Title: Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, Fifth Series, No. 9, Vol. I, March 1, 1884
Author: Various
Language: English
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LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART, FIFTH SERIES, NO. 9, VOL. I, MARCH 1,
1884 ***



[Illustration:

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL

OF

POPULAR

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART

Fifth Series

ESTABLISHED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, 1832

CONDUCTED BY R. CHAMBERS (SECUNDUS)

NO. 9.—VOL. I.      SATURDAY, MARCH 1, 1884.      PRICE 1½_d._]



BIRDS OF SPRING.

BY RICHARD JEFFERIES, AUTHOR OF THE ‘GAMEKEEPER AT HOME,’ ETC.


The birds of spring come as imperceptibly as the leaves. One by one the
buds open on hawthorn and willow, till all at once the hedges appear
green, and so the birds steal quietly into the bushes and trees, till
by-and-by a chorus fills the wood, and each warm shower is welcomed
with varied song. To many, the majority of spring-birds are really
unknown; the cuckoo, the nightingale, and the swallow, are all with
which they are acquainted, and these three make the summer. The loud
cuckoo cannot be overlooked by any one passing even a short time in
the fields; the nightingale is so familiar in verse that every one
tries to hear it; and the swallows enter the towns and twitter at the
chimney-top. But these are really only the principal representatives of
the crowd of birds that flock to our hedges in the early summer; and
perhaps it would be accurate to say that no other area of equal extent,
either in Europe or elsewhere, receives so many feathered visitors.
The English climate is the established subject of abuse, yet it is the
climate most preferred and sought by the birds, who have the choice of
immense continents.

Nothing that I have ever read of, or seen, or that I expect to see,
equals the beauty and the delight of a summer spent in our woods and
meadows. Green leaves and grass, and sunshine, blue skies, and sweet
brooks—there is nothing to approach it; it is no wonder the birds are
tempted to us. The food they find is so abundant, that after all their
efforts, little apparent diminution can be noticed; to this fertile
and lovely country, therefore, they hasten every year. It might be
said that the spring-birds begin to come to us in the autumn, as early
as October, when hedge-sparrows and golden-crested wrens, larks,
blackbirds, and thrushes, and many others, float over on the gales from
the coasts of Norway. Their numbers, especially of the smaller birds,
such as larks, are immense, and their line of flight so extended that
it strikes our shores for a distance of two hundred miles. The vastness
of these numbers, indeed, makes me question whether they all come from
Scandinavia. That is their route; Norway seems to be the last land they
see before crossing; but I think it possible that their original homes
may have been farther still. Though many go back in the spring, many
individuals remain here, and rejoice in the plenty of the hedgerows.
As all roads of old time led to Rome, so do bird-routes lead to these
islands. Some of these birds appear to pair in November, and so have
settled their courtship long before the crocuses of St Valentine. Much
difference is apparent in the dates recorded of the arrivals in spring;
they vary year by year, and now one and now another bird presents
itself first, so that I shall not in these notes attempt to arrange
them in strict order.

One of the first noticeable in southern fields is the common wagtail.
When his shrill note is heard echoing against the walls of the
outhouses as he rises from the ground, the carters and ploughmen know
that there will not be much more frost. If icicles hang from the
thatched eaves, they will not long hang, but melt before the softer
wind. The bitter part of winter is over. The wagtail is a house-bird,
making the houses or cattle-pens its centre, and remaining about them
for months. There is not a farmhouse in the south of England without
its summer pair of wagtails, not more than one pair as a rule, for they
are not gregarious till winter; but considering that every farmhouse
has its pair, their numbers must be really large.

Where wheatears frequent, their return is very marked; they appear
suddenly in the gardens and open places, and cannot be overlooked.
Swallows return one by one at first, and we get used to them by
degrees. The wheatears seem to drop out of the night, and to be
showered down on the ground in the morning. A white bar on the tail
renders them conspicuous, for at that time much of the surface of the
earth is bare and dark. Naturally birds of the wildest and most open
country, they yet show no dread, but approach the houses closely. They
are local in their habits, or perhaps follow a broad but well-defined
route of migration; so that while common in one place, they are rare
in others. In two localities with which I am familiar, and know every
path, I never saw a wheatear. I heard of them occasionally as passing
over, but they were not birds of the district. In Sussex, on the
contrary, the wheatear is as regularly seen as the blackbird; and in
the spring and summer you cannot go a walk without finding them. They
change their ground three times: first on arrival, they feed in the
gardens and arable fields; next, they go up on the hills; lastly, they
return to the coast, and frequent the extreme edge of the cliffs and
the land by the shore. Every bird has its different manner; I do not
know how else to express it. Now, the wheatears move in numbers, and
yet not in concert; in spring, perhaps twenty may be counted in sight
at once on the ground, feeding together and yet quite separate; just
opposite in manner to starlings, who feed side by side and rise and
fly as one. Every wheatear feeds by himself, a space between him and
his neighbour, dotted about, and yet they obviously have a certain
amount of mutual understanding; they recognise that they belong to the
same family, but maintain their individuality. On the hills in their
breeding season they act in the same way; each pair has a wide piece
of turf, sometimes many acres. But if you see one pair, it is certain
that other pairs are in the neighbourhood. In their breeding-grounds
they will not permit a man to approach so near as when they arrive,
or as when the nesting is over. At the time of their arrival, any one
can walk up within a short distance; so again in autumn. During the
nesting-time the wheatear perches on a molehill, or a large flint, or
any slight elevation above the open surface of the downs, and allows no
one to come closer than fifty yards.

The hedge-sparrows, that creep about the bushes of the hedgerow as mice
creep about the banks, are early in spring joined by the whitethroats,
almost the first hedgebirds to return. The thicker the undergrowth
of nettles and wild parsley, rushes and rough grasses, the more the
whitethroat likes the spot. Amongst this tangled mass he lives and
feeds, slipping about under the brambles and ferns as rapidly as if
the way was clear. Loudest of all, the chiff-chaff sings in the ash
woods, bare and leafless, while yet the sharp winds rush between the
poles, rattling them together, and bringing down the dead twigs to the
earth. The violets are difficult to find, few and scattered; but his
clear note rings in the hushes of the eastern breeze, encouraging the
flowers. It is very pleasant indeed to hear him; one’s hands are dry
and the skin rough with the east wind; the trunks of the trees look
dry, and the lichens have shrivelled on the bark; the brook looks dark;
gray dust rises and drifts, and the gray clouds hurry over; but the
chiff-chaff sings, and it is certainly spring. The first green leaves
which the elder put forth in January have been burned up by frost, and
the woodbine, which looked as if it would soon be entirely green then,
has been checked, and remains a promise only. The chiff-chaff tells the
buds of the coming April rains and the sweet soft intervals of warm
sun. He is a sure forerunner. He defies the bitter wind; his little
heart is as true as steel. He is one of the birds in which I feel a
personal interest, as if I could converse with him. The willow-wren,
his friend, comes later, and has a gentler, plaintive song.

Meadow-pipits are not migrants in the sense that the swallows are; but
they move about and so change their localities, that when they come
back they have much of the interest of a spring-bird. They rise from
the ground and sing in the air like larks, but not at such a height,
nor is the song so beautiful. These, too, are early birds. They often
frequent very exposed places, as the side of a hill where the air is
keen, and where one would not expect to meet with so lively a little
creature. The pond has not yet any of the growths that will presently
render its margin green; the willow-herbs are still low, the aquatic
grasses have not become strong, and the osiers are without leaf. If
examined closely, evidences of growth would be found everywhere around
it; but as yet the surface is open, and it looks cold. Along the brook
the shoals are visible, as the flags have not risen from the stems
which were cut down in the autumn. In the sedges, however, the first
young shoots are thrusting up, and the reeds have started, slender
green stalks tipped with the first leaves. At the verge of the water, a
thick green plant of marsh-marigold has one or two great golden flowers
open. This is the appearance of his home when the sedge-reedling
returns to it. Sometimes he may be seen flitting across the pond, or
perched for a moment on an exposed branch; but he quickly returns to
the dry sedges or the bushes, or climbs in and out the willow-stoles.
It is too bare and open for him at the pond, or even by the brook-side.
So much does he love concealment, that although to be near the water
is his habit, for a while he prefers to keep back among the bushes. As
the reeds and reed canary-grass come up and form a cover—as the sedges
grow green and advance to the edge of the water—as the sword-flags lift
up and expand, opening from a centre, the sedge-reedling issues from
the bushes and enters these vigorous growths, on which he perches, and
about which he climbs as if they were trees. In the pleasant mornings,
when the sun grows warm about eleven o’clock, he calls and sings with
scarcely a cessation, and is answered by his companions up and down
the stream. He does but just interrupt his search for food to sing;
he stays a moment, calls, and immediately resumes his prying into
every crevice of the branches and stoles. The thrush often sits on a
bough and sings for a length of time, apart from his food, and without
thinking of it, absorbed in his song, and full of the sweetness of the
day. These restless sedge-reedlings cannot pause; their little feet
are for ever at work, climbing about the willow-stoles where the wands
spring from the trunk; they never reflect, they are always engaged.
This restlessness is to them a great pleasure; they are filled with
the life which the sun gives, and express it in every motion; they
are so joyful, they cannot be still. Step into the osier bed amongst
them gently; they will chirp—a note like a sparrow’s—just in front,
and only recede a yard at a time, as you push through the tall grass,
flags, and underwood. Stand where you can see the brook, not too near,
but so as to see it through a fringe of sedges and willows. The pink
lychnis or ragged robin grows among the grasses; the iris flowers
higher on the shore. The water-vole comes swimming past on his way
to nibble the green weeds in the stream round about the great branch
which fell two winters since and remains in the water. Aquatic plants
take root in its shelter. There, too, a moorhen goes, sometimes diving
under the bough. A blackbird flies up to drink or bathe, never at the
grassy edge, but always choosing a spot where he can get at the stream
free from obstruction. The sound of many birds singing comes from the
hedge across the meadow; it mingles with the rush of the water through
a drawn hatch—finches and linnets, thrush and chiff-chaff, wren and
whitethroat, and others farther away, whose louder notes only, reach.
The singing is so mixed and interwoven, and is made of so many notes,
it seems as if it were the leaves singing, the countless leaves, as if
they had voices.

A brightly coloured bird, the redstart, appears suddenly in spring,
like a flower that has bloomed before the bud was noticed. Red is his
chief colour, and as he rushes out from his perch to take an insect
on the wing, he looks like a red streak. These birds sometimes nest
near farmhouses in the rickyards, sometimes by copses, and sometimes
in the deepest and most secluded coombes or glens, the farthest places
from habitation; so that they cannot be said to have any preference,
as so many birds have, for a particular kind of locality; but they
return year by year to the places they have chosen. The return of the
corncrake or landrail is quickly recognised by the noise he makes in
the grass; he is the noisiest of all the spring-birds. The return of
the goatsucker is hardly noticed at first. This is not at all a rare,
but rather a local bird, well known in many places, but in others
unnoticed, except by those who feel a special interest. A bird must be
common and plentiful before people generally observe it, so that there
are many of the labouring class who have never seen the goatsucker,
or would say so, if you asked them. Few observe the migration of the
turtle-doves, perhaps confusing them with the wood-pigeons, which
stay in the fields all the winter. By the time the sap is well up in
the oaks, all the birds have arrived, and the tremulous cooing of the
turtle-dove is heard by those engaged in barking the felled trees.
The sap rises slowly in the oaks, moving gradually through the minute
interstices or capillary tubes of this close-grained wood; the softer
timber trees are full of it long before the oak; and when the oak is
putting forth its leaves, it is high spring. Doves stay so much at
this time in the great hawthorns of the hedgerows and at the edge of
the copses, that they are seldom noticed, though comparatively large
birds. They are easily seen by any who wish; the coo-coo tells where
they are; and in walking gently to find them, many other lesser birds
will be observed. A wryneck may be caught sight of on a bough overhead;
a black-headed bunting, in the hedge where there is a wet ditch and
rushes; a blackcap, in the birches; and the ‘zee-zee-zee’ of the
tree-pipit by the oaks just through the narrow copse.

This is the most pleasant and the best way to observe—to have an
object, when so many things will be seen that would have been
passed unnoticed. To steal softly along the hedgerow, keeping out
of sight as much as possible, pausing now and then to listen as the
coo-coo is approached; and then, when near enough to see the doves,
to remain quiet behind a tree, is the surest way to see everything
else. The thrush will not move from her nest if passed so quietly;
the chaffinch’s lichen-made nest will be caught sight of against the
elm-trunk—it would escape notice otherwise; the whitethroat may be
watched in the nettles almost underneath; a rabbit will sit on his
haunches and look at you from among the bare green stalks of brake
rising; mice will rustle under the ground-ivy’s purple flowers; a mole
perhaps may be seen, for at this time they often leave their burrows
and run along the surface; and indeed so numerous are the sights and
sounds and interesting things, that you will soon be conscious of the
fact, that while you watch one, two or three more are escaping you. It
would be the same with any other search as well as the dove; I choose
the dove because by then all the other creatures are come and are busy,
and because it is a fairly large bird with a distinctive note, and
consequently a good guide.

But these are not all the spring-birds: there are the whinchats,
fly-catchers, sandpipers, ring-ousels, and others that are occasional
or rare. There is not a corner of the fields, woods, streams, or hills,
which does not receive a new inhabitant; the sandpiper comes to the
open sandy margins of the pool; the fly-catcher, to the old post by the
garden; the whinchat, to the furze; the tree-pipit, to the oaks, where
their boughs overhang meadow or cornfield; the sedge-reedling, to the
osiers; the dove, to the thick hedgerows; the wheatear, to the hills;
and I see I have overlooked the butcher-bird or shrike, as indeed in
writing of these things one is certain to overlook something, so wide
is the subject. Many of the spring-birds do not sing on their first
arrival, but stay a little while; by that time, others are here. Grass
blade comes up by grass blade till the meadows are freshly green; leaf
comes forth by leaf till the trees are covered; and like the leaves,
the birds gently take their places, till the hedges are imperceptibly
filled.



BY MEAD AND STREAM.

BY CHARLES GIBBON.


CHAPTER XIV.—IN HARVEST-TIME.

Meanwhile the harvest-work on the lands of Ringsford Manor was
progressing rapidly—to the surprise of the neighbours, who had heard
that Mr Hadleigh could not obtain hands, owing to his craze about the
beer question. He did not obtain much sympathy in the district in this
attempted social revolution. It was known that he was not a teetotaler
himself; and most of the proprietors and farmers and all the labourers
took Caleb Kersey’s view, that apart from the question whether beer
was good or bad for them, this autocratic refusal of it to those who
preferred to have it was an interference with the liberty of the
subject. As he passed through the market-place, a band of labourers had
shouted in chorus the old rhyme: ‘Darn his eyes, whoever tries, to rob
a poor man of his beer.’

But in spite of this determined opposition, here was a strong troop
of men and women clearing the ground so fast that it looked as if the
Ringsford cutting and ingathering would be completed as soon as that of
any other farm. And the beer was not allowed on the field.

This was wonderful: but a greater wonder still was the fact that the
hands who had been so swiftly brought together were working under Caleb
Kersey himself—Caleb, the peasants’ champion, the temperance defender
of every man’s right to get drunk if he liked! There were mutterings
of discontent amongst his followers: there were whispers that he had
been heavily bribed to desert their cause; and those who had previously
deserted him, shook their heavy heads, declaring that they ‘knowed what
was a-coming.’

‘It ain’t fair on him—he ain’t acting square by me,’ Jacob Cone, the
Ringsford bailiff, had been heard to say in the _Cherry Tree_ taproom.
‘He comes and he takes my place, and does whatever master wants, when I
was a-trying to get master to let folk have their own way, as they’ve
been allays ’customed to.’

That was Jacob’s first and last grumble; for Caleb, hearing of it, took
him to every one of the hands, and each made the same statement:

‘We can do without the beer. We gave it up because we choose to, and
not because we’re forced to.’

For the rest, Caleb contented himself with saying simply: ‘I ain’t
working for Mr Hadleigh, and I wasn’t hired by him.’

‘Daresay he contracted with some un?’

A nod would be the response to his inquisitive friend; and Caleb
would proceed with his work as earnestly as if his life depended upon
accomplishing a given task within the day. His example inspired the
younger men with some spirit of emulation, and the women, old and
young, with admiration. The old stagers bluntly told him at the close
of the first day that they could not keep pace with him, and did not
mean to try.

‘Do the best you can, lads, and you’ll satisfy me,’ was all he said.

The whispers as to his treason to the cause of the ‘Union,’ which
floated about, and of which he was perfectly conscious, had no other
effect upon him than to make him labour with increased zeal. But he
smarted inwardly; for, like all popular leaders, he felt keenly the
signs of waning favour amongst his followers—felt them the more keenly
because he had so often, to his own serious detriment, proved his
integrity, and knew that he was faithful as ever to the cause he had
espoused.

It is doubtful if he would have been able to hold up so stoutly against
the swelling tide of unpopularity, if there had not been a compensating
influence upon him, strengthening his arm, although it did not always
keep his head cool, or his pulse steady.

Every morning, when the white mist was rising from the hollows, and
the trees appeared through it like shadows of themselves, whilst the
long grass through which he tramped to the field sparkled and glowed
around him, as the sun cleared the atmosphere, his way took him by the
gardener’s cottage. Every evening, when the harvest-moon was rising
slowly over the tree-tops, his way homeward took him again by the
cottage. He frequently caught a glimpse of Pansy, and generally had an
opportunity of exchanging greetings with her.

‘A fine morning,’ he would say; and he was under the impression that
he spoke with a smile, but always looked as solemn as if he were at a
funeral.

‘Yes, a fine morning,’ she would say with a real smile, and a tint on
her cheeks as if they reflected the radiance of the sun.

Then he would stand as if he had something more to say; but first he
had to look up at the sky; next strain his eyes over the rolling-ground
in the direction of the Forest, as if much depended upon his noting
the development of the trees through the mist; and again up at the
chimney-top, to observe which way the wind was blowing. The result of
all this observation being:

‘We’ll have a rare drying wind to-day.’

Then she, in a modified way, would go through the same pantomime and
answer pleasantly; ‘Yes, I think you will.’

And he would pass on, leaving that great ‘something’ he wanted to
say still unspoken. Yet Caleb was reputed to be a man possessed of a
special gift of speech. He showed no lack of it in the presence of any
one save Pansy.

‘I wonder what gars him come round this way ilka mornin’ and night,’
said Sam Culver one day to his daughter, looking at her suspiciously.
‘He’d be far sooner hame if he gaed round by the wood, like other folk.’

‘I cannot tell, father,’ she answered, her gypsy cheeks aglow: ‘maybe
he has to go up to the House for something.’

Sam shook his head thoughtfully: he did not relish the idea which had
entered it.

‘Kersey is a decent enough lad; but he is wildish in his notions of
things, and a’ the farmers round about are feared to trust him with ony
work. That’s no the right way to get through the world, my lass, and I
wouldna like to see you with sic a man.’

Pansy was a little startled by this plain way of suggesting why
Caleb chose to take the longest route to his work; and she proceeded
hurriedly to clear away the breakfast dishes. That evening, Caleb did
not see her as he passed the cottage.

Whatever Sam Culver’s opinion of Caleb Kersey might have been, it
underwent considerable modification, if not an entire change, as he
watched him work and the harvest rapidly drawing to a close under his
care. At anyrate, one evening, as Caleb was exchanging that stereotyped
greeting with Pansy, and was about to pass on, her father came up and
asked him in to supper.

‘It’s just a plate o’ porridge and milk, you ken; but you’re welcome,
if yer not ower proud to sup it. Mony’s the great man has sought
naething better.’

A little shyness on Caleb’s part was quickly overcome. He entered the
cottage, and was presently seated at the same table with Pansy. He was
amply compensated for all that he had suffered on account of yielding
to Madge’s request that he should take the Ringsford harvest in hand.

The gardener, since he had settled in the south, had, like many of his
countrymen, considerably loosened the Puritanical stays which he had
been accustomed to wear in the north. Indeed, it was said that he had
been discovered in the greenhouse on a Sabbath, when he ought to have
been in church. He still, however, felt the influence of old habits,
and so he said grace in this fashion:

‘Fa’ tae, fa’ tae, and thank the Lord for a guid supper.’

When the meal was finished, Sam took his guest out to see a new
geranium which he was cultivating; and then he revealed to him a fancy
which he had been cultivating as largely as his geranium.

‘I was thinking, Kersey, that you have been getting on bravely with the
harvest. Noo, if you could just manage to cut the last stook on the day
of Mr Philip’s dinner, it would be a real surprise to the folk at the
house, and a grand feather in your cap.’

‘I think it can be done,’ said Caleb quietly.

And it was done. On the evening fixed for the festival, the last sheaf
of the Ringsford grain was placed on the lawn in front of the Manor.
Whilst the guests were arriving, Madge had been told by Sam Culver that
this was to be done; so she went out with Uncle Dick and Mr Hadleigh to
congratulate Caleb on the good harvest he had gathered in, and to thank
him on her own part for having undertaken the task.

‘It’s the best job you have ever done, Caleb,’ cried Uncle Dick, giving
him a hearty slap on the shoulder. ‘Stick to this kind of thing, my
lad, and leave speechifying to them that cannot do any better.’

‘I am always ready to work,’ replied Caleb, avoiding the second part of
his well-wisher’s speech.

‘I offer you my sincere thanks, Kersey,’ said Mr Hadleigh in his
reserved way; ‘and it would please me to hear of anything I could do
for you.’

‘I am obliged to you.’

This ungraciously, but with a slight movement of the head, which might
be called half a nod.

‘You can bear it in mind. Had I known that you would be finished
to-day, I should have arranged for our harvest-home gathering to take
place this evening. I am sure that would have gratified Miss Heathcote
and my son.’

Another half-nod, and Caleb moved away.

The gong sounded. Mr Hadleigh gave his arm to Madge, and led her
towards the house.

As they entered the hall, they were met by the butler.

‘Do you know where Mr Philip is, sir?’ asked the man nervously. ‘Dinner
is quite ready, and he is not in the house; and nobody has seen him
since he started for town this morning.’

The butler’s anxiety was equally divided between the danger of having
the dinner spoiled and the question as to what had become of Philip.

‘Have you sent to his room?’

‘I have been there myself, sir. His things are all lying ready for him;
but he is nowhere about.’

Mr Hadleigh frowned.

‘This is very annoying. I told him he should not go to town to-day. He
has missed his train, I suppose. Give him a quarter of an hour, Terry,
and then serve dinner.... Excuse me, Miss Heathcote, one moment.’

He beckoned to a footman, who followed him into a small sideroom.

‘Send Cone to the station,’ he said in a low voice; ‘and bid him
inquire if there has been an accident on the line.’


CHAPTER XV.—THE BANQUET WAITS.

The explanation that Philip, having important business in town, had no
doubt been detained so long as to have missed his train, satisfied all
the guests except one. She, however, maintained as calm a demeanour
as Mr Hadleigh himself; and he regarded her at times with a curiously
thoughtful expression.

‘How brave she is,’ was his thought. ‘Can she have misgivings and he so
firm?’

Madge had misgivings; for Philip had told her that he had only to put
his seal on the despatch-box containing the important papers he was
to carry with him to Uncle Shield, and that he expected to return
early enough to call at Willowmere before going home. This, she had
suggested, would be waste of time, for she would be busy with her
elaborate toilet, and unable to see him. They both enjoyed the fun
of the idea that she should be so long engaged in dressing for this
important occasion as to leave no time to see him.

‘Well, I shall see Uncle Dick at anyrate, and of course he will be
a first-rate substitute. Indeed, now I think of it, he would be far
more interesting than a coquettish young person whose mind is wholly
absorbed in the arrangement of her bows and laces. He would tell me
all about the spread of the foot-and-mouth disease, and that would be
useful information at anyrate. Eh?’

They parted, laughing, and thus it was only a half-promise that he
should call. She was not surprised, therefore, when he did not appear.

When, however, the hour of dinner at the Manor arrived and he had
not yet returned, she felt that vague anxiety which is almost more
difficult to hide in the presence of others than the pain of some
definite calamity. She knew quite well that if he had only missed a
train, he would have telegraphed. But no one looking at her would have
suspected that her mind was disturbed by the least unhappy thought.

Miss Hadleigh only said: ‘That careless boy! To be late on such an
occasion as this when he knows that papa is always put out when
anybody is late’—and went on doing her best to remember her duty as
a hostess by not giving all her attention to ‘Alfred.’ Miss Caroline
only whispered in reply: ‘He is so stupid.’ As for Miss Bertha, she
was so busily engaged in conversation with one of her brother Coutts’s
friends, that she was unconscious of any disarrangement of the
evening’s programme.

So the party in the drawing-room buzzed like a hive of contented bees
on a warm summer day, and no one showed the slightest symptom of being
aware that the hour appointed for dinner had passed.

The vicar, Paul Havens, was a hale, sunny-faced man of about fifty
years, with bushy iron-gray hair and whiskers, and square muscular
frame. He was one of those men whose strong, kindly nature reflects
itself upon all who come in contact with him, and inspires them too
with a sense of strength. His genial presence was like fresh air in
the mansion or the peasant’s cot. He was no ‘sporting parson;’ but he
chatted with Crawshay with as much interest as if he were, about the
prospects of sport on the stubble this season, and how the pheasants
were likely to turn out when their time came. Then, as Dr Guy came up,
the vicar turned to little Mrs Joy in time to relieve her from utter
distraction at the cynical jokes and compliments of Coutts Hadleigh.
The latter delighted in bewildering this good lady, whose wits were not
particularly quick, although, with her husband, Dr Edwin Joy, she was
an enthusiastic social reformer.

‘My husband and I believe,’ she would say, with her little head bending
slightly to one side, ‘that want of thrift is at the bottom of all
the poverty and misery of the working-classes in town and country.
Now we endeavour to inculcate that great fact on all who come under
our influence; and Dr Joy, as my father’s partner, you know, has many
opportunities for speaking a word in season. And we always speak it!
Thrift, thrift, thrift, is our text; and I assure you we have succeeded
in making _some_ improvements in our district.’

And they did preach from this text with untiring enthusiasm; they
diligently perused every book and pamphlet published on the subject,
and their own affairs were continually in a hopeless muddle. They could
always see exactly what other people ought to do under any given
circumstances, and were always ready with the best advice; but they
were like children in dealing with the most ordinary difficulties of
their own lives. They were a good-natured couple, however, thoroughly
sincere and well meaning, so that these little idiosyncrasies amused
their friends, and did no harm to the working-people on whose behalf
they were specially exercised.

Mrs Joy’s father, Dr Guy, smiled grimly at the profound wisdom they
displayed in other people’s business, and the folly which invariably
cropped up whenever they had anything to do for themselves. At the
beginning of every year, they made a serious calculation of the least
amount their income was likely to be for the coming twelve months, and
resolved to live within it; they even determined to lay aside some
portion to meet contingencies. At the end of every year, they were
amazed to find how far they had exceeded their calculated expenditure,
and spent days in wondering how it could be.

‘Edwin, I cannot understand it,’ Mrs Joy would exclaim helplessly.

‘Neither can I,’ he would answer with a puzzled look at the figures
before him. Then, brightening up, he would say: ‘We must try again, my
dear.’

‘Yes, we must try again, dear,’ she would say, also brightening up, and
comforted by visions of the surplus which the mighty thrift would give
them next time.

Then they would make another serious calculation of ways and means,
and with light hearts, go on just as before, studying and preaching
the doctrines which, by some inscrutable twist in their natures,
they were unable to practise. They were so like children playing at
housekeeping, that although Dr Guy had to bear the consequences of
their mismanagement, he could not be angry with them long at a time.
Besides, he had consolation in two facts: first, that Fanny was his
only child, and would inherit everything he possessed; and second, that
Edwin Joy was really a clever surgeon, successful in his practice,
and much liked by his patients, notwithstanding his stupidity in
money matters. Indeed, the greater part of the practice rested on his
shoulders now, and nothing delighted him more than to be up to the eyes
in work.

Dr Guy belonged to the old school of country practitioners, and was as
much interested in agriculture as in physic. He had a small farm, in
the management of which he found agreeable occupation. So he took the
first opportunity of getting Crawshay into a corner to discuss the best
means of stamping out the rapidly spreading foot-and-mouth disease and
the advantages of ensilage.

Madge and Mrs Crawshay looking on, were well pleased to see that for
once Uncle Dick did not regret coming to Ringsford. But although Madge
found time to think of this, and to give intelligent attention to any
one who addressed her, she glanced often at the door expectantly.

At length the door opened, the butler entered, spoke a few words to his
master, and then withdrew. Mr Hadleigh immediately advanced to Madge.

‘I am glad to tell you, Philip has returned,’ he said in a quiet voice.

A flush of pleasure on her calm face expressed her gratitude for this
good news.

‘Then he was only detained—nothing has happened?’

‘I presume that nothing particular has happened; but we shall learn
presently from himself. His message to me was only to desire that we
should proceed to dinner at once, and allow him to join us in the
dining-room. So you must permit Coutts to take you down.’



CALLS BEFORE THE CURTAIN.


It has often been said that an actor exists upon the breath of
applause; and to a certain extent this is literally as well as
figuratively true; for during a long period of his early career he is
fated to undergo many hardships, and frequently finds himself playing
week after week for one of those unscrupulous ‘managers’ who can
hardly be got to pay their company their salaries, while revelling
in all possible comfort themselves. Indeed, a long chapter might be
written upon the sorrows incident to ‘the profession;’ but this would
be entirely beside our present purpose. Suffice it to remark, as an
introduction to our immediate theme, that no histrion ever yet trod the
boards who was unmindful of the public recognition of his talents; and
so soon as an opportunity offers in which to distinguish himself, and
his efforts are rewarded with a round of applause, from that moment
will he devote himself the more assiduously to his calling, by reason
of the enviable stimulus so received.

It has been placed upon record how Fanny Horton, a once celebrated
actress, won her first applause in a somewhat singular manner. During
her performance in a particular scene, she was loudly hissed, when,
advancing to the footlights, she asked: ‘Which do you dislike—my
playing or my person?’ ‘The playing, the playing!’ was the answer from
all parts of the house. ‘Well,’ she returned, ‘that consoles me; for my
playing may be bettered, but my person I cannot alter!’ The audience
were so struck with the ingenuity of this retort, that they immediately
applauded as loudly as they had the moment before condemned her; and
from that night she improved in her acting, and soon became a favourite
with the public.

It will scarcely be denied that applause is not only welcome, but
necessary to the actor; and even so great an artiste as Mrs Siddons
was susceptible to the force of this truth, though not so much in its
regard to professional adulation, as for personal convenience. ‘It
encourages,’ she was wont to say; ‘and better still, it gives time
for breath!’ On this account, as well as for other obvious reasons,
the managers of the Parisian theatres have organised a regular system
of hired applause, termed the _claque_; and this not only saves the
audience the trouble of applauding, but it is frequently the means
of influencing the success of a new production, while it affords
the actors engaged an opportunity of purchasing a too frequently
questionable notoriety by a monetary arrangement with the _claque_, or
at anyrate with the head of that department who grandiloquently styles
himself ‘the contractor for success.’

But it must not by any means be imagined that the _claque_ is a
modern institution. From the time of the ancient drama downwards,
the approbation of the spectators has always been eagerly courted by
the performers, and hired persons to applaud their acting regularly
attended the representations. Both the Greeks and the Romans made use
of the device. It has been well attested that Nero, the Roman emperor,
who at all times took an active part in the theatrical representations
of his day, enforced applause at the point of the sword; and Suetonius
tells us that one day when Nero sang the fable of _Atis and the
Bacchantes_, he deputed Burrhus and Seneca to incite the audience to
applaud. On one occasion, while the emperor was on the stage, singing
to his own accompaniment on the lyre, an earthquake shook the imperial
city; yet not one among that enormous assemblage dared so much as
attempt to flee from the danger, or leave his seat, fearing the summary
wrath of the tyrant, whose will held them so powerfully in bondage. At
another time, a poor woman fell asleep during the performance, and on
one of Nero’s soldiers descrying her situation, she narrowly escaped
with her life.

But the Romans could not give Nero the honour of a call before the
curtain, for the simple reason that drop-curtains were not then in use.
Indeed, the introduction of stage-curtains belongs to a comparatively
late period. In the reign of Elizabeth, we find that the theatres—or
playhouses, as they were termed—were of the most primitive kind. For
the most part the performances were conducted on a rude platform in
the London inn yards; while the few regular stationary playhouses were
little better furnished in the way of proper dramatic accessories.
The use of scenery is, of course, nowhere to be traced, and the only
semblance to a proscenium consisted of a pair of tapestry curtains,
which were drawn aside by cords when the performance began. The same
arrangement has also been found in all examples of the early Spanish,
Portuguese, and other continental theatres.

Among the earliest permanent English playhouses were ‘The Theatre’
and ‘The Fortune,’ neither of which, however, possessed a proper
drop-curtain. But ‘The Red Bull,’ another old theatre, had a
drop-curtain; and when, in the year 1633, that playhouse was
demolished, rebuilt, and enlarged, it was decorated in a manner almost
in advance of the time, the management particularly priding itself
upon ‘a stage-curtain of pure Naples silk.’ It was not until the year
1656 that the first attempt of Sir William Davenant to establish the
lyric drama in England brought with it the use of regular painted
scenery on our stage. As an introductory venture, and fully aware that
the performance of everything of a dramatic tendency had long been
prohibited throughout the country, he announced a miscellaneous kind of
entertainment, consisting of ‘music and declamation,’ which was duly
held at Rutland House in Charterhouse Yard, on the 23d of May. Thus
far encouraged, he immediately followed with the first genuine opera,
entitled _The Siege of Rhodes_, employing a libretto, music, costumes,
and five elaborate scenes. Further representations of opera were always
signalised by the use of scenery, and the example was naturally soon
followed by the drama, so soon as the altered condition of the times
had sufficiently permitted its revival. In place of a drop-curtain
of tapestry, silk, or other material, a painted scene also came into
fashion, on which was generally shown some incident in the opera
about to be enacted. The painted crimson curtain used in _The Siege
of Rhodes_ had upon it also a representation of the arms and military
trophies of the several nations which took part in this memorable siege.

Still, for all that, the green curtain retained its position in all
permanent theatres—and even in the puppet-shows, so popular in their
day—nor was it until quite recently that the more fashionable houses
thought proper to dispense with it altogether.

Touching upon stage-curtains of our own time, it will scarcely be
necessary to dilate upon the peculiarly constructed proscenium of the
present Haymarket Theatre, London, which is nothing more or less than
an elaborate picture in its gilt frame. The curtain of course forms the
picture, and no orchestra-pew being visible, the frame or proscenium
is continued on the lower side without interruption. The footlights
are not discovered until the rising of the curtain, and the ‘calls’
are necessarily responded to on the stage itself, for which purpose
the curtain is again drawn up. Perhaps the most interesting curtain
of the ordinary character is that now in use at New Sadler’s Wells
Theatre, which conveys to the eye a very perfect idea of that famous
‘musick-house’ on the banks of the New River in ‘merrie Islington,’ as
it appeared rather more than a hundred years ago.

Mr Henry Irving in his established dramatic home at the Lyceum Theatre
has always preferred to take his ‘calls’ on the stage itself; indeed,
he never appears in front of the curtain except on the night of the
opening or the termination of his season, which is always looked
forward to in London as an event. The production of _Romeo and Juliet_
afforded him an agreeable opportunity, however, of making a new
departure in his manner of responding to the congratulations of his
patrons—the living ‘Prologue’ opening the tragedy by stepping forward
from between a pair of truly magnificent curtains of yellow plush,
when, having recited his lines, the withdrawal of these curtains
unveiled the first scene representing ‘the public place’ at Verona. Mr
Irving, further, took occasion at the close of each act of leading Miss
Ellen Terry before the footlights in the same manner, thus obviating
the necessity of raising the curtain proper before these calls could be
replied to.

So much for theatrical curtains in general. We will now go on to
narrate several notable incidents connected with ‘Calls before the
Curtain.’

When David Garrick made his re-appearance at Drury Lane, after an
absence of two years during a provincial tour, the theatre was packed
from floor to ceiling, and the audience were quite beside themselves
with enthusiasm. The play was announced to be _Much Ado About Nothing_;
but, as the actor expected, he had first to show himself in front of
the curtain. He had prepared an address to the audience, which he
delivered previous to beginning the play. When he came upon the stage,
he was welcomed with three loud plaudits, each finishing with a huzza.

When R. W. Elliston was manager of the ‘Royal Circus,’ to which he
gave the present name of the ‘Surrey Theatre,’ he was one night called
before the curtain under rather exceptional circumstances. On that
occasion, an actor named Carles, who had long been a popular favourite
at that house, was absent, having unfortunately been arrested for debt
while on his way to the theatre, and another actor, possibly not very
much his inferior in regard to talent, had to be substituted. The
performance, however, had not long commenced, when the audience missed
their favourite, and called loudly for ‘Carles!’ Carles not appearing,
the uproar became general; and as soon as the curtain had fallen upon
the first act, the manager was summoned. Elliston duly appeared and
asked, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, what is your pleasure?’ But to all that
he said they cried only ‘Carles!’ Not yet aware of their intentions, he
exclaimed: ‘One at a time, if you please;’ and singling out a puny yet
over-energetic malcontent in the pit, he begged pardon of the audience,
saying: ‘Let me hear what _this_ gentleman has to say.’ Then addressing
the man: ‘Now, sir, I’ll attend to you _first_, if the rest of the
gentlemen will allow me.’

The man, as might be imagined, was not a little taken aback at this
remark; yet he managed to say: ‘Carles’ name is in the bill, and where
is he?’ At this, Elliston assumed a grave air, and folding his arms,
addressed the people as follows: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, with your
leave I will say a few words. I admit that Mr Carles’ name _is_ in
the bill; I do not wish to deny it; but’—here he assumed a decidedly
tragic tone—‘but are you to be reminded of the many accidents that may
intervene between the issuing of that bill and the evening’s fulfilment
of its promise? Is it requisite to remind the enlightened and thinking
portion of the public here assembled that the chances and changes of
human life are dependent upon circumstances, and not upon ourselves?’

Here all shouted: ‘Ay, ay; bravo!’

The manager, pointing to the man in the pit, went on: ‘And you, sir,
who are so loud in your demand for Mr Carles, cannot _you_ also
imagine that his absence may be occasioned by some sore distress,
some occurrence not within human foresight to anticipate or divert?
Cannot you picture to yourself the possibility of Mr Carles at this
moment lying upon a sick—nay, perhaps a dying bed, surrounded by his
weeping children and his agonised wife’ [Mr Carles was a bachelor!],
‘whose very bread depends upon the existence of an affectionate devoted
husband and father, and who _may_ be deprived of his exertions and
support for ever? Is it so _very_ difficult to imagine a scene like
this taking place at the very moment when you are calling for him so
imperiously to appear before you, selfishly desirous of your present
amusement and unmindful of his probable danger!’ Great and general
applause.

Inwardly, Mr Elliston felt struck at the success of his diplomacy,
especially as at this point the audience turned against the man who had
spoken, and joined their voices in cries of ‘Turn him out!’ to which
sentence the manager found it best to lend countenance; and having
given his permission, the unlucky ‘pitite’ was summarily ejected from
the theatre, and in a little while the performance was continued in
perfect order.

Calls for the author after the first representation of a new play are,
of course, frequent, the more especially when the work has given entire
satisfaction. In some instances, the audience summon that individual
to appear for no other purpose than to hiss him for the unskilfulness
of his performance; in which case, the author will most probably
retaliate with a speech wherein mention of ‘an organised opposition’
comes uppermost. Speaking of the former, some curious examples might
be noted. An author frequently announces, through the medium of the
manager, that he has betaken himself abroad, or, say, to Scotland,
fearing the result of his piece, whereas he may be quietly looking on
at the back of the pit, or has concealed himself behind the curtains
of a private box. In another case, the successful author will attempt
to make a speech, while bowing his acknowledgments, and signally fail,
retiring considerably more abashed than triumphant. But the crowning
episode to be narrated in this connection occurred some years ago at
one of the Dublin theatres, when one of the tragedies of Sophocles was
put on the stage. At the close of the performance, the ‘gods’ loudly
called for the author; whereupon the manager explained that as the
author had been dead more than two thousand years, he could not very
well appear. Nothing disconcerted, a very small gallery-boy called out:
‘Then let’s have his mummy!’

Dramatic, including operatic, artistes taking their benefits are almost
invariably honoured with a call before the curtain. On such occasions,
too, they may fairly be entitled to considerable latitude in various
ways, as, for instance, in their own selection of the programme for
that evening. Notwithstanding this, they should not suffer themselves
to infringe the ordinary regulations of the establishment. Not very
long ago, a star _prima donna_ of the very first magnitude, when taking
her benefit at the Imperial Opera, St Petersburg, found herself called
before the curtain more than twenty consecutive times. In the end
she occupied the centre of the stage, and addressed her enthusiastic
patrons a few words in the Russian language, then offered to show
her gratitude for their favours by singing them a song in their own
tongue. This was received with rapturous applause; but judge of her
surprise when, after retiring from the stage, the management fined her
two thousand francs for addressing the audience without permission!
The proceeds of her benefit were thus considerably reduced; and her
experience was only in one degree removed from that of the French
pantomimist and dancer, as related by Charles Kemble. This individual
was in the habit of taking a benefit at regular intervals, but always
with a loss. One night, however, he came before the curtain with a
beaming countenance, and after a polite bow, he acknowledged his thanks
in these terms: ‘Dear public, moche oblige; very good benefice; only
lose half a crown dis time. _I come again!_’

At an American theatre, an actor once took his benefit, and selected
as the play for the occasion, _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_. The company being
small, he found it necessary not only to subject several of the
incidental characters to being doubled—that is, one actor to sustain
two different characters in the same piece, rapidly changing his
costume from one to the other as occasion requires—but he also accepted
a double himself. His was that of Sambo with St Clair. St Clair
appears in one act, and Sambo in the next. Having won considerable
honours as the first individual, the actor, directly the curtain had
descended, hurried away to his dressing-room to prepare in all haste
his toilet and costume for Sambo. His face and hands had of course to
be blacked; and in the midst of this operation of applying the burnt
cork, the prompter entered his room to announce that the audience were
uproarious for him to appear before the curtain. ‘But I can’t,’ he
exclaimed; ‘it is impossible; I’m just making up for Sambo!’ Nothing,
however, would satisfy his patrons short of responding to his call; so
boisterously demanded, that, without his compliance, the performance
could not possibly proceed. At length our hero made his appearance.
But the audience were scarcely prepared to receive him in his altered
person, and, failing to recognise the metamorphosed St Clair in the
half-made-up Sambo, they shouted: ‘Go away! Who sent for you?’

Floral offerings are, of course, pleasantly associated with artistes’
benefits, and long may they so continue. The Emperor Nero, it is
said, always provided the Roman spectators with the thousand-and-one
bouquets which were thrown at his feet when he occupied the stage. But
bouquets _voluntarily_ offered are worthy to be prized very highly.
Not very long ago, Mr Edward Terry, when taking his leave of an Irish
audience, was honoured with the reception of a beautiful floral wreath,
which must have been infinitely more acceptable than that wreath
of _immortelles_ which some insulting ruffian cast at the feet of
Mademoiselle Favart, at a French theatre, a few years ago, in order
to indicate that her age had placed her beyond the power of playing
youthful parts. Had she been composed of the same metal as was the
actor in the following example, she would have enjoyed the opportunity
presented of paying the wretch back in his own coin. The story may be
accepted as true.

At the close of his own benefit performance, a certain favourite
comedian was called before the curtain at a theatre in Vienna. In the
midst of a shower of bouquets, some insulting individual threw a bunch
of vegetables on the stage. Very complacently the _bénéficier_, having
marked from what portion of the house it had proceeded, picked up the
article, and said: ‘We have here an interesting collection of carrots
and turnips. From my slight knowledge of natural history, I believe
this to be the proper food for asses; I therefore return it to its
owner, for who knows in these hard times he may be in want of such a
meal in the morning!’ With these words, he threw the object whence it
came; and the individual being discovered, was immediately expelled
from the theatre amid mingled hisses and applause.



THE MINER’S PARTNER.


IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER I.

There was a good deal of excitement in the mining camps at and near
Flume City, which, as every mining reader knows, was prominent among
the gold-diggings, and gold-washings also, of Colorado twenty years
ago. A meeting of miners was being held at the largest building in
the city—a wooden shed, which called itself a restaurant, at which
there were assembled some forty or fifty men, rough-looking, roughly
clad, and armed with revolver and knife, although no intention existed
of using such weapons at this gathering. The assembly, indeed, had
been called together with an object calculated to promote union and
comradeship—to assist in maintaining individual rights and to support
the law generally.

There was a president, of course, and his discourse, if not polished,
was much to the point. ‘I reckon,’ he said, after the meeting had
lasted perhaps an hour, and several speeches had been made, with a good
deal of shouting in the way of approval—‘I reckon that the citizens who
have spoken are about right. We have got some traitors among us, and
that’s where the worst comes in. It wasn’t by chance that any outside
loafer knew just when to steal the washings at the Long Placer last
night, or that Scotch Ned was sent away when the stamp-mill was broken.
We know who broke the mill—it was Bill Dobell. But who told him to come
in then? And who could have known that the Kentucky boys at the Long
Placer had got the best washings they had seen this year? Who could
have known that but one among us?’

The president said much more to this effect; but the remainder of his
speech, with the various orations which followed, need not be given, as
we have shown what was the nature of the excitement which had called
the miners into solemn conclave.

The language used was odd and quaint enough; to many it would have
sounded absurd in its phraseology; but no fault could have been found
with the matter. That was direct and shrewd, and evinced a strong
determination to put down the mischief which was making itself felt.

At the conclusion of a pithy harangue, in which the speaker urged
vigorous and brief proceedings against any one detected in such
unpardonable conduct, or reasonably suspected of complicity in
the crime—for robbing the troughs in a mining country is looked
upon as worse than murder, and is considered to be quite as bad as
horse-stealing—a voice exclaimed: ‘You air right, colonel!’

Every one started at the sound, and looked in the direction of the
speaker, who, having recently joined the meeting, with several others,
stood near the door. A dozen men whispered to their next neighbours:
‘Why, it is Rube Steele!’ And significant glances were exchanged.

‘I thought the other day there was Injuns lying around to thieve,’
continued the man; ‘so, when’——

‘You told us so, Rube,’ interrupted the president; ‘and the Kentucky
boys from the Long Placer came into committee on the subject; and their
troughs were robbed while they were gone. You know _that_, I estimate?’

A murmur as of approval of the president’s language ran through the
meeting. Rube noted this, but it did not disturb him. A peculiarly
sinister glance which he threw around him was perhaps natural to his
not greatly attractive features.

‘Yes; I expect I know that; and I expect that I know the tale about
the Injuns was a fraud,’ returned Rube. Something like a sarcastically
approving laugh ran through the meeting at these words; but the speaker
continued, without appearing to notice it: ‘That stranger from San
Francisco was the man who brought the news. You believed him; so did I.’

‘We believed you, Rube; you said the man was reliable,’ again
interrupted the president.

‘That is so,’ replied Rube. ‘He brought messages from leading Frisco
citizens, men known to me, and so I believed him. But I tell you he is
no good; and he has gone off with nigh upon three thousand dollars in
gold-dust which I trusted to him. He brought me an order from Ben, my
pardner, to say he was to have the dust; and though I did not like the
idea, I parted with it. And on coming into camp and asking Ben about
it, I find he never gave any order at all. And it is my belief that
this is the man who robbed the washings at the Kentucky boys’ placer.’

‘And where is Ben?’ began the president, who would probably have said
more, but that a man burst hastily into the saloon as the question was
asked, and shouted in answer: ‘Here! Here is Reuben Steele’s pardner.
Who wants him?’

‘We want you to hear what has been said,’ returned the president, ‘and
to give us your opinion about Californy Jones—the stranger who was
introduced by your pardner, but who, Rube now says, is the man who
robbed the placer, and has robbed him of three thousand dollars.’

‘I can’t say anything about the placer; maybe Rube knows more about
that than I do,’ replied the new-comer. ‘But the man has gone off with
three thousand dollars; that’s a sure fact; and as Rube gave him the
dust, it’s a sure fact too, he knows more about that than I do.’

‘I know no more than yourself,’ retorted Rube. ‘The man produced an
order from you. I could not tell that it was a forgery, and you have
always considered yourself as the boss of our outfit.’

‘Wal, gentlemen, and Mr President,’ continued Ben, ‘I can tell you
we have got murderers among us. Yes, gentlemen, that is so—real
cold-blooded murderers, that will lie in wait for honest, law-abiding
citizens and shoot them from behind rocks.’

A louder murmur ran through the assembly here; and the president asked
Ben his meaning.

‘My meaning is this,’ continued Ben. ‘You know I am clearing out, and
shall leave the camp in a day or two, so that we are realising all our
property, and this gold-dust was a part of what I am going East with.
So, I kinder felt like riled at losing it; and when my pardner told me,
as cool as maybe, that he concluded this stranger had vamoosed with my
dust’——

‘And mine!’ interjected Rube.

‘Wal, let every man speak of his own business,’ returned Ben, who was
evidently in anything but a good temper. ‘I say he had cleared out
with mine, anyhow; and I was riled, I tell you. But at that minute, I
saw, crossing the Mule Back Ridge, two men on horseback. The Ridge is
distant a good piece; but I could swear one was that stranger. “Send
some of the boys on,” said I to Rube. “I shall go through the cañon, so
shall meet them. They must cross there, if they don’t mean to go into
the mountains.” And I was sure they did not want the mountain road. So
I sot off. But I was waited for. There are as bad men left in the camp
as have gone out of it; and at the very entrance of the cañon, when
them horsemen must have been a good two miles away, some desperadoes
fired at me from behind a rock. There was more than one shot fired
at the same time, I know; and—see here, Mr President!—they took good
aim.’ As he said this, he threw off his long outer coat, and handed it
to the president, who, after a momentary examination, held it up, and
exhibited an unmistakable bullet-hole in the skirt.

‘That was near—that is a fact!’ exclaimed the president. ‘And what did
you do then?’

‘I turned back,’ said Ben. ‘It was of no use my pushing on alone, with
the rocks lined with murderers, with men who expected me, and were in
league with Californy Jones.’

‘And where was Rube?’ asked the president.

‘I was at the head of a bunch of boys of the right sort, seven or eight
of them, that I had looked up in the camp. They are here now: Long Sim,
Missouri Rob, Major Dimey and friend, with some others, all first-class
citizens.’

An assenting exclamation from each of those he named confirmed the
speaker.

‘I could not do more than that,’ continued Rube. ‘And when I found my
pardner on the return-track, it was no use my proceeding. I came back
to the city, and then right away to this here convention.’

‘I could have raised twice the force in a quarter of the time he took!’
cried Ben, intercepting some remark which it was evident the president
was about to make. ‘And why I did not come straight here was because
there was something in my tent I thought I had best look after. I had
left my tent in the care of a friend; but you don’t know what may
happen, with such loafers and scoundrels hanging around.’

‘Wal, fellow-citizens,’ said the president, ‘this convention didn’t
assemble, I reckon, to hear the rights of any difference between two
pardners; and it ain’t our business nohow. We are here to discuss the
existence of thieves and scallawags amongst us, and to decide upon the
beet means of clearing them out—that is all.’

Thus recalled to business, the assembly resumed its former discussion,
and the quarrel between the partners was not again openly referred
to; but it coloured all that was said, and many remarks upon it were
made in the body of the meeting. It was clear that public feeling was
much against Rube Steele, although a few of those present were his
partisans; but these latter appeared to consist only of the ‘bunch’
of citizens he had referred to, and were not altogether free from
suspicion themselves.

The gathering separated without having come to any formal resolve,
beyond appointing a few of their members to act in committee and to
decide what steps should be taken; but as it was notorious that each of
the chosen ones was a leader among the Regulators, as they were once
called—or the Vigilantes, to use their now familiar Spanish name—there
was probably more significance in their appointment than at first
appeared.

For that night at anyrate no fresh outrages were apprehended; the
thieves, whoever they were, possessed information too prompt and too
certain to allow them to venture on a renewal of their attempts during
the excitement and watchfulness which would prevail for a time in the
vicinity of Flume City.

In its neighbourhood, few persons were abroad after nightfall; it was
dangerous, indeed, for any one to approach a tent without making his
presence loudly known; a shot would probably be the first intimation
that he was trespassing on dangerous ground; while a few of the miners
possessed large and savage dogs, which would be loosed on hearing
a footstep near the tent. So those who had business which led them
abroad, were careful to confine themselves to the main street of Flume
City, if such a title could fitly be applied to the straggling avenue
which ran from end to end of the place. But spite of these drawbacks, a
few persons were moving in the environs of the city, and even at a good
distance beyond its boundaries, dark though the night was, and only
relieved from utter gloom by the starlight, for moon there was none.

One man who was going towards the town, stopped suddenly, as his quick
ear caught the sound of an approaching footstep, and with the caution
of one accustomed to frontier-life, drew himself up by the side of one
of the very few trees which remained in the vicinity of Flume City, so
that in the obscurity it was almost impossible for any passing eye to
detect him. The next instant a single man hurried by, passing between
the first comer and the starry sky, so that his figure was visible
with tolerable distinctness to the concealed watcher. This second man
did not look to the right or left—it would have been almost impossible
for him to detect the spy, had he done so—but went quickly on in a
direction which seemed to surprise the hidden observer.

‘What can he want there?’ exclaimed the latter, stepping from his
hiding-place, when the other had fairly gone past. ‘There ain’t no
shanties nor no living soul in that direction. It was surely Rube
Steele; and without he has gone crazy, I can’t fix anyhow why he should
be going towards the cañon after nightfall. I will see where he _is_
going; and if he has turned crazy, I may help him; and if not, I shall
find out what he wants in the mountain pass.

He was moving carefully but quickly in the direction the other had
taken, while he was muttering these disinterested sentiments; and
although he could only see the figure he followed, at intervals, when
the man climbed a ledge and stood for an instant in relief against
the sky, yet there was no difficulty in the pursuit. He could hear
his steps as they disturbed the loose stones which strewed the way,
and knew besides, that in the wild spot which they had reached, there
was no means of turning to the right or left, so that he could not
easily miss the chase. Presently the tread of the foremost man became
slower, and the pursuer, as a matter of course, moved at a slower rate
also—slower and slower still, until the former stopped, or only moved
about the same spot of ground.

‘What on airth is he going to do?’ muttered the other man. ‘It’s so
dark—for he is right under the shadow of Big Loaf Rock—that he can’t
see to dig, nor hunt after any buried—— Wal! that means something!’
This exclamation was caused by a low whistle which Rube Steele—if
indeed it were that person—suddenly gave. This was repeated, and
then answered from a distance. ‘I feel like seeing the end of this,’
continued the spy; ‘and I mean to.’

Acting upon this determination, he crawled carefully forward, for he
was too near to venture upon standing upright; and moreover, as the
answering whistle had proved that others were in the neighbourhood,
he was compelled to be on his guard against discovery from other
quarters. His quick ear soon caught the sound of an approaching tread,
and directly after, he heard words spoken. The spy’s curiosity was
now raised tenfold, especially as one of the two men who were now, as
he well knew, close to him, struck a match to light his pipe, and the
momentary flash showed him both figures in a brief glimpse. They were
unluckily placed with their backs towards him, so that he could not
see their features. He now felt confident that the first one was Rube
Steele, and that the second was not entirely unknown to him, but more
than this he could not tell.

This was terribly tantalising; and after the brief illumination of the
match, a more impenetrable darkness seemed to have settled upon the
pass and the rocks around; so, at all hazards, he resolved to get still
nearer. He was perhaps a little unguarded in his eagerness, and made
some slight noise, and it is certain that he had not calculated all the
hazards which might environ him, for a low fierce growl showed that a
dog was with the men, and the spy shuddered with horror as he heard the
sound.

‘Did you hear anything?’ said a harsh voice. ‘The dog would not have
growled like that, unless some one was hanging around.’

‘Nonsense!’ returned the other; and the voice was certainly the voice
of Rube Steele. ‘He heard a jack-rabbit, perhaps, or scented a polecat.
I reckon there ain’t a soul within a league of this cañon to-night. The
miners are all at Flume City, and the Indians have left the district
for more than a week past.’

‘You may be right,’ returned the first speaker. ‘But the dog is uneasy,
and I never knew him give them signs for game or venison; no, nor for
Injun neither. I should have said there was a white man near. But we
air a little too much in the line of the main pass to show a light,
which we must do. Come behind this rock.—Good dog!—mind ’em!’ These
last words were of course addressed to the dog, which had continued to
growl at intervals while his master was speaking, although the unseen
watcher had lain as still as death. The animal was apparently soothed
by being thus noticed, and probably followed the men, whose footsteps
could be heard as they removed to the proposed cover behind the Big
Loaf Rock.

The spy had no inclination to follow them to learn more, but crawled
carefully and noiselessly over the ground until he was at a safe
distance from the pass; so far, indeed, that he judged that even the
acute ears and scent of the dog could not detect him when he rose, and
hurried in the direction of the city as fast as his legs could carry
him.

On the outskirts, he knocked at the door of a shanty, a log-built hut
with earthen floor, such as the Mexican peasantry, and even their
betters, often reside in; and in answer to a gruff challenge from
within—for the inmates were in bed, or stretched on such pallets as
served for beds—he returned an answer which seemed to satisfy the
questioner, for after a little more gruff grumbling, the door was
opened, and he was admitted.

In answer to his inquiry, the gruff voice said: ‘No; nary drop of
anything but water; ye kin have that. Your voice sounds all of a
tremble, Absalom; and if ye don’t get shot over the cards or drown
yourself, I guess ye won’t last long as a miner, anyhow.’

Absalom, as he was called, hesitated for a moment, as though about to
say something in his defence, but eventually decided on making no reply
to this rather unpleasant speech, and threw himself down on a buffalo
skin which the other man pushed towards him. No further conversation
took place, and the shanty was as dark and silent as were the remainder
of the scattered dwellings on the outskirts of Flume City.



CURIOSITIES OF THE ELECTRIC LIGHT.


The first curiosity of the electric light was of course its discovery
in 1802 by Humphry Davy, then an assistant-lecturer at the Royal
Institution. With one of the new batteries which Volta had invented
two years before, Davy was surprised to get a brilliant white light
when the poles of the battery were joined through two pieces of carbon.
Later on, his astonishment was increased when he found how intensely
hot was this ‘arch’ of carbon light—the hottest known artificial
source. ‘Platinum,’ he wrote, ‘was melted as readily as is wax in the
flame of a common candle; quartz, the sapphire, magnesia, lime, all
entered into fusion.’ Even the diamond swells out into a black mass
in the electric arc, and carbon itself has been known to soften. Dr
Siemens, as is well known, utilised this fervent heat to fuse metals
in a crucible. With the arc from a dynamo capable of giving a light
of five thousand candles, he fused fifteen pounds of broken files in
as many minutes. Indeed, the temperature of the arc ranges from two
thousand to five thousand degrees Centigrade. Another curiosity of
the arc is that it can be shown in water or other liquids without
quenching. Liquids have a diffusive action on the light; and a globule
of fused oxide of iron between platinum wires conveying the current,
produces a very fine golden light. The fused plaster of Paris between
the carbons of the Jablochkoff candle also forms a brilliant source of
light in the arc; as does the marble separator which answers the same
purpose in the _lampe soleil_. Indeed, this white-hot marble, rendered
luminous by the arc, gives out a mellow radiance so closely resembling
sunshine as to give the lamp its name. Such a light is very suitable
for illuminating picture-galleries.

Electric light is also produced by sending a discharge through vacuum
tubes like those of Geissler; and the varied colours thus produced
are exceedingly pretty. Phosphorescent substances, too, such as the
sulphide of barium, or the platino-barium cyanide, become highly
luminous when inclosed in a tube and traversed by the electric current.

Besides the voltaic arc, we have now, however, another kind of electric
light—namely, the incandescence which is produced by sending the
current through a very slender filament of platinum wire or carbon
fibre inclosed in a glass bulb exhausted of air. Such are the lamps
of Swan, Edison, and others. These lamps have also their curious
features. The temperature of the filament is of course much lower than
the temperature of the arc. It is only about eighteen hundred degrees
Centigrade, for if it were higher, the delicate filament would be
dissipated into vapour which would condense like smoke on the cool
glass. With a platinum filament, the metal would ‘silver’ the interior
of the bulb. Curiously enough, when the copper ‘electrodes’ or wires
conveying the current inside the bulb to the filament of an Edison lamp
are accidentally dissipated by excess of current, the carbon thread
seems to shelter the glass from the copper shower, for Dr J. Fleming
has observed that there is always a blank line on the glass opposite
the filament, while all the rest is coated with a film of copper. When
the carbon itself is dissipated, this blank line is not seen, and
the whole interior of the bulb appears to be smoked. According to Dr
Fleming, this means that the molecules of copper move in straight lines
in the vacuum.

During the ordinary action of one of these lamps there is believed to
be a kind of molecular bombardment between the two sides of the carbon
filament, which is usually bent into a loop. This battery of atoms in
time disintegrates the filament near its junction with the wires where
it is severest, and a patent has recently been taken out by Mr Brush,
the well-known inventor, for the insertion of a mica screen between the
legs of the filament to shield them from the pellets.

The spectrum of the voltaic arc consists of the continuous ribbon
spectrum of the white-hot solid carbons, and certain bright lines
due to the glowing vapours of the arc. The light is rich in the
blue or actinic rays so productive of chemical action, and hence it
is, perhaps, that Dr Siemens found it so effective in forcing fruit
and flowers by night in lieu of the sun. It helps the development of
chlorophyl; and perhaps the electricity itself has also something to
do with assisting growth, apart from the light, for several French
experimenters have found that electrified soil and air seem to foster
plants better than unelectrified. It is remarkable, too, that young
bamboo shoots grow very rapidly after the thunderstorms which usher in
the Indian monsoons.

The power of the arc-light is something unrivalled by any other light,
whether of limelight or magnesium. At the famous Crystal Palace
Electrical Exhibition, an arc reputed to be one hundred and fifty
thousand candles in power was lighted every evening. The carbons
were stout copper-plated bars nearly two and a half inches thick.
This intensity of illumination renders the arc eminently adapted for
lighthouses and search-lights. Hence it is that the French government
have decided to light forty of their coast lighthouses by electricity,
and that most of our warships and military trains are now equipped
with electric lamps for searching purposes. We read that the fleet at
Alexandria explored the Egyptian forts by night with powerful arcs; and
that the French Admiral at Madagascar struck terror into the breasts of
the simple Hovas by a similar display.

For scouring the sea in search of torpedo-boats by night, or icebergs
and other ships during a fog, the value of the arc-light cannot be
too highly estimated. The screw-steamer _Faraday_, while engaged some
time ago in laying a new Atlantic cable, would have run right into an
iceberg in a Newfoundland fog, but for the electric beam projected
from her bows into the misty air ahead. Fog, however, has a peculiarly
strong quenching power over the arc-light, owing to the preference it
has for absorbing all the blue rays, and to the comparative poverty of
the orange colour. Hence it is that electric arc-lamps look so white
and dim in a dense fog. A single gas-jet can be seen about as far as a
two-thousand-candle arc-lamp. This is because the gas-jet is rich in
those red rays which penetrate a fog without being absorbed; whereas it
is poor in the blue rays which are quenched. For this reason, also, the
incandescence lamp is preferable to the arc for a misty atmosphere.

The incandescence lamp can also burn under water, and owing to its
pretty shape, its pure light, its cleanliness, and independence of
everything except wires to bring the current to it, is highly suitable
for decorative purposes. It particularly lends itself to ornamental
devices of a floral order; and a great variety of chandeliers and
brackets have now been designed representing various plants with leaves
of brass or filagree, and flowers composed of tinted crystal cups
containing the lamps. Fruit is also simulated by lamps of coloured
glass. For example, at a Drury Lane Christmas pantomime, both holly and
mistletoe berries were imitated by incandescence lamps of crimson and
opal glass. Artificial lemon-trees, with fruit consisting of yellow
lamps, also make a pretty dining-table ornament. So do vases of roses
with incandescence lamps hid in them, an ornament devised by Mr J.
W. Swan for his residence at Bromley. Aquaria, too, can be lighted
internally by incandescence bulbs, and it would be very pretty to see
the lamps lying beside growing sea-anemones, whose expansion might seem
the more lovely under the stimulus of their rays.

A Christmas-tree looks very pretty when lighted by a hundred
incandescence lamps; the first attempted being in all probability that
in the Swedish section of the Electrical Exhibition held in Paris
two years ago. At the Vienna Electrical Exhibition there are, while
we write, some novel effects of electric illumination; for instance,
there is a hall lighted entirely from the ceiling by electricity. The
ceiling is painted a deep blue to represent the sky, and studded with
innumerable stars in the shape of incandescence lamps. This reminds
us of the allegorical sun produced in the window of Mr Mayal, the
well-known photographer, by means of the same illuminant.

From its cool brightness and safety from fire, the incandescence
light is very well adapted for theatres, and there are now several
opera-houses and theatres lighted by it. The Savoy Theatre, London; the
Princess’s Theatre, Manchester; the Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, &c.,
are all lit by incandescence lamps owing to its brilliance as compared
with gas. Some change was necessary in the making-up of the actors
and actresses, and the painting of the scenes; but at the New Grand
Theatre, Islington, the changes have been avoided by the use of yellow
glass bulbs which soften the light. At the Electrical Exhibition,
Vienna, there is a model theatre with numerous scenic effects never
before attempted by gas; and moonlight, sunrise, sunset, twilight,
and night are all imitated with great fidelity. In the drama of _Love
and Money_ at the Adelphi Theatre, a flood of daylight bursting in
upon some entombed miners through a hole cut in the coal by a rescuing
party was very well imitated by a beam of ‘arc’ light. The practice
of wearing tiny star lamps on the hair or dress has also come more
into fashion. Probably the first use of it was by the fairies in the
comic opera of _Iolanthe_ at the Savoy Theatre. Each fairy carried a
small accumulator on her back half concealed by her wings, and this
gave electricity to a miniature Swan lamp mounted on her forehead.
Ladies are sometimes to be seen with miniature lamps attached to their
dresses, and lighted by a touch of their fingers upon a small key hid
in their belts. One might have glowworm or firefly ornaments at this
rate. The ‘death’s-head’ pin worn by gentlemen in Paris a year or two
ago was a similar application of the electric current. On touching a
key to complete the electric circuit of a small pocket battery, the
eyes of the death’s-head in the wearer’s breast began to shine like
sparks of fire.

The use of the electric light for sporting purposes has had some
curious developments. Polo, cricket, base ball, skating, and so on,
have all been played by night. At the Montreal Ice Carnival last
winter, the huge ice palace was illuminated both out and in with
thousands of electric lights, and skating, curling, snow-shoeing, and
toboganning went on by night as well as day.

Gnats are fascinated by a powerful electric lamp, and dance about it as
they do in a beam of evening sunshine. Light has an attraction for many
animals besides insects. Flying-fish spring out of the sea when sailors
hang a lantern by the ship’s side; and in California now it is the
custom to submerge a cluster of Edison lamps from the bows of a boat
with a net expanded below. When the fish gather round the light the net
is closed on them, and after being hauled out of the water they are put
into water-tanks, and sent alive on special cars by overland rail to
New York and the Eastern States. The French _chasseur_ also makes a bag
sometimes by employing an electric light to attract his feathered game;
pigeons especially being lured by it.

Owing to its power, the arc-light is very well suited for signalling
purposes; and hence it is now used with the heliograph to signal the
approach of cyclones between the British island of Mauritius and
Reunion in the Indian Ocean. It has also been proposed to signal by
transparent balloons lit by incandescence lamps. The balloon is raised
to a good height by a rope which also carries the wires conveying the
current to the lamps; and flashes according to an understood code of
signals are made by working a key to interrupt the current, as in the
act of telegraphing.

Diving operations under the sea are greatly facilitated by the electric
light; and a trial was recently made of a powerful lamp at Marseilles
in lighting up the hull of a sunken ship. The amber hunters of the
Baltic are also using the light for seeking the fossil gum on the
sea-bed, instead of waiting until the waves cast it on the shore.
Sea-water is remarkably clear, and the rocks of the seashore are often
beautifully covered with weeds and shells. It is no wonder, then, that
a submarine balloon has been devised by one Signor Toselli at Nice,
for going under water to examine them. This observatory holds eight
people, and has a glass bottom and an electric light for illuminating
the sea-caves.

The electric light is not free from danger; but, from not being
explosive, it is far from being as fatal in its effects as gas. There
have been several deaths from electric shock caused by the very
powerful currents of the Brush and Jablochkoff machines. For instance,
a man was killed instantly on board the late Czar’s yacht _Livadia_
when crossing the Bay of Biscay. He had accidentally grasped the bare
connections of one of the electric lamps and received the current
through his breast. Others have been killed by touching bare wires
conveying the current; a man in Kansas City, United States, met his
death quite recently in repairing some electric light wires without
knowing that the current flowed in them. Carelessness of some kind
was the source of these misfortunes; but the use of such very deadly
currents is to be deprecated. When the electromotive force of an
electric current exceeds five hundred volts it becomes dangerous, and
hence it is that the Board of Trade prohibits the use of more powerful
currents for general lighting. The use of overhead wires, sometimes
uninsulated and never wholly insulated, such as obtains in some parts
of the United States, ought also to be eschewed, and underground
cables, safe out of harm’s way, employed instead. With cables buried
in the earth, we should not have a repetition of the curious incident
which recently happened at the Luray Cavern in Virginia, where
lightning ran into the cave along the electric light conductors and
destroyed some of the finest stalactites.

The plan of having tall masts with a cluster of very powerful lights
reflected from the height by mirrors is a very good one, since it
obviates the distribution of wires and lamps. By imitating the sun, in
this way a Californian town is entirely lighted from one or two masts;
and it is satisfactory to know that the system is being tried at South
Kensington.

The dynamos of electric machines have been known to explode, or rather
burst from the centrifugal force due to the rapid revolution of the
armature. An accident of this kind recently caused great alarm in a New
York theatre. Sparks from the red-hot carbons of arc-lamps, or between
wire and wire of the conductors, have also led to many small fires;
but none of any great consequence. A spark is so feeble a source of
heat that, unlike the spilling of an oil-lamp, it does not produce a
powerful fire, provided the materials it falls among are not highly
inflammable. On the whole, the danger of fire with electric lighting,
especially incandescence lighting, has probably been exaggerated. The
incandescence lamp itself is very safe, since if one be enveloped in
light dry muslin and broken, the muslin is not burnt. In fact, the rush
of air caused by the broken vacuum entirely dissipates the red-hot
filament.

From its injurious aspects we turn now to its beneficial qualities.
The arc-light by its brilliance is not good for the eyesight when
looked at direct, but there is probably nothing harmful in the light
itself, unless it should be the excess of violet rays. It is a cool
light; and hot lights, by drying the natural humours of the eye, are
the most prejudicial to the sight. The incandescence light which
is free from excess of violet rays is also a cool light; and as it
neither pollutes nor burns the air of a chamber, it is the best light
for a student. Small reading-lamps, fitted with movable arms carrying
incandescent bulbs, are now manufactured for this purpose. Even with
the incandescence lamp, however, it is advisable not to look at the
brilliant filament.

Surgeons and dentists find these little incandescence lamps of great
service in examining the teeth and mouth. Some are made no larger than
a pea. Others are fitted into silver probes (cooled by circulating
water) for insertion into the stomach to illuminate its coats, or
enable a physician to diagnose other internal organs. Dr Payne, of
Newcastle-on-Tyne, recently made an examination of the liver by
inserting one of these endoscopes into it through an incision made in
the abdomen. M. Trouvé has also fitted a small lamp to a belt which
goes round the physician’s forehead, thereby enabling him to direct the
light to where he is looking. Another experimenter has so applied the
light that he has been able to photograph the vocal chords while in
the act of singing; and a third has illuminated the whole interior of
a living fish, so that all the main physiological operations could be
witnessed by a class of students. Such services as these could not be
rendered by any other known illuminator.



HUSH-MONEY.


Out of the countless variety of evil-doers who thrive upon the
misfortunes of their fellow-creatures, and are enabled to gain a means
of livelihood by the folly and timidity of their dupes, one class above
all others seem to conduct their depredations with much success, on
account of the defenceless position of the unhappy individuals upon
whom they prey. We allude to those who make it their business to levy
what is termed ‘hush-money.’

There are innumerable miscreants who thrive upon the possession of some
discreditable secret or family skeleton, which throws a desolating
blight over many a life, to all appearance surrounded by every comfort
and luxury wealth can command. Scoundrels of this description, secure
in the helplessness of their victims, pursue with impunity their
merciless system of extortion, being well aware that the terror of
exposure is so great, that silence will be purchased at any price.
If persons who are threatened by ruffians of this kind with exposure
of some private matter, were once and for all to refuse to pay one
penny for the silence of these extortioners, how much misery would
be avoided! Each instalment of hush-money only serves to whet the
appetites of these social harpies. It is infinitely preferable to face
boldly at first the worst, no matter of how serious a nature, than
to supply blackmail for the purchase of what can never be security.
The majority of malefactors are cowards at heart, although a craven
nature is in such cases concealed often by bluster and braggadocio. It
therefore becomes all the more important at once to withstand their
infamous importunities.

The ordinary observer, while reading in some sensational novel the evil
deeds and extortion perpetrated by the class of knaves who subsist
on hush-money, would be inclined to attribute them to romance. It
is, however, well known to those who have had experience in criminal
matters, that the novelist’s fertile imagination pales before stern
reality. Innocent persons have been threatened with an accusation of
some infamous crime, and at the same time money has been demanded as
the price of silence. The dread caused by even an accusation of such a
nature has often, unfortunately, induced persons so situated to accede
to extortionate demands. There are plenty of _mauvais sujets_ hovering
about society who make it their business to become intimate with the
private history of those upon whose infirmities they intend to trade.
Not many years since, a notable instance of this occurred. A gentleman
in a high social position was ruthlessly assailed and socially ruined
by a miscreant, who traded upon the possession of some information of
a dubious nature reflecting discredit upon his wife. For a lengthened
period this gentleman had paid considerable sums of money for the
silence of his persecutor; at last, however, driven to desperation by
continual and increased demands for hush-money, he preferred rather to
face a public trial than continue longer subject to such tyranny and
extortion.

The following apt illustration of blackmailing, which came under the
writer’s personal cognisance, will show the rascality in vogue amongst
these wretches. A wealthy merchant was for some years completely in
the power of a thorough-paced scoundrel who had previously been in his
employ. This knave became acquainted with a delicate family matter,
which, if disclosed, could but entail shame and misery upon his late
employer. He threatened to make this information public unless well
paid for his silence. This gentleman, although surrounded by every
luxury, was in truth a thoroughly miserable man. Living in a constant
state of fear lest his family skeleton should be revealed in all its
hideousness, he continued from time to time to supply his tormentor
with large sums of money. The continual mental strain caused his health
to give way, until at last he wisely determined to consult his legal
adviser upon what was the bane of his life. Prompt steps were then
taken, which for ever freed him from further extortion. These things
daily happen, and yet, unfortunately, frequently remain unpunished.

What can be more terrible than to exist in constant fear of pending
ruin—entirely at the mercy of some miscreant, who by one word
can destroy a hitherto stainless reputation! It is a true saying
that ‘there is a skeleton in every house,’ and if discovered by
any designing knave, may be transformed into a sword of Damocles.
Confidential servants and discharged valets often wring large sums from
their former employers by means of extortionate demands combined with
threats of disclosing certain family matters calculated to bring shame
upon their late masters’ or mistresses’ good name.

The payment of any illicit demand as a price of secrecy rarely, if
ever, permanently obtains the object in view, the donor being more or
less in constant fear lest a disclosure should take place. This usually
transpires sooner or later, when the torturer has abstracted the
uttermost penny from his victim. No greater delusion can possibly exist
than that ‘hush-money’ will secure durable secrecy.

Happily, however, the legislature, having in view the nefarious
practices of such criminals, has provided a most potent remedy against
this class of robbers, which remedy cannot be too generally known.
The Act of Parliament 24 and 25 Vict. s. 49, enacts, _That whosoever
shall accuse or threaten any person with a view to extort money or
valuable security, shall be guilty of felony, and be liable at the
discretion of the court to be kept in penal servitude for life, or for
any term not less than five years_. All demands for hush-money met at
the outset by firm and unyielding refusal, is the best and only course
to adopt. In the majority of instances, a villain would at once be
completely checkmated; and even should he venture to extremities, the
law is powerful enough to put an end to his shameful trade. Anything
is better than to live in constant terror of exposure, and to be
remorselessly plundered by such a vampire. We often hear of strange
suicides, the reason for which is wholly incomprehensible. It is by
no means surprising that, at times, persons wanting in resolution,
are made desperate by a system of exquisite mental torture, when
unmercifully applied by these extortioners. Innumerable unhappy persons
are unquestionably thus tormented, like Prometheus on his rock. Such
anguish, although unseen, is far greater than physical suffering, as
all mental tribulation is more severe than mere bodily pain.

If any one who is assailed by a miscreant in quest of ‘hush-money’ were
at once to place the matter in the hands of some respectable solicitor,
a course of misery would be avoided, as any attempt to extort money
through threats or otherwise comes clearly within the provisions of the
Act above mentioned; and criminal proceedings will be found the most
effectual means for exterminating so great a social pest.



DONALD—A PONY.


    Are thy tired feet on this rough earth yet walking,
            Thou patient silent one;
    Maybe, with humble cart, and poor wares hawking,
            Thy life-course nearly run?

    Be thankful that thou dost not e’er remember
            One radiant summer day;
    That dreams of June come not in _thy_ December,
            When skies are cold and gray!

    He rode on thee along the sunny highway,
            To meet me where I stood
    Out from the village, in a soft green by-way—
            Our young hearts were in flood.

    He saw me—swift as thought from off thee leaping,
            He led thee by one hand;
    And with the other clasped me, sweetly keeping
            Me under Love’s command.

    Ah! then began a walk through Eden’s glory—
            We wandered slowly on;
    While I, deep blushing, saw and read the story
            That through his blue eyes shone.

    We sat, and let thee browse—came some light laughter
            To ease our brimming hearts,
    That could not tell their too full joy; till—after—
            When pierced by parting’s darts.

    The hour flew on—ah me! ’twas our last meeting
            Ere he would cross the sea;
    And when again we two should offer greeting,
            I was his bride to be.

    So we clung close, each costly moment counting,
            Wild with our vain self-pity!—
    The hour was o’er—then slowly on thee mounting,
            He rode back to the city.

    O Donald! Yesterday, to Wemyss Bay going,
            I passed that very spot;
    I saw thee browse, whilst our swift tears were flowing—
            (I have not yet forgot).

    He sailed across the sea; but came not hither
            For me, his bride, again;
    And Hope and Joy fled far—I know not whither,
            But left me Love and Pain.

    My lonely days are dull and cold and common,
            And thine mayhap are done;
    But—a _new_ day dawns for man and woman
            After this setting sun.

                K. T.

       *       *       *       *       *

Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON,
and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.

       *       *       *       *       *

_All Rights Reserved._



*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, Fifth Series, No. 9, Vol. I, March 1, 1884" ***

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