Silver, owing to the lesser amount in existence, and its less convenient portability, is fast being superseded by gold in monetary circles. Of the amount of the precious metals in existence, $8,166,000,000 are furnished by gold; and of their annual product $98,000,000 are furnished by it. The ratio of silver to gold has risen from fifteen and one-half, which it has maintained since 1700, to nineteen and one-half, at the present time, and with a still rising tendency. Owing to the great loss by abrasion of coin the amount of silver in existence has gained but little within the last forty-two years, it having increased but nine per cent, while that of gold has increased three hundred and thirteen per-cent. The price of the precious metals follow the great politico-economic law of supply and demand. Gold, owing to its great demand for international exchanges, has maintained its present price for the last one hundred and sixty years, while silver has declined twenty-two per cent. within thirteen. The prestige enjoyed for centuries, as the instrument and measure of commerce in all the civilized and trading parts of the world, and its normal currency, has been gradually lost since 1843, and will probably never be recovered by silver.

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RAMBLES AMONG MASSACHUSETTS HILLS.

By Atherton P. Mason, M.D.

In the old Bay State there is no elevation of surface that really deserves the name of mountain, but yet some of the more lofty eminences rejoice in this appellation which serves to distinguish them from their lesser brethren, the hills. In this paper, however, let us start on the assumption that all the elevated points in the State that are worthy of having received a name, from Saddle Mountain downwards, are hills. This uniformity of nomenclature surely will not detract from the almost sublime grandeur of Greylock and Wachusett any more than it will enhance the picturesque beauty of Sugar Loaf, or the Blue Hills of Milton.

There are three rather lofty and extensive ranges of hills crossing Massachusetts. The most western of the three is the Taconic range, which is upon the very border of the State. East of this, across a valley several miles wide, is the Hoosac range, which occupies eastern Berkshire and the territory between this almost Alpine county and the winding Connecticut. Still east of this is the hilly belt of country comprising eastern Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden Counties, and the whole of Worcester County, to which range no particular name has been given. The Hoosac and Taconic ranges may be considered as a portion of the great Appalachian system of eastern North America, of which the Green Mountains of Vermont are a continuation; while the third hilly belt may be regarded as a side-show, so to speak, to the main exhibition of nature's mighty upheavals. In this belt Wachusett is by far the grandest elevation, and Worcester County may well be proud of the majestic pile in her midst; but as it has been so recently described in the BAY STATE MONTHLY, nothing need be said of it in this paper.

Scenery, in order to be truly mountainous, must present to the spectator's eye towering peaks, bristling crags and beetling cliffs, overhanging deep ravines and foaming torrents. Such objects rivet the attention and produce a feeling of deep awe and reverence as one gazes upon them and endeavors to contemplate the mighty forces of nature that gave them being. Taking the word in this sense it may truly be said that the scenery of Berkshire County closely approximates to mountainous. In other parts of the State the isolated hills generally present a rounded outline, and with a few exceptions do not inspire those strong emotions which one must necessarily experience while standing like a pigmy among the piled-up, craggy hills of northern Berkshire. Here is found the most lofty elevation in the State—Saddle Mountain—whose summit is three thousand six hundred feet above tide water. Its name originated from the alleged resemblance of its top to a saddle, and is certainly neither poetical nor romantic.

This is true of the majority of the names of our hills, and Professor Edward Hitchcock, in commenting on their uncouthness, concluded his disapproval with a pun worth preserving, by saying, "Fortunately there are some summits in the State yet unnamed. It is to be hoped that men of taste will see to it that neither Tom, nor Toby, nor Bears, nor Rattlesnakes, nor Sugar Loaves shall be Saddled upon them." The highest point of this great mass is appropriately named Greylock on account of its hoary appearance in winter. As the cold increases the line of frostwork creeps down the sides, producing fantastic changes in the aspect of the hill. Saddle Mountain lies near Williamstown and is between the Hoosac and Taconic ranges. It is insulated, being almost entirely surrounded by valleys, and forms a very imposing object in the scenery of that region. It consists essentially of three distinct ridges, separated by two valleys, called respectively the Hopper and the Bellows. Greylock is the middle ridge, and from its lofty summit a grand view can be obtained, and it is much frequented by sight-seers during the summer. To the west is seen the beautiful valley in which nestles Williamstown, with its fine college grounds and buildings, and beyond rises the slope of the Taconic range, stretching from north to south in an almost continuous chain, while to the north-west are the lofty hills beyond the Hudson. The thriving town of North Adams lies in an adjacent valley to the east, and beyond is the Hoosac range. Looking towards the north or south one sees ridge after ridge, rising in constant succession, until the peaks vanish in the distant horizon. It is indeed a sublime sight, and may well inspire feelings of deepest reverence for the Power that controls those mighty forces that produced these everlasting hills.

Though loth to leave this grand pinnacle, we must not tarry longer upon Greylock. Let us now take a trip down the Housatonic valley, close beside the Taconic range. This forms an almost continuous ridge across the State, and its summit is nearly upon the line between our State and New York. There are no peaks of consequence until we get south of Pittsfield. The range is bold and precipitous on its western side, and fine views may be obtained from almost any part of the ridge. The highest point of the old stage road between Pittsfield and Albany affords a good prospect, though a view from an old road between Hancock and Lanesboro is perhaps more striking. On either side are the valleys of the Hudson and Housatonic, the cities of Albany and Pittsfield, the distant Catskills and the Hoosac range. A little south of Pittsfield is a spur from the Taconic range, parting from it at Egremont. The various portions have received different names—the northern being called Lenox Mountain, the middle Stockbridge Mountain, and the southern Tom Ball. The last named is the highest part of the spur, and is located in the township of Alford. The view from Tom Ball is very fine. A perfect panorama of hills, with handsome towns and villages nestling in the valleys, is spread out before the eyes, while the southern horizon is filled by the giant piles in the township of Mount Washington.

Going still further south we find just north-east of Great Barrington a vast mass to which the ugly name of Beartown Mountain was applied by our forefathers. Its altitude is nearly equal to that of the other great hills of Berkshire, but being quite gradual in ascent, and much rounded, does not impress the traveller as much as it might, and there are no peaks from which a good view is obtainable. Just west of this is a hill that deserves mention. It is called Monument Mountain, and was so named because of a great pile of stones found at its southern extremity, and supposed to have been placed there by the aborigines to commemorate some important event. This hill rises only about five hundred feet above the plain, but its eastern side presents an imposing appearance, being an almost perpendicular wall of quartz. From the top there is an excellent view. Saddle Mountain can be seen, and portions of the Green Mountains, while to the west the Catskills, blue and dim in the distance, appear through a depression in the Taconic range. Near the highest part of the cliff a pinnacle of quartz has been parted from the main mass, and forms a tower fifty feet high, called Pulpit Rock. It was standing not long ago, but the frost may have toppled it over ere this.

Before leaving this portion of Berkshire we must visit the township of Mount Washington, near Sheffield. It consists wholly of an immense hill, and the few inhabitants dwell in a valley that is two thousand feet above tide water. This valley is bounded on the west by the Taconic range, which a little farther south rises nearly one thousand feet above the valley, and is there called Alender Mountain, and on the east by an imposing peak, originally called Ball, or Bald, Mountain, but which Professor Hitchcock named Mount Everett, in honor of Edward Everett, at that time Governor of Massachusetts. Mount Washington is not as well known as it should be. Comparatively few people in the State, outside of Berkshire, are even aware that such a town exists. But it would be a delightful place in which to spend a quiet summer. It is cool and healthy, the air is clear and bracing, and the scenery simply superb. The view from Mount Everett fully equals, if it does not surpass, that from Greylock. In whatever direction the spectator looks a most glorious display greets his eyes. Peak rises above peak on all sides, and the blue surfaces of lakes and ponds in the vicinity greatly enhance the beauty of the scene; while the charming valley through which winds the Hoosatonic River stretches far to the north and south.

One more locality must be visited before leaving this Alpine county of Berkshire, and that is Hoosac Mountain. Before the tunnel was completed a stage ran from the east side over the mountain and down into North Adams; so there is a good road all the way over. The walk is by no means difficult, and one feels well repaid for his labor. The road runs quite near the three main shafts that go down to the tunnel beneath. The woody growth is scanty, and hence the view is unobscured the greater part of the way. After reaching the summit the prospect towards the east is especially beautiful. The surface slopes off towards the Connecticut and is dotted with innumerable hills and ridges, among which winds the romantic valley of the Deerfield River. This is but a meagre account of the scenery of Berkshire, than which there is certainly none grander in the State, though in beauty it is inferior to that of the Connecticut valley.

In regard to geological formation it need only be remarked that the Berkshire valleys are almost wholly composed of limestone, and the supply for architectural and agricultural purposes being practically unlimited, will prove a source of great wealth to that region for many years to come. The hills, however, are all composed of quartz, gneiss, talcose slate, or mica slate.

We will now visit the valley of the Connecticut, where is to be found some of the boldest, and by all odds the most beautiful scenery in Massachusetts. The broad and fertile plains through which the river gently flows are, in themselves, charming, but when we add to them the bordering hills, the scene is one of surpassing loveliness.

Between Hadley and Easthampton, the river runs through a gorge in a greenstone ridge nearly one thousand feet high. The portion of the ridge east of the river is called Mount Holyoke, and the portion west of it Mount Tom. This gorge is very interesting because of showing the amount of erosion that can be performed by water in long periods of time. In all probability the bed of the Connecticut was, in remote time, much higher than it is at present, and the river itself much larger, and the rich, alluvial plains that border it at the present day were once beneath its broad waters.

At one point in the gorge a mass of greenstone projects some rods into the river from the west side of Holyoke, having a perpendicular face twenty to one hundred feet high. This mass exhibits a columnar structure similar to that of the Giant's Causeway. The structure is not very evident above the level of the river, but at low water, by rowing along the face of this rock one can find the tops of regular columns reaching nearly to the water's surface. On the opposite side of Holyoke, not far from the road going to the summit, is another interesting example of these greenstone columns. Professor Hitchcock named these respectively Titan's Pier and Titan's Piazza; and any lover of geology is well repaid for the labor spent in getting a view of them.

Holyoke, though two hundred feet lower than Tom, is more frequented by visitors. The ascent is not very difficult, and the view from the summit is both grand and beautiful. The river is of course the most attractive feature in the landscape. Far to the north and south it stretches, like a silver, sinuous thread, gradually becoming narrower until it is lost in the distance. Owing to an optical illusion the river seems to ascend in both directions, and at the points where it is lost to view, seems on a level with the eye. It is one of the best examples of this species of optical illusion to be found in this part of the country.

A half century ago the river between this gorge and a point about a quarter of a mile north of it made a most magnificent curve, three miles long; but during the flood in the spring of 1840 a straight channel was cut across, and the water continuing to flow in the old bed as well as the new, there existed for some years what may be called an island in the river.

At least three educational institutions of importance can be seen from the summit of Holyoke—Mount Holyoke Female Seminary in South Hadley, Smith College in Northampton, and Amherst College. Of the towns seen from here Northampton presents the most beautiful aspect. Its fine public and private edifices and grand old elms show to great advantage. One cannot tire of looking at the level plain stretching along on either side of the river, its surface divided into rectangular plats, covered in summer by the various luxuriant crops. The view to the south includes, of course, the river, and also the pleasant village of South Hadley with its Seminary. Springfield is not very plainly visible, but the spires of Hartford, Connecticut, can be seen on a clear day. To the south-west, and at one's very feet, is the wide gorge, with Tom rising directly across, its top being nearly two hundred feet above the position of the observer. To the north-west Greylock is seen shooting up its head beyond the Hoosac. To the north-east Monadnock looms up in the distance, while Wachusett lies low in the eastern horizon. Close to the observer are Toby and Sugar Loaf, each presenting rather peculiar and fantastic outlines. The view from Tom is essentially the same as that from Holyoke, and embracing as it does a radius of at least seventy-five miles in every direction, over the most fertile and charming region in New England, is one of rare beauty.

The ridge forming Tom and Holyoke is, as has been said, composed of greenstone. All the other hills of consequence about the valley of the Connecticut are sandstone, and this is distinctively a sandstone region. Of the other three hills to be spoken of, Toby and Sugar Loaf hold about the same relation to each other as do Holyoke and Tom, the Connecticut flowing between Toby on the east and Sugar Loaf on the west. The former is nearly one thousand feet high, and lies in the northern part of Sunderland village. It is of irregular shape, being indented by a number of valleys, and is densely wooded, so that until within the last few years it has not been a very desirable place from which to obtain a view; but there are now accommodations for sight-seers, and some of the obstructing forest having been removed, interesting views may now be obtained from several parts of the hill. The view of the valley of the Connecticut from the southern part of the highest ridge is perhaps even finer than that from Holyoke.

Sugar Loaf, on the other side of the river, in South Deerfield, is one of the most picturesque objects to be found in this region. It is an isolated peak of red sandstone rising, on the riverside, by an almost perpendicular cliff, to the height of five hundred feet. From the river it looks wholly inaccessible, but on the opposite side is a very good path, rather steep, to be sure, by which one can gain the summit with comparative ease. Upon the top there is a house in which is a good telescope that visitors can use for a small fee, and a very extensive view may thus be obtained. But the most interesting feature of a visit to this hill is to stand upon the brink of the precipice on the eastern side, and look down to the river and green plain five hundred feet below. One feels an almost irresistible desire to take a plunge into the blue waters of the Connecticut.

This hill overlooks the place where one of the most inhuman atrocities was perpetrated by the Indians, and a scene of carnage enacted that will long be remembered by the people of New England. The Bloody Brook massacre occurred in 1675 on a spot about a mile north-west of this hill, and eighty young men, "the very flower of Essex County," while engaged in transporting grain from Deerfield to Hadley, were suprised by the Indians and murdered almost to a man.

A little north of Sugar Loaf is Deerfield Mountain, or, as it is often called in that region by the original Indian name, Pocumtuck, which is the last eminence to be visited in this locality. Its summit is about seven hundred feet above the village of Old Deerfield, and the bold sandstone brow overlooks the valley of the Deerfield River. This brow is bare and level for quite a space upon its top, and is called Pocumtuck Rock. It is a favorite place for picnic parties, and if there were a good road to the summit it would be more extensively patronized. It is certainly a most lovely spot in which to eat your evening meal, and gaze down upon the waters of the Deerfield, glittering in the rays of the setting sun; and as the sun descends towards the western hills, it is delightful to watch the shadows creeping along the plain below, until at last the brilliancy of the river is snuffed out, and the shades of evening gather fast within the peaceful valley. An excellent view of Old Deerfield, or Deerfield Street, as it is often called, is also obtained from the Rock. But very few of the houses can be seen owing to the magnificent elm trees that line either side of the street, and form in summer a continuous arch of greenness above it; and beneath the shade of these old patriarchs of nature nestle many a quaint dwelling. There is much in Deerfield to interest the antiquarian, historian, and lover of nature; and all admirers of art will take an interest in it because it was the birthplace, and for many years the residence, of George Fuller, the painter, who recently died in Boston. Deerfield is one of the best places in which to pass the summer, but is not so much frequented by visitors as it once was, as there are at present no sufficient hotel accommodations. A hotel of considerable size was burned there two years ago, and has not been rebuilt.

We depart from the hills of the Connecticut and Deerfield valleys with perhaps greater reluctance than was experienced on leaving the Berkshire hills, for the reason that the scenery in these valleys is toned down and mellowed into a uniformity of beauty, which can be appreciated not alone in a single locality, but as a whole. The river forms a centre about which all these beauties are aggregated; while in Berkshire one is impressed more by single and somewhat startling evidences of nature's beauty and grandeur.

Between the Connecticut and the Atlantic coast are many beautiful eminences, a few of which may be alluded to. Big Watatic and Little Watatic are two prominent hills situated in Ashburnham on very high land, but are densely wooded and little visited. In Fitchburg there is a hill which, though inconsiderable in size, being only about three hundred feet high, is worthy of mention. It is a rounded mass of solid granite, and, though extensively quarried for many years, seems to have suffered very little diminution in size. It is called Rollstone Hill, and the name is said to have originated from an event that occurred over two centuries ago. When, in 1676, the Indians sacked Lancaster, among the captives carried off by them towards Canada was Mrs. Rowlandson, the wife of the minister at Lancaster. It is claimed that the party encamped during the second night of their march upon the top of this hill, which was afterwards called Rowlandson hill, and since has degenerated into Rollstone. This origin is uncertain, however.

This sketch would be incomplete without a brief mention of a few of the eminences about Boston. The Blue Hills of Milton form the most conspicuous range in the vicinity, reaching an altitude of over seven hundred feet in the south-western part of Milton, and afford a fine view of Boston and its suburbs, and the harbor.

Corey Hill, in Brookline, is easily accessible, and offers the best and most complete view that could possibly be desired. One sees Brookline, with its handsome residences and public buildings just below him; Beacon street extends in a straight line towards the north-east, and leads the eye to the Common and the State House. To the north, beyond the Charles, lies the great university city of Massachusetts, with the tower of Memorial Hall overtopping all other buildings, and to the south, and near at hand, are the sparkling waters of Chestnut Hill reservoir.

We have spent but a brief time skipping over some of the principal elevations in the State, and what has been said gives but an imperfect picture of the reality; for views from elevated points do not, by any manner of means, show one all that is interesting and beautiful in the scenery of adjacent country. There are deep ravines, romantic gorges, and wooded valleys that require individual inspection to obtain a true idea of their picturesqueness. But this sketch, such as it is, is offered to the readers of the BAY STATE MONTHLY, in the hope that it may, to some slight degree, lead to a more complete recognition and appreciation of the vast amount of natural beauty contained within the limits of our beloved Bay State.

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ELIZABETH.[2]

A ROMANCE OF COLONIAL DAYS.

By Frances C. Sparhawk, Author of "A Lazy Man's Work."

CHAPTER XVII.

DESSERT.

At dinner Elizabeth was between Sir Temple Dacre and Major Vaughan. The former devoted himself especially to her. Opposite sat Katie, Lord Bulchester on one hand, while on the other was placed the guest last arrived, the one whose coming had been doubtful because it had not been certain that he would reach the city in time to accept his invitation. Lord Bulchester so far forgot his manners as to pay very little attention to the pretty young lady who had been assigned to him; his thoughts were all for Katie Archdale, his ears were for her, and his eyes, except for the defiant glances which shot past her at Kenelm Waldo, this last arrival, to whom had fallen the place on her other hand. Katie's air of pensiveness as she took her seat seemed to her aunt suitable and very becoming. But it was impossible to the girl's nature not to enjoy the situation, and the smile that often lurked slyly in the depths of her dimples and brought a light beneath the grave droop of her eyelids made her only the handsomer. Her dress of white India muslin was simple and beautiful; it heightened the effect of her gravity of demeanor, and by making her seem even more youthful than she was, softened any expression of enjoyment that flashed across her pensiveness. Elizabeth in her brocade thought how little the girl needed ornament. Edmonson, watching the high-bred air of the latter, her attentiveness and tact where she used to be dreamy, her face full of indications of strength and refinement, felt that in ten years, when Katie's attractions had waned, Elizabeth would have an added charm of presence, and an added power. He admired intellect, although he so readily adapted himself to people with tastes, and pursuits differing from intellectual, and secretly he had his ambitions. When he should marry well, as he intended to do, the wealth thus gained would give him the place to which his birth entitled him, and then he looked forward to political eminence. Supposing, only supposing, that one day he should be premier he mused, studying Elizabeth,—stranger things had happened—what a help a wife like this would be to him; her pride, her self-control, her graciousness, her wit would then come into play excellently. She belonged to him by right, and——. Again there came that ominous flash in his eyes as they turned furtively in another direction, and the shadow that lurked in his heart leaped forward again and clutched at its victim. Then Edmonson turned with a smile to Colonel Pepperell beside him, and asked some further particulars about the hostility of the Indian tribes.

Archdale, glancing at Elizabeth, saw that she looked extremely well. He was grateful for her courage and her helpfulness, and he understood better than she dreamed of his doing the distress that the present state of affairs caused her. He liked her in a spirit of comradeship. She seemed to him sensitive, yet he felt that in an emergency she would prove as strong to act as to endure. In no case, he told himself, could he ever be in love with her; she was too cold, too intellectual, she had not enough softness or sweetness to charm him even if his fair cousin had never existed. But when there was need of a woman with pride and resolution enough to deny strenuously the force of a marriage ceremony that had never been intended, nobody could answer the need better than Mistress Royal. And it really was not necessary for that purpose that she should feel him such an ogre as he believed she did. However, that was of no consequence. He brought himself back forcibly from a gloomy study of possibilities. There was enough for a man to do in this new world if love were denied him. He began to talk to those next him about the war already going on at the North.

"Young Archdale has caught the infection," said Pepperell, soon after to his listener. "He will be in harness before we know it." Edmonson smiled musingly.

"The very thing," he answered, "the very thing, Colonel Pepperell, for a young man to do. If he go, I have no doubt I shall catch the fever, too, being in the same house with him; Lord Bulchester may also, who knows? there are three soldiers for you."

"For me, indeed!" echoed the Colonel with a laugh. "I should not refuse you, though; I should be proud to pass you over to our commander, whoever he may be."

Lord Bulchester at the moment looked as if his struggles for the coming months were more likely to be personal than political. Katie had turned to him with the kindest attention; her eyes looked into his with a shy interest in the devotion that she found there. She was answering some remark of his, more at length, it may be, than she need have done, but with a most graceful amendment of an opinion doubtfully expressed, when Waldo broke in with some question to her, and she finished in haste and turned to him. Bulchester turned to him also, and in the eyes of the two men as they met was war. Waldo had come back with the determination that while there was life there should be hope. He had until this time regarded Bulchester's marked attentions with the amusement that the nobleman's unattractive exterior was likely to meet with in a rival. Added to that was Waldo's conceit, which made him look through the large end of the telescope in viewing others. But now he had heard Katie's dallying—why hadn't she finished the fellow up quickly?—he had read the determination in Bulchester's face, and had remembered his title. Katie, meanwhile, with admirable unconsciousness, talked, now with one, now with the other, giving most attention to Waldo, and yet making Bulchester feel that if she had been assigned to him at dinner the greater share would without effort from her have been his.

The dinner went on. Sir Temple Dacre's comments were so kind that they could not be offensive. Most of them were made to Elizabeth. He admired Madam Archdale, and thought that her son resembled her; he thought that Colonel Pepperell had the air of a leader of men. "One born so," he said. "He seems always to know what he means, that's it, and he doesn't always tell you. On the whole, perhaps, the last is as great a point, because men don't take ideas readily; they never half look at them; they have too many crotchets of their own; or if not that, too much thick-headedness. The only way to do is to send out the result of one's conclusions in the form of an order, and say nothing about how it was come at."

"You are speaking only of military matters?" she asked.

"Well, no, of things in general."

"Then it wouldn't do in our part of the Colonies," she said. "I once heard of a little boy who was called 'Whatfor Winship' because he was perpetually asking the reasons of things. That is like us. We think a great deal of an aristocracy, provided we can all be aristocrats. Everybody is sure that he can decide any matter that comes up, and then from a sense of fairness we put it to vote. That's the way we manage here."

"Yes," answered Sir Temple, "we across the water know that you people are deuced fond of managing—Beg pardon.—But let me tell you what Walpole, our former minister, said one day when I dined with him. 'Going to America, I understand?' he asked. I said I was. 'Well, I hope over there they'll let you travel in the way it pleases you, it's more than they did to our orders; there is such an ado if those people are not handled with velvet gloves, and the thickest velvet we have, too. I would like you to tell me if you can make out what it all means,' he said."

"And so you're taking notes to see what sort of a set we are? One thing, Sir Temple, you'll find us loyal to our mother, though she does domineer sometimes. And tell Sir Robert that children old enough to contribute to the support of the family, as we do, ought to be allowed to put in a word now and then as to its management."

Sir Temple looked at her, not having an answer ready and little dreaming that a generation later this truth that the beautiful lips had uttered so simply, yet with a proud curve through their merriment, would be forced upon the English ministry at the point of the bayonet. But he lived to see it. Then he thought more than once of this day, of Elizabeth, with her dignity and her brightness, who had seen into the heart of one of the world's great struggles and had spoken the thought that later the cannon of a nation thundered through the earth. Now, however, he looked at her without a full idea of her meaning, thinking her only clever, and ready, and a trifle wanting in respect toward the powers that be, and that this lack came from her youth and should be treated with indulgence. It was a woman's way of looking at things, he said to himself, for he recognized sometimes the same spirit in Lady Dacre.

"Florence seems well entertained," he said aloud, looking at his wife, who was laughing at one of Edmonson's sallies. "That's a brilliant fellow, Mistress Royal; he will make his mark in the world; it's a pity, though, he hasn't a fortune to help him forward; he ought to be in Parliament."

"So he thinks, perhaps," she answered, remembering something that he had said to her one day on his first visit to the country, and understanding more clearly than ever the use that she might have been in the world.

"Very possibly he does. He appreciates himself, that is certain. It's half the battle to know one's own power; sometimes I think it's three-quarters of it. Because, you see, when a man knows his strong points he's always meeting others at his best, and as for his worst,—why, I imagine Edmonson would rather keep those dark." Elizabeth looked up inquiringly, but she said nothing, and Sir Temple added, "In fact, most of us would; we don't expect that charity from men which we find from Heaven." She did not answer, and he talked on, for theorizing was a favorite amusement, but his wife always snubbed him when he attempted it, and most men either showed weariness or had theories of their own which they were in such haste to air that his had only half a chance. Now, here was a young lady ready to listen, and, since it was not because she was unable to talk well herself, her listening was a compliment that he felt.

At first Elizabeth did listen. But her companion fairly launched, went on excellently by himself, and involuntarily her eyes turned upon Edmonson. He was very handsome; she wondered if it was his conversation with Lady Dacre that gave him so much animation. Since circumstances had roused Elizabeth from the dreamy state in which she used to indulge, she had lost something of her belief in his intellectual superiority, for the things that had once seemed so difficult as to be almost impossible to her had suddenly become simple enough; now that, they being required of her, she found herself doing them. That was the way with Elizabeth; whatever she could do she thought easy; it was the things that she believed lay beyond her for which she had the reverence. She was not much used to praise; the little that occasionally fell to her surprised and embarrassed her, so that she seemed to receive it coldly, or else the thing itself appeared to her so trivial that doing it well was a matter of course. She learned with remarkable quickness, for her mind was in good working order and grasped strongly whatever it laid hold of. A few months ago Edmonson's social accomplishments had seemed a marvel to her. Already she was beginning to see that, after all, they did not require a very high order of mind, though she was far from undervaluing them or thinking it possible that she could ever have such power of being agreeable. She was wondering that day as she watched him how much better ambitions he had, and what life would bring him. She could not understand him.

But in a few moments she was watching another face that had now a stronger fascination for her than ever—Katie's. How lovely she looked. Her demureness was giving way under the assaults that fate was making upon it, and she was becoming more and more like her old self—with a difference, however, toward Elizabeth, if toward no one else. It was true, she had greeted her with effusive warmth, but even then Elizabeth had felt the change and drawn back humbly in response to it. But if more proof had been needed, it had been given. For, as they stood together a moment before dinner, Katie said, "How much pleasure it must have given you to meet these guests of Stephen's; no wonder they seem agreeable to you; it may be that you owe so much to them." Elizabeth looked at her in amazement. "You know," continued Katie, "that these are the people whose romantic story Master Harwin related to us one memorable evening?" "No, indeed, I never dreamed of it, Katie," she added, her voice trembling. "Why are you like this? You know how it all came about; you know that—" "Mistress Archdale," Waldo's voice broke in, and the young man came forward to be welcomed by a touch of Katie's hand and a smile that gave him some excuse for lingering at her side. Elizabeth, after responding briefly to his greeting, turned away. Her heart was heavy. It made very little difference about the Dacres, but she had lost Katie, that was a great deal. Last night she had thought that she might find the girl's resentment gone and her sense of justice, if not her affection, ruling her. At least there was this comfort, thought the watcher, she had not broken Katie's heart, it had only been her own—that was better, after all, than breaking anyone's else. Yet a sudden choking came into her throat, she found her eyes grown dim, steadied her vision, heard a few words of what Sir Temple was saying about English rule, assented by a monosyllable, and went back to watching Katie, who seemed above sad fortunes as she sat so unmistakably enjoying herself. She talked a little with Bulchester, and smiled upon him until he beamed with delight; then leaving him full of a secret conviction that she found him more congenial than the neighbor on her other hand, she devoted herself to Waldo, whose fierce suspicions had died out so that he was tranquilly enjoying his dinner, or exchanging remarks with some other guest, secretly delighted with the skill which Katie showed in making herself agreeable to bores. Her bright brown hair would have gleamed in the sunlight without the gold-dust it was powdered with. Her complexion, one of Titian's warm blondes, was at its perfection; her eyes were grave enough for steady expression, and at times for a touch of pathos; it was at the sudden curving of her lips they filled with light, which was gone again directly, making the beholder feel that the sunshine had flashed over her face. As Elizabeth looked at her, and admired her, and felt her heart still going out toward her and tried to find excuse for her cruelty, the wish not to meet Katie's glance made her turn her eyes away for a moment. They fell upon Archdale, who sat motionless, looking at Katie. At that moment his mind, stung by jealousy, made one of those maddened leaps against the slowness of the age that prophesied the railroad and the telegraph by showing the necessity for them. The second man who had been sent off to England the day that Archdale had told Elizabeth of the misadventure of the first was clear in head and as quick in movement as means of locomotion at that time permitted, but it seemed to Archdale at that instant that the very sun had stood still in the heavens to make the summer days run longer, and that the most welcome certainty with such a messenger as had been chosen would come too late. When he should be free, let rivals do their best; but now——. He seemed to have lost himself and to be living in a dream of the girl, as if her presence and her beauty and a sudden sense of distance from her filled him with agony. Suddenly he stirred and his eyes met Elizabeth's and fell. He turned away quickly and began to talk.

For the moment she had no power at all. She was pierced by a sharper sense of her situation than had ever come to her before, and that had been enough. She was one too many in the world. She must give place, and she must not be long about it. A ringing was in her ears; a darkness was around her. But she called back her forces with an effort; she must not think until she should be alone. She turned back to Sir Temple, caught his last words, and answered him in haste, beginning at random and going on with a fluency which even he had not expected.

Colonel Pepperell, who was able to do more things at once than carry on his dinner and a conversation with his neighbor, looked down hard at his plate a moment and muttered under his breath, "Poor thing! Poor thing!"

CHAPTER XVIII.

LANDMARKS.

When the ladies had left the table and gone into the garden Elizabeth moved restlessly from one to another. Before very long the gentlemen joined them, when Edmonson, after a little engineering, a few moments of detention here and there, came up to her as she was sauntering with several others on the bank of the little river. He contrived to separate her from the rest and walked with her a few steps behind them. His vivacity had not deserted him, and she felt that it would be no effort to talk to him, and that in listening she should be enough interested not to forget herself.

"How beautiful it is here," she began.

"Yes, but I don't care much for landscape when I can get anything better, and a woman who knows life and understands how to make herself entertaining is a great deal better. Therefore, at present I have no eyes for scenery."

"Well, what is it?" cried Elizabeth, with a smile that was a flash, possibly of annoyance, rather than a gleam of pleasure. "As the saying goes, what axe have you to grind, Master Edmonson? All this flattery must be for some object. Can I do anything for you? If only I had influence with the Grand Mogul, or any other high official, I would speak to him for you with pleasure. You see your cause is already won, so don't waste any more powder." And she turned to him with a little laugh that was both bitter and defiant. It was a bad time to tell Elizabeth Royal that she had powers of fascination. It was possible that Edmonson understood her, for his observations, though not openly expressed like Sir Temple Dacre's, were more pertinent. But this seemed to him an opportunity not to be lost. "The voice that soothes the wounds of vanity is always welcome," he mused. "I only meant that it pleased me to talk with you," he answered. "I had no intention of gilding refined gold. As you so frankly conclude I have an axe to grind, there is no reason why I should hide the fact. But you can not grind it, else I should come to you. I am equal to that. And he looked at her, first with a cool audacity in his eyes, which he knew she would meet; and then as he held her gaze with a sudden softening from which she turned away.

"Then, if I can not, why don't you ask some one who can, Colonel Archdale, for instance? He likes to be obliging—that is, I take it for granted he does."

"Perhaps I shall." They had left the water now and were following the path up toward the house. There was a pause. "The air of this place does not agree with you," he began abruptly, "You are much paler than when you came."

"I am happy to say it is quite the contrary with you," she answered. "Our sea breezes have given you the hue of health."

"Yes, that—and other things. You turn away from any reference to your self, but you can never prevent my caring more for your welfare than for anything else in the world." He was speaking softly in tones that were deep with earnestness. There was no doubt that in some way she did fascinate him.

She came to a halt and looked him full in the face without a blush, an added pallor, or any sign of emotion. At that moment she felt herself Archdale's wife, and felt, too, that Edmonson considered her so.

"You can't have any great objects in your life, then, if you fritter away your interest on an idle acquaintance whom you will forget as soon as you are out of her sight, and, if you'll pardon me, who will forget you, except when something calls up your name, or a reminiscence of you." Even Edmonson as he stood staring at her drew his breath like one recovering from a shock. Then as he looked her face changed and he saw tears on her lashes. She reached out her hand toward him and raised her eyes to his with a pathetic appeal. "I know it's the habit of gentlemen to make gallant speeches," she said, "probably more in your own country than here; we are more simple, and as for me, I'm ignorant, I know that very well. I am not as quick as other people, I suppose, but I don't like this sort of thing, I never shall. Somehow, it hurts me, it seems as if one despised me. Well, never mind, it's not that, of course; you are in the habit of doing it, because it's the fashion. But why won't you talk to me naturally, just as other people do?"

Edmonson looked at her with absorbed attention. He was convinced. The thing was incredible, but it was true. She was not feigning, she did not understand him. Her blindness came from one of two causes, either she was incapable of passion, or her heart was not yet aroused. For he argued that if she had loved any one she must have read him.

"I will do as you ask me," he said simply, taking the only course that was open to him unless he had wished to banish himself entirely. But as he walked slowly on beside her again the evil look came into his downcast eyes, and the shadow darted out in his thoughts terrible and triumphant.

When they were near the house, and she was about to turn back again toward the others, still enjoying the summer air, he said. "Will you come with me into the hall? I want to ask you about something I noticed there." This was only so far true that he had found the antlers which he remembered hung there an excuse to stand face to face with her a few moments longer, and to talk with her, and have her answers even about these trivial things all to himself before the others came. It was of no use to pretend to himself now that disappointed ambition was the cause of his chagrin at losing Elizabeth; his feeling was not chagrin, it was something like fury. He had never denied himself anything, he would not deny himself now. As to this woman who the higher he found, and the more he admired her, the more she eluded him, and with every unconscious movement drew tighter the chain that bound him; he had a purpose concerning her. He was not capable of deep or continued devotion, but when he had an object in view nothing mattered to him but that. If he gained it, doubtless something else would absorb him; if he lost—blackness filled this blank, but here he had resolved not to lose.

As he stood in the hall with Elizabeth beside the open door and watched her delicate face and perceived the readiness with which she answered his questions in full, as if glad of so simple a subject, he said to himself, "That fancy of hers for me was lighter than I thought. She has not yet quaffed the nectar of love—not yet—not yet." He gave little attention to her story of the shooting of the stag, Stephen's feat when a boy of fourteen; she did not of course know as much of the history of the Archdales as did the petted young beauty to whom he had been talking before dinner, and she in the midst of her fluent account wondered in her own mind where she had heard it all, and remembered that it had been one of Katie's stories when they were at school together.

"You see how large a creature it must have been," she finished, "the forehead hangs quite low, but I can't touch the tip of the under branch of this antler." She made the effort as she spoke, and reaching up on tiptoe, caught at the antler to steady herself. It swung a little on one side, and she stood looking at the hole torn in the tapestry by Stephen's gun on that day, when he had gone into the woods in desperate mood. It had been covered, and no one had noticed it, unless, possibly, the servants in dusting, but, if so, they had not told of the accident, not wishing to run the risk of being blamed for it.

"Did I do that?" asked Elizabeth. It seemed to her as if to have injured an Archdale to the value of a pin would be intolerable.

"No indeed," said Edmonson. "I saw it just as you moved. The antler is smooth here, see." And he made her pass her hand over the polished surface above the tear. "Perhaps there is some roughness in the wall," he added, "it may be a nail under the tapestry that somebody found out before we came."

She reached up eagerly.

"No," she said, "something must have struck against it and caught it, for so far from being rough here, it's hollow. I can put my finger into it; it is one of the openings between the beams." They went on talking while Elizabeth's finger was unconsciously tapping the wall through the torn hanging. All at once she broke off in the midst of what she was saying to cry, "Why, there certainly is something very strange here; it is like the canvas of a picture. Touch it, and see if it does not feel so to you."

Edmonson reached up his hand as she withdrew hers. His eyes seemed to scintillate as he felt the surface of the canvas under his finger; his face flushed deeply; it was with effort that he restrained a jubilant cry, and his tones betrayed a triumph that he could not hide, while excitement broke through his barriers of measured words.

"Really, we must look into this," he said. "This may be El Dorado to—some of us. Let us wager, Mistress Royal, whom it most concerns, you, or me."

"I suppose it's some old family portrait and belongs to the Colonel," she answered.

"Yes, I suppose so," he said, waiving the question of the wager as she had done. "Don't you propose to ask him?"

Elizabeth looked amazed, then flushed deeply as she realized her imprudence in having spoken of the canvas.

"Certainly not," she answered. "I don't see how what Colonel Archdale has on his walls concerns me."

"I should think a possible daughter-in-law would feel somewhat differently." She winced, then answered coolly; "She ought not."

"Well, at least, I am curious. I own it. I must see what we have unearthed here. Won't you ask the Colonel to show us his private portrait gallery? He will do anything for you, I notice."

"Certainly not," she answered.

"Certainly he won't do everything for you, or certainly you will not ask him—which?" insisted Edmonson.

"Both. I shall never test him, and I shall make no comments on what I may find on his walls. Nor will you, Master Edmonson, for no gentleman would."

"Do you object to my seeing it?" She looked at him wonderingly.

"Why should I, if it were open? But I will tell you what I do object to, to my coming here and seeming to pry upon—the family. I wish it had been somebody else instead of me who had found it, or that it had never been found at all. I beg you will spare me, Master Edmonson," And she looked at him with the rare entreaty of a proud nature.

"Perhaps it's not a picture after all," he said. "You may be mistaken. Don't you think so?"

"No," she answered. "I am not mistaken, but—."

"Don't fear that I shall speak one word," he cried as she hesitated. "I would sooner lose my life than annoy you, to say nothing of losing my amusement. If I can't see what is behind the hanging without doing that, why, I'll not see it at all."

"Thank you," she said gratefully, dwelling only upon the first part of his speech. "I was sure you would feel so."

"Yes, words and questions would be a clumsy way. I'll show you a better." And while she looked at him wondering what he meant, he turned from her and in an instant, bringing up a chair, had stepped upon it and made with his penknife a line across what he judged would be the top of the picture. Feeling along the length of this with his finger he cut a perpendicular line from each end of it, so that the tapestry fell down like the end of a broad ribbon, and showed that Elizabeth had not been at fault in her supposition. He had stepped down from the chair, replaced it, and returned to her side while she still stood in dumb consternation. He was smiling. "There!" he said. The thing had been done in a flash; he had scarcely glanced at the painting, until, as he spoke, he fell back a step. Then he caught her arm.

"Look!" he cried hoarsely, "Look!"

But he need not have told her to look, she was doing it with eyes wide open and lips parted and motionless. "I was right, you see. I had a right to do this," he said.

She drew away from the grasp that he still laid on her arm in his absorption. "Yes, I was right," he repeated. "Do you see?"

"No," she answered, "I understand nothing. Explain yourself. Or wait. It is time now to call Colonel Archdale. You will explain to him this liberty, and the meaning of this—this strange coincidence."

"Ah, ha!" he cried. "You see it? Everybody will see it; isn't it so? Tell me," he insisted.

"I suppose so," she faltered, looking at his triumphant face and feeling a presentiment that some evil was to fall upon the Archdale family. If so she would have helped to bring it.

"Let us send for him," repeated Edmonson. "Or, no. Let us surprise them all, give them an entertainment not planned by mine admirable host. Come, let us go out into the garden, and when we return, here will be a new face to greet us. That will be more as you wish it? I want it to be as you wish."

"You have not considered me at all."

"The day will come when you will not say that," he answered, looking at her fixedly, then turning away with abruptness. "We must name our new friend," he added. "Suppose we call him Banquo's ghost? Banquo's ghost, you remember, existed to only one person. Did you ever see him on the stage? You must, some day in London. He rises up in solemn majesty from a secret trap door, and overwhelms Mac—Well! here's the trap door." And he touched the slashed tapestry with his finger. "Shall I tell you why I call him so?" he went on, coming close to her as if about to whisper some secret.

"No," she said, drawing back. "If you know any secrets belonging to this family, I don't want to hear them. You will be obliged to apologize to the Colonel for defacing his wall, and whatever explanation you have to give, will be given to him."

Edmonson watched her with a smile.

"Do you know," he said, "that you have an exaggerated conscience? But you have the faculty of making it seem charming. As you please, then. I will give my explanation to the Colonel as soon as he is ready for it—as soon, and even before. Shall we go into the garden again until somebody comes?"

Elizabeth did not answer immediately. She stopped on the threshold where she had been standing and looked at the speaker with an expression he could not read. She had thought well of this young man. Was it going to be that she could no longer believe in him? She did not care so much for that in itself, but it seemed as if all the world in which she had moved, the ideal world founded on beauty and nobleness, even if, indeed, one cornerstone of it were pain, had fallen to pieces about her. Among so many ruins the ruin of another ideal would not be so very much, but it would give more pain than was due to itself. As she looked up at him Edmonson's face lost its exultation. "Perhaps I am mistaken; I ought to hear before I judge," she thought.

"I would rather stay here," she said at last. "There are footsteps now—it is Master Archdale." She thought as she spoke that the girlish figure walking beside him was Katie's, but when the two came nearer she saw that it was not his cousin to whom Stephen was talking so merrily, but another of his mother's guests. Katie was in the distance with Kenelm Waldo. Bulchester had disappeared for the moment—no, he was with Madam Archdale. As these and others sauntered up to the hall, Edmonson partially closing the opening by pushing the tapestry behind the antlers, retreated, and occupied himself with an examination of these long branches that like a personal weapon had divided the thick underbrush of his way before him. It was not until most of the party were in the hall, not until the Colonel had come in with Madam Pepperell, that he suddenly went forward and drew down the cut tapestry, and at the moment put himself into the same attitude with the man in the picture, and in this attitude stood with his eyes glancing keenly from one to another of the spectators.

There was a murmur, not rising to articulateness, which seemed to be surprise at the sight of the portrait so unexpectedly disclosed. Then followed a breathless hush. It was in the hush that Edmonson's eyes were busiest. But that, too, was short. For, a cry of astonishment rose from nearly every one in the hall. This, though coming from many throats, had but one import.

"What a likeness! Perfect! Wonderful! How came it there? How came he here? What does it mean?"

From Edmonson, standing motionless, the assembly looked toward Stephen, and from him, plainly as much at a loss as themselves, they turned their eyes where his were already fixed, upon the face of his father. But the Colonel, pale and amazed, with a dark shadow fallen upon his face from the door near by him—or perhaps from some door opening in his own breast—seemed no more able than the others to read the riddle. Indeed, he was the first to ask the explanation that all were seeking.

"When and how did you bring that picture here?" he said. "And whose portrait is it?" For he had rejected the first suggestion of its being Edmonson himself. The dress belonged to an earlier period, and the face was that of a man somewhat older; it could not be thought of as the portrait of the young man standing beside it; it was simply a marvellous likeness.

"I found it here," returned Edmonson with a bow. "I have seen the copy of it many times, this is the original painting by Lely. It came here—I mean to the Colonies—by one of those mistakes that one member of a family sometimes, perpetrates upon the others. How it ever got behind this hanging it is out of my province to tell. I yield the field to Colonel Archdale."

"I know nothing of it," said that gentleman. "The house was built when I was a child. It was one of the preparations for my father's second marriage. The tapestry is an heirloom; it is so old that I am always afraid of its tearing, and it is never taken from the wall. My house is at the disposal of my guests, to be sure, but none of them could have destroyed anything else that I should have felt the injury to so keenly."

"It was not willingly done," returned Edmonson, "it was by the impulse of fate. As to the picture, it does not seem strange that we expect Colonel Archdale to know whom his own family portraits represent."

"It may not seem strange, but it is not unprecedented to be ignorant," answered his host. "My father must have known, but in obeying his injunctions as to care of the tapestry I had no idea that I was keeping anything but bare walls from view. Even these antlers are fastened to a great nail in one of the beams. I remember it since I was a child. The hanging was fitted over it, and I was glad when it was put to use in this way."

"Yes, no doubt he could tell us about the portrait if we could only get at him," returned Edmonson coming back to his subject. "But as to who the gentleman is, and why you have flattered me so far as to be able to discover any likeness between us, I owe you all an explanation. And Colonel Archdale, another one besides, which I am most ready to make, for having presumed to search out the painting when I found by accident that there was one behind here. No time is so good as the present. Then, too, I have aroused the curiosity of these ladies and gentlemen, and I am afraid they will owe me a grudge if I don't gratify it by telling the whole story."

"Indeed we shall," cried Katie Archdale.

Bulchester had entered behind the others unseen in the concentration of attention upon the portrait and its exhibitor, and had spent his moment of amazement in silence. He now glided up to Edmonson and said something to him in an undertone too low to be caught by anyone else. The other replied by a look of scorn, and a muttered something that sounded very like, "You always were a fool." Then he stood silent, glancing first at Stephen, and then at the Colonel. The young man faced him in haughty defiance of his manner which made his words almost insulting. The elder stood with his suavity a little disturbed, it is true; but no one except Edmonson found fear in his face, or interpreted what he said as a desire of postponement when he suggested that if there were anything interesting to be heard they should wait until all the stragglers had come up, and then adjourn to the drawing-room where they would be more comfortable.

Edmonson bowed slightly in answer, smiled, thanked him, but observed that it was most flattering to an orator to find his audience increase as he went on, and began:

"I am to tell you who this gentleman of the portrait is, and why I resemble him."

All at once Stephen glanced at Elizabeth. He had found her in the hall with Edmonson. Had she any hand in this unveiling of an ancestral face? He thought of the possibility of shame that might follow—of shame, because he remembered the talk of the two men in the woods and the old butler's look at Edmonson that very morning. If this triumphant fellow had any such thing to tell, did she already know it? Was she upon such terms of intimacy with him as this? She stood apart, still near the doorway where Edmonson had left her. None of the curiosity expressed everywhere else was in her face. She seemed scarcely listening; she looked as if she were far away and the people about her and the words they were saying belonged to a different world. But it was not so, for it was the consciousness that she was in the world about her and bound to it that gave her the expression of struggle. Chains held her when she wanted to be free. She was one too many here. Before her was Archdale's face as he had looked at Katie, and between these two a stupid woman whom she had no patience with, whom she hated—herself. And now there might be coming an added pain that she had brought. She did not care especially for Archdale's pain, except that it was of her bringing.

But Edmonson went on talking, and Stephen, like the others, forgot everything in listening. He saw his father's brows contract, and knew that he was biting his under lip hard, as he did when he was much troubled.

Edmonson still went on with his story. He certainly made it interesting. Stephen's secret uneasiness passed into surprise, distrust, conviction, inward disturbance as he stood with his haughty air unchanged.

CHAPTER XIX.

RANKLING ARROWS.

Elizabeth was alone at last, that is, as much as a thought pursuing like a personality lets one be alone. When she crossed her room in the silence it was a relief to hear no voices, not to be obliged to answer when she had not listened and was afraid lest she should not answer rightly. Yet the events of the last few hours, the stray words as they seemed to her that she had heard, the faces that had been before her kept moving on before her now and repeating themselves faintly for a little time, just as one whose head is throbbing with some continued sound still hears it through all his pulses, even when he has gone out of reach of the reality. She seemed to be driving home with Lady Dacre's face full of tenderness opposite her. The sympathy had been almost too much for Elizabeth, her eyes had not met the compassionate glances. Sir Temple had conversed for three; he had been very kind, too, but the kindness hurt her, for she knew they pitied her.

Elizabeth had an humble way with her sometimes, and, as has been said, her own achievements seemed to her worthless. She had nothing of that blatant quality, vanity, which claims from others and by reason of its arrogance gets to be called pride; but her dignity strove above everything to be sufficient for itself. Such a spirit shrinks from claiming the appreciation it hungers for, shrinks back into itself, and passes for shyness, or humility, or anything but what it is, that supreme pride that seeks from the world its highest, the allegiance of love, in return for its own love of what is true and grand. Finding a denial in those it meets, it draws away in a silence that to people who rate assertion as power seems tameness, for its action is beyond them, like sights that need a telescope, or sounds out of reach of the ear. Pride like this has two possibilities. It is a Saint Christopher that will serve only the highest. That unfound, it grows bitter, and shrinks more and more into itself, and withers into hopelessness. But if it find the Highest and draw upon that love too great for change or failure, then all things have a new proportion, for grown up to the shelter of the eternities, human judgments dwindle, and human slights, however they may scar, cannot destroy.

The person Elizabeth seemed to see most clearly was Archdale in that one moment in which all his heart had been revealed. Yet it seemed to her that it was not of him that she was thinking most but of Katie's pain and anger. If she were to be separated from Stephen Archdale forever, what wonder that she was grieved with the woman who had done it? For Elizabeth knew that though Katie liked admiration, she loved Stephen. Elizabeth herself saw that he was superior, not only in appearance, but in mind, to any of the suitors with whom she confessed that in event of the worst it was possible that the girl might console herself.

But Elizabeth was by no means so far above thoughts of herself that any other woman's suffering was bringing to her face the look that came upon it as her pride and her fear forced her away from the belief she had determined to hold, into a horror lest all she dreaded was true, lest she was really the wife of the man who at the very lightest disliked her. She could not blame him for that, and it would not have been the worst thing, since she cared nothing about him; she had not fotgotten his look of scorn on that day of the wedding, it came back to her often; but what of that, she asked herself, since she returned it? But to-night there was more than this; to-night his heart had been shown, and Elizabeth had seen how she stood for misery to him, seen, too, another danger which she had never thought of before. This possibility, remote enough, would not be put out of sight now. It might happen that if there were proved to have been no marriage between herself and Stephen Archdale, the certainty of this would come too late to save Katie for him. Elizabeth turned wild at the sense of her own helplessness. "I am one too many in the world," she thought; she could not have spoken, all her will was concentrating into action. Night had overswept her; she forgot everything in her thought for the beings whom she saw were covered by the same cloud. She was to be always an ugly obstacle to the happiness of Katie and of a man she pitied. Whichever way she turned it seemed that there was no other chance for her. She would not go through the world one too many. On coming into the room she had put back the curtains for more air and had blown out the candles. She did not light them again; all that she was going to do she could see well enough to do by the stars and the long summer twilight. She sat down in the armchair beside her table, drew her dressing-case toward her, and opening it, unlocked one compartment with a tiny key found in another. The package so carefully locked away here was something that Mrs. Eveleigh in one of her nervous moods had given her to keep, lest some accident should happen. To be sure, she had given it under promise that no one should know of it, for she had used it for only a little while for her complexion, she explained to Elizabeth, and might never want it again. But, on the other hand, she might. It had been a good deal of trouble to buy it; she did not want to run another gauntlet of questions. So the powder had lain in Elizabeth's dressing-case, unremembered even, until to-night. Now she took it out with a firm hand; there was no sign of shrinking or fear about her, not because she was incapable of it, for she had her terrors, though she showed them less than some women. But she was a soldier in the midst of battle whose only object is to dislodge the enemy; what it will cost is not counted. She waited a moment, then opened the paper so steadily that she spilled none of the powder in the dimness. She had no last words to say, nothing to leave; it would be understood. She spread out the paper a little more, still firmly, still so absorbed in the thought of escape as to have taken no account of the way. Then she bent her face over it and slowly drew nearer. Suddenly she raised her head; it seemed as if a voice had called her, a voice so clear, so still, so full of power that she waited submissive and wondering. In another moment she came to herself, the brave self that suffering had thrust away usurping its place by a wicked will. She drew a long breath as if waking from a horrible dream, and sat quiet for a while, her hands clenched and brought together. She shivered in the summer air. Suddenly she rose, took up the paper, and going to the window, tossed it out, scattering its contents. "It shall never tempt any one like this again," she said aloud.

Then slipping down to the floor, she leaned her arms upon the windowsill and buried her face in them.

"God, forgive me," she cried. "It was Thy cross that I was casting off. But my life is in Thy guidance. I will take all the pain from Thy hand. Forgive me. Help me against my wicked pride. And in return for the misery I have brought, give me something good that I may do, some little favor. And yet—Thy will be done," she added brokenly, then trembled lest that Will should refuse the one request which seemed to promise any relief; trembled, but did not retract. "I will wait, I will trust," she said, and looked into the depths beyond the stars with no fear that her prayer would fall back into itself like a sound which, finding no home, returns weary, and robbed of its meaning and strength. She knew that the something which fell upon her was forgiveness too deep for words and an assurance of guidance. For the telephone is not new but as old as humanity and with a call in every man's consciousness. It summons him at times to leave what he is doing and listen. And when in some depth of need he sends a message, then, because no other ear than his may catch the answer given, is there for that reason none? The soul is like science; it cannot break through its boundaries and burst in upon the unknowable that surrounds its little realm of knowledge, but wherever it presses against these barriers they recede without being destroyed, and the adventurer, still in his own domain, brings back new treasures to the old life. The source of power is, we know, forever beyond us, but in going out toward that we enter the realm of power and are charged with it.

In the stillness that had fallen upon her Elizabeth rose softly, and made her preparations for the night.

Archdale came down early the next morning. He stood a few moments in the hall waiting for the appearance of the person he had come to meet. As he looked out into the garden, a picture seemed to rise before him, one that was not within his horizon at present. He seemed to be looking out into a garden as he had been that morning when, with his mother, Sir Temple and Lady Dacre, he had paid a visit to Madam Pepperell. Looking into this garden absently he had seen Elizabeth. Unaware of visitors in the house, she was going on with her occupation of gathering roses. Archdale the day before, wondering about her complicity with Edmonson's scheme had had this vision of her come between him and any belief in this. It came again that next morning as he was waiting to see Edmonson alone, and imagined his mind full only of what he had learned from him the day before. He remembered the expression of her face; he had never seen it gentle like this. She had been standing only a few rods distant with scarcely so much as her profile turned toward him. A cluster was in her left hand; in her right a stem just broken off, holding a rose and several buds. She was perfectly still, seeming to have forgotten to move, to be lost in reverie. She saw him no more than her roses; she was alone with her thoughts. There was a strength and a sadness in the delicate outline, especially in the mouth, which he had not seen before, perhaps, because he had never studied her profile. As he had thought of this expression while he had stood before the uncovered portrait, he had said to himself that certainly she had not been willingly concerned in helping forward another's misfortune. While he sat watching her he had been inclined to go to her, obeying his impulse rather than his judgment, which told him that even if he were in any way the cause of her sorrow, he could do nothing to help her. But Lady Dacre had spoken to him at the moment, and before he could answer her he had seen a servant go up to Elizabeth, and had perceived that she was coming into the house.

This morning also it was Lady Dacre's voice that broke in upon him. She was hurrying through the hall with eyes on the open door.

"Good morning," she said. "Has Madam Archdale gone into the garden yet? I told her I should be there first this morning, and now she has stolen a march upon me." Archdale was startled. Yes, his mother was in the garden, he saw her now. Was the other only a vision? "Will you follow, Temple?" cried her ladyship. Her husband, who had been coming down stairs as his wife spoke, greeted Archdale hastily and accepted her invitation, for some one else stood in the hall, having entered it, his observer supposed, from the library, for he had not seen him on the stairs. This other one was coming forward to his host when Sir Temple passed, and in another moment he stood face to face with Archdale.

"Good morning," he said with a bow. His expression had changed from the sneer it had worn as he stood in the shadow covertly watching Archdale's face. "Friends, is it not?" he added, and he smiled and held out his hand tentatively. His host hesitated in the least, then took it. He had been obliged to remind himself first that instinct was not an autocrat of one's manners. Edmonson perceived the hesitation, slight as it was, and the shadow in his heart sprang up and darkened his face for a moment. Then he gave a short laugh, and turned toward the sunshine. "That's right," he said; "let us part on good terms; it's luck, not I, that you find against you."

"It was about this very thing that I was waiting here to speak to you this morning," returned Stephen. "I was going to beg you to remain until we can look into things a little; you, and my father, and I, you understand? It can be done more conveniently here than anywhere else,—and I trust I need not assure you that you are welcome. Of course, I don't pretend to like the turn of affairs."

"Not necessary," interposed the other, the covert impertinence under his frank smile making Archdale flush, and return haughtily:

"I was merely going to say that we must accept with the best grace possible the consequences of things that happened so long before our day."

"This philosophy is delightful on your lips. As for myself, I shall not find that acceptance of the situation makes any demand for philosophical endurance."

He tossed his head a little as he ended in amusement at having finished his opponent at the same time as his speech.

"Perhaps that is well," returned Archdale quietly. "Then it is settled that you stay a few days longer with us?" he added.

"Thank you. I shall be happy to do so. When you need me, I am at your service; for you will find that I have proofs enough to be satisfactory. I have not considered that my unsupported word would be taken as sufficient guarantee in a case like this, where, you know, incredulity is so desirable."

"Yes, Master Edmonson, I confess, where incredulity is so desirable. Well, then, after breakfast I shall be obliged to trouble you."

"Thank you," answered Edmonson, marching off immediately. "I think Lady Dacre is in need of my services. She is struggling with a rose that has climbed up out of her reach, and her husband has disappeared altogether; he is probably assisting Madam Archdale. These husbands are not in the right place, you see." With which Parthian arrow he disappeared, and was soon filling Lady Dacre's hands with her coveted treasures.

Archdale watched him a few moments noticing his easy movements and his air of assurance.

"Impudent fellow," he muttered, setting his teeth, "to speak to an Archdale in that style. I can't believe him. I shall have Allston examine his proofs; he has a hawk's eye for flaws. But there's the likeness. Yes, his story may be true; but the man has the making of a knave in him, if the work is not done already."

It was almost dinner time. Elizabeth had been out sailing with Madam Archdale, Colonel Pepperell, and Sir Temple, and Lady Dacre. They were in the Colonel's boat; and Madam Pepperell, who had been detained, had sent her young guest to represent her. But Edmonson had gone off with his host to Colonel Archdale's, and Bulchester had mysteriously disappeared soon afterward. Elizabeth suspected that he had gone to pay a visit to Katie and had found her so fascinating that he could not tear himself from her society, or that he had wandered off somewhere by himself to dwell upon her perfections. "Poor simpleton!" she said to herself in the revulsion from her fears of the night before. At all events, the result was the same; there were only three at Seascape to accept the Colonel's invitation to go sailing.

It was always a refreshment to Elizabeth to be with Sir Temple and Lady Dacre; that morning it was even better than being alone; they were the only ones purely spectators in the drama of struggle and suffering going on under the courtesies that were its scenic accompaniments. When they talked and jested it was out of happy hearts, at least so far as the things about them were concerned, and for this reason the strain was taken from her in their presence. She had only to be gay enough, and there was no need of watching her words lest they should be misconstrued. If she had been asked why anything that she said or did was liable to be misconstrued, she could not have told. This was her feeling, but she did not see her way; no flash of the electric storm that the blackness foreboded had yet shown her where she stood; but the elemental conditions affected her.

The boat on its return had landed Madam Archdale and her guests on the pebbly beach at Seascape, not far from the house. They had said farewell and sauntered up the path toward it and disappeared. The boat was about putting out again when a man came running up to the Colonel, and begged him to wait to speak with the Captain of a schooner standing out about half a mile. The Captain had come ashore on purpose to see him and was a little way down the beach now hurrying toward him. The business was urgent.

"Go back without me," the Colonel said. "I may be kept here for some time." But Elizabeth had had enough of sailing for that day; she was already on shore and said that she would rather walk home. As Pepperell left her with an apology she walked on a few rods, and stopped to speak to a fisherman cleaning his boat. She had seen him at the house and had heard that he had lost his child the week before. As she turned from him she went on slowly until she came to where a boulder towered over her head and seemed to bar her progress except along the shore. She knew the zigzag way that wound about its base and led her into the straight path again which would take her across the grounds of Seascape and bring her into the road not far from Colonel Pepperell's home. But before she had time to enter this way, voices on the other side of the boulder startled her. Her first thought was that Lady Dacre and her husband had come back. But she perceived that the tones were Bulchester's. She stood still an instant, wishing that she could reach the road without being obliged to talk to him or any one, she felt so little like it. But there was no hope of that. There was a rough seat cut in the stone on the other side; the views landward and seaward were delightful; the great elm near by shaded the place, and Bulchester had probably ensconced himself there with somebody else. She must go by, and if they even joined her, it was no matter. She made a movement forward, when Edrnonson's voice with a ring that she had never heard in it came to her ears. Yet it was not his tones, but his words, that made her cower and stand motionless with startled eyes and parted lips, until, slowly, as wonder grew into disgust, her face crimsoned from brow to throat and drooped, as if to hide from itself. Was this the way that men spoke of women, with sneers, with scoffing? In all her innocent life she had never looked even through bars at the world that such expressions revealed, dimly enough to her veiled in her simplicity.

The Puritan spirit of her country, that although it sometimes put bands on the freeman, chained the brute in human nature in his dungeon, lest his breath in the land should breed death, had been in such accord with her own fair womanhood that she had not realized that all the world was not as safe as her own home, as safe, though not as happy. Yet the sneer that Edmonson had spoken seemed to him so slight, so much a matter of course, that it was forgotten as soon as uttered; it was merely his way of looking at a world unknown to his listener. She did not know of what woman it was that he had dared to speak with such contempt; probably of some one she had never seen. It was not at the stranger alone; it was through her at all women that the mire of suspicion had been thrown.

She could not go forward now, and while she stood trying to grow calm through her indignation and seeing that she must go home by the other road, which would take her quite a distance out of her way, scraps of the conversation that fell upon her ears found lodgment in her mind. The two seemed to be talking of some man now. Then all at once she heard Bulchester say:

"It's the oddity that takes you;"—she had lost what went before—"that will soon wear off. But I'm glad enough you're not as wise as I, to prefer the other. What makes you so sure, though, that he has secured your—?" In some movement she lost the last word and the answer, unless it were merely a significant exclamation of belief. "You wouldn't stand upon the chances of change though," resumed Bulchester, "I know you well enough. But, according to you, there's the insuperable obstacle."

Edmonson laughed contemptuously.

"Insuperable?" he answered. "Stray shots have taken off more superfluous kings and men than the world knows of. And just now, with this prospect of war before the country, something is sure to happen,—to happen, Bulchester; luck has a passion for me, and after all her caprices, she is coming to—."

Elizabeth lost the rest of the sentence. She was already on her way home by the other road, treading softly while on the beach, lest the pebbles should betray her footsteps. When she was well out of hearing she stopped a moment to take breath. She stood looking out upon the expanse of ocean before her as if her sight could reach to the unknown world beyond it.

"Last night," she said, "I thought the worst had come to me. I was wrong."

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

[Footnote 2: Copyright, 1884, by Frances C. Sparhawk.]

* * * * *



MEMORY'S PICTURES.

By Charles Carleton Coffin, 1846.

It is a pleasure to throw back the door, And view the relics of departed hours; To brush the cobwebs from the ancient lore, And turn again the book of withered flowers. Within the dusty chambers of the past, Old pictures hang upon the crumbling walls; Dim shadowy forms are in the twilight cast, And many a dance is whirling through the halls. There are bright fires blazing on the hearth, The merry shout falls on the ear again; And little footsteps patter down the path, Just like the coming of the summer rain. I hear the music of the rippling rill, The dews of morn are sprinkled on my cheek; While down the valley and upon the hill The laughing echoes play their hide-and-seek. I roam the meadow where the violets grow, I watch the shadows o'er the mountain creep; I bathe my feet where sparkling fountains flow, Or bow my head on moss-grown rocks to sleep. I hear the bell ring out the passing hour, I hear its music o 'er the valleys flung; O, what a preacher is that time-worn tower, Reading great sermons with its iron tongue! The old church clock, forever swinging slow, With moving hands at morning and at even, Points to the sleepers in the yard below, Then lifts them upward to the distant heaven. How will such memories o' er the spirit stray, Of hopes and joys, of sorrows and of tears; They are the tomb-stones time will ne'er decay, Although the moss will gather with the years.