CHAPTER V.

SHADOWS AND LILIES.

Mr. Schöninger came early to the rehearsal that evening, and, in his stately fashion, made himself unusually agreeable. There was, perhaps, a very slight widening of the eyes, expressive of surprise, if not of displeasure, when he saw Miss Ferrier's critics, but his salutation did not lack any necessary courtesy. He did not lose his equanimity even when, later, while they were singing a fugue passage, a sonorous but stupid bass came in enthusiastically just one bar too soon.

"I am glad you chose to do that to-night instead of to-morrow night, sir," the director said quietly. "Now we will try it again."

And yet Mr. Schöninger was, in his profession, an object of terror to some of his pupils, and of scrupulous, if not anxious, attention to all; for not only did he possess notably that exalted musical sensitiveness which no true artist lacks, but he concealed under an habitual self-control, and great exactness in the discharge of his duty, a fiery impatience of temper, and a hearty dislike for the drudgery of his profession.

"If your doctrines regarding future punishments are true," he once said to F. Chevreuse, "then the physical part of a musician's purgatory will be to listen to discords striving after, but never attaining to, harmony, and his hell to hear sublime harmonies rent and distorted by discords. I never come so near believing in an embodied spirit of evil as when I hear a masterpiece of one of the great composers mangled by a tyro. I haven't a doubt that Chopin or Schumann might be played so as to throw me into convulsions."

And F. Chevreuse had answered after his kind: "And your spiritual purgatory, sir, will be the recollection of those long years during which you have persisted in playing with one thumb, as a bleak monody, that divine trio of which all the harmonies of the universe are but faint echoes."

Nothing of this artistic irritability appeared to-night, as we have said. In its stead was a gentleness quite new in the musician's demeanor, and so slight as to be like that first film of coming verdure on the oak, when, some spring morning, one looks out and doubts whether it is a dimness of the eyes or the atmosphere, or a budding foliage which has set swimming those sharp outlines of branch and twig.

"He is really human," Annette whispered to Miss Pembroke; and Honora smiled acquiescence, though she would scarcely have employed such an expression for her thought. She had already discovered in Mr. Schöninger a very gentle humanity.

Low as the whisper was, his ears caught it, and two sharp eyes, watching him, saw an almost imperceptible tremor of the eyelids, which was the only sign he gave. The owner of these eyes did not by any means approve of the manner in which their leader had given Miss Pembroke her music that evening, leaving the other ladies to be served as they might; still less did she approve of the coldness with which her own coquettish demands on his attention had been met. It was scarcely worth while to submit to the drudgery of rehearsing, in a chorus too, if that was to be all the return. Rising carelessly, therefore, and allowing the sheet of music on her lap to fall unheeded to the floor, Miss Carthusen sauntered off toward where Miss Ferrier's two critics sat apart, talking busily, having, apparently, as she had anticipated, written their reports of the rehearsal before coming to it.

These critics were a formidable pair, for they criticised everybody and everything. One of them added to a man's sarcasm a woman's finer malice, which pricks with the needlepoint. Dr. Porson was a tall, aquiline-faced, choleric man, with sharp eyes that, looking through a pair of clear and remarkably lustrous glasses, saw the chink in everybody's armor. Those who knew him would rather see lightning than meet the flash of his glasses turned on them, and feel the probing glances that shot through, and thunder would have been music to their ears compared to the short laugh that greeted a sinister discovery.

The other was Mr. Sales, the new editor of _The Aurora_, a little wasp of a man. He had twinkling black eyes that needed no lens to assist their vision, and a thin-lipped mouth with a slim black moustache hanging at either corner, like a strong pen-dash made with black ink. Dr. Porson called them quotation-marks, and had a way of smoothing imaginary moustaches on his own clean-shaven face whenever the younger man said any very good thing without giving credit for it.

"A clever little eclectic," the doctor said of him. "He pilfers with the best taste in the world, and, with the innocence of a babe, believes everybody else to be original. He never writes anything worth reading but I want to congratulate him on his 'able scissors.' 'Able scissors' is not mine," the doctor added, "but it is good. I found it in _Blackwood's_."

These two gentlemen had arrived early, and, seated apart, in a side-window of the long drawing-room, crunched the people between their teeth as they entered. Between the morsels, the doctor enlightened his companion, a new-comer in the city, regarding Crichton and the Crichtonians.

"There's little Jones, the most irritating person I know," the doctor said. "By what chance he should have that robust voice I cannot imagine. Sometimes I think it doesn't come out of his own throat, but that he has a large ventriloquist whom he carries about with him. I shouldn't wonder if the fellow were now just outside that open sash. Did you see the way he marched past us, all dickey and boot-heels? A man who is but five feet high has no right to assume six-foot manners; he has scarcely the right to exist at all among well-grown people. Besides, they always wear large hats. Not but I respect a small stature in a clever person," he admitted, with a side glance at Mr. Sales' slight figure. "We don't wish to have our diamonds by the hundredweight. But common, pudding-stone men must be in imposing masses, or we want them cleared away as _débris_."

"Is Mr. Schöninger a pudding-stone man?" the young editor asked, when that gentleman had passed them by.

Dr. Porson's face unconsciously dropped its mocking. "If you should strike Mr. Schöninger in any way," he said, "you would find him flint. The only faults I see in the man are his excessive caution and secretiveness. He is here, evidently, only to get all the money he can, and, when he has enough, will wash his hands of us; therefore, wishes for no intimacies. That is my interpretation. He is a gentleman, however. A man must have the most perfect politeness of soul to salute Mme. Ferrier as he did. While they were speaking together, she actually had the air of a lady. See her look after him. It is an art which we critics cannot learn, sir, that of setting people in their best light. Of course it would spoil our trade if we did learn it; but, for all that, we miss something. Schöninger is a Jew, to be sure, but that signifies nothing. Each one to his taste. We no longer trouble ourselves about people's faith. When you say that a man believes this or that, it's as though you said, he eats this or that. The world moves. Why, sir, a few years ago, we wouldn't have spoken to a man who ate frogs any more than to a cannibal; and now we are so fond of the little reptiles that there isn't a frog left to sing in the swamps."

"But," Mr. Sales objected, "society has established certain rules--" then stopped, finding himself in deep water.

"Undoubtedly," the doctor replied, as gravely as though something had been said. "The Flat-head Indians now, who seem to have understood the science of phrenology, think it the proper thing to have a plateau on the top of the head. Their reason is, probably, a moral rather than an æsthetic one. They know that the peaceful and placable qualities, those which impel a man to let go, are kept in little chambers in the front top of the brain. They have other use for their attics. So they just clap a board on the baby's soft head, and press the space meant for such useless stuff as benevolence and reverence back, so as to increase the storage for the noble qualities of firmness and self-esteem. That is one of the rules of their society; and I have always considered it a most striking and beautiful instance of the proper employment of means to an end. There is a certain sublime and simple directness in it. No circuitous, century-long labor of trying to square the fluid contents of a round vessel, but just a board on the head. That, sir, should be the first step in evangelizing the heathen--shape their heads. When you want a man to think in a certain way, put a strong pressure on his contradictory bumps, and preach to him afterwards. That's what I tell our minister, Mr. Atherton. There he is now, that bald man with the fair hair. He is a glorious base. His great-grandfather was a conceited Anglo-Saxon, and he's the fourth power of him. The reason why he does not believe in the divinity of Christ is because he was not of Anglo-Saxon birth."

Here, across the _pianissimo_ chorus which made the vocal accompaniment of an Alp-song, Miss Ferrier's brilliant voice flashed like lightning in clear, sharp zigzags, startling the two into silence.

"That wasn't bad," the doctor said when she ended.

The younger gentleman applauded with such enthusiasm that Annette blushed with pleasure. "She needs but one thing to make her voice perfect," he said, "and that is a great sorrow."

"Yes, as I was telling you some time ago," the doctor resumed, "we are a liberal and hospitable people in Crichton. We have no prejudices. Everybody is welcome, even the devil. We are æsthetic, too. We admire the picturesque. We wouldn't object to seeing an interesting family of children shot with arrows, provided they would fall with a grace, and their mother would assume the true Niobe attitude. In literature, too, how we shine! We have reached the sublime of the superficial. There's your Miss Carthusen, now, with her original poetry. How nicely she dished up that conceit of Montaigne's, that somebody is peculiar because he has no peculiarities. I've forgotten, it is so long since I read him. I haven't looked over the new edition that this poetess of ours has peeped into and fished a fancy out of. But yesterday I was charmed to see it scintillating, in rhymed lines, in the Olympian corner of _The Aurora_, over the well-known signature of _Fleur-de-lis_."

The young man looked mortified. He had never read Montaigne, and had announced this production as original and remarkable, firmly believing the writer to be a genius. But he did not choose to tell Dr. Porson that.

"What would you?" he asked, raising his eyebrows and his voice in a philosophical manner. "I must fill the paper; and it is better to put in good thought at second-hand than flat originals. How many know the difference?"

Here Annette's voice stopped them again.

"Strange that girl sings so well to-night," said the doctor, adjusting his glasses for a clearer glance. "She looks well, too. Must be the inspiration of her lover's presence. That's the kind of fellow, sir, that a woman takes a fancy to--a pale, beautiful young man with a slouched hat and a secret sorrow, the sorrow usually having reference to the pocket."

Lawrence Gerald sat near his lady, and seemed to be absorbed in his occupation of cutting a rosebud across in thin slices with his pocket-knife, a proceeding his mother viewed with gentle distress. But when the song was ended, he looked up at Annette and smiled, seeming to be rather proud of her. And, looking so, his eyes lingered a little, expressing interest and a slight surprise, as if he beheld there something worth looking at which he had not noticed before. Had he cared to observe, he might have known already that Miss Ferrier had moments of being beautiful. This was one of them.

There is a pain that looks like delight, when the heart bleeds into the cheeks, the lips part with a smile that does not touch the eyes, and the eyes shine with a dazzling brilliancy that may well be mistaken for joyousness. With such feverish beauty Annette was radiant this evening, and the excitement of singing and of applause had added the last touch of brightness.

The programme for the concert was chiefly of popular music, or a kind of old-fashioned music they were making popular, part-songs and glees. They had attained great finish and delicacy in executing these, and the effect was charming, and far preferable to operas and operatic airs as we usually hear them. It would have been a bold woman who would have asked Mr. Schöninger's permission to sing a difficult _aria_. Annette had once made such a request, but with indifferent success.

"Mademoiselle," the teacher replied, "you have a better voice than either of the Pattis; but a voice is only a beginning. You must learn the alphabet of music before you can read its poems. When you are ready to be a Norma, I will resign you to some teacher who knows more than I do."

The singing was at an end, and the singers left their seats and wandered about the house and garden. Only Mr. Schöninger lingered by the piano, and, seeing him still there, no one went far away, those outside leaning in at the window.

He seated himself presently, and played a Polonaise. He sat far back, almost at arm's length from the keys, and, as he touched it, the instrument seemed to possess an immortal soul. One knew not which most to admire, the power that made a single piano sound like an orchestra, or the delicacy that produced strains fine and clear like horns of fairyland.

When he had finished, he went to ask Mrs. Gerald how the singing had gone.

"I observed that you listened," he remarked, being within Dr. Porson's hearing.

Mrs. Gerald had been sitting for the last half-hour beside Mrs. Ferrier, and the time had been penitential, as all her intercourse with Annette's mother was. It was hard for a fond mother and a sensitive lady to listen to such indelicate complaints and insinuations as Mrs. Ferrier was constantly addressing to her when they were together without uttering any sharp word in return. To be reminded that Lawrence was making a very advantageous marriage without retorting that she would be far more happy to see him the husband of Honora Pembroke, required an effort; and to restrain the quick flash, or the angry tears in her fiery Celtic heart when she heard him undervalued, was almost more than she could do. But she had conquered herself for God's sake and for her son's sake, perhaps a little for pride's sake, had given the soft answer when she could, and remained silent when speech seemed too great an effort.

That coarse insolence of mere money to refined poverty, and the mistaking equality before the law for personal equality, are at any time sufficiently offensive; how much more so when the victim is in some measure in the tormentor's power.

Mrs. Gerald's face showed how severe the trial had been. Her blue eyes had the unsteady lustre of a dew that dared not gather into tears, a painful smile trembled on her lips, and her cheeks were scarlet. Had she been at liberty, this lady could perfectly well have known how to ignore or reprove impertinence without ruffling her smooth brow or losing her tranquil manner; but she was not free, and the restraint was agitating. This rude woman's rudest insinuation was but truth, and she must bear it. Yet, mother-like, she never thought of reproaching her son for what she suffered.

"I never heard music I liked so well," she said to Mr. Schöninger's question. "We are under obligation to you for giving us what we can understand. The composition you have just played delighted me, too, though it is probable that I do not at all appreciate its beauties. It made me think of fairies dancing in a ring."

"It was a dance-tune," Mr. Schöninger said, pleased that she had perceived the thought; for it required a fine and sympathetic ear to discern the step in that capricious movement of Chopin's.

The fact that he was a Jew had prevented her looking on this man with any interest, or feeling it possible that any friendship could exist between them; but the thought passed her mind, as he spoke, that Mr. Schöninger might be a very amiable person if he chose. There was a delicate and reserved sweetness in that faint smile of his which reminded her of some expression she had seen on Honora's face, when she was conversing with a gentleman who had the good fortune to please her.

Meantime, Lawrence had been having a little dispute with Annette. "What's this about the wine?" he whispered to her. "John says there isn't any to be had."

He looked astonished, and with reason, for the fault of the Ferrier entertainments had always been their profusion.

"I meant to have told you that I had concluded not to have wine," she said. "Two gentlemen present are intemperate men, who make their families very unhappy, and when they begin to drink they do not know where to stop. The last time Mr. Lane was here he became really quite unsteady before he went away."

"But the others!" Lawrence exclaimed. "What will they think?"

"They may understand just why it is," she replied; "and they may not think anything about it. I should not imagine that they need occupy their minds very long with the subject."

"Why, you must know, Annette, that some of them come here for nothing but the supper, and chiefly the wine," the young man urged unguardedly.

She drew up slightly. "So I have heard, Lawrence; and I wish to discourage such visitors' coming. People who are in the devouring mood should not go visiting; they are disagreeable. I have never seen in company that liveliness which comes after supper without a feeling of disgust. It may not go beyond proper bounds, but still it is a greater or less degree of intoxication. I have provided everything I could think of for their refreshment and cheering, but nothing to make them tipsy. I gave you a good reason at first, Lawrence, and I have a better. My father died of liquor, and my brother is becoming a slave to it. I will help to make no drunkards."

"Well," the young man sighed resignedly, "you mean well; but I can't help thinking you a little quixotic."

"The Ferriers are giving us _eau sucrée_ instead of wine to-night," sneered one of the company to Mr. Schöninger, a while after.

"They show good taste in doing so," he replied coldly. "There are always bar-rooms and drinking-saloons enough for those who are addicted to drink. I never wish to take wine from the hand of a lady, nor to drink it in her presence."

The night was brilliantly full-moonlighted, and so warm that they had lit as little gas as possible. A soft glow from the upper floor, and the bright doors of the drawing-room, made the hall chandelier useless. Miss Ferrier's new organ there was flooded with a silvery radiance that poured through a window. Mr. Schöninger came out and seated himself before it.

"Shall I play a fugue of Bach's?" he asked of Miss Pembroke, who was standing in the open door leading to the garden.

She took a step toward him, into the shadow between moonlight of window and door, and the light seemed to follow her, lingering in her fair face and her white dress. Even the waxen jasmine blossoms in her hair appeared to be luminous.

"Yes," she said, "if you are to play only once more; but, if more than once, let that be last. I never lose the sound and motion of one of Bach's fugues till I have slept; and I like to keep the murmur it leaves, as if my ears were sea-shells."

She went back to stand in the door, but, after a few minutes, stepped softly and slowly further away, and passed by the drawing-room doors, through which she saw Annette talking with animation and many gestures, while her two critics listened and nodded occasional acquiescence, and Lawrence withdrawn to a window-seat with Miss Carthusen, and Mrs. Ferrier the centre of a group of young people, who listened to her with ill-concealed smiles of amusement. At length she found the place she wanted, an arm-chair under the front portico, and, seated there, gathered up that strong, wilful rush of harmony as a whole. It did not seem to have ceased when Mr. Schöninger joined her. She was so full of the echoes of his music that for a moment she looked at him standing beside her as if it had been his wraith.

He pointed silently and smiling to the corner of the veranda visible from where they sat. It was on the shady side of the house, and still further screened by vines, and the half-drawn curtains of the window looking into it allowed but a single beam of gaslight to escape. In that nook were gathered half a dozen children, peeping into the drawing-room. They were as silent as the shadows in which they lurked, and their bare feet had given no notice of their coming. Their bodies were almost invisible, but their eager little faces shone in the red light, and now and then a small hand was lifted into sight.

"It reminds me," he said, "of a passage in the Koran, where Mahomet declares that it had been revealed to him that a company of genii had listened while he was reading a chapter, and that one of them had remarked: 'Verily, we have heard a most admirable discourse.' That amused me; and I fancied that an effective picture might be made of it: the prophet reading at night by the light of an antique lamp that shone purely on his solemn face and beard, and his green robe, with, perhaps, the pet cat curled round on the sleeve. The casement should be open wide, and crowded with a multitude of yearning, exquisite faces, the lips parted with the intensity of their listening. As I came along the hall just now, I saw one of those children through the window, and in that light it looked like a cameo cut in pink coral."

"I fancy they are some of my children," Miss Pembroke said, and rose. "Let us see. They ought not to be out so late, nor to intrude."

"Oh! spare the poor little wretches," Mr. Schöninger said laughingly, as she took his arm. "We find this commonplace enough, but to them it is wonderful. I think we might be tempted to trespass a little if we could get a peep into veritable fairyland. This is to them fairyland."

"That anything is a strong temptation is no excuse for yielding," the lady said in a playful tone that took away any appearance of reproof from her words. "We do not go into battle in order to surrender without a struggle, nor to surrender at all, but to become heroes. I must teach my little ones to have heroic thoughts."

The children, engrossed in the bright scene within, did not perceive any approach from without till all retreat was cut off for them, and they turned, with startled faces, to find themselves confronted by a tall gentleman, on whose arm leaned a lady whom they looked up to with a tender but reverent love.

These children were of a class accustomed to a word and a blow, and their instinctive motion was to shrink back into a corner, and hide their faces.

"I am sorry to see you here, my dears," she said. "Please go home now, like good children."

That was her way of reproving.

She stood aside, and the little vagabonds shied out past her, each one trying to hide his face, and scampering off on soundless feet as soon as he had reached the ground.

"So you have a school?" Mr. Schöninger asked, as they went round through the garden.

They came out into the moonlight, and approached the rear of the house, where a number of the company were gathered, standing among the flowers.

"Yes, I have fifty, or more, of these little ones, and I find it interesting. They were in danger of growing up in the street, and I had nothing else to do--that is, nothing that seemed so plain a duty. So I took the largest room in an old house of mine just verging on the region where these children live, and have them come there every day."

"You must find teaching laborious," the gentleman said.

"Oh! no. I am strong and healthy, and I do not fatigue myself nor them. The whole is free to them, of course, and I am responsible to no one, therefore can instruct or amuse them in my own way. As far as possible, I wish to supply the incompetency of their mothers. If I give the little ones a happy hour, during which they behave properly, and teach them one thing, I am satisfied. One of the branches I try to instruct them in is neatness. No soiled face is allowed to speak to me, nor soiled hands to touch me. Then they sing and read, and learn prayers and a little doctrine, and I tell them stories. When the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Notre Dame come, my occupation will of course be gone."

"I wish I might some time be allowed to visit this school of yours," Mr. Schöninger said hesitatingly. "I could give them a singing-lesson, and tell them a story. Little Rose Tracy likes my stories."

Miss Pembroke was thoughtful a moment, then consented. She had witnessed with approval Mr. Schöninger's treatment of Miss Carthusen that evening, and respected him for it. "The day after to-morrow, in the afternoon, would be a good time," she said. "It is to be a sort of holiday, on account of the firemen's procession. The procession passes the school-room, and I have promised the children that they shall watch it."

They went in to take leave, for the company was breaking up.

"Oh! by the way, Mr. Schöninger," Annette said, recollecting, "did you get the shawl you left here at the last rehearsal? It was thrown on a garden-seat, and forgotten."

"Yes; I stepped in early the next morning, and took it," he said. His countenance changed slightly as he spoke. The eyelids drooped, and his whole air expressed reserve.

"The next morning!" she repeated to herself, but said nothing.

Lawrence went off with Miss Carthusen; and as Mrs. Gerald and Honora went out at the same time with Mr. Schöninger, he asked permission to accompany them.

"How lovely the night is!" Mrs. Gerald murmured, as they walked quietly along under the trees of the avenue, and saw all the beautiful city bathed in moonlight, and ringed about with mountains like a wall. "Heaven can scarcely have a greater physical beauty than earth has sometimes."

"I do not think," the gentleman said, "that heaven will be so much more beautiful than earth, but our eyes will be opened to see the beauties that exist."

He spoke very quietly, with an air of weariness or depression; and, when they reached home, bowed his good-night without speaking.

The two ladies stood a moment in the door, looking out over the town. "If that man were not a Jew, I should find him agreeable," Mrs. Gerald said. "As it is, it seems odd that we should see so much of him."

"I am inclined to believe," Honora said slowly, "that it is not right for us to refuse a friendly intercourse with suitable associates on account of any difference of religion, unless they intrude on us a belief or disbelief which we hold to be sacrilegious."

"Could you love a Jew?" Mrs. Gerald asked, rather abruptly.

Honora considered the matter a little while. "Our Lord loved them, even those who crucified him. I could love them. Besides, I do not believe that the Jews of to-day would practise violence any more than Christians would. We are friendly with Unitarians, yet they are not very different from some Jews. I think we should love everybody but the eternally lost. I could more easily become attached to an upright and conscientious Jew, than to a Catholic who did not practise his religion."

Mr. Schöninger, as soon as he had left the ladies, mended his pace, and strode off rapidly down the hill. In a few minutes he had reached a lighted railroad station, where people were going to and fro.

"Just in time!" he muttered, and ran to catch a train that was beginning to slip over the track. Grasping the hand-rail, he drew himself on to the step of the last car, then walked through the other cars, and, finally, took his seat in that next the engine. Once a week he gave lessons in a town fifteen miles from Crichton, and he usually found it more agreeable to take the night train down than to go in the morning.

In selecting this car he had hoped to be alone; but he had hardly taken his seat when he heard a step following him, and another man appeared and went into the seat in front of him--an insignificant-looking person, with a mean face. He turned about, put his feet on the seat, stretched his arm along the back, and, assuming an insinuating smile, bade Mr. Schöninger good evening. He had, apparently, settled himself for a long conversation.

Mr. Schöninger's habits were those of a scrupulous gentleman, and he had, even among gentlemen, the charming distinction of always keeping his feet on the floor. This man's manners were, therefore, in more than one way offensive, and his salutation received no more encouraging reply than a stare, and a scarcely perceptible inclination of the head.

Mr. Schöninger seemed, indeed, to regret even this slight concession, for he rose immediately with an air of decision, and walked forward to the first seat. The door of the car was open there as they rushed on through the darkness, and, looking forward, it was like beholding the half-veiled entrance of a cavern of fire. A cloud of illuminated smoke and steam swept about and enveloped the engine with a bright atmosphere impenetrable to the sight, and through this loomed the gigantic shadow of a man. This shadow sometimes disappeared for a moment only to appear again, and seemed to make threatening gestures, and to catch and press down into the flames some unseen adversary. Mr. Schöninger's fancy was wide awake, though his eyes were half asleep, and this strange object became to him an object of terror. Painful and anxious thoughts, which he had resolutely put away, left yet a dim and mysterious background, on which this grotesque figure, gigantic and wrapped in fire, was thrown in strong relief. He imagined it an impending doom, which might at any moment fall upon him.

Finding these fancies intolerable at length, he shook himself wide awake, rose, and walked unsteadily up and down the car. In doing so, he perceived that his fellow-passenger had retreated to the last seat, and was, apparently, sleeping, his cap drawn low over his forehead. But Mr. Schöninger's glance detected a slight change in the position of the head as he commenced his promenade, and he could not divest himself of the belief that, from under the low hat-brim, a glance as sharp as his own was following his every movement.

In an ordinary and healthy mood of mind he would have cared little for such espionage; but he was not in such a mood. Circumstances had of late tried his nerves, and it required all his power of self-control to maintain a composed exterior. Did this man suspect his trouble, and search for, or, perhaps, divine, or, possibly, know the cause of it? He would gladly have caught the fellow in his arms, and thrown him headlong into the outer darkness.

He returned to his place, and, leaning close to the window, looked out into the night. If he had hoped to quiet himself by the sight of a familiar nature, he was disappointed, for the scene had a weird, though occasionally beautiful aspect, very unlike reality. The moon had set, leaving that darkness which follows a bright moonlight, or precedes the dawn of day, when the stars seem to be confounded by the near yet invisible radiance of their conqueror, and dare not shine with their own full lustre. Only this locomotive, dashing through the heart of the night, rendered visible a flying panorama. Groves of trees twirled round, surprised in some mystic dance; streams flashed out in all their windings, red and serpent-like, and hid themselves as suddenly; wide plains swam past, all a blur, with hills and mountains stumbling against the horizon. Only one spot had even a hint of familiarity. Framed round by a great semi-circle of woods, not many rods from the track, was a long, narrow pond, with a few acres of smooth green beyond it, and a white cottage close to its farthest shore. This little scene was as perfectly secluded, apparently, as if it had been in the midst of a continent otherwise uninhabited. No road nor neighboring house was visible from the railroad. The dwellers in that cottage seemed to be solitary and remote, knowing nothing of the wide, busy world save what they saw from their vine-draped windows when the long, noisy train, crowded with strangers, hurried past them, never stopping. What web that clattering shuttle wove they might wonder, but could not know, could scarcely care as they dreamed their lives away, lotos-eating. For the lotos was not wanting.

Mr. Schöninger recollected his first glimpse of that place as he had whirled past one summer morning, and swiftly now he caught the scene between his eyelids, and closed them on it, and dreamed over it. He saw the varied green of the forest, and the velvet green of the banks, and the blue and brooding sky. Like a sylvan nymph the cottage stood in its draping vines, and tried to catch glimpses of itself in the glassy waters at its feet, half smothered in drifting fragrant snow of water-lilies.

What sort of being should come forth from that dwelling of peace? Mr. Schöninger asked himself. Who should stretch out hands to him, and draw him out of his troubled life, approaching now a climax he shrank from? His heart rose and beat quickly. The door under the vines swung slowly back, and a woman floated out over the green, as silent and as gracious as a cloud over the blue above. The drapery fluttered back from her advancing foot till it reached the first shining ripple of the pond, and then she paused--a presence so warm and living that it quickened his breathing. She stretched her strong white arms out toward him over the lilies she would not cross, and the face was Honora Pembroke's. The large, calm look, the earnest glow that saved from coldness, the full humanity steeped through and shone through by spiritual loveliness--they were all hers.

He started, and opened his eyes. Their pace was slackening, the great black figure in its fiery atmosphere was in some spasm of motion, and walls of brick and stone were shutting them in.

The cars stopped at the foot of an immense flight of stairs that stretched upward indefinitely, a dingy Jacob's ladder, without the angels. Mr. Schöninger slowly ascended them, heavyhearted again, and therefore heavy-footed; and, not far behind, a man with a skulking step and a mean face followed after. There was nothing very mysterious in this walk. It led merely through a deserted business street, by the shortest route, to a respectable hotel. Mr. Schöninger called for a room, and went to it immediately; the little man lingered in the office, and hung about the desk.

"That gentleman comes down here pretty often in the night, doesn't he?" he asked of the clerk.

The man nodded, without looking up.

"Does he always record his name when he comes?" pursued the questioner.

"Can't say," was the short answer, still without looking up.

"Comes down every Wednesday night, I suppose?" remarked the stranger.

The clerk suddenly thrust his face past the corner of the desk behind which his catechiser stood. "Look here, sir, what name shall I put down for you?" he asked sharply.

The man drew back a little, and turned away. "I'm not sure of booking myself here," he replied.

The clerk came down promptly from his perch. "Then it's time to lock up," he said.

And when he had locked the door, and pulled down the curtains, with a snap that threatened to break their fastenings, he put his hands in his pockets, and made a short and emphatic address to an imaginary audience.

"I don't believe there is any redemption for spies," he said; "and I would rather have a thief in my house than a sneak. You sometimes hear of a criminal who repents; but nobody ever yet heard of one of your prying, peeping, tattling sort reforming."

There being no other person present, no one contradicted him, a circumstance which seemed to increase the strength of his convictions. He paced the room two or three times, then returned to his first stand, removing his hands from his pockets to clasp them behind his back, as being a more dignified attitude for a speaker.

"If I had my will," he pursued, "every nose that poked itself into other people's affairs would be cut off."

Bravo! Mr. Clerk. You have sense. But if you had also that sanguinary wish of yours, what a number of mutilated visages would be going about the world! How many feminine faces would be shorn of their _retroussé_, or long, rooting feature, or clawing, parrot beak, and how many men would be incapacitated for taking snuff!

Having delivered himself of his rather extreme opinion, this excellent man shut up the house and retired.

Mr. Schöninger looked forward with interest to his promised visit to Miss Pembroke's school, and was so anxious that she should not by any forgetfulness or change of plan deprive him of it, that he reminded her as they came out of the hall, after their concert, of the permission she had given him for the next afternoon.

"Certainly!" she replied smiling. "But how can you think of such a trifle after the grand success of this evening?"

For their concert had been a perfect success, and Mr. Schöninger himself had been applauded with such enthusiasm as had pleased even him. It was the first time he had played in public in Crichton, and, respectable as he held their musical taste to be, he had not been prepared to see so ready an appreciation of the higher order of instrumental music.

"I never saw a more appreciative audience," he said. "They applauded at the right places, and it was a well-bred applause. How delicate was that little whisper of a clapping during the prelude! It was like the faint rustling of leaves in a summer wind, and so soft that not a note was lost. I have never seen so nearly perfect an audience in any other city in this country."

"Do not we always tell you that Crichton is the most charming city in the world?" laughed Annette Ferrier, who had caught his last remark.

She was passing him, accompanied by Lawrence Gerald. Her face was bright with excitement, and the glistening of her ornaments and her gauzy robe through the black lace mantle that covered her from head to foot gave her the look of a butterfly caught in a web. She had sung brilliantly, dividing the honors of the evening with Mr. Schöninger, and Lawrence, finding her admired by others, was gallant to her himself. On the whole, she was radiant with delight.

"Do not expect too much of my little ones," Miss Pembroke said, recurring to the proposed visit. "Recollect, they are all poor, and they have had but little instruction."

Mr. Schöninger did not tell her that his interest was in her more than in the children, and that he desired to see how she would conduct herself in such circumstances rather than take any note of the persons and acquirements of her pupils. To his mind it was very strange that a lady of her refinement should wish to assume such a work without necessity. His conception of the character of teachers of children was not flattering; he thought a certain vulgarity inseparable from such persons, a positiveness of speech, an oracular tone of voice, and an authoritative air, which the employment conferred on successful teachers, if it did not find them already possessed of. It amused him to fancy these fifty children swarming about Miss Pembroke, like ants about a lily, and it annoyed him to think that she might receive some stain from them.

"I like ladies to be charitable," he said to himself, as he went homeward; "but there are kinds of rough work I would prefer they should delegate to others."

He was thinking of the physical part of the work; Honora of the spiritual.

The school-room was the lower floor of a house at the corner of two streets, and had been used as a shop, the two wide show-windows at either side of the door giving a full light. The upper floors were occupied as a dwelling-house. These windows looked out on a wide and respectable street; but the cross street, beginning fairly enough, deteriorated as it went on toward the Saranac, through the poorest section of the city, and ended in shanties and a dingy wharf where lobsters were perpetually being boiled in large kettles in dingy boats, and crowds of ragged children seemed to be always hanging about, sucking lobster-claws, or on the watch for them. Miss Pembroke's charge were from this class of children, and one of her great difficulties was to keep her school-room from having the fixed odor of a fish-market.

The room was severely clean and spotless, and, but that the side-walls were nearly covered with maps, bookcases, and blackboards, would have been glaring white; for the walls and ceiling were white-washed, the wood-work painted white, and the floor scoured white. Two rows of oak-colored benches extended across the room, the backs toward the windows. The sun shone in unobstructed all the afternoon. Only when it began to touch the last row of benches were the green worsted curtains drawn down far enough to keep it within bounds. Miss Pembroke's chair, table, and piano were in the space opposite the door. On the centre of the wall behind her hung a large crucifix, and on a bracket beneath it a marble Child Jesus stretched out his arms to the little ones. On larger brackets to right and left stood an Immaculate Lady and a S. Joseph. They were thus in the midst of the Holy Family.

These images were constantly surrounded by wreaths, arches, and flowers, so that the end of the room had quite the appearance of a bower; and on all his festivals, and whenever prayers were said, a candle was lighted before the Infant Jesus, who was the patron of their school, and the dearest object of their childish devotion. It was delightful to them to know that they need not always approach their God in the language, to them, often inexplicable, of the mature and the learned, but that they could whisper their ingenuous petitions and praises into the indulgent ear of a holy Child, using their own language, and asking him to be their interpreter. S. Joseph with the lily and the white Lady with her folded hands they worshipped with awe; but they were not afraid of the dear Infant who stretched out his arms to them.

Fifty little faces, all brown, but otherwise various, looked straight at their teacher--blue eyes and brown eyes, black eyes and grey, large eyes and small eyes, bright and dull eyes; and fifty young souls were at that instant occupied with one thought. The first faint thrilling of the silence with martial music was heard, and they were eager to take their places to see the advancing procession. But Miss Pembroke waited still. She had told Mr. Schöninger to come at three o'clock, and it lacked five minutes of that. Just as she was thinking that she would give him two minutes' grace, he appeared.

She went at once to place the children, and he watched with a smile of pleasure and amusement the soldierly precision of the performance. The door was opened wide, and two of the largest boys carried out and placed a bench near the edge of the upper step. At the motion of a finger, the smallest boys filed out and seated themselves on this bench, and an equal number of larger ones stood behind keeping guard. Then the door was closed. At the next silent gesture the smallest of the boys and girls remaining seated themselves in the low, broad ledge of the windows, the next size placed a bench across each window recess for themselves, and the largest again stood behind the benches. Not a word had been spoken, not a child had turned its head, not the slightest noise nor confusion had occurred, and all were perfectly well placed to see.

"What admirable order!" the gentleman exclaimed. "You must have drilled them thoroughly."

"It did not seem to me wasting time," Miss Pembroke replied. "I wish to impress on them the necessity of a decorous and reserved manner in public. They are too prone to presume, and be more than ordinarily lawless on such occasions. Besides, it teaches them self-control."

The two sat back at a little distance. The children began to stretch their heads forward, and whisper exclamations to each other. The air resounded with martial sounds, and a solid front of superb grey horses appeared, well-caparisoned and well-ridden, the full crimped manes tossed over their arching necks. Behind them another and another line pressed, making a living wall.

"I think one feels the influence of such a mass of strong life and courage," Miss Pembroke remarked. "It seems to me it would invigorate a weak person to be near those horses."

Mr. Schöninger had been thinking nearly the same thing. "I have fancied it not unlikely," he said, "that in a bold cavalry charge the horses may help to inspire the riders. The neighborhood of strong animal life is, no doubt, invigorating. It would be fine to stand face to face with a herd of wild cattle, if they could be surely stopped in mid-career, to feel the air stirring with their breaths, and see their eyes glaring through heaps of rough mane. There would be something electrical in it, as there is in a crowd of men; and in both cases it is a merely physical excitement."

"But a crowd of men may be electrified by some great thought," suggested Honora.

"Not unless each had the thought in his single mind before, either latent or conscious. I do not believe that any crowd or excitement, however immense, can put a great thought into a little soul. I can never act with an excited crowd, can hardly look at one with respect." His lip expressed contempt. "It is true that an eloquent leader may have the power of inciting people to some good deed; but even so, they are only a machine which he works. Great thoughts are not vociferous. They float in air, with no sound, unless it is the sound of wings."

Honora checked the words that rose to her lips so suddenly that a deep blush bathed her face. She had been thinking of the crowd that roared "Crucify him!" and had recollected only just in time that they were this man's remote ancestors. But she recollected also that it was to him as original sin was to her, an hereditary, but not a personal, stain, and that baptism could wash both away. Her charity began at home, in the great Christian family, but it stayed not there: it overflowed to all living creatures.

"I have almost an enthusiasm for firemen," she said hastily. "They sometimes perform such wonders, and run such terrible risks for scarcely a reward. Unlike soldiers, they save without destroying anything. How beautiful their engines are!"

The procession was a long and very brilliant one, and the companies had vied with each other in decoration. The engines shone as if made of burnished gold and silver, and wreaths and bouquets of green and flowers decked them.

"These processions, more than any others I have seen, remind me of descriptions of pageants in the old time," remarked Honora, when they had been silent a while. "There is so much show and glitter in them, and the costumes are so gay. How I would like to be transported back to that time for one year!"

Her thoughts had taken a flight between the first and last words, and she was thinking of mediæval religion, with its untroubled faith and its fiery zeal.

Mr. Schöninger did not share her enthusiasm. Those had been bitter days for his people, and perhaps he was thinking so.

"I imagine you would ask to be transported back again before the year was over," he said quietly. "Those times look very picturesque at this distance, with their Rembrandt shading. But there was no more heroism then than there is to-day. I far prefer the hero of to-day. He is a better bred man, not so blatant as the mediæval. It seems to me that the admirers of that time are chiefly the poets, who sacrifice everything to the picturesque; ambitious men, who covet power; and--pardon me!--devout ladies who have been captivated by legends of the saints, and stories of ecclesiastical pageantry, but who take little thought for humanity at large."

"But in those days," said Miss Pembroke, "men had some respect for authority and law, and now they despise it."

"It is the fault of authority if it is despised," Mr. Schöninger replied with decision. "License is the inevitable reaction from tyranny, and is in proportion to it. So long as man retains any vestige of the image of the Creator, tyranny will always, in time, produce rebels. The world is now inebriated with freedom; let those whose abuse of authority created this burning thirst share the opprobrium of its excesses. Some day the equilibrium will be found. We cannot force it; it is a question of growth; but we can help. You are helping it," he added, smiling.

"What you have said sounds just," she replied, thoughtfully; "and I like justice. Perhaps the abuse of legitimate authority is a greater sin than rebellion against it, since the ruler should be wiser and better than the ruled."

They were again silent awhile, the gentleman hesitating whether to speak his thought, and finally speaking.

"Trust one who has studied the world well," he said earnestly. "Instead of being determined not to believe, mankind at this time is longing to believe. But it is determined not to be duped. The sceptic of to-day was made by the hypocrite of yesterday, and half the scepticism is affected, as half the piety was affected. Men are ashamed and afraid to be caught in a trap, and they pretend to disbelieve, when in fact they only doubt. You must now prove to them that truth itself is true, since they have so often been deceived by falsehood in the garb of truth. Let a man or a measure prove to be sincere and honest, and there was never a period in the history of the world when either would win more hearty approval than now. It is true that the childlike trustfulness of mankind is gone, partly from growth, partly because it has been abused; but the nobler powers are maturing. To believe this, you need not give up your faith. I have seen the eyes of one of the most bitter of scoffers fill with tears, and his lips tremble, at a proof of ardent and pious devotion which was not meant to be known. That man was a scoffer because his common sense and sentiment of justice had been insulted by pious pretenders. If he could believe, he would be a saint."

Honora Pembroke's face was troubled. There could be no doubt that the man was honest and sincere in what he said, and that much of what he said was true. But was a Jew to teach a Christian? She could not be sure that his judgment was unbiased, and that one more learned than she would not be able to refute him. She said the best thing she could think of.

"False professors do not make false doctrines. And if the human mind is becoming so adult and strong, it should judge the truth by itself, not by the person who professes it."

"You are quite right," Mr. Schöninger answered. "And that is precisely what people are learning to do. It is also what many, who wish truth to be believed on their own testimony, object to their doing. I repeat"--he glanced with anxiety into her clouded face--"I earnestly assure you that I have not uttered a word which conflicts with your creed, though it is not mine. If I were to-day to become a Catholic, I should only reiterate what I have said on this subject."

The cloud passed from her face, but still she did not speak. She was not gifted in argument, and this subject was complex, and, moreover, a bone of contention.

"It has occurred to me," he said presently, "that the people in Crichton, though they appear to be very liberal, may still have a prejudice against me as a Jew. That would be of no consequence to me in the case of most of them; but there are a few whom I should be sorry to know had such a feeling. The Jews are much misunderstood and slandered, though people have an opportunity of learning their true character if they would. The majority seem to look on every Jew as a probable or possible usurer and dealer in old clothes, and a person capable of joining a rabble at any moment, and pursuing an innocent man to death. I do not, of course, fancy for an instant that you have any sympathy with such people; but I think it possible that you may misunderstand my attitude toward your church. I have not the slightest feeling of enmity against it as long as it does not do violence to me or mine, and while its members are true to the doctrines of peace and charity which they profess. As an artist I admire it. Its theology is the only one which still retains binding and implacable obligations of form, consequently, the only one that can inspire high art. I do not count the old Jews, who are rapidly melting away. I am of the reformed Jews."

"You no longer expect the coming of the Redeemer, nor the return to Jerusalem, nor the triumph of your people?" she asked, looking at him in astonishment.

"We no longer believe in them," he replied.

"What, then, is left you?" she exclaimed.

He smiled slightly. "I expect and long for the redemption of mankind by the spirit of God, and I believe that truth and charity will prevail, though they may not descend from heaven to become incarnate in one form. The Jerusalem my people will return to is the spiritual city of the children of God. Is it not nobler than the pretty myths which have been wasting our energies and dividing the brotherhood of men into petty clans, all hating each other even while they professed that love was their prime virtue?"

"But sacrifice," she said, "what did you mean by that?"

"We had truth and error mingled. The sacrifice was merely a remnant of heathen customs. Peoples who knew nothing of Judaism nor of Christianity had their offerings and sacrifices. The Jews were the chosen people, finer and more spiritual than any other; and to the souls of the chosen among them the Creator revealed his truths. They renounced all heathenish doctrines, and into the few ceremonies and customs they retained they infused a spiritual significance. As the race deteriorated, this spiritual meaning was misinterpreted, and became more and more literal and gross. The people fell into sin, and for this the Creator punished them by taking away their power and pre-eminence, and by scattering them over the face of the earth."

Honora listened intently; and when he had finished, she uttered but one word. Clasping her hands and lifting her eyes, her heart seemed to burst upward like a fountain, tossing that one word into air, "Emmanuel!"

Not the primeval Creator alone, distant and awful, but God with us! Into this vast and terrible void which had been spread out before her, she invoked with passion the incarnate, the lowly, the pitiful, the suffering God.

"We hold that sacrifice is a practice of divine institution retained from our first parents, not an originally heathen custom," she added after a moment, regaining her composure. "You are, however, obliged to give up your belief in it, or be inconsistent. I can see now that if you hold to the sacrifice, you must hold to the Redeemer; if to the Redeemer, then you must believe in Christ, since the time is gone by for expectation; and if you accept the Christ, you must be a Roman Catholic."

"Precisely!" said the Jew. He had felt a momentary electric shock at the passion of her first exclamation, and had seen with emotion the flush and fire in her countenance. Now he smiled at her concise statement of the case.

Miss Pembroke rose, for the last of the procession was passing. The children were called back to their seats in the same order in which they had left them, and a few simple exercises were gone through with at the request of their visitor. All was well calculated to unfold and inform their young minds, but nothing was for show.

Mr. Schöninger blushed for the mistake he had made in fancying that any occupation on earth could be more refined and noble than Miss Pembroke's, when it was conducted in Miss Pembroke's manner. It seemed an occupation for angels. She possessed, evidently, in a preeminent degree, the power to understand and interest children, and she used that power to perfect ends. There was none of that personal familiarity which he had dreaded to see, that promiscuous fondness and caressing by which some women fancy they please children, when, in fact, the finer sort of children are oftener than not displeased with it. A kind touch of her fingers was to them an immense favor, and a kiss would have been remembered for ever. But while they treated her with profound respect, they approached her with perfect confidence and delight. They gathered about her, and gazed into her sympathetic face, bright and transparent with love from a bountiful woman's heart. They looked at her as a sky full of little stars may look into a smooth lake, and each saw its own reflection there, and was happy. In her soul all innocent infantile thoughts and fancies were condensed, as cloud and spray are condensed into water, and not only could she remember the process, but she could reverse it at will, could evaporate a thought or truth too strong for childish intellects, and give it in the form of rosy clouds to wide, grasping, childish imaginations.

Only one exercise failed at first. The children were shy of singing before the stranger. All their voices faltered into silence but one, a rather fair voice of a little boy who was perfectly self-confident, and who evidently expected applause.

Mr. Schöninger took no notice of the child. Its vanity and boldness displeased him. "A shallow thing!" he thought; and said, "I see that I must hire you to sing for me. You like fairy-stories, surely. Well, sing me but one song, and I will tell you the story."

His voice and smile reassured them. Moreover, a gentleman, no matter how splendid he might be, who could tell fairy-stories, could not be very dreadful. They exchanged smiles and glances, took courage, fixed their eyes on their teacher, and sang a pretty hymn in good time and tune, and with good expression.

In their first essay the musician had caught a faltering little silvery note, which had failed as soon as heard. In the second it came out round and clear, a voice of surprising beauty. He marked the singer, and called him forward as soon as the hymn was over. The boy came awkwardly and blushing. He was the ugliest and most dingy pupil there. Only a pair of melancholy, dark, and lustrous eyes, habitually downcast, and a set of perfect teeth, redeemed the face from being disagreeable. Through those eyes looked a winged soul that did not recognize itself, still less expect recognition from others, but felt only the vague weight and sadness of an uncongenial life. He gave the impression of a beautiful bird whose every plume is so laden with mire it cannot fly.

"You have a good voice, and should learn how to sing," Mr. Schöninger said to him kindly. "I will teach you, if Miss Pembroke approves, and will make the arrangements. Of course it will cost you nothing."

"He needs encouragement," the musician remarked when the boy had returned to his seat; "and he needs to have his position defined before the others. Do you not perceive that they despise him? He has the voice of an angel, and he looks remarkable. And now for my story."

The children's eyes sparkled with anticipation, and the teacher leaned smilingly to listen. Let us listen also, and become better acquainted with Mr. Schöninger.

"Once upon a time, there was a great wrangle in a certain street," the story-teller began. "Five little boys and girls were quarreling, and two dogs were barking. The neighbors put their heads out their windows, and the policeman stopped. Mrs. Blake put her two forefingers in her two ears, for the noise was near her step, and the five boys and girls were all telling her together what the matter was, and whose fault it was. Then the mothers called their children home, and two went into Mrs. Blake's, for they were hers. This was the story she drew from them: Anne Blake had said a cross word to one of the others, that other had made a face at the next, the third had slapped the fourth, and it went round the circle. So it seemed that Anne started the whole by speaking a cross word.

"'Since you are sorry, I will talk no more to you about it,' her mother said. 'But I wish you to go up to your chamber and sit alone a little while, and think over a Chinese proverb which is written on this slip of paper. You are ten years old, and must begin to think.'

"Anne went slowly up-stairs to her chamber, shut the door after her, and sat down in a little cushioned chair by the window to read her proverb. Its being Chinese did not prevent it from being good. This is what she read: 'A word once spoken, a coach and six cannot bring it back again.'

"The day was warm, and the curtain at the window swung with a lulling motion, giving glimpses of blue sky with white clouds sailing over, and, below, of the top of a grape-vine full of leaves and small green grapes.

"Anne gazed at the sky till it made her feel sleepy--gazing at bright things does make one sleepy--then she gazed at the grape-vine. Presently, she saw something in this vine that looked like a tiny ladder, hidden among the leaves. It looked so much like a ladder that she leaned forward and pulled the curtain aside, to see more plainly. Sure enough! It was the loveliest ladder, or stairway, winding down and down. Its steps were dark, like vine branches, and there was a railing at each side of twigs and tendrils, and it wound down and down, in sight and out of sight. And, more wonderful still, it was no longer a yard, with the city about, she saw, but a great vine covering all the window, and glimpses of a moonlighted forest down below.

"'I must go down,' says Anne; and so down she went on the beautiful stairs.

"Lights and shades fluttered over her, and the leaves clapped together, and little tendrils caught at her dress in play. And by-and-by she stepped on to the brightest greensward that could be, full of blue and white violets. The trees arched over her, the air was sweet, and there was a smooth pond near by. The water was so very smooth that she would never have known it was water if the banks had not turned the wrong way in it, and the trees grown down instead of up. A little white boat, too, had another little white boat under it, the two keel to keel. Swans ran down the shore as she looked, and splashed into the water, dipping their heads under, and making the whole surface so full of motion that the upside-down trees and banks and boat disappeared. Words cannot describe how beautiful the place was. There was every kind of flower, and hosts of birds, and the moonlight was so bright that all could be distinctly seen. There were also a great many splendid moths that looked like flowers flying about, and flapping their petals.

"But the most beautiful part was that everything seemed to breathe of peace and love. The birds sang and cooed to each other, the blossoms leaned cheek to cheek, the water laughed at the stones it ran over, and the wet stones smiled back, the gray old rocks held tenderly the flowers and mosses that grew in their hollows, and the mosses and flowers held on to the rocks with their tiny roots, like little children clinging to old people who are fond of them.

"'How beautiful it is to see them so loving,' Anne said. 'They are a sort of people, too; for they look alive. I wish other folks would be as good. I'm sure I try; but then somebody always comes along and says something ugly; and then, of course, I can't help being ugly back again.'

"'Oh! yes, you can,' said a sweet voice close by.

"Anne looked and saw a charming little lady standing beside her. She was so beautiful that words cannot describe her, and she carried a pink petunia for a parasol to preserve her complexion. For she was exquisitely fair, and the moonlight was really very bright.

"'Oh! yes, you can,' she repeated when Anne looked at her. 'You can give a pleasant answer, and then people will stop being ugly.'

"'I could do it if everybody else would,' Anne said. 'The beginning is the trouble. How nice it would be if there were a king over all the world, and he would say, Now, after I have counted three, all of you stop being cross, and begin to love each other, and keep on loving a whole hour. If you don't, I'll cut your heads off!'

"'That would not be love; it would be a make-believe to save their heads,' the little lady answered. 'But there is such a king, and he has commanded us to love each other, and....'

"Here she was interrupted by a loud flapping of wings and a terrible croaking, and a great black bird, something like a bat, flew by; and wherever it struck its wings other bats flew out, and the air grew dark with them, and all the beautiful forest was changed. The stones tried to stop the brook, and the brook tried to upset the stones; the leaves struck each other, the swans and little birds began to pull each other's feathers out. All was discord.

"And then there was a rolling of wheels, and a trampling of hoofs, and a great yellow coach appeared drawn by six horses covered with foam. The coachman looked as if he were driving for his life, and there was a head thrust from each window of the coach, telling him to drive faster. All the heads wore caps like dish-covers, and had long braids of hair hanging down their necks, though they were men; and their eyes slanted down toward their noses, instead of going straight across their faces.

"'We are trying to catch a wicked word that is ruining all the place,' they said, 'but we cannot. A wicked word has wings.'

"'So has a kind word wings,' said the little lady. 'Send a kind word after the cross one, and perhaps it may bring it back.'

"'You are right, madam,' said one of the Chinamen; and he nodded his head till the long braid at the back of it wagged to and fro. And he kept on nodding so queerly that Anne felt obliged to nod too, and so he nodded, and she nodded, till he nodded his head off. And then she nodded her head off--no, not quite off; but she nodded so that she waked herself up. For she had been dreaming.

"Then she jumped up and ran down-stairs and out doors as fast as her feet would carry her. And in ten minutes she was back again, all out of breath, and full of excitement. 'Mother,' she said, 'a coach and six can't do it, but a kind word can. I told Jane I was sorry, and she told--and we all told each other that we were sorry, and then we were glad.' The words were rather mixed up, but the meaning was all right."

"I am truly grateful to you for allowing me to come this afternoon," Mr. Schöninger said on taking leave. "My visit has been to me like a drop of cold water to one in a fever, or like the sound of David's harp to Saul. I am refreshed."

He looked both sad and pleased. "I was about to thank you for coming," Honora answered. "You have given me and the children much pleasure."

And so, with a friendly salutation, they separated.

She mused a moment. "If he could believe in the sacrifice, all would follow," she thought.

Then she called the children to their prayers, but first said a word to them.

"There is something, my dear children, that I want very much," she said. "Oh! I long for it. I shall be unhappy if I do not have it. And I want all of you to ask the Infant Jesus to give it to me for his dear mother's sake. Ask with all your hearts. I will tell him what I wish for."

Her wish was that Mr. Schöninger might believe that sacrifice was a divine revelation, not a heathenish custom.

"That is all he needs from me," she thought. "I trust him. If he has that to begin with, he will himself ask God for the rest."

ITALIAN CONFISCATION LAWS.

REVIEWED FROM AN AMERICAN STAND-POINT.

BY A LAWYER.

"No state shall pass any _ex post facto_ law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts."[2]

This is indeed a moral law, and has been recognized as such by all civilized nations.

Justice Curtis, in his _Life of Webster_ (vol. i., chap. 7, p. 165) thus notices the decision in the Supreme Court which first gave the scope and meaning of this clause in regard to charters of private corporations:

"The framers of the Constitution of the United States, moved chiefly by the mischiefs created by the preceding legislation of the states, which had made serious encroachments on the rights of property, inserted a clause in that instrument which declared that 'no state shall pass any _ex post facto_ law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts.' The first branch of this clause had always been understood to relate to criminal legislation, the second to legislation affecting civil rights. But before the case of Dartmouth College v. Woodward occurred, there had been no judicial decisions respecting the meaning and scope of the restraint in regard to contracts, excepting that it had more than once been determined by the Supreme Court of the United States that a grant of lands made by a state is a contract within the protection of this provision, and is, therefore, irrevocable. The decisions, however, could go but little way toward the solution of the questions involved in the case of the college. They did, indeed, establish the principle that contracts of the state itself are beyond the reach of subsequent legislation equally with contracts between individuals, and that there are grants of a state that are contracts. But this college stood upon a charter granted by the crown of England before the American Revolution. Was the state of New Hampshire--a sovereign in all respects after the Revolution, and remaining one after the federal constitution, excepting in those respects in which it had subjected its sovereignty to the restraints of that instrument--bound by the contracts of the English crown? Is the grant of a charter of incorporation a contract between the sovereign power and those on whom the charter is bestowed? If an act of incorporation is a contract, is it so in any case but that of a private corporation? Was this college, which was an institution of learning, established for the promotion of education, a private corporation, or was it one of those instruments of government which are at all times under the control and subject to the direction of the legislative power? All these questions were involved in the inquiry, whether the legislative power of the state had been so restrained by the constitution of the United States that it could not alter the charter of this institution, against the will of the trustees, without impairing the obligation of a contract. If this inquiry were to receive an affirmative answer, the constitutional jurisprudence of the United States would embrace a principle of the utmost importance to every similar institution of learning, and to every incorporation then existing, or thereafter to exist, not belonging to the machinery of government as a political instrument....

"On the conclusion of the argument the Chief-Justice (Marshall) intimated that a decision was not to be expected until the next term. It was made in February, 1819, fully confirming the grounds on which Mr. Webster had placed the cause. From this decision, the principle in our constitutional jurisprudence which regards a charter of a private corporation as a contract, and places it under the protection of the Constitution of the United States, takes its date."

We add a passage from Mr. Webster's speech in this case, as quoted by the same author from a letter of Prof. Goodrich, of Yale College, to Rufus Choate:

"This, sir, is my case. It is the case not merely of that humble institution; it is the case of every college in our land. It is more. It is the case of every eleemosynary institution throughout our country--of all those great charities founded by the piety of our ancestors to alleviate human misery and scatter blessings along the pathway of life. It is more! It is, in some sense, the case of every man among us who has property of which he may be stripped, for the question is simply this: Shall our state legislatures be allowed to take that which is not their own, to turn it from its original use, and apply it to such ends or purposes as they in their discretion shall see fit?"

The charitable and religious institutions of Italy and the States of the Church were founded under guarantees as strong at least as those which assured the perpetuity of Dartmouth College, and were entitled to as much immunity from confiscation and intrusion for all coming time.

When a law is in its nature a contract, and absolute rights have vested under that contract, a repeal of the law cannot divest those rights, nor annihilate or impair a title acquired under the law. A grant is a contract according to the meaning given to the word by jurists. A grant is a contract executed, and a party is always estopped by his own grant. A party cannot pronounce his own act or deed invalid, whatever cause may be assigned for its invalidity, and though that party be the legislature of a state. A grant amounts to an extinguishment of the right of the grantor, and implies a contract not to reassert that right. A grant from a state should be as much protected as a grant from one individual to another; therefore, a state is as much inhibited from impairing its own contracts, or a contract to which it is a party, as it is from impairing the obligation of contracts between two individuals. A grant once made by the ruling or competent power, creates an indefeasible and irrevocable title. There is no authority or principle which could support the doctrine that such a grant was revocable in its own nature, and held only _durante bene placito_. For no ruling power, be it kingly, legislative, or otherwise, can repeal a law or grant creating a corporate body, or confirming to them property already acquired under the faith of previous laws or edicts, and by such repeal vest the property in others without the consent or default of the corporators. Such a procedure would be repugnant to the principles of natural justice. A society or order of religious people holding property in common or _in solido_, may be considered in the character of a private eleemosynary institution endowed with a capacity to take property for objects unconnected with government: it receives gifts or devises, and other private donations bestowed by individuals on the faith of its perpetuity and usefulness--such a corporation not being invested with any political power whatever, or partaking in any degree in the administration of civil government. It is merely an institution or private corporation for general charity. It is established under a charter, which was a contract, to which the donors, the trustees of the corporation, and the governing power were the original parties, and it was granted for a valuable consideration--for the security and disposition of the property necessary for the existence of the community, order, or society.

The legal interest, in every such literary and charitable institution, is in trustees, and to be asserted by them, which they claim or defend on behalf of the society or community for the object of religion, charity, or education, for which they were originally created, and the private donations made. Contracts of this kind, creating such charitable or educational institutions, should be at all times protected by the state, and their rights maintained by the courts administered by a pure and just judiciary. Conquests or revolutions cannot change the rights acquired under such contracts, and no state should by any act transfer the rights of property theretofore acquired, nor transfer from the trustees appointed according to the will of the founders or donors. The will of the state should not be substituted for the will of the donors, or convert an institution, moulded according to the will of its founders, and placed under the control of people of their own selection, into government property. Such action is of course subversive of the original compact on the faith of which the donors invested their gifts, donations, or devises, and is, therefore, repugnant to every idea of honesty and good morals, for enforcing which governments are instituted.

A grant to a private trustee, for the benefit of a particular _cestui que trust_, or for any special, private, or public charity, cannot be the less a contract because the trustee takes nothing for his own benefit. Nor does a private donation vested in a trustee for objects of a general nature thereby become a public trust, which a government may at its pleasure take from the trustee. A government cannot even revoke a grant of its own funds, when given to a corporation or private person for special uses. It has no other remaining authority but what is judicial to enforce the proper administration of the trust. Nor is such a grant less a contract though no beneficial interest accrues to the possessor. All incorporeal hereditaments, as immunities, dignities, offices, and franchises, are rights deemed valuable in law, and whenever they are the subject of contract or grant they should be held as legal estates. They are held as powers coupled with interests, and consequently are vested rights, and of which the possessors should not be divested by any legislative body without their consent.

Chief-Justice Marshall (in U. S. _v._ Percheman, _7 Peters 86_) says: It is unusual, even in cases of conquest, for the conqueror to do more than to displace the sovereign and assume dominion over the country; and that the modern usage of nations, which has become law, would be violated; that sense of justice and right which is acknowledged and felt by the whole civilized world, would be outraged if private property should be generally confiscated and private rights annulled.

Justice Sprague (Amy Warwick, _2 Sprague 150_) says: Confiscations of property, not for any use that has been made of it, which go not against an offending thing, but are inflicted for the personal delinquency of the owner, are punitive, and punishment should be inflicted only upon due conviction of personal guilt.

The communities whose rights are now invaded and whose property is confiscated, ought to be protected under the law of nations. For, by this law is understood that code of public instruction which defines the rights and prescribes the duties of nations in their intercourse with each other. The faithful observance of this law is essential to national character and the happiness of mankind. According to Montesquieu, it is founded on the principle that different nations ought to do each other as much good in peace, and as little harm in war, as possible. The most useful and practical part of the law of nations is instituted or positive law, founded on usage, consent, and agreement. It is impossible to separate this law from natural jurisprudence, or to consider that it does not derive much of its force and dignity from the same principle of right reason, the same views of the nature and constitution of man, and the same sanction of divine revelation, as those from which the science of morality is deduced. There is a natural and a positive law of nations. By the former, every state in its relations with other states is bound to conduct itself with justice, good faith, and benevolence; and this application of the law of nature has been called by Vattel the necessary law of nations, because nations are bound by the law of nature to observe it; and it is termed by others the internal law of nations, because it is obligatory upon them in point of conscience.

That eminent jurist, Chancellor Kent, says that the science of public law should not be separated from that of ethics, nor encourage the dangerous suggestion that governments are not strictly bound by the obligations of truth, justice, and humanity in relation to other powers, as they are in the management of their own local concerns. States or bodies politic are to be considered as moral persons, having a public will, capable and free to do right and wrong, inasmuch as they are collections of individuals, each of whom carries with him into the service of the community the same binding law of morality and religion which ought to control his conduct in private life.

The law of nations consists of general principles of right and justice, equally suitable to the government of individuals in a state of natural equality and to the relations and conduct of nations; the conduct of nations should be governed by principles fairly to be deduced from the rights and duties of nations and the nature of moral obligation; and we have the authority of lawyers of antiquity, and of some of the first masters in the modern school of public law, for placing the moral obligations of nations and of individuals on similar grounds, and for considering individual and national morality as parts of one and the same science.

The law of nations, as far as it is founded upon the principles of natural law, is equally binding in every age, and upon all mankind.

The law of nature, by the obligations of which individuals and states are bound, is identical with the will of God, and that will is ascertained by consulting divine revelation, where that is declaratory, or by the application of human reason where revelation is silent. Christianity is an authoritative publication of natural religion, and it is from the sanction which revelation gives to natural law that we must expect respect to be paid to justice between nations. Christianity reveals to us a general system of morality, but the application to the details of practice is often left to be discovered by human reason.

Justice is of perpetual obligation, and is essential to the well-being of every society. The great commonwealth of nations stands in need of law, and observance of faith, and the practice of justice.

If the question was one to be decided by the civil courts according to the American rules concerning rights to property held by ecclesiastical bodies, the points involved might be presented as follows:

1. Where the property which is the subject of controversy is, by the express terms of the deed or will of the donor or other instrument under which it is held, devoted to the teaching, support, or spread of a specific form of religious doctrine and belief.

2. Where the property is held by a religious congregation, which by the nature of its organization is strictly independent of other ecclesiastical associations, and, so far as church government is concerned, owes no fealty or obligation to any higher authority.

3. The third is where the religious congregation or ecclesiastical body holding the property is but a subordinate member of some general church organization in which there are superior ecclesiastical tribunals with a general and ultimate power of control, more or less complete, in some supreme judicatory over the whole membership of that general organization.

Respecting the first of these classes, it does not admit of a rational doubt that an individual or an association of individuals may dedicate property by way of trust to the purpose of sustaining, supporting, and propagating definite religious doctrines or principles, provided that in doing so they violate no law of morality, and give to the instrument by which their purpose is evidenced the formalities which the law requires.

And it is then the duty of a court of law, in a case properly brought before it, to see that the property so dedicated is not diverted from the trust which is thus attached to its use. So long as there are persons qualified within the meaning of the original dedication, and who are also willing to teach the doctrines or principles prescribed in the act of dedication, and so long as there is any one so interested in the execution of the trust as to have a standing in court, it must be that they can prevent the diversion of the property or fund to other and different uses.

This is the general doctrine of courts of equity as to charities, and it is also applicable to ecclesiastical matters.

In such case, where the trust is confided to a religious congregation or church government, it is not in the power of the majority of that congregation, however preponderant by reason of a change of views on religion, to carry the property so confided to them to the support of new and conflicting doctrine.

A pious man building and dedicating a house of worship to the sole and exclusive use of those who believe in the doctrines of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, and placing it under the control of those who at the time held the same belief, has a right to expect that the law will prevent that property from being used for any other purpose whatsoever. The law should throw its protection around the trust, and it is the duty of courts of law to enforce a trust clearly defined, and to inquire whether the party accused of violating the trust is using the property so dedicated as to defeat the declared objects of the trust. In such cases, the right to the use of the property must be determined by the ordinary principles which govern voluntary associations.

The same rule prevails as to the class of cases coming within the view of the third proposition, as to property acquired in any of the usual modes for the general use of a religious congregation which is itself part of a larger and general organization, with which it is connected by religious views and ecclesiastical government, and which appeals to the courts to determine the right to the use of the property so acquired. That is, where property has been purchased for the use of the congregation, and so long as any such body can be ascertained to be of that congregation, and is under its control and bound by its orders and judgments, or its regular and legitimate successor, it is entitled to the use of the property.

In this class of cases, the rule of action which governs the civil courts of the United States, as enunciated by the highest legal tribunal, the Supreme Court, is founded upon a broad and sound view of the relations of church and state, and is, that wherever questions of faith or of discipline, or ecclesiastical rule, custom, or law, have been decided by the highest of these church judicatories to which the matter has been carried, the legal tribunals must accept such decisions as final, and as binding on them in their application to the case before them.[3]

In delivering the opinion of the court in that case, the learned Mr. Justice Miller said:

"In this country the full and free right to entertain any religious belief, to practise any religious principle, and to teach any religious doctrine which does not violate the laws of morality and property, and which does not infringe personal rights, is conceded to all. The law is not committed to the support of any dogma, the establishment of any sect. The right to organize voluntary religious associations, to assist in the expression and dissemination of any religious doctrine, and to create tribunals for the decision of controverted questions of faith within the association, and for the ecclesiastical government of all the individual members, congregations, and officers within the general association, is unquestioned. All who unite themselves to such a body do so with an implied consent to this government, and are bound to submit to it. But it would be a vain consent, and would lead to the total subversion of such religious bodies, if any one aggrieved by one of their decisions could appeal to the secular courts and have them reversed. It is of the essence of these religious unions, and of their right to establish tribunals for the decision of questions arising among themselves, that those decisions should be binding in all cases of ecclesiastical cognizance, subject to only such appeals as the organism itself provides for.

"Nor do we see that justice would be likely to be promoted by submitting those decisions to review in the ordinary judicial tribunals.

"The Catholic Church has constitutional and ecclesiastical laws of its own that task the ablest minds to become familiar with. It cannot be expected that judges of the civil courts can be as competent in the ecclesiastical law as the ablest men in the church. It would therefore be an appeal from the more learned tribunal in the law, which should decide the case, to one which is less so.

"These views are supported by the preponderant weight of authority in this country."

And according to the American rule, where the subject-matter of dispute, inquiry, or decision is strictly and purely ecclesiastical in its character, it is a matter over which the civil courts should not exercise any jurisdiction--a matter which concerns theological controversy, church discipline, ecclesiastical government, or the conformity of the members of the church to the standard of morals required of them, the civil court has not and should not have any jurisdiction. If the civil courts were at liberty to inquire into the whole subject of doctrinal theology, usages, and customs, the written laws and fundamental principles would have to be examined into with minuteness and care, for they would be the criteria by which the validity of the ecclesiastical decree would be determined in the civil court. And that would deprive the authorities of the church of their proper right and power to construe their own church laws, and would open the way to the evil of transferring to the civil courts, where the rights to property were concerned, the decision of all ecclesiastical questions.[4]

Of all the cases in which this doctrine is applied, no better representative can be found than that of Shannon _v._ Frost,[5] where the principle is ably supported by the learned Chief-Justice of the Court of Appeals of Kentucky, wherein he says:

"This court, having no ecclesiastical jurisdiction, cannot revise or question ordinary acts of church discipline. Our only judicial power in the case arises from the conflicting claims of the parties in the church property, and the use of it. We cannot decide who ought to be members of the church, nor whether the excommunicated have been justly or unjustly, regularly or irregularly, cut off from the body of the church."

The same principle was laid down in the subsequent case of Gibson _v._ Armstrong,[6] and of Watson _v._ Avery.[7]

One of the most careful and well-considered judgments on the subject is that of the Court of Appeals of South Carolina, delivered by Chancellor Johnson in the case of Harmon _v._ Dreher.[8] That case turned upon certain rights in the use of church property claimed by the minister, notwithstanding his expulsion from the synod as one of its members:

"He stands," says the chancellor, "convicted of the offences alleged against him by the sentence of the spiritual body of which he was a voluntary member, and whose proceedings he had bound himself to abide. It belongs not to the civil power to enter into or review the proceedings of a spiritual court. The structure of our government has for the preservation of religious liberty rescued the temporal institutions from religious interference; on the other hand, it has secured religious liberty from the invasion of the civil authority. The judgments, therefore, of religious associations, bearing on their own members, are not examinable here; and I am not to enquire whether the doctrines attributed to Mr. Dreher were held by him, or whether, if held, were anti-Lutheran, or whether his conduct was or was not in accordance with the duty he owed to the synod or to his denomination.... When a civil right depends upon an ecclesiastical matter, it is the civil court and not the ecclesiastical which is to decide. But the civil tribunal tries the civil right, and no more, taking the ecclesiastical decisions out of which the civil right arises as it finds them."

This principle is reaffirmed by the same court in the John's Island Church case.[9] And in Den _v._ Bolton[10] the Supreme Court of New Jersey asserts the same principle.

The Supreme Court of Illinois, in the case of Ferraria _v._ Vascouelles, refers to the case of Shannon _v._ Frost with approval, and adopts the language of the court, that the judicial eye cannot penetrate the veil of the church for the forbidden purpose of vindicating the alleged wrongs of excised members; when they became members, they did so upon the condition of continuing or not as they and their churches might determine, and they thereby submit to the ecclesiastical power, and cannot now invoke the supervisory power of the civil tribunals.

And in the case of Chase _v._ Cheney, recently decided in the same (Illinois) court, Judge Lawrence says: "The opinion implies that in the administration of ecclesiastical discipline, and where no other right of property is involved, their loss of the clerical office or salary incident to such discipline, a spiritual court is the exclusive judge of its own jurisdiction, and that its decision of that question is binding on the secular courts."

In the case of Watson _v._ Ferris,[11] which was a case growing out of the schism in the Presbyterian Church in Missouri, the court held that whether a case was regularly or irregularly before the assembly, was a question which the assembly had the right to determine for itself, and no civil court could reverse, modify, or impair its action in a matter of merely ecclesiastical concern.

The opinion of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, expressed in the case of the German Reformed Church _v._ Seibert,[12] sets forth that the decisions of ecclesiastical courts, like every other judicial tribunal, are final, as they are the best judges of what constitutes an offence against the word of God and the discipline of the church. Any other than those courts must be incompetent judges of matters of faith, discipline, and doctrine; and civil courts, if they should be so unwise as to attempt to supervise their judgments on matters which come within their jurisdiction, would only involve themselves in a sea of uncertainty and doubt, which would do anything but improve religion and good morals.

In the subsequent case of McGinnis _v._ Watson,[13] this principle is again applied and supported by a more elaborate argument.

Lord Chancellor Eldon, upon delivering the opinion of the House of Lords in the celebrated test-case of Craigdallie _v._ Aikman, reported in 2 _Bligh_, 529 (1 _Dow_, 1), said: That they (the law lords) had adopted this principle as their rule and guide for cases of dispute respecting the right to property conveyed for the use of religious worship--that it is a trust which is to be enforced for the purpose of maintaining that religious worship for which the property was devoted, and in the event of schism (the original deed having made no provision for such cases) its uses are to be enforced, not on behalf of a majority of the congregation, nor yet exclusively in behalf of the party adhering to the general body, but in favor of that part of the society adhering to and maintaining the original principles upon which it was founded: the exclusive standard or guide by which conflicting claims are to be decided is adherence to the church itself.

Regarding, therefore, church property, or the property of religious societies, communities, or orders, in the same manner as the private property of any other corporation or individual, it may with safety be assumed as a settled and fundamental law that ought to be recognized by every Christian and civilized state, that it is bound to make just indemnity and compensation to the citizen or subject, society, or corporation, or community, for all property taken under the pressure of state necessity for the public good, convenience, or safety. The eminent domain of the state should be so exercised as to work no wrong, to inflict no private injury, without giving to the party aggrieved ample redress. This doctrine was not engrafted on the public law to give license to despotic and arbitrary sovereigns. It has its foundation in the organization of society, and is essential to the maintenance of public virtue in every government, whether a republic, a monarchy, or a despotism. It is of the very essence of sovereignty, for without it a state cannot perform its first and highest duties--those required by justice and righteousness. Whenever, therefore, from necessity a state appropriates to public use the private property of an individual or of a corporation, lay or religious, it is obliged by a law as imperative as that by which it makes the appropriation, to give to the party aggrieved redress commensurate with the injury sustained. Upon any other principle the social compact would work mischief and wrong. The state might impoverish the citizen it was established to protect, and trample on those rights of property, security for which was one of the great objects of its creation.

All the elementary writers of authority sustain these views of the duty and obligations of states.

Justice requires, says Vattel, that the community or individual be indemnified at the public charge.

The taking, says Grotius, must be for some public advantage; as, for instance, in time of war, the erection of a rampart or fortification, or where his standing corn or storehouses are destroyed to prevent their being of use to the enemy, in which case the person injured should receive a just compensation for the loss he suffers out of the common stock. The state is obliged to repair the damage suffered by any citizen out of the public funds. The conversion cannot take place either to gratify any whim, caprice, or fashion; it must be an actual public necessity. For, do we not read of an instance where some king, perhaps of Prussia, was erecting a magnificent palace at his capital, and, in order to carry out the design of the architect, it became necessary to remove a small unsightly tenement, the property of a poor man, who, though so poor, would not sell his place or consent that it should be removed, and there it remained for years, an eyesore perhaps to many, and yet the king, as the chief depositary of justice, would not permit it to be disturbed, although urged by his flatterers and courtiers to do so, until in lapse of years the owner died, and his successors consented to sell. The historian recalls the justice of the king, that all honest and honorable rulers and men might follow such a noble example of honor and justice. But can any one reasonably praise such an act, and approve of the confiscation of the houses of religious and charitable associations in Italy, and the very suppression and wiping out of the corporation or society itself, without trial, or charge of offence or crime other than the offence of doing good to the human race without pay, fee, or reward here, but looking only to heaven for recompense.

If the Italian government or parliament may to-day confiscate or escheat the property of Catholic communities, and thus commit a breach of the pact made by former rulers, emperors, or governments with the founders of such communities, disregarding all inherent rights of succession and perpetuity, may it not to-morrow also commit a breach of its own compacts or implied guarantees, and confiscate or escheat all the property of churches, school-houses, colleges, of other denominations who have lately or are now building them within Italian jurisdiction? For what obstacle is to prevent it doing so? Having outraged and set aside as nought the moral or human law, styled law of nations, in this respect, may it not do so again in any other, from either whim or caprice? Unless there is some power left in public opinion to restrain it, this is a dilemma from which all the arguments of theoretical political economists or logicians cannot relieve them.

Therefore, is it not a question now well worthy the consideration of all honest-thinking men, whether or not they should aid public opinion in sending forth a note of warning against this doctrine of confiscation--for else, perhaps, the disease may make a wider sweep over the earth, and parliaments or congresses be elected for the purpose of confiscating or escheating other property besides church property or the property of religious or charitable houses or communities?

Judging from the tenor and tone of American decisions--upon the question involved--pronounced by some of our ablest and purest men, this "confiscation," or, more expressively, this "spoliation" of the property of the church and of religious orders, by Victor Emanuel, under color of parliamentary enactments, and tested also by recognized rules of international law, to say nothing of that higher law which commands us to "do unto others, etc.," such "confiscation" is utterly indefensible upon any doctrine other than that set forth in the nefarious maxim, "To the victors belong the spoils," and any acquiescence on the part of the Christian nations, Catholic or non-Catholic, is simply disgraceful, and an act of homage to the prince of this world which is in itself an act of dishonor towards God.

And as any title so acquired can only be maintained so long as the usurper has the material power to occupy and defend, it is certain that with the destruction of that power the true and rightful owners may revive and assert their rights of ownership and possession, as the lawful successors of the original grantors and founders, regardless of any claims or incumbrances whatsoever made or suffered by intervening holders or intruders.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by Rev. I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

[2] Constitution of the United States.

[3] Watson _v._ Jones, _13 Wallace 729_.

[4] See Cardcross case, McMillan _v._ General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, 22 _D._ (_Scotch Ct. of Sess._) 270, decided 23d December, 1859. Attorney-General _v._ Pearson, _3 Merivale 353_; Miller _v._ Goble, _2 Denio 492_.

[5] _3 B. Monroe 253_.

[6] _7 B. Monroe 481_.

[7] _2 Bush 332_.

[8] 2 Speers' _Equity_ 87.

[9] 2 Richardson's _Equity_ 215.

[10] _7 Halstead 206_.

[11] _45 Missouri 183_.

[12] _3 Barr 291_.

[13] _41 Pennsylvania State 21_.

HOW GEORGE HOWARD WAS CURED.

To give up the battle of life at any age is bad, so long as a flicker of life is left. It is like deserting the doomed ship whilst the groaning planks hold together; like refusing to make one in the forlorn hope, but choosing rather to sit down with closed eyes, and let death come as it may. But to give up the battle of life at five-and-twenty, when the battle can scarcely be said to have begun, whilst the future lies hidden behind an uncertain mist, when the sinews are braced, the eyes clear, the heart hopeful, the hair unsilvered--to give it up then is like deserting the ship whilst all is fair sailing, like sneaking from the ranks at first scent of the enemy. It is as cowardly as for the sentinel to abandon his post or the ensign to surrender without a blow the colors which he swore to defend to death; nay, as for the husband to desert the wife he chose out of all the world before God to be his until death. Yet this was what George Howard had done.

Of course a woman was in it, as she is in most difficulties here below. And is it not her province? If she sometimes happen to be "in it" a little too much, rather in the light of an obstacle than a helper--well, the best and not the worst must be made of her under the awkward circumstances. The first man, if Mr. Darwin will excuse the heresy, set us a good example in this way. It was a pity that Eve did not turn her ear away from the voice of the charmer; but as she did the other thing, and so wrought upon her husband that he followed her example, after all he made the very best of a very bad bargain, and, like a true man, stuck to his wife. But to return from Adam to his XIXth century descendant, Mr. George Howard: Why had that promising young gentleman metaphorically "thrown up the sponge," and drawn aside like a coward from the broad road of life, to linger on uselessly in this little out-of-the-way French town where nobody knew him, where nobody heard of him from the great city at the other side of the ocean, which he left one fine morning a year or more ago without a word of warning or a single good-by to the many friends whose kindly eyes had looked hopefully upon him, and whose friendly lips had prophesied success? Why had he gone out from this busy heart of the New World, palpitating with promise and half-defined yearnings, to bury himself away in this silent nook in an obscure corner of the south of France, doing nothing, caring nothing, planning nothing, wearily waiting for life to end?

As is generally the case with despairing five-and-twenty in the masculine, and despondent seventeen or eighteen in the feminine, sex, it was one of those peculiar difficulties known as "affairs of the heart." Nobody ever knew the exact ins and outs of it; how far the lady was to blame, and how far George had himself to accuse. Like many a passionate, high-souled young man, where he bestowed his heart he expected that heart to absorb and fill up the life and soul of the woman he loved. That effect does follow generally, but by degrees more or less slow. George was apt to love too fiercely and too fast. But young, high-spirited girls like to be wooed before they are won. Though their hearts may have been virtually taken by storm long before the besieging party so much as suspect that a breach has been made in the stubborn fortress, still they like to make a show of surrendering at discretion, and marching out with all the honors of war, rather than be instantly and absolutely overwhelmed by love. There is such a thing as a surfeit of happiness. George Howard had probably made this mistake. Such lovers as he are apt to start at shadows, imagining them realities. The end of it was that George's fortress surrendered to somebody else, married the conqueror, and was disgracefully happy. Whether or not she ever cast a thought back on the bright young fellow that once loved her so fiercely, who can tell? Probably not. She made a good match--and contented wives soon drop romance; sooner than husbands often. It is astonishing how easily the goddess we adore before marriage descends from the clouds, walks the earth like a sturdy woman, and becomes a practical, sensible wife. It may be a little unromantic at first sight, but it is undoubtedly by far the best thing she could do under the circumstances. But when poor George saw his goddess riding about smiling and happy by the side of her husband, and that husband not himself, he could not endure the sight. After lingering a little in misery, he threw up his connections, and left the city for what destination nobody knew.

George Howard was alone in the world. His mother had died early; his father went off when George was twenty, leaving him fortune enough to help him to make life as pleasant as he chose to make it for himself. He was advancing rapidly in his profession--law--and had made a host of friends when the collapse came. As is so often the case, his pride, instead of sustaining him, sank under the blow. Most probably, if the truth were told, the wound inflicted on his self-esteem rankled deeper than that which had killed his love. The thought that another man could succeed where George Howard had failed would have been gall and wormwood to him in any case; but when the object of rivalry was a woman's heart, and George Howard's were the rejected addresses, death would be a small word to express the consummation of that gentleman's misery; it was the annihilation of all that made life worth the living. "Howard the jilted," he seemed to read in everybody's eye, when perhaps not half a dozen persons knew anything about the affair. Jilted by a girl! How could a man recover such a blow? What was there in the wide world to fill up the void left in one when his mighty self shrank to such insignificant proportions?

Common sense might have suggested that there was more than one woman in the world, and that there lay a deeper fund of love in the heart of a man than could be exhausted on the first girl he chanced to meet and admire. It might have suggested also that failure in love did not necessarily mean failure in matters which, after all, as far as the world outside of our little selves is concerned, are of far more importance than love. Man is not sent into this world for the one purpose of being "married and done for," as the phrase goes. But when did common sense find the ear of a lover, particularly of a lover rejected?

So here was George Howard, clever enough, good-looking enough, and by no means a bad fellow, self-stranded on the barren sand-banks of life, with a short five-and-twenty years behind him, a future full of fair promise still before him, hugging a useless sorrow in silent sadness, and making that his bride.

He lived on listlessly from day to day. He mixed with no circle; he knew nobody. He took his meals at his hotel, addressed a few commonplaces to those he happened to meet, and passed most of his time in the open air, taking long strolls into the country, walking up and down the beach by the sea, watching the solitary sails that came and went and faded out of sight--sadly, it seemed to him sometimes, as though beckoning him back to a living world. There were few visitors at the little town, save just during the hottest of the summer months. Such as did come hurried away again as fast as they could. The train rushed through it day after day, a crowd of peering faces would show themselves a few moments at the windows of the cars, strange eyes would stare curiously at the strange place, and pass on a moment after as indifferent as before. Something of the instinct which prompts a wounded animal to seek out a silent covert where it may lie down with its wound and die alone, must have conducted George Howard to this spot.

Yet to a man who had only gone there for a short holiday, weary awhile of the rush, and the struggle, and the incessant strain and roar of a busier life, the little French town, with its quaint look and quaint ways, might have offered a refreshing relief from the dust, and the turmoil, and the worry of the world of politics and money, railroads and trade. Many a one doubtless has at some time or other had the wish to wake up some morning a century or two ago in a world that had gone away. To such the placid evenings by the sea, the homely looks of the inhabitants, the clean blouses of the men, the white caps of the women, the busy tongues of the children, the long silver hair of M. le Curé, the dances by the sea as the sun went down, the slow wains drawn by drowsy oxen, the fuss and bustle of the weekly market-day, the big _gendarme_ with his clanking sword, the white houses and their antique gables, with the beat of the surf on the beach for ever, and the fresh odor of the ocean pervading all places, would have seemed the delicious realization of many a picture looked on and lingered over in a gilded frame.

But on the deadened senses of George Howard these simple scenes, and sights, and sounds fell as you might fancy the roll of the muffled drums to fall on the one stretched out in the coffin who is being borne speedily on by the living to his grave. They wake no life in him; he makes no stir; he is let down into the earth--a farewell roll, and the grave is closed over him for ever, whilst the bright world above seems to smile the merrier that another dead man is hidden away.

Of course, this kind of life and mode of thought were rapidly telling on him and bringing nearer and nearer the consummation he seemed to desire. The step grew slower, the eyes began to lose their quick lustre, the cheek its flush, the body its swing and half-defiant bearing. The simple people round about looked at him silently, shook their heads, and sighed as he moved by without noticing them. He grew more and more attached to the beach, where he would stroll up and down and sit for hours on the yellow sand, staring out blankly at the broad water, casting a pebble into it from time to time, and watching the circles that it made. There was something congenial to his nature in the changeable face and mood, the smile, the frown, the hoarse breathing, the sob, the sigh, the roar, the rage of the ocean. To all these changes something within him gave a voice, until the very spirit of the mysterious deep seemed to creep into his being, and make it an abode there.

So he lived on, never writing to a friend, never yearning to go back to the world he had quitted, and which still held out its arms to him. All ambition, all desire of achievement, all common feeling with the world into which he had been born, seemed to have gradually oozed out of him. He had staked his happiness and lost, and now he only wished for the end to come soon. It never occurred to him that he had possibly staked his happiness at too low a figure. He only saw before him an empty life with a dreary existence. At such stages, some men commit suicide. He was not yet coward enough for that, though not Christian enough to perceive that this world was not made for one man and one woman only, but for all the children of Adam.

But happily, however man may reject Providence, and close his eyes to a Power that shapeth all things for good, Providence mercifully refuses to reject him without at least giving him plenty of opportunities, humanly called chances, to come back to the possession of his senses, and the fulfilment of the mission which is appointed unto every man. And one of George Howard's chances came about this wise.

A favorite walk of his was along a winding road leading some distance out of the little town up a lofty hill, from the summit of which the eye could scan the sweeping circle of the waters, stretching out in its glittering wonder to the verge of dimness, or, inland, where miles and miles of fair pasture-land and vineyards spread away in gentle undulations, with smoke rising from hollows in which hamlets slept, and church spires clove the clear air, and airy villas crowned the pleasant hills. Alternate gleams of sea and land shot through the tall poplars that lined the road as it circled round the hill. At the top, buried amid trees, and fronted by a garden filled almost the year through with delicious flowers, was the Maison Plaquet, a sort of _café_, where visitors could procure a cup of coffee, a glass of _eau sucrée_, or the good wines _du pays_. This establishment was presided over by Mme. Plaquet, a buxom dame with a merry eye and kindly voice, whose pleasant face had become quite a part of the landscape. There was understood to be a M. Plaquet somewhere, but he did not often show himself to visitors. He left the whole business to madame, having a strong suspicion that there was no woman like her in the world, and spent most of his time trimming the flower-beds, pruning the trees, or tending to the vineyard.

George was a frequent visitor at the Maison Plaquet. He would spend hours in the garden dreaming. Madame was won by his handsome face and the fixed sadness in his eyes, which always lighted up, however, in response to her genial greeting. She half suspected that it was something more than a love of nature which sent the _pauvre garçon_, as she called him, away from friends, and home, and family, to sit there day after day dreaming in her arbor, beautiful as it was. With the chatty good-nature which in a Frenchwoman never seems offensive, she would sometimes try to draw him out of himself, to learn something about him that might help her to lift the settled cloud off his handsome face. To Mme. Plaquet it seemed almost a sin against the good God to wear a cloudy face always. But George was so jealously reserved that she gave him up, with the secret conviction that it was love alone that could inflict so deep a wound on so young a heart, and that love alone could heal it.

One afternoon, whilst George was reclining in the arbor, a riding party of gay cavaliers and dames showed themselves suddenly in front of the Maison Plaquet. Exclamations of delight at the beauty of the scene burst from one and another. One fair young girl stood her horse just at the entrance to the arbor, and, to those within, completely filled in the picture. Thus she met the dreamy eyes of Mr. George Howard. The steed was a little restive, but with a firm though gentle hand she curbed him until he stood still as death and she upon him. The light hat she wore was thrown back, showing a shapely head with glossy curls, around which the sun made a glory under the clustering blossoms. For a moment horse and rider seemed to stand out startlingly clear from the sky, and for that moment George allowed his eyes to linger there as upon a striking picture. A moment after, the party had dismounted, entered the arbor, and seated themselves at a table opposite to our friend. As the centre figure of the picture which had attracted his gaze passed, she glanced at him, and he had a momentary view of a blooming cheek and a pair of those large, soft, but courageous eyes, filled with that courage which makes a man reverence a woman--eyes round, and full, and clear as a child's, that fear no evil without, because they are conscious of none within. The party was a gay one, and their gaiety grated on George's ear. He rose and sauntered down the hill, a little sadder, if possible, than when he had ascended it.

After his departure, one of the gentlemen, an old acquaintance of Mme. Plaquet's apparently, inquired of her who her strange visitor might be whom he had met there more than once, and always alone.

Madame, with a sigh and many a shrug, and much amiable volubility, told the company that she knew nothing at all about him, save that he lived in the little town _en bas_, that he came there very often, that he was evidently suffering from some great trouble, that he was a good gentleman and always gave something to the poor when they asked him, and that it was a great pity so handsome a young gentleman should offend the good God by not being happy.

The ladies were quite interested in madame's narrative. Ladies will be interested about good-looking young men who are suffering from that romantic complaint, an incurable melancholy. But as madame's narrative, eloquent and pathetic though it was, left them in much the same state of enlightenment as before with regard to the interesting stranger, all they could do was sigh a little, remount, and resume their gay tone. Just as they were commencing the descent, a hare started and frightened the horse of the young lady who had attracted George's attention. A plunge, a rear, and an instant after it was out of sight, thundering down the steep road at a speed that mocked pursuit.

George was strolling along in his listless way, stopping now at this turn, now at that, to admire the scenery, pluck a flower or a leaf, and muse a little. He had almost arrived at the foot of the hill, when a cry from above and a clatter of hoofs broke on his ear. He stood at a narrow turn between two high banks opening into the last bend of the road, to listen and observe. A moment after, a horse with a lady on his back came tearing down at a mad speed right on him. A glance showed that the rider stood in imminent danger of her life, and that the only means of saving her was to stop the animal in the midst of its wild career. The thought and determination to do something had scarcely time to flash through his brain, when the horse was on him; and how he never knew, but he found himself dragging at the reins--a stumble of the steed against the bank as it swerved, a fainting lady in his arms, and a moment after a crowd of persons around them. He surrendered her to the care of her friends, and, seeing her revive whilst they were engaged in tending her, took occasion to slink away unobserved, as though he had been guilty of some mean action. And the Maison Plaquet saw him no more.

About a week after this occurrence, he was taking one of his usual moody walks along the beach, his hands clasped behind him, and his eyes following the golden path that led away over the waters down to the sinking sun. He walked along listlessly, insensible to everything save the subtle solemnity of the hour, when the brooding calm of the evening began to settle over the crimson wave and the flushed earth. He did not observe a figure leaning against a huge boulder that lay rosy-red right in his path. The leaning figure was that of a young man, who, like George, was surveying the scene, but with an air of genuine admiration curiously tempered by the eye of a connoisseur examining a painting as to the merits or defects of which his oracular opinion might be called for at any moment by a listening world. Let us look at him as he leans back there, so contented, to all seeming, with the world in general, and possibly with himself in particular; for notwithstanding an occasional touch of what in others would be called impertinence, but in him was really rather assumed than natural, and, as he was wont to say, often got him out of difficulties, Ned Fitzgerald was a fellow you would like.

His slim, well-knit figure, clad in a light summer suit, his pleasant, animated face surmounted by a straw hat that became him, his bright eyes glancing around and taking all in in a sweep--the sinking sun, the mingling colors on the waters, the flush on the hills, the blood-red glow on the sands, the quiet circles of a solitary sea-bird that turned and dipped its snow-white wings in the rosy light--to one looking at him, he made nature seem all the more lovely and enjoyable for having one who could feel its loveliness so thoroughly and so evidently.

The quick eye did not take long to pick out the slightly stooped figure that seemed so wrapt in silent thought, and, as it neared him, never turned its gaze from the dying sun. Mr. Ned Fitzgerald watched its approach, and, with his usual tendency to be sociable, evidently contemplated addressing it; when, as it came close enough to distinguish the features, he started from his recumbent position, took off his hat and tossed it wildly in the air, never waiting to catch it again, but, rushing towards George, seized that astounded and miserable mortal in his arms, and hugged him almost to suffocation before he could see who it was, whilst the exclamation burst from him:

"Why, George Howard, by all that's impossible!"

Another hug and a longer one, and a hearty laugh, and a shake of both hands up and down, and a look of genuine pleasure in the bright eyes that seemed to throw a light over the kindly face--Ned's pleasantry was contagious, and the first flush of surprise on George's face was succeeded by a faint smile as soon as he recognized his old friend and school-fellow, whilst a sort of moisture forced itself into his own eyes. It was as though he had come back from the grave a moment to find that after all the hand shaken so vigorously by an old friend--the best-liked old friend of them all, who had studied with him, and fought with him, and played with him, and got into all sorts of scrapes and out of them with him, and built with him those bubble castles that boys will build at school, destitute of nothing save foundation--was still real flesh and blood, and that the heart throbbing within him was still human.

"Why, Ned, old fellow, what in the name of wonder brought you here?"

"Destiny, my boy, destiny, fate--anything you please that may give a sufficiently solemn turn to a landslip close by which interfered considerably with locomotion, and forced me bag and baggage out of my snug _coupé_, to set me down in this unknown corner of the earth, absolutely without a soul to speak to, for one night. But I do believe I could have endured a broken head as well as a broken journey for the sake of dropping on you again, old boy."

Why young gentlemen, supposed to know the meaning of words, should find such a secret fund of special endearment in the terms which they so lavishly apply to one another of "old boy," "old fellow," or "old man," is a mystery whose solution is still to appear. Young persons of the opposite sex, as it is called--goodness knows why--are not in the habit of addressing each other as "old woman," "old duck," or "old maid." Such terms would be esteemed in them as anything but endearing, although married ladies have been known to speak of their lord and master as "a dear, good old thing." However, to return from this digression, which is becoming dangerous, to the "old" men in question:

"Well, Ned, I am really glad to see you," said George, and then added slowly, as the old chill came back to him, "and that's more than I'd say to many an old acquaintance--now."

He looked away moodily to where the sun had gone down, as the gray began to settle over the water. Ned took a quick glance at his friend, and saw that, as he expressed it to himself, "all was not right somewhere." He had seen very little of Howard since they left college, and knew nothing of what had driven him from New York. However, he determined to take no notice of his last remark for the present, but said gaily:

"This sea of yours gives one a tremendous appetite. I move dinner. There's nothing like dinner to liven up a man's wits. Come along, George. We have had our fill of gorgeous sunsets and scenery for one day. There's a poetry as well as a glare in the gaslight when it shines on a well-spread table. What! you have no gas here? Happy people! One tax the less. But it is to be hoped you find something to eat in this backbone of the world. Now, come along, and we'll have all the adventures by flood and field with the cigars."

Ned was at his best during dinner, though, for that matter, he seemed always at his best. His presence gave a pleasant flavor to dishes which time after time George had turned away from with disgust. He had an original remark for everything. And the polite French waiter was rather astonished as the dinner progressed to see M. O--art, as the domestics called George, give vent to an occasional laugh, which grew and grew, until the two old friends became almost as uproarious as a couple of school-boys out for a holiday.

That delicious after-dinner moment having arrived when the cigars are lighted and the legs stretched out in lazy contentment, without the slightest regard for "the proprieties"--nobody but themselves being present--they began their questionings and cross-questionings. George was the first to start.

"Well, Ned, what in the name of good fortune brought you down here? What are you doing? Still writing?"

"Yes. At present I am despatched on a secret diplomatic mission, which of course it is impossible for me to divulge, by the editor of the greatest daily in the world. You know what that means."

"Well, I can guess. The particular 'greatest daily' does not matter much. There are so many."

"Yes; and the fun of it is, I write for them all. The six or seven special correspondents who keep New York and London on the _qui vive_ with regard to European affairs, and who lay bare to their wondering vision from time to time the real undercurrent of those affairs, social, political, and religious, are often one and the same with your Mephistophelian friend."

"Bohemianizing, eh? Why, I took you to be respectable, Ned. Ah! a newspaper office is a sadly demoralizing place."

"Pshaw! What will you have? The public wants news, and somebody must furnish it. People nowadays are much the same as people ever were. Humanity must have something to talk about, or it could not exist. Humanity is a woman."

"I agree with you there; that is why I have abandoned it."

"Oh! I see what you would say. There are two sides to that. But what I mean is, we must talk, or the world will come to a stand-still. The newspaper man nowadays furnishes the staple commodity on which the world exercises its tongue."

"Nowadays, yes. Well, it's a poor commodity. Somebody has well called it the 'cheap and nasty.'"

"Always the same, George; always the same. What was the cry of the Athenians when S. Paul went amongst them? 'What news? _Quid novi?_'--and the Athenians were the intellect of their time. To-day we live too fast for the tongue; hence electricity, hence the daily."

"Hence the Bohemian?"

"Well, Bohemian is a much-misapplied word. It requires a sort of genius to be a true Bohemian; erratic genius, if you like, but still genius. Bohemianism is not all boots down at heel, crushed hat, and broken elbows, five-cent cigars and lager-beer that a friend pays for, with an occasional bottle of champagne when the pocket happens to be flush. Look at me, for instance, supplying the six or seven leading dailies with news. If I tell a lie one day, I contradict it the next. If I send a false account to the government organ, I send an extra true one to the opposition, and a trimmer to the free and independent. If the government is malicious, the opposition is ultra pious; and if the free and independent is scandalous, both unite in coming down on and crushing it. To be sure, things get mixed up a little sometimes; but, on the whole, matters are pretty evenly balanced, and in the end the truth comes uppermost. Then all along you are supported by the secret conviction that nobody ever believes a word you say."

"Whose fault is that?" asked George.

"The weakness of humanity, my dear fellow. You must not go too deeply into things, nor expect a daily newspaper, with its villanous printers, to be true as gospel. A newspaper correspondent is despatched to find news; and if he can't find it...."

"He invents."

"Well, what is the use of imagination, unless you exercise it a bit? But it is the greatest fun in the world to see yourself quoted by opposite parties for opposite purposes."

"Yes, it must be amusing. Some people--old-fashioned people, to be sure--might consider it a trifle dishonest, perhaps; but then, they are behind the age."

Ned rose, laughed, and took a turn round the room. Standing opposite his friend, he said:

"So, George, I find I have succeeded in giving you an exalted idea of my character and ability already. Have you forgotten that famous gift I had of extemporizing yarns at school? Well, to relieve your mind, the devil--that is to say, Mr. Edward Fitzgerald--is not quite so black as he has painted himself. Nor, indeed, am I quite so powerful and fluent a writer as I have imagined. I am on a mission here, though; partly business, and partly to take my sister back with me to New York. She has been staying with some of her school friends, convent companions. I was on my way to join them when this lucky accident tumbled me into your hermitage. And now, what has brought you here? You seem quite domiciled. Why, I expected to have heard great things of you by this time."

"I? Oh! I am doing nothing," said George, with a sigh, coming back to himself.

"Nothing! Well, that is not such a bad occupation when you only know how to do it, and can find no other employment."

"Why, what else can a fellow do?"

Ned was fairly taken aback at this question. To ask him what a fellow could do in this world was like asking him why he had teeth, or hands, or a head, or life altogether. After an amazed stare at his friend, he answered:

"Well, I suppose that what a man can do is generally best known to himself, when, like you, he has life in his veins, brains in his head, and money in his pocket. At all events, it is scarcely likely that you were made for the precise purpose of burying yourself alive here."

"Oh! I don't know. It is not such a bad sort of life," said George wearily. "Here I have no cares, and fuss, and bother, no visitors to bore, and no bores to visit. Nobody comes to borrow or beg. There is no necessity for playing at compliments with people for whom you do not care a straw, and who care for you less. Here is, instead, the sea, and the shore, and the woods, and the hills, a fair table, a good enough washerwoman, and people around you who never speak till they are spoken to. What more can a fellow want?"

Ned made no reply. He was puffing his cigar in silence, and following the curling smoke with his eye as he blew it against the light--a favorite fashion of his when thinking to himself. He was thinking now, rapidly, how changed was his friend in so short a time. He was wondering where all the ardent spirit and high hopes that fired him a few years back had gone. Contact with the world, instead of crushing, had raised his own hopes the more. Why had it not done the same for Howard? He could find no solution to the difficulty; for life to him was a glorious battle, and inaction worse than death. His friend must have encountered some great shock, some bitter disappointment, at the outset. He was seeking the clew in the smoke apparently. After a painful pause, he at length asked:

"How long have you been here now, George?"

"On and off, a year or more. I go and come. I make short excursions round about for a week or so sometimes, but I always return here."

"You entered a firm on the other side, did you not?"

"No; I was about to do so."

"And why didn't you? Were they cheats?"

"No."

"Did they fail?"

"No."

"Did _you_ fail? Did you lose any money in any way?"

"No, what makes you ask?"

"Because I want to find out what the trouble is with you. You are not in love?"

"Good God! No!" exclaimed George almost fiercely, as he rose, strode to the window, and stood there looking out at the moon.

The bitterness of his tone, the abruptness of his action, told the observant Ned that unwittingly he had touched the right chord. He indulged in a silent whistle to himself, and shook his head as a good-hearted physician might over a hopeless case. Ned confessed himself a bad hand at ministering to the love complaint. That was the only ill for which he would advocate the calling in of a female physician. For heart disease of this nature, Ned would, on his own authority, grant a diploma to any suitable lady doctor; for he was convinced of the utter inability of man to handle such a delicate affair. So he shook his head despondently.

Whilst these thoughts were passing through the brain of the now very wide-awake Mr. Fitzgerald, George seemed to have recovered his usual dead calm, and, leaving the window as he proceeded to light a fresh cigar, inquired, with a smile that seemed to anticipate a characteristic answer:

"Ned, have you ever been in love?"

It was now Ned's turn to rise. He tore about the room frantically a moment, dashed his hand through his hair, and finally, coming to a stand-still before his amused friend, burst out:

"In love! Have I ever been in love? What a question to ask a man! Don't you know my name? Did you ever hear of a Fitzgerald or any other of his race who had not been in love? Why, man, I fall in love every day of my life. How can I help it when every woman I see for five minutes falls in love with me. I might say I have lost my heart so often that I don't think there's a bit of it left to lose now; and still I go on falling in love by sheer force of habit." And Ned "hove to" with a comic burst of despair.

"You are a happy man, Ned," said George, laughing.

"Happy?" questioned Ned, half to himself, and as though the idea had struck him for the first time in his life. "Well, I suppose I am. I don't see much advantage to be gained by being otherwise."

"Nor I; but, for all that, people differently constructed from your fortunate self cannot always help being otherwise."

"Bah! Of course they can; particularly in love matters. Love was not meant to make a man mope, but to stir him up. Those old fogies in the middle ages had a much truer idea of love, as of many other things, than we have nowadays, with all our boasting. Ah! love then was the genuine article. Not all sighs, and tears, and millinery, and newspaper paragraphs, and mothers-in-law, and the lovers playing cat's-cradle to each other. No; but the man went about his business, bearing his love in his heart for a year and a day. He wore his lady's gage on his helm, and, if his business happened to be the giving and taking of hard knocks, why, he gave and took, his love and himself against the world. He rode in the lists under his lady's eye, and proved himself a brave man for her sake. Love nerved his arm, whilst it purified his heart and softened his soul. Why did the wife gird the buckler on her lord? Love was akin to religion then, marriage a sacrament, and not, as it now is...."

"A social exchange, a trade carried on by the great Mother-in-law Company, Unlimited--a thing of barter and loss, where dollars are wedded to dollars by the magistrate, where youth and beauty sells herself to old age for so much a year and her own carriage. O Ned, Ned! what a pity we were not born in the middle ages!"

"Hallo!" said Ned, "I did not mean to go quite so far as that, George. After all, they were men and women then, just as we are; and, though one cannot help breaking out now and again on modern notions, one thing is certain--for every true knight there is somewhere a true lady."

"Have you found yours yet, Ned?"

"Perhaps not, perhaps yes," said Ned, dropping a moment his light tone. "Perhaps because I am not a true knight; perhaps because, though I found a true lady, she was meant for somebody else. Because I may have made one mistake, that is no reason why my true lady should not be waiting for me somewhere, nor why I should fail to rejoice at seeing two others happy, though my own toes may have been trodden on a little bit. After all, the world is very wide and full of happy possibilities."

Something unusual in Ned's tone seemed to spring from real feeling that lay concealed under his usual airy manner; perhaps suffering, with which his good-nature cared not to trouble the sufficiently trouble-laden world. For the first time in his life, George Howard felt a little ashamed of himself, and conscious of something akin to selfishness in his nature which he had never suspected there before. It takes a very long time to see ourselves. Self-knowledge comes piecemeal, and the pieces that go to make the human mosaic are sometimes very ugly when seen alone, though they may pass muster in the whole, and merge and be lost in its common symmetry.

When he awoke the following morning, and the thought came to him that the usually dreary day was to be enlivened for once by the presence of Ned Fitzgerald, the thought was not an unpleasant one; and when that gentleman burst into his room with a bundle of sea-weed in his hand, speckled all over with curious little shells, which he said he would keep for Mary, the look of young, active, earnest life in his bright eyes and diffused over his whole person seemed in some indescribable manner to make the sun brighter and the air clearer. George began to feel young again, and examined the shells and the slimy weed, over which Ned gloated and expatiated, with an interest that would have been a marvel to him yesterday.

"And who is Mary?" he asked, as that name passed Ned's lips more than once.

"Why, the sister I was telling you about."

"Oh!" said George, and was silent.

That evening, it was arranged that Ned should go the next day, and bring Mary back with him. As he found the little town so quaint and quiet, he determined to stay a week or so with his old friend, instead of going on directly to Paris, as he had intended; and George, to pass the interval, made his first visit since the accident to his friend, Mme. Plaquet.

That good dame was as angry as she could be with him. Why had he not come to see her for so long? What had he been doing? Was he sick from the dragging that _méchant_, the horse, had given him? How did she know about it? Why, had not M. de Lorme and the ladies been there almost every day since, and all on purpose to meet him and thank him for his brave service? And now, was not mademoiselle going away, and her heart breaking because she could not see her preserver, and thank him for saving her life? And there was the card and the letter of M. de Lorme waiting for him all these days. She would not have it sent, because she expected monsieur to come every day. Ah! it was cruel!

George opened the letter, and found that it was an eulogium of M. de Lorme on his gallantry and devotion, to which he was indebted for the life, probably, of his charming young friend; that her brave but unknown preserver would confer an honor on her and on M. de Lorme by favoring them with his distinguished friendship; that it was cruel of him to escape from them whilst they were all engaged with his charming young friend; that he hoped he would excuse this mode of addressing him, as, owing to the peculiarity of the circumstances, he knew of no other; and that, as his charming young friend was about to leave them, he would no longer deny them the opportunity, so much desired, of paying the deep debt of gratitude they owed him, by allowing them to testify in person their admiration of his admirable courage and chivalrous devotion.

"Well, and what do you say?" asked Mme. Plaquet, as, with arms folded and a general air of mistress of the situation, she surveyed her mysterious young friend, whilst, with a half-amused countenance, he read M. de Lorme's missive.

"Oh!" said George, "I don't know. What a fuss you French people make about stopping a horse! There--don't say any more about it. I have a friend staying with me who knows how to arrange all these matters, and I will consult him. To-morrow or the day after he shall come to see you. You will like him. Is the lady quite recovered?"

"Entirely. But she looked so sad when she came, and came, and never found you. Ah! if I were a handsome young man, how many horses would I not stop, only to get one such glance from such lovely eyes!"

The next morning, Ned was to return with his sister, and George went down to the railway station to meet them. If he showed himself a trifle more careful than he had been lately in his selection of a tie and in his dress generally, and if anybody had entered at the time and told him so, George would probably have been angry at the idea of his returning to such weaknesses. There was Ned's pleasant face at the window; there he is waving his hat; and here he is now introducing Miss Mary Fitzgerald to his old friend, Mr. George Howard, to the mutual astonishment and evident confusion of that lady and gentleman, who blushed and turned pale by turns like guilty things. Even Ned was dumfoundered a moment, and argued to himself, from these silent but unmistakable signs of recognition between the parties, that his ceremony of introduction was quite a superfluous piece of etiquette.

He broke the awkward silence in his characteristic fashion:

"Well, if you people know each other already, you had better say so at once, and not let me make an ass of myself by going through a formal introduction--a thing I always hate. Mary, do you know George, or don't you?"

There were tears in Mary's large eyes, as, clinging a moment to her brother, she sobbed rather than said:

"O Ned! this is the gentleman I told you of, ... to whom I owe my life, ... of whom we were all speaking...." And then, turning the luminous and still tearful eyes full on George, who could scarcely stand up against the rush of mingled feelings that oppressed him, said, with a genuine simplicity and native grace which were most moving, as she took his hand in her own with an action at once gentle and natural: "Sir, it was a bitter thought to me that I should be compelled to leave France without knowing and thanking the brave gentleman who risked his life to save mine. I had hoped to see you at M. de Lorme's, and had so much to say to you. But now that I meet you," glancing at Ned, "in this ... in this way, my heart is so full I can say nothing...." And the gathering tears began to fall.

It was time for Ned to intervene:

"Oho! So you are the unknown knight whom M. de Lorme and the ladies have been raving about; who goes around in sable sadness, rescuing charming young ladies from perilous situations, and disappearing as mysteriously as you come. Faith, my friend, there is a nice romance concocted over you. But, George, my boy, I could say a great deal more than my eloquent sister has done on this subject, only I know it would be distasteful to you. However, we shall have it out together on the quiet some day. But what a shame!" Ned rattled on as they made their way to the hotel. "Here is all my nice little plot spoiled. Mary, I gave him such a description of you. Let me see, George, what was she like? Red-haired, freckled, middle-aged, and stout; short of breath and tall of body; weighing one hundred and seventy pounds after dinner, and a trifle less before." George looked disgusted, and Mary was laughing. "You took snuff, Mary, and wore your carroty curls in little whisks of brown paper half through the day. You had a vixenish temper, a liking for toddy, and would insist on speaking French to the servants with a beautiful Galway accent, and swore at them like a trooper for not understanding you. It was only out of pure regard for your handsome brother and for the sake of 'auld lang syne' that my friend George would tolerate your presence at all. And here you are the whole time old and valued friends, under mutual obligations to each other--you for saving my middle-aged relative from being run away with and dashed to pieces by a vicious brute, and my middle-aged relative for being gracious enough to allow you to do anything of the kind. I declare it _is_ shameful, and almost makes one take the rash oath of never telling a good-natured lie again."

This harangue of Ned's set them both at their ease as though they had known each other all their lives.

"And may I ask, Miss Fitzgerald, if this conscientious brother of yours gave an equally accurate description of his old school-fellow?" said George, laughing.

"Mary, don't tell.... He'll murder me...."

"I was instructed all the way along to be particularly kind and attentive to a dapper...."

"No, not dapper ..." interjected Ned.

"Yes, dapper, Mr. Howard; I remember the word distinctly. A dapper little old gentleman with a bald head and only one eye, who was as deaf as a post, but would not allow any one to consider him so. I was led to understand that he made excellent company at table, only that he simply followed out his own train of thought, and his remarks consequently were generally rather _mal-à-propos_; and in fact quite a lot of other things that I cannot remember, save that I was to take him his drops every morning at half-past eleven precisely, and always put six lumps of sugar in his coffee, and none in his tea."

There was a merry dinner-party that evening at the hotel, and a long ramble by the beach afterwards under the moon.

Mary had a great deal of Ned's happy nature in her, and between the two, what with sailing, and riding, and long strolls, George could not well help throwing off his despondency. The light soon came back to the eye, the color to the cheek, the spring to the step, the gaiety to the young heart, the belief that, after all, life was not such a bad thing, and that there were pleasant places even in this miserable world for those who sought them in the right spirit.

"Your friend George is getting quite gay," remarked Mary one evening, as brother and sister sat alone, during the temporary absence of the subject of that young lady's remark.

"Yes, poor fellow. He was in a sad way when I dropped on him. Going to the dev--I mean the grave, fast."

"Why, what was the matter with him?"

"Oh! I don't know. Put his foot in it somehow."

"Put his foot in what?"

"In the wrong box, of course. How stupid you women are!"

"But what wrong box, Ned?"

That gentleman looked ineffable disgust at his beautiful sister, whose eyes were fixed a little anxiously on his. Then taking the peachy cheeks between both hands, he drew her face up to his own and kissed her, saying, "There, Mary.... There are only two women in the world to whom I would do that.... You are one--"

"And the other?" asked Mary, a little bewildered.

"Is to come," answered Ned enigmatically. "It will take some time perhaps to find her. One makes a mistake sometimes among so many. When he does, he puts his foot in the wrong box."

"And you think he--that is, Mr. Howard has quite recovered now?" asked Mary, after a pause.

"Well, it looks as though he were very near it; but here he is to speak for himself," said Ned, as George half bounded into the room, flushed with exercise, and looking as handsome as any young lady could wish.

But why give the stages of what all know so well and have heard thousands of times told and retold? One morning, some months after, the little French town looked very gay. There were green rushes strewn at the door of the hotel, and all the towns-people turned out in gala attire. There was the carriage of M. de Lorme, and an enormous bouquet in the coachman's button-hole. There were more carriages, and more coachmen, and more bouquets. Soon the church was filled with a buzzing and excited crowd that hushed into silence as a bridal party moved up the nave and stood at the steps of the altar, whilst the venerable _curé_ in the name of God joined the hands together which no power on earth may sunder. The sunlight fell softly on them through windows of pictured saints. Mme. Plaquet was there, wiping her eyes, and weeping silently, as she praised the good God, who had saved the _pauvre garçon_ and brought it all about so wonderfully. M. Plaquet was there, more convinced than ever that his wife was a wonderful woman; for had not she made the match? Old women, and tender girls wept as the sweet bride passed out a wife, amid showers of blossoms strewn in her path by little white-robed children. They blessed her for an angel, and her handsome husband, whom they all knew so sad, and who now looked so happy. There was another happy face, with bright eyes and a sunny smile, that attracted many an eye--the face, the eyes, and the smile of Mr. Edward Fitzgerald. If the reader would know more of George's history, it is being made. He has found his true lady-love, and is proving himself a true knight. Ned, gay Ned, is as merry as ever. He is called uncle now by a chubby-cheeked youngster with sturdy legs and the large eyes of his mother, into whose innocent face his father often gazes half anxiously, wondering will he ever come to imitate him in his short-lived folly. Ned has not put his foot in the right box yet; so he says, but rumor tells another tale. He may meet us again some day.

RECENT POETRY.

BY AUBREY DE VERE.

We looked for peach and grape-bunch drenched in dew:-- He serves us up the dirt in which they grew.

CRIME--ITS ORIGIN AND CURE.

It is no exaggeration to say that there is scarcely a man or woman in the community who, upon taking up a morning newspaper, is not prepared to find recorded in its pages at least one case of wilful murder or some other atrocious infraction of the law, human and divine. Whether it be homicide or uxoricide, attempt at either, or the criminal indulgence of the baser passions; whether the result of artificial excitement or the wilful premeditation of bad or diseased minds, the effect is the same on the public, and the dreadfully frequent recurrence of such offences--that the lives of the most harmless among us are put in jeopardy equally with those of the most belligerent; while the law, the first office of which is to protect the life, honor, and property of the citizen, is practically ignored and defied.

This terrible prevalence of crime has been a fruitful subject of comment, and while the supineness of the legal guardians of the general welfare and the unaccountable stupidity or weak sentimentality of jurymen have been unsparingly denounced, very little has been done in the way of intelligent legislation to check the ever-flowing stream of criminality. It is true that the common and the statute laws have long ago prescribed death as the penalty for the commission of murder, arson, treason, and one or two other high crimes, long terms of imprisonment in state-prisons and penitentiaries for felonies, and shorter terms in local prisons for minor offences, but all these wise enactments do not appear to check the onward march of outrage and lawlessness. The result is that abroad the good name of the Republic suffers, while at home the very familiarity with deeds of violence and dishonesty created by the sensational and minute newspaper reports is debasing the youth of the country, and, by throwing a halo of romance over their commission, robs them of half their repulsive and disgusting features.

Still, while much indignation and more apprehension have been manifested at the growth of crime and the apathy and ignorance of those entrusted with the duty of repressing it, very little has been done either to remove the causes which lead to its perpetration, or to visit it with condign punishment when all other efforts have failed. This mere theorizing over what is a tangible evil is deeply to be deplored. Surely nothing can be more worthy of the attention of the statesman and the philanthropist than the study and analysis of this frightful social phenomenon, with a view of limiting its growth, even though it were found impossible to lesson appreciably its present gigantic proportions. It is well recognized that it is the primary duty of all civil governments to protect the lives, liberties, and property of their subjects, and our own national and state organizations, clothed as they are with such ample powers and supported by popular approbation, ought to be the foremost in discharging this trust. Under arbitrary or usurping governments, such as those which dominate Poland, Ireland, and Italy, it is generally difficult to execute what is called the law, for the oppressed people are at enmity with their oppressors, and take every opportunity to oppose and thwart what is styled the administration of justice. They feel, and properly feel, that "the world is not their friend, nor the world's law;" but with us it ought to be far different. Here the laws are made by the people, and it is understood for the people, and hence every good citizen should feel a personal interest in the rectitude and exactitude of their administration. He is not only injured in person and property by imperfect and ignorant legislation, through his own carelessness, but he violates his obligations to his fellow-man when through neglect, or from unworthy motives, he does not do all in his power to prevent it.

However, to act intelligently as well as conscientiously in matters of such gravity, the study of the origin of the evils which afflict and disgrace our country, and the sources from whence they generally spring, requires more attention than has usually been given, even by those who most deplore their existence. It will not do to throw down your newspaper after perusing accounts of three or four cases of murder, and ask to what is the world coming? It is almost equally useless to occasionally hang a criminal, or to send another to prison for life. For the one so punished, a score at least escape, and the demands neither of retributive nor distributive justice are satisfied. The evil-disposed gratify their revenge by the commission of these crimes, while their chances of punishment are no more than one in twenty. Thus the plague that infests society daily becomes more noxious and, as it were, epidemic.

Crime has its latitude and longitude, its nationality, classes, and castes, its peculiar inciting causes, as well as the great vital cause--the absence of true religious faith and practice. For instance, it might be easily demonstrated that the many-nationed people of the United States are addicted to special classes of crime, as distinct and almost as obvious as their language, habits, and intellectual idiosyncrasies. We speak now of the more flagrant violations of the social compact, not with the intention of discriminating against any class or race in the community, nor with the object of holding the mass of any people, no matter what their origin or country, responsible for the acts of a few among them--for after all the criminals are in a small minority, fortunately, among all nations--but to point out the nature and peculiar motives for the commission of offences against the law as they exist among different classes of our population, so that suitable remedies may be applied to the respective cases.

Outrages against law and justice depend to a certain extent on locality for their distinctive character. The desperate hand-to-hand encounters which have so long characterized a certain class of society in the border states, are as different in motive from that of the cool Connecticut poisoner, as the assassin of our aristocratic circles is dissimilar to the ruffian of the slums.

When we ascribe homicide to the criminal classes of America, we do not assume it to be a national sin, for though of late we have read of some cases in New England and the West, and know of many deliberate ones in this vicinity, we refer specially in our analysis to the remote Southern and Southwestern states, where the bowie-knife, the rifle, and the revolver are considered much more efficacious and prompt in the settlement of disputes than the slower and less exciting appeal to the courts. It may be said that this is the natural consequence of the war, the termination of which has thrown out of employment many desperate men habituated to the use of arms; but this is only partially true, for the same state of society existed in New Orleans, Arkansas, and along the banks of the Mississippi many years anterior to the late internecine contest. Lawless men of every grade, gamblers, horse-thieves, the idle, and the debauched, have for nearly two generations infested those and neighboring localities; deadly quarrels were constantly springing up, and were decided in a moment by the death of one if not of both disputants; and the public authorities, whenever they dared to interfere, were sure to be set at defiance, if not maltreated. The same state of affairs exists to this day, but in a modified form, and there seems to have been no way discovered to alter it.

Still, the American people as a whole are not responsible for what might be called a local disorganization of society, grown out of their rapidly-extending settlements, whence flock naturally many outcasts, vagabonds, and reckless men, anxious to escape the odium of public opinion and the chastisement that awaited them in the older and more thickly settled communities of the East. But our country, with a better show of reason, may be accused of condoning, if not of actually encouraging, a widespread system of political and commercial dishonesty, an offence which, though not by any means as bad as the taking of human life in its direct consequences, indirectly encourages and promotes the commission of the greater crime. A legislator or a judge who can be guilty of taking bribes, is sure, the one to make bad laws and the other to execute good ones corruptly. Criminals who have political or moneyed influence are allowed to escape with impunity, with a _carte blanche_ to continue their nefarious business. Whoever has read the proceedings of the several investigating committees in Washington during the last session of Congress, and of our State Senate acting as a court of impeachment during the summer of 1872, will hardly doubt the truth of this assertion.

This spirit of bribery, false swearing and peculation we find prevailing, among some of the most prominent members of the national Congress, who, these investigations have shown, are not above the acceptance of paltry bribes for the use or abuse of their high delegated authority; we find it in many of our state legislatures, particularly when a United States senator is to be elected or the interest of a railroad company, a corporation, or a wealthy private individual is to be subserved by forcing or retarding legislation; and it is a matter of public notoriety that among the officers of municipal corporations, notably our own, where integrity, if in any place, should find a home, the most unblushing robbery, swindling, and false swearing have prevailed for years. Again, let us look at the history of our large banks and insurance companies. There is scarcely a week passes but we hear of defaulting officers and clerks who, after years of secret, continuous stealing and false entries, finally decamp, leaving it to be discovered that the aggregate amount of their individual abstractions reaches tens and hundreds of thousands. What makes this "respectable" species of larceny so heartless and reprehensible is, that the money so stolen does not actually belong to the institutions themselves, but to the public, and generally the poorer classes, who are depositors or policyholders. It is significant that in proportion to the number of counting-houses superintended by their owners to the number of banks and insurance companies the trust-funds of which are in keeping of paid officials, the number of defalcations in the former are as a mere nothing compared with those of the latter. Why? In one case, the merchant is liable to lose his own money by negligence; in the other, the president and directors lose only that of other people, and thus a criminal betrayal of trust is added to swindling.

Now, these blots on the national escutcheon are of comparatively recent date, and are the result mainly of two causes: the late war, which suddenly elevated an ignorant and ignoble class to enormous wealth, and the corruption of politics and politicians by the unguarded and unchecked abuse of universal suffrage. The shoddyites and the politicians, having no claim on the respect or esteem of honest men, commenced a career of extravagance and vulgar display, which, if it did not win the approbation of the judicious and refined, certainly was well calculated to dazzle the moral vision of the vain and unstable. Palaces, diamonds, and resplendent equipages became the order of the day, and their effect on the integrity of the staid men of business was marked and deleterious in the highest degree. Mrs. A., whose husband before the war was doing a thriving little business and was content with an occasional drive in a hired light-wagon, now enjoyed the luxury of a private carriage and liveried servants; consequently Mrs. B., whose husband was cashier in a bank at two or three thousand a year, must have one similar. Mr. C., who was a resident of the Sixth or Seventh Ward previous to his election to office, and occupied part of a comfortable house, now lived in a handsome mansion on Madison or Fifth avenues; hence Mr. D., who was confidential clerk in a large importing house, abandoned his cosy cottage in the suburbs and followed his old friend's example. Now, how are B. and D. to support this luxury? Clearly, not out of their salaries. Having control of the funds and enjoying the confidence of their employers, they abstract the money and rush into Wall or New Streets to gamble in gold or stocks. They are not common thieves--oh! no; they only borrowed from time to time large sums of cash from the true owners, intending to return it; but they never do so! For a short time they are lucky, and are able to keep place in a course of wild dissipation with A. and C., but sooner or later a crisis arrives, there is "a panic in the street," and they lose all. Then follow flight, detection, and public exposure--in any well-regulated community, we might add dishonor. But it is not so; for, you see, this is the age of progress and enlightenment. The public think very lightly of such matters, probably from their very frequency, and soon forget them; the "knowing ones" condemn the fugitives only for not having been "smart" enough; the bank or insurance authorities compromise the felony for a consideration, for it is only the public, not themselves personally, who have suffered; and, after a brief sojourn in Europe or Canada, the criminals return to the bosom of their families prepared to enter on some new field of peculation.

As for the political rogues, no one seems to heed their depredations. Public opinion has become so vitiated that it is expected every man in office will steal; in fact, some persons go so far as to say they ought to steal, holding it a trivial affair to appropriate large amounts of the people's money, while they would hesitate long before advising any one to rob a till or strip a clothes-line. We recollect an official in this city who for a wonder was so honest that he was poorer when he resigned than when he accepted office. Upon being met on an occasion by a friend and congratulated on having been able to purchase one of the largest hotels in New York out of the "spoils," the gentleman indignantly resented the insult in no measured terms. His acquaintance laughed quietly, and walked away with an expression of mingled pity and contempt on his countenance.

Now this lust for gain, this inordinate love of display, which leads the inexperienced and weak-minded into so many unworthy actions, should be abated, if we hope to preserve anything like commercial honor and political purity. They are eating into the very vitals of society, infecting the very highest as well as the lowest class in the community; and though the consequences to which they lead may not appear so heinous as other crimes, they are so far-reaching and so general that they might well be classed with those to which the law attaches its severest penalties. There was a time, not very far distant, when the idea of attempting to bribe a senator, or what is called "buying up" a state legislature, would have been considered preposterous, and when the counting-house and the banker's desk were considered the temple and altar, as it were, of honesty and integrity. Why is it that so lamentable a change has taken place, and in so short a time? Clearly, because an insatiate longing for the acquisition of wealth, speedily and with as little labor as possible, has taken possession of the present generation, and in a headlong pursuit of fortune, honor, reputation, and conscience are too often cast aside and forgotten. This should not be so in a country like ours of unlimited resources, and where industry and ability need never look in vain for a competency.

But a more diabolical crime against all law, natural, human, and divine, is the system, so prevalent in some sections of this country, of mothers depriving their inchoate offspring of existence even on the very threshold of their entrance into the world. So unnatural is this offence that it is beyond the power of language to reprobate it adequately, and in charity we hope that the guilty votaries of ease and fashion, who perpetrate such horrible atrocities, do not realize the full turpitude of their acts. We had long refused to believe that such a violation, not only of God's law, but of the strongest and most beautiful instincts of our nature--the parent's love for her child--existed to any great extent, but we have been so often assured of it by physicians and other reputable persons conversant with such matters, that we have been forced to admit as true the existence among us of a crime that would disgrace the veriest savage. We are assured that in certain localities, which we shall not particularize, the evil is not only widespread but is growing into a custom, and this extraordinary fact is adduced as one of the reasons why the children of native-born parents are so few in proportion to those of foreigners. If we were to look for a primary cause for such barbaric criminality in merely human motives, we should fail to find one at all commensurate with the enormity of the guilt. The wish of married women to be freed from the care of young children, so that they, being unincumbered by household duties and cares, may participate in outdoor pleasures, attend the opera, the theatres, concerts, and ball-rooms, has been advanced with some force as one of the reasons; but this is not sufficient, for we find the heinous practice prevailing in remote towns and villages where no such attractions are presented. The laws of civil marriage and of divorce, as recognized in most of the states of the Union; that curse of what is called modern civilization; that fatal legacy handed down to us by the "Reformers," has much to answer for in this respect. Protestantism has reduced the holy sacramental bond of matrimony beneath the level of a limited co-partnership, degraded the nuptial contract below the most trivial commercial obligation, annihilated its responsibilities, destroyed its safeguards, and even wishes to go further--to ignore the very shadow of marriage, from which it has long since taken the substance. The purchase of a piece of land or the delivery of a bale of goods is now attended with more ceremony than that sacred rite at which our Saviour himself attended in Galilee and at which he performed his first miracle! How deeply has humanity been made to suffer for the bestiality of Henry Tudor and the apostasy of the monk of Augsburg! Is it any wonder then that a link, so thoughtlessly accepted and so lightly worn, should be as unceremoniously sundered, and that the woman, who does not know but on the morrow she may be either plaintiff or defendant in a divorce suit, should be adverse to bringing into the world children which either parent may claim or disown?

But the grand motive cause is to be found still deeper. If the truth must be told, the masses of the people of this noble country are fast sinking into intellectual paganism, beside which that of imperial Rome was harmless and innocuous. Protestantism, as has often been predicted, has nearly reached its logical conclusion--infidelity. Read the sermons of the prominent sensational preachers, their newspapers and periodicals, and what do you find in them? No stern lessons of Christian morality; no appeals to the moral conscience or exposition of the beauties of the cardinal virtues; no dogma, as befits heaven-appointed guides; no doctrine such as only the ordained of God can preach and teach; but, instead, stale tirades against Catholicity, rehashed lyceum lectures, and fragments of stump-speeches delivered before the last election and interlarded with pious ejaculations to suit the occasion, apologies for being Christians at all, and occasional efforts to explain away Christianity itself--all covered over with a thin veil of cant and mock philanthropy.

Do we find these so-called ministers telling their congregations that marriage is an indissoluble tie, which no man can burst asunder; that the object of it is to enable husband and wife to live together happily and to bring up their children in the love and fear of God; that to take the life of an infant ante-natal is a dark, deadly, mortal sin; that no living human being who has not received baptism can ever see the face of God; and that whoever wilfully deprives her helpless babe of that ineffable delight will have to account for that lost soul to its Maker? Oh! no; that might shock the sensibilities of their audiences, and might lead to their own expulsion from their livings. Is it surprising, then, that a vice so much in harmony with the working of human passions, as apparently devoid of all moral responsibility as it is free from civil punishment, should be so frequently and so freely indulged in by those whose base inclinations are unchecked and unregulated by anything like true Christian teaching?

But what most surprises us is the appearance in the public prints for the past two or three years of numerous cases of suicide. This "self-slaughter" was a crime, we thought, confined to the older nations of Europe almost exclusively. The Americans are neither a despondent, an impoverished, nor a sentimental people; and yet we have been exceedingly pained to read of men well-to-do in the world, many of them being comfortable farmers and most of them advanced in years, deliberately taking that life which God gave them for wise and useful purposes, and voluntarily going before the judgment-seat of their Maker with the crime of murder on their souls. The policy of the old common law was to consider every suicide insane, but that was merely a fiction to save his goods from confiscation by the crown; we would fain believe that the numerous instances among ourselves were the result of aberration of mind--doubtless some of them were; but others have been planned and executed with such forethought as to preclude the possibility of such a supposition. As we write, we have before us a copy of a New York journal in which no less than four suicides of Americans in various parts of the country are recorded.[14]

It has been debated whether the act of a suicide is, humanly speaking, one of courage or cowardice: we are inclined to the latter opinion, but the question is immaterial. Whatever be its character in that respect, it is sure to originate in the absence of any belief which affirms a hereafter, or in that morbid form of idiocy known as spiritualism, which runs into the other extreme. In either case, it can only be prevented by moral suasion, for the civil law is of course utterly powerless in the matter; yet of all known crimes it is the most seductive, and even might be called contagious.

Let us now turn to another class of our people--the adopted citizens, and consider the peculiarities of their criminal classes. The largest proportion of our immigrant population is from Ireland, and, coming from a misgoverned and plundered land, many of them, indeed we think a large majority, are very poor indeed, so destitute that they have not means to bring them to the West, or into the rural districts, and consequently remain in the large cities for life. We have observed that deeds of violence committed by a certain class of Irish-Americans are disproportionately large, when compared with the native population or with those of other countries. We regret to be obliged to say so.

We yield to none in our respect, nay affection, for the children of long-suffering and persecuted Ireland, but we would be untrue to ourselves and unjust to the bulk of our fellow-citizens of Irish birth were we to ignore or deny that but too many of them allow themselves to be led into the commission of acts of violence not unfrequently ending in deadly quarrel.

This should not be. As a rule, an Irishman is social, humorous, and kind, affectionate in his family relations and disinterested in his friendships. In this country he has all the advantages that religion can afford, the churches are open to him every day, he is not restricted in his attendance at divine service on Sundays, he has always, particularly in cities and large towns, an opportunity of hearing good, practical, and instructive sermons and discourses on the duties of life, at least once a week; and the strength to resist temptation, which the sacraments alone can give, is always within his power to obtain.

Whence, then, originates this ungovernable passion, this desperate recklessness that resists all control, and, disregarding consequences, rushes madly into sin, makes man an outlaw among his fellows, and drags him to the dungeon and the scaffold? We must not attribute it to his defective education, the result of a jealous and tyrannical system of government in his native country, though it may have something to do with it; neither will the fact that many who had golden dreams before they reached our shores failed to realize them, and so became heedless. Poverty and destitution have been pleaded in extenuation, but they are more a result than a cause; for no able-bodied man, if well-conducted, need be in that sense either poor or destitute in this country, where labor is ever in demand. No; the secret, if it be a secret, lies in one word--intoxication, and, as a consequence, in the neglect of the religious duties taught and performed in their younger days. Intoxication is the demon that creeps into their souls, fires their heated blood, plunges his victims into an abyss of crime and transforms man, the noblest work of the Creator, into a ferocious brute. We are aware that instances of forgery, arson, swindling, and premeditated homicide--in fact, all offences requiring skill and deliberation--are exceedingly rare among our Irish-born population, but that is no reason why a few men born and baptized in the church, as little children taught the great truths of religion in the simple words of the catechism, and as adults weekly and almost daily within reach of moral instruction and a participation in the benefits of the sacraments, should by their neglect of religion, and their insane desire for deleterious stimulants, disgrace the race from which they have sprung and bring obloquy on the religion they profess to respect, but never practise. Who ever heard of an Irish adopted citizen, a teetotaler or even a uniformly temperate man, committing an atrocious crime or a deliberate breach of the laws of his adopted country?

No better illustration can be given of the beneficial effects of temperance on the Irish character than the following official statistics taken from the _Life of Father Mathew_. The author says:

"As a conclusive proof that the diminution of crime [in Ireland] was one of the necessary consequences of the spread of temperance among those classes of the community most liable to be tempted to acts of violence or dishonesty, some few facts from the official records of the time may be quoted here. They are taken from the returns of 'outrages specially reported by the constabulary,' from the year 1837 to the year 1841, both included. The number of homicides, which was 247 in 1838, was only 105 in 1841. There were 91 cases of 'firing at the person' in 1837 and but 66 in 1841. The 'assaults on police' were 91 in 1837 and but 58 in 1841. Incendiary fires, which were as many as 459 in 1838, were 390 in 1841. Robberies, thus specially reported, diminished wonderfully from 725 in 1837 to 257 in 1841! The offence of 'killing, cutting, or maiming cattle' was also seriously lessened; the cases reported in 1839 being 433, to 213 in 1841! The decrease in cases of 'robbery of arms' was most significant; from being 246 in 1837 there were but 111 in 1841. The offence of 'appearing in arms' showed a favorable diminution, falling from 110 in 1837 to 66 in 1841. The effect of sobriety on 'faction fights' was equally remarkable. There were 20 of such cases in 1839 and 8 in 1841. The dangerous offence of 'rescuing prisoners,' which was represented by 34 in 1837, had no return in 1841.

"Without entering further into details, the following returns of the number committed during a period of seven years, from 1839 to 1845, must bring conviction home to the mind of any rational and dispassionate person that sobriety is good for the individual and the community:

Total Year. No. 1839 12,049 1840 11,194 1841 9,287 1842 9,875 1843 8,620 1844 8,042 1845 7,107

"The number of sentences of death and transportation evidenced the operation of some powerful and beneficial influence on the public morals. The number of capital sentences in eight years, from 1839 to 1846, was as follows:

No. of Year. Sentences. 1839 66 1840 43 1841 40 1842 25 1843 16 1844 20 1845 13 1846 14

"The sentences to transportation during the same period, from 1839 to 1846, exhibited the like wonderful result:

No. of Year. Sentences. 1839 916 1840 751 1841 643 1842 667 1843 482 1844 526 1845 428 1846 504

"The figures already quoted are most valuable, as they prove, beyond the possibility of a doubt, that national drunkenness is the chief cause of crime, and that sobriety is, humanly speaking, one of the best preservatives of the morals of a people."[15]

When we recollect that during the years above reported the consumption of ardent spirits had decreased one-half, though the population had increased by at least a quarter of a million, the inexorable logic of the figures above quoted becomes irresistible--intemperance is a greater enemy of the Irish race than even her hereditary foe, England.

With the Germans it is different. They are by no means given to indulgence in violent stimulants, though they, too, are a social people, fond of enjoyment and of their national beverage, beer; yet crime, and that of a very serious character, is not unusual among them, particularly the killing of females. And here again we have the evidence of the terrible havoc which the great rebellion of the XVIth century against the church and her authority has wrought in the social relations of mankind. Germany was the originator, the centre, and the main supporter of that revolt on the Continent of Europe, and, having been violently wrested from the seat of Catholic unity, has ever since been groping in the dark, oscillating between heathenism and transcendentalism, without stability or any sort of fixed principles. The blight of the Reformation, so called, has eaten into the very marrow of their family relations, and what would be deemed infamous for women of other countries to do, is considered among a certain class of this people, limited, it is true, a matter of course.

Once again, let us not be misunderstood. In ascribing this species of offence to the Germans in the United States, we do not mean to say that it is general to the whole body; on the contrary, we are happy to know that it is confined to a few, for, as a whole, the people from the north of Europe are perhaps the most law-abiding portion of our citizens. We are well aware that in this city, and in the West and South, there are many learned professors, devoted priests, and devout congregations, all of German birth, as well as many reputable merchants, mechanics, and professional men of the same nationality, who worship God according to their hereditary customs; but we think we do not go too far in saying that the majority of German-Americans have practically no religion, that they never enter a church, say a prayer, or perform any of the ordinary duties of a Christian. Some years ago, the writer was introduced into a Germania society in a neighboring city which consisted of over three hundred members, all gentlemen of education and wealth. He subsequently visited it three or four times on various Sundays, and always found its spacious suite of rooms crowded. Upon enquiring where those persons went to church, his friend placidly replied: "I don't think there is one of us ever goes to church; you know I do not." If such an example is set by the "higher classes," what can we expect from those in the lower scale of social life?

We often have had occasion to admire the way in which the Germans enjoy themselves on week-days and Sundays; the order and good-fellowship which prevail at their gatherings, their songs and instrumental music, and the fact that they always bring with them their wives and children to partake of their enjoyment. But our satisfaction at seeing them go to the rural retreats on a Sunday morning, and return peaceably in the evening after a long day of rational pleasure, has been considerably lessened by the knowledge that no portion of the day, set apart as a day of prayer as well as of rest, has been devoted by those pleasure-seekers to the service of the great Giver of all blessings, of happiness here and hereafter. Such practical defiance of God's law, such ingratitude towards our common Father, such complete disregard of the simplest requirements of religion, must necessarily blunt the moral sense, more especially as it affects and weakens the sanctified tie that binds husband and wife. It is therefore with more sorrow than surprise that we read of so many cases among our German fellow-citizens of men and women living with other persons' wives and husbands. Such conditions are unlawful and short-lived, the fruitful source of anger, jealousy, and discontent, and not unusually culminate in ill-treatment, blows, and even death.

While we also ascribe the crime of the destruction of offspring to the Germans, we do not mean to say that it is practised to any extent among them, but that the foul crime is perpetrated in this and other large cities almost exclusively by German quack doctors, male and female; their victims being generally from other nationalities. For this the German people are not so much to blame as our own press, which publishes the advertisements of those miscreants and scatters them broadcast on the world for a paltry consideration; and our state legislatures, which have neglected until lately to enact proper laws; and our prosecuting attorneys, who have failed to enforce such enactments as we have on our statute-books against this class of rank murderers.

Offences against property are almost exclusively in the hands of our English criminals, if we except the horse-stealing of the Southwest. Our most expert pickpockets, our most dexterous sneak-thieves, daring highwaymen, and scientific burglars come from London, many of whom have served her Majesty for a term of years in her penal colonies, and are so well known to the detectives of the British metropolis that they have sought new fields of enterprise in this country. They have been preceded or accompanied by prize-fighters, gamblers, and keepers of low dens called concert-saloons. The former they make the partners in their labors and gains, and in the latter hot-beds of infamy they find shelter and concealment. It may be said that this class of crimes is far less reprehensible than those above enumerated, and so they would be were it not that highway robbery and burglary sometimes terminate in the taking of human life. Still, it must be said in justice that we hear of very few cases of wilful homicide being perpetrated by the English among us, though, like the French, suicide is not unknown to them, but arises from different causes. The Briton "shuffles off this mortal coil" through moroseness and despondency; the Gaul gaily prepares to smother himself with carbonic acid gas from a morbid sentimentality, and a contempt for the precious gift of life which he is about to throw away.

Now, if all these offences were simply infractions of the municipal law, we would naturally look to our legislatures, our courts, juries, and sheriffs for their prevention or punishment, but they are not only that, but breaches of the divine law, and we must depend likewise on the efficacy of moral suasion to prevent if not to correct them. Public opinion can do much to repress crime, the legislative, administrative, and judicial branches of our various local governments, each in its sphere, might effect far more good; but it is on the teachings of true Christianity alone, and all the consequences that flow from it, that we must rely if we wish to stem the tide of misery, vice, and outrage which are fast surging over every portion of our fair land. The strong arm of the civil power is potent to punish when the crime has been committed, but weak indeed to prevent its perpetration. This higher and nobler duty is reserved for religion, and for religion alone. It is well enough to make concise and exact punitive laws, though this is not always done; and to administer them fearlessly, honestly, and intelligently, though the reverse is generally the case; still, experience has taught us that wise enactments and impartial judges have very little power to stay the promptings of bad hearts or repress the temptations ever presenting themselves to men of vicious habits or defective moral training. The church, and only the church, can rule the mind and heart of man, can train him from his infancy, before he knows or is responsible to any civil law, can strengthen him with the graces of the sacraments, arm him with the most potent of all weapons against sin--prayer--place constantly before his eyes the certainty of everlasting bliss or eternal damnation, keep him in the "narrow path," and thus prevent the possibility of his being an enemy to society and an outcast of heaven.

Next to the church comes the school. The importance of education to the well-being of society can never be overstated. It may be well said that it is in the school-room the seeds of vice or virtue are first sown, it is there that the future benefactor or the enemy of his kind commences his career in life, and it is upon the proper or vicious method of teaching which he receives as a boy depends mainly his future course in the world. No wonder, then, that the Catholic Church is so desirous of superintending the training of those little ones who by the sacrament of baptism have been made children of God and heirs to the kingdom of heaven; that the zealous parish priest should mourn over the loss of hundreds of the youth of his congregation, who, taught in Protestant or infidel schools, have fallen away from the faith to plunge into sin and vice. Is he to be blamed if he exhausts every resource and strains every nerve to establish for his people a school where their offspring will be guarded from worldly contamination, and trained in all the beautiful morality of Catholic doctrine? Few seem to understand the comprehensive meaning of the word education. The mere acquisition of worldly knowledge is not education, the development of the highest intellectual powers is not education, but only a part, and a secondary part at that, of a complete education; for without inculcating morality, justice, a high sense of honor, a noble disregard for self, and a sympathy for the suffering and unfortunate, you curse man with a disposition that is its own Nemesis, with unlawful desires that "make the food they feed on," and simply enlarge his capacity for doing evil.

That this is the result of our present common-school system cannot well be gainsaid in view of the general spirit of peculation and corruption which prevails in those very portions of the country where such schools are most numerous and best attended and supported. And this view is not ours alone. Already we find the secular press, hitherto the strongest opponents of denominational education, clamoring for a reform in our method of public instruction. "We must have," says a leading daily paper of this city, "a higher system of morals taught in our public schools"; though the writer does not condescend to say how morals can be taught without religion, or who are to be the teachers. Is it the fagged-out teacher who tries to earn his salary by the least possible labor, and who perhaps, in this respect, is as deficient as the children themselves; or is it the trained priest or the lowly Christian Brother, who has devoted himself heart and soul to the service of God and of his creatures, and whose reward is not of this world?

Our common schools, with some modifications, are decidedly a New England invention, but none the worse for that, for the early settlers of that much-abused region, whatever may have been their other faults, were neither an irreligious nor an immoral people. On the contrary they were deeply imbued with a sense of the dignity of religion and a reverence for its ministers, according to their limited and erroneous but honestly entertained ideas; and being all of one way of thinking, they established schools, at the public expense it is true, but they took care that their peculiar theological notions should go hand-in-hand with secular teaching. The minister, the elder, or the deacon generally united with his clerical office that of schoolmaster, and the morals as well as the intellectual qualities of the pupils were sedulously developed and cultivated. Now all this is changed. The foundation upon which the public-school system was built has crumbled into dust, and the superstructure cannot and ought not to stand longer. Our country is now composed of many nationalities, believing in various creeds, and the task of educating the rising generation should be remitted to each denomination to take care of and instruct its own members. If we want to inculcate true lessons of morality and integrity, to stop bribery, forgery, perjury, dishonesty, infanticide, and homicide, we must change our system of education, or it is possible that society, laboring under so heavy a burden of sin and dishonor, will in the near future be crushed to pieces.

But for the adult immigrants who have never felt the baleful influence of our public schools, what is the remedy? For the Germans we would say, a more general attendance at divine service. They are pre-eminently an organizing people: why do not those good German Catholics who are so constant in their devotions establish more societies, with a view to induce their erring compatriots to give up at least a portion of that time now wholly devoted to pleasure to the worship of God? This would be a work of great charity, and if earnestly undertaken would doubtless be successful. The panacea that lies before our Irish fellow-citizens is temperance--that observed, we venture to say that they will be found among the most moral and orderly portion of our population. In this connection we are glad to observe the untiring energy exhibited by prominent laymen to organize and unite temperance societies, and the encouragement given them by priests and bishops. Our Irish friends must not forget that not only the honor of their native land and the prosperity of their children in that of their adoption depend on their good conduct and sobriety, but that, to a great extent, the Catholic Church in America is contemned or revered in proportion as they act against or in harmony with her doctrine and discipline. If woe be denounced against whosoever gives scandal, a blessing is also promised to those who, by their actions, glorify the name of God.

FOOTNOTES:

[14] New York _Times_, May 13, 1873.

[15] _Father Mathew: A Biography._ By John Francis Maguire, M.P. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Co. 1871.

THE TROUVERE.[16]

BY AUBREY DE VERE.

I make not songs, but only find:-- Love, following still the circling sun, His carols casts on every wind, And other singer is there none!

I follow Love, though far he flies; I sing his song, at random found Like plume some bird of Paradise Drops, passing, on our dusky bound.

In some, methinks, at times there glows The passion of a heavenlier sphere: These, too, I sing:--but sweetest those I dare not sing, and faintly hear.

FOOTNOTES:

[16] The Greeks called the poet "the Maker." In the middle ages, some of the best poets took a more modest title--that of "the Finder."

MADAME AGNES.

FROM THE FRENCH OF CHARLES DUBOIS.