third was walking to and fro, poking among the 
 rocks and peering over the edge into the water. While 
 I Avas still watching them with the stupefaction of sur- 
 prise, my mind hardly yet able to work on what my 
 eyes re2')orted, this third j^erson suddenly stooped and 
 summoned his companions with a cry so loud that it 
 reached my ears upon the hill. The others ran to him, 
 even dropping the compass in their hurry, and I could 
 see the bone and the shoe-buckle going from hand to 
 hand, causing the most unusual gesticulations of sur- 
 prise and interest. Just then I could hear the seamen 
 crying from the boat, and saw them point westward to 
 that cloud continent which was ever the more rapidly 
 unfurling its blackness over heaven. The others 
 seemed to consult ; but the danger was too pressing to 
 be braved, and they bundled into the boat carrying my 
 relics with them, and set forth out of the bay with all 
 speed of oars. 
 
 I made no more ado about the matter, but turned 
 and ran for the house. Whoever these men were, it 
 was fit my uncle should be instantly informed. It was 
 not then altogether too late in the day for a descent of 
 the Jacobites ; and may be Prince Charlie, whom I 
 knew my iincle to detest, was one of the three suiaeriors 
 whom I had seen upon the rock. Yet as I ran, leaping 
 from rock to rock, and turned the matter loosely in my
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 43 
 
 mind, this theory grew ever the longer the less welcome 
 to my reason. The compass, the map, the interest 
 awakened by the buckle, and the conduct of that one 
 among the strangers who had looked so often below him 
 in the water, all seemed to point to a different explana- 
 tion of their presence on that outlying, obscure islet of 
 the western sea. The Madrid historian, the search in- 
 stituted by Dr. Eobertson, the bearded stranger with 
 the rings, my own fruitless search that very morning in 
 the deep water of Sandag Bay, ran together, piece by 
 piece, in my memory, and I made sure that these 
 strangers must be Spaniards in quest of ancient treas- 
 ure and the lost ship of the Armada. But the people 
 living in outlying islands, such as Aros, are answerable 
 for their own security ; there is none near by to protect 
 or even to help them ; and the presence in such a spot 
 of a 2rew of foreign adventurers — j^oor, greedy, and 
 most likely lawless — filled me with apprehensions for 
 my uncle's money, and even for the safety of his daugh- 
 ter. I was still wondering how we were to get rid of 
 them when I came, all breathless, to the top of Aros. 
 The whole world was shadowed over ; only in the ex- 
 treme east, on a hill of the mainland, one last gleam of 
 sunshine lingered like a jewel ; rain had begun to fall, 
 not heavily, but in great drops ; the sea was rising with 
 each moment, and already a band of white encircled 
 Aros and the nearer coasts of G-risapol. The boat was 
 still pulling seaward, but I now became aware of what
 
 44 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 had been liiddeu from me lower down — a large, heavily 
 sparred, handsome schooner, lying to at the south end 
 of Aros. Since I had not seen her in the morning when 
 I had looked around so closely at the signs of the 
 ■weather, and upon these lone waters where a sail was 
 rarely visible, it was clear she must have lain last night 
 behind the uninhabited Eilean G-our, and this proved 
 conclusively that she was manned by strangers to our 
 coast, for that anchorage, though good enough to look 
 at, is little better than a trap for ships. With such 
 ignorant sailors upon so wild a coast, the coming gale 
 was not unlikely to bring death upon its wings. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE GALE. 
 
 I FOUND my uncle at the gable end, watching the 
 signs of the weather, with a pipe in his fingers. 
 
 *' Uncle," said I, "there were men ashore at Sandag 
 Bay " 
 
 I had no time to go further ; indeed, I not only for- 
 got my words, but even my weariness, so strange was 
 the effect on Uncle Gordon. He dropped his pipe and 
 fell back against the end of the house with his jaw 
 fallen, his eyes staring, and his long face as white as 
 paper. "We must have looked at one another silently 
 for a quarter of a minute, before he made answer in 
 this extraordinary fashion : " Had he a hair kep on ? "
 
 THE MERRY MEIS". 45 
 
 I knew as well as if I had been there that the man 
 who now lay buried at Sandag had worn a hairy cap, 
 and that he had come ashore alive. For the first and 
 only time I lost toleration for the man who was my ben- 
 efactor and the father of the woman I hoped to call my 
 wife. 
 
 ''These were living men," said I, ''perhaps Jaco- 
 bites, perhaps the French, perhaps pirates, perhaps ad- 
 venturers come here to seek the Spanish treasure ship ; 
 but, whatever they may be, dangerous at least to your 
 daughter and my cousin. As for your own guilty ter- 
 rors, man, the dead sleeps well where you have laid him. 
 I stood this morning by his grave ; he will not wake be- 
 fore the trump of doom." 
 
 My kinsman looked upon me, blinking, while I spoke; 
 then he fixed his eyes for a little on the ground, and 
 pulled his fingers foolishly ; but it was plain that he 
 was past the power of speech. 
 
 " Come," said I. " You must think for others. You 
 must come up the hill with me, and see this ship." 
 
 He obeyed without a word or a look, following slowly 
 after my impatient strides. The spring seemed to have 
 gone out of his body, and he scrambled heavily up and 
 down the rocks, instead of leaping, as he was wont, from 
 one to another. Nor could I, for all my cries, induce 
 him to make better haste. Only once he replied to me 
 complainiugly, and like one in bodily pain : " Ay, ay, 
 man, I'm coming." Long before we had reached the
 
 46 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 toi-), I had no other thought for him but pity. If the 
 crime had been monstrous, the punishment was in pro- 
 portion. 
 
 At last we emerged above the sky-line of the hill, and 
 could see around us. All was black and stormy to the 
 eye ; the last gleam of sun had vanished ; a wind had 
 sprung up, not yet high, but gusty and unsteady to the 
 point ; the rain, on the other hand, had ceased. Short 
 as was the interval, the sea already ran vastly higher 
 than when I had stood there last ; already it had begun 
 to break over some of the outward reefs, and already it 
 moaned aloud in the sea-caves of Aros. I looked at 
 first, in vain for the schooner. 
 
 *' There she is," I said at last. But her new position, 
 and the course she was now lying, puzzled me. " They 
 cannot mean to beat to sea," I cried. 
 
 ^'That's what they mean," said my uncle, with some- 
 thing like joy ; and just then the schooner went about 
 and stood upon another tack, which put the question 
 beyond the reach of doubt. These strangers, seeing a 
 gale on hand, had thought first of sea-room. With the 
 wind that threatened, in these reef-sown waters and con- 
 tending against so violent a stream of tide, their course 
 was certain death. 
 
 '' Good God ! " said I, " they are all lost." 
 
 "Ay," returned my uncle, '^a' — a' lost. They had- 
 nae a chance but to rin for Kyle Dona. The gate 
 they're gaun the noo, they couldnae win through an the
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 47 
 
 muckle deil were there to pilot them. Eh, man," he 
 continued, touching me on the sleeve, ''it's a braw 
 nicht for a shipwreck ! Twa in ae twalmonth ! Eh, 
 but the Merry Men '11 dance bonny ! " 
 
 I looked at him, and it was then that I began to 
 fancy him no longer in his right mind. He was peering 
 up to me, as if for sympathy, a timid joy in his eyes. 
 All that had passed between us was already forgotten in 
 the prospect of this fresh disaster. 
 
 "If it were not too late," I cried with indignation, 
 " I would take the coble and go out to warn them. " 
 
 " Na, na," he protested, ''ye maunnae interfere ; ye 
 maunnae meddle wi' the like o' that. It's His," — doff- 
 ing his bonnet — " His wull. And, eh, man ! but it's a 
 braw nicht for't ! " 
 
 Something like fear began to creep into my soul; and, 
 reminding him that I had not yet dined, I proposed we 
 should return to the house. But no ; nothing would 
 tear him from his place of outlook. 
 
 "I maun see the hail thing, man, Cherlie," he ex- 
 plained ; and then as the schooner went about a second 
 time, " Eh, but they han'le her bonny ! " he cried. 
 "The Christ-Anna was naething to this." 
 
 Already the men on board the schooner must have 
 begun to realize some part, but not yet the twentieth, 
 of the dangers that environed their doomed ship. At 
 every lull of the capricious wind they must have seen 
 how fast the current swept them back. Each tack was
 
 48 THE MERRY MEIST. 
 
 made shorter, as they saw how little it prevailed. Every 
 moment the rising swell began to boom and foam upon 
 another sunken reef ; and ever and again a breaker 
 would fall in sounding ruin under the very bows of her, 
 and the brown reef and streaming tangle appear in the 
 hollow of the wave. I tell you, they had to stand to their 
 tackle : there was no idle man aboard that ship, God 
 knows. It was upon the progress of a scene so horrible 
 to any human-hearted man that my misguided uncle 
 now pored and gloated like a connoisseur. As I turned 
 to go down the hill, he vras lying on his belly on the 
 summit, with his hands stretched forth and clutching 
 in the heather. He seemed rejuvenated, mind and 
 body. 
 
 When I got back to the house already dismally af- 
 fected, I was still more sadly downcast at the sight of 
 Mary. She had her sleeves rolled up over her strong 
 arms, and was quietly making bread. I got a bannock 
 from the dresser and sat down to eat it in silence. 
 
 " Are ye wearied, lad ? " she asked after a while. 
 
 "1 am not so much wearied, Mary," I replied, getting 
 on my feet, " as I am weary of delay, and perhaps of 
 Aros too. You know me well enough to judge me 
 fairly, say what I like. Well, Mary, you may be sure 
 of this : you had better be anywhere but here." 
 
 " I'll be sure of one thing," she returned : " I'll be 
 where my duty is." 
 
 *' You forget, you have a duty to yourself," I said.
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 49 
 
 '* Ay, man ? " she replied, ponuding at the dough ; 
 " will you have found that in the Bible, now ? " 
 
 "Mary," I said solemnly, ''you must not laugh at 
 me just now. God knows I am in no heart for laugh- 
 ing. If we could get your father with us, it would be 
 best ; but with him or without him, I want you far 
 away from here, my girl ; for your own sake, and for 
 mine, ay, and for your father's too, I want you far — far 
 away from here. I came with other thoughts ; I came 
 here as a man comes home ; now it is all changed, and 
 I have no desire nor hope but to flee — for that's the 
 word — flee, like a bird out of the fowler's snare, from 
 this accursed island." 
 
 She had stopped her work by this time. 
 ^ ''And do you think, now," said she, "do you think, 
 now, I have neither eyes nor ears ? Do ye think I have- 
 nae broken ray heart to have these braws (as he calls 
 them, God forgive him !) thrown into the sea ? Do ye 
 think I have lived with him, day in, day out, and not 
 seen what you saw in an hour or two Y No," she said, 
 "I know there's wrong in it; what wrong, I neither 
 know nor want to know. There was never an ill thing 
 made better by meddling, that I could hear of. But, 
 my lad, you must never ask me to leave my father. 
 While the breath is in his body, I'll be with him. And 
 he's not long for here, either : that I can tell you, 
 Charlie — he's not long for here. The mark is on his 
 brow ; and better so — maybe better so."
 
 50 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 I was a while silent, not knowing what to say ; and 
 when I roused my head at last to speak, she got before 
 me. 
 
 *' Charlie," she said, ''what's right for me, neednae 
 be right for yon. There's sin upon this house and 
 trouble ; you are a stranger ; take your things upon 
 your back and go your ways to better places and to bet- 
 ter folk, and if you were ever minded to come back, 
 though it were twenty years syne, you would find me 
 aye waiting." 
 
 "Mary Ellen," I said, " I asked you to be my wife, 
 and you said as good as yes. That's done for good. 
 Wherever you are, I am ; as I shall answer to my 
 God." 
 
 As I said the words, the wind suddenly burst out rav- 
 ing, and then seemed to stand still and shudder round 
 the house of Aros. It was the first squall, or prologue, 
 of the coming tempest, and as we started and looked 
 about us, we found that a gloom, like the approach of 
 evening, had settled round the house. 
 
 •''God pity all jooor folks at sea !" she said. " We'll 
 see no more of my father till the morrow's morning." 
 
 And then she told me, as we sat by the fire and 
 hearkened to the rising gusts, of how this change had 
 fallen upon my uncle. All last winter he had been dark 
 and fitful in his mind. Whenever the Eoost ran high, 
 or, as Mary said, whenever the Merry Men were danc- 
 ing, he would lie out for hours together on the Head, if
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 61 
 
 it were at night, or on the top of Aros by day, watching 
 the tumult of the sea, and sweeping the liorizon for a 
 sail. After February the tenth, when the wealth-bring- 
 ing wreck was cast ashore at Sandag, he had been at 
 first unnaturally gay, and his excitement had never 
 fallen in degree, but only changed in kind from dark to 
 darker. He neglected his work, and kept Eorie idle. 
 They two would speak together by the hour at the gable 
 end, in guarded tones and with an air of secrecy and 
 almost of guilt ; and if she questioned either, as at first 
 she sometimes did, her inquiries were put aside with 
 confusion. Since Rorie had first remarked the fish that 
 hung about the ferry, his master liad never set foot but 
 once upon the mainland of the Ross. That once — it 
 was in the height of the springs — he had passed dry- 
 shod while the tide was out ; but, having lingered over- 
 long on the far side, found himself cut off from Ai'os by 
 the returning waters. It was with a shriek of agony 
 that he had leaped across the gut, and he had reached 
 home thereafter in a fever-fit of fear. A fear of the 
 sea, a constant haunting thought of the sea, appeared 
 in his talk and devotions, and even in his looks when he 
 was silent. 
 
 Rorie alone came in to supper ; but a little later my 
 uncle appeared, took a bottle under his arm, put some 
 bread in his pocket, and set forth again to his outlook, 
 followed this time by Rorie. I heard that the schooner 
 was losing ground, but the crew were still fighting every
 
 52 THE MEERT MEN. 
 
 inch with hopeless ingenuity and courage ; and the 
 news filled my mind with blackness. 
 
 A little after sundown the full fury of the gale broke 
 forth, such a gale as I have never seen in summer, nor, 
 seeing how swiftly it had come, even in winter. Mary 
 and I sat in silence, the house quaking overhead, the 
 tempest howling without, the fire between us sputtering 
 with raindrops. Our thoughts were far away with the 
 poor fellows on the schooner, or my not less unhappy 
 uncle, houseless on the promontory ; and yet ever and 
 again we were startled back to ourselves, when the wind 
 would rise and strike the gable like a solid body, or 
 suddenly fall and draw away, so that the fire leaped into 
 flame and our hearts bounded in our sides. Now the 
 storm in its might would seize and shake the four cor- 
 ners of the roof, roaring like Leviathan in anger. Anon, 
 in a lull, cold eddies of tempest moved shudderingly in 
 the room, lifting the hair upon our heads and passing 
 between us as we sat. And again the wind would break 
 forth in a chorus of melancholy sounds, hooting low in 
 the chimney, wailing with flutelike softness round the 
 house. 
 
 It was perhaps eight o'clock when Eorie came in and 
 pulled me mysteriously to the door. My uncle, it ap- 
 peared, had frightened even his constant comrade ; and 
 Eorie, uneasy at his extravagance, prayed rae to come 
 out and share the watch. I hastened to do as I was 
 asked ; tlie more readily as, what with fear and horror.
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 53 
 
 and the electrical tension of the night, I was myself 
 restless and disposed for action. I told Mary to be 
 under no alarm, for I sliould be a safeguard on her 
 father ; and wrapping myself warmly in a plaid, I fol- 
 lowed Eorie into the open air. 
 
 The night, though we were so little past midsummer, 
 was as dark as January. Intervals of a groping twi- 
 light alternated with spells of utter blackness ; and it 
 was impossible to trace the reason of these changes in 
 the flying horror of the sky. The wind blew the breath 
 out of a man's nostrils ; all heaven seemed to thunder 
 overhead like one huge sail ; . and when there fell a mo- 
 mentary lull on Aros, we could hear the gusts dismally 
 sweeping in the distance. Over all the lowlands of the 
 Eoss, the wind must have blown as fierce as on the open 
 sea ; and God only knows the uproar that was raging 
 around the head of Ben Kyaw. Sheets of mingled 
 spray and rain were driven in our faces. All round the 
 isle of Aros the surf, with an incessant, hammering 
 thunder, beat upon the reefs and beaches. Now louder 
 in one place, now lower in another, like the combi- 
 nations of orchestral music, the constant mass of sound 
 was hardly varied for a moment. And loud above all 
 this hurly-burly I could hear the changeful voices of the 
 Eoost and the intermittent roaring of the Merry Men. 
 At that hour, there flashed into my mind the reason of 
 the name that they were called. For the noise of them 
 seemed almost mirthful, as it out-topped the other
 
 54 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 noises of the night ; or if not mirthful, yet instinct 
 with a portentous joviality. Nay, and it seemed even 
 human. As Vvhen savage men have drunk away their 
 reason, and, discarding speech, bawl together in their 
 madness by the hour ; so, to my ears, these deadly 
 breakers shouted by Aros in the night. 
 
 Arm in arm, and staggering against the wind, Rorie 
 and I won every yard of ground with conscious effort. 
 We slipped on the wet sod, we fell together sj^rawling on 
 the rocks. Bruised, drenched, beaten, and breathless, 
 it must have taken ns near half an hour to get from the 
 house down to the Head that overlooks the Roost. 
 There, it seemed, was my uncle's favourite observatory. 
 Right in the face of it, where the cliff is highest and 
 most sheer, a hump of earth, like a parapet, makes a 
 place of shelter from the common winds, where a man 
 may sit in quiet and see the tide and the mad billows 
 contending at his feet. As he might look down from the 
 window of a house upon some street disturbance, so, 
 from this post, he looks down upon the tumbling of the 
 Merry Men. On such a night, of course, he peers upon 
 a world of blackness, where the waters wheel and boil, 
 where the waves joust together with the noise of an ex- 
 plosion, and the foam towers and vanishes in the twink- 
 ling of an eye. Never before had I seen the Merry Men 
 thus violent. The fury, height and transiency of their 
 spoutings was a thing to be seen and not recounted. 
 Hiffh over our heads on the cliff rose their white columns
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 55 
 
 in the darkness ; and the same instant, like phantoms, 
 they were gone. Sometimes three at a time would thus 
 aspire and vanish ; sometimes a gust took them, and the 
 spray would fall about us, heavy as a wave. And yet 
 the spectacle was rather maddening in its levity than im- 
 j^ressive by its force. Thought was beaten down by the 
 confounding uproar ; a gleeful vacancy possessed the 
 brains of men, a state akin to madness ; and I found my- 
 self at times following the dance of the Merry Men as it 
 were a tune upon a jigging instrument. 
 
 I first caught sight of my uncle when we were still 
 some yards away in one of the flying glimpses of twilight 
 that chequered the pitch darkness of the night. He was 
 standing up behind the parapet, his head thrown back 
 and the bottle to his mouth. As he put it down, he saw 
 and recognized us with a toss of one hand fleeringly 
 above his head. 
 
 " Has he been drinking ? " shouted I to Rorie. 
 
 *'He will aye be drunk when the wind blaws," re- 
 tumd Eorie in the same high key, and it was all that I 
 could do to hear him. 
 
 " Then — was he so — in February ? " I inquired. 
 
 Eorie's ''Ay " was a cause of joy to me. The murder, 
 then, had not sprung in cold blood from calculation ; it 
 was an act of madness no more to be condemned than to 
 be pardoned. My uncle was a dangerous mad-man, if 
 you will, but he was not cruel and base as I had feared. 
 Yet what a scene for a carouse, what an incredible vice.
 
 56 THE MEREY MEN. 
 
 was this that the poor man had chosen ! I have always 
 thought drunkenness a wild and almost fearful j)leasure, 
 rather demoniacal than human ; but drunkenness, out 
 here in the roaring blackness, on the edge of a cliff 
 above that hell of waters, the man's head spinning like 
 the Roost, his foot tottering on the edge of death, his 
 ear watching for the signs of shipwreck, surely that, if 
 it were credible in any one, was morally impossible in a 
 man like my uncle, whose mind was set upon a damna- 
 tory creed and haunted by the darkest superstitions. 
 Yet so it was ; and, as we reached the bight of shelter 
 and could breathe again, I saw the man's eyes shining 
 in the night with an unholy glimmer. 
 
 "Eh, Charlie, man, it's grand ! " he cried. " See to 
 them !" he continued, dragging nif, to the edge of the 
 abyss from whence arose that deatening clamour and 
 those clouds of spray ; *'see to them dancin', man ! Is 
 that no wicked ? " 
 
 He jDronounced the word with gusto, and I thought it 
 suited with the scene. 
 
 *' They're yowlin' for thon schooner," he went on, his 
 thin, insane voice clearly audible in the shelter of the 
 bank, "an' she's comin' aye nearer, aye nearer, aye 
 nearer an' nearer an' nearer ; an' they ken't, the folk 
 kens it, they keu weel it's by wi' them. Charlie, lad, 
 they're a' drunk in yon schooner, a' dozened wi' drink. 
 They were a' drunk in the Christ-Anna, at the hinder 
 end. There's naue could droou at sea wantin' the
 
 THE MERRY MEST. 57 
 
 brandy. Hoot awa, what do you ken?" with a sudden 
 blast of anger. " I tell ye, it cannae be ; they daurnae 
 droon withoot it. Ha'e/' holding out the bottle, " tak' 
 a sow 13." 
 
 I was about to refuse, but Eorie touched me as if in 
 warning; and indeed I had already thought better of the 
 movement. I took the bottle, therefore, and not only 
 drank freely myself, but contrived to spill even more as 
 I was doing so. It was pure spirit, and almost strangled 
 me to swallow. My kinsman did not observe the loss, 
 but, once more throwing back his head, drained the re- 
 main'der to the dregs. Then, with a loud laugh, he cast 
 the bottle forth among the Merry Men, who seemed to 
 leap up, shouting to receive it, 
 
 **Ha'e, bairns!" he cried, "there's your han'sel. 
 Ye'll get bonnier nor that, or morning." 
 
 Suddenly, out in the black night before us, and not 
 two hundred yards away, we heard, at a moment when 
 the wind was silent, the clear note of a human voice. 
 Instantly the wind swept howling down upon the Head, 
 and the Eoost bellowed, and churned, and danced with 
 a new fury. But we had heard the sound, and we knew, 
 with agony, that this was the doomed ship now close on 
 ruin, and that what we had heard was the voice of her 
 master issuing his last command. Crouching together 
 on the edge, we waited, straining every sense, for the in- 
 evitable end. It was long, however, and to us it seemed 
 like ages, ere the schooner suddenly appeared for one
 
 58 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 brief instant, relieved against a tower of glimmering 
 foam. I still see her reefed mainsail flapping loose, as 
 the boom fell heavily across the deck; I still seethe black 
 outline of the hull, and still think I can distinguish the 
 figure of a man stretched upon the tiller. Yet the whole 
 sight we had of her passed swifter than lightning ; the 
 very wave that disclosed her fell burying her for ever; 
 the mingled cry of many voices at the point of death 
 rose and was quenched in the roaring of the Merry Men. 
 And with that the tragedy was at an end. The strong 
 ship, with all her gear, and the lamp perhaps still 
 burning in the cabin, the lives of so many men, precious 
 surely to others, dear, at least, as heaven to themselves, 
 had all, in that one moment, gone down into the surg- 
 ing waters. They were gone like a dream. And the 
 wind still ran and shouted, and the senseless waters in 
 the Koost still leaped and tumbled as before. 
 
 How long we lay there together, we three, speechless 
 and motionless, is more than I can tell, but it must 
 have been for long. x\t length, one by one, and almost 
 mechanically, we crawled back into the shelter of the 
 bank. As I lay against the parapet, wholly wi'etched 
 and not entirely master of my mind, I could hear my 
 kinsman maundering to himself in an altered and 
 melancholy mood. Now he would repeat to himself 
 with maudlin iteration, " Sic a fecht as they had — sic 
 a sair fecht as they had, puir lads, puir lads ! " and 
 anon he would bewail that " a' the gear was as gude's
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 69 
 
 tint," because the ship had gone down among the 
 Merry Men instead of stranding on the shore ; and 
 throughout, the name — the Christ-Anna — would come 
 and go in his divagations, pronounced with shudder- 
 ing awe. The storm all this time was rapidly abating. 
 In half an hour the wind had fallen to a breeze, and 
 the change was accompanied or caused by a heavy, 
 cold, and plumi^ing rain. I must then have fallen 
 asleep, and when I came to myself, drenched, stiff, and 
 unrefreshed, day had already broken, grey, wet, dis- 
 comfortable day; the wind blew in faint and shifting 
 capfuls, the tide was out, the Roost was at its lowest, 
 and only the strong beating surf round all the coasts of 
 Arcs remained to witness of the furies of the night. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A MAN" OUT OF THE SEA. 
 
 RoRiE set out for the house in search of warmth and 
 breakfast; but my uncle was bent upon examining the 
 shores of Aros, and I felt it a part of duty to accom- 
 pany him throughout. He was now docile and quiet, 
 but tremulous and weak in mind and body ; and it was 
 with the eagerness of a child that he pursued his ex- 
 ploration. He climbed far down upon the rocks ; on 
 the beaches, he pursued the retreating breakers. The 
 merest broken plank or rag of cordage was a treasure in
 
 60 THE MEREY MEN. 
 
 his eyes to be secured at the peril of his life. To see 
 him, with weak and stumbling footsteps, expose him- 
 self to the pursuit of the surf, or the snares and pitfalls 
 of the weedy rock, kept me in a perpetual terror. My 
 arm was ready to support him, my hand clutched him 
 by the skirt, I helped him to draw his j)itiful discoveries 
 beyond, the reach of the returning wave ; a nurse accom- 
 panying a child of seven would have had no different 
 experience. 
 
 Yet, weakened as he was by the reaction from his 
 madness of the night before, the passions that smould- 
 ered in his nature were those of a strong man. His 
 terror of the sea, although conquered for the moment, 
 was still undiminished ; had the sea been a lake of 
 living flames, he could not have shrunk more jmnically 
 from its touch; and once, when his foot slipped and he 
 plunged to the midleg into a pool of water, the shriek 
 that came up out of his soul vv^as like the cry of death. 
 He sat still for a while, panting like a dog, after that ; 
 hut his desire for the spoils of shipwreck triumphed 
 once more over his fears ; once more he tottered among 
 the curded foam ; once more he crawled upon the rocks 
 among the bursting bubbles ; once more his whole heart 
 seemed to be set on driftwood, fit, if it was fit for any- 
 thing, to throw upon the fire. Pleased as he was with 
 what he found, he still incessantly grumbled at his ill- 
 fortune. 
 
 "Arcs," he said, ''is no a place for wrecks ava' — no
 
 THE MEKRY MEN. 61 
 
 ava'. A' the years I've dwalt here, this ane maks the 
 second ; and the best o' the gear clean tint ! ■' 
 
 "Uncle," said I, for we were now on a stretch of 
 open sand, where there was nothing to divert his mind, 
 " I saw yon last night, as I never thought to see you — • 
 you were drunk." 
 
 *'Na, na," he said, ''no as bad as that. I had been 
 drinking, though. And to tell ye the Grod's truth, it's 
 a thing I cannae mend. There's nae soberer man than 
 me in my ordnar ; but when I hear the wind blaw in 
 my lug, it's my belief that I gang gyte." 
 
 "You are a religious man," I replied, "and this is 
 sin." 
 
 "On," he returned, "if it wasuae sin, I dinnae ken 
 that I would care for't. Ye see, man, it's defiance. 
 There's a sair spang o' the auld sin o' the warld in yon 
 sea ; it's an unchristian business at the best o't ; an' 
 whiles when it gets up, an' the wind skreighs — the wind 
 an' her are a kind of sib, I'm thinkin' — an' thae Merry 
 Men, the daft callants, blawin' and lauchin', and puir 
 souls in the deid thraws warstlin' the leelang niclit wi' 
 their bit ships — weel, it comes ower rae like a glamour. 
 I'm a deil, I ken't. But I think naething o' the puir 
 sailor lads ; I'm wi' the sea, I'm just like ane o' her ain 
 Merry Men." 
 
 I thought I should touch him in a joint of his har- 
 ness. I turned me towards the sea ; the surf was run- 
 ning gaily, wave after wave, with their manes blowing
 
 62 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 behind them, riding one after another up the beach, 
 towering, carving, falling one upon another on the 
 trampled sand. Without, the salt air, the scared gulls, 
 the widespread army of the sea-chargers, neighing to 
 each other, as they gathered together to the assault of 
 Aros ; and close before us, that line on the flat sands 
 that, with all their number and their fury, they might 
 never pass. 
 
 " Thus far shalt thou go," said I, "and no farther." 
 And then I quoted as solemnly as I was able a verse 
 that I had often before fitted to the chorus of the 
 breakers : — 
 
 But yet the Lord that is on high, 
 
 Is more of might by far, 
 Than noise of many waters is, 
 
 As great sea billows are. 
 
 '*Ay," said my kinsman, "at the hinder end, the 
 Lord will triumi^h ; I dinnae misdoobt that. But here 
 on earth, even silly men-folk daur Him to His face. 
 It is nae wise ; I am nae sayin' that it's wise ; but it's 
 the pride of the eye, and it's the lust o' life, an' it's the 
 wale o' jjleesures." 
 
 I said no more, for we had now begun to cross a neck 
 of land that lay between us and Sandag ; and I with- 
 held my last appeal to the man's better reason till we 
 should stand upon the spot associated with his crime. 
 Nor did he pursue the subject ; but he walked beside 
 me with a firmer step. The call that I had made upon
 
 THE MERRY MEN. 63 
 
 his mind acted like a stimulant, and I could see that he 
 had forgotten his search for worthless jetsam, in a pro- 
 found, gloomy, and yet stirring train of thought. In 
 three or four minutes we had topped the brae and 
 begun to go down upon Sandag. The wreck had been 
 roughly handled by the sea ; the stem had been spun 
 round and dragged a little lower down; and perhaps 
 the stern had been forced a little higher, for the two 
 parts now lay entirely separate on the beach. When we 
 came to the grave I stopped, uncovered my head in the 
 thick rain, and, looking my kinsman in the face, 
 addressed him. 
 
 "A man," said I, ''was in God's providence suffered 
 to escape from mortal dangers ; he was poor, he was 
 naked, he was wet, he was weary, he was a stranger ; 
 he had every claim upon the bowels of your compas- 
 sion ; it may be that he was the salt of the earth, holy, 
 helpful, and kind ; it may be he was a man laden with 
 iniquities to whom death was the beginning of torment. 
 I ask you in the sight of heaven : Gordon Darnaway, 
 where is the man for whom Christ died ?" 
 
 He started visibly at the last words ; but there came 
 no answer, and his face expressed no feeling but a vague 
 alarm. 
 
 "You were my father's brother," I continued ; "you 
 have taught me to count your house as if it were my 
 father's house ; and we are both sinful men walking 
 before the Lord among the sins and dangers of this life.
 
 64 . THE MERRY MEK. 
 
 It is by our evil that God leads us into good ; we sin, I 
 dare not say by His temptation, but I must say with 
 His consent ; and to any but the brutish man his sins 
 are the beginning of wisdom. God has warned you by 
 this crime ; He warns you still by the bloody grave 
 between our feet ; and if there shall follow no repent- 
 ance, no improvement, no return to Him, what can we 
 look for but the following of some memorable Judg- 
 ment ? " 
 
 Even as I spoke the words, the eyes of my uncle wan- 
 dered from my face. A change fell upon his looks that 
 cannot be described ; his features seemed to dwindle in 
 size, the colour faded from his cheeks, one hand rose 
 waveringly and pointed over my shoulder into the dis- 
 tance, and the oft-repeated name fell once more from 
 his lips : " The Christ- A una ! " 
 
 I turned ; and if I was not appalled to the same 
 degree, as I return thanks to Heaven that I had not the 
 cause, I was still startled by the sight that met my 
 eyes. The form of a man stood upright on the cabin- 
 hutch of the wrecked ship ; his back was towards us ; 
 he appeared to be scanning the offing with shaded eyes, 
 and his figure was relieved to its full height, which was 
 plainly very great, against the sea and sky. I have said 
 a thousand times that I am not superstitious ; but at 
 that moment, with my mind running upon death and 
 sin, the unexplained appearance of a stranger on that 
 sea-girt, solitary island filled me with a surprise that
 
 THE MERRY MEZST. 65 
 
 bordered close on terror. It seemed scarce possible that 
 any human soul should liave come ashore alive in such 
 a sea as had raged last night along the coasts of Aros ; 
 and the only vessel within miles had gone down before 
 our eyes among the Merry Men. I was assailed with 
 doubts that made suspense unbearable, and, to put the 
 matter to the touch at once, stepped forward and hailed 
 the figure like a shijD. 
 
 He turned about, and I thought he started to behold 
 us. At this my courage instantly revived, and I called 
 and signed to him to draw near, and he, on his part, 
 dropped immediately to the sands, and began slowly to 
 approach, with many stops and hesitations. At each 
 repeated mark of the man's uneasiness I grew the more 
 confident myself ; and I advanced another step, encour- 
 aging him as I did so with my head and hand. It was 
 plain the castav/ay had heard indifferent accounts of our 
 island hospitality ; and indeed, about this time, the 
 people farther north had a sorry reputation. 
 
 " Why," I said, '' the man is black ! " 
 
 And Just at that moment, in a voice that I could 
 scarce have recognised, my kinsman began swearing and 
 praying in a mingled stream. I looked at iiim ; he had 
 fallen on his knees, his face was agonised ; at each step 
 of the castaway's the pitch of his voice rose, the volu- 
 bility of his utterance and the fervour of his language 
 redoubled. I call it prayer, for it was addressed to God ; 
 but surely no such ranting incongruities were ever 
 5
 
 66 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 before addressed to the Creator by a creature : surely if 
 prayer can be a sin, this mad harangue was sinful. I 
 ran to my kinsman, I seized liim by the shoulders, I 
 dragged him to his feet. 
 
 "Silence, man," said I, "respect your God in words, 
 if not in action. Here, on the very scene of your trans- 
 gressions, He sends you an occasion of atonement. 
 Forward and embrace it ; welcome like a father yon 
 creature who comes trembling to your mercy." 
 
 "With that, T tried to force him towards the black ; 
 but he felled me to the ground, burst from my grasp, 
 leaving the shoulder of his jacket, and fled up the hill- 
 side towards the top of Aros like a deer. I staggered to 
 my feet again, bruised and somewhat stunned ; the 
 negro had jaaused in surprise, perhaps in terror, some 
 halfway between me and the wreck ; my uncle was al- 
 ready far away, bounding from rock to rock ; and I thus 
 found myself torn for a time between two duties. But 
 I judged, and I pray Heaven that I judged rightly, in 
 favour of the poor wretcli upon the sands ; his misfor- 
 tune was at least not j)lainly of his own creation ; it was 
 one, besides, that I could certainly relieve ; and I had 
 begun by that time to regard my uncle as an incurable 
 and dismal lunatic. I advanced accordingly towards 
 the black, who now awaited my approach with folded 
 arms, like one prepared for either destiny. As I came 
 nearer, he reached forth his hand with a great gesture, 
 such as I had seen from the pulpit, and spoke to me in
 
 THE MEKRY MEN". 67 
 
 something of a pulpit voice, but not a word was com- 
 prehensible. I tried him first in English, then in Gae- 
 lic, both in vain ; so that it was clear we must rely upon 
 the tongue of looks and gestures. Thereupon I signed 
 to him to follow me, which he did readily and with a 
 grave obeisance like a fallen king ; all the while there 
 had come no shade of alteration in his face, neither of 
 anxiety while he was still waiting, nor of relief now that 
 he was reassured ; if he were a slave, as I supposed, I 
 could not but judge he must have fallen from some 
 high place in his own country, and fallen as he was, I 
 could not but admire his bearing. As we passed the 
 grave, I paused and raised my hands and eyes to heaven 
 in token of respect and sorrow for the dead ; and he, as 
 if in answer, bowed low and spread his hands abroad ; 
 it was a strange motion, but done like a thing of com- 
 mon custom ; and I supposed it was ceremonial in the 
 land from which he came. At the same time he pointed, 
 to my uncle, whom we could just see perched upon a 
 knoll, and touched his head to indicate that he was mad. 
 We took the long way round the shore, for I feared 
 to excite my uncle if we struck across the island ; and 
 as we walked, I had time enough to mature the little 
 dramatic exhibition by which I hoped to satisfy my 
 doubts. Accordingly, pausing on a rock, I proceeded 
 to imitate before the negro the action of the man whom 
 I had seen the day before taking bearings wdth the 
 compass at Sandag. He understood me at once, and.
 
 68 THE MERRY MEN". 
 
 taking the Imitation out of my liauds, showed me where 
 the boat was, pointed out seaward as if to indicate the 
 position of the schooner, and then down along the edge 
 of the rock with the words "Esj)irito Santo," strangely 
 pronounced, but clear enough for recognition. 1 had 
 thus been right in my conjecture ; the pretended his- 
 torical inquiry had been but a cloak for treasure-hunt- 
 ing ; the man who had played Dr. Eobertson was the 
 same as the foreigner wJio visited Grisapol in spring, 
 and now, with many others, lay dead under the Eoost 
 of Aros : there had their greed brought them, there 
 should their bones be tossed for evermore. In the 
 meantime the black continued his imitation of the 
 scene, now looking up skyward as though watching the 
 appi'oach of the storm ; now, in the character of a sea- 
 man, waving the rest to come aboard ; now as an officer, 
 running along the rock and entering the boat ; and 
 anon bending over imaginary oars with the air of a 
 hurried boatman ; but all with the same solemnity of 
 manner, so that I was never even moved to smile. 
 Lastly, he indicated to me, by a pantomime not to be 
 described in words, how he himself had gone up to 
 examine the stranded wreck, and, to his grief and in- 
 dignation, had been deserted by his comrades ; and 
 thereupon folded his arms once more, and stooped his 
 head, like one accepting fate. 
 
 The mystery of his presence being thus solved for 
 me, I explained to him by means of a sketch the fate
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 69 
 
 of the vessel and of all aboard her. He showed no 
 surprise nor sorrow, and, with a sudden lifting of his 
 open hand, seemed to dismiss his former friends or 
 masters (whichever they had been) into God's pleasure. 
 Eespect came upon me and grew stronger, the more I 
 observed him ; I saw he had a powerful mind and a 
 sober and severe character, such as I loved to commune 
 "with ; and before we reached the house of Aros I had 
 almost forgotten, and wholly forgiven him, his uncanny 
 coloux'. 
 
 To Mary I told all that had passed without suppres- 
 sion, though I own my heart failed me ; but I did 
 wrong to doubt her sense of justice. 
 
 "You did the right," she said. ''God's will be 
 done." And she set out meat for us at once. 
 
 As soon as I was satisfied, I bade Eorie keep an eye 
 upon the castaway, who was still eating, and set forth 
 again myself to find my uncle. I had not gone far 
 before I saw him sitting in the same place, upon the 
 very topmost knoll, and seemingly in the same attitude 
 as when I had last observed him. From that point, as 
 I have said, the most of Aros and the neighbouring 
 Eoss would be spread below him like a map ; and it was 
 plain that he kept a bright look-out in all directions, 
 for my head had scarcely risen above the summit of the 
 firsb ascent before he had leaped to his feet and turned 
 as if to face me. I hailed him at once, as well as I was 
 able, in the same tones and words as I had often used
 
 70 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 before, when I had come to summon him to dinner. 
 He made not so much as a movement in reply. I 
 passed on a little farther, and again tried parley, with 
 the same result. But when I began a second time to 
 advance, his insane fears blazed up again, and still in 
 dead silence, but with incredible speed, he began to flee 
 from before me along the rocky summit of the hill. 
 An hour before, he had been dead weary, and I had 
 been comparatively active. But now his strength was 
 recruited by the fervour of insanity, and it would have 
 been vain for me to dream of pursuit, i^ay, the veiy 
 attempt, I thought, might have inflamed his terrors, 
 and thus increased the miseries of our position. And 
 I had nothing left but to turn homeward and make my 
 sad report to Mary. 
 
 She heard it, as she had heard the first, with a con- 
 cerned composure, and, bidding me lie down and take 
 that rest of which I stood so much in need, set forth 
 herself in quest of her misguided father. At that age 
 it would have been a strange thing that put me from 
 either meat or sleep ; I slept long and deep ; and it was 
 already long past noon before I awoke and came down- 
 stairs into the kitchen. Mary, Rorie, and the black 
 castaway were seated about the fire in silence ; and I 
 could see that Mary had been weeping. There was 
 cause enough, as I soon learned, for tears. First she, 
 and then Rorie, had been forth to seek my uncle ; each 
 in turn had found him perched upon the hill-top, and
 
 THE MERRY ME]!?". 71 
 
 from each in turn he had silently and swiftly fled. 
 Rorie had tried to chsse him, but in yain ; madness lent 
 a new vigour to his bounds ; he sprang from rock to rock 
 over the widest gullies ; he scoured like the wind along 
 the hill-tops ; he doubled and twisted like a hare before 
 the dogs ; and Eorie at length gave in ; and the last 
 that lie saw, my uncle was seated as before upon the 
 crest of Aros. Even during the hottest excitement of 
 the chase, even when the fleet-footed servant had come, 
 for a moment, very near to capture him, the poor luna- 
 tic had uttered not a sound. He fled, and he was 
 silent, like a beast ; and this silence had terrified his 
 pursuer. 
 
 There was something heart-breaking in the situation. 
 How to capture the madman, how to feed him in the 
 meanwhile, and what to do with him when he was cap- 
 tured, were the three difficulties that we had to solve. 
 
 " The black," said I, "' is the cause of this attack. 
 It may even be his presence in the house that keeps 
 my uncle on the hill. We have done the fair thing ; 
 he has been fed and warmed under this roof ; now I 
 propose that Rorie put him across the bay in the 
 coble, and take him through the Ross as far as 
 Grisapol." 
 
 In this proposal Mary heartily concurred ; and bid- 
 ding the black follow us, we all three descended to 
 the pier. Certainly, Heaven's will was declared 
 against Gordon Darnaway ; a thing had happened.
 
 72 THE MERRY MEJST. 
 
 never paralleled before in Aros ; during the storm, the 
 coble had broken loose, and, striking on the rough 
 splinters of the pier, now lay in four feet of water 
 with one side stove in. Three days of work at least 
 would be required to make her float. But I was not 
 to be beaten. I led the whole party round to where 
 the gut was narrowest, swam to the other side, and 
 called to the black to follow me. He signed, with the 
 same clearness and quiet as before, that he knew not 
 the art ; and there was truth apparent in his signals, 
 it would have occurred to none of us to doubt his 
 truth ; and that hope being over, we must all go back 
 even as we came to the house of Aros, the negro 
 walking in our midst without embarrassment. 
 
 All we could do that day was to make one more 
 attempt to communicate with the unhappy madman. 
 Again he was visible on his perch ; again he fled in 
 silence. But food and*a great cloak were at least left 
 for his comfort ; the rain, besides, had cleared away, 
 and the night promised to be even warm. We might 
 compose ourselves, we thought, until the morrow ; rest 
 was the chief requisite, that we might be strengthened 
 for unusual exertions ; and as none cared to talk, we 
 separated at an early hour. 
 
 I lay long awake, planning a campaign for the mor- 
 row. I was to place the black on the side of Sandag, 
 whence he should head my uncle towards the house ; 
 Korie in the west, I on the east, were to complete the
 
 THE MERKY MEN, 73 
 
 cordon, as best we might. It seemed to me, the more 
 I recalled the coufiguration of the island, that it should 
 be possible, though hard, to force him do^Ti upon the 
 low ground along Aros Bay ; and once there, even with 
 the strength of his madness, ultimate escape was hardly 
 to be feared. It was on his terror of the black that 
 I relied ; for I made sure, however he might run, it 
 would not be in the direction of the man whom he sup- 
 posed to have returned from the dead, and thus one 
 point of the compass at least would be secure. 
 
 When at length I fell asleep, it was to be awakened 
 shortly after by a dream of wrecks, black men, and sub- 
 marine adventure ; and I found myself so shaken and 
 fevered that I arose, descended the stair, and stepped 
 out before the house. Within, Eorie and the black were 
 asleep together in the kitchen ; outside was a wonderful 
 clear night of stars, with here and there a cloud still 
 hanging, last stragglers of the tempest. It was near 
 the top of the flood, and the Merry Men were roaring 
 in the windless quiet of the night. Never, not even 
 in the height of the tempest, had I heard their song 
 with greater awe. Now, when the winds were gathered 
 home, when the deep was dandling itself back into its 
 summer slumber, and when the stars rained their gentle 
 light over land and sea, the voice of these tide-breakers 
 was still raised for havoc. They seemed, indeed, to be 
 a part of the world's evil and the tragic side of life. 
 Nor were their meaningless vociferations the only sounds
 
 74 THE MEKKY MEN". 
 
 that broke the silence of the night. For I could hear, 
 now shrill and thrilling and now almost drowned, the 
 note of a human voice that accompanied the uproar of 
 the Roost. I knew it for my kinsman's ; and a gi'eat 
 fear fell upon me of God's judgments, and the evil in 
 the world. I went back again into the darkness of the 
 house as into a place of shelter, and lay long upon my 
 bed, pondering these mysteries. 
 
 It was late when I again woke, and I leaped into my 
 clothes and hurried to the kitchen. No one was there ; 
 Rorie and the black had both stealthily departed long 
 before ; and my heart stood still at the discovery. I 
 could rely on Rorie's heart, but I placed no trust in liis 
 discretion. If he had thus set out without a word, he 
 was plainly bent upon some service to my uncle. But 
 what service could he hope to render even alone, far less 
 in the company of the man in whom my uncle found 
 his fears incarnated ? Even if I were not already too 
 late to prevent some deadly mischief, it was plain I 
 must delay no longer. With the thought I was out of 
 the house ; and often as I have run on the rough sides 
 of Aros, I never ran as I did that fatal morning. I do 
 not believe I put twelve minutes to the whole ascent. 
 
 My uncle was gone from his perch. The basket had 
 indeed been torn open and the meat scattered on the 
 turf ; but, as we found afterwards, no mouthful had 
 been tasted ; and there was not another trace of liuman 
 existence in that wide field of view. Day had already
 
 THE MERRY MEN". 75 
 
 filled the clear heavens ; the sun already lighted in a 
 rosy bloom upon the crest of Ben Kyaw ; but all below 
 me the rude knolls of Aros and the shield of the sea lay 
 steeped in the clear darkling twilight of the dawn. 
 
 *' Eorie ! " I cried ; and again " Rorie ! " My voice 
 died in the silence, but there came no answer back. If 
 there were indeed an enterprise afoot to catch my uncle, 
 it "was plainly not in fleetness of foot, but in dexterity of 
 stalking, that the hunters placed their trust. I ran on 
 farther, keeping the higher spurs, and looking right and 
 left, nor did I pause again till I was on the mount above 
 Sandag, I could see the wreck, the uncovered belt of 
 sand, the waves idly beating, the long ledge of rocks, 
 and on either hand the tumbled knolls, boulders, and 
 gullies of the island. But still no human thing. 
 
 At a stride tbe sunshine fell on Aros, and the shadows 
 and colours leaped into being. Not half a moment later, 
 below me to the west, sheep began to scatter as in a 
 panic. There came a cry. I saw my uncle running. I 
 saw the black jump up in hot pursuit ; and before I had 
 time to understand, Eorie also had appeared, calling di- 
 rections in Gaelic as to a dog herding sheep. 
 
 I took to my heels to interfere, and perhaps I had 
 done better to have waited where I was, for I was the 
 means of cutting off the madman's last escape. There 
 was nothing before him from that moment but the 
 grave, the wreck, and the sea in Sandag Bay. And yet 
 Heaven knows that what I did was for the best.
 
 76 THE MERRY MEN. 
 
 My uncle Gordon saw in what direction, horrible to 
 him, the chase was driving him. He doubled, darting 
 to the right and left ; but high as the fever ran in his 
 veins, the black was still the swifter. Turn where he 
 would, he was still forestalled, still driven toward the 
 scene of his crime. Suddenly he began to shriek aloud, 
 so that the coast re-echoed ; and now both I and Eorie 
 were calling on the black to stop. But all was vain, for 
 it was written otherwise. The pursuer still ran, the 
 chase still sped before him screaming ; they avoided 
 the grave, and skimmed close past the timbers of the 
 wreck ; in a breath they had cleared the sand ; and 
 still my kinsman did not pause, but dashed straight into 
 the surf ; and the black, now almost within reach, still 
 followed swiftly behind him. Eorie and I both stopped, 
 for the thing was now beyond the hands of men, and 
 these were the decrees of God that came to pass before 
 our eyes. There was never a sharper ending. On that 
 steep beach they were beyond their depth at a bound ; 
 neither could swim ; the black rose once for a moment 
 with a throttling cry ; but the current had them, racing 
 seaward ; and if ever they came up again, which God 
 alone can tell, it would be ten minutes after, at the far 
 end of Aros Eoost, where the seabirds hover fishing.
 
 WILL a THE MILL, 
 
 THE PLAIIs" AND THE STARS. 
 
 The Mill where Will lived with his adopted parents 
 stood in a falling valley between pine woods and great 
 mountains. Above, hill after hill, soared upwards 
 until they soared out of the depth of the hardiest 
 timber, and stood naked against the sky. Some way 
 up, a long grey village lay like a seam or a rag of 
 vapour on a wooded hillside ; and when the wind was 
 favourable, the sound of the church bells would drop 
 down, thin and silvery, to Will. Below, the valley 
 grew ever steeper and steeper, and at the same time 
 widened out on either hand ; and from an eminence 
 beside the mill it was possible to see its whole length 
 and away beyond it over a wide plain, where the river 
 turned and shone, and moved on from city to city on 
 its voyage towards the sea. It chanced that over this 
 valley there lay a pass into a neighbouring kingdom ; 
 so that, quiet and rural as it was, the road that ran 
 along beside the river was a high thoroughfare between 
 two splendid and powerful societies. All through the 
 summer, travelling-carriages came crawling up, or
 
 73 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 went plunging briskly downwards past the mill : and 
 as it happened that the other side was very much 
 easier of ascent, the path was not much frequented, 
 except by people going in one direction ; and of all 
 the carriages that Will saw go by, five-sixths were 
 plunging briskly downwards and only one-sixth crawl- 
 ing up. Much more Avas this tbe case with foot-pas- 
 sengers. All the light-footed tourists, all the pedlars 
 laden with strange wares, were tending downward like 
 the river that accompanied their path. Nor was this 
 all ; for when Will was yet a child a disastrous war 
 arose over a great part of the world. The newspapers 
 Avere full of defeats and victories, the earth rang with 
 cavalry hoofs, and often for days together and for 
 miles around the coil of battle terrified good people 
 from their labours in the field. Of all this, nothing 
 was heard for a long time in the valley ; but at last 
 one of the commanders pushed an army over the pass 
 by forced marches, and for three days horse and foot, 
 cannon and tumbril, drum and standard, kept pour- 
 ing downward past the mill. All day the child stood 
 and watchM them on their passage — the rhythmical 
 stride, the pale, unshaven faces tanned about the eyes, 
 the discoloured regimentals and the tattered flags, 
 filled him with a sense of weariness, pity, and wonder ; 
 and all night long, after he was in bed, he could hear 
 the cannon pounding and the feet tramjoling, and the 
 great armament sweeping onward and downward past
 
 WILL O' THE MLLL. 79 
 
 the mill. No one in the valley ever heard the fate of 
 the expedition, for they lay out of the way of gossip 
 in those troublous times ; but Will saw one thing 
 plainly, that not a man returned. Whither had they 
 all gone ? Whither went all the tourists and pedlars 
 with strange wares ? whither all the brisk barouches 
 with servants in the dicky ? whither the water of the 
 stream, ever coursing downv/ard and ever renewed from 
 above ? Even the wind blew oftener down the valley, 
 and carried the dead leaves along Avith it in the fall. 
 It seemed like a great conspiracy of things animate and 
 inanimate ; they all went downward, fleetly and gaily 
 downward, and only he, it seemed, remained behind, 
 like a stock ujaon the wayside. It sometimes made 
 him glad when he noticed how the fishes kept their 
 heads up stream. They, at least, stood faithfully by 
 him, while all else were posting downward to the un- 
 known world. 
 
 One evening he asked the miller where the river 
 went. 
 
 " It goes down the valley," answered he, '^ and turns 
 a power of mills — six score mills, they say, from here 
 to Unterdeck — and it none the wearier after all. And 
 then it goes out into the lowlands, and waters the 
 great corn country, and runs through a sight of fine 
 cities (so they say) where kings live all alone in great 
 palaces, with a sentry walking up and down before the 
 door. And it goes under bridges with stone men upon 
 6
 
 80 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 them, looking clown and smiling so curious at the 
 water, and living folks leaning their elbows on the wall 
 and looking over too. And then it goes on and on, 
 and down through marshes and sands, until at last it 
 falls into the sea, where the ships are that bring parrots 
 and tobacco from the Indies. Ay, it has a long trot 
 before it as it goes singing over our weir, bless its 
 heart ! " 
 
 '^ And what is the sea ?" asked Will. 
 
 "The sea !" cried the miller. " Lord help us all, it 
 is the greatest thing God made ! That is where all the 
 water in the world runs down into a great salt lake. 
 There it lies, as flat as my hand and as innocent-like as 
 a child ; but they do say when the wind blows it gets 
 up into water-mountains bigger than any of ours, and 
 swallows down great ships bigger than our mill, and 
 makes such a roaring that you can hear it miles away 
 upon the land. There are great fish in it five times 
 bigger than a bull, and one old serpent as long as our 
 river and as old as all the world, with whiskers like a 
 man, and a crown of silver on her head." 
 
 Will thought he had never heard anything like this, 
 and he kept on asking question after question about the 
 world that lay away down the river, with all its perils 
 and marvels, until the old miller became quite in- 
 terested himself, and at last took him by the hand and 
 led him to the hilltop that overlooks the valley and the 
 plain. The sun was near setting, and hung low down
 
 WILL O' THE MILL, 81 
 
 in a cloudless sky. Everytliiug was defined and glorU 
 fied in golden light. Will had never seen so great an 
 expanse of country in his life ; he stood and gazed with 
 all his eyes. He could see the cities, and the woods 
 and fields, and. the bright curves of the river, and far 
 away to where the rim of the plain trenched along the 
 shining heavens. An over-mastering emotion seized 
 upon the boy, soul and body ; his heart beat so thickly 
 that he could not breathe ; the scene swam before his 
 eyes ; the sun seemed to wheel round and round, and 
 throw off, as it turned, strange shapes which disap- 
 peared with the rapidity of thought, and were suc- 
 ceeded by others. Will covered his face with his 
 hands, and burst into a violent fit of tears ; and the 
 poor miller, sadly disappointed and perplexed, saw 
 nothing better for it than to take him up in his arms 
 and carry him home in silence. 
 
 From that day forward. Will was full of new hopes 
 and longings. Something kept tugging at his heart- 
 strings ; the running water carried his desires along 
 with it as he dreamed over its fleeting surface ; the 
 wind, as it ran over innumerable tree-tops, hailed him 
 with encouraging v/ords ; branches beckoned downward ; 
 the open road, as it shouldered round the angles and 
 went turning and vanishing fast and faster down the 
 valley, tortured him with its solicitations. He spent 
 long whiles on the eminemce, looking down the river- 
 shed and abroad on the flat lowlands, and watched the
 
 82 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 clouds that travelled forth upon the sluggish wind and 
 trailed their purple shadows on the plain ; or he would 
 linger by the wayside, and follow the carriages with his 
 eyes as they rattled downward by the river. It did not 
 matter what it was ; everything that went that way, 
 were it cloud or carriage, bird or brown water in the 
 stream, ho felt his heart flow out after it in an ecstasy 
 of longing. 
 
 We are told by men of science that all the ventures of 
 mariners on the sea, all that counter-marching of tribes 
 and races that confounds old history with its dust and 
 rumour, sijrang from nothing more abstruse than the 
 laws of supply and demand, and a certain natural in- 
 stinct for cheap rations. To any one thinking deeply, 
 this will seem a dull and pitiful explanation. The 
 tribes that came swarming out of the North and East, 
 if they were indeed pressed onward from behind by 
 others, were drawn at the same time by the magnetic 
 influence of the South and West. The fame of other 
 lands had reached them ; the name of the eternal city 
 rang in their ears ; they were not colonists, but pil- 
 grims ; they travelled towards wine and gold and sun- 
 shine, but their hearts were set on something higher. 
 That divine unrest, that old stinging trouble of human- 
 ity that makes all high achievements and all miserable 
 failure, the same that spread wings with Icarus, the 
 same that sent Columbus into the desolate Atlantic, in- 
 spired and supported these barbarians on their perilous
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 83 
 
 march. There is one legend wliich profoundly repre- 
 sents their spirit, of how a flying party of these wan- 
 derers encountered a very old man shod with iron. The 
 old man asked them whither they were going ; and they 
 answered with one voice : "To the Eternal City !" He 
 looked upon them gravely. ''I have sought it," he 
 said, '•' over the most part of the world. Thi'ce such 
 pairs as I now carry on my feet have I worn out upon 
 this pilgrimage, and now the fourth is growing slender 
 underneath my steps. And all this while I have not 
 found the city." And he turned and went his own way 
 alone, leaving them astonished. 
 
 And yet this would scarcely parallel the intensity of 
 Will's feeling for the plain. If he could only go far 
 enough out tiiere, he felt as if his eyesight would be 
 purged and clarified, as if his hearing would grow more 
 delicate, and his very breath would come and go with 
 luxury. He was transplanted and withering where he 
 was ; he lay in a strange country and was sick for home. 
 Bit by bit, he pieced together broken notions of the 
 world below : of the river, ever moving and growing 
 until it sailed forth into the majestic ocean ; of the 
 cities, full of brisk and beautiful peoj^le, playing fount- 
 ains, bands of music and marble palaces, and lighted up 
 at night from end to end with artificial stars of gold ; of 
 the great churches, wise universities, brave armies, and 
 untold money lying stored in vaults ; of the high-flying 
 vice that moved in the sunshine, and the stealth and
 
 84 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 swiftness of midnight murder. I have said he was sick 
 as if for home : the figure halts. He was like some one 
 lying- in twilit, formless jore-existence, and stretching 
 out his hands lovingly towards many-coloured, many- 
 sounding life. It was no wonder he was unhappy, he 
 would go and tell the fish : they were made for their 
 life, wished for no more than worms and running water, 
 and a hole below a falling hank ; but he was differently 
 designed, full of desires and aspirations, itching at the 
 fingers, lusting with the eyes, whom the whole varie- 
 gated world could not satisfy with aspects. The true 
 life, the true bright sunshine, lay far out upon the plain. 
 And ! to see this sunlight once before he died ! to 
 move with a Jocund spirit in a golden land ! to hear the 
 trained singers and sweet church bells, and see the holi- 
 day gardens ! **And fish !"'he would cry, "if you 
 would only turn your noses down stream, yon could 
 swim so easily into the fabled waters and see the vast 
 ships passing over your head like clouds, and hear the 
 great water- hills making music over you all day long ! " 
 But the fish kept looking jDatiently in their own direc- 
 tion, until Will hardly knew whether to laugh or cry. 
 
 Hitherto the traffic on the road had passed by Will, 
 like something seen in a picture : he had perhaps ex- 
 changed salutations with a tourist, or caught sight of an 
 old gentleman in a travelling cap at a carriage window; 
 but for the most jaart it had been a mere symbol, which 
 he contemplated from apart and with something of a
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 85 
 
 superstitious feeling. A time came at last when this 
 was to be changed. The miller, who was a greedy man 
 in his way, and never forewent an opportunity of honest 
 profit, turned the mill-house into a little wayside inn, 
 and, several pieces of good fortune falling in oppor- 
 tunely, built stables and got the position of post master 
 on the road. It now became Will's duty to wait upon 
 people, as they sat to break their fasts in the little ar- 
 bour at the top of the mill garden ; and you may be sure 
 that he kept his ears open, and learned many new things 
 about the outside world as he brought the omelette or 
 the wine. Nay, he would often get into conversation 
 with single guests, and by adroit questions and polite 
 attention, not only gratify his own curiosity, but win 
 the goodwill of the travellers. Many complimented the 
 old couple on their serving-boy ; and a professor was 
 eager to take him away with him, and have him 
 properly educated in the plain. The miller and his 
 wife were mightily astonished and even more pleased. 
 They thought it a very good thing that they should 
 have opened their inn. " You see," the old man would 
 remark, "he has a kind of talent for a publican; he 
 never would have made anything else ! " And so life 
 wagged on in the valley, with high satisfaction to all 
 concerned but Will. Every carriage that left the inn- 
 door seemed to take a part of him away with it; and 
 when people jestingly offered him a lift, he could v/ith 
 difficulty command his emotion. Night after night
 
 86 WILL THE MILL. 
 
 he would dream that he was awakened by flustered 
 servants, and that a splendid equipage waited at the 
 door to carry him down into the plain ; night after 
 night ; until the dream, which had seemed all jollity 
 to him at first, began to take on a colour of gravity, and 
 the nocturnal summons and waiting equipage occupied 
 a place in his mind as something to be both feared and 
 hoped for. 
 
 One day, when Will was about sixteen, a fat young 
 man arrived at sunset to pass the night. He was a con- 
 tented-looking fellow, with a jolly eye, and carried a 
 knapsack. While dinner was preparing, he sat in the 
 arbour to read a book ; but as soon as he had begun to 
 observe Will, the book was laid aside ; he was plainly 
 one of those who prefer living people to people made of 
 ink and paper. Will, on his part, although he had 
 not been much interested in the stranger at first sight, 
 soon began to take a great deal of pleasure in his talk, 
 which was full of good nature and good sense, and at 
 last conceived a great respect for his character and wis- 
 dom. They sat far into the night ; and about two in 
 the morning Will opened his heart to the young man, 
 and told him how he longed to leave the valley and 
 what bright hopes he had connected with the cities of 
 the plain. The young man whistled, and then broke 
 into a smile. 
 
 "My young friend," he remarked, ''you are a very 
 curious little fellow to be sure, and wish a great many
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 87 
 
 things which you will never get. Wiiy. you would feel 
 quite ashamed if you knew how the little fellows in these 
 fairy cities of yours are all after the same sort of non- 
 sense, and keep breaking their hearts to get up into the 
 mountains. And let me tell you, those who go down 
 into the plains are a very short while there before they 
 wish themselves heartily back again. The air is not so 
 light nor so pure ; nor is the sun any brighter. As for 
 the beautiful men and women, you would see many of 
 them in rags and many of them deformed with horrible 
 disorders ; and a city is so hard a place for people who 
 are poor and sensitive that many choose to die by their 
 own hand." 
 
 *'You must think me very simple," answered Will. 
 '* Although I have never been out of this valley, believe 
 me, I have used my eyes. I know how one thing lives 
 on another ; for instance, how the fish hangs in the 
 eddy to catch his fellows ; and the shepherd, who makes 
 so pretty a picture carrying home the lamb, is only 
 carrying it home for dinner. I do not expect to find all 
 things right in your cities. That is not what troubles 
 me ; it might have been that once upon a time ; but al- 
 though I live here always, I have asked many questions 
 and learned a great deal in these last years, and cer- 
 tainly enough to cure me of my old fancies. But you 
 would not have me die like a dog and not see all that is 
 to be seen, and do all that a man can do, let it be good 
 or evil ? you would not have me spend all my days be-
 
 88 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 tween this road here and the river, and not so much as 
 make a motion to be up and live my life ? — I would 
 rather die out of hand/' he cried, " than linger on as I 
 am doing." 
 
 ''Thousands of people," said the young man, "live 
 and die like you, and are none the less happy." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Will, " if there are thousands who would 
 like, why should not one of them have my place ? " 
 
 It was quite dark ; there was a hanging lamjD in the 
 arbour which lit up the table and the faces of the 
 speakers ; and along the arch, the leaves upon the trellis 
 stood out illuminated against the night sky, a pattern of 
 transi^arent green upon a dusky purple. The fat young 
 man rose, and, taking Will by the arm, led him out 
 under tlie open heavens. 
 
 " Did you ever look at the stars ? " he asked, pointing 
 upwards. 
 
 " Often and often," answered Will. 
 
 " And do you know what they are ? " 
 
 "I have fancied many things." 
 
 ''They are worlds like ours," said the young man. 
 "Some of them less ; many of them a million times 
 greater ; and some of the least sparkles that you see are 
 not only worlds, but whole clusters of worlds turning 
 about each other in the midst of space. We do not 
 know what there may be in any of them ; perhaps the 
 answer to all our difficulties or the cure of all our suffer- 
 ings : and yet we can never reach them ; not all the skill
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 89 
 
 of the craftiest of men can fit out a sliip for the nearest 
 of these our neighbours, nor would the life of the most 
 aged suffice for such a journey. When a great battle has 
 been lost or a dear friend is dead, when we are hipped or 
 in high spirits, there they are unweariedly shining over- 
 head. We may stand down here, a whole army of us 
 together, and shout until we break our hearts, and not a 
 whisper reaches them. We may climb the highest 
 mountain, and we are no nearer them. All we can do is 
 to stand down here in the garden and take off our hats ; 
 the starshine lights upon our heads, and where mine is 
 a little bald, I dare say you can see it glisten in the dark- 
 ness. The mountain and the mouse. That is like to be 
 all we shall ever have to do with Arcturus or Aldebaran. 
 Can you apply a parable?" he added, laying his hand upon 
 Will's shoulder. "It is not the same thing as a reason, 
 but usually vastly more convincing." 
 
 Will hung his head a little, and then raised it once 
 more to heaven. The stars seemed to expand and emit 
 a sharper brilliancy ; and as he kept turning his eyes 
 higher and higher, they seemed to increase in multitude 
 under his gaze. 
 
 '' I see," he said, turning to the young man. " We 
 are in a rat-trap." 
 
 " Something of that size. Did you ever see a squirrel 
 turning in a cage ? and another squirrel sitting philo- 
 sophically over his nuts ? I needn't ask you which of 
 them looked more of a fool."
 
 90 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 THE parson's MAEJORY. 
 
 After some years the old people died, both in one 
 winter, very carefully tended by their adopted son, and 
 very quietly mourned when they were gone. People 
 who had heard of his roving fancies supposed he would 
 hasten to sell the property, and go down the river to 
 push his fortunes. But there was never any sign of 
 such an intention on the part of Will. On the con- 
 trary, he had the inn set on a better footing, and hired 
 a couple of servants to assist him in carrying it on ; and 
 there he settled down, a kind, talkative, inscrutable 
 young man, six feet three in his stockings, with an 
 iron constitution and a friendly voice. He soon began 
 to take rank in the district as a bit of an oddity : it was 
 not much to be wondered at from the first, for he was 
 always full of notions, and kept calling the plainest 
 common-sense in question ; but what most raised the 
 report upon him was the odd circumstance of his court- 
 ship with the parson's Marjory. 
 
 The parson's Marjory was a lass about nineteen, when 
 Will would be about thirty ; well enough looking, and 
 much better educated than any other girl in that part 
 of the country, as became her parentage. She held her 
 head very high, and had already refused several offers 
 of marriage with a grand air, which had got her hard 
 names among the neighbours. For all that she was 
 a good girl, and one that would have made any man 
 well contented.
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 91 
 
 Will had never seen much of her ; for although the 
 church and parsonage were only two miles from his own 
 door, he was never known to go there hut on Sundays 
 It chanced, however, that the parsonage fell into dis- 
 repair, and had to be dismiintled ; and the parson and 
 his daughter took lodgings for a month or so, on very 
 much reduced terms, at Will's inn. Now, what with 
 the inn, and the mill, and the old miller's savings, our 
 friend was a man of substance ; and besides that, he 
 had a name for good temper and shrewdness, which 
 make a capital portion in marriage ; and so it was cur- 
 rently gossiped, among their ill-wishers, that the parson 
 and his daughter had not chosen their temporary lodg- 
 ing with their eyes shut. Will was about the last man 
 in the world to be cajoled or frightened into marriage. 
 You had only to look into his eyes, limpid and still like 
 pools of water, and yet with a sort of clear light that 
 seemed to come from within, and you would understand 
 at once that here was one who knew his own mind, and 
 would stand to it immovably. Marjory herself was no 
 weakling by her looks, with strong, steady eyes and a 
 resolute and quiet bearing. It might be a question 
 whether she was not Will's match in steadfastness, after 
 all, or which of them would rule the roast in marriage. 
 But Marjory had never given it a thought, and accom- 
 panied her father with the most unshaken innocence 
 and unconcern. 
 
 The season was still so early that Will's customers
 
 92 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 were few and far between ; but the lilacs were already 
 flowering, and the weather was so mild that the party 
 took dinner under the trellice, with the noise of the 
 river in their ears and the woods ringing about them 
 with the songs of birds. Will soon began to take a par- 
 ticular pleasure in these dinners. The parson was rather 
 a dull companion, with a habit of dozing at table ; but 
 nothing rude or cruel ever fell from his lips. And as 
 for the parson's daughter, she suited her surroundings 
 with the best grace imaginable ; and whatever she said 
 seemed so pat and pretty that Will conceived a great 
 idea of her talents. He could see her face, as she leaned 
 forward, against a background of rising pinewoods ; her 
 eyes shone peaceably ; the light lay around her hair like 
 a kerchief; something that was hardly a smile rippled 
 her pale cheeks, and Will could not contain himself from 
 gazing on her in an agreeable dismay. She looked, even 
 in her quietest moments, so complete in herself, and so 
 quick with life down to her finger tips and the very 
 skirts of her dress, that the remainder of created things 
 became no more than a blot by comparison ; and if Will 
 glanced away from her to her surroundings, the trees 
 looked inanimate and senseless, the clouds liung in 
 heaven like dead things, and even the mountain tops 
 were disenchanted. The whole valley could not com- 
 pare in looks with this one girl. 
 
 Will was always observant in the society of his fellow- 
 creatures ; but his observation became almost painfully
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 93 
 
 eager in the case of Marjory. He listened to all she 
 uttered, and read her eyes, at the same time, for tJie 
 unspoken commentary. Many kind, simple, and sincere 
 speeches found an echo in his heart. He became 
 conscious of a soul beautifully poised upon itself, 
 nothing doubting, nothing desiring, clothed in peace. 
 It was not possible to separate her thoughts from her 
 appearance. The turn of her wrist, the still sound of 
 her voice, the light in her eyes, the lines of her body, 
 fell in tune with her grave and gentle words, like the 
 accompaniment that sustains and harmonises the voice 
 of the singer. Her influence was one thing, not to be 
 divided or discussed, only to be felt with gratitude and 
 joy. To Will, her presence recalled something of his 
 childhood, and the thought of her took its place in his 
 mind beside that of dawn, of running water, and of the 
 earliest violets and lilacs. It is the property of things 
 seen for the first time, or for the first time after long, 
 like the flowers in spring, to reawaken in us the sharp 
 edge of sense and that impression of mystic strangeness 
 which otherwise passes out of life with the coming of 
 years ; but the sight of a loved face is what renews a 
 man's character from the fountain upwards. 
 
 One day after dinner Will took a stroll among the 
 firs ; a grave beatitude possessed him from top to toe, 
 and he kept smiling to himself and the landscape as he 
 went. The river ran between the stepping-stones with 
 a pretty wimple ; a bird sang loudly in the wood ; the
 
 94 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 hill-tops looked immeasurably higb, and as he glanced 
 at them from time to time seemed to contemplate his 
 movements with a beneficent but awful curiosity. His 
 way took him to the eminence which overlooked the 
 plain ; and there he sat down upon a stone, and fell into 
 deep and pleasant thought. The plain lay abroad with 
 its cities and silver river ; everything was asleep, except 
 a great eddy of birds which kept rising and falling and 
 going round and round in the blue air. He repeated 
 Marjory's name aloud, and the sound of it gratified his 
 ear. He shut his eyes, and her image sprang up before 
 him, quietly luminous and attended with good thoughts. 
 The river might run for ever ; the birds fly higher and 
 higher till they touched the stars. He saw it was empty 
 bustle after all ; for here, without stirring a foot, wait- 
 ing patiently in his own narrow valley, he also had 
 attained the better sunlight. 
 
 The next day "Will made a sort of declaration across 
 the dinner-table, while the parson was filling his pipe. 
 
 ''Miss Marjory," he said, "I never knew any one I 
 liked so well as you. I am mostly a cold, unkindly sort 
 of man ; not from want of heart, but out of strangeness 
 in my way of thinking ; and people seem far away from 
 me. 'Tis as if there were a circle round me, which kept 
 every one out but you ; I can hear the others talking 
 and laughing ; but you come quite close. Maybe, this 
 is disagreeable to you ?" he asked. 
 
 Marjory made no answer.
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 95 
 
 " Speak up, girl," said the parson. 
 
 ''Nay, now," returned AYill, "I wouldn't press her, 
 parson. I feel tongue-tied myself, who am not used to 
 it ; and she's a woman, and little more than a child, 
 when all is said. But for my part, as far as I can un- 
 derstand what people mean by it, I fancy I must be 
 what they call in love. I do not wish to be held as 
 committing myself ; for I may be wrong ; but that is 
 how I believe things are with me. And if Miss Marjory 
 should feel any otherwise on her part, mayhap she 
 would be so kind as shake her head." 
 
 Marjory was silent, and gave no sigzi that she had 
 heard. 
 
 " How is that, parson ? " asked Will. 
 
 " The girl must speak," replied the parson, laying 
 down his pipe. *' Here's our neighbour who says he 
 loves you, Madge. Do you love him, ay or no ? " 
 
 '' I think I do," said Marjory, faintly. 
 
 '* Well then, that's all that could be wished ! " cried 
 Will, heartily. And he took her hand across the table, 
 and held it a moment in both of his with great satisfac- 
 tion. 
 
 " You must marry," observed the parson, replacing 
 his pipe in his mouth. 
 
 "Is that the right thing to do, think you ?" de- 
 manded Will. 
 
 *' It is indispensable," said the parson. 
 
 "Very well," replied the wooer. 
 7
 
 96 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 Two or three days passed away with great delight to 
 "Will, although a bystander might scarce have found it 
 out. He continued to take his meals opposite Marjory, 
 and to talk with her and gaze upon her in her father's 
 presence ; but he made no attempt to see ber alone, nor 
 in any other way changed his conduct towards her from 
 wbat it had been since the beginning. Perhaps the girl 
 was a little disappointed, and perhaps not unjustly ; 
 and yet if it had been enough to be always in tbe 
 thoughts of another person, and so pervade and alter 
 his whole life, she might have been thoroughly con- 
 tented. For she was never out of Will's mind for an 
 instant. He sat over the stream, and watched the dust 
 of the eddy, and the poised fish, and straining weeds; 
 he wandered out alone into the purple even, with all 
 the blackbirds piping round him in the wood ; he rose 
 early in the morning, and saw the sky turn from grey 
 to gold, and the light leap upon the hill-tops ; and all 
 the while he kept wondering if he had never seen such 
 things before, or how it was that they should look so 
 different now. The sound of his own mill-wheel, or of 
 the wind among the trees, confounded and charmed his 
 heart. The most enchanting thoughts presented them- 
 selves unbidden in his mind. He was so happy that he 
 could not sleep at night, and so restless that he could 
 hardly sit still out of her company. And yet it seemed 
 as if he avoided her rather than sought her out. 
 
 One day, as he was coming home from a ramble. Will
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 97 
 
 found Marjory in the garden picking flowers, and as he 
 came up with her, slackened his pace and continued 
 walking by her side. 
 
 "You like flowers ?" he said. 
 
 '^ Indeed I love them dearly," she replied. ''Do 
 you ? " 
 
 " Why, no," said he, " not so much. They are a 
 very small affair, when all is done. I can fancy people 
 caring for them greatly, but not doing as you are just 
 now." ' 
 
 **How ?" she asked, pausing and looking up at him. 
 
 " Plucking them," said he. '' They are a deal better 
 off where they are, and look a deal prettier, if you go to 
 that." 
 
 *'I wish to have them for my own," she answered, 
 *' to carry them near my heart, and keep them in my 
 room. They tempt me when they grow here ; they 
 eeem to say, ' Come and do something with us ;' but 
 once I have cut them and pat them by, the charm is 
 laid, and I can look at them with quite an easy heart." 
 
 "You wish to possess them," replied Will, " in order 
 to think no more about them. It's a bit like killing the 
 goose with the golden eggs. It's a bit like what I 
 wished to do when I was a boy. Because I had a fancy 
 for looking out over the plain, I wished to go down 
 there — where I couldn't look out over it any longer. 
 Was not that fine reasoning ? Dear, dear, if they only 
 thought of it, all the world would do like me ; and you
 
 98 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 would let jour flowers alone, just as I stay up here in 
 the mountains." Suddenly he broke off sharp. ''By 
 the Lord ! " he cried. And when she asked him what 
 was wrong, he turned the question off, and walked away 
 into the house with rather a humorous expression of 
 face. 
 
 He was silent at table ; and after the night had fallen 
 and the stars had come out overhead, he walked up and 
 down for hours in the courtyard and garden with an 
 uneven pace. There was still a light in the window of 
 Marjory's room : one little oblong patch of orange in a 
 world of dark blue hills and silver starlight. Will's 
 mind ran a great deal on the window ; but his thoughts 
 were not very lover-like. "^ There she is in her room," 
 he thought, '^and there are the stars overhead : — a bless- 
 ing upon both ! " Both were good influences in his life ; 
 both soothed and braced him in his profound content- 
 ment with the world. And what more should he desire 
 with either ? The fat young man and his councils were 
 so present to his mind, that he threw back his head, 
 and, putting his hands before his mouth, shouted aloud 
 to the populous heavens. Whether from the position of 
 his head or the sudden strain of the exertion, he seemed 
 to see a momentary shock among the stars, and a diffu- 
 sion of frosty light pass from one to another along the 
 sky. At the same instant, a corner of the blind was 
 lifted up and lowered again at once. He laughed a loud 
 ho-bo ! "One and another!" thought Will. "The
 
 WILL 0' THE MILL. 99 
 
 stars tremble, and the blind goes up. "Why, before 
 Heaven, what a great magician I must be ! Now if I 
 were only a fool, should not I be in a pretty way ? " 
 And he went off to bed, chuckling to himself : " If I 
 were only a fool !" 
 
 The next morning, pretty early, he saw her once 
 more in the garden, and sought her out. 
 
 "I have been thinking about getting married," he 
 began abruptly; ''and after having turned it all over, 
 I have made up my mind it's not worth while." 
 
 She turned upon him for a single moment ; but his 
 radiant, kindly appearance would, under the circum- 
 stances, have disconcerted an angel, and she looked 
 down again upon the ground in silence. He could see 
 her tremble. 
 
 '' I hope you don't mind," he went on, a little taken 
 aback. " You ought not. I have turned it all over, 
 and upon my soul there's nothing in it. We should 
 never be one whit nearer than we are just now, and, if 
 lam a wise man, nothing like so happy." 
 
 " It is unnecessary to go round about with me," she 
 said. " I very well remember that you refused to 
 commit yourself ; and nov/ that I see you were mistaken, 
 and in reality have never cared for me, I can only feel 
 sad that I have been so far misled." 
 
 " I ask your pardon," said Will stoutly ; "you do 
 not understand my meaning. As to whether I have 
 ever loved vou or not, I must leave that to others. But
 
 100 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 for oue thing, my feeling is not changed ; and for 
 another, you may make it your boast that you have 
 made ray whole life and character something different 
 from what they were. I mean what I say ; no less. I 
 do not think getting married is worth while. I would 
 rather you went on living with your father, so that I 
 could walk over and see you once, or maybe twice a 
 week, as people go to church, and then we should both 
 be all the happier between whiles. That's my notion. 
 But I'll marry you if you will," he added. 
 
 " Do you know that you are insulting me ?" she 
 broke out. 
 
 ^*N"ot I, Marjory," said he ; '' if there is anything in 
 a clear conscience, not I. I offer all my heart's best 
 affections ; you can take it or want it, though I suspect 
 it's beyond either your power or mine to change what 
 has once been done, and sot me fancy-free. I'll marry 
 you, if you like ; but I tell you again and again, it's 
 not worth while, and we had best stay friends. Though 
 I am a quiet man I have noticed a heap of things in 
 my life. Trust in me, and take things as I propose; 
 or, if you don't like that, say the word, and I'll marry 
 you out of hand." 
 
 There was a considerable pause, and Will, who be- 
 gan to feel uneasy, began to grow angry in consequence. 
 
 " It seems you are too proud to say your mind," he 
 said. " Believe me that's a pity. A clean shrift makes 
 simple living. Can a man be m'^ve downright or hon-
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. TOl 
 
 Durable to a woman than I haye been ? I have said my 
 say, and given you your choice. Do you want me to 
 marry you ? or Avill you take my friendship, as I think 
 best ? or have you had enough of me for good ? Speak 
 out for the dear God's sake ! You know your father 
 told you a girl should speak her mind in these affairs." 
 
 She seemed to recover herself at that, turned without 
 a word, walked rapidly tlirough the garden, and dis- 
 appeared into the house, leaving Will in some confusion 
 as to the result. He walked up and down the garden, 
 whistling softly to himself. Sometimes he stopped and 
 contemplated the sky and hill-tops ; sometimes he went 
 down to the tail of the weir and sat there, looking 
 foolishly in the water. All this dubiety and perturba- 
 tion was so foreign to his nature and the life which 
 he had resolutely chosen for himself, that he began 
 to regret Marjory's arrival. " After all," he thought, 
 " I was as happy as a man need be. I could come 
 down here and watch my fishes all day long if I wanted: 
 I was as settled and contented as my old mill." 
 
 Marjory came down to dinner, looking very trim and 
 quiet ; and no sooner were all three at table than she 
 made her father a speech, with her eyes fixed upon her 
 plate, but showing no other sign of embarrassment or 
 distress. 
 
 "Father," she began, ''Mr. Will and I have been 
 talking things over. We see that we have each made 
 a mistake about our feelings, and he has agreed, at 
 
 UNTVEF.STTY OF CALIFORNIA 
 SANTA BAHriARA COLLEGE LIBKAKY
 
 102 WILL o' TUE MILL. 
 
 my request, to give up all idea of marriage, and be no 
 more than my very good friend, as in the past. You 
 see, there is no shadow of a quarrel, and indeed I hope 
 we shall see a great deal of him in the future, for his 
 visits will always be welcome in our house. Of course, 
 father, you will know best, but perhaps we should do 
 better to leave Mr. "Will's house for the present. I be- 
 lieve, after what has passed, we should hardly be agree- 
 able inmates for some days." 
 
 Will, who had commanded himself with difficulty 
 from the first, broke out upon this into an inarticulate 
 noise, and raised one hand with an appearance of real 
 dismay, as if he were about to interfere and contradict. 
 But she checked him at once, looking up at him with 
 a swift glance and an angry flush upon her cheek. 
 
 *' You will perhaps have the good grace," she said, 
 ''to let me explain these matters for myself." 
 
 "Will was put entirely out of countenance by her ex- 
 pression and the ring of her voice. He held his peace, 
 concluding that there were somethings about this girl be- 
 yond his comprehension, in which he was exactly right. 
 
 The poor parson was quite crestfallen. He tried to 
 prove that this was no more than a true lovers' tiff, 
 which would pass o2 before night ; and when he was 
 dislodged from that position, he went on to argue that 
 where there was no quarrel there could be no call for 
 a separation ; for the good man liked both his enter- 
 tainment and his host. It was curious to see how the
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 103 
 
 girl managed thera, saying little all the time, and that 
 very quietly, and yet twisting them round her finger 
 and insensibly leading them wherever she would by 
 feminine tact and generalship. It scarcely seemed to 
 have been her doing — it seemed as if things had merely 
 so fallen out — that she and her father took their de- 
 parture that same afternoon in a farm-cart, and went 
 farther down the valley, to wait, until their own house 
 was ready for them, in another hamlet. But Will had 
 been observing closely, and was well aware of her dex- 
 terity and resolution. When he found himself alone 
 he had a great many curious matters to turn over in 
 his mind. He was very sad and solitary, to begin with. 
 All the interest had gone out of his life, and he might 
 look up at the stars as long as he pleased, he somehow 
 failed to find suj^port or consolation. And then he 
 was in such a turmoil of spirit about Marjory. He had 
 been puzzled and Irritated at her behaviour, and yet he 
 could not keep himself from admiring it. He thought 
 he recognised a fine, perverse angel in that still soul 
 which he had never hitherto suspected ; and though he 
 saw it was an influence that would fit but ill with his 
 own life of artificial calm, he could not keep himself 
 from ardently desiring to possess it. Like a man who 
 has lived among shadows and now meets the sun, he 
 was both j)'^iiied and delighted. 
 
 As the days went forward he passed from one ex- 
 treme to another; now pluming himself on the strength
 
 104 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 of bis determination, now despising his timid and 
 silly caution. The former was, perhaps, the true 
 thought of his heart, and represented the regular 
 tenor of the man's reflections ; but the latter burst 
 forth from time to time with an unruly yiolence, and 
 then he would forget all consideration, and go up and 
 down his house and garden or walk among the fir- 
 woods like one who is beside himself with remorse. 
 To equable, steady-minded Will this state of matters 
 was intolerable ; and he determined, at whatever cost, 
 to bring it to an end. So, one warm summer after- 
 noon he put on his best clothes, took a thorn switch in 
 his hand, and set out down the valley by the river. As 
 soon as he had taken his determination, he had re- 
 gained at a bound his customary peace of heart, and he 
 enjoyed the bright weather and the variety of the scene 
 Avithout any admixture of alarm or unpleasant eager- 
 ness. It was nearly the same to him how the matter 
 turned out. If she accepted him he would have to marry 
 her this time, which perhaps was all for the best. If 
 she refused him, he would have done his utmost, 
 and might follow his own way in the future with an 
 untroubled conscience. He hoped, on the whole, she 
 would refuse him ; and then, again, as he saw the 
 brown roof which sheltered her, peeping through 
 some willows at an angle of the stream, he was half 
 inclined to reverse the wish, and more than half 
 ashamed of himself for this infirmity of purpose.
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 105 
 
 Marjory seemed glad to see him, and gave him her 
 hand without affectation or delay. 
 
 " I haye been thinking about this marriage/' he 
 began. 
 
 "So have I," she answered. ''And I resjoect you 
 more and more for a very wise man. You understood 
 me better than I understood myself ; and I am now 
 quite certain that things are all for the best as they 
 are." 
 
 " At the same time ," ventured "Will. 
 
 ''You must be tired," she interrupted. "Take a 
 seat and let me fetch you a glass of wine. The after- 
 noon is so warm ; and I wish you not to be displeased 
 with your visit. You must come quite often ; once a 
 week, if you can spare the time ; I am always so glad 
 to see my friends." 
 
 "0, very well," thought Will to himself. "It 
 appears I was right after all." And he paid a very 
 agreeable visit, walked home again in capital spirits, 
 and gave himself no further concern about the matter. 
 
 For nearly three years Will and Marjory continued 
 on these terms, seeing each other once or twice a week 
 without any word of love between them ; and for all 
 that time I believe Will was nearly as happy as a man 
 can be. He rather stinted himself the pleasure of 
 seeing her ; and he would often walk half-way over to 
 the parsonage, and then back again, as if to whet his 
 appetite. Indeed there was one corner of the road.
 
 106 WILL 0' THE MILL. 
 
 whence he could see the church-spire wedged into a 
 crevice of the yalley between slo^jing firwoods, with a 
 triangular snatch of plain by way of background, which 
 he greatly affected as a place to sit and moralise in 
 before returning homewards ; and the peasants got so 
 much into the habit of finding him there in the twi- 
 light that they gave it the name of ''Will o' the Mill's 
 Corner." 
 
 At the end of the three years Marjory played him a 
 sad trick by suddenly marrying somebody else. Will kept 
 his countenance bravely, and merely remarked that, for 
 as little as he knew of women, he had acted very pru- 
 dently in not marrying her himself three years before. 
 She plainly knew very little of her own mind,, and, in 
 spite of a deceptive manner, was as fickle and flighty as 
 the rest of them. He had to congratulate himself on 
 an escape, he said, and would take a higher opinion of 
 his own wisdom in consequence. But at heart, he was 
 reasonably displeased, moped a good deal for a month 
 or two, and fell away in flesh, to the astonishment of 
 his serving-lads. 
 
 It was perhaps a year after this marriage that Will 
 was awakened late one night by the sound of a horse 
 galloping on the road, followed by precipitate knocking 
 at the inn-door. He opened his window and saw a 
 farm servant, mounted and holding a led horse by the 
 bridle, who told him to make what haste he could and 
 go along with him ; for Marjory was dying, and had
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 107 
 
 sent urgently to fetch liira to her bedside. Will was no 
 horseman, and made so little sjieed upon the way that 
 the poor young wife was yery near her end before he 
 arrived. But they had some minutes' talk in private, 
 and he was present and wept very bitterly while she 
 breathed her last. 
 
 DEATH. 
 
 Year after year went away into nothing, with great 
 explosions and outcries in the cities on the plain : red 
 revolt springing up and being suppressed in blood, bat- 
 tle swaying hither and thither, patient astronomers in 
 observatory towers picking out and christening new 
 stars, plays being performed in lighted theatres, people 
 .being carried into hospital on stretchers, and all the 
 usual turmoil and agitation of men's lives in crowded 
 centres. Up in Will's valley only the winds and sea- 
 sons made an epoch ; the fish hung in the swift stream, 
 the birds circled overhead, the pine-tops rustled under- 
 neath the stars, the tall hills stood over all ; and Will 
 went to and fro, minding his wayside inn, until the 
 snow began to thicken on his head. His heart was 
 young and vigorous ; and if his pulses kept a sober 
 time, they still beat strong and steady in his wrists. 
 He carried a ruddy stain on either cheek, like a ripe 
 apple ; he stooped a little, but his step was still tirm ; 
 and his sinewy hands were reached out to all men 
 with a friendly pressure. His face was covered with 
 those wrinkles which are got in open air, and which.
 
 108 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 rightly looked at, are no more than a sort of permanent 
 sunburning ; sucli T\Tinkles heighten the stupidity of 
 stupid faces ; but to a person like Will, with his clear 
 eyes and smiling mouth, only give another charm by 
 testifying to a simple and easy life. His talk was full 
 of wise sayings. He had a taste for other people ; and 
 other people had a taste for him. When the valley was 
 full of tourists in the season, there were merry nights 
 in Will's arbour ; and his views, which seemed whimsi- 
 cal to his neighbours, were often enough admired by 
 learned people out of towns and colleges. Indeed, he 
 had a very noble old age, and grew daily better known ; 
 so that his fame was heard of in the cities of the plain ; 
 and young men who had been summer travellers spoke 
 together in cafes of Will o' the Mill and his rough phi- 
 losophy. Many and many an invitation, you may be 
 sure, he had ; but nothing could tempt him from his 
 upland valley. He would shake his head and smile 
 over his tobacco-pipe with a deal of meaning. " You 
 come too late," he would answer. "I am a dead man 
 now : I have lived and died already. Fifty years ago 
 you would have brought my heart^into my mouth ; and 
 now you do not even tempt me. But that is the object 
 of long living, that man should cease to care about 
 life." And again: "There is only one difference be- 
 tween a long life and a good dinner : that, in the din- 
 ner, the sweets come last." Or once more : " When 
 I was a boy, I was a bit puzzled, and hardly knew
 
 WILL O' THE MILL, 109 
 
 whether it was myself or the world that was curious and 
 worth looking into. 'Now, I know it is myself, and 
 stick to that." 
 
 He never showed any symptoms of frailty, but kept 
 stalwart and firm to the last ; but they say he grew less 
 talkative towards the end, and would listen to other 
 people by the hour in an amused and sympathetic 
 silence. Only, when he did speak, it was more to the 
 point and more charged with old esijerience. He drank 
 a bottle of wine gladly ; above all, at sunset on the hill- 
 top or quite late at night under the stars in the arbour. 
 The sight of something attractive and unattainable sea- 
 soned his enjoyment, he would say ; and he professed 
 he had lived long enough to admire a candle all the 
 more when he could compare it with a planet. 
 
 One night, in his seventy-second year, he awoke in 
 bed, in such uneasiness of body and mind that he arose 
 and dressed himself and went out to meditate in the 
 arbour. It was pitch dark, without a star ; the river 
 was swollen, and the wet woods and meadows loaded 
 the air with perfume. It had thundered during the 
 day, and it promised more thunder for the morrow. 
 A murky, stifling night for a man of seventy-two ! 
 Whether it was the weather or the wakefulness, or 
 some little touch of fever in his old limbs. Will's mind 
 was besieged by tumultuous and crying memories. His 
 boyhood, the night with the fat young man, the death 
 of his adopted parents, the summer days with Marjory,
 
 110 WILL O' THE MILL, 
 
 and many of those small circumstances, which seem 
 nothing to another, and are yet the very gist of a 
 man's own life to himself — things seen, words heard, 
 looks misconstrued — arose from their forgotten cor- 
 ners and usurped his attention. The dead them- 
 selves were with him, not merely taking part in this 
 thin show of memory that defiled before his brain, but 
 revisiting his bodily senses as they do in profound and 
 vivid dreams. The fat young man leaned his elbows on 
 the table opposite ; Marjory came and went with an 
 apronful of flowers between the garden and the arbour ; 
 he could hear the old parson knocking out his pipe or 
 blowing his resonant nose. The tide of his conscious- 
 ness ebbed and flowed : he was sometimes half-asleep 
 and drowned in his recollections of the past ; and some- 
 times he was broad awake, wondering at himself. But 
 abont the middle of the night he was startled by the 
 voice of the dead miller calling to him out of the house 
 as he used to do on the arrival of custom. The hallu- 
 cination was so perfect that Will sprang from his seat 
 and stood listening for the summons to be I'epeated ; 
 and as he listened he became conscious of another noise 
 besides the brawling of the river and the ringing in his 
 feverish ears. It was like the stir of the horses and the 
 creaking of harness, as though a carriage with an im- 
 patient team had been brought up upon the road before 
 the courtyard gate. At such an hour, upon this rough 
 and dangerous pass, the supposition was no better than
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. Ill 
 
 absurd ; and Will dismissed it from his mind, and re- 
 sumed his seat upon the arbour chair ; and sleep closed 
 over him again like running water. He was once again 
 awakened by the dead miller's call, thinner and more 
 spectral than before ; and once again he heard the noise 
 of an equipage upon the road. And so thrice and four 
 times, the same dream, or the same fancy, presented 
 itself to his senses : until at length, smiling to himself 
 as when one humours a nervous child, he proceeded 
 towards the gate to set his uncertainty at rest. 
 
 From the arbour to the gate was no great distance, 
 and yet it took Will some time ; it seemed as if the 
 dead thickened around him in the court, and crossed 
 his path at every step. For, first, he was suddenly 
 surprised by an overpowering sweetness of heliotropes ; 
 it was as if his garden had been planted with this flower 
 from end to end, and the hot, damp night had drawn 
 forth all their perfumes in a breath. Now the helio- 
 trope had been Marjory's favourite flower, and since 
 her death not one of them had ever been planted in 
 Will's ground. 
 
 " I must be going crazy," he thought. " Poor Mar- 
 jory and her heliotropes ! " 
 
 And with that he raised his eyes towards the window 
 that had once been hers. If he had been bewildered 
 before, he was now almost terrified ; for there was a 
 light in the room ; the window was an orange oblong 
 as of yore ; and the corner of the blind was lifted and 
 8
 
 112 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 let full as on the night when- he stood and shouted to 
 the stars in his perplexity. The illusion only endured 
 an instant; but it left him somewhat unmanned, rub- 
 bing his eyes and staring at the outline of the house and 
 the black night behind it. While he thus stood, and it 
 seemed as if he must have stood there quite a long 
 time, there came a renewal of the noises on the road : 
 and he turned in time to meet a stranger, who was ad- 
 vancing to meet him across the court. There was 
 something like the outline of a great carriage discerni- 
 ble on the road behind the stranger, and, above that, a 
 few black pine-tops, like so many plumes. 
 
 *' Master Will ?" asked the new-comer, in brief mili- 
 tary fashion. 
 
 ''That same, sir," answered Will. "Can I do any- 
 thing to serve you ? " 
 
 " I have heard you much spoken of, Master Will," 
 returned the other ; " much spoken of, and well. And 
 though I have both hands full of business, I wish to 
 drink a bottle of wine with you in your arbour. Before 
 I go, I shall introduce myself." 
 
 Will led the way to the trellis, and got a lamp lighted 
 and a bottle uncorked. He was not altogether unused 
 to such complimentary interviews, and hoped little 
 enough from this one, being schooled by many disap- 
 pointments. A sort of cloud had settled on his wits 
 and prevented him from remembering the strangeness 
 of the hour. He moved like a person in his sleep ; and
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 113 
 
 it seemed as if the lamp caught fire and the bottle came 
 uncorked with the facility of thought. Still, he had 
 some curiosity about the appearance of his visitor, and 
 tried in vain to turn the light into his face ; either he 
 handled the lamp clumsily, or there was a dimness over 
 his eyes ; but he could make out little more than a 
 shadow at table with him. He stared and stared at this 
 shadow, as he wiped out the glasses, and began to feel 
 cold and strange about the heart. The silence weighed 
 upon him, for he could hear nothing now, not even the 
 river, but the drumming of his own arteries in his ears. 
 
 ^'Here's to you," said the stranger, roughly. 
 
 " Here is my service, sir," replied Will, sipping his 
 wine, which somehow tasted oddly. 
 
 " I understand you are a very positive fellow," pur- 
 sued the stranger. 
 
 Will made answer with a smile of some satisfaction 
 and a little nod. 
 
 " So am I," continued the other ; " and it is the de- 
 light of my heart to tramp on people's corns. I will 
 have nobody positive but myself ; not one. I have 
 crossed the whims, in my time, of kings and generals 
 and great artists. And what would you say," he went 
 on, "^ if 1 had come up here on purpose to cross yours ? " 
 
 Will had it on his tongue to make a sharp rejoinder; 
 
 but the politeness of an old innkeeper prevailed ; and he 
 
 held his peace and made answer with a civil gesture of 
 
 the hand. 
 8
 
 114 WILL O' THE MILL. 
 
 "I have," said the stranger. ''And if I did not hold 
 you in a particular esteem, I should make no words 
 about the matter. It appears yoa pride yourself on 
 staying where you are. You mean to stick by your inn. 
 Now I mean you shall come for a turn with me in my 
 barouche ; and before this bottle's empty, so you shall." 
 
 " That would be an odd thing, to be sure," replied 
 Will, with a chuckle. " Why, sir, I have grown here 
 like an old oak-tree ; the Devil himself could hardly 
 root me up : and for all I perceive you are a very enter- 
 taining old gentleman, I would wager you another bottle 
 you lose your pains with me." 
 
 The dimness of Will's eyesight had been increasing 
 all this while ; but he was somehow conscious of a 
 sharp and chilling scrutiny which irritated and yet 
 overmastered him. 
 
 " You need not think," he broke out suddenly, in an 
 explosive, febrile manner that startled and alarmed him- 
 self, " that I am a stay-at-home, because I fear any- 
 thing under Grod. ' God knows I am tired enough of it 
 all ; and when the time comes for a longer journey than 
 ever you dream of, I reckon I shall find myself j^repared." 
 
 The stranger emptied his glass and pushed it away 
 from him. He looked down for a little, and then, 
 leaning over the table, tapped Will three times upon 
 the forearm with a single finger. *' The time has 
 come ! " he said solemnly. 
 
 An ugly thrill spread from the spot he touched.
 
 WILL O' THE MILL. 115 
 
 The tones of bis voice were dull and startling, and 
 echoed strangely in Will's heart. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he said, with some discom- 
 posure. "What do you mean ?" 
 
 " Look at me, and you will find your eyesight swim. 
 Raise your baud ; it is dead-heavy. Tbis is your last 
 bottle of wine. Master Will, and your last night upon 
 the earth." 
 
 "You are a doctor ? " quavered Will. 
 
 " The best that ever was," replied the other ; "for I 
 cure both mind and body with the same prescription. 
 I take away all pain and I forgive all sins ; and where 
 my patients have gone wrong in life, I smooth out all 
 complications and set them free again upon their feet." 
 
 " I have no need of you," said Will. 
 
 " A time comes for all men. Master Will," replied the 
 doctor, " when the helm is taken out of their hands. 
 For you, because you were prudent and quiet, it has 
 been long of coming, and you have had long to dis- 
 cipline yourself for its reception. You have seen what 
 is to be seen about your mill ; you have sat close all 
 your days like a hare in its form ; but now that is at an 
 end ; and," added the doctor, getting on his feet, ''you 
 must arise and come with me." 
 
 " You are a strange physician," said Will, looking 
 steadfastly upon his guest." 
 
 "I am a natural law," he replied, "and people call 
 me Death."
 
 116 WILL O' THE MILL., 
 
 "Why did you not tell me so at first ?" cried Will. 
 *' I have been waiting for you these many years. Give 
 me your hand, and welcome." 
 
 "Lean upon my arm," said the stranger, "for al- 
 ready your strength abates. Lean on me heavily as you 
 need ; for though I am old, I am very strong. It is but 
 three steps to my carriage, and there all your trouble 
 ends. Why, Will," he added, "I have been yearn- 
 ing for you as if you were my own son ; and of all the 
 men that ever I came for in my long days, I have come 
 for you most gladly. I am caustic, and sometimes 
 offend people at first sight ; but I am a good friend at 
 heart to such as you." 
 
 " Since Marjory was taken," returned Will, " I de- 
 clare before God you were the only friend I had to look 
 for." 
 
 So the pair went arm-in-arm across the courtyard. 
 
 One of the servants awoke about this time and heard 
 the noise of horses joawiug before he dropped asleep 
 again ; all down the valley that night there was a rush- 
 ing as of a smooth and steady wind descending towards 
 the plain ; and when the world rose next morning, sure 
 enough Will o' the Mill had gone at last upon his 
 travels. 

 
 MARKHEIM. 
 
 " Yes," said tlie dealer, " our windfalls are of various 
 kinds. Some customers are ignorant, and then I touch 
 a dividend on my superior knowledge. Some are dis- 
 honest," and here he held up the candle, so that the 
 light fell strongly on his visitor, ''and in that case," he 
 continued, " I profit by my virtue." 
 
 Markheim had but just entered from the daylight 
 streets, and his eyes had not yet grown familiar with the 
 mingled shine and darkness in the shop. At these 
 pointed words, and before the near presence of the 
 flame, he blinked painfully and looked aside. 
 
 The dealer chuckled. ''You come to me on Christ- 
 mas Day," he resumed, "when you know that I am 
 alone in my house, put up my shutters, and make a 
 point of refusing business. Well, you will have to pay 
 for that ; you will have to pay for my loss of time, 
 when I should be balancing my books ; you will have 
 to pay, besides, for a kind of manner that I remark in 
 you to-day very strongly. I am the essence of discre- 
 tion, and ask no awkward questions ; but when a cus- 
 tomer cannot look me in the eye, he has to pay for it." 
 The dealer once more chuckled ; and then, changing to
 
 118 MARKHEIM. 
 
 his usual business voice, though still with a note of 
 irony, '' You can give, as usual, a clear account of how 
 you came into the possession of the object ? " he con- 
 tinued. " Still your uncle's cabinet ? A remarkable 
 collector, sir ! " 
 
 And the little pale, round-shouldered dealer stood 
 almost on tip-toe, looking over the top of his gold 
 spectacles, and nodding his head with every mark of 
 disbelief. Markheim returned his gaze with one of in- 
 finite pity, and a touch of horror. 
 
 "This time," said he, "yoa are in error. I have 
 not come to sell, but to buy. I have no curios to dis- 
 pose of; my uncle's cabinet is bare to the wainscot; 
 even were it still intact, I have done well on the Stock 
 Exchange, and should more likely add to it than other- 
 wise, and my errand to-day is simplicity itself. I seek 
 a Christmas present for a lady," he continued, waxing 
 more fluent as he struck into the speech he had pre- 
 pared ; "and certainly I owe you every excuse for thus 
 disturbing you upon so small a matter. But the thing 
 was neglected yesterday ; I must produce my little 
 compliment at dinner ; and, as you very well know, a 
 rich marriage is not a thing to be neglected." 
 
 There followed a pause, during which the dealer 
 seemed to weigh this statement incredulously. The 
 ticking of many clocks among the curious lumber of 
 the shop, and the faint rushing of the cabs in a near 
 thoroughfare, filled up the interval of silence.
 
 MARKHEIM. 119 
 
 ''Well, sir," said the dealer, ''be it so. You are an 
 old customer after all ; and if, as you say, you have 
 the chance of a good marriage, far be it from me to be 
 an obstacle. Here is a nice thing for a lady now," he 
 went on, " this hand glass — fifteenth century, w^ar- 
 ranted ; comes from a good .collection, too; but I 
 reserve the name, in the interests of my customer, who 
 was just like yourself, my dear sir, the nephew and sole 
 heir of a remarkable collector." 
 
 The dealer, while he thus ran on in his dry and biting 
 voice, had stooped to take the object from its jilace ; 
 and, as he had done so, a shock had passed through 
 Markheim, a start both of hand and foot, a sudden leap 
 of many tumultuous passions to the face. It passed as 
 swiftly as it came, and left no trace beyond a certain 
 trembling of the hand that now received the glass. 
 
 ''A glass," he said hoarsely, and then paused, and re- 
 peated it more clearly. ''A glass? For Christmas? 
 Surely not ? " 
 
 "And why not?" cried the dealer. "Why not a 
 glass ? " 
 
 Markheim was looking upon him with an indefinable 
 expression. " Yoii ask me why not ? " he said. " Why, 
 look here — look in it — look at yourself ! Do you like to 
 see it ? No ! nor I — nor any man." 
 
 The little man had jumped back when Markheim had 
 so suddenly confronted him with the mirror ; but now, 
 perceiving there was nothing worse on hand, he chuckled.
 
 120 MARKHEIM. 
 
 '^ Your future lady, sir, must be pretty hard favoured," 
 said he. 
 
 "^I ask you," said Markheim, ''for a Christmas pres- 
 ent, and you give me this — this damned reminder of 
 years, and sins and follies — this hand-conscience ! Did 
 you mean it ? Had you a thought in your mind ? Tell 
 me. It will be better for you if you do. Come, tell me 
 about yourself. I hazard a guess now, that you are in 
 secret a very charitable man ? " 
 
 The dealer looked closely at his companion. It was 
 very odd, Markheim did not appear to be laughing ; 
 there was something in his face like an eager sparkle of 
 hope, but nothing of mirth. 
 
 " What are you driving at ? " the dealer asked. 
 
 "Not charitable?" returned the other, gloomily. 
 *'' Not charitable ; not pious ; not scrupulous ; unloving, 
 unbeloved ; a hand to get money, a safe to keep it. 
 Is that all ? Dear God, man, is that all ?" 
 
 "I will tell you what it is," began the dealer, with 
 some sharpness, and then broke off again into a chuckle. 
 " But I see this is a love match of yours, and you have 
 been drinking the lady's health." 
 
 *' Ah ! " cried Markheim, with a strange curiosity. 
 '* Ah, have you been in love ? Tell me about that." 
 
 "I," cried the dealer. "I in love ! I never had the 
 time, nor have I the time to-day for all this nonsense. 
 "Will you take the glass ? " 
 
 *' Where is the hurry?" returned Markheim. "It
 
 MARKHEIM. 121 
 
 is very j)leasant to stand here talking ; and life is so 
 short and insecure that I would not hurry away from 
 any pleasure — no, not even from so mild a one as this. 
 We should ratlier cling, cling to what little we can get, 
 like a man at a cliff's edge. Every second is a cliff, if 
 you think upon it — a cliff a mile high — high enough, 
 if we fall, to dash us out of every feature of humanity. 
 Hence it is best to talk pleasantly. Let us talk of each 
 other ; why should we wear this mask ? Let us be con- 
 fidential. Who knows, we might become friends ?" 
 
 *' I have just one word to say to you," said the dealer. 
 " Either make your purchase, or walk out of my 
 shop." 
 
 '' True, true," said Markheim. " Enough fooling. 
 To business. Show me something else." 
 
 The dealer stooped once more, this time to replace 
 the glass upon the shelf, his thin blond hair falling over 
 his eyes as he did so. Markheim moved a little nearer, 
 with one hand in tlie pocket of liis greatcoat ; he drew 
 himself up and filled his lungs ; at the same time many 
 different emotions were depicted together on his face — 
 terror, horror, and resolve, fascination and a physical 
 repulsion ; and through a haggard lift of his upper lip, 
 his teeth looked out. 
 
 " This, perhaps, may suit," observed the dealer ; and 
 then, as he began to re-arise, Markheim bounded from 
 behind upon his victim. The long, skewerlike dagger 
 flashed and fell. The dealer struggled like a hen.
 
 122 MARKHEIM. 
 
 striking his temple on the shelf, and 'then tumbled on 
 the floor in a heap. 
 
 Time had some score of small Toices in that shop, 
 some stately and slow as was becoming to their great 
 age ; others garrulous and hurried. All these told out 
 the seconds in an intricate chorus of tickings. Then 
 the passage of a lad's feet, heavily running on the pave- 
 ment, broke in upon these smaller voices and startled 
 Markheim into the consciousness of his surroundings. 
 He looked about him awfully. The candle stood on the 
 counter, its flame solemnly wagging in a draught ; and 
 by that inconsiderable movement, the whole room was 
 filled with noiseless bustle and kej)t heaving like a sea : 
 the tall shadows nodding, the gross blots of darkness 
 Bwelliug and dwindling as with respiration, the faces of 
 the portraits and the china gods changing and wavering 
 like images in water. The inner door stood ajar, aud 
 peered into that leaguer of shadows with a long slit of 
 daylight like a pointing finger. 
 
 From these fear-stricken rovings, Markheim's eyes 
 returned to the body of his victim, where it lay both 
 humped and sprawling, incredibly small and strangely 
 meaner than in life. In these poor, miserly clothes, in 
 that ungainly attitude, the dealer lay like so much saw- 
 dust. Markheim had feared to see it, and, lo ! it was 
 nothing. And yet, as he gazed, this bundle of old 
 clothes and pool of blood began to find eloquent voices. 
 There it must lie ; there was none to work the cunning
 
 MARKHEIM. 123 
 
 hinges or direct tlie miracle of locomotion — there it 
 must lie till it was found. Found ! ay, and then ? 
 Then would this dead flesh lift up a cry that would ring 
 over England, and fill the world with the echoes of 
 pursuit. Ay, dead or not, this was still the enemy. 
 " Time was that when the brains were out," he thought; 
 and the first word struck into his mind. Time, now 
 that the deed was accomplished — time, which had closed 
 for the yictim, had become instant and momentous for 
 the slayer. 
 
 The thought was yet in his mind, when, first one and 
 then another, with every variety of pace and voice — one 
 deep as the bell from a cathedral turret, another ringing 
 on its treble notes the prelude of a waltz — the clocks be- 
 gan to strike the hour of three in the afternoon. 
 
 The sudden outbreak of so many tongues in that 
 dumb chamber staggered him. He began to bestir him- 
 self, going to and fro with the candle, beleaguered by 
 moving shadows, and startled to the soul by chance 
 reflections. In many rich mirrors, some of home de- 
 signs, some from Venice or Amsterdam, he saw his face 
 repeated and repeated, as it were an army of spies ; his 
 own eyes mot and detected him ; and the sound of his 
 own steps, lightly as they fell, vexed the surrounding 
 quiet. And still as he continued to fill his pockets, his 
 mind accused him, with a sickening iteration, of the 
 thousand faults of his design. He should have chosen 
 a more quiet hour ; he should have prepared an alibi ;
 
 124 MARKHEIM. 
 
 he should not have used a knife ; he should have been 
 more cautious, and only bound and gagged the dealer, 
 and not killed him ; he should have been more bold, 
 and killed the servant also ; he should have done all 
 things otherwise ; poignant regrets, weary, incessant 
 toiling of the mind to change what was unchangeable, 
 to plan what was now useless, to be the architect of the 
 irrevocable past. Meanwhile, and behind all this ac- 
 tivity, brute terrors, like the scurrying of rats in a de- 
 serted attic, filled the more remote chambers of his 
 brain with riot ; the hand of the constable would fall 
 heavy on his shoulder, and his nerves would Jerk like a 
 hooked fish ; or he beheld, in galloping defile, the dock, 
 the prison, the gallows, and the black coffin. 
 
 Terror of the people in the street sat down before his 
 mind like a besieging army. It was impossible, he 
 thought, but that some rumour of the struggle must 
 have reached their ears and set on edge their curiosity ; 
 and now, in all the neighbouring houses, he divined 
 them sitting motionless and with uplifted ear — solitary 
 people, condemned to spend Christmas dwelling alone 
 on memories of the past, and now startiugly recalled 
 from that tender exercise ; happy family parties, struck 
 into silence round the table, the mother still with 
 raised finger : every degree and age and humour, but 
 all, by their own hearths, prying and hearkening and 
 weaving the rope that was to hang him. Sometimes it 
 seemed to him he could not move too softly ; the clink
 
 MARKHEIM. 125 
 
 of the tall Bohemian goblets rang out loudly like a 
 bell ; and alarmed by the bigness of the ticking, he was 
 tempted to stop the clocks. And then, again, with a 
 swift transition of his terrors, the very silence of the 
 place appeared a source of peril, and a thing to strike 
 and freeze the passer-by ; and he would step more 
 boldly, and bustle aloud among the contents of the 
 shop, and imitate, with elaborate bravado, the move- 
 ments of a busy man at ease in his own house. 
 
 But he was now so pulled about by different alarms 
 that, while one portion of his mind was still alert and 
 cunning, another trembled on the brink of lunacy. 
 One hallucination in particular took a strong hold on 
 his credulity. The neighbour hearkening with white 
 face beside his window, the passer-by arrested by a hor- 
 rible surmise on the pavement — these could at worst 
 suspect, they could not know ; through the brick walls 
 and shuttered windows only sounds could penetrate. 
 But here, within the house, was he alone ? He knew 
 he was ; he had watched the servant set forth sweet- 
 hearting, in her poor best, ''out for the day" written 
 in every ribbon and smile. Yes, he was alone, of 
 course ; and yet, in the bulk of empty house above him, 
 he could surely hear a stir of delicate footing — he was 
 surely conscious, inexplicably conscious of some pres- 
 ence. Ay, surely ; to every room and comer of the 
 house his imagination followed it ; and now it was a 
 faceless thing, and yet had eyes to see with ; and again
 
 126 MAKKHEIM. 
 
 it was a shadow of himself ; and yet again behold the 
 image of the dead dealer, reiuspired with cunning and 
 hatred. 
 
 At times, with a strong effort, he would glance at the 
 open door which still seemed to repel his eyes. The 
 house was tall, the skylight small and dirty, the day 
 blind with fog ; and the light that filtered down to the 
 ground story was exceedingly faiut, and showed dimly 
 on the threshold of the shop. And yet, in that strip 
 of doubtful brightness, did there not hang wavering a 
 shadow ? 
 
 Suddenly, from the street outside, a very jovial 
 gentleman began to beat with a staff on the shop-door, 
 accompanying his blows with shouts and railleries in 
 which the dealer was continually called upon by name. 
 Markheim, smitten into ice glanced at the dead man. 
 But no ! he lay quite still ; he was fled away far beyond 
 earshot of these blows and shoutings ; he was sunk be- 
 neath seas of silence ; and his name, which would once 
 have caught his notice above the howling of a storm, 
 had become an empty sound. And presently the jovial 
 gentleman desisted from his knocking and departed. 
 
 Here was a broad hint to hurry what remained to be 
 done, to get forth from this accusing neighbourhood, 
 to plunge into a bath of London multitudes, and to 
 reach, on the other side of day, that haven of safety and 
 apparent innocence — his bed. One visitor had come : 
 at any moment another might follow and be more ob-
 
 MAEKHEIM. 127 
 
 stinate. To have done the deed, and yet not to reap the 
 profit, would be too abhorrent a faihire. The money, 
 that was now Markheim's concern ; and as a means to 
 that, the keys. 
 
 He glanced over his shoulder at the open door, where 
 the shadow was still lingering and shivering ; and with 
 no conscious repugnance of the mind, yet with a tremor 
 of the belly, he drew near the body of his victim. 
 The human character had quite dejDarted. Like a suit 
 half-stuffed with bran, the limbs lay scattered, the trunk 
 doubled, on the floor ; and yet the thing repelled him. 
 Although so dingy and inconsiderable to the eye, he 
 feared it might have more significance to the touch. He 
 took the body by the shoulders, and turned it on its back. 
 It was strangely light and supple, and the limbs, as if 
 they had been broken, fell into the oddest postures. The 
 face was robbed of all expression ; but it was as pale as 
 wax, and shockingly smeared with blood about one 
 temple. That was, for Markheim, the one displeasing 
 circumstance. It carried him ba<3k, upon the instant, 
 to a certain fair day in a fishers' village : a gray day, a 
 piping wind, a crowd upon the street, the blare of 
 brasses, the booming of drums, the nasal voice of a 
 ballad singer ; and a boy going to and fro, buried over 
 head in the crowd and divided between interest and fear, 
 until, coming out upon the chief place of concourse, he 
 beheld a booth and a great screen with pictures, dis- 
 mally designed, garlishly coloured : Brownrigg with her
 
 128 MAEKHEIil. 
 
 apprentice ; the Mannings with their murdered guest ; 
 "NYeare in the death -grip of Thurtell ; and a score 
 besides of famous crimes. The thing was as clear as an 
 illusion ; he was once again that little boy ; he was 
 looking once again, and with the same sense of physical 
 revolt, at these yile pictures ; he was still stunned by 
 the thumping of the drums. A bar of that day's music 
 returned upon his memory ; and at that, for the first 
 time, a qualm came over him, a breath of nausea, a 
 sudden weakness of the joints, which he must instantly 
 resist and conquer. 
 
 He judged it more prudent to confront than to flee 
 from these considerations ; looking the more hardily in 
 the dead face, bending his mind to realise the nature 
 and greatness of his crime. So little a while ago that 
 face had moved with every change of sentiment, that 
 pale mouth had spoken, that body had been all on fire 
 with governable energies ; and now, and by his act, that 
 piece of life had been arrested, as the horologist, with 
 interjected finger, arrests the beating of the clock. So 
 he reasoned in vain ; he could rise to no more remorse- 
 ful consciousness ; the same heart which had shuddered 
 before the painted eflBgies of crime, looked on its reality 
 unmoved. At best, he felt a gleam of pity for one who 
 had been endowed in rain with all those faculties that 
 can make the world a garden of enchantment, one who 
 had never lived and who was now dead. But of peni- 
 tence, no, not a tremor.
 
 MAKKHEIM. 129 
 
 With that, shaking himself clear of these considera- 
 tions, he found the keys and advanced towards the open 
 door of the shop. Outside, it had begun to rain smartly ; 
 and the sound of the shower upon the roof had banished 
 silence. Like some dripping cavern, the chambers of 
 the house were haunted by an incessant echoing, which 
 filled the ear and mingled with the ticking of tlie clocks. 
 And, as Markheim approached the door, he seemed to 
 hear, in answer to his own cautious tread, the steps of 
 another foot withdrawing up the stair. The shadow 
 still palpitated loosely on the threshold. He threw a 
 ton's weight of resolve upon his muscles, and drew back 
 the door. 
 
 The faint, foggy daylight glimmered dimly on the 
 bare floor and stairs ; on the bright suit of armour 
 posted, halbert in hand, upon the landing ; and on the 
 dark wood-carvings, and framed pictures that hung 
 against the yellow panels of the wainscot. So loud was 
 the beating of the rain through all the house that, in 
 Markheim's ears, it began to be distinguished into many 
 different sounds. Footsteps and sighs, the tread of regi- 
 ments marching in the distance, the chink of money in 
 the counting, and the creaking of doors held stealthily 
 ajar, appeared to mingle with the patter of the drops 
 upon the cupola and the gushing of the water in the 
 pipes. The sense that he was not alone grew upon him 
 to the verge of madness. On every side he was haunted 
 and begirt by presences. He heard them moving in the
 
 130 MARKHEIM. 
 
 upper chambers ; from the shop, he heard the dead man 
 getting to his legs ; and as he began with a great effort 
 to mount the stairs, feet fled quietly before him and 
 followed stealthily behind. If he were but deaf, he 
 thought, how tranquilly he would possess his soul ! And 
 then again, and hearkening with ever fresh attention, 
 he blessed himself for that unresting sense which held 
 the outposts and stood a trusty sentinel upon his life. 
 His head turned continually on his neck ; his eyes, 
 which seemed starting from their orbits, scouted on 
 every side, and on every side were half -rewarded as with 
 the tail of something nameless vanishing. The four- 
 and-twenty steps to the first floor were four-and-twcnty 
 agonies. 
 
 On that first storey, the doors stood ajar, three of 
 them like three ambushes, shaking his nerves like the 
 throats of cannon. He could never again, he felt, be 
 sufficiently immured and fortified from men's observ- 
 ing eyes ; he longed to bo home, girt in by walls, 
 buried among bedclothes, and invisible to all but God. 
 And at that thought he wondered a little, recollecting 
 tales of other murderers and the fear they were said to 
 entertain of heavenly avengers. It was not so, at least, 
 with him. He feared the laws of nature, lest, in their 
 callous and immutable procedure, they should preserve 
 some damning evidence of his crime. He feared ten- 
 fold more, with a slavish, superstitious terror, some 
 scission in the continuity of man's experience, some
 
 MAEKHEIM. 131 
 
 wilful illegality of nature. He played a game of skill, 
 depending on the rules, calculating consequence from 
 cause ; and what if nature, as the defeated tyrant 
 overthrew the chess-board, should break the mould of 
 their succession ? The like had befallen Napoleon (so 
 writers said) when the winter changed the time of its 
 appearance. The like might befall Markheim : the 
 solid walls might become transparent and reveal his 
 doings like those of bees in a glass hive ; the stout 
 planks might yield under his foot like quicksands and 
 detain him in their clutch ; ay, and there were soberer 
 accidents that might destroy him : if, for instance, the 
 house should fall and imprison him beside the body of 
 his victim ; or the house next door should fly on fire, 
 and the firemen invade him from all sides. These 
 things he feared ; and, in a sense, these things might 
 be called the hands of God reached forth against sin. 
 But about God himself he was at ease ; his act was 
 doubtless exceptional, but so were his excuses, which 
 God knew ; it was there, and not among men, that he 
 felt sure of justice. 
 
 When he had got safe into the drawing-room, and 
 shut the door behind him, he was aware of a respite 
 from alarms. The room was quite dismantled, un- 
 carpeted besides, and strewn with packing cases and 
 incongruous furniture ; several great pier-glasses, in 
 which he beheld himself at various angles, like an actor 
 on a stage ; many pictures, framed and unframed.
 
 132 MAEKHEIM. 
 
 standing, with their faces to the wall ; a fine Sheraton 
 sideboard, a cabinet of marquetry, and a great old 
 bed, with tapestry hangings. The windows opened 
 to the floor ; but by great good fortune the lower part 
 of the shutters had been closed, and this concealed 
 him from the neighbours. Here, then, Markheim 
 drew in a packing case before the cabinet, and began 
 to search among the kej^s. It was a long business, for 
 there were many ; and it was irksome, besides ; for, 
 after all, there might be nothing in the cabinet, and 
 time was on the wing. But the closeness of the occu- 
 pation sobered him. With the tail of his eye he saw 
 the door — even glanced at it from time to time di- 
 rectly, like a besieged commander pleased to verify the 
 good estate of his defences. But in truth he was at 
 peace. The rain falling in the street sounded natural 
 and pleasant. Presently, on the other side, the notes 
 of a piano were wakened to the music of a hymn, and 
 the voices of many children took up the air and words. 
 How stately, how comfortable was the melody ! How 
 fresh the youthful voices ! Markheim gave ear to it 
 smilingly, as he sorted out the keys ; and his mind was 
 thronged with answerable ideas and images ; church- 
 going children and the pealing of the high organ ; 
 children afield, bathers by the brookside, ramblers on 
 the brambly common, kite-fiyers in the windy and 
 cloud-navigated sky ; and then, at another cadence of 
 the hymn, back again to church, and the somnolence
 
 MAKKHEIM. 133 
 
 of summer Sundays, and the high genteel voice of the 
 parson (which he smiled a little to recall) and the 
 painted Jacobean tombs, and the dim lettering of the 
 Ten Commandments in the chancel. 
 
 And as he sat thus, at once busy and absent, he was 
 startled to his feet. A flash of ice, a flash of fire, a 
 bursting gush of blood, went over him, and then he stood 
 transfixed and thrilling. A step mounted the stair 
 slowly and steadily, and presently a hand was laid upon 
 the knob, and the lock clicked, and the door opened. 
 
 Fear held Markheim in a vice. What to expect he 
 knew not, whether the dead man walking, or the official 
 ministers of human justice, or some chance witness 
 blindly stumbling in to consign him to the gallows. 
 But when a face was thrust into the aperture, glanced 
 round the room, looked at him, nodded and smiled as 
 if in friendly recognition, and then withdrew again, 
 and the door closed behind it, his fear broke loose from 
 his control in a hoarse cry. At the sound of this the 
 visitant returned. 
 
 "Did you call me ?" he asked, pleasantly, and with 
 that he entered the room and closed the door behind 
 him. 
 
 Markheim stood and gazed at him with all his eyes. 
 Perhaps there was a film upon his sight, but the out- 
 lines of the new comer seemed to change and waver like 
 those of the idols in the wavering candle-light of the 
 shop ; and at times he thought he knew him ; and at
 
 134 MARKHEIM. 
 
 times lie thought he bore a likeness to himself ; and al- 
 ways, like a lumj) of living terror, there lay in his bo- 
 som the conviction that this thing was not of the earth 
 and not of God. 
 
 And yet the creature had a strange air of the com- 
 monplace, as he stood looking on Markheim with a 
 smile ; and when he added : "You are looking for the 
 money, I believe ? " it was in the tones of everyday 
 politeness. 
 
 Markheim made no answer. 
 
 ''I should warn you," resumed the other, ''that the 
 maid has left her sweetheart earlier than usual and will 
 soon be here. If Mr. Markheim be found in this house, 
 I need not describe to him the consequences." 
 
 " You know me ? " cried the murderer. 
 
 The visitor smiled. "You have long been a favorite 
 of mine," he said ; "and I have long observed and often 
 sought to help you." 
 
 "What are you ?" cried Markheim : "the devil ?" 
 
 "What I may be," returned the other, "cannot 
 affect the service I propose to render you." 
 
 " It can," cried Markheim ; "it does ! Be helped by 
 you ? No, never ; not by you ! You do not know me 
 yet ; thank God, you do not know me ! " 
 
 "I know you," replied the visitant, with a sort of 
 kind severity or rather firmness. "I know you to the 
 soul." 
 
 ''Know me !" cried Markheim. "Who can do so ?
 
 MARKHEIM. 135 
 
 My life is but a travesty and slander on myself. I have 
 lived to belie my nature. All men do ; all men are bet- 
 ter than this disguise that grows about and stifles them. 
 You see each dragged away by life, like one whom 
 bravos have seized and muffled in a cloak. If they had 
 their own control— if you could see their faces, they 
 would be altogether difEerent, they would shine out for 
 heroes and saints ! I am worse than most ; myself is 
 more overlaid ; my excuse is known to me and God. 
 But, had I the time, I could disclose myself." 
 
 *'To me ?" inquired the visitant. 
 
 "To you before all," returned the murderer. "I 
 supposed you were intelligent. I thought — since you 
 exist — you would prove a reader of the heart. And yet 
 you would propose to judge me by my acts ! Think of 
 it ; my acts ! I was born and I have lived in a land of 
 giants ; giants have dragged me by the wrists since I 
 was born out of my mother — the giants of circum- 
 stance. And you would judge me by my acts ! But 
 can you not look within ? Can you not understand 
 that evil is hateful to me ? Can you not see within me 
 the clear writing of conscience, never blurred by any 
 wilful sophistry, although too often disregarded ? Can 
 you not read me for a thing that surely must be com- 
 mon as humanity — the unwilling sinner ? " 
 
 "All this is very feelingly expressed," was the reply, 
 " but it regards me not. These points of consistency 
 are beyond my province, and 1 care not in the least by
 
 136 MARKHEIM. 
 
 what compulsion you may have been dragged away, so 
 as you are but carried in the right direction. But time 
 flies; the servant delays, looking in the faces of the 
 crowd and at the pictures on the hoardings, but still 
 she keeps moving nearer ; and remember, it is as if the 
 gallows itself was striding towards you through the 
 Christmas streets ! Shall I help you ; I, who know all ? 
 Shall I tell you where to find the money ? " 
 
 " For what price ?" asked Markheim. 
 
 ''I offer you the service for a Christmas gift," re- 
 turned the other. 
 
 Markheim could not refrain from smiling with a kind 
 of bitter triumph. "No," said he, "I will take noth- 
 ing at your hands ; if I were dying of thirst, and it was 
 your hand that j)ut the pitcher to my lips, I should find 
 the courage to refuse. It may be credulous, but I will 
 do nothing to commit myself to evil." 
 
 "I have no objection to a death-bed repentance," ob- 
 served the visitant. 
 
 " Because you disbelieve their efficacy ! " Markheim 
 cried. 
 
 "I do not say so," returned the other ; "but I look 
 on these things from a different side, and when the life 
 is done my interest falls. The man has lived to serve 
 me, to spread black looks under colour of religion, or to 
 sow tares in the wheat-field, as you do, in a course of 
 weak compliance with desire. Now that he draws so 
 near to his deliverance, he can add but one act of ser-
 
 MARKHEIM. 187 
 
 vice — to repent, to die smiling, and thus to build up in 
 confidence and hope the more timorous of my surviving 
 followers. I am not so hard a master. Try me. Ac- 
 cept my help. Please yourself in life as you have done 
 hitherto ; please yourself more amply, spread your 
 elbows at the board ; and when the night begins to fall 
 and the curtains to be drawn, I tell you, for your 
 greater comfort, that you will find it even easy to com- 
 pound your quarrel with your conscience, and to make 
 a truckling peace with God. I came but now from such 
 a deathbed, and the room was full of sincere mourners, 
 listening to the man's last words : and when I looked 
 into that face, which had been set as a flint against 
 mercy, I found it smiling with hope." 
 
 *' And do you, then, suppose me such a creature ?" 
 asked Markheim. " Do you think I have no more 
 generous aspirations than to sin, and sin, and sin, 
 and, at last, sneak into heaven ? My heart rises at the 
 thought. Is this, then, your experience of mankind ? 
 or is it because you find me with red hands that you 
 presume such baseness ? and is this crime of murder 
 indeed so impious as to dry up the very springs of 
 good ? " 
 
 '^ Murder is to me no special category," replied the 
 other. " All sins are murder, even as all life is war. 
 I behold your race, like starving mariners on a raft, 
 plucking crusts out of the hands of famine and feed- 
 ing on each other's lives. I follow sins beyond the mo-
 
 138 MARKHEIM. 
 
 roent of their acting ; I find in all that the last con- 
 sequence is death ; and to my eyes, the pretty maid 
 who thwarts her mother with such taking graces on 
 a question of a ball, drips no less yisibly with human 
 gore than such a murderer as yourself. Do I say that 
 I follow sins ? I follow virtues also ; they differ not 
 by the thickness of a nail, they are both scythes for the 
 reaping angel of Death. Evil, for which I live, con- 
 sists not in action but in character. The bad man is 
 dear to me ; not the bad act, whose fruits, if we could 
 follow them far enough down the hurtling cataract of 
 the ages, might yet be found more blessed than those 
 of the rarest virtues. And it is not because you have 
 killed a dealer, but because you are Markheim, that I 
 offered to forward your escape. " 
 
 " I will lay my heart open to you," answered Mark- 
 heim. " This crime on which you find me is my last. 
 On my way to it I have learned many lessons ; itself 
 is a lesson, a momentous lesson. Hitherto I have been 
 driven with revolt to what I would not ; I was a bond- 
 slave to poverty, driven and scourged. There are ro- 
 bust virtues that can stand in these temptations ; mine 
 was not so : I had a thirst of pleasure. But to-day, 
 and out of this deed, I pluck both warning and riches — 
 both the power and a fresh resolve to be myself. I be- 
 come in all things a free actor in the world ; I begin to 
 see myself all changed, these hands the agents of good, 
 this heart at peace. Something comes over me out of
 
 MARKHEIM. 139 
 
 the past ; something of what I have dreamed on Sab- 
 bath evenings to the sound of the church organ, of 
 what I forecast when I shed tears over noble books, or 
 talked, an innocent child, with my mother. There lies 
 my life ; I have wandered a few years, but now I see 
 once more my city of destination." 
 
 *' You are to use this money on the Stock Exchange, 
 I think ? " remarked the visitor ; ''and there, if I mis- 
 take not, you have already lost some thousands ?" 
 
 ''Ah," said Markheim, " but this time I have a sure 
 thing." 
 
 "This time, again, you will lose," replied the visitor 
 quietly. 
 
 "Ah, but I keep back the half !" cried Markheim. 
 
 " That also you will lose," said the other. 
 
 The sweat started upon Markheim's brow. "Well, 
 then, what matter?" he exclaimed. "Say it be lost, 
 say I am plunged again in poverty, shall one part of 
 me, and that the worse, continue until the end to over- 
 ride the better ? Evil and good run strong in mo, 
 haling me both ways. I do not love the one thing, I 
 love all. I can conceive great deeds, renunciations, 
 martyrdoms ; and though I be fallen to such a crime as 
 murder, pity is no stranger to my thoughts. I pity the 
 poor ; who knows their trials better than myself ? I 
 pity and help them ; I prize love, I love honest laugh- 
 ter ; there is no good thing nor true thing on earth but 
 I love it from my heart. And are my vices only to
 
 140 MARKHEIM. 
 
 direct my life, and my virtues to lie without effect, like 
 some passive lumber of the mind ? Not so ; good, also, 
 is a spring of acts." 
 
 But the visitant raised his finger. ''For six-and- 
 thirty years that you have been in this world," said he, 
 "through many changes of fortune and varieties of 
 humour, I have watched you steadily fall. Fifteen 
 years ago you would have started at a theft. Three 
 years hack you would have blenched at the name of 
 murder. Is there any crime, is there any cruelty or 
 meanness, from which you still recoil ? — five years from 
 now I shall detect you in the fact ! Downward, down- 
 ward, lies your way ; nor can anything but death avail 
 to stop you." 
 
 ''It is true," Markheim said huskily, "I have in 
 some degree complied with evil. But it is so with 
 all : the very saints, in the mere exercise of living, 
 grow less dainty, and take on the tone of their sur- 
 roundings." 
 
 "I will ijropound to you one simple question," said 
 the other; "and as you answer, I shall read to you 
 your moral horoscope. You have grown in many 
 things more lax ; possibly you do right to be so ; and 
 at any account, it is the same with all men. But 
 granting that, are you in any one particular, however 
 trifling, more difficult to jjlease with your own conduct, 
 or do you go in all things with a looser rein ? " 
 
 " In any one ? " repeated Markheim, with an anguish
 
 MARKHEIM. 141 
 
 of consideration. ''No," lie added, with despair, "in 
 none ! I have gone down in all." 
 
 ''Then," said the visitor, "content yourself with 
 what you are, for you will never change ; and the 
 words of your part on this stage are irrevocably written 
 down." 
 
 Markheim stood for a long while silent, and indeed 
 it was the visitor who first broke the silence. " That 
 being so," he said, "shall I show you the money ?" 
 
 " And grace ? " cried Markheim. 
 
 "Have you not tried it ?" returned the other. "Two 
 or three years ago, did I not see you on the platform of 
 revival meetings, and was not your voice the loudest in 
 the hymn ? " , 
 
 "It is true," said Markheim ; "and I see clearly 
 what remains for me by way of duty. I thank you for 
 these lessons from my soul ; my eyes are opened, and I 
 behold myself at last for what I am." 
 
 At this moment, the sharp note of the door-bell rang 
 through the house ; and the visitant, as though this were 
 some concerted signal for which he had been waiting, 
 changed at once in his demeanour. 
 
 "The maid!" he cried. "She has returned, as I 
 forewarned you, and there is now before you one more 
 difficult passage. Her master, you must say, is ill ; you 
 must let her in, with an assured but rather serious 
 countenance — no smiles, no overacting, and I promise 
 you success ! Once the girl within, and the door closed.
 
 142 MAEKHEIM. 
 
 the same dexterity that has already rid you of the dealer 
 will relieve you of this last danger in your path. 
 Thenceforward you have the whole evening — the whole 
 night, if needful — to ransack the treasures of the house 
 and to make good your safety. This is help that comes 
 to you with the mask of danger. Up ! " he cried : 
 " up, friend ; your life hangs trembling in the scales . 
 ujj, and act ! " 
 
 Markheim steadily regarded his counsellor. " If I be 
 condemned to evil acts," he said, '^ there is still one 
 door of freedom open — I can cease from action. If my 
 life be an ill thing, I can lay it down. Though I be, 
 as you say truly, at the beck of every small temptation, 
 I can yet, by one decisive gesture, place myself beyond 
 the reach of all. My love of good is damned to barren- 
 ness ; it may, and let it be ! But I have still my hatred 
 of evil ; and from that, to your galling disappointment, 
 you shall see that I can draw both energy and courage." 
 
 The features of the visitor began to undergo a won- 
 derful and lovely change : they brightened and soft- 
 ened with a tender triumph ; and, even as they bright- 
 ened, faded and dislimned. But Markheim did not 
 pause to watch or understand the transformation. He 
 opened the door and went downstairs very slowly, think- 
 ing to himself. His past went soberly before him ; he 
 beheld it as it was, ugly and strenuous like a dream, 
 random as chance-medley — a scene of defeat. Life, as 
 he thus reviewed it, tempted him no longer ; but on the
 
 MARKHEIM. 143 
 
 further side he perceived a quiet haven for his bark. 
 He paused in the passage, aud' looked into the shop, 
 where the candle still burned by the dead body. It was 
 strangely silent. Thoughts of the dealer swarmed into 
 his mind, as he stood gazing. And then the bell once 
 more broke out into impatient clamour. 
 
 He confronted the maid upon the threshold with 
 something like a smile. 
 
 "You had better go for the police/' said he: "I 
 have killed your master."
 
 THRA WN JANET. 
 
 The Eevereud Murdoch Soulis was long minister of 
 the moorland parish of Balweary, in the vale of Dule. 
 A severe, bleak-faced old man, dreadful to his hearers, 
 he dwelt in the last years of his life, without relative 
 or servant or any human company, in the small and 
 lonely manse under the Hanging Shaw. In spite of the 
 iron comj)osure of his features, his eye was wild, scared, 
 and uncertain ; and when he dwelt, in private admo- 
 nitions, on the future of the impenitent, it seemed as 
 if his eye pierced through the storms of time to the 
 terrors of eternity. ]^Iany young persons, coming to 
 prepare themselves against the season of the Holy Com- 
 munion, were dreadfully affected by his talk. He had 
 a sermon on 1st Peter, v. and 8th, "The devil as a 
 roaring lion," on the Sunday after every seventeenth of 
 August, and he was accustomed to surpass himself 
 upon that text both by the appalling nature of the 
 matter and the terror of his bearing in the pulpit. 
 The children were frightened into fits, and the old 
 looked more than usually oracular, and were, all that 
 day, full of those hints that Hamlet deprecated. The 
 manse itself, where it stood by the water of Dule
 
 THRAWIST JANET. 145 
 
 among some thick trees, with the Shaw overhanging it 
 on the one side, and on the other many cold, moorish 
 hilltops rising towards the sky, had begun, at a very 
 early period of Mr. Soulis's ministry, to be avoided in 
 the dusk hours by all who valued themselves upon their 
 prudence ; and guidmcn sitting at the clachan alehouse 
 shook their heads together at the thought of passing 
 late by that uncanny neighbourhood. There was one 
 spot, to be more particular, which was regarded with 
 especial awe. The manse stood between the high road 
 and the water of Dule, with a gable to each ; its back 
 was towards the kirktown of Balweary, nearly half a 
 mile away ; in front of it, a bare garden, hedged with 
 thorn, occupied the land between the river and the 
 road. The house was two stories high, with two large 
 rooms on each. It opened not directly on the garden, 
 but on a causewayed path, or passage, giving on the 
 road on the one hand, and closed on the otlier by the 
 tall willows and elders that bordered on the stream. 
 And it was this strip of causeway that enjoyed among 
 the young parishioners of Balweary so infamous a repu- 
 tation. The minister walked there often after dark, 
 eometimes groaning aloud in the instancy of his un- 
 spoken prayers ; and when he was from home, and the 
 manse door was locked, the more daring schoolboys 
 ventured, Avith beating hearts, to " follow my leader " 
 across that legendary spot. 
 
 This atmosphere of terror, surrounding, as it did, a 
 10
 
 146 THEAWN JANET. 
 
 man of God of spotless character and orthodoxy, was a 
 common cause of wonder and subject of inquiry among 
 the few strangers who were led by chance or business 
 into that unknown, outlying country. But many even 
 of ithe peojole of the parish were ignorant of the strange 
 events which had marked the first year of Mr. Soulis's 
 ministrations ; and among those who were better in- 
 formed, some were naturally reticent, and others shy of 
 that particular topic. Now and again, only, one of 
 the older folk would warm into courage over his third 
 tumbler, and recount the cause of the minister's strange 
 looks and solitary life. 
 
 Fifty years syne, when Mr. Soulis cam first into 
 Ba' weary, he was still a young man — a callant, the folk 
 said — fu' o' book learniu' and grand at the exijosition, 
 but, as was natural in sae young a man, wi' nae leevin' 
 experience in religion. The younger sort were greatly 
 taken wi' his gifts and his gab ; but auld, concerned, 
 serious men and women were moved even to prayer for 
 the young man, whom they took to be a self-deceiver, 
 and the parish that was like to be sae ill-supplied. It 
 was before the days o' the moderates — weary fa' th^m ; 
 but ill things are like guid — they baith come bit by bit, 
 a pickle at a time ; and there were folk even then that 
 said the Lord had left the college professors to their ain 
 devices, an' the lads that went to study wi' them wad 
 hae done mair and better sittin' in a peat-bog, like their
 
 THRAWISr JANET, 147 
 
 forbears of the persecution, wi' a Bible under their ox- 
 ter and a speerit o' prayer in their heart. There was nae 
 doubt, onjway, but that Mr. Soulis had been ower lang 
 at the college. He was careful and troubled for mony 
 things besides the ae thing needful. He had a feck o' 
 books wi' him — mair than had ever been seen before in 
 a' that presbytery ; and a sair wark the carrier had wi' 
 them, for they were a' like to have smooredin the Deil's 
 Hag between this and Kilmackerlie. They were books 
 o' divinity, to be sure, or so they ca'd them ; but the 
 serious were o' opinion there was little service for sae 
 mony, when the hail o' God's Word would gang in the 
 neuk of a plaid. Then he wad sit half the day and half 
 the nicht forbye, which was scant decent — writin', nae 
 less ; and first, they were feared he wad read his ser- 
 mons ; and syne it proved he was writin' a book himsel', 
 which was surely no fittin' for ane of his years an' sma' 
 experience. 
 
 Onyway it behoved him to get an auld, decent wife 
 to keep the manse for him an' see to his bit denners ; 
 and he was recommended to an auld limmer — Janet 
 M'Clour, they ca'd her — and sae far left to himsel' as 
 to be ower persuaded. There was mony advised him to 
 the contrar, for Janet was mair than suspeckit by the 
 best folk in Ba'weary. Lang or that, she had had a 
 wean to a dragoon ; she hadnae come forrit* for maybe 
 thretty year ; and bairns had seen her mumblin' to 
 * To come forrit— to offer oneself as a communicant.
 
 148 THKAWN JAJSET. 
 
 hersel' up on Key's Loan in the gloamin', whilk was an 
 unco time an' place for a God-fearin' woman. Howso- 
 ever, it was the laird himsel' that had first tauld the 
 minister o' Janet ; and in thae days he wad have gane a 
 far gate to i^leesure the laird. When folk tauld him 
 that Janet was sib to the deil, it was a' superstition by 
 his way of it ; an' when they cast up the Bible to him 
 an' the witch of Endor, he wad threep it doun their 
 thrapples that thir days were a' gane by, and the deil 
 was mercifully restrained. 
 
 Weel, when it got about the clachan that Janet 
 M'Clour was to be servant at the manse, the folk were 
 fair mad wi' her an' him tliegetlier ; and some o' the 
 guidwives had nae better to dae than get round her door 
 cheeks and chairge her wi' a' that was ken't again her, 
 frae the sodger's bairn to John Tamson's twa kye. She 
 was nae great speaker ; folk usually let her gang her ain 
 gate, an' she let them gang theirs, wi' neither Fair-guid- 
 een nor Fair-guid-day ; but when she buckled to, she 
 had a tongue to deave the miller. Up she got, an' there 
 wasnae an auld story in Ba'weary but she gart somebody 
 lowp for it that day ; they couldnae say ae thing but she 
 could say twa to it ; till, at the hinder end, the guid- 
 wives up and claught hand of her, and clawed the coats 
 aff her back, and pu'd her doun the clachan to the 
 water o' Dule, to see if she were a witch or no, soum or 
 droun. The carline skirled till ye could hear her at the 
 Hangin' Shaw, and she focht like ten ; there was mony
 
 THRAWiq" JANET. 149 
 
 a guidwife bure the mark of her ncist day an' mony a 
 lang day after ; and Jast in tlie hettest o' the collieshan- 
 gie, wha suld come up (for his sins) but the new minis- 
 ter. 
 
 '^ Women," said he (and lie had a grand voice), ''1 
 charge you in the Lord's name to let her go." 
 
 Janet ran to him — she was fair wud wi' terror — an' 
 clang to him, an' prayed him, for Christ's sake, save 
 her frae the cummers ; an' they, for their pairt, tauld 
 him a' that was ken't, and maybe mair. 
 
 '* Woman," says he to Janet, " is this true ? " 
 
 "As the Lord sees me," says she, ''as the Lord made 
 me, no a word o't. Forbye the bairn," says she, ''I've 
 been a decent woman a' my days." 
 
 "Will you," says Mr. Soulis, "in the name of God, 
 and before me. His unworthy minister, renounce the 
 devil and his works ? " 
 
 Weel, it wad appear that when he askit that, she 
 gave a girn that fairly frichtit them that saw her, an' 
 they could hear her teeth play dirl thegether in her 
 chafts ; but there was naething for it but the ae way or 
 the ither ; an' Janet lifted up her hand and renounced 
 the deil before them a'. 
 
 "And now," says Mr. Soulis to the guidwives, 
 "home with ye, one and all, and pray to Grod for His 
 forgiveness." 
 
 And he gied Janet his arm, though she had little on 
 her but a sark, and took her up the clachan to her ain
 
 160 THRAWK JANET. 
 
 door like a leddy of the land ; an' her scrieghin' and 
 laughin' as was a scandal to be heard. 
 
 There were mony grave folk lang ower their prayers 
 that nicht ; but when the morn cam' there was sic a 
 fear fell upon a' Ba'weary that the bairns hid theirsels, 
 and even the men folk stood and keekit frae their doors. 
 For there was Janet comin' doun the clachan — her or 
 her likeness, nane could tell — wi' her neck thrawn, and 
 her held on ae side, like a body that has been hangit, 
 and a girn on her face like an unstreakit corp. By an' 
 by they got used wi' it, and even speered at her to ken 
 what was wrang ; but frae that day forth she couldnae 
 speak like a Christian woman, but slavered and played 
 click wi' her teeth like a pair o' shears ; and frae that 
 day forth the name o' God cam never on her lips. 
 Whiles she wad try to say it, but it michtnae be. 
 Them that kenned best said least ; but they never gied 
 that Thing the name o' Janet M'Clour ; for the auld 
 Janet, by their way o't, was in muckle hell that day. 
 But the minister was neither to hand nor to bind ; he 
 preached about naething but the folk's cruelty that had 
 gi'en her a stroke of the palsy ; he skelpt the bairns that 
 meddled her ; and he had her up to the manse that 
 same nicht, and dwalled there a' his lane wi' her under 
 the Hangin' Shaw. 
 
 Weel, time gaed by : and the idler sort commenced 
 to think mair lichtly o' that black business. The min- 
 ister was weel thocht o' ; he was aye late at the writing,
 
 THRAWN" JANET. 151 
 
 folk wad see his can'le doon by the Dule water after 
 twal' at e'en ; and he seemed pleased wi' himsel' and 
 upsitten as at first, though a' body could see that he 
 was dwining. As for Janet she cam an' she gaed ; if 
 she didnae speak muckle afore, it was reason she should 
 speak less then ; she meddled uaebody ; but she was an 
 eldritch thing to see, an' nane wad hae mistrysted wi' 
 her for Ba'weary glebe. 
 
 About the end o' July there cam' a spell o' weather, 
 the like o't never was in that country side ; it was lown 
 an' het an' heartless ; the herds couldnae win up the 
 Black Hill, the bairns were ower weariet to play ; an' 
 yet it was gousty too, wi' claps o' het Avund that rum- 
 m'led in the glens, and bits o' shouers that sleekened 
 naething. We aye thocht it but to thun'er on the 
 morn ; but the morn cam, an' the morn's morning, and 
 it was aye the same uncanny weather, sair on folks and 
 bestial. Of a' that were the waur, nane suffered like 
 Mr. Soulis ; he could neither sleep nor eat, he tauld his 
 elders ; an' when he wasnae writin' at his weary book, 
 he wad be stravaguin' ower a' the countryside like a man 
 possessed, when a' body else was blythe to keep caller 
 ben the house. 
 
 Abune Hangin' Shaw, in the bield o' the Black Hill, 
 there's a bit enclosed grund wi' an iron yefct ; and it 
 seems, in the auld days, that was the kirdyaird o' 
 Ba'weary, and consecrated by the Papists before the 
 blessed licht shone upon the kingdom. It was a great
 
 152 THE AWN JANET. 
 
 howff, o' Mr. Soulis's ony way ; there he would sit an' 
 consider his sermons ; and inded it's a bieldy bit. "Weel, 
 as he came ower the wast end o' the Black Hill, ae day, 
 he saw first twa, an syne fower, an' syne seeven corbie 
 craws fleein' round an' round abune the auld kirkyaird. 
 They flew laigh and heavy, an' squawked to ither as 
 they gaed ; and it was cigar to Mr. Soulis that some- 
 thing had put them frae their ordinar. He wasnae easy 
 fleyed, an' gaed straucht up to the wa's ; and what suld 
 he find there but a man, or the appearance of a man, 
 sittin' in the inside upon a grave. He was of a great 
 stature, an' black as hell, and his e'en were singular to 
 see.* Mr. Soulis had heard tell of o' black men, mony's 
 the time ; but there was something unco about this 
 black man that daunted him. Het as he was, he took a 
 kind o' cauld grue in the marrow o' his banes ; but up 
 he spak for a' that ; an' says he : " My friend, are you 
 a stranger in this place ? " The black man answered 
 never a word ; he got upon his feet, an' begude to hirsle 
 to the wa' on the far side ; but he aye lookit at the min- 
 ister ; an' the minister stood an' lookit back ; till a' in a 
 meenute the black man was ower the wa' an' riunin' for 
 the.bield o' the trees. Mr. Soulis, he hardly kenned 
 why, ran after him ; but he was sair forjaskit wi' his 
 
 * It was a common belief in Scotland that the devil appeared as 
 a black man. This appears in several witch trials and I think in 
 Law's Memorials, that delightful store-house of the quaint and 
 grisly.
 
 THKAWN JAKET. 153 
 
 walk an' the liet, unhalesome weather ; and rin as he 
 likit, he got nae mair than a glisk o' the black man 
 amang the birks, till he won cloun to the foot o' the hill- 
 side, an' there he saw him ance mair, gaun, hap, step, 
 an' lowp, ower Dule water to the manse. 
 
 Mr. Soulis wasnae weel pleased that this fearsome 
 gangrel suld mak' sae free wi' Ba' weary manse ; an' he 
 ran the harder, an' wet shoon, ower the burn, an' up 
 the walk ; but the deil a black man was there to see. 
 He stepped out upon the road, but there was naebody 
 there ; he gaed a' ower the gairdeu, but na, nae black 
 man. At the hinder end, and a bit feared as was but 
 natural, he lifted the hasp and into the manse ; and 
 there was Janet M'Clour before his een, wi' her thrawn 
 craig, and nane sae pleased to see him. And he aye 
 minded sinsyne, when first he set his een upon her, he 
 had the same cauld and deidly grue. 
 
 " Janet," says he, " have you seen a black man ? " 
 
 " A black man ?" quo' she. " Save us a' ! Ye're no 
 wise, minister. There's nae black man in a' Ba-weary." 
 
 But she didnae speak plain, ye maun understand ; but 
 yam-yammered, like a powny wi' the bit in its moo. 
 
 " Weel," says he, " Janet, if there was nae black man, 
 I have spoken with the Accuser of the Brethren." 
 
 And he sat down like ane wi' a fever, an' his teeth 
 cMttered in his heid. 
 
 " Hoots," says she, ''think shame to yoursel', minis- 
 ter ;" an' gied him a drap brandy that she keejst aye by her.
 
 154 THRAWN JANET. 
 
 Syne Mr. Soulis gaed into his study amang a' his 
 books. It's a lang, laigh, mirk chalmer, perishin' 
 cauld in winter, an' no very dry even in the top o* 
 the simmer, for the manse stands near the burn. 
 Sae doun he sat, and thocht of a' that had come an' 
 gane since he was in Ba-weary, an' his hame, an' the 
 days when he was a bairn an' ran daffin' on the braes ; 
 and that black man aye ran in his heid like the ower- 
 come of a sang. Aye the mair he thocht, the mair he 
 thocht o' the black man. He tried the prayer, an' the 
 words wouldnae come to him ; an' he tried, they say, 
 to write at his book, but he could nae mak' nae mair 
 o' that. There was whiles he thocht the black man 
 was at his oxter, an' the swat stood upon him cauld 
 as well-water ; and there was other whiles, when he 
 cam to himsel' like a christened bairn and minded 
 naething. 
 
 The upshot was that he gaed to the window an' 
 stood glowrin' at Dule water. The trees are unco 
 thick, an' the water lies deep an' black under the 
 manse ; and there was Janet washin' the cla'es wi' 
 her coats kilted. She had her back to the minister, 
 an' he, for his pairt, hardly kenned what he was 
 lookin' at. Syne she turned round, an' shawed her 
 face ; Mr. Soulis had the same cauld grue as twice 
 that day afore, an' it was borne in upon him what 
 folk said, that Janet was deid lang syne, an' this was 
 a bogle in her clay-cauld flesh. He drew back a pickle
 
 THEAWN JANET. 155 
 
 and he scanned her narrowly. She was tramp-trampin' 
 in the cla'es, croonin' to hersel' ; and eh ! Gnde guide 
 us, but it was a fearsome face. Whiles she sang louder, 
 but there was nae man born o' woman that could tell 
 the words o' her sang ; an' whiles she lookit side-lang 
 doun, but there was naething there for her to look at. 
 There gaed a scunner through the flesh upon his banes ; 
 and that was Heeven's advertisement. But Mr. Soulis 
 just blamed himsel', he said, to think sae ill of a puir, 
 auld afflicted wife that hadnae a freend forbye himsel' ; 
 an' he put up a bit prayer for him an' her, an' drank a 
 little caller water — for his heart rose again the meat — 
 an' gaed up to his naked bed in the gloaming. 
 
 That was a nicht that has never been forgotten in 
 Ba'weary, the nicht o' the seeventeenth of August, seven- 
 teen hun'er' an twal'. It had been het afore, as I hae 
 said, but that nicht it was better than ever. The sun 
 gaed doun amang unco-lookin' clouds ; it fell as mirk as 
 the pit ; no a star, no a breath o' wund ; ye couldnae 
 see your ban' afore your face, and even the auld folk 
 cuist the covers frae their beds and lay pechin' for their 
 breath. Wi' a' that he had upon his mind, it was gey 
 and unlikely Mr. Soulis wad get muckle sleep. He lay 
 an' he tummled ; the gude, caller bed that he got into 
 brunt his very banes ; whiles he slept, and whiles he 
 waukened ; whiles he heard the time o' nicht, and 
 whiles a tyke yowlin' up the muir, as if somebody was 
 deid ; whiles he thocht he heard bogles claverin' in his
 
 156 THRAW]Sr JANET. 
 
 lug, an' whiles he saw spunkies in the room. He 
 behoved, he judged, to be sick ; an' sick he was — little 
 he jaloosed the sickness. 
 
 At the hinder end, he got a clearness in his mind, sat 
 up in his sark on the bed-side, and fell thinkin' ance 
 mair o' the black man an' Janet. He couldnae weel tell 
 how — maybe it was the cauld to his feet — but it cam' in 
 upon him wi' a spate that there was some connection 
 between thir twa, an' that either or baith o' them were 
 bogles. And just at that moment, in Janet's room, 
 which was neist to his, there cam' a stramp o' feet as if 
 men were wars'lin', an' then a loud bang ; an' then a 
 wund gaed reishling round the fower quarters of the 
 house ; an' then a' was aince mair as seelent as the 
 grare. 
 
 Mr. Soulis was feared for neither man nor deevil. He 
 got his tinder-box, an' lit a can'le, an' made three steps 
 o't ower to Janet's door. It was on the hasp, an' he 
 pushed it open, an' keeked bauldly in. It was a big 
 room, as big as the minister's ain, an' plenished Avi' 
 grand, auld, solid gear, for he had naething else. There 
 was a fower-posted bed wi' auld tapestry ; and a braw 
 cabinet of aik, that was fu' o' the minister's divinity 
 books, an' put there to be out o' the gate ; an' a wheen 
 duds o' Janet's lying here and there about the floor. 
 But nae Janet could Mr. Soulis see ; nor ony sign of a 
 contention. In he gaed (an' there's few that wad ha'e 
 followed him) an' lookit a' round, an' listened. But
 
 THRAWN JANET. 157 
 
 there was was naethin' to be heard, neither inside the 
 manse nor in a' Ba'weary parish, an' naethin' to be seen 
 but the muckle shadows tnrnin' round the can'le. An' 
 then a' at aince, the minister's heart played dunt an' 
 stood stock-still ; an' a cauld wund blew amang the 
 hairs o' his heid. Whaten a weary sicht was that for 
 the puir man's een ! For there was Janet hangin' frae 
 a nail beside the auld aik cabinet : her heid aye lay on 
 her shoother, her een were steeked, the tongue projekit 
 frae her mouth, and her heels were twa feet clear abune 
 the floor. 
 
 ''God forgive us all!" thocht Mr. Soulis, ''poor 
 Janet's dead." 
 
 He cam' a step nearer to the corp ; an' then his heart 
 fair whammled in his inside. For by what cantrip it 
 wad ill-beseem a man to judge, she was hingiu' frae a 
 single nail an' by a single wursted thread for darnin' hose. 
 
 It's an awfu' thing to be your lane at nicht wi' siccan 
 prodigies o' darkness ; but Mr. Soulis was strong in the 
 Lord. He turned an' gaed his ways oot o' that room, 
 and lockit the door ahint him ; and step by step, doon 
 the stairs, as heavy as leed ; and set doon the can'le on 
 the table at the stairfoot. He couldnae pray, he could- 
 nae think, he was dreepin' wi' caul' swat, an' naething 
 could he hear but the dunt-dunt-duntin' o' his ain heart. 
 He micht maybe have stood there an hour, or maybe 
 twa, he minded sae little ; when a' o' a sudden, he heard 
 a laigh, uncanny steer upstairs ; a foot gaed to an' fro
 
 158 THRAWN JAXET. 
 
 in the cliam'er whaur the corp was hingin' ; syne the 
 door was opened, though he minded weel that he had 
 lockit it ; an' s}Tie there was a step upon the landin', an' 
 it seemed to him as if the corp Avas lookin' ower the rail 
 and doun upon him whaur he stood. 
 
 He took wp the can'le again (for he couldnae want the 
 licht), and as saftly as ever he could, gaed straucht out 
 o' the manse an to the far end o' the causeway. It was 
 aye pit-mirk ; the flame o' the can'le, when he set it on 
 the grund, brunt steedy and clear as in a room ; nae- 
 thing moved, but the Dule water seepin' and sabbin' 
 doon the glen, an' yon unhaly footstep that cam' plod- 
 din doun the stairs inside the manse. He kenned the 
 foot over weel, for it was Janet's ; and at ilka step that 
 cam' a wee thing nearer, the cauld got deeper in his 
 vitals. He commended his soul to Him that made an' 
 keepit him ; "and Lord," said he, "give me strength 
 this night to war against the powers of evil." 
 
 By this time the foot was comin' through the passage 
 for the door ; he could hear a hand skirt alang the wa', 
 as if the fearsome thing was feelin' for its way. The 
 saughs tossed an' maned thegether, a long sigh cam' 
 ower the hills, the flame o' the can'le was blawn aboot ; 
 an' there stood the corp of Thrawn Janet, wi' her 
 grogram goun an' her black mutch, wi' the heid aye 
 upon the shouther, an' the girn still upon the face o't — 
 leevin', ye wad hae said — deid, as Mr. Soulis weel 
 kenned — upon the threshold o' the manse.
 
 THRAWN JANET. 169 
 
 It's a strange thing that the saul of man should be 
 that thirled into his perishable body ; but the minister 
 saw that, an' his heart didnae break. 
 
 She didnae stand there lang ; she began to move again 
 an' cam' slowly towards Mr. Soulis whaur he stood 
 under the saughs. A' the life o' his body, a' the 
 strength o' his sjieerit, were glowerin' frae his een. It 
 seemed she was gaun to speak, but wanted words, an' 
 made a sign wi' the left hand. There cam' a clap o' 
 wund, like a cat's fuff ; oot gaed the can'le, the saughs 
 skrieghed like folk ; an' Mr. Soulis kenned that, live or 
 die, this was the end o't. 
 
 " Witch, beldame, devil ! " he cried, *' I charge you, 
 by the power of God, begone — if you be dead, to the 
 grave — if you be damned, to hell." 
 
 An' at that moment the Lord's ain hand out o' the 
 Heevens struck the Horror whaur it stood; the auld, 
 deid, desecrated corp o' the witch-wife, sae lang keepit 
 frae the grave and hirsled round by deils, lowed up like 
 a brunstane spunk and fell in ashes to the grund ; the 
 thunder followed, peal on dirling peal, the rairing rain 
 upon the back o' that ; and Mr. Soulis lowped through 
 the garden hedge, and ran, wi' skelloch upon skelloch, 
 for the clachan. 
 
 That same mornin', John Christie saw the Black Man 
 pass the Muckle Cairn as it was chappin' six ; before 
 eicht, he gaed by the change-house at Knockdow ; an' 
 no lang after, Sandy M'Lellan saw him gaun linkin'
 
 160 THEAW^f JASTET. 
 
 doun tbe braes frae Kilmackerlie. There's little doubt 
 but it was bim that d walled sae lang in Janet's body ; 
 but he was awa' at last ; and sinsyne the deil has never 
 fashed us in Ba'weary. 
 
 But it was a sair dispensation for the minister ; lang, 
 lang be lay ravin' in his bed ; and frae that hour to this, 
 he was the man ye ken the day.
 
 OLALLA. 
 
 ''Kow/' said the doctor, "my part is done, and, I 
 may say, with some vanity, well done. It remains only to 
 get you out of this cold and poisonous city, and to give 
 you two months of a pure air and an easy conscience. 
 The last is your affair. To the first I think I can help 
 you. It falls indeed rather oddly ; it was but the other 
 day the Padre came in from the country ; and as he and 
 I are old friends, although of contrary professions, he 
 applied to me in a matter of distress among some of his 
 parishioners. This was a family — but you are ignorant 
 of Spain, and even the names of our grandees are hardly 
 known to you ; suffice it, then, that they were once 
 great people, and are now fallen to the brink of destitu- 
 tion. Nothing now belongs to them but the residencia, 
 and certain leagues of desert mountain, in the grei^'l .r 
 part of which not even a goat could support life. But 
 the house is a fine old place, and stands at a great 
 height among the hills, and most salubriously ; and I 
 had no sooner heard my friend's tale, than I remem- 
 bered you. I told him I had a wounded officer, 
 wounded in the good cause, who was now able to make 
 a change ; and I proposed that his friends should take 
 11
 
 162 OLALLA. 
 
 you for a lodger. Instantly the Padre's face grew dark, 
 as I had maliciously foreseen it would. It was out of 
 the question, he said. Then let them starve, said I, for 
 I have no sympathy with tatterdemalion pride. There- 
 upon we separated, not very content with one another ; 
 but yesterday, to my wonder, the Padre returned and 
 made a submission : the difficulty, he said, he had 
 found upon enquiry to be less than he had feared ; or, 
 in other words, these proud people had put their pride 
 in their pocket. I closed with the offer ; and, subject 
 to your approval, I have taken rooms for you in the 
 residencia. The air of these mountains will renew your 
 blood; and the quiet in which you will there live is 
 worth all the medicines in the world." 
 
 '' Doctor," said I, "you have been throughout my 
 good angel, and your advice is a command. But tell 
 me, if you please, something of the family with which I 
 am to reside." 
 
 "I am coming to that," replied my friend ; ''and, 
 indeed, there is a diflBculty in the way. These beggars 
 s>^ip as I have said, of very high descent and swollen 
 with the most baseless vanity ; they have lived for some 
 generations in a growing isolation, drawing away, on 
 either hand, from the rich who had now become too 
 high for them, and from the poor, whom they still 
 regarded as too low ; and even to-day, when poverty 
 forces them to unfasten their door to a guest, they can- 
 not do so without a most ungracious stipulation. You 
 are to remain, they say, a stranger ; they will give you
 
 OLALLA. 163 
 
 attendance, but they refuse from the first the idea of 
 the smallest intimacy." 
 
 I will not deny that I was piqued, and perhaps the 
 feeling strengthened my desire to go, for I was confi- 
 dent that I could break down that barrier if I desired. 
 *' There is nothing offensive in such a stipulation," said 
 I; "and I even sympathise with the feeling that in- 
 spired it." 
 
 ''It is true they have never seen you," returned the 
 doctor politely ; " and if they knew you were the hand- 
 somest and the most pleasant man that ever came from 
 England (where I am told that handsome men are com- 
 mon, but pleasant ones not so much so), they would 
 doubtless make you welcome with a better grace. But 
 since you take the thing so well, it matters not. To 
 me, indeed, it seems discourteous. But you will find 
 yourself the gainer. The family will not much tempt 
 you. A mother, a son, and a daughter ; an old woman 
 said to be halfwitted, a country lout, and a country 
 girl, who stands very high with her confessor, and is, 
 therefore," chuckled the physician, "most likely 
 plain ; there is not much in that to attract the fancy of 
 a dashing officer." 
 
 "And yet you say they are high-born," I objected. 
 
 "Well, as to that, I should distinguish," returned the 
 doctor. "The mother is ; not so the children. The 
 mother was the last representative of a princely stock, 
 degenerate both in parts and fortune. Her father was 
 not only jjoor, he was mad : and the girl ran wild about
 
 164 OLALLA. 
 
 the residencia till bis death. Then, much of the for- 
 tune having died witli him, and the family being quite 
 extinct, the girl ran wilder than ever, until at last she 
 married. Heaven knows whom, a muleteer some say, 
 others a smuggler ; while there are some who uphold 
 there was no marriage at all, and that Felipe and Olalla 
 are bastards. The union, such as it was, was tragically 
 dissolved some years ago ; but they live in such seclu- 
 sion, and the country at that time was in so much dis- 
 order, that the precise manner of the man's end is 
 known only to the priest — if even to him." 
 
 ** I begin to think I shall have strange experiences," 
 said I. 
 
 " I would not romance, if I were you," replied the 
 doctor; "you will find, I fear, a very grovelling and 
 commonplace reality. Felipe, for instance, I have seen. 
 And what am I to say ? He is very rustic, very cun- 
 ning, very loutish, and, I should say, an innocent ; the 
 others are probably to match. No, no, seiior command- 
 ante, you must seek congenial society among the great 
 sights of our mountains ; and in these at least, if you 
 are at all a lover of the works of nature, I promise you 
 will not be disappointed." 
 
 The next day Felipe came for me in a rough country 
 cart, drawn by a mule ; and a little before the stroke of 
 noon, after I had said farewell to the doctor, the inn- 
 keeper, and different good souls who had befriended me 
 during my sickness, we set forth out of the city by the 
 Eastern gate, and began to ascend into the Sierra. I
 
 OLALLA. 165 
 
 had been so long a prisoner, since I was left behind for 
 dying after the loss of the convoy, that the mere smell 
 of the earth set me smiling. The country through 
 which we went was wild and rocky, partially covered 
 witli rough woods, now of the cork-tree, and now of 
 the great Spanish chestnut, and frequently intersected 
 by the beds of mountain torrents. The sun shone, the 
 wind rustled joyously ; and we had advanced some 
 miles, and the city had already shrunk into an incon- 
 siderable knoll upon the plain behind us, before my 
 attention began to be diverted to the companion of my 
 drive. To the eye, he seemed but a diminutive, lout- 
 ish, well-made country lad, such as the doctor had de- 
 scribed, mighty quick and active, but devoid of any 
 culture ; and this first impression was with most ob- 
 servers final. What began to strike me was his 
 familiar, chattering talk ; so strangely inconsistent with 
 the terms on which I was to be received ; and partly 
 from his imperfect enunciation, partly from the 
 sprightly incoherence of the matter, so very difficult 
 to follow clearly without an effort of the mind. It is 
 true I had before talked with jjersons of a similar 
 mental constitution; persons who seemed to live (as he 
 did) by the senses, taken and possessed by the visual 
 object of the moment and unable to discharge their 
 minds of that impression. His seemed to me (as I sat, 
 distantly giving ear) a kind of conversation proper to 
 drivers, who pass much of their time in a great vacancy 
 of the intellect and threading the sights of a familiar
 
 166 OLALLA, 
 
 country. But this was not the case of Felipe ; by his 
 own account, he was a home-keeper; ''I wish I was 
 there now," he said ; and then spying a tree by the 
 wayside, he broke off to tell me that he had once seen 
 a crow among its branches. 
 
 " X crow ?" I repeated, struck by the ineptitude of 
 the remark, and thinking I had heard imperfectly. 
 
 But by this time be was already filled with a new 
 idea ; hearkening with a rapt intentness, his head on 
 one side, his face puckered ; and he struck me rudely, 
 to make me hold my peace. Then he smiled and shook 
 his head. 
 
 " What did you hear ?" I asked. 
 
 '* 0, it is all right," he said ; and began encouraging 
 his mule with cries that echoed unhumanly up the 
 mountain walls. 
 
 I looked at him more closely. He was superlatively 
 well-built, light, and lithe and strong; he was well- 
 featured; his yellow eyes were very large, though, 
 perhaps, not very expressive ; take him altogether, he 
 was a pleasant-looking lad, and I had no fault to find 
 with him, beyond that he was of a dusky hue, and in- 
 clined to hairyness ; two characteristics that I disliked. 
 It was his mind that puzzled, and yet attracted me. 
 The doctor's phrase — an innocent — came back to me ; 
 and I was wondering if that were, after all, the true 
 description, when the road began to go down into the 
 narrow and naked chasm of a torrent. The waters 
 thundered tumultuously in the bottom ; and the ra-
 
 OLALLA. 167 
 
 vine was filled full of the sound, the thin spray, and 
 the claps of wind, that accompanied their descent. 
 The scene was certainly impressive ; but the road was 
 in that part very securely walled in ; the mule went 
 steadily forward ; and I was astonished to perceive the 
 paleness of terror in the face of my companion. The 
 voice of that wild river was inconstant, now sinking 
 lower as if in weariness, now doubling its hoarse tones ; 
 momentary freshets seemed to swell its volume, sweep- 
 ing down the gorge, raving and booming against the 
 barrier walls ; and I observed it was at each of these 
 accessions to the clamour, that my driver more particu- 
 larly winced and blanched. Some thoughts of Scottish 
 superstition and the river Kelpie passed across my 
 mind ; I wondered if perchance the like were prevalent 
 in that part of Spain ; and turning to Felipe, sought to 
 draw him out. 
 
 " A¥hat is the matter ? " I asked. 
 
 "0, I am afraid," he replied. 
 
 " Of what are you afraid ? " I returned. " This seems 
 one of the safest places on this very dangerous road." 
 
 '' It makes a noise," he said, with a simplicity of awe 
 that set my doubts at rest. 
 
 The lad was but a child in intellect ; his mind was 
 like his body, active and swift, but stunted in develop- 
 ment ; and I began from that time forth to regard him 
 with a measure of pity, and to listen at first, with indul- 
 gence, and at last even with pleasure, to his disjointed 
 babble.
 
 108 OLALLA. 
 
 By about four in the afternoon we had crossed the 
 summit of the mountain line, said farewell to the west- 
 ern sunshine, and began to go down upon the other 
 side, skirting the edge of many ravines and moving 
 through the shadow of dusky woods. There rose upon 
 all sides the voice of falling water, not condensed and 
 formidable as in the gorge of the river, but scattered 
 and sounding gaily and musically from glen to glen. 
 Here, too, the spirits of my driver mended, and he be- 
 gan to sing aloud in a falsetto voice, and with a singu- 
 lar bluntness of musical perception, never true either to 
 melody or key, but wandering at will, and yet somehow 
 with an effect that was natural and pleasing, like that 
 of the song of birds. As the dusk increased, I fell 
 more and more under the spell of this artless warbling, 
 listening and waiting for some articulate air, and still 
 disappointed ; and when at last I asked him what it 
 was he sang — "0," cried he, "I am just singing!" 
 Above all, I was taken with a trick he had of un- 
 weariedly rejoeating the same note at little intervals ; it 
 was not so monotonous as you would think, or, at least, 
 not disagreeable ; and it seemed to breathe a wonder- 
 ful contentment with what is, such as we love to fancy 
 in the attitude of trees, or the quiescence of a jdooI. 
 
 Night had fallen dark before we came out upon a 
 plateau, and drew up a little after, before a certain 
 lump of superior blackness which I could only conjec- 
 ture to be the residencia. Here, my guide, getting 
 down from the cart, hooted and whistled for a long
 
 OLALLA. 169' 
 
 time ill vain ; until at last an old peasant man came 
 towards us from somewhere in the surrounding dark, 
 carrying a candle in his hand. By the light of this I 
 was able to perceive a great arched doorway of a Moor- 
 ish character : it was closed by iron-studded gates, in 
 one of the leaves of which Felipe opened a wicket. 
 The peasant carried off the cart to some out-building ; 
 but my guide and I passed through the wicket, which 
 was closed again behind us ; and by the glimmer of the 
 candle, passed through a court, up a stone stair, along 
 a section of an open gallery, and up more stairs again, 
 until we came at last to the door of a great and some- 
 what bare apartment. This room, which I understood 
 was to be mine, was pierced by three windows, lined 
 with some lustrous wood disposed in panels, and car- 
 peted with the skins of many savage animals. A bright 
 fire burned in the chimney, and shed abroad a change- 
 able flicker ; close up to the blaze there was drawn a 
 table, laid for supper ; and in the far end a bed stood 
 ready. I was pleased by these preparations, and said so 
 to Felipe ; and he, with the same simplicity of disposi- 
 tion that I had already remarked in him, warmly re- 
 echoed my praises. "A fine room," he said; "a very 
 fine room. And fire, too ; fire is good ; it melts out 
 the pleasure in your bones. And the bed," he con- 
 tinued, carrying over the candle in that direction — 
 *' see what fine sheets — how soft, how smooth, 
 smooth ; " and he passed his hand again and again 
 over their texture, and then laid down his head and
 
 170 OLALLA. 
 
 rubbed his cheeks among them with a grossness of con- 
 tent that somehow offended me. I took the candle 
 from his hand (for I feared he would set the bed on 
 fire) and walked back to tlie supper-table, where, per- 
 ceiving a measure of wine, I poured out a cup and 
 called to him to come and drink of it. He started to 
 his feet at once and ran to me with a strong expression 
 of hope ; but when he saw the wine, he yisibly shud- 
 dered. 
 
 *'0h, no," he said, ''not that; that is for you. I 
 hate it." 
 
 ''Very well, Seiior," said I; "then I will drink to 
 your good health, and to the prosperity of your house 
 and family. Speaking of which," I added, after I had 
 drunk^ '* shall I not have the pleasure of laying my 
 salutations in person at the feet of the Seiiora, your 
 mother ? " 
 
 But at these words all the childishness passed out of 
 his face, and was succeeded by a look of indescribable cun- 
 ning and secrecy. He backed away from me at the same 
 time, as though I were an animal about to leap or some 
 dangerous fellow with a weapon, and when he had got 
 near the door, glowered at me sullenly with contracted 
 pupils. " No," he said at last, and the next moment 
 was gone noiselessly out of the room ; and I heard his 
 footing die away downstairs as light as rainfall, and 
 silence closed over the house. 
 
 After I had supped I drew up the table nearer to the 
 bed and began to prepare for rest ; but in the new posi-
 
 OLALLA. 171 
 
 tion of the light, I was struck by a picture on the wall. 
 It represented a woman, still young. To judge by her 
 costume and the mellow unity which reigned over the 
 canvas, she had long been dead ; to judge by the vivac- 
 ity of the attitude, the eyes and the features, I might 
 have been beholding in a mirror the image of life. Her 
 figure was very slim and strong, and of a just propor- 
 tion ; red tresses lay like a crown over her brow ; her 
 eyes, of a very golden brown, held mine with a look ; and 
 her face, which was perfectly shaped, was yet marred by 
 a cruel, sullen, and sensual expression. Something in 
 both face and figure, something exquisitely intangible, 
 like the echo of an echo, suggested the features and 
 bearing of my guide ; and I stood awhile, unpleasantly 
 attracted and wondering at the oddity of the resem- 
 blance. The common, carnal stock of that race, which 
 had been originally designed for such high dames as the 
 one now looking on me from the canvas, had fallen to 
 baser uses, wearing country clothes, sitting on the 
 shaft and holding the reins of a mule cart, to bring 
 home a lodger. Perhaps an actual link subsisted ; per- 
 haps some scruple of the delicate flesh that was once 
 clothed upon with the satin and brocade of the dead 
 lady, now winced at the rude contact of Felipe's frieze. 
 
 The first light of the morning shone full upon the 
 portrait, and, as I lay awake, my eyes continued to 
 dwell upon it with growing complacency ; its beauty 
 crept about my heart insidiously, silencing my scrui^les 
 one after another ; and while I knew that to love such
 
 172 OLALLA. 
 
 a woman were to sign and seal one's own sentence of 
 degeneration, I still knew that, if she were alive, I 
 should love her. Day after day the double knowledge 
 of her wickedness and of my weakness grew clearer. 
 She came to be the heroine of many day-dreams, in 
 which her eyes led on to, and sufficiently rewarded, 
 crimes. She cast a dark shadow on my fancy ; and 
 when I was out in the free air of heaven, taking vigor- 
 ous exercise and healthily renewing the current of my 
 blood, it was often a glad thought to me that my en- 
 chantress was safe in the grave, her wand of beauty 
 broken, her lips closed in silence, her philtre spilt. 
 And yet I had a half-lingering terror that she might 
 not be dead after all, but re-arisen in the body of some 
 descendant. 
 
 Felipe served my meals in my own apartment ; and 
 his resemblance to the portrait haunted me. At times 
 it was not ; at times, upon some change of attitude or 
 flash of expression, it would leap o^^t upon me like a 
 ghost. It was above all in his ill tempers that the like- 
 ness triumphed. He certainly liked me ; he was proud 
 of my notice, which he sought to engage by many sim- 
 ple and childlike devices ; he loved to sit close before 
 my fire, talking his broken talk or singing his odd, end- 
 less, wordless songs, and sometimes drawing his hand 
 over my clothes with an affectionate manner of caress- 
 ing that never failed to cause in me an embarrassment 
 of which I was ashamed. But for all that, he was 
 capable of flashes of causeless anger and fits of sturdy
 
 OLALLA. 173 
 
 sullenness. At a word of reproof, I have seen him up- 
 Bet the dish of which I was about to eat, and this not 
 surreptitiously, but witli defiance ; and similarly at a 
 hint of inquisition. I was not unnaturally curious, be- 
 ing in a strange place and surrounded by strange people, 
 but at the shadow of a question, he shrank back, lower- 
 ing and dangerous. Then it was that, for a fraction of 
 a second, thfs rough lad might have been the brother of 
 the lady in the frame. But these humours were swift 
 to pass ; and the resemblance died along with them. 
 
 In these first days I saw nothing of any one but Fe- 
 lipe, unless the portrait is to be counted ; and since the 
 lad was plainly of weak mind, and had moments of pas- 
 sion, it may be wondered that I bore his dangerous 
 neighbourhood with equanimity. As a matter of fact, 
 it was for some time irksome ; but it happened before 
 long that I obtained over him so complete a mastery as 
 set my disquietude at rest. 
 
 It fell in this way. He was by nature slothful, and 
 much of a vagabond, and yet he kept by the house, and 
 not only waited upon my wants, but laboured every day 
 in the garden or small farm to the south of the resi- 
 dencia. Here he would be joined by the peasant whom 
 I had seen on the night of my arrival, and who dwelt at 
 the far end of the enclosure, about half a mile away, in 
 a rude out-house ; but it was plain to me that, of these 
 two, it was Felipe who did most ; and though I would 
 sometimes see him throw down his spade and go to 
 sleep among the very plants he had been digging, his
 
 174 OLALLA. 
 
 constancy and energy were admirable in themselyes, and 
 still more so since I was well assured they were foreign 
 to liis disposition and the fruit of an ungrateful effort. 
 But while I admired, I wondered what had called forth 
 in a lad so shuttle-witted this enduring sense of duty. 
 How was it sustained ? I asked myself, and to what 
 length did it prevail over his instincts ? The priest was 
 possibly his inspirer ; but the priest came one day to 
 the residencia. I saw him both come and go after an 
 interval of close upon an hour, from a knoll where I 
 was sketching, and all that time Felipe continued to 
 labour undisturbed in the garden. 
 
 At last, in a very unworthy spirit, I determined to de- 
 bauch the lad from his good resolutions, and, waylaying 
 him at the gate, easily persuaded him to join me in a 
 ramble. It was a fine day, and the woods to which I led 
 him were green and pleasant and sweet-smelling and 
 alive with the hum of insects. Here he discovered him- 
 self in a fresh character, mounting up to heights of 
 gaiety that abashed me, and displaying an energy and 
 grace of movement that delighted the eye. He leaped, 
 he ran round me in mere glee ; he would stop, and look 
 and listen, and seemed to drink in the world like a cor- 
 dial ; and then he would suddenly spring into a tree 
 with one bound, and hang and gambol there like one at 
 home. Little as he said to me, and that of not much 
 import, I have rarely enjoyed more stirring company ; 
 the sight of his delight was a continual feast ; the speed 
 and accuracy of his movements pleased me to the heart ;
 
 OLALLA. 175 
 
 and I might have been so thoughtlessly unkind as to 
 make a habit of these walks, had not chance prepared a 
 very rude conclusion to my pleasure. By some swift- 
 ness or dexterity the lad captured a squirrel in a tree- 
 top. He was then some way ahead of me, but I saw him 
 drop to the ground and crouch there, crying aloud for 
 pleasure like a child. The sound stirred my sympathies, 
 it was so fresh and innocent ; but as I bettered my 
 pace to draw near, the cry of the squirrel knocked upon 
 my heart. I have heard and seen much of the cruelty of 
 lads, and above all of peasants ; but what I now beheld 
 struck me into a passion of anger. I thrust the fellow 
 aside, plucked the poor brute out of his hands, and with 
 swift mercy killed it. Then I turned upon the tor- 
 tui'er, spoke to him long out of the heat of my indigna- 
 tion, calling him names at which he seemed to wither ; 
 and at length, pointing toward the residencia, bade him 
 begone and leave me, for I chose to walk with men, not 
 with vermin. He fell upon his knees, and, the words 
 coming to him with more clearness than usual, poured 
 out a stream of the most touching supplications, begging 
 me in mercy to forgive him, to forget what he had done, 
 to look to the future. " 0, I try so hard," he said. 
 *' 0, commandante, bear with Felipe this once ; he will 
 never be a brute again ! " Thereupon, much more af- 
 fected than I cared to show, I suffered myself to be per- 
 suaded, and at last shook hands with him and made it 
 up. But the squirrel, by way of penance, I made him 
 bury ; speaking of the poor thing's beauty, telling him
 
 176 OLALLA. 
 
 what pains it had suffered, and how base a thing was 
 the abase of strength. " See, Felipe," said I, " you are 
 strong indeed ; but in my hands you are as helpless as 
 that jDoor thing of the trees. Give me your hand in 
 mine. You cannot remove it. Now suppose that I 
 were cruel like you, and took a pleasure in i^ain. I only 
 tighten my hold, and see how you suffer." He screamed 
 aloud, his face stricken ashy and dotted with needle 
 points of sweat ; and when I set him free, he fell to the 
 earth and nursed his hand and moaned over it like a baby. 
 But he took the lesson in good part ; and whether from 
 that, or from what I had said to him, or the higher 
 notion he now had of my bodily strength, his original 
 affection was changed into a dog-like, adoring fidelity. 
 
 Meanwhile I gained rapidly in health. The resi- 
 dencia stood on the crown of a stony plateau ; on 
 every side the mountains hemmed it about ; only from 
 the roof, where was a bartizan, there might be seen 
 between two peaks, a small segment of plain blue, with 
 extreme distance. The air in these altitudes moved 
 freely and largely ; great clouds congregated there, and 
 were broken up by the wind and left in tatters on the 
 hilltops ; a hoarse, and yet faint rumbling of torrents 
 rose from all round ; and one could there study all 
 the ruder and more ancient characters of nature in 
 something of their pristine force. I delighted from 
 the first in the vigorous scenery and changeful 
 weather; nor less in the antique and dilapidated man-' 
 sion where I dwelt. This was a large oblong, flanked at
 
 OLALLA. 177 
 
 two opposite comers by bastion-like projections, one of 
 which commanded the door, while both were loopholed 
 for musketry. The lower storey was, besides, naked of 
 windows, so that the building, if garrisoned, could not 
 be carried without artillery. It enclosed an open court 
 planted with pomegranate trees. From this a broad 
 flight of marble stairs ascended to an open gallery, run- 
 ning all round and resting, towards the court, on slender 
 pillars. Thence again, several enclosed stairs led to the 
 upper storeys of the house, which were thus broken up 
 into distinct divisions. The windows, both within and 
 without, were closely shuttered ; some of the stone- 
 work in the upper parts had fallen ; the roof, in one 
 place, had been wrecked in one of the flurries of wind 
 which were common in these mountains; and the 
 whole house, in the strong, beating sunlight, and stand- 
 ing out above a grove of stunted cork-trees, thickly 
 laden and discoloured with dust, looked like the sleeping 
 palace of the legend. The court, in particular, seemed 
 the very home of slumber. A hoarse cooing of doves 
 haunted about tlie eaves ; the winds were excluded, but 
 when they blew outside, the mountain dust fell here as 
 thick as rain, and veiled the red bloom of the pome- 
 granates ; shuttered windows and the closed doors of 
 numerous cellars, and the vacant arches of the gallery, 
 enclosed it ; and all day long the sun made broken 
 profiles on the four sides, and paraded the shadow of 
 the pillars on the gallery floor. At the ground level 
 there was, however, a certain pillared recess, which bore 
 13
 
 178 OLALLA. 
 
 the marks of human habitation. Though it was open 
 in front upon the court, it was yet provided with a 
 chimney, where a wood fire would be always prettily 
 blazing ; and the tile floor was littered with the skins of 
 animals. 
 
 It was in this place that I first saw my hostess. She 
 had drawn one of the skins forward and sat in the sun, 
 leaning against a pillar. It was her dress that struck 
 me first of all, for it was rich and brightly coloured, and 
 shone out in that dusty courtyard with something of the 
 same relief as the flowers of the pomegranates. At a 
 second look it was her beauty of person that took hold 
 of me. As she sat back — watching me, I thought, 
 though with invisible eyes — and wearing at the same 
 time an expression of almost imbecile good-humour and 
 contentment, she showed a perfectness of feature and a 
 quiet nobility of attitude that were beyond a statue's. 
 I took oif my hat to her in passing, and her face 
 puckered with suspicion as swiftly and lightly as a pool 
 ruffles in the breeze; but she paid no heed to my cour- 
 tesy. I went forth on my customary walk a trifle 
 daunted, her idol-like impassivity haunting me ; and 
 when I returned, although she was still in much the 
 same posture, I was half surprised to see that she had 
 moved as far as the next pillar, following the sunshine. 
 This time, however, slie addressed me with some trivial 
 salutation, civilly enough conceived, and uttered in the 
 same deep-chested, and yet indistmct and lisping tones, 
 that hd(\ already baffled the utmost niceness of my
 
 OLALLA. 179 
 
 hearing from her son. I answered rather at a venture; 
 for not only did I fail to take her meaning vrith pre- 
 cision, but the sudden disclosure of her eyes disturbed 
 me. They were unusually large, the iris golden like 
 Felipe's, but the pupil at that moment so distended 
 that they seemed almost black ; and what affected me 
 was not so much their size as (what was perhaps its 
 consequence) the singular insignificance of their regard. 
 A look more blankly stupid I have never met. My eyes 
 dropped before it even as I spoke, and I went on my 
 way upstairs to my own room, at once baffled and em- 
 barrassed. Yet, when I came there and saw the face of 
 the portrait, I was again reminded of the miracle of 
 family descent. My hostess was, indeed, both older and 
 fuller in person; her eyes were of a different colour ; her 
 face, besides, was not only free from the ill-significance 
 that offended and attracted me in the painting ; it was 
 devoid of either good or bad — a moral blank expressing 
 literally naught. And yet there was a likeness, not so 
 much speaking as immanent, not so much in any par- 
 ticular feature as upon the whole. It should seem, I 
 thought, as if when the master set his signature to that 
 grave canvas, he had not only caught the image of one 
 smiling and false-eyed woman, but stamj)ed the essential 
 quality of a race. 
 
 From that day forth, whether I came or went, I was 
 sure to find the Senora seated in the sun against a pillar, 
 or stretched on a rug before the fire ; only at times she 
 would shift her station to the tgp round of the stone
 
 180 OLALLA. 
 
 staircase, where she lay with tlie same nonchalance right 
 across my path. In all these days, I never knew her to 
 display the least spark of energy beyond what she ex- 
 pended in brushing and re-brushing her copious copper- 
 coloured hair, or in lisping out, in the rich and broken 
 hoarseness of her voice, her customary idle salutations 
 to myself. These, I think, were her two chief pleasures, 
 beyond that of mere quiescence. She seemed always 
 proud of her remarks, as though they had been wit- 
 ticisms : and, indeed, though they were empty enough, 
 like the conversation of many respectable persons, and 
 turned on a very narrow range of subjects, they were 
 never meaningless or incoherent; nay, they had a certain 
 beauty of their own, breathing, as they did, of her entire 
 contentment. Now she would speak of the warmth 
 in which (like her son) she greatly delighted; now of 
 the flowers of the pomegranate trees, and now of the 
 white doves and long-winged swallows that fanned the 
 air of the court. The birds excited her. As they raked 
 the eaves in their swift flight, or skimmed sidelong past 
 her with a rush of wind, she would sometimes stir, and 
 sit a little up, and seem to awaken from her doze of 
 satisfaction. B\it for the rest of her days she lay luxu- 
 riously folded on herself and sunk in sloth and pleasure. 
 Her invincible content at first annoyed me, but I came 
 gradually to find re^Dose in the spectacle, until at last 
 it grew to be my habit to sit down beside her four times 
 in the day, both coming and going, and to talk with 
 her sleepily, I scarce knew of what. I had come to like
 
 OLALLA. 181 
 
 her dull, almost animal neighbourhood ; her beauty and 
 her stupidity soothed and amused me. I began to find 
 a kind of transcendental good sense in her remarks, and 
 her unfathomable good nature moved me to admiration 
 and envy. The liking was returned ; she enjoyed my 
 presence half-unconsciously, as a man in deep medita- 
 tion may enjoy the babbling of a brook. I can scarce 
 say she brightened when I came, for satisfaction was 
 written on her face eternally, as on some foolish stat- 
 ue's ; but I was made conscious of her pleasure by some 
 more intimate communication than the sight. And one 
 day, as I sat within reach of her on the marble step, she 
 suddenly shot forth one of her hands and patted mine. 
 The thing was done, and she was back in her accus- 
 tomed attitude, before my mind had received intelli- 
 gence of the caress ; and when I turned to look her in 
 the face I could perceive no answerable sentiment. It 
 was plain she attached no moment to the act, and I 
 blamed myself for my own more uneasy consciousness. 
 
 The sight and (if I may so call it) the acquaintance of 
 the mother confirmed the view I had already taken of 
 the sou. The family blood had been impoverished, per- 
 haps by long in-breeding, which I knew to be a common 
 error among the proud and the exclusive. No decline, 
 indeed, was to be traced in the body, which had been 
 handed down unimpaired in shapeliness and strength ; 
 and the faces of to-day were struck as sharply from the 
 mint as the face of two centuries ago that smiled upon 
 me from the portrait. But the intelligence (that more
 
 182 OLALLA. 
 
 precious heirloom) was degenerate ; the treasure of an- 
 cestral memory ran low ; and it had required the po- 
 tent, plebeian crossing of a muleteer or mountain con- 
 trabandista to raise what approached hebetude in the 
 mother into the active oddity of the son. Yet, of the 
 two, it was the mother I preferred. Of Feliije, venge- 
 ful and placable, full of starts and shyings, inconstant 
 as a hare, I could even conceive as a creature possibly 
 noxious. Of the mother I had no thoughts but those 
 of kindness. And, indeed, as spectators are apt igno- 
 rantly to take sides, I gi'ew something of a partisan in 
 the enmity which I perceived to smoulder between 
 them. Ti-ue, it seemed mostly on the mother's part. 
 She would sometimes draw in her breath as he came 
 near, and the pupils of her vacant eyes would contract 
 with horror or fear. Her emotions, such as they were, 
 were much upon the surface and readily shared ; and 
 this latent repulsion occupied my mind, and kept me 
 wondering on what grounds it rested, and whether the 
 son was certainly in fault. 
 
 I had been about ten days in the residencia, when 
 there sprang up a high and harsh wind, carrying clouds 
 of dust. It came out of malarious lowlands, and over 
 several snowy sierras. The nerves of those on whom it 
 blew were strung and jangled ; their eyes smarted with 
 the dust ; their legs ached under the burthen of their 
 body ; and the touch of one hand upon another grew to 
 be odious. The wind, besides, came down the gullies 
 of the hills and stormed about the house with a great.
 
 OLALLA. 183 
 
 hollow buzzing and whistling that was wearisome to the 
 ear and dismally depressing to the mind. It did not so 
 much blow in gusts as with the steady sweep of a water- 
 fall, so that there was no remission of discomfort while 
 it blew. But higher upon the mountain, it was prob- 
 ably of a more variable strength, with accesses of fury ; 
 for there came down at times afar-ofE wailing, infinitely 
 grievous to hear ; and at times, on one of the high 
 shelves or terraces, there would start up, and then dis- 
 perse, a tower of dust, like the smoke of an explo- 
 sion. 
 
 I no sooner awoke in bed than I was conscious of the 
 nervous tension and depression of the weather, and the 
 effect grew stronger as the day proceeded. It was in 
 vain that I resisted ; in vain that I set forth upon my 
 customary morning's walk ; the irrational, unchanging 
 fury of the storm had soon beat down my strength and 
 wrecked my temper ; and I returned to the residencia, 
 glowing with dry heat, and foul and gritty with dust. 
 The court had a forlorn appearance ; now and then a 
 glimmer of sun fled over it ; now and then the wind 
 swooped down upon the pomegranates, and scattered the 
 blossoms, and set the window shutters clapping on the 
 wall. In the recess the Seuora was pacing to and fro 
 with a flushed countenance and bright eyes ; I thought, 
 too, she was speaking to herself, like one in anger. But 
 when I addressed her with my customary salutation, she 
 only replied by a sharp gesture and continued her walk. 
 The weather had distempered even this impassive
 
 184 OLALLA. 
 
 creature ; and as I went on upstairs I was the less 
 ashamed of my own discomposure. 
 
 All day the wind continued ; and I sat in my room 
 and made a feint of reading, or walked up and down, 
 and listened to the riot overhead. Night fell, and I 
 had not so much as a candle. I began to long for some 
 society, and stole down to the court. It was now 
 plunged in the blue of the first darkness ; but the recess 
 was redly lighted by the fire. The wood had been piled 
 high, and was crowned by a shock of flames, which the 
 draught of the chimney brandished to and fro. In this 
 strong and shaken brightness the Seiiora continued 
 pacing from wall to wall with disconnected gestures, 
 clasping her hands, stretching forth her arms, throwing 
 back her head as in appeal to heaven. In these dis- 
 ordered movements the beauty and grace of the woman 
 showed more clearly ; but there was a light in her eye 
 that struck on me unpleasantly ; and when I had 
 looked on awhile in silence, and seemingly unobserved, 
 I turned tail as I had come, and groped my way back 
 again to my own chamber. 
 
 By the time Felipe brought my supper and lights, 
 my nerve was utterly gone ; and, had the lad been such 
 as I was used to seeing him, I should have kept him 
 (even by force had that been necessary) to take off the 
 edge. from my distasteful solitude. But on Felipe, also, 
 the wind had exercised its influence. He had been 
 feverish all day ; now that the night had come he was 
 fallen into a low and tremulous humour that reacted on
 
 OLALLA. 185 
 
 my own. The sight of his scared face, his starts and 
 pallors and sudden harkenings, unstrung me ; and 
 when he dropped and broke a dish, I fairly leaped out 
 of my seat. 
 
 " I think we are all mad to-day," said I, affecting to 
 laugh. 
 
 "It is the black wind," he replied dolefully. " You 
 feel as if you must do something, and you don't know 
 what it is." 
 
 I noted the aptness of the description ; but, indeed, 
 Felipe had sometimes a strange felicity in rendering 
 into words the sensations of the body. "And your 
 mother, too," said I ; "she seems to feel this weather 
 much. Do you not fear she may be unwell ? " 
 
 He stared at me a little, and then said, "No," almost 
 defiantly ; and the next moment, carrying his hand to 
 his brow, cried out lamentably on the wind and the 
 noise that made his head go round like a millwheel. 
 " Who can be well ? " he cried ; and, indeed, I could 
 only echo his question, for I was disturbed enough my- 
 self. 
 
 I went to bed early, wearied with day-long restless- 
 ness : but the poisonous nature of tlie wind, and its un- 
 godly and unintermittent uproar, would not suffer me 
 to sleep. I lay there and tossed, my nerves and senses 
 on the stretch. At times I would doze, dream horribly, 
 and Avake again ; and these snatches of oblivion con- 
 fused me as to time. But it must have been late on in 
 the night, when I was suddenly startled by an outbreak
 
 186 OLALLA. 
 
 of pitiable and hateful cries. I leaped from my bed, 
 supposing I bad dreamed ; but the cries still continued 
 to fill the house, cries of pain, I thought, but certainly 
 of rage also, and so savage and discordant that they 
 shocked the heart. It was no illusion ; some living 
 thing, some lunatic or some wild animal, was being 
 foully tortured. The thought of Felipe and the squir- 
 rel flashed into my mind, and I ran to the door, but it 
 had been locked from the outside ; and I might shake 
 it as I pleased, I was a fast prisoner. Still the cries 
 continued. Now they would dwindle down into a 
 moaning that seemed to be articulate, and at these 
 times I made sure they must be human ; and again 
 they would break forth and fill the house with ravings 
 worthy of hell. I stood at the door and gave ear to 
 them, till at last they died away. Long after that, I 
 still lingered and still continued to hear them mingle 
 in fancy with the storming of the wind ; and when at 
 last I crept to my bed, it was with a deadly sickness and 
 a blackness of horror on my heart. 
 
 It was little wonder if I slept no more. Why had I 
 been locked in ? What had j^assed ? Who was the 
 author of these indescribable and shocking cries ? A 
 human being ? It was inconceivable. A beast ? The 
 cries were scarce quite bestial ; and what animal, short 
 of a lion or a tiger, could thus shake the solid walls of 
 the residencia ? And while I was thus turning over 
 the elements of the mystery, it came into my mind 
 that I had not yet set eyes upon the daughter of the
 
 OLALLA. 187 
 
 house. What was more probable than that the daugh- 
 ter of the Seuora, and the sister of Felipe, should be 
 herself insane ? Or, what more likely than that these 
 ignorant and half-witted people should seek to manage 
 an afflicted kinswoman by violence ? Here was a solu- 
 tion ; and yet when I called to mind the cries (which I 
 never did without a shuddering chill) it seemed alto- 
 gether insufficient : not even cruelty could wring such 
 cries from madness. But of one thing I was sure : I 
 could not live in a house where such a thing was half 
 conceivable, and not probe the matter home and, if 
 necessary, interfere. 
 
 The next day came, the wind had blown itself out, 
 and there was nothing to remind me of the business of 
 the night. Felipe came to my bedside with obvious 
 cheerfulness ; as I passed through the court, the Se- 
 flora was sunning herself with her accustomed immo- 
 bility ; and when I issued from the gateway, I found 
 the whole face of nature austerely smiling, the heavens 
 of a cold blue, and sown with great cloud islands, and 
 the mountain-sides mapped forth into provinces of 
 light and shadow. A short walk restored me to myself, 
 and renewed within me the resolve to plumb this mys- 
 tery ; and when, from the vantage of my knoll, I had 
 seen Felipe pass forth to his labours in the garden, I 
 returned at once to the residencia to put my design in 
 practice. The Seflora appeared plunged in slumber ; 
 I stood awhile and marked her, but she did not stir ; 
 even if my design were indiscreet I had little to fear
 
 188 OLALLA. 
 
 from such a guarcliiin ; and turning away, I mounted 
 to the gallery and began my exploration of the house. 
 
 All morning I went from one door to another, and 
 entered spacious and faded chambers, some rudely 
 shuttered, some receiving their full charge of daylight, 
 all empty and unhomely. It was a rich house, on 
 which Time had breathed his tarnish and dust had 
 scattered disillusion. The spider swung there ; the 
 bloated tarantula scampered on the cornices ; ants had 
 their crowded highways on the floor of halls of au- 
 dience ; the big and foul fly, that lives on carrion and 
 is often the messenger of death, had set up his nest in 
 the rotten woodwork, and buzzed heavily about the 
 rooms. Here and there a stool or two, a couch, a bed, 
 or a great carved chair remained behind, like islets on 
 the bare floors, to testify of man's bygone habitation ; 
 and everywhere the walls were set with the portraits of 
 the dead. I could judge, by these decaying effigies, in 
 the house of what a great and what a handsome race I 
 was then wandering. Many of the men wore orders on 
 their breasts and had the port of noble offices ; the 
 women were all richly attired ; the canvases most of 
 them by famous hands. But it was not so much these 
 evidences of greatness that took hold upon my mind, 
 even contrasted, as they were, wdth the present depopu- 
 lation and decay of that great house. It was rather the 
 parable of family life that I read in this succession of 
 fair faces and shapely bodies. Never before had I so 
 realized the miracle of the continued race, the creation
 
 OLALLA. 189 
 
 and recreation, the weaving and changing and handing 
 down of fleshly elements. That a child should be born 
 of its mother, that it should grow and clothe itself (we 
 know not how) with humanity, and jrat on inherited 
 looks, and turn its head with the manner of one ascend- 
 ant, and offer its hand with the gesture of another, 
 are wonders dulled for us by repetition. But in the 
 singular unity of look, in the common features and 
 common bearing, of all these painted generations on the 
 walls of the residencia, the miracle started out and 
 looked me in the face. And an ancient mirror falling 
 opportunely in my way, I stood and read my own 
 features a long while, tracing out on either hand the 
 filaments of descent and the bonds that knit me with 
 my family. 
 
 At last, in the course of these inyestigations, I opened 
 the door of a chamber that bore the marks of habita- 
 tion. It was of large proportions and faced to the 
 north, where the mountains were most wildly figured. 
 The embers of a fire smouldered and smoked upon the 
 hearth, to which a chair had been drawn close. And 
 yet the aspect of the chamber was ascetic to the degree 
 of sternness ; the chair was uncushioned ; the floor and 
 walls were naked ; and beyond the books which lay 
 here and there in some confusion, there was no instru- 
 ment of either work or pleasure. The sight of books 
 in the house of such a family exceedingly amazed me ; 
 and I began with a great hurry, and in momentary fear 
 of interruption, to go from one to another and hastily
 
 190 OLALLA. 
 
 inspect their character. They were of all sorts, de- 
 votional, historical, and scientific, but mostly of a great 
 age and iu the Latin tongue. Some I could see to bear 
 the marks of constant study ; others had been torn 
 across and tossed aside as if in petulance or disap- 
 l^roval. Lastly, as I cruised about that empty chamber, 
 I espied some papers written upon with pencil on a 
 table near the window. An unthinking curiosity led 
 me to take one up. It bore a copy of verses, very 
 roughly metred in the original Spanish, and which I 
 may render somewhat thus — 
 
 Pleasure approached with pain and shame, 
 Grief with a wreath of lilies came. 
 Pleasure showed the lovely sun ; 
 Jesu dear, how sweet it shone ! 
 Grief with her worn hand pointed on, 
 Jesu dear, to thee ! 
 
 Shame and confusion at once fell on me ; and, laying 
 down the paper, I beat an immediate retreat from the 
 apartment. Neither Felipe nor his mother could have 
 read the books nor written these rough but feeling 
 verses. It was plain I had stumbled with sacrilegious 
 feet into the room of the daughter of the house. God 
 knows, my own heart most sharply punished me for my 
 indiscretion. The thought that I had thus secretly 
 pushed my way into the confidence of a girl so strangely 
 situated, and the fear that she might somehow come to 
 hear of it, oppressed me like guilt. I blamed myself 
 besides for my suspicions of the night before ; wondered
 
 OLALLA. 191 
 
 that I should ever have attributed those shocking cries 
 to one of whom I now conceived as of a saint, spectral 
 of mien, wasted with maceration, bound up in the 
 practices of a mechanical devotion, and dwelling in a 
 great isolation of soul with her incongruous relatives ; 
 and as I leaned on the balustrade of the gallery and 
 looked down into the bright close of pomegranates and 
 at the gaily dressed and somnolent woman, who just 
 then stretched herself and delicately licked her lips as 
 in the very sensuality of sloth, my mind swiftly com- 
 pared the scene with the cold chamber looking north- 
 ward on the mountains, where the daughter dwelt. 
 
 Tliat same afternoon, as I sat upon my knoll, I saw 
 the Padre enter the gates of the residencia. The reve- 
 lation of the daughter's character had struck home to 
 my fancy, and almost blotted out the horrors of the 
 night before ; but at sight of this worthy man the mem- 
 ory revived. I descended, then, from the knoll, and 
 making a circuit among the woods, posted myself by the 
 wayside to await his passage. As soon as he appeared I 
 stepped forth and introduced myself as the lodger of the 
 residencia. He had a very strong, honest countenance, 
 on Avhich it was easy to read the mingled emotions with 
 which he regarded me, as a foreigner, a heretic, and yet 
 one who had been wounded for the good cause. Of the 
 family at the residencia he spoke with reserve, and yet 
 with respect. • I mentioned that I had not yet seen the 
 daughter, whereupon he remarked that that was as it 
 should be, and looked at me a little askance. Lastly, I
 
 192 OLALLA. 
 
 plucked Tip courage to refer to the cries tliat had dis- 
 turbed me in the night. He heard mc out in silence, 
 and then stopped and partly turned about, as though to 
 mark beyond doubt that he was dismissing mc. 
 
 " Do you take tobacco powder ?" said he, offering his 
 snuff-box ; and then, when I had refused, •'! am an old 
 man," he added, ''and I may be allowed to remind you 
 that you are a guest." 
 
 "I have, then, your authority," I returned, firmly 
 enough, although I flushed at the implied reproof, "to 
 let things take their course, and not to interfere ? " 
 
 He said ''yes," and with a somewhat uneasy salute 
 turned and left me where I was. But he had done two 
 things : he had set my conscience at rest, and he had 
 awakened my delicacy. I made a great effort, once 
 more dismissed the recollections of the night, and fell 
 once more to brooding on my saintly poetess. At the 
 same time, I could not quite forget that I had been 
 locked in, and that night when Felipe brought me my 
 supper I attacked him warily on both points of in- 
 terest. 
 
 "I never see your sister," said I casually. 
 
 "Oh, no," said he ; "she is a good, good girl," and 
 his mind instantly veered to something else. 
 
 " Your sister is pious, I suppose," I asked in the next 
 pause. 
 
 " Oh," he cried, joining his hands with extreme fer- 
 vour, " a saint ; it is she that keeps me up." 
 
 "You are very fortunate," said I, "for the most of
 
 OLALLA. 193 
 
 US, I am afraid, and myself among the number, are 
 better at going down." 
 
 '^Seuor," said Felipe earnestly, ''I would not say 
 tliat. You should not tempt your angel. If one goes 
 down, where is he to stop ? " 
 
 "Why, Felipe," said I, "I had no guess you were a 
 preacher, and I may say a good one ; but I suppose that 
 is your sister's doing ?" 
 
 He nodded at me with round eyes. 
 
 ''Well, then,"' I continued, "she has doubtless re- 
 proved you for your sin of cruelty ?" 
 
 "Twelve times 1" he cried ; for this was the phrase 
 by which the odd creature expressed the sense of fre- 
 quency. "And I told her you had done so — I remem- 
 bered that," he added proudly — "and she was pleased." 
 
 "Then, Felipe," said I, "what were those cries that 
 I heard last night ? for surely they were cries of some 
 creature in suffering." 
 
 "The wind," returned Felipe, looking in the fire. 
 
 I took his hand in mine, at which, thinking it to be 
 a caress, he smiled with a brightness of pleasure that 
 came near disarming my resolve. But I trod the weak- 
 ness down. "The wind," I repeated; "and yet I 
 think it was this hand," holding it up, " that had first 
 locked me in." The lad shook visibly, but answered 
 never a word. "Well," said I, "I am a stranger and a 
 guest. It is not my part either to meddle or to judge 
 in your affairs ; in these you shall take your sister's 
 counsel, which I cannot doubt to be excellent. But in 
 13
 
 194 OLALLA. 
 
 SO far as concerns my own I will be no man's prisoner, 
 and I demand that key." Half an hour later my door 
 was suddenly thrown open, and the key tossed ringing 
 on the floor. 
 
 A day or two after I came in from a walk a little be- 
 fore the point of noon. The Senora was lying lapped 
 in slumber on the threshold of the recess ; the pigeons 
 dozed below the eaves like snowdrifts ; the house was 
 under a deep spell of noontide quiet ; and only a wan- 
 dering and gentle wind from the mountain stole round 
 the galleries, rustled among the pomegranates, and 
 pleasantly stirred the shadows. Something in the still- 
 ness moved me to imitation, and I went very lightly 
 across the court and up the marble staircase. My foot 
 was on the topmost round, when a door opened, and I 
 found myself face to face with Olalla. Surprise trans- 
 fixed me ; her loveliness struck to my heart ; she glow^ ed 
 in the deep shadow of the gallery, a gem of colour ; her 
 eyes took hold upon mine and clung there, and bound 
 us together like the Joining of hands ; and the moments 
 we thus stood face to face, drinking each other in, were 
 sacramental and the wedding of souls. I know not how 
 long it was before I awoke out of a deep trance, and, 
 hastily bowing, passed on into the upper stair. She did 
 not move, but followed me with her great, thirsting 
 eyes ; and as I passed out of sight it seemed to me as if 
 she paled and faded. 
 
 In my own room, I opened the window and looked 
 out, and could not think what change had come uj)on
 
 OLALLA. 195 
 
 that austere field of mountains that it should thus sing 
 and shine under the lofty heaven. I liad seen her — 
 Olalla ! And the stone crags answered, Olalla ! and the 
 dumb, unfathomable azure answered, Olalla ! The pale 
 saint of my dreams had vanished for ever ; and in her 
 place I beheld this maiden on whom God had lavished 
 the richest colours and the most exuberant energies of 
 life, whom he had made active as a deer, slender as a 
 reed, and in whose great eyes he had lighted the torches 
 of the soul. The thrill of her young life, strung like a 
 wild animal's, had entered into me ; the force of soul 
 that had looked out from her eyes and conquered mine, 
 mantled about my heart and sprang to my lij^s in sing- 
 ing. She passed through my veins : she was one with 
 me. 
 
 I will not say that this enthusiasm declined ; rather 
 my soul held out in its ecstasy as in a strong castle, and 
 was there besieged by cold and sorrowful considera- 
 tions. I could not doubt but that I loved her at first 
 sight, and already with a quivering ardour that was 
 strange to my experience. What then was to follow ? 
 She was the child of an afflicted house, the Senora's 
 daughter, the sister of Felipe ; she bore it even in her 
 beauty. She had the lightness and swiftness of the 
 one, swift as an arrow, light as dew ; like the other, 
 she shone on the pale background of the world with the 
 brilliancy of flowers. I could not call by the name of 
 brother that half-witted lad, nor by the name of mother 
 that immovable and lovely thing of flesh, whose silly
 
 196 OLALLA. 
 
 eyes and perpetual simper now recurred to my mind 
 like something hateful. And if I could not marry, 
 what then ? She was helplessly unprotected ; her eyes, 
 in that single and long glance which had been all our 
 intercourse, had confessed a weakness equal to my own ; 
 but in my heart I knew her for the student of the cold 
 northern chamber, and the writer of the sorrowful 
 lines ; and this was a knowledge to disarm a brute. To 
 flee was more than I could find courage for ; but I reg- 
 istered a vow of unsleeping circumspection. 
 
 As I turned from the window, my eyes alighted on 
 the portrait. It had fallen dead, like a candle after 
 sunrise ; it followed me with eyes of paint. I knew it 
 to be like, and marvelled at the tenacity of type in that 
 declining race ; but the likeness was swallowed up in 
 difference. I remembered how it had seemed to me a 
 thing unapproachable in the life, a creature rather of 
 the painter's craft than of the modesty of nature, and I 
 marvelled at the thought, and exulted in the image of 
 Olalla. Beauty I had seen before, and not been 
 charmed, and I had been often drawn to women, who 
 were not beautiful except to me ; but in Olalla all that 
 I desired and had not dared to imagine was united. 
 
 I did not see her the next day, and my heart ached 
 and my eyes longed for her, as men long for morning. 
 But the day after, when I returned, about my nsual 
 hour, she was once more on the gallery, and our looks 
 once more met and embraced. I would have spoken, I 
 would have drawn near to her ; but strongly as she
 
 OLALLA. 197 
 
 plucked at my heart, drawing me like a magnet, some- 
 thing yet more imperious withheld me ; and I could 
 only bow and pass by ; and she, leaving my salutation 
 unanswered, only followed me with her noble eyes. 
 
 I had now her image by rote, and as I conned the 
 traits in memory it seemed as if I read her very heart. 
 Slie was dressed with something of her mother's co- 
 quetry, and love of positive colour. Her robe, which I 
 knew she must have made with her own hands, clung 
 about her with a cunning grace. After the fashion of 
 that country, besides, her bodice stood open in the mid- 
 dle, in a long slit, and here, in spite of the poverty of 
 the house, a gold coin, hanging by a ribbon, lay on her 
 brown bosom. These were proofs, had any been needed, 
 of her inborn delight in life and her own loveliness. 
 On the other hand, in her eyes that hung upon mine, I 
 could read depth beyond depth of passion and sadness, 
 lights of poetry and hope, blacknesses of despair, and 
 thoughts that were above the earth. It was a lovely 
 body, but the inmate, the soul, was more than worthy 
 of that lodging. Should I leave this incomparable 
 flower to wither unseen on these rough mountains ? 
 Should I despise the great gift offered me in the elo- 
 quent silence of her eyes ? Here was a soul immured ; 
 should I not burst its prison ? All side considerations 
 fell off from me ; were she the child of Herod I swore I 
 should make her mine ; and that very evening I set 
 myself, with a mingled sense of treachery and disgrace, 
 to captivate the brother. Perhaps I read him with
 
 198 OLALLA. 
 
 more favourable eyes, perhaps the thought of his 
 sister always summoned up the better qualities of that 
 imperfect soul ; but he had never seemed to me so ami- 
 able, and his very likeness to Olalla, while it annoyed, 
 yet softened me. 
 
 A third day passed in vain — an empty desert of hours. 
 I would not lose a chance, and loitered all afternoon in 
 the court where (to give myself a countenance) I spoke 
 more than usual with the Seuora. God knows it was with 
 a most tender and sincere interest that I now studied 
 her; and even as for Felipe, so now for the mother, I 
 was conscious of a growing warmth of toleration. And 
 yet I wondered. Even while I spoke with her, she 
 would doze off into a little sleep, and presently awake 
 again without embarrassment ; and this composure 
 staggered me. And again, as I marked her make in- 
 finitesimal changes in her posture, savouring and linger- 
 ing on the bodily pleasure of the moment, I was driven 
 to wonder at this depth of passive sensuality. She 
 lived in her body ; and her consciousness was all. sunk 
 into and disseminated through her members, where it 
 luxuriously dwelt. Lastly, I could not grow accustomed 
 to her eyes. Each time she turned on me these great 
 beautiful and meaningless orbs, wide open to the day, 
 but closed against human inquiry — each time I had oc- 
 casion to observe the lively changes of her pupils which 
 expanded and contracted in a breath — I know not what 
 it was came over me, I can find no name for the min- 
 gled feeling of disappointment, annoyance, and distaste
 
 OLALLA. 199 
 
 that jarred along my nerves. I tried her on a variety of 
 subjects, equally in vain ; and at last led the talk to her 
 daughter. But even there she proved indifferent ; said 
 she was pretty, which (as with children) was her high- 
 est word of commendation, but was plainly incapable of 
 any higher thought ; and when I remarked tliat Olalla 
 seemed silent, merely yawned in my face and replied 
 that speech was of no great use when you had nothing 
 to say. " People speak much, very much," she added, 
 looking at me with expanded pupils ; and then again 
 yawned, and again showed me a mouth that was as 
 dainty as a toy. This time I took the hint, and, leav- 
 ing her to her repose, went up into my own chamber to 
 sit by the open window, looking on the hills and not be- 
 holding them, sunk in lustrous and deep dreams, and 
 hearkening in fancy to the note of a voice that I had 
 never heard. 
 
 I awoke on the fifth morning with a brightness of an- 
 ticipation that seemed to challenge fate. I was sure of 
 myself, light of heart and foot, and resolved to put my 
 love incontinently to the touch of knowledge. It should 
 lie no longer under the bonds of silence, a dumb thing, 
 living by the eye only, like tlie love of beasts ; but should 
 now put on the spirit, and enter upon the joys of the 
 complete human intimacy. I thought of it with wild 
 hopes, like a voyager to El Dorado ; into that unknown 
 and lovely country of her soul, I no longer trembled to 
 adventure. Yet when I did indeed encounter her, the 
 same force of passion descended on me and at once sub-
 
 200 OLALLA. 
 
 merged mj mind ; speech seemed to drop away from me 
 like a childish habit ; and I but drew near to her as the 
 giddy man draws near to the margin of a gulf. She 
 drew back from me a little as I came ; but her eyes did 
 not waver from mine, and these lured me forward. At 
 last, when I was already within reach of her, I stopped. 
 Words were denied me ; if I advanced I could but clasp 
 her to my heart in silence ; and all that was sane in me, 
 aU that was still unconquered, revolted against the 
 thought of such an accost. So we stood for a second, all 
 our life in our eyes, exchanging salvos of attraction and 
 yet each resisting ; and then, with a great effort of the 
 will, and conscious at the same time of a sudden bitter- 
 ness of disappointment, I turned and went away in the 
 same silence. 
 
 "What power lay upon me that I could not speak ? 
 And she, why was she also silent ? Why did she draw 
 away before me dumbly, with fascinated eyes ? Was 
 this love ? or was it a mere brute attraction, mindless 
 and inevitable, like that of the magnet for the steel ? 
 We had never spoken, we were wholly strangers ; and 
 yet an influence, strong as the grasp of a giant, swept us 
 silently together. On my side, it filled me witli im- 
 patience ; and yet I was sure that she was worthy ; I had 
 seen her books, read her verses, and thus, in a sense, 
 divined the soul of my mistress. But on her side, it 
 struck me almost cold. Of me, she knew nothing but 
 my bodily favour ; she was drawn to me as stones fall to 
 earth ; the laws that rule the earth conducted her, uncou-
 
 OLALLA. 201 
 
 sen ting, to my arms ; and I drew back at the thought of 
 such a bridal, and began to be jealous for myself. It was 
 not thus that I desired to be loved. And then I began to 
 fall into a great pity for the girl herself. I thought how 
 sharp must be her mortification, that she, the student, 
 the recluse, Felii^e's saintly monitress, should have thus 
 confessed an overweening weakness for a man with whom 
 she had never exchanged a word. And at the coming of 
 pity, all other thoughts were swallowed up ; and I 
 longed only to find and console and reassure her ; to tell 
 her how wholly her love was returned on my side, and 
 how her choice, even if blindly made, was not unworthy. 
 The next day it was glorious weather ; depth upon 
 depth of blue over-canopied the mountains ; the sun 
 shone wide ; and the wind in the trees and the many 
 falling torrents in the mountains filled the air with deli- 
 cate and haunting music. Yet I was prostrated with 
 sadness. My heart wept for the sight of Olalla, as a 
 child weeps for its mother. I sat down on a boulder on 
 the verge of the low cliffs that bound the plateau to the 
 north. Thence I looked down into the wooded valley of 
 a stream, where no foot came. In the mood I was in, 
 it was even touching to behold the place untenanted ; it 
 lacked Olalla ; and I thought of the delight and glory 
 of a life passed wholly with her in that strong air, and 
 among these rugged and lovely surroundings, at first 
 with a whimpering sentiment, and then again with such 
 a fiery Joy that I seemed to grow in strength and stature, 
 like a Samson.
 
 202 OLALLA. 
 
 And then suddenly I was aware of Olalla drawing 
 near. She appeared out of a grove of cork-trees, and 
 came straight towards me ; and I stood up and waited. 
 She seemed in her walking a creature of such life and 
 five and lightness as amazed me ; yet she came quietly 
 and slowly. Her energy was in the slowness ; but for 
 inimitable strength, I felt she would have run, she 
 would have flown to me. Still, as she approached, 
 she kept her eyes lowered to the ground ; and when 
 she had drawn quite near, it was without one glance 
 that she addressed me. At the first note of her voice 
 I started. It was for this I had been waiting ; this 
 was the last test of my love. And lo, her enunciation 
 was i^recise and clear, not lisjiing and incomplete like 
 that of her family ; and the voice, Jiough-deeper than 
 usual with women, was still both youthful and womanly. 
 She spoke in a rich chord ; golden contralto strains 
 mingled with hoarseness, as the red threads were 
 mingled with the brown among her tresses. It was 
 not only a voice that spoke to my heart directly ; but 
 it spoke to me of her. And yet her words immediately 
 plunged me back upon desj^air. 
 
 ''You will go away," she said, '''to-day." 
 Her example broke the bonds of my speech ; I felt 
 as lightened of a weight, or as if a spell had been dis- 
 solved. I know not in what words I answered ; but, 
 standing before her on the cliffs, I poured out the whole 
 ardour of my love, telling her that I lived upon the 
 thought of her, slept only to dream of her loveliness,
 
 OLALLA. 203 
 
 and would gladly forswear my country, my language, 
 and my friends, to live for ever by her side. And then, 
 strongly commanding myself, I changed the note ; I 
 reassured, I comforted her ; I told her I had divined 
 in her a pious and heroic spirit, with which I was 
 worthy to sympathise, and which I longed to share and 
 ligliten. *' Nature," I told her, "was the voice of God, 
 which men disobey at peril : and if we were thus 
 dumbly drawn together, ay, even as by a miracle of 
 love, it must imply a divine fitness in our souls ; we 
 must be made," I said — "made for one another. We 
 should be mad rebels," I cried out — "mad rebels against 
 God, not to obey this instinct." 
 
 She shook her head. "You will go to-day," she 
 repeated, and then with a gesture, and in a sudden, 
 sharp note — "no, not to-day," she cried, "to-morrow." 
 
 But at this sign of relenting, power came in upon me 
 in a tide. I stretched out my arms and called upon her 
 name ; and she leaped to me and clung to me. The 
 hills rocked about us, the earth quailed ; a shock as of 
 a blow went through me and left me blind and dizzy. 
 And the next moment she had thrust me back, broken 
 rudely from my arms, and fled with the speed of a deer 
 among the cork-trees. 
 
 I stood, and shouted to the mountains ; I turned and 
 went back towards the residencia, walking upon air. 
 She sent me away, and yet I had but to call ujion her 
 name and she came to me. These were but the weak- 
 nesses of girls, from which even she, the strangest of
 
 204 OLALLA. 
 
 her sex, was not exempted. Go ? Not I, Olalla — 0, not 
 I, Olalla, my Olalla ! A bird sang near by ; and in that 
 season, birds were rare. It bade me be of good cheer. 
 And once more the whole countenance of nature, from 
 the ponderous and stable mountains down to the light- 
 est leaf and the smallest darting fly in the shadow of the 
 groves, began to stir before me and to put on the linea- 
 ments of life and wear a face of awful joy. The sun- 
 shine struck upon the hills, strong as a hammer on the 
 anvil, and the hills shook ; the earth, under that vigor- 
 ous insolation, yielded up heady scents ; the woods 
 smouldered in the blaze. I felt the thrill of travail and 
 delight run through the earth. Something elemental, 
 something rude, violent, and savage, in the love that 
 sang in my heart, was like a key to nature's secrets ; and 
 the very stones that rattled under my feet appeared 
 alive and friendly. Olalla ! Her touch had quickened, 
 and renewed, and strung me up to the old pitch of con- 
 cert with the rugged earth, to a swelling of the soul that 
 men learn to forget in their polite assemblies. Love 
 burned in me like rage ; tenderness waxed fierce ; I 
 hated, I adored, I pitied, I revered her with ecstasy. 
 She seemed the link that bound me in with dead things 
 on the one hand, and with our pure and pitying God 
 upon the other ; a thing brutal and divine, and akin at 
 once to the innocence and to the unbridled forces of 
 the earth. 
 
 My head thus reeling, I came into the courtyard of 
 the residencia, and the sight of the mother struck me
 
 OLALLA. 205 
 
 like a revelation. She sat there, all sloth and content- 
 ment, blinking under the strong sunshine, branded with 
 , a passive enjoyment, a creature set quite apart, before 
 whom my ardour fell away like a thing ashamed. I 
 stopped a moment, and, commanding such shaken tones 
 as I was able, said a word or two. She looked at me 
 with her unfathomable kindness ; lier voice in reply 
 sounded vaguely out of the realm of peace in which she 
 slumbered, and there fell on my mind, for the first time, 
 a sense of respect for one so uniformly innocent and 
 happy, and I passed on in a kind of wonder at myself, 
 that I should be so much disquieted. 
 
 On my table there lay a piece of the same yellow 
 paper I had seen in the north room ; it was written on 
 with pencil in the same hand, Olalla's hand, and I picked 
 it up with a sudden sinking of alarm, and read, "If you 
 have any kindness for Olalla, if you have any chivalry 
 for a creature sorely wrought, go from here to-day ; in 
 pity, in honour, for the sake of Him who died, I suppli- 
 cate that you shall go." I looked at this awhile in mere 
 stupidity, then I began to awaken to a weariness and 
 horror of life ; the sunshine darkened outside on the 
 bare hills, and I began to shake like a man in terror. 
 The vacancy thus suddenly opened in my life unmanned 
 me like a physical void. It was not my heart, it was not 
 my happiness, it was life itself that was involved. I 
 could not lose her. I said so, and stood repeating it. 
 And then, like one in a dream, I moved to the window, 
 put forth my hand to open the casement, and thrust it
 
 206 OLALLA. 
 
 through the pane. The blood spurted from my wrist ; 
 and with an instantaneous quietude and command of 
 myself, I pressed my thumb on the little leaping foun- 
 tain, and reflected what to do. In that empty room 
 there was nothing to my purpose ; I felt, besides, that I 
 required assistance. There shot into my mind a hope 
 that Olalla herself might be my helper, and I turned 
 and went down stairs, still keeping my thumb upon the 
 wound. 
 
 There was no sign of either Olalla or Felii3e, and I 
 addressed myself to the recess, whither the Senora had 
 now drawn quite back and sat dozing close before the 
 fire, for no degree of heat appeared too much for her. 
 
 ''Pardon me," said I, *'if I disturb you, but I must 
 apply to you for help." 
 
 She looked up sleepily and asked me what it was, and 
 with the Tery words, I thought she drew in her breath 
 with a widening of the nostrils and seemed to come sud- 
 denly and fully alive. 
 
 "I have cut myself," I said, "and rather badly. 
 See !" And I held out my two hands from which the 
 blood was oozing and dripping. 
 
 Her great eyes opened wide, the pupils shrank into 
 points ; a yeil seemed to fall from her face, and leave it 
 sharply expressive and yet inscrutable. And as I still 
 stood, marvelling a little at her disturbance, she came 
 swiftly up to me, and stooped and caughb me by the 
 hand ; and the next moment my hand was at her mouth, 
 and she had bitten me to the bone. The pang of the
 
 OLALLA. 207 
 
 bite, the sudden spurting of blood, and the monstrous 
 horror of the act, flashed througli me all in one, and I 
 beat her back ; and she sprang at me again and again, 
 with bestial cries, cries that I recognised, such cries as 
 had awakened me on the night of the high wind. Her 
 strength was like that of madness ; mine was rapidly 
 ebbing with the loss of blood ; my mind besides was 
 whirling with the abhorrent strangeness of the onslaught, 
 and I was already forced against the wall, when Olalla 
 ran betwixt us, and Felipe, following at a bound, pinned 
 down his mother on the floor. 
 
 A trance-like weakness fell upon me ; I saw, heard, 
 and felt, but I was incapable of movement. I heard the 
 struggle roll to and fro upon the floor, the yells of that 
 catamount ringing up to Heaven as she strove to reach 
 me. I felt Olalla clasp me in her arms, her hair falling 
 on my face, and, with the strength of a man, raise and 
 half drag, half carry me up stairs into my own room, 
 where she cast me down upon the bed. Then I saw her 
 hasten to the door and lock it, and stand an instant lis- 
 tening to the savage cries that shook the residencia. 
 And then, swift and light as a thought, she was again 
 beside me, binding ujd my hand, laying it in her bosom, 
 moaning and mourning over it with dove-like sounds. 
 They were not words that came to her, they were sounds 
 more beautiful than speech, infinitely touching, infi- 
 nitely tender ; and yet as I lay there, a thought stung to 
 my heart, a thought wounded me like a sword, a thought, 
 like a worm in a flower, profaned the holiness of my
 
 208 OLALLA. 
 
 love. Yes, they were beautiful sounds, and they were 
 inspired by human tenderness ; but was their beauty 
 human ? 
 
 All day I lay there. For a long time the cries of that 
 nameless female thing, as she struggled with her half- 
 witted whelp, resounded through the house, and pierced 
 me with despairing sorrow and disgust. They were the 
 death-cry of my love ; my love was murdered ; it was 
 not only dead, but an offence to me ; and yet, think as 
 I pleased, feel as I must, it still swelled within me like a 
 storm of sweetness, and my heart melted at her looks 
 and touch. This horror that had sprung out, this 
 doubt ujion Olalla, this savage and bestial strain that 
 ran not only through the whole behaviour of her family, 
 but found a place in the very foundations and story of 
 our love — though it appalled, though it shocked and 
 sickened me, was yet not of power to break the knot of 
 my infatuation. 
 
 When the cries had ceased, there came the scraping at 
 the door, by which I knew Felipe was without ; and 
 Olalla went and spoke to him — I know not what. With 
 that exception, she stayed close beside me, now kneeling 
 by my bed and fervently praying, now sitting with her 
 eyes upon mine. So then, for these six hours I drank 
 in her beauty, and silently perused the story in her face. 
 I saw the golden coin hover on her breaths ; I saw her 
 eyes darken and brighten, and still speak no language 
 but that of an unfathomable kindness ; I saw the fault- 
 less face, and, through the robe, the lines of the fault-
 
 OLALLA. 209 
 
 less body. Night came at last, and in the growing 
 darkness of the chamber, the sight of her slowly melted; 
 but even then the touch of her smooth hand lingered in 
 mine and talked with me. To lie thus in deadly weak- 
 ness and drink in the traits of the beloved, is to reawake 
 to love from whatever shock of disillusion. I reasoned 
 with myself ; and I shut my eyes on horrors, and again 
 I was very bold to accept the worst. What mattered it, 
 if that imperious sentiment survived ; if her eyes still 
 beckoned and attached me ; if now, even as before, 
 every fibre of my dull body yearned and turned to her ? 
 Late on in the night some strength revived in me, and 
 I spoke : — 
 
 " Olalla," I said, " nothing matters ; I ask nothing ; 
 I am content ; I love you." 
 
 She knelt down awhile and prayed, and I devoutly 
 respected her devotions. The moon had begun to shine 
 in upon one side of each of the three windows, and 
 make a misty clearness in the room, by which I saw her 
 indistinctly. When she rearose she made the sign of the 
 cross. 
 
 ''It is for me to speak," she said, "and for you to 
 listen. I know ; you can but guess. I prayed, how I 
 prayed for you to leave this place. I begged it of you, 
 and I know you would have granted me even this ; or 
 if not, let me think soJ" 
 
 "1 love you," I said. 
 
 "And yet you have lived in the world," she said ; 
 after a pause, " you are a man and wise ; and I am but 
 14
 
 210 OLALLA. 
 
 a child. Forgive me, if I seem to teach, who am as 
 ignorant as the trees of the mountain ; but those who 
 learn much do but skim the face of knowledge ; they 
 seize the laws, they conceive the dignity of the design — 
 the horror of the living fact fades from their memory. 
 It is we who sit at home with evil who remember, I 
 think, and are warned and j)ity. Go, rather, go now, 
 and keep me in mind. So I shall have a life in the 
 cherished j^laces of your memory : a life as much my 
 own, as that which I lead in this body." 
 
 "I love you," I said once more; and reaching out 
 my weak hand, took hers, and carried it to my lij^s, and 
 kissed it. Nor did slis resist, but winced a little ; and I 
 could see her look upon me with a frown that was not 
 unkindly, only sad and baffled. And then it seemed she 
 made a call upon her resolution ; plucked my hand 
 towards her, herself at the same time leaning somewhat 
 forward, and laid it on the beating of her heart. 
 *' There," she cried, ''you feel the very footfall of my 
 life. It only moves for you ; it is yours. But is it even 
 mine ? It is mine indeed to offer you, as I might take 
 the coin from my neck, as I might break a live branch 
 from a tree, and give it you. And yet not mine ! I 
 dwell, or I think I dwell (if I exist at all), somewhere 
 apart, an impotent prisoner, and carried about and 
 deafened by a mob that I disown. This capsule, such 
 as throbs against the sides of animals, knows you at a 
 touch for its master; ay, it loves you ! But my soul, 
 does my soul ? I think not; I know not, fearing to
 
 OLALLA. 211 
 
 ask. Yet when you spoke to me your words were of 
 the soul ; it is of the soul that you ask — it is only from 
 the soul that you would take me." 
 
 " Olalla," I said, " the soul and the body are one, 
 and mostly so in love. What the body chooses, the 
 soul loves ; where the body clings, the soul cleaves ; 
 body for body, soul to soul they come together at 
 God's signal ; and the lower part (if we can call aught 
 low) is only the footstool and foundation of the high- 
 est." 
 
 **Have you," she said, ''seen the portraits in the 
 house of my fathers ? Have you looked at my mother 
 or at Felipe ? Have your eyes ever rested on that pic- 
 ture that hangs by your bed ? She who sat for it died 
 ages ago ; and she did evil in her life. But look again : 
 there is my hand to the least line, there are my eyes 
 and my hair. What is mine, then, and what am I ? 
 If not a curve in this poor body of mine (which you 
 love, and for the sake of which you dotingly dream that 
 you love me) not a gesture that I can frame, not a tone 
 of my voice, not any look from my eyes, no, not even 
 now when I speak to him 1 love, but has belonged to 
 others ? Others, ages dead, have wooed other men with 
 my eyes ; other men have heard the pleading of the 
 same voice that now sounds in your ears. The hands 
 of the dead are in my bosom ; they move me, they 
 pluck me, they guide me ; I am a puppet at their com- 
 mand ; and I but reinform features and attributes that 
 have long been laid aside from evil in the quiet of the
 
 212 OLALLA. 
 
 grave. Is it me you love, friend ? or the race that 
 made me ? The girl who does not know and can- 
 not answer for the least portion of herself ? or the 
 stream of which she is a transitory eddy, the tree of 
 which she is the passing fruit ? The race exists ; it is 
 old, it is ever young, it carries its etei^nal destiny in its 
 bosom ; upon it, like waves upon the sea, individual 
 succeeds to individual, mocked with a semblance of 
 self-control, but they are nothing. We speak of the 
 soul, but the soul is in the race." 
 
 "You fret against the common law," I said. "You 
 rebel against the voice of God, which he has made so 
 winning to convince, so imperious to command. Hear 
 it, and how it speaks between us ! Your hand clings 
 to mine, your heart leaps at my touch, the unknown 
 elements of which we are compounded awake and run 
 together at a look ; the clay of the earth remembers its 
 independent life and yearns to join us ; we are drawn 
 together as the stars are turned about in space, or as 
 the tides ebb and flow, by things older and greater than 
 we ourselves." 
 
 "Alas!" she said, "what can I say to you? My 
 fathers, eight hundred years ^go, ruled all this pro- 
 vince : they were wise, great, cunning, and cruel ; they 
 were a picked race of the Spanish ; their flags led in 
 war ; the king called them his cousin ; the people, 
 when the rope was slung for them or when they re- 
 turned and found their hovels smoking, blasphemed 
 their name. Presently a change began. Man has
 
 OLALLA. 213 
 
 risen ; if he has sprung from the brutes, he can descend 
 again to the same level. The breath of weariness blew 
 on their humanity and the cords relaxed ; they began 
 to go down ; their minds fell on sleep, their passions 
 awoke in gusts, heady and senseless like the wind in 
 the gutters of the mountains ; beauty was still handed 
 down, but no longer the guiding wit nor the human 
 heart ; the seed passed on, it was wrapped in flesh, the 
 flesh covered the bones, but they were the bones and 
 the flesh of brutes, and their mind was as the mind of 
 flies. I speak to you as I dare ; but you have seen for 
 yourself how the wheel has gone backward with my 
 doomed race. I stand, as it were, upon a little rising 
 ground in this desperate descent, and see both before 
 and behind, both what we have lost and to what we are 
 condemned to go farther downward. And shall I — I 
 that dwell aj)art in the house of the dead, my body, 
 loathing its ways — shall I rejieat the spell ? Shall I 
 bind another spirit, reluctant as my own, into this be- 
 witched and tempest-broken tenement that I now suffer 
 in ? Shall I hand down this cursed vessel of humanity, 
 charge it with fresh life as with fresh poison, and dash 
 it, like a fire, in the faces of posterity ? But my vow 
 has been given ; the race shall cease from off the earth. 
 At this hour my brother is making ready ; his foot will 
 soon be on the stair ; and you will go with him and pass 
 out of my sight for ever. Think of me sometimes as 
 one to whom the lesson of life was very harshly told, 
 but who heard it with courage ; as one who loved you
 
 214 OLALLA. 
 
 indeed, but who hated herself so deeply that her love 
 was hateful to her ; as one who sent you away and yet 
 would haye longed to keep you for ever ; who had no 
 dearer hope than to forget you, and no greater fear 
 than to be forgotten." 
 
 She had drawn towards the door as she spoke, her 
 rich voice sounding softer and farther away ; and with 
 the last word she was gone, and I lay alone in the 
 moonlit chamber. What I might have done had not I 
 lain bound by my extreme weakness, I know not ; but 
 as it was there fell upon me a great and blank despair. 
 It was not long before there shone in at the door the 
 ruddy glimmer of a lantern, and Felipe coming, 
 charged me without a word upon his shoulders, and 
 carried me down to the great gate, where the cart was 
 waiting. In the moonlight the hills stood out sharply, 
 as if they were of cardboard ; on the glimmering sur- 
 face of the plateau, and from among the low trees 
 which swung together and si)arkled in the wind, the 
 great black cube of the residencia stood out bulkily, 
 its mass only broken by three dimly lighted windows in 
 the northern front above the gate. They were Olalla's 
 windows, and as the cart jolted onwards I kept my eyes 
 fixed upon them till, where the road dipped into a val- 
 ley, they were lost to my view for ever. Felipe walked 
 in silence beside the shafts, but from time to time he 
 would check the mule and seem to look back upon me ; 
 and at length drew quite near and laid his hand upon 
 my head. There was such kindness in the touch, and
 
 OLALLA. 2J5 
 
 such a simplicity, as of the brutes, that tears broke 
 from me like the bursting of an artery. 
 
 *•' Felipe," I said, "take me where they will ask no 
 questions." 
 
 He said never a word, but he turned his mule about, 
 end for end, retraced some j^art of the way we had 
 gone, and, striking into another path, led me to the 
 mountain village, which was, as we say in Scotland, 
 the kirkton of that thinly peopled district. Some 
 broken memories dwell in my mind of the day breaking 
 over the plain, of the cart stopping, of arms that helped 
 me down, of a bare room into which I was carried, and 
 of a swoon that fell upon me like sleep. 
 
 The next day and the days following, the old priest 
 was often at my side with his snuff-box and prayer 
 book, and after a while, when I began to pick up 
 strength, he told me that I was now on a fair way to 
 recovery, and must as scon as possible hurry my depar- 
 ture ; whereupon, without naming any reason, he took 
 snuff and looked at me sideways. I did not affect igno- 
 rance ; I knew he must have seen Olalla. ''Sir," said 
 I, ''you know that I do not ask in wantonness. What 
 of that family ? " 
 
 He said they were very unfortunate ; that it seemed 
 a declining race, and that they were very poor and had 
 been much neglected. 
 
 "But she has not," I said. "Thanks, doubtless, to 
 yourself, she is instructed and wise beyond the use of 
 women."
 
 216 OLALLA. 
 
 ''Yes," he said; 'Hlic Senorita is well-informed. 
 But the family has been neglected." 
 
 ''The mother ? " I queried. 
 
 "Yes, the mother too," said the Padre, taking snuff. 
 "But Felipe is a well-intentioned lad." 
 
 " The mother is odd ? " I asked. 
 
 "Very odd," replied the priest. 
 
 "I think, sir, we beat about the bush," said I. 
 "You must know more of my affairs than you allow. 
 You must know my curiosity to be justified on many 
 grounds. Will you not be frank with me ? " 
 
 " My son," said the old gentleman, "I will be very 
 frank with you on matters within my competence ; on 
 those of which I know nothing it does not require much 
 discretion to be silent. I will not fence with you, I 
 take your meaning perfectly ; and what can I say, but 
 that we are all in God's hands, and that His ways are 
 not as our ways ? I have even advised with my superi- 
 ors in the church, but they, too, were dumb. It is a 
 great mystery. " 
 
 " Is she mad ? " I asked. 
 
 " I Avill answer you according to my belief. She is 
 not," returned the Padre, "or she was not. When she 
 was young — God help me, I fear I neglected that wild 
 lamb — she was surely sane ; and yet, although it did 
 not run to such heights, the same strain was already 
 notable ; it had been so before her in her father, ay, and 
 before him, and this inclined me, perhaps, to think too 
 lightly of it. But these things go on grov/ing, not only 
 in the individual but in the race."
 
 OLALLA. 217 
 
 "When she was young," I began, and my voice 
 failed me for a moment, and it was only with a great 
 effort that I was able to add, " was she like Olalla ? " 
 
 "Now God forbid!" exclaimed the Padre. "God 
 forbid that any man should think so slightingly of my 
 favourite penitent. No, no ; the Senorita (but for her 
 beauty, which I wish most honestly she had less of) 
 has not a hair's resemblance to what her mother was 
 at the same age. I could not bear to have you think 
 so ; though. Heaven knows, it were, perhaps, better 
 that you should." 
 
 At this, I raised myself in bed, and opened my heart 
 to the old man ; telling him of our love and of her de- 
 cision, owning my own horrors, my own passing fancies, 
 but telling him that these were at an end ; and with 
 something more than a purely formal submission, ap- 
 pealing to his judgment. 
 
 He heard me very patiently and witliout surprise ; 
 and when I had done, he sat for some time silent. 
 Then he began : " The church," and instantly broke off 
 again to apologise. "' I had forgotten, my child, that 
 you were not a Christian," said he. "And indeed, 
 upon a point so highly unusual, even the church can 
 scarce be said to have decided. But would you have 
 my opinion ? The Senorita is, in a matter of this kind, 
 the best judge ; I would accept her judgment." 
 
 On the back of that he went away, nor was he thence- 
 forward so assiduous in his visits ; indeed, even when I 
 began to get about again, he plainly feared and dep-
 
 218 OLALLA. 
 
 recated my society, not as in distaste but much as a 
 man might be disposed to flee from the riddling sphynx. 
 The villagers, too, avoided me ; they were unwilling to 
 be my guides upon the mountain. I thought they 
 looked at me askance, and I made sure that the more 
 superstitious crossed themselves on my approach. At 
 first I set this down to my heretical opinions ; but it 
 began at length to dawn upon me that if I was thus re- 
 doubted it was because I had stayed at the residencia. 
 All men despise the savage notions of such peasantry ; 
 and yet I was conscious of a chill shadow that seemed 
 to fall and dwell upon my love. It did not conquer, 
 but I may not deny that it restrained my ardour. 
 
 Some miles westward of the village there was a gap 
 in the sierra, from which the eye plunged direct upon 
 the residencia ; and thither it became my daily habit to 
 repair. A wood crowned the summit ; and just where 
 the 23athway issued from its fringes, it was overhung by 
 a considerable shelf of rock, and that, in its turn, was 
 surmounted by a crucifix of the size of life and more 
 than usually painful in design. This was my perch ; 
 thence, day after day, I looked down upon the plateau, 
 and the great old house, and could see Felipe, no bigger 
 than a fiy, going to and fro about the garden. Some- 
 times mists would draw across the view, and be broken 
 up again by mountain winds ; sometimes the plain 
 slumbered below me in unbroken sunshine ; it would 
 sometimes be all blotted out by rain. This distant 
 post, these interrupted sights of the place where my life
 
 OLALLA. 219 
 
 had been so strangely changed suited the indecision of 
 my humour. I passed whole days there, debating with 
 myself the various elements of our position ; now lean- 
 ing to the suggestions of love, now giving an ear to 
 prudence, and in the end halting irresolute between the 
 two. 
 
 One day, as I was sitting on my rock, there came 
 by that way a somewhat gaunt peasant wrapped in a 
 mantle. He was a stranger, and plainly did not know 
 me even by repute ; for, instead of keeping the other 
 side, he drew near and sat down beside me, and we 
 had soon fallen in talk. Among other things he told 
 me he had been a muleteer, and in former years had 
 much frequented these mountains ; later on, he had 
 followed the army with his mules, had realised a com- 
 petence, and was now living retired with his family. 
 
 "Do you know that house?" I inquired, at last, 
 pointing to the residencia, for I readily wearied of any 
 talk that kept me from the thought of Olalla. 
 
 He looked at me darkly and crossed himself. 
 
 " Too well," he said, " it was there that one of my 
 comrades sold himself to Satan ; the Virgin shield us 
 from temptations ! He has paid the 25rice ; he is now 
 burning in the reddest place in Hell ! " 
 
 A fear came upon me ; I could answer nothing ; and 
 presently the man resumed, as if to himself. "Yes," 
 he said, " yes, I know it. I have passed its doors. 
 There was snow upon the pass, the wind was driving 
 it ; sure enough there was death that night upon the
 
 220 OLALLA. 
 
 mountains, but there was worse beside the hearth. I 
 took him by the arm, Seuor, and dragged him to the 
 gate; I conjured him, by all he loved and respected, to 
 go forth with me ; I went on my knees before him in 
 the snow ; and I could see he was moved by my en- 
 treat3\ And just then she came out on the gallery, and 
 called him by his name ; and he turned, and there was 
 she standing with a lamp in her hand and smiling on 
 him to come back. I cried out aloud to God, and 
 threw my arms about him, but he jDut me by, and left 
 me alone. He had made his choice ; God help us. I 
 would pray for him, but to what end ? there are sins 
 that not even the Pope can loose." 
 
 " And your friend, "I asked, ''what became of him ?" 
 
 "Nay, God knows," said the muleteer ; "If all be 
 true that we hear, his end was like his sin, a thing to 
 raise the hair." 
 
 *' Do you mean that he was killed ? " I asked. 
 
 " Sure enough, he was killed," returned the man. 
 *' But how ? Ay, how ? But these are things that 
 it is sin to speak of." 
 
 "■ The people of that house . . . " I began. 
 
 But he interrupted me with a savage outburst. 
 "The people?" he cried. "What people? There 
 are neither men nor women in that house of Satan's ! 
 What ? have you lived here so long, and never heard ? " 
 And here he put his mouth to my ear and whispered, 
 as if even the fowls of the mountain might have over- 
 heard and been striken with horror.
 
 OLALLA. 221 
 
 What he told me was not true, nor was it even 
 original ; being, indeed, but a new edition, vamped up 
 again by village ignorance and superstition, of stories 
 nearly as ancient as the race of man. It was rather 
 the application that appalled me. In the old days, 
 he said, the church would have burned out that nest 
 of basilisks ; but the arm of the cliurch was now 
 shortened ; his friend Miguel had been unpunished 
 by the hands by men, and left to the more awful 
 judgment of an offended God. This was wrong ; but 
 it should be so no more. The Padre was sunk in age ; 
 he was even bewitched himself ; but the eyes of his 
 flock were now awake to their own danger ; and some 
 day — ay, and before long — the smoke of that house 
 should go up to heaven. 
 
 He left me filled with horror and fear. Which way 
 to turn I knew not ; whether first to warn the Padre, or 
 to carry my ill-news direct to the threatened inhabitants 
 of the residencia. Fate was to decide for rae ; for, 
 while I was still hesitating, I beheld the veiled figure of 
 a woman drawing near to me up the pathway. No veil 
 could deceive my penetration ; by every line and every 
 movement I recognized Olalla ; and keeping hidden be- 
 hind a corner of the rock, I suffered her to gain the 
 summit. Then I came forward. She knew me and 
 paused, but did not speak ; I, too, remained silent ; 
 and we continued for some time to gaze upon each 
 other with a passionate sadness. 
 
 '' I thought you had gone," she said at length. " It
 
 222 OLALLA. 
 
 is all that you can do for me — to go. It is all I ever 
 asked of yon. And you still stay. But do you know, 
 that every day heaps up the peril of death, not only on 
 your head, but on ours ? A report has gone about the 
 mountain ; it is thought you love me^. and the people 
 will not suffer it." 
 
 I saw she was already informed of her danger, and I 
 rejoiced at it. ''Olalla," I said, ''I am ready to go 
 this day, this very hour, but not alone." 
 
 She stepped aside and knelt down before the crucifix 
 to pray, and I stood by and looked now at her and now 
 at the object of her adoration, now at the living figure 
 of the penitent, and now at the ghastly, daubed coun- 
 tenance, the painted wounds, and the projected ribs of 
 the image. The silence was only broken by the wailing 
 of some large birds that circled sidelong, as if in sur- 
 prise or alarm, about the summit of the hills. Presently 
 Olalla rose again, turned towards me, raised her veil, 
 and, still leaning with one hand on the shaft of the cru- 
 cifix, looked upon me with a pale and sorrowful coun- 
 tenance. 
 
 "I have laid my hand upon the cross," she said. 
 " The Padre says you are no Christian ; but look up 
 for a moment with my eyes, and behold the face of the 
 Man of Sorrows. We are all such as He was — the in- 
 heritors of sin ; we must all bear and expiate a past 
 which was not ours ; there is in all of us — ay, even in 
 me — a sparkle of the divine. Like Him, we must en- 
 dure for a little while, until morning returns bringing
 
 OLALLA. 223 
 
 peace. Suffer me to pass on upon my way alone ; it is 
 thus that I shall be least lonely, counting for my 
 friend Him who is the friend of all the distressed ; it is 
 thus that I shall be the most happy, having taken my 
 farewell of earthly happiness, and willingly accepted 
 sorrow for my portion." 
 
 I looked at the face of the crucifix, and, though I 
 was no friend to images, and despised that imitative 
 and grimacing art of which it was a rude example, some 
 sense of what the thing implied was carried home to my 
 intelligence. The face looked down upon me with a 
 painful and deadly contraction ; but the rays of a glory 
 encircled it, and reminded me that the sacrifice was vol- 
 untary. It stood there, crowning the rock, as it still 
 stands on so many highway sides, vainly preaching to 
 passers-by, an emblem of sad and noble truths ; that 
 pleasure is not an end, but an accident ; that pain is the 
 choice of the magnanimoias ; that it is best to suffer all 
 things and do well. I turned and went down the 
 movmtain in silence ; and when I looked back for the 
 last time before the wood closed about my path, I saw 
 Olalla still leaning on the crucifix.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 BY THE DYING MOUXTEBANK. 
 
 They had sent for the doctor from Bourrou before 
 six. About eight some villagers came round for the 
 performance, and were told how matters stood. It 
 seemed a liberty for a mountebank to fall ill like real 
 people, and they made off again in dudgeon. By ten 
 Madame Tentaillon was gravely alarmed, and had sent 
 down the street for Doctor Desprez. 
 
 The Doctor was at work over his manuscripts in one 
 corner of the little dining-room, and his wife was asleep 
 over the fire in another, when the messenger arrived. 
 
 ''Sapristi !" said the Doctor, ^'yon should have sent 
 for me before. It was a case for hurry." And he fol- 
 lowed the messenger as he was, in his slippers and skull- 
 cap. 
 
 The inn was not thirty yards away, but the messenger 
 did not stop there; he went iu at one door and out by 
 another into the court, and then led the way by a 
 flight of steps beside the stable, to the loft where the 
 mountebank lay sick. If Doctor Desprez were to live 
 a thousand years, he would never forget his arrival in
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 225 
 
 tliat room ; for not only was the scene picturesque, but 
 the moment made a date in his existence. We reckon 
 our lives, I hardly know why, from the date of our first 
 sorry appearance in society, as if from a first humilia- 
 tion ; for no actor can come upon the stage with a 
 worse grace. Not to go further back, which would be 
 judged too curious, there are subsequently many moving 
 and decisive accidents in the lives of all, which would 
 make as logical a period as this of birth. And here, for 
 instance, Doctor Desprez, a man past forty, who had 
 made what is called a failure in life, and was moreover 
 married, found himself at a new point of departure 
 when he opened the door of the loft above Tentaillon's 
 stable. 
 
 It was a large place, lighted only by a single candle 
 set upon the floor. The mountebank lay on his back 
 upon a pallet ; a large man, with a Quixotic nose in- 
 flamed with drinking. Madame Tentaillon stooped over 
 him, applying a hot water and mustard embrocation to 
 his feet ; and on a chair close by sat a little fellow of 
 eleven or twelve, with his feet dangling. These three 
 were the only occupants, except the shadows. But the 
 shadows were a company in themselves ; the extent of 
 the room exaggerated them to a gigantic size, and from 
 the low position of the candle the light struck upwards 
 and produced deformed foreshortenings. The mounte- 
 bank's profile was enlarged upon the wall in caricature, 
 and it was strange to see his nose shorten and lengthen 
 as the flame was blow^i about by draughts. As for Ma- 
 15
 
 226 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 dame Tentaillon, her shadow was no more than a gross 
 hump of shoulders, with now and again a hemisphere 
 of head. The chair legs were spindled out as long as 
 stilts, and the boy sat perched atop of them, like a 
 cloud, in the corner of the roof. 
 
 It was the boy who took the Doctor's fancy. He had 
 a great arched sknll, the forehead and the hands of a 
 musician, and a pair of haunting eyes. It was not 
 merely that these eyes were large, or steady, or the 
 softest ruddy brown. There was a look in them, be- 
 sides, which thrilled the Doctor, and made him half 
 uneasy. He was sure he had seen such a look before, 
 and yet he could not remember how or where. It was 
 as if this boy, who was quite a stranger to him, had the 
 eyes of an old friend or an old enemy. And the boy 
 would give him no peace ; he seemed profoundly indif- 
 ferent to what was going on, or rather abstracted from 
 it in a superior contemplation, beating gently with his 
 feet against the bars of the chair, and holding his hands 
 folded on his lap. But, for all- that, his eyes kept fol- 
 lowing the Doctor about the room with a thoughtful 
 fixity of gaze. Desprez could not tell whether he was 
 fascinating the boy, or the boy was fascinating him. 
 He busied himself over the sick man : he put questions, 
 he felt the pulse, he jested, he grew a little hot and 
 swore : and still, whenever he looked round, there were 
 the brown eyes waiting for his with the same inquiring, 
 melancholy gaze. 
 
 At last the Doctor hit on the solution at a leap. He
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FRANCHARD. 227 
 
 remembered the look now. The little fellow, although 
 he was as straight as a dart, had the eyes that go usu- 
 ally with a crooked back ; he was not at all deformed, 
 and yet a deformed person seemed to be looking at you 
 from below his brows. The Doctor drew a long breath, 
 he was so much relieved to find a theory (for he loved 
 theories) and to explain away his interest. 
 
 For all that, he despatched the invalid with unusual 
 haste, and, still kneeling with one knee on the floor, 
 turned a little round and looked the boy over at his 
 leisure. The boy was not in the least put out, but 
 looked placidly back at the Doctor." 
 
 •' Is this your father ? " asked Desprez. 
 
 " Oh, no," returned the boy ; '^my master." 
 
 " Are you fond of him ? " continued the Doctor. 
 
 "No, sir," said the boy. 
 
 Madame Tentaillon and Desprez exchanged expres- 
 sive glances. 
 
 " That is bad, my man," resumed the latter, with a 
 shade of sternness. " Every one should be fond of the 
 dying, or conceal their sentiments ; and your master 
 here is dying. If I have w^atched a bird a little while 
 stealing my cherries, I have a thought of disappoint- 
 ment when he flies away over my garden wall, and I see 
 him steer for the forest and vanish. How much more a 
 creature such as this, so strong, so astute, so richly en- 
 dowed with faculties ! When I think that, in a few 
 hours, the speech will be silenced, the breath extinct, 
 and even the shadow vanished from the wall, I who
 
 228 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 never saw liim, this lady who knew liim only as a guest, 
 are touched with some affection." 
 
 The boy was silent for a little, and appeared to be 
 reflecting. 
 
 " You did not know him,'' he replied at last. "He 
 was a bad man. " 
 
 "He is a little pagan," said the landlady, "For 
 that matter, they are all the same, these mountebanks, 
 tumblers, artists, and what not. They have no inte- 
 rior. " 
 
 But the doctor was still scrutinising the little pagan, 
 his eyebrows knotted and uplifted. 
 
 " What is your name ? " he asked. 
 
 " Jean-Marie," said the lad. 
 
 Desprez leaped upon him with one of his sudden 
 flashes of excitement, and felt his head all over from an 
 ethnological point of view. 
 
 /'Celtic, Celtic !" he said. 
 
 "Celtic !" cried Madame Tentaillon, who had per- 
 haps confounded the word with hydrocephalous. " Poor 
 lad ! is it dangerous ?" 
 
 " That depends," returned the Doctor, grimly. And 
 then once more addressing the boy : " And what do 
 you do for your living, Jean- Marie ? " he inquired. 
 
 "I tumble," was the answer. 
 
 "So! Tumble?" repeated Desprez. "Probably 
 healthful. I hazard the guess, Madame Tentaillon, that 
 tumbling is a healthful way of life. And have you 
 never done anvthing- else but tumble ? "
 
 THE TREASUKE OF FRANCHARD. 229 
 
 ** Before I learned that, I used to steal," answered 
 Jean-Marie gravely. 
 
 ''Upon my word !" cried the doctor. "You are a 
 nice little man for your age. Madame, when my con- 
 frere comes from Bourron, you will communicate my 
 unfavourable opinion. I leave the case in his hands ; 
 but of course, on any alarming symptom, above all if 
 there should be a sign of rally, do not hestitate to knock 
 me up, I am a doctor no longer, I thank God ; but I 
 have been one. Good night, madame. Good sleep to 
 you, Jean- Marie." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MORNING TALK. 
 
 Doctor Desprez always rose early. Before the smoke 
 arose, before the first cart rattled over the bridge to the 
 day's labour in the fields, he was to be found wandering 
 in his garden. Now he would pick a bunch of grapes ; 
 now he would eat a big pear under the trellice ; now he 
 would draw all sorts of fancies on the path with, the end 
 of his cane ; now he would go down and watch the river 
 running endlessly past the timber landing-place at which 
 he moored his boat. There was no time, he used to 
 say, for making theories like the early morning. " I 
 rise earlier than any one else in the village," he once 
 boasted. ''It is a fair consequence that I know more 
 and wish to do less with my knowledge."
 
 230 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 The Doctor was a connoisseur of sunrises, and loved 
 a good theatrical effect to usher in the day. He had a 
 theory of dew, by which he could predict the weather. 
 Indeed, most things served him to that end : the sound 
 of the bells from all the neighbouring villages, the smell 
 of the forest, the visits and the behaviour of both birds 
 and fishes, the look of the plants in his garden, the dis- 
 position of cloud, the colour of the light, and last, al- 
 though not least, the arsenal of meteorological instru- 
 ments in a louvre-boarded hutch upon the lawn. Ever 
 since he had settled at Gretz, he had been growing more 
 and more into the local meteorologist, the unpaid cham- 
 pion of the local climate. He thought at first there was 
 no place so healthful in the arrondissement. By the 
 end of the second year, he protested there was none so 
 wholesome in the whole department. And for some 
 time before he met Jean- Marie he had been prepared to 
 challenge all France and the better part of Europe for a 
 rival to his chosen sjsot. 
 
 '•' Doctor," he would say — " doctor is a foul word. It 
 should not be used to ladies. It implies disease. I 
 remark it, as a flaw in our civilisation, that we have not 
 the proper horror of disease. Now I, for my part, have 
 washed my hands of it ; I have renounced my laureation; 
 I am no doctor ; I am only a worshipj^er of the true 
 goddess Hygieia. Ah, believe me, it is she who has the 
 cestus ! And here, in this exiguous hamlet, has shfe 
 placed her shrine : here she dwells and lavishes her 
 gifts ; here I walk with her in the early morning, and
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 231 
 
 she shows me how strong she has made the peasants, 
 how fruitful she has made the fields, how the trees grow 
 up tall and comely under her eyes, and the fishes in 
 the river become clean and agile at her presence. — 
 Rheumatism ! " he would cry, on some malapert inter- 
 ruption, ^' 0, yes, I believe we do have a little rheu- 
 matism. That could hardly be avoided, you know, on 
 a river. And of course the place stands a little low ; 
 and the meadows are marshy, there's no doubt. But, 
 my dear sir, look at Bourron ! Bourron stands high. 
 Bourron is close to the forest ; plenty of ozone there, 
 you would say. Well, compared with G-retz, Bourron is 
 a perfect shambles." 
 
 The morning after he had been summoned to the 
 dying mountebank, the Doctor visited the wharf at the 
 tail of his garden, and had a long look at the running 
 water. This he called prayer ; but whether his adora- 
 tions were addressed to the goddess Hygieia or some 
 more orthodox deity, never plainly appeared. For he 
 had uttered doubtful oracles, sometimes declaring that 
 a river was the type of bodily health, sometimes extol- 
 ling it as the great moral preacher, continually preach- 
 ing peace, continuity, and diligence to man's tormented 
 spirits. After he had watched a mile or so of the clear 
 water running by before his eyes, seen a fish or two 
 come to the surface with a gleam of silver, and suffi- 
 ciently admired the long shadows of the trees falling 
 half across the river from the opi^osite bank, with 
 patches of moving sunlight in between, he strolled once
 
 232 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 more up the garden and through his house into the 
 street, feeling cool and renovated. 
 
 The sound of his feet upon the causeway began the 
 business of the day ; for the village was still sound 
 asleep. The church tower looked very airy in the sun- 
 light ; a few birds that turned about it, seemed to swim 
 in an atmosphere of more than usual rarity ; and the 
 Doctor, walking in long transparent shadows, filled his 
 lungs amply, and proclaimed himself well contended 
 with the morning. 
 
 On one of the posts before Tentaillon's carriage entry 
 he espied a little dark figure perched in a meditative at- 
 titude, and immediately recognised Jean-Marie. 
 
 ''Aha !" he said, stopping before him humorously, 
 with a, hand on either knee. " So we rise early in the 
 morning, do we ? It appears to me that we have all 
 the vices of a philosopher," 
 
 The boy got to his feet and made a grave saluta- 
 tion, 
 
 "And how is our patient ? " asked Desprez. 
 
 It appeared the patient was about the same. 
 
 " And why do you rise early in the morning ?" he 
 pursued. 
 
 Jean-Marie, after a long silence, professed that he 
 hardly knew, 
 
 "You hardly know?" repeated Desprez, "We 
 hardly know anything, my man, until we try to learn. 
 Interrogate your consciousness. Come, push me this 
 inquiry home. Do you like it ? "
 
 THE TEEASURE OF FRAKCHAED. 233 
 
 '* Yes," said the boy slowly ; "yes, I like it," 
 
 "And why do you like it?" continued the Doctor. 
 " (We are now pursuing the Socratic method.) Why do 
 you like it ?" 
 
 "It is quiet," answered Jean -Marie ; "and I have 
 nothing to do ; and then I feel as if I were good," 
 
 Doctor Desprez took a seat on the post at the oppo- 
 site side. He was beginning to take an interest in the 
 talk, for the boy plainly thought before he spoke, and 
 tried to answer truly, "It apj)ears you have a taste for 
 feeling good," said the Doctor. " Now, there you puz- 
 zle me extremely ; for I thought you said you were a 
 thief; and the two are incompatible." 
 
 " Is it very bad to steal ?" asked Jean-Marie. 
 
 " Such is the general opinion, little boy," replied the 
 Doctor, 
 
 " No ; but I mean as I stole," exclaimed the other. 
 " For I had no choice, I think it is surely right to 
 have bread ; it must be right to have bread, there comes 
 so plain a want of it. And then they beat me cruelly 
 if I returned with nothing," he added. " I was not 
 ignorant of right and wrong ; for before that I had 
 been well taught by a priest, who was very kind to me." 
 (The Doctor made a horrible grimace at the word 
 " priest.") " But it seemed to me, when one had 
 nothing to eat and was beaten, it was a different affair. 
 I would not have stolen for tartlets, I believe ; but any 
 one would steal for baker's bread." 
 
 *' And so I suppose," said the Doctor, with a rising
 
 234 THE TREASURE OF FiiAI^CHARD. 
 
 sneer, " you j)rayed God to forgive you, and explained 
 the case to Him at length." 
 
 " Why, sir ? " asked Jean-Marie. ''I do not sec." 
 
 *'Your priest would see, however," retorted Desprez. 
 
 "Would he ?" asked the boy, troubled for the first 
 time. " I should have thought God would have 
 known. " 
 
 "Eh ?" snarled the Doctor. 
 
 " I should have thought God would have understood 
 me," replied the other. " You do not, I see ; but then 
 it was God that made me think so, was it not ? " 
 
 "Little boy, little boy," said Dr. Desprez, " I told 
 you already you had the vices of j)hilosoi:)hy ; if you 
 display the virtues also, I must go. I am a student of 
 the blessed laws of health, an observer of plain and 
 temperate nature in her common walks ; and I cannot 
 preserve my equanimity in presence of a monster. Do 
 you understand ?" 
 
 " No, sir," said the boy. 
 
 " I will make my meaning clear to you," replied the 
 Doctor. "Look there at the sky — behind the belfry 
 first, where it is so light, and then up and up, turning 
 your chin back, right to the top of the dome, where it 
 is already as blue as at noon. Is not that a beautiful 
 colour ? Does it not please the heart ? We have seen 
 it all our lives, until it has grown in with our familiar 
 thoughts. Now," changing his tone, "suppose that sky 
 to become suddenly of a live and fiery amber, like the 
 colour of clear coals, and growing scarlet towards the
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FRANCHARD, 235 
 
 top — I do not say it would be any the less beautiful ; 
 but would you like it as well ? " 
 
 *' I suppose not," answered Jean-Marie. 
 
 " Neither do I like you," returned the doctor, roughly. 
 " I hate all odd people, and you are the most curious 
 little boy in all the world." 
 
 Jean-Marie seemed to ponder for a while, and then he 
 raised his head again and looked over at the Doctor with 
 an air of candid inquiry. '' But are not you a very curi- 
 ous gentleman ? " he asked. 
 
 The Doctor threw away his stick, bounded on the 
 boy, clasped him to his bosom, and kissed him on 
 both cheeks. "Admirable, admirable imp ! " he cried. 
 ''What a morning, what an hour for a theorist of forty- 
 two ! No," he continued, apostrophising heaven, ''I 
 did not know that such boys existed ; I was ignorant 
 they made them so ; I had doubted of my race ; and 
 now ! It is like," he added, picking up his stick, " like 
 a lovers' meeting. I have bruised my favourite staff in 
 that moment of enthusiasm. The injury, however, is 
 not grave." He caught the boy looking at him in ob- 
 vious wonder, embarrassment, and alarm. ''Hullo !" 
 said he, " why do you look at me like that ? Egad, I 
 believe the boy despises me. Do you despise me, boy ? " 
 
 "0, no," replied Jean-Marie, seriously; "only I do 
 not understand." 
 
 "You must excuse me, sir," returned the Doctor, 
 with gravity; "I am still so young. 0, hang him !" 
 he added to himself. And he took his seat again and
 
 236 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 observed the boy sardonically. ''He has spoiled the 
 quiet of my morning," thought he. ''I shall be nervous 
 all day, and have a febricule when I digest. Let me 
 compose myself." And so he dismissed his pre-occupa- 
 tions by an effort of the will which he had long practised, 
 and let his soul roam abroad in the contemplation of the 
 morning. He inhaled the air, tasting it critically as a 
 connoisseur tastes a vintage, and prolonging the expira- 
 tion with hygienic gusto. He counted the little flecks 
 of cloud along the sky. He followed the movements of 
 the birds round the church tower — making long sweeps, 
 hanging poised, or turning airy somersaults in fancy, 
 and beating the wind with imaginary pinions. And in 
 this way he regained peace of mind and animal compos- 
 ure, conscious of his limbs, conscious of the sight of his 
 eyes, conscious that the air had a cool taste, like a fruit, 
 at the top of his throat ; and at last, in complete ab- 
 straction, he began to sing. The Doctor had but one 
 air — "Malbrouck s'en va-t-en guerre ; " even with that 
 he was on terms of mere politeness ; and his musical ex- 
 ploits were always reserved for moments Avhen he was 
 alone and entirely happy. 
 
 He was recalled to earth rudely by a pained expres- 
 sion on the boy's face. ''What do you think of my 
 singing ? " he inquired, stopping in the middle of a 
 note ; and then, after he had waited some little while 
 and received no answer, " What do you think of my 
 singing ?" he repeated, imperiously. 
 
 " I do not like it," faltered Jean-Marie.
 
 THE TEEASURE OF FRANCHARD. 237 
 
 " Oh, come ! " cried the Doctor. " Possibly you are 
 a performer yourself ? " 
 
 "1 sing better than that," replied the boy. 
 
 The Doctor eyed him for some seconds in stupefac- 
 tion. He was aware that he was angry, and blushed 
 for himself in consequence, which made him angrier. 
 " If this is how you address your master !" he said at 
 last, with a shrug and a flourish of his arms. 
 
 " I do not speak to him at all," returned the boy. 
 'a do not like him." 
 
 " Then you like me ? " snapped Doctor Desprez, with 
 unusual eagerness, 
 
 '^ I do not know," answered Jean-Marie. 
 
 The Doctor rose. " I shall wish you a good morn- 
 ing," he said. ''You are too much forme. Perhaps 
 you have blood in your veins, perhaps celestial ichor, or 
 perhaps you circulate nothing more grOss than respira- 
 ble air ; but of one thing I am iuexpugnably assured : — 
 that you are no human being. No, boy " — shaking his 
 stick at him — '' you are not a human being. Write, 
 write it in your memory — ' I am not a human being — I 
 have no pretension to be a human being — I am a dive, 
 a dream, an angel, an acrostic, an illusion — what you 
 please, but not a human being.' And so accept my 
 humble salutations and farewell ! " 
 
 And with that the Doctor made ofE along the street 
 in some emotion, and the boy stood, mentally gaping, 
 where he left him.
 
 238 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 THE ADOPTION. 
 
 Madame Desprez, who answered to the Christian 
 name of Anastasie, presented an agreeable type of her 
 sex ; exceedingly wholesome to look upon, a stout 
 irune, with cool smooth cheeks, steady, dark eyes, and 
 hands that neither art nor nature could improve. She 
 was the sort of person over whom adversity passes like a 
 summer cloud ; she might, in the worst of conjunc- 
 tions, knit her brows into one vertical furrow for a mo- 
 ment, but the next it would be gone. She had much of 
 the placidity of a contented nun ; with little of her 
 piety, however ; for Anastasie was of a very mundane 
 nature, fond of oysters and old wine, and somewliat bold 
 pleasantries, and devoted to her husband for her own 
 sake rather than for his. She was imperturbably good- 
 natured, but had no idea of self-sacrifice. To live in 
 that pleasant old house, with a green garden behind 
 and bright flowers about the window, to eat and drink 
 of the best, to gossip with a neighbour for a quarter of 
 an hour, never to wear stays or a dress except when she 
 went to Fontainebleau shopping, to be kept in a con- 
 tinual supply of racy novels, and to be married to 
 Doctor Desprez and have no ground of jealously, filled 
 the cup of her nature to the brim. Those who had 
 known the Doctor in bachelor days, when he had aired 
 quite as many theories, but of a different order, attrib- 
 uted his present philosophy to the study of Anastasie.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 239 
 
 It was her brute enjoyment thut he rationalised and 
 perhaps vainly imitated. 
 
 Madame DesjDrez was an artist in the kitchen, and 
 made coffee to a nicety. She had a knack of tidiness, 
 with which she had infected the Doctor ; everything 
 was in its place ; everything capable of polish shone 
 gloriously ; and dust was a thing banished from her 
 empire. Aline, their single servant, had no other busi- 
 ness in the world but to scour and burnish. So Doctor 
 Desprez lived in his house like a fatted calf, warmed 
 and cosseted to his heart's content. 
 
 The midday meal was excellent. There was a ripe 
 melon, a fish from the river in a memorable Bearnaise 
 sauce, a fat fowl in a fricassee, and a dish of asparagus, 
 followed by some fruit. The Doctor drank half a hot- 
 tie plus one glass, the wife half a bottle minus the same 
 quantity, which was a marital privilege, of an excel- 
 lent Cote-Rotie, seven years old. Then the coffee was 
 brought, and a flask of Chartreuse for madame, for the 
 Doctor despised and distrusted such decoctions ; and 
 then Aline left the wedded pair to the pleasures of mem- 
 ory and digestion. 
 
 ''It is a very fortunate circumstance, my cherished 
 one," observed the Doctor — " this coffee is adorable — a 
 very fortunate circumstance upon the whole — Anastasie, 
 I beseech you, go without that poison for to-day ; only 
 one day, and you will feel the benefit, I pledge my repu- 
 tation." 
 
 " What is this fortunate circumstance, my friend?"
 
 240 THE TREASURE OF FRAXCHARD. 
 
 inquired Anastasie, not heeding his protest, which was 
 of daily recurrence. 
 
 "That we haye no children, my beautiful,'" replied 
 the Doctor. ''I think of it more and more as the years 
 go on, and with more and more gratitude towards the 
 Power that dispenses such afflictions. Your health, my 
 darling, my studious quiet, our little kitchen delicacies, 
 how they would all haye suffered, how they would all 
 have been sacrificed ! And for what ? Children are 
 the last word of human imperfection. Health flees be- 
 fore their face. They cry, my dear ; they put yexatious 
 questions ; they demand to be fed, to be washed, to be 
 educated, to haye their noses blown ; and then, when 
 the time comes, they break our hearts, as I break this 
 piece of sugar. A pair of professed egoists, like you 
 and me, should avoid offspring, like an infidelity." 
 
 *' Indeed ! " said she ; and she laughed. " Now, that 
 is like you — to take credit for the thing you could not 
 help." 
 
 "My dear," returned the Doctor, solemnly, "we 
 might have adopted." 
 
 " Never ! " cried madame. " Never, Doctor, with my 
 consent. If the child were my own flesh and blood, I 
 would not say no. But to take another person's indis- 
 cretion on my shoulders, my dear friend, I have too 
 much sense." 
 
 " Precisely," replied the Doctor. " We both had. 
 And I am all the better pleased with our wisdom, be- 
 cause — because " He looked at her sharply.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 241 
 
 " Because what ? " she asked, with a faint premo- 
 nition of danger. 
 
 " Because I have found the right person," said the 
 Doctor firmly, " and shall adopt him this afternoon." 
 
 Anastasie looked at him out of a mist. "^ You have 
 lost your reason," she said ; and there was a clang in 
 her voice that seemed to threaten trouble. 
 
 '•'Not so, my dear," he replied; "I retain its com- 
 plete exercise. To the proof : instead of attempting to 
 cloak my inconsistency, I have, by way of preparing 
 you, thrown it into strong relief. You will there, I 
 think, recognize the philosojoher who has the ecstasy to 
 call you wife. The fact is, I have been reckoning all 
 this while without an accident. I never thought to 
 find a son of my own. Now, last night, I found one. 
 Do not unnecessarily alarm yourself, my dear ; he is 
 not a drojj of blood to me that I know. It is his mind, 
 darling, his mind that calls me father." 
 
 *' His mind ! " she repeated with a titter between 
 scorn and hysterics. "His mind, indeed ! Henri, is 
 this an idiotic pleasantry, or are you mad ? His mind ! 
 And what of my mind ? 
 
 ''Truly," replied the Doctor with a shrug, "you 
 have your finger on the hitch. He will be strikingly 
 antipathetic to my beautiful Anastasie. She will 
 never understand him ; he will never understand her. 
 You married the animal side of my nature, dear ; and 
 it is on the spiritual side that I find my affinity for 
 Jean-Marie. So much so, that, to be perfectly frank, I 
 16
 
 242 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 stand in some awe of liim myself. You will easily per- 
 ceive that I am announcing a calamity for you. Do 
 not," he broke out in tones of real solicitude — "do not 
 give way to tears after a meal, Anastasie. You will 
 certainly give yourself a false digestion." 
 
 Anastasie controlled herself. " You know how will- 
 ing I am to humour you," she said, ''m all reasonable 
 matters. But on this point "' 
 
 " My dear love," interrupted the Doctor, eager to 
 prevent a refusal, " who wished to leave Paris ? Who 
 made me give up cards, and the opera, and the boule- 
 vard, and my social relations, and all that was my life 
 before I knew you ? Have I been faithful ? Have I 
 been obedient ? Have I not borne my doom with 
 cheerfulness ? In all honesty, Anastasie, have I not a 
 right to a stij)ulation on my side ? I have, and you 
 know it. I stipulate my son. " 
 
 Anastasie was aware of defeat ; she struck her 
 colours instantly. "You will break my heart," she 
 sighed. 
 
 "Not in the least," said he. ''You will feel a 
 trifling inconvenience for a month, just as I did when 
 I was first brought to this vile hamlet; then your ad- 
 mirable sense and temper will prevail, and I see you al- 
 ready as content as ever, and making your husband the 
 happiest of men." 
 
 " You know I can refuse you nothing," she said, 
 with a last flicker of resistance ; " nothing that will 
 make you truly happier. But will this ? Are you sure,
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 243 
 
 my husband ? Last night, you say, you found him ! 
 He may be the worst of humbugs." 
 
 " I think not," replied the Doctor. " But do not 
 suppose me so unwary as to adopt him out of hand. I 
 am, I flatter myself, a finished man of the world ; I 
 have had all possibilities in view ; my plan is contrived 
 to meet them all. I take the lad as stable boy. If he 
 pilfer, if he grumble, if he desire to change, I shall see 
 I was mistaken ; I shall recognize him for no son of 
 mine, and send him tramping." 
 
 "You will never do so when the time comes," said 
 his wife ; "I know your good heart." 
 
 She reached out her hand to him, with a sigh ; the 
 Doctor smiled as he took it and carried it to his lips ; 
 he had gained his point with greater ease than he had 
 dared to hope ; for perhaps the twentieth time he had 
 proved the efficacy of his trusty argument, his Excali- 
 bur, the hint of a return to Paris. Six months in the 
 capital, for a man of the Doctor's antecedents and re- 
 lations, implied no less a calamity than total ruin. 
 Anastasia had saved the remainder of his fortune by 
 keeping him strictly in the country. The very name 
 of Paris put her in a blue fear ; and she would have al- 
 lowed her husband to keep a menagerie in the back 
 garden, let alone adopting a stable-boy, rather than per- 
 mit the question of return to be discussed. 
 
 About four of the afternoon, the mountebank ren- 
 dered up his ghost ; he had never been conscious since 
 his seizure. Doctor Desprez was present at his last
 
 244 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 passage, and declared the farce over. Then he took 
 Jean-Marie by the shoulder and led him out into the 
 inn garden where there was a conyenient bench beside 
 the river. Here he sat him down and made the boy 
 place himself on his left. 
 
 *' Jean-Marie," he said very gravely, *Hhis world is 
 exceedingly vast ; and even France, which is only a 
 small corner of it, is a great place for a little lad like 
 you. Unfortunately it is full of eager, shouldering 
 people moving on ; and there are very few bakers' shops 
 for so many eaters. Your master is dead ; you are not 
 fit to gain a living by yourself ; you do not wish to steal? 
 No. Your situation then is undesirable ; it is, for the 
 moment, critical. On the other hand, you behold in 
 me a man not old, though elderly, still enjojring the 
 youth of the heart and the intelligence ; a man of in- 
 struction ; easily situated in this world's affairs ; keep- 
 ing a good table : — a man, neither as friend nor host, to 
 be despised. I offer you your food and clothes, and to 
 teach you lessons in the evening, which will be infinitely 
 more to the purpose for a lad of your stamp than those 
 of all the priests in Europe. I propose no wages, but if 
 ever you take a thought to leave me, the door shall be 
 open, and I will give you a hundred francs to start the 
 world upon. In return, I have an old horse and chaise, 
 which you would very speedily learn to clean and keep 
 in order. Do not hurry yourself to answer, and take it 
 or leave it as you judge aright. Only remember this, 
 that I am no sentimentalist or charitable person, but a
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 245 
 
 man who lives rigorously to himself ; and that if I make 
 the proposal, it is for my own ends— it is because I per- 
 ceive clearly an advantage to myself. And now, re- 
 flect." 
 
 "I shall be very glad. I do not see what else I can 
 do. I thank you, sir, most kindly, and I will try to be 
 useful," said the boy. 
 
 " Thank you," said the Doctor warmly, rising at the 
 same time and wiping his brow, for he had suffered ago- 
 nies while the thing hung in the wind. A refusal, after 
 the scene at noon, would have placed him in a ridiculous 
 light before Anastasie. " How hot and heavy is the 
 evening, to be sure ! I have always had a fancy to be a 
 fish in summer, Jean-Marie, here in the Loing beside 
 Gretz. I should lie under a water-lily and listen to the 
 bells, which must sound most delicately down below. 
 That would be a life — do you not think so too ? " 
 
 "Yes," said Jean-Marie. 
 
 " Thank God you have imagination ! " cried the Doc- 
 tor, embracing the boy with his usual effusive warmth, 
 though it was a proceeding that seemed to disconcert 
 the sufTerer almost as much as if he had been an Eng- 
 lish schoolboy of the same age. "And now," he added, 
 "I will take you to my wife." 
 
 Madame Desprez sat in the dining-room in a cool 
 wrapper. All the blinds were down, and the tile floor 
 had been recently sprinkled with water ; her eyes were 
 half shut, but she affected to be reading a novel as they 
 entered. Though she was a bustling woman, she en-
 
 246 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 joyed repose between whiles and had a remarkable ap- 
 petite for sleep. 
 
 The Doctor went through a solemn form of intro- 
 duction, adding, for the benefit of both parties, ''You 
 must try to like each other for my sake." 
 
 '•' He is very pretty," said Anastasie. " Will you kiss 
 me, my pretty little fellow ? " 
 
 The Doctor was furious, and dragged her into the 
 passage. ''Are you a fool, Anastasie ? " he said. " What 
 is all this I hear about the tact of women ? Heaven 
 knows, I have not met with it in my experience. You 
 address my little philosopher as if he were an infant. 
 He must be spoken to with more respect, I tell you ; he 
 must not be kissed and Georgy-porgy'd like an ordinary 
 child." 
 
 "I only did it to please you, I am sure," replied 
 Anastasie ; "but I will try to do better." 
 
 The Doctor apologised for his warmth. "But I do 
 wish him," he continued, " to feel at home among us. 
 And really your conduct was so idiotic, my cherished 
 one, and so utterly and distantly out of jjlace, that a 
 saint might have been pardoned a little vehemence in 
 disapproval. Do, do try — if it is possible for a woman 
 to understand young people — but of course it is not, 
 and I waste my breath. Hold your tongue as much as 
 possible at least, and observe my conduct narrowly ; it 
 will serve you for a model." 
 
 Anastasie did as she was bidden, and considered the 
 Doctor's behaviour. She observed that he embraced the
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCE ARD. 247 
 
 boy three times in the course of the evening, and man- 
 aged generally to confound and abash the little fellow 
 out of speech and appetite. But she had the true wom- 
 anly heroism in little affairs. Not only did she refrain 
 from the cheap revenge of exposing the Doctor's errors 
 to himself, but she did her best to remove their ill-effect 
 on Jean-Marie. When Desprez went out for his last 
 breath of air before retiring for the night, she came 
 over to the boy's side and took his hand. 
 
 *'You must not be surprised nor frightened by my 
 husband's manners," she said. "He is the kindest of 
 men, but so clever that he is sometimes difficult to un- 
 derstand. You will soon grow used to him, and then 
 you will love him, for that nobody can help. As for 
 me, you may be sure, I shall try to make you happy, 
 and will not bother you at all. I think we should be 
 excellent friends, you and I. I am not clever, but I am 
 very good-natured. Will you give me a kiss ? " 
 
 He held up his face, and f.he took him in her arms 
 and then began to cry. The woman had spoken in 
 complaisance ; but she had warmed to her own words, 
 and tenderness followed. The Doctor, entering, found 
 them enlaced : he concluded that his wife was in fault ; 
 and he was just beginning, in an awful voice, "Anas- 
 
 tasie ," when she looked up at him, smiling, with 
 
 an upraised finger ; and he held his peace, wondering, 
 while she led the boy to his attic.
 
 248 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE EDUCATIO^ST OF A PHILOSOPHER. 
 
 The installation of the adopted stable-boy was thus 
 happily effected, and the Avheels of life continued to run 
 smoothly in the Doctor's house, Jean-Marie did his 
 horse and carriage duty in the morning; sometimes 
 helped in the housework ; sometimes walked abroad 
 with the Doctor, to drink wisdom from the fountain- 
 head ; and was introduced at night to the sciences and 
 the dead tongues. He retained his singular placidity of 
 mind and manner ; he was rarely in fault ; but he made 
 only a very partial progress in his studies, and remained 
 much of a stranger in the family. 
 
 The Doctor was a pattern of regularity. All fore- 
 noon he worked on his great book, the " Comparative 
 Pharmacopoeia, or Historical Dictionary of all Medi- 
 cines," which as yet consisted principally of slips of 
 paper and pins. When finished, it was to fill many 
 personable Tolumes and to combine antiquarian interest 
 with professional utility. But the Doctor was studious 
 of literary graces and the picturesque ; an anecdote, a 
 touch of manners, a moral qualification, or a sounding 
 epithet was sure to be j)referred before a piece of science ; 
 a little more, and he would have written the " Com- 
 parative Pharmacoi:)oeia " in verse ! The article "^Mum- 
 mia," for instance, was already complete, though the 
 remainder of the work had not progressed beyond the 
 letter A. It was exceedingly copious and entertaining,
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 249 
 
 written with qiiaintness and colour, exact, erudite, a 
 literary article ; but it would hardly have afforded guid- 
 ance to a practising physician of to-day. The feminine 
 good sense of his wife had led her to point this out with 
 uncompromising sincerity ; for the Dictionary w^as duly 
 read aloud to her, betwixt sleep and waking, as it pro- 
 ceeded towards an infinitely distant completion ; and 
 the Doctor was a little sore on the subject of mummies, 
 and sometimes resented an allusion with asperity. 
 
 After the midday meal and a proper period of diges- 
 tion, he walked, sometimes alone, sometimes accom- 
 panied by Jean-Marie ; for madame would have pre- 
 ferred any hardship rather than walk. 
 
 She was, as I have said, a very busy person, continu- 
 ally occupied about material comforts, and ready to 
 drop asleep over a novel the instant she was disengaged. 
 This was the less objectionable, as she never snored or 
 grew distempered in complexion when she slept. On 
 the contrary, she looked the very picture of luxurious 
 and appetising ease, and woke without a start to the 
 perfect possession of her faculties. I am afraid she was 
 greatly an animal, but she was a very nice animal to 
 have about. In this way, she had little to do with 
 Jean-Marie ; but the sympathy which had been estab- 
 lished between them on the first night remained un- 
 broken ; they held occasional conversations, mostly on 
 household matters ; to the extreme disappointment of 
 the Doctor, they occasionally sallied off together to that 
 temple of debasing superstition, the village church ;
 
 250 THE TREASURE 0? FRAN^CIIARD. 
 
 madame and lie, both in tlieir Sunday's best, drove 
 twice a month to Fontainebleau and returned hiden 
 with 25urchases ; and in short, although the Doctor still 
 continued to regard them as in'econcilably antipa- 
 thetic, their relation was as intimate, friendly, and con- 
 fidential as their natures suffered. 
 
 I fear, however, that in her heart of hearts, madame 
 kindly despised and pitied the boy. xShe had no admi- 
 ration for his class of virtues ; she liked a smart, polite, 
 forward, roguish sort of boy, cap in hand, light of foot, 
 meeting the eye; she liked volubility, charm, a little 
 vice — the promise of a second Doctor Desprez. And it 
 was ]}cr indefeasible belief that Jean-Marie was dull. 
 '' Poor dear boy," she had said once, " how sad it is 
 that he should be so stupid ! " She had never repeated 
 that remark, for the Doctor had raged like a wild bull, 
 denouncing the brutal bluntness of her mind, bemoan- 
 ing his own fate to be so unequally mated with an ass, 
 and, what touched Anastasie more nearly, menacing the 
 table china by the fury of his gesticulations. But she 
 adhered silently to her opinion ; and when Jean-Marie 
 was sitting, stolid, blank, but not unhappy, over his 
 unfinished tasks, she would snatch her opportunity in 
 the Doctor's absence, go over to him, put her arms 
 about his neck, lay her cheek to his, and communicate 
 her sympathy with his distress, "Do not mind," she 
 would say ; '' I, too, am not at all clever, and I can as- 
 sure you that it makes no difference in life." 
 
 The Doctor's view was naturally different. Tliat
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAKCHARD. 251 
 
 gentleman never wearied of the sound of his own voice, 
 which was, to say the truth, agreeable enough to hear. 
 He now had a listener, who was not so cynically indif- 
 ferent as Anastasie, and who sometimes put him on his 
 mettle by the most relevant objections. Besides, was 
 he not educating the boy ? And education, philoso- 
 phers are agreed, is the most philosophical of duties. 
 What can be more heavenly to poor mankind than to 
 have one's hobby grow into a duty to the State ? Then, 
 indeed, do the ways of life become ways of pleasantness. 
 Never had the Doctor seen reason to be more content 
 with his endowments. Philosophy flowed smoothly 
 from his lips. He was so agile a dialectician that he 
 could trace his nonsense, when challenged, back to 
 some root in sense, and prove it to be a sort of flower 
 upon his system. He slipped out of antinomies like a 
 fish, and left his disciple marvelling at the rabbi's depth. 
 Moreover, deep down in his heart the Doctor was 
 disappointed with the ill-success of his more formal 
 education. A boy, chosen by so acute an observer for 
 his aptitude, and guided along the path of learning by 
 so philosophic an instructor, was bound, by the nature 
 of the universe, to make a more obvious and lasting 
 advance. Now Jean-Marie was slow in all things, im- 
 penetrable in others ; and his jiower of forgetting was 
 fully on a level with his power to learn. Therefore the 
 Doctor cherished his peripatetic lectures, to which the 
 boy attended, which he generally appeared to enjoy, and 
 by which he often profited.
 
 252 THE TEEASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 Many and many were the talks they had together ; and 
 health and moderation proved the subject of the Doctor's 
 divagations. To these he lovingly returned. 
 
 *'I lead you," he would say, ^'by the green pastures. 
 My system, my beliefs, my medicines, are resumed in 
 one phrase — to avoid excess. Blessed nature, healthy, 
 temperate nature, abhors and exterminates excess. 
 Human law, in this matter, imitates at a great distance 
 her provisions ; and we must strive to supplement the 
 efforts of the law. Yes, boy, we must be a law to our- 
 selves and for our neighbours — lex armata — armed, 
 emphatic, tyrannous law. If you see a crapulous human 
 ruin snuffing, dash him from his box ! The judge, 
 though in a way an admission of disease, is less offensive 
 to me than either the doctor or the priest. Above all 
 the doctor — the doctor and the purulent trash and 
 garbage of his pharmacopoeia ! Pure air — from the 
 neighbourhood of a pinetum for the sake of the turpen- 
 tine — unadulterated wine, and the reflections of an 
 unsophisticated spirit in the presence of the works of 
 nature — these, my boy, are the best medical appliances 
 and the best religious comforts. Devote yourself to 
 these. Hark ! there are the bells of Bourron (the wind 
 is in the north, it will be fair). How clear and airy is 
 the sound ! The nerves are harmonised and quieted ; 
 the mind attuned to silence ; and observe how easily and 
 regularly beats the heart ! Your unenlightened doctor 
 would see nothing in these sensations ; and yet you 
 yourself perceive they are a part of health. — Did you
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FRAN"CHARD. 253 
 
 remember your cinchona this morning ? Good. Ciuchona 
 also is a work of nature ; it is, after all, only the bark 
 of a tree which we might gather for ourselves if we 
 lived in the locality. — What a world is this ! Though 
 a professed atheist, I delight to bear my testimony to 
 the world. Look at the gratuitous remedies and 
 pleasures that surround our path ! The river runs by 
 the garden end, our bath, our fishpond, our natural 
 system of drainage. There is a well in the court which 
 sends up sparkling water from the earth's very heart, 
 clean, cool, and, with a little wine, most wholesome. 
 The district is notorious for its salubrity ; rheumatism 
 is the only prevalent complaint, and I myself have never 
 had a touch of it. I tell you — and my opinion is based 
 upon the coldest, clearest processes of reason — if I, if 
 you, desired to leave this home of pleasures, it would be 
 the duty, it would be the privilege, of our best friend to 
 prevent us with a pistol bullet." 
 
 One beautiful June day they sat upon the hill outside 
 the village. The river, as blue as heaven, shone here 
 and there among the foliage. The indefatigable birds 
 turned and flickered about Gretz church tower. A 
 healthy wind blew from over the forest, and the sound 
 of innumerable thousands of tree-tops and innumerable 
 millions on millions of green leaves was abroad in the 
 air, and filled the ear with something between whispered 
 speech and singing. It seemed as if every blade of grass 
 must hide a cigale ; and the fields rang merrily with 
 their music, jingling far and near as with the sleigh-
 
 254 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 bells of the fairy queen. From their station on the 
 slope the eye embraced a large space of poplar 'd plain 
 upon the one hand, the waving hill -tops of the forest on 
 the other, and Gretz itself in the middle, a handful of 
 roofs. Under the bestriding arch of the blue heavens, 
 the place seemed dwindled to a toy. It seemed incred- 
 ible that people dwelt, and could find room to turn or 
 air to breathe, in such a corner of the world. The 
 thought came home to the boy, perhaps for the first 
 time, and he gave it words. 
 
 " How small it looks ! " he sighed. 
 
 "Ay," replied the Doctor, " small enough now. Yet 
 it was once a walled city ; thriving, full of furred bur- 
 gesses and men in armour, humming with affairs ; — ■ 
 with tall spires, for aught that I know, and portly towers 
 along the battlements. A thousand chimneys ceased 
 smoking at the curfew bell. There were gibbets at the 
 gate as thick as scarecrows. In time of Avar, the assault 
 swarmed against it with ladders, the arrovv's fell like 
 leaves, the defenders sallied hotly over the drawbridge, 
 each side uttered its cry as they plied their weapons. 
 Do you know that the walls extended as far as the Com- 
 manderie ? Tradition so reports. Alas, what a long 
 way off is all this confusion — nothing left of it but my 
 quiet words spoken in your ear — and the town itself 
 shrunk to the hamlet underneath us ! By-and-by came 
 the English wars — you shall hear more of the English, 
 a stupid people, who sometimes blundered into good — 
 and Gretz was taken, sacked, and burned. It is the his-
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAKCHARD. 255 
 
 tory of many towns ; but Gretz never rose again ; it was 
 never rebuilt ; its ruins were a quarry to serve the growth 
 of rivals ; and the stones of Gretz are now ei'ect along 
 the streets of Nemours. It gratifies me that our old 
 house was the first to rise after the calamity ; when the 
 town had come to an end, it inaugurated the hamlet." 
 
 " I, too, am glad of that," said Jean-Marie. 
 
 *'li should be the temple of the humbler virtues," 
 responded the Doctor with a savoury gusto. " Perhaps 
 one of the reasons why I love my little hamlet as I do, 
 is that we have a similar history, she and I. Have I 
 told you that I was once rich ? " 
 
 '•I do not think so," answered Jean-Marie. " I do 
 not think I should have forgotten. I am sorry you 
 should have lost your fortune." 
 
 ''Sorry ?" cried the Doctor. ''Why, I find I have 
 scarce begun your education after all. Listen to me ! 
 Would 3"ou rather live in the old Gretz or in the new, 
 free from the alarms of war, with the green country at 
 the door, without noise, passports, the exactions of tlie 
 soldiery, or the jangle of the curfew-bell to send us off to 
 bed by sundown ? " 
 
 "1 suppose I should prefer the new," replied the 
 boy. 
 
 ''Precisely," returned the Doctor ; "so do I. And, 
 in the same way, I prefer my present moderate fortune 
 to my former wealth. Golden mediocrity ! cried the 
 adorable ancients ; and I subscribe to their enthusiasm. 
 Have I not good wine, good food, good air, the fields
 
 256 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 and the forest for my walk, a house, an admirable wife, 
 a boy whom I protest I cherish like a son ? Now, if I 
 were still rich, I should indubitably make my residence 
 in Paris — you know Paris — Paris and Paradise are not 
 convertible terms. This pleasant noise of the wind 
 streaming among leaves changed into the grinding Babel 
 of the street, the stupid glare of pilaster substituted for 
 this quiet pattern of greens and greys, the nerves shat- 
 tered, the digestion falsified — picture the fall ! Already 
 you perceive the consequences ; the mind is stimulated, 
 the heart steps to a different measure, and the man is 
 himself no longer. I have passionately studied myself 
 — the true business of philosophy. I know my character 
 as the musician knows the ventages of his flute. Should 
 I return to Paris, I should ruin myself gambling ; nay, 
 I go further — I should break the heart of my Anastasie 
 with infidelities." 
 
 This was too much for Jean-Marie. That a place 
 should so transform the most excellent of men trans- 
 cended his belief. Paris, he protested, was even au 
 agreeable place of residence. "Nor when I lived in 
 that city did I feel much difference," he pleaded. 
 
 "What!" cried the Doctor. "Did you not steal 
 when you were there ? " 
 
 But the boy could never be brought to see that he 
 had done anything wrong when he stole. Nor, indeed, 
 did the Doctor think he had ; but that gentleman 
 was never very scrupulous when in want of a retort. 
 
 "And now," he concluded, "do you begin to under-
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAISTCHARD. 257 
 
 stand ? Mj only friends were those who ruined me. 
 Gretz has been my academy, my sanatorium, my heaven 
 of innocent pleasures. If millions are ofCered me, I 
 wave them back : Retro, 8athanas ! — Evil one, begone ! 
 Fix your mind on my example ; despise riches, avoid 
 the debasing influence of cities. Hygiene — hygiene 
 and mediocrity of fortune — these be your watchwords 
 during life ! " 
 
 The Doctor's system of hygiene strikingly coincided 
 with his tastes ; and his picture of the perfect life was 
 a faithful description of the one he was leading at the 
 time. But it is easy to convince a boy, whom you sup- 
 ply with all the facts for the discussion. And besides, 
 there was one thing admirable in the philosophy, and 
 that was the enthusiasm of the philosopher. There was 
 never any one more vigorously determined to be 
 pleased ; and if he was not a great logician, and so had 
 no right to convince the intellect, he was certainly 
 something of a poet, and had a fascination to seduce 
 the heart. What he could not achieve in his customary 
 humour of a radiant admiration of himself and his cir- 
 cumstances, he sometimes effected in his fits of gloom. 
 
 *'Boy," he would say, ''avoid me to-day. If I were 
 superstitious, I should even beg for an interest in your 
 prayers. I am in the black fit ; the evil spirit of King- 
 Saul, the hag of the merchant Abudah, the personal 
 devil of the mediaeval monk, is with me — is in me," 
 tapping on his breast. The vices of my nature are now 
 uppermost ; innocent pleasures woo me in vain ; I long 
 17
 
 258 THE TKEASURE OF FRANCnARD. 
 
 for Paris, for my wallowing in the mire. See," he 
 would continue, producing a handful of silver, "1 de- 
 nude myself, I am not to be trusted with the price of a 
 fare. Take it, keep it for me, squander it on deleteri- 
 ous candy, throw it in the deepest of the river — I Avill 
 homologate your action. Save me from that part of 
 myself which I disown. If you see me falter, do not 
 hesitate ; if necessary, wreck the train ! I speak, of 
 course, by a parable. Any extremity' were better than 
 for me to reach Paris alive." 
 
 Doubtless the Doctor enjoyed these little scenes, as a 
 variation in his part ; they represented the BjTonic 
 element in the somewhat artificial poetry of his exist- 
 ence ; but to the boy, though he was dimly aware of 
 their theatricality, they represented more. The Doctor 
 made perhaps too little, the boy possibly too much, of 
 the reality and gravity of these temptations. 
 
 One day a great light shone for Jean-Marie. " Could 
 not riches be used well ? " he asked. 
 
 "In theory, yes," replied the Doctor. " But it is 
 found in experience that no one does so. All the world 
 imagine they will be exceptional when they grow 
 wealthy ; but possession is debasing, new desires spring 
 up ; and the silly taste for ostentation eats out the heart 
 of pleasure." 
 
 ''Then you might be better if you had less," said the 
 boy. 
 
 "Certainly not," replied the Doctor; bnt his voice 
 quavered as he spoke.
 
 THE TEEASUKE OF FKAIS'CHARD. 259 
 
 ** Why ? " demanded pitiless innocence. 
 
 Doctor Desprez saw all the colours of the rainbow in 
 a moment ; the stable universe appeared to be about 
 capsizing with him. " Because," said he — affecting de- 
 liberation after an obvious pause — '' because I have 
 formed my life for my present income. It is not good 
 for men of my years to be violently dissevered from 
 their habits." 
 
 That was a sharp brush. The Doctor breathed hard, 
 and fell into taciturnity for the afternoon. As for the 
 boy, he was delighted with the resolution of his doubts ; 
 even wondered that he had not foreseen the obvious and 
 conclusive answer. His faith in the Doctor was a stout 
 piece of goods. Desprez was inclined to be a sheet in 
 the wind's eye after dinner, especially after Ehone wine, 
 his favourite weakness. He would then remark on the 
 warmth of his feeling for Anastasie, and with inflamed 
 cheeks and a loose, flustered smile, debate upon all sorts 
 of tojiics, and be feebly and indiscreetly witty. But the 
 adopted stable-boy would not permit himself to enter- 
 tain a doubt that savoured of ingratitude. It is quite 
 true that a man may be a second father to you, and yet 
 take too much to drink ; but the best natures are ever 
 slow to acce})t such truths. 
 
 The Doctor tlioroughly possessed his heart, but per- 
 haps he exaggerated his influence over his mind. Cer- 
 tainly Jean-Marie adopted some of his master's opinions, 
 but I have yet to learn that he ever surrendered one of 
 his own. Convictions existed in him by divine right ;
 
 260 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 they were virgin, unwrouglit, the brute metal of decis- 
 ion. He coukl add others indeed, but he could not 
 put away ; neither did he care if they were perfectly 
 agreed among themselves ; and his spiritual pleasures 
 had nothing to do with turning them over or justifying 
 them in words. Words were with him a mere accom- 
 plishment, like dancing. When he was by himself, his 
 pleasures were almost vegetable. He would slip into the 
 woods towards Acheres, and sit in the mouth of a cave 
 among grey birches. His soul stared straight out of his 
 eyes ; be did not move or think ; sunlight, thin shadows 
 moving in the wind, the edge of firs against the sky, oc- 
 cupied and bound his faculties. He was pure unity, a 
 spirit wholly abstracted. A single mood filled him, to 
 wliich all the objects of sense contributed, as the colours 
 of the spectrum merge and disappear in white light. 
 
 So while the Doctor made himself drunk with words, 
 the adopted stable-boy bemused himself with silence. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 TREASURE TROVE. 
 
 The Doctor's carriage was a two-wheeled gig with a 
 hood ; a kind of vehicle in much favour among country 
 doctors. On how many roads has one not seen it, a_ 
 great way off between the poplars I — in how many village 
 streets, tied to a gate-post ! This sort of chariot is 
 affected — particularly at the trot — by a kind of pitching 
 movement to and fro across the axle, which well entitles
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANTCHARD. 261 
 
 it to the style of a Noddy. The hood describes a con- 
 siderable arc against the landscape, with a solemnly 
 absurd effect on the contemplative pedestrian. To 
 ride in such a carriage cannot be numbered among the 
 things that appertain to glory ; but I haye no doubt it 
 may be useful in liver complaint. Thence, perhaps, 
 its wide popularity among physicians. 
 
 One morning early, Jean-Marie led forth the Doctor's 
 noddy, opened the gate, and mounted to the driving- 
 seat. The Doctor followed, arrayed from top to toe in 
 spotless linen, armed with an immense flesh-coloured 
 umbrella, and girt with a botanical case on a baldric ; 
 and tlie equipage drove off smartly in a breeze of its 
 own provocation. They were bound for Franchard, to 
 collect plants, with an eye to the '' Comparative Phar- 
 macopoeia." 
 
 A little rattling on the ojien roads, andihey came to 
 the borders of the forest and struck into an unfre- 
 quented track ; the noddy yawed softly over the sand, 
 with an accompaniment of snapping twigs. There was 
 a great, green, softly murmuring cloud of congregated 
 foliage overhead. In the arcades of the forest the air 
 retained the freshness of the night. The athletic bear- 
 ing of the trees, each carrying its leafy mountain, 
 pleased the mind like so many statues and the lines of 
 the trunk led the eye admiringly upward to where the 
 extreme leaves sparkled in a patch of azure. Squirrels 
 leaped in mid air. It was a proper spot for a devotee 
 of the goddess Hygieia.
 
 262 THE TREASURE OF FRAKCHARD. 
 
 " Have you been to Francliarcl, Jean-Marie ? " in- 
 quired the Doctor. " I fancy not." 
 
 " Never," replied the boy. 
 
 "It is ruin in a gorge," continued Desprez, adopting 
 his expository voice; "the ruin of a hermitage and 
 chapel. History tells us much of Franchard ; how the 
 recluse was often slain by robbers ; how he lived on a 
 most insufficient diet ; how he was expected to pass his 
 days in prayer. A letter' is preserved, addressed to one of 
 these solitaries by the superior of his order, full of admi- 
 rable hygienic advice ; bidding him go from his book to 
 praying, and so back again, for variety's sake, and when 
 he was weary of both to stroll about his garden and ob- 
 serve the honey bees. It is to this day my own system. 
 You must often have remarked me leaving the " Phar- 
 macopoeia" — often even in the middle of a phrase — to 
 come forth into the sun and air. I admire the writer of 
 that letter from my heart ; he was a man of thought on 
 the most important subjects. But, indeed, had I lived 
 in the Middle Ages (I am heartily glad that I did not) 
 I should have been an eremite myself — if I had not been 
 a professed buffoon, that is. These were the only philo- 
 sophical lives yet open : laughter or prayer ; sneers, we 
 might say, and tears. Until the sun of the Positive 
 arose, the wise man had to make his choice between 
 these two." 
 
 "I have been a buffoon, of course," observed Jean- 
 Marie. 
 
 " I cannot imagine you to have excelled in your pro-
 
 THE TKEASURE OF FRAKCHARD. 263 
 
 fession," said the Doctor, admiring the boy's gravity. 
 " Do you ever laugh ? " 
 
 ''Ob, yes," replied the other. "I laugh often. I 
 am very fond of Jokes." 
 
 " Singular being ! " said Desprez. " But I divagate 
 (I perceive in a thousand ways that I grow old) Fran- 
 chard was at length destroyed in the English wars, the 
 same that levelled Gretz. But — here is the point — the 
 hermits (for there were already more than one) had 
 foreseen the danger and carefully concealed the sacrificial 
 vessels. These vessels were of monstrous value, Jean- 
 Marie — monstrous value — priceless, we may say ; ex- 
 quisitely worked, of exquisite material. And now, 
 mark me, they have never been found. In the reign of 
 Louis Quatorze some fellows were digging hard by the 
 ruins. Suddenly — took ! — the spade hit upon an ob- 
 stacle. Imagine the men looking one to another ; im- 
 agine how their hearts bounded, how their colour came 
 and went. It was a coffer, and in Franchard the place 
 of buried treasure ! They tore it open like famished 
 beasts. Alas ! it was not the treasure ; only some 
 priestly robes, which, at the touch of the eating air, 
 fell upon themselves and instantly wasted into dust. 
 The perspiration of these good fellows turned cold upon 
 them, Jean-Marie. I will pledge my reputation, if there 
 was anything like a cutting wind, one or other had a 
 pneumonia for his trouble." 
 
 '' I should like to have seen them turning into dust," 
 said Jean-Marie. " Otherwise, I should not have cared 
 so greatly."
 
 264 TUE TREASURE OF FRANCHAED. 
 
 " You have no imagination," cried the Doctor. 
 *' Picture to yourself the scene. Dwell on the idea — a 
 great treasure lying in the earth for centuries : the 
 material for a giddy, copious, opulent existence not 
 employed ; dresses and exquisite pictures unseen ; the 
 swiftest galloping horses not stirring a hoof, arrested by 
 a spell ; women with the beautiful faculty of smiles, not 
 smiling ; cards, dice, opera singing, orchestras, castles, 
 beautiful parks and gardens, big ships with a tower of 
 sailcloth, all lying unborn in a coffin — and the stupid 
 trees growing overhead in the sunlight, year after year. 
 The thought drives one frantic." 
 
 "It is only money," replied Jean- Marie. ''It would 
 do harm." 
 
 ''Ocome!" cried Desprez, "that is philosophy; it 
 is all very fine, but not to the point just now. And be- 
 sides, it is not 'only money,' as you call it ; there are 
 works of art in the question ; the vessels were carved. 
 You speak like a child. You weary me exceedingly, 
 quoting my words out of all logical connection, like a 
 parroquet. " 
 
 "And at any rate, we have nothing to do with it," 
 returned the boy submissively. 
 
 They struck the Eoute Eondo at that moment ; and 
 the sudden change to the rattling causeway combined, 
 with the Doctor's irritation, to keep him silent. The 
 noddy jigged along; the trees went by, looking on 
 silently, as if they had something on their minds. 
 The Quadrilateral was passed ; then came Franchard.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 265 
 
 They put up the horse at the little solitary inn, and 
 went forth strolling. The gorge was clyed deeply with 
 heather ; the rocks and birches standing luminous in 
 the sun. A great humming of bees about the flowers 
 disposed Jean- Marie to sleep, and he sat down against 
 a clump of heather, while the Doctor went briskly to 
 and fro, with quick turns, culling his simples. 
 
 The boy's head had fallen a little forward, his eyes 
 were closed, his fingers had fallen lax about his knees, 
 when a sudden cry called him to his feet. It was a 
 strange sound, thin and brief ; it fell dead, and silence 
 returned as though it had never been interrupted. He 
 had not recognised the Doctor's voice ; but, as there 
 was no one else in all the valley, it was plainly the 
 Doctor who had given utterance to the sound. He 
 looked right and left, and there was Desprez, standing 
 in a niche between two boulders, and looking round 
 on his adopted son with a countenance as white as 
 paper. 
 
 " A viper ! " cried Jean-Marie, running towards him. 
 '' A vij^er ! You are bitten ! " 
 
 The Doctor came down heavily out of the cleft, and 
 advanced in silence to meet the boy, whom he took 
 roughly by the shoulder. 
 
 "'l have found it," he said, with a gasp. 
 
 "A plant ?" asked Jean-Marie. 
 
 Desprez had a fit of unnatural gaiety, which the rocks 
 took up and mimicked. "A plant ! " he repeated scorn- 
 fully. " Well — yes — a plant. And here," he added
 
 266 THE TREASUKE OF FEAIS'CHARD. 
 
 suddenly, showing Ins right hand, wliich he had hitherto 
 concealed behind his back — " here is one of tlie bulbs." 
 
 Jean-Marie saw a dirty platter, coated with earth. 
 
 " That ? " said he. ^' It is a plate ! " 
 
 " It is a coach and horses," cried the Doctor. " Boy," 
 he continued, growing warmer, " I ^'lucked away a 
 great pad of moss from between these boulders, and dis- 
 closed a crevice ; and when I looked in, what do you 
 suppose I saw ? I saw a house in Paris with' a court 
 and garden, I saw my wife shining Avith diamonds, I 
 saw myself a deputy, I saw you — well, I — I saw your 
 future," he concluded, rather feebly. ''I have just dis- 
 covered America," he added. 
 
 " But what is it ? " asked the boy. 
 
 "The Treasure of Franchard," cried the Doctor; 
 and, throwing his brown straw hat upon the ground, he 
 whooped like an Indian and sprang upon Jean-Marie, 
 whom 'he suffocated with embraces and bedewed with 
 tears. Then he flung himself down among the heather 
 and once more laughed until the valley rang. 
 
 But the boy had now an interest of liis own, a boy's 
 interest. No sooner was he released from the Doctor's 
 accolade than he ran to the boulders, sprang into the 
 niche, and, thrusting his hand into the crevice, drew 
 forth one after another, encrusted with the earth of ages, 
 the flagons, candlesticks, and jiatens of the hermitage of 
 Franchard. A casket came last, tightly shut and very 
 heavy. 
 
 " 0, what fun ! " he cried.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHAED. 267 
 
 But when he looked back at the Doctor, who had fol- 
 lowed close behind and was silently observing, the words 
 died from his lips. Desprez was once more the colour of 
 ashes ; his lip worked and trembled ; a sort of bestial 
 greed possessed him. 
 
 '^This is childish," he said. *' We lose precious 
 time. Back to the inn, harness the trap, and bring it to 
 yon bank. Eun for your life, and remember — not one 
 whisper. I stay here to watch." 
 
 Jean-Marie did as he was bid, though not without 
 surprise. The noddy was brought round to the spot in- 
 dicated ; and the two gradually transported the treasure 
 from its place of concealment to the boot below the 
 driving seat. Once it was all stored the Doctor recov- 
 ered his gaiety. 
 
 " I pay my grateful duties to the genius of this dell," 
 he said. " Oh, for a live coal, a heifer, and a jar of 
 country wine ! I am in the vein for sacrifice, for a su- 
 perb libation. Well, and why not ? We are at Fran- 
 chard. English pale ale is to be had — not classical, in- 
 deed, but excellent. Boy, we shall drink ale." 
 
 "But I thought it was so unwholesome," said Jean- 
 Marie, " and very dear besides. " 
 
 " Fiddle-de-dee ! " exclaimed the Doctor gaily. " To 
 the inn ! " 
 
 And he stepped into the noddy, tossing his head, with 
 an elastic, youthful air. The horse was turned, and in 
 a few seconds they drew up beside the palings of the 
 inn garden.
 
 268 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHAED. 
 
 ''Here," said Desprez — ''here, near the stable, so 
 that we may keep an eye upon things." 
 
 They tied the horse, and entered the garden, the Doc- 
 tor singing, now in fantastic high notes, now produc- 
 ing deep reverberations from his chest. He took a seat, 
 rapped loudly on the table, assailed the waiter with wit- 
 ticisms; and when the bottle of Bass was at length pro- 
 duced, far more charged with gas than the most delirious 
 champagne, he filled out a long glassful of froth, and 
 pushed it over to Jean- Marie. " Drink," he said ; 
 "drink deep." 
 
 "I would rather not," faltered the boy, true to his 
 training. 
 
 **"What?" thundered Desprez. 
 
 " I am afraid of it," said Jean-Marie ; my stom- 
 ach " 
 
 "Take it or leave it," interrupted Desprez fiercely; 
 "but understand it once for all — there is nothing so 
 contemptible as a precisian." 
 
 Here "was a new lesson ! The boy sat benfiised, look- 
 ing at the glass but not tasting it, while the Doctor 
 emptied and refilled his own, at first with clouded brow, 
 but gradually yielding to the sun, the heady, prickling 
 beverage, and his own predisposition to be happy. 
 
 " Once in a way," he said at last, by way of a conces- 
 sion to the boy's more rigorous attitude, '• once in a way, 
 and at so critical a moment, this ale is a nectar for the 
 gods. The habit, indeed, is debasing ; wine, the juice 
 of the grape, is the true drink of the Frenchman, as I
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAXCHARD. 269 
 
 have often had occasion to point ont ; and I do not 
 know that I can blame you for refusing this outlandish 
 stimulant. You can have some wine and cakes. Is the 
 bottle empty ? Well, we will not be proud ; we will have 
 jiity on your glass." 
 
 The beer being done, the Doctor chafed bitterly while 
 Jean-Marie finished his cakes. "^I burn to be gone," 
 he said, looking at his watch. " Good God, how slow 
 you eat ! " And yet to eat slowly was his own particu- 
 lar prescription, the main secret of longevity ! 
 
 His martyrdom, however, reached an end at last ; the 
 pair resumed their places in the buggy, and Desprez, 
 leaning luxuriously back, announced his intention of 
 proceeding to Fontainebleau. 
 
 "To Fontainebleau ?" repeated Jean-Marie. 
 
 "My words are always measured," said the Doctor. 
 '*0n!" 
 
 The Doctor was driven through the glades of paradise ; 
 the air, the ligbt, the shining leaves, the very move- 
 ments of the vehicle, seemed to fall in tune witb his 
 golden meditations ; with his head thrown back, he 
 dreamed a series of sunny visions, ale and pleasure 
 dancing in his veins. At last he spoke. 
 
 "I shall telegraph for Casimir," he said. ''Good 
 Casimir ! a fellow of the lower order of intelligence, 
 Jean-Marie, distinctly not creative, not poetic ; and yet 
 he will repay your study ; liis fortune is vast, and is en- 
 tirely due to his own exertions. He is the very fellow 
 to help us to dispose of our trinkets, find us a suitable
 
 270 THE TEEASURE OF FEANCHARD. 
 
 house in Paris, and manage the details of our installa- 
 tion. Admirable Casimir, one of my oldest comrades ! 
 It was on his advice, I may add, that I invested my 
 little fortune in Turkish bonds ; when we have added 
 these spoils of the mediaeval church to our. stake in the 
 Mahometan empire, little boy, we shall positively roll 
 among doubloons, positively roll ! Beautiful forest," he 
 cried, " farewell ! Though called to other scenes, I 
 will not forget thee. Thy name is graven in my heart. 
 Under the influence of prosperity I become dithyrambic, 
 Jean-Marie. Such is the impulse of the natural soul ; 
 such was the constitution of primaeval man. And I — 
 well, I will not refuse the credit — I have preserved my 
 youth like a virginity ; another, who should have led 
 the same snoozing, countryfied existence for these years, 
 another had become rusted, become stereotype ; but I, 
 I praise my happy constitution, retain the sjjring un- 
 broken. Fresh opulence and a new sphere of duties 
 find me unabated in ardour and only more mature by 
 knowledge. For this prospective change, Jean-Marie — 
 it may probably have shocked you. Tell me now, did it 
 not strike you as an inconsistency ? Confess — it is use- 
 less to dissemble — it pained you ? 
 
 " Yes," said the boy. 
 
 " You see," returned the Doctor, with sublime 
 fatuity, " I read your thoughts ! Nor am I surprised — 
 your education is not yet complete ; the higher duties 
 of men have not been yet presented to you fully. A 
 hint — till we have leisure — must suffice. Now that I
 
 THE TREASURE OF FKANCHARD. 271 
 
 am ouce more in possession of a modest competence ; 
 now that I have so long prepared myself in silent medi- 
 tation, it becomes my superior duty to proceed to Paris. 
 My scientific training, my undoubted command of 
 language, mark me out for the service of my country. 
 Modesty in such a case would be a snare. If sin were a 
 philosophical expression, I should call it sinful. A man 
 must not deny his manifest abilities, for that is to evade 
 his obligations. I must be up and doing ; I must be no 
 skulker in life's battle." 
 
 So he rattled on, copiously greasing the joint of his 
 inconsistency Avith words ; while the boy listened si- 
 lently, his eyes fixed on the horse, his mind seething. 
 It was all lost eloquence ; no array of words could un- 
 settle a belief of Jean-Marie's ; and he drove into Fon- 
 tainebleau filled with pity, horror, indignation, and 
 despair. 
 
 In the town Jean-Marie was kept a fixture on the 
 driving-seat, to guard the treasure ; while the Doctor, 
 with a singular, slightly tipsy airiness of manner, flut- 
 tered in and out of cafes, where he shook hands with 
 garrison ofiicers, and mixed an absinthe with the nicety 
 of old experience ; in and out of shops, from which he 
 returned laden with costly fi'uits, real turtle, a magnifi- 
 cent piece of silk for his wife, a preposterous cane for 
 himself, and a kepi of tlie newest fashion for the boy ; 
 in and out of the telegraph office, whence he despatched 
 his telegram, and where three hours later he received 
 an answer promising a visit on the morrow ; and gen-
 
 272 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 erally pervaded Fontainebleau with the first fine aroma 
 of his diviue good humour. 
 
 The sun was very low when they set forth again ; the 
 shadows of the forest trees extended across the broad 
 white road that led them home ; the penetrating odour 
 of the evening wood had already arisen, like a cloud of 
 incense, from that broad field of treetops ; and even in 
 the streets of the town, where the air had been baked 
 all day between white walls, it came in whiffs and 
 pulses, like a distant music. Half-way home, the last 
 gold flicker vanished from a great oak upon the left ; 
 and when they came forth beyond the borders of the 
 wood, the plain was already sunken in pearly greyness, 
 and a great, jiale moon came swinging skyward through 
 the filmy poplars. 
 
 The Doctor sang, the Doctor whistled, the Doctor 
 talked. He spoke of the woods, and the wars, and the 
 deposition of dew ; he brightened and babbled of Paris ; 
 he soared into cloudy bombast on the glories of the 
 political arena. All was to be changed ; as the day de- 
 parted, it took with it the vestiges of an outworn exist- 
 ence, and to-morrow's sun was to inaugurate the new. 
 ''Enough," he cried, '*' of this life of maceration!" 
 His wife (still beautiful, or he was sadly partial) was to 
 be no longer buried ; she should now shine before 
 society. Jean-Marie would find the world at his feet ; 
 the roads open to success, wealth, honour, and post- 
 humous renown. '^ And 0, by the way," said he, " for 
 God's sake keep your tongue quiet ! You are, of course.
 
 THE TEEASURE OF FRAlSrCHARD. 273 
 
 a very silent fellow ; it is a quality I gladly recognise in 
 you — silence, golden silence ! But this is a matter of 
 grayity. No word must get abroad ; none but the good 
 Casimir is to be trusted ; we shall jorobably dispose of 
 the Yessels in England." 
 
 *'But are they not eyen ours ? " the boy said, almost 
 with a sob — it was the only time he had spoken. 
 
 " Ours in this sense, that they are nobody else's/' re- 
 plied the Doctor. ''But the State would haye some 
 claim. If they were stolen, for instance, we should be 
 unable to demand their restitution ; we should have no 
 title ; we should be unable eyen to communicate with 
 the police. Such is the monstrous condition of the 
 law.* It is a mere instance of what remains to be 
 done, of the injustices that may yet be righted by an 
 ardent, actiye, and philosophical deputy." 
 
 Jean-Marie put his faith in Madame Desprcz ; and as 
 they drove forward down the road from Bourron, be- 
 tween the rustling poplars, he prayed in his teeth, and 
 whipped up the horse to an unusual speed. Surely, as 
 soon as they arrived, madame would assert her char- 
 acter, and bring this waking nightmare to an end. 
 
 Their entrance into G-retz was heralded and accom- 
 panied by a most furious barking; all the dogs in the 
 village seemed to smell the treasure in the noddy. But 
 there was no one in the street, saye three lounging land- 
 scape painters at Tentaillon's door. Jean-Marie opened 
 the green gate and led in the horse and carriage ; and 
 * Let it be so, for my tale I 
 18
 
 274 THE TREASUKE OF FRANCnARD. 
 
 almost at the same moment Madame Desprez came to 
 the kitchea threshold with a lighted lantern ; for the 
 moon was not yet high enough to clear the garden wails. 
 
 '' Close the gates, Jean-Marie ! " cried the Doctor, 
 somewhat unsteadily alighting. ''Anastasie, where is 
 Aline ? " 
 
 '•' She has gone to Montereau to see her parents," said 
 madame. 
 
 '^All is for the best!" exclaimed the Doctor fer- 
 vently. "Here, quick, come near to me; I do not 
 wish to speak too loud,*' he continued. "' Darling, we 
 are wealthy !" 
 
 '^Wealthy ! " repeated the wife. 
 
 "I have found the treasure of Franchard," replied 
 her husband. ''See, here are the first fruits; a pine- 
 apple, a dress for my ever-beautiful — it will suit her — 
 trust a husband's, trust a lover's, taste ! Embrace me, 
 darling ! This grimy episode is over ; the butterfly un- 
 folds its painted wings. To-morrow Casimir will come ; 
 in a week we may be in Paris — happy at last ! You shall 
 have diamonds. Jean-^Iarie, take it out of the boot, 
 with religious care, and bring it piece by piece into the 
 dining-room. We shall have plate at table ! Darling, 
 hasten and prepare this turtle ; it ^vill be a whet — it 
 will be an addition to our meagre ordinary. I myself 
 will proceed to the cellar. We shall have a bottle of 
 that little Beaujolais you like, and finish with the Her- 
 mitage ; there are still three bottles left. Worthy wine 
 for a worthy occasion."
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 275 
 
 *'But, my husband; you jjut me in a whirl," she 
 cried. " I do not comprehend." 
 
 " The turtle, my adored, the turtle ! " cried the Doc- 
 tor ; and he pushed her towards the kitchen, lantern 
 and all. 
 
 Jean-Marie stood dumfounded. He had pictured to 
 himself a different scene — a more immediate protest, 
 and his hope began to dwindle on the spot. 
 
 The Doctor was everywhere, a little doubtful on his 
 legs, perhaps, and now and then taking the wall with 
 his shoulder ; for it was long since he had tasted ab- 
 sinthe, and he was even then reflecting that the ab- 
 sinthe had been a misconception. Not that he re- 
 gretted excess on such a glorious day, but he made a 
 mental memorandum to beware ; he must not, a second 
 time, become the victim of a deleterious habit. He 
 had his wine out of the cellar in a twinkling ; he 
 arranged the sacrificial vessels, some on the white table- 
 cloth, some on the sideboard, still crusted with historic 
 earth. He was in and out of the kitchen, plying An- 
 astasie with vermouth, heating her with glimpses of the 
 future, estimating their new wealth at ever larger 
 figures ; and before they sat down to supper, the lady's 
 virtue had melted in the fire of his enthusiasm, her 
 timidity had disappeared ; she, too, had begun to speak 
 disparagingly of the life at Gretz ; and as she took her 
 place and helped the soup, her eyes shone with the 
 glitter of prospective diamonds. 
 
 All through the meal, she and the Doctor made and
 
 276 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 unmade fairy plans. Tbey bobbed and bowed and 
 pledged each other. Their faces ran over with smiles ; 
 their eyes scattered sparkles, as they projected the 
 Doctor's political honours and the lady's drawing-room 
 ovations. 
 
 " But you will not be a Red ! " cried Anastasie. 
 
 "I am Left Centre to the core," replied the Doctor. 
 
 "Madame Gastein will present us — we shall find our- 
 selves forgotten," said the lady. 
 
 "Never," protested the Doctor. "Beauty and talent 
 leave a mark." 
 
 "I have positively forgotten how to dress," she 
 sighed. 
 
 " Darling, you make me blush," cried he. " Yours 
 has been a tragic marriage ! " 
 
 "But your success — to see you appreciated, hon- 
 oured, your name in all the papers, that will be more 
 than i^leasure — it will be heaven ! " she cried. 
 
 "And once a week," said the Doctor, archly scan- 
 ning the syllables, "once a week — one good little game 
 of baccarat ? " 
 
 " Only once a week ? " she questioned, threatening 
 him with a finger. 
 
 "I swear it by my political honour," cried he. 
 
 " I spoil you," she said, and gave him her hand. 
 
 He covered it with kisses. 
 
 Jean-Marie escaped into the night. The moon 
 swung high over Gretz. He went down to the garden 
 end and sat on the Jetty. The river ran by with eddies
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 277 
 
 of oily silver, and a low, monotonous song. Faint veils 
 of mist moved among the poplars on the farther side. 
 The reeds were quietly nodding. A hundred times 
 already had the boy sat, on such a night, and watched 
 the streaming river with untroubled fancy. And this 
 perhaps was to be the last. He was to leave this famil- 
 iar hamlet, this green, rustling country, this bright 
 and quiet stream ; he was to pass into the great city ; 
 his dear lady mistress was to move bedizened into sa- 
 loons ; his good, garrulous, kind-hearted master to 
 become a brawling deputy ; and both be lost forever to 
 Jean-Marie and their better selves. He knew his own 
 defects; he knew he must sink into less and less con- 
 sideration in the turmoil of a city life; sink more and 
 more from the child into the servant. And he began 
 dimly to believe the Doctor's prophecies of evil. He 
 could see a change in both. His generous incredulity 
 failed hioi for this once ; a child mnst have perceived 
 that the Hermitage had comi^leted what the absinthe 
 had begun. If this were the first day, what would be 
 the last ? " If necessary, Avreck the train," thought he, 
 remembering the Doctor's parable. He looked round 
 on the delightful scene ; he drank deep of the charmed 
 night air, laden with the scent of hay. " If necessary, 
 wreck the train," he repeated. And he rose and re- 
 turned to the house.
 
 278 THE TREASURE OF FRAN CHARD. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 A CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION, IN TWO PARTS. 
 
 The next morning there was a most unusual outcry 
 in the Doctor's house. The last thing before going to 
 bed, the Doctor had locked up some valuables in the 
 dining-room cupboard ; and behold, when he rose again, 
 as he did about four o'clock, the cupboard had been 
 broken open, and the valuables in question had. disap- 
 peared. Madame and Jean-Marie were summoned, from 
 their rooms, and. appeared in hasty toilets ; they found 
 the Doctor raving, calling the heavens to witness and 
 avenge his injury, pacing the room bare-footed, Avith 
 the tails of his night-shirt flirting as he turned. 
 
 ''Gone !" he said ; "the things are gone,. the fortune 
 gone ! We are paupers once more. Boy ! what do you 
 know of this ? Speak up, sir, speak up. Do you know 
 of it ? Where are they ? " He had him by the arm, 
 shaking him like a bag, and the boy's words, if he had 
 any, were jolted forth in inarticulate murmurs. The 
 Doctor, with a revulsion from his own violence, set him 
 down again. He observed Anastasie in tears. "Anas- 
 tasie," he said, in quite an altered voice, "compose 
 yourself, command your feelings. I would not have 
 you give way to passion like the vulgar. This — this 
 trifling accident must be lived dowo. Jean-Marie, bring 
 me my smaller medicine chest. A gentle laxative is 
 indicated." 
 
 And he dosed the family all round, leading the way
 
 THE TRExVSURE OF FRAISTCHARD, 279 
 
 himself with a double quantity. The wretched Auas- 
 tasie, who had never been ill in the whole course of her 
 existence, and whose soul recoiled from remedies, wept 
 •floods of tears as she sipped, and shuddered, and pro- 
 tested, and then v>^as bullied and shouted at until she 
 sipped again. As for Jean-Marie, he took his portion 
 down with stoicism. 
 
 "I have given him a less amount," observed the Doc- 
 tor, " his youth protecting him against emotion. And 
 now that we have thus parried any morbid consequences, 
 let us reason." 
 
 *'I am so cold," wailed Anastasie. 
 
 *' Cold !" cried the doctor. "I give thanks to God 
 that I am made of fierier material. Why, madam, a 
 blow like this would set a frog into a transpiration. If 
 you are cold, you can retire ; and, by the way, you 
 might throw me down my trousers. It is chilly for the 
 legs." 
 
 "Oh, no !" protested Anastasie; "1 will stay with 
 you." 
 
 ''Nay, madame, you shall not suffer for your devo- 
 tion," said the doctor. " I will myself fetch you a 
 shawl." And he went upstairs and returned more fully 
 clad and with an armful of wraps for the shivering 
 Anastasie. "And now," he resumed, "to investigate 
 this crime. Let us proceed by induction. Anastasie, 
 do you know anything that can help us ? " Anastasie 
 knew nothing. " Or you, Jean-Marie ?" 
 
 " Not I," replied the boy steadily.
 
 280 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 " Good," returned the Doctor. " We shall now turn 
 our attention to the material evidences. (I was born 
 to be a detective ; I have the eye and the systematic 
 spirit.) First, violence has been employed. The door 
 was broken open ; and it may be observed, in passing, 
 that the lock was dear indeed at what I paid for it : a 
 crow to pluck with Master Goguelat. Second, here is 
 the instrument employed, one of our osm table-knives, 
 one of our best, my dear ; which seems to indicate no 
 preparation on the part of the gang — if gang it was. 
 Thirdly, I observe that nothing has been removed ex- 
 cept the Franchard dishes and the casket ; our own 
 silver has been minutely respected. This is wily ; it 
 shows intelligence, a knowledge of the code, a desire to 
 avoid legal consequences. I argue from this fact that 
 the gang numbers persons of respectability — outward, 
 of course, and merely outward, as the robbery proves. 
 But I argue, second, that we must have been observed 
 at Franchard itself by some occult observer, and dogged 
 throughout the day with a skill and patience that I 
 venture to qualify as consummate. Xo ordinary man, 
 no occasional criminal, would have shown himself capa- 
 ble of this combination. We have in our neighbour- 
 hood, it is far from improbable, a retired bandit of the 
 highest order of intelligence." 
 
 " Good heaven ! " cried the horrified Anastasie. 
 " Henri, how can you ! "' 
 
 '' My cherished one, this is a process of induction," 
 said the Doctor. " If any of my steps are unsound, cor-
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FKANCHARD. 281 
 
 rect me. Yon are silent ? Then do not, I beseech you, 
 be so vulgarly illogical as to revolt from my conclusion. 
 We have now arrived," he resumed, " at some idea of 
 the composition of the gang — for I incline to the hy- 
 pothesis of more than one — and we now leave this room, 
 which can disclose no more, and turn our attention to 
 the court and garden. (Jean-Marie, I trust you are 
 observantly following my various steps ; this is an ex- 
 cellent piece of education for you.) Come with me to 
 the door. No steps on the court ; it is unfortunate our 
 court should be paved. On what small matters bang 
 the destiny of these delicate investigations ! Hey ! 
 What have we here ? I have led you to the very spot," 
 he said, standing grandly backward and indicating the 
 green gate. " An escalade, as you can now see for 
 yourselves, has taken place." 
 
 Sure enough, the green paint was in several places 
 scratclied and broken; and one of the panels preserved 
 the print of a nailed shoe. The foot had slipped, how- 
 ever, and it was difficult to estimate the size of the shoe, 
 and impossible to distinguish the pattern of the nails. 
 
 ''The whole robbery," concluded the Doctor, "step 
 by step, has been reconstituted. Inductive science can 
 no further go. " 
 
 "It is wonderful," said his wifeJ "'You should in- 
 deed have been a detective, Henri. I had no idea of 
 your talents." 
 
 "My dear," replied Desprez, condescendingly, "a 
 man of scientific imagination combines the lesser facul-
 
 282 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 ties ; he is a detective just as lie is a publicist or a 
 general ; these are but local applications of his special 
 talent. But now," he continued, ''would you have me 
 go further ? Would you have me lay my finger on 
 the culprits— or rather, for I cannot promise quite so 
 much, point out to you the very house where they con- 
 sort ? It may be a satisfaction, at least it is all we are 
 likely to get, since we are denied the remedy of law. I 
 reach the further stage in this way. In order to fill 
 my outline of the robbery, I require a man likely to be 
 m the forest idling, I require a man of education, I re- 
 quire a man superior to considerations of morality. 
 The three requisites all centre in Tantaillon's boarders. 
 They are painters, therefore they are continually loung- 
 ing in the forest. They are painters, therefore they are 
 not unlikely to have some smattering of education. 
 Lastly, because they are jDainters, they are probably im- 
 moral. And this I prove in two ways. First, paintinsr 
 is an art which merely addresses the eye ; it does not in 
 any particular exercise the moral sense. And second, 
 painting, in common with all the other arts, implies the 
 dangerous quality of imagination. A man of imagina- 
 tion is never moral ; he outsoars literal demarcations 
 and reviews life under too many shifting lights to rest 
 content with the invidious distinctions of the law ! " 
 
 " But you always say — at least, so I understood you " 
 — said madame, '' that these lads display no imagination 
 whatever." 
 
 "My dear, they displayed imagination, and of a very
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 283 
 
 fantastic order, too," returned the Doctor, ''when they 
 embraced their beggarly profession. Besides — and this 
 is an argument exactly suited to your intellectual level 
 — many of them are English and American. " Where 
 else should we expect to find a thief ? — And now you 
 had better get your coffee. Because we have lost a 
 treasure, there is no reason for starving. For my part, 
 I shall break my fast with white wine. I feel unaccount- 
 ably heated and thirsty to-day. I can only attribute it to 
 the shock of the discovery. And yet, you will bear me 
 out, I supported the emotion nobly." 
 
 The Doctor had now talked himself back into an ad- 
 mirable humour ; and as he sat in the arbour and slowly 
 imbibed a large allowance of white wine and picked a lit- 
 tle bread and cheese with no very impetuous appetite, if 
 a third of his meditations ran upon the missing treasure, 
 the other two-thirds were more pleasingly busied in the 
 retrospect of his detective skill. 
 
 About eleven Casimir arrived ; he had caught an 
 early train to Fontainebleau, and driven over to save 
 time ; and now his cab was stabled at Tentaillon's, and 
 he remarked, studying his watch, that he could spare 
 an hour and a half. He was much the man of business, 
 decisively spoken, given to frowning in an intellectual 
 manner. Auastasie's born brother, he did not waste 
 much sentiment on the lady, gave her an English fam- 
 ily kiss, and demanded a meal without delay. 
 
 ''You can tell me your story while we eat," he ob- 
 served. " Anything good to-day, Stasie?"
 
 284 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 He was promised something good. The trio sat 
 down to table in the arbour, Jean-Marie waiting as well 
 as eating, and the Doctor recounted what had hap- 
 pened in his richest narrative manner. Casimir heard 
 it with explosions of laughter. 
 
 '' What a streak of luck for you, my good brother," 
 he observed, when the tale was over. " If you had 
 gone to Paris, you would have played dick-duck-drake 
 with the whole consignment in three months. Your 
 own would have followed ; and you would have come to 
 me in a procession like the last time. But I give you 
 warning — Stasie may Aveep and Henri ratiocinate — it 
 will not serve you twice. Your next collapse will be 
 fatal. I thought I had told you so, Stasie ? Hey ? 
 No sense ? " 
 
 The Doctor winced and looked furtively at Jean- 
 Marie ; but the boy seemed apathetic. 
 
 *'And then again," broke out Casimir, "what chil- 
 dren you are — \acious children, my faith ! How could 
 you tell the value of this trash ? It might have been 
 worth nothing, or next door." 
 
 t "Pardon me,'' said the Doctor. "You have your 
 usual flow of spirits, I perceive, but even less than your 
 usual deliberation. I am not entirely ignorant of these 
 matters." 
 
 " Not entirely ignorant of anything ever I heard of," 
 interrupted Casimir, bowing, and raising his glass with 
 a sort of pert ijoliteness, 
 
 "At least," resumed the Doctor, "I gave my mind
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAXCHARD. 285 
 
 to the subject — that yon may ])e willing to believe — and 
 I estimated that our capital would be doubled." And 
 he described the nature of the find. 
 
 "My word of honour !" said Casirnir, "I half believe 
 you ! But much would depend on the quality of the 
 gold." 
 
 " The quality, my dear Casimir, was " And the 
 
 Doctor, in default of language, kissed his finger-tips. 
 
 "I would not take your word for it, my good 
 friend," retorted the man of business. " You are a 
 man of very rosy views. But tliis robbery," he con- 
 tinued — "this robbery is an odd thing. Of course I 
 pass over your nonsense about gangs and landscape- 
 painters. For mo, that is a dream. Who was in the 
 house last night ?" 
 
 ''None but ourselves," replied the Doctor. 
 
 ''And this young gentleman ?" asked Casimir, jerk- 
 ing a nod in the direction of Jean-Marie. 
 
 " He too " — the Doctor bowed. 
 
 "Well; and, if it is a fair question, who is he?" 
 pursued the brother-in-law. 
 
 "Jean-Marie," answered the Doctor, "combines the 
 functions of a son and stable-boy. He began as the 
 latter, but he rose rapidly to the more honourable rank 
 in our affections. He is, I may say, the greatest com- 
 fort in our lives." 
 
 " Ha ! " said Casimir. '•' And previous to becoming 
 one of you ? " 
 
 " Jean-Marie has lived a remarkable existence ; his
 
 286 THE TKEASURE OF FRANCnARD. 
 
 experience has been eminently formative," replied 
 Desprez. " If I had to choose an education for my son, 
 I should have chosen such another. Beginning life with 
 mountebanks and thieves, passing onward to the society 
 and friendship of philosophers, he may be said to have 
 skimmed the volume of human life." 
 
 "Thieves?" repeated the brother-in-law, with a 
 meditative air. 
 
 The Doctor could have bitten his tongue out. He 
 foresaw what was coming, and jarepared his mind for a 
 vigorous defence. 
 
 "Did you ever steal yourself ?" asked Casimir, turn- 
 ing suddenly on Jean-Marie, and for the first time em- 
 ploying a single eyeglass which hung round his neck. 
 
 '' Yes, sir," replied the boy, with a deep blush. 
 
 Casimir turned to the others with pursed lips, and 
 nodded to them meaningly. '' Hey ? " said he ; " how 
 is that ?" 
 
 " Jean-Marie is a teller of the truth," returned the 
 Doctor, throwing out his bust. 
 
 '' He has never told a lie," added madame. " He is 
 the best of boys." 
 
 " Never told a lie, has he not ?" reflected Casimir, 
 " Strange, very strange. Give me your attention my 
 young friend," he continued. "You knew about this 
 treasure ? " 
 
 "He helped to bring it home," interposed the 
 Doctor. 
 
 " Desprez, I ask you nothing but to hold your
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRAJfCHARD. 287 
 
 tongue," returned Casimir. "I mean to question this 
 stable-boy of yours ; and if you are so certain of his 
 innocence, you can afford to let him answer for liim- 
 self. Now, sir," he resumed, pointing liis eyeglass 
 straight at Jean-Marie. " You knew it could be stolen 
 with impunity ? You knew you could not be pros- 
 ecuted ? Come ! Did you, or did you not ? " 
 
 " I did," answered Jean -Marie, in a miserable 
 whisper. He sat there changing colour like a revolv- 
 ing pharos, twisting his fingers hysterically, swallowing 
 air, the picture of guilt. 
 
 '' You knew where it was put ? " resumed the inquis- 
 itor. 
 
 ''Yes," from Jean-Marie. 
 
 " You say you have been a thief before," continued 
 Casimir. '' Now how am I to know that you are not 
 one still ? I suppose you could climb the green gate ? " 
 
 " Yes," still lov/er, from the culprit. 
 
 " Well, then, it was you who stole these things. You 
 know it, and you dare not deny it. Look me in the 
 face ! Eaise your sneak's eyes, and answer ! " 
 
 But in place of anything of that sort Jean-Marie 
 broke into a dismal howl and fled from the arbour. 
 Anastasie, as she pursued to cajsture and reassure the 
 victim, found time to send one Parthian arrow — 
 '' Casimir, you are a brute ! " 
 
 " My brother," said Desi3rez, with the greatest dig- 
 nity, '' you take upon yourself a license " 
 
 "Desprez," interrupted Casimir, " for Heaven's sake
 
 288 THE TEEASUEE OF FEANCHAED. 
 
 be a man of the world. You telegraph me to leave my 
 business and come down here on yonrs. I come, I ask 
 the business, you say ' Find me this thief ! ' Well, I 
 find him ; I say ' There he is !' Yoa need not like it, 
 but you have no manner of right to take offence." 
 
 '* Well," returned the Doctor, '^I grant that ; I will 
 even thank you for your mistaken zeal. But your by- 
 pothesis was so extravagantly monstrous " 
 
 "Look here," interrupted Casimir ; "was it you or 
 Stasie ? " 
 
 " Certainly not," answered the Doctor. 
 
 " Very well ; then it was the boy. Say no more 
 about it," said the brother-in-law, and he produced his 
 cigar-case. 
 
 "I will say this much more," returned Desprcz : " if 
 that boy came and told me so himself, I should not be- 
 lieve him ; and if I did believe him, so implicit is my 
 trust, I should conclude that he had acted for the 
 best. 
 
 "Well, well," said Casimir, indulgently. "Have you 
 a light ? I must be going. And by the way, I wish 
 you would let me sell your Turks for you. I always told 
 vou, it meant smash. I tell you so again. Indeed, it 
 was partly that that Ijrought me down. You never ac- 
 knowledge my letters — a most unpardonable habit." 
 
 " My good brother," replied the Doctor blandly, "I 
 have never denied your ability in business ; but I can 
 perceive your limitations." 
 
 " Egad, my friend, I can return the compliment," ob-
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FRANCHARD. 289 
 
 served the man of business. " Your limitation is to be 
 downright irrational." 
 
 " Observe the relative position," returned the Doctor 
 with a smile. " It is your attitude to believe through 
 thick and thin in one man's judgment — your own. I 
 follow the same opinion, but critically and with open 
 eyes. "Which is the more irrational ? — I leave it to 
 yourself. " 
 
 " 0, my dear fellow ! " cried Casimir, '' stick to your 
 Turks, stick to your stable-boy, go to the devil in 
 general in your own way and be done with it. But 
 don't ratiocinate with me — I cannot bear it. And so, 
 ta-ta. I might as well have stayed away for any good 
 I've done. Say good-bye from me to Stasie, and to 
 the sullen hang-dog of a stable-boy, if you insist on 
 it ; I'm off." 
 
 And Casimir departed. The Doctor, that night, dis- 
 sected his character before Anastasie. " One thing, 
 my beautiful, "he said, "he has learned one thing from 
 his lifelong acquaintance with your husband : the word 
 ratiocinate. It shines in his vocabulary, like a jewel 
 in a muck-heap. And, even so, he continually misap- 
 plies it. For you must have observed he uses it as a 
 sort of taunt, in the case of to ergotise, implying, as it 
 were — the poor, dear fellow ! — a vain of sophistry. As 
 for his cruelty to Jean-Marie, it must be forgiven him 
 — it is not his nature, it is the nature of his life. A 
 man who deals with money, my dear, is a man lost." 
 
 With Jean-Marie the process of reconciliation had 
 19
 
 290 THE TREASURE OF FRAXCHARD. 
 
 been somewhat slow. At first lie was inconsolable, in- 
 sisted on leaving the family, went from paroxysm to 
 paroxysm of tears ; and it was only after Anastasie had 
 been closeted for an hour with him, alone, that she 
 came forth, songht out the Doctor, and, with tears in 
 her eyes, acquainted that gentleman with what had 
 passed. 
 
 " At first, my husband, he would hear of nothing," 
 she said. '"Imagine ! if he had left us ! what would 
 th'e treasure be to that ? Horrible treasure, it has 
 brought all this about ! At last, after he has sobbed 
 his very heart out, he agrees to stay on a condition — we 
 are not to mention this matter, this infamous suspicion, 
 not even to mention the robbery. On that agreement 
 only, the poor, cruel boy will consent to remain among 
 his friends." 
 
 *'But this inhibition," said the Doctor, ''this em- 
 bargo — it cannot possibly apply to me ? " 
 
 " To all of us," Anastasie assured him. 
 
 " My cherished one," Desprez protested, "you must 
 have misunderstood. It cannot apply to me. He 
 would naturally come to me." 
 
 "Henri," she said, "it docs; I swear to you it 
 does." 
 
 " This is a painful, a very painful circumstance," the 
 Doctor said, looking a little black. " I cannot affect, 
 Anastasie, to be anything but justly wounded. I feel 
 this, I feel it, my wife, acutely." 
 
 " I knew you would," she said. " But if you had
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 291 
 
 seen his distress ! We must make allowances, we must 
 sacrifice our feelings," 
 
 *' I trust, m}' dear, you have never found me averse to 
 sacrifices," returned the Doctor very stiffly. 
 
 *' And you will let me go and tell him that you have 
 agreed ? It will be like your noble nature," she cried. 
 
 So it would, he perceived — it would be like his noble 
 nature ! Up Jumped his spirits, triumphant at the 
 thought. "Go, darling," he said nobly, '^ reassure 
 him. The subject is buried ; more — I make an effort, 
 I have accustomed my will to these exertions — and it is 
 forgotten." 
 
 A little after, but still with swollen eyes and look- 
 ing mortally sheepish, Jean-Marie reappeared and went 
 ostentatiously about his business. He was the only un- 
 happy member of the party that sat down that night to 
 supper. As for the Doctor, he was radiant. He thus 
 sang the requiem of the treasure : — 
 
 "This has been, on the whole, a most amusing epi- 
 sode," he said. "We are not a penny the worse — nay, 
 we are immensely gainers. Our philosophy has been 
 exercised ; some of the turtle is still left — the most 
 wholesome of delicacies ; I have my staff, Anastasie has 
 her new dress, Jean-Marie is the proud jjossessor of a 
 fashionable kepi. Besides, we had a glass of Hermitage 
 last night ; the glow still suffuses my memory. I was 
 growing positively niggardly with that Hermitage, posi- 
 tively niggardly. Let me take the hint : we had one 
 bottle to celebrate the appearance of our visionary for-
 
 292 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 tune ; let us have a second to console us for its occulta- 
 tion. The third I hereby dedicate to Jean-Marie's wed- 
 diuof breakfast." 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF DESPREZ. 
 
 The Doctor's house has not yet received the compli- 
 ment of a description, and it is now high time tliat the 
 omission were supplied, for the house is itself an actor 
 in the story, and one whose part is nearly at an end. 
 Two stories in height, walls of a warm yellow, tiles of 
 an ancient ruddy brown diversified with moss and 
 lichen, it stood with one wall to the street in the angle 
 of the Doctor's property. It was roomy, draughty, and 
 inconvenient. The large rafters were here and there 
 engraven with rude marks and patterns ; the handrail 
 of the stair was carved in countrified arabesque ; a stout 
 timber pillar, which did duty to support the dining- 
 room roof, bore mysterious characters on its darker side, 
 runes, according to the Doctor ; nor did he fail, when 
 lie ran over the legendary history of the house and its 
 possessors, to dwell upon the Scandinavian scholar who 
 had left them. Floors, doors, and rafters made a great 
 variety of angles ; every room had a particular inclina- 
 tion ; the gable had tilted towards the garden, after the 
 manner of a leaning tower, and one of the former pro- 
 prietors had buttressed the building from that side with 
 a great strut of wood, like the derrick of a crane. Al-
 
 THE TEEASFRE OF FRA2s' CHARD. 293 
 
 together, it had many marks of ruin ; it was a house for 
 the rats to desert ; and nothing but its excellent bright- 
 ness — the window-glass polished and shining, the paint 
 well scoured, the brasses radiant, the very prop all 
 wreathed about with climbing flowers — nothing but its 
 air of a well-tended, smiling yeteran, sitting, crutch and 
 all, in the sunny corner of a garden, marked it as a 
 house for comfortable people to inhabit. In poor or idle 
 management it would soon have hurried into the black- 
 guard stages of decay. As it was, the whole family 
 loved it, and the Doctor was never better inspired than 
 when he narrated its imaginary story and drew the 
 character of its successive masters, from the Hebrew 
 merchant who had re-edified its walls after the sack of 
 the town, and past the mysterious engraver of the runes, 
 down to the long-headed, dirty-handed boor from whom 
 he had himself acquired it at a ruinous expense. As for 
 any alarm, about its security, the idea had never pre- 
 sented itself. What had stood four centuries might 
 well endure a little longer. 
 
 Indeed, in this particular winter, after the finding 
 and losing of the treasure, the Desprez' had an anxiety 
 of a very different order, and one which lay nearer their 
 hearts. Jean-Marie was plainly not himself. He had 
 fits of hectic activity, when he made unusual exertions 
 to please, spoke more and faster, and redoubled in at- 
 tention to his lessons. But these were interrupted by 
 spells of melancholia and brooding silence, when the boy 
 was little better than unbearable.
 
 294 THE TEEASURE 0¥ FRAJCCHAED. 
 
 "Silence," the Doctor moralised — "you see, Anas- 
 tasie, what comes of silence. Had the boy properly un- 
 bosomed himself, the little disappointment about the 
 treasui'e, the little annoyance about Casimir's incivility, 
 would long ago have been forgotten. As it is, they 
 prey U2Don him like a disease. He loses flesh, his appe- 
 tite is variable, and, on the whole, impaired. I keep 
 him on the strictest regimen, I exhibit the most power- 
 ful tonics ; both in vain." 
 
 "Don't you think you drug him too much ?" asked 
 madame, with an irrepressible shudder. 
 
 "Drug?" cried the Doctor; " I drug ? Anastasie, 
 you are mad ! " 
 
 Time went on, and the boy's health still slowly de- 
 clined. The Doctor blamed the weather, which was 
 cold and boisterous. He called in his confrere from 
 Bourron, took a fancy for him, magnified his capacity, 
 and was pretty soon under treatment himself — it scarcely 
 appeared for what complaint. He and Jean-Marie had 
 each medicine to take at different periods of the day. 
 The Doctor used to lie in wait for the exact moment, 
 watch in hand. "There is nothing like regularity," he 
 would say, fill out the doses, and dilate on the virtues of 
 the draught ; and if the boy seemed none the better, the 
 Doctor was not at all the worse. 
 
 Gunpowder Day, the boy was particularly low. It 
 was scowling, squally weather. Huge broken companies 
 of cloud sailed swiftly overhead ; raking gleams of sun- 
 light swept the village, and were followed by intervals
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 295 
 
 of darkness and white, flying rain. At times the wind 
 lifted up its voice and bellowed. The trees were all 
 scourging themselves along the meadows, the last leaves 
 flying like dust. 
 
 Tlie Doctor, between the boy and the weather, was in 
 his element ; he had a theory to prove. He sat with his 
 watch out and a barometer in front of him, waiting for 
 the squalls and noting their effect upon the human 
 pulse. ''For the true philosopher," he remarked de- 
 lightedly, "every fact in nature is a toy." A letter 
 came to him ; but, as its arrival coincided with the 
 approach of another gust, he merely crammed it into 
 his pocket, gave the time to Jean-Marie, and the next 
 moment they were both counting their pulses as if for a 
 wager. 
 
 At nightfall the wind rose into a tempest. It besieged 
 the hamlet, apparently from every side, as if with bat- 
 teries of cannon ; the houses shook and groaned ; live 
 coals were blown upon the floor. The uproar and 
 terror of the night kept people long awake, sitting with 
 pallid faces giving ear. 
 
 It was twelve before the Desprez family retired. By 
 half-past one, when the storm was already somewhat past 
 its height, the Doctor was awakened from a troubled 
 slumber, and sat up. A noise still rang in his ears, but 
 whether of this world or the world of dreams he was not 
 certain. Another clap of wind followed. It was accom- 
 panied by a sickening movement of the whole house, 
 and in the subsequent lull Desprez could hear the tiles
 
 296 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 pouring like a cataract into the loft above his head. He 
 plucked Anastasie bodily out of bed. 
 
 "Eun!" he cried, thrusting some wearing apparel 
 into her hands; ''the house is falling! To the gar- 
 den ! " 
 
 She did not pause to be twice bidden ; she was down 
 the stair in an instant. She had never before suspected 
 herself of such activity. The Doctor meanwhile, with 
 the speed of a piece of pantomime business, and unde- 
 terred by broken shins, proceeded to rout out Jean-Marie, 
 tore Aline from her virgin slumbers, seized her by the 
 hand, and tumbled downstairs and into the garden, with 
 the girl tumbling behind him, still not half-awake. 
 
 The fugitives rendezvous'd in the arbour by some 
 common instinct. Then came a bull's-eye flash of 
 struggling moonshine, which disclosed their four 
 figures standing huddled from the wind in a raffle of 
 flying drapery, and not without a considerable need 
 for more. At the humiliating spectacle Anastasie 
 clutched her nightdress desperately about her and 
 burst loudly into tears. The Doctor flew to console 
 her ; but she elbowed him away. She suspected 
 everybody of being the general public, and thought 
 the darkness was alive with eyes. 
 
 Another gleam and another violent gust arrived 
 together ; the house was seen to rock on its founda- 
 tion, and, just as the light was once more eclipsed, 
 a crash which triumphed over the shouting of the 
 wind announced its fall, and for a moment the whole
 
 THE TREASUEE OF FRANCHARD. 297 
 
 garden was alive with skipping tiles and brickbats. 
 One such missile grazed the Doctor's ear ; another 
 descended on the bare foot of Aline, who instantly 
 made night hideous with her shrieks. 
 
 By this time the hamlet was alarmed, lights flashed 
 from the windows, hails reached the party, and the 
 Doctor answered, nobly contending against Aline and 
 the tempest. But this prospect of help only awakened 
 Anastasie to a more active stage of terror. 
 
 " Henri, people will be coming," she screamed in 
 her husband's ear. 
 
 " I trust so," he replied. 
 
 *' They cannot. I would rather die," she wailed. 
 
 *' My dear," said the Doctor reprovingly, "you are 
 excited. I gave you some clothes. What have you 
 done with them ?" 
 
 **.0h, I don't know — I must have thrown them 
 away ! Where are they ? " she sobbed. 
 
 Desprez groped about in the darkness. "Admir- 
 able ! " he remarked ; "my grey velveteen trousers ! 
 This will exactly meet your necessities." 
 
 " Give them to me ! " she cried fiercely ; but as soon 
 as she had them in her haads her mood appeared to 
 alter — she stood silent for a moment, and then pressed 
 the garment back upon the Doctor. "Give it to Aline," 
 she said — " j)oor girl." 
 
 "Nonsense I" said the Doctor. "Aline does not 
 know what she is about. Aline is beside herself with 
 terror ; and at any rate, she is a peasant. Now I am
 
 298 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 really concerned at this exposure for a person of your 
 housekeeping habits ; my solicitude and your fantastic 
 modesty both point to the same remedy — the pantala- 
 loons. " He held them ready. 
 
 "It is impossible. You do not understand," she 
 said with dignity. 
 
 By this time rescue was at hand. It had been found 
 impracticable to enter by the street, for the gate was 
 blocked with masonry, and the nodding ruin still 
 threatened further avalanches. But between the Doc- 
 tor's garden and the one on the right hand there was 
 that very picturesque contrivance — a common well ; 
 the door on the Desprez' side had chanced to be nn- 
 bolted, and now, through the arched aperture a man's 
 bearded face and an arm supporting a lantern were in- 
 troduced into the world of windy darkness, where Anas- 
 tasie concealed her woes. The light struck here and 
 there among the tossing apple bouglis, it glinted on 
 the grass ; but the lantern and the glowing face be- 
 came the centre of the world. Anastasie crouched 
 back from the intrusion. 
 
 " This way ! '' shouted the man. '' Are you all safe ? " 
 
 Aline, still screaming, ran to the new comer, and was 
 presently hauled head -foremost through the wall. 
 
 " Now, Anastasie, come on ; it is your turn," said the 
 husband. 
 
 **' I cannot," she replied. 
 
 ''Are we all to die of exposure, madame ? " thundered 
 Doctor Desprez.
 
 THE TEEASURE OF FEANCHARD. 299 
 
 *' Yon can go ! " she cried. " Oh, go, go away ! I 
 can stay here ; I am quite warm." 
 
 The Doctor took her by the shoulders with an oath. 
 
 ''Stop ! " she screamed. "1 will put them on." 
 
 She took the detested lendingsin her hand once more ; 
 but her repulsion was stronger than shame. " Never ! " 
 she cried, shuddering, and flung them far away into 
 the night. 
 
 Next moment the Doctor had whirled her to the well. 
 The man was there and the lantern ; Anastasie closed 
 her eyes and appeared to herself to be about to die. 
 How she was transported through the arch she knew 
 not ; but once on the other side she was received by the 
 neighbour's wife, and enveloped in a friendly blanket. 
 
 Beds were made ready for the two women, clothes of 
 very various sizes for the Doctor and Jean-Marie ; and 
 for the remainder of the night, while madame dozed in 
 and out on the borderland of hysterics, her husband sat 
 beside the fire and held forth to the admiring neigh- 
 bours. He showed them, at length, the causes of the 
 accident ; for years, he explained, the fall had been im- 
 pending ; one sign had followed another, the joints had 
 opened, the plaster had cracked, the old walls bowed in- 
 ward ; last, not three weeks ago, the cellar door had 
 begun to work with difficulty in its grooves. " The 
 cellar ! " he said, gravely shaking his head over a glass 
 of mulled wine. " That reminds me of my poor vin- 
 tages. By a manifest providence the Hermitage was 
 nearly at an end. One bottle — I lose but one bottle of
 
 300 THE TREASURE OF FRAIS'CHARD. 
 
 that incomparable wine. It had been set apart against 
 Jean-Marie's wedding. Well, I must lay down some 
 more ; it will be an interest in life. I am, however, a 
 man somewhat advanced in years. My great work is 
 now buried in the fall of my humble roof ; it will never 
 be completed — my name will have been writ in water. 
 And yet you find me calm — I would say cheerful. Can 
 your priest do more ? " 
 
 By the first glimpse of day theijarty sallied forth from 
 the fireside into the street. The wind had fallen, but 
 still charioted a world of troubled clouds ; the air bit 
 like frost ; and the party, as they stood about the ruins 
 in the rainy twilight of the morning, beat upon their 
 breasts and blew into their hands for warmth. The 
 house had entirely fallen, the walls outward, the roof 
 in ; it was a mere heap of rubbish, with here and there 
 a forlorn spear of broken rafter. A sentinel was jjlaced 
 over the ruins to protect the property, and the j^arty ad- 
 journed to Tentaillon's to break their fast at the Doctor's 
 expense. The bottle circulated somewhat freely ; and 
 before they left the table it had begun to snow. 
 
 For three days the snow continued to fall, and the 
 ruins, covered with tarpaulin and watched by sentries, 
 were left undisturbed. The Desprez' meanwhile had 
 taken up their abode at Tentaillon's. Madame spent 
 her time in the kitchen, concocting little delicacies, 
 with the admiring aid of Madame Tentaillon, or sitting 
 by the fire in thoughtful abstraction. The fall of the 
 house affected her wonderfully little ; that blow had
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 301 
 
 been parried by another ; and in her mind she was con- 
 tinually fighting over again the battle of the trousers. 
 Had she done right ? Had she done wrong ? And now 
 she would applaud her determination ; and anon, with a 
 horrid flush of unavailing penitence, she would regret 
 the trousers. N'o juncture in her life had so much ex- 
 ercised her judgment. In the meantime the Doctor had 
 become vastly pleased with his situation. Two of the 
 summer boarders still lingered behind the rest, prisoners 
 for lack of a remittance ; they were both English, but 
 one of them spoke French pretty fluently, and was, be- 
 sides, a humorous, agile- minded fellow, with whom the 
 Doctor could reason by the hour, secure of comprehen- 
 sion. Many were the glasses they emptied, many the 
 topics they discussed. 
 
 '' Anastasie," the Doctor said on the third morning, 
 '' take an example from your husband, from Jean- 
 Marie. The excitement has done more for the boy 
 than all my tonics, he takes his turn as sentry with pos- 
 itive gusto. As for me, you behold me. I have made 
 friends with the Egyptians ; and my Pharaoh is, I swear 
 it, a most agreeable companion. You alone are hipped. 
 About a house — a few dresses ? What are they in com- 
 parison to the ' Pharmacopoeia ' — the labour of years 
 lying buried below stones and sticks in this depressing 
 hamlet ? The snow falls ; I shake it from my cloak ! 
 Imitate me. Our income will be impaired, I grant it, 
 since we must rebuild ; but moderation, patience, and 
 philosophy will gather about the hearth. In the mean-
 
 302 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD, 
 
 while, the Tentaillous are obligiug ; the table, with 
 youi' additions, will pass ; only the wine is execrable — 
 well, I shall send for some to-day. My Pharaoh will be 
 gratified to drink a decent glass ; aha ! and I shall see if 
 he possesses that acme of organisation — a palate. If he 
 has a palate, he is perfect." 
 
 ''Henri," she said, shaking her head, "yon are a 
 man -, you cannot understand my feelings ; no woman 
 could shake off the memory of so public a humiliation." 
 
 The Doctor could not restrain a titter. " Pardon 
 me, darling," he said ; "but really, to the philosophical 
 intelligence, the incident apj^ears so small a trifle. You 
 looked extremely well " 
 
 " Henri ! " she cried. 
 
 '■Well, well, I will say no more," he replied. 
 "Though, to be sure, if you had consented to indue 
 
 ^i p)'opos," he broke off, "and my trousers ! They 
 
 are lying in the snow — my favourite trousers ? " And 
 he dashed in quest of Jean-Marie. 
 
 Two hours afterwards the boy returned to the inn 
 with a spade under one arm and a curious sop of cloth- 
 ing under the other. 
 
 The Doctor ruefully took it in his hands. " They 
 haye been !" he said. " Their tense is past. Excellent 
 pantaloons, you are no more ! Stay I something in the 
 pocket," and he produced a piece of paper. " A letter ! 
 ay, now I mind me ; it was received on the morning of 
 the gale, when I was absorbed in delicate investigations. 
 It is still legible. From poor, dear Casimir ! It is as
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 303 
 
 well," he chuckled, ''that I have educated him to pa- 
 tience. Poor C'asimir and his correspondence — his in- 
 finitesimal, timorous, idiotic correspondence ! " 
 
 He had by this time cautiously unfolded the wet 
 letter ; but, as tie bent himself to decipher the writing, 
 a cloud descended on his brow. 
 
 " Bigre ! " he cried, with a galvanic start. 
 
 And then the letter was whipped into the fire, and 
 the Doctor's cap was on his head in the turn of a hand. 
 
 "Ten minutes ! I can catch it, if I run," he cried. 
 *' It is always late. I go to Paris. I shall telegraph." 
 
 " Henri ! what is wrong ? " cried his wife. 
 
 " Ottoman Bonds ! " came from the disappearing 
 Doctor ; and Anastasie and Jean-Marie were left face 
 to face with the wet trousers. Desprez had gone to 
 Paris, for the second time in seven years ; he had gone 
 to Paris with a pair of wooden shoes, a knitted spencer, 
 a black blouse, a country nightcap, and twenty francs 
 in his pocket. The fall of the house was but a secon- 
 dary marvel ; the whole world might have fallen and 
 scarce left his family more petrified. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE WAGES OF PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 On the morning of the next day, the Doctor, a mere 
 spectre of himself, was brought back in the custody of 
 Casimir. They found Anastasie and the boy sittiug 
 together by the fire ; and Desprez, who had exchanged
 
 804 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 liis toilette for a ready-made rig-out of jioor materials, 
 waved his baud as he entered, and sank speechless on 
 the nearest chair. Madame turned direct to Casimir. 
 
 " What is wrong ?" she cried. 
 
 " Well,'"' replied Casimir, ''what have I told you all 
 along ? It has come. It is a clean shave, this time ; 
 so you may as well bear up and make the best of it. 
 House down, too, eh ? Bad luck, upon my soul." 
 
 " Are we — are we — ruined ? " she gasped. 
 
 The Doctor stretched out his arms to her. *' Ruined," 
 he replied, ''you are ruined by your sinister husband." 
 
 Casimir observed the consequent embrace through 
 his eyeglass; then he turned to Jean-Marie. "You 
 hear?" he said. "They are ruined; no more pick- 
 ings, no more house, no more fat cutlets. It strikes 
 me, my friend, that you had best be packing ; the 
 present speculation is about vvorked out." And ho 
 nodded to him meaningly. 
 
 "Never!" cried Desprez, springing up. "Jean- 
 ftlarie, if you prefer to leave me, now that I am poor, 
 you can go ; you shall receiv'C your hundred francs, if 
 so much remains to me. But if you will consent to 
 stay" — the Doctor wept a little — "Casimir offers me a 
 place — as clerk," he resumed. "'The emohmients are 
 slender, but they will be enough for three. It is too much 
 already to have lost my fortune ; must I lose my son ?" 
 
 Jean-Marie sobbed bitterly, but without a word. 
 
 " I don't like boys who cry, " observed Casimir. 
 " This one is always crying. Here ! you clear out of
 
 THE TREASURE OP FRANCHARD. 305 
 
 this for a little ; I have business with 3'our master and 
 mistress, and these domestic feelings may be settled after 
 I am gone. March ! " and he held the door open. 
 
 Jean-Marie slunk out, like a detected thief. 
 
 By twelve they were all at table but Jean-Marie. 
 
 "Hey ?" said Casimir. " Gone, you see. Took the 
 hint at once." 
 
 "I do not, I confess,'' said Desprez, " I do not seek 
 to excuse his absence. It speaks a v/ant of heart that 
 disappoints me sorely." 
 
 " Want of manners," corrected Casimir. " Heart, he 
 never had. Why, Desprez, for a clever fellow, you are 
 the most gullible mortal in creation. Your ignorance 
 of human nature and human business is beyond belief. 
 You are swindled by heathen Turks, swindled by vag- 
 abond children, swindled right and left, upstairs and 
 downstairs. I think it must be your imagination. I 
 thank my stars I have none." 
 
 " Pardon me," replied Desprez, still humbly, but with 
 a return of spirit at sight of a distinction to be drawn ; 
 " pardon me, Casimir. You possess, even to an emi- 
 nent degree, the commercial imagination. It was the 
 lack of that in me — it appears it is my weak point — that 
 has led to these repeated shocks. By the commercial 
 imagination the financier forecasts the destiny of his 
 investments, marks the falling house " 
 
 "Egad," interrupted Casimir : "our friend the stable- 
 boy appears to have his share of it." 
 
 The Doctor was silenced ; and the meal was continued 
 
 30
 
 306 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 and finished priucipally to the tune of the brother-in- 
 law's not very consolatory conversation. He entirely 
 ignored the two young English painters, turning a blind 
 eyeglass to their salutations, and continuing his remarks 
 as if he were alone in the bosom of his family; and with 
 every second word he ripped another stitch out of the 
 air balloon of Desprez's vanity. By the time coffee was 
 over the poor Doctor was as limp as a napkin. 
 
 "Let us go and see the ruins," said Casimir, 
 
 They strolled forth into the street. The fall of the 
 house, like the loss of a front tooth, had quite trans- 
 formed the village. Through the gap the eye com- 
 manded a great stretch of open snowy country, and the 
 place shrank in comparison. It was like a room with an 
 open door. The sentinel stood by the green gate, look- 
 ing very red and cold, but he had a pleasant word for 
 tlie Doctor and his wealthy kinsman. 
 
 Casimir looked at the mound of ruins, he tried the 
 quality of the tarpaulin. " H'm," he said, "I hope the 
 cellar arch has stood. If it has, my good brother, I will 
 give you a good price for the wines." 
 
 " We shall start digging to-morrow," said the sentry. 
 " There is no more fear of snow." 
 
 •'My friend," returned Casimir sententiously, '"'you 
 had better wait till you get paid." 
 
 The Doctor winced, and began dragging his offensive 
 brother-in-law towards Tentaillon's. In the house 
 there would be fewer auditors, and these already in the 
 secret of his fall.
 
 THE TREASURE OF FRANCHARD, 307 
 
 ''Hullo," cried Casimir, "there goes the stable-boy 
 with his luggage ; no, egad, he is taking it into the 
 inn." 
 
 And sure enough, Jean-Marie was seen to cross the 
 snowy street and enter Tentaillon's, staggering under 
 a large hamper. 
 
 The Doctor stopjDed with a sudden, wild hope. 
 
 "What can he have?" he said. "Let us go and 
 see." And he hurried on. 
 
 " His luggage, to be sure," answered Casimir. " He 
 is on the move — thanks to the commercial imagina- 
 tion." 
 
 " I have not seen that hamper for — for ever so long," 
 remarked the Doctor. 
 
 "Nor will you see it much longer," chuckled Casi- 
 mir; "unless, indeed, we interfere. And by the way, 
 I insist on an examination." 
 
 "You will not require," said Desprez, positively with 
 a sob ; and, casting a moist, triumphant glance at Casi- 
 mir, he began to run. 
 
 "What the devil is up with him, I wonder ?" Casi- 
 mir reflected ; and then, curiosity taking the upper 
 hand, he followed the Doctor's example and took to his 
 heels. 
 
 The hamper was so heavy and large, and Jean-Marie 
 himself so little and so weary, that it had taken him a 
 great while to bundle it upstairs to the Desprez' pri- 
 vate I'oom ; and he had just set it down on the floor 
 in front of Anastasie, when the Doctor arrived, and was
 
 308 THE TEEASURE OF FRANCHARD. 
 
 closely followed by the man of business. Boy and ham- 
 per were both in a most sorry plight ; for the one had 
 passed four months underground in a certain cave on 
 the way to Acheres, and the other had run about five 
 miles, as hard as his legs would carry him, half that 
 distance under a staggering weight. 
 
 "Jean-Marie," cried the Doctor, in a voice that was 
 
 only too seraphic to be called hysterical, " is it ? 
 
 It is!" he cried. "0, my son, my son !" And he 
 sat down upon the hamper and sobbed like a little 
 child. 
 
 "You will not go to Paris, now," said Jean-Marie 
 sheepishly. 
 
 " Casimir," said Desprez, raising his wet face, "do 
 you see that boy, that angel boy ? He is the thief ; he 
 took the treasure from a man unfit to be entrusted 
 with its use ; he brings it back to me when I am 
 sobered and humbled. These, Casimir, are the Fruits 
 of my Teaching, and this moment is the Eeward of my 
 Life." 
 
 " TYews," said Casimir.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE.
 
 TO 
 
 KATHARINE DE MATTOS. 
 
 It's ill to loose the bands that God decreed to bind ; 
 Still will we be tlie children of tlie heather and the wind. 
 Far away from home, it's still for you and mc 
 That the broom is blowing bonnie in the north countrie.
 
 STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL 
 AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 STORY OF THE DOOR. 
 
 Mk. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged 
 countenance, that was never lighted by a smile ; cold, 
 scanty and embarrassed in discourse ; backward in senti- 
 ment ; lean, loag, dusty, dreary and yet somehow lov- 
 able. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to 
 his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his 
 eye ; something indeed which never found its way into 
 his talk, but which spoke not only in these silent sym- 
 bols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly 
 in the acts of his life. He was austere with himself ; 
 drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for 
 vintages ; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not 
 crossed the doors of one for twenty 3^ears. But he had 
 an approved tolerance for others ; sometimes wondering, 
 almost with envy, at the high pressure of sj^irits involved 
 in their misdeeds ; and in any extremity inclined to 
 help rather than to rej^rove. . '' I incline to Cain's 
 heresy," he used to say quaintly : " I let my brother go
 
 312 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 to the devil in liis own way." In tliis character, it w^as 
 frequently his fortune to be the last reputable acquaint- 
 ance and the last good influence in the lives of down- 
 going men. And to such as these, so long as they came 
 about his chambers, he never marked a shade of change 
 in his demeanour. 
 
 No doubt the feat was easy to Mr. Utterson ; for he 
 was undemonstrative at the best, and even his friendship 
 seemed to be founded in a similar catholicity of good- 
 nature. It is the mark of a modest man to acce2:)t his 
 friendly circle ready-made from the hands of oj^por- 
 tunity ; and that was the lawyer's way. His friends 
 were those of his own blood or those whom he had 
 known the longest ; his affections, like ivy, were the 
 growth of time, they implied no aptness in the object. 
 Hence, no doubt, the bond that united him to Mr. 
 Richard Enfield, his distant kinsman, the well-known 
 man about town. It was a nut to crack for many, what 
 these two could see in each other, or what subject they 
 could find in common. It was reported by those who 
 encountered them in their Sunday walks, that they said 
 nothing, looked singularly dull, and would hail with 
 obvious relief the appearance of a friend. For all that, 
 the two men put the greatest store by these excursions, 
 counted them the chief jewel of each week, and not 
 only set aside occasions of pleasure, but even resisted 
 the calls of business, that they might enjoy them unin- 
 terrupted. 
 
 It chanced on one of these rambles that their way led
 
 DR. JEKYLL AKD MR. HYDE. 313 
 
 them down a by-street in a busy qnarter of London. 
 Tlie street was small and what is called quiet, but it 
 drove a thriving trade on the Aveek-days. The inhabit- 
 ants were all doing well, it seemed, and all emnlously 
 hoping to do better still, and laying out the surplus of 
 their gains in coquetry ; so that the shop fronts stood 
 along that thoroughfare Avith an air of invitation, like 
 rows of smiling saleswomen. Even on Sunday, Avhen it 
 veiled its more florid charms and lay comparatively 
 empty of passage, the street shone out in contrast to its 
 dingy neighbourhood, like a fire in a forest ; and with 
 its freshly painted shutters, well-polished brasses, and 
 general cleanliness and gaiety of note, instantly caught 
 and pleased the eye of the passenger. 
 
 Two doors from one corner, on the left hand going 
 east, the line was broken by the entry of a court ; and 
 Just at that point, a certain sinister block of building 
 thrust forward its gable on the street. It was two 
 storeys high ; showed no window, nothing but a door on 
 the lower storey and a blind forehead of discoloured Avail 
 on the upper ; and bore in every feature, the marks of 
 prolonged and sordid negligence. The door, Avhich Avas 
 equipped Avith neither bell nor knocker, Avas blistered 
 and distained. Tramps slouched into the recess and 
 struck matches on the panels ; children kept sliop upon 
 the steps ; the schoolboy had tried his knife on the 
 mouldings ; and for close on a generation, no one had 
 appeared to drive away these random visitors or to 
 repair their ravages.
 
 314 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 Mr. Enfield and the lawyer were on the oth-er side of 
 the by-street ; but when they came abreast of the entry, 
 the former lifted up his cane and pointed. 
 
 "^ Did you ever remark that door?" he asked; and 
 Avhen his comjDanion had replied in the affirmative, ''It 
 is connected in my mind," added he, " with a very odd 
 story." 
 
 "Indeed ?" said Mr. Utterson, with a slight change 
 of voice, " and what Avas that ?" 
 
 " Well, it was this w^ay," returned Mr. Enfield : " I 
 was coming home from some place at the end of the 
 world, about three o'clock of a black winter morning, 
 and my way lay through a j^art of town where there 
 was literally nothing to be seen but lamps. Street after 
 street, and all the folks asleep — street after street, all 
 lighted up as if for a procession and all as empty as a 
 church — till at last ] got into that state of mind when a 
 man listens and listens and begins to long for the sight 
 of a policeman. All at once, I saw two figures : one a 
 little man who was stumj^ing along eastward at a good 
 walk, and the other a girl of maybe eight or ten who 
 was running as hard as she was able down a cross street. 
 Well, sir, the two ran into one another naturally enough 
 at the corner ; and then came the horrible j)art of the 
 thing ; for the man trampled calmly over the child's 
 body and left her screaming on the ground. It sounds 
 nothing to hear, but it was hellish to see. It wasn't 
 like a man ; it was like some damned Juggernaut. I 
 gave a view halloa, took to my heels, collared my gentle-
 
 DE. JEKYLL AND MR, HYDE. 315 
 
 man, and brought him back to where there was already 
 quite a grou^J about the screaming child. He was per- 
 fectly cool and made no resistance, but gave me one 
 look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat on me like 
 running. The people who had turned out Avere the 
 girl's own family ; and pretty soon, the doctor, for 
 whom she had been sent, put in his appearance. Well, 
 the child was not much the worse, more frightened, ac- 
 cording to the Sawbones ; and there you might have 
 supposed would be an end to it. But there was one 
 curious circumstance. I had taken a loathing to my 
 gentleman at first sight. So had the child's family, 
 which was only natural. But the doctor's case was 
 what struck me. He was the usual cut and dry apothe- 
 cary, of no particular age and colour, with a strong 
 Edinburgh accent, and about as emotional as a bagpipe. 
 Well, sir, he was like the rest of us ; every time he 
 looked at my prisoner, I saw that Sawbones turn sick 
 and white Avitli the desire to kill him. I knew Avhat 
 Avas in his mind, just as he kncAV Avhat was in mine ; 
 and killing being out of the question, Ave did the next 
 best. We told the man Ave could and Avould make such 
 a scandal out of this, as should make his name stink 
 from one end of London to the other. If he had any 
 friends or any credit, Ave undertook that he should lose 
 them. And all the time, as Ave Avere pitching it in red 
 hot, Ave Avere keeping the Avomen off him as best Ave 
 could, for they Avere as wild as harpies. I never saw a 
 circle of such hateful faces : and there was the man in
 
 316 DR. JEKTLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 tlie middle,, with a kind of black, sneering coolness — 
 frightened too, I could see that — but carrying it off, 
 sir, really like Satan. ' If you choose to make capital 
 out of this accident,' said he, ' I am naturally helpless. 
 Xo gentleman but wishes to avoid a scene,' says he. 
 'Name your figure.' Well, we screwed him up to a 
 hundred pounds for the child's family ; he would have 
 clearly liked to stick out ; but there was something 
 about the lot of us that meant mischief, and at last he 
 struck. The next thing was to get the money ; and 
 where do you think he carried us but to that place 
 with the door ? — whipped out a ke}', went in, and 
 pi'esently came back with the matter of ten joounds in 
 gold and a clieque for the balauce on Coutts's, drawn 
 payable to bearer and signed with a name that I can't 
 mention, though it's one of the points of my story, but 
 it was a name at least very well known and often 
 printed. The figure was stiff ; but the signature was 
 good for more than that, if it was only genuine. I took 
 the liberty of pointing out to my gentleman that the 
 whole business looked apocryphal, and that a man does 
 not, in real life, walk into a cellar door at four in the 
 morning and come out of it with another man's cheque 
 for close upon a hundred pounds. But he was quite 
 easy and sneering. ' Set your mind at rest,' says he, '^I 
 will stay with you till the banks open and cash the 
 cheque myself.' So we all set off, the doctor, and the 
 child's father, and our friend and myself, and passed the 
 rest of the night in my chambers ; and next day, when
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE, 317 
 
 we had breakfasted, went in a body to the bauk. I 
 gave iu the check myself, and said I had every reason to 
 believe it was a forgery. Not a bit of it. The cheque 
 Avas genuine." 
 
 " Tut — tut," said Mr. Utterson. 
 
 " I see you feel as I do," said Mr. Enfield, " Yes, 
 it's a bad story. For my man was a fellow that nobody 
 could have to do with, a really damnable man ; and the 
 person that drew the cheque is the very pink of the pro- 
 prieties, celebrated too, and (what makes it worse) one 
 of your fellows who do what they call good. Black mail, 
 I suppose ; an honest man paying through the nose for 
 some of the capers of his youth. Black Mail House is 
 what I call that place with the door, in consequence. 
 Though even that, you know, is far from explaining 
 all," he added, and with the words fell into a vein of 
 musing. 
 
 From this he was recalled by Mr. Utterson asking 
 rather suddenly: '^'^ And you don't know if the drawer 
 of tlie cheque lives there ? " 
 
 ''A likely j^lace, isn^t it?'' returned Mr. Enfield. 
 " But I happen to have noticed his address ; he lives in 
 some square or other." 
 
 "^And you never asked about the^^lace with the 
 door ? " said Mr. Utterson. 
 
 " ISTo, sir : I had a delicacy," was the reply. " I feel 
 very strongly about putting questions ; it partakes too 
 much of the style of the day of judgment. You start a 
 question, and it's like starting a stone. You sit quietly
 
 318 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 on the toj) of a hill ; and away the stone goes, starting 
 others ; and presently some bland old bird (the last you 
 would have thought of) is knocked on the head in his 
 own back garden and the family have to change their 
 name. No, sir, I make it a rule of mine : the more it 
 looks like Queer Street, the less I ask." 
 
 " A very good rule, too," said the lawyer. 
 
 '^ But I have studied the place for myself,"' continued 
 Mr. Enfield. " It seems scarcely a house. There is no 
 other door, and nobody goes in or out of that one but, 
 once in a great while, the gentleman of my adventure. 
 There are three windows looking on the court on the 
 first floor ; none beloAV ; the wdndows are always shut 
 but they're clean. And then there is a chimney which 
 is generally smoking ; so somebody must live there. 
 And yet it's not so sure ; for the buildings are so packed 
 together about that court, that it's hard to say where 
 one ends and another begins." 
 
 The pair walked on again for a while in silence ; and 
 then '' Enfield," said Mr. Utterson, '' that's a good rule 
 of yours." 
 
 " Yes, I think it is," returned Enfield. 
 
 " But for all that," continued the lawyer, " there's 
 one point I want to ask : I want to ask the name of that 
 man who walked over the child." 
 
 '' AY ell," said Mr. Enfield, '' I can't see what harm it 
 would do. It was a man of the name of Hyde." 
 
 " Ilm," said Mr. Utterson. " What sort of a man is 
 he to see ? "
 
 DE. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 319 
 
 " He is not eas}^ to describe. There is something 
 wrong with his appearance ; something displeasing, 
 something downright detestable. I never saw a man I 
 so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be 
 deformed somewhere ; he gives a strong feeling of de- 
 formity, although I couldn't specify the point. He's an 
 extraordinary looking man, and yet I really can name 
 nothing out of the way. No, sir ; I can make no hand 
 of it ; I can't describe him. And it's not Avaut of mem- 
 ory ; for I declare I can see him this moment." 
 
 Mr. Utterson again walked some way in silence and 
 obviously under a weight of consideration. " You are 
 sure he used a key ? " he inquired at last. 
 
 " My dear sir . . ." began Enfield, surprised out of 
 himself. 
 
 ^' Yes, I know," said Utterson ; " I know it must 
 seem strange. The fact is, if I do not ask you the 
 name of the other party, it is because I know it already. 
 You see, Richard, your tale has gone home. If you 
 have been inexact in any point, you had better cor- 
 rect it." 
 
 " I think you might have warned me," returned the 
 other with a touch of sullenness. " But I have been 
 pedantically exact, as you call it. The fellow had a 
 key ; and what's more, ho has it still. I saw him use it, 
 not a week ago." 
 
 Mr. Utterson sighed deeply but said never a word ; and 
 the young man presently resumed. "Here is another 
 lesson to say nothing," said he. '' I am ashamed
 
 320 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 of my long tongue. Ijct us make a bargain never to 
 refer to this again." 
 
 " With all my heart," said the lawyer. " I shake 
 hands on that, Richard." 
 
 SEARCH FOR MR. HYDE. 
 
 That evening Mr. Utterson came home to his bache- 
 lor house in sombre spirits and sat down to dinner with- 
 out relish. It was his custom of a Sunday, when this 
 meal was over, to sit close by the fire, a volume of some 
 dry divinity on his reading desk, until the clock of the 
 neighbouring church rang out the hour of twelve, when 
 he would go soberly and gratefully to bed. On this 
 night, however, as soon as the cloth was taken away, 
 he took up a candle and went into his business room. 
 There he opened his safe, took from the most private 
 part of it a document endorsed on the envelope as Dr. 
 Jekyll's Will, and sat down with a clouded brow to 
 study its contents. Tbe will was holograph, for Mr. 
 Utterson, though he took charge of it now that it was 
 made, had refused to lend the least assistance in the 
 making of it ; it provided not only that, in case of the 
 decease of Henry Jekyll, M.D., D.C.L., LL.D., F.R.S., 
 etc., all his possessions were to pass into the hands of 
 his "^friend and benefactor Edward Hyde," but that in 
 case of Dr. Jekyll's " disappearance or unexplained ab- 
 sence for any period exceeding three calendar months," 
 the said Edward Hyde should step into the said Henry
 
 DE. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 321 
 
 JekylFs shoes without further delay and free from any 
 burthen or obligation^, beyond the payment of a few 
 small sums to the members of tlie doctor's household. 
 This document had long been the lawyer's eyesore. It 
 offended him both as a lawyer and as a lover of the sane 
 and customary sides of life, to whom the fanciful was 
 the immodest. And hitherto it Avas his ignorance of 
 Mr. Hyde that had swelled his indignation ; now, by a 
 sudden turn, it was his knowledge. It was already bad 
 enough when the name was but a name of which he 
 could learn no more. It was worse when it began to be 
 clothed upon with detestable attributes ; and out of the 
 shifting, insubstantial mists that had so long baffled his 
 eye, there leaped up the sudden, definite presentment of 
 a fiend. 
 
 " I thought it was madness," he said, as he replaced 
 the obnoxious paper in the safe, " and now I begin to 
 fear it is disgrace." 
 
 AYith that he blew out his candle, put on a great 
 coat, and set forth in the direction of Cavendish Square, 
 that citadel of medicine, where his friend, the great Dr. 
 Lanyon, had his house and received his crowding pa- 
 tients. '' If anyone knows, it will be Lanyon," he had 
 thought. 
 
 The solemn butler knew and welcomed him ; he was 
 
 subjected to no stage of delay, but ushered direct from 
 
 the door to the dining-room where Dr. Lanyon sat alone 
 
 over his wine. This was a hearty, healthy, dapjaer, 
 
 red-faced gentleman, with a shock of hair prematurely 
 21
 
 322 DR. JEKTLL AN'D MR. HYDE. 
 
 white, and a boisterous and decided manner. At sight 
 of Mr. Utterson, he sprang up from his chair and wel- 
 comed him Avith both hands. The geniality, as was the 
 way of the man, was somewhat theatrical to the eye ; 
 but it reposed on genuine feeling. For these two were 
 old friends, old mates both at school and college, both 
 thorough respecters of themselves and of each other, 
 and, what does not always follow, men who thoroughly 
 enjoyed each other's company. 
 
 After a little rambling talk, the lawyer led up to the 
 subject which so disagreeably preoccupied his mind. 
 
 "I suppose, Lanyon," said he, ''you and I must be 
 the two oldest friends that Henry Jekyll has ? " 
 
 " I wish the friends were younger," chuckled Dr. 
 Lanyon.. " But I suppose we are. And what of that ? 
 I see little of him now." 
 
 "Indeed?" said Utterson. ''I thought you had a 
 bond of common interest." 
 
 " We had," was the reply. " But it is more than ten 
 years since Henry Jekyll became too fanciful for me. 
 He began to go wrong, wrong in mind ; and though of 
 course I continue to take an interest in liim for old 
 sake's sake, as they say, I see and I have seen devilish 
 little of the man. Such unscientific balderdash," added 
 the doctor, flushing suddenly purple, " would have 
 estranged Damon and Pythias." 
 
 This little spirt of temper was somewhat of a relief 
 to Mr. Utterson. '' They have only differed on some 
 point of science," he thought ; and being a man of no
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 823 
 
 scientific passions (except in the matter of convey- 
 ancing), lie even added : '' It is nothing worse than 
 that ! " He gave his friend a few seconds to recover his 
 composure, and then approached the question he- had 
 come to put. '*' Did you ever come across a' protege of 
 his — one Hyde ? " he asked. 
 
 " Hyde ? " repeated Lanyon. " No. Never heard of 
 him. Since my time." 
 
 That was the amount of information tliat the lawyer 
 carried back with him to the great, dark bed on which 
 he tossed to and fro, until the small hours of the morn- 
 ing began to grow large. It was a night of little ease to 
 his toiling mind, toiling in mere darkness and besieged 
 by qnestions. 
 
 Six o'clock struck on the bells of the church that was 
 so conveniently near to Mr. Utterson's dwelling, and 
 still he was digging at the problem. Hitherto it had 
 touched him on the intellectual side alone ; but now his 
 imagination also was engaged, or rather enslaved ; and 
 as he lay and tossed in the gross darkness of the night 
 and the curtained room, Mr. Enfield's tale went by 
 before his mind in a scroll of lighted pictures. He 
 would be aware of the great field of lamps of a noc- 
 turnal city ; then of the figure of a man walking 
 swiftly ; then of a child running from the doctor's ; and 
 then these met, and that hnman Juggernant trod the 
 child down and passed on regardless of her screams. 
 Or else he would see a room in a rich house, where his 
 friend lay asleep, drear.iing and smiling at his dreams ;
 
 324 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 and then tlie door of that room would be opened, the 
 curtains of the bed plucked ajmrt, the sleeper recalled, 
 and lo ! there would stand by his side a figure to whom 
 power was given, and even at that dead hour, he must 
 rise and do*its bidding. The figure in these two phases 
 haunted the lawyer all night ; and if at any time he 
 dozed over, it was but to see it glide more stealthily 
 through sleeping houses, or move the more swiftly and 
 still the more swiftly, even to dizziness, through wider 
 labyrinths of lamplighted city, and at every street cor- 
 ner crush a child and leave her screaming. And still 
 the figure had no face by which he might know it ; 
 even in his dreams, it had no face, or one that baffled 
 him and melted before his eyes ; and thus it was that 
 there sprang up and grew apace in the lawyer's mind a 
 singularly strong, almost an inordinate, curiosity to 
 behold the features of the real j\Ir. Hyde. ^ If he could 
 but once set eyes on him, he thought the mystery would 
 lighten and perhaps roll altogether away, as was the 
 habit of mysterious things when well examined. He 
 might see a reason for his friend's strange preference or 
 bondage (call it which you please) and even for the 
 startling clause of the will. At least it would be a face 
 worth seeing : the face of a man who was without 
 bov/els of mercy : a face Avhich had but to show itself to 
 raise up, in the mind of the unimpressionable Enfield, a 
 spirit of enduring hatred. 
 
 From that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt 
 the door in the by-street of shops. In the morning
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 325 
 
 before office hours, at uoon when business was plent}^, 
 and time scarce, at night under the face of the fogged 
 city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude or 
 concourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen 
 post. 
 
 " If he be Mr. Hyde,'' he had thought, " I shall be 
 Mr. Seek." 
 
 And at last his patience was rewarded. It was a fine 
 dry night ; frost in the air ; the streets as clean as a 
 ballroom floor ; the lamps, unshaken by any wind, 
 drawing a regular pattern of light and shadow. By ten 
 o'clock, when the shops were closed, the by-street was 
 very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of London 
 from all round, very silent. Small sounds carried far ; 
 domestic sounds out of the houses were clearly audible 
 on either side of the roadway ; and the rumour of the 
 approach of any jaassenger preceded him by a long time. 
 Mr. Utterson had been some minutes at his post, when 
 he was aware of an odd, light footstep drawing near. 
 In the course of his nightly patrols, he had long grown 
 accustomed to the quaint effect with Avhicli the footfalls 
 of a single person, while he is still a great way off, sud- 
 denly spring out distinct from the vast hum and clatter 
 of the city. Yet his attention had never before been 
 so sharply and decisively arrested ; and it was with a 
 strong, superstitious prevision of success that he with- 
 drew into the entry of the court. 
 
 The steps drew swiftly nearer, and swelled out sud- 
 denly louder as they turned the end of the street.
 
 326 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 The lawyer, lookiiig forth from the entry, could soon 
 see "what manner of man he had to deal with. He was 
 small and very plainly dressed, and the look of him, 
 even at that distance, went somehow strongly against 
 the watcher's inclination. But he made straight for the 
 door, crossing the roadway to save time ; and as he 
 came, he drew a key from his pocket like one approach- 
 ing home. 
 
 Mr. Utterson stepped out and touched him on the 
 shoulder as he passed. " Mr. Hyde, I think ?" 
 
 Mr. Hyde shrank back with a hissing intake of the 
 breath. But his fear was only momentary ; and though 
 he did not look the lawyer in the face, he answered 
 coolly enough : '^ That is my name. What do you 
 want ? " 
 
 '-' I see you are going in," returned the lawyer. " I 
 am an old friend of Dr. Jekyll's — Mr. Utterson of 
 Gaunt Street — you must have heard my name ; and 
 meeting you so conveniently, I thought you might 
 admit me." 
 
 " You will not find Dr. Jekyll ; he is from home," 
 replied Mr. Hyde, blowing in the key. And then sud- 
 denly, but still without looking up, " How did you 
 know me?" he asked. 
 
 '' On your side," said Mr. Utterson, " Avill you do me 
 a favour ? " 
 
 " AYith pleasure," replied the other. '^ AYhat shall 
 it be ? " 
 
 " Will you let me see your face ?" asked the lawyer.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 327 
 
 Mr. Hyde a23peared to hesitate,, aud then, as if upon 
 some sudden reflection, fronted about with an air of 
 defiance ; and the pair stared at each other pretty fixedly 
 for a few seconds. " ISTow I shall know you again," 
 said jVIr. Utterson. " It may be useful." 
 
 " Yes," returned Mr. Hyde, "it is as well we have 
 met ; and apropos, you should have my address." And 
 he gave a number of a street in Soho. 
 
 " Good God !" thought Mr. Utterson, " can he, too, 
 have been thinking of the Avill ? " But he kept his 
 feelings to himself and only grunted in acknowledgment 
 of the address. 
 
 '•' And now," said the other, "' how did you know 
 me ? " 
 
 " By descrij)tion,''' was the reply. 
 
 " Whose description ?" 
 
 " We have common friends," said Mr. Utterson. 
 
 "Common friends?" echoed Mr. Hyde, a little 
 hoarsely. " Who are they ?" 
 
 " Jekyll, for instance," said the lawyer. 
 
 " He never told you," cried Mr. Hyde, witli a flush 
 of anger. "' I did not think you would have lied." 
 
 *'•' Come," said Mr. Utterson, "' that is not fitting 
 language. " 
 
 The other snarled aloud into a savage laugh ; and the 
 next moment, with extraordinary quickness, he had 
 unlocked^ the door and disappeared into the house. 
 
 The lawyer stood awhile when Mr. Hyde had left 
 him, the picture of disquietude. Then he began
 
 328 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 slowl}^ to mount the street, pausing every step or two 
 and 2:)uttiug his hand to his brow like a man in mental 
 ])erplexity. The problem he was thus debating as he 
 Avalked, was one of a class that is rarely solved. Mr. 
 Hyde was jiale and dwarfish, he gave an impression of 
 deformity without any nameable malformation, he had 
 a displeasing smile, he had borne himself to the lawyer 
 with a sort of murderous mixture of timidity and bold- 
 ness, and he spoke with a husky, whispering and some- 
 what broken voice ; all these were points against him, 
 but not all of these together could explain the hitherto 
 unknown disgust, loathing and fear with which Mr. 
 Utterson regarded him. " There must be something 
 else," said the perplexed gentleman. " There is some- 
 thing more, if I could find a name for it. God bless 
 me, the man seems hardly human ! Something troglo- 
 dytic, shall we say ? or can it be the old story of Dr. 
 Fell ? or is it the mere radiance of a foul soul that thus 
 transpires through, and transfigures, its clay continent ? 
 The last, I think ; for, my poor old Harry Jekyll, if 
 ever I read Satan's signature upon a face, it is on that 
 of your new friend." 
 
 Round the corner from the by-street, there was a 
 square of ancient, handsome houses, now for the most 
 part decayed from their high estate and let in flats 
 and chambers to all sorts and conditions of men ; maji- 
 engravers, architects, shady lawyers and the agents of 
 obscure enterprises. One house, however, second from 
 the corner, was still occupied entire ; and at the door of
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 329 
 
 this, which wore a great air of wealth and comfort, 
 though it was now plunged in darkness except for the 
 fanlight, Mr. Utterson stoj^i^ed and knocked. A well- 
 dressed, elderly servant opened the door. 
 
 " Is Dr. Jekyll at home, Poole ? " asked the lawyer. 
 
 '•■ 1 will see, Mr. Utterson," said Poole, admitting the 
 visitor, as he spoke, into a large, low-roofed, comfortable 
 hall, paved with flags, warmed (after the fashion of a 
 country house) by a bright, oi)eu fire, and furnished 
 with costly cabinets of oak. " Will you wait here by the 
 fire, sir ? or shall I give you a light in the dining-room ? '*■' 
 
 " Here, thank you," said the lawyer, and he drew 
 near and leaned on the tall fender. This hall, in which 
 he was now left alone, was a pet fancy of his friend the 
 doctor's ; and Utterson himself was wont to speak of it 
 as the pleasantest room in London. But to-night there 
 was a shudder in his blood ; the face of Hyde sat heavy 
 on his memory ; he felt (what was rare with him) a nau- 
 sea and distaste of life ; and in the gloom of his spirits, 
 he seemed to read a menace in the flickering of the fire- 
 light on the polished cabinets and the uneasy starting of 
 the shadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his relief, 
 when Poole presently returned to announce that Dr. 
 Jekyll was gone out. 
 
 ''' I saw Mr. Hyde go in by the old dissecting-room 
 door, Poole," he said. " Is that right, when Dr. Jekyll 
 is from home ? " 
 
 '' Quite right, Mr. Utterson, sir," replied the servant. 
 " Mr. Hvde has a key."
 
 330 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 " Your master seems to repose a great deal of trust in 
 that young man, Poole," resumed the other musingly. 
 
 " Yes, sir, he do indeed," said Poole. " '\\'e have all 
 orders to obey him." 
 
 "I do not think I ever met Mr. Hyde ?" asked Ut- 
 terson. 
 
 "0, dear no, sir. He never dines here," replied the 
 butler. " Indeed we see very little of him on this side 
 of the house ; he mostly comes and goes by the labor- 
 atory. " 
 
 '' Well, good-night, Poole." 
 
 " Good-night, Mr. Utterson." 
 
 And the lawyer set out homeward with a very heavy 
 heart. " Poor Harry Jekyll," he thought, " my mind 
 misgives me he is in deep waters ! He was wild when 
 he was young ; a long while ago to be sure ; but in the 
 law of God, there is no statute of limitations. Ay, it 
 must be that ; the ghost of some old sin, the cancer of 
 some concealed disgrace : punishment coming, pede 
 clan do, years after memory has forgotten and self-love 
 condoned the fault." And tlie lawyer, scared by the 
 thought, brooded awhile on his own past, groping in all 
 the corners of memory, lest by chance some Jack-in-the- 
 Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there. His 
 past was fairly blameless ; few men could read the rolls 
 of their life with less apprehension ; yet he was humbled 
 to the dust by the many ill things he had done, aud 
 raised up again into a sober and fearful gratitude by the 
 many that he had come so near to doing, yet avoided.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 331 
 
 And then by a return on his former subject, he con- 
 ceived a spark of hope. " This Master Hyde, if he were 
 studied," thought he, ''must have secrets of his own; 
 black secrets, by the look of him ; secrets compared 
 to which poor Jekyll's worst would be like sunshine. 
 Things cannot continue as they are. It turns me cold 
 to think of this creature stealing like a thief to Harry's 
 bedside ; poor Harry, what a wakening ! And the dan- 
 ger of it ; for if this Hyde suspects the existence of the 
 will, he may grow impatient to inherit. Ay, I must put 
 my shoulder to the wheel — if Jekyll will but let me," he 
 added, " if Jekyll will only let me." For once more he 
 saw before his mind's eye, as clear as a transparency, the 
 strange clauses of the will. 
 
 DR. JEKYLL WAS QUITE AT EASE. 
 
 A FORTNIGHT later, by excellent good fortune, the 
 doctor gave one of his pleasant dinners to some five or 
 six old cronies, all intelligent, reputable men and all 
 judges of good wine ; and Mr. Utterson so contrived 
 that he remained behind after the others had departed. 
 This was no new arrangement, but a thing that had be- 
 fallen many scores of times. Where Utterson was liked, 
 he was liked well. Hosts loved to detain the dry law- 
 yer, when the light-hearted and the loose-tougued had 
 already their foot on the threshold ; they liked to sit 
 awhile in his unobtrusive company, practising for soli-
 
 332 DE. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 tude, sobering their minds in the man's rich silence 
 after the ex^iense and strain of gaiety. To this rule. 
 Dr. Jekyll was no excej)tion ; and as he now sat on the 
 opposite side of the fire — a large, well-made, smooth- 
 faced man of fifty, with something of a slyish cast per- 
 haps, but ever}^ mark of capacity and kindness — you 
 could see by his looks that he cherished for Mr. Utter- 
 son a sincere and warm affection. 
 
 " I have been wanting to speak to you, Jekyll,'' began 
 the latter. ''' You know that will of yours ?" 
 
 A close observer might have gathered that the topic 
 was distasteful ; but the doctor carried it off gaily. 
 '^M}' j)oor Utterson," said he, "you are unfortunate in 
 such a client. I never saw a man so distressed as you 
 were by my will ; unless it Avere that hide-bound pedant, 
 Lanyon, at what he called my scientific heresies. 0, I 
 know he's a good fellow — you needn't frown — an ex- 
 cellent fellow, and I always mean to see more of him ; 
 but a hide-bound pedant for all that ; an ignorant, 
 blatant pedant. I was never more disappointed in any 
 man than Lanyon." 
 
 " You know I never approved of it," pursued Utter- 
 son, ruthlessly disregarding the fresh topic. 
 
 " My will ? Yes, certainly, I know that," said the 
 doctor, a trifle sharply. " You have told me so." 
 
 "Well, I tell you so again," continued the lawyer. 
 " I have been learning something of young Hyde." 
 
 The large handsome face of Dr. Jekyll grew pale to 
 the very lips, and there came a blackness about his eyes.
 
 DK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 333 
 
 " I do not care to hear more," said he. '' This is a 
 matter I thought we had agreed to drop." 
 
 "What I heard Avas abominable/'' said Utterson. 
 
 '' It can make no change. You do not understand 
 my position," returned the doctor, with a certain iu- 
 coherency of manner. " I am painfully situated, Utter- 
 son ; my position is a very strange — a very strange one. 
 It is one of those affairs that cannot be mended by 
 talking." 
 
 " Jekyll," said Utterson, "you know me : I am a 
 man to be trusted. Make a clean breast of this in con- 
 fidence ; and I make no doubt I can get you out of it." 
 
 '' My good Utterson," said the doctor, " this is very 
 good of you, this is downright good of you, and I can- 
 not find words to thank you in. I believe you fully ; I 
 would trust you before any man alive, ay, before myself, 
 if I could make the choice ; but indeed it isn't what 
 you fancy ; it is not so bad as that ; and just to put your 
 good heart at rest, I will tell you one thing : the 
 moment I choose, I can be rid of Mr. Hyde. I give you 
 my hand upon that ; and I thank yon again and again ; 
 and I will just add one little word, Utterson, that I'm 
 sure you'll take in good part : this is a j^rivate matter, 
 and I beg of you to let it sleep." 
 
 Utterson reflected a little, looking in the fire. 
 
 " I have no doubt you are perfectly right," he said at 
 last, getting to his feet. 
 
 " Well, but since we have touched upon this business, 
 and for the last time I hope," continued the doctor.
 
 334 DK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 " there is one point I should like you to understand. I 
 have really a very great interest in poor Hyde. I know 
 you have seen him ; he told me so ; and I fear he was 
 rude. But I do sincerely take a great, a very great 
 interest in that young ma.i ; and if I am taken away, 
 Utterson, I wish you to promise me that you will bear 
 with him and get his rights for him. I think you 
 would, if you knew all ; and it would be a weight off 
 my mind if you would promise." 
 
 "I can't j)retend that I shall ever like him," said the 
 lawyer. 
 
 "I don't ask that," pleaded Jekyll, laying his hand 
 upon the other's arm ; "I only ask for justice ; I only 
 ask you to help him for my sake, when I am no longer 
 here." 
 
 Utterson heaved an irrepressible sigh. '^ Well," said 
 he, '•' I promise." 
 
 THE CAREW MUEDER CASE. 
 
 Nearly a year later, in tlie month of October, 
 18 — , Loudon was startled by a crime of singular 
 ferocity and rendered all the more notable by the high 
 position of the victim. The details were few and start- 
 ling. A maid servant living alone in a house not far 
 from the river, had gone up stairs to bed about eleven. 
 Although a fog rolled over the city in the small hours, 
 the early part of the night was cloudless, and the lane, 
 which the maid's window overlooked, was brilliantlv lit
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 335 
 
 by the full moon. It seems she was romantically given, 
 for she sat down upon her box, wliich stood imme- 
 diately under the window, and fell into a dream of 
 musing. Never (she used to say, with streaming tears, 
 when she narrated that experience), never had she felt 
 more at peace with all men or thought more kindly of 
 the world. And as she so sat she became aware of an 
 aged and beautiful gentleman with white hair, drawing 
 near along the lane ; and advancing to meet him, an- 
 other and very small gentleman, to whom at first she 
 paid less attention. When they had come within speech 
 (wliich was just under the maid's eyes) the older man 
 bowed and accosted the other with a very pretty manner 
 of politeness. It did not seem as if the subject of his 
 address were of great importance ; indeed, from his 
 pointing, it sometimes appeared as if he were only in- 
 quiring his way ; but the moon shone on his face as he 
 spoke, and the girl was pleased to watcli it, it seemed to 
 breathe such an innocent and old-world kindness of dis- 
 position, yet with something high too, as of a well- 
 founded self-content. Presently her eye wandered to 
 the other, and she was surprised to recognize in him a 
 certain Mr. Hyde, who had once visited her master and 
 for whom she had conceived a dislike. He had in his 
 hand a heavy cane, with which he was trifling ; but he 
 answered never a word, and seemed to listen with an ill- 
 contained impatience. And then all of a sudden he 
 broke out in a great flame of anger, stamping with his 
 foot, brandishing the cane, and carrying on (as the
 
 336 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 maid described it) like a madman. The old gentleman 
 took a step back, with the air of one very mucli sur- 
 prised and a trifle hurt ; and at that Mr. Hyde broke 
 out of all bounds and clubbed him to the earth. And 
 next moment;, with ape-like fury, he was trampling his 
 victim under foot and hailing down a storm of blows, 
 under which the bones were audibly shattered and the 
 body jumped upon the roadway. At the horror of these 
 sights and sounds, the maid fainted. 
 
 It was two o'clock when she came to herself and 
 called for the police. The murderer was gone long ago ; 
 but there lay his victim in the middle of the lane, in- 
 credibly mangled. The stick with which the deed had 
 been done, although it was of some rare and very tough 
 and heavy w^ood, had broken in the middle under the 
 stress of this insensate cruelty ; and one splintered half 
 had rolled in the neighbouring gutter — the other, with- 
 out doubt, had been carried away by the murderer. A 
 purse and a gold watch were found upon the victim : 
 but no cards or papers, excej)t a sealed and stamped 
 envelope, which he had been probably carrying to the 
 post, and which bore the name and address of Mr. 
 Utterson. 
 
 This was brought to the lawyer the next morning, 
 before he was out of bed ; and he had no sooner seen it, 
 and been told the circumstances, than he shot out a sol- 
 emn lip. " I shall say nothing till I have seen the 
 body," said he ; '•' this may be very serious. Have the 
 kindness to wait while I dress." And with the same
 
 DR. JEKYLL AKD MR. HYDE. 337 
 
 grave countenance he liurried through his breakfast and 
 drove to the j^olice station, wliither the body had been 
 carried. As soon as he came into the cell, he nodded. 
 
 "Yes," said he, "I recognise him. I am sorry to 
 say that this is Sir Danvers Carew."' 
 
 " Good God, sir," exclaimed the officer, " is it pos- 
 sible V And the next moment his eye lighted up with 
 professional ambition. "This will make a deal of 
 noise," he said. "And perhaps you can help us to the 
 man." And he briefly narrated Avhat the maid had 
 seen, and showed the broken stick. 
 
 Mr. Utterson had already quailed at the name of 
 Hyde ; but when the stick was laid before him, he could 
 doubt no longer ; broken and battered as it was, he 
 recognised it for one that he had himself presented 
 many years before to Henry Jekyll. 
 
 "Is this Mr. Hyde a person of small stature?" he 
 inquired. 
 
 "Particularly small and particularly wicked-looking, 
 is what the maid calls him," said the officer. 
 
 Mr. Utterson reflected ; and then, raising his head, 
 " If you will come with me in my cab," he said, " I 
 think I can take you to his house." 
 
 It was by this time about nine in the morning, and 
 the first fog of the season. A great chocolate-coloured 
 pall lowered over heaven, but the wind was continually 
 charging and routing these embattled vapours ; so tliat 
 as the cab crawled from street to street, Mr. Utterson 
 beheld a marvellous number of degrees and hues of twi- 
 23
 
 338 DE. JEKYLL AND ME. HYDE. 
 
 light ; for here it \voi:ld be dark like the back-end of 
 evening ; and there would, be a glow of a rich, lurid 
 brown, like the light of some strange conflagration ; and 
 here, for a moment, the fog would be quite broken up, 
 and a haggard shaft of daylight would glance in be- 
 tween the swirling wreaths. The dismal quarter of 
 Soho seen under these changing glimpses, with its 
 muddy ways, and slatternly passengers, and its lamps, 
 which had never been extinguished or had been kin- 
 dled afresh to combat tliis mournful reinvasion of dark- 
 ness, seemed, in the lawyer's eyes, like a district of some 
 city in a nightmare. The thoughts of his mind, be- 
 sides, were of the gloomiest dye ; and when he glanced 
 at the companion of his drive, he was conscious of some 
 touch of that terror of the law and the law's officers, 
 which may at times assail the most honest. 
 
 As the cab drew up before the address indicated, the 
 fog lifted a little and showed him a dingy street, a gin 
 palace, a low French eating house, a shoj) for the retail 
 of penny numbers and twopenny salads, many ragged 
 children huddled in the doorways, and many women of 
 many different nationalities passing out, key in hand, to 
 have a morning glass ; and the next moment the fog 
 settled down again upon that part, as brown as umber, 
 and cut him oil from his blackguardly surroundings. 
 This was the home of Henry Jekyll's favourite ; of a 
 man who was heir to quarter of a million sterling. 
 
 An ivory-faced and silvery-haired old woman opened 
 the door. She had an evil face, smoothed by hypocrisy ;
 
 DR. JEKYLL AKD MR. HYDE. 339 
 
 but her manners were excellent. Yes, she said, this was 
 Mr. Hyde's, but he was not at home ; he had been in 
 that night very late, but had gone away again in less 
 than an hour ; there was nothing strange in that ; his 
 habits were very irregular, and he was often absent ; for 
 instance, it was nearly two months since she had seen 
 him till yesterday. 
 
 " Very well, then, we wish to see his rooms," said the 
 lawyer ; and when the woman began to declare it was 
 impossible, " I had better tell you who this i^erson is," 
 he added. " This is Inspector Newcomen of Scotland 
 Yard." 
 
 A flash of odious joy appeared upon the woman^s face. 
 " Ah ! " said she, " he is in trouble I What has he 
 done ? " 
 
 Mr. Utterson and the inspector exchanged glances. 
 " He don't seem a very popular character," observed the 
 latter. "And now, my good woman, just let me and 
 this gentleman have a look about us." 
 
 In the whole extent of the house, which but for the 
 old Avoman remained otherwise empty, Mr. Hyde had 
 only used a couple of rooms ; but these were furnished 
 with luxury and good taste. A closet was tilled with 
 wine ; the plate was of silver, the napery elegant ; a good 
 picture hung upon the walls, a gift (as Utterson su}^- 
 posed) from Henry Jekyll, who was much of a connois- 
 seur ; and the carpets were of many plies and agreeable 
 in colour. At this moment, however, the rooms bore 
 every mark of having been recently and hurriedly ran^
 
 340 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 Backed ; clothes lay about the floor, with their pockets 
 inside out ; lock-fast drawers stood open ; and on the 
 hearth there lay a pile of gray ashes, as though many 
 papers had been burned. From these embers the in- 
 spector disinterred the butt end of a green chef|ue book, 
 which had resisted the action of the fire ; the other half 
 of the stick was found behind the door ; and as this 
 clinched his suspicions, the officer declared himself 
 delighted. A visit to the bank, where several thousand 
 pounds were found to be lying to the murderer's credit, 
 completed his gratification. 
 
 " You may depend upon it, sir," he told Mr. Utter- 
 son : " I have him in my hand. He must have lost his 
 head, or he never would have left the stick or, above all, 
 burned the cheque book. Why, money's life to the 
 man. We have nothing to do but wait for him at the 
 bank, and get out the handbills." 
 
 This last, however, was not so easy of accomplish- 
 ment ; for Mr. Hyde had numbered few familiars — even 
 the master of the servant maid had only seen him twice ; 
 his family could nowhere be traced ; he had never been 
 photographed ; and the few who could describe him dif- 
 fered widely, as common observers will. Only on one 
 point, were they agreed ; and that was the haunting 
 sense of unexpressed deformity with which the fugitive 
 impressed his beholders.
 
 DR. JEKYLL Ai^D MR. HYDE. 341 
 
 INCIDENT OF THE LETTER. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon, when Mr. Uttersou 
 found his way to Dr. Jekyll's door, wliere lie was at once 
 admitted by Poole, and carried down by the kitchen 
 offices and across a yard which had once been a garden, 
 to the building which was indifferently known as the 
 laboratory or the dissecting rooms. The doctor had 
 bought the house from the heirs of a celebrated sur- 
 geon ; and his own tastes being rather chemical than 
 anatomical, had changed the destination of the block at 
 the bottom of the garden. It was the first time that the 
 lawyer had been received in that part of his friend's 
 quarters ; and he eyed the dingy, windowless structure 
 with curiosity, and gazed round with a distasteful sense 
 of strangeness as he crossed the theatre, once crowded 
 with eager students and now lying gaunt and silent, the 
 tables laden with chemical apparatus, the floor strewn 
 with crates and littered with packing straw, and the 
 light falling dimly through the foggy cupola. At the 
 further end, a flight of stairs mounted to a door covered 
 with red baize ; and through this, Mr. Utterson was at 
 last received into the doctor's cabinet. It was a large 
 room, fitted round witli glass presses, furnished, among 
 other things, with a cheval-glass and a business table, 
 and looking out upon the court by three dusty windows 
 barred with iron. The fire burned in the grate ; a lamp 
 was set lighted on the chimney shelf, for even in the 
 houses the fog began to lie thickly ; and there, close up
 
 342 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 to the warmth, sat Dr. Jekyl], looking deadly sick. He 
 did not rise to meet his visitor, but held out a cold hand 
 and bade him welcome in a changed voice. 
 
 " And now," said Mr. Utterson, as soon as Poole had 
 left them, ' ' you have heard the news ? " 
 
 The doctor shuddered. ''They were crying it in 
 the square," he said. " I heard them in my dining- 
 room." 
 
 " One word," said the lawyer. " Carew was my client, 
 but so are you, and I want to know what I am doing. 
 You have not been mad enough to hide this fellow ? " 
 
 "Utterson, I swear to God," cried the doctor, "I 
 swear to God I will never set eyes on him again. I bind 
 my honour to you that I am done with him in this 
 world. It is all at an end. And indeed he does not 
 want my help ; you do not know him as I do ; he is safe, 
 he is quite safe ; mark my words, he will never more be 
 heard of." 
 
 The lawyer listened gloomily ; he did not like his 
 friend's feverish manner. '"' You seem pretty sure of 
 him," said he ; " and for your sake, I hope you may be 
 right. If it came to a trial, your name might appear." 
 
 " I am quite sure of him," replied Jekyll ; "I have 
 grounds for certainty that I cannot share with anyone. 
 But there is one thing on which you may advise me. I 
 have — I have received a letter ; and I am at a loss 
 whether I should show it to the police. I should like to 
 leave it in your hands, Utterson ; you would judge 
 wisely, I am sure ; I have so great a trust in you."
 
 DK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 343 
 
 " Yon fear, I suppose, tliat it might lead to his detec- 
 tion ? " asked the hiwyer. 
 
 " No/' said the other. " I cannot say that I care what 
 becomes of Hyde ; I am quite done with him. I was 
 thinking of my own character, which this hateful busi- 
 ness has rather exposed." 
 
 Utterson ruminated awhile ; he was surprised at his 
 friend's selfishness, and yet relieved by it. "Well," said 
 he, at last, "^let me see the letter." 
 
 The letter was written in an odd, upright hand and 
 signed " Edward Hyde " : and it signified, briefly enough, 
 that the writer's benefactor. Dr. Jekyll, whom he had 
 long so unworthily repaid for a thousand generosities, 
 need labour under no alarm for his safety, as he had 
 means of escape on which he placed a sure dependence. 
 The lawyer liked this letter well enough ; it put a better 
 colour on the intimacy than ho had looked for ; and he 
 blamed himself for some of his past suspicions. 
 
 "Have you the envelope ?" he asked. 
 
 "1 burned it," replied Jekyll, "before I thought 
 what I was about. But it bore no postmark. The note 
 was handed in." 
 
 " Shall I keep this and sleep upon it ? " asked Utter- 
 son. 
 
 " I wish you to judge for me entirely," was the reply. 
 " I have lost confidence in myself." 
 
 " Well, I shall consider," returned the lawyer. " And 
 now one word more : it was Hyde who dictated the terms 
 in your will about that disappearance ? "
 
 3M DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 The doctor seemed seized with a quahii of faintness ; 
 he shut his mouth tight and nodded. 
 
 '^ I knew it," said Utterson. " He meant to murder 
 you. You have had a fine escape.'" 
 
 '"' I have had Avhat is far more to the purpose," re- 
 turned the doctor solemnly : '"I have had a lesson — 
 God, Utterson, what a lesson I have had ! " And he 
 covered his face for a moment with his hands. 
 
 On his way out, the lawyer stopped and had a word or 
 two with Poole. " By the bye," said he, " there was a 
 letter handed in to-day : what was the messenger like ?" 
 But Poole was positive nothing had come except by post ; 
 " and only circulars by that," he added. 
 
 This news sent off the visitor Mith his fears renewed. 
 Plainly the letter had come by the laboratory door ; pos- 
 sibly, indeed, it had been written in the cabinet ; and if 
 that were so, it must be differently judged, and handled 
 with the more caution. The newsboys, as he went, were 
 crying themselves hoarse along the footways : " Special 
 edition. Shocking murder of an M. P." That was the 
 funeral oration of one friend and client ; and he could 
 not help a certain apprehension lest the good name of 
 another should be sucked down in the eddy of the scan- 
 dal. It was, at least, a ticklish decision that he had to 
 make ; and self-reliant as he was by habit, he began to 
 cherish a longing for advice. It was not to be had di- 
 rectly ; but perhaps, he thought, it might be fished for. 
 
 Presently after, he sat on one side of his own hearth, 
 with Mr. Guest, his head clerk, upon the other, and
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR, HYDE. 345 
 
 midway between, at a nicely calculated distance from 
 the fire, a bottle of a particular old wine that had long 
 dwelt unsunned in the foundations of his house. The 
 fog still slept on the wing above the drowned cit}^ 
 where the lamps glimmered like carbuncles ; and 
 through the muffle and smother of these fallen clouds, 
 the procession of the town's life was still rolling in 
 through the great arteries with a sound as of a mighty 
 Avind. But the room was gay with firelight. In the 
 bottle the acids were long ago resolved ; the imperial 
 dye had softened with time, as the colour grows richer 
 in stained windows ; and the glow of hot autumn after- 
 noons on hillside vineyards, was ready to be set free and 
 to disperse the fogs of London. Insensibly the lawyer 
 melted. There was no man from whom he kept fewer 
 secrets than Mr. Guest ; and he was not always sure 
 that he kept as many as he meant. Guest had often 
 been on business to the doctors ; he knew Poole ; he 
 could scarce have failed to hear of ^h\ Hyde's famil- 
 iarity about the house ; he might draw conclusions : was 
 it not as Avell, then, that he should see a letter which 
 put that mystery to rights ? and above all since Guest, 
 being a great student and critic of handwriting, would 
 consider the step natural and obliging ? The clerk, 
 besides, was a man of counsel ; he would scarce read so 
 strange a document without dropping a remark ; and 
 by that remark Mr. ITtterson might shape his future 
 course. 
 
 " This is a sad business about Sir Dan vers," he said.
 
 346 DR. JEKTLL AND MR, HYDE. 
 
 " Yes, sir^ indeed. It has elicited a great deal of 
 public feeling," returned Guest. ''' The man, of course, 
 was mad." 
 
 '' I should like to hear your views on that," replied 
 Utterson. " I have a document here in his handwrit- 
 ing ; it is between ourselves, for I scarce know what to 
 do about it ; it is an ugly business at the best. But 
 there it is ; quite in your way : a murderer's auto- 
 graph." 
 
 Guest's eyes brightened, and he sat down at once 
 and studied it with passion. " Xo, sir," he said : '' not 
 mad ; but it is an odd hand." 
 
 " And by all accounts a very odd writer," added the 
 lawyer. 
 
 Just then the servant entered with a note. 
 
 '"Is that from Dr. Jekyll, sir ?" inquired the clerk. 
 " I thought I knew the writing. Anything private, 
 Mr. Utterson ? " 
 
 " Only an invitation to dinner. Why ? Do you want 
 to see it ? " 
 
 " One moment. I thank you, sir ; " and the clerk 
 laid the two sheets of paper alongside and sedulously 
 compared their contents. " Thank you, sir," he said at 
 last, returning both ; " it's a very interesting auto- 
 graph." 
 
 There was a j^ause, during which Mr. Utterson 
 struggled with himself. " Why did you compare them. 
 Guest ? " he inquired suddenly. 
 
 " Well, sir," returned the clerk, " there's a rather
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 3-i7 
 
 singular resemblance ; the two hands are in many points 
 identical : only differently sloped." 
 
 " Rather qnaint/' said Utterson. 
 
 " It is, as you say, rather quaint," returned Guest. 
 
 " I wouldn't speak of this note, you know," said the 
 master. 
 
 " No, sir," said the clerk. " I understand." 
 
 But no sooner was Mr. Utterson alone that night, 
 than he locked the note into his safe, where it reposed 
 from that time forward. " What ! " he thought. 
 " Henry Jekyll forge for a murderer ! " And his blood 
 ran cold in his veins. 
 
 EEMARKABLE INCIDENT OF DR. LANYON. 
 
 Time ran on ; thousands of jDOunds were offered in 
 reward, for the death of Sir Danvers was resented as a 
 public injury ; but Mr. Hyde had disappeared out of 
 the ken of the jDolice as though he had never existed. 
 Much of his past was unearthed, indeed, and all dis- 
 reputable : tales came out of the man's cruelty, at once 
 so callous and violent ; of his vile life, of his strange 
 associates, of the hatred that seemed to have surrounded 
 his career ; but of his present whereabouts, not a 
 whisper. From the time he had left the house in Soho 
 on the morning of the murder, he was simply blotted 
 out ; and gradually, as time drew on, Mr. Utterson be- 
 gan to recover from the hotness of his alarm, and to 
 grow more at quiet with himself. The death of Sir
 
 348 DK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 Danvers was, to liis way of thinking, more than paid 
 for by the disappearance of Mr. Hyde. Now that that 
 evil influence had been withdrawn, a new life began for 
 Dr. Jekyll. He came out of his seclusion, renewed re- 
 lations with his friends, became once more their familiar 
 guest and entertainer ; and whilst he had always been 
 known for charities, he was now no less distinguished 
 for religion. He was busy, he was much in the open 
 air, he did good ; his face seemed to open and brighten, 
 as if with an inward consciousness of service ; and for 
 more than two months, the doctor was at peace. 
 
 On the 8th of January IJtterson had dined at the 
 doctor's with a small party ; Lauyon had been there ; 
 and the face of the host had looked from one to the 
 other as in the old days when the trio were inseparable 
 friends. On the 12th, and again on the 14th, the door 
 was shut against the lawyer. '' The doctor was confined 
 to the house," Poole said, "and saw no one." On the 
 15th, he tried again, and was again refused ; and having 
 now been used for the last two n^onths to see his friend 
 almost daily, he found this return of solitude to weigh 
 upon his spirits. The fifth night he had in Guest to 
 dine with him ; and the sixth he betook himself to Dr. 
 Lanyon's. 
 
 There at least he was not denied admittance ; but 
 Avhen he came in, he was shocked at the change which 
 had taken place in the doctor's appearance. He had 
 his death-warrant written legibly upon his face. The 
 rosy man had grown pale ; his flesh had fallen away ; he
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 349 
 
 was visibly balder aud older ; and yet it was not bo 
 much these tokens of a swift physical decay that ar- 
 rested the lawyer's notice;, as a look in the eye and 
 quality of manner that seemed to testify to some deep- 
 seated terror of the mind. It was unlikely that the 
 doctor should fear death ; and yet that was what Utter- 
 son was tempted to suspect. " Yes,'" he thought ; " he 
 is a doctor,, he must know his own state and that his 
 days are counted : and the knowledge is more than 
 he can bear." And yet when Utterson remarked on 
 his ill-looks, it was with an air of great firmness that 
 Lanyon declared himself a doomed man. 
 
 "I have liad a shock," he said, "and I shall never 
 recover. It is a question of weeks. Well, life has been 
 pleasant ; I liked it ; yes, sir, I used to like it. I 
 sometimes think if we knew all, we should be more 
 glad to get away." 
 
 "Jekyll is ill, too," observed Utterson. '' Have you 
 seen him ?" 
 
 But Lanyon's face changed, and he held up a trem- 
 bling hand. "I wish to see or hear no more of Dr. 
 Jekyll," he said in a loud, unsteady voice. " I am 
 quite done with that person ; and I beg that you 
 will spare me any allusion to one whom I regard as 
 dead." 
 
 " Tut-tut,'' said Mr. Utterson ; and then after a con- 
 siderable pause, "Can't I do anything?" he inquired. 
 " We are three very old friends, Lanyon ; we shall not 
 live to make others."
 
 350 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 ''Xothing can be done,*' returned Lanyon ; *'ask 
 himself.*' 
 
 "He will not see me/' said the lawyer. 
 
 " I am not surprised at that/*' was the reply. " Some 
 day, Utterson, after I am dead, you may perhaps come 
 to learn the right and wrong of this. I cannot tell you. 
 And in the meantime, if 5'ou can sit and talk with me 
 of other things, for God's sake, stay and do so ; but if 
 you cannot keeja clear of this accursed topic, then, in 
 God's name, go, for I cannot bear it." 
 
 As soon as he got home, Utterson sat down and 
 wrote to Jekyll, complaining of his exclusion from the 
 house, and asking the cause of this unhappy break with 
 Lanyon ; and the next day brought him a long answer, 
 often very pathetically worded, and sometimes darkly 
 mysterious in drift. The quarrel with Lanyon was in- 
 curable. " I do not blame our old friend," Jekyll 
 wrote, '' but I share his view that we must never meet. 
 I mean from henceforth to lead a life of extreme seclu- 
 sion ; you must not be surprised, nor must you doubt 
 my friendship, if my door is often shut even to you. 
 You must suffer me to go my own dark way. I have 
 brought on myself a punishment and a danger that I 
 cannot name. If I am the chief of sinners, I am the 
 chief of sufferers also. I could not think that this 
 earth contained a j)lace for sufferings and terrors so 
 unmanning ; and you can do but one thing, L'tterson, 
 to lighten this destiny, and that is to resj^ect my 
 silence." I'tterson was amazed ; the dark influence of
 
 DE. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 351 
 
 Hyde liad been withdrawn, the doctor had returned to 
 his old tasks and amities ; a Aveek ago, the prospect had 
 smiled with every promise of a cheerful and an hon- 
 oured age ; and now in a moment, friendship, and peace 
 of mind, and the whole tenor of his life were wrecked. 
 So great and unprepared a change pointed to madness ; 
 but in view of Lanyon's manner and words, there must 
 lie for it some deeper ground. 
 
 A week afterwards Dr. Lanyon took to his bed, and 
 in something less than a fortnight he was dead. The 
 night after the funeral, at which he had been sadly 
 affected, Utterson locked the door of his business room, 
 and sitting there by the light of a melancholy candle, 
 drew out and set before him an envelope addressed by 
 the hand and sealed with the seal of his dead friend. 
 " Private : for the hands of J. G. Utterson alojs^e, 
 and in case of his predecease to he destroyed unread," 
 so it was emphatically superscribed ; and the lawyer 
 dreaded to behold the contents. " I have buried one 
 friend to-day," he thought : " what if this should cost 
 me another ? " And then he condemned the fear as a 
 disloyalty, and broke the seal. Within there was an- 
 other enclosure, likewise sealed, and marked upon the 
 cover as ^^not to be opened till the death or disapjoear- 
 ance of Dr. Henry Jekyll." Utterson could not trust 
 his eyes. Yes, it Avas disappearance ; here again, as in 
 the mad Avill which he had long ago restored to its 
 author, here again were the idea of a disappearance and 
 tlie name of Henry Jekyll bracketted. But in the Avill,
 
 352 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 that idea had sprung from the sinister suggestion of the 
 man Hyde ; it was set there with a purpose all too plain 
 and horrible. Written by the hand of Lanyon^ what 
 should it mean ? A great curiosity came on the trustee, 
 to disregard the prohibition and dive at once to the 
 bottom of these mysteries ; but professional honour and 
 faith to his dead friend were stringent obligations ; and 
 the j)acket slept in the inmost corner of his private 
 safe. 
 
 It is one thing to mortify curiosity, another to con- 
 quer it ; and it may be doubted if, from that day forth, 
 Utterson desired the society of his surviving friend with 
 the same eagerness. He thought of him kindly ; but 
 his thoughts were disquieted and fearful. He went to 
 call indeed ; but he was perhaps relieved to be denied 
 admittance ; perhaps, in his heart, he preferred to speak 
 with Poole upon the doorstep and surrounded by the air 
 and sounds of the open city, rather than to be admitted 
 into that house of voluntary bondage, and to sit and 
 speak with its inscrutable recluse. Poole had, indeed, 
 no very jjleasant news to communicate. The doctor, it 
 appeared, now more than ever confined himself to the 
 cabinet over the laboratory, where he would sometimes 
 even sleep ; he was out of spirits, he had grown very 
 silent, he did not read ; it seemed as if he had some- 
 thing on his mind. Utterson became so used to the 
 unvarying character of these reports, that he fell off 
 little by little in the frequency of his visits.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE, 353 
 
 INCIDENT AT THE WINDOW. 
 
 It chanced on Sunday, when Mr. Utterson was on his 
 iisual walk with Mr. Enfield, that their way lay once 
 again through the by-street ; and that when they came 
 in front of the door, both stopped to gaze on it. 
 
 '' Well," said Enfield, "' that story's at an end at 
 least. We shall never see more of Mr. Hyde." 
 
 •'*' I hope not," said Utterson. " Did I ever tell you 
 that I once saw him, and shared your feeling of repul- 
 sion ?" 
 
 " It was impossible to do the one without the other," 
 returned Enfield. "' And by the way, what an ass you 
 must have thought me, not to know that this was a back 
 way to Dr. JekylFs ! It was partly your own fault that 
 I found it out, even when I did." 
 
 ''So you found it out, did you?" said Utterson. 
 " But if that be so, we may step into the court and take 
 a look at the windows. To tell you the truth, I am 
 uneasy about poor Jekyll ; and even outside, I feel as 
 if the presence of a friend might do him good," 
 
 The court was very cool and a little damp, and full of 
 premature twilight, although the sky, high up over- 
 head, was still bright with sunsef The middle one of 
 the three windows was half way open ; and sitting close 
 beside it, taking the air with an infinite sadness of mien, 
 like some disconsolate prisoner, Utterson saw Dr. Jekyll. 
 
 ''What! Jekyll!" he cried, "I trust you are 
 better. " 
 
 . 23
 
 354 DK. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 " I am very low, Utterson," replied the doctor 
 drearily, " very low. It will not last long, thank God." 
 
 " You stay too much indoors," said the law3^er. 
 " You should be out, whipping up the circulation like 
 Mr. Enfield and me. (This is my cousin — Mr. Enfield 
 — Dr. Jekyll. ) Come now ; get your hat and take a 
 quick turn with us." 
 
 " You are very good," sighed the other. '• I should 
 like to very much ; but no, no, no, it is quite impos- 
 sible ; I dare not. But indeed, Utterson, I am very 
 glad to see you ; this is really a great pleasure ; I would 
 ask you and Mr. Enfield up, but the place is really not 
 fit." 
 
 '' "Why then," said the lawyer, good-naturedly, " the 
 best thing we can do is to stay down here and speak 
 with you from where we are." 
 
 " That is just what I was about to venture to pro- 
 pose," returned the doctor with a smile. But the words 
 were hardly uttered, before the smile was struck out of 
 his face and succeeded by an expression of such abject 
 terror and despair, as froze the very blood of the two 
 gentlemen below. They saw it but for a glimpse, for 
 the window was instantly thrust down ; but that 
 glimpse had been sufficient, and they turned and left 
 the court without a word. In silence, too, they 
 traversed the by-street ; and it was not until they had 
 come into a neighbouring thoroughfare, where even 
 upon a Sunday there were still some stirrings of life, 
 that Mr. Utterson at last turned and looked at his com-
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 355 
 
 pauion. They were both jiale ; aud there was au 
 answering horror in tlieir eyes. 
 
 " God forgive us, God forgive us/' said Mr. Utterson. 
 
 But Mr. Enfield only nodded his head very seriously, 
 and walked on once more in silence. 
 
 THE LAST NIGHT. 
 
 ]\[r. Utterson was sitting by his fireside one evening 
 after dinner, when he was surprised to receive a visit 
 from Poole. 
 
 '' Bless me, Poole, what brings you here ?'' he cried ; 
 and then taking a second look at him, ''What ails 
 you ? " he added ; ''is the doctor ill ? " 
 
 " Mr. Utterson," said the man, " there is something 
 wrong." 
 
 " Take a seat, and here is a glass of wine for you," 
 said the lawyer. " Now, take your time, and tell me 
 plainly what you want." 
 
 " You know the doctor's ways, sir," replied Poole, 
 '' and how he shuts himself up. "Well, he's shut up 
 again in the cabinet ; and I don't like it, sir — I wish I 
 may die if I like it. Mr. Utterson, sir, I'm afraid." 
 
 " Now, my good man," said the lawyer, '•' be explicit. 
 What are you afraid of ? " 
 
 "I've been afraid for about a week," returned Poole, 
 doggedly disregarding the question, "and I can bear it 
 no more."
 
 356 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 The man's appearance amply bore out his words : his 
 manner was altered for the worse ; and except for the 
 moment when he had first announced his terror, he had 
 not once looked the lawyer in the face. Even now, he 
 sat with the glass of wine untasted on his knee, and his 
 eyes directed to a corner of the floor. "I can bear it 
 no more," he rejieated. 
 
 " Come," said the lawyer, •' I see you have some good 
 reason, Poole ; I see there is something seriously amiss. 
 Try to tell me what it is.'"' 
 
 " I think there's been foul play," said Poole, hoarsely. 
 
 "Foul play I" cried the lawyer, a good deal fright- 
 ened and rather inclined to be irritated in consequence. 
 " What foul play ? What does the man mean ? " 
 
 '' I daren't say, sir," was the answer ; "but will you 
 come along wdtli me and see for yourself ? " 
 
 Mr. Utterson's only answer was to rise and get his hat 
 and great coat ; but he observed with wonder the great- 
 ness of the relief that appeared upon the butler's face, 
 and perhaps with no less, that the wine was still un- 
 tasted when he set it down to follow. 
 
 It was a wild, cold, seasonable night of March, with 
 a pale moon, lying on her back as though the Avind had 
 tilted her, and a flying wrack of the most diaphanous 
 and lawny texture. The Aviud made talking difficult, 
 and flecked the blood into the face. It seemed to have 
 swept the streets unusually bare of passengers, besides ; 
 for Mr. Utterson thought he had never seen that part of 
 London so deserted. He could have wished it other-
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 357 
 
 wise ; never in his life had he been conscious of so sharp 
 a wish to see and touch his fellow-creatures ; for strugf- 
 gie as he mighty, there was borne in upon his mind a 
 crushing anticipation of calamity. The square, when 
 they got there;, was all full of wind and dust, and the 
 thin trees in the garden Avere lashing themselves along 
 the railing. Poole, who had kept all the way a pace or 
 two ahead, now pnlled up in the middle of the pave- 
 ment, and in spite of the biting weather, took off his 
 hat and mopped his brow with a red pocket-handker- 
 chief. But for all the hurry of his coming, these were 
 not the dews of exertion that he wiped away, but the 
 moisture of some strangling anguish ; for his face was 
 white and his voice, when he spoke, harsh and broken. 
 
 " Well, sir," he said, "here we are, and God grant 
 there be nothing wrong." 
 
 " Amen, Poole," said the lawyer. 
 
 Thereupon the servant knocked in a very guarded 
 manner ; the door was opened on the chain ; and a voice 
 asked from within, " Is that you, Poole ?" 
 
 " It's all right," said Poole. " Open the door." 
 
 The hall, when they entered it, was brightly lighted 
 up ; the fire was built high ; and about the hearth the 
 whole of the servants, men and women, stood huddled 
 together like a flock of sheep. At the sight of Mr. 
 Utterson, the housemaid broke into hysterical whimper- 
 ing ; and the cook, crying out '''' Bless God! it's Mr. 
 Utterson," ran forward as if to take him in her 
 arms.
 
 358 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 "What, what ? Are you all here ?" said the lawyer 
 peevishly. ''Very irregular, very unseemly ; your mas- 
 ter would be far from -pleased." 
 
 " They're all afraid/' said Poole. 
 
 Blank silence followed, no one protesting ; only the 
 maid lifted up her voice and now wept loudly. 
 
 " Hold your tongue ! " Poole said to her, with a feroc- 
 ity of accent that testified to his own jangled nerves ; 
 and indeed, Avlien the girl had so suddenly raised the 
 note of her lamentation, they had all started and turned 
 towards the inner door with faces of dreadful expec- 
 tation. "■ And now," continued the butler, addressing 
 the knife-boy, "reach me a candle, and we'll get 
 this through hands at once." And then he begged Mr. 
 Utterson to follow him, and led the way to the back 
 garden. 
 
 " Now, sir," said he, " you come as gently as you can. 
 I want you to hear, and I don't want you to be heard. 
 And see here, sir, if by any chance he was to ask you in, 
 don't go." 
 
 Mr. Utterson's nerves, at this unlooked-for termi- 
 nation, gave a jerk that nearly threw him from his bal- 
 ance ; but he recollected his courage and followed the 
 butler into the laboratory building and through the sur- 
 gical theatre, with its lumber of crates and bottles, to 
 the foot of the stair. Here Poole motioned him to 
 stand on one side and listen ; while he himself, setting 
 down the candle and making a great and obvious call on 
 his resolution, mounted the steps and knocked with a
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 359 
 
 somewliat uncertain hand on tlie red baize of the cabinet 
 door. 
 
 " Mr. Utterson, sir, asking to see you/' he called ; 
 and even as he did so, once more violently signed to the 
 lawyer to give ear. 
 
 A voice answered from Avithin : '* Tell him I cannot 
 see anyone," it said complainingly. 
 
 " Thank you, sir," said Poole, with a note of some- 
 thing like triumph in his voice ; and taking uj) his 
 candle, he led Mr. Utterson back across the yard and 
 into the great kitchen, wdiere the fire was out and the 
 beetles were leaping on the floor. 
 
 "Sir," he said, looking Mr. Utterson in the eyes, 
 " was that my master's voice ?" 
 
 " It seems much changed," replied the lawyer, very 
 pale, but giving look for look. 
 
 " Changed ? AYell, yes, I think so," said the butler. 
 " Have I been twenty years in this man's house, to be 
 deceived about his voice ? No, sir ; master's made away 
 with ; he was made away with, eight days ago, when we 
 heard him cry out upon the name of God ; and u'ho's in 
 there instead of him, and why it stays there, is a thing 
 that cries to Heaven, ilr. Utterson ! " 
 
 " This is a very strange tale, Poole ; this is rather a 
 wild tale, my man," said Mr. Utterson, biting his fin- 
 ger. '' Sujjpose it were as you suppose, sujijjosing Dr. 
 Jekyll to have been — well, murdered, what could induce 
 the murderer to stay ? That won't hold Avater ; it 
 doesn't commend itself to reason."
 
 360 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Utterson, you are a hard man to satisfy, 
 but I'll do it 3'et/' said Poole. " xill this last week (you 
 must know) him, or it, or whatever it is that lives in 
 that cabinet, has been crying night and day for some 
 sort of medicine and cannot get it to his mind. It was 
 sometimes his Avay — the master's, that is — to write his 
 orders on a sheet of paper and throw it on the stair. 
 We've had nothing else this week back ; nothing but 
 papers, and a closed door, and the very meals left there 
 to be smuggled in when nobody was looking. Well, sir, 
 every day, ay, and twice and thrice in the same day, 
 there have been orders and complaints, and I have been 
 sent flying to all the wholesale chemists in town. 
 Every time I brought the stuff back, there would be 
 another paper telling me to return it, because it was not 
 pure, and another order to a different firm. This drug 
 is wanted bitter bad, sir, whatever for." 
 
 " Have you any of these papers ? " asked Mr. Utter- 
 son. 
 
 Poole felt in his pocket and handed out a crumpled 
 note, which the lawyer, bending nearer to the candle, 
 carefully examined. Its contents ran thus : " Dr. 
 Jekyll presents his compliments to Messrs. Maw. He 
 assures them that their last samj)le is impure and quite 
 useless for his present purpose. In the year 18 — , Dr. 
 J. purchased a somewhat large quantity from Messrs. M. 
 He now begs them to search with the most sedulous 
 care, and should any of the same quality be left, to for- 
 ward it to him at once. Expense is no consideration.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 361 
 
 The importancp of this to Dr. J. can hardly be exagger- 
 ated." So far the letter had run composedl}' enough, 
 but here with a sndden splntter of the pen, the writer's 
 emotion had broken loose. '^ For God's sake," he had 
 added, " find me some of the old." 
 
 " This is a strange note," said Mr. Utterson ; and 
 then sharpl}', " How do you come to have it open ? " 
 
 " The man at Maw's was main angry, sir, and he 
 threw it bacl^ to me like so much dirt," returned 
 Poole. 
 
 " This is unquestionably the doctor's hand, do you 
 knoAv ? " resumed the lawyer. 
 
 '' I thought it looked like it," said the servant rather 
 sulkily ; and then, with another voice, " But what mat- 
 ters hand of write ? " he said. '' I've seen him ! " 
 
 " Seen him ? " repeated Mr. Utterson. " Well ? " 
 
 " That's it I " said Poole. '' It was this way. I 
 came suddenly into the theatre from the garden. It 
 seems he had slipped out to look for this drug or what- 
 ever it is ; for the cabinet door was open, and there he 
 Avas at the far end of the room digging among the 
 crates. He looked up when I came in, gave a kind of 
 cry, and whipped upstairs into the cabinet. It was but 
 for one minute that I saw him, but the hair stood upon 
 my head like quills. Sir, if that was my master, why 
 had he a mask upon his face ? If it was my master, 
 why did he cry out like a rat, and run from me ? I 
 have served him long enough. And then ..." 
 The man paused and passed his hand over his face.
 
 362 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 "These are all very strange circumstances/ said Mr. 
 Utterson, " but I think I begin to see daylight. Your 
 master, Poole, is plainly seized with one of those mala- 
 dies that both torture and deform the sufferer : hence, 
 for aught I know, the alteration of his voice ; hence 
 the mask and the avoidance of his friends ; hence his 
 eagerness to find this drug, by means of which the poor 
 soul retains some hope of ultimate recovery — God grant 
 that he be not deceived I There is my explanation ; it 
 is sad enough, Poole, ay, and appalling to consider ; but 
 it is plain and natural, hangs well together, and delivers 
 us from all exorbitant alarms." 
 
 " Sir," said the butler, turning to a sort of mottled 
 pallor, " that thing was not my master, and there's the 
 truth. My master " — here he looked round him and 
 began to whisper — " is a tall, fine build of a man, and 
 this was more of a dwarf." L'tterson attempted to pro- 
 test. " 0, sir,^" cried Poole, " do you think I do not 
 know my master after twenty years ? Do you think I do 
 not know where his head comes to in the cabinet door, 
 where I saw him every morning of my life ? Xo, sir, 
 that thing in the mask was never Dr. Jekyll — God 
 knows what it was, but it was never Dr. Jekyll ; and it 
 is the belief of m}' heart that there was murder done." 
 
 " Poole," replied the lawyer, " if you say that, it will 
 become my duty to make certain. Much as I desire to 
 spare your master's feelings, much as I am puzzled by 
 this note which seems to prove him to be still alive> I 
 shall consider it mv dutv to break in that door,"
 
 DR. JEKTLL AND MR. HYDE. 363 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Utterson, that's talking I *' cried the butler. 
 
 " And now comes the second question, "' resumed 
 Utterson : " "Who is going to do it ?" 
 
 " Why, you and me," was the undaunted reply. 
 
 '^ That's very well said," returned the lawyer ; " and 
 whatever comes of it, I shall make it my business to see 
 you are no loser." 
 
 " There is an axe in the theatre," continued Poole ; 
 " and you might take the kitchen poker for yourself." 
 
 The lawyer took that rude but weighty instrument 
 into his hand, and balanced it. " Do you know, 
 Poole," he said, looking up, " that you and I are about 
 to place ourselves in a ^^osition of some peril ? " 
 
 '^ You may say so, sir, indeed," returned the butler. 
 
 ''It is well, then, that we should be frank," said the 
 other. " We both think more than Ave have said ; let 
 us make a clean breast. This masked figure that you 
 saw, did you recognise it ? " 
 
 " Well, sir, it went so quick, and the creature was so 
 doubled ujd, that I could hardly swear to that," was the 
 answer. " But if you mean, was it Mr. Hyde ? — why, 
 yes, I think it was ! You see, it was much of the same 
 bigness ; and it had the same quick, light way with it ; 
 and then who else could have got in by the laboratory 
 door ? You have not forgot, sir, that at the time of 
 the murder he had still the key with him ? But that's 
 not all. I don't know, Mr. Utterson, if ever you met 
 this Mr. Hyde ? " 
 
 "Yes," said the lav/yer, '' I once spoke with him."
 
 364 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 " Then you must know as well as the rest of us that 
 there was something queer about that gentleman — some- 
 thing that gave a man a turn — I don't know rightly how 
 to say it, sir, beyond this : that you felt it in your mar- 
 row kind of cold and thin." 
 
 "I own I felt something of what you describe/" said 
 Mr. Utterson. 
 
 ''Quite so, sir," returned Poole. '"Well, when that 
 masked thing like a monkey jumped from among the 
 chemicals and whipped into the cabinet, it went down 
 m}^ spine like ice. 0, I know it's not evidence, Mr. 
 Utterson ; I'm book-learned enough for that ; but a 
 man has his feelings, and I give you my bible-word it 
 was Mr. Hyde ! " 
 
 "Ay, ay," said the lawyer. '• My fears incline to the 
 same point. Evil, I fear, founded — evil was sure to 
 come — of that connection. Ay, truly, I believe you ; I 
 believe poor Harry is killed ; and I believe his murderer 
 (for what purpose, God alone can tell) is still lurking in 
 his victim's room. "Well, let our name be vengeance. 
 Call Bradshaw." 
 
 The footman came at the summons, very white and 
 nervous. 
 
 " Pull yourself together, Bradshaw^," said the lawyer. 
 " This suspense, I know, is telling upon all of you ; but 
 it is now our intention to make an end of it. Poole, 
 here, and I are going to force our way into the cabinet. 
 If all is well, my shoulders are broad enough to bear 
 the blame. Meanwhile, lest anything should really be
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 365 
 
 amiss, or any malefactor seek to escape by the back, you 
 and the boy must go round the corner with a pair of 
 good sticks and take your jDost at tlie laboratory door. 
 We give you ten minutes, to get to your stations." 
 
 As Bradshaw left, the lawyer looked at his watch. 
 "And now, Poole, let us get to ours," he said; and 
 taking the poker under his arm, led the way into the 
 yard. The scud had banked over the moon, and it was 
 now quite dark. The wind, which only broke in puffs 
 and draughts into that deep well of building, tossed the 
 light of the candle to and fro about their steps, until 
 they came into the shelter of the theatre, where they sat 
 down silently to wait. London hummed solemnly all 
 around ; but nearer at hand, the stillness was only 
 broken by the sounds of a footfall moving to and fro 
 along the cabinet floor. 
 
 " So it will walk all day, sir," whispered Poole ; '^ay, 
 and the better part of the night. Only when a new 
 sample comes from the chemist, there's a bit of a break. 
 Ah, it's an ill-conscience that's such an enemy to rest ! 
 Ah, sir, there's blood foully shed in every step of it ! 
 But hark again, a little closer — put your heart in your 
 ears, Mr. Utterson, and tell me, is that the doctor's foot ?'' 
 
 The steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, 
 for all they went so slowlj' ; it was different indeed from 
 the heavy creaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson 
 sighed. " Is there never anything else ? " he asked. 
 
 Poole nodded. " Once," he said. " Once I heard it 
 
 weeping
 
 360 DR. JEKYLL AND MB. HYDE. 
 
 *' Weej)ing ? how that ?" said the lawyer, conscious of 
 a suddeu chill of horror. 
 
 ""Weeping like a woman or a lost soul/"' said the but- 
 ler. " I came away with that u2:)on my heart, that I 
 could have wept too.'*' 
 
 But now the ten minutes drew to an end. Poole dis- 
 interred the axe from under a stack of packing sti'aw ; 
 the candle Avas set upon the nearest table to light them 
 to the attack ; and they drew near with bated breath to 
 where that jDatient foot was still going up and down, up 
 and down, in the quiet of the night. 
 
 "' Jekyll,*' cried Utterson, with a loud voice, ""I de- 
 mand to see you." He paused a moment, but there 
 came no reply. " I give you fair warning, our suspi- 
 cions are aroused, and I mitst and shall see you,'' he 
 resumed; '^if not by fair means, then by foul — if not 
 of your consent, then by brute force I " 
 
 "'Utterson," said the voice, "for God's sake, have 
 mercy I " 
 
 '•'Ah, that's not Jekyll's voice — it's Hyde's!" cried 
 Utterson. " Down with the door, Poole ! " 
 
 Poole swung the axe over his shoulder; the blow 
 shook the building, and the red baize door leaped 
 against the lock and hinges. A dismal screech, as 
 of mere animal terror, rang from the cabinet. Up 
 went the axe again, and again the panels crashed and 
 the frame bounded ; four times the blow fell ; but 
 the wood was tough and the fittings were of excellent 
 workmanship ; and it was not until the fifth, that the
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 367 
 
 lock burst in sunder and the wreck of the door fell 
 inwards on the carpet. 
 
 The besiegers, aj)palled by their own i-iot and the 
 stillness that had succeeded, stood back a little aiid 
 peered in. There lay the cabinet before their eyes in 
 the quiet lamplight, a good fire glowing and chattering 
 on the hearth, the kettle singing its thin straiu, a 
 drawer or two open, papers neatly set forth on the 
 business table, and nearer the fire, the things laid out 
 for tea : the quietest room, you would have said, and, 
 but for the glazed presses full of chemicals, the most 
 commonplace that night in London. 
 
 Eight in the midst there lay the body of a man 
 sorely contorted and still twitching. They drew near 
 on tiptoe, turned it on its back and beheld the face of 
 Edward Hyde. He was dressed in clothes far too large 
 for him, clothes of the doctor's bigness ; the cords of 
 his face still moved with a semblance of life, but life 
 was quite gone : and by the crushed jihial in the hand 
 and the strong smell of kernels that hung upon the 
 air, Utterson knew that he was looking on the body 
 of a self-destroyer. 
 
 " We have come too late," he said sternly, "whether 
 to save or punish. Hyde is gone to his account ; and 
 it only remains for us to find the body of your master." 
 
 The far greater proportion of the building was oc- 
 cupied by the theatre, which filled almost the whole 
 ground story and Avas lighted from above, and by the 
 cabinet, which formed an upper story at one end and
 
 368 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 looked upon the court. A corridor joined the theatre 
 to the door on the by-street ; and with this the cabinet 
 communicated separately by a second flight of stairs. 
 There were besides a few dark closets and a spacious 
 cellar. All these they now thoroughly examined. Each 
 closet needed but a glance, for all were empty, and all, 
 by the dust that fell from their doors, had stood long 
 unopened. The cellar, indeed, was filled with crazy 
 lumber, mostly dating from the times of the surgeon 
 who was Jekyll's predecessor ; but even as they opened 
 the door they were advertised of the uselessness of 
 further search, by the fall of a perfect mat of cobweb 
 which had for years sealed up the entrance. !N"owhere 
 was there any trace of Henry Jekyll, dead or alive. 
 
 Poole stamped on the flags of the corridor. " He 
 must be buried here,'"' he said, hearkening to the 
 sound. 
 
 " Or he may have fled," said Utterson, and he turned 
 to examine the door in the by-street. It was locked ; 
 and lying near by on the flags, they found the key, 
 already stained Avith rust. 
 
 "' This does not look like use,"' observed the lawyer. 
 
 '' Use ! " echoed Poole. '* Do you not see, sir, it is 
 broken ? mach as if a man had stamped on it." 
 
 " Ay," continued Utterson, ''and the fractures, too, 
 are rusty." The two men looked at each other with a 
 scare. " This is beyond me, Poole," said the lawyer. 
 " Let us go back to the cabinet." 
 
 They mounted the stair in silence, and still Avith an
 
 DK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 369 
 
 occasional awestruck glance at the dead body, proceeded 
 more thoroughly to examine the coiitents of the cabinet. 
 At one table, there were traces of chemical work, vari- 
 ous measured heaps of some white salt being laid on 
 glass saucers, as though for an experiment in which the 
 unhapjiy man had been prevented. 
 
 "^ That is the same drug that I was always bringing 
 liim," said Poole ; and even as he spoke, the kettle witli 
 a startling noise boiled over. 
 
 This brought them to the fireside, where the easy- 
 chair was drawn cosily up, and the tea things stood 
 ready to the sitter's elbow, the very sugar in the cup. 
 There were several books on a shelf ; one lay beside the 
 tea things open, and Utterson was amazed to find it a 
 copy of a pious work, for which Jekyll had several 
 times expressed a great esteem, annotated, in his own 
 hand, with startling blasphemies. 
 
 Next, in the course of their review of the chamber, 
 the searchers came to the cheval glass, into whose depths 
 they looked with an involuntary horror. But it was so 
 turned as to show them nothing but the rosy glow play- 
 ing on the roof, the fire sparkling in a hundred repeti- 
 tions along the glazed front of the presses, and their 
 own pale and fearful countenances stooj^ing to look in. 
 
 ''This glass have seen some strange things, sir," whis- 
 pered Poole. 
 
 ''And surely none stranger than itself," echoed the 
 
 lawyer in the same tones. "For what did Jekyll "' — he 
 
 caught himself up at the word with a start, and then 
 24
 
 370 DE. JEKTLL AXD ME. HYDE. 
 
 conquering tlie weakness — ''Svliat could Jekyll want 
 Avitli it ? ■' he said. 
 
 " You may say that ! " said Poole. 
 
 Next they turned to the business table. On the desk, 
 among the neat array of papers, a large envelope was 
 uppermost, and bore, in the doctor's hand, the name of 
 ]\rr. Utterson. The lawyer unsealed it, and several en- 
 closures fell to the floor. The first was a will, drawn in 
 the same eccentric terms as the one which he had re- 
 turned six months before, to serve as a testament in case 
 of death and as a deed of gift in case of disappearance ; 
 but in place of the name of Edward Hyde, the lawyer, 
 with indescribable amazement, read the name of Gabriel 
 John Utterson. He looked at Poole, and then back 
 at the paper, and last of all at the dead malefactor 
 stretched upon the carj)et. 
 
 " My head goes round," he said. " He has been all 
 these days in possession ; he had no cause to like me ; he 
 must have raged to see himself displaced ; and he has 
 not destroyed this document.'' 
 
 He caught up the next pajaer ; it was a brief note in 
 the doctor's hand and dated at the top. " Poole ! " 
 the lawyer cried, ''he was alive and here this day. He 
 cannot have been disposed of in so short a space ; he 
 must be still alive, he must have fled ! And then, why 
 fled ? and how ? and in that case, can we venture to de- 
 clare this suicide ? 0, we must be careful. I foresee 
 that we may yet involve your master in some dire catas- 
 trophe."
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 371 
 
 " Why don't you read it, sir ? " asked Poole. 
 
 '' Because I fear," replied the lawyer solemnlv. 
 " God grant I have no cause for it ! " And with that 
 he brought the paper to his eyes and read as follows : 
 
 " My dear Utterson, — When this shall fall into your 
 hands, I shall have disappeared, under what circum- 
 stances I have not the i3enetration to foresee, hut my in- 
 stinct and all the circumstances of my nameless situa- 
 tion tell me that the end is sure and must be early. Go 
 then, and first read the narrative which Lanyon warned 
 me he was to place in your hands ; and if you care to 
 hear more, turn to the confession of 
 
 " Your unworthy and unhappy friend, 
 
 ''Henry Jekyll." 
 
 " There was a third enclosure ?" asked Utterson. 
 
 " Here, sir," said Poole, and gave into his hands a 
 considerable packet sealed in several places. 
 
 The lawyer put it in his pocket. '"I Avould say noth- 
 ing of this paper. If your master has fled or is dead, 
 we may at least save his credit. It is now ten ; I must 
 go home and read these documents in quiet ; but I shall 
 be back before midnight, when we sliall send for the 
 police." 
 
 They went out, locking the door of the theatre be- 
 hind them ; and Utterson, once more leaving the ser- 
 vants gathered about the fire in the hall, trudged back 
 to his office to read the two narratives in which this 
 mystery was now to be explained.
 
 372 BR. JEKYLL AND MR, HYDE. 
 
 DE. LANYON'S NARRATIVE. 
 
 On the ninth of January, now four clays ago, I re- 
 ceived by the evening delivery a registered envelope, 
 addressed in the hand of my colleague and old school- 
 companion, Henry Jekyll. I was a good deal surprised 
 by this ; for we were by no means in the habit of 
 correspondence ; I had seen the man, dined with him, 
 indeed, the night before ; and I could imagine nothing 
 in our intercourse tliat should justify formality of 
 registration. The contents increased my wonder ; for 
 this is how the letter ran : 
 
 "10th December, 18—. 
 
 ''Dear Lanyon, — You are one of my oldest friends ; 
 and although we may have differed at times on scientific 
 questions, I cannot remember, at least on my side, any 
 break in our affection. There was never a day when, 
 if you had said to me, ' Jekyll, my life, my honour, 
 my reason, depend upon you,'' I would not have sacri- 
 ficed my left hand to help you, Lanyon, my life, my 
 honour, my reason, are all at your mercy ; if 3^ou fail 
 me to-night, I am lost. You might suppose, after this 
 preface, that I am going to ask you for something dis- 
 honourable to grant. Judge for yourself, 
 
 " I want you to postpone all other engagements for 
 to-niglit — ay, even if you were summoned to the bed- 
 side of an emperor ; to take a cab, unless your carriage 
 should be actuallv at the door ; and with this letter in
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 373 
 
 your hand for consultation, to drive straight to my 
 house. Poole, my butler, has his orders ; you will find 
 him waiting your arrival with a locksmith. The door 
 of my cabinet is then to be forced : and you are to go 
 in alone ; to open the glazed press (letter E) on the left 
 hand, breaking the lock if it be shut ; and to draw out, 
 ivith all its contents as they stand, the fourth drawer 
 from the top or (which is the same thing) the third 
 from the bottom. In my extreme distress of mind, I 
 have a morbid fear of misdirecting you ; but even if I 
 am in error, you may know the right drawer by its con- 
 tents : some j^owders, a i^hial and a paper book. This 
 drawer I beg of you to carry back with you to Caven- 
 dish Square exactly as it stands. 
 
 " That is the first part of the service : now for the 
 second. You should be back, if you set out at once on 
 the receipt of this, long before midnight ; but I will 
 leave you that amount of margin, not only in the fear 
 of one of those obstacles that can neither be prevented 
 nor foreseen, but because an hour when 3'our servants 
 are in bed is to be preferred for what will then remain 
 to do. At midnight, then, I have to ask you to be 
 alone in your consulting room, to admit with your own 
 hand into the house a man who will present himself 
 in my name, and to place in his hands the drawer that 
 you will have brought with you from my cabinet. 
 Then you will have played your part and earned my 
 gratitude completely. Five minutes afterwards, if you 
 insist upon an explanation, you Avill have understood
 
 374 DE. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 thiit these arraugemeuts are of capital im^iortance ; and 
 that by the neglect of oue of them, fantastic as they 
 must appear, you might have charged your conscience 
 "with my death or the shipwreck of my reason, 
 
 " Confident as I am that you will not trifle with this 
 appeal, my heart sinks and my hand trembles at the 
 bare thought of such a possibility. Think of me at this 
 hour, in a strange place, laboring under a blackness of 
 distress that no fancy can exaggerate, and yet Avell 
 aware that, if you will but punctually serve me, my 
 troubles will roll away like a story that is told. Serve 
 me, my dear Lanyon, and save 
 
 '" Your friend, 
 
 "H.J. 
 
 "P.S. — I had already sealed this up when a fresh 
 terror struck upon my soul. It is possible that the 
 post-office may fail me, and this letter not come into 
 your hands until to-morrow morning. In that case, 
 dear Lanyon, do my errand when it shall be most con- 
 venient for you in the course of the day ; and once more 
 expect my messenger at midnight. It may then already 
 be too late ; and if that night passes without event, you 
 will know that you have seen the last of Henry Jekyll." 
 
 Upon the reading of this letter, I made sure my col- 
 league was insane ; but till that was proved beyond the 
 possibility of doubt, I felt bound to do as he requested. 
 The less I understood of this farrago, the less I was in 
 a position to judge of its importance ; and an appeal
 
 DE. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 375 
 
 SO worded could not be set aside without a grave re- 
 sponsibility. I rose accordingly from table, got into 
 a hansom, and drove straight to Jekyll's house. Tlie 
 butler was awaiting my arrival ; he had received by the 
 same post as mine a registered letter of instruction, 
 and had sent at once for a locksmith and a carpenter. 
 The tradesmen came while we were yet speaking ; and 
 we moved in a body to old Dr. Denman's surgical 
 theatre, from which (as you are doubtless aware) 
 Jekyll's private cabinet is most conveniently entered. 
 The door was very strong, the lock excellent ; the car- 
 penter avowed he would have great trouble and have 
 to do much damage, if force were to be used ; and the 
 locksmith was near despair. But this last was a handy 
 fellow, and after two hours^ work, the door stood open. 
 The joress marked E was unlocked ; and I took out the 
 drawer, had it filled up with straw and tied in a sheet, 
 and returned with it to Cavendish Square. 
 
 Here I proceeded to examine its contents. The pow- 
 ders were neatly enough made up, but not with the 
 nicety of the dispensing chemist ; so that it was plain 
 they were of Jekyll's private manufacture : and when 
 I opened one of the wrappers I found what seemed to 
 me a simple crystalline salt of a white colour. The 
 phial, to which I next turned my attention, might have 
 been about half full of a blood-red liquor, which was 
 highly pungent to the sense of smell and seemed to 
 me to contain phosphorus and some volatile ether. At 
 the other ingredients I could make no guess. The book
 
 376 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 was au ordinary version book and contained little but 
 a series of dates. These covered a period of many years, 
 but I observed that the entries ceased nearly a year ago 
 and quite abruptly. Here and there a brief remark was 
 appended to a date, usually no more than a single word : 
 "double" occurring perhaps six times in a total of 
 several hundred entries ; and once very early in the list 
 and followed by several marks of exclamation, " total 
 failure ! ! ! " All this, though it whetted my curiosity, 
 told me little that was definite. Here were a phial of 
 some tincture, a paper of some salt, and the record of a 
 series of experiments that had led (like too many of 
 Jekyll's investigations) to no end of practical usefulness. 
 How could the presence of these articles in my house 
 affect either the honour, the sanity, or the life of my 
 flighty colleague ? If his messenger could go to one 
 place, why could he not go to another ? And even 
 granting some impediment, why was this gentleman 
 to be received by me in secret ? The more I reflected 
 the more convinced I grew that I was dealing with a 
 case of cerebral disease ; and though I dismissed my 
 servants to bed, I loaded an old revolver, that I might 
 be found in some posture of self-defence. 
 
 Twelve o'clock had scarce rung out over London, 
 ere the knocker sounded very gently on the door. I 
 M'^ent myself at the summons, and found a small man 
 crouching against the pillars of the portico. 
 
 "^ Are you come from Dr. Jekyll ?" I asked. 
 
 He told me "yes" by a constrained gesture: and
 
 DK. JEKYLL AXD ME. HYDE. 377 
 
 wlieu I had bidden him enter, he did not obey me 
 witliont a searching backward glance into the darkness 
 of the square. There was a policeman not far oif, 
 advancing with his bull's eye open ; and at the sight, 
 I thought my visitor started and made greater haste. 
 
 These particulars struck me, I confess, disagreeably ; 
 and as I followed him into the bright light of the 
 consulting room, I kept my hand ready on my weapon. 
 Here, at last, I had a chance of clearly seeing him. I 
 had never set eyes on him before, so much was certain. 
 He was small, as I have said ; I was struck besides 
 with the shocking expression of his face, with his re- 
 markable combination of great muscular activity and 
 great apparent debility of constitution, and — last biit 
 not least — with the odd, sul)jective disturbance caused 
 by his neighbourhood. This bore some resemblance to 
 incipient rigor, and was accompanied by a marked 
 sinking of the pulse. At the time, I set it down to 
 some idiosyncratic, personal distaste, and merely won- 
 dered at the acuteness of the symptoms ; but I have 
 since had reason to believe the cause to lie much deej^er 
 in the nature of man, and to turn on some nobler hinge 
 than the principle of hatred. 
 
 This person (who had thus, from the first moment of 
 his entrance, struck in me what I can only describe as a 
 disgustful curiosity) was dressed in a fashion that would 
 have made an ordinary person laughable ; his clothes, 
 that is to say, although they w'ere of rich and sober fab- 
 ric, were enormously too large for him in every measure-
 
 378 DK. JEKYLL AND MK. HYDE, 
 
 ment — the trousers hangiug on liis legs aud rolled up to 
 kee]) them from the ground^ the waist of the coat below 
 his haunches, aud the collar sprawliug wide upon his 
 shoulders. Strange to relate, this ludicrous accoutre- 
 ment was far from moving me to laughter. Eather, as 
 there was something abnormal and misbegotten in the 
 very essence of the creature that now faced me — some- 
 thing seizing, surprising and revolting — this fresh dis- 
 parity seemed but to fit in with and to reinforce it ; so 
 that to my interest in the man's nature and character, 
 there was added a curiosity as to his origin, his life, his 
 fortune and status in the world. 
 
 These observations, though they have taken so great 
 a sjDace to be set down in, were yet the work of a few 
 seconds. My visitor was, indeed, on fire with sombre 
 excitement. 
 
 " Have you got it ? "' he cried. " Have you got it ? " 
 And so lively was his imjjatience that he even laid his 
 hand upon my arm and sought to shake me. 
 
 I put him back, conscious at his touch of a certain icy 
 pang along my blood. " Come, sir,'' said I. " You 
 forget that I have not yet the j)leasure of your acquaint- 
 ance. Be seated, if you please." And I showed him 
 an example, and sat down myself in my customary seat 
 and with as fair an imitation of my ordinary manner to 
 a patient, as the lateness of the hour, the nature of my 
 preoccupations, and the horror I had of my visitor, 
 would suffer me to muster. 
 
 "I beg your pardon. Dr. Lanyon," he replied civilly
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 379 
 
 enough. "What you say is very well founded ; and my 
 impatience has shown its heels to my politeness. I 
 come here at the instance of your colleague, Dr. Henry 
 Jekyll, on a piece of business of some moment ; and I 
 understood . . ." He j^aused and put his hand to 
 his throat, and I could see, in spite of his collected man- 
 ner, that he was wrestling against the approaches of the 
 hysteria — " I understood, a drawer . . ." 
 
 But here I took pity on my visitor's susj^ense, and 
 some perhaps on my own growing curiosity. 
 
 " There it is, sir/' said I, jDointing to the drawer, 
 where it lay on the floor behind a table and still covered 
 with the sheet. 
 
 He sprang to it, and then paused, and laid his hand 
 upon his heart : I could hear his teeth grate with the 
 convulsive action of his jaws ; and his face was so 
 ghastly to see that I grew alarmed both for his life and 
 reason. 
 
 " Compose yourself," said I. 
 
 He turned a dreadful smile to me, and as if with the 
 decision of despair, plucked away the sheet. At sight 
 of the contents, he uttered one loud sob of such 
 immense relief that I sat petrified. And the nest mo- 
 ment, in a voice that was already fairly well under con- 
 trol, '' Have you a graduated glass ? " he asked. 
 
 I rose from my place with something of an effort and 
 gave him what he asked. 
 
 He thanked me with a smiling nod, measured out a 
 few minims of the red tincture and added one of the
 
 380 BK. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 powders. The mixture, which was at first of a reddish 
 hue, began, in proportion as the cr3^sta]s melted, to 
 brighten in colour, to effervesce audibly, and to throw 
 off small fumes of vapour. Suddenly and at the same 
 moment, the ebullition ceased and the compound 
 changed to a dark jjurple, which faded again more 
 slowly to a watery green. My visitor, who had watched 
 these metamorphoses with a keen eye, smiled, set down 
 the glass upon the table, and then turned and looked 
 upon me with an air of scrutiny. 
 
 " And now," said he, "' to settle what remains. "Will 
 you be Avise ? will you be guided ? will you suffer me to 
 take this glass in my hand and to go forth from your 
 house without further parley ? or has the greed of 
 curiosity too much command of you ? Think before 
 you answer, for it shall be done as you decide. As you 
 decide, you shall be left as you were before, and neither 
 richer nor wiser, unless the sense of service rendered to 
 a man in mortal distress may be counted as a kind of 
 riches of the soul. Or, if you shall so jorefer to choose, 
 a new province of knowledge and new avenues to fame 
 and power shall be laid open to you, here, in this room, 
 upon the instant ; and your sight shall be blasted by a 
 prodigy to stagger the unbelief of Satan." 
 
 '' Sir," said I, affecting a coolness that I was far from 
 truly possessing, "you speak enigmas, and you will j^er- 
 haps not wonder that I hear you with no very strong 
 impression of belief. But I have gone too far in the 
 way of inexplicable services to pause before I see the end."
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR, HYDE. 381 
 
 "It is well," replied my visitor. "Lanyon, you re- 
 member your vows : what follows is under the seal of 
 our profession. And now, you who have so long been 
 bound to the most narrow and material views, you who 
 have denied the virtue of transcendental medicine, you 
 who have derided your superiors — behold ! " 
 
 He put the glass to his lips and drank at one gulp. 
 A cry followed ; he reeled, staggered, clutched at the 
 table and held on, staring with injected eyes, gasping 
 with open mouth ; and as I looked there came, I 
 thought, a change — he seemed to swell — his face became 
 suddenly black and the features seemed to melt and 
 alter — and the next moment, I had sprung to my feet 
 and leaped back against the wall, my arm raised to 
 shield me from that prodigy, my mind submerged in 
 terror. 
 
 "0 God!" I screamed, and "0 God!" again and 
 again ; for there before my eyes — pale and shaken, and 
 half fainting, and groping before him with his hands, 
 like a man restored from death — there stood Henry 
 Jekyll ! 
 
 What he told me in the next hour, I cannot bring my 
 mind to set on paper. I saw what I saw, I heard what 
 I heard, and my soul sickened at it ; and yet uoav when 
 that sight has faded from my eyes, I ask myself if I be- 
 lieve it, and I cannot answer. My life is shaken to its 
 roots ; sleep has left me ; the deadliest terror sits by me 
 at all hours of the day and night ; I feel that my days 
 are numbered, and that I must die ; and yet I shall die
 
 382 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 incredulous. As for the moral turjoitude that man un- 
 veiled to me, even with tears of penitence, I cannot, 
 even in memory, dvrell on it without a start of horror. 
 I will say but one thing, Utterson, and that (if you can 
 bring your mind to credit it) will be more than enough. 
 The creature who crept into my house that night was, 
 on Jekyll's own confession, known by the name of Hyde 
 and hunted for in every corner of the laud as the mur- 
 derer of Carew. 
 
 Hastie Laxtox. 
 
 HEJS^EY JEKYLL'S FULL STATEMENT OF 
 THE CASE. 
 
 I WAS born in the year IS — to a large fortune, en- 
 dowed besides with excellent 2^arts, inclined by nature 
 to industry, fond of the respect of the wise and good 
 among my fellow-men, and thus, as might have been 
 ■supposed, with every guarantee of an honourable and 
 distinguished future. And indeed the worst of my 
 faults was a certain impatient gaiety of disposition, 
 such as has made the happiness of man}^, but such as I 
 found it hard to reconcile with my imperious desire to 
 carry my head high, and wear a more than commonly 
 grave countenance before the public. Hence it came 
 about that I concealed my pleasures ; and that when I 
 reached years of reflection, and began to look round me 
 and take stock of my progress and position in the world, 
 I stood already committed to a profound duplicity of
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 383 
 
 life. Many a man would have even blazoned such irreg- 
 ularities as I was guilty of ; but from the high views 
 that I had set before me, I regarded and hid them with 
 an almost morbid sense of shamg,^ It was thus rather 
 the exacting nature of my aspirations than any particu- 
 lar degradation in my faults, that made me what I was, 
 and, Avitli even a deeper trench than in the majority of 
 men, severed in me those provinces of good and_ ilL 
 which divide and compound man's _d iial nature . In this 
 case, I Avas driven to reflect deeply and inveterately on 
 that hard law of life, which lies at the root of religion 
 and is one of the most plentiful springs of distress. 
 Though BO profound a double-dealer, I was in no sense a 
 hypocrite ; both sides of me were in dead earnest ; I was 
 no more myself when I laid aside restraint and plunged 
 in shame, than when I laboured, in the eye of day, at 
 the furtherance of knowledge or the relief of sorrow and 
 suffering. And it chanced that the direction of my sci- 
 entific studies, which led wholly towards the mystic and 
 the transcendental, reacted and shed a strong light on 
 this consciousness of the perennial war among my mem- 
 bers. With every day, and from both sides of my intel- 
 ligence, the moral and the intellectual, I thus drew 
 steadily nearer to that truth, by whose partial discovery 
 I have been doomed to such a dreadful shipwreck : that 
 jnan is not truly one, but truly two. I say two, because 
 the state of my own knowledge does not pass beyond 
 that point. Others will follow, others will outstrip? me 
 on the same lines ; and I hazard the guess that man will
 
 384 UIl. JEKYLL AND Mil. HYDE. 
 
 be ultimately known for a mere polity of mnltifarious, 
 incongruous and indejiendent denizens. I for my part, 
 from the nature of my life, advanced infallibly in one 
 direction and in one direction only. It was on the 
 moral side, and in my own j)erson, that I learned to 
 recognise the thorough and primitive duality of man ; I 
 saw that, of the two natures that contended in the field 
 of my consciousness, even if I could rightly be said to be 
 either, it was only because I was radically both ; and 
 from an early date, even before the course of my scien- 
 tific discoveries had begun to suggest the most naked 
 jDOSsibility of such a miracle, I had learned to dwell 
 with pleasure, as a beloved daydream, on the thought 
 of the sei:)aration of these elements. If_,fiachy~I told 
 myself, could but be housed in sej^arate identities, life 
 would be relieved of all that was unbearable ; the unjust 
 might go his way, delivered from the aspirations and 
 remorse of his more upright twin ; and the just could 
 walk steadfastly and securely on his upward path, doing 
 the good things in which he found his pleasure, and no 
 longer exposed to disgrace and penitence by the hands 
 of this extraneous evil. It w^as the curse of mankind 
 that these incongruous faggots were thus bound to- 
 gether — that in the agonised Avomb of consciousness, 
 these polar twins should be continuously struggling. 
 How, then, were they dissociated ? 
 
 I was so far in my reflections when, as I have said, a 
 side light began to shine upon the subject from the 
 laboratory table. I began to perceive more deci)ly than
 
 DR. JEKTLL AND MR. HYDE. 385 
 
 it has ever yet been stated, the trembling immateriality, 
 the mist-like transience, of this seemingly so solid body 
 in which we Avalk attired. Certain agents I found to 
 have the power to shake and to pluck back that fleshly 
 vestment, even as a wind might toss the curtains of a 
 pavilion. For two good reasons, I will not enter deeply 
 into this scientific branch of my confession. First, 
 because I have been made to learn that the doom and 
 burthen of our life is bound forever on man's shoulders, 
 and when the attempt is made to cast it off, it but 
 returns upon us with more unfamiliar and more awful 
 pressure. Second, because, as my narrative will make, 
 alas ! too evident, my discoveries were incomplete. 
 Enough, then, that I not only recognised my natural 
 body for the mere aura and effulgence of certain of the 
 powers that made up my spirit, but managed to com- 
 pound a drug by which these powers should be de- 
 throned from their supremacy, and a second form and 
 countenance substituted, none the less natural to me 
 because thej;jwereJhe^jxpression, and bore tlie stamp, 
 fif Jower elements in my soul. 
 
 I hesitated long before I put this theory to the test 
 of practice. I knew well that I risked death ; for any 
 drug that so potently controlled and shook the very for- 
 tress of identity, might by the least scruple of an over- 
 dose or at the least inopportunity in the moment of 
 exhibition, utterly blot out that immaterial tabernacle 
 which I looked to it to change. But the temptation of 
 a discgvery so singular and profound, at last overcame 
 25
 
 886 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 the suggestions of alarm. I had long since prepared my 
 tincture ; I purchased at once, from a firm of wholesale 
 chemists, a large quantity of a particular salt which I 
 knew, from my experiments, to be the last ingredient 
 required ; and late one accursed night, I compounded 
 the elements] watched them boil and smoke together in 
 the glacs, and when the ebullition had subsided, with a 
 strong glow of courage, drank off the jiotion. 
 j The most racking pangs succeeded : a grinding in the 
 'bones, deadly nausea, and a horror of the spirit that 
 cannot be exceeded at the hour of birth or death. 
 Then these agonies began swiftly to subside, and I came 
 to myself as if out of a great sickness. There w^as some- 
 thing strange in my sensations, something indescribably 
 new and, from its very novelty, incredibly sweet. I felt 
 younger, lighter, happier in body ; within I was con- 
 scious of a heady recklessness, a_^ current of disordexed 
 sensual images running like a mill race in my fancy, a 
 solution of the bonds of obligation, an unknown but not 
 an innocent freedom of the soul. I knew myself, at the 
 first breath of this new life, to be more wicked, tenfold 
 mare wicked, sold a slave to my original evil ; and the 
 thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like 
 wine. I stretched out my hands, exulting in the fresh- 
 ness of these sensations ; and in the act, I Avas suddenly 
 aware that I had lost in stature. 
 
 There was no mirror, at that date, in my room ; that 
 which stands beside me as I write, was brought there 
 later on and for the very purpose of these transforma-
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 387 
 
 tions. The uiglit, liowever, was far gone into the morn- 
 ing — the morning, black as it was, was nearly ripe for 
 the conception of the day — the inmates of my house 
 Avere locked in the most rigorous hours of slumber ; and 
 I determined, flushed as I was with hope and triumph, 
 to venture in my new shape as far as to my bedroom. I 
 crossed the yard, wherein the constellations looked down 
 upon me, I could have thought, with wonder, the first 
 creature of that sort that their unsleeping vigilance had 
 yet disclosed to them ; I stole through the corridors, a 
 stranger in my own house ; and coming to my room, 
 I saw for the first time the appearance of Edward Hyde. 
 I must here speak by theory alone, saying not that 
 which I know, but that which I suppose to be most 
 probable. The evil side of my nature, to which I had 
 now transferred the stamping efficacy, was less robust 
 and less developed than the good which I had just de- 
 posed. Again, in the course of my life, which had been, 
 after all, nine-tenths a life of effort, virtue and control, 
 it had been much less exercised and much less ex- 
 hausted. And hence, as I think, it came about that 
 Edward Hyde was so much smaller, slighter and 
 younger than Henry Jekyll. Even as good shone upon 
 the countenance of the one, evil was written broadly and 
 plainly on the face of the other. Evil besides (which^I 
 must still belie-y-e-lQ._be. the lethal side of man) had left 
 on that body an imprint of deformity and decay. And 
 yet when I looked upon that ugly idol in the glass, I 
 was conscious of no repugnance, rather of a leap of
 
 388 DE. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 welcome. This, too, was myself. It seemed natural and 
 human. In my eyes it bore a livelier image of the spirit, 
 it seemed more express and single, than the imperfect 
 and divided countenance I had been hitherto accus- 
 tomed to call mine. And in so far I was doubtless 
 right. I have observed that when I wore the semblance 
 of Edward Hyde, none could come near to me at first 
 without a visible misgiving of the flesh. This, as I take 
 it, was because all human beings, as we meet them, are 
 commingled out of good and evil : and Edward Hyde, 
 alone in the ranks of mankind, was jjure evil. 
 
 I lingered but a moment at the mirror : the second 
 and conclusive experiment had yet to be attempted "^ it 
 yet remained to be seen if I had lost my identity beyond 
 redemption and must flee before daylight from a house 
 that was no longer mine ; and hurrying back to my cab- 
 inet, I once more prepared and drank the cup, once 
 more suffered the pangs of dissolution, and came to my- 
 self once more with the character, the stature and the 
 face of Henry Jekyll. 
 
 Tliat night I had come to the fatal cross roads. Had 
 I approached my discovery in a more noble spirit, had I 
 risked the experiment while under the empire of gener- 
 ous or pious aspirations, all must have been otherwise, 
 and from these agonies of death and birth, I had come 
 forth an angel instead of a fiend. The drug had no dis-' 
 criminating action ; it was neither diabolical nor divine ; 
 it but shook the doors of the prisonhouse of my disj)Osi- 
 tion ; and like the captives of Philippi, that which
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 389 
 
 Btood within ran forth. At that time my virtue slum- 
 bered ; my evil, kept awake by ambition, was alert and 
 swift to seize the occasion ; and tlie thing that was ])yo- 
 jected was Edward Hyde. Hence, although . I had now 
 two characters as well as two appearances, one Avas 
 wholly evil, and the other was still the old Henry 
 Jekyll, that incongruous com])ound of whose reforma- 
 tion and improvement I had already learned to despair. 
 The movement was thus wholly toward the worse. 
 
 Even at that time, I had not yet conquered my aver- 
 sion to the dryness of a life of study. I would still be 
 merrily disposed at times ; and as my pleasures were 
 (to say the least) undignified, and I was not only well 
 known and highly considered, but growing towards the 
 elderly man, this incoherency of my lif e was daij y_gro_w- 
 X' i^ more unwelcome. Itjvason_this_sideJ:;l^^ new._ 
 
 power tempted me until I feJlin slavery. I had but to 
 drink the cup, to doff at once the body of the noted 
 professor, and to assume, like a thick cloak, that of 
 Edward Hyde. I smiled at the notion ; it seemed to me 
 at the time to be humorous ; and I made my prepara- 
 tions with the most studious care. I took and furnished 
 that house in Solio, to which Hyde was tracked by the 
 police ; and engaged as housekeeper a creature whom I 
 Avell knew to be silent and unscrupulous. On the other 
 side, I announced to my servants that a Mr. Hyde 
 (whom I described) was to have full liberty and power 
 about my house in the square ; and to parry mishaps, I 
 even called and made myself a familiar object, in my 
 
 ^
 
 390 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 secoud character. I next drew up that will to which 
 3'ou so much objected ; so that if anything befell me in 
 the person of Dr. Jekyll, I could enter on that of 
 Edward Hyde without jiecuniary loss. And thus forti- 
 fied, as I supposed, on every side, I began to profit by 
 the strange immunities of my position. 
 
 Men have before hired braves to transact their crimes, 
 Avhile their own person and reputation sat under shelter. 
 Iwas_the_ first that everjli d so for h is pleasures. I was 
 the first that could thus plod in the public eye with a 
 load of genial respectability, and in a moment, like a 
 schoolboy, strip off these lendings and spring headlong 
 into the sea of liberty. But for me, in my impene- 
 trable mantle, the safety was complete. Think of it — 
 I did not even exist ! Let me but escape into my labor- 
 atory door, give me but a second or two to mix and 
 swallow the draught that I had always standing ready ; 
 and whatever he had done, Edward Hyde would pass 
 away like the stain of breath upon a mirror ; and there 
 in his stead, quietly at home, trimming the midnight 
 lamp in his study, a man who could afford to laugh at 
 suspicion, would be Henry Jekyll. 
 
 The pleasures which I made haste to seek in ni}' dis- 
 guise were, as I have said, undignified ; I would scarce 
 use a harder term. But in the hands of Edward Hyde, 
 they soon began to turn towards the monstrous. "When 
 I would come back from these excursions, I was often 
 plunged into a kind of wonder at ni}' vicarious de- 
 pravity. This familiar that I called out of my own
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 391 
 
 soul, and sent forth alone to do his good pleasure, was a 
 being inherently malign and villainous ; his every act 
 and thought centered on self : drinking pleasure with 
 bestial avidity from any degree of torture to another ; 
 relentless like a man of stone. Henry Jekyll stood at 
 times aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde ; but the 
 situation was apart from ordinary laws, and insidiously 
 relaxed the grasp of conscience. It was Hyde, after all, 
 and Hyde alone, that was guilty. Jekyll was no worse ; 
 he woke again to his good qualities seemingly unim- 
 paired ; he would even make haste, where it was pos- 
 sible, to undo the evil done by Hyde. And thus his 
 conscience slumbered. 
 
 Into the details of the infamy at which I thus con- 
 nived (for even now I can scarce grant that I committed 
 it) I have no design of entering ; I mean but to point 
 out the warnings and the successive steps with which 
 my chastisement approached. I met with one accident 
 which, as it brought on no consequence, I shall no more 
 than mention. An act of cruelty to a child aroused 
 against me the anger of a passer-by, whom I recognized 
 the other day in the person of your kinsman ; the 
 doctor and the child's family joined him ; there were 
 moments when I feared for my life ; and at last, in 
 order to pacify their too just resentment, Edward Hyde 
 had to bring them to the door, and pay them in a 
 cheque drawn in the name of Henry Jekyll. But this 
 danger was easily eliminated from the future, by open- 
 ing an account at another bank in the name of Edward
 
 392 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 Hyde himself ; aud Avlieii, by sloping my own hand 
 backward, I had siipplied my double with a signature, I 
 thought I sat beyond the reach of fate. 
 
 Some two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, 
 I had been out for one of my adventures, had returned 
 at a late hour, and woke the next day in bed with some- 
 what odd sensations. It was in vain I looked about 
 me ; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall projoor- 
 tions of my room in the square ; in vain that I recog- 
 nised the pattern of the bed curtains and the design of 
 the mahogany frame ; something still kept insisting 
 that I was not where I was, that I had not wakened 
 where I seemed to be, but in the little room in Soho 
 where I was accustomed to sleejD in the body of Edw\ard 
 Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological 
 way, began lazily to inquire into the elements of this 
 illusion, occasionally, even as I did so, dropping back 
 into a comfortable morning doze. I was still so engaged 
 when, in one of my more wakeful moments, my eyes 
 fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry Jekyll 
 (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape 
 and size : it was large, firm, white and comely. But 
 the hand which I now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow 
 light of a mid-London morning, lying half shut on the 
 bed clothes, was lean, corded, knuckly, of a dusky 
 pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth of hair. 
 It was the hand of Edward Hyde. 
 
 I must have stared upon it for near half a minute, 
 sunk as I was in the mere stupidity of wonder, before
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 393 
 
 terror woke nj:) iu my breast as suddeu and startliug as 
 the crash of cymbals ; and bounding from my bed, I 
 rushed to the mirror. At the sight that met my eyes, 
 my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin 
 and icy. Yes, I had gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had 
 awakened Edward Hyde. How was this to be ex- 
 plained ? I asked myself ; and then, with another 
 bound of terror — how "was it to be remedied ? It was 
 well on in the morning ; the servants were up ; all my 
 drugs were in the cabinet — a long journey down two 
 i^air of stairs, through the back passage, across the open 
 court and through the anatomical theatre, from where I 
 was then standing horror-struck. It might indeed be 
 possible to cover my face ; but of what use was that, 
 when I was unable to conceal the alteration in my 
 stature ? And then with an overpowering sweetness 
 of relief, it came back upon my mind that the servants 
 were already used to the coming and going of my 
 second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I was able, 
 in clothes of my own size : had soon passed through the 
 house, where Bradshaw stared and drew back at seeing 
 Mr. Hyde at such an hour and in such a strange array ; 
 and ten minutes later. Dr. Jekyll had returned to his 
 own shape and was sitting down, with a darkened brow, 
 to make a feint of breakfasting. 
 
 Small indeed was my appetite. This inexplicable 
 incident, this reversal of my previous experience, 
 seemed, like the Babylonian finger on the wall, to be 
 s})cl]ing out the letters of my judgment; and I began
 
 394 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 
 
 to reflect more seriously than ever befoi-e on the issues 
 and possibilities of my double existence. That part of 
 me which I had the power of projecting, had lately 
 been much exercised and nourished ; it had seemed to 
 me of late as though the bod}' of Edward Hyde had 
 grown in stature, as though (when I wore that form) I 
 were conscious of a more generous tide of blood ; and I 
 began to spy a danger that, if this were much prolonged, 
 the balance of my nature might be permanently over- 
 thrown, the power of voluntary change be forfeited, 
 and the character of Edward Hyde become irrevocably 
 mine. The power of the drug had not been always 
 equally displayed. Once, very early in my career, it 
 had totally failed me ; since then I had been obliged on 
 more than one occasion to double, and once, with in- 
 finite risk of death, to treble the amount ; and these 
 rare uncertainties had cast hitherto the sole shadow on 
 my contentment. Xow, however, and in the light of 
 that morning's accident, I was led to remark that 
 whereas, in the beginning, the difficulty had been to 
 throw off the body of Jekyll, it had of late gradually 
 but decidedly transferred itself to the other side. All 
 things therefore seemed to point to this : that I was 
 
 \[ slowly losing hold of my original and better self, and 
 'becoming slowly incorporated with my second and 
 
 worse. 
 
 Between these two, I now felt I had to choose, ily 
 two natures had memory in common, but all other 
 faculties were most unequally shared between them.
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 395 
 
 Jekyll (who was composite) now with the most sensitive 
 apprehensions, now with a greedy gusto, projected and 
 shared in the pleasures and adventures of Hyde ; but 
 Hyde was indifferent to Jekyll, or but remembered him 
 as the mountain bandit remembers the cavern in whicli 
 he conceals himself from pursuit. Jekyll had more 
 than a father^s interest ; Hyde had more than a son's 
 indifference. To cast in my lot with Jekyll, was to die 
 to those appetites which I had long secretly indulged 
 and had of late begun to j^ampei'- To cast it in with 
 Hyde, was to die to a thousand interests and aspirations, 
 and to become, at a blow and forever, despised and 
 friendless. The bargain might appear unequal ; but 
 there was still another consideration in the scales ; for 
 while Jekyll would suffer smartingly in the fires of 
 abstinence, Hyde would be not even conscious of all 
 that he had lost. Strange as my circumstances were, 
 the terms of this debate are as old and commonplace as 
 man ; much the same inducements and alarms cast the 
 die for any tempted and trembling sinner ; and it fell 
 out with me, as it falls with so vast a majority of 
 my fellows, that I chose the better part and was found 
 wanting in the strength to keep to it. 
 
 Yes, I preferred the elderly and discontented doctor, 
 surrounded by friends and cherishing honest hopes ; and 
 bade a resolute farewell to the liberty, the comparative 
 youth, the light step, leaping impulses and secret pleas- 
 ures, that I had enjoyed in the disguise of Hyde. I 
 made this choice perhaps with some unconscious res-
 
 390 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 crvation, for I neither gave up the house in Soho, nor 
 destroyed the clothes of Edward Hyde, which still lay 
 ready in my cabinet. For two months, however, I was 
 true to my determination ; for two months, I lei-aJife 
 of such severity as I had never before attained to, and 
 enjoyed the compensations of an approving conscience. 
 But time began at last to obliterate the freshness of my 
 alarm ; the praises of conscience began to grow into a 
 thing of course ; I began to be tortured with throes and 
 longings, as of Hyde struggling after freedom ; and at 
 last, in an hour of moral weakness, I once again com- 
 pounded and swallowed the transforming draught. 
 
 I do not suppose that, when a drunkard reasons with 
 himself upon his vice, he is once out of five hundred 
 times affected by the dangers that he runs through his 
 brutish, physical insensibility ; neither had I, long as I 
 had considered my position, made enough allowance for 
 the complete moral insensibility and insensate readiness 
 to evil, which were the leading characters of Edward 
 Hyde. Yet it was by these that I was punished. _My 
 devil had been long caged, he came out roaring. I 
 Avas conscious, even when I took the draught, of a more 
 unbridled, a more furious propensity to ill. Jt must 
 have been this, I suppose, that stirred in my soul that 
 tempest of impatience with which I listened to the civil- 
 ities of my unhappy victim ; I declare, at least, before 
 God, no man morally sane could have been guilty of 
 that crime upon so pitiful a provocation ; and that I 
 struck in no more reasonable spirit than that in which a
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 397 
 
 sick child may Ijreak a pliwthing. But I had A'olun- 
 tarily stripped myself of all those balancing instincts by 
 which even the worst of us continues to walk with some 
 degree of steadiness among temptations ; and in my 
 case, to be tempted, however slightly, was to fall. 
 
 V Instantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged, 
 ith a transport of glee, I mauled the unresisting body, 
 tasting delight from every blow ; and it was not till 
 weariness had begun to succeed, that I was suddenl}^, in 
 the top fit of my delirium, struck through the heart b}'' 
 a cold thrill of terror. A mist dispersed ; I saw my life 
 to be forfeit ; and fled from the scene of these excesses, 
 at once glorifying and trembling, my lust of evil grati- 
 fied and stimulated, my love of life screwed to the top- 
 most pegT^ I ran to the house in Soho, and (to make 
 assurance doubly sure) destroyed my papers ; thence I 
 set out through the lamplit streets, in the same divided 
 ecstasy of mind, gloating on my crime, light-headedly 
 devising others in the future, and yet still hastening 
 and still hearkening in my wake for the steps of the 
 avenger. Hyde had a song upon his lips as he com- 
 pounded the draught, and as he drank it, pledged the 
 dead man. The pangs of transformation had not done 
 tearing him, before Henry Jekyll, with streaming tears 
 of gratitude and remorse, had fallen upon his knees and 
 lifted his clasped hands to God. The veil of self-indul- 
 gence was rent from head to foot. I saw my life as a 
 whole : I followed it up from the days of childhood, 
 when I had walked with my father's hand, and through
 
 398 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 the self-denying toils of my professional life, to arrive 
 again and again, with the same sense of unreality, at the 
 damned horrors of the evening. I could have screamed 
 aloud ; I sought with tears and prayers to smother down 
 the crowd of hideous images and sounds with which my 
 memory swarmed against me ; and still, between the 
 petitions, the ugly face of my iniquity stared into my 
 soul. As the acuteness of this remorse began to die 
 away, it was succeeded by a sense of joy. The problem 
 of my conduct was solved. Hyde was thenceforth im- 
 j)Ossible ; whether I Avould or not, I was now confined to 
 the better part of my existence ; and 0, how I rejoiced 
 to think it ! with what williug humility, I embraced 
 anew the restrictions of natural life I with what sincere 
 renunciation, I locked the door by which I had so often 
 gone and come, and ground the key under my heel I 
 
 The next day, came the news that the murder had 
 been overlooked, that the guilt of Hyde was patent to 
 the world, and that the victim was a man high in pub- 
 lic estimation. It was not only a crime, it had been a 
 tragic folly. I think I was glad to know it ; I think I 
 was glad to have my better impulses thus buttressed and 
 guarded by the terrors of the scaffold. Jekyll was now 
 my city of refuge ; let but Hyde peep out an instant, 
 and the hands of all men would be raised to take and 
 slay him. 
 
 I resolved in my future conduct to redeem the past ; 
 and I can say with honesty that my resolve was fruitful 
 of some good. You know yourself how earnestly in the
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 399 
 
 last months of last year, I laboured to relieve suffering ; 
 yoit know that much was done for others, and that the 
 days passed quietly, almost happily for myself. Nor can 
 I truly say that I wearied of this beneficent and inno- 
 cent life ; I think instead that I daily enjoyed it more 
 completely ; but I was still cursed with my duality of 
 purpose ; and as the first edge of my penitence wore off, 
 the lower side of me, so long indulged, so recently 
 chained down, began to growl for license. Not that I 
 dreamed of resuscitating Hyde ; the bare idea of that 
 would startle me to frenzy : no, it was in my own per- 
 son, that I was once more tempted to trifle with my 
 conscience ; and it was as an ordinary secret sinner, that 
 I at last fell before the assaults of temptation. 
 
 There comes an end to all things ; the most capacious 
 measure is filled at last ; and this brief condescension to 
 my evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul. And 
 yet I was not alarmed ; the fall seemed natural, like a 
 return to the old days before I had made my discovery. 
 It was a fine, clear, January day, wet under foot where 
 the frost had melted, but cloudless overhead ; and the 
 Regent's Park was full of winter chirrupings and sweet 
 Avith spring odours. I sat in the sun on a bench ; the 
 animal within me licking the chops of memory ; the 
 spiritual side a little drowsed, promising subsequent 
 penitence, but not yet moved to begin. After all, I re- 
 flected, I was like my neighbours ; and then I smiled, 
 comparing myself with other men, comparing my active 
 goodwill with the lazy cruelty of their neglect. And at
 
 400 DR. JEKYLL AXD 3IR. HYDE. 
 
 the very moment of that vain-glorious thought, a qualm 
 came over me, a horrid nausea and the most deadly 
 shuddering. These passed away, and left me faint ; 
 and then as in its turn the faiutness subsided, I began 
 to be aware of a change in the temper of my thoughts, a 
 greater boldness, a contempt of danger, a solution of the 
 bonds of obligation. I looked down ; my clothes hung 
 formlessly on my shrunken limbs ; the hand that lay on 
 my knee was corded and hairy. I was once more Ed- 
 ward Hyde. A moment before I had been safe of all 
 men's respect, wealthy, beloved — the cloth laying for me 
 in the dining-room at home ; and now I was the com- 
 mon quarry of mankind, hunted, houseless, a known 
 murderer, thrall to the gallows. 
 
 My reason wavered, but it did not fail me utterly. I 
 have more than once observed that, in my second char- 
 acter, m}" faculties seemed sharpened to a point and my 
 spirits more tensely elastic ; thus it came about that, 
 where Jekyll perhaps might have succumbed, Hyde rose 
 to the importance of the moment. My drugs were in 
 one of the presses of my cabinet ; how was I to reach 
 them ? That was the problem that (crushing my tem- 
 ples in my hands) I set myself to solve. The laboratory 
 door I had closed. If I sought to enter by the house, 
 my own servants would consign me to the gallows. I 
 saw I must employ another hand, and thought of Lan- 
 yon. How was he to be reached ? how persuaded ? 
 Supposing that I escaped capture in the streets, how was 
 I to make my way into his presence ? and how should
 
 DR. JEKYLL AXD MR. HYDE. 401 
 
 I, an unknown and displeasing visitor, prevail on the 
 famous physician to rifle tlie study of his colleague, Dr. 
 Jelcyll ? Then I remembered that of my original char- 
 acter, one part remained to me : I could write my own 
 hand ; and once I had conceived that kindling spark, 
 the way that I must follow became lighted up from end 
 to end. 
 
 Thereupon, I arranged my clothes as best I could, 
 and summoning a j^assing hansom, drove to an hotel in 
 Portland Street, the name of which I chanced to remem- 
 ber. At my appearance (which was indeed comical 
 enough, however tragic a fate these garments covered) 
 the driver could not conceal his mirth. I gnashed my 
 teeth upon him with a gust of devilish fury ; and the 
 smile withered from his face — happily for him — yet 
 more happily for myself, for in another instant I had 
 certainly dragged him from his perch. At the inn, as I 
 entered, I looked about me with so black a countenance 
 as made the attendants tremble ; not a look did they 
 exchange in my presence ; but obsequiously took my 
 orders, led me to a private room, and brought me 
 wherewithal to write. Hyde in danger of his life was 
 a creature new to me ; shaken with inordinate anger, 
 strung to the pitch of murder, lusting to inflict pain. 
 Yet the creature was astute ; mastered his fury with a 
 great effort of the will ; composed his two important 
 letters, one to Lanyon and one to Poole ; and that he 
 might receive actual evidence of their being posted, sent 
 them out with directions that the}' should be registered. 
 26
 
 402 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 Thenceforward, he sat all day over the fire in the 
 private room, gnawing his nails ; there he dined, sitting 
 alone with his fears, the waiter visibly quailing before 
 his eye ; and thence, when the night was fully come, 
 he set forth in the corner of a closed cab, and was 
 driven to and fro about the streets of the city. He, 
 I say — I cannot say, I. \_That child of Hell had nothing 
 human ; nothing lived in him but fear and hatred. 
 And when at last, thinking the driver had begun to 
 grow suspicious, he discharged the cab and ventured 
 on foot, attired in his misfitting clothes, an object 
 marked out for observation, into the midst of the 
 nocturnal passengers, these tw^o base passions raged 
 within him like a tempest. He w-alked fast, hunted 
 by his fears, chattering to himself, skulking through 
 the less frequented thoroughfares, counting the min- 
 utes that still divided him from midnight. Once a 
 woman spoke to him , offering, I think, a box of lights. 
 He smote her in the face, and she fled.^^^. 
 
 When I came to myself at Lanyon's, the horror of 
 my old friend perhaps affected me somewhat : I do 
 not know ; it was at least but a drop in the sea to the 
 abhorrence with which I looked back upon these hours. 
 A change had come over me. It was no longer the fear 
 of the gallows, it was the horror of being Hyde that 
 racked me. I received Lanyon's condemnation partly 
 in a dream ; it was partly in a dream that I came home 
 to my own house and got into bed. I slept after the 
 prostration of the day, with a stringent and jorofound
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 403 
 
 sluiiiber Avhicli not eveu tlie nightmares that wrung 
 me could avail to break. I awoke in the morning 
 shaken, weakened, but refreshed. I still hated and 
 feared the thought of the brute that slept within me, 
 and I had not of course forgotten the appalling dangers 
 of the day before ; but I was once more at home, in 
 my own house and close to my drugs ; and gratitude 
 for my escape shone so strong in my soul that it almost 
 rivalled the brightness of lioj^e. 
 
 I was stepi)ing leisurely across the court after break- 
 fast, drinking the chill of the air with pleasure, when 
 I was seized again with those indescribable sensations 
 that heralded the change ; and I had but the time to 
 gain the shelter of my cabinet, before I was once again 
 raging and freezing with the passions of Hyde. It 
 took on this occasion a double dose to recall me to 
 myself ; and alas ! six hours after, as I sat looking sadly 
 in the fire, the pangs returned, and the drug had to 
 be re-administered. In short, from, that day forth it 
 seemed only by a great effort as of gymnastics, and 
 only under the immediate stimulation of the drug, that 
 I. was able to wear the countenance of Jekyll. At all 
 hours of the day and night, I would be taken with the 
 premonitory shudder ; above all, if I slept, or even 
 dozed for a moment in my chair, it was always as 
 Hyde that I awakened. Under the strain of this con- 
 tinually impending doom and Ijy the sleeplessness to 
 which I now condemned myself, ay, even beyond what 
 I had thought j)ossible to man, I became, in my own
 
 4:04 BR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 person, a creature eaten np and emptied by fever, 
 languidly weak both in body and mind, and solely 
 occupied by one thought : the horror of my other self. 
 But when I slept, or when the virtue of the medicine 
 wore oif, I would leap almost without transition (for 
 the pangs of transformation grew daily less marked) 
 into the possession of a fancy brimming with images 
 of terror, a soul boiling with causeless hatreds, and a 
 body that seemed not strong enough to contain the 
 raging energies of life, i^he powers of Hyde seemed 
 to have grown with the sickliness of Jekyll. And cer- 
 tainly the hate that now divided them was equal on 
 each side. With Jekyll, it v/as a thing of vital instinct. 
 He had now seen the full deformity of that creature that 
 shared Avith him some of the phenomena of conscious- 
 ness, and Avas co-heir Avith him to death : and beyond 
 these links of community, which in themseh'es made the 
 most poignant part of his distress, he thought of Hyde, 
 for all his energy of life, as of something not only hell- 
 ish but inorganic. This was the shocking thing ; that 
 the slime of the pit seemed to utter cries and voices ; 
 that the amorphous dust gesticulated and sinned ; that 
 what was dead, and had no shape, should usurp the 
 offices of life. And this again, that that insurgent hor- 
 ror was knit to him closer than a Avife, closer than an 
 eye ; lay caged in his flesh, Avhere he heard it mutter 
 and felt it struggle to be born ; and at every hour of 
 weakness, and in the confidence of slumber, preA^ailed 
 against him, and deposed him out of life. The hatred
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 405 
 
 of Hyde for Jekyll, was of a different order. His terror 
 of the gallows drove him continually to commit tem- 
 porary suicide, and return to his subordinate station of 
 a part instead of a person ; but he loathed the necessity, 
 he loathed the despondency into which Jekyll was now 
 fallen, and he resented the dislike with which he was 
 himself regarded. Hence the apelike tricks that he 
 would play me, scrawling in my own hand blasi^hemies 
 on the pages of my books, burning the letters and 
 destroying the portrait of my father ; and indeed, bad 
 it not been for his fear of death, he would long ago 
 have ruined himself in order to involve me in the ruin. 
 But his love of life is wonderful ; I go further : I, 
 Avho sicken and freeze at the mere thought of him, 
 when I recall the abjection and passion of this attach- 
 ment, and when I know how he fears my power to 
 cut him off by suicide, I find it in my heart to pity 
 him. 
 
 It is useless, and the time awfully fails me, to pro- 
 long this description ; no one has ever suffered such 
 torments, let that suffice ; and yet even to these, habit 
 brought — no, not alleviation — but a certain callousness 
 of soul, a certain acquiescence of despair ; and my pun- 
 ishment might have gone on for years, but for the last 
 calamity which has now fallen, and which has finally 
 severed me from my own face and nature. My provi- 
 sion of the salt, which had never been renewed since the 
 date of the first experiment, began to run low. I sent 
 out for a fresh supply, and mixed the draught ; the
 
 406 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 
 
 ehullition followed, and the first change of colour, not 
 the second; I drank it and it was without efficiency. 
 You will learn from Poole how I have had London 
 ransacked ; it was in vain ; and I am now persuaded 
 that my first supply was impure, and that it was 
 that unknown impurity which lent efficacy to the 
 draught. 
 
 About a week has passed, and I am now finishing this 
 statement under the influence of the last of the old pow- 
 ders. This, then, is the last time, short of a miracle, 
 that Henry Jekyll can think his own thoughts or see his 
 own face (now how sadly altered I) in the glass. Nor 
 must I delay too long to bring my writing to an end ; 
 for if my narrative has hitherto escaped destruction, it 
 has been by a combination of great prudence and great 
 good luck. Should the throes of change take me in the 
 act of writing it, Hyde will tear it iu pieces ; but if 
 some time shall have elapsed after I have laid it by, his 
 wonderful selfishness and circumscription to the moment 
 will probably save it once again from the action of his 
 apelike spite. And indeed the doom that is closing on 
 us both, has already changed and crushed him. Half 
 an hour from noAV, when I shall again and forever rein- 
 due that hated personality, I know how I shall sit shud- 
 dering and weeping in my chair, or continue, with the 
 most strained and fearstrnck ecstasy of listening, to pace 
 np and down this room (my last earthly refuge) and 
 give ear to every sound of menace. Will Hyde die upon 
 the scaffold ? or will he find courage to release himself
 
 DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 407 
 
 at the last momeut ? God knows ; I am careless ; this 
 is my true hour of death, and what is to follow concerns 
 another than myself. Here then, as I lay down the jjen 
 and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of 
 that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.
 
 \
 
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 Santa Barbara College Library 
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