EIGN
icOUsiN PHILLIS
I
THE LIBRARY
OF
THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES
COUSIN PHILLIS.
TALES FROM FOREIGN LANDS.
UNIFORM IN STYLE AND PRICE.
*
I.
Memories : A Story of German Love. Translated from
the German of Max Mim.if.r, by Geo. P. Upton. i6nio,
173 pages, gilt top.
II.
Graziella: A Story of Italian Love. Translated from
the French of A. ur Lamartine, by James R. Runnion,
i6nio, 235 pages, gilt top.
III.
Marie: A Story of Russian Love. From the Russian
of Al^K.XANDKR PlSHKlN, by MaRIE H. DE ZiELIN.SKA.
i6mo, 210 pages, gilt top.
IV.
Madeleine: A Story of French Love. Translated from
the French of Julks Sandf.ai;, by Francis Charlot.
i6mo, 244 pages, gilt top.
V.
Marianela : A Story of Spanish Love. Translated from
the Spanish of B. Pkri-z Gai.dhs, by Helen \V. Lester.
i6mo, 243 pages, gilt top.
VI.
Cousin Phillis: A Story of English Love. By Mrs.
(Iaskp.li,. i6mo, 222 pages, gilt top.
COUSIN PHILLIS
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE
BY
MRS. GASKELL
CHICAGO
A. C. McCLURG AND COMPANY
1S95
SRLF
COUSIN PHILLIS.
PART I .
IT is a great thinf^ for a lad when he is
first turned into the independence of
lodginj^s. I do not tliink I ever was so satis-
fied and proud in my Hfe as when, at seven-
teen, I sat down in a Httle three-cornered room
above a pastry-cook's shop in the county town
of Eltham. My father had left me that
afternoon, after delivcrinii^ himself of a few
plain precepts, strouf^^ly expressed, for my
guidance in the new course of life on which
I was entering. I was to be a clerk under
the engineer who had undertaken to make
the little branch line fic^m Eltham to Hornby.
7
G5557'i
COUSIN PHILLIS.
My father had got me this situation, which
was in a position rather above his own in
life; or perhaps I should say, above the sta-
tion into which he was born and bred; for he
was raising himself every year in men's con-
sideration and respect. lie was a mechanic
by trade, but he had some inventive genius,
and a great deal of perseverance, and had
devised several valuable improvements in
railway machinery. He did not do this for
profit, though, as was reasonable, what came
in the natural course of things was acceptable;
he worked out his ideas because, as he said,
" until he could put them into shape, they
plagued him by night and by day." But this
is enough about my dear father; it is a good
thing for a country where there are many like
him. He was a sturdy Independent by de-
scent and conviction ; and this it was, I be-
lieve, which made hirn place me in the lodg-
ings at the pastry-cook's. The shop was
kept by the two sisters of our minister at
home; and this was considered as a sort of
safeguard to my morals, when I was turned
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 9
loose upon the temptations of the county
town, with a salary of thirty pounds a year.
My father had given up two precious days,
and put on his Sunday clothes, in order to
bring me to Eltham, and accompany me first
to the office, to introduce me to my new
master (who was under some obligations to
my father for a suggestion), and next to
take me to call on the Independent minister
of the little congregation at Eltham. And
then he left me; and though sorry to part with
him, I now began to taste with relish the
pleasure of being my own master. I un-
packed the hamper that my mother had pro-
vided me with, and smelt the pots of preserve
with all the delight of a possessor who might
break into their contents at any time he
pleased. I handled and weighed in my fancy
the home-cured ham, which seemed to promise
me interminable feasts; and, above all, there
was the fine savor of knowing that I might
eat of these dainties when I liked, at my sole
will, not dependent on the pleasure of any-
one else, however indulgent. I stowed my
lO CO us r AT PHILLIS.
eatables away in the little corner cupboard
that room was all corners, and everything was
placed in a corner, the fireplace, the window,
the cupboard; I myself seemed to be the only
thing in the middle, and there was hardly
room for me. The table was made of a fold-
ing leaf under the window, and the window-
looked out upon the market-place; so the
studies for the prosecution of which my father
had brought himself to pay extra for a sitting-
room for me ran a considerable chance of
being diverted from books to men and women.
I was to have my meals with the two elderly
Miss Browns in the little parlor behind the
three-cornered shop downstairs; my breakfasts
and dinners at least, for, as my hours in an
evening were likely to be uncertain, my tea
or supper was to be an independent meal.
Then, after this pride and satisfaction,
came a sense of desolation. I had never been
from home before, and I was an only child ;
and though my father's spoken maxim had
been, " Spare the rod, and spoil the child,"
yet, unconsciously, his heart had yearned after
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. II
me, and his ways towaitl me were more tender
than he knew, or would have approved of in
himself, could he have known. My mother,
who never professed sternness, was far more
severe than my father; perhaps my boyish
faults annoyed her more; for I remember,
now that I have written the above words, how
she pleaded for me once in my riper years,
when I really offended against my father's
sense of right.
But I have nothing to do with that now.
It is about cousin Phillis that I am going to
write, and as vet I am far enough from even
saying who cousin Phillis was.
For some months after I was settled in
Eltham, the new employment in which I was
engaged the new independence of my life
occupied all my thoughts. I was at my desk
by eight o'clock, home to dinner at one, back
at the oflicc by two. The afternoon work
was more uncertain than the morning's; it
might be tlie same, or it might lie that I had
to accompany Mr. Iloklsworth, the managing
engineer, to some point on the line between
12 CO US I ^r Pf/ILLIS.
Eltham and Hornby. This I always enjoyed,
because of the variety, and because of the
country we traversed (which was very wild
and pretty), and because I was thrown into
companionship with Mr. Holdsworth, who
held the position of hero in my boyish mind.
He was a young man of five-and-twenty or
so, and was in a station above mine, both by
birth and education; and he had travelled on
the Continent, and wore mustaches and whis-
kers of a somewhat foreign fashion. He was
really a fine fellow in a good number of ways,
and I might have fallen into much worse
hands.
Every Saturday I wrote home, telling of
my weekly doings my father had insisted
upon this; but there was so little variety in
my life that I often found it hard work to fill
a letter. On Sundays I went twice to chapel,
up a dark, narrow entry, to hear droning
hymns, and long prayers, and a still longer
sermon, preached to a small congregation, of
which T was, by nearly a score of years, the
youngest member. Occasionally, Mr. Peters,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 13
the minister, would ask me home to tea after
the second service. I dreaded the honor, for
I usually sat on the edge of my chair all the
evening, and answered solemn questions, put
in a deep bass voice, until household prayer-
time came, at eight o'clock, when Mrs. Peters
came in, smoothing down her apron, and the
maid-of-all-work followed, and first a sermon,
and then a chapter was read, and a long im-
promptu prayer followed, till some instinct
told IMr, Peters that supper-time had come,
and we rose from our knees with hunger for
our predominant feeling. Over supper the
minister did unbend a little into one or two
ponderous jokes, as if to show me that minis-
ters were men, after all. And then at ten
o'clock I went home, and enjoyed my long-
lepressed yawns in the three-cornered room
before going to bed.
Dinah and Hannah Dawson, so their names
were put on tlie board above the shop-door I
alwavs called them Aliss Dawson and Miss
Hannah considered these visits of mine to
Mr. Peters as the greatest honor a young man
1 4 COUSIN PHILLIS.
could have; and evidently thought that if, after
such privileges, I did not work out my salva-
tion, I was a sort of modern Judas Iscariot. On
the contrary, they shook their heads over my
intercourse with Mr. Holdsworth. He had
been so kind to me in many ways, that when I
cut into my ham, I hovered over the thought
of asking him to tea in my room, more espe-
cially as the annual fair was being held in
Eltham market-place, and the sight of the
booths, the merry-go-rounds, the wild-beast
shows, and such country pomps, was (as I
thought at seventeen) very attractive. But
when I ventured to allude to my wish in even
distant terms, Miss Hannah caught me up, and
spoke of the sinfulness of such sights, and
something about wallowing in the mire, and
then vaulted into France, and spoke evil of the
nation, and all who had ever set foot therein,
till, seeing that her anger was concentrating
itself into a point, and that that point was Mr.
Holdsworth, I thought it would be better to
finish my breakfast, and make what haste I
could out of the sound of her voice. I rather
A STORV OF EJVGL/SH LOVE. J 5
wondered afterward to hear her and Miss
Dawson counting up tlieir weekly profits with
glee and saying that a pastry-cook's shop in
the corner of the market-place, in Eltham fair
week, was no such bad thing. However, I
never ventured to ask Mr. Holdsworth to my
lodgings.
There is not much to tell about this first
year of mine at Eltham. But when I was
nearly nineteen, and beginning to think of
whiskers on my own account, I came to know
cousin Phillis, whose very existence had been
unknown to me till then. Mr. Holdsw^orth
and I had been out to Heathbridge for a day,
working hard. Heathbridge was near Hornby,
for our line of railway was above half finished.
Of course, a day's outing was a great thing to
tell about in my weekly letters; and I fell to
describing the country a fault I was not
often guilty of. I told my father of the bogs,
all over wild myrtle and soft moss, and shaking
ground over which we liad to carry our line;
and how Mr. Holds wortli and I had gone for
our mid-day meals for we liad to stay here
1 6 COUSIN PHILLIS.
for two days and a night to a pretty village
hard by, Heathbridge proper; and how I hoped
we should often have to go there, for the shak-
ing, uncertain ground was puzzling our engi-
neers one end of the line going up as soon
as the other was weighted down. ( I had no
thought for the shareholders' interests, as may
be seen; we had to make a new line on firmer
ground before the junction railway was com-
pleted.) I told all this at great length, thank-
ful to fill up my paper. By return letter, I
heard that a second cousin of my mother's was
married to the Independent minister of Horn-
by, Ebenezer Holman by name, and lived at
Heathbridge proper; the very Heathbridge I
had described, or so my mother believed, for
she had never seen her cousin Phillis Green,
who was something of an heiress (my father
believed), being her father's only child, and old
Thomas Green had owned an estate of near
upon fifty acres, which must have come to his
daughter. ISIy mother's feeling of kinship
seemed to have been strongly stirred bv the
mention of Heathbridge, for my father said she
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 17
desired me, if ever I went thither again, to
make inquiry for the Reverend Ebenezer Hol-
man; and if indeed he lived there, I was fur-
ther to ask if he had not married one Phillis
Green ; and if both these questions were ans-
wered in the afHrniative, I was to go and intro-
duce myself as the only child of Margaret
Manning, born Moneypenny. I was enraged
at myself for having named Heathbridge at all,
when I found what it was drawing down upon
me. One Independent minister, as I said to
myself, was enough for any man, and here I
knew (that is to say, I had been catechized on
Sabbath mornings by) Mr. Hunter, our min-
ister at home; and I had had to be civil to
old Peters at Eltham, and behave myself
for five hours running whenever he asked
me to tea at his house; and now, just as I felt
the free air blowing about me up at Ileatii-
1)ridge, I was to ferret out another minister, and
I should perhaps have to be catechized by him,
or else asked to tea at his house. J^esides, I did
not like pushing myself upon strangers, who
perhaps had ne\ ei" heaid of my mother's n.une.
iS COUSIN PHILLIS.
and such an odd name as it was Money-
penny; and if they had, had never cared more
for her than she had for them, apparently, until
this unlucky mention of Ileathbridge.
Still, I would not disobey my parents in
such a trifle, however irksome it might be. So
the next time our business took me to Heath-
bridge, and we were dining in the little sanded
inn-parlor, I took the opportunity of Mr.
Iloldsworth's being out of the room, and asked
the questions which I was bidden to ask of the
rosy-cheeked maid. 1 was either unintelligible
or she was stupid ; for she said she did not
know, but would ask master; and of course the
landlord came in to understand what it was I
wanted to know; and I had to bring out all m}-
stammering inquiries before Mr. lloldsworth,
who would never have attemled to them, I dare
say, if I had not blushed, and blundered, and
made such a fool of myself.
"Yes," the landlord said, "the Hope Farm
was in Heathbridge proper, and the owner's
name was Holman, and he w as an Independent
minister, and, as far as the landlord could tell.
A STORT OF ENGLrSH LOVE. 19
his wife's Christian name was Pliillis, anyhow
her maiden name was Green."
" Relations of yours ? " asked Mr. Holds-
worth.
" No, sir -only my mother's second cousins.
Yes, I suppose they are relations. But I never
saw them in my life."
"The Hope Farm is not a stone's throw
from here," said the officious landlord, going
to the window. " If you carry your eye over
yon bed of hollyhocks, over the damson ti'ees
in the orchard yonder, you may see a stack of
fiueer-like stone chimneys. Them is the Hope
Farm chimneys; it's an old place, though Hol-
man keeps it in good order."
jMr. Holdsworth had risen from the table
with more promptitude than I had, and was
standing by the window, looking. At the
landlord's last words he turned round, smiling
"It is not often that parsons know how to
keep land in order, is it?"
"Beg pardon, sir, but I must speak as I find;
and Minister Ilolman we call the church
clergyman here 'parson,' sir; he would be bit
20 COUSIN PHILIJS.
jealous if he heard a Dissenter called parson
Minister Holman knows what he's ahout as
well as e'er a farmer in the neighhorhood. He
gives up five days a week to his own work, and
two to the Lord's; and it is difficult to say whicli
he works hardest at. He spends Saturday and
Sunday a-writing sermons and a-visiting his
flock at Hornby ; and at five o'clock on Mon-
day morning he'll be guiding his plow in the
Hope Farm yonder just as well as if he could
neither read nor write. But your dinner wall
be getting cold, gentlemen."
So we went back to table. After awhile
Mr. Holdsworth broke the silence: "If I
w^ere you. Manning, I'd look up these relations
of yours. You can go and see what they're
like while we're waiting for Dobson's estimates,
and I'll smoke a cigar in the garden mean-
while."
" Thank you, sir. But 1 don't know them,
and I don't think I want to know them."
" What did you ask all those fpicstions for,
then?" said he, looking quicklv u]) at me. He
had no notion of doing;' or savin<r thin<js with-
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 2 1
out a purpose. I did not answer, so he contin-
ued, "Make up your mind, and go off and
see what this farmer-minister is like, and come
hack and tell me I should like to hear."
I was so in the habit of yielding to his
authority, or influence, that I never thought of
resisting, but went on my errand, though I
remember feeling as if I would ratlier have
had my head cut off. The landlord, who had
evidently taken an interest in the event of our
discussion in away that country landlords have,
accompanied me to the house door, and gave
me repeated directions, as if I was likely to
miss my way in two hundred yards. But I
listened to him, for I was glad of the delay, to
sci'ew up my courage for the effort of facing
unknown people and introducing myself. I
went along the lane, I recollect, switcliing all
tlie taller roadside weeds, till, after a turn or
two, I found myself close in front of the Hope
Farm. There was a garden between the house
and the shady, grassy lane; I afterward found
that this garden was called the court; perhaps
because tliere was a low wall around it, with an
2 2 COUSIN PlIILLIS.
iron railing on the top of the wall, and two
great gates hetvveen pillars crowned with stone
balls for a state entrance to the flagged path
leading up to the front door. It was not the
habit of the place to go in either by these great
gates or by the front door; the gates, indeed,
were locked, as I found, though the door stood
wide open. I had to go around by a side path
lightly worn on a broad grassy way, which led
past the court wall, past a horse-mount, half
covered with stone-crop and the little wild yel-
low fumitory, to another door "the curate,"
as I found it was termed by the master of the
house, while the front door, " handsome and all
for show," was termed the " rector." I knocked
with my hand upon the "curate" door; a tall
girl, about my own age, as I thought, came
and opened it, and stood there silent, waiting
to know my errand. I see her now Cousin
Phillis. The westering sun shone full upon
her, and made a slanting stream of light into
the room within. She was dressed in daik
blue cotton of some kind, up to her throat,
down to her wrists, with a little frill of the
A STOR7^ OP ENGLISH LOVE. 23
same wherever it touched her white skin. And
sucli a white skin as it was! I have never seen
the hke. She had Hght hair, nearer yellow
than any other color. She looked me steadily
in the face with large, quiet eyes, wondering,
but untroubled by the sight of a stranger. I
thought it odd that, so old, so full-grown as she
was, she should wear a 2^i''''^fore over her
gown.
Before I had quite made up my mind what
to say in reply to her mute inquiry of what I
wanted there, a woman's voice called out, "Who
is it, Phillis? If it is anyone for buttermilk
send them around to the back door."
I thought I could rather si^eak to the owner
of that voice than to the girl before me; so I
passed her, and stood at the entrance of a room,
hat in hand, for this side door ojoened straight
into the hall or house-place where the family
sat when work was done. There was a brisk
little woman of forty or so ironing some huge
muslin cravats under tlie light of a long vine-
shaded casement window. She looked at me
distruslfulh till I began to si)eak. " ^^y name
24 COUSIiY PIIILLTS.
is Paul jNIanning," said I; but I saw she did
not know the name. "My mother's name was
^loneypcnny," said I "Margaret Money-
penny."
"And she married one John Manning, of
Birmingham," said Mrs. Ilolman, eagerly.
"And you'll be her son. Sit down! I am
right glad to see you. To think of your being
Margaret's son! Why she was almost a child
not so long ago. Well, to be sure, it is five-
and-twenty years ago. And what brings you
into tliese parts? "
She sat down herself, as if oppressed by
her curiosity as to all the five-and-twenty years
that had passed by since she had seen my
mother. Her daughter Phillis took up her knit-
ting a long gray worsted man's stocking, I
remember and knitted away without looking
at her work. I felt that the steady gaze of
those deep gray eyes was upon me, though
once, when I stealthily raised mine to hers, she
was examining something on the wall above
my head.
When I had answered all my cousin IIol-
A STOnr OF ENGLISH LOVE. 25
man's questions, she heaved a long hreath, and
said, "To think of Margaret Moncypenny's
boy being in our house! I wish the minister
was here. Phillis, in what field is thy father
to-day?"
"In the five-acre; they are beginning to
cut the corn."
" He'll not like being sent for, then, else I
siiould have liked you to have seen the minister.
But the five-acre is a good step off. You shall
have a glass of wine and a bit of cake before
you stir from this house, though. You're bound
to go, you say, or else the minister comes in
mostly when the men have theii' four o'clock."
" I must go I ought to have been off be-
fore now."
" Here, then, Phillis, take the keys." She
gave her daughter some whispered directions,
and Phillis left the room.
"She is my cousin, is she not?" I asked.
I knew she was, but somehow I wanted to talk
of her, and did not know how to begin.
"Yes Phillis Holman. She is our only
child now."
26 COUSIN PIIILLIS.
Either from that " now," or from a strange
momentary wistfuhiess in her eyes, I knew
that there had been more children, who were
now dead.
"How old is cousin Phillis?" said I,
scarcely venturing on the new name, it seemed
too prettily familiar for me to call her by it;
but cousin Holman took no notice of it, answer-
ing straight to the purpose.
" Seventeen last May-day ; but the minister
does not like to hear me calling it May-day,"
said she, checking herself with a little awe.
" Phillis was seventeen on the fii-st day of May
last," she repeated in an amended edition.
" And I am nineteen in another month,"
thought I, to myself; I don't know why.
Then Phillis came in, carrying a tray with
wine and cake upon it.
" We keep a house-servant," said cousin
Holman, " but it is churning-day, and she is
busy." It was meant as a little proud apology
for her daughter's being the handmaiden.
" I like doing it, mother," said Phillis, in
her grave, full voice.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 27
I felt as if I were somebody in the Old
Testament who, I could not recollect being
served and waited upon by the daughter of
the host. Was I like Abraham's steward,
when Rebekah gave him to drink at the well?
I thought Isaac had not gone the pleasantest
way to work in \vinning him a wife. But
Phillis never thought about such things. She
was a stately, gracious young woman, in the
dress and with the simplicity of a child.
As I had been taught, I drank to the
health of my new-found cousin and her hus-
band, and then T ventured to name my cousin
Phillis with a little bow of my head toward
her; but I was too awkward to look and see
how she took my compliment. " I must go
now," said I, rising.
Neither of the women had thought of
sharing in the wine; cousin Ilolman had
broken a l)it of cake for form's sake.
" 1 wish the minister had been within," said
his wife, rising, too, vSccretly I was very glad
he was not. I did not take kindly to ministers
ni those days, and T thought he must be a
28 CO us /AT PIJILLIS.
particular kind of man, by his objecting to the
term May-day. But before I went, cousin
riolman made me promise that I would come
back on the Saturday following and spend
Sunday with them, when I should see some-
thing of " the minister."
" Come on Friday, if you can," were her
last words as she stood at the curate-door,
shading her eyes from the sinking sun with
her hand.
Inside the house sat cousin Phillis, her
golden hair, her dazzling complexion, lighting
up the corner of the vine-shadowed room. She
had not risen when I bade hergood-by; she
had looked at me straight as she said her tran-
quil words of farewell.
I found Mr. Holdsworth down at the line,
hard at work superintending. As soon as he
had a pause, he said, " Well, Manning, what
are the new cousins like? How do preaching
and farming seem to get on together? If the
mmister turns out to be practical as well as
reverend, T sliall begin to respect him."
But he hardly attended to my answer, he
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 29
was so much more occupied with directing his
work-people. Indeed, my answer did not
come very readily; and the most distinct part
of it was the mention of the invitation that had
been given me.
" Oh, of course you can go and on Friday,
too, if you like; there is no reason why not
this week, and you have done a long spell of
work this time, old fellow."
I thought that I did not want to go on
Friday; but when the day came, I found that
I should prefer going to staying away, so I
availed myself of Mr. Holdsworth's permis-
sion, and went over to Hope Farm some time
in the afternoon, a little later than my last
visit. I found the " curate " open to admit the
soft September air, so tempered by the warmth
of the sun that it was warmer out of doors
than in, although the wooden log lay smolder-
ing in front of a heap of hot ashes on the
hearth. The vine-leaves ovei- the window had
a tinge more vellow, their edges were here and
there scoichcd and ])ro\viK'd; there was no
ironing about, and cousin Ilohnan sat just
30 COUSIN PIIILLIS.
outside the house, mending a shirt. PhilHs
was at her knitting indoors; it seemed as if
she had been at it all the week. The many-
speckled fowls were pecking about in the
farmyard beyond, and the milk-cans glittered
with brightness, hung out to sweeten. The
court was so full of flowers that they crept out
upon the low-covered wall and horse-mount,
and were even to be found self-sown upon the
turf that bordered the path to the back of the
house. I fancied that my Sunday coat was
scented for days afterward by the bushes of
sweetbrier and the fraxinella that perfumed
the air. From time to time cousin Holman
put her hand into a covered basket at her feet,
and threw handsful of corn down for the
pigeons that cooed and fluttered in the air
around, in expectation of this treat.
I had a thorough welcome as soon as she
saw me. "Now this is kind this is right
down friendly," shaking my hand warmly.
" Phillis, your Cousin Manning is come!"
" Call me Paul, will you ? " said I; " they
call me so at home, and Manning in the oflice."
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 31
" Well, Paul, then. Your room is all
ready for you, Paul, for, as I said to the min-
ister, ' ril have it ready whether he comes o'
Friday or not.' And the minister said he
must go up to the Ashfield whether you were
to come or not; but he would come home
betimes to see if you were here. I'll show
you to your room, and you can wash the dust
off a bit."
After I came down, I think she did not
quite know what to do with me; or she might
think that I was dull; or she might have work
to do in which I hindered her; for she called
Phillis, and bade her put on her bonnet, and
go with me to the Ashfield, and find father.
So we set off, I in a little flutter of desire to
make myself agreeable, but wishing that my
companion were not quite so tall; for she was
above me in height. \Vhile I was wondering
how to begin our conversation, she took up
the words.
" I suppose, cousin Paul, you have to be
very ])usy at your work all day long in gen-
eral."
32 COUSIN PIIILLIS.
" Yes, we have to be in the office at half-
past eight; and we have an hour for dinner,
and then we go at it again till eight or nine."
" Then you have not much time for read-
ing."
" No," said I, with a sudden consciousness
that I did not make the most of what leisure I
had.
" No more have I. Father always gets
an hour before going a-field in the mornings,
but mother does not like me to get up so
early."
" My mother is always wanting me to get
up earlier when I am at home."
" What time do you get up?"
" Oh ! ah ! sometimes half-past six;
not often though;" for I remembered only
twice that I had done so during the past sum-
mer.
She turned her head and looked at me.
" Father is up at three; and so was mother
till she was ill. I should like to be up at foin."
"Your father up at three! Why, what
has he to do at that hour .'' "
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 33
"What has he not to do? He has his
private exercise in his own room; he always
rings the great bell which calls the men to
milking; he rouses up Betty, our maid; as
often as not he gives the horses their feed
before the man is up for Jem, who takes
care of the horses, is an old man; and father
is always loth to disturb him; he looks at the
calves, and the shoulders, heels, traces, chaff,
and corn before the horses go a-field; he has
often to whip-cord the plow-whips; he sees
the hogs fed; he looks into the swill -tubs,
and writes his orders for what is wanted for
man and beast; yes, and for fuel, too. And
then, if he has a bit of time to spare, he
comes in and reads with me but only En-
glish; we keep Latin for the evenings, that we
may have time to enjoy it; and then he calls
in the man to breakfast, and cuts the boys'
bread and cheese; and sees their wooden bot-
tles filled and sends them off to their work
and by this time it is half-past six, and we
have our breakfast. Tliere is father," she
exclnimed, pointing out to me a man in his
3
34 COUSIN PHILLIS.
shirt-sleeves, taller by the head than the other
two with whom he was working. We only
saw him through the leaves of the ash-trees
growing in the hedge, and I thought I must
be confusing the figures, or mistaken: that
man still looked like a very powerful laborer,
and had none of the precise demureness of
appearance which I had always imagined was
the 1^ characteristic of a minister. It was the
Reverend Ebenezer Holman, however. He
gave us a nod as we entered the stubble-field;
and I think he would have come to meet us
but that he was in the middle of giving some
directions to his men. I could see that Phillis
was built more after his type than her moth-
er's. He, like his daughter, was largely
made, and of a fair, ruddy complexion,
whereas hers was brilliant and delicate. His
hair had been yellow or sandy, but now was
grizzled. Yet his gray hairs betokened no
failure in strength. I never saw a more pow-
erful man deep chest, lean flanks, well-
planted head. By this time we were nearly
up to him; and he interrupted himself and
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 35
stepped forward; holding out his hand tome
but addressing PhilHs.
"Well, my lass, this is cousin Manning, I
suppose. Wait a minute, young man, and
I'll put on my coat, and give you a decorous
and formal welcome. But Ned Hall,
there ought to be a water-furrow across this
land: it's a nasty, stiff, clayey, dauby bit of
ground, and thou and I must fall to, come
next Monday I beg your pardon, cousin
Manning and there's old Jem's cottage
wants a bit of thatch; you can do that job to-
morrow while I am busy." Then, suddenly
changing the tone of his deep bass voice to
an odd suggestion of chapels and preachers,
he added, " Now, I will give out the psalm,
'Come all harmonious tongues,' to be sung to
' Mount Ephraim ' tune."
He lifted his spade in his hand, and began
to beat time with it; the two laborers seemed
to know both words and music, though I did
not; and so did Phillis: her rich voice fol-
lowed her father's as he set the tune; and
the men came in with more uncertaintv, but
36 COUSIN PHILLIS.
still harmoniously. Phillis looked at me once
or twice with a little surprise at my silence;
but I did not know the words. There we
five stood, bareheaded, excepting- Phillis, in
the brawny stubble-field, from which all the
shocks of corn had not yet been carried a
dark wood on one side, where the wood-
pigeons were cooing; blue distance seen
through the ash-trees on the other. Some-
how, I think that if I had known the words,
and could have sung, my throat would have
been choked up by the feeling of the unac-
customed scene.
The hymn was ended, and the men had
drawn off before I could stir. I saw the
minister beginning to put on his coat, and
looking at me with friendh- inspection in his
gaze, before I could rouse myself.
" I dare say you railway gentlemen don't
wind up the day with singing a psalm to-
gether," said he; "but it is not a bad practice,
not a bad practice. We have had it a bit
earlier to-day for hospitality's sake that's
all."
A STOR7' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 37
I had nothing particular to say to this,
though I was thinking a great deal. From
time to time I stole a look at my companion.
His coat was hlack, and so was his waistcoat;
neckcloth he had none, his strong full throat
heing bare above the snow-white shirt. He
wore drab-colored knee-breeches, gray worsted
stockings (I thought I knew the maker), and
strong-nailed shoes. He carried his hat in his
hand, as if he liked to feel the coming breeze
lifting his hair. After awhile, I saw that the
father took hold of tlie daughter's hand, and
so, they holding each other, went along toward
home. We had to cross a lane. In it there
were two little children, one lying prone on
the grass in a passion of crying, the other
standing stock still, with its finger in its
mouth, the large tears slowly rolling down its
cheeks for sympath}'. The cause of their
distress was evident: there was a broken
brown pitcher, and a little pool of spilt milk
on the road.
"Hollo! Hollo! What's all this?" said
the minister. " Why, what have you been
38 COUSIN PHIL LIS.
about, Tommy" lifting the little petticoated
lad, who was lying sobbing, with one vigor-
ous arm. Tommy looked at him with sur-
prise in his roui;d eyes, but no affright
they were evidently old acquaintances.
"Mammy's jug !" said he, at last, begin-
ning to cry afresh.
" Well ! and will crying piece mammy's
jug, or pick up spilt milk? How did you
manage it. Tommy?"
"He" (jerking his head at the other)
" and me was running races."
" Tommy said he could beat me," put in
the other.
" Now, I wonder what will make you
two silly lads mind, and not run races again
with a pitcher of milk between you," said the
minister, as if musing. " I might flog you,
and so save mammy the trouble; for I dare
say she'll do it if I don't." The fresh burst
of whimpering from both showed the proba-
bility of this. " Or I might take you to the
Hope Farm, and give you some more milk ;
but then you'd be running races again, and
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 39
my milk would follow that to the ground,
and make another white pool. I think the
flogging would be best don't you?"
" We would never run races no more,"
said the elder of the two.
"Then you'd not be boys; you'd be
angels."
" Xo, we shouldn't."
"Why not?"
They looked into each other's eyes for
an answer to this puzzling question. At
length, one said, " Angels is dead folk."
"Come; we'll not get too deep into the-
ology. What do you think of my lending
you a tin can with a lid to carry the milk
home in? That would not break, at any rate;
though I would not answer for the milk not
spilling if you ran races. That's it!"
lie had dropped his daughter's hand, and
now held out each of h.is to the little fellows.
Phillis and I followed, and listened to the
prattle wh.ich the minister's companions now
poured out to him, and wliich he was evi-
dently enjoving. At a certain point, there
4 COUSIN PHILLTS.
was a sudden burst of the tawny, ruddy-
evening landscape. The minister turned
around and quoted a line or two of Latin.
" It's wonderful," said he, " how exactly
Virgil has hit the enduring epithets, nearly two
thousand years ago, and in Italy; and yet how
it describes to a T what is now lying before us
in the parish of Heathbridge, county ,
England."
" I dare say it does," said I, all aglow with
shame, for I had forgotten the little Latin I
ever knew.
The minister shifted his eyes to Phillis's
face; it mutely gave him back the sympathetic
appreciation that I, in my ignorance, could not
bestow.
" Oh ! this is worse than the catechism,"
thought I ; " that was only remembering
words."
" Phillis, lass, thou must go home with
these lads, and tell their mother all about the
race and the milk. Mammy must always know
the truth," now speaking to the children.
"And tell her, too, from me, that I have got
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 4 1
the best birch rod in the parish ; and that if she
ever thinks her children want a flogging she
must bring them to me, and, if I think they
deserve it, I'll give it them better than she can."
So Phillis led the children toward the dairy,
somewhere in the back yard, and I followed
the minister in through the " curate " into the
house-place.
" Their mother," said he, " is a bit of a
vixen, and apt to punish her children without
rhyme or reason. I try to keep the parish rod
as well as the parish bull."
He sat down in the three-cornered chair by
the fireside, and looked around the empty
room.
"Where's the missus?" said he to himself.
But she was there in a minute; it was her
regular plan to give him his welcome home
by a look, by a touch, nothing more as soon
as she could after his return, and he had missed
her now. Regardless of my presence, he went
over the dav's doings to her; and then, getting
up, he said he must go and make himself
"reverend," and that then we would have a
42 COUSIN PlIILLIS.
cup of tea in the parlor. The parlor was a
large room with two casemented windows on
the other side of the broad flagged joassage
leading from the rector-door to the wide stair-
case, with its shallow, polished oaken steps, on
which no carpet was ever laid. The parlor floor
was covered in the middle by a home-made
carpeting of needlework and list. One or two
quaint family pictures of the Holman family
hung around the walls; the fire-grate and irons
were much ornamented with brass; and on a
table against the wall between the windows, a
a great beau-pot of flowers was placed upon
the folio volumes of Matthew Henry's Bible.
It was a compliment to me to use this room,
and I tried to be grateful for it; but we never
had our meals there after the first day, and I
was glad of it; for the large house-place, living-
room, dining-room, whichever you might like
to call it, was twice as comfortable and cheer-
ful. There was a rug in front of the great
large fireplace, and an oven by the grate, and a
crook, with the kettle hanging from it, over the
bright wood-fire; everything that ought to be
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 43
black and polished in that room was black and
polished; and the flags, and window curtains, and
such things as were to be white and clean were
just spotless in their purity. Opposite to the
fireplace, extending the whole length of the
room, was an oaken shovel-board, with the
right incline for a skillful player to send the
weights into the prescribed space. There were
baskets of white work about, and a small shelf
of books hung against the wall, books used for
reading, and not for propping up a beau-pot of
flowers. I took down one or two of those
books once when I was left alone in the house-
place on the first evening Virgil, Caesai", a
Greek grammar oh, dear! ah me! and Phillis
Ilolman's name in each of them! I shut them
up, and put them back in their places, and
walked as far away from the bookshelf as I
could. Yes, and I gave my cousin Phillis a
wide berth, although she was sitting at her
work quietly enough, and her hair was looking
more golden, her dark e\elasiies longer, her
round pillar of a throat whiter tlian ever. We
Iiad done tea, and we had returned into the
44 COUSIN PH/LLTS.
house-place that the minister might smoke his
pipe without fear of contaminating the drab
damask window-curtains of the parlor. He
had made himself " reverend " by putting on
one of the voluminous white muslin neck-
cloths that I had seen cousin Holman ironing
the first visit I had paid to the Hope Farm, and
by making one or two other unimportant
changes in his dress. He sat looking steadily
at me, but whether he saw me or not I can not
tell. At the time I fancied that he did, and
was gauging me in some unknown fashion in
his secret mind. Every now and then he took
his pipe out of his mouth, knocked out the
ashes, and asked me some fresh question. As
long as these related to my acquiicments or my
reading, I shuffled uneasily and did not know
what to answer. Bj'-and-by he got around to
the more practical subject of railroads, and on
this I was more at home. I really had taken
an interest in my work; nor would Mr. Holds-
worth, indeed, have kept me in his employment
if I had not given my mind as well as my time
to it; and I was, besides, full of the difficulties
A STOnr OF ENGLISH LOVE. 45
which beset us just then, owing to our not
being able to find a steady bottom on the
Heathbridge moss, over which we wished to
carry our Hue. In the midst of all my eager-
ness in speaking about this, I could not help
being struck with the extreme pertinence of his
questions. I do not mean that he did not show
ignorance of many of the details of engineer-
ing; that was to have been expected; but on the
premises he had got hold of, lie thought clearly
and reasoned logically. Phillis so like him
as she was both in body and mind kept
stopping at her work and looking at me, trying
to fully understand all that I said. I felt she
did ; and perhaps it made me take more pains
in using clear expressions, and arranging my
words, than I otherwise should.
"She shall see I know something worth
knowing, though it mayn't be her dead-and-
gone languages," thought I.
"T see," said the minister, at length. "I
understand it all. You've a cleai', good head
of \ouY own, my lad, choose how you came
by it."
46 COUSIN PHI I. LIS.
" From my father," said I proudly. " Have
you not heard of his discovery of a new
method of shuntinjr? It was in the Gazette.
It was patented. I thought every one had
heard of Manning's patent winch."
" We don't know who invented the alpha-
bet," said he, half smiling, and taking up his
pipe.
" No, I dare say not, sir," replied I, half
offended; "that's so long ago."
Puff puff puff.
" But your father must be a notable man.
I heard of him once before; and it is not
many a one fifty miles away whose fame
reaches Heathbridge "
" My father is a notable man, sir. It is not
me that says so; it is Mr. Holdsworth, and
and everybody."
" He is right to stand up for his father,"
said cousin Holman, as if she were pleading
for me.
I chafed inwardly, thinking that my father
needed no one to stand up for him. He was
man sufficient for himself.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 47
" Yes he is right," said the minister,
placidly. " Right, because it comes from his
heart I'ight, too, as I believe, in point of fact.
Else there is many a young cockerel that will
stand upon a dunghill and crow about his
father, by way of making his own plumage
to shine. I should like to know thy father,"
he went on, turning straight to me, with a
kindly, frank look in his eyes.
But I was vexed, and would take no notice.
Presently, having finished his pipe, he got up
and left the room. Phillis put her work hastily
down, and went after him. In a minute or
two she returned and sat down again. Not
long after, and before I had quite recovered
my good temper, he opened the door out of
which he had passed, and called to me to come
to him. I went across a narrow stone passage
into a strange, many-cornered room, not ten
feet in area, part study, part counting-house,
looking into the farmyai"d; with a desk to sit
at, a desk to stand at, a spittoon, a set of shelves
with old divinitv books upon them; another,
smaller, filled with books on farriery, farming.
4S COUSIN PHILLIS.
manures, and such subjects, with pieces of
paper containing memoranda stuck against the
whitewashed walls with wafers, nails, pins,
anything that came readiest to hand; a box of
carpenter's tools on the floor, and some manu-
scripts in shorthand on the desk.
He turned around half laughing. " That
foolish girl of mine thinks I have vexed
you" putting his large, powerful hand on
my shoulder. " ' Nay,' says I ; ' kindly meant
is kindly taken' is it not so?"
" It was not quite, sir," replied I, van-
quished by his manner; "but it shall be in
future,"
" Come, that's right. You and I shall be
friends. Indeed, it's not many a one I would
bring in here. But I was reading a book this
morning, and I could not make it out; it is a
book that was left here by mistake one day;
I had subscribed to Ijrother Robinson's sermons;
and I was glad to see this instead of them, for
sermons though they be, they're . . . well,
never mind ! I took 'em both, and made my old
coat do a bit longer; but all's fish that comes
A STOR2' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 49
to my net. I have fewer books than leisure to
read them, and I have a prodigious big appe-
tite. Here it is."
It was a vohime of stiff mechanics, involv-
ing many technical terms, and some rather
deep mathematics. These last, which would
have puzzled me, seemed easy enough to him ;
all that he wanted was the explanations of the
technical words, which I could easily give.
While he was looking through the book to
find the places where he had been puzzled, my
wandering eve caught on some of the papers
on the wall, and I could not help reading one,
which has stuck by me ever since. At first
it seemed a kind of weekly diary; but then I
saw that the seven days were portioned out for
special prayers and intercessions; Monday for
his family, Tuesday foi" enemies, Wednesday
for the Independent churches, Thursday for all
other churches, Fridav for persons afflicted,
vSaturday for his own soul, Sunday for all
wanderers and sinncis, that tliey might be
brought home tcj the ff)ld.
Wc were called back into the house-j^lace
4
50 COUSIN P HILL IS.
to have supper. A door opening into the kitchen
was opened; and all stood up in both rooms,
while the minister, tall, large, one hand resting
on the spread table, the other lifted up, said,
in the deep voice that would have been loud
had it not been so full and rich, but with the
peculiar accent or twang that I believe is con-
sidered devout by some people, " Whether we
eat or drink, or whatsoever we do, let us do all
to the glory of God."
The supper was an immense meat-pie. We
of the house-place were helped first; then the
minister hit the handle of his buckhorn carv-
ing-knife on the table once, and said,
" Now or never," which meant, did any of
us want anv more; and when we had all de-
clined, either by silence or by words, he knocked
twice with his knife on the table, and Betty
came in through the open door, and carried off
the great dish to the kitchen, where an old man
and a young one, and a help-girl, were await-
ing their meal.
" Shut the door if you will," said the min-
ister to Betty.
A STORl' OF ENGL IS f I LOVE. 5 1
" That's in honor of you," said cousin Hol-
man, in a tone of satisfaction, as the door was
shut.
" When we've no stranger with us, the min-
ister is so fond of keeping the door open, and
talking to the men and maids, just as much
as to PhiUis and me."
" It brings us all together like a household
just before we meet as a household in prayer,"
said he, in explanation. " But to go back to
what we were talking about can you tell me
of any simple book on dynamics that I could
put in my pocket, and study a little at leisure
limes in the day ? "
" Leisure times, father ? " said Phillis, with
a nearer approach to a smile than I had yet
seen on her face.
"Ves; leisure times, daughter. There is
many an odd minute lost in waiting for other
folk; and now that i^ailroads are coming so
neai" us, it ])ch()oyes us to know something about
them."
I tliought of his own description of his
" prodigicnis big appetite" for learning. And
52 COUSIN PHILLIS.
he had a good appetite of his own for the more
material victuals before him. But I saw, or
fancied I saw, that he had some rule for him-
self in the matter both of food and drink.
As soon as supper was done the household
assembled for prayer. It was a long impromptu
evening prayer; and it would have seemed
desultory enough had I not had a glimpse of
the kind of day that preceded it, and so been
able to find a clue to the thoughts that preceded
the disjointed utterances; for he kept there,
kneeling down in the center of a circle, his
eyes shut, his outstretched hands pressed palm
to palm sometimes with a long pause of
silence, as if waiting to see if there was any-
thing else he wished to " lay before the Lord "
(to use his own expression) before he con-
cluded with the blessing. He prayed for the
cattle and live creatures, rather to my surprise;
for my attention had begun to wander, till it
was recalled by the familiar words.
And here I must not forget to name an odd
incident at the conclusion of the prayer, and
before we had risen from our knees (indeed
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 53
before Betty was well awake, for she made a
nightly practice of having a sound nap, her
weary head lying on her stalwart arms); the
minister, still kneeling in our midst, but with
his eyes wide open, and his arms dropped by
his side, spoke to the elder man, who turned
around on his knees to attend. "John, didst
see that Daisy had her warm mash to-night;
for we must not neglect the means, John --two
quarts of gruel, a spoonful of ginger, and a gill
of beer the poor beast needs it, and I fear it
slipped out of my mind to tell thee; and here
was I asking a blessing and neglecting the
means, which is a mockery," said he, dropping
his voice.
Before we went to bed he told me he
should see little or nothing more of me during
my visit, which was to end on vSunday even-
ing, as he always gave up both Saturday and
.Sabbath to his work in the ministry. I re-
membered that the landlord at tlie inn had told
me this on the day when I first incpiired about
these new relations of mine; and I did not dis-
like the opportunity which I saw would be
54 COUSIN P HILL IS.
afforded me of becoming more acquainted with
cousin Holman and Phillis, though I earnestly
hoped that the latter would not attack me on
the subject of the dead languages.
I went to bed and dreamed that I was as
tall as cousin Phillis, and had a sudden and
miraculous growth of whisker, and a still more
miraculous acquaintance with Latin and Greek.
Alas! I wakened up still a short, beardless
lad, with " tempus fugit " for my sole remem-
brance of the little Latin I had once learned.
While I was dressing, a bright thought came
over me: I could question cousin Phillis, in-
stead of her questioning me, and so manage to
keejD the choice of the subjects of conversation
in my own power.
Early as it was, everyone had breakfasted,
and my basin of bread and milk was put on the
oven top to await my coming down. Every-
one was gone about their work. Tlie first to
come into the house-place was Phillis with a
basket of eggs. Faithful to my resolution, I
asked,
"What are those?"
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 55
She looked at me for a moment, and then
said gravely
"Potatoes!"
"No! they are not," said I. "They are
eggs. What do you mean by saying they are
potatoes?"
"What do you mean by asking me what
they were, when they were plain to be seen ? "
retorted she.
We were both getting a little angry with
each other.
" I don't know. I wanted to begin to talk
to you; and I was afraid you would talk to me
about books as you did yesterday. I have not
read much, and you and the minister have read
so much."
" I have not," said she. " But you are our
guest; and mother says I must make it pleasant
to you. We won't talk about books. What
must we talk about?"
"1 don't know. How old arc you?"
" vSeventeen last May. How old are
you?"
" I am nineteen. Older tlnan you by nearly
56 COUSIN PHILLIS.
two years," said I, drawing myself up to my
full height.
" I should not have thought you were above
sixteen," she replied, as quietly as if she were
not saying the most provoking thing she possi-
bly could. Then came a pause.
" What are you going to do now? " asked I.
"I should be dusting the bedchambers; but
mother said I had better stay and make it
pleasant to you," said she, a little plaintively,
as if dusting rooms was far the easiest task.
"Will you take me to see the live stock? I
like animals, though I don't know much about
them."
" Oh, do you? I am so glad! I was afraid
you would not like animals, as you did not like
books."
I wondered why she said this. I think it
was because she had begun to fancy all our
tastes must be dissimilar. We went together
all through the farmyard; we fed the poultry,
she kneeling down with her pinafore full of
corn and meal, and tempting the little timid,
downy chickens upon it, much to the anxiety
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. SI
of the fussy, ruffled hen, their mother. She
called to the pigeons, who fluttered down at
the sound of her voice. She and I examined
the great sleek cart-horses; sympathized in our
dislike of pigs; fed the calves; coaxed the sick
cow, Daisy; and admired the others out at pas-
ture; and came back tired and hungry and
dirty at dinner-time, having quite forgotten
that there were such things as dead languages,
and consequently capital friends.
PART II.
COUSIN HOLMAN gave me the weekly
county newspaper to read aloud to her,
while she mended stockings out of a high
piled-up basket, Phillis helping her mother. I
read and read, unregardful of the words I was
uttering, thinking of all manner of other things;
of the bright color of Phillis' hair, as the
afternoon sun fell on her bending head; of the
silence of the house, which enabled me to hear
the double tick of the old clock which stood
halfway up the stairs; of the variety of inartic-
ulate noises which cousin Holman made while
I read, to show her sympathy, wonder, or
horror at the newspaper intelligence. The
tranquil monotony of that hour made me feel
as if I had lived forever, and should live for-
ever droning out paragraphs in that warm
S8
A STOin' OF EXGLISH LOVE. 59
sunny room, with my two quiet hearers, and
the curled-up pussy cat sleeping- on the hearth-
rug, and the clock on the house-stairs perpetu-
ally clicking- out the passage of the moments.
By and bv Betty, the servant, came to the door
into the kitchen, and made a sign to Phillis,
who put her half-mended stocking down, and
went away to the kitchen without a word.
Looking at cousin Holman a minute or two
afterward, I saw that she had dropped her
chin upon her breast, and had fallen fast asleep.
I put the newspaper down, and was nearly
following her example, when a waft of air
from some unseen source slightly opened the
door of communication with the kitchen, that
Phillis must have left unfastened; and I sav/
part of her figure as she sat bv tlie dresser
peeling apples with quick dexterity of finger,
but with repeated turnings of her head toward
some book King on the dresser by her. I
softly rose, and as softly went into the kitchen,
and looked over her shoulder ; beff)re she was
aware of mv neighboiliood, 1 liad seen that
the book was in a language uid<nown to me.
6o COUSIN PHIL LIS.
and the running title was L,'' Inferno. Just as
I was making out the relationship of this word
to " infernal," she started and turned around,
and, as if continuing her thought as she spoke,
she sighed out
"Oh! it is so difficult! Can you help me?"
putting her finger below a line.
"Me! I! Not I! I don't even know what
language it is in ! "
"Don't you see it is Dante? " she replied,
almost petulantly; she did so want help.
" Italian, then? " said I, dubiously; for I
was not quite sure.
" Yes. And I do so want to make it out.
Father can help me a little, for he knows
Latin; but then he has so little time."
" You have not much, I should think, if
you have often to try and do two things at
once, as you are doing now."
"Oh! that's nothing! Father bought a
heap of old books cheap. And I knew some-
thing about Dante before; and I have always
liked Virgil so much! Paring apples is noth-
A STORT OF EXGLISH LOVE. 6i
ing, if I could only make out this old Italian.
I wish you knew it."
" I wish I did," said I, moved by her im-
petuosity of tone, " If, now, only Mr. Holds-
worth were here; he can speak Italian like
anything, I believe."
"Who is Mr. Holdsworth?" said Phillis,
looking up.
" Oh, he's our head engineer. He's a
regular first-rate fellow! He can do any-
thing;" my hero-worship and my pride in
my chief all coming into play. Besides, if I
was not clever and book-learned myself, it was
something to belong to someone \vho was.
"How is it that he speaks Italian?" asked
Phillis.
" He had to make a railway through Pied-
mont, which is in Italy, I believe; and he had
to talk to all the workmen in Italian; and I
have heard him say that for nearly two years
lie had onh' Italian books to read in the queer,
outlandish places he was in "
"Oh, dear!" said Phillis; "I wish "
62 COUSIN PHTLLIS.
and then she stopped. I was not quite sure
whether to say the next thing that came into
my mind; but I said it.
" Could I ask him anything about 3'our
book, or your difficulties? "
She was silent for a minute or two, and
then she made reply
"No! T think not. Thank you very much,
though. I can generally puzzle a thing out
in time. And then, perhaps, I remember it
better than if someone had helped me. I'll
put it away now, and you must move off, for
I've got to make the paste for the pies; we
always have a cold dinner on Sabbaths."
"But I may stay and help you, mayn't I?"
" Oh, yes; not that you can heljD at all, but
I like to have you with me."
I was both flattered and annoyed at this
straightforward avowal. I was pleased that
she liked me; but I was young coxcomb
enough to have wished to plav the lover, and
I was quite wise enough to perceive that if
she had any idea of the kind in her head she
would never have spoken out so frankly. I
A STORY OF ENGLISH I.OVE. 63
comforted myself immediately, however, by
finding out that the grapes were sour. A
great, tall girl in a pinafore, half a head taller
than I was, reading books that I had never heard
of, and talking about them, too, as of far more
interest than any mere personal subjects; that
was the last day on which I ever thought of
my dear cousin Phillis as the possible mistress
of my heart and life. But we were all the
greater friends for this idea being utterly put
awav and buried out of sight.
Late in the evening the minister came
home from Hornby. He had been calling on
the different members of his flock ; and un-
satisfactory work it had proved to him, it
seemed from the fragments that dropped out
of his thoughts into his talk.
" I don't see the men ; they are all at their
business, their shops, or their warehouses; they
ought to be there. I have no fault to find
witli them; onlv if a pastor's teaching or
words of admonition are good for anything,
they are needed bv the men as much as by
the women."
64 COUSIN PHILLIS.
" Cannot you go and see them in their
places of business, and remind them of their
Christian privileges and duties, minister? "
asked cousin Holman, who evidently thought
that her husband's words could never be out
of place.
" No! " said he, shaking his head. " I judge
them by myself. If there are clouds in the
sky, and I am getting in the hay just ready for
loading, and rain sure to come in the night, I
should look ill upon brother Robinson if he
came into the field to speak about serious things."
" But, at any rate, father, you do good to
the women, and perhaps they repeat what
you have said to them to their husbands and
children?"
" It is to be hoped they do, for I cannot
reach the men directly ; but the women are
apt to tarry before coming to me, to put on
ribbons and gauds; as if they could hear the
message I bear to them best in their smart
clothes. Mrs. Dobson to-day Phillis, I
am thankful thou dost not care for the vani-
ties of dress! "
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 65
Phillis reddened a little as she said, in a
low, humble voice,
" But I do, father, I'm afraid. I often wish
I could wear pretty-colored ribbons around my
throat like the squire's daughters."
"It's but natural, minister!" said his wife;
" I'm not above liking a silk gown better than
a cotton one, myself!"
" The love of dress is a temptation and a
snare," said he, gravely. " The true adornment
is a meek and quiet spirit. And, wife," said
he, as a sudden thought crossed his mind, " in
that matter, I, too, have sinned. I wanted to
ask vou, could we not sleep in the gray room,
instead of our own?"
" Sleep in the gray room ? change our
room at this time o' day?" cousin Ilolman
asked, in dismay.
" Yes," said he. " It would save me from
a dailv temptation to anger. Look at my
cliini" he continued; " I cut it this morning
I cut it on Wednesday when I was shaving;
I do not know how many times I have cut
it of late, and all from impatience at see-
5
66 COUSriV PHILLIS.
ing Timothy Cooper at his work in the
yard."
"He's a downright lazy tyke!" said cousin
Holman. " He's not worth his wages. There's
but Httle he can do and what he can do he
does badly."
" True," said the minister. " But he is but,
so to speak, a half-wit; and yet he has got a
wife and children."
" More shame for him! "
" But that is past change. And if I turn him
off, no one else will take him on. Yet I can-
not help watching him of a morning as he goes
sauntering about his work in the yard; and I
watch, and I watch, till the old Adam rises strong
within me at his lazy ways, and some day, I
am afraid, I shall go down and send him about
his business let alone the way in which he
makes me cut myself while I am shaving
and then his wife and children will starve. I
wish we could move to the gray room."
I do not remember much more of my first
visit to the Hope Farm. We went to chapel
in Heathbridge, slowly and decorously walk-
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 67
ing along the lanes, ruddy and tawny with the
coloring of the coming autumn. The minister
walked a little before us, his hands behind his
back, his head bent down, thinking about the
discourse to be delivered to his people, cousin
Holman said; and we spoke low and quietly,
in order not to interrupt his thoughts. But I
could not help noticing the respectful greet-
ings which he received from both rich and
poor as we went along; greetings which he
acknowledged with a kindly wave of his hand,
but with no words of reply. As we drew near
the town, I could see some of the young fellows
we met cast admiring looks on Phillis; and
that made mc look, too. vShe had on a white
gown, and a short, black silk cloak, according
to the fashion of the day. A straw" bonnet
with brown ribbon strings; that was all. But
what her dress wanted in color her sweet,
bonny face had. The walk made her cheeks
bloom like the rose, the \erv whites of her
eves had a ])hie tinge in them, and her dark
cvclashes brought f)ut the de]:)th of the blue
eves tliemselves. Her yellow hair was put
68 COUSTN PIIILLIS.
away as straight as its natural curliness would
allow. If she did not perceive the admiration
she excited, I am sure cousin Holman did; for
she looked as fierce and as proud as ever her
quiet face could look, guarding her treasure,
and yet glad to perceive that others could see
that it was a treasure. That afternoon 1 had
to return to Eltham to be ready for the next
day's work. I found out afterward that the
minister and his family were all " exercised in
spirit," as to whether they did well in asking
me to repeat my visits at the Hope Farm, see-
ing that of necessity I must return to Eltham
on the sabbath-day. However, they did go on
asking me, and I went on visiting them, when-
ever my other engagements permitted me, Mr.
Holdsworth being in this case, as in all, a kind
and indulgent friend. Nor did my new ac-
quaintances oust him from my strong regard
and admiration. I had room in my heart for
all, I am happy to say, and, as far as I can re-
member, I kept praising each to the other in a
manner Avhich, if I had been an older tnan,
living more amongst people of the world, I
A STOnr OF ENGLISH LOVE. 69
should have thought unwise, as well as a little
ridiculous. It was unwise, certainly, as it was
almost sure to cause disappointment if ever
they did become acquainted; and perhaps it
was ridiculous, though I do not think we any
of us thought it so at the time. The minister
used to listen to my accounts of Mr. Holds-
worth's many accomplishments and various
adventures in travel with the truest interest,
and most kindly good faith; and Mr. Holds-
worth in return liked to hear about my visits
to the farm, and description of my cousin's life
there liked it, I mean, as much as he liked
anvthing that was merely narrative, without
leading to action.
So I went to the farm certainly, on an
average, once a month during that autumn;
the course of life there was so peaceful and
(juiet, that I can only remember one small
event, and that was one that I think I took
more notice of than anyone else: Pliillis left
off wearing the pinafores that had always been
so obnoxious to me, 1 dn not know why they
were banished, but on one of my visits 1 found
yo COUSIN PHIL LIS.
them replaced by pretty linen aprons in the
morning, and a black silk one in the afternoon.
And the blue cotton gown became a brown
stuff one as winter drew on; this sounds like
some book I once read, in wdiich a migration
from the blue bed to the brown was spoken of
as a great family event.
Toward Christmas my dear father came
to see me, and to consult Mr. Holdsworth
about the improvement which has since been
known as " Manning's driving wheel." Mr.
Holdsworth, as I think I have before said,
had a very great regard for my father, who
had been employed in the same great machine-
shop in which Mr. Holdsworth had served
his apprenticeship; and he and my father had
many mutual jokes about one of these gentle-
men-apprentices who used to set about his
smith's work in white wash-leather gloves,
for fear of spoiling his hands. Mr. Holds-
worth often spoke to me about my father as
having the same kind of genius for mechan-
ical invention as that of George Stephenson,
and my father had come over now to consult
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 71
him about several improvements, as well as
an offer of partnership. It was a great pleas-
ure to me to see the mutual regard of these
two men. Mr. Holdsworth, young, hand-
some, keen, well-dressed, an object of admira-
tion to all the youth of Eltham; my father, in
his decent but unfashionable Sunday clothes,
his plain, sensible face full of hard lines, the
marks of toil and thought, his hands, black-
ened beyond the power of soap and water
by years of labor in the foundry ; speaking a
strong Northern dialect, while Mr. Holds-
worth had a long, soft drawl in his voice, as
many of the Southerners have, and was reck-
oned in Eltham to give himself airs.
Although most of my father's leisure time
was occupied with conversations about the
business I have mentioned, he felt that he
ought not to Ij^'ave Eltham without going to
pay his respects to the relations who had
been so kind to his son. So he and I ran up
on an engine along the incomplete line as
far as Ileatlibridge, and went, by invitation,
to spend a day at the farm.
72 COUSIN PHILLIS.
It was odd and yet pleasant to me to per-
ceive how these two men, each having led
up to this point such totally dissimilar lives,
seemed to come together by instinct, after
one quiet, straight look into each other's faces.
My father was a thin, wiry man of five foot
seven; the minister was a broad-shouldered,
fresh-colored man of six foot one; they wei'c
neither of them great talkers in general
perhaps the minister the most so but they
spoke much to each other. My father went
into tlie fields with the minister; I think I
see him now, with his hands behind his back,
listening intently to all explanations of tillage,
and the different processes of farming; occa-
sionally taking up an implement, as if un-
consciously, and examining it with a critical
eye, and now and then asking a question,
which I could see was considered as j^ertinent
by his companion. Then we returned to
look at the cattle, housed and bedded in ex-
pectation of the snow-storm hanging black
on the western horizon, and my father learned
the points of a cow with as much attention
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 73
as if he meant to turn farmer. He had his
little hook that he used for mechanical mem-
oranda and measurements in his pocket, and
he took it out to write down " straight back,"
" small muzzle," *' deep barrel," and I know
not what else, under the head "cow." lie
was very critical on a turnip-cutting machine,
the clumsiness of which first incited him to
talk; and when we went into the house he
sat thinking and quiet for a bit, while Phillis
and her mother made the last preparations
for tea, with a little unheeded apology from
cousin Ilolman, because we were not sitting
in the best pai^loi-, which she thought might
be chilly on so cold a night. I wanted noth-
ing better than the blazing, crackling fire that
sent a glow over all the house-place, and
warmed the snowy flags under our feet till
they seemed to have more heat than the crim-
son rug right in front of the fire. .After tea,
as Phillis and I were talking together verv
happilv, I heard an irrepressible exclamation
from cousin Ilolman,
" ^Vhatever is the man about!"
74 COUSIN PHILLIS.
And on looking around, I saw my father
taking a straight burning stick out of the fire,
and after waiting for a minute, and examin-
ing the charred end to see if it was fitted for
his purpose, he went to the hardwood dresser,
scoured to the last pitch of whiteness and
cleanliness, and began drawing with the stick;
the best substitute for chalk or charcoal within
his reach, for his pocket-book pencil was not
strong or bold enough for his purpose.
When he had done, he began to explain his
new model of a turnip-cutting machine to the
minister, who had been watching him in
silence all the time. Cousin Holman had, in
the meantime, taken a duster out of a drawer,
and, under pretense of being as much inter-
ested as her husband in the drawing, was
secretly trying on an outside mark how
easily it would come off, and whether it would
leave her dresser as white as before. Then
Phillis was sent for the book on dynamics,
about which I had been consulted during my
first visit, and my father had to explain many
difiiculties, which he did in language as clear
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 75
as his mind, making drawings with his stick
wherever they were needed as illustrations,
the minister sitting with his massive head rest-
ing on his hands, his elbows on the table,
almost unconscious of Phillis, leaning over
and listening greedily, with her hand on his
shoulder, sucking in information like her
father's own daughter. I was rather sorry
for cousin Holman; I had been so once or
twice before; for do what she would she was
completely unable even to understand the
pleasure her husband and daughter took in
intellectual pursuits, much less to care in the
least herself for the pursuits themselves, and
was thus unavoidably thrown out of some of
their interests. I had once or twice thought
she was a little jealous of her own child, as a
fitter companion for her husband than she was
herself; and I fancied the minister himself
was aware of this feeling, for I had noticed
an occasional sudden change of subject, and a
tenderness of appeal in his voice as he spoke
to her, wliicii always made her look contented
and peaceful again. 1 d(j \\o\. tliink that Phillis
7^ COUSIN PIIILLIS.
ever perceived these little shadows; in the first
place, she had such complete reverence for her
parents that she listened to them both as if
they had been St. Peter and St. Paul; and be-
sides, she was always too much engrossed with
any matter in hand to think about other people's
manners and looks.
This night I could see, though she did not,
how much she was winning on my father. She
asked a few questions which showed that she
had followed his explanations up to that point;
possibly, too, her unusual beauty might have
something to do wath his favorable impression
of her; but he made no scruple of expressing
his admiration of her to her father and mother
in her absence from the room ; and from that
evening I date a project of his which came out
to me a day or two afterward, as we sat in my
little three-cornered room in Eltham.
" Paul," he began, " I never thought to be
a rich man; but I think it's coming upon me.
Some folk are making a deal of my new
machine" (calling it by its technical name),
" and Ellison, of the Borough Green Works,
A STOR2' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 77
has gone so far as to ask me to be his
partner."
"Mr. Elhson, the Justice! who lives in
King Street? why, he drives his carriage!"
said I, doubting, yet exultant.
" Ay, lad, John Ellison. But that's no sign
that I shall drive my carriage. Though I
should like to save thy mother walking, for
she's not so young as she was. But that's a
long way off, anyhow. I reckon I should start
with a third profit. It might be seven hun-
dred, or it might be more. I should like to
have the power to work out some fancies o'
mine. I care for that much more than for th'
brass. And Ellison has no lads, and by nature
the l:)usiness would come to thee in course o'
time. Ellison's lasses are but bits o' things,
and are not like to come by husbands just yet;
and when they do, mav be they'll not be in the
mechanical line. It will be an opening for
thee, lad, if thou art stead}-. Thou'rt not great
shakes, I know, in th' inventing line; but
manv a one gets on better without having
fancies for somethin<r he does not see and
78 COUSIN PHILLIS.
never has seen. I'm right down glad to see
that mother's cousins are such uncommon folk
for sense and goodness. I have taken the
minister to my heart like a brother; and she is
a womanly, quiet sort of a body. And I'll tell
you frank, Paul, it will be a happy day for me
if ever you can come and tell me that Phillis
Holman is like to be my daughter. I think if
that lass had not a penny, she would be the
making of a man ; and she'll have yon house
and lands, and you may be her match yet in
fortune if all goes well."
I was growing as red as fire; I did not
know what to say, and yet I wanted to say
something; but the idea of having a wife of
my own at some future day, though it had
often floated about in my own head, sounded
so strange when it was thus first spoken about
by my father. He saw my confusion, and half
smiling said,
" Well, lad, what dost say to the old father's
plans? Thou art but young, to be sure; but
when I was thy age, I would ha' given
my right hand if I might ha' thought of
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 79
the chance of wedding the lass I cared
for "
"My mother?" asked I, a little struck by
the change of his tone of voice.
"Xo! not thy mother. Thy mother is a
very good woman none better. No! the
lass I cared for at nineteen ne'er knew how I
loved her, and a year or two after and she was
dead, and ne'er knew. I think she would ha'
been glad to ha' known it, poor Molly; but I
had to leave the place where we lived for to
try to earn my bread and I meant to come
back but before ever I did, she was dead
and gone: I ha' never gone there since. But
if you fancy Phillis Holman, and can get her
to fancy you, my lad, it shall go different with
you, Paul, to what it did with your father."
I took counsel with mvself very rapidly,
and I came to a clear conclusion.
" Father," said T, " if I fancied Phillis ever
so much, she woukl never fancy me. I like
her as much as I could like a sister, and she
likes me as if I were her brother her younger
brother."
8o COUSIN PHILLIS.
I could see my father's countenance fall a
little.
" You see she's so clever she's more like
a man than a woman she knows Latin and
Greek."
" She'd forget 'em, if she'd a houseful of
children," was my father's comment on this.
" But she knows many a thing besides, and
is wise as well as learned; she has been so
much with her father. She would never think
much of me, and I should like my wife to think
a deal of her husband."
" It is not just book-learning or the want
of it as makes a wife think much or little of
her husband," replied my father, evidently un-
willing to give up a project which had taken
deep root in his mind. "It's a something I
don't rightly know how to call it if he's
manly, and sensible, and straightforward; and
I reckon you're that, my boy."
" I don't think I should like to have a wife
taller than I am, father," said I, smiling; he
smiled too, but not heartily.
" Well," said he, after a pause. " It's but a
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 8 1
few days I've been thinking of it; but I'd got
as fond of my notion as if it had been a new
engine as I'd been planning out. Here's our
Paul, thinks I to myself, a good sensible breed
o' lad, as has never vexed or troubled his
mother or me; with a good business opening
out before him, age nineteen, not so bad-
looking, though perhaps not to call handsome,
and here's his cousin, not too near a cousin, but
just nice, as one may say; aged seventeen, good
and true, and well brought up to work with
her hands as well as her head ; a scholar, but
that can't be helped, and is more her mis-
fortune than her fault, seeing she is the only
child of a scholar and as I said afore, once
she's a wife and a mother she'll forget it all,
I'll be bound, with a good fortune in land
and house when it shall please the Lord to
take her parents to himself; with eyes like
poor Molly's for beauty, a color that comes
and goes on a milk-white skin, and as pretty
a moutli "
" Why, Mr. Manning, what fair lady are
you describing?" asked Mr. Iloldsworth, who
6
82 COUSIN PHIL LIS.
had come quickly and suddenly upon our tete-
h-tete., and had caught my father's last words
as he entered the room.
Both my father and I felt rather abashed;
it was such an odd subject for us to be talking
about; but my father, like a straightforward,
simple man as he was, spoke out the truth.
" I've been telling Paul of Ellison's offer,
and saying how good an opening it made for
him "
" I wish I'd as good," said Mr. Holdsworth.
" But has the business a ' pretty mouth? ' "
" You're always so full of your joking, Mr.
Holdsworth," said my father. " I was going to
say that if he and his cousin Phillis Ilolman
liked to make it up between them, I would put
no spoke in the wheel."
"Phillis Ilolman!" said Mr. Holdsworth.
" Is she the daughter of the minister-farmer
out at Heathbridge? Have I been helping on
the course of true love by letting you go there
so often? I knew nothing of it."
" There is nothing to know," said I, more
annoyed than I chose to show. " There is no
A STOR7' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 83
more true love in the case than may be be-
tween the first brother and sister you may
choose to meet. I have been telHng father
she would never think of me; she's a great
deal taller and cleverer; and I'd rather be
taller and more learned than my wife, when I
have one."
" And it is she, then, that has the pretty
mouth your father spoke about? I should
think that would be an antidote to the clever-
ness and learning. But I ought to apologize
for breaking in upon vour last night; I came
upon business to your father."
And then he and my father began to talk
about many things that had no interest for me
just then, and I began to go over again my
conversation with my father. The more I
tliought about it the more I felt that I had
spoken truly about mv feelings toward Phillis
Ilolman. I loved her dearlv as a sister, but I
could never fancy her as my wife. Still less
could I thiidv of her e\er yes, condescending .,
that is tlie word condescending to irinrrv me.
I was roused from a rcveiie on what I should
4 COUSTN PHILLIS.
like my possible wife to be, by hearing my
father's warm praise of the minister, as a most
unusual character; how they had got back
from the diameter of driving-wheels to the
subject of the Holmans I could never tell; but
I saw that my father's weighty praises were
exciting some curiosity in Mr. Holdsworth's
mind; indeed, he said, almost in a voice of
reproach,
" Why, Paul, you never told me what
kind of a fellow this minister-cousin of yours
was! "
" I don't know that I found out, sir," said I.
" But if I had, I don't think you'd have listened
to me, as you have done to my father."
"No! most likely not, old fellow," replied
Mr. Holdsworth, laughing. And again and
afresh I saw what a handsome, pleasant, clear
face his was; and though this evening I had
been a bit put out with him through his
sudden coming, and his having heard my
father's open-hearted confidence my hero
resumed all his empire over me by his bright
merry laugh.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 85
And if he had not resumed his old place
that night, he would have done so the next day,
when, after my father's departure, Air. Holds-
worth spoke about him with such just respect
for his character, such ungrudging admiration
of his great mechanical genius, that I was com-
pelled to say, almost unawares,
" Thank you, sir. I am very much obliged
to you."
" Oh, you're not at all. I am only speaking
the truth. Here's a 15irmingham workman,
self-educated, one mav sav having never asso-
ciated with stimulating minds, or had what
advantages travel and contact with the world
may be supposed to afford working out his
own thoughts into steel and iron, making a
scientific name for himself a fortune, if it
pleases him to work for money and keeping
his singleness of lieart, his perfect simplicity
of manner; it puts me out of patience to think
of mv expensive schooling, mv travels hither
and thither, my heaps of scientific books, and I
have done nothing to speak of. But it's evi-
dently good blood; theie's that Mr. Holman,
86 COUSTN PHILLIS.
that cousin of yours, made of the same
stuff."
" But he's only cousin because he married
my mother's second cousin," said I.
" That knocks a pretty theorj' on the head,
and twice over, too. I should like to make
Holman's acquaintance."
" I am sure they would be so glad to see
you at Hope Farm," said I, eagerly. " In fact,
they've asked me to bring. you several times;
only I thought you would find it dull."
" Not at all. I can't go yet though, even
if you do get me an invitation; for the
Company want me to go to the
Valley, and look over the ground a bit for
them, to see if it would do for a branch line; it's
a job which may take me away for some time ;
but I shall be backward and forward, and you're
quite up to doing what is needed in my ab-
sence; the only work that may be beyond you
is keeping old Jevons from drinking."
He went on giving me directions about the
management of the men employed on the line,
and no more was said then, or for several
A STORT OF EXGLISH LOVE. 87
months, about his going to Hope Farm. He
went off into Valley, a dark, overshadowed
dale, where the sun seemed to set behind the
hills befoie four o'clock on midsummer after-
noons.
Perhaps it was this that brought on the
attack of low fever which he had soon after
the beginning of the new year; he was very
ill for many weeks, almost many months; a
inarried sister his only relation, I think
came down from London to nurse him, and I
went over to him when I could, to see him,
and give him " masculine news," as he called
it; reports of the progress of the line, which,
I am glad to sav, I was able to carr}- on in his
absence, in the slow, gradual way which suited
the company best, while trade was in a languid
state, and money dear in the market. Of
course, witli this occupation for my scanty
leisure, I did not often go over to Hope Farm.
Whenever I ditl go, I met with a tliorough
welcome; and manv iiujuiries were made as
to Holdsworth's illness, and the progress of his
recovery.
SS COUSIN PHTLLTS.
At length, in June I think it was, he was
siitiiciently recovered to come back to his lodg-
ings at Eltham, and resume part at least of his
woik. His sister, Mrs. Robinson, had be n
obliged to leave him some weeks before, owing
to some epidemic among her own children.
As long as I had seen Mr. Iloldsworth in the
rooms at the little inn at Hensleydale, where I
had been accustomed to look upon him as an
invalid, I had not been aware of the visible
shake his fever had given to his health. But,
once back in the old lodgings, where I had
always seen him so buoyant, eloquent, decided,
and vigorous in former days, my spirits sank
at the change in one whom I had always re-
garded with a strong feeling of admiring affec-
tion. He sank into silence and despondency
after the least exertion ; he seemed as if he
could not make up his mind to any action, or
else that, when it was made up, he lacked
strength to carry out his purpose. Of course,
it was but the natural state of slow conva-
lescence, after so sharp an illness; but at the
time, I did not know this, and perhaps I repre-
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 89
sented his state as more serious than it was
to my kind relations at Hope Farm; who, in
their grave, simple, eager way, immediately
thought of the only help they could give.
" Bring him out here," said the minister.
'' Our air here is good to a proverb; the June
days are fine; he may loiter away his time in
the hayfield, and the sweet smells will be a
balm in themselves better than physic."
"And," said cousin Holman, scarcely wait-
ing for her husband to finish his sentence,
" tell him there is new milk and fresh eggs
to be had for the asking; it's lucky Daisy has
just calved, for her milk is always as good as
other cow's cream ; and there is the plaid room
with the morning sun all streaming in."
Phillis said nothing, but looked as much
interested in the project as anvone. I took it
up myself. I wanted them to see him ; him to
know them. I proposed it to him when I got
Iiome. lie was too languid after the day's
fatigue, to be willing to make the little exer-
tion of going among strangers; and disap-
pointed me by almost declining to accept the
go C0U3IN PHILLIS.
invitation I brought. The next morning it
was different; he apologized for his ungra-
ciousness of the night before; and told me
that he would get all things in train, so as to
be ready to go out with me to Hope Farm on
the following Saturday.
" For you must go with me, Manning,"
said he; "I used to be as impudent a fellow
as need be, and rather liked going among
strangers, and making my way; but since my
illness I am almost like a girl, and turn hot
and cold with shyness, as they do, I fancy."
So it was fixed. We were to go out to
Hope Farm on Saturday afternoon; and it
was also understood that if the air and the life
suited Mr. Holdsworth, he was to remain
there for a week or ten days, doing what work
he could at that end of the line, while I took
his place at Eltham to the best of my ability.
I grew a little nervous, as the time drew near,
and wondered how the brilliant Holdsworth
would agree with the quiet, quaint family of
the minister; how they would like him, and
many of his half-foreign ways. I tried to pre-
A STORT OF EI^GLTSH LOVE. 9I
pare him, by telling him from time to time
little things about the goings-on at Hope
Farm.
" Manning," said he, " I see you don't think
I am half good enough for your friends. Out
with it, man."
" No," I replied, boldly. " I think you are
good; but I don't know if you are quite of
their kind of goodness."
" And you've found out already that there
is a greater chance of disagreement between
two ' kinds of goodness,' each having its own
idea of right, than between a given goodness
and a moderate degree of naughtiness which
last often arises from an indifference to right?"
" I don't know. I think you're talking
metaphysics, and I am sure that is bad for
you."
" ' When a man talks to you in a way that
you don't understand about a thing which
he does not untlcrstand, them's meta]ihvsics.'
You remember the clown's definition, don't
you, Maiuiing? "
" Xo, I don't," said I. " lint what I do
92 COUSIN PHILLIS.
understand is, that you must go to bed; and
tell me at what time we must start to-morrow,
that I may go to Hepworth, and get those
letters written we were talking about this
morning."
" Wait till to-morrow, and let us see what
the day is like," he answered, with such languid
indecision as showed me he was over-fatigued.
So I went my way.
The morrow was blue and sunny, and
beautiful; the very perfection of an early sum-
mer's day. Mr. Holdsworth was all impa-
tience to be off into the country; morning had
brought back his freshness of strength, and
consequent eagerness to be doing. I was
afraid we were going to my cousin's farm
rather too early, before they would expect us;
but what could I do with such a restless,
vehement man as Holdsworth was that morn
ing? We came down upon the Hope Farm
before the dew was off the grass on the shady
side of the lane; the great house-dog w^as
loose, basking in the sun, near the closed side
door. I was surprised at this door being shut.
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 93
for all summer long it was open from morn-
ing to night; but it was only on latch. I
opened it, Rover watching me with half-
suspicious, half-trustful eyes. The room was
empty.
" I don't know where they can be," said I.
" But come in and sit down while I go and
look for them. You must be tired."
" Not I. This sweet, balmy air is like a
thousand tonics. Besides, this room is hot, and
smells of those pungent wood-ashes. What
are we to do? "
" Go around to the kitchen. J?etty will tell
us where they are."
So we went around into the farmyard,
Rover accompanying us out of a grave sense
of duty. Betty was \vashing out her milk-
pans in the cold, bubbling spring-water that
constantly trickled in and out of a stone trough.
In such weather as this, most of her kitchen-
wc^rk was done out of doors.
"Eh, dear!" said she, " the minister and
missus is away at Hornby! They ne'er thought
(jf your coming so betimes! The missus had
94 COUSIN PHILLIS.
some errands to do, and she thought as she'd
walk with the minister and be back by dinner-
time."
"Did not they expect us to dinner?"
said I.
" Well, they did, and they did not, as I
may say Missus said to me the cold lamb
would do well enough if you did not come;
and if you did, I was to put on a chicken and
some bacon to boil; and I'll go do it now, for it
is hard to boil bacon enough."
" And is Phillis gone, too ? " Mr. Holds-
worth was making friends with Rover.
"No! She's just somewhere about. I
reckon you'll find her in the kitchen-garden,
getting peas."
" Let us go there," said Holdsworth, sud-
denly leaving off his play with the dog.
So I led the way into the kitchen-garden.
It was in the first promise of a summer profuse
in vegetables and fruits. Perhaps it was not
so much cared for as other parts of the prop-
erty ; but it was more attended to than
most kitchen-gardens belonging to farm-
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 95
houses. There were borders of flowers
along each side of the gravel walks; and
there was an old sheltering wall on the
north side covered with tolerably choice fruit-
trees ; there was a slope down to the fishpond
at the end, where there were great strawberry-
beds; and raspberry-bushes and rose-bushes
grew wherever there was a space; it seemed a
chance which had been planted. Long rows
of peas stretched at right angles from the main
walk, and I saw Phillis stooping down among
them, before she saw us. As soon as she
heard our cranching steps on the gravel, she
stood up, and, shading her eyes from the sun,
recognized us. She was quite still for a mo-
ment, and then came slowly toward us, blush-
ing a little from evident shyness. 1 had never
seen Phillis sliy before.
This IS Mr. Iloldsworth, Phillis," said I,
as soon as I had shaken hands with her. She
glanced up at bim, and then looked down, more
tluslied than e\ei- at his grand formality of
taking his hat off and bowing; such manners
had never been seen at llcjpe Farm l)ef(jre.
96 COUSIN PHILLIS.
" Father and mother are out. They will
be so sorry; you did not write, Paul, as you
said you would."
" It was my fault," said Holdsworth, under-
standing what she meant as well as if she had
put it more fully into words. " I have not yet
given up all the privileges of an invalid; one
of which is indecision. Last night, when 3'our
cousin asked me at what time we were to
start, I really could not make up my mind."
Phillis seemed as if she could not make up
her mind as to what to do with us. I tried to
help her
" Have you finished getting peas? " taking
hold of the half-filled basket she was uncon-
sciously holding in her hand; "or may we
stay and help you ? "
" If you would. But perhaps it will tire
you, sir?" added she, speaking now to Holds-
worth.
" Not a bit," said he. " It will carry me
back twenty years in my life, when I used to
gather peas in my grandfather's garden. I
suppose I may eat a few as I go along? "
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 97
" Certainly, sir. But if you went to the
strawberry-beds you would find some straw-
berries ripe, and Paul can show you where
they are."
" I am afraid you distrust me. I can assure
you I know the exact fullness at which peas
should be gathered. I take great care not to
pluck them when they are unripe. I will not
be turned off, as unfit for my work."
This was a style of half-joking talk that
Phillis was not accustomed to. She looked for
a moinent as if she would have liked to defend
herself from the plaj-ful charge of distrust
made against her, but she ended by not saying
a word. We all plucked our peas in busy
silence for the next five minutes. Then Holds-
worth lifted himself up from between the
rows, and said, a little wearily
" I am afraid I must strike work. I am
not as strong as I fancied myself."
Phillis was full of penitence immediately
lie did, indeed, look pale; and she blamed
herself for having allowed him to help
her.
7
98 COUSIN PHILLIS.
" It was very thoughtless of me. I did
not know I thought, perhaps, you really
liked it. I ought to have offered you some-
thing to eat, sir! Oh, Paul, we have gathered
quite enough; how stupid I was to forget that
Mr. Holdsworth had been ill!" And in a
blushing hurry she led the way toward the
house. We went in, and she moved a heavy
cushioned chair forward, into which Holds-
worth was only too glad to sink. Then with
deft and quiet speed she brought in a little
tray, wine, water, cake, home-made bread and
newly-churned butter. She stood by in some
anxiety till, after bite and sup, the color re-
turned to Mr. Holdsworth's face, and he would
fain have made us some laughing apologies for
the fright he had given us. But then Phillis
drew back from her innocent show of care and
interest, and relapsed into the cold shyness
habitual to her when she was first thrown into
the company of strangers. She brought out
the last week's county paper (which Mr. Holds-
worth had read five days ago) and then quietly
withdrew ; and then he subsided into languor,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 99
leaning back and shutting his eyes as if he
would go to sleep. I stole into the kitchen
after Phillis; but she had made the round of
the corner of the house outside, and I found
her sitting on the horse-mount, with her basket
of peas, and a basin into which she was shell-
ing them. Rover lay at her feet, snapping
now and then at the flies. I went to her, and
tried to help her; but somehow the sweet,
crisp young peas found their w^iy more fre-
quently into my mouth than into the basket,
while we talked together in a low tone, fearful
of being overbcard through the open case-
ments of the house-place in which Holdsworth
was resting.
" Don't you think him handsome? " asked I,
" Perhaps yes I have hardly looked at
him," she replied. " But is not he very like a
foreigner?"
" Yes, he cuts his hair foreign fashion,"
said I.
" I like an Englishman to look like an En-
glishman."
" I don't think he tliinks about it. lie says
lOO COUSIN PHILLIS.
he began that way when he was in Italy, be-
cause everybody wore it so, and it is natural to
keep it on in England."
" Not if he began it in Italy, because every-
body there wore it so. Everybody here wears
it differently."
I was a little offended with Phillis's logical
fault-finding with my friend; and I determined
to change the subject,
" When is your mother coming home? "
" I should think she might come any time
now; but she had to go and see Mrs. Morton,
who was ill, and she might be kept, and not be
home till dinner. Don't you think you ought
to go and see how Mr. Holdsworth is going
on, Paul.'' He may be faint again."
I went at her bidding; but there was no
need for it. Mr. Holdsworth was up, standing
by the window, his hands in his pockets; he
had evidently been watching us. He turned
away as I entered.
" So that is the girl I found your good
father planning for your wife, Paul, that even-
ing when I interrupted you! Are you of the
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. lOl
same coy mind still? It did not look like it a
minute ago."
"Phillis and I understand each other," I re-
plied, sturdily. " We are like brother and
sister. She would not have me as a husband,
if there was not another man in the world ;
and it would take a deal to make me think of
her as my father wishes" (somehow I did
not like to say "as a wife"), "but we love
each other dearly."
"Well? lam rather surprised at it- ^not
at your loving each other in a brother-and-
sister kind of way but at your finding it so
impossible to fall in love with such a beautiful
woman."
Woman! beautiful woman! I had thought
of Phillis as a comely but awkward girl; and
I could not banish the pinafore from my mind's
eye when I tried to pictui'c her to myself.
Now I turned, as Mr. lloldswoith had done,
to look at her again out of tlie window; she
had just finished her task, and was standing
up, her back to us, holding the basket, and the
COUSIN PIIILLIS.
basin in it, high in air, out of Rover's reach,
who was giving vent to his delight at the prob-
abiHty of a change of 2:)lace by glad leaps and
barks, and snatches at what he imagined to be
a withheld prize. At length she grew tired of
their mutual play, and with a feint of striking
him, and a "Down, Rover! do hush!" she
looked toward the window where we were
standing, as if to reassure herself that no one
had been disturbed by the noise, and seeing us,
she colored all over, and hurried away, with
Rover still curving in sinuous lines about her
as she walked.
" I should like to have sketched her," said
Mr. Holdsworth, as he turned away. He went
back to his chair, and rested in silence for a
minute or two. Then he was up again.
" I would give a good deal for a book," said
he. " It would keep me quiet." He began to
look around; there were a few volumes at one
end of the shovel-board.
" Fifth volume of IMatthew Henry's Com-
mentary^'' said he, reading their titles aloud.
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 03
''Housexvifc's Complete ATanualy Berridge
on Prayer ; L'' Infcrtio Dante!" in great sur-
prise. "Why, who reads this?"
" I told you Phillis read it. Don't you re-
member? She knows Latin and Greek, too."
" To be sin^el I remember! But somehow
I never put two and two together. That quiet
girl, full of household work, is the wonderful
scholar, then, that put you to rout with her
questions when you first began to come here.
To be sure, 'Cousin Phillis!' What's here: a
paper with the hard, obsolete words written
out. I wonder what sort of a dictionary she
has got. Baretti won't tell her all these words.
Stay! I have got a pencil here. I'll write
down the most accepted meanings, and save
her a little trouble."
So he took her book and the paper back to
the little round table, and emploved himself in
writing explanations and definitions of the
\vf)rds which had troubled her. I was not sure
if he was not taking a libertv; it did not quite
please me, and vet I did not know whv. lie
had only just done, and replaced the paper in
104- COUSIN PHILLIS.
the book, and put the hitter back in its place,
when I heard the sound of wheels stopping in
the lane, and looking out I saw cousin Holman
getting out of a neighbor's gig, making her
little curtsey of acknowledgment, and then
coming towards the house. I went out to meet
her.
"Oh, Paul!" said she, "I am so sorry I was
kept; and then Thomas Dobson said if I would
wait a quarter of an hour, he would But
where's your friend, Mr. Holdsworth? I hope
he is come."
Just then he came out, and with his pleasant,
cordial manner took her hand, and thanked her
for asking him to come out here to get strong.
" I'm sure I am very glad to see you, sir.
It was the minister's thought. I took it into
my head you would be dull in our quiet house,
foi- Paul says you've been such a great traveler;
but the minister said dullness would perhaps
suit you while you were but ailing, and that I
was to ask Paul to be here as much as he could.
I hope you'll find yourself happy with us, I'm
sure, sir. Has Phillis given you something to
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 05
eat and drink, I wonder? there's a deal in eat-
ing a little often, if one has to get strong after
an illness." And then she began to question,
him as to the details of his indisposition in her
simple, motherly way. He seemed at once to
understand her, and to enter into friendly rela-
tions with her. It was not quite the same in
the evening when the minister came home.
Men have always a little natural antipathy to
get over when they first meet as strangers.
J^ut in this case each was disposed to make an
effort to like the other; only each was to each
a specimen of an unknown class. I had to
leave the Hope Farm on Sunday afternoon, as
I had Air. Holdsworth's work as well as my
own to look to in Eltham; and I was not at all
sure how things would go on during the week
that Iloldsworth was to lemain on his visit; I
had been once or twice in hot water already at
the near clash of opinions between the minister
and my much-vaunted friend. On the Wednes-
day I received a short note from Iloldsworth;
he was going to stay on, and return with me
on the fcjllowiiig Sunday, and he wanted me to
lo6 COUSIN PHILLIS.
send him a certain list of books, his theodolite
and other surveying instruments, all of which
could easily be conveyed down the line to
Heathbridge. I went to his lodgings and
picked out the books. Italian, Latin, trigonom-
etry; a pretty considerable parcel they made,
besides the implements. I began to be curious
as to the general progress of affairs at Hope
Farm, but I could not go over till the Satur-
day. At Heathbridge I found Holdsworth,
come to meet me. He was looking quite a
different man to what I had left him; em-
browned, sparkles in his eyes, so languid
before. I told him how much stronger he
looked.
"Yes! "said he. I am fidgeting fain to be
at work again. Last week I dreaded the
thoughts of my employment; now I am full of
desire to begin. This week in the country has
done wonders for me."
"You have enjoyed yourself, then?"
" Oh! it has been perfect in its way. Such
a thorough country life! and yet removed
from the dullness which I always used to fancy
A STORV OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 07
accompanied country life, by the extraordinary
intelligence of the minister. I have fallen into
calling him ' the minister,' like everyone else."
"You get on with him, then? " said I. " I
was a little afraid."
" I was on the verge of displeasing him
once or twice, I fear, with random assertions
and exaggerated expressions, such as one al-
wavs uses with other people, and thinks noth-
ing of; but I tried to check myself when I
saw how it shocked the good man ; and really
it is very wholesome exercise, this trying to
make one's words represent one's thoughts,
instead of merely looking to their effect on
others."
"Then you are quite friends now?" I
asked.
" Yes, thoroughly; at any rate as far as I
go. T never met with a man with such a de-
sire for knowledge. In information, as fai- as
it can he gained frcjm books, lie fai" exceeds me
on most subjects; but then I ha\e ti^aveled and
seen were not you surprised at the list of
thinirs I sent for? "
io8 COUSIN PHI LIAS.
"Yes! I thought it did not promise much
rest."
"Oh! some of the books were for the
minister, and some for his daughter. (I call her
Phillis to myself, but I use euphuisms in speak-
ing about her to others. I don't like to seem
familiar, and yet Miss Holman is a term I have
never heard used.)"
" 1 thought the Italian books were for her."
"Yes! Fancy her trying at Dante for her
first book in Italian! I had a capital novel by
Manzoni, / Pro?nessi Sposi, just the thing
for a beginner; and if she must still puzzle out
Dante, my dictionary is far better than hers."
" Then she found out you had written those
definitions on her list of words?"
"Oh, yes!" with a smile of amusement
and pleasure. He was going to tell me what
had taken place, but checked himself.
" But I don't think the minister will like
your having given her a novel to read?"
" Pooh! What can be more harmless? Whv
make a bugbear of a word? It is as pretty
and innocent a tale as can be met with. You
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 09
don't suppose they take Virgil for gos-
pel?"
By this time we were at the farm. I think
Phillis gave me a wxirmer welcome than usual,
and cousin Holman was kindness itself. Yet
somehow I felt as if I had lost my place, and
that Holdsworth had taken it. He knew all
the ways of the house ; he was full of little
filial attentions to cousin Holman; he treated
Phillis with the affectionate condescension of
an elder brother; not a bit more; not in any
way different. He questioned me about the pro-
gress of affairs in Eltham with eager interest.
"Ah I" said cousin Holman, "you'll be
spending a different kind of time next week to
what you have done this! I can see how busy
you'll make yourself! But if you don't take
care you'll be ill again, and have to come back
to our quiet ways of going on."
" Do you suppose I shall need to be ill
to wish to come back here?" he answered,
warmly. " I am onlv afraid vou have treated
me so kindlv tliat I shall alwavs l)e turning up
on your hands."
no COUSIN PHILLIS.
" That's right," she replied. " Only don't
go and make yourself ill by overwork. I
hope you'll go on with a cup of new milk
every morning, for I am sure that is the best
medicine; and put a teaspoonful of rum in it,
if you like; many a one speaks highly of that,
only we had no rum in the house."
I brought with me an atmosphere of active
life which I think he had begun to miss; and
it was natural that he should seek my com-
pany, after his week of retirement. Once I
saw Phillis looking at us as we talked together
with a kind of wistful curiosity; but as soon as
she caught my eye, she turned away, blushing
deeply.
That evening I had a little talk with the
minister. I strolled along the Hornby road to
meet him; for Holdsworth was giving Phillis
an Italian lesson, and cousin Holman had fallen
asleep over her work.
Somehow, and not unwillingly on my part,
our talk fell on the friend whom I had intro-
duced to the Hope Farm.
"Yes! I like him!" said the minister,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. HI
weighing his words a Uttle as he spoke. " I
Hke him. I hope I am justified in doing it,
but he takes hold of me, as it were; and I have
almost been afraid lest he carries me away, in
spite of my judgment."
"He is a good fellow; indeed he is," said I.
" Aly father thinks well of him ; and I have
seen a deal of him. I would not have had
him come here if I did not know that you
would approve of him."
" Yes " (once more hesitating), " I like him,
and I think he is an upright man; there is a
want of seriousness in his talk at times; but, at
the same time, it is wonderful to listen to him !
He makes Horace and Virgil living, instead of
dead, by the stories he tells me of his sojourn
in the ver}' countries where they lived, ;nid
where to this day, he says but it is like
dram-drinking. I listen to him till I forget
my duties, and am carried off my feet. Last
Sabbath evening he led us away into talk
on profane subjects ill ])efitting the day."
By this time we were at the house, and our
conversation stopped. But before the day was
112 COUSIN PHILLIS.
out, I saw the unconscious hold that my friend
had got over all the family. And no wonder;
he had seen so much and done so much as
compared to them, and he told about it all so
easily and naturally, and yet as I never heard
anyone else do; and his ready pencil was out
in an instant to draw on scraps of paper all
sorts of illustrations modes of drawing up
water in Northern Italy, wine-carts, buffaloes,
stone-pines, I know not what. After we had
all looked at these drawings, Phillis gathered
them together, and took them.
It is many years since I have seen thee, Ed-
ward Holdsworth, but thou wast a delightful
fellow! Ay, and a good one too; though much
sorrow was caused by thee!
"Vii^^
PART III.
JUST after this I went home for a week's
hohday. Everything was prospering there;
my father's new partnership gave evident
satisfaction to both parties. There was no dis-
play of increased wealth in our modest house-
hold ; but my mother had a few extra comforts
provided for her by her husband. I made ac-
([uaintance with ^Ir. and Jvlrs. Ellison, and first
saw prettv Margaret Ellison, who is now my
wife. When I returned to Ellham, I found that
a step was decided upon, which had been in
contemplation for some time: that Holdsworth
and I should remove our (juartcrs to Hornby;
our daily presence, and as much of our time as
8 113
114 COUSIN PHIL LIS.
possible, being required for the completion of
the line at that end.
Of course this led to greater facility of in-
tercourse with the Hope Farm people. We
could easily walk out there after our day's
work was done, and spend a balmy evening
hour or two, and yet return before the sum-
mer's twilight had quite faded away. Many a
time, indeed, we would fain have stayed
longer the open air, the fresh and pleasant
country, m.ade so agreeable a contrast to the
close, hot town lodgings which I shared with
Mr. Holdsworth ; but early hours, both at eve
and morn, were an imperative necessity with
the minister, and he made no scruple at turning
either, or both of us, out of the house directly
after evening prayer, or "exercise," as he called
it. The remembrance of many a happy day,
and of several little scenes, comes back upon
me as I think of that summer. They rise like
pictures to my memory, and in this way I can
date their succession; for I know that corn-
harvest must have come after haymaking,
apple-gathering after corn-harvest.
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. II5
The removal to Hornby took up some time,
during wiiich we had neither of us any leisure
to go out to the Hope Farm. Mr. Holdsworth
had been out there once during my absence at
home. One sultry evening, when work was
done, he proposed our walking out and paying
the Holmans a visit. It so happened that I
had omitted to write my usual weekly letter
home in our press of business, and I wished to
finish that before going out. Then he said
that he would go, and that I could follow him
if I liked. This I did in about an hour; the
weather was so oppressive, I remember, that I
took off my coat as 1 walked, and hung it over
my arm. All tlie doors and windows at the
farm were open when I arrived there, and
every tiny leaf on the trees was still. The
silence of tlie place was profound ; at first I
thought that it was entirely deserted; but just
as I drew near the door I heard a weak, sweet
voice begin to sing; it was cousin Ilolman, all
V)y herself in the house-i^lace, piping up a
hymn, as she knitted away in the clouded light.
She ga\e me a kindly welcome, and poured
Il6 COUSrN PHILLIS.
out all the small domestic news of the fortnight
past upon me, and, in return, I told her about
my own people and my visit at home.
" Where are the rest?" at length I asked.
Betty and the men were in the field helping
with the last load of hay, for the minister said
there would be rain before the morning. Yes,
and the minister himself, and Phillis, and Mr.
Holdsworth were all there helping. She
thought that she herself could have done some-
thing; but perhaps she was the least fit for
haymaking of anyone; and somebody must
stay at home and take care of the house, there
were so many tramps about; if I had not had
something to do with the railroad she would
have called them navvies. I asked her if she
minded being left alone, as I should like to go
and help; and having her full and glad per-
mission to leave her alone, I went off, following
her directions: through the farmyard, past the
cattle-pond, into the ash-field, beyond into the
higher field with two holly-bushes in the mid-
dle. I arrived there: there was Betty with all
the farming men, and a cleared field, and a
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 17
heavily laden cart; one man at the top of the
great pile ready to catch the fragrant hay
which the others threw up to him with their
pitchforks; a little heap of cast-off clothes in a
corner of the field (for the heat, even at seven
o'clock, was insufferable), a few cans and bas-
kets, and Rover lying by them panting, and
keeping watch. Plenty of loud, hearty, cheer-
ful talking; but no minister, no Phillis, no Mr.
Holdsworth. Betty saw me first, and under-
standing who it was that I was in search of,
she came toward me.
" They're out yonder agait wi' them
things o' jMeaster lloldsworth's."
So "out yonder" I went; out onto a broad
upland common, full of red sandbanks, and
sweeps and hollows; bordered by dark firs,
purple in the coming shadows, but near at hand
all ablaze with flowering gorse, or, as we call
it in the south, furze-bushes, which, seen
against the belt of distant trees, appeared bril-
liantly golden. On tliis heath, a little way
from the field-gate, I saw the three. I counted
their heads, joined together in an eager group
1 1 8 COUSIN PHIL L IS.
over Iloldsvvorth's theodolite. He was teach-
ing the minister the practical art of survey-
ing and taking a level. I was wanted to assist,
and was quickly set to work to hold the chain.
Phillis was as intent as her father; she had
hardly time to greet me, so desirous was she to
hear some answer to her father's question.
So we went on, the dark clouds still gather-
ing, for perhaps five minutes after my arrival.
Then came the blinding lightning and the
rumble and quick-following rattling peal of
thunder right over our heads. It came sooner
than I expected, sooner than they had looked
for; the rain delayed not; it came pouring
down; and what were we to do for shelter?
Phillis had nothing on but her indoor things-
no bonnet, no shawl. Quick as the darting
lightning around us, Holdsworth took off his
coat and w^rapped it around her neck and
shoulders, and, almost without a word, hurried
us all into such poor shelter as one of the over-
hanging sandbanks could give. There we
were, cowered down, close together, Phillis
innermost, almost too tightly packed to free
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 119
her arms enough to divest herself of the coat,
which she, in her turn, tried to put lightly
over Holdsworth's shoulders. In doing so,
she touched his shirt.
"Oh, how ^vet you are!" she cried in
pitying dismav; "and you've hardly got over
your fever! Oh, Mr. Iloldsworth, I am so
sorry!" He turned his head a little, smiling at
her.
" If I do catch cold, it is all my fault for
having deluded you into staying out here;" but
she only murmured again, " I am so sorry."
The minister spoke now. " It is a regular
downpour. Please God that the hay is saved!
Ikit there is no likelihood of its ceasing, and I
had better go home at once, and send you all
some wraps; umbrellas will not be safe with
yonder thunder and lightning."
Both Iloldsworth and I offered to go in-
stead of him; but he was resolved, although
perhaps it wculd have l)een wiser if Holds-
worth, wet as he already was, had kept him-
self in exercise. As he moved off, Phillis
crept out, and could see on to the storm-swept
I20 COUSIN PHILLIS.
heath. Part of Hoklsworth's apparatus still
remained exposed to all the rain. Before we
could have any warning, she had rushed out
of the shelter and collected the various things,
and brought them back in triumph to where
we crouched. Holdsworth had stood up, un-
certain whether to go to her assistance or not.
She came running back, her long, lovely hair
floating and dripping, her eyes glad and bright,
and her color freshened to a glow of health by
the exercise and the rain,
" Now, Miss Holman, that's what I call
willful," said Holdsworth, as she gave them to
him. "No, I won't thank you" (his looks
were thanking her all the time). " My little
bit of dampness annoyed you, because you
thought I had got wet in your service; so you
were determined to make me as uncomfort-
able as you were yourself. It was an unchris-
tian piece of revenge!"
His tone of badinage (as the French call
it) would have been palpable enough to any-
one accustomed to the world; but Phillis was
not, and it distressed or rather bewildered her.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 121
" Unchristian" had to her a very serious mean-
ing; it was not a word to be used Hghtly; and
though she did not exactly understand what
wrong it was that she was accused of doing,
she was evidently desirous to throw off the
imputation. At first her earnestness to dis-
claim unkind motives amused Holdsworth;
while his light continuance of the joke per-
plexed her still more; but at last he said some-
thing gravely, and in too low a tone for me to
hear, which made her all at once become silent,
and called out her blushes. After awhile, the
minister came back, a moving mass of shawls,
cloaks, and umbrellas. Phillis kept very close
to her father's side on our return to the farm.
She appeared to me to be shrinking away from
Holdsworth, while he had not the slightest
variation in his manner from what it usually
was in his graver moods; kind, protecting, and
thoughtful toward her. Of course, there was
a great commotion about our wet clothes; but
I name the little events of that evening now
because I wondered at the time what he had
said in that low voice to silence Phillis so
122 COUSIN PHILLIS.
effectually, and because, in thinking of their
intercourse by the light of future events, that
evening stands out with some prominence.
I have said that after our removal to Horn-
by our communications with the farm became
almost of daily occurrence. Cousin Holman
and I were the two who had least to do with
this intimacy. After Mr. Holdsworth regained
his health, he too often talked above her head
in intellectual matters, and too often in his
light bantering tone for her to feel quite at her
ease with him. I really believe that he adopted
this latter tone in speaking to her because he
did not know what to talk about to a purely
motherly woman, whose intellect had never
been cultivated, and whose loving heart was
entirely occupied with her husband, her child,
her household affairs, and, perhaps, a little
with the concerns of the members of her hus-
band's congregation, because they, in a way,
belonged to her husband. I had noticed be-
fore that she had fleeting shadows of jealousy
even of Phillis, when her daughter and her
husband appeared to have strong interests and
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 23
sympathies in things which were quite beyond
her comprehension. I had noticed it in my first
acquaintance with them, I say, and had ad-
mired the deHcate tact which made the min-
ister, on such occasions, bring the conversation
back to such subjects as those on which his
wife, with her practical experience of every-
day Hfe, was an authority; while Phillis, de-
voted to her father, unconsciously followed his
lead, totally unaware, in her filial reverence, of
his motive for doing so.
To return to Holdsworth. The minister
had at more than one time spoken of him to
me with slight distrust, principally occasioned
by the suspicion that his careless words were
not always those of soberness and truth. But
it was more as a protest against the fascination
which the younger inan evidently exercised
over the elder one more as it were to
strengthen himself against yielding to this fas-
cination that the niinistei^ spoke out to me
about this failing of Iloldsworth's, as it ap-
peared to him. In return Holdsworth was
subdued by the minister's upiightness and
124 COUSIN PHILLIS.
goodness, and delighted with his clear intel-
lect his strong, healthy craving after further
knowledge. I never met two men who took
more thorough pleasure and relish in each
other's society. To Phillis his relation con-
tinued that of an elder brother; he directed her
studies into new paths, he patiently drew out
the expression of many of her thoughts and
perplexities, and unformed theories scarcely
ever now falling into the vein of banter which
she was so slow to understand.
One day harvest-time he had been
drawing on a loose piece of paper sketching
ears of corn, sketching carts drawn by bullocks
and laden with grapes all the time talking
with Phillis and me, cousin Holman putting in
her not pertinent remarks, when suddenly he
said to Phillis,
"Keep your head still; I see a sketch! 1
have often tried to draw your head from mem-
ory, and failed; but I think I can do it now.
If I succeed I will give it to your mother.
You would like a portrait of your daughter as
Ceres, would you not, ma'am?"
A STORr OF ENGLISH LOVE. 125
" I should like a picture of her; yes, very
much, thank you, Mr. Hoklsworth ; but if you
put that straw in her hair" (he was holding
some wheat ears above her passive head, look-
ing at the effect with an artistic eye), "you'll
ruffle her hair. Phillis, my dear, if you're to
have your picture taken, go upstairs and brush
your hair smooth."
" Not on any account. I beg your pardon,
but I want hair loosely flowing."
He began to draw, looking intently at
Phillis; I could see this stare of his discom-
posed her her color came and went, her
breath quickened with the consciousness of
his regard; at last, when he said, "Please look
at me for a minute or two, I want to get in the
eyes," she looked up at him, quivered, and sud-
denly got up and left the room. He did not
say a word, but went on with some other part
of the drawing; his silence was unnatural, and
his dark cheek blanched a little. Cousin Hol-
man looked up from her work, and put her
spectacles down.
"What's the matter? Where is she <rone?"
126 COC'S/X PHILLIS.
Holdsworth never uttered a word, but went
on drawing, I felt obliged to say something;
it was stupid enough, but stupidity was better
than silence just then.
" ril go and call her," said I. vSo I went
into the hall, and to the bottom of the stairs;
but just as I was going to call Phillis, she came
down swiftlv with her bonnet on, and saying,
" I'm going to father in the five-acre," passed
out by the open "rector," right in front of the
house-place windows, and out at the little white
side-gate. She had been seen bv her mother
and Holdsworth, as she passed ; so there was
no need for explanation, onlv cousin Holman
and I had a long discussion as to whether she
could have found the room too hot, or what
had occasioned her sudden departure. Holds-
worth was verv quiet during all the rest of that
day; nor did he resume the portrait-taking by
his own desire, onlv at my cousin Holman's
request the next time that he came; and then
he said he should not require any more formal
sittings for onlv sucli a slight sketch as he felt
himself capable of making, Phillis was just
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 12)
the same as ever the next time I saw her after
her abrupt passing me in the hall. She never
gave any explanation of her rush out of the
room.
So all things went on, at least as far as my
observation reached at the time, or memory can
recall now, till the great apple-gathering of the
year. The nights were frosty, the mornings
and evenings were misty, but at mid-day all
was sunny and bright, and it was one mid-day
that both of us being on the line near Heath-
bridge, and knowing that they were gathering
apples at the farm, we resolved to spend the
men's dinner-hour in going over there. We
found the great clothes-baskets full of apples,
scenting the house, and stopping up the way;
and an universal air of merry contentment with
this, the final produce of the year. The yellow
leaves hung on the trees ready to flutter down
at the slightest puff of air; the great bushes of
Michaelmas daisies in the kitchen garden were
making their last show of (lowers. We must
needs taste the fruit off the different trees, and
pass our judgment as to their flavor; and we
128 COUSIN PHILLIS.
went away with our pockets stuffed with those
we liked best. As we had passed to the or-
chard, Holdsworth had admired and spoken
about some flower which he saw; it so hap-
pened he had never seen this old-fashioned
kind since the days of his boyhood. I do not
know whether he had thought anything more
about this chance speech of his, but I know I
had not^ when Phillis, who had been missing
just at the last moment of our hurried visit, re-
appeared, with a little nosegay of this same
flower, which she was tying up with a blade
of grass. She offered it to Holdsworth as he
stood with her father on the point of departure
I saw their faces. I saw for the first time an
unmistakable look of love in his black eyes; it
was more than gratitude for the little attention;
it was tender and beseeching passionate.
She shrank from it in confusion, her glance
fell on me; and, partly to hide her emotion,
partly out of real kindness at what might ap-
pear ungracious neglect of an older friend, she
flew off to gather me a few late-blooming
China roses. But it was the first time she
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 129
had ever done anything of the kind for
me.
We had to walk fast to be back on the Hne
before the men's return, so we spoke but Httle
to each other, and of course the afternoon was
too much occupied for us to have any talk. In
the evening we went back to our joint lodg-
ings in Hornby. There, on a table, lay a letter
for Holdsworth, which had been forwarded to
him from Eltham. As our tea was ready, and
I had had nothing to eat since morning, I fell
to directly without paying much attention to
my companion as he opened and read his
letter. He was very silent for a few minutes;
at length he said,
" Old fellow I I'm going to leave you!"
"Leave me I" said I. "How? When?"
" This letter ought to have come to hand
sooner. It is from Greathed, the engineer"
(Greathed was well known in those days; he
is dead lunv, and his name half-forgotten); "he
wants to see me about some business; in fact,
I may as well tell you, Paul, this letter con-
tains a very advantageous proposal for me to
9
130 COUSIN PHILLIS.
go out to Canada, and superintend the making
of a line there."
I was in utter cHsmay.
"But what will our company say to that?"
" Oh, Greathed has the superintendence of
this line, you know ; and he is going to be en-
gineer-in-chief to this Canadian line; many of
the shareholders in this company are going in
for the other, so I fancy they will make no dif-
ficulty in following Greathed's lead ; he says
he has a young man ready to put in my place."
I hate him," said I.
"Thank you," said Holdsworth, laughing.
" But you must not," he resumed, "for this
is a very good thing for me, and, of course, if
no one can be found to take my inferior work,
I can't be spared to take the superior. I only
wish I had received this letter a day sooner.
Every hour is of consequence, for Greathed
says they are threatening a rival line. Do you
know, Paul, I almost fanc}' I must go up to-
night? I can take an engine back to Eltham,
and catch the night train. I should not like
Greathed to think me lukewaim."
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 131
" But you'll come back?" I asked, distressed
at the thought of this sudden parting-.
" Oh, yes! At least I hope so. They may
want me to go out by the next steamer, that
will be on Saturday." He began to eat and
drink standing, but I think he was quite un-
conscious of the nature of either his food or
his drink.
"I will go to-night. Activity and readiness
go a long way in our profession. Remember
that, my boy! I hope I shall come back, but
if I don't, be sure and recollect all the words
of wisdom that have fallen from my lips.
Now where's the portmanteau? If I can gain
half an hour for a gathering up of mv things
in Eltliam, so much the better. I'm clear of
debt anyhow; and what I owe for my lodg-
ings vou can pav for me out of my quarter's
salary, due November 4th."
"Then you don't think vou will come
back? " I said, dcspondingly.
" I will come back sometime, never fear,"
said he kindly. " I mav be hack in a couple
of days, having been found incompetent for
132 COUSIN PHILLIS.
the Canadian work ; or I may not be wanted
to go out so soon as I now anticipate. Any-
how you don't suppose I am going to forget
you, Paul this work out there ought not to
take me above two years, and perhaps, after
that, we may be emploj^ed together again."
Perhaps! I had very Httle hope. The
same kind of happy days never returns. How-
ever, I did all I could in helping him; clothes,
papers, books, instruments; how we pushed
and struggled how I stuffed ! All was done
in a much shorter time than we had calculated
upon, when I had run down to the sheds to
order the engine. I was going to drive him to
Eltham. We sat ready for a summons. Holds-
worth took up the little nosegay that he had
brought away from the Hope Farm, and had
laid on the mantel-piece on first coming into
the room. He smelt at it, and caressed it
with his lips.
" What grieves me is that I did not know
that I have not said good-by to to them."
He spoke in a grave tone, the shadow of
the coming separation falling upon him at last.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 133
" I will tell them," said I. " I am sure they
will be very sorry." Then we were silent.
" I never liked any family so much."
" I knew you would like them."
"How one's thoughts change, this morn-
ing I was full of a hope, Paul." He paused,
and then he said,
" You put that sketch in carefully ? "
" That outline of a head ?" asked I. But I
knew he meant an abortive sketch of Phillis,
which had not been successful enough for him
to complete it with shading or coloring.
"Yes. What a sweet innocent face it is!
and yet so Oh, dear!"
He sighed and got up, his hands in his
pockets, to walk up and down the room in
evident disturbance of mind. He suddenly
stopped opposite to me.
" You'll tell them how it all was. Be sure
and tell the good minister that T was so sorry
noX. to wish him go()d-b\-, and to thank him
and his wife for all their kindness. As for
Phillis, please (iod in two vcars I'll be back
and tell her myself all in my heart."
134 COUSIN PHIL LIS.
"You love Phillis, then?" said 1.
"Love her! Yes, that I do. Who could
help it, seeing her as I have done? Her char-
acter as unusual and rare as her beauty ! God
bless her! God keep her in her high tranquil-
lity, her pure innocence. Two years! It is
a long time. But she lives in such seclusion,
almost like the sleeping beauty, Paul" (he
was smiling now, though a minute before I
had thought him on the verge of tears)
" but I shall come back like a prince f lom
Canada, and waken her to my love. I can't
help hoping that it won't be difficult, eh,
Paul?"
This touch of coxcombry displeased me a
little, and I made no answer. He went on,
half apologetically,
"You see, the salary they offer me is large;
and beside that, this experience will give me a
name which will entitle me to expect a still
larger in any future undertaking."
" That won't influence Phillis."
"No! but it will make me more eligible
in the eyes of her father and mother."
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 135
I made no answer.
" You give me your best wishes, Paul,"
said he, ahnost pleading. " You would like
me for a cousin ? "
I heard the scream and whistle of the en-
gine ready down at the sheds.
"Ay, that 1 should," I replied, suddenly
softened toward my friend now that he was
going away. " I wish you were to he married
to-morrow, and I were to be best man."
" Thank you, lad. Now for this cursed
portmanteau (how the minister would be
shocked); but it is heavy!" and off we sped
into the darkness,
lie only just caught the night train at
Eltham, and I slept, desolately enough, at my
old lodgings at Miss Dawson's, for that night.
Of course the next few days 1 was busier than
e\er, doing both his work and my own. Then
came a letter from him, vcrv short and affec-
tionate, lie was going out in the Saturday
steamer, as he had more than half expected;
and bv the following Alondav the man
wiio was to succeed him wouUl be down
136 COUSIN PHI I. LIS.
at Eltham. There was a P. S., with only
these words:
" My nosegay goes with me to Canada, but
I do not need it to remind me of Hope Farm."
Saturday came; but it was very hite before
I could go out to the farm. It was a frosty
night, the stars shone clear above me, and the
road was crisping beneath my feet. They
must have heard my footsteps before I got up
to the house. They were sitting at their usual
employments in the house-place when I went
in. Phillis' eyes went beyond me in their look
of welcome, and then fell in quiet disappoint-
ment on her work.
"And where's Mr. Holdsworth?" asked
cousin Holman, in a minute or two. " I hope
his cold is not worse I did not like his short
cough."
I laughed awkwardly; for I felt that I was
the bearer of unpleasant news.
" His cold had i?eed be better for he's
gone gone away to Canada!"
I purposely looked away from Phillis, as I
\hus abruptly told my news.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 137
" To Canada!" said the minister.
"Gone away!" said his wife.
But no word from Phillis.
"Yes!" said I. "lie found a letter at
Hornby when we got home the other night
when we got home from here; he ought to
have got it sooner; he was ordered to go up
to London directly, and to see some people
about a new line in Canada, and he's gone to
lay it down; he has sailed to-day. He was
sadly grieved not to have time to come out and
wish you all good-by; but he started for Lon-
don within two hours after he got that letter.
He bade me thank you most gratefully for all
your kindnesses; he was very sorry not to come
here once again."
Phillis got up and left the room with noise-
less steps.
"I am very sorry," said the minister.
" I am sure so am I!" said cousin Holman.
" I was real fond of that lad ever since I nursed
him last June after that bad fevev."
The minister went on asking me questions
respecting Holdsworth's futuie plans, and
138 COUSIN PHTLLIS.
brought out a large old-fashioned atlas, that he
might find out the exact places between which
the new railroad was to run. Then supper
was ready; it was always on the table as soon
as the clock on the stairs struck eight, and
down came Phillis her face white and set,
her dry 6yes looking defiance to me, for I am
afraid I hurt her maidenly pride by my glance
of sympathetic interest as she entered the room.
Never a word did she say never a question
did she ask about the absent friend, yet she
forced herself to talk.
And so it was all the next day. She was
as pale as could be, like one who has received
some shock ; but she would not let me talk to
her, and she tried hard to behave as usual. Two
or three times I repeated, in public, the various
affectionate messages to the family with which
I was charged by Holdsworth; but she took
no more notice of them than if my words had
been empty air. And in this mood I left her
on the Sal)bath evening.
My new master was not half so indulgent
as my old one. He kept up strict discipline as
A STOin' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 139
to hours, so that it was some time before I
could again go out, even to pay a call at the
Hope Farm.
It was a cold misty evening in November.
The air, even indoors, seemed full of haze; yet
there was a great log burning on the hearth,
which ought to have made the room cheerful.
Cousin Holman and Phillis w^ere sitting at the
little round table before the fire, working away
in silence. The minister had his books out on
the dresser, seemingly deep in study, by the
light of his solitary candle; perhaps the fear of
disturbing him made the unusual stillness of
the room. But a welcome was ready for me
from all; not noisy, not demonstrative that
it never was; my damp wrappers were taken
off, the next meal ^vas hastened, and a chair
placed for me on one side of the fire, so that 1
pretty much commanded a view of the room.
Mv eye caught on Phillis, looking so pale and
weary, and with a sort of aching tone (if I may
call it so) in her \f)ice. She was doing all the
accustomed things fulfilling small household
duties, but somehow differently I can't tell
140 COUSIN PHILLIS.
you how, for she was just as deft and quick in
her movements, only the Hght spring was gone
out of them. Cousin Holman began to ques-
tion me; even the minister put aside his books,
and came and stood on the opposite side of the
fireplace, to hear what waft of intelligence I
brought. I had first to tell them why I had
not been to see them for so long more than
five weeks. The answer was simple enough;
business and the necessity of attending strictly
to the orders of a new superintendent, who had
not yet learned trust, much less indulgence.
The minister nodded his approval of my con-
duct, and said,
"Right, Paul! ' Servants, obey in all things
your masters according to the flesh.' I have
had my fears lest you had too much license
under Edward Holdsworth."
"Ah," said cousin Holman, "poor Mr.
Holdsworth, he'll be on the salt seas by this
time!"
" No, indeed," said I, "he's landed. I have
had a letter from him from Halifax,"
Immediately a shower of questions fell thick
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 141
upon me. When? How? What was he
doing? How did he like it? What sort of a
voj-^age? etc.
" Many is the time we have thought of him
when the wind was blowing so hard; the old
quince tree is blown down, Paul, that on the
right hand of the great pear tree; it was blown
down last Monday week, and it was that night
that I asked the minister to pray in an especial
manner for all them that went down in ships
upon the great deep, and he said then that Mr.
Holdsworth might be already landed; but I
said, even if the prayer did not fit him, it was
sure to be fitting somebody out at sea, who
would need tlie Lord's care. Both Phillis and
I thought he would be a month on the
seas."
Phillis began to speak, but her voice did
not come rightly at first. It was a little higher
pitched than usual, when she said,
" We thought he would be a month if he
went in a sailing-vessel, or perhaps longer. I
suppose he went in a steamer?"
" Old Obadiah Grimshaw was more than
142 COUSIN PHILLIS.
six weeks in getting to America," observed
cousin Hoi man.
" I presume he cannot as yet tell how he
likes his new work?" asked the minister.
"No! he is but just landed; it is but one
page long. I'll read it to you, shall I ?
Dear Paul:
We are safe on shore after a rough passage.
Thought you would like to hear this, but homeward-
bound steamer is making signals for letters. Will
write again soon. It seems a year since I left Hornby.
Longer since I was at the farm. I have got my nose-
gay safe. Remember me lo the llolmans.
Yours,
E. H."
" That's not much, certainly," said the min-
ister. " But it's a comfort to know he's on
land these blowy nights."
Phillis said nothing. She kept her head
bent down over her work; but I don't think
she put a stitch in while I was reading the let-
ter. I wondered if she understood what nose-
gay was meant; but I could not tell. When
next she lifted up her face there were two
spots of brilliant color on the cheeks that had
been so pale before. After I had spent an
A STOR2' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 143
hour or two there, I was bound to return back
to Hornby. I told them I did not know when
I could come again, as we by which I mean
the company had undertaken the Hensley-
dale line; that branch for which poor Holds-
worth was surveying when he caught his fever.
"But you'll have a holiday at Christmas,"
said my cousin. " Surely they'll not be such
heathens as to work you then?"
"Perhaps the lad will be going home," said
the minister, as if to mitigate his wife's urgency;
but for all that, I believe he wanted me to
come. Phillis fixed her eyes on me with a
wistful expression, hard to resist. But, indeed,
I had no thought of resisting. Under my new
master I had no hope of a holiday long enough
to enable me to go to Birmingham and see my
parents with any comfort; and nothing could
be pleasanter to me than to find mvself at home
at my cousin's for a day or two, then. vSo it
was fixed tliat we were to meet in Hornby
Chapel on Christmas Day, and that I was to
accompany them home after service, and if
possible to stay over the next day.
144 COUSIN PHILLIS.
I was not able to get to chapel till late
on the appointed day, and so I took a seat near
the door in considerable shame, although it
really was not my fault. When the service was
ended, I went and stood in the porch to await
the coming out of my cousins. Some worthy
people belonging to the congregation clustered
into a group just where I stood, and exchanged
the good wishes of the season. It had just be-
gun to snow, and this occasioned a little delay,
and they fell into further conversation. I was
not attending to what was not meant for me to
hear, till I caught the name of Phillis Holman.
And then I listened; where was the harm?
"I never saw any one so changed!"
I asked Mrs. Holman," quoth another, " ' is
Phillis well? ' and she just said she had been
having a cold which had pulled her down; she
did not seem to think anything of it."
" They had best take care of her," said one
of the oldest of the good ladies; "Phillis comes
of a family as is not long-lived. Her mother's
sister, Lydia Green, her own aunt as was, died of
a decline just when she was about this lass's age."
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE, 145
This ill-omened talk was broken in upon
by the coming out of the minister, his wife
and daughter, and the consequent interchange
of Christmas compliments. I had had a shock,
and felt heavy-hearted and anxious, and hardly
up to making the appropriate replies to the
kind greetings of my relations. I looked ask-
ance at Phillis. She had certainly grown taller
and slighter, and was thinner; but there was a
flush of color on her face which deceived me
for a time, and made me think she was looking
as well as ever, I only saw her paleness after
we had returned to the farm, and she had sub-
sided into silence and quiet. Her grey eyes
looked hollow and sad ; her complexion was of
a dead white. But she Avent about just as
usual ; at least, just as she had done the last
time I was there, and seemed to have no ail-
ment; and I was inclined to think that my
cousin was right when she had answered the
inquiries of the good-natured gossips, and told
them that Phillis was suffering from the con-
sequences of a bad cold, nothing more.
I have said that I was to stay over the next
10
146 COUSIN PHILLIS.
day; a great deal of snow had come down, but
not all, they said, though the ground was cov-
ered deep with the white fall. The minister
was anxiously housing his cattle, and preparing
all things for a long continuance of the same
kind of weather. The men were chopping
wood, sending wheat to the mill to be ground
before the road should become impassable for a
cart and horse. My cousin and Phillis had
gone upstairs to the apple-room to cover up the
fruit from the frost. I had been out the
greater part of the morning, and came in about
an hour hcfoi^e dinner. To my surprise, know-
ing how she had planned to be engaged, I
found Phillis sitting at the dresser, resting her
head on her two hands and reading, or seeming
to read. She did not look up when I came in,
but murmured something about her mother
having sent her down out of the cold. It
flashed across me that she was crying, but I
put it down to some little spirt of temper; I
might have known better than to suspect the
gentle, serene Phillis of crossness, poor girl; I
stooped down and began to stir and build up
A STOR7' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 147
the fire, which appeared to have been neglected.
While my head was down I heard a noise
which made me pause and listen a sob, an
unmistakable, irrepressible sob. I started up.
"PhillisI" I cried, going toward her, with
my hand out, to take hers for sympathy with
her sorrow, whatever it was. But she was too
quick for me, she held her hand out of my
grasp, for fear of mv detaining her; as she
quickly passed out^of the house, she said,
"Don't, Paul! I cannot bear it!" and
passed me, still sobbing, and went out into the
keen, open air.
I stood still and wondered. What could
have come to Phillis? The most perfect har-
mony prevailed in the familv, and Phillis
especially, good and gentle as she was, was so
])cloved that if they had found out that her
linger ached, it would have cast a shadow over
their hearts. Had T done anvthing to vex her?
Xo: she was crving before I came in. I went
to look at Iicr book one of those imintelli-
gible Italian books. I could make neither
head nor tail of it. I saw some pencil-notes
148 COUSIN PHILLIS.
on the margin, in Holdsworth's handwrit-
ing.
Could that be it? Could that be the cause
of her white looks, her weary eyes, her wasted
figure, her struggling sobs? This idea came
upon me like a flash of lightning on a dark
night, making all things so clear we cannot
forget them afterward when the gloomy ob-
scurity I'eturns. I was still standing with the
book in my hand when I heard cousin Hol-
man's footsteps on the stairs, and as I did not
wish to speak to her just then, I followed Phil-
lis' example, and rushed out of the house.
The snow was lying on the ground; I could
track her feet by the marks they had made; 1
could see where Rover had joined her. I fol-
lowed on till I came to a great stack of wood
in the orchard it was built up against the
back wall of the outbuildings, and I recol-
lected then how Phillis had told me, that first
day when we strolled about together, that
underneath this stack had been her hermitage,
her sanctuary, when she was a child ; how she
used to bring her book to study there, or her
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 149
work, when she was not wanted in the house;
and she had now evidently gone back to this
quiet retreat of her childhood, forgetful of the
clue given me by her footmarks on the new-
fallen snow. The stack was built up very
high; but through the interstices of the sticks
I could see her figure, although I did not all at
once perceive how I could get to her. She
was sitting on a log of wood, Rover by her.
She had laid her cheek on Rover's head, and
had her arm around his neck, partly for a pil-
low, partly from an instinctive craving for
warmth on that bitter cold day. She was
making a low moan, like an animal in pain, or
perhaps more like the sobbing of the wind.
Rover, highly flattered by her caress, and also,
perhaps, touched by sympathy, was flapping
his heavy tail against the ground, but not
otherwise moving a hair, until he heard my
approach with his quick erected ears. Then,
with a short, alirupt bark of distrust, he sprang
up as if to leave his mistress. Both he and I
were immovably still for a moment. I was
not sure if what I longed to do was wise; and
150 COUSIN PHILLIS.
yet I could not bear to see the sweet serenity
of my dear cousin's life so disturbed by a suf-
fering which I thought I could assuage. But
Rover's ears were sharper than my breathing
was noiseless; he heard me, and sprang out
from under Phillis's restraining hand.
" Oh, Rover, don't you leave me, too," she
plained out.
"Phillis!" said I, seeing by Rover's exit
that the entrance to where she sat was to be
found on the other side of the stack. " Phillis,
come out! You have got a cold already; and
it is not fit for you to sit there on such a day as
this. You know how displeased and anxious
it would make them all."
She sighed, but obeyed; stooping a little,
she came out, and stood upright, opposite to
me in the lonely, leafless orchard. Her face
looked so meek and so sad that I felt as if I
ought to beg her pardon for my necessarily
authoritative words.
" Sometimes I feel the house so close," she
said; "and I used to sit under the wood-stack
A ST0R7^ OF ENGLISH LOVE. 15 1
when I was a chil(]. It was very kind of you,
but there was no need to come after me. I
don't catch cold easily."
"Come with me into this cow-house, Phillis.
I have got something to say to you; and I can't
stand this cold, if you can."
I think she would fain have run away
again; hut her fit of energy was all spent.
She followed me unwillingly enough that I
could see. The place to which I took her was
full of the fi'agrant breath of the cows, and
was a little warmer than the outer air. I put
her inside, and stood myself in the doorway,
thinking how I could best begin. At last I
plunged into it.
" I must see that you don't get cold for
more reasons than one; if you are ill, Ilolds-
woith will be so anxious and miserable out
there" (by which I meant Canada)
.She shot one j^enetrating look at me, and
then turned iicr face away with a slightly im-
patient movement. If she could have run away
then she would, but I held the means of exit
152 COUSIN PHILLIS.
in my own power. " In for a penny in for a
pound," thought I, and I went on rapidly, any-
how,
" He talked so much about you, just before
he left that night after he had been here, you
know and you had given him those flowers."
She put her hands up to hide her face, but
she was listening now listening with all her
ears.
" He had never spoken much about you be-
fore, but the sudden going away unlocked his
heart, and he told me how he loved you, and
how he hoped on his return that you might be
his wife."
" Don't," said she, almost gasping out the
word, which she had tried once or twice before
to speak ; but her voice had been choked.
Now she put her hand backward; she had
quite turned away from me, and felt for mine.
She gave it a soft lingering pressure; and then
she put her arms down on the wooden division,
and laid her head on it, and cried quiet
tears. I did not understand her at once, and
feared lest I had mistaken the whole case, and
A STOnr OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 53
only annoyed her. I went up to her. " Oh,
Phillis! I am so sorry I thought you would,
perhaps, have cared to hear it; he did talk so
feelingly, as if he did love you so much, and
somehow I thought it would give you pleas-
ure."
She lifted up her head and looked at me.
Such a look ! Her eyes, glittering with tears
as they were, expressed an almost heavenly
happiness; her tender mouth was curved with
raptiu-e her color vivid and hlushing; but as
if she was afraid her face expressed too much,
more than the thankfulness to me she was
essaying to speak, she hid it again almost im-
mediately. So it was all right then, and my
conjecture was well-founded! I tried to re-
member something more to tell her of what
he had said, but again she stopped me.
" Don't," she said. She still kept her face
covered and hidden. In half a minute she
added, in a very low voice, " Please, Paul, I
think I would rather not hear any more I
don't mean but what I have but what I am
very much obliged Only only, I think I
154 COUSIN PHILLIS.
would rather hear the rest from himself when
he comes back."
And then she cried a little more, in quite a
different way. I did not say any more, I
waited for her. By-and-by she turned toward
me not meeting my eyes, however ; and put-
ting her hand in mine just as if we were two
children, she said,
" We had best go back now I don't look
as if I had been crying, do I? "
" You look as if you had a bad cold," was
all the answer I made.
"Oh! but I am I am quite well, only
cold; and a good run will warm me. Come
along, Paul."
So we ran, hand in hand, till, just as we
were on the threshold of the house she
stopped
" Paul, 25lcase, we won't speak about that
asrain."
PART IV.
WHEN I went over on Easter day I
heard tlie chapel-gossips compliment-
ing cousin Ilolman on her daughter's blooming
looks, quite forgetful of their sinister prophecies
three months before. And I looked at Phillis,
and did not wonder at their words. I had not
seen her since the day after Christmas Day. I
had left the Hope Farm only a few hours after
I had told her the news which had quickened
her heart into renewed life and vigor. The
remembrance of our conversation in the cow-
house was vividly in mv mind as I looked at
her when her l)i-ight, healthy appearance was
rcniaikcd upon. As her eves met mine our
mutual recollections flashed intelligence from
one to the other. She turned awa\., her color
155
I $6 CO us/ IV PHILLIS.
heightening as she did so. She seemed to he
shy of me for the first few hours after our
meeting, and I felt rather vexed with her for
her conscious avoidance of me after my long
absence. I had stepped a little out of my
usual line in telling her what I did ; not that I
had received any charge of secrecy, or given
even the slightest promise to Holdsworth that
I would not repeat his words. But I had an
uneasy feeling sometimes when I thought of
what I had done in the excitement of seeing
Phillis so ill and in so much trouble. I meant
to have told Holdsworth when I wrote next to
him; but when I had my half-finished letter
before me I sat with my pen in my hand hesi-
tating. I had more scruple in revealing what
I had found out or guessed at of Phillis' secret
than in repeating to her his spoken words. I
did not think I had any right to say out to him
what I believed namely, that she loved him
dearly, and had felt his absence even to the in-
jury of her health. Yet to explain what I had
done in telling her how he had spoken about
her that last night, it would be necessary to
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 57
give my reasons, so I had settled within myself
to leave it alone. As she had told me she
should like to hear all the details and fuller
particulars and more explicit declarations first
from him, so he should have the pleasure of
extracting- the delicious tender secret from her
maidenly lips, I would not hetray my guesses,
my surmises, my all but certain knowledge of
the state of her heart. I had received two let-
ters from him after he had settled to his busi-
ness; they were full of life and energy; but in
each there had been a message to the family at
the Hope Farm of more than common regard;
and a slight but distinct mention of Phillis her-
self, showing that she stood single and alone in
his memory. These letters I had sent on to
the minister, for he was sure to care for them,
even supposing he had been unacquainted witli
their writer, because they were so clever and
so picturesquely worded that they brought,
as it were, a whiff of foreign atmosphere into
his circumscribed life. T used to wonder what
was the trade or business in which the minister
would not have thriven, mentally I mean, if it
158 COUSIN PHILLIS.
had so happened that he Iiad been called into
that state. He would have made a capital
engineer, that I know; and he had a fancy for
the sea, like many other land-locked men to
whom the great deep is a mystery and a fasci-
nation. He read law books with relish; and,
once happening to borrow De Lohne on the
British Constitution (or some such title), he
talked about jurisprudence till he was far be-
yond my depth. But to return to Holdsworth's
letters. When the minister sent them back he
also wrote out a list of questions suggested by
their perusal, which I was to pass on in my
answers to Holdsworth, until I thought of sug
gesting a direct correspondence between the
two. That was the state of things as regarded
the absent one when I went to the farm for my
Easter visit, and when I found Phillis in that
state of shy reserve toward me which I have
named Viefore. I thought she was ungrateful;
for I was not quite sure if I had done wisely in
having told her what I did I had committed
a fault, or a folly perhaps, and all for her sake;
and here was she, less friends with me than
A STO/?7' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 159
she had ever been before. This little estrange-
ment only lasted a few hours. I think that as
soon as she felt pretty sure of there being no
recurrence, either by word, look or allusion, to
the one subject that was predominant in her
mind, she came back to her old sisterly ways
with me. She had much to tell me of her own
familiar interests; how Rover had been ill, and
how anxious they had all of them been, and
how, after some little discussion between her
father and her, both equally grieved by the
sufferings of the old dog, he had been " remem-
bered in the household prayers," and how he
had begun to get better only the very next day
and then she would have led me into a conver-
sation on the right ends of praver, and on
special providences, and I know not what; only
I "jibbed" like their old cart horse and refused
to stir a step in that direction. Then we talked
about the different broods of chickens, and she
showed me the hens that were good mothers,
and told me the characters of all the poultry
with the utmost good faith; and in all good
faitii r listened, for I believe thei'e was a great
l6o COUSIN PHILLIS.
deal of truth in all she said. And then we
strolled on into the wood beyond the ash-
meadow, and both of us sought for early prim-
roses and the fresh green crinkled leaves. She
was not afraid of being alone with me after
the first day. I never saw her so lovely or so
happy. I think she hardly knew why she was
so happy all the time. I can see her now,
standing under the budding branches of the
gray trees, over which a tinge of green seemed
to be deepening day after day, her sun-bonnet
fallen back on her neck, her hands full of deli-
cate wood-flowers, quite unconscious of my
gaze, but intent on sweet mockery of sorfie bird
in neighboring bush or tree. She had the art
of warbling, and replying to the notes of differ-
ent birds, and knew their song, their habits and
ways, more accurately than anyone else I ever
knew. She had often done it at my request the
spring before; but this year she really gurgled
and whistled and warbled just as they did, out of
the very fulness and joy of her heart. She was
more than ever the very apple of her father's
eye; her mother gave her both her own share
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. l6l
of love and that of the dead child who had
died in infancy. I have heard cousin Holman
murmur, after a long dreamy look at Phillis,
and tell herself how like she was growing to
Johnnie, and soothe herself with plaintive inar-
ticulate sounds and many gentle shakes of the
head, for the aching sense of loss she would
never get over in this world. The old servants
about the place had the dumb loyal attachment
to the child of the land, common to most agri-
cultural laborers; not often stirred into activity
or expression. My cousin Phillis was like a
rose that had come to full bloom on the sunny
side of a lonely house, sheltered from storms.
I have read in some book of poetry,
A maid whom there were none to praise,
And very few to love.
And somehow those lines always reminded me
of Phillis; yet they were not true of her cither.
I never heard iier praised, and out of her own
household there were very few to love her;
but though no one spoke out their approbation,
she always did right in her parents' eyes, out
1 63 COUSIN PHILLIS.
of her natural simple goodness and wisdom.
Holdsworth's name was never mentioned be-
tween us when we were alone; but I had sent
on his letters to the minister, as I have said;
and more than once he began to talk about our
absent friend when he was smoking his pipe
after the day's work was done. Then Phillis
hung her head a little over her work and lis-
tened in silence.
"I miss him more than I thought for; no
offence to you, Paul. I said once his company
was like dram drinking; that was before I
knew him ; and perhaps I spoke in a spirit of
judgment. To some men's minds everything
presents itself strongly and they speak accord-
ingly, and so did he. And I thought in my
vanity of censorship that his were not true and
sober words; they would not have been if I
had used them, but they were so to a man of
his class of perceptions, I thought of the mea-
sure with which I had been meting to him
when Brother Robinson was here last Thurs-
day and told me that a poor little quotation T
was making from the Gcorrrics savored of
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 163
vain babbling and profane heathenism. He
went so far as to say that by learning
other languages than our own we w^ere flying
in the face of the Lord's purpose when He had
said, at the building of the Tower of Babel,
that He would confound their languages so that
they should not understand each other's speech.
As Brother Robinson was to me so was I to
the quick wits, bright senses and ready words
of Holdsworth."
The first little cloud upon my peace came
in the shape of a letter from Canada, in which
there were two or three sentences that troubled
me more than they ought to have done, to
judge merely from the words employed. It
was this: "I should feel dreary enough in this
out-of-the-way place if it were not for a friend-
ship I have formed with a French Canadian of
the name of Ventadour. He and his family
are a great resource to me in the If^ig evenings.
I never heard such delicious vocal music as
the voices of tliese Ventadour ])()vs and girls in
their part songs; and the foreign element re-
tained in their characters and manner of livinu"
164 CO us IN PHILTJS.
reminds me of some of the happiest days of my
life. Lucille, the second daughter, is curiously
like Phillis Holman." In vain I said to myself
that it was probably this likeness that made
him take pleasure in the society of the Venta-
dour family. In vain I told my anxious fancy
that nothing could be more natural than this
intimacy, and that there was no sign of its lead-
ing to any consequence that ought to disturb
me. I had a presentiment, and I was disturbed;
and I could not reason it away. I dare say my
presentiment was rendered more persistent and
keen by the doubts which would force them-
selves into my mind, as to whether I had done
well in repeating Iloldsworth's words to Phillis.
Her state of vivid happiness this summer was
markedly different to the peaceful serenity of
former davs. If in my thoughtfulness at
noticing this I caught her eye, she blushed and
sparkled all over, guessing that I was remem-
bering our joint secret. Her eyes fell before
mine, as if she could hardly bear me to see the
revelation of their bright glances. And yet T
considered again and comforted myself by the
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 165
reflection that, if this change had been anything
more than my silly fancy, her father or her
mother would have perceived it. But they went
on in tranquil unconsciousness and undisturbed
peace.
A change in my own life was quickly
approaching. In the July of this year my
occupation on the railway and its branches
came to an end. The lines were completed
and I was to leave shire, to return to Bir-
mingham, where there was a niche already
provided for me in my father's prosperous
business. But before I left the north it was
an understood thing among us all that I
was to go and pay a visit of some weeks at the
Hope Farm. My father was as much pleased
at this plan as I was; and the dear family of
cousins often spoke of things to be done and
sights to be shown me during this visit. My
want of wisdom in having told " that thing"
(under such ambiguous words T concealed the
injudicious confidence I liad made to Phillis)
was the only drawback to my anticipations of
pleasure.
1 66 COUSIN PHILLIS.
The ways of life were too simple at the
Hope Farm for my coming to them to make
the slightest disturbance. I knew my room,
like a son of the house. I knew the regular
course of their days, and that I was expected
to fall into it like one of the family. Deep
summer peace brooded over the place; the
warm golden air was filled with the murmur
of insects near at hand, the more distant sound
of voices out in the fields, the clear far-away
rumble of carts over the stone-paved lanes
miles away. The heat was too great for the
birds to be singing; only now and then one
might hear the wood pigeons in the trees
beyond the ash-field. The cattle stood knee
deep in the pond, flicking their tails about to
keep off the flies. The minister stood in the
hay-field, without hat or cravat, coat or waist-
coat, panting and smiling. Phillis had been
leading the row of farm servants, turning the
swathes of fragrant hay with measured move-
ment. She went to the end to the hedge,
and then, throwing down her rake, she came
to me with her free, sisterly welcome. " Go,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 167
Paul! " said the minister. " We need all hands
to make use of the sunshine to-day. ' Whatso-
ever thine hand findeth to do, do it with all thy
might.' It will be a healthy change of work
for thee, lad; and I find my best rest in
change of work." So off I went, a willing
laborer, following Phillis' lead; it was the
primitive distinction of rank; the boy who
frightened the sparrows off the fruit was the
last in our rear. We did not leave off till the
red sun was gone down behind the fir trees
bordering the common. Then we went home
to supper prayers to bed ; some bird sing-
ing far into the night, as I heard it through my
(jpen window, and the poultry beginning their
clatter and cackle in the earliest morning. I
had carried \\ hat luggage I immediately needed
with me from my lodgings and the rest was to
he sent bv the carrier. lie brought it to the
farm betimes that morning, and along with it
he brought a letter or two that had arrived
since I had left. I was talking to cousin IIol-
man about my mother's ways of making
bread, I reiiicnd)er; cousin Ilolman was ques-
1 68 COUSIN PHILLIS.
tioning me and had got me far beyond my
depth in the house-place, when the letters
were brought in by one of the men and
I had to pay the carrier for his trouble be-
fore I could look at them. A bill a Cana-
dian letter! What instinct made me so thank-
ful that I was alone with my dear unobservant
cousin? What made me hurry them away
into my coat pocket? I do not know. I felt
strange and sick and made irrelevant answers,
I am afraid. Then I went to my room, osten-
sibly to carry up my boxes. I sat on the side
of my bed and opened my letter from Holds-
worth. It seemed to me as if I had read its
contents before and knew exactly what he had
got to say. I knew he was going to be
married to Lucille Ventadour; nay, that he
was married; for this was the 5th of July and
he wrote word that his marriage was fixed to
take place on the 29th of June. I knew all the
reasons he gave, all the raptures he went into,
I held the letter loosely in my hands and looked
into vacancy, yet I saw a chaffinch's nest on
the lichen-covered trunk of an old apple tree
STORr OF ENGLISH I.OVE. 169
opposite my window, and saw the mother-bird
come fluttering in to feed her brood and yet
I did not see it, although it seemed to me after-
ward as if I could have drawn every fibre,
every feather. I was stirred up to action by
the merry sound of voices and the clamp of
rustic feet coming home for the mid-day meal.
I knew I must go down to dinner; I knew,
too, I must tell Phillis; for in his happy ego-
tism, his new-fangled foppery, Iloldsworth had
put in a P. S., saying that he should send wed-
ding cards to me and some other Hornby and
Eltham acquaintances, and "to his kind friends
at Hope Farm." Phillis had faded away to
one among several " kind friends." I don't
know how I got through dinner that day. I
remember forcing myself to eat and talking hard;
but I also recollect the wondering look in the
minister's eyes. He was not one to think evil
without cause; but many a one would have
taken me fcjr drunk. As soon as I decently
could I left tl'ie table, saying I would go out for
a walk. At fiist I must have tried to stun re-
flection by raj)id walking, for I had lost myself
170 COUSIN PIIILLIS.
on the high moorlands far beyond the familiar
gorse-covered common, before I was obliged
for very weariness to slacken my pace. I kept
wishing oh! how fervently wishing I had
never committed that blunder; that the one
little half-hour's indiscretion could be blotted
out. Alternating with this was anger against
Holdsworth; unjust enough, I dare say. I
suppose I stayed in that solitary place for a
good hour or more, and then I turned home-
ward, resolved to get over the telling Phillis at
the first opportunity, but shrinking from the
fulfilment of my resolution so much that when
I came into the house and saw Phillis (doors
and windows open wide in the sultry weather)
alone in the kitchen, I became quite sick with
apprehension. She was standing by the dresser,
cutting up a great household loaf into hunches
of bread for the hungry laborers who might
come in any minute, for the heavy thunder-
clouds were overspreading the sky. She
looked around as she heard my step.
" You should have been in the field, helping
with the hay," said she, in her calm, pleasant
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 171
voice. I had heard her as I came near the
house softly chanting some hymn-tune, and
the peacefuhiess of that seemed to be brooding
over her now.
" Perliaps I should. It looks as if it was
going to rain."
" Yes; there is thunder about. Mother has
had to go to bed with one of her bad head-
aches. Now you are come in "
" Phillis," said I, rushing at my subject and
interrupting her, " I went a long walk to think
over a letter I had this morning a letter from
Canada. You don't know how it has grieved
me." I held it out to her as I spoke. Her
color changed a little, but it was more the re-
flection of mv face, I think, than because she
formed any definite idea from my words. Still
she did not take the letter. I had to bid her
read it, before she cjuitc understood what I
wished. She sat down rather suddenly as she
received it into her hands; and, spreading it on
the dresser before her, she rested her forehead
on the palms of her hands, her arms supported
on the table, her figure a little averted, and her
172 COUSIN PHILLIS.
countenance thus shaded. I looked out of the
open window; my heart was very heavy.
How peaceful it all seemed in the farmyard!
Peace and plenty. How still and deep was the
silence of the house! Tick-tick went the un-
seen clock on the wide staircase. I had heard
the rustle once, when she turned over the page
of thin paper. She must have read to the
end. Yet she did not move, or say a word, or
even sigh. I kept on looking out of the win-
dow, my hands in my pockets. I wonder hovv
long that time really was? It seemed to me
interminable unbearable. At length I looked
around at her. She must have felt my look,
for she changed her attitude with a quick sharp
movement, and caught my eyes.
" Don't look so sorry, Paul," she said.
" Don't, please. I can't bear it. There is
nothing to be sorry for. I think not, at least.
You have not done wrong, at any rate." I
felt that I groaned, but I don't think she heard
me. "And he, there's no wrong in his mar-
rying, is there? I'm sure I hope he'll be
happy. Oh! how I hope it!" These last
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 173
words were like a wail; but I believe she was
afraid of breaking down, for she changed the
key in which she spoke, and hurried on, " Lu-
cille that's our English Lucy, I suppose?
Lucille Holdsworth! It's a pretty name; and
I hope I forget what I was going to say.
Oh! it was this. Paul, I think we need never
speak about this again; only remember you are
not to be sorry. You have not done wrong;
\ou have been very, t'crj' kind; and if I see
you looking grieved I don't know what I
might do, I might break down, you know."
I think she was on the point of doing so
then, but the dark storm came dashing down,
and the thunder-cloud broke right above the
house, as it seemed. Her mother, roused from
sleep, called out for Fhillis; the men and
women from the hayfield came running into
shelter, drenched through. The minister fol-
lowed, smiling, and not unpleasantly excited
l)v the war of elements; for, bv dint of hard
woik through the long summer's day, the
greater part of the hav was safely housed in
the barn in the Held. Once or twice in the
174 COUS/N PHILLIS.
succeeding bustle I came across Phillis, al-
ways busy, and, as it seemed to me, always
doing the right thing. When 1 was alone
in my own room at night I allowed my-
self to feel relieved; and to believe that
the worst was over, and was not so very
bad after all. But the succeeding days were
very miserable. Sometimes I thought it must
be my fancy that falsely represented Phillis to
me as strangely changed, for surely, if this idea
of mine was well-founded, her parents her
father and mother her own flesh and blood
would have been the first to perceive it. Yet
they went on in their household peace and con-
tent; if anything, a little more cheerfull}^ than
usual, for the " harvest of the first-fruits," as
the minister called it, had been more bounteous
than usual, and there was plenty all around in
which the humblest laborer was made to share.
After the one thunderstorm, came one or two
lovely serene summer days, during which the
hav was all carried; and then succeeded long
soft rains filling the ears of corn, and causing
the mown grass to spring afresh. The minis-
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 175
ter allowed himself a few more hours of re-
laxation and home enjoyment than usual
during this wet spell: hard earth-bound frost
was his winter holiday; these wet days, after
the hay harvest, his summer holiday. We sat
with open windows, the fragrance and the
freshness called out by the soft-falling rain
filling the house-place; while the quiet cease-
less patter among the leaves outside ought to
have had the same lulling effect as all other
gentle perpetual sounds, such as mill-wheels
and bubbling springs, have on the nerves of
happv people. But two of us were not happy.
I was sure enough of myself, for one. I was
worse than sure, I was wretchedly anxious
about Phillis. Ever since that day of the
thunderstorm there had been a new, sharp, dis-
c(jrdant sound to me in her voice, a sort of
jangle in her tone; and Vv.y restless eyes had no
quietness in them; and her color came and
went without a cause that I could find out.
The minister, ha]:)pv in ignorance of what
most concerned him, brought out his books,
his learned volumes and classics. Wliether he
176 COUSIN PHILLIS.
read and talked to Phillis, or to me, I do not
know ; but feeling by instinct that she was not,
could not be, attending to the peaceful details,
so strange and foreign to the turmoil in her
heart, I forced myself to listen, and if possible
to understand.
"Look here!" said the minister, tapping
the old vellum-bound book he held ; " in the
first Geo7-gic he speaks of rolling and irriga-
tion; a little further on he insists on choice of
the best seed, and advises us to keep the drains
clear. Again, no Scotch farmer could give
shrewder advice than to cut light meadows
while the dew is on, even though it involve
nightwork. It is all living truth in these days."
He began beating time with a ruler upon his
knee, to some Latin lines he read aloud just
then. I suppose the monotonous chant irri-
tated Phillis to some irregular energy, for I
remember the quick knotting and breaking of
the thread with which she was sewing. I
never hear that snap repeated now, without
suspecting some sting or stab troubling the
heart of the worker. Cousin Holman, at her
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 177
peaceful knitting, noticed the reason why Phil-
Hs had so constantly to interrupt the progress
of her seam.
" It is bad thread, I'm afraid," she said, in
a gentle sympathetic voice. But it was too
much for Phillis.
" The thread is bad everything is bad
I am so tired of it all!" And she put down
her work, and hastily left the room. I do not
suppose that in all her life Phillis had ever
shown so much temper before. In many a
family the tone, the manner, would not have
been noticed; but here it fell with a sharp sur-
prise upon the sweet, calm atmosphere of home.
The minister put down ruler and book, and
pushed his spectacles up to his forehead. The
mother looked distressed for a moment, and
then smoothed her features and said in an ex-
planatory tone, "It's the weather, I think.
Some people feci it different to others. It
always brings on a headache with me." She
got up to follow her daugliter, but half-way to
tlie door she thought better of it, and came
back to her seat. Good mother! she hoped
I?
178 COUSIN PHTLLIS.
the better to conceal the unusual spirit of tem-
per, by pretendin<2^ not to take much notice of
it. "Go on, minister," she said; "it is very
interesting what you are reading about, and
when I don't quite understand it, I like the
sound of your voice." So he went on, but
languidly and irregularly, and beat no more
time with his ruler to any Latin lines. When
the dusk came on, early that July night be-
cause of the cloudy sky, Phillis came softly
back, making as though nothing had happened.
She took up her w'ork, but it was too dark to
do many stitches; and she dropped it soon.
Then I saw how her hand stole into her
mother's, and how this latter fondled it with
quiet little caresses, while the minister, as fully
aware as I was to this tender pantomime, went
on talking in a happier tone of voice about
things as uninterestmg to him, at the time, I
verily believe, as they were to me; and that is
saying a good deal, and shows how much more
real what was passing before him was, even to
a farmer, than the agricultural customs of the
ancients.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 79
I remember one thing more, an attack
which Betty the servant made upon me one
day as I came in through the kitchen where
she was churning, and stopped to ask her for a
drink of buttermilk.
"I say, cousin Paul" (she had adopted the
family habit of addressing me generally as
cousin Paul, and always speaking of me in
that form), "something's amiss with our Phil-
lis, and I reckon you've a good guess what it
is. vShc's not one to take up wi' such as you"
(not complimentary, but that Betty never was,
even to those for whom she felt the highest re-
spect), "but Pd as lief yon Iloldsworth had
never come near us. So there you've a bit o'
my mind."
And a very unsatisfactory bit it was. I did
not know what to answer to the glimpse at the
ix'al state of the case implied in the shrewd
woman's speech; so I tried to put her off by
assuming sui^prise at her first assertion.
"Amiss with Phillis! I should like to
know whv \'ou think an\tbing is wiT)ng with
her. She l(Kjks as Ijlooniing as any one can do,"
l8o COUSIN PHILLIS.
"Poor lad! you're but a big child after all;
and you've likely never beared of a fever-flush.
But you know better nor that, my fine fellow!
so don't think for to put me off wi' blooms and
blossoms and such-like talk. What makes her
walk about for hours and hours o' nights when
she used to be abed and asleep? I sleep next
room to her, and hear her plain as can be.
What makes her come in panting and ready to
drop into that chair" nodding to one close
to the door "and it's 'Oh! Betty, some
water, please?' That's the way she comes in
now, when she used to come back as fresh and
bright as she went out. If yon friend o' yours
has played her false, he's a deal for t' answer
for; she's a lass who's as sweet and as sound as
a nut, and the very apple of her father's eye,
and of her mother's too, only wi' her she ranks
second to th' minister. You'll have to look
after yon chap, for I, for one, will stand no
wrong to our Phillis."
What was I to do, or to say? I wanted to
justify Holdsworth, to keep Phillis' secret,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. i8i
and to jDacify the woman, all in the same breath.
I did not take the best course, I'm afraid.
" I don't believe Holdsworth ever spoke a
word of of love to her in all his life. I'm
sure he didn't."
" Ay, ay ! but there's eyes, and there's hands,
as well as tongues; and a man has two o' th'
one and but one o' t'other."
"And she's so young; do you suppose her
parents would not have seen it ? "
"Well! if you ax me that, I'll say out
boldly, ' No.' They've called her ' the child '
so long ' the child ' is always their name for
her when thc\- talk on her between themselves,
as if never anvljody else had a ewe lamb be-
fore them that she's grown up to be a
woman under their very eyes, and they look
on her still as if she were in her long clothes.
And you ne'er heard on a man falling in love
wi' a babbv in long-clothes I"
"No?" said I, half laughing. But she
went on as grave as a judge.
" Ay I you see you'll laugh at the bare
152 COUSIN PIIILLIS.
thought on it and I'll be bound th' minister,
though he's not a laughing man, would ha'
sniggled at th' notion of falling in love wi' the
child. Where's Holdsworth off to?"
" Canada," said I, shortly.
" Canada here, Canada there," she replied,
testily. " Tell me how far he's off, instead of
giving me your gibberish. Is he a two days'
journey away ? or a three ? or a week ? "
"He's ever so far off three weeks at the
least," cried I in despair. "And he's either
married or just going to be. So there!" I ex-
pected a fresh burst of anger. But no; the
matter was too serious. Betty sat down and
kept silence for a minute or two. She looked
so miserable and downcast that I could not help
going on and taking her a little into my confi-
dence.
" It is quite true what I said. I know he
never spoke a word to her. I think he liked
her, but it's all over now. The best thing we
can do the best and kindest for her and I
know you love her, Betty "
"I nursed her in my arms; I gave her little
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1S3
brother his last taste o' earthly food," said
Betty, putting- her apron up to her eyes.
"Well! don't let us show her we guess
that she is grieving; she'll get over it the
sooner. Her father and mother don't even
guess at it, and we must make as if we didn't.
It's too late now to do anything else."
"I'll never let on; I know nought. I've
known true love mysel' in my day. But I
wish he'd been farred before he ever came near
this house, with his ' Please Betty ' this and
' Please Betty ' that, and drinking up our new
milk as if he'd been a cat; I hate such beguil-
ing wavs."
I thought it was as well to let her exhaust
herself in abusing the absent Holdsworth; if it
was shabby and treacherous in me I came in
for my punishment directly.
" It's a caution to a man how he goes about
beguiling. Some men do it as easv and inno-
cent as cooing doves. Don't you be none of
'em, mv lad. Not that you've got the gifts to
do it, either; vou're no great shakes to look at,
neither for figure nor yet for face, and it would
184 COUSIN PHILLIS.
need be a deaf adder to be taken in wi' your
words, though there may be no great harm in
'em." A lad of nineteen or twenty is not flat-
tered by such an out-spoken opinion even from
the oklest and ugHest of her sex; and I was
only too glad to change the subject by my re-
peated injunctions to keep Phillis' secret. The
end of our conversation was this speech of
hers:
" You great gaupus, for all you're called
cousin o' th' minister many a one is cursed
wi' fools for cousins d'ye think I can't see
sense except through your spectacles? I give
you leave to cut out my tongue and nail it up
on th' barn door for a caution to magpies, if I
let out on that jDoor wench, either to herself or
any one that is hers, as the Bible says. Now
you've heard me speak Scripture language per-
haps you'll be content and leave me my kitchen
to myself."
During all these days, from the 5th of July
to the 17th, I must have forgotten what Holds-
worth had said about sending cards. And yet
I think I could not have quite forgotten; but,
A STORl' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1S5
once having told Phillis about his marriage, I
must have looked upon the after consequences
of cards as of no importance. At any rate
they came upon me as a surprise at last. The
penny-post reform, as people call it, had come
into operation a short time before; but the
never-ending stream of notes and letters which
seem now to flow in upon most households had
not yet begun its course; at least in those remote
parts. There was a post-ofFice at Hornby ; and
an old fellow, who stowed away the few letters
in any or all his pockets, as it best suited him,
was the letter carrier to Ileathbridge and the
neighborhood. I have often met him in the
lanes thereabouts and asked him for letters.
Sometimes I have come upon him, sitting on
the hedge bank resting; and he has begged me
to read him an address, too illegible for his
spectacled eyes to decipher. When I used to
inquire if he had anvthing for me, or for Holds-
worth ( he was not particular to whom he gave up
the letters, so that he got rid of them somehow,
and could set off homeward) he would say he
thought he iiad, f(;r such was his invarialjle
i86 COUSIN PHILLIS.
safe form of answer; and would fumble in
breast - pockets, waistcoat - pockets, breeches -
pockets, and, as a last resource, in coat-tail-
pockets; and at length try to comfort me, if I
looked disappointed, by telling me " Hoo had
missed this toime, but was sure to write to-
morrow;" "Hoo" representing an imaginary
sweetheart.
Sometimes I had seen the minister bring
home a letter which he had found lying for
him at the little shop that was the post-office at
Heathbridge, or from the grander establish-
ment at Hornby. Once or twice, Josiah, the
carter, remembered that the old letter-carrier
had trusted him with an epistle to " Measter,"
as they had met in the lanes. I think it must
have been about ten days after my arrival at
the farm, and my talk to Phillis cutting bread-
and-butter at the kitchen dresser, before the
day on which the minister suddenly spoke at
the dinner-table, and said,
" By-the-by, I've got a letter in my pocket.
Reach me my coat here, Phillis." The weather
was still sultrv, and for coolness and ease the
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1S7
minister was sitting in his shirt-sleeves. " I went
to Ileathbridge about the paper they had sent
me, which spoils all the pens and I called at the
post-office, and found a letter for me, unpaid
and they did not like to trust it to old Zekiel!
Ay! here it is! Now we shall hear news of
Holdsworth I thought I'd keep it till we
were all together." My heart seemed to stop
beating and I hung my head over my plate,
not daring to look up. What would come of
it now? What was Phillis doing? How was
she looking? A moment of suspense and
then he spoke again. "Why! what's this?
Here are two visiting tickets with his name on,
no writing at all. No! it's not his name on
both. Mj{S. Holdsworth! The young man
has gone and got married." I lifted my head
at these w^ords; I could not help looking just
for one instant at Phillis. It seemed to me as
if slie had been keeping watch over my face
and wavs. Her face was brilliantly flushed;
her eyes were dry and glittering; but she did
not speak; her lips were set together almost as
if slie was pinching them tight to prevent
1 88 COUSIN P HILL IS.
words or sounds coming out. Cousin Holman's
face expressed surprise and interest.
"Well!" said she, "who'd ha' thought it!
He's made quick work of his wooing and wed-
ding. I'm sure I wish him happy. Let me
see " ^ counting on her fingers, "October,
November, December, January, February,
March, April, May, June, July at least
we're at the 28th, it is nearly ten months
after all, and reckon a month each way
off "
" Did you know of this news before?" said
the minister, turning sharp around on me, sur-
prised, I suppose, at my silence, hardly sus-
picious, as yet.
" I knew I had heard something. It
is to a French Canadian young lady," I went
on, forcing myself to talk. " Her name is
Ventadour."
"Lucille Ventadour!" said Fhillis, in a
sharp voice, out of tune.
" Then you knew too! " exclaimed the min-
ister.
We both spoke at once. I said, " I heard
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 1 89
of the probability of and told Phillis."
She said, " He is married to Lucille Ventadour,
of French descent; one of a large family near
St. Meurice, am not I right?" I nodded.
" Paul told me, that is all we know, is not it?
Did you see the Howsons, father, in Heath-
bridge?" and she forced herself to talk more
than she had done for several days, asking
many questions, trying, as I could see, to keep
the conversation off the one raw surface, on
which to touch was agony. I had less self-
command; but I followed her lead. I was not
so much absorbed in the conversation but what
I could sec that the minister was puzzled and
uneasy; though he seconded Phillis' efforts to
prevent her mother from recurring to the great
piece of news, and uttering continual exclama-
tions of wonder and siu^prise. Hut with that
one exception we were all disturbed out of our
natural equanimity, more or less. Every dav,
every hour, I was reproaching myself more
and moi'c for m\- bluiulciing ofliciousncss. If
only I liad licld niv foolisli tongue for tliat one
half-hoiu'; if only I had not been in such ini-
190 COUSIN PHILLIS.
patient haste to do something to rcHeve pain !
I could have knocked my stupid head against
the wall in my remorse. Yet all I could do
now was to second the hrave girl in her efforts
to conceal her disappointment and keep her
maidenly secret. But I thought that dinner
would never, never come to an end. I suffered
for her, even more than for myself. Until
now everything whicli I had heard spoken in
that happy household were simple words of
true meaning. If we had aught to say, we
said it; and if any one preferred silence, nay if
all did so, there would have heen no spasmodic,
forced efforts to talk for the sake of talking,
or to keep off intrusive thoughts or suspi-
cions.
At length we got up from our places, and
prepared to disperse; but two or three of us
had lost our zest and interest in the daily labor.
The minister stood looking out of the window
in silence, and when he roused himself to go
out to the field where his laborers were work-
ing, it was witli a sigh ; and he tried to avert
his troubled face as he passed us on his way to
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 191
the door. When he had left us, I caught
sight of Phillis' face, as, thinking herself un-
observed, her countenance relaxed for a mo-
ment or two into sad, woful weariness. She
started into briskness again when her mother
spoke, and hunied away to do some little er-
rand at her bidding. When we two w^ere
alone, cousin Holman recurred to Holdsworth's
marriage. She was one of those people who
like to view an event from every side of prob-
ability, or even possibility; and she had been
cut short from indulging herself in this way
during dinner,
" To think of Mi". Holdsworth's being mar-
ried! I can't get over it, Paul. Not but what
he was a very nice young man! I don't like
her name, though; it sounds foreign. Say it
again, my dear. I hope she'll know how to
take care of him, English fashion. He is not
strong, and if she does not sec that his things
are well aired, I should be afraid of the old
cough."
"He always said he was stronger than he
had evei' been before, after that fever."
193 COUSIN PHILLIS.
" He might think so, but I have my doubts.
He was a very pleasant young man, but he did
not stand nursing very well. He got tired of
being coddled, as he called it. I hope they'll
soon come back to England, and then he'll
have a chance for his health. I wonder, now,
if she speaks English; but, to be sure, he can
speak foreign tongues like anything, as I've
heard the minister say,"
And so we went on for some time, till she
became drowsy over her knitting, on the sultry
summer afternoon; and I stole away for a
walk, for I wanted some solitude in which to
think over things, and, alas! to blame myself
with poignant stabs of remorse.
I lounged lazily as soon as I got to the
wood. Here and there the bubbling, brawling
brook circled around a great stone, or a root of
an old tree, and made a pool; otherwise it
coursed brightly over the gravel and stones. I
stood by one of these for more than half an
hour, or, indeed, longer, throwing bits of wood
or pebbles into the water, and wondering what
I could do to remedy the present state of
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 193
things. Of course all my meditation was of
no use; and at length the distant sound of the
horn employed to tell the men far afield to
leave off work, warned me that it was six
o'clock, and time for me to go home. Then I
caught wafts of the loud-voiced singing of the
evening psalm. As I was crossing the ash-
field I saw the minister at some distance talking
to a man. I could not hear what they were
saying, hut I saw an impatient or dissentient (I
could not tell which) gesture on the part of
the former, who walked quickly away, and
was apparently absorhed in his thoughts, for
though he passed within twenty yards of me,
as both our paths converged toward home, he
took no notice of me. We passed the evening
in a way which was even worse than dinner-
time. The minister was silent, depressed, even
irritable. Poor cousin Ilolman was utterly
perplexed by tliis unusual frame of mind and
temj)er in her husband; she was not well her-
self, and was suffering from the extreme and
sultry heat, which made her less talkative than
usual. Phillis, usuallv so reverently tender to
13
194 COUSIN P If ILL IS.
her parents, so soft, so gentle, seemed now to
take no notice of the iniusual state of things,
but talked to me to anyone, on indifferent
subjects, regardless of her father's gravity, of
her mother's piteous looks of bewilderment.
But once my eyes fell upon her hands, con-
cealed under the table, and I could see the pas-
sionate, convulsive manner in which she laced
and interlaced her fingers perpetually, wringing
them together from time to time, wringing till
the compressed flesh became perfectly white.
What could I do? I talked with her, as I saw
she wished; her gray eyes had dark circles
around them, and a strange kind of dark light
in them; her cheeks were flushed, but her lips
were white and wan. I wondered that others
did not read these signs as clearly as I did.
But perhaps they did ; I think, from what came
afterward, the minister did.
Poor cousin Holman! she worshipped her
husband ; and the outward signs of his uneasi-
ness were more patent to her simple heart than
were her daughter's. After awhile she could
bear it no longer. She got up, and, softly lay-
A STOUT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 195
ing her hand on his broad stooping shoulder,
she said,--
" Wliat is the matter, minister? Has any-
tliing gone wrong? "
He started as if from a dream. PliilHs
Iiung her head, and caught her breath in terror
at the answer slie feared. But he, loolving
around witli a sweeping glance, turned his
broad, wise face up to his anxious wife, and
forced a smile, and took her hand in a reassur-
ing manner.
" I am blaming myself, dear. I have been
overcome with anger this aftei'noon. I scarcely
knew what I was doing, but I turned away
Timothy Cooper. He has killed the Ribstone
pippin at the corner of the orchard ; gone and
piled the quicklime for the mortar for the new
stable wall against the trunk of the tree
stupid fellow! killed the tree outright and it
loaded with apples!"
" And Ribstone pippins are so scarce! " said
sympathetic cousin Holman.
"Ay! Hut Timothy is but a half-wit; and
he has a wife and children. He had often put
196 COUSIN PHILLIS.
me to it sore, with his slothful ways, but I had
laid it before the Lord, and striven to bear with
him. But I will not stand it any longer, it's
past my patience. And he has notice to find
another place. Wife, we won't talk more
about it." He took her hand gently off his
shoulder, touched it with his lips; but relapsed
into a silence as profound, if not quite so mo-
rose in appearance, as before. I could not tell
why, but this bit of talk between her father
and mother seemed to take all the factitious
spirits out of Phillis. She did not speak now,
but looked out of the open casement at the
calm large moon, slowly moving through the
twilight sky. Once I thought her eyes were
filling with teais; but, if so, she shook them
off, and arose with alacrity when her mother,
tired and dispirited, proposed to go to bed im-
mediately after prayers. We all said good-
night in our separate ways to the minister, who
still sat at the table with the great Bible open
before him, not much looking up at any of our
salutations, but returning them kindly. But
when I, last of all, was on tlie point of leav-
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 197
ing the room, he said, still scarcely looking
up,
" Paul, you will oblige me by staying here
a few minutes. I would fain have some talk
with you."
I knew what was coming, all in a moment.
I carefully shut-to the door, put out my candle,
and sat down to my fate. lie seemed to find
some difficulty in beginning, for, if I had not
heard tliat he wanted to speak to me, I should
never have guessed it, he seemed so much ab-
sorbed in reading a chajiter to the end. Sud-
denly he lifted his head up and said,
" It is about that friend of yours. Holds-
worth! Paul, have you any reason for think-
ing he has played tricks upon Phillis?"
I saw that his eyes were blazing with such
a fire of anger at the ])are idea, that I lost all
my presence of mind, and only repeated,
"Played tricks on Phillis!"
"Ay! you know what I mean: made love
to her, courted her, made hei' thiidv that he
loved her, and then gone awa\- and left her.
Put it as you will, only give me an answer of
198 COUSIN PHILLIS.
some kind or another a true answer, I mean
and don't repeat my words, Paul."
He was shaking all over as he said this. I
did not delay a moment in answering him,
" I do not believe that Edward Holdsworth
ever played tricks on Phillis, ever made love
to her; he never, to my knowledge, made her
believe that he loved her."
I stopped; I wanted to nerve up my cour-
age for a confession, yet I wished to save the
secret of Phillis' love for Holdsworth as much
as I could; that secret which she had so striven
to keep sacred and safe, and I had need of
some reflection before I went on with what I
had to say.
He began again before I had quite arranged
my manner of speech. It was almost as if to
himself, "She is my only child; my little
daughter! She is hardly out of childhood; I
have thought to gather her imder my wings
for years to come; her mother and I would lay
down our lives to keep her from harm and
grief." Then, raising his voice, and looking
at me, he said, " Something has gone wrong
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 199
with the child; and it seemed to me to date
from the time she heard of that marriage. It
is hard to think that you may know more of
her secret cares and sorrows than I do but
perhaps you do, Paul, perhaps you do only,
if it he not a sin, tell me what I can do to
make her happy again ; tell me."
" It will not do much good, I am afraid,"
said I, " but I will own how wrong I did ; I
don't mean wrong in the way of sin, but in
the way of judgment. Iloldsworth told me
just before he went that he loved Phillis, and
hoped to make her his wife, and I told her."
There! it was out; all my part in it, at
least; and I set my lips tight together and
waited for the words to come. I did not see
his face; I looked straight at the wall opposite;
but I heard him once begin to speak and then
turn over the leaves in the book before him.
How awfullv still that room was! The air
outside, liow still it was! The open windows
let in no rustle of lca\es, no twitter or move-
ment of bii-(Is no soinid whatever. The clock
on the stairs the minister's hartl l)reathnitr
200 COUSIN PHILLIS.
was it to go on forever? Impatient beyond
bearing at the deep quiet, I spoke again,
I did it for the best, as I thought."
The minister shut the book to hastily and
stood up. Then I saw how angry he was.
"For the best, do you say? It was best,
was it, to go and tell a young girl what you
never told a word of to her parents, who trusted
you like a son of their own?"
He began walking about, up and down the
room close under the open windows, churning
up his bitter thoughts of me.
" To put such thoughts into the child's
head," continued he; "to spoil her peaceful
maidenhood with talk about another man's
love; and such love, too," he spoke scornfully
now "a love that is ready for any young
woman. Oh, the misery in my poor little
daughter's face to-day at dinner the misery,
Paul! I thought you were one to be trusted
vour father's son, too, to go and put such
thoughts into the child's mind; you two talking
together about that man wishing to marry her."
I could not help remembering the pinafore,
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 20I
the childish garment which PhilHs wore so
long, as if her parents were unaware of her
progress toward womanhood. Just in the same
way the minister spoke and thought of her now,
as a child, whose innocent peace I had spoiled
by vain and foolish talk. I knew that the
truth was different, though I could hardly have
told it now ; but, indeed, I never thought of
trying to tell; it was far from my mind to add
one iota to the sorrow which I had caused.
The minister went on walking, occasionally
stopping to move things on the table, or articles
of furniture, in a sharp, impatient, meaningless
way; then he began again,
"So young, so pure from the world! how
could you go and talk to such a child, raising
hopes, exciting feelings all to end thus; and
best so, even though I saw her poor piteous
face look as it did. I can't forgive you, Paul;
it was more than wrong it was wicked to
go and repeat that man's words."
His back was now to the door, and, in list-
ening to his low angry tones, he cHd not hear it
slowly open, nor did he see Phillis, standing
202 COUSIN PHILLIS.
just within the room, until he turned round;
then he stood still. She must have been half
undressed; but she had covered herself with a
dark winter cloak, which fell in long folds to
her white, naked, noiseless feet. Her face was
strangely pale; her eyes heavy in the black
circles around them. She came up to the table
very slowly and leaned her hand upon it, say-
ing mournfully,
"Father, you must not blame Paul. I could
not help hearing a great deal of what you were
saying. He did tell me, and perhaps it would
have been wiser not, dear Paul! But oh,
dear! oh, dear! I am so sick with shame! He
told me out of his kind heart, because he saw
that I was so very unhappy at his going
away."
She hung her head and leaned more heavily
than before on her supporting hand.
"I don't understand," said her father; but
he was beginning to understand. Phillis did
not answer till he asked her again. I could
have struck him now for his cruelty; but then
I knew all.
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 203
"I loved him, father!" she said at length,
raising her eyes to the minister's face.
" Had he ever spoken of love to you? Paul
says not!"
" Never." She let fall her eyes, and drooped
more than ever. I almost thought she would
fall.
" I could not have believed it," said he, in a
hard voice, yet sighing the moment he had
spoken. A dead silence for a moment. "Paul!
I was unjust to you. You deserved blame,
but not all that I said." Then again a silence.
I thought I saw Phillis' white lips moving, but
it might be the flickering of the candle-light
a moth had flown in through the open case-
ment and was fluttering around the flame; I
might have saved it, but I did not care to do so,
my heart was too full of other things. At any
rate, no sound was heard for long endless min-
utes. Then he said, " Phillis! did we not
make you happy here? Have we not loved
you enough ? "
She did not seem to understand the drift of
this question; she looked up as if bewildered.
204 COUSIN PlilLLIS.
and her beautiful eyes dilated with a painful,
tortured expression. He went on, without no-
ticing the look on her face; he did not see it,
I am sure.
"And yet you would have left us, left your
home, left your father and your mother, and
gone away with this stranger, wandering over
the world."
He suffered, too; there were tones of pain
in the voice in which he uttered this reproach.
Probably the father and daughter were never
so far apart in their lives, so unsympathetic.
Yet some new terror came over her, and it
was to him she turned for help. A shadow
came over her face, and she tottered toward
her father; falling down, her arms across his
knees, and moaning out,
" Father, my head ! my head ! " and then
she slipped through his quick-enfolding arms,
and lay on the floor at his feet.
I shall never forget his sudden look of
agony while I live; never! We raised her up;
her color had strangely darkened ; she was in-
sensible. I ran through the back-kitchen to
A STOin' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 205
the yard pump and brought back water. The
minister had her on his knees, her head against
his breast, almost as though she were a sleep-
ing child. He was trying to rise up with his
poor precious burden, but the momentary ter-
ror had robbed the strong man of his strength,
and he sank back in his chair with sobbing
breath.
".She is not dead, Paul! is she?" he whis-
pered, hoarse, as I came near him.
I, too, could not speak, but I pointed to the
quivering of the muscles around her mouth.
Just then cousin Ilolman, attracted by some
unwonted sound, came down. I remember I
was surprised at the time at her presence of
mind, she seemed to know so much better what
to do than the minister, in the midst of the sick
affright which blanched her countenance, and
made her trem])le all over. I think now that
it was the recollection of what had gone before;
the miseiable thought that possibly his words
had brought on this attack, whatever it might
be, that so unmanned the minister. We car-
ried her upstairs, antl wliilc llie women were
2o6 COUSIN PHILLIS.
putting her to bed, still unconscious, still slightly
convulsed, I slipped out, and saddled one of
the horses, and rode as fast as a heavy-trotting
beast could go, to Hornby, to find the doctor
there, and bring him back. He was out,
might be detained the whole night. I remem-
ber saying, "God help us all!" as I sat on my
horse, under the window, through which the
apprentice's head had appeared to answer my
furious tugs at the night-bell. He was a good-
natured fellow. He said,
" He may be home in half an hour, there's
no knowing; but I dare say he will. I'll send
him out to the Hope Farm directly he comes
in. It's that good-looking 3'oung woman, Hol-
man's daughter, that's ill, isn't it?"
Yes."
" It would be a pity if she was to go.
She's an only child, isn't she? I'll get up, and
smoke a pipe in the surgery, ready for the
governor's coming home. I might go to sleep
if I went to bed again."
" Thank you, you're a good fellow ! " and I
rode back almost as quickly as I came.
A STOR7' OF ENGLISH LOVE. 207
It was a brain fever. The doctor said so,
when he came in the early summer morning.
I beHeve we had come to know the nature of
the illness in the night-watches that had gone
before. As to hope of ultimate recovery, or
even evil prophecy of the probable end, the
cautious doctor would be entrapped into neither.
He gave his directions and promised to come
again; so soon, that this one thing showed his
opinion of the gravity of the case.
By God's mercy she recovered, but it was a
long, weary time first. According to pre-
viously made plans, I was to have gone home
at the beginning of August. But all such
ideas were put aside now, without a word being
spoken. T really think that I was necessary in
the house, and esioecially necessary to the min-
ister at this time; my father was the last man
in the world, under such circumstances, to ex-
pect me home.
I say, I think I was necessary in the house.
Every person (I had almost said every creature,
for all the duml) l)casts seemed t(^ know and
love Phillis) about the place went grieving and
2oS COUSIN PHIL LIS.
sad, as though a cloud was over the sun. They
did their work, each striving to steer clear of
the temptation to eye-service, in fulfilment of
the trust reposed in them by the minister. Foi-
the day after Phillis had been taken ill, he had
called all the men employed on the farm into
the empty barn ; and there he had entreated their
prayers for his only child; and then and there
he had told them of his present incapacity for
thought about any other thing in this world
but his little daughter, lying nigh unto death,
and he had asked them to go on with their
daily labors as best they could without his
direction. So, as I say, these honest men did
their work to the best of their ability, but they
slouched along with sad and careful faces, com-
ing one by one in the dim mornings to ask
news of the sorrow that overshadowed the
house; and receiving Betty's intelligence, always
rather darkened by passing through her mind,
with slow shakes of the head and a dull wist-
fulness of sympathy. But, poor fellows, they
were hardly fit to be trusted with hasty mes-
sages, and here my poor services came in.
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 209
One time I was to ride hard to Sir William
Bentinck's and petition for ice out of his ice-
house, to put on Phillis' head. Another it was to
Eltham I must go, by train, horse, anyhow, and
bid the doctor there come for a consultation,
for fresh symptoms had appeared, whicli Mr.
Brown, of Hornby, considered unfavorable.
Many an hour have I sat on the window-seat,
half-way up the stairs, close by the old clock,
listening in the hot stillness of the house for
the sounds in the sick-room. The minister
and I met often, but spoke together seldom.
He looked so old so old! He shared the
nursing with his wife; the strength that was
needed seemed to be given to them both in that
day. They required no one else about their
child. Every office about her was sacred to
them*, even Betty only went into the room for
the most necessary purposes. Once I saw
Phillis through the open door; her pretty
golden hair had been cut off long before; her
head was covered with wet cloths, and she was
moving it backward and forward on the pillow,
with weary, never-ending motion, her poor
H
2 10 COUSIN PHIL LIS.
eyes shut, trying in the old accustomed way to
croon out a hymn tune, hut perpetually hreak-
ing it up into moans of pain. Her mother sat
by her, tearless, changing the cloths upon her
head with patient solicitude. I did not see the
minister at first, but there he was in a dark cor-
ner, down upon his knees, his hands clasped
together in passionate prayer. Then the door
shut and I saw no more.
One day he was wanted and I had to sum-
mon him. Brother Robinson and another
minister, hearing of his " trial," had come to
see him. I told him this upon the stair-landing
in a whisper. He was strangely troubled.
" They will want me to lay bare my heart.
I cannot do it. Paul, stay with me. They
mean well ; but as for spiritual help at such a
time it is God only, God only, who can give
it."
So I went in with him. They were two
ministers from the neighborhood ; both older
than Ebenezer Holman ; but evidently inferior
to him in education and worldly position. I
thought they looked at me as if I were an
A STORY OF ENGLISH LOVE. 21 I
intruder, but remembering the minister's words
I held my ground, and took up one of poor
Phillis' books (of which I could not read a
word) to have an ostensible occupation. Pres-
ently I was asked to "engage in prayer," and
we all knelt down. Brother Robinson " leading,"
and quoting largely as I remember from the
Book of Job. He seemed to take for his text,
if texts are ever taken for prayers, "Behold
thou hast instructed many; but now it is come
upon thee, and thou faintest, it toucheth thee
and thou art troubled." When we others rose
up, the minister continued for some minutes on
his knees. Then he too got up, and stood
facing us for a moment, before we all sat
down in conclave. After a pause Robinson
began,
" We grieve for you. Brother Holman, for
your trouble is great. But we would fain have
you remember you are as a light set on a hill;
and the congregation are looking at you with
watchful eyes. We have l)ecn talking as we
came along on the two duties required of you
in this strait; Brother Hodgson and me. And
COUSIN PHILLIS.
we have resolved to exhort you on these two
points. First, God has given you the oppor-
tunity of showing forth an example of resigna-
tion." Poor Mr. Holman visibly winced at
this word. I could fancy how he had tossed
aside such brotherly preachings in his happier
moments; but now his whole system was un-
strung, and "resignation" seemed a term
which presupposed that the dreaded misery of
losing Phillis was inevitable. But good stupid
Mr. Robinson went on. " We hear on all
sides that there are scarce any hopes of your
child's recovery; and it may be well to bring
you to mind of Abraham ; and how he was
willing to kill his only child when the Lord
commanded. Take example by him. Brother
Holman. Let us hear you say, ' The Lord
giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be
the name of the Lord!'"
There was a pause of expectancy. I verily
believe the minister tried to feel it; but he
could not. Heart of flesh was too strong.
Heart of stone he had not.
" I will say it to my God, when He gives
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 213
me strength, when the day comes," he spoke
at last.
The other two looked at each other, and
shook their heads. I think the rehictance to
answer as they wished was not quite unex-
pected. The minister went on: "There are
hopes yet," he said, as if to himself. " God
has given me a great heart for hopiiig, and I
will not look forward beyond the hour."
Then turning more to them, and speaking
louder, he added : " Brethren, God will
strengthen me when the time comes, when
such resignation as you speak of is needed.
Till then I cannot feel it; and what I do not
feel I will not express; using words as if they
were a charm." He was getting chafed, I
could see.
He had rather put them out by these
speeches of his; ])ut after a short time and
some more sliakes of the liead, Robinson be-
gan again,
" .Secondh', we would liave vou listen to
llie \oice of the lod, and ask yourself for
what sins this trial lias l)een laid upon vou;
214 cousrN PiiiLiJS.
whether you may not have been too much
given up to your farm and your cattle; whether
this world's learning has not puffed you up to
vain conceit and neglect of the things of God ;
whether you have not made an idol of your
daughter? "
"I cannot answer I will not answer!"
exclaimed the minister. "My sins I confess to
God. But if they were scarlet (and they are
so in His sight," he added, humbly), "I hold
with Christ that afflictions are not sent by God
in wrath as penalties for sin."
Is that orthodox, Brother Robinson ? "
asked the third minister, in a deferential tone
of inquiry.
Despite the minister's injunction not to
leave him, I tliought matters were getting so
serious that a little homely interruption would
be more to the purpose than my continued
presence, and I went around to the kitchen to
ask for Betty's help.
" 'Od rot 'em!" said she; "they're always
a-coming at ill-convenient times; and they have
such hearty appetites, they'll make nothing of
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 215
what would have served master and you since
our poor lass has been ill. I've but a bit of
cold beef in th' house; but I'll do some ham
and eggs, and that'll rout 'em from worrying
the minister. They're a deal quieter after
they've had their victual. Last time as old
Robinson came, he was very reprehensible
upon master's learning, which he couldn't com-
pass to save his life, so he needn't have been
afeard of that temptation, and used words long
enough to have knocked a body down; but
after me and missus had given him his fill of
victual, and he'd had some good ale and a pipe,
he spoke just like any other man, and could
crack a joke with me."
Their visit was the only break in the long
weary days and nights. I do not mean that
no other inquiries were made. I believe that
all the neighbors hung about the place daily
till thev could learn from some out-comer how
Phillis Ilolman was. But tliey knew better
than to come up to the house, for the August
weather was so hot that every door and win-
dow was kept constantly open, and the least
2l6 COUSIN P HILL IS.
sound outside penetrated all through. I am
sure the cocks and hens had a sad time of it;
for Betty drove them all into an empty barn,
and kept them fastened up in the dark for sev-
eral days, with very little effect as regarded
their crowing and clacking. At length came
a sleep which was the crisis, and from which
she wakened up with a new faint life. Her
slumber had lasted many, many hours. We
scarcely dared to breathe or move during the
time; we had striven to hope so long, that we
were sick at heart, and durst not trust in the
favorable signs: the even breathing, the moist-
ened skin, the slight return of delicate color
into the pale, wan lips. I recollect stealing out
that evening in the dusk, and wandering down
the grassy lane, under the shadow of the over-
arching elms to the little bridge at the foot of
the hill, where the lane to the Hope Farm
joined another road to Hornby. On the low
parapet of that bridge I found Timothy Coop-
er, the stupid, half-witted laborer, sitting, idly
throwing bits of mortar into the brook below.
He just looked up at me as I came near, but
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 217
gave me no greeting, either by word or ges-
ture. He had generally made some sign of
recognition to me, but this time I thought he
was sullen at being dismissed. Nevertheless I
felt as if it would be a relief to talk a little to
some one, and I sat down by him. While I
was thinking how to begin, he yawned
weariedly.
" You are tired, Tim ? " said I.
" Ay," said he. " But I reckon I may go
home now."
" Have you been sitting here long?"
" Welly all day long. Leastways sin' seven
i' th' morning."
" Why what in the world have you been
doing? "
" Nought."
"Why have you been sitting here, then?"
" T' keep carts off." He was up now,
stretching himself and shaking his lubberly
limbs.
" Carts I what carts? "
"Carts as might ha' wakened yon wench!
It's Hornbv market-dav. I reckon yo're no
2i8 COUSIN PHILLIS.
better nor a half-wit yoursel'." He cocked his
eye at me as if he were gauging my intel-
lect.
" And have you been sitting here all day to
keep the lane quiet?"
" Ay. I've nought else to do. Th' minis-
ter has turned me adrift. Have yo' beared
how th' lass is faring to-night?"
" They hope she'll waken better for this
long sleep. Good-night to you, and God bless
you, Timothy," said I.
He scarcely took any notice of my words,
as he lumbered across a stile that led to his cot-
tage. Presently I went home to the farm.
Phillis had stirred, had spoken two or three
faint words. Her mother was with her, drop-
ping nourishment into her scarce conscious
mouth. The rest of the household were sum-
moned to evening prayer for the first time for
many days. It was a return to the daily habits
of happiness and health. But in these silent
days our very lives had been an unspoken
prayer. Now we met in the house-place, and
looked at each otlier with strange recognition
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 219
of the thankfulness on all our faces. We knelt
down; we waited for the minister's voice. He
did not begin as usual. He could not; he was
choking. Presently we heard the strong man's
sob. Then old John turned around on his
knees, and said,
" Minister, I reckon we have blessed the
Lord wi' all our .souls, though we've ne'er
talked about it; and maybe He'll not need
spoken words this night. God bless us all, and
keep our Phillis safe from harm! Amen."
Old Jolm's impromptu prayer was all we
had that night.
" Our Phillis," as he had called her, grew
better day by day from that time. Not quick-
ly; I sometimes grew desponding, and feared
that she would never be what she had been be-
fore; no more she has, in some ways.
I seized an early opportunity to tell the
minister about Timothy Cooper's unsolicited
watch on the bridge duiing the long summer's
day.
"(rod f()rgi\'e me!" said the minister. "I
have been too proud in my o\yn conceit. Tiie
220 COUSIN PHILLIS.
first steps I take out of this house shall be to
Cooper's cottage."
I need hardly say Timothy was reinstated
in his place on the farm ; and I have often
since admired the patience with which his
master tried to teach him how to do the easy
work which was henceforward carefully ad-
justed to his capacity.
Phillis was carried downstairs and lay for
hour after hour quite silent on the great sofa,
drawn up under the windows of the house-
place. She seemed always the same, gentle,
quiet and sad. Her energy did not return with
her bodily strength. It was sometimes pitiful
to see her parents' vain endeavors to rouse her
to interest. One day the minister brought her
a set of blue ribbons, reminding her with a
tender smile of a former conversation in which
she had owned to a love of such feminine
vanities. She spoke gratefully to him, but
when he was gone she laid them on one side
and languidly shut her eyes. Another time I
saw her mother brinsr her the Latin and Italian
A STORT OF ENGLISH LOVE. 221
books that she had been so fond of before her
iHness or, rather, before Holdsworth had gone
away. That was worst of all. She turned
her face to the wall and cried as soon as her
mother's back was turned. Betty was laying
the cloth for the early dinner. Her sharp
eyes saw the state of the case.
"Now, Phillis!" said she, coming up to the
sofa; "we ha' done a' wc can for you, and th'
doctors has done a' they can for you, and I
think the Lord has done a' He can for you, and
more than you deserve, too, if you don't do
something for yourself. If I were you, I'd
rise up and snuff the moon, sooner than break
your father's and your mother's hearts wi'
watching and waiting till it pleases you to fight
your own way back to cheerfulness. There,
I never favored long preachings, and I've said
my say."
A day or two after Phillis asked me, when
we were alone, if I thought my father and
mother would allow her to go and stay with
tliem for a couple of months. She blushed a
222
COUSIN PHILLIS.
little as she faltered out her wish for a change
of thought and scene.
"Only for a short time, Paul. Then we
will go back to the peace of the old days. I
know we shall; I can, and I will!"
THE END.
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