It was an impressive spectacle, like all of the same kind that have preceded and followed it—a glorious spectacle, when the faces of most of the men were observed, and nothing of the despairing dullness of the conscript's eye seen there, but the vigorous pride and determination of men who were going forth at the call of their country to battle for that country to the death. And yet a sad spectacle, as all the others have been, when waste of life and mismanagement of power were taken into the account, and when the thinned ranks that should return, of the full ranks that went so proudly away, came to be remembered. Something of this latter feeling, and the peculiarities of the time, made the waving of handkerchiefs and the clapping of hands less frequent and cordial than the fine-looking fellows and their excellent appointments really deserved.

"The d—l take the politics and policy of Massachusetts!" broke out Tom Leslie, when the array had half passed. "I do not like her, and never did. But she does send out troops as the old Trojan horse poured out heroes; she does know how to equip and take care of them, as we do not; and they fight—oh, Harding, don't they?"

"Not any better than most of our New York troops, I fancy!" replied Harding, an incarnate New Yorker, to the last observation.

"Not better, perhaps, but more steadily—not so dashingly, but more inevitably," said Leslie, going into one of his fits of abstract philosophy, where he must perforce be followed, like a maniac by his keeper. "Our New York boys go into the fight more as a spree—the New Englanders more as a duty. Our boys enjoy it—they endure it; and some one else than myself must decide which is the higher order of courage. Almost all the New Englanders are comparatively fanatics, while we have very few indeed, unless it may be fanaticism to worship the old flag—God bless it! If it could have been possible for England to be plunged into a general war with some other country, immediately after the Restoration, something like this same distinction would have been seen. Sir Gervase Langford would have charged upon the foe, his feathers flying and his lady's colors woven into a love-knot above his cuirass, singing a roundelay of decidedly loose tendencies, precisely as he had once charged beside Prince Rupert on the bloody day of Long Marston; and Master John Grimston would have snuffled a psalm through his nose and made a thanksgiving prayer over a cut throat, swinging his long two-handed sword meanwhile, as he had done when mowing down the 'malignants' at Naseby, under the very eye of Oliver himself. That would have been an odd mixture for the same army; but we have an odder, when the neat-whiskered clerk from behind the dry-goods counter in this city—the rough fisherman from Cape Cod—the lumberman from the forests of Maine—and the long, gangling squirrel-hunters from the wilds of Wisconsin,—all meet together to fight for the same cause."

"True," said Harding—"true. And I suppose that fanaticism does fight well. It has no fear of death, and very little of consequences. How much difference was there, I wonder, between Ali at the head of his Moslem horde, fresh from the teachings of Mohammed himself, and fully impressed with the belief that if he died he should go at once to the company of the Houris in Paradise,—and Cromwell—or Old John Brown—in a corresponding madness of supposed Christianity? Not much, eh?"

"Not much—none at all!" replied Leslie. "But see how long this one regiment has been in filing past. Only one regiment—not much more than a thousand men, and yet the street seems full of the glisten of their bayonets for half-a-mile. We have grown used to handling the phrases 'thirty thousand,' 'fifty thousand,' 'one hundred thousand,' or even 'a quarter of a million' of men, just as glibly as we speak of one, two or ten millions of money; and yet we realize very little of the force of those numbers. Fifty thousand men are considered to be no army—nothing more than a skirmishing party, now-a-days; and yet to form it, forty or fifty such bodies of men as that which has just passed us must be included. Is it any wonder—after studying a thousand men in this manner—that while we have many generals capable of managing five or ten thousand, very few can command fifty thousand without making a mess of it, and a hundred thousand succeeds in crazing almost every one of our commanders?"

"Wonder? No, I should think not," said Harding, laughing. "I have puzzle enough, sometimes, with even that number of figures, and I should make a bad muddle of handling that quantity of men. But, by the way, did you ever read that singular novel, 'Border War,' by a South-western writer, Jones, published several years ago?"

"I have skimmed it—never read it," said Leslie. "Remarkable book, I should say, to be read over now-a-days, when the event then handled as romance has become reality!"

"The numbers of his opposing forces, as compared with the actual armies of the present day, are the great point of interest," said Harding. "He makes terrible blunders in guessing at the great battle-ground of the war, as he lays the principal battles in Upper Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and does not seem to contemplate the possibility of there being any fighting on Southern soil. But his numbers—I think he made each of the opposing forces number some one hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand men; and a sharp reviewer broke out into a loud guffaw over the impossibility that any such number of men could ever be arrayed against each other, on the soil of the United States, by any possible convulsion. Only a few years have passed, and we have three or four times his numbers in the fight on either side, with half a million more men to be called for."

"We are travelling fast—that is all," replied Leslie.

"You couldn't exactly inform me where, could you?" asked Harding. "But,—phew!—w!—w!" looking at his watch, "the soldiers are gone and time is up; I must look after my deposits before three."

"And what are we to do about our mystery?" asked Leslie, as the other was about to leave him. "Give that up altogether?—or will you agree to take a hand in at personal investigation?"

"Yes—no—I really do not know what to say, Tom!" was the reply of Harding. "At all events, I have spent all the time I can spare to-day, looking after that and the soldiers. 'Business first and pleasure afterwards,' you know."

"Yes," said Leslie, "as the excellent Duke of Gloster remarked, when he first killed the old King and then murdered the young Princes."

"Pshaw!" replied Harding, "I think I may have heard that before."

"Very possibly," said Leslie, too much used to slight rebuffs to pay them any great attention.

"Well, I shall walk down faster than you—bye-bye, old fellow. Look in at my place to-morrow and let us see whether we can arrange to do anything more in opposition to His High Mightiness Superintendent and Provost Marshal Kennedy," said Harding, moving away.

"Look! look! over there!" said Leslie, just as his friend was leaving him. "There is a piece of infernal impudence!"

The two friends were yet on the East side of Broadway, as they had come out from Broome Street. The procession had passed from the street, and the crowd on the sidewalks had materially cleared away. Leslie had been looking across at the passengers on the "shilling side." Two ladies, neatly dressed in street costume, and wearing light gypsies, were walking together, downward. Behind them, and so close that he nearly trod upon their dresses, a tall man was walking apparently upon tip-toe and leaning over so that his head was almost between theirs. He was evidently not of their party—was apparently listening to their conversation and scanning the necks and busts before him somewhat too closely; they all the while unconscious what a miserable libel on humanity was dogging them. He looked foreign—perhaps French, especially in the extraordinary curve and bell of his black round hat,—was well-dressed, and seemed to be gray-haired enough to know better.

"Impudence? I should think so," replied Harding, as he caught sight of the two girls and their unobserved follower. "That dirty hound would rob a church! Oh, if I could only see that taller one turn around, now, and fetch him such a slap in the face that it would ring for a twelvemonth! Why, by Heavens, Leslie!" he said, looking closer. "I ought to know that figure, and I do. Come over, and let us see the end of this."

"And your bank account?" asked Leslie.

"Oh, never mind that—come along!" and in half a minute they were across the street and close behind the ladies and their persecutor. The latter kept his place, dodging his head around at every opportunity as if to get a sight of the face of the taller girl, and both apparently yet unconscious of his presence.

"Do you see a policeman?" asked Harding, in a low voice. "I will have that fellow taken up."

"Not a policeman!" answered Leslie. "If you know either of the ladies, take the scoundrel by the collar, or let me."

"I do know the taller girl," said Harding, "and—"

Suddenly he was interrupted. The taller lady on the outside wheeled around so suddenly as almost to throw the tip-toe follower off his feet, confronted him boldly, flung up the short light veil that depended from her gypsy and partially hid her features, ineffable scorn and delicious impudence dancing at the same moment out of her dark eyes and flushed cheeks,—and burst out with:

"You have followed me long enough. Perhaps you want a better look? Here it is! How do you like me?"

"Oh, Joe!" said the other lady, almost sinking with fright.

"Upon my honor, miss—ladies—it was all a mistake—I was not following you—that is—I thought—"

"You are lying, sir, and you know it!" spoke the strange girl, the words fairly hissing from her red lips and the coming tears already combating with anger in her voice. "You have followed us for more than a block, leaning over our very shoulders, and if I was only a man I would flog you within an inch of your life!" Here pride and shame overcame anger, and the tears burst out in spite of her; so that by the time she had concluded she was nearly as weak and helpless as her frightened companion.

The sneaking scoundrel attempted to get away, not less from the anger of the outraged girl than from the passers-by, a dozen or two of whom had already collected; but before he could make any movement in that direction, a hand—that of Walter Harding, was laid on his collar, swinging him violently around; and a small Malacca cane—that of Tom Leslie, was laid about his shoulders and back with such good will that the human hound literally yelled with pain. "Serve him right!" "Give it to him!" and other exclamations of the same character, broke from those who had heard the girl's words and who saw the punishment; and in thirty seconds he was perhaps as thoroughly-flogged a man as Broadway ever saw. Then Harding released him with a kick, and he made three howling leaps to an omnibus passing up, and disappeared inside. The impression on the minds of the spectators was that he would not much enjoy his ride; and they no doubt had another impression in which we may fully share, that though vulgarism is "bred in the bone and will come out in the flesh," yet the flogged man would be very careful of the locality in which he again indulged in the same atrocious habit.

All this time the taller girl, though endeavoring to control her emotion, was literally sobbing with shame and anger, while yet half-laughing at the sudden punishment of her persecutor. The other lady had been too much frightened to utter a second exclamation, and neither had paid any attention to the personality of their defenders.

But at this stage of the proceedings, Walter Harding lifted his hat (his hands having been too busy before) and approached the taller lady.

"Miss Harris, if I am not mistaken."

"Harris—that is my name, certainly," said the lady, "and you do not know how much we thank you for your kindness, but—"

"But you don't remember me, eh?" This was said with a smile that brought some new expression to his face, and the wild girl instantly cried:

"Yes, I do remember you—you are—you are—" but she had not yet recovered the name from the mists of forgetfulness, if she remembered the face.

"Walter Harding, merchant, of this city, Miss Josephine, and very glad to meet you again, even under such circumstances."

"Mr. Harding—oh yes, what a crazy head I have!" said the lady, smiles now altogether taking the place of the struggling tears, and giving him both her hands with the freedom of a school-girl—either in acknowledgment of his late service or as an apology for her momentary forgetfulness. "Mr. Harding, of course! Newport—Purgatory—Dumpling Rocks—everywhere—what fish we caught and what a jolly month we had—didn't we? And then to think that I should have forgotten you, even for a moment!"

The explanation of which is, that Walter Lane Harding had met Miss Josephine Harris at Newport, in the summer of 1860, and that they had been much pleased with the society of each other and companions in many a stroll and fishing-excursion. Probably neither believed, when they parted, that two years would elapse without another meeting; but in the great Babel of city life it is only occasionally that we can manage to make ourselves heard by each other, above the clattering of the hammers and the confusion of tongues. Had they been lovers, they would have found each other before, no matter what stood in the way; but friendships, even the warmest, have little of the fierce energy of love, and a very cobweb mesh of circumstances or business engagements can bind the sentiment, while there is no cord spun in the long rope-walk of life, strong enough to fetter the free limbs of the passion. That Walter Harding and Josephine Harris had only met by accident after two years, and yet both living in the same city and moving in the same walk of society—proved that they might have liked but had never loved.

The few passers-by who had collected around the ladies at the time of the insult, had separated when they proved to be in the company of male acquaintances; and in a moment after the recognition between Harding and Joe Harris, the latter had introduced Miss Bell Crawford, the heroine of the cerise ribbon, to both the gentlemen; and she had received an introduction which caused her to start and color singularly the moment their eyes met—to Mr. Tom Leslie, traveler, newspaper-correspondent, Jack-at-all-trades and general good fellow. Was that interested and conscious look repaid by another on the part of Tom Leslie, or had he had sufficient time after seeing the young girl and before speaking to her, to recover from any agitation, pleasurable or the contrary, incident to the meeting? Did they know each other or only something of each other? Had they met before, and if so, when and where? Perhaps some light may be thrown on all these questions, a little later in the progress of this story.

At the present juncture two of the parties were hungry; the third what is called "peckish," which means a little hungry and quite capable of bolting a sandwich or the wing of a cold turkey; and the fourth very much in a hurry and anxious to get away to his business.

"We sent our carriage home, knowing that we could not get through Broadway while the troops were passing," said Bell Crawford, "with orders to have it call for us late in the afternoon, at a friend's house near Union Square. We were just going down to Taylor's for a little lunch, when this awkward affair occurred: may we ask you to join us, gentlemen?"

"Oh yes," said Josephine Harris, with her school-girl pleasure at the proposition ill-concealed. "That will be—yes, well, I may as well say out what I think—that will be jolly."

"As for my friend Leslie here," said Harding, "he has nothing to do, and can certainly ask no greater pleasure than to join you. We were just about separating when we saw you. For myself, I must forego the pleasure, for I have the misfortune to be a busy man, and I must really wish you a hurried good-morning, leaving you in my friend's care."

With a promise to call upon the ladies at his earliest convenience, the young merchant hurried away, with every evidence that his thoughts were intent upon the balance at his banker's and the question whether certain regular customers who were to have called during the morning had been duly impressed by his clerks with the merits of certain choice styles of goods, rapidly on the rise, that he would himself have commended to their particular attention. And yet there are odd mixtures, sometimes, even in the minds of merchants—mixtures in which customers become blended with curls and profits with profiles; for Walter Lane Harding, as he wasted yet one more moment to step into Gilsey's and light a choice Havana, indulged in a train of thought which might have been shaped into words something in the manner following:

"A pretty woman—that Miss Crawford, decidedly ladylike—which the other is not, however pleasant a companion. I should as soon think of falling in love with a handsome bombshell, as with her. No knowing when she might explode. Now if I had met Miss Crawford at Newport two years ago, who knows but affairs might have been different? Heigho!" And so Walter Harding went on to his business; while Tom Leslie, the member of the party who was "peckish," accompanied the two girls, who were decidedly hungry, to that over-gilt and tawdry caricature upon some of the palace-halls of the Old World, known as "Taylor's Saloon."



CHAPTER XI.

SOME REFLECTIONS ON COMPARATIVE CHARACTER—OF HOUSES AS WELL AS MEN—TEMPTATION, AND THE LEGENDS OF THE "LURLEY" AND THE "FROZEN HAND"—A LUNCH AT TAYLOR'S, AND AN ARRANGEMENT.

In the "great day of final assize," when beneath the one unerring Eye and Hand all the drosses of life and circumstance shall be melted away and all the films and disfigurements removed from action and intention,—there will be many things, we have reason to believe, shown in a widely different light from that in which human eyes have looked upon them. Human character will surprise the beholders, if it does not produce the same effect even upon the subject under examination. Many a poor wretch who has been stumbling along through life, unfortunate and apparently guilty, of no seeming use either to himself or the world, will be found to have filled a place of necessity not suspected—to have done much good and very little harm—and to have been acting from motives quite as pure as those that in other hearts have produced such different effects. Many a "good" man will be stripped so bare of the garments woven around him by circumstances or his own self-righteousness, and so many of his best deeds will be proved to have proceeded from selfish, interested and unholy motives, that every success and every word of past approbation will be a reproach, and his naked soul will stand shivering in the chilling breath of God's displeasure.

It is not exactly certain that houses will come to judgment; but if they do, there will be the same marked difference in the estimation in which many of them have been held by the community surrounding them, and the truth of their influence shown in the "sunlight of the eternal morning." Some miserable tenant-house in Bermondsey or the Swamp, overcrowded with human rats, its atmosphere so noisome that fever floated on every breath and the passer-by from Belgravia or Murray Hill put his perfumed handkerchief to his nostrils to escape the deadly infection,—may be found to have been far less injurious to the neighborhood than the corner-house on Park Lane or the double-front of brown stone within the shadow of Dr. Spring's church on Fifth Avenue. Within the one the miserable occupants may have festered in body and rotted in soul—harming only themselves and the physical atmosphere meanwhile, and victims of the horrible aggregation of poverty in great cities; while within the other a maelstrom of pleasant dissipation has been whirling, to which the victims came in their own carriages with full liveries, the waves as they circled sending up jets of cooling spray and redolent of perfumes from the flowers of sunny lands—but continually widening its circle of evil attraction and drawing in those who thenceforth had no power of resistance against the banded demons of wine, of play and of lascivious enjoyment, who lurked beneath the waters, eager for their prey.

The fable of the "Lurline" is the story of human life and temptation; and yet few of the thousands who have read it in the old German legend of the "Lurleiberg" or the charming "Bridal of Belmont" of the author of "Lillian," or who have gazed at it for hours when presented upon the stage in the shape of "Ondine" or the "Naiad Queen,"—have fully realized its significance. To most it has been merely a pretty conceit or an effective spectacle; to the close student it is an absorbing picture of the enthralment of human energies. Sir Huldebrand of Kingstettin is a true as well as a valiant knight, and he has a golden-haired and white-handed ladie-love in the neighboring castle of the Baron of Steinbrunnen. He has a hope, a love, a faith, a duty; and on the day when he fares forth from Kingstettin and takes his way to the river bank, he has mirth as well as all these, for Karl, his merry servant, is beside him. But the day is hot and sultry, and he dismounts from his horse and lies down to sleep beside the Lurleiberg. He has granted himself rest and indulgence. Half in his sleep and half in his waking thought he sees the stream rippling below the banks and circling in pleasant eddies by rock and mossy edge, while the water-lilies nestle down their soft cheeks to the lapping water in the sheltered nooks, and the willows bend down and kiss the stream with the swaying tips of their hundred fingers, and little gleams of golden sunshine steal through the branches and touch the soft ripples here and there with such tints of transparent light as the pencil of painter never mastered. Oh, how deliciously sweet and dreamy is that half wakeful feeling of repose and indulgence! And then the music rises—gentle and almost undistinguishable at first from the singing ripple of the water—then clearer and more distinct, but with still a tinkling ripple in every cadence, and the name of the listener insensibly blended. Flattery has come with indulgence, and the subtle wine of its intoxication is mounting to his brain. Then he turns dreamily on his couch of moss, and looks over the bank into the river. Above the water white hands are circling and snowy bosoms are gleaming, and in the midst is one form of matchless rounded beauty, with a face of angelic splendor, her eye-lids gemmed with the tear-drops of an awakened affection, and her waved brown hair caressed by the tide as it sweeps backward. All the white hands are beckoning to him, and all the coral lips are uttering those low musical words in which his name is blended. The brain of the knight grows dizzy—chains of which he only feels a pleasure in the slight pressure, twine around his limbs. Voluptuous enjoyment takes the place of energy—he is himself no longer. He cannot even laugh—he can only sigh—Karl has gone chasing some Lurline of his own, far down the meadow. Ermengarde, who has been for hours leaning out of the high window at Steinbrunnen, and looking anxiously for her expected lover—is nothing to him now. His promised aid to Sir Rudolph to-morrow, with helm on brow and lance in rest, against the invader who threatens the lands of both with ravage, is nothing to him now. Love and duty are alike forgotten. The temptation has done its full work through indolence and indulgence, and the knight is lost. The brown-haired Lurline is worth all earth and heaven. Let all the rest go, without a sigh or a regret—be his the murmur of the river, the delicious music embodying his name, and the beckoning of the white hands towards him! He does not leap into the water, as some have held: he merely bends nearer to the verge, then slips down with eager eyes and outstretched hands; the white arms twine around him; the music sounds for one moment more sweetly but more sadly than ever, as the waves close above the pair so unholily wedded; then the ripples sing on and all is quiet beauty as before—calm and quiet beauty, as if no tomb had closed above the energies of a human soul.

Sir Huldebrand may come back again, after a time, as the legend is fond of making him do. He may even marry the golden-haired Ermengarde and sire children to heir his lands and perpetuate his name. But the knight is himself a wreck, with all his best energies burnt out in those weird orgies beneath the water; and his bridal vow is a hollow one, for when he utters it he hears the shriek of the Lurline blending with the wedding music, and his nightly couch is to be henceforth a torture of unrest—his ride by day a mere hopeless fleeing from the ghosts of dead pleasures.

Something of the same character is that other wild legend which has grown into song and drama—sprung from the Norse branch of the great German mind,—that of the "Ice Witch" or the "Frozen Hand." Here the Viking Harold is less wrecked by temptation than by circumstance; but the result of the enthralment is the same. The ice of the Pole closes around him with the same fatality as the waters of the Rhine around his brother and prototype. Surrounded by the white arms of Hecla in her palace of ice, he ceases to lament the bride who is awaiting him in the far South; and he has not even a thought of regret to cast towards his perished companions and the stout ship that once bore him so proudly, her brown ribs now bleaching whitely on the Arctic shore. He too returns, after a long period, but he brings with him the fatal gift of his Northern bride—a hand of ice. He may be strong and brave still, as he was when he went away; but he is no longer the peerless and envied warrior. Men look upon him with a ghostly shudder, and women shrink back from his chilling presence. Not even Freja can thaw away all the ice that has gathered in his veins. He may chastise the robber Ruric from the hills, and sleep once more in the warm embrace of Isoldane; but who knows that at some midnight hour the old curse may not return upon him and the hand he stretches in love and fondness strike death to the hearts that are dearest? Not the same—changed, changed—as is every man who has once yielded to the great temptation of his existence.

All this, which may be purely irrelevant matter, has grown out of a visit paid by some of the characters in this narration, to a fashionable restaurant and saloon on Broadway, and the belief that in some of those houses temptation is lurking in so insidious and deadly a form that they are doing a thousand times the injury inflicted by the acknowledged haunts of vice. Special allusion may or may not be made to the gorgeous but tawdry room in which the three sat down to discuss their a la mode beef, coffee and biscuits. Any one of the fashionable houses to which ladies habitually resort without male protection, for a noonday lunch when shopping,—may serve as a type of all the rest; and not one of them but may be passed with a shudder, by husbands who wish their wives to remain like Cesar's, not only chaste but above suspicion,—and by fathers who do not desire the peach-bloom too early rubbed off from the innocence of their fair daughters.

At this marble table, where the cloth is being so carefully spread by the white-napkined waiter who has a steaming cluster of dishes on a salver on the table opposite,—there may be a little party, like that of our three friends, dropped in on the most proper of errands—that of merely procuring a bit of lunch in the midst of a day of business, without going home for it or visiting the table d'hote at a hotel; but at the next table and the next there is something different. Here sit a party of three giddy girls, without male protection, innocent enough in their lives and intentions, but boldly exposing their faces to the rude gaze of any of the libertine diners-out who may happen to be at the tables opposite, and returning that gaze, when met, with a smile and a simper that merely means scorn and self-confidence but may be easily construed into a less creditable expression. And at this table, only two removed, discussing a pate de foix gras which may or may not have come from Strasburg of the Big Goose Livers, and washing down his edibles with a glass of liqueur that fires the blood like so much molten lava,—sits a boldfaced man, fashionable in dress and perfumed in hair and whiskers, whose gaze is that of the evil eye upon the reputation of any woman, and who has no better occupation than lounging in any place of public resort, to spy out the beauties of female face and figure and the weaknesses in the fortifications that surround female virtue. And here—at one of the opposite row of tables, her cup of coffee and plate of French trifles in pasty just being set down before her—here is a sadder spectacle than either. The wife of a wealthy merchant, yet young, beautiful and attractive, but with a frightened look in her dark eye and a nervous glancing round at the door every time it opens, which too well reveals her story to the close observer. She is waiting for her lover—harsh word in that connection, but the true and only one; her lover, whose acquaintance she may have made through unforbidden glances in this very room, and whom she has permitted to approach her, slowly but surely, as the serpent stole upon Eve in Eden, until she has fallen completely into his power, losing honor, self-respect, everything that a true wife most values, and probably supporting the wretch in a course of gambling and dissipation, with money wrung on one pitiable pretext or other from the grudging hand of her betrayed husband.

It is enough!—let the curtain fall. But oh, heart of man, put up the prayer that other and holier lips once uttered: "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil!" And may not the houses indeed come into judgment?

We have no concern whatever with the pleasant small-talk which floated over the little table at Taylor's, from the lips of Tom Leslie and his two female companions; nor is there any need to pause at this juncture and remark whether the strange glance of Josephine Harris on being introduced to the young man on the street, was repeated or returned. The trio seemed to be a very happy one, Miss Bell Crawford a little starched at first towards a man who had been flung into her way so ambiguously, but rattle-pated Joe firing off occasional fusillades of odd sayings, and Tom, the prince of preux chevaliers, falling into the position of an old acquaintance with marvellous rapidity. Their lunch was nearly over, when the mischievous face of Joe, who had been making running comments upon some of the people on the other side of the room, good-naturedly wicked if not complimentary—lit up with a conceit which set her hazel-gray eyes laughing away down to the depths of her brain. At the same moment the quick eyes of Bell Crawford saw that the hand of the merry girl was rummaging in her pocket, and her face became anxious. Before the latter could speak, however, the hand of Joe came out with the treasure she had been seeking—a torn half column, or less, of the Herald. The moment Miss Crawford saw the slip, her anxiety seemed to be redoubled, and she reached over to Joe, as if to take the paper, with the words, half-pleading, half-pettish:

"Don't, Joe—pray don't!"

"Oh, but I must!" said the mischievous girl, taking care that her companion should not reach the slip. "I cannot think of throwing away such an excellent opportunity. I say, Mr. Leslie, you are not an unscrupulous destroyer of female innocence—one of those dreadful fellows we read about in the books, are you?"

"Oh, Joe, I am ashamed of you!" said Bell Crawford, and she lay back in her chair, very near to a fit of the sulks.

"Really," said Tom Leslie, blushing a little in spite of himself, though without knowing precisely why—"really, Miss Harris, I am afraid I am not the best of men, but I hope I do not deserve any such terrible appellation."

"There, I told you so, Bell, I knew he wasn't!" went on the wild girl, as if she had been asking a solemn question and receiving a conclusive answer. "We can trust him—he says we can, and I am going to put him to the test at once. Suppose, Mr. Leslie, that a couple of distressed damsels—"

"What a ninny you are making of yourself!" put in Miss Crawford, in a tone not very far from earnest.

"Suppose that a couple of distressed damsels," Josephine Harris went on, without heeding her in the least, "about to pass through a gloomy and desolate wood, on the way to an enchanted castle, should appeal to you to accompany them and give them the benefit of your courage and your—yes, your respectability, in the adventure; would you go with them, even if you were obliged to abandon a game of billiards and forfeit the smoking of two cigars for that purpose?" and she threw herself back in her chair, screwed her face into the expression supposed to belong to a grand inquisitor, and waited for a reply.

"I would do my devoir like a true knight," said Leslie, making a mock bow over the table, with his hand on his heart, "even if I forfeited thereby not only two cigars but four and the playing of two whole games of billiards."

"Generous knight!" said Joe, still preserving her melodramatic tone, "we trust you—we enlist you into our service, 'for three years or during the war!' Read!" and she solemnly handed over the slip of paper, on which Leslie perceived the following advertisement, marked around with black crayon, and under the general head of "Astrology":—

"THE STARS HAVE SAID IT! MADAME ELISE BOUTELL, from Paris, whom the stars favor and to whom the secrets of the unknown world are revealed, may be consulted on any of the great events of life, at No. — Prince Street, near the Bowery, every day, between 10 A.M. and 6 P.M. Let ignorance be banished, and let the light of the world unknown dawn on the darkened minds. Persons who attempt deception in visiting Madame Boutell, will find all disguise unavailing; but all confidences are safe, as strict secrecy is observed."

"Well?" added Leslie, looking up inquiringly, after reading the mysterious announcement.

"Well?" said the mad girl, mimicking him. "Is that all the effect it produces upon you? Do your knees not shake and does not your hair start up on end when you think of it, so that your hat—if your hat was not unfortunately hung upon the hook yonder, would require to be held on by main force?"

"How can you be so absurd?" suggested Bell, who really feared that the pronounced behaviour of her friend might draw too much attention to their table, as there was indeed some danger of its doing.

"Bah!" said Joe, "I couldn't be absurd! I was 'never absurd in my life,' as Sir Harcourt Courtley says. But Mr. Leslie!—what have I said? You look pale—ill!" and the face of the young girl tamed instantly to an expression of genuine alarm, not at all unwarranted by the circumstances. The face of Tom Leslie had indeed undergone a sudden change. His usual ruddy cheek seemed ghastly white, his eyes stared glassily, and there was a quick convulsive shiver running over his frame which did not escape the notice of either of his two companions. The kind heart of Josephine Harris at once hit upon a solution for the otherwise strange spectacle. She had said some awkward word—touched some hidden and painful chord connected with past suffering or experience; and she felt like having her tongue extracted at the root for the commission of such a blunder.

What was the cause of this sudden emotion? The explanation may not be so difficult to any thoughtful reader of this story as it was to the two young girls who sought it. Tom Leslie had merely read over the mendacious advertisement, at first, with the same indifference given to thousands of corresponding humbugs; and at the first reading he had not noticed the place at all. At the second reading, his mind took in the direction: "No. — Prince Street, near Bowery," and at the same moment he comprehended the words, "Madame Elise Boutell, from Paris." Tom Leslie was every thing else than a coward; and yet he had shuddered before at the sight and the memory of the "red woman:" he whitened and shuddered now. What if another meeting with that mysterious woman was at hand?—if the scenes of the Rue la Reynie Ogniard were about to be re-enacted? The French name and the words "from Paris," the place, which seemed to him undoubtedly the same of his adventure with Harding—all made up a presumption of identity that was for the moment overwhelming.

But those who show surprise or emotion quickest are not slowest to recover from its effects. Whatever he felt, nothing more was to be shown the two ladies. Reaching for a glass of ice-water standing upon the table, Leslie drank the whole of it off at a draught, and the electric shock at once restored the tone to his system and brought back the red blood to his face. With a laugh he said:

"I really beg ten thousand pardons for alarming you, but these slight attacks are constitutional, and they need not cause the least fear. That is over, and I am as well as ever. What was it you were saying, Miss Harris?"

"Thank heaven that you are better!" said the kind-hearted girl. "I was really for the instant apprehensive that something I had said might have awakened some painful recollection. I was trying to get you, at that moment, to understand the terrible significance of this advertisement."

"Well," said Leslie, laughing, "what am I to understand? That you have been testing the skill of this seeress, or that you are about to do so?"

"There you go!" said Joe Harris. "Now you are on the other side of the fence! Excuse my similes, but I have not always been cooped up in this humdrum city—I occasionally pay visits to the country. A moment ago you grew pale at the name of the mighty Madame Boutell, whose cognomen sounds a good deal like the Yankee 'doo tell!' I admit; and now you are laughing at her!" The young girl had by this time recovered from her good-natured anxiety and regained her habitual vivacity, and she rattled on to the great edification of her auditors, and happily without attracting any additional notice from the people at the other tables. "Yes, sir, Miss Crawford and myself are about to consult this modest exponent of the mysteries of the stars, though about what we have not the least idea. I have not, at least; have you, Bell?"

"Not the ghost of an idea," was the answer of Miss Crawford.

"Ghost is good, in that connection," rattled on the gay girl. "You see I have never yet consulted a fortune-teller, and I am afraid I shall soon be too old to do it to advantage. I lost my faith in Santa Claus, a good many years ago, and long before my stocking was too big to hang up; and I cried over the discovery for a fortnight. Suppose I should lose my faith in fortune-telling before I ever had any experience in that direction—wouldn't it be dreadful?"

"But why this lady in particular?" asked Leslie, who was at the moment studying a theme which no man knows more about to-day than was known in the days of Aristotle—that of chances and coincidences.

"Oh," said Joe, fumbling in her pocket for other slips, and drawing them out and exhibiting them with great gravity, to the infinite amusement at least of Leslie. "Oh, I have been preparing myself, and found the best. Here is a 'Madame R.,' who has 'just arrived in the city and taken a room at No. 7 Pickle Place.' That would never do, you see. 'Taken a room' is too suggestive of limited accommodations and no carpet on a very dirty stair. Then here is another, in which 'Madame Francena Guessberg' promises to 'give information about absent friends' and to 'show the faces of future husbands.' Most of my friends who are absent I never wish to hear of again; and as to the husbands, I shall see them all soon enough, if not too soon."

"Hem!" said Leslie, though scarcely knowing why he made that comment.

"That is all," continued the wild girl. "All the rest are insignificant or impossible, except—no, here is one who promises to 'call names.' Now if there is any thing in the world that I don't like except when I do it myself, it is 'calling names.' And now see Madame Boutell. There is nothing of the petty or the insignificant about her. She has the 'stars' at command, and is about to open the 'unknown world.' She is the woman, of course! Knows all about the 'great events' of life. Can't be humbugged, and keeps a secret as a steel-trap holds a rat. And now, will you go with us, and protect us, and—Mr. Harding said you were a newspaper man,—will you take down a full, true and circumstantial account of all that occurs? That is what I have been trying to get at for this quarter of an hour. Will you go with us?"

"You are going to-day, then?" asked Leslie.

"Miss Harris insisted upon my accompanying her, and I half consented to do so," said Miss Bell Crawford, apologetically.

"Fiddlestick!" said the merry riddle. "Don't try to beg out of it, Miss Bell! She sent her carriage home, Mr. Leslie, so that we need not be seen going there with it; and there we were going, two lovely and unprotected females, when providence raised up a champion in the person of our new friend."

"Who hopes yet to be an old friend, and who will go with you, with the greatest pleasure," said Leslie. "At the same time"—reflecting a moment—"at the same time I must be as prudent about myself, for certain reasons, which I will explain some day if you wish it—as Miss Crawford has been about her carriage. Oblige me by remaining at the table here and trifling with some creams, chocolate and a few bon-bons, while I leave you for a few minutes—not more than fifteen or twenty. At the end of that time I shall be ready to accompany you."

Giving the necessary orders and throwing a bill to the waiter, Tom Leslie passed rapidly out into the street and walked quite as rapidly up Broadway, until he turned again down Broome Street, which he had quitted with Harding but a little while before. Had he more to do with the Police?



CHAPTER XII.

FORTUNE-TELLING AND OTHER SUPERSTITIONS—THE EVERY-DAY OMENS THAT WE HALF BELIEVE—ORIGINS OF THIS WEAKNESS—FORTUNE-TELLERS OF NEW YORK, BOSTON AND WASHINGTON.

While Tom Leslie has gone around to Broome Street on his undeclared errand, and while the ladies are making an excuse to while away the time until his return, in the discussion of the after-dinner provocatives to indigestion recommended, let us enter a little more closely upon a subject merely indicated in the foregoing chapter, and then sneered at by at least one of the conversationists—that of the fortune-telling imposition which so largely prevails, especially in the great cities, and the general course of human superstition in connection with it.

It may be set down, as a general principle, that every man is more or less superstitious—that is, impressed with ideas and omens which go beyond the material world and bid utter defiance to reason. Every woman is certainly so. It is not less undeniable, meanwhile, that nearly every man and woman denies this fact of their natures and considers the mere allegation to be an insult. Oftenest from the fear of ridicule, but sometimes, no doubt, because any discussion of the matter is deemed improper,—few acknowledge this peculiarity of nature, even to their most intimate friends: some, who must be aware that they possess it, deny it even to themselves. The subject is set down as contraband, universally, unless when the weakness of a third party is to be ridiculed, or a personal freedom from the superstition asserted; and yet this very silence and the boasting are both suspicious. No man boasts so much over his own wealth as he who has little or none; and no man is so silent, except under the influence of great excitement, as he who has a great thought oppressing him or a great fear continually tugging at his heart-strings. The most hopeless disbelievers in the Divine Being, that can possibly be met, are those who seldom or never enter into a controversy on the subject; and the least assured is he who oftenest enters into controversy, perhaps for the purpose of strengthening his own belief. There are Captain Barecolts, of course, who go bravely into battle after venting boasts that seem to stamp them as arrant cowards, and who come out of the conflict with stories staggering all human comprehension; but these cases are rare, and they do not go beyond the requisite number of exceptions to justify the rule.

Perhaps the most general of the ordinary superstitions of the country is the indefinable impression that the catching a first sight of the new moon over the right shoulder ensures good fortune in the ensuing month, while a first glance of it over the left is correspondingly unlucky. (It may be said, in a parenthesis, that the fast phrase, "over the left," so prevalent during the past few years, to indicate the reverse of what has just been spoken, has its derivation from the impression that such an untoward sinister glance may neutralize all effort and bring notable misfortune.) Of a hundred men interrogated on this point, ninety-five will assert that they hold no such superstition, and that they have never even thought of the direction in which they first saw the new moon of any particular month. And yet of that ninety-five, the chances are that ninety are in the habit of taking precautions to meet the young crescent in the proper or lucky manner, or of indulging in a slight shudder or feeling of unpleasantness when they realize that they have accidentally blundered into the opposite.

Next in prevalence to this, may be cited the superstition that any pointed article, as a knife, a pin, or a pair of scissors, falling accidentally from the hand and sticking direct in the floor or the carpet, indicates the coming of visitors during the same day, to the house in which the omen occurred. Hundreds and even thousands of housewives, not only the ignorant but the more intelligent, immediately upon witnessing or being informed of such an important event, make preparation, on the part of themselves and their households, if any are felt to be necessary, for the reception of the visitors who are sure to arrive within the time indicated by the omen. Some, but not so many, add to this the superstition that the involuntary twitching of the eye-lid or itching of the eyebrow indicates the coming of visitors in the same manner; and many a projected absence from the house is deferred by our good ladies, from one or another of these omens and the impression that by absence at that particular time they may lose the opportunity of seeing valued friends.

Next in generality, if not even entitled to precedence of the last, is the superstition that the gift of a knife or any sharp article of cutlery, is almost certain to produce estrangement between the giver and the receiver—in other words, to "cut friendship." Ridiculous as the superstition may appear, there is scarcely one of either sex who does not pay some respect to it; and of one thousand knives that may happen to be transferred between intimate friends (and lovers) it is safe to say that not less than nine hundred and ninety have the omen guarded against by a half playful demand and acceptance of some small coin in return, giving the transfer some slight fiction of being a mercantile transaction. The statistics of how many loves or friendships have really been severed by non-attention to this important precaution, might be somewhat difficult to compile, and the attempt need not be made in this connection.

Thousands of musically inclined young ladies have serious objections to singing before breakfast, quoting, not altogether jocularly, the proverb that "one who sings before breakfast will cry [weep] before night," which no doubt had its origin in a proverb derived from the Orientals, that that—

"The bird which singeth in the early morn, Ere night by cruel talons will be torn."

Not less unaccountable, and yet impressive, are some of the superstitions connected with marriage, death, and the departure of friends. A belief very generally prevails that when a couple enter a church to be married, if the bride steps at all in advance of the bridegroom, he will be found an unwilling and unfaithful husband; while if the opposite should happen to be the order of precedence, even by a few inches, the marriage tie will prove a happy and long-enduring one. The belief that the bridal hour should occur during clear weather, is perhaps a natural one, and derived from well-understood natural laws affecting the physical systems of those entering into such intimate relations; but the superstition goes further and considers sunshine on the bridal day a specific against all the possible ills of matrimonial life. This feeling supplies half of a doggrel couplet which came to us from the Saxons, and which blends marriage and burial somewhat singularly:—

"Happy is the bride that the sun shines on; And blessed is the corpse that the rain rains on."

There are thousands of persons who have objections to counting the number of carriages at a funeral, from the superstition that the one who does so will very soon be called to attend a funeral at home; and the same objection exists to putting on, even for a moment, any portion of a mourning garb worn by another, under the impression that the temporary wearer will in some way be influenced to wear mourning very soon for some lost relative. No doubt fifty other and similar superstitions connected with death and burial might be adduced, even without alluding to those of more frightful import and now very little regarded, which belong more peculiarly to the Eastern world, and which inculcate the leaving open of a window at the moment of death, to allow the unrestrained flight of the passing soul, and reprobate the leaving of any open vessel of water in the vicinity of the death-chamber, in the fear that the disembodied spirit, yet weak and untried of wing, may fall therein and perish!

One more superstition, connected with the departure of friends, must be noted—the more peculiarly as there is a sad beauty in the thought. Very many nervous and excitable people fear to look after those who are going away on long journeys or dangerous enterprises, under the fear that such a look after them may prevent their return. One peculiar instance of the indulgence of this superstition, and its apparent fulfilment, happens to have fallen under notice, during the present struggle. When the President's first call for volunteers was made, among those who responded was one young lad of eighteen, a mere handsome boy in appearance and altogether delicate in constitution, who left a comfortable position to fulfil what he believed to be a stern duty. He had two female cousins, of nearly his own age, and with whom he had been in close intimacy. Going away hurriedly, with little time to bestow on farewells, he called to bid them good-bye one dark and threatening night. Some tears of emotion were shed, and the sad farewell was spoken. When he passed down the walk, both the cousins stood without the door and watched his figure as it grew dimmer and disappeared in the dusk of the distant street. When they returned to the cheerfulness of the lighted room, the younger burst into tears.

"We have doomed him," she said. "We watched him when he went away, and looked after him as long as he could be seen. He will never come back. His young life will fade out and disappear, just as we saw him fading away in the darkness."

A month later the young soldier was dead; and something more than ordinary reasoning will be necessary to persuade the two cousins—the younger and more impressive, especially—that their gazing after him did not cast an evil omen on his fate and a blight upon his life. Another near relative has since gone away on the same patriotic errand; but when the farewells were spoken in the lighted room, the two girls escaped at once and hid themselves in another apartment, so that they should not even see him disappear through the door. When last heard from,[10] fever and bullet had yet spared him; and what more is needed to make the two young girls hopelessly superstitious for life, at least in this one regard? They are not the only persons who have seen and felt that fading out in the darkness as an omen; for the same observer who once stood on the bluff at Long Branch, as a heavy night of storm was closing, and saw the "Star of the West" gradually fade away and disappear into that threatening storm and darkness—unconscious that she was to emerge again to play so important a part in the drama of the nation's degradation,—the same observer saw the same omen at Niblo's not long ago, when the poor Jewess of Miss Bateman's wonderful "Leah" fell back step by step into the crowd, as the curtain was dropping, her last hope withered and her last duty done, and nothing remaining but to "follow on with my people."

[Footnote 10: February 1st, 1863.]

And at all such times Proserpine comes back, as she may have cast wistful glances towards the vanishing home of her childhood, when the rude hands of the ravishers were bearing her away from the spot where she was gathering flowers in the vale of Enna; and we think of Orpheus taking that fatal, wistful last look back at Eurydice, with the thought in his eyes that could not give her up even for a moment, when emerging to the outer air from the flames and smoke of Tartarus. Wistful glances back at all we have lost are embodied; and all these long, agonizing appeals of the eye against that fate of separation which cannot be longer combated with tongue or hand, are made over again for our torture.

It has been said that some persons endeavor to deceive themselves with reference to their holding any belief in omens and auguries. And some of those who by position and education should be lifted above gross errors, are quite as liable as others to this self-deception. Quite a large circle of prominent persons may remember an instance in which a leading Doctor of Divinity, renowned for his strong common-sense as well as beloved for his goodness, was joining in a general conversation on human traits and oddities, when one of the company alluded to popular superstitions and acknowledged that he had one, though only one—that of the "moon over the shoulder." Another confessed to another, and still another to another, while the Doctor "pished" and "pshawed" at each until he made him heartily ashamed of his confession. The man of the lunar tendencies, however, had a habit of bearding lions, clerical as well as other, and he at last turned on the Doctor.

"Do you mean to say that you have no superstitions whatever, Doctor?" he asked.

"None whatever," said the Doctor, confidently.

"You have no confidence in supernatural revelations in any relation of life?" pursued the questioner.

"None whatever," repeated the Doctor.

"And you never act—try, now, if you please, to remember—you never act under impression from any omen that does not appeal to reason, or are made more or less comfortable by the existence of one? In other words, is there no occurrence that ever induces you to alter your course of action, when that occurrence has nothing whatever to do with the object in view, and when you can give no such explanation to yourself as you would like to give to the outside world, for the feeling or the change?"

"There is nothing of the kind," replied the Doctor to this long question. Then he suddenly seemed to remember—paused, and colored a little as he went on. "I acknowledge my error, gentlemen," he said. "I have a superstition, though I never before thought of it in the light of one. I am rendered exceedingly uncomfortable, and almost ready to turn back, if a cat, dog or other animal chances to run across the way before me, at the moment when I am starting upon any journey."

The laugh which began to run round the company was politely smothered in compliment to the good Doctor's candor; but the fact of a universal superstition of some description or other was considered to be very prettily established.

But the conversation did not end here; and one who had before borne little part in it—a man of some distinction in literary as well as political life,—was drawn out by what had occurred, to make a statement with reference to himself which exhibited another phenomenon in supernaturalist belief—a man who not only had a superstition and acknowledged it, but could give a reason for holding it.

"Humph!" he said, "some of you have superstitions and acknowledge them without showing that you have any grounds for your belief; and the Doctor, who has also a superstition, does not seem to have been aware of it before. Now I am a believer in the supernatural, and I have had cause to be so."

"Indeed I and how?" asked some member of the company.

"As thus," answered the believer. "And I will tell you the story as briefly as I can and still make it intelligible,—from the fact that a severe head-ache is the inevitable penalty of telling it at all. I resided in a country section of a neighboring State, some twenty years-ago; and about three miles distant, in another little hamlet of a dozen or two houses, lived the young lady to whom I was engaged to be married. My Sundays were idle ones, and as I was busy most of the week, I generally spent the afternoon of each Sunday, and sometimes the whole of the day, at the house of my expectant bride, whom I will call Gertrude for the occasion. I kept no horse, and habitually walked over to the village. I had never ridden over, let it be borne in mind, as that is a point of interest. I very seldom rode anywhere, and Gertrude had never seen me on horseback.

"It happened, as I came out from my place of boarding, one fine Sunday afternoon in mid-winter, that one of the neighbors, who kept a number of fine horses, was bringing a couple of them out for exercise. They were very restive, and he complained that they stood still too much and needed to have the spirit taken out of them a little. I laughingly replied that if he would saddle one, I would do him that favor; and he threw the saddle on a very fast running-mare, and mounted me. Accordingly, and of course from what appeared a mere accident, I rode over to the place of my destination.

"There was a small stable behind the house occupied by the family of my betrothed, across a little garden-lot, and I rode round the house without dismounting, to care for my horse. As I passed the house, I saw Gertrude standing at the door, and looking frightfully ill and pale. I hurried to the stables, threw the saddle from my horse, and returned instantly to the house. Gertrude met me at the door, threw herself into my arms (a demonstration not habitual) and sobbed herself almost into hysterics and insensibility. I succeeded in calming her a little, and she then informed me of the cause of her behavior. She was frightened to death at seeing me come on horseback; and the reason she gave for this was that the night before she had dreamed that I came on horseback—that her brother, a young man in mercantile business a few miles away, also came on horseback (his usual habit)—and that while her brother and myself were riding rapidly together, I was thrown and his horse dashed out my brains with his hoofs!

"Here was a pleasant omen, or would have been to a believer in the supernatural; but I belonged to the opposite extreme. I laughed at Gertrude's fears, and finally succeeded in driving them away, though with great difficulty, by the information that her brother had gone West the day before and could not possibly be riding around in this section, seeking my life with a horse-shoe. She was staggered but not satisfied—I could see that fact in her eye. Still she shook off the apparent feeling, and we joined the family. Half an hour after, her brother rode up and stabled his horse—he having been accidentally prevented leaving for the West as arranged. At this new confirmation of her fears, very flattering to me but very inconvenient, Gertrude fell into another fit of frightened hysterics; nothing being said to any of the members of the family, however. I succeeded in chasing away this second attack, with a few more kisses and a little less scolding than before. With the lady again apparently pacified, we rejoined the company, and the evening passed in music and conversation. The shadow did not entirely leave the face of Gertrude, and she watched me continually. For myself, I had no thought whatever on the subject, except sorrow for her painful hallucination.

"At about ten o'clock, the brother rose to go for his horse, and I accompanied him to look after mine but not to go home, for the "courting" hours—the dearest of all—were yet to come. At the stable, as he was mounting, we talked of the speed of his horse and of the one I rode; and he bantered me to mount and ride with him a mile. There was a splendid stretch of smooth road for a couple of miles on his way, and without a moment's thought of Gertrude I threw the saddle on my horse and rode away with him, the people at the house being altogether unaware that I had gone farther than to the stables.

"I have no idea what set us to horse-racing on that Sunday night; but race we did. Both horses had good foot and the road was excellent, though the night was dusky. Before we had gone half a mile we were going at top speed. When we reached the end of the hard road he was a little ahead, and I banteringly called to him to 'repeat.' He wheeled at once, and away we went like the wind. From turning behind, I had a little the start, and kept it. Perhaps we were fifty yards from the house, when my mare stepped on a stone, as I suppose, and went down, throwing me clear of the stirrups, up in the air like a rocket, and down on my head like a spile-driver. I of course lay insensible with a crushed skull; and the brother was so near behind and going at such speed that he could not have stopped, even if he had known what was the matter.

"Noise—lights—confusion. Gertrude bending over me in hysteric screams—so they told me afterwards. Part of the hair was gone from one side of my head, dashed off by the foot of the brother's horse, that had just thus narrowly missed dashing out my few brains. That is all, gentlemen. The dream-prophecy was fulfilled within that hair's-breadth (excuse the bad pun), by a succession of circumstances that were not arranged by human motion and could not have been expected from anything in the past; and until some one can explain or reason away the coincidence, I shall not give up my belief that dreams are sometimes revelations."

Perhaps it is idle to enter upon any speculations as to the origin of these superstitions in the human mind; as they may almost be held to be a part of nature, having a corresponding development in all countries and all ages. Some of the worst and most injurious of superstitions—those which involve the supposed presence of the dead, of haunting spectres and evil spirits, destroying the nerves and paralyzing the whole system—unquestionably have much of their origin in the "bug-a-boo" falsehoods told to children by foolish mothers and careless nurses, to frighten them into "being good." Thousands of men as well as women never recover from the effects of these crimes against the credulous faith of childhood—for they are no less. Then there are particular passages in our literature, sacred and profane, which do their share at-upholding the belief in the supernatural, especially as connected with the uninspired foretelling of future events—"fortune-telling." The case of the Witch of Endor and her invocation of the spirit of Samuel, which is given in Holy Writ as an actual occurrence and no fable, of course takes precedence of all others in influence; and the superstitious man who is also a religionist, always has the one unanswerable reply ready for any one who attempts to reason away the idea of occult knowledge: "Ah, but the Witch of Endor: what will you do with her? If the Bible is true—and you would not like to doubt that—she was a wicked woman, not susceptible to prophetic influences, and yet she did foretell the future and bring up the spirits of the dead. If this was possible then, why not now?"

From the church we pass to the theatre, and from the Book of all Books to that which nearest follows it in the sublimity of its wisdom—Shakspeare. No one doubts "Hamlet" much more than the First Book of Samuel, and yet the play is altogether a falsehood if there is no revelation made to the Prince of the guilt of his Uncle; and the spiritual character of the revelation is not at all affected by the question whether Hamlet saw or thought he saw the ghost of his murdered father. Again comes "Macbeth," and though we may allow Banquo's ghost to be altogether a diseased fancy of the guilty man's brain, yet the whole story of the temptation is destroyed unless the witches on the blasted heath really make him true prophecies for false purposes. These sublime fancies appeal to our eyes, and through the eyes to our beliefs, night after night and year after year; and if they do not create a superstition in any mind previously clear of the influence, they at least prevent the disabuse of many a mind and preserve from ridicule what would else be contemptible.

It was with reference to fortune-telling especially that this discussion of our predominant superstitions commenced; and this indefensibly episodical chapter must close with a mere suggestion as to the extent to which that imposition is practised in our leading cities. Very few, it may be suspected, know how prevalent is this superstition among us—quite equivalent to the gipsy palmistry of the European countries. Of very late years it has principally become "spiritualism" and the fortune-tellers are oftener known as "mediums" than by the older appellation; and scarcely one of the impostors but pretends to physic the body as well as cure the soul; but the old leaven runs through all, and all classes have some share in the speculation. Sooty negresses, up dingy stairs, are consulted by ragged specimens of their own color, as to the truth of the allegation that too much familiarity has been exercised by an unauthorized "culled pusson" towards a certain wife or husband,—or as to the availability of a certain combination of numbers in a fifty cent investment at that exciting game known as "policies" or "4-11-44," erewhile the peculiar province of that Honorable gentleman who (more or less) wrote "Fort Lafayette." And, per contra, more pretentious witches (the women have monopolized the trade almost altogether, of late years) are consulted by fair girls who come in their own carriages, as to the truth or availability of a lover or the possibility of recovering lost affections or stolen property. How many of those seeresses are "mediums" for the worst of communications, or how many per centum of the habitues of such places go to eventual ruin, it is not the purpose of this chapter to inquire.

There are three recognized "centres" in the loyal States—each a city, and supposed to be an enlightened one. New York, the commercial, monetary and even military centre; Boston, the literary and intellectual; and Washington, the governmental and diplomatic. Taking up at random the first three dailies of a certain date, at hand—one from each of the three cities—the following regular advertisers are shown, quoting from each of the three "astrology" columns and omitting the directions.

New York: eleven. No. 1.—"Madame Wilson, a bona-fide astrologist, that every one can depend on. Tells the object of your visit as soon as you enter; tells of the past, present and future of your life, warns you of danger, and brings success out of the most perilous undertakings. N.B.—Celebrated magic charms." No. 2.—"Madame Morrow, seventh daughter, has foresight to tell how soon and how often you marry, and all you wish to know, even your thoughts, or no pay. Lucky charms free. Her magic image is now in full operation." No. 3.—"The Gipsey Woman has just arrived. If you wish to know all the secrets of your past and future life, the knowledge of which will save you years of sorrow and care, don't fail to consult the palmist." No. 4.—"Cora A. Seaman, independent clairvoyant, consults on all subjects, both medical and business; detects diseases of all kinds and prescribes remedies; gives invaluable advice on all matters of life." No. 5.—"Madame Ray is the best clairvoyant and astrologist in the city. She tells your very thoughts, gives lucky numbers, and causes speedy marriages." No. 6.—"Madame Clifford, the greatest living American clairvoyant. Detects diseases, prescribes remedies, finds absent friends, and communes clairvoyantly with persons in the army." No. 7.—"Madame Estelle, seventh daughter, can be consulted on love, marriage, sickness, losses, business, lucky numbers and charms. Satisfaction guaranteed." No. 8.—"Mrs. Addie Banker, medical and business clairvoyant, successfully treats all diseases, consults on business, and gives invaluable advice on all matters of life." No. 9.—"Who has not heard of the celebrated Madame Prewster, who can be consulted with entire satisfaction? She has no equal. She tells the name of future wife or husband—also that of her visitor." No. 10.—"The greatest wonder in the world is the accomplished Madame Byron, from Paris, who can be consulted with the strictest confidence on all affairs of life. Restores drunken and unfaithful husbands; has a secret to make you beloved by your heart's idol; and brings together those long separated." No. 11.—"Madame Widger, clairvoyant and gifted Spanish lady; unveils the mysteries of futurity, love, marriage, absent friends, sickness; prescribes medicines for all diseases; tells lucky numbers, property lost or stolen, &c."

Boston: thirteen. No. 1.—"The great astrologer.

"The road to wedlock would you know, Delay not, but to Baron go. A happy marriage, man or maid, May be secured by Baron's aid.

"He will reveal secrets no living mortal ever knew. No charge for causing speedy marriages and showing likenesses of friends." No. 2.—"Astonishing to all I Madame Wright, the celebrated astrologist, born with a natural gift to tell all the events of your life, even your very thoughts and whether you are married or single; how many times you will marry; will show the likeness of your present and future husband and absent friends; will cause speedy marriages; tells the object of your visit. Her equal is not to be found—has astonished thousands by her magic power." No. 3.—"Madame F. Gretzburg will ensure to whoever addresses her, giving the year of their birth and their complexion, a correct written delineation of their character, and a statement of their past, present and future lives. All questions regarding love, marriage, absent friends, business, or any subject within the scope of her clear, discerning spiritual vision, will be promptly and definitely answered ... so far as she with her great and wonderful prophetic and perceptive powers, can see them." No. 4.—"Prof. A.F. Huse, seer and magnetic physician. The Professor's great power of retrovision, his spontaneous and lucid knowledge of one's present life and affairs, and his keen forecasting of one's future career," etc. No. 5.—"Mrs. King will reveal the mysteries of the past, present and future, and describe absent friends, and is very successful in business matters. Also has an article that causes you good luck in any undertaking, whether business or love, and can be sent by mail to any address." No. 6.—"Mrs. Frances, clairvoyant, describes past, present and forthcoming events, and all kinds of business and diseases. Has medicines," etc. No. 7.—"Prof. Lyster, astrologer and botanic physician." No. 8.—"Madame Wilder, the world-renowned fortune-teller and independent clairvoyant ... is prepared to reveal the mysteries of the past, present and future." No. 9.—"Madame Roussell, independent clairvoyant, is prepared to reveal the mysteries of the past, present and future." No. 10.—"Madame Jerome Nurtnay, the celebrated Canadian seeress and natural clairvoyant, ... will reveal the present and future." (This one clairvoyant, it will be observed, has no past.) No. 11.—"Mrs. Yah, clairvoyant and healing medium ... will examine and heal the sick, and also reveal business affairs, describe absent friends, and call names. Has been very successful in recovering stolen property." No. 12.—"Madame Cousin Cannon, the only world-renowned fortune-teller and independent clairvoyant," etc. No. 13.—"Madame Mont ... would like to be patronized by her friends and they public, on the past, present and future events."

Washington: nine. No. 1.—"Madame Ross, doctress and astrologist. Was born with a natural gift—was never known to fail. She can tell your very thoughts, cause speedy marriages, and bring together those long separated." No. 2.—"Mrs. L. Smith, a most excellent test and healing medium sees your living as well as deceased friends, gets names, reads the future." No. 3.—(Here we have the first male name, as well as apparently the most dangerously powerful of all). "Mons. Herbonne, from Paris. Clairvoyant, seer and fortune-teller. Reads the future as well as the past, and has infallible charms. Can cast the horoscope of any soldier about going into battle, and foretell his fate to a certainty." No. 4.—"Madame Bushe, powerful clairvoyant and influencing medium. Has secrets for the obtaining of places desired under government, and love-philters for those who have been unfortunate in their attachments." Nos. 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 differing not materially from those before cited as able to read the past, present and future, rejoin the parted and influence the whole future life.

And here, as by this time Tom Leslie must certainly have accomplished his business in Broome Street, and Joe Harris and Bell Crawford sipped and eaten themselves into an indigestion at Taylor's—this examination of a subject little understood must cease, to allow the three to carry out their projected folly. But really how much have superior education and increasing intelligence done to clear away the grossest of impositions and to discourage the most audacious experiments upon public patience? And yet—what shall be said of the facts—uncolored and undeniable facts—narrated in a subsequent chapter?



CHAPTER XIII.

TEN MINUTES AT A COSTUMER'S—HOW TOM LESLIE GREW SUDDENLY OLD—JOE HARRIS' SPECULATION ON "THOSE EYES"—ANOTHER SURPRISE, AND WHAT FOLLOWED.

Mr. Tom Leslie's visit was not to the Police headquarters in Broome Street, albeit he turned down that street from Broadway when he reached it after leaving the two ladies at Taylor's. He took the other or upper side of the street, and stopped immediately opposite the Police building, at a two-story brick house whereon appeared the name of "R. Williams" in gilt letters, and a little lower, "Ball Costumer," and in the two first floor windows of which, over a basement set apart for the use of persons in need of bad servants and servants in search of worse places—appeared such a collection of distorted human faces that a general execution by the guillotine seemed to have been going on, with all the heads hung up against the glass to dry. The ghastly faces were, in fact, those of papier-mache masks, waiting for customers desirous of a certain amount of personal disfigurement, whether on the stage or in the masked ball; and behind one row of them could be seen the glitter of an imitation coat of mail which looked very much like the real article at a distance, but would have been of about as much use to keep out sword-point or lance-head in the tourneys of the olden time, as so much cobweb or blotting paper.

Within the inner door of the costumer's, which Leslie entered hurriedly, might have been gathered the spoils of all ages and all kingdoms, taking tinsel for gold and stuff for brocade. The robes and mantles of queens hung suspended from the walls, blended here and there with suits of beaded and fringed Indian leather, odd coats and trousers for exaggerated Jonathans, and diamonded garments of motley for clowns. Around on the floor, on two sides of the apartment, lay heaps of garments of all incongruous descriptions, from the court dress of King Charles' time to the tow and homespun of the Southern darkey, as if just tumbled over for examination. A few stage swords and spears and two or three suits of armor of suspicious likeness to block-tin, occupied one of the back corners; while suspended from pegs and arranged upon shelves were false beards, wigs and eyebrows, preposterous noses, Indian head-dresses of feathers, hats of Italian bandits wreathed with greasy ribbons, and crowns and coronets of all apparent values, from that flashing with light which Isabella might have worn when all the gold and gems of Columbus' new world lay at her disposal, to the thin band of gold with one gem in the centre of the front, which some virgin princess might modestly have blushed under on her wedding day. Through the half-open door leading to the adjoining apartment in the rear, still other treasures of costume run mad were discoverable; until the thought was likely to strike the observer that "R. Williams, Costumer," had been the happy recipient of all the cast-off clothes, hirsute as well as sartorial, dropped by half a dozen generations ranging from king to clod-hopper.

A short, dark-whiskered, sallow man came forward as Leslie entered, addressing him by name, with an inquiry after his wishes.

"I want a disguise," said Leslie—"particularly a disguise of the face, and one that can deceive the sharpest of eyes."

The costumer looked at his face for a moment. "I can make you up," he said, "so that your best friend—or what is of more difficulty, the woman who loved you best or hated you worst—wouldn't know you."

"That is it," said Leslie. "Now be quick, like a good fellow, for I have only five minutes."

"You will not need to change your pants, I think," said the costumer. "Throw off your coat—here is one that will button close and hide your vest, and I think you will find it about your size. Yours is a gray—this is a dark brown and rather a genteel garment, and will suit the gray pants."

Leslie threw off his coat and put on the brown substitute, which fitted him very respectably.

"That is enough in the way of clothes, I should think," remarked the costumer, "unless you should be dodging a very sharp woman, or one of Kennedy's men."

"It is a sharp woman I am trying to dodge," said Leslie, with a laugh, "but I think she will know very little about my clothes. The face—the face is the thing! Make me up so that you don't know me—so that I won't know myself—so that my wife, if I had one, would scream for a policeman if I attempted to kiss her."

"Yes, the face—that is what we are coming to," replied the costumer. "You have a moustache already. That we cannot very well cut off, I suppose."

"Not if I know it!" graphically but somewhat inelegantly said Tom, who had one of his many prides hidden away somewhere in the flowing sweep of that ornament to the upper lip.

"Then we must gray it!" said the costumer. "No objection to looking a little older?"

"Make me as old as Dr. Parr or old Galen's head, if you like," was the answer. "Only be quick, for the sauciest and best-looking girl in New York is waiting for me."

"To run away and be married? eh?" asked the costumer, as he went to a shelf and took down a cup of some preparation very like paint, and with it a brush. "None of my business, though! Hold still, and never mind the smell. It will be dry in two minutes, and water will not touch it, but you can clean it out at once with turpentine." He applied the mixture to Leslie's moustache, the member over it being drawn up considerably at times as if the bouquet of one of Hackley's summer gutters was rising; but in less than two minutes, as the costumer had said, the smell ceased, the mixture was dry, and Tom Leslie had a moustache grayish-white enough to have belonged to Sulpizio.

"Beautiful!" said the costumer, handing the subject a small mirror from the wall. "The hair and beard directly. Now for a complexion old enough to suit such a facial ornament." In a moment, he had a small cup of brown paint, with a camel's-hair brush, and was operating on Leslie's forehead and cheeks, artistically throwing in a few wrinkles on the former and neatly executed crows-feet under the eyes, in water-colors that dried as soon as applied. Leslie, by the aid of a glass, saw himself getting old, a little more plainly than most of us recognize the ravages made on our faces by time.

"By George!" he said. "Stop!—hold on!—don't make those crows-feet any plainer, or I shall begin to get weak in the back and shaky in the knees, and you will need to supply me with a cane."

"They will come off easier than the next ones painted there, probably!" commented the philosophical costumer, as he finished painting up his human sign. "And now for the finishing stroke!" He stepped to a drawer, took out a gray full-bottom beard, fitted it neatly to the chin, clasped the springs back of the ears, added to it a gray wig, made easy-fitting by the short hair on the head, and once more handed Leslie the glass.

The young man looked. The last vestige of youth had departed, and he appeared as he might have expected to do thirty years later when he had touched sixty and gone on downward.

"Capital!" he said—"capital! If any man, or woman, knows me behind this disguise, there is some reason beyond nature for their doing so. There—throw me a hat—anything unlike my own—for I have already remained too long. I will see you again some time this evening." Handing the costumer a bill, with the air of one who had taken such accommodations before and knew what they cost, Leslie put on a respectable looking speckled Leghorn hat brought from the back room, took one more glance at his metamorphosis in the glass, and passed hurriedly out into the street and down Broadway towards Taylor's.

To return to that place for a few moments, after Tom Leslie had left it and before he was again heard from.

Josephine Harris sat for perhaps five minutes after the chocolate was brought, toying with the spoon and the cup, a little consciously red in face, and saying never a word—an amount of reticence quite as unusual for her, as ice in summer. Bell Crawford made two or three remarks, and she answered them with "Ah!" and "Humph!" till the other pouted a little sullenly and said no more.