"Our holy Superior is out a good while this morning," he said, at length.

The observation was made in the smoothest and most silken tones, but they carried with them such a singular suggestion of doubt and inquiry that they seemed like an accusation.

"Ah?" replied the other, perceiving evidently some intended undertone of suspicion lurking in the words, but apparently resolved not to commit himself to his companion.

"Yes," said the first; "the zeal of the house of the Lord consumes him, the blessed man!"

"Blessed man!" echoed the second, rolling up his eyes, and giving a deep sigh, which shook his portly proportions so that they quivered like jelly.

"If he goes on in this way much longer," continued Father Johannes, "there will soon be very little mortal left of him; the saints will claim him."

Father Anselmo gave something resembling a pious groan, but darted meanwhile a shrewd observant glance at the speaker.

"What would become of the convent, were he gone?" said Father Johannes. "All these blessed reforms which he has brought about would fall back; for our nature is fearfully corrupt, and ever tends to wallow in the mire of sin and pollution. What changes hath he wrought in us all! To be sure, the means were sometimes severe. I remember, brother, when he had you under ground for more than ten days. My heart was pained for you; but I suppose you know that it was necessary, in order to bring you to that eminent state of sanctity where you now stand."

The heavy, sensual features of Father Anselmo flushed up with some emotion, whether of anger or of fear it was hard to tell; but he gave one hasty glance at his companion, which, if a glance could kill, would have struck him dead, and then there fell over his countenance, like a veil, an expression of sanctimonious humility, as he replied,—

"Thank you for your sympathy, dearest brother. I remember, too, how I felt for you that week when you were fed only on bread and water, and had to take it on your knees off the floor, while the rest of us sat at table. How blessed it must be to have one's pride brought down in that way! When our dear, blessed Superior first came, brother, you were as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke, but now what a blessed change! It must give you so much peace! How you must love him!"

"I think we love him about equally," said Father Johannes, his dark, thin features expressing the concentration of malignity. "His labors have been blessed among us. Not often does a faithful shepherd meet so loving a flock. I have been told that the great Peter Abelard found far less gratitude. They tried to poison him in the most holy wine."

"How absurd!" interrupted Father Anselmo, hastily; "as if the blood of the Lord, as if our Lord himself, could be made poison!"

"Brother, it is a fact," insisted the former, in tones silvery with humility and sweetness.

"A fact that the most holy blood can be poisoned?" replied the other, with horror evidently genuine.

"I grieve to say, brother," said Father Johannes, "that in my profane and worldly days I tried that experiment on a dog, and the poor brute died in five minutes. Ah, brother," he added, observing that his obese companion was now thoroughly roused, "you see before you the chief of sinners! Judas was nothing to me; and yet, such are the triumphs of grace, I am an unworthy member of this most blessed and pious brotherhood; but I do penance daily in sackcloth and ashes for my offence."

"But, Brother Johannes, was it really so? did it really happen?" inquired Father Anselmo, looking puzzled. "Where, then, is our faith?"

"Doth our faith rest on human reason, or on the evidence of our senses, Brother Anselmo? I bless God that I have arrived at that state where I can adoringly say, 'I believe, because it is impossible.' Yea, brother, I know it to be a fact that the ungodly have sometimes destroyed holy men, like our Superior, who could not be induced to taste wine for any worldly purpose, by drugging the blessed cup; so dreadful are the ragings of Satan in our corrupt nature!"

"I can't see into that," said Father Anselmo, still looking confused.

"Brother," answered Father Johannes, "permit an unworthy sinner to remind you that you must not try to see into anything; all that is wanted of you in our most holy religion is to shut your eyes and believe; all things are possible to the eye of faith. Now, humanly speaking," he added, with a peculiarly meaning look, "who would believe that you kept all the fasts of our order, and all the extraordinary ones which it hath pleased our blessed Superior to lay upon us, as you surely do? A worldling might swear, to look at you, that such flesh and color must come in some way from good meat and good wine; but we remember how the three children throve on the pulse and rejected the meat from the king's table."

The countenance of Father Anselmo expressed both anger and alarm at this home-thrust, and the changes did not escape the keen eye of Father Johannes, who went on.

"I directed the eyes of our holy father upon you as a striking example of the benefits of abstemious living, showing that the days of miracles are not yet past in the Church, as some skeptics would have us believe. He seemed to study you attentively. I have no doubt he will honor you with some more particular inquiries,—the blessed saint!"

Father Anselmo turned uneasily on his seat and stealthily eyed his companion, to see, if possible, how much real knowledge was expressed by his words, and then answered on quite another topic.

"How this garden has fallen to decay! We miss old Father Angelo sorely, who was always trimming and cleansing it. Our Superior is too heavenly-minded to have much thought for earthly things, and so it goes."

Father Johannes watched this attempt at diversion with a glitter of stealthy malice, and, seeming to be absorbed in contemplation, broke out again exactly where he had left off on the unwelcome subject.

"I mind me now, Brother Anselmo, that, when you came out of your cell to prayers, the other night, your utterance was thick, and your eyes heavy and watery, and your gait uncertain. One would swear that you had been drunken with new wine; but we knew it was all the effect of fasting and devout contemplation, which inebriates the soul with holy raptures, as happened to the blessed Apostles on the day of Pentecost. I remarked the same to our holy father, and he seemed to give it earnest heed, for I saw him watching you through all the services. How blessed is such watchfulness!"

"The Devil take him!" said Father Anselmo, suddenly thrown off his guard; but checking himself, he added, confusedly,—"I mean"—

"I understand you, brother," said Father Johannes; "it is a motion of the old nature not yet entirely subdued. A little more of the discipline of the lower vaults, which you have found so precious, will set all that right."

"You would not inform against me?" said Father Anselmo, with an expression of alarm.

"It would be my duty, I suppose," said Father Johannes, with a sigh; "but, sinner that I am, I never could bring my mind to such proceedings with the vigor of our blessed father. Had I been Superior of the convent, as was talked of, bow differently might things have proceeded! I should have erred by a sinful laxness. How fortunate that it was he, instead of such a miserable sinner as myself!"

"Well, tell me, then, Father Johannes,—for your eyes are shrewd as a lynx's,—is our good Superior so perfect as he seems? or does he have his little private comforts sometimes, like the rest of us? Nobody, you know, can stand it to be always on the top round of the ladder to Paradise. For my part, between you and me, I never believed all that story they read to us so often about Saint Simon Stylites, who passed so many years on the top of a pillar and never came down. Trust me, the old boy found his way down sometimes, when all the world was asleep, and got somebody to do duty for him meantime, while he took a little something comfortable. Is it not so?"

"I am told to believe, and I do believe," said Father Johannes, casting down his eyes, piously; "and, dear brother, it ill befits a sinner like me to reprove; but it seemeth to me as if you make too much use of the eyes of carnal inquiry. Touching the life of our holy father, I cannot believe the most scrupulous watch can detect anything in his walk or conversation other than appears in his profession. His food is next to nothing,—a little chopped spinach or some bitter herb cooked without salt for ordinary days, and on fast days he mingles this with ashes, according to a saintly rule. As for sleep, I believe he does without it; for at no time of the night, when I have knocked at the door of his cell, have I found him sleeping. He is always at his prayers or breviary. His cell hath only a rough, hard board for a bed, with a log of rough wood for a pillow; yet he complains of that as tempting to indolence."

Father Anselmo shrugged his fat shoulders, ruefully.

"It's all well enough," he said, "for those that want to take this hard road to Paradise; but why need they drive the flock up with them?"

"True enough, Brother Anselmo," said Father Johannes; "but the flock will rejoice in it in the end, doubtless. I understand he is purposing to draw yet stricter the reins of discipline. We ought to be thankful."

"Thankful? We can't wink but six times a week now," said Father Anselmo; "and by-and-by he won't let us wink at all."

"Hist! hush! here he comes," said Father Johannes, "What ails him? he looks wild, like a man distraught."

In a moment more, in fact, Father Francesco strode hastily through the corridor, with his deep-set eyes dilated and glittering, and a vivid hectic flush on his hollow cheeks. He paid no regard to the salutation of the obsequious monks; in fact, he seemed scarcely to see them, but hurried in a disordered manner through the passages and gained the room of his cell, which he shut and locked with a violent clang.

"What has come over him now?" said Father Anselmo.

Father Johannes stealthily followed some distance, and then stood with his lean neck outstretched and his head turned in the direction where the Superior had disappeared. The whole attitude of the man, with his acute glittering eye, might remind one of a serpent making an observation before darting after his prey.

"Something is working him," he said to himself; "what may it be?"

Meanwhile that heavy oaken door had closed on a narrow cell,—bare of everything which could be supposed to be a matter of convenience in the abode of a human being. A table of the rudest and most primitive construction was garnished with a skull, whose empty eyeholes and grinning teeth were the most conspicuous objects in the room. Behind this stood a large crucifix, manifestly the work of no common master, and bearing evident traces in its workmanship of Florentine art: it was, perhaps, one of the relics of the former wealth of the nobleman who had buried his name and worldly possessions in this living sepulchre. A splendid manuscript breviary, richly illuminated, lay open on the table; and the fair fancy of its flowery letters, the lustre of gold and silver on its pages, formed a singular contrast to the squalid nakedness of everything else in the room. This book, too, had been a family heirloom; some lingering shred of human and domestic affection sheltered itself under the protection of religion in making it the companion of his self-imposed life of penance and renunciation.

Father Francesco had just returned from the scene in the confessional we have already described. That day had brought to him one of those pungent and vivid inward revelations which sometimes overset in a moment some delusion that has been the cherished growth of years. Henceforth the reign of self-deception was past,—there was no more self-concealment, no more evasion. He loved Agnes,—he knew it,—he said it over and over again to himself with a stormy intensity of energy; and in this hour the whole of his nature seemed to rise in rebellion against the awful barriers which hemmed in and threatened this passion. He now saw clearly that all that he had been calling fatherly tenderness, pastoral zeal, Christian unity, and a thousand other evangelical names, was nothing more nor less than a passion that had gone to the roots of existence and absorbed into itself all that there was of him. Where was he to look for refuge? What hymn, what prayer had he not blent with her image? It was this that he had given to her as a holy lesson,—it was that that she had spoken of to him as the best expression of her feelings. This prayer he had explained to her,—he remembered just the beautiful light in her eyes, which were fixed on his so trustingly. How dear to him had been that unquestioning devotion, that tender, innocent humility!—how dear, and how dangerous!

We have read of flowing rivulets wandering peacefully without ripple or commotion, so long as no barrier stayed their course, suddenly chafing in angry fury when an impassable dam was thrown across their waters. So any affection, however genial and gentle in its own nature, may become an ungovernable, ferocious passion, by the intervention of fatal obstacles in its course. In the case of Father Francesco, the sense of guilt and degradation fell like a blight over all the past that had been so ignorantly happy. He thought he had been living on manna, but found it poison. Satan had been fooling him, leading him on blindfold, and laughing at his simplicity, and now mocked at his captivity. And how nearly had he been hurried by a sudden and overwhelming influence to the very brink of disgrace! He felt himself shiver and grow cold to think of it. A moment more and he had blasted that pure ear with forbidden words of passion; and even now he remembered, with horror, the look of grave and troubled surprise in those confiding eyes, that had always looked up to him trustingly, as to God. A moment more and he had betrayed the faith he taught her, shattered her trust in the holy ministry, and perhaps imperilled her salvation. He breathed a sigh of relief when he thought of it,—he had not betrayed himself, he had not fallen in her esteem, he still stood on that sacred vantage-ground where his power over her was so great, and where at least he possessed her confidence and veneration. There was still time for recollection, for self-control, for a vehement struggle which should set all right again: but, alas! how shall a man struggle who finds his whole inner nature boiling in furious rebellion against the dictates of his conscience,—self against self?

It is true, also, that no passions are deeper in their hold, more pervading and more vital to the whole human being, than those that make their first entrance through the higher nature, and, beginning with a religious and poetic ideality, gradually work their way through the whole fabric of the human existence.

From grosser passions, whose roots lie in the senses, there is always a refuge in man's loftier nature. He can cast them aside with contempt, and leave them as one whose lower story is flooded can remove to a higher loft, and live serenely with a purer air and wider prospect. But to love that is born of ideality, of intellectual sympathy, of harmonies of the spiritual and Immortal nature, of the very poetry and purity of the soul, if it be placed where reason and religion forbid its exercise and expression, what refuge but the grave,—what hope but that wide eternity where all human barriers fall, all human relations end, and love ceases to be a crime? A man of the world may struggle by change of scene, place, and employment. He may put oceans between himself and the things that speak of what he desires to forget. He may fill the void in his life with the stirring excitement of the battlefield, or the whirl of travel from city to city, or the press of business and care. But what help is there for him whose life is tied down to the narrow sphere of the convent,—to the monotony of a bare cell, to the endless repetition of the same prayers, the same chants, the same prostrations, especially when all that ever redeemed it from monotony has been that image and that sympathy which conscience now bids him forget?

When Father Francesco precipitated himself into his cell and locked the door, it was with the desperation of a man who flies from a mortal enemy. It seemed to him that all eyes saw just what was boiling within him,—that the wild thoughts that seemed to scream their turbulent importunities in his ears were speaking so loud that all the world would hear. He should disgrace himself before the brethren whom he had so long been striving to bring to order and to teach the lessons of holy self-control. He saw himself pointed at, hissed at, degraded, by the very men who had quailed before his own reproofs; and scarcely, when he had bolted the door behind him, did he feel himself safe. Panting and breathless, he fell on his knees before the crucifix, and, bowing his head in his hands, fell forward upon the floor. As a spent wave melts at the foot of a rock, so all his strength passed away, and he lay awhile in a kind of insensibility,—a state in which, though consciously existing, he had no further control over his thoughts and feelings. In that state of dreamy exhaustion his mind seemed like a mirror, which, without vitality or will of its own, simply lies still and reflects the objects that may pass over it. As clouds sailing in the heavens cast their images, one after another, on the glassy floor of a waveless sea, so the scenes of his former life drifted in vivid pictures athwart his memory. He saw his father's palace,—the wide, cool, marble halls,—the gardens resounding with the voices of falling waters. He saw the fair face of his mother, and played with the jewels upon her hands. He saw again the picture of himself, in all the flush of youth and health, clattering on horseback through the streets of Florence with troops of gay young friends, now dead to him as he to them. He saw himself in the bowers of gay ladies, whose golden hair, lustrous eyes, and siren wiles came back shivering and trembling in the waters of memory in a thousand undulating reflections. There were wild revels,—orgies such as Florence remembers with shame to this day. There was intermingled the turbulent din of arms,—the haughty passion, the sudden provocation, the swift revenge. And then came the awful hour of conviction, the face of that wonderful man whose preaching had stirred all souls,—and then those fearful days of penance,—that darkness of the tomb,—that dying to the world,—those solemn vows, and the fearful struggles by which they had been followed.

"Oh, my God!" he cried, "is it all in vain?—so many prayers? so many struggles?—and shall I fail of salvation at last?"

He seemed to himself as a swimmer, who, having exhausted his last gasp of strength in reaching the shore, is suddenly lifted up on a cruel wave and drawn back into the deep. There seemed nothing for him but to fold his arms and sink.

For he felt no strength now to resist,—he felt no wish to conquer,—he only prayed that he might lie there and die. It seemed to him that the love which possessed him and tyrannized over his very being was a doom,—a curse sent upon him by some malignant fate with whose power it was vain to struggle. He detested his work,—he detested his duties,—he loathed his vows,—and there was not a thing in his whole future to which he looked forward otherwise than with the extreme of aversion, except one to which he clung with a bitter and defiant tenacity,—the spiritual guidance of Agnes. Guidance!—he laughed aloud, in the bitterness of his soul, as he thought of this. He was her guide,—her confessor,—to him she was bound to reveal every change of feeling; and this love that he too well perceived rising in her heart for another,—he would wring from her own confessions the means to repress and circumvent it. If she could not be his, he might at least prevent her from belonging to any other,—he might at least keep her always within the sphere of his spiritual authority. Had he not a right to do this?—had he not a right to cherish an evident vocation,—a right to reclaim her from the embrace of an excommunicated infidel, and present her as a chaste bride at the altar of the Lord? Perhaps, when that was done, when an irrevocable barrier should separate her from all possibility of earthly love, when the awful marriage-vow should have been spoken which should seal her heart for heaven alone, he might recover some of the blessed calm which her influence once brought over him, and these wild desires might cease, and these feverish pulses be still.

Such were the vague images and dreams of the past and future that floated over his mind, as he lay in a heavy sort of lethargy on the floor of his cell, and hour after hour passed away. It grew afternoon, and the radiance of evening came on. The window of the cell overlooked the broad Mediterranean, all one blue glitter of smiles and sparkles. The white-winged boats were flitting lightly to and fro, like gauzy-winged insects in the summer air,—the song of the fishermen drawing their nets on the beach floated cheerily upward. Capri lay like a half-dissolved opal in shimmering clouds of mist, and Naples gleamed out pearly clear in the purple distance. Vesuvius, with its cloud-spotted sides, its garlanded villas and villages, its silvery crown of vapor, seemed a warm-hearted and genial old giant lying down in his gorgeous repose and holding all things on his heaving bosom in a kindly embrace.

So was the earth flooded with light and glory, that the tide poured into the cell, giving the richness of an old Venetian painting to its bare and squalid furniture. The crucifix glowed along all its sculptured lines with rich golden hues. The breviary, whose many-colored leaves fluttered as the wind from the sea drew inward, was yet brighter in its gorgeous tints. It seemed a sort of devotional butterfly perched before the grinning skull, which was bronzed by the enchanted light into warmer tones of color, as if some remembrance of what once it saw and felt came back upon it. So also the bare, miserable board which served for the bed, and its rude pillow, were glorified. A stray sunbeam, too, fluttered down on the floor like a pitying spirit, to light up that pale, thin face, whose classic outlines had now a sharp, yellow setness, like that of swooning or death; it seemed to linger compassionately on the sunken, wasted cheeks, on the long black lashes that fell over the deep hollows beneath the eyes like a funereal veil. Poor man! lying crushed and torn, like a piece of rockweed wrenched from its rock by a storm and thrown up withered upon the beach!

From the leaves of the breviary there depends, by a fragment of gold braid, a sparkling something that wavers and glitters in the evening light. It is a cross of the cheapest and simplest material, that once belonged to Agnes. She lost it from her rosary at the confessional, and Father Francesco saw it fall, yet would not warn her of the loss, for he longed to posses something that had belonged to her. He made it a mark to one of her favorite hymns; but she never knew where it had gone. Little could she dream, in her simplicity, what a power she held over the man who seemed to her an object of such awful veneration. Little did she dream that the poor little tinsel cross had such a mighty charm with it, and that she herself, in her childlike simplicity, her ignorant innocence, her peaceful tenderness and trust, was raising such a turbulent storm of passion in the heart which she supposed to be above the reach of all human changes.

And now, through the golden air, the Ave Maria is sounding from the convent-bells, and answered by a thousand tones and echoes from the churches of the old town, and all Christendom gives a moment's adoring pause to celebrate the moment when an angel addressed to a mortal maiden words that had been wept and prayed for during thousands of years. Dimly they sounded through his ear, in that half-deadly trance,—not with plaintive sweetness and motherly tenderness, but like notes of doom and vengeance. He felt rebellious impulses within, which rose up in hatred against them, and all that recalled to his mind the faith which seemed a tyranny, and the vows which appeared to him such a hopeless and miserable failure.

But now there came other sounds nearer and more earthly. His quickened senses perceive a busy patter of sandalled feet outside his cell, and a whispering of consultation,—and then the silvery, snaky tones of Father Johannes, which had that oily, penetrative quality which passes through all substances with such distinctness.

"Brethren," he said, "I feel bound in conscience to knock. Our blessed Superior carries his mortifications altogether too far. His faithful sons must beset him with filial inquiries."

The condition in which Father Francesco was lying, like many abnormal states of extreme exhaustion, seemed to be attended with a mysterious quickening of the magnetic forces and intuitive perceptions. He felt the hypocrisy of those tones, and they sounded in his ear like the suppressed hiss of a deadly serpent. He had always suspected that this man hated him to the death; and he felt now that he was come with his stealthy-tread and his almost supernatural power of prying observation, to read the very inmost secrets of his heart. He knew that he longed for nothing so much as the power to hurl him from his place and to reign in his stead; and the instinct of self-defence roused him. He started up as one starts from a dream, waked by a whisper in the ear, and, raising himself on his elbow, looked towards the door.

A cautious rap was heard, and then a pause. Father Francesco smiled with a peculiar and bitter expression. The rap became louder, more energetic, stormy at last, intermingled with vehement calls on his name.

Father Francesco rose at length, settled his garments, passed his hands over his brow, and then, composing himself to an expression of deliberate gravity, opened the door and stood before them.

"Holy father," said Father Johannes, "the hearts of your sons have been saddened. A whole day have you withdrawn your presence from our devotions. We feared you might have fainted, your pious austerities so often transcend the powers of Nature."

"I grieve to have saddened the hearts of such affectionate sons," said the Superior, fixing his eye keenly on Father Johannes; "but I have been performing a peculiar office of prayer to-day for a soul in deadly peril, and have been so absorbed therein that I have known nothing that passed. There is a soul among us, brethren," he added, "that stands at this moment so near to damnation that even the most blessed Mother of God is in doubt for its salvation, and whether it can be saved at all God only knows."

These words, rising up from a tremendous groundswell of repressed feeling, had a fearful, almost supernatural earnestness that made the body of the monks tremble. Most of them were conscious of living but a shabby, shambling, dissembling life, evading in every possible way the efforts of their Superior to bring them up to the requirements of their profession; and therefore, when these words were bolted out among them with such a glowing intensity, every one of them began mentally feeling for the key of his own private and interior skeleton-closet, and wondering which of their ghastly occupants was coming to light now.

Father Johannes alone was unmoved, because he had long since ceased to have a conscience. A throb of moral pulsation had for years been an impossibility to the dried and hardened fibre of his inner nature. He was one of those real, genuine, thorough unbelievers in all religion and all faith and all spirituality, whose unbelief grows only more callous by the constant handling of sacred things. Ambition was the ruling motive of his life, and every faculty was sharpened into such acuteness under its action that his penetration seemed at times almost preternatural.

While he stood with downcast eyes and hands crossed upon his breast, listening to the burning words which remorse and despair wrung from his Superior, he was calmly and warily studying to see what could be made of the evident interior conflict that convulsed him. Was there some secret sin? Had that sanctity at last found the temptation that was more than a match for it? And what could it be?

To a nature with any strong combative force there is no tonic like the presence of a secret and powerful enemy, and the stealthy glances of Father Johannes's serpent eye did more towards restoring Father Francesco to self-mastery than the most conscientious struggles could have done. He grew calm, resolved, determined. Self-respect was dear to him,—and dear to him no less that reflection of self-respect which a man reads in other eyes. He would not forfeit his conventual honor, or bring a stain on his order, or, least of all, expose himself to the scoffing eye of a triumphant enemy. Such were the motives that now came to his aid, while as yet the whole of his inner nature rebelled at the thought that he must tear up by the roots and wholly extirpate this love that seemed to have sent its fine fibres through every nerve of his being. "No!" he said to himself, with a fierce interior rebellion, "that I will not do! Right or wrong, come heaven, come hell, I will love her; and if lost I must be, lost I will be!" And while this determination lasted, prayer seemed to him a mockery. He dared not pray alone now, when most he needed prayer; but he moved forward with dignity towards the convent-chapel to lead the vesper devotions of his brethren. Outwardly he was calm and rigid as a statue; but as he commenced the service, his utterance had a terrible meaning and earnestness that were felt even by the most drowsy and leaden of his flock. It is singular how the dumb, imprisoned soul, locked within the walls of the body, sometimes gives such a piercing power to the tones of the voice during the access of a great agony. The effect is entirely involuntary, and often against the most strenuous opposition of the will; but one sometimes hears another reading or repeating words with an intense vitality, a living force, which tells of some inward anguish or conflict of which the language itself gives no expression.

Never were the long-drawn intonations of the chants and prayers of the Church pervaded by a more terrible, wild fervor than the Superior that night breathed into them. They seemed to wail, to supplicate, to combat, to menace, to sink in despairing pauses of helpless anguish, and anon to rise in stormy agonies of passionate importunity; and the monks quailed and trembled, they scarce knew why, with forebodings of coming wrath and judgment.

In the evening exhortation, which it had been the Superior's custom to add to the prayers of the vesper-hour, he dwelt with a terrible and ghastly eloquence on the loss of the soul.

"Brethren," he said, "believe me, the very first hour of a damned spirit in hell will outweigh all the prosperities of the most prosperous life. If you could gain the whole world, that one hour of hell would outweigh it all; how much more such miserable, pitiful scraps and fragments of the world as they gain who for the sake of a little fleshly ease neglect the duties of a holy profession! There is a broad way to hell through a convent, my brothers, where miserable wretches go who have neither the spirit to serve the Devil wholly, nor the patience to serve God; there be many shaven crowns that gnash their teeth in hell to-night,—many a monk's robe is burning on its owner in living fire, and the devils call him a fool for choosing to be damned in so hard a way. 'Could you not come here by some easier road than a cloister?' they ask. 'If you must sell your soul, why did you not get something for it?' Brethren, there be devils waiting for some of us; they are laughing at your paltry shifts and evasions, at your efforts to make things easy,—for they know how it will all end at last. Rouse yourselves! Awake! Salvation is no easy matter,—nothing to be got between sleeping and waking. Watch, pray, scourge the flesh, fast, weep, bow down in sackcloth, mingle your bread with ashes, if by any means ye may escape the everlasting fire!"

"Bless me!" said Father Anselmo, when the services were over, casting a half-scared glance after the retreating figure of the Superior as he left the chapel, and drawing a long breath; "it's enough to make one sweat to hear him go on. What has come over him? Anyhow, I'll give myself a hundred lashes this very night: something must be done."

"Well," said another, "I confess I did hide a cold wing of fowl in the sleeve of my gown last fast-day. My old aunt gave it to me, and I was forced to take it for relation's sake; but I'll do so no more, as I'm a living sinner. I'll do a penance this very night."

Father Johannes stood under one of the arches that looked into the gloomy garden, and, with his hands crossed upon his breast, and his cold, glittering eye fixed stealthily now on one and now on another, listened with an ill-disguised sneer to these hasty evidences of fear and remorse in the monks, as they thronged the corridor on the way to their cells. Suddenly turning to a young brother who had lately joined the convent, he said to him,—

"And what of the pretty Clarice, my brother?"

The blood flushed deep into the pale cheek of the young monk, and his frame shook with some interior emotion, as he answered,—

"She is recovering."

"And she sent for thee to shrive her?"

"My God!" said the young man, with an imploring, wild expression in his dark eyes, "she did; but I would not go."

"Then Nature is still strong," said Father Johannes, pitilessly eying the young man.

"When will it ever die?" said the stripling, with a despairing gesture; "it heeds neither heaven nor hell."

"Well, patience, boy! if you have lost an earthly bride, you have gained a heavenly one. The Church is our espoused in white linen. Bless the Lord, without ceasing, for the exchange."

There was an inexpressible mocking irony in the tones in which this was said, that made itself felt to the finely vitalized spirit of the youth, though to all the rest it sounded like the accredited average pious talk which is more or less the current coin of religious organizations.

Now no one knows through what wanton deviltry Father Johannes broached this painful topic with the poor youth; but he had a peculiar faculty, with his smooth tones and his sanctimonious smiles, of thrusting red-hot needles into any wounds which he either knew or suspected under the coarse woollen robes of his brethren. He appeared to do it in all coolness, in a way of psychological investigation.

He smiled, as the youth turned away, and a moment after started as if a thought had suddenly struck him.

"I have it!" he said to himself. "There may be a woman at the bottom of this discomposure of our holy father; for he is wrought upon by something to the very bottom of his soul. I have not studied human nature so many years for nothing. Father Francesco hath been much in the guidance of women. His preaching hath wrought upon them, and perchance among them.—Aha!" he said to himself, as he paced up and down, "I have it! I'll try an experiment upon him!"

CHAPTER XV.

THE SERPENT'S EXPERIMENT.

Father Francesco sat leaning his head on his hand by the window of his cell, looking out upon the sea as it rose and fell, with the reflections of the fast coming stars glittering like so many jewels on its breast. The glow of evening had almost faded, but there was a wan, tremulous light from the moon, and a clearness, produced by the reflection of such an expanse of water, which still rendered objects in his cell quite discernible.

In the terrible denunciations and warnings just uttered, he had been preaching to himself, striving to bring a force on his own soul by which he might reduce its interior rebellion to submission; but, alas! when was ever love cast out by fear? He knew not as yet the only remedy for such sorrow,—that there is a love celestial and divine, of which earthly love in its purest form is only the sacramental symbol and emblem, and that this divine love can by God's power so outflood human affections as to bear the soul above all earthly idols to its only immortal rest. This great truth rises like a rock amid stormy seas, and many is the sailor struggling in salt and bitter waters who cannot yet believe it is to be found. A few saints like Saint Augustin had reached it,—but through what buffetings, what anguish!

At this moment, however, there was in the heart of the father one of those collapses which follow the crisis of some mortal struggle. He leaned on the windowsill, exhausted and helpless.

Suddenly, a kind of illusion of the senses came over him, such as is not infrequent to sensitive natures in severe crises of mental anguish. He thought he heard Agnes singing, as he had sometimes heard her when he had called in his pastoral ministrations at the little garden and paused awhile outside that he might hear her finish a favorite hymn, which, like a shy bird, she sang all the more sweetly for thinking herself alone.

Quite as if they were sung in his ear, and in her very tones, he heard the words of Saint Bernard, which we have introduced to our reader:—

Jesu dulcis memoria, Dans vera cordi gaudia: Sed super mel et omnia Ejus dulcis praesentia.

"Jesu, spes poenitentibus, Quam pius es petentibus, Quam bonus te quaerentibus, Sed quis invenientibus!"

Soft and sweet and solemn was the illusion, as if some spirit breathed them with a breath of tenderness over his soul; and he threw himself with a burst of tears before the crucifix.

"O Jesus, where, then, art Thou? Why must I thus suffer? She is not the one altogether lovely; it is Thou,—Thou, her Creator and mine! Why, why cannot I find Thee? Oh, take from my heart all other love but Thine alone!"

Yet even this very prayer, this very hymn, were blent with the remembrance of Agnes; for was it not she who first had taught him the lesson of heavenly love? Was not she the first one who had taught him to look upward to Jesus other than as an avenging judge? Michel Angelo has embodied in a fearful painting, which now deforms the Sistine Chapel, that image of stormy vengeance which a religion debased by force and fear had substituted for the tender, good shepherd of earlier Christianity. It was only in the heart of a lowly maiden that Christ had been made manifest to the eye of the monk, as of old he was revealed to the world through a virgin. And how could he, then, forget her, or cease to love her, when every prayer and hymn, every sacred round of the ladder by which he must climb, was so full of memorials of her? While crying and panting for the supreme, the divine, the invisible love, he found his heart still craving the visible one,—the one so well known, revealing itself to the senses, and bringing with it the certainty of visible companionship.

As he was thus kneeling and wrestling with himself, a sudden knock at his door startled him. He had made it a point, never, at any hour of the day or night, to deny himself to a brother who sought him for counsel, however disagreeable the person and however unreasonable the visit. He therefore rose and unbolted the door, and saw Father Johannes standing with folded arms and downcast head, in an attitude of composed humility.

"What would you with me, brother?" he asked, calmly.

"My father, I have a wrestling of mind for one of our brethren whose case I would present to you."

"Come in, my brother," said the Superior. At the same time he lighted a little iron lamp, of antique form, such as are still in common use in that region, and, seating himself on the board which served for his couch, made a motion to Father Johannes to be seated also.

The latter sat down, eying, as he did so, the whole interior of the apartment, so far as it was revealed by the glimmer of the taper.

"Well, my son," said Father Francesco, "what is it?"

"I have my doubts of the spiritual safety of Brother Bernard," said Father Johannes.

"Wherefore?" asked the Superior, briefly.

"Holy father, you are aware of the history of the brother, and of the worldly affliction that drove him to this blessed profession?"

"I am," replied the Superior, with the same brevity.

"He narrated it to me fully," said Father Johannes. "The maiden he was betrothed to was married to another in his absence on a long journey, being craftily made to suppose him dead."

"I tell you I know the circumstances," said the Superior.

"I merely recalled them, because, moved doubtless by your sermon, he dropped words to me to-night which led me to suppose that this sinful, earthly love was not yet extirpated from his soul. Of late the woman was sick and nigh unto death, and sent for him."

"But he did not go?" interposed Father Francesco.

"No, he did not,—grace was given him thus far,—but he dropped words to me to the effect, that in secret he still cherished the love of this woman; and the awful words your Reverence has been, speaking to us to-night have moved me with fear for the youth's soul, of the which I, as an elder brother, have had some charge, and I came to consult with you as to what help there might be for him."

Father Francesco turned away his head a moment and there was a pause; at last he said, in a tone that seemed like the throb of some deep, interior anguish,—

"The Lord help him!"

"Amen!" said Father Johannes, taking keen note of the apparent emotion.

"You must have experience in these matters, my father," he added, after a pause,—"so many hearts have been laid open to you. I would crave to know of you what you think is the safest and most certain cure for this love of woman, if once it hath got possession of the heart."

"Death!" said Father Francesco, after a solemn pause.

"I do not understand you," said Father Johannes.

"My son," said Father Francesco, rising up with an air of authority, "you do not understand,—there is nothing in you by which you should understand. This unhappy brother hath opened his case to me, and I have counselled him all I know of prayer and fastings and watchings and mortifications. Let him persevere in the same; and if all these fail, the good Lord will send the other in His own time. There is an end to all things in this life, and that end shall certainly come at last. Bid him persevere and hope in this.—And now, brother," added the Superior, with dignity, "if you have no other query, time flies and eternity comes on,—go, watch and pray, and leave me to my prayers also."

He raised his hand with a gesture of benediction, and Father Johannes, awed in spite of himself, felt impelled to leave the apartment.

"Is it so, or is it not?" he said. "I cannot tell. He did seem to wince and turn away his head when I proposed the case; but then he made fight at last. I cannot tell whether I have got any advantage or not; but patience! we shall see!"

* * * * *

HEALTH IN THE CAMP.

All the world has heard a great deal of the sufferings and mortality of the English and French armies in the late Russian war; and in most countries the story has been heard to some purpose. Reforms and new methods have been instituted in almost every country in Europe,—so strong has been the effect of the mere outline of the case, which is all that has been furnished to the public. The broad facts of the singular mortality first, and the singular healthfulness of the British army afterwards, on the same spot and under the same military circumstances as before, have interested all rulers of armies, and brought about great benefits to the soldier, throughout the length and breadth of Europe. Within these broad outlines there was a multitude of details which were never recorded in a systematic way, or which, for good and sufficient reasons, could not be made public at the time; and these details are the part of the story most interesting to soldiers actually in the field or likely to be called there soon. They are also deeply interesting to every order of persons concerned in a civil war; for such a war summons forth a citizen soldiery to form a system for themselves in regard to the life of the march and the camp, and to do the best they can for that life and health which they have devoted to their country. Under such circumstances it cannot but be interesting to the patriots in the camp and to their families at home to know some facts which they cannot have heard before of the mistakes made at the beginning of the last Russian war, and the repair of those mistakes before the end of it. The prompt and anxious care exercised by the American Sanitary Commission, and the benevolent diligence bestowed on the organization of hospitals for the Federal forces, show that the lesson of the Crimean campaign has been studied in the United States; and this is an encouragement to afford further illustrations of the case, when new material is at command.

I am thinking most of the volunteer forces at this moment, for the obvious reason that their health is in greater danger than that of the professional soldier. The regular troops live under a system which is always at work to feed, clothe, lodge, and entertain them: whereas the volunteers are quitting one mode of life for another, all the circumstances of which had to be created at the shortest notice. To them their first campaign must be very like what it was to British soldiers who had never seen war to be sent to Turkey first, and then to the Crimea, to live a new kind of life, and meet discomforts and dangers which they had never dreamed of. I shall therefore select my details with a view to the volunteers and their friends in the first place.

The enthusiasm which started the volunteers of every Northern State on their new path of duty could hardly exceed that by which the British troops were escorted from their barrack-gates to the margin of the sea. The war was universally approved (except by a clique of peace-men); and there was a universal confidence that the troops would do their duty well, though not one man in a thousand of them had ever seen war. As they marched down to their ships, in the best mood, and with every appearance of health and spirit, nobody formed any conception of what would happen. Parliament had fulfilled the wishes of the people by voting liberal sums for the due support of the troops; the Administration desired and ordered that everything should be done for the soldier's welfare; and as far as orders and arrangements went, the scheme was thoroughly well intended and generous. Who could anticipate, that, while the enemy never once gained a battle or obtained an advantage over British or French, two-thirds of that fine stout British force would perish in a few months? Of the twenty-five thousand who went out, eighteen thousand were dead in a year; and the enemy was answerable for a very small proportion of those deaths. Before me lie the returns of six months of those twelve, showing the fate of the troops for that time; and it furnishes the key to the whole story.

In those six months, the admissions into hospital in the Crimea (exclusive of the Santari Hospital) were 52,548. The number shows that many must have entered the hospitals more than once, as well as that the place of the dead was supplied by new comers from England. Of these, nearly fifty thousand were absolutely untouched by the Russians. Only 3,806 of the whole number were wounded. Even this is not the most striking circumstance. It is more impressive that three-fourths of the sick suffered unnecessarily. Seventy-five per cent. of them suffered from preventable diseases. That is, the naturally sick were 12,563; while the needlessly sick were 36,179. When we look at the deaths from this number, the case appears still more striking. The deaths were 5,359; and of these scarcely more than the odd hundreds were from wounds,—that is, 373. Of the remainder, little more than one-tenth were unavoidable deaths. The natural deaths, as we may call them, were only 521; while the preventable deaths were 4,465. Very different would have been the spirit of the parting in England, if the soldiers' friends had imagined that so small a number would fall by Russian gun or bayonet, or by natural sickness, while the mortality from mismanagement would at one season of the next year exceed that of London in the worst days of the Great Plague.

That the case was really what is here represented was proved by the actual prevention of this needless sickness during the last year of the war. In the same camp, and under the same circumstances of warfare, the mortality was reduced, by good management, to a degree unhoped for by all but those who achieved it. The deaths for the last half year were one-third fewer than at home! And yet the army that died was composed of fine, well-trained troops; while the army that lived and flourished was of a far inferior material when it came out,—raw, untravelled, and unhardened to the military life.

How did these things happen? There can be no more important question for Americans at this time.

I will not go into the history of the weaknesses and faults of the administration of departments at home. They have been abundantly published already; and we may hope that they bear no relation to the American case. It is more interesting to look into the circumstances of the march and the camp, for illustration of what makes the health or the sickness of the soldier.

Wherever the men were to provide themselves with anything to eat or to wear out of their pay, they were found to suffer. There is no natural market, with fair prices, in the neighborhood of warfare; and, on the one hand, a man cannot often get what he wishes, and, on the other, he is tempted to buy something not so good for him. If there are commissariat stores opened, there is an endless accumulation of business,—a mass of accounts to keep of the stoppages from the men's pay. On all accounts it is found better for all parties that the wants of the soldier should be altogether supplied in the form of rations of varied food and drink, and of clothing varying with climate and season.

In regard to food, which comes first in importance of the five heads of the soldier's wants, the English soldier was remarkably helpless till he learned better. The Russians cut that matter very short. Every man carried a certain portion of black rye bread and some spirit. No cooking was required, and the men were very independent. But the diet is bad; and the Russian regiments were composed of sallow-faced men, who died "like flies" under frequently recurring epidemics. The Turks were in their own country, and used their accustomed diet. The French are the most apt, the most practised, and the most economical managers of food of any of the parties engaged in the war. Their campaigns in Algeria had taught them how to help themselves; and they could obtain a decent meal where an Englishman would have eaten nothing, or something utterly unwholesome. The Sardinians came next, and it was edifying to see how they could build a fire-place and obtain a fire in a few minutes to boil their pot. In other ways both French and Sardinians suffered miserably when the British had surmounted their misfortunes. The mortality from cholera and dysentery in the French force, during the last year, was uncalculated and unreported. It was so excessive as, in fact, to close the war too soon. The Sardinians were ravaged by disease from their huts being made partly under ground. But, so far as the preparation of their food went, both had the advantage of the British, in a way which will never happen again. I believe the Americans and the English are bad cooks in about the same degree; and the warning afforded by the one may be accepted by the other.

At the end of a day, in Bulgaria or the Crimea, what happened was this.

The soldiers who did not understand cooking or messing had to satisfy their hunger any way they could. They were so exhausted that they were sure to drink up their allowance of grog the first moment they could lay hands on it. Then there was hard biscuit, a lump of very salt pork or beef, as hard as a board, and some coffee, raw. Those who had no touch of scurvy (and they were few) munched their biscuit while they poked about everywhere with a knife, digging up roots or cutting green wood to make a fire. Each made a hole in the ground, unless there was a bank or great stone at hand, and there he tried, for one half-hour after another, to kindle a fire. When he got up a flame, there was his salt meat to cook: it ought to have been soaked and stewed for hours; but he could not wait; and he pulled it to pieces, and gnawed what he could of it, when it was barely warm. Then he had to roast his coffee, which he did in the lid of his camp-kettle, burning it black, and breaking it as small as he could, with stones or anyhow. Such coffee as it would make could hardly be worth the trouble. It was called by one of the doctors charcoal and water. Such a supper could not fit a man for outpost duty for the night, nor give him good sleep after the toils of the day.

The Sardinians, meantime, united in companies, some members of which were usually on the spot to prepare supper for the rest. They knew how to look for or provide a shelter for their fire, if only a foot high; and how to cut three or four little trenches, converging at the fire, so as to afford a good draught which would kindle even bad fuel. They had good stews and porridge and coffee ready when wanted. The French always had fresh bread. They carried portable ovens and good bakers. The British had flour, after a time, but they did not know how to make bread; and if men volunteered for the office, day after day, it usually turned out that they had a mind for a holiday, and knew nothing of baking; and their bread came out of the oven too heavy, or sour, or sticky, or burnt, to be eaten. As scurvy spread and deepened, the doctors made eager demands on Government for lime-juice, and more lime-juice. Government had sent plenty of lime-juice; but it was somehow neglected among the stores for twenty-four days when it was most wanted, as was the supply of rice for six weeks when dysentery was raging. All the time, the truth was, as was acknowledged afterwards, that the thing really wanted was good food. The lime-juice was a medicine, a specific; but it could be of no real use till the frame was nourished with proper food.

When flour, and preserved vegetables, and fresh meat were served out, and there were coffee-mills all through the camp, the men were still unable to benefit by the change as their allies did. They could grind and make their coffee; but they were still without good fresh bread and soup. They despised the preserved vegetables, not believing that those little cakes could do them any good. When they learned at last how two ounces of those little cakes were equal, when well cooked, to eight ounces of fresh vegetables, and just as profitable for a stew or with their meat, they duly prized them, and during the final healthy period those pressed vegetables were regarded in the camp as a necessary of life. By that time, Soyer's zeal had introduced good cookery into the camp. Roads were made by which supplies were continually arriving. Fresh meat abounded; and it was brought in on its own legs, so that it was certain that beef was beef, and mutton mutton, instead of goat's flesh being substituted, as in Bulgaria. By that time it was discovered that the most lavish orders at home and the profusest expenditure by the commissariat will not feed and clothe an army in a foreign country, unless there is some agency, working between the commissariat and the soldiers, to take care that the food is actually in their hands in an eatable form, and the clothes on their backs.

It is for American soldiers to judge how much of this applies to their case. The great majority of the volunteers must be handy, self-helping men; and bands of citizens from the same towns or villages must be disposed and accustomed to concerted action; but cooking is probably the last thing they have any of them turned their hand to. Much depends on the source of their food-supply. I fear they live on the country they are in,—at least, when in the enemy's country. This is very easy living, certainly. To shoot pigs or fowls in road or yard is one way of getting fresh meat, as ravaging gardens is a short way of feasting on vegetables. But supposing the forces fed from a regular commissariat department, is there anything to be learned from the Crimean campaigns?

The British are better supplied with the food of the country, wherever they are, than the French, because it is their theory and practice to pay as they go; whereas it is the French, or at least the Bonapartist theory and practice, to "make the war support itself," that is, to live upon the people of the country. In the Peninsular War, the French often found themselves in a desert where they could not stay; whereas, when Wellington and his troops followed upon their steps, the peasants reappeared from all quarters, bringing materials for a daily market. In the Crimea, the faithful and ready payments of the English commissariat insured plenty of food material, in the form of cattle and flour, biscuit and vegetables. The defect was in means of transport for bringing provisions to the camp. The men were trying to eat hard salt meat and biscuit, when scurvy made all eating difficult, while herds of cattle were waiting to be slaughtered, and ship-loads of flour were lying seven miles off. Whole deck-loads of cabbages and onions were thrown into the sea, while the men in camp were pining for vegetable food. An impracticable track lay between; and the poor fellows died by thousands before the road could be made good, and transport-animals obtained, and the food distributed among the tents and huts. Experience taught the officers that the food should be taken entire charge of by departments of the army till it was actually smoking in the men's hands. There were agents, of course, in all the countries round, to buy up the cattle, flour, and vegetables needed. The animals should be delivered at appointed spots, alive and in good condition, that there might be no smuggling in of joints of doubtful character. There should be a regular arrangement of shambles, at a proper distance from the tents, and provided with a special drainage, and means of disposing instantly of the offal. Each company in the camp should have its kitchen, and one or two skilled cooks,—one to serve on each day, with perhaps two assistants from the company. After the regular establishment of the kitchens, there was always food ready and coffee procurable for the tired men who came in from the trenches or outpost duty; and it was a man's own fault, if he went without a meal when off duty.

It was found to be a grave mistake to feed the soldiers on navy salt beef and pork. Corned beef and pork salted for a fortnight have far more nourishment and make much less waste in the preparation than meat which is salted for a voyage of months. After a time, very little of the hard salted meat was used at all. When it was, it was considered essential to serve out peas with the pork, and flour, raisins, and suet, for a pudding, on salt-beef days. In course of time there were additions which made considerable variety: as rice, preserved potatoes, pressed vegetables, cheese, dried fruits and suet for puddings, sugar, coffee properly roasted, and malt liquor. Beer and porter answer much better than any kind of spirit, and are worth pains and cost to obtain. With such variety as this, with portable kitchens in the place of the cumbersome camp-kettle per man, with fresh bread, well-cooked meat and vegetables, and well-made coffee, the soldiers will have every chance of health that diet can afford. Whereas hard and long-kept salt meat, insufficiently soaked and cooked, and hastily broiled meat or fowls, just killed, and swallowed by hungry men unskilled in preparing food, help on diseases of the alimentary system as effectually as that intemperance in melons and cucumbers and unripe grapes and apples which has destroyed more soldiers than all the weapons of all enemies.

So much for the food. Next in order come the clothing, and care of the person.

The newspapers have a great deal to say, as we have all seen, about the badness of much of the clothing furnished to the Federal troops. There is no need to denounce the conduct of faithless contractors in such a case; and the glorious zeal of the women, and of all who can help to make up clothing for the army, shows that the volunteers at least will be well clad, if the good-will of society can effect it. Whatever the form of dress, it is the height of imprudence to use flimsy material for it.

It seems to be everywhere agreed, in a general way, that the soldier's dress should be of an easy fit, in the first place; light enough for hot weather and noon service, with resources of warmth for cold weather and night duty. In Europe, the blouse or loose tunic is preferred to every other form of coat, and knickerbockers or gaiters to any form of trousers. The shoe or boot is the weak point of almost all military forces. The French are getting over it; and the English are learning from them. The number of sizes and proportions is, I think, five to one of what it used to be in the early part of the century, so that any soldier can get fitted. The Duke of Wellington wrote home from the Peninsula in those days,—"If you don't send shoes, the army can't march." The enemy marched away to a long distance before the shoes arrived; and when they came, they were all too small. Such things do not happen now; but it often does happen that hundreds are made footsore, and thrown out of the march, by being ill-shod; and there seems reason to believe that much of the lagging and apparent desertion of stragglers in the marches of the volunteers of the Federal army is owing to the difficulty of keeping up with men who walk at ease. If the Southern troops are in such want of shoes as is reported, that circumstance alone is almost enough to turn the scale, provided the Northern regiments attain the full use of their feet by being accurately fitted with stout shoes or boots. During the darkest days in the Crimea, those who had boots which would stick on ceased to take them off. They slept in them, wet or dry, knowing, that, once off, they could never be got on again. Such things cannot happen in the Northern States, where the stoppage of the trade in shoes to the South leaves leather, skill, and time for the proper shoeing of the army; but it may not yet be thoroughly understood how far the practical value of every soldier depends on the welfare of his feet, and how many sizes and proportions of shoe are needed for duly fitting a thousand men.

As for the rest, the conclusion after the Crimean campaign was that flannel shirts answer better than cotton on the whole. If the shirt is cotton, there must be a flannel waistcoat; and the flannel shirt answers the purpose of both, while it is as easily washed as any material. Every man should have a flannel bandage for the body, in case of illness, or unusual fatigue, or sudden changes of temperature. The make and pressure of the knapsack are very important, so that the weight may be thrown on the shoulders, without pressure on the chest or interference with the arms. The main object is the avoidance of pressure everywhere, from the toe-joints to the crown of the head. For this the head-covering should be studied, that it may afford shelter and shade from heat and light, and keep on, against the wind, without pressure on the temples or forehead. For this the neck-tie should he studied, and the cut of the coat-chest and sleeve, when coats must be worn: and every man must have some sort of overcoat, for chilly and damp hours of duty. There is great danger in the wearing of water-proof fabrics, unless they are so loose as to admit of a free circulation of air between them and the body.

With the clothing is generally connected the care of the person. It is often made a question, With whom rests the responsibility of the personal cleanliness of the soldier? The medical men declare that they do what they can, but that there is nothing to be said when the men are unsupplied with water; and all persuasions are thrown away when the poor fellows are in tatters, and sleeping on dirty straw or the bare ground. The indolent ones, at least, go on from day to day without undressing, combing, or washing, till they are swarming with vermin; and then they have lost self-respect. But if, before it is too late, there is an issue of new shirts, boots, stockings, comforters, or woollen gloves, the event puts spirit into them; they will strip and wash, and throw out dirt and rags from their sleeping-places, and feel respectable again.

Perhaps the first consideration should be on the part of the quartermaster, whose business it is to see to the supply of water; and the sanitary officer has next to take care that every man gets his eight or ten gallons per day. If the soldiers are posted near a stream which can be used for bathing and washing clothes, there ought to be no difficulty; and every man may fairly be required to be as thoroughly washed from head to foot every days and as clean in his inner clothing, as his own little children at home. If on high and dry ground, where the water-supply is restricted, some method and order are needed; but no pains should be spared to afford each man his eight or ten gallons.

This cannot be done, unless the source of supply is properly guarded. When unrestrained access is afforded to a spring-head or pond, the water is fatally wasted and spoiled. In the Crimea, the English officers had to build round the spring-heads, and establish a regular order in getting supplied. Where there is crowding, dirt gets thrown in, the water is muddied, or animals are brought to drink at the source. This ruins everything; for animals will not drink below, when the mouth of horse, mule, or cow has touched the water above. The way is for guardians to take possession, and board over the source, and make a reservoir with taps, allowing water to be taken first for drinking and washing purposes, a flow being otherwise provided by spout and troughs for the animals, and for cleansing the camp. The difference on the same spot was enormous between the time when a British sergeant wrote that he was not so well as at home, and could not expect it, not having had his shoes or any of his clothes off for five months, and the same time the next year, when every respectable soldier was fresh and tidy, with his blood flowing healthfully under a clean skin. The poor sergeant said, in his days of discomfort: "I wonder what our sweethearts would think of us, if they were to see us now,—unshaved, unwashed, and quite old men!" Cut in a year, those who survived had grown young again,—not shaven, perhaps, for their beards were a great natural comfort on winter duty, but brushed and washed, in vigorous health, and gay spirits.

The next consideration is the soldier's abode,—whether tent, or hut, or quarters.

I have shown certain British doctors demanding lime-juice when food was necessary first. In the same way, there was a cry from the same quarter for peat charcoal, instead of preventing the need of disinfectants. Wherever men are congregated in large numbers,—in a caravan, at a fair in the East or a protracted camp-meeting in the far West, or as a military force anywhere, there is always animal refuse which should not be permitted to lie about for a day or an hour. Dead camels among Oriental merchants, dead horses among Western soldiers, are the cause of plague. It is to be hoped that there will never be a military encampment again without the appointment of officers whose business it shall be to see that all carrion, offal, and dirt of every kind is put away into its proper place instantly. For those receptacles, and for stables and shambles, peat charcoal is a great blessing; but it ought not to be needed in or about the abodes of the men. The case is different in different armies. The French have a showy orderliness in their way of settling themselves on new ground,—forming their camp into streets, with names painted up, and opening post-office, cafes, and bazaars of camp-followers; but they are not radically neat in their ways. In a few days or weeks their settlement is a place of stench, turning to disease; and thus it was, that, notwithstanding their fresh bread, and good cookery, and clever arrangements, they were swept away by cholera and dysentery, to an extent unrevealed to this day, while the British force, once well fed and clothed, had actually only five per cent sick from all causes, in their whole force.

The Sardinians suffered, as I have already observed, from their way of making their huts. They excavated a space, to the depth of three or four feet, and used the earth they threw out to embank the walls raised upon the edge of the excavation. This procured warmth in winter and coolness in hot weather; but the interior was damp and ill-ventilated; and as soon as there was any collection of refuse within, cholera and fever broke out. It is essential to health that the dwelling should be above ground, admitting the circulation of air from the base to the ridge of the roof, where there should be an escape for it at all hours of the day and night.

Among volunteer troops in America, the difficulty would naturally seem to be the newness of the discipline, the strangeness of the requisite obedience. Something must be true of all that is said of the scattering about of food, and other things which have no business to lie about on the ground. A soldier is out of his duty who throws away a crust of bread or meat, or casts bones to dogs, or in any way helps to taint the air or obstruct the watercourses or drains. It may be troublesome to obey the requisitions of the sanitary authorities; but it is the only chance for escaping camp-disease.

On the other hand, in fixing on a spot for encampment, it is due to the soldier to avoid all boggy places, and all places where the air is stagnant from inclosure by woods, or near burial-grounds, or where the soil is unfavorable to drainage. The military officer must admit the advice of the sanitary officer in the case, though he may not be always able to adopt it. When no overwhelming military considerations interfere, the soldiers have a right to be placed on the most dry and pervious soil that may offer, in an airy situation, removed from swamps and dense woods, and admitting of easy drainage. Wood and water used to be the quartermaster's sole demands; now, good soil and air are added, and a suitable slope of the ground, and other minor requisites.

It depends on the character of the country whether quarters in towns and villages are best, or huts or tents. In Europe, town quarters are found particularly fatal; and the state of health of the inmates of tents and huts depends much on the structure and placing of either. Precisely the same kind of hut in the Crimea held a little company of men in perfect health, or a set of invalids, carried out one after another to their graves. Nay, the same hut bore these different characters, according to its position at the top of a slope, or half-way down, so as to collect under its floor the drainage from a spring. American soldiers, however, are hardly likely to be hutted, I suppose; so I need say no more than that in huts and tents alike it is indispensable to health that there should be air-holes,—large spaces, sheltered from rain,—in the highest part of the structure, whether the entrance below be open or closed. The sanitary officers no doubt have it in charge to see that every man has his due allowance of cubic feet of fresh air,—in other words, to take care that each tent or other apartment is well ventilated, and not crowded. The men's affair is to establish such rules among comrades as that no one shall stop up air-holes, or overcrowd the place with guests, or taint the air with unwholesome fumes. In the British army, bell-tents are not allowed at all as hospital tents. Active, healthy men may use them in their resting hours; but their condemnation as abodes for the sick shows how pressing is the duty of ventilating them for the use of the strongest and healthiest.

A sound and airy tent being provided, the next consideration is of bedding.

The surgeons of the British force were always on the lookout for straw and hay, after being informed at the outset that the men could not have bedding, though it was hoped there was enough for the hospitals. A few nights in the dust, among the old bones and rubbish of Gallipoli, and then in the Bulgarian marshes, showed that it would be better to bestow the bedding before the men went into hospital, and sheets of material were obtained for some of them to lie upon. A zealous surgeon pointed out to the proper officer that this bedding consisted in fact of double ticking, evidently intended as paillasses, to be stuffed with straw. The straw not being granted, he actually set to work to make hay; and, being well aided by the soldiers, he soon saw them sleeping on good mattresses. It was understood in England, and believed by the Government, that every soldier in camp had three blankets; and after a time, this came true: but in the interval, during the damp autumn and bitter winter, they had but one. Lying on wet ground, with one damp and dirty blanket over them, prepared hundreds for the hospital and the grave. The mischief was owing to the jealousy of some of the medical authorities, in the first place, who would not see, believe, or allow to be reported, the fact that the men were in any way ill-supplied, because these same doctors had specified the stores that would be wanted,—and next, to the absence of a department for the actual distribution of existing stores. With the bedding the case was the same as with the lime-juice and the rice: there was plenty; but it was not served out till too late. When the huts were inhabited, in the Crimea, and the wooden platforms had a dry soil beneath, and every man had a bed of some sort and three blankets, there was no more cholera or fever.

The American case is radically unlike that of any of the combatants in the Crimean War, because they are on the soil of their own country, within reach of their own railways, and always in the midst of the ordinary commodities of life. In such a position, they can with the utmost ease be supplied with whatever they really want,—so profuse as are the funds placed at the command of the authorities. Considering this, and the well-known handiness of Americans, there need surely be no disease and death from privation. This may be confidently said while we have before us the case of the British in the Crimea during the second winter of the war. A sanitary commission had been sent out; and under their authority, and by the help of experience, everything was rectified. The healthy were stronger than ever; there was scarcely any sickness; and the wounded recovered without drawback. As the British ended, the Americans ought to begin.

On the last two heads of the soldier's case there is little to be said here, because the American troops are at home, and not in a perilous foreign climate, and on the shores of a remote sea. Their drill can hardly be appointed for wrong hours, or otherwise mismanaged. In regard to transport, they have not the embarrassment of crowds of sick and wounded, far away in the Black Sea, without any adequate supply of mules and carriages, after the horses had died off, and without any organization of hospital ships at all equal to the demand. Neither do they depend for clothing and medicines on the arrival of successive ships through the storms of the Euxine; and they will never see the dreary spectacle of the foundering of a noble vessel just arriving, in November, with ample stores of winter clothing, medicines, and comforts, which six hours more would have placed in safety. Under the head of transport, they ought to have nothing to suffer.

Having gone through the separate items, and looking at the case as a whole, we may easily perceive that in America, as in England and France and every other country, the responsibility of the soldier's health in camp is shared thus.

The authorities are bound so to arrange their work as that there shall be no hitch through which disaster shall reach the soldiery. The relations between the military and medical authorities must be so settled and made clear as that no professional jealousy among the doctors shall keep the commanding officers in the dark as to the needs—of their men, and that no self-will or ignorance in commanding officers shall neutralize the counsels of the medical men. The military authorities must not depend on the report of any doctor who may be incompetent as to the provision made for the men's health, and the doctor must be authorized to represent the dangers of a bad encampment without being liable to a recommendation to keep his opinion to himself till he is asked for it. These particular dangers are best obviated by the appointment of sanitary officers, to attend the forces, and take charge of the health of the army, as the physicians and surgeons take charge of its sickness. If, besides, there is a separate department between the commissariat and the soldiery, to see that the comforts provided are actually brought within every man's grasp, the authorities will have done their part.

The rest is the soldier's own concern. When cruelly pressed by hardship, the soldiers in Turkey and the Crimea took to drinking; and what they drank was poison. The vile raid with which they intoxicated themselves carried hundreds to the grave as surely as arsenic would have done. When, at last, they were well fed, warm, clean, and comfortable, and well amused in the coffee-houses opened for them, there was an end, or a vast diminution, of the evil of drunkenness. Good coffee and harmless luxuries were sold to them at cost price; and books and magazines and newspapers, chess, draughts, and other games, were at their command. The American soldiery are a more cultivated set of men than these, and are in proportion more inexcusable for any resort to intemperance. They ought to have neither the external discomfort nor the internal vacuity which have caused drunkenness in other armies. The resort to strong drinks so prevalent in the Americans is an ever-lasting mystery to Europeans, who recognize in them a self-governing people, universally educated up to a capacity for intellectual interests such as are elsewhere found to be a safeguard against intemperance in drink. If the precautions instituted by the authorities are well supported by the volunteers themselves, the most fatal of all perils will be got rid of. If not, the army will perish by a veritable suicide. But such a fate cannot be in store for such an army.

There is something else almost as indispensable to the health of soldiers as sobriety, and that is subordination. The true, magnanimous, patriotic spirit of subordination is not more necessary to military achievement than it is to the personal composure and the trustworthiness of nerve of the individual soldier. A strong desire and fixed habit of obedience to command relieve a man of all internal conflict between self-will and circumstance, and give him possession of his full powers of action and endurance. If absolute reliance on authority is a necessity to the great majority of mankind, (which it is,) it is to the few wisest and strongest a keen enjoyment when they can righteously indulge in it; and the occasion on which it is supremely a duty—in the case of military or naval service—is one of privilege. Americans are less accustomed than others to prompt and exact obedience, being a self-governing and unmilitary nation: and they may require some time to become aware of the privileges of subordination to command. But time will satisfy them of the truth; and those who learn the lesson most quickly will be the most sensible of the advantage to health of body, through ease of mind. The abdication of self-will in regard to the ordering of affairs, the repose of reliance upon the responsible parties, the exercise of silent endurance about hardships and fatigues, the self-respect which relishes the honor of cooperation through obedience, the sense of patriotic devotedness which glows through every act of submission to command,—all these elevated feelings tend to composure of the nerves, to the fortifying of brain and limb, and the genial repose and exaltation of all the powers of mind and body. I need not contrast with this the case of the discontented and turbulent volunteer, questioning commands which he is not qualified to judge of, and complaining of troubles which cannot be helped. It is needless to show what wear-and-tear is caused by such a spirit, and how nerve and strength must, in such a case, fail in the hour of effort or of crisis, and give way at once before the assault of disease. By the aid of sobriety and the calm and cheerful subordination of the true military character, the health of the Federal army may be equal to its high mission: and all friends of human freedom, in all lands, must heartily pray that it may be so.

There is another department of the subject which I propose to treat of another month: "Health in the Military Hospital."



"THE STORMY PETREL."

Where the gray crags beat back the northern main, And all around, the ever restless waves, Like white sea-wolves, howl on the lonely sands, Clings a low roof, close by the sounding surge. If, in your summer rambles by the shore, His spray-tost cottage you may chance espy, Enter and greet the blind old mariner.

Full sixty winters he has watched beside The turbulent ocean, with one purpose warmed: To rescue drowning men. And round the coast— For so his comrades named him in his youth— They know him as "The Stormy Petrel" still.

Once he was lightning-swift, and strong; his eyes Peered through the dark, and far discerned the wreck Plunged on the reef. Then with bold speed he flew, The life-boat launched, and dared the smiting rocks.

'T is said by those long dwelling near his door, That hundreds have been storm-saved by his arm; That never was he known to sleep, or lag In-doors, when danger swept the seas. His life Was given to toil, his strength to perilous blasts. In freezing floods when tempests hurled the deep, And battling winds clashed in their icy caves, Scared housewives, waking, thought of him, and said, "'The Stormy Petrel' is abroad to-night, And watches from the cliffs."

He could not rest When shipwrecked forms might gasp amid the waves, And not a cry be answered from the shore.

Now Heaven has quenched his sight; but when he hears By his lone hearth the sullen sea-winds clang, Or listens, in the mad, wild, drowning night, As younger footsteps hurry o'er the beach To pluck the sailor from his sharp-fanged death,— The old man starts, with generous impulse thrilled, And, with the natural habit of his heart, Calls to his neighbors in a cheery tone, Tells them he'll pilot toward the signal guns, And then, remembering all his weight of years, Sinks on his couch, and weeps that he is blind.



A STORY OF TO-DAY.

Margaret stood looking down in her quiet way at the sloping moors and fog. She, too, had her place and work. She thought that night she saw it clearly, and kept her eyes fixed on it, as I said. They plodded steadily down the wide years opening before her. Whatever slow, unending work lay in them, whatever hungry loneliness they held for her heart, or coarseness of deed, she saw it all, shrinking from nothing. She looked at the tense blue-corded veins in her wrist, full of fine pure blood,—gauged herself coolly, her lease of life, her power of endurance,—measured it out against the work waiting for her. The work would be long, she knew. She would be old before it was finished, quite an old woman, hard, mechanical, worn out. But the day would be so bright, when it came, it would atone for all: the day would be bright, the home warm again; it would hold all that life had promised her of good.

All? Oh, Margaret, Margaret! Was there no sullen doubt in the brave resolve? Was there no shadow rose just then, dark, ironical, blotting out father and mother and home, coming nearer, less alien to your soul than these, than even your God?

If any such cold, masterful shadow rose out of years gone, and clutched at the truest life of her heart, she stifled it, and thrust it down. And yet, leaning on the gate, and thinking drearily, vacantly, she remembered a time when God came nearer to her than He did now, and came through that shadow,—when, by the help of that dead hope, He of whom she read to-night came close, an infinitely tender Helper, who, with the human love that was in her heart to-day, had loved his mother and John and Mary. Now, struggle as she would for healthy hopes and warmth, the world was gray and silent. Her defeated woman's nature called it so, bitterly. Christ was a dim ideal power, heaven far-off. She doubted if it held anything as real as that which she had lost.

As if to bring back the old times more vividly to her, there happened one of those curious little coincidences with which Fate, we think, has nothing to do. She heard a quick step along the clay road, and a muddy little terrier jumped up, barking, beside her. She stopped with a suddenness strange in her slow movements. "Tiger!" she said, stroking its head with passionate eagerness. The dog licked her hand, smelt her clothes to know if she were the same: it was two years since he had seen her. She sat there, softly stroking him. Presently there was a sound of wheels jogging down the road, and a voice singing snatches of some song, one of those cheery street-songs that the boys whistle. It was a low, weak voice, but very pleasant. Margaret heard it through the dark; she kissed the dog with a strange paleness on her face, and stood up, quiet, attentive as before. Tiger still kept licking her hand, as it hung by her side: it was cold, and trembled as he touched it. She waited a moment, then pushed the dog from her, as if his touch, even, caused her to break some vow. He whined, but she hurried away, not waiting to know how he came, or with whom. Perhaps, if Dr. Knowles had seen her face as she looked back at him, he would have thought there were depths in her nature which his probing eyes had never reached.

The wheels came close, and directly a cart stopped at the gate. It was one of those little wagons that hucksters drive; only this seemed to be a home-made affair, patched up with wicker-work and bits of board. It was piled up with baskets of vegetables, eggs, and chickens, and on a broken bench in the middle sat the driver, a woman. You could not help laughing, when you looked at the whole turn-out, it had such a make-shift look altogether.

The reins were twisted rope, the wheels uneven. It went jolting along in such a careless, jolly way, as if it would not care in the least, should it go to pieces any minute just there in the road. The donkey that drew it was bony and blind of one eye; but he winked the other knowingly at you, as if to ask if you saw the joke of the thing. Even the voice of the owner of the establishment, chirruping some idle song, as I told you, was one of the cheeriest sounds you ever heard. Joel, up at the barn, forgot his dignity to salute it with a prolonged "Hillo!" and presently appeared at the gate.

"I'm late, Joel," said the weak voice. It sounded like a child's near at hand.

"We can trade in the dark, Lois, both bein' honest," he responded, graciously, hoisting a basket of tomatoes into the cart, and taking out a jug of vinegar.

"Is that Lois?" said Mrs. Howth, coming to the gate. "Sit still, child. Don't get down."

But the child, as she called her, had scrambled off the cart, and stood beside her, leaning on the wheel, for she was helplessly crippled.

"I thought you would be down tonight. I put some coffee on the stove. Bring it out, Joel."

Mrs. Howth never put up the shield between herself and this member of "the class,"—because, perhaps, she was so wretchedly low in the social scale. However, I suppose she never gave a reason for it even to herself. Nobody could help being kind to Lois, even if he tried. Joel brought the coffee with more readiness than he would have waited on Mrs. Howth.

"Barney will be jealous," he said, patting the bare ribs of the old donkey, and glancing wistfully at his mistress.

"Give him his supper, surely," she said, taking the hint.

It was a real treat to see how Lois enjoyed her supper, sipping and tasting the warm coffee, her face in a glow, like an epicure over some rare Falernian. You would be sure, from, just that little thing, that no sparkle of warmth or pleasure in the world slipped by her which she did not catch and enjoy and be thankful for to the uttermost. You would think, perhaps, pitifully, that not much pleasure or warmth would ever go down so low, within her reach. Now that she stood on the ground, she scarcely came up to the level of the wheel; some deformity of her legs made her walk with a curious rolling jerk, very comical to see. She laughed at it, when other people did; if it vexed her at all, she never showed it. She had turned back her calico sun-bonnet, and stood looking up at Mrs. Howth and Joel, laughing as they talked—with her. The face would have startled you on so old and stunted a body. It was a child's face, quick, eager, with that pitiful beauty you always see in deformed people. Her eyes, I think, were the kindliest, the hopefullest I ever saw. Nothing but the pale thickness of her skin betrayed the fact that set Lois apart from even the poorest poor,—the taint in her veins of black blood.

"Whoy! be n't this Tiger?" said Joel, as the dog ran yelping about him. "How comed yoh with him, Lois?"

"Tiger an' his master's good friends o' mine,—you remember they allus was. An' he's back now, Mr. Holmes,—been back for a month."

Margaret, walking in the porch with her father, stopped.

"Are you tired, father? It is late."

"And you are worn out, poor child! It was selfish in me to forget. Good-night, dear!"

Margaret kissed him, laughing cheerfully, as she led him to his room-door. He lingered, holding her dress.

"Perhaps it will be easier for you tomorrow than it was to-day?" hesitating.

"I am sure it will. To-morrow will be sure to be better than to-day."

She left him, and went away with a slow step that did not echo the promise of her words.

Joel, meanwhile, consulted apart with his mistress.

"Of course," she said, emphatically.—"You must stay until morning, Lois. It is too late. Joel will toss you up a bed in the loft."

The queer little body hesitated.

"I can stay," she said, at last. "It's his watch at the mill to-night."

"Whose watch?" demanded Joel.

Her face brightened.

"Father's. He's back, mum."

Joel caught himself in a whistle.

"He's very stiddy, Joel,—as stiddy as yuh."

"I am very glad he has come back, Lois," said Mrs. Howth, gravely.

At every place where Lois had been that day she had told her bit of good news, and at every place it had been met with the same kindly smile and "I'm glad he's back, Lois."

Yet Joe Yare, fresh from two years in the penitentiary, was not exactly the person whom society usually welcomes with open arms. Lois had a vague suspicion of this, perhaps; for, as she hobbled along the path, she added to her own assurance of his "stiddiness" earnest explanations to Joel of how he had a place in the Croft Street woollen-mills, and how Dr. Knowles had said he was as ready a stoker as any in the furnace-rooms.

The sound of her weak, eager voice was silent presently, and nothing broke the quiet and cold of the night. Even the morning, when it came long after, came quiet and cool,—the warm red dawn helplessly smothered under great waves of gray cloud. Margaret, looking out into the thick fog, lay down wearily again, closing her eyes. What was the day to her?

Very slowly the night was driven back. An hour after, when she lifted her head again, the stars were still glittering through the foggy arch, like sparks of brassy blue, and the sky and hills and valleys were one drifting, slow-heaving mass of ashy damp. Off in the east a stifled red film groped through. It was another day coming; she might as well get up, and live the rest of her life out;—what else had she to do?

Whatever this night had been to the girl, it left one thought sharp, alive, in the exhausted quiet of her brain: a cowardly dread of the trial of the day, when she would see him again. Was the old struggle of years before coming back? Was it all to go over again? She was worn out. She had been quiet in these—two years: what had gone before she never looked back upon; but it made her thankful for even this stupid quiet. And now, when she had planned her life, busy and useful and contented, why need God have sent the old thought to taunt her? A wild, sickening sense of what might have been struggled up: she thrust it down,—she had kept it down all night; the old pain should not come back,—it should not. She did not think of the love she had given up as a dream, as verse-makers or sham people do; she knew it to be the reality of her life. She cried for it even now, with all the fierce strength of her nature; it was the best she knew; through it she came nearest to God. Thinking of the day when she had given it up, she remembered it with a vague consciousness of having fought a deadly struggle with her fate, and that she had been conquered,—never had lived again. Let it be; she could not bear the struggle again.

She went on dressing herself in a dreary, mechanical way. Once, a bitter laugh came on her face, as she looked into the glass, and saw the dead, dull eyes, and the wrinkle on her forehead. Was that the face to be crowned with delicate caresses and love? She scorned herself for the moment, grew sick of herself, balked, thwarted in her true life as she was. Other women whom God has loved enough to probe to the depths of their nature have done the same,—saw themselves as others saw them: their strength drying up within them, jeered at, utterly alone. It is a trial we laugh at. I think the quick fagots at the stake were fitter subjects for laughter than the slow gnawing hunger in the heart of many a slighted woman or a selfish man. They come out of the trial as out of martyrdom, according to their faith: you see its marks sometimes in a frivolous old age going down with tawdry hopes and starved eyes to the grave; you see its victory in the freshest, fullest lives in the earth. This woman had accepted her trial, but she took it up as an inflexible fate which she did not understand; it was new to her; its solitude, its hopeless thirst were freshly bitter. She loathed herself as one whom God had thought unworthy of every woman's right,—to love and be loved.

She went to the window, looking blankly out into the gray cold. Any one with keen analytic eye, noting the thin muscles of this woman, the childish, scarlet lips, the eyes deep, concealing, would have foretold that she would conquer in the trial, that she would force her soul down,—but that the forcing down would leave the weak, flaccid body spent and dead. One thing was certain: no curious eyes would see the struggle; the body might be nerveless or sickly, but it had the great power of reticence; the calm with which she faced the closest gaze was natural to her,—no mask. When she left her room and went down, the same unaltered quiet that had baffled Knowles steadied her step and cooled her eyes.

After you have made a sacrifice of yourself for others, did you ever notice how apt you were to doubt, as soon as the deed was irrevocable, whether, after all, it were worth while to have done it? How poor seems the good gained! How new and unimagined the agony of empty hands and stifled wish! Very slow the angels are, sometimes, that are sent to minister!

Margaret, going down the stairs that morning, found none of the chivalric unselfish glow of the night before in her home. It was an old, bare house in the midst of dreary moors, in which her life was slowly to be worn out: that was all. It did not matter; life was short: she could thank God for that at least.

She opened the house-door. A draught of cold morning air struck her face, sweeping from the west; it had driven the fog in great gray banks upon the hills, or in shimmering broken swamps into the cleft hollows: a vague twilight filled the space left bare. Tiger, asleep in the hall, rushed out into the meadow, barking, wild with the freshness and cold, then back again to tear round her for a noisy good-morning. The touch of the dog seemed to bring her closer to his master; she put him away; she dared not suffer even that treachery to her purpose: because, in fact, the very circumstances that had forced her to give him up made it weak cowardice to turn again. It was a simple story, yet one which she dared not tell to herself; for it was not altogether for her father's sake she had made the sacrifice. She knew, that, though she might be near to this man Holmes as his own soul, she was a clog on him,—stood in his way,—kept him back. So she had quietly stood aside, taken up her own solitary burden, and left him with his clear self-reliant life,—with his Self, dearer to him than she had ever been. Why should it not be? she thought,—remembering the man as he was, a master among men. He was back again; she must see him. So she stood there with this persistent dread running through her brain.

Suddenly, in the lane by the house, she heard a voice talking to Joel,—the huckster-girl. What a weak, cheery sound it was in the cold and fog! It touched her curiously: broke through her morbid thought as anything true and healthy would have done. "Poor Lois!" she thought, with an eager pity, forgetting her own intolerable future for the moment, as she gathered up some breakfast and went with it down the lane. Morning had come; great heavy bars of light fell from behind the hills athwart the banks of gray and black fog; there was shifting, uneasy, obstinate tumult among the shadows; they did not mean to yield to the coming dawn. The hills, the massed woods, the mist opposed their immovable front, scornfully. Margaret did not notice the silent contest until she reached the lane. The girl Lois, sitting in her cart, was looking, quiet, attentive, at the slow surge of the shadows, and the slower lifting of the slanted rays.