"He did so, and the sound echoed and re-echoed, but there was no response.

"'Again,' I said, and 'again,' and 'again,' with no better result. It was anything but encouraging.

"'They cannot hear, they are asleep: take up a stone and beat the door. You must awaken them.'

"He obediently picked up a stone, and there followed a noise like thunder. I should not have been surprised to see the wee house tilt over and lie down on its side under the force of the blows. Now a gruff voice called out, 'What do you want?'

"'Lodging.'

"'We have no room for any one: go away.'

"'Tell him I must stay,' And with the help of my prompting the old fellow put my case in the most persuasive light possible, but, although we talked and knocked with perseverance, the owner of the voice neither appeared, nor would he vouchsafe us another answer. One might have thought the house had been suddenly enchanted.

"'It is of no use—of no use whatever: they will not open,' finally said my exhausted companion.

"'Is there no other inn here?'

"'No: you will have to return.'

"'Then you must take me to Creil.'

"'That I can't do. I have been away too long already: there is a freight-train expected, and I must see that the track is clear. We must go back;' and he turned resolutely and led the way.

"Just as we left the village a gay party of peasant-girls passed us coming from a ball, laughing and chatting merrily with their beaus. I had an insane idea of accosting them, appealing to their pity, and asking them to keep me for the night, but fear lest they should refuse restrained me: I was too dejected to risk a second repulse. I have been able to realize the poetical things they tell us of the sensations of outcasts, of adventurers; and homeless wanderers ever since. The sight of this merry party made me feel more terribly alone; and the beaus—well, I confess I did wonder what Fred was doing at that moment. Then I thought of the horror of my aunt could she know where I was, and what she would think of the 'footsteps' her own niece was making just then, could she see her.

"When we arrived at the station my guide preceded me to the waiting-room, and I, completely worn out, meekly followed him.

"'This is much better than sleeping in the fields,' he remarked cheerily as we entered: 'shall I make you a fire?'

"'No, thank you, but let me go into the other room.' My reason for this was that its sofas and chairs had some pretensions to comfort, being 'first class.' He went to open the connecting door. It was locked.

"'This is the only room that is open: I am sorry. Wait a moment: I will bring something to make a pillow, and you can sleep like a top.' He went out, and returned with an old coat, which he folded for me, and which, after covering it with my handkerchief, made a tolerable resting-place for my head. My bed was a hard bench.

"'Now,' said my protector in a tone of much satisfaction—'now, you will be well. Voila un bon gite! Both these other doors are fastened, and this one you can lock after me. Very early I will come and take you part of the way back, and by daylight you can easily find the rest yourself. Bonne nuit, mademoiselle: dormez bien.' He went to the door, and taking the key from the outside put it inside. It would not turn. The lock had been made to work with two keys, and the other was absent.

"'I will tell you what I will do,' said my friend, not in the least discomfited: 'I will lock the door and take the key with me. I must go up the road about two miles on my beat, but you can feel quite safe: no one can get in while I am gone. There is another watchman on the road: he might come while I am away, and—and raise a row. It is best to lock you up.' He nodded his head with great complacency at his good management, and prepared to leave me. I could suggest nothing better. I was at the end of my resources, and had to accept my fate. It would be interesting to know what the Pompadour or Queen Elizabeth would have done under the circumstances, wouldn't it?

"It was with no pleasant feeling that I saw the door shut, heard the key turned, then withdrawn: the lantern glimmered for a moment through the window, and I was left in the darkness a prisoner. Thoroughly a prisoner, for none of the three doors had keys on my side, and the windows, with their tiny panes of ground glass, were high above the floor. Then, too, the old man had insisted on speaking in a whisper, and walked about on tiptoe. Who were those persons he evidently feared to waken? Persons near by, of course. Probably they carried the missing keys and could enter at any moment. And the other watchman? What if he should come, and, this being the room allotted to himself and companion, refuse to be barred out? Those other unknowns would be aroused by his knocking, and rush in to seek an explanation. If I were found there, should I be taken before the police as a vagabond? Or imagine a fire—a fire and no one knowing that I am here! A fire and no means of escape! My friends losing all trace of me, unable to ascertain how I came by my death! And such a horrible death! Four hours yet till dawn! What might not happen in four hours? The man himself might only have gone to seek an accomplice to murder me. He might have known that the key would not turn on the inside. But at last, in spite of myself, fatigue conquered fear and I slept.

"I cannot say how long I had been unconscious when I was awakened by hearing a key turning in the lock: the door cautiously opened, and a man entered and came toward the bench where I was lying. My drowsiness calmed me. I wondered quite placidly whether it was to be robbery or murder. What a paragraph it would make in the Moniteur next day! I would cheerfully give him my watch and purse if they would content him. I might call out and rouse the house, but most likely Brunhilda in my situation would have held a parley. A good precedent. I sat up to show that I was awake, and in doing so recognized my old man. Though nothing could look more threatening as he stealthily advanced, shading his light, taking pains to make no noise, I could not entirely mistrust the weatherbeaten face with its anxious, benevolent eyes that met mine.

"'Is it time to go?' I asked.

"'Not yet, but soon. I have just returned, and came in to know if you would have a fire: it is cold outside.'

"'No, never mind: I am doing well enough. I think I will take another nap.'

"'Very well: I shall be near for the rest of the night, so you need not be afraid.' And he left, carefully locking me in again.

"When he came for me the dawn was beginning to break; the morning star was shining in the sky; the earliest birds were twittering, and cocks answered each other from distance to distance; but not a human being was to be seen. We crossed ploughed fields and stubble to find the road, and I felt the truth of my guide's augury of the night before. Had I attempted to go alone I should have become bewildered, and ended by sleeping in the fields. It did strike me that if the man wished to rob me, now would be his chance, and at first I intentionally kept a little behind; but his innocent garrulity was such as to allay all suspicions, and we jogged on very amicably until, coming to two roads, he pointed out that which leads to Creil, and bade me good-bye.

"Had I had the giving of a medal of the Legion of Honor, I should have decorated him on the spot. I believe it repaid me for my annoyance to have found such ample goodness, such chivalry, such kindness, growing as it were by the wayside. It was as if the world had rolled back into the days of knight-errantry, when to rescue and protect distressed damsels ranked next to religious worship. Sure am I if my weatherbeaten old man had lived at that time, none would have been more renowned for gentle deeds: in this prosaic age he is but a watchman on a railroad. I was about to pour out my gratitude, when I remembered we were in the nineteenth century, and looking into his face, I fancied that something more substantial would be better. I drew out my purse. He was frankly delighted with what I gave him, saying only that it was too much, and we separated mutually pleased.

"I sauntered on, lingering by the way to avoid waiting at Creil; consequently, I was just able to procure my ticket and a paper of brioches at the buffet when the English train came in. As I stood at the door, knowing that as soon as it moved off the Belgian train was due, whom should I see get out but Fred! I thought he would re-enter in a moment, and placed myself so that he could not see me. I was mistaken. The train started, and mine puffed up: there he was still. In the crowd I hoped I should not be discovered, but as I stepped from the door his eyes met mine, and he rushed up to me with the exclamation, 'In the name of Heaven, how did you get here? Was there an accident? Are you hurt? What is the matter?'

"It was singular how his voice unnerved me: I could not say a word. The crowd carried us with them, and he helped me into a car, sitting by me and recommencing his questions. Then I stammered, 'You will be taken on if you do not get out: there is nothing wrong.'

"For answer he shut the door of the compartment, and said, 'I am going with you. Now tell me how you come to be here?'

"I do not know why I should have given way when all danger was over—I believe there is no parallel case in the life of any celebrated woman—but I suppose I was tired out. My anxiety and fright, a night spent on a hard board, the surprise of meeting Mr. Kenderdine,—whatever it was, I leaned back in the corner of the seat, took out my handkerchief, and cried harder than I had ever done in my life before. He was greatly alarmed, but, like a sensible man, waited until I became more composed, and when I was able to tell him, instead of blaming me or thinking I was stupid, he censured himself for not accompanying me.

"'I did mean to ask your permission to do so, Miss Eleanor,' he said slightly embarrassed, 'and I was prig enough to think you would allow it, but when you told me of your engagement I did not dare. After you left I had a dread that something might happen, and I could not rest satisfied until I had made up my mind to come on and see that you had arrived safely. I thought you would forgive me, as it is for the last time, and De Vezin need not be jealous, for he will have you for ever, while I—' Fred can be wonderfully pathetic.

"Then I made up my mind to undeceive him, as was my duty, you know. I told him very gently that he was under a false impression. I was not engaged: my aunt had educated me for a purpose, and we both had quite determined that I should never marry, but instead do something great in the world, though I had not yet decided what. I explained it to him fully, so that there should be no more mistakes about it. When I ended I did not venture to look at him for a long time, fearing to see him grieved at this irrevocable barrier; but when I did, what was my surprise to see his face beaming with joy! He began impetuously, 'If you had told me I was to be crowned at Brussels, it would not be better news. I was sure it was De Vezin who separated us. Now I can hope.'

"'You must not talk in that way if you do not want our friendship to cease: you offend me deeply. Can't you see that if you persist in this idea of yours, our pleasant acquaintance must end?' It was so frivolous in Fred, and I spoke very decidedly.

"'Not at all, Eleanor: it would only begin. Why should not our whole life be like this past year?'

"'You know it can't,' said I. 'Haven't I told you the reason?'

"'It will be no reason when De Vezin asks you,' said he suspiciously.

"'De Vezin is nothing to me.'

"'You carry a gage d'amour from him on your watch-chain at this very minute.'

"Now, wasn't that talk silly? De Vezin had brought me a two-centime piece one day because I said I had never seen one, and I put a hole in it and hung it to my chain. Fred to call that a gage d'amour!

"'Nonsense!' said I.

"'De Vezin thought the same when he saw it there. I took him for a fool, but I see he was right.'

"'Well, now you will see you were both fools,' said I angrily, and I twisted off the coin and threw it from the window.

"'Is only that preposterous notion in the way?' he asked, looking happy again and taking a seat by me.

"I told you how I cried on first entering the cars, and now—would you believe it?—I got terribly embarrassed. It seemed as if everything I did or said made matters worse. I was scarcely able to stammer, 'My aunt—'

"'I will speak to her. Let me put this on your finger until I can replace it by another:' and he slipped off his seal and leaned forward with an entreating look.

"I shook my head.

"'I won't ask you to promise anything: only wear it that I may not be forgotten in Rome.'

"'No, no, I cannot!' I exclaimed, clasping my hands. I suppose the action and tone were very exaggerated, for Mr. Kenderdine drew back, saying, 'I shall not force you to take it;' and then went to the other window, took a newspaper out of his pocket and pretended to read it, while I was angry and sorry and miserable, though why I should feel so much like crying at what had only amused me the day before I cannot understand. I suppose none of those wonderful ladies would have acted so, would they?

"But you are tired long ago, and you can easily imagine what comes after. See!" and she turned a ring on her finger until I could catch the shimmer of its stone. "That is how it ended; and though I did not accept it until the next spring in Rome, I shall always blame that night for the whole affair. When I asked Fred why he took the trouble to follow me after the double snubbing I had given him, he said 'I was worth it.' But since we are engaged he teases me shamefully—calls me doctor, hopes I intend to support him in comfort and ease, and says that it always was his ambition to be the husband of a strong-minded woman, and broadly hints about my experience in traveling being so useful to him. And aunt? When I first told her she looked so shocked and disappointed that I threw myself in her arms, saying I would not distress her for the world; that I would do anything she desired; that if she wished she might send Fred off, for I loved her best on earth. But after some minutes of deep thought she looked at me quizzically and replied, 'You know, dear, I always said you must choose your career for yourself.' Then seeing that I seemed hurt and ashamed, she kissed me and whispered, 'Love makes us selfish: my affection for you has grown stronger than my ambition. If you are happy, my Eleanor, I can wait patiently for the advancement of the rest of my sex.'"

Then Eleanor rose, and drawing her shawl round her preparatory to going, said shyly, "And what I came to tell you is, that the wedding will take place at Christmas."

ITA ANIOL PROKOP.



AN AMERICAN LADY'S OCCUPATIONS SEVENTY YEARS AGO.

We are looking over sundry trunks and boxes, the careful and the careless gatherings of three generations. There are law-papers in dusty files; familiar gossipy letters from brothers and sisters and college chums; dignified letters from reverend judges and law-makers; letters bursting with scandalized Federalisms, and burning or melting with long-forgotten joys and sorrows. We have read some thousands of these papers, and begin to be very uncertain about the times we are living in. What indeed is this year of our Lord? We have a dim recollection that we have been wished a happy New Year in 1875, yet we are living and thinking with the boys and girls of 1776, who have grown to be the men and women of Jefferson's time.

To make things more misty to our comprehension, we are sitting by a dormer window in a high, "hip-roofed" garret of a mansion built just before the Revolution, and the air is redolent of ancient memories. The very cobweb that swung across the window just now has a venerable appearance, entirely inconsistent with the fact that the housemaid's broom was supposed to have whisked across these beams but yesterday. But then the housemaids of to-day, as everybody knows, are, as a source of perplexity and vexation of spirit, always to be relied upon, but never to be relied upon for anything else. And with the thought we sigh for the "good old days" and the "good old servants" of our grandmothers.

Happy grandmothers! so blessed in their simple, quiet lives, unvexed by ever-changing fashions and domestics! What did they know of trouble whose best silk gowns remained in fashion from year to year, and whose cooks never treated them to an empty breakfast-table, and a cool "I thought I'd be a-lavin' this marnin', mum"? Happy grandmothers!

Thus thinking, we pick up a little rough paper-book with marbled covers from the corner of the old hair trunk where it was long ago thrown by some careless hand. The little tumbled book proves to be a diary. Not a record of a soul's strivings and pantings after a higher life, or a curiously minute inquiry into the possible reasons which induced the Almighty to allow Satan to afflict Job, but a simple daily note-book, the memoranda of a housekeeper. The old letters had been to us what the newspapers of to-day will be to the great-grandchildren of the present generation. The diary carried us back into the immediate home-life of seventy years ago.

The diarist had been a fair and stately dame in her day, and it is easy to remove her from the frame where her portrait hangs on the walls of the south parlor, and fancy her seated in the same room before the crackling fire jotting down the memoranda of the day. She is a pretty sight, we think, sitting in her straight-backed mahogany arm-chair, with her feet on the polished brass fender and her book resting on the little stand, which also holds the two tall silver candlesticks with their tall tallow candles, for wax candles are saved for gala-nights, when diaries are not in requisition. She must have been nearly forty years old when she wrote in this little book, but we see her as her portrait shows her, very young-looking in spite of her stateliness, enhanced though it is by the high turban of embroidered muslin edged with soft lace falling over the clusters of fair curls on her temples, and by the black satin gown, short-waisted and scanty, relieved only by delicate lace frills, which shade the beautiful throat and the strong, white, shapely hands. The shadow on her face as she gazes into the fire is not marvelous, for it is winter in her quiet Connecticut home; the post comes but twice a week; her husband is representing his State in Washington, and her only child is studying in distant Yale. Perhaps, though, the shadow is not that of pure loneliness. Is there not some perplexity in it? And something also of vexation? Yes, and it is the very vexation of spirit which—in the face of Solomon's venerable testimony to the contrary—we had fancied to be peculiar to our own evil days. Almost the first entry in this quaint little diary is to the effect that "Jim was sulky to-night and gave short answers." A little farther on we find that "Yesterday Jim went away without leave, and stayed all night;" which delinquency, being accompanied by a suspicion of drunkenness, caused the anxious dame to "send for General T—— to come and give Jim a lecture." Lecturing, however, was not then so popular as now, and Jim appears to have profited little by the veteran general's discourse, for on the very next night he repeats his offence. We have reason also to fear that Jim's honesty was not above suspicion, for we read that Betsey, an American woman who acted as assistant housekeeper and companion, "found in Jim's possession a red morocco pocket-book which I had given her, but "—alas for Betsey!—"with the contents all gone."

Other entries to the effect that madam one day lost her key to the wine-cellar, and the next day discovered the bibulous Jim in the said cellar "sucking brandy through a straw inserted in the bunghole of the cask," and that, "furthermore, Jim had confessed to having stolen and sold a coffee-basin for rum," do not tend to raise in our estimation this pattern of an ancient darkey. This time it appears that madam did not need to call in the aid of General T——, for she admits that she herself "lectured Jim severely;" sarcastically adding, "he professed penitence, but that did not hinder him from stealing another basin to-day."

But the refractory Jim, we think, must have been the exception which proved the rule that all servants prior to the late Celtic invasion were models of deportment. Accordingly, we are not surprised to find that Betsey was a handmaiden held in high estimation, and that "old Jack" was a servant whose shortcomings were offset by his general good conduct and affectionate heart. But we find also that there was a certain Sally, who could be tolerated only because of her great culinary skill; and an uncertain Silvy, who appears to have been in mind, if not in fact, the twin-sister of Jim, with a spice of Topsy thrown in.

The trouble in those days was not the prospect of suddenly losing cook or nursemaid, but that there was no getting rid of either. The fact of slavery was, under the act of 1793, slowly fading away from Connecticut, but all its habits remained in full force. "I wish I could send Jim and Silvy away," writes madam, "but the poor rascals have no place to go to."

Silvy was a tricksome spright that delighted in breaking bottles of the "best Madeira wine and spilling the contents over the new English carpet" when the mistress had invited the parson's and the doctor's families to dinner. This, though of course it was "not to be endured," might have been accidental, and so was very "tolerable" in comparison with Silvy's next exploits of poisoning the beloved house-dog and throwing by the roadside the bottle of wine—possibly emptied first—the jar of jelly and the fresh quarter of lamb which had been sent to a poor and sick old woman. These two offences, occurring on the same day, we are sorry to confess, incited the stately, white-handed dame to do something more decisive than to "deliver a lecture" to Silvy. It is demurely recorded that "for these two misdeeds I whipped Silvy." What effect the whipping had upon that somewhat too frolicsome damsel we are not informed, but madam admits that it made herself ill, and adds that "if Silvy does not reform it is impossible to see what can be done for her, for she will not listen to remonstrance. Betsey is not strong enough to punish so strapping a wench, and it does not seem right that a man should be set to whip any woman or girl, even a wench, else Jack could do it."

However, Jack's own patience having been tried by the refractory Silvy, he seems to have taken the matter into his own hands, for his mistress tells us how she was scandalized, on her return from church, by "finding Jack whipping Silvy," while that young lady was "screaming vehemently, so that all the people passing by could hear her." As Jack had discovered Silvy engaged in the amiable diversion of breaking the legs of the young calves by throwing stones at them, one can have a little charity for his summary action, although, as madam gravely remarks, "he might at least have waited until Monday."

The calves, by the way, had an unlucky winter of it, and were especially shaky about the legs. We find that a few weeks later "Jack having neglected to repair the barn floor, as he had been directed, a plank had given way and three of the calves' legs had been broken by the fall." We have felt a deep interest in the fate of these calves, but with all our anxiety have failed to discover whether three calves had all their legs broken, or only three legs in all had been sacrificed to Jack's culpable neglect.

By this time we begin to think that madam would have been just as well off if she had not kept so many servants, and to wonder what they could have had to do. Perhaps it was the idle man's playmate that made the trouble. But a little farther reading in the old diary dissipates this illusion. If anybody thinks that our grandmothers must have been cursed with ennui because they did not attend three parties a night three times a week, with operas and theatres to fill in the off nights, they are mightily mistaken.

Of sociability there could have been no lack in this rural neighborhood, for besides a ball or two madam records numbers of tea-drinkings and debating clubs, and meetings of the Clio, a literary club, at which assisted at least two future judges of the supreme courts of the States of their adoption, and several other men and women whose names would attract attention even in our clattering days. Visiting, too, of the old-fashioned spend-the-day sort had not gone out of date—was indeed so common that madam one evening enters in her journal—whether in sorrow or in thankfulness there is nothing to tell us, but at least as a notable fact—that she had "had no company to-day."

But it was not company that occupied all the hours of so busy a dame as our diarist. Though she had not to remodel her dresses in hot chase after the last novelty of the fashion-weekly, she had to superintend the manufacture of the stuff of which her maids' gowns and her own morning-gowns were made, to say nothing of bed-and table-linen, etc. Bridget in our day seems to think that to do a family washing is a labor of Hercules. Yet seventy years ago before a towel could be washed the soap wherewith to cleanse it must be made at home; and this not by the aid of condensed lye or potash, but with lye drawn by a tedious process of filtering water through barrels or leach-tubs of hard-wood ashes. The "setting" of these tubs was one of the first labors of the spring, and to see that Silvy or Jim poured on the water at regular intervals, and did not continue pouring after the lye had become "too weak to bear up an egg," was a part of Betsey's daily duty for some weeks. Then came the soap-boiling in great iron kettles over the fire in the wide fireplace. Apparently, this was not always a certain operation. Science had not yet put her meddling but useful finger into the soap-pot, for madam sadly records that on the twenty-first of May she had superintended the soap-boiling, but had not been blessed with "good luck;" and on the third of June we find the suggestive entry, "Finished the soap-boiling to-day." Eleven days—for we must of course count out the two Sundays—eleven days of greasy, odorous soap-boiling! We think that if we had been in madam's slippers we should have allowed Sally, Silvy and the rest to try the virtues of the unaided waters of heaven upon the family washing, and when this ceased to be efficacious should have let the clothes be purified by fire. But upon second thoughts, no: it was too much trouble to make those clothes.

We are not yet through with the preparations for the washing. The ancient housewife could not do without starch for her "ruffs and cuffs and fardingales," and for her lord's elaborately plaited ruffles. Yet she could not buy a box of "Duryea's best refined." The starch, like the soap, must be made at home. "On this day," writes our diarist, "had a bushel of wheat put in soak for starch;" and in another place we find the details of the starch-making process. The wheat was put into a tub and covered with water. As the chaff rose to the top it was skimmed off. Each day the water was carefully turned off, without disturbing the wheat, and fresh water was added, until after several days there was nothing left but a hard and perfectly white mass in the bottom of the tub. This mass was spread upon pewter platters and dried in the sun.

Another sore trouble was the breadmaking. The great wheat-fields of the West were not then opened, and we find that the wheat was frequently "smutty;" hence, that "the barrel was bad," which must sorely have tried the soul of the good housewife. Woe be to Silvy if that damsel did not carry herself gingerly on the baking-day when the long, flat shovel removed from the cavernous brick oven only heavy and sticky lumps of baked dough, in place of the light white loaves which the painstaking housewife had a right to expect!

In the absence of husband and son the care of a large farm fell upon our madam's shoulders, and the details of cost and income are dotted through the little journal. We can imagine the lady, gracious in her stateliness, marshaling old General T—— and Colonel C——, two veterans of the Revolution, out into her barnyard to get their opinion as to the value of her fat cattle, and the concealed disapproval with which she received their judgment that forty-five dollars was a fair price for the pair, "when," as she quietly remarks, "I considered that fifty dollars was little enough for so fine a pair of fat cattle; and in fact I got my own price for them the next day."

Fifty dollars was a much larger sum then than now. Imagine how many things could be bought for fifty dollars, when butter brought but ten, veal three or four, beef six or seven cents respectively per pound, and a pair of fat young chickens brought but twenty-five cents! There is one article upon whose accession of price we can dwell with pleasure. Madam records discontentedly that it "took two men all day to kill four hogs, notwithstanding that she had spent fifty cents for a half gallon of rum for them to drink." Fancy the sort of liquor that could now be bought for a dollar the gallon, and the sort of men that could drink two quarts thereof and live!

It is heretical, of course, to hint a syllable against the open wood-fire which crackled and flickered so beautifully while our madam wrote about her cattle and pigs and Jim and Silvy, but in truth we cannot envy our ancestors the care of those fires. With three yawning, devouring fireplaces constantly to be fed, and an additional one for each of the guest-rooms so often occupied during the winter—for this was the visiting season—there was no lack of business for Ralph, a white man; and his colored coadjutors, Jack and Jim. When we look at the still existing kitchen fireplace, nine feet in width and four in depth, we cease to blame Jack for neglecting to mend the barn floor. We only wonder that he found time to whip Silvy.

Among the occupations of the women one great time-consumer must have been the daily scouring, so much woodwork was left unpainted to be kept as white as a clean sea-beach by applications of soap and sand. Probably a good deal of this hand-and-knee work fell upon the unfortunate Silvy, as well as the polishing of the pewter plates, the brass fenders, andirons, tongs, shovels, door-knobs, knockers, and the various brazen ornaments which bedecked the heavy sideboards and tall secretaries.

Seventy years ago, when gas and kerosene were not, and wax candles were an extravagance indulged in only on state occasions, even by the wealthy, the tallow dip was an article of necessity, and "candle dip-day" was as certain of recurrence as Christmas, though perhaps even less welcome than the equally certain annual Fast Day. Fancy an immense kitchen with the before-mentioned fireplace in the centre of one side. Over the blaze of backlog and forestick, and something like half a cord of "eight-foot wood," are swinging the iron cranes laden with great kettles of melting tallow. On the opposite side of the kitchen two long poles about two feet apart are supported at their extremities upon the seats of chairs. Beside the poles are other great kettles containing melted tallow poured on the top of hot water. Across the poles are the slender candle-rods, from which depend ranks upon ranks of candle-wicks made of tow, for cotton wick is a later invention. Little by little, by endlessly repeating the slow process of dipping into the kettles of melted tallow and hanging them to cool, the wicks take on their proper coating of tallow. To make the candles as large as possible was the aim, for the more tallow the brighter the light. When done, the ranks of candles, still depending from the rods, were hung in the sunniest spots of a sunny garret to bleach.

But all these employments were as play compared with the home manufacture of dry goods. Ralph, Jack and Jim had no time for such work, so two other men were all winter kept busy in the barn at "crackling flax" and afterward passing it through a coarse hetchel to separate the coarsest or "swingling tow." After this the flax was made up into switches or "heads" like those which we see in pictures, or that which Faust's Marguerite so temptingly wields. These were deposited in barrels in the garret. During the winter the "heads" were brought down by the women to be rehetcheled once and again, removing first the coarser, and then the finer tow. This must have been a fearfully dusty operation. It makes one cough only to think of "the inch depth of flax-dust" which settled upon Betsey's protecting handkerchief while she "hetcheled."

The finest and best of the flax was saved for spinning into thread, for cotton thread there was none, excepting, possibly, a little of very poor quality in small skeins. The small wheel that we see in the far corner of the garret—just like Marguerite's—was used for spinning the fine thread. A larger wheel was used to spin the tow into yarn for the coarse clothing for boys and negroes or for "filling" in the coarser linens. All the boys, and very often the men—perhaps even our M.C. himself—wore in summer trousers made of linen cloth, for which the yarn was spun at home by the maids, and was then taken to the weaver's to be made into cloth. Part of the linen yarn was dyed blue, and, mingled with white or unbleached yarn, was woven into a chequered stuff for the curtains of servants' beds and for dresses for the maids and aprons for their mistresses. In view of the fact that all the bed-linen and most of the table-linen was thus made at home, one cannot wonder that a house-wife's linen-closet was an object of special care and pride.

If there were at that time any woolen manufactories in the United States, their powers of production must have been very limited, while foreign cloths could only have been worn by the gentlemen, and by them probably not at all times, for a few years later than the date of madam's diary we find that English cloths were sold at the then fearful prices of eighteen and twenty dollars per yard. So sheep must be kept and sheared, and their wool carded, rolled and spun. As linen-spinning was the fancy-work of winter, so wool-spinning was that of summer. Back and forth before the loud-humming big wheel briskly stepped the cheerful spinner through the long bright afternoons of summer, busily spinning the yarn that was to be woven into cloths and flannels of different textures. Busily indeed must both mistress and maids have stepped, for not without their labors could be provided the coats and trousers, the undershirts, the petticoats and the woolen sheets, to say nothing of blankets, white or chequered, and the heavy coverlets of blue or green and white yarns woven into curiously intermingling figures, all composed of little squares; and last, but not least, the yarn for countless pairs of long warm stockings for the feet of master and man, mistress and maid. For as a legacy from dying slavery the servants were still unable or unwilling to provide for their own wants, and the house-mistress had frequently to knit Jack's stockings with her own fair fingers, as well as to "cut out the stuff for Jim's pantaloons," which she will "try to teach Silvy to sew."

Did we think that we had reached the last purpose for which the homespun woolen yarn was required? We were mistaken, for here is the entry: "To-day dyed the yarn for back-hall carpet. Remember to tell the weaver that I prefer it plaided instead of striped."

Economy of time must, one would think, have been the most necessary of economies to the old-time housewives. With so many things to do, how did they find time to make those marvels of misplaced industry, the patched bed-quilts? Our diarist, rich as her closets were in blankets and linen, left but few bed-quilts to vex the eyes of her descendants, yet we read that "Betsey and I quilted a bed-quilt this afternoon"—their fingers were surely nimble—"and in the evening"—happy change of employment!—"Betsey finished reading aloud from Blair's Lectures. To-morrow evening we shall begin the Spectator. My husband has sent us by private hand Mr. A. Pope's translation of the Iliad and Odyssey, but it has not yet arrived. Strange that a private hand should be slower than the post!"

And indeed the slowness of the post had been a source of frequent disquietude to our madam during this lonely winter, for very lonely it was to the waiting wife and mother, notwithstanding all her occupations. "'Life's employments are life's enjoyments,'" she sadly writes on the night before Christmas, "and surely I have not a few of them; but with my beloved husband and son far from me I cannot half enjoy my life. I have given the servants their presents to-night" (though living in Puritan Connecticut, our madam was of Hollandish stock, and did not ignore the Christmas festival), "and paid them eighteen pence apiece not to wish me a Merry Christmas to-morrow, for little merriment indeed should there be for me."

Yet she was a cheerful soul, this stately madam who sadly gazes into the fire on the Christmas Eve of seventy years ago—a cheerful, loving soul, and a kindly (notwithstanding her chastisement of the delinquent Silvy); and after all the winter wore not unhappily away.

With the opening spring husband and son returned to gladden her heart, and we close the little diary with a smile at once of sympathy and of amusement as we read that while madam had intended to meet her loved ones with the family coach on their landing from the sloop at Poughkeepsie, thirty miles from her home, she was "so detained by reason of the depth and vileness of the mud that it was full fifteen miles this side the river" (Hudson) "that our coach fell in with a hired carriage coming this way. The road was so bad that we had difficulty in passing, and it was not until we were almost by that my dear husband noticed his own coach. There was some trouble in getting from the one carriage to the other, but when all were safely in the coach there was much rejoicing, you may be sure."

ETHEL C. GALE.



A MARCH VIOLET.

Black boughs against a pale, clear sky, Slight mists of cloud-wreaths floating by; Soft sunlight, gray-blue smoky air, Wet thawing snows on hillsides bare; Loud streams, moist sodden earth; below Quick seedlings stir, rich juices flow Through frozen veins of rigid wood, And the whole forest bursts in bud. No longer stark the branches spread An iron network overhead, Albeit naked still of green; Through this soft, lustrous vapor seen, On budding boughs a warm flush glows, With tints of purple and pale rose. Breathing of spring, the delicate air Lifts playfully the loosened hair To kiss the cool brow. Let us rest In this bright, sheltered nook, now blest With broad noon sunshine over all, Though here June's leafiest shadows fall. Young grass sprouts here. Look up! the sky Is veiled by woven greenery, Fresh little folded leaves—the first, And goldener than green, they burst Their thick full buds and take the breeze. Here, when November stripped the trees, I came to wrestle with a grief: Solace I sought not, nor relief. I shed no tears, I craved no grace, I fain would see Grief face to face, Fathom her awful eyes at length, Measure my strength against her strength. I wondered why the Preacher saith, "Like as the grass that withereth." The late, close blades still waved around: I clutched a handful from the ground. "He mocks us cruelly," I said: "The frail herb lives, and she is dead." I lay dumb, sightless, deaf as she; The long slow hours passed over me. I saw Grief face to face; I know The very form and traits of Woe. I drained the galled dregs of the draught She offered me: I could have laughed In irony of sheer despair, Although I could not weep. The air Thickened with twilight shadows dim: I rose and left. I knew each limb Of these great trees, each gnarled, rough root Piercing the clay, each cone of fruit They bear in autumn. What blooms here, Filling the honeyed atmosphere With faint, delicious fragrancies, Freighted with blessed memories? The earliest March violet, Dear as the image of Regret, And beautiful as Hope. Again Past visions thrill and haunt my brain. Through tears I see the nodding head, The purple and the green dispread. Here, where I nursed despair that morn, The promise of fresh joy is born, Arrayed in sober colors still, But piercing the gray mould to fill With vague sweet influence the air, To lift the heart's dead weight of care, Longings and golden dreams to bring With joyous phantasies of spring.

EMMA LAZARUS.



WHAT IS A CONCLAVE?

It may be that before these lines meet the eye of the readers they are intended for the world will be once again witnessing that function of the Roman Catholic Church which of all others makes the highest pretensions to transcendental spiritual significance, and is in reality the most utterly and grossly mundane—a conclave. In any case, it cannot be long before that singular spectacle is enacted on the accustomed stage before the converging eyes of Christendom. In any case, too, it will be nearly thirty years since the world has seen the like. And never before since St. Peter sat (or did not sit) in the seat of the Roman bishops has so long a period elapsed unmarked by the election of a supreme pontiff. The coming conclave will be held under circumstances essentially dissimilar from those surrounding all its predecessors, as will be readily understood if we consider the difference which recent changes, both lay and ecclesiastical, have made in the position of the pope. If, on the one hand, the political changes in Europe have taken from the cardinals the power of creating a sovereign prince, the ecclesiastical changes which the late ecumenical council has wrought in the constitution of the Church have placed in their hands the power and duty of selecting a supreme ruler of the Church with acknowledged claims to a loftier and more tremendous authority than the most high-handed of his predecessors has hitherto claimed. And the nature of this authority is such that the political rulers of the world may well feel—and are, as we know, feeling—a more anxious interest in the result of the election than they have for many a generation felt in the elevation of a temporal ruler of the ci-devant States of the Church. Under these circumstances it may be acceptable to our readers to have some brief account of what conclaves are and have been.

That this method of choosing a supreme head of the universal Church was in its origin abusive—that the earliest popes were chosen by the suffrages of the entire body of the faithful, that by a process of encroachment this election was in the course of time arrogated to themselves by the Roman clergy, and was ultimately, by a further process of similar encroachment, monopolized by the "Sacred College" of cardinals,—all this is sufficiently well known. It is, however, curious enough to merit a passing word, that a precisely analogous process of progressive encroachment may be observed to have taken place in the mode of appointing the bishops of the Church, not only in the Catholic, but also in the Protestant branch of it. First freely elected by the body of the faithful, they were subsequently chosen by the clergy, and lastly by a small and select body of these in the form of a "chapter." Only in this case a further step of encroachment being still possible, that step has been made; and bishops are nominated in the Catholic Church formally, and in the Anglican really, by the pope and the sovereign respectively.

It does not seem that in the earliest elections made by the cardinals the precautions of a "conclave," or a shutting up together of the cardinals, was adopted. The first conclave seems to have been that which elected Innocent IV. in 1243, and the motive for the locking up appears to have been the fear of interference by the emperor Frederick, who was at the time ravaging all the country around Rome. The first conclave that was guarded by a Savelli, in whose family the office of marshal of the Church and guardian of the conclaves became hereditary, was that which elected Nicholas IV. in 1288. The mode in which this pontiff merited his elevation is worth telling, apropos of conclaves. The conclave had lasted over ten months, and been prolonged into the hottest and most unhealthy season, insomuch that six cardinals died, many more fell ill, and all ran away save one, the bishop of Palestrina. He, "keeping large fires continually burning to correct the air," stuck to it, remained in conclave all alone, and was unanimously elected pope at the return of the cardinals when the pestilence had ceased. In 1270 we find a conclave sitting under difficulties of another kind. It was at Viterbo, and their Eminences sat for two years without making any election; whereupon, we are told, Raniero Gatti, the captain of the city, took the step of unroofing the palace in which they were assembled as a means of hastening their decision. That their Eminences were not thus to be hurried, however, is proved by their having subsequently dated a bull, still to be seen with its seventeen seals, "from the unroofed episcopal palace of Viterbo." There were four or five popes elected subsequently to this, however, without conclaves; but from the death of Boniface VIII. in 1303 the series of conclaves has been unbroken. Celestine V., who abdicated in 1294, drew up the rules which, confirmed by his successor, Boniface VIII., and by many subsequent popes from time to time down to the last century, still regulate the assembling and holding of the conclave, modified in some degree, as regards the food and private comforts of the cardinals, by indulgence of later pontiffs.

In old and long-since-forgotten books concerning the conclaves many curious particulars may be found respecting the customs and ceremonies connected with the disposal of the body of the deceased pontiff. A learnedly antiquarian dispute has been raised on the question whether in early times the body of a pope was embalmed, as we understand the word, or only exteriorly washed and perfumed. It seems, on the whole, clear that the first pope who was, properly speaking, embalmed, was Julius II., who died in 1513. But here is a striking account of the condition of things in the papal palace after the death of that great, high-handed and powerful pontiff, Sixtus IV., which occurred in 1484, after a reign of thirteen years. The statement is that of Burcardo (Burckhardt), the papal master of the ceremonies, the same writer whose diary, jotted down from day to day, has revealed to us the incredible atrocities of the court of Alexander VI., the Borgia pope, who died in 1503. "For all that I could do," writes the master of the ceremonies, who perhaps at that time occupied some less conspicuous post in the papal court, "I could not get a basin, a towel, or any kind of utensil in which the wine and the water for the odoriferous herbs could be put for washing the body of the deceased. Nor could I obtain drawers or a clean shirt for putting on the body, though I asked for them again and again. At length the cook lent me the copper kettle in which he was wont to heat the water for washing the plates, together with some hot water; and Andrew the barber brought me his barber's basin from his shop. So the pontiff was washed. And as there was no towel to wipe the body with, I caused him to be wiped with the shirt in which he died, torn into two halves. I could not change the drawers in which he died and was washed, because there were no others. His canonical vestments were put upon him without any shirt, and a pair of red cloth stockings, furnished by the bishop of Cervia, who was his chamberlain, and a long tunic, if I remember rightly, of red damask, as well as some other things." This pope, whose body was thus washed with his shirt torn in half for want of a towel, was that same Sixtus the enormous wealth and boundless luxury of whose nephews seem almost fabulous to readers even of these money-abounding days.

The explanation of the extraordinary state of things above described is to be found in the custom which existed of sacking the apartments of the deceased pope as soon as ever the breath was out of his body. The utter lawlessness which prevailed at Rome sede vacante—that is to say, during the interval between the death of one pope and the election of his successor—was not, indeed, confined to the residence of the departed pontiff. Throughout Rome all law used to be on those occasions in abeyance. The streets were scenes of the most unbridled excesses and violence of all sorts. That was the time for the satisfying of old grudges. Murder was as common as murderous hate; and no man's life was safe save in so far as his own hand or his own walls could protect it. And walls did not always avail. I find a petition to Leo X. from a monastery in Rome, setting forth that a document assuring certain indulgences to the house had been lost at the time of the sack and plunder of the convent during the last conclave. No sort of claim, it is to be observed, is attempted to be set up of redress for the plunder and destruction of the property of the convent; only a prayer that the privileges in question might be again granted in consideration of the loss of the document. A very curious illustration of Roman manners in the sixteenth century is to be found in a practice with regard to these periods of interregnum which I find recorded by Cancellieri in his work on the conclaves. Roman wives, it seems, were forbidden—not without reason—to leave their homes and go forth into the streets of Rome at their pleasure. But in the articles of the marriage contract it was stipulated that the lady should be free to go out on certain specified occasions, mainly ecclesiastical festivals; and among these it was always specially provided that the lady might go out during the days of the exposition of the body of a deceased pope for the purpose of kissing his feet. One would have thought that, looking to the state of things in the city, the time of the interregnum would have been the very last to select for ladies to venture into the streets. It would seem, however, that the Roman matrons thought otherwise. Cancellieri says that it was in those days a common saying among Roman ladies that "Happy were they who were married to Spaniards!" For it would seem that the Spanish husbands in Rome did not think it necessary to enforce this restraint on their wives—a circumstance that rather curiously contradicts our general notions of Spanish marital feelings and discipline.

In truth, the condition of Rome during the period of the conclave down to very recent times affords a singular evidence of the virtue of the old French formula, "Le roi est mort! Vive le roi!" as signifying the non-existence of any period of transition between one embodiment of law and authority and his successor; for the absence of any similar provision in the case of the popes made Rome a veritable hell upon earth during the period of a papal election.

But if the city outside the walls within which the purple fathers of the Church were deliberating presented a scene which was a disgrace and a scandal to Christendom, that which was being enacted within those walls was very often still more profoundly scandalous. Never probably has any human institution existed in which practice was more grossly and notoriously in disaccord with pretensions and theory, and with respect to which the highest and most sacred of all conceivable human sanctions was so shamelessly desecrated and profaned to the lowest and vilest uses.

Before touching on this part of the subject, however, it is necessary first to give in as few words as possible some intelligible account of the formal regulations and method of holding the conclave and electing the pontiff. All the regulations, which have been made with extreme minuteness, together with the subsequent modifications of them by different pontiffs, would occupy far too much space to be given here. The following rules seem to be the essential points. Ten days, including that of the pope's death, are to be allowed for the coming of absent cardinals. This delay may, however, be dispensed with for urgent reasons. The conclave should properly be held in the building in which the pope died. Regulations of various degrees of rigor have been made for securing the isolation of the members of the Sacred College, greater latitude and indulgence having been permitted as we approach modern times. Sundry means also were devised for hastening the deliberations of their Eminences. The old rule of Gregory X. prescribed that if an election were not made in three days, the cardinals should be supplied during the following five days with one dish only at dinner and one at supper; and if at the end of those five days the election was still uncompleted, the electors should be allowed only bread and water till they had accomplished their task. But, as may be readily supposed, all this has been materially modified. Many of the minute and rigorous precautions for preventing communication with the world outside the conclave have also fallen into desuetude. The purpose of these, however—that is, the absolute prevention of any possibility of consultation between those in conclave and those outside—is still sought to be, and probably is, maintained. Cardinals obliged to leave the conclave by ill-health, on sworn certificates of the two physicians who are shut up with them in conclave, may return to it, if able to do so, before the election is made. No censure or excommunication or deposition of any cardinal by the pope whose successor is to be elected can avail to deprive such cardinal of the right to take part in the conclave and in the election. No cardinal under pain of excommunication may say anything, or promise anything, or request anything, to or from another cardinal for the purpose of influencing him in the giving of his vote. It may safely be asserted, however, that pretty much all that is done in the conclave from the beginning to the end of it is one long contravention of this rule. The whole—at all events, the main—occupation of those in conclave consists of exactly what is here forbidden. The rule proceeds to declare that all such bargains, agreements and obligations, even sworn to, are ipso facto void, and "he who does not keep them merits praise rather than the blame of perjury." This merit elected popes have usually been found to strive after with all their strength. Julius II., by a bull issued in 1505, declared that any pope elected by means of bargains or promises is elected simoniacally; that his election is null even if he have the vote of every cardinal; that he is a heresiarch and no pope; that such an election cannot become valid by enthronation, or by lapse of time, or by the obedience of the cardinals; that it is lawful for the cardinals, the clergy and the people of Rome to refuse obedience to a pope so elected. On all which Monsignor Spondano in his ecclesiastical annals, remarks, with a naivete of hypocrisy which is irresistibly amusing, that inasmuch as there would be considerable difficulty in applying the remedy proposed, God has specially provided that there should never be any need of it. How far Monsignor Spondano can have supposed that such was the case will become evident from the account of the doings of a conclave which I propose giving to the reader presently.

Together with the cardinals there are shut up in the conclave two attendants, called "conclavisti," for each cardinal, or three for such of them as are ill or infirm; one sacristan, two masters of the ceremonies, one confessor, two physicians, one surgeon, one carpenter, two barbers and ten porters. Any conclavist who may leave the conclave cannot on any account return. The different cells prepared in the Quirinal, Vatican or other place in which the conclave may be held are assigned to the cardinals by lot. The election may be made in the conclave in either of three different manners—by scrutiny of votes, by compromise, or by acclamation. A vote by scrutiny is to be taken twice every day in the conclave—once in the morning and once in the afternoon. All the cardinals, save such as are confined to their cells by infirmity, proceed to the chapel, and there, after the mass, receive the communion. They then return each to his cell to breakfast, and afterward meet in the chapel again. The next morning at 8 A.M. the sub-master of the ceremonies rings a bell at the door of each cell; at half-past eight he rings again; and at nine a third time, adding in a loud voice the summons, "In capellam Domini!"

The arrangement of the Pauline Chapel at the Vatican, in which the voting takes place, is as follows: The floor is raised by a boarding to the level of the pontifical throne, which stands by the side of the altar, and which is left in its place in readiness for the newly-elected pope to seat himself and receive the "adoration" of his electors. All around the walls of the chapel are erected as many thrones as there are cardinals, and over each of them a canopy, so arranged that by means of a cord it can be suddenly let down; so that at the moment the election is pronounced all the canopies are suddenly made to fall except that of the new pope. In front of each throne and under each canopy there is a little table covered with silk—green in the case of all those cardinals who have been created previously to the pontificate of the pope recently deceased, and purple in the case of those created by him. The colors of the canopies are similar. On each table are printed registers prepared for registering the votes at each scrutiny, the schedules for giving the votes, the means for sealing, etc. On the front of each table is inscribed the name of the cardinal who is to occupy it, together with his armorial bearings. In the midst of the body of the chapel are six little tables covered with green cloth, with a seat at each of them for the use of any cardinal who may fear that his neighbor might overlook him while writing his voting paper if he wrote it on the table before his throne. In front of the altar there is a large table covered with crimson silk, on which are folded schedules, wafers, sealing-wax; four candles, not lighted, but ready for use; a tinder-box with steel and matches; scarlet and purple twine for filing the voting schedules; a box of needles for the same purpose; a tablet with seventy holes in it, answering to the number of cardinals if the college were full, and in each hole a little wooden counter with the name of a cardinal, so that there are as many counters as cardinals in the college; and finally, a copy of the form of oath respecting the putting the schedules into the urns, the two urns themselves, and a box with a key, used for receiving the voting papers of such cardinals as may be too ill to leave their cells. The two urns, however, at the time of the scrutiny are placed on the altar. Behind the altar there is placed a little iron brazier or stove, in which, after every scrutiny which does not succeed in electing a pope, the voting papers are burned, together with some damp straw, the object being to cause a dense smoke, which, passing by a pipe outside the building, serves to inform the Romans that no election has yet been made. Twice a day, at about the same hour every day till the election is achieved, this smoke, which is eagerly watched for by all Rome, and specially by the commandant of the Castle of St. Angleo, who is waiting to fire a salute for the new pope, tells the city that there is no pope yet. When the hour passes and no smoke is seen, it is known that the election is made, and the cannoneers fire away without waiting to know whom they are saluting.

There is no portion of the day or of the lives of the cardinals in conclave which is not regulated by a host of minute regulations and ceremonies. The introduction of the food supplied to them; the form of bringing it from their palaces; the method of communication with the outside world, and the precautions taken to prevent any communication with reference to the great business in hand; the form and color of the garments to be worn by their Eminences and by all the subordinates; the amount of remuneration and perquisites to be received by the latter (among which regulations I find the following: "Let no man receive anything who has not purchased the office he holds"); the order of precedence of everybody, from the dean of the Sacred College to the last sweeper who enters the conclave with their Eminences,—all subject to minute rules, which would require, one would imagine, a lifetime to make one's self master of, and which, curious as some of them are, it is impossible to find place for here. We must get on to the method of voting.

Each cardinal has a schedule about eight inches long by six wide, divided by printed lines into five parts. On the topmost is printed "Ego, Cardinalis——," to be filled up with the name and titles of the elector using it. On the second space are printed, toward either side of the paper, two circles, indicating the exact place where the paper when folded is to be sealed. On the middle space is printed the words "Eligo in Summum Pontificem R'um D'um meum Dom. Card.," leaving only the name of the person chosen to be filled in. On the fourth space two circles are printed, as on the second, indicating the places of two more seals, which, when the paper is folded and sealed down, make it impossible to see the motto which is written, together with a number, on the last space. On the back of the second and fourth divisions are printed the words "nomen" and "signum," denoting that immediately under them are the name and motto of the elector. There are also printed certain ornamental flourishes, the object of which is to render it impossible to see the writing within through the paper. Thus, the schedule, with its top and bottom folds sealed down, can be freely opened so far as to allow the name of the cardinal for whom the vote is given to be seen, but not so far as to make it possible to see the name or motto of the giver of the vote.

When the voting papers have been thus prepared, the senior cardinal, the dean of the Sacred College, rises from his throne and walks to the foot of the altar, holding his schedule aloft between his finger and thumb. There he kneels and passes a brief time in private prayer. Then rising to his feet, he pronounces aloud in a sonorous voice the following oath: "Testor Christum Dominum qui me judicaturus est, me eligire quem secundum Deum judico eligi debere, et quod in accessu praestabo" ("I call to witness the Lord Christ, who shall judge me, that I elect him whom before God I judge ought to be elected, and which vote I shall give also in the accessit"). The last words allude to a subsequent part of the business of the election, to be explained presently. It is hardly necessary to point out to the reader that this oath, solemn as it sounds, might just as well be omitted. It is as a matter of course evident that each elector will give his vote for the person who ought in his opinion to be elected. But as to the motives of that opinion, as to the grounds on which it seems best to each elector that such and such a man ought to be elected, the oath says nothing. The cardinals whose votes Alexander VI. bought thought, no doubt, that in all honesty they ought to give their voices for the man who had fairly paid for them. But, putting aside such gross cases, let the reader reflect for a moment how extensive a ground is covered by the celebrated "A.M.D.G." formula ("Ad majorem Dei gloriam"). The conscience of an elector may be supposed to speak to him thus: "It is true that I know A.B. to be a profligate and thoroughly worldly man, but his influence with such or such a statesman or monarch will probably be the means of saving the Church from a schism in this, that or the other country. And that assuredly is A.M.D.G. And he is the man, therefore, who ought to be elected."

Well, the oath having been thus pronounced, the voter places his folded schedule on a silver salver, and with this casts it into the silver urn which is on the altar. And one after another every cardinal present does the same—every cardinal present except, however, any one who may not have received at least deacon's orders. One so disqualified may indeed be empowered to vote by dispensation of the deceased pope; but this dispensation is usually given for a limited period—a few days probably—only; and if this time has expired before the election is completed the cardinal who is not in sacred orders must cease to vote till he have received orders. It has frequently occurred that cardinals have been ordained under these circumstances in the conclave. When all the schedules have been placed in the urn, three cardinals, who have been previously chosen by lot for the purpose, as scrutineers proceed to verify the result of the voting. First, the schedules are counted to ascertain that they are equal in number to the number of the cardinals present. If this should not be the case, all are forthwith burned and the business is recommenced. But if this is all right, then comes the moment of interest which sets many an old heart beating under its purple vestments. The three scrutineers seat themselves at the large table with their backs turned to the altar, so that they face the assembly. Then each cardinal in his throne-seat places on the little table before him a large sheet duly prepared with the names of all the cardinals living, and ruled columns for the votes, and pen in hand awaits the declaration of these. The first scrutineer takes a schedule from the urn, unfolds the central part, leaving the two sealed ends intact, takes note of the vote declared within, and hands the paper to the second scrutineer, who also notes the vote and hands it to the third, who declares the vote aloud in a voice audible to all present, and each cardinal marks it on his register. Then, if the votes shall have been sufficient to elect the pope—that is, two-thirds of those voting—there is nothing more to be done save to number the votes, to verify them, and then burn the schedules. But if this is not the case, as it rarely if ever is, the cardinals proceed to the accessit. The papers and all the forms for this are precisely the same as for the first voting, save that in the place of the word "Eligo" there is the word "Accedo," and that in the place of the name of the cardinal voted for those who do not choose to alter their previous vote write "Nemini" ("To no one"). Then the matter proceeds as before; and if no election is effected, the assembly breaks up, and meets for another voting and scrutiny that afternoon or the next morning, as the case may be. And this is done twice every day till the election is made. The reader, I fear, may think that I have been prolix in my statement of these particulars of the method of the election, but I can assure him that I have given him only the main and important points, selected from some hundreds of pages in the works of those who have treated on the wonderfully minute regulations and prescriptions with which the whole matter is surrounded.

It will be easily seen that the moment of proceeding to the accessit is the time for fine strokes of policy, for the most cautious prudence and craftiest cunning. The general condition of the ground has been disclosed by the results of the previous scrutiny. The possibilities and chances begin to discover themselves. "Frequently," says the President de Brosses, who was at Rome during the conclave which elected Benedict XIV. in 1740, in the charming published volume of his letters—"Frequently at the accessit everything which was done at the preceding ceremony is reversed; and it is at the accessit that the most subtle strokes of policy are practiced. Sometimes, for example, when a party has been formed for any cardinal, the leader of the party keeps in reserve for the accessit all the votes that he can count on as certain, and induces those that he suspects may be doubtful to vote for the person intended to be made pope at the first scrutiny, so as to make sure by the number of votes given whether his supporters have been true to their party, and to avoid unmasking his policy till he shall be sure of his coup."

The story of the conclave which elected Cardinal Lambertini pope as Benedict XIV., gives a curious picture of the schemes and intrigues carried on in the mysterious seclusion of the conclave. Clement XII., of the Florentine Corsini family, had died. The cardinal Corsini, his nephew, was at the head of one faction in the conclave, and the cardinal Albani, nephew of Clement XI., who died in 1721, at the head of the other. The former party seemed at the beginning of the conclave to be the most numerous. But De Brosses describes the two men as follows. Corsini, he says, had little intelligence, less sense, and no capacity for affairs. Of Albani, he says that he was "highly considered for his capacity, and both hated and feared to excess—a man without faith, without principles; an implacable enemy even when appearing to be reconciled; of a great genius for affairs; inexhaustible in resource and intrigue; the ablest man in the college, and the worst-hearted man in Rome." It soon became clear that the struggle between the factions thus led would be severe, and the conclave a long one. The history of the plots and counterplots by which each strove to circumvent the other is extremely amusing, but too long to be given here. After various fruitless attempts, the Corsini faction concentrated all their forces on Cardinal Aldrovandi. He was a man of decent character, and had the support of a small body of independent cardinals, called the "Zelanti," who, to the great disgust and contempt of their brethren in purple, were mainly influenced by the consideration of the worthiness of his character. The number of voices needed to make the election was thirty-four: Aldrovandi had thirty-three. Cardinal Passionei, the scrutator who had to declare the votes, and a member of the opposite faction, became, we are told, as pale as death when he announced with trembling voice the thirty-third vote. There was every reason to think that at the accessit he would have the one other vote needful to make the election. But it was not so. The terrible Albani was too much feared, and had his own party too well in hand. But the thing was run very close. The danger was great that during the hours of the night that must intervene before the next scrutiny some means might be found to detach one Albani follower from his allegiance. There was the great bait to be offered that the one who changed his vote would be in effect the maker of the new pope. Under these circumstances, Albani felt that nothing but some "heroic" measure could save him. What he did was this: There was a certain Father Ravali, a Cordelier, and one of the leading men of his order, on whom Albani could depend, and who was, in language more expressive than ecclesiastical, "up to anything." This monk was instructed to seek a conference with Aldrovandi at the rota. (The rota was the opening in the wall at which such interviews were permitted in presence of certain high dignitaries specially appointed to attend it, for the express purpose of hearing all that might be said, and preventing any communication having reference to the business of the conclave. How they performed their duty the present story shows.) The monk began by saying that all Rome looked upon the election of Aldrovandi as a certain thing. Aldrovandi, doing the humble, replied that to be sure many of his brethren had deigned to think of him, but that he did not make any progress—that there were those who were too determinately opposed to his election, etc. The monk thereupon goes into a long and unctuous discourse on all the sad evils to Christendom of a conclave so prolonged. (It had already lasted over five months.) To which Aldrovandi replies that he ought rather to address his remonstrances to Cardinal Albani, who is in truth the cause of the inability of the conclave to come to an election. "Ah, monsignor," returns the Cordelier, "put yourself in the place of the cardinal Albani. I know his sentiments from the many conversations we have had together. He is far from feeling any personal objection or enmity to you. But you know that there has been in the past unpleasant feeling between your family and his, and he fears that you are animated by hostility toward him." "I assure you," replies Aldrovandi, falling into the trap, "that he is greatly mistaken. I have long since forgotten all the circumstances you allude to. Besides, as I remember, the cardinal had no part in the matter. He can't doubt that I have the greatest respect for his personal character. Besides, I am not the man to forget a service rendered to me." "Since those are the sentiments of Your Eminence," cries the monk, "I begin to see an end to this interminable conclave. I perceive that there will be no difficulty in arranging matters between Your Eminence and the cardinal Albani. Will you permit me to be the medium of your sentiments upon the subject?" Aldrovandi is delighted, and feels the tiara already on his head. Then, after a little indifferent talk, the Cordelier, in the act of taking leave of the cardinal, turns back and says, "But, after all, the mere word of a poor monk like me is hardly sufficient between personages such as Your Eminence and the cardinal Albani. Permit me to write you a letter, in which I will lay before Your Eminence those considerations concerning the crying evils of the length of this conclave which I have ventured to mention to you, and that will give me an opportunity of entering on the matters we have been speaking of. And then you, in your reply to me, can take occasion to say what you have already been observing to me of your sentiments toward the cardinal Albani." Aldrovandi eagerly agreed to this, and the two letters were at once written. "I am told," adds De Brosses, "that the letter of Aldrovandi was strong on the subject of the gratitude he should feel toward Albani." No sooner has the perfidious Cordelier got the letter into his hand than he runs with it to Albani, who goes with it at once to the body of the "Zelanti" cardinals with pious horror in his face: "Here! Look at your Aldrovandi, your man of God, that you tell me is incapable of intriguing in order to become His vicar! Here he is making promises to seduce me into violating my conscience."—"Alas! alas! It is too true! Clearly the Holy Ghost will none of him. Speak to us of him no more!" So Aldrovandi's chance was gone, and Albani found the means of uniting the necessary number of voices on Lambertini, a good-enough sort of man, by all accounts, but hardly of the wood from which popes are or should be made. He became that Benedict XIV. who was Voltaire's correspondent, and who, as the story goes, when he was asked by a young Roman patrician to make him a list of the books he would recommend for his studies, replied, "My dear boy, we always keep a list of the best books ready made. It is called the Index Expurgatorius!"

Such were the doings of conclaves, and such the popes which resulted from them, in that eighteenth century whose boasted philosophy pretty well culminated in the conviction that pudding was good and sugar sweet. Such will not be the conclave which will assemble at the death of the present pontiff. The election will doubtless be scrupulously canonical on all points; and, though it may be doubted how far the deliberations of the Sacred College will be calculated to advance the truly understood spiritual interests of humanity, there is, I think, little doubt that they will be directed, according to the lights of the members, to the choice of that individual who shall in their opinion be most likely to advance the interests of the Church "A.D.M.G."

T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE.



MONSOOR PACHA.

Monsoor Pacha, it is pleasant to meet Here, in the heart of this treacherous town— Where faith is a peril and courtship a cheat, More false to the touch than a rose overblown— With a soul that is true to itself, as your own.

Monsoor Pacha, as two gentlemen may, Civilized, city-bred, link we our hands: Now from the town to the desert away! Ours is a friendship whose spirit demands The scope of the sky and the stretch of the sands.

Monsoor Pacha, doff your courtier's garb; We have given to courtesy all of its dues; Spring to your throne on the back of your barb, Shake to the breezes your regal burnous, Wave your lance-sceptre wherever you choose!

Monsoor, my chief! ah, I know you at length! King of the desert, your children are come To cluster, like sheep, in the shade of your strength, Or to strike, like young lions, for country and home, When your eyes are ablaze at the roll of the drum!

Monsoor, my chief! now one gallop, to see The land you have sworn that no despot shall grind! Though sun-tanned and arid, by Allah! 'tis free! Its crops are these lances: these sons of the wind, Our steeds, are its flocks—a grim harvest to bind!

Monsoor, my chief! how we dash o'er the sand, Hissing behind us like storm-driven snow! Flash the long guns of your wild Arab band, Brandish the spears, and the light jereeds throw, As, half-winged, through the shrill singing breezes we go!

Monsoor, my chief! send the horses away: The sports of your tribe I have seen with delight. Now let us watch while the rose-tinted day Fades from the desert, and peace-bearing Night Shakes the first gem on her brow in our sight.

Monsoor, my host! lo, I enter your tent, As brother by brother, hands clasping, is led: I sleep like a child in a dream Heaven-sent; For have I not eaten the salt and the bread? And Monsoor will answer for me with his head.

GEORGE H. BOKER.

CONSTANTINOPLE, Jan. 10, 1875.



HOW HAM WAS CURED.

This was in slave times. It was also immediately after dinner, and the gentlemen had gone to the east piazza. Mr. Smith was walking back and forth, talking somewhat excitedly for him, while Dr. Rutherford sat with his feet on the railing, thoughtfully executing the sentimental performance of cutting his nails. Dr. Rutherford was an old friend of Mr. Smith who had been studying surgery in Philadelphia, and now, on his way back to South Carolina, had tarried to make us a visit.

"You see," Mr. Smith was saying, "about a week ago one of our old negroes died under the impression that she was 'tricked' or bewitched, and the consequence has been that the entire plantation is demoralized. You never saw anything like it."

"Many a time," said Dr. Rutherford, and calmly cut his nails.

"There is not a negro on the place," continued Edward, "who does not lie down at night in terror of the Evil Eye, and go to his work in the morning paralyzed by dread of what the day may bring. Why, there is a perfect panic among them. They are falling about like a set of ten-pins. This morning I sent for Wash (best hand on the place) to see about setting out tobacco plants, and behold Wash curled up under a haystack getting ready to die! It is enough to—So as soon as you came this morning a plan entered my head for putting a stop to the thing. It will be necessary to acknowledge that two or three of them are under the spell, and it is better to select those who already fancy themselves so.—Rosalie!" I appeared at the window. "Are any of the house-servants 'witched?"

"Mercy is," said I, "and I presume Mammy is going to be: I saw her make a curtsey to the black cat this morning."

"Well, what is your plan?" inquired Dr. Rutherford.

Mr. Smith seated himself on the piazza railing, dangling his feet thereagainst, rounding his shoulders in the most attractive and engaging manner, as you see men do, and proceeded to develop his idea. I was called off at the moment, and did not return for an hour or two. As I did so I heard Dr. Rutherford say, "All right! Blow the horn;" and the overseer down in the yard

Blew a blast as loud and shrill As the wild-boar heard on Temple Hill—

an event which at this unusual hour of the day produced perfect consternation among the already excited negroes. They no doubt supposed it the musical exercise set apart for the performance of the angel Gabriel on the day of judgment, and in less than ten minutes all without exception had come pell-mell, helter-skelter, running to "the house." The dairymaid left her churn, and the housemaid put down her broom; the ploughs stood still, and when the horses turned their heads to see what was the matter they found they had no driver; she also who was cooking for the hands "fled from the path of duty" (no Casabianca nonsense for her!), leaving the "middling" to sputter into blackness and the corn-pones to share its fate. Mothers had gathered up their children of both sexes, and grouped them in little terrified companies about the yard and around the piazza-steps.

Edward was now among them, endeavoring to subdue the excitement, and having to some extent succeeded, he made a signal to Dr. Rutherford, who came forward to address the negroes. Throwing his shoulders back and looking around with dignity, he exclaimed, "I am the great Dr. Rutherford, the witch-doctor of Boston! I was far away in the North, hundreds of miles from here, and I saw a spot on the sun, and it looked like the Evil Eye! And I found it was a great black smoke. Then I knew that witch-fires were burning in the mountains, and witches were dancing in the valleys; and the light of the Eye was red! I am the great Dr. Rutherford, the witch-doctor of Boston! I called my black cat up and told her to smell for blood, and she smelled, and she smelled, and she smelled! She smelled, and she smelled, and she smelled! And presently her hair stood up like bristles, and her eyes shot out sparks of fire, and her tail was as stiff as iron!" He threw his shoulders back, looked imposingly around and repeated: "I am the great Dr. Rutherford the witch-doctor of Boston! My black Cat tells me that the witch is here—that she has hung the deadly nightshade at your cabin-doors, and your blood is turning to water. You are beginning to wither away. You shiver in the sunshine; you don't want to eat; your hearts are heavy and you don't feel like work; and when you come from the field you don't take down the banjo and pat and shuffle and dance, but you sit down in the corner with your heads on your hands, and would go to sleep, but you know that as soon as you shut your eyes she will cast hers on you through the chinks in the cabin-wall."

"Dat's me!" said Mercy—"dat certny is me!"

"Gret day in de mornin', mas' witch-doctor! How you know? Is you been tricked?" inquired Martha, who, having been reared on the plantation, was unacquainted with the etiquette observed at lectures.

Wash groaned heavily, and shook his head from side to side in silent commendation of the doctor's lore.

"My black cat tells me that the witch is here; and she is here!" (Immense sensation among the children of Ham.) "But," continued he with a majestic wave of the arm, "she can do you no harm, for I also am here, the great Dr. Rutherford, the witch-doctor of Boston!"

"Doctor," inquired Edward in a loud voice, "can you tell who is conjured and who is not?"

"I cannot tell unless robed in the blandishments of plagiarism and the satellites of hygienic art as expunged by the gyrations of nebular hypothesis. Await ye!" He and Mr, Smith went into the house.

The negroes were very much impressed. They have excessive reverence for grandiloquent language, and the less they understand of it the better they like it.

"What dat he say, honey?" asked old Mammy. "I can't heer like I used ter."

"He says he will be back soon, Mammy, and tell if any of you are tricked," said I; and just then Edward and the doctor reappeared, bearing between them a pine table. On this table were arranged about forty little pyramids of whitish-looking powder, and in their midst stood a bottle containing some clear liquid, like water. Dr. Rutherford seated himself behind it, robed in the black gown he had used in the dissecting-room, and crowned by a conical head-piece about two feet high, manufactured by Edward and himself, and which they had completed by placing on the pinnacle thereof a human skull. The effect of this picturesque costume was heightened by two large red circles around the doctor's eyes—whether obtained from the juice of the pokeberry or the inkstand on Edward's desk need not be determined.

In front of the table stood the negroes, men, women and children. There was the preacher, decked in the clerical livery of a standing collar and white cravat, but, perhaps in deference to the day of the week, these were modified by the secular apparel of a yellow cotton shirt and homespun pantaloons, attached to a pair of old "galluses," which had been mended with twine, and pieced with leather, and lengthened with string, till, if any of the original remained, none could tell the color thereof nor what they had been in the day of their youth. The effect was not harmonious. There was Mammy, with her low wrinkled forehead, and white turban, and toothless gums, and skin of shining blackness, which testified that her material wants were not neglected. There was Wash, a great, stalwart negro, who ordinarily seemed able to cope with any ten men you might meet, now looking so subdued and dispirited, and of a complexion so ashy, that he really appeared old and shrunken and weak. There was William Wirt, the ploughboy, affected by a chronic grin which not even the solemnity of this occasion could dissipate, but the character of which seemed changed by the awestruck eyes that rolled above the heavy red lips and huge white teeth. There was Apollo—in social and domestic circles known as 'Poller—there was Apollo, his hair standing about his head in little black tufts or horns wrapped with cotton cord to make it grow, one brawny black shoulder protruding from a rent in his yellow cotton shirt, his pantaloons hanging loosely around his hips, and bagging around that wonderful foot which did not suggest his name, unless his sponsors in baptism were of a very satirical turn. There were Martha, and Susan, and Minerva, and Cinderella, and Chesterfield, and Pitt, and a great many other grown ones, besides a crowd of children, the smallest among the latter being clad in the dishabille of a single garment, which reached perhaps to the knee, but had little to boast in the way of latitude.

There they all stood in little groups about the yard, looking with awe and reverence at the great Dr. Rutherford, who sat behind the table with his black gown and frightful eyes and skull-crowned cap.

"You see these little heaps of powder and this bottle of water. You will come forward one at a time and pour a few drops of the water in this bottle on one of these little heaps of powder. If the powder turns black, the person who pours on the water is 'witched. If the powder remains white, the person who pours on the water is not 'witched. You may all examine the powders, and see for yourselves whether there is any difference between them, and you will each pour from the same bottle."

During a silence so intense that nothing was heard save the hum of two great "bumblebees" that darted in and out among the trees and flew at erratic angles above our heads, the negroes came forward and stretched their necks over each other's shoulders, peering curiously at the little mounds of powder that lay before them, at the innocent-looking bottle that stood in their midst, and the great high priest who sat behind. They stretched their necks over each other's shoulders, and each endeavored to push his neighbor to the front; but those in front, with due reverence for the uncanny nature of the table, were determined not to be forced too near it, and the result was a quiet struggle, a silent wrestle, an undertone of wriggle, that was irresistibly funny.

Then arose the great high priest: "Range ye!"

Not knowing the nature of this order, the negroes scattered instanter and then collected en masse around Mr. Smith.

"Range ye! range!" repeated the doctor with dignity, and Edward proceeded to arrange them in a long, straggling row, urging upon them that there was no cause for alarm, as, even should any of them prove 'witched, the doctor had charms with him by which to cast off the spell.

"Come, Martha," said Edward; but Martha was dismayed, and giving her neighbor a hasty shove, exclaimed,

"You go fus', Unk' Lumfrey: you's de preacher."

Uncle Humphrey disengaged his elbow with an angry hitch: "I don't keer if I is: go 'long yose'f."

"Well, de Lord knows I'm 'feerd to go," said Martha; "but ef I sot up for preachin', 'peers to me I wouldn' be'feerd to sass witches nor goses, nor nuffin' else."

"I don't preach no time but Sundays, an' dis ain't Sunday," said Uncle Humphrey.

"Hy, nigger!" exclaimed Martha in desperation, "is you gwine to go back on de Lord cos 'tain't Sunday? How come you don't trus' on Him week-a-days?"

"I does trus' on Him fur as enny sense in doin' uv it; but ef I go to enny my foolishness, fus' thing I know de Lord gwine leave me to take keer uv myse'f, preacher or no preacher—same as ef He was ter say, 'Dat's all right, cap'n: ef you gwine to boss dis job, boss it;' an' den whar I be? Mas' Ned tole you to go: go on, an' lemme 'lone."

"Uncle Humphrey," said Edward, "there is nothing whatever to be afraid of, and you must set the rest an example. Come!"

Uncle Humphrey obeyed, but as he did so he turned his head and rolled—or, as the negroes say, walled—his eyes at Martha in a manner which convinced her, whatever her doubts in other matters pertaining to theology, that there is such a thing as future punishment. The old fellow advanced, and under direction of the great high priest poured some of the contents of the bottle on the powder indicated to him, and it remained white.

"Thang Gord!" he exclaimed with a fervency which left no doubt of his sincerity, and hastened away.

Two or three others followed with a similar result. Then came Mercy, the housemaid, and as her trembling fingers poured the liquid forth, behold the powder changed and turned to black! The commotion was indescribable, and Mercy was about to have a nervous fit when Dr. Rutherford, fixing his eyes on her, said in a tone of command, "Be quiet—be perfectly quiet, and in two hours I will destroy the spell. Go over there and sit down."

She tottered to a seat under one of the trees.

One or two more took their turn, among them Mammy, but the powders remained white. I had entreated Edward not to pronounce her 'witched, because she was so old and I loved her so: I could not bear that she should be frightened. You should have seen her when she found that she was safe. The stiff old limbs became supple and the terrified countenance full of joy, and the dear ridiculous old thing threw her arms up in the air, and laughed and cried, and shouted, and praised God, and knocked off her turban, and burst open her apron-strings, and refused to be quieted till the doctor ordered her to be removed from the scene of action. The idea of retiring to the seclusion of her cabin while all this was going on was simply preposterous, and Mammy at once exhibited the soothing effect of the suggestion; so the play proceeded.

More white powders. Then Apollo's turned black, and, poor fellow! when it did so, he might have been a god or a demon, or anything else you never saw, for his face looked little like that of a human being, giving you the impression only of wildly-rolling eyeballs, and great white teeth glistening in a ghastly, feeble, almost idiotic grin.

Edward went up to him and laid his hand on his shoulder: "That's all right, my boy. We'll have you straight in no time, and you will be the best man at the shucking to-morrow night."

More white powders. Then came Wash, great big Wash; and when his powder changed, what do you suppose he did? Well, he just fainted outright.

The remaining powders retaining their color, and Wash having been restored to consciousness, Dr. Rutherford directed him to a clump of chinquapin bushes near the "big gate" at the entrance of the plantation. There he would find a flat stone. Beneath this stone he would find thirteen grains of moulding corn and some goat's hair. These he was to bring back with him. Under the first rail near the same gate Mercy would find: a dead frog with its eyes torn out, and across the road in the hollow of a stump Apollo was to look for a muskrat's tail and a weasel's paw. They went off reluctantly, the entire corps de plantation following, and soon they all came scampering back, trampling down the ox-eyed daisies and jamming each other against the corners of the rail fence, for, sure enough, the witch's treasures had been found, but not a soul had dared to touch them. Dr. Rutherford sternly ordered them back, but all hands hung fire, and their countenances evinced resistance of such a stubborn character that Edward at length volunteered to go with them. Then it was all right, and presently returned the most laughable procession that was ever seen—Wash with his arms at right angles, bearing his grains of moulding grain on a burdock leaf which he held at as great a distance as the size of the leaf and the length of his arms would admit, his neck craned out and his eyes so glued to the uncanny corn that he stumbled over every stick and stone that lay in his path; Mercy next, with ludicrous solemnity, bearing her unsightly burden on the end of a corn-stalk; Apollo last, his weasel's paw and muskrat's tail deposited in the toe of an old brogan which he had found by the roadside, brown and wrinkled and stiff, with a hole in the side and the ears curled back, and which he had hung by the heel to a long crooked stick. On they came, the crowd around them following at irregular distances, surging back and forth, advancing or retreating as they were urged by curiosity or repelled by fear.