The Girl’s Own Paper, by Various—A Project Gutenberg eBook

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 367, January 8, 1887, by Various

Produced by: Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER

CHAPTER XIII.

ow delicious it is when one is young to wake up in a fresh place on a summer’s morning. It was my belief that the birds woke me, there was such a twittering under the eaves where the house-martins had built their nests, such a warbling of thrushes breakfasting on the dewy lawn, such a cawing of rooks under the elm trees; such a joyous bird-symphony altogether, while I lay in my old-fashioned blue bed, looking round the quaint old room and trying to decipher the meaning of the curious prints in their black frames. When I was tired of this I rose and went to the window. The kitchen garden, with its row of beehives, was just under the window, and beyond were Cherrytree-lane and Squire Hawtry’s cornfield, and then a vague blue line, and a brown sail shimmering in the sunlight. The sweet peacefulness of the scene seemed to sink into my heart, and I could have sung my Te Deum with the birds.

When the children were dressed and we had finished our early breakfast, I went to the window with Reggie while Hannah was clearing the table. Joyce had already climbed up on the window seat; she was wild to go into the garden and see auntie’s pets, and I thought it would be no harm to humour her fancy and defer our walk to the shore.

As we stood there Miss Cheriton came out on the terrace. She wore a broad brimmed hat, and long gardening gloves, and carried a basket. She gave a low, peculiar call, and in a moment there was a fluttering of wings in the air, and a crowd of pigeons came round her feet to pick up the grain she had scattered; the pheasants and peacocks joined them.

I thought what a pretty picture it would have made; the old red brick house with its ivy-covered gables in the background; the terrace with its sundial and antique vases; the girl in her white gown with her beautiful pets round her, her favourite blue pigeons eating out of her hand.

“Oh, auntie, may we come?” pleaded Joyce; and Miss Cheriton looked up at us and smiled and nodded, and Joyce snatched her sun-bonnet and in a few minutes we had joined her on the terrace.

She greeted us with evident pleasure, and playfully held up her finger to silence Joyce.

“Don’t make a noise, my pet, or Rolf will hear you and want to come out; he is having his breakfast with Aunt Adelaide; and he is so rough and tiresome that I do not care to have him with me just now; you shall go with me into the poultry yard and feed the little yellow chicks yourself.”

Joyce was highly delighted at this prospect, and trotted along in her big white sun-bonnet, chattering as fast as her tongue would go. When we arrived at the poultry yard, Miss Cheriton filled her pinafore with grain and showed her where to throw it, and then picked up one of the downy yellow chicks for Reggie to kiss and hug; but he was so unwilling to part with it that we had some trouble to rescue the warm struggling thing; only the speckled hen was in such a fuss, clacking loudly in the midst of her brood. When we had exhausted the grain and had fed some grey rabbits, and had peeped in at the stables, and had bestowed a passing attention on the big St. Bernard in his kennel—Miss Cheriton’s chief favourite next to her brown mare, Bonnie—we sat down on a bench in the orchard, at some little distance from the beehives, while the children gathered daisies and buttercups.

“I am so fond of this old orchard,” observed Miss Cheriton, as she threw down her empty basket and removed her gloves, showing a pair of small brown hands that looked very strong and capable; “when I have nothing else to do, I and my pets come here and enjoy the quiet. Do you know, the peacocks and pheasants will follow me all over the place as closely as a dog? They don’t mind Lion a bit; and he is as gentle as a lamb. On Sunday afternoon I have all the creatures round me. Adelaide declares I waste my time dreadfully with the beasties.”

“They must give you plenty of occupation, Miss Cheriton,” for I have come to the conclusion that this girl was far from idle. The care of that extensive poultry-yard could be no sinecure’s office, besides which the beehives were her exclusive charge, though I heard afterwards the gardener’s son, Jim, was her under helper. All the live things about the place looked to her for food and comfort. She had a cage full of canaries in the conservatory, and a large grey parrot as well.

“Oh, I am always with my pets and flowers until luncheon-time,” she remarked, carelessly; “Jim is a very handy boy, and helps me with the rough work. I was up at six this morning, and we had moved half the pots in the conservatory before breakfast. I am always up early, except in the winter; the world is not half awake at that time of the year, and certainly not well lighted.”

“Those beehives must be a very profitable investment,” I observed, for I had heard before now that people had added largely to their incomes by keeping bees.

“You would be surprised how much I make by my hives,” she returned. “I have only a limited interest in the poultry yard, and have to find chickens and eggs for the household, but the beehives are my own. I succeeded so well with them last year, and I believe I shall do just as well this autumn. I am very proud of my bees.”

“It would not be a bad plan——” I began, and then I stopped, for I had spoken hastily, and how could I know if my words would be well received?

“Well,” she said, with a pretty air of impatience, “why do you stop? You have got something dreadfully sensible in your head, and I should like to hear it.”

“I am rather too quick with my words,” I answered, somewhat hesitating. “I was only thinking of what you said last night; you were condemning yourself very needlessly, as I think, and comparing your means of usefulness with Mrs. Morton’s.”

“With Violet’s many-sided duties. Well, I do not retract my words. I said I was always amusing myself; so I am; my bees are my playthings.”

“You could make them work for you if you chose,” I returned, quickly; “if one of these hives, for example, were devoted to some good purpose, if the money you got for the honey were given to one of those institutions in which your sister takes such interest.”

“Oh, what a nice idea,” she exclaimed, with a bright look. “I wonder what put that into your head. I was rather uncomfortable having all that money to spend on myself; I thought of giving some to Adelaide for Rolf, only I cannot get up an interest in that boy. I have more than I want, for one does not need so many dresses in the country, and nothing will induce me to go through a London season again. I tried it once,” with a merry laugh, “just to please Violet, but it nearly killed me, so I wrote to father to take me away. I should have liked the balls very well, only I got so dreadfully sleepy before they were over, and the rides in the Row were nice, if only they would have let me gallop, but I was nearly taken up for furious riding once when I could not get Bonnie to stop, and after that Alick lectured me, and I got sick of it.”

“It is not life at all; it is a daily round of harassing duties. Look what it has done for Violet—robbed her of spirits and bloom; she will be an old woman before her time. The fun is very well, but there is too much of it. I pined for fresh air, for the garden, and the bees, and my other pets. I am afraid my partners thought me dreadfully rustic; I seemed to amuse them. I do not care for the young men in ball-rooms, they are so vapid, and, for all their politeness, they seemed to be laughing at one.”

I could not help smiling at this; it was very odd she should be so frank with me. She must have forgotten that I had no experience of ball-rooms, and had never danced except at school-parties, when the girls were allowed to bring their brothers.

“You are looking satirical, Miss Fenton. Oh, of course, I see what you mean; but never mind, there are better things than balls in life. For my part, I prefer a solitary gallop on Bonnie to Strauss’s best waltz, though I do love dancing too, but, you see, neither Violet nor I have been trained to a fashionable life. We have lived in the country, have risen early, and been in the open air from morning to night, and now poor{227} Violet never goes to bed in time to get a beauty sleep, and she drives instead of taking a good walk, so no wonder her cheeks get pale and thin.”

“Oh, it is no use talking about Violet, I have given her up long ago; Alick has robbed me of her entirely. Now about your benevolent project; I mean to carry it out. Do you know the Children’s Incurable Hospital, Maida Vale? Violet is always working for that. There is to be a ‘Muriel Cot,’ in memory of the dear little baby she lost. Now why should I not have a ‘Children’s Hive,’ and make those special bees gather honey for those little incurable children. I call that a lovely idea. Look, that end hive under the apple tree shall be the one. Miss Fenton, you have emancipated me; I feel a philanthropist already; the world will be the better for me and my workers.”

I looked at her admiringly; such a lovely colour had come to her face, and her eyes looked so bright and happy. I felt I understood Gay Cheriton from that moment. She was one of those guileless, innocent natures that are long in throwing off childhood. She was full of generous impulses, frank and outspoken to a fault; the yoke of life pressed lightly on her; she was like an unbridled colt, that had never felt the curb or the spur; gentle guidance, a word from those she loved, was sufficient to restrain her. I knew now why Joyce had called her the little auntie; there was an air of extreme youth about her; she was so very lovable that diminutiveness suited her, and I thought her father’s pet name of humming bird suited her exactly; she was so quick and bright and restless, her vitality and energy demanded constant movement.

“How I am chattering!” she said at last, “and I have all the vases to fill before luncheon, but, as I told you last night, I am fond of talking if I can get anyone to listen to me. Adelaide never will listen to me patiently; she says I am such a chatterbox. Goodbye for the present, Miss Fenton.” And she tripped away, singing in such a fresh young voice as she went down the orchard that I did not wonder when a little brown linnet perched on a rose-bush answered her. I think the birds must have loved to hear her.

I sat for some time contemplating the low white gate and the row of beehives. I was rather pleased with the idea I had started; a word in season sometimes brings a rich harvest. I thought some time of the tiny workers in their brown livery bringing in their rich stores for the afflicted children; and it seemed to me that the offering would be a sweet savour to the Master who loved children.

I fell into a reverie over it; I thought how much might be done for others with little cost if people would only think; it is want of thought that clogs usefulness. Great sacrifices are so seldom demanded from us; we are not now called upon to forsake all that we hold dear and follow the Christ—little daily duties, small hourly renunciations, pleasures given up for some cheerful loving service: these are the free-will offerings that all may yield, only the people must “give willingly.”

The morning passed pleasantly in the sunny orchard; when the children tired of their play we went back to the house that they might have their noonday sleep. I was sitting alone in the nursery, mending Reggie’s pinafore, when I heard the clatter of noisy footsteps in the corridor, and a moment after the nursery latch was lifted without ceremony, and Rolf peeped in. He had a droll, half-ashamed expression on his face, but it bore no trace of yesterday’s ill-humour.

“My name is Miss Fenton, as I told you yesterday; or, you may call me Nurse if you choose. Yes; you may come in and talk to me if you like, Master Rolf; but you must be very quiet, as your little cousins are asleep.”

“What precious babies they must be to sleep in the day!” he observed, disdainfully, as he planted himself without ceremony on the window seat. “I sit up until ten o’clock every night; sometimes I will not go to bed until mother goes.”

“Wealthy means rich, doesn’t it? Well, Juddy said I shall be a rich man some day. I have got father’s watch and sword now, only mother locks them up until I am bigger. You are not rich, eh, Miss Fenton?” peeping into my face rather maliciously.

“Oh, I knew that you are only a nurse; I heard mother and Aunt Gay talking about you last night. Mother said you were a poor sort, and she wondered at Violet’s infatuation. She thought you stuck up and disagreeable, and not much to look at; a plain young woman, and very disrespectful. There, now!”

“Master Rolf,” I observed, calmly, and suppressing my inward wrath, “you call yourself a gentleman, but I assure you a savage shows more gentlemanly feeling than you. Don’t you know your mother’s words should be sacred, and you are bound in honour not to repeat them?” And then, as he seemed rather impressed at this, I told him how, even among savages and wild and uncultured nations, the sense of hospitality and gratitude was so strong that, when a man had partaken of bread and salt, broken the bread of fellowship, he was bound in honour not to betray or injure his host in any way; and I related to him an anecdote of an Armenian servant, who had long been faithful to his master, and had defended him in many dangers in his travels through a lawless country.

“The master,” I continued, “had vast treasures under his care, and he was greatly troubled when his servant said he must leave him. Judge what his feelings must have been when the man coolly told him that he had entered into a league with some banditti to rob him of his money; that it would be mean to remain in his service under these circumstances, and that he had given him warning of his intention, that he might defend himself, and that now they were equal.

“Even this lawless robber had some notions of honour, Master Rolf; while he ate his master’s bread and salt he was bound by his service not to injure him. Now you are only a little boy, but you ought to understand that you also are bound not to betray your mother or repeat her words, as long as you eat her bread and salt; that is the way people do so much mischief in the world, repeating things they know are not meant to be heard.”

“I like that story awfully. Yes,” and looking at me critically, “I like you too, though you are a plain young woman. No, I did not mean to say that,” interrupting himself in a hurry; “bread and salt, you know; I shall always think of that when I am going to tell Juddy things that mother says. She is an old stupid, you know, and she never has time to make a tail to my kite, and mother says she has no patience with her, she is such an——Oh, oh, Miss Fenton, bread and salt! How ever shall I remember when I want to put Juddy in a rage?”

“I daresay I shall be able to help you with your kite,” I returned, changing the subject, “but we shall want plenty of string and paper.”

“Oh, you nice old thing,” replied Rolf, ecstatically. “You are not a bit plain, not a bit; I shall tell mother I think you lovely, and that I mean to marry you when I grow up. Won’t she stare at that? May I bring my kite here this afternoon?”

“Oh, then I will come with you. Mother,” as Mrs. Markham appeared at the door, and looked at us with unfeigned surprise, “I can’t drive with you this afternoon; I am going on the beach with Miss Fenton and the children.”

PART I.

That being the case, our net will be spread wide enough to catch a very miscellaneous collection of facts. Nothing will come amiss to us that in any way illustrates the domestic existence of our ancestors, and every reader, whatever her turn of mind, will be sure to find something worth taking note of.

It will be a different sort of narrative from the history of great men, or a tale of battles, sieges, and such-like imposing circumstances. We shall speak of houses and furniture, food and clothing, etiquette and good manners, wages and prices, education and superstition, household industries and household amusements, old recipes and domestic medicines, the ways of the poor and the ways of the rich. We shall make as much of needles and pins as ordinary history-books do of swords and guns, and a girl singing an old song will have more attention than they give to an ambassador negotiating a foreign treaty.

The worst of it is that the subject is long, whilst our space is of necessity short. We shall try, however, to change that disadvantage into an advantage, by giving only those facts that appear most interesting. There is a pleasure, too, when reading about a subject, to know that the half has not been told, and that to all who care to pursue it on their own account a rich harvest remains yet unreaped.

We are not going to begin with the time “when wild in woods the noble savage ran,” and homes were in caves and under the shade of green trees; our starting-point is to be the reign of Henry VIII., and our first article will embrace that reign and the reigns of Edward VI. and Queen Mary—in other words, from 1509 to 1558.

In those far-back days many things were different from what they are now. There has been a great advance in material comfort. Our forefathers, no doubt, had just as much wit and wisdom as we have; but we can boast an advantage over them in possessing more of the conveniences of life. In that respect, at least, we are lucky to have been born so late.

Let us not imagine, however, that they had a bad time of it, or were discontented or miserable because they had not everything just like us. People do not sigh after what they have never either seen or heard of. We really find happiness in our affections—not in our material surroundings, which are of secondary importance; and it is not unreasonable to conclude that, as human nature is always the same, these ancestors of ours enjoyed life in their way quite as much as we do.

We start with the subject of houses and furniture. When Henry VIII. began to reign, well-to-do people in towns lived, as a rule, in houses built principally of timber, the fronts being often ornamented with rich carvings of fanciful and grotesque objects. The upper storeys projected; so much so, indeed, that in a street people in the attics on either side could almost shake hands. There was a reason for building in this way. As the houses were of perishable material, each storey gave protection from the weather to the storey beneath it.

Such a quantity of timber being used, there was a great danger of fire, and the warning of the bellmen who proclaimed the hours of the night in London was certainly needed, when, to their instructions to “be charitable to the poor, and pray for the dead,” they added, “Take care of your fire and candle.”

The labouring people in the country lived in houses constructed of the first things that came to hand—often nothing but wattle and mud or clay. When the mud or clay cracked, under the influence of summer’s heat or winter’s frost, it was a simple matter with the same material to “stop a hole to keep the wind away.” Ventilation was very defective, and Erasmus attributes the frequent sicknesses with which England was then visited in a great measure to the want of fresh air in the dwelling-houses.

The ideas that regulated the furnishing and decoration of the houses of the upper classes form a marked contrast to those prevailing nowadays. The furniture was more massive, and there was less of it. The bedchamber of Henry VIII. contained only a couple of joint cupboards, a joint stool, two hand-irons, a fire-fork, a pair of tongs, a fire-pan, and a steel mirror covered with yellow velvet.

Carpets came into use before the reign of Henry VIII. was far advanced, though in the reign of Queen Mary rushes still strewed the floor of the presence-chamber. Feather beds were used in Henry VIII.’s reign by the upper classes. When they went travelling, they were no longer content with the floor or a hard bench at halting-places, but generally carried portable beds (packed in leather cases) with them on horseback. In the lower ranks of life straw pallets, or rough mats with a round log for a pillow, formed the ordinary provision for sleeping.

Ladies’ dresses amongst the nobility in Henry VIII.’s reign had a certain formality, but in many points were elegant and becoming. Early in the sixteenth century they were made low and cut square about the neck: the sleeves were tight at the shoulder, but suddenly became very large and open, showing the puffed sleeves of the under-dress. The long skirts were worn open in front to the waist, showing the kirtle or petticoat. Sometimes, however, dresses were worn high, with short waists and a small falling collar.

At a little later date the sleeves of dresses were puffed at the shoulders, and when the dress was made open above the girdle, what was called a “partlet”—a kind of habit-shirt—was worn beneath it, and carried up to the throat.

Sleeves were one of the strong points of the ladies of those times. They were independent articles of clothing, and were attached at pleasure to the rest of the costume. “Much splendour,” says Mr. J. R. Planché, “was lavished on this part of the dress, and its various fashions were singularly quaint and elegant.” Amongst the inventories of Henry VIII.’s reign we find “three pair of purple satin sleeves for women; one pair of linen sleeves, paned with gold over the arm, quilted with black silk, and wrought with flowers between the panes and at the hands; one pair of sleeves of purple gold tissue damask wire, each sleeve tied with aglets of gold; one pair of crimson satin sleeves, four buttons of gold being set on each sleeve, and in every button nine pearls.”

Necklaces and other ornaments of jewellery were much worn. No dress was complete without a girdle, and from the girdle was suspended by means of chains such articles as tablets, knives and purses. Sometimes, in place of the chains, the girdles themselves had a long pendant, which was elaborately decorated.

We get a glimpse of the style of dress amongst commoner folk, in the history of a famous clothier known as “Jack of Newbury.” When Jack was married, the bride, in her wedding costume, must have cut quite a picturesque figure. “The bride,” we read, “being dressed in a gown of sheep’s russet and a kirtle of fine worsted, her head attired in a billiment (habiliment) of gold, and her hair, as yellow as gold, hanging down behind her, which was curiously combed and plaited, according to the manner of those days, was led to church by two boys with bride laces, and rosemary tied about their silken sleeves.”

Mrs. Jack became a widow, and after she had laid aside her weeds she is described as coming one day out of the kitchen “in a fair train gown stuck full of silver pins, having a white cap on her head, with cuts of curious needlework under the same, and an apron before her as white as driven snow.”

The ordinary costume for men of the upper ranks in the time of Henry VIII. was a full-skirted jacket or doublet, with large sleeves to the wrists, over which was hung a short cloak or coat, with loose hanging sleeves and a broad, rolling collar of fur. To these articles of dress was added a brimmed cap, jewelled and bordered with ostrich feathers; stockings and square-toed shoes.

A sumptuary law was passed in 1533, limiting the use of certain expensive stuffs and valuable personal ornaments to certain classes. Common people and serving men, for example, were confined to the use of cloth of a fixed price, and lamb’s fur only, and they were forbidden to wear any ornaments or even buttons of gold, silver, or gilt work, excepting the badge of their lord or master.

The apprentices of London wore blue cloaks in summer, and in winter gowns of the same colour. Blue cloaks or gowns were a mark of servitude.

Fourteen years before the beginning of Henry VIII.’s reign wages were settled by Act of Parliament. A free mason, master carpenter, rough mason, bricklayer, master tiler, plumber, glazier, carver or joiner, was allowed from Easter to Michaelmas to take 6d. a day, without meat or drink. Suppose he had meat and drink, he could only charge 4d. A master having under him six men was allowed a penny a day extra. From{229} Michaelmas to Easter a penny a day was taken off these prices. Wages, however, gradually rose all through the sixteenth century.

In 1511, in the household of the Earl of Northumberland, the principal priest of the chapel had £5 a year; a chaplain graduate £3 6s. 8d.; a chaplain not a graduate, £2; a minstrel, £4; a serving boy, 13s. 4d. These payments were over and above food and lodging.

When wages and salaries were so low, compared with those of our own day, we must expect to find a corresponding difference in prices. In 1541 a hundred eggs sold for 1s. 2d., a dozen pigeons cost 10d., a good fat goose cost 8d., and you could buy a fat sheep for from 2s. 4d. to 4s., and an ox for about £2. In 1533 an Act was passed by which the price of beef and pork was fixed at ½d. a pound, and veal at ¾d.

Of the state of learning, in the houses at any rate of the upper classes, much is to be said that reflects credit on our ancestors. The royal court of Henry VIII., whatever might be its faults, did not neglect study. In the case of Prince Edward, afterwards Edward VI., devotion to his books no doubt had an injurious effect on his health, and there is no saying what might have been the result to England had he had less learning and more exercise. Bishop Burnet tells us that he was so forward in his education that “before he was eight years old he wrote Latin letters to his father, who was a prince of that stern severity that one can hardly think that those about his son durst cheat him by making letters for him.”

Mary had a good knowledge of classic authors, and wrote good Latin letters. Elizabeth began every day with an hour’s reading in the Greek Testament, the tragedies of Sophocles, and the orations of Isocrates and Demosthenes. She also was a good Latin scholar, spoke French and Italian as fluently as English, had a smattering of Dutch and German, and was a devourer of works on history.

These two princesses were the highest in station of the accomplished women of the time, but there were many who equalled, and some who surpassed, them in learning. The most remarkable of all for accomplishments was certainly Lady Jane Grey, afterwards the unfortunate queen of a ten-days’ reign. Lady Jane took so kindly to study that she became the marvel of the age for her acquirements. She excelled in needlework and in music, and, aided by her tutor, Dr. Elmer, or Aylmer, afterwards Bishop of London, had thoroughly mastered Latin, Greek, French, and Italian, and knew something of at least three Oriental tongues—Hebrew, Chaldee, and Arabic.

One of the most interesting passages—and a touching one it is, too—in the writings of Roger Ascham is that in “The Schoolmaster,” in which he describes a visit he paid to the home of Lady Jane’s parents in Leicestershire in 1550. She was then little over thirteen years old. It gives us a glimpse of the girl-life of the period in a high rank of society, and deserves to be quoted in full.

“Before I went into Germany,” says Ascham, “I came to Broadgate, in Leicestershire, to take my leave of that noble Lady Jane Grey, to whom I was exceeding much beholden. Her parents, the Duke and Duchess, with all the household, gentlemen and gentlewomen, were hunting in the park. I found her in her chamber, reading Phædon Platonis, in Greek, and that with as much delight as some gentlemen would read a merry tale in Boccaccio.

“After salutation and duty done with some other talk, I asked her why she would leave such pastime in the park?

“Smiling, she answered me, ‘I wis all their sport in the park is but a shadow to that pleasure that I find in Plato. Alas, good folk! they never felt what true pleasure meant.’

“‘And how came you, madam,’ quoth I, ‘to this deep knowledge of pleasure, and what did chiefly allure you unto it, seeing not many women but very few men have attained thereunto?’

“‘I will tell you,’ quoth she, ‘and tell you a truth which perchance you will marvel at. One of the greatest benefits that God ever gave me is that He sent me so sharp and severe parents, and so gentle a schoolmaster. For when I am in presence either of father or mother, whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand or go, eat, drink, be merry or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or doing anything else, I must do it as it were in such weight, measure, and number—even so perfectly as God made the world—or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, yea, presently, sometimes, with pinches, nips, and bobs, and other ways which I will not name for the honour I bear them; so without measure misordered that I think myself in hell, till time come that I must go to Mr. Elmer, who teacheth me so gently, so pleasantly, with such fair allurements to learning, that I think all the time nothing whiles I am with him. And when I am called from him I fall on weeping, because whatsoever I do else but learning is full of grief, trouble, fear, and whole misliking unto me. And thus my book hath been so much my pleasure, and bringeth daily to me more pleasure and more, that in respect of it all other pleasures in very deed be but trifles and troubles unto me.’

“I remember this talk gladly,” Ascham adds, “both because it is so worthy of memory, and because, also, it was the last talk that ever I had and the last time that ever I saw that noble and worthy lady.”

However learning might flourish in the upper circles of society, it seems to have languished in the schools and among the people. But efforts were made in the direction of popular education, and more grammar schools it is said were founded in the latter part of Henry VIII.’s reign than in the three hundred years preceding.

Music was practised by all classes. Erasmus, who saw much of England in the beginning of the sixteenth century, speaks of the English as the most accomplished in the skill of music of any people. “It is certain,” says Mr. Chappell, “that the beginning of the sixteenth century produced in England a race of musicians equal to the best in foreign countries, and in point of secular music decidedly in advance of them.”

Henry VIII. was a great patron of music, and, more than that, he was himself a composer and performer. He played well on both the virginals and the lute, and could sing at sight. But to sing at sight was a common accomplishment amongst gentlemen; so common, indeed, that inability to do so was looked on as a serious drawback to success in life. Homes were rendered cheerful by the singing of madrigals and other part music. The first collection of songs in parts that was printed in England belongs to the year 1530.

Besides music, many other recreations were indulged in. These were the days of archery, casting of the bar, wrestling, and such martial sports as fighting with swords and battle-axes. For rural pastimes there were hunting and hawking—and in these the ladies were often as enthusiastic as the gentlemen. Card-playing was highly popular, and in the reign of Henry VIII. a prohibitory statute was found necessary to prevent apprentices from using cards, except in the Christmas holidays, and then only in their masters’ houses. The same statute forbade any householder to permit card-playing in his house, under the penalty of six shillings and eightpence for every offence.

May Day was a general holiday, and Maypoles were set up in every town and village. The observance of May Day differed no doubt in minor particulars in different places, but in general it consisted in people of all ranks going out early in the morning into the “sweet meadows and green woods,” where they broke down branches from the trees, and adorned them with nosegays and crowns of flowers. “This done, they returned homewards with their booty, and made their doors and windows triumph in the flowery spoil.” The Maypole was set up, and the rest of the day was spent in dancing round it, and in sports of different kinds. When evening came, bonfires were lighted in the streets. Even the reigning sovereign joined in these amusements. On May Day, 1515, Henry VIII. and Queen Katherine, his wife, rode a-Maying from Greenwich to the high ground of Shooter’s-hill, accompanied by many lords and ladies.

There was a famous London Maypole in Cornhill before the parish church of St. Andrew, which thus got the name of St. Andrew Undershaft. The pole or shaft, Stow tells us, was set up by the citizens “every year, on May Day, in the morning, in the midst of the street, before the south door of the said church; which shaft, when it was set on end and fixed in the ground, was higher than the church steeple.” When its annual day of usefulness was over, the pole was taken down again and hung on iron hooks above the doors of the neighbouring houses.

This pole was destroyed in 1550, the fourth year of Edward VI.’s reign, in an outburst of Puritanism, after a sermon preached at St. Paul’s Cross against May games. The inhabitants of the houses against whose wall the pole had found shelter sawed it in pieces, and every man took a bit and made use of it to light his fire.

Mingled with the festivities of May Day there was a distinct set of sports, very popular in the early part of the sixteenth century, intended to represent the adventures of the renowned woodland hero, Robin Hood. The enthusiasm with which the common people entered into these sports may be seen from the reception Bishop Latimer met with when he once proposed to preach in a town on the 1st of May. He tells the incident himself in a sermon he preached in 1549 before Edward VI.

“I came once myself,” he says, “to a place, riding on a journey homeward from London, and I sent word overnight into the town that I would preach there in the morning because it was holy day, and methought it was an holy day’s work.” (It was the Feast of the Apostles Philip and James.) “The church stood in my way, and I took my horse and my company and went thither. I thought I should have found a great company in the church, and when I came there the church door was fast locked.

“I tarried there half an hour and more. At last the key was found, and one of the parish comes to me and says, ‘Sir, this is a busy day with us. We cannot hear you. It is Robin Hood’s Day. The parish are gone abroad to gather for Robin Hood. I pray you forbid them not.’

“I was fain there to give place to Robin Hood. I thought my rochet”—or bishop’s surplice—“should have been regarded, though I were not; but it would not serve; it was fain to give place to Robin Hood.”

How did stay-at-home people amuse themselves then in the long winter evenings? No doubt they either made time seem short by going to sleep, or they sat by the fireside singing songs or telling oft-told stories, or exercising their wits by asking each other riddles or conundrums. Some of their fireside riddles are preserved in a little book called “Demands Joyous”—in modern English{230} Merry Questions—which was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1511.

The following are a few of the conundrums contained in this work, and at some of them the reader, who is well acquainted with the conundrums of the present day, will be tempted to exclaim with Solomon, that there is nothing new under the sun.

“What is it that never was and never will be?—A mouse’s nest in a cat’s ear.

“How many straws go to a goose’s nest?—Not one, for straws, not having feet, cannot go anywhere.

“How many calves’ tails would it take to reach from the earth to the sky?—No more than one, if it be long enough.

“Why doth a dog turn round three times before he lieth down?—Because he knoweth not his bed’s head from the foot thereof.

“Why do men make an oven in a town? Because they cannot make a town in an oven.

“What is the worst bestowed charity that one can give?—Alms to a blind man; for he would be glad to see the person hanged that gave it to him.”

An industry of considerable interest from a domestic point of view came to the front in 1542; this was the manufacture of pins. These useful articles were originally made abroad, but the English pinners took to making them, and on their engaging to keep the public well supplied at reasonable prices, an Act of Parliament was passed in the year just named, forbidding the sale of any sort of pins excepting “only such as shall be double-headed, and have the heads soldered fast to the shank of the pin, well smoothed, the shank well shaven, the point well and round filed, canted and sharped.”

The English pinmakers, however, either proved unable or unwilling to keep their part of the bargain, and complaints were so loudly made that the pins were not what they should be, that in 1545 the Act was declared “frustrate and annihilated, and to be repealed for ever.” Pins of good quality were of brass, but unscrupulous makers made pins of iron wire, blanched, and passed them off as brass ones.

People who went from home then had no choice—they must either ride or walk. Kings, queens, and gentlefolk all mounted to the saddle, the ladies being accustomed to ride on pillions fixed on the horse, and generally behind some relative or serving-man. Rude carriages, however, made their appearance in England in 1555.

Before the Reformation there were no poor’s rates. The poor had their wants supplied by charitable doles given at religious houses, and by contributions placed in the poor man’s box which stood in every church. In all parishes there was a church house supplied with dishes and cooking utensils. “Here,” says John Aubrey, “the housekeepers met, and were merry and gave their charity.”

Begging, under certain conditions, was regulated by an Act of Parliament passed in 1530. By this Act justices of the peace were required to give licences under their seals to such poor, aged, and impotent persons to beg within a certain precinct as they thought had most need. If anyone begged out of the district assigned to him he was to be set in the stocks two days and two nights; and if anyone begged without first obtaining a licence he was to be put in the stocks three days and three nights, and be fed with bread and water only.

Vagrants were very sternly dealt with; but in this Act, and in subsequent legislation on the same subject, we see that our sixteenth-century forefathers had an honest desire to do their duty in relieving such as were in “unfeigned misery.” In an Act passed in the first year of Edward VI.’s reign we find the curate of every parish required, “on every Sunday and holiday, after reading the Gospel of the day, to make (according to such talent as God hath given him) a godly and brief exhortation to his parishioners, moving and exciting them to remember the poor people, and the duty of Christian charity in relieving of them which be their brethren in Christ, born in the same parish and needing their help.”

One of the interesting households of the period was that of Sir Thomas More, the famous Lord Chancellor who was executed in 1535. More lived at Chelsea, and of his happy home there Erasmus, who knew him well, has given the following charming account:—“More,” he says, “has built, near London, upon the Thames, a modest yet commodious mansion. There he lives, surrounded by his numerous family, including his wife, his son, and his son’s wife, his three daughters and their husbands, with eleven grandchildren. There is not any man living so affectionate to his children as he, and he loveth his old wife as if she were a girl of fifteen. Such is the excellence of his disposition, that whatsoever happeneth that could not be helped, he is as cheerful and as well pleased as though the best thing possible had been done.

“In More’s house you would say that Plato’s Academy was revived again, only whereas in the Academy the discussion turned upon geometry and the power of numbers, the house at Chelsea is a veritable school of Christian religion. In it is none, man or woman, but readeth or studieth the liberal arts; yet is their chief care of piety. There is never any seen idle. The head of the house governs it, not by a lofty carriage and oft rebukes, but by gentleness and amiable manners. Every member is busy in his place, performing his duty with alacrity; nor is sober mirth wanting.”

Speaking of More’s home life in his “Short History of the English People,” Mr. J. R. Green says:—“The reserve which the age exacted from parents was thrown to the winds in More’s intercourse with his children. He loved teaching them, and lured them to their deeper studies by the coins and curiosities he had gathered in his cabinet. He was as fond of their pets and their games as the children themselves, and would take grave scholars and statesmen into the garden to see his girls’ rabbit-hutches or to watch the gambols of their favourite monkey.”

CHAPTER XIV.

hen Jack was gone, Mrs. Shelley insisted on Fairy’s going to bed, for the child was worn out with fatigue and excitement, and she and John watched by Charlie’s couch in turns through the short summer night, which, short as it was, seemed all too long when spent in anxiously watching for a change which did not come. Once, and once only during the night, did Charlie open his eyes and murmur, “Where am I?” but before the shepherd, who was sitting by him, had time to answer, he had again relapsed into unconsciousness.

From the first John Shelley had taken a hopeful view, and even this momentary return to consciousness filled him with hope; the next interval might be longer perhaps; at any rate, it was a favourable sign in the shepherd’s opinion. At four o’clock Mrs. Shelley came to take her husband’s place, and then, to her surprise, he told her he was going to walk to the nearest point where the London coach passed and give Jack the latest bulletin before he started.

And so, to Jack’s joy and amazement, the first time the coach paused to take up the Lewes letters, there stood his father by the inn door, waiting to speak to him. In a moment Jack, who, with Mr. Leslie, was occupying the boxseat, was down on the ground grasping his father’s hand and eagerly asking what news.

“No worse, Jack; if anything, a trifle better; he was conscious for a few moments last night; just opened his eyes and said ‘Where am I?’ but I knew you would like to hear the latest news, as you can’t have a letter till you get to New York, and I don’t know how long that will be after you arrive there.”

“Oh, I’ll let you know all about the mails, shepherd, when I come back. Come, Jack,” called out Mr. Leslie, from the box.

“God bless you, my boy, and grant we may meet again someday,” said the shepherd, wringing Jack’s hand, and then the lad, with tears in his eyes, jumped back to his place, the coachman{231} cracked his whip, and in a few minutes nothing remained but a cloud of dust, through which John Shelley was straining his eyes to catch a last glimpse of his eldest son.

The next day or two were passed in such a whirl of excitement, what with the exhilarating feeling of travelling on the top of a coach for the first time in his life, and being whirled up to London by four horses in a few hours, and then the wonderful things which, even in his brief visit, he saw there, and then the long journey to Liverpool, and the sight of the docks and the ship he was to sail in, for in those early days of the nineteenth century no steamer had as yet crossed the Atlantic. All this so occupied Jack’s time and thoughts that though that vision of Charlie stretched pale and insensible at home haunted him from time to time, still he had no leisure to dwell on it. But when on Monday Mr. Leslie, having seen him on board, took leave of him, and Jack was left alone among a crowd of strangers, with nothing to do for five or six weeks but watch the sea and sky, then the thought of Charlie would not be banished, and his anxiety to know how he was became intense. Luckily Jack turned out at first a bad sailor, and the physical tortures of sea-sickness counteracted the mental suffering he was enduring, which, with so little to divert his mind, might have ended in an attack of brain fever. When he was well enough to leave his berth, he made friends with the captain and one or two of the passengers, who took a fancy to this fine, good-looking young man, who certainly looked exceedingly unlike a shepherd in the suit Mr. Leslie had bought him at a London tailor’s. His new friends lent him books, and he derived both pleasure and benefit from conversing with them, but yet, though he read and studied hard during the voyage, it was a terrible time to him, and no landsman ever rejoiced more at the sight of land than Jack did when they sighted the American coast. He always looked back on that voyage as a dreadful nightmare, for all through he had been haunted by the terrible fear, almost too terrible to put into words, lest he should be guilty of the sin of Cain.

His first act on landing was to inquire when he could have a letter from England, and finding three weeks hence was the earliest time he could hope to receive one, for the ship he had come by had just brought a mail, he made up his mind to dismiss the subject as much as possible, and wait as patiently as he could for the letter which would colour his whole life.

His new occupation, upon which he entered at once, was far more congenial than sheep-washing or shearing, and the entirely new life he led and the new country he was living in, with its strange customs and foreign people, all helped to give a fresh stimulus to Jack’s mind, and if it had not been for the shadow cast over his life by the memory of the events which had been the immediate cause of his coming hither, his first few weeks in New York would have ranked among some of the happiest in his life. As it was, they slipped by far more quickly than he had thought possible, and at last he heard the news that the English mail had arrived, and he bent his steps to the post-office to ask if there were any letters for him.

How Jack’s heart thumped as he stood watching the clerk diving into some pigeon-holes in search of his letters; he fancied the people in the office must have heard its wild beatings.

Yes, there were two letters; the first Jack saw at a glance was from Mr. Leslie, the other was directed by Fairy. The paper on which the letter was written—there were no envelopes in those days—was not black-edged, and that, though he dare not lay much stress upon it, was, perhaps, a hopeful sign, but yet, as he broke the wafer, he was still in such fear and trembling lest its contents should be unfavourable, that he dared not open it until he was safe in his own lodgings, where no curious eyes could watch his behaviour as he read his fate.

It was indeed well no curious eyes were able to pry into Jack’s humble room, his castle as he liked to call it, for, poor as it was, it was his own, paid for out of his earnings, for when he came to the end of the long crossed sheet he buried his face in his hands, and his great strong frame shook with his sobs.

The letter, though directed by Fairy, was from Mrs. Shelley, and ran as follows:—

And then followed a few lines in the shepherd’s handwriting, written with elaborate pains and much effort, as Jack knew, for John Shelley was much more accustomed to wield his crook than his pen, which was certainly not that of a ready writer. His preparations were as elaborate as the writing itself. First he rolled up the sleeves of his smock; then he ran his hands through his hair, and rubbed the back of his head; then he wetted his fingers; finally he fixed the pen in his right hand, after a fashion of his own; and Jack, as he read the postscript of his mother’s letter, pictured to himself his father’s attitude as he wrote it, leaning half across the kitchen table, and moving his whole body, as if every stroke was the greatest exertion, as it was to him. But if the manner of his writing was eccentric, the matter was excellent, in spite of the spelling, which was original, and Jack treasured up his father’s words carefully, and vowed never to forget how gently and kindly the shepherd had dealt with him in his trouble.

On the Monday afternoon, while No. 1 was resting, the elder bachelor sallied out by himself to see one or two of the important old churches. By the aid of a map of the town, he found his way to the dirty old church of St. Maurizio, where he saw some strangely beautiful paintings of Aurelio and Bernardino Luini. He greatly wondered if the abject poor, at their silent devotions—for there was no service at the time—were as greatly influenced by art as were their predecessors in the less enlightened days. But without wasting his time further in worthless dreamings, which could better be done at another time, he passed out of the stuffy and ugly little church into the glorious sunlight, and proceeded to the more famous church of Santa Maria della Grazie, to see the most popular picture ever painted—namely, “The Last Supper,” by Leonardo da Vinci.

The church was entered first; and here again were groups of the poorest at their private devotions. Rapture sublime seemed now and then to illumine the face of a dirty beggar as he or she glanced at a crucifix or a relic which was exposed to view over the altar of the Lady Chapel. Could such worship be wrong if it softened, and so greatly softened, hearts like these, in bodies ill-fed and ill-clothed, making a repulsive exterior glorified by a countenance of secret joy? But disappointment came by means of a surly sacristan, a veritable Judas with a bag, who roughly attended the worshippers, and pocketed pence in return for wiping their pocket handkerchiefs (for such we perforce call their dirty rags) on the glass case on the altar containing the relic before mentioned. To see the emotion of the deluded creatures, who kissed their rags with ecstatic bliss on receiving them again, was a strange sight, and struck us as widely different from that of the woman who kissed the blue fringe on Christ’s garment as He{234} passed her—for what “virtue” could come out of the operation in the Church of Santa Maria della Grazie? The act of devotion and lowly love in the Gospel story was not done from force of habit, nor was the privilege given in return for money—and, oh! how different the Object and the intention!

The greatest painting in the world (“The Last Supper”) is to be seen in an old outhouse which was used by the reverend monks as a refectory before the dissolution of the monastery, and which has since been used as a stable by French dragoons.

The painting is in a sad state of dilapidation, caused by damp and attempted restorations in 1770, and also by the bad treatment it has had at the hands of tourists. But much of the genius of the painting is still seen, and we bow in lowly reverence before a work which surely has been productive of much religious elevation in many generations and nations.

The Dominicans, in dining in this old refectory, must have been wonderfully impressed at seeing Christ at the other end of the room taking His Last Supper with them; for the accessories of table-cloth, glasses, etc., in the painting resemble the identical articles used by the monks, and all helped the great illusion. But again a disillusion! for, as will be seen on a reference to the picture, the reverend fathers committed the sacrilege of forming a doorway in a part of the picture—actually cutting off the legs of the chief Figure—in their desire to have their dinner warm!

The illness of the younger bachelor, which had threatened to ruin our holiday, was not nearly so serious as the doctor had led us to expect. On the second day the fever much abated, and we determined to resume our journey after the third day. The doctor, however, advised us not to go to either Cremona or Mantua, as these cities, especially the former, are unhealthy, and might bring on a renewal of the fever. This was a disappointment, as we were anxious to see Cremona, which, apart from its cathedral and other buildings, has always been renowned for the manufacture of violins and other stringed instruments. To see fiddles of every shape and size hung out in the open air to dry like so many clothes after washing, was too novel a sight to miss without a bitter pang.

We determined to make up for our disappointment in not seeing Cremona and Mantua, by visiting the town of Pavia and the magnificent monastery or Certosa close to it.

So we arranged to make the excursion to the Certosa and Pavia, to return to Milan for a visit to the Brera Gallery, to dine, and to get our trunks, and finally depart for Verona, if possible, on the same day. This was rather an extensive programme, especially as one of us had just recovered from an illness; but we determined if possible to abide by it.

The great Lombard plain is relieved from monotony by being cut-up with canals and ditches, running between avenues of willows and poplars, reminding one of the scenery in Dutch pictures.

Of course the Certosa is in many respects an exquisite building. The magnificence of the materials of its altars, screens, pavements, &c., and the enormous wealth of sculpture lavished over every portion of it, render this church one of the most remarkable structures in the world. But when one comes to study it and to think it well over, the question arises whether this immense amount of costly material, this vast amount of labour and skill, ought not to have produced something far more “striking” in general effect. In fact, it rather reminds one of the so-called French dinners, which English people are in the habit of giving, from which one comes away thoroughly unsatisfied, with only a confused recollection of a great number of costly dishes. It almost appears as if in the Certosa the sculptors had been set to do the architecture and the painters to execute the sculpture; each has so attempted to overdo and over-elaborate his portion of the work that he has “strained” his art, until it has lost those wholesome restrictions which the æsthetic principles, both of classic and mediæval times, had placed upon it. Thus we find the architectural outlines broken up and lost in a forest of detail, and the sculptured panels have elaborated backgrounds more suited for pictorial works than for carving.

The façade, which our girls perfectly know by photograph, was designed by Borgognone, far better known as a painter, and was commenced about 1473.

One really sees nothing of the church until entering the large gate, covered on the outside with damaged frescoes; the wonderful façade presents itself on the other side of the quadrangle.

As can well be imagined, the first sight of this wonderful front nearly took our breath away, so vast is the amount of sculpture and so elaborate the designs. The upper portion is far less elaborate than the lower; indeed, we thought that they were by different architects.

The most richly decorated portion of the façade is that on the level of the portico, the two windows on either side of the latter being completely enclosed by a vast amount of sculpturesque ornament. This elaboration is carried out to such an extent that the mullions of the windows, instead of being simply moulded, are carved into imitations of candelabra, with foliage, lizards, and little cupids in the act of climbing, and ornamenting every portion.

The subjects which pleased us the most were the pictures of sculpture, a little above the level of a man’s head, representing scenes in religious history. These are very beautiful and perfect, though some of the heads and attitudes of the figures are, to say the least, grotesque.

We may mention that a great number of the most eminent Italian masters for nearly two centuries had a hand in the elaboration of the façade, including the great Donatello.

Before entering the church, we visited the two cloisters, which are very picturesque. The arches of the first one are full of terra-cotta ornamentation. It is approached from the church by a magnificent white marble doorway.

The great cloister is very large, and is surrounded by cells, which remind one that the Certosa was once a monastery, and belonged to the Carthusians. This curious order of men never see one another, except in church. Each man has four rooms and a little garden entirely to himself. He has his bedroom, his study, his workshop, and his toolroom. These Carthusians were extremely fond of gardening, and we have received many benefits from their knowledge of horticulture. They also invented the well-known liqueur, Chartreuse. Hence their name. This was invented as a medicine, and is most wholesome and beneficial for certain illnesses; but it is now, of course, more used for its gastronomic than its medicinal qualities.

The church was commenced in the latter part of the fourteenth century; it is in form a Latin cross, and in style a mixture of Romanesque and Gothic. The whole of the interior is very richly decorated, all kinds of material being used, and the altars are beautifully inlaid and studded with precious stones, gold, etc. There are, however, scarcely any fine pictures, the few good ones having been removed, and the great number remaining scarcely add to the beauty of the interior.

There are seven chapels on either side of the nave, which are railed off from the latter. These were shown to us by a guide, not by a monk, as the guide-books say.

The Certosa is magnificently kept, and in order to make it even more “smart,” the old pavement has been replaced by a very bright mosaic one, which reflects the church like glass. But of all, the choir is the most magnificent, the tabernacle and altar-screen being sumptuous sixteenth century Renaissance work, and on either side of the altar the walls are decorated with rich sculpture.

In the transepts are two monuments, viz., those of Gian-Galeazzo Visconti, the founder of the church, and of Ludovico Moro and his wife, Beatrice d’Este.

Gian-Galeazzo Visconti was the most celebrated of the great Lombard family of Visconti, who practically ruled Milan for over a century and a half. So great was the power of this family, that they at times subjected nearly the whole of Northern Italy, and Gian-Galeazzo, after completely defeating an army sent against him by the Emperor of Germany, and after having captured by degrees the whole of Lombardy, was about to declare himself King of Italy, when death put an end to his ambition in the year 1402.

Gian-Galeazzo Visconti was the founder of Milan Cathedral and the Certosa of Pavia, and, as before mentioned, a superb monument has been erected to his memory in the latter church; but this monument was more than half a century in construction, by which time the people had forgotten where the prince had been buried; and thus the body of this great man, who had defeated numberless armies and caused to be erected two of the most sumptuous buildings in Europe, lies no one knows where.

The son of Gian-Galeazzo ruled in Milan upon his father’s death, after which the Sforza family succeeded, and held power until the middle of the sixteenth century, when the emperor, Charles V., who was practical master of Italy, handed over the duchy of Milan to his son Philip.

After leaving the Certosa, the two bachelors hired one of the light one-horse carriages, of which there are always a number outside the church, and drove to Pavia. That drive was most pleasant. It was a lovely spring day, with a brilliant sun, though not too hot, and the country was all aglow with bright colour.

Pavia is a very curious old place. Of all the old garlic-smelling, dirty, and badly-drained cities of North Italy, it is the most garlic-smelling, the dirtiest, and the worst drained; but it is very quaint withal. The old marketplaces, the projecting roofs, and the curious outdoor shops give it a wonderfully “old-world” appearance, and we enjoyed this ramble through the old city greatly, notwithstanding the horrible smells and the difficulty we had to find our way about the place. After wandering for some little time, we came to the Piazza del Duomo, which is most picturesque, and the effect was much enhanced when we were there, as it was market time. The vast quantity of old women, dressed in the most quaint manner, selling the oddest of wares, added no little to a scene which must always be paintable to a degree. The cathedral, rising on one side of the piazza, with its huge campanile, though picturesque, can scarcely be called beautiful. It has never been finished, and when we were there it was in a terrible state of dilapidation. Of the interior we could see nothing except a heap of scaffold-poles, as it was in course of restoration, and even the shrine of the great St. Augustine was concealed from view.

The most interesting church in Pavia is San Michele, and, though we were rather pressed for time, we determined to see it.

San Michele is an early Romanesque church{235} of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and is very beautiful, both externally and internally. The façade is richly ornamented with bands of carving and small open galleries, and the chancel internally is on a much higher level than the nave, and is approached by a great flight of steps, giving it a most dignified appearance.

After leaving San Michele we tried to find our way to the station; no easy matter, as we found to our cost. We think we must have made the circumference of the city three times before an Italian boy, rather more intelligent than his fellows, at last pointed us out a place which proved to be the station, from whence we returned to Milan.

The Brera Gallery contains a magnificent collection of pictures. In an article like this it is impossible to give a detailed description of these paintings, and a mere list of works of art is both uninteresting and uninstructive; besides which no description of pictures is of any value unless it is prefaced by an account of the various schools to which the artists belong—a task which has been admirably done already by Miss Emily Macirone in the pages of this magazine. However, we may mention that the gallery is a complete history of Italian art.

To commence with, we find a good example of Giotto, who (as our girls will see from the excellent chart of the chief painters of the various schools of art, page 629 of our Annual for 1886) flourished in the commencement of the fourteenth century. As on a future occasion we shall have to speak of this painter, when describing the Arena Chapel at Padua, all we shall say at present is that one should not attempt to criticise him or the works of this early Italian school by mere isolated pictures found in galleries. Of course in the days of Giotto Italian art was more or less in its infancy, and the mechanical knowledge possessed by these fourteenth century painters was meagre, therefore we must not expect to find grand effects of chiaroscuro, neither is the rich colour of the later school to be discovered.

Of the more perfected early Italian school we find works by Luca Signorelli, Giovanni Bellini, whom we shall find far better represented in Venice, and the excellent Francia, whose lovely picture of “Mater Dolorosa” in our National Gallery is so well known to our girls. We find, also, works of Raffaelle, Leonardo da Vinci and his pupil, Luini. But the best represented painters in the Brera are the later Venetian school, especially Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. The great glory of the collection is Raffaelle’s picture of the marriage of the Virgin. The arrangement of this picture at first struck us as being extremely formal. We find in the background a twelve-sided temple crowned with a dome, standing directly in the middle of the picture. The architecture of this temple has been severely criticised; but it by no means follows that because Raffaelle thought the structure suitable for his picture he would ever have built anything like it. In front of the temple is a very formal pavement divided into large squares. All the figures are grouped together immediately in the foreground. The High Priest stands in the centre, holding the hands of Mary and Joseph. Behind Joseph are many youths, and behind Mary are a number of women—five in each group, thus keeping up the symmetrical arrangement which runs throughout the whole picture. There is a charming grace about the head of Mary and the two women standing immediately behind her. May we call them the bridesmaids?

Joseph and the youths who accompany him are represented with rods, but it will be noticed that Joseph’s rod is crowned with five blossoms, probably of the almond. Several explanations have been given of this. The most poetical supposes it refers to an ancient legend that Mary had several suitors, as would be almost certain to be the case of a maiden of the house of David, possessed, moreover, of great personal beauty. The legend records that the various suitors each cut a rod, which they laid in the temple, and that after a time Joseph’s rod was discovered to have blossomed. Some writers suppose that the youths breaking the rods refer to an ancient custom practised in Jewish marriages.

The picture is extremely beautiful in colour, brilliant and well preserved. We venture to suggest that the very symmetrical and formal arrangement of the picture may have resulted from its having been intended as the centre portion of a group of compositions.

Titian is best represented by the frequently engraved picture of St. Jerome—a work full of grand power and magnificent chiaroscuro. Leonardo da Vinci’s work in the gallery is one of very great interest, as it is a study for the head of the Saviour for his mighty work of the Last Supper.

As the evening approaches, we dine at one of the perfect ristoranti of Milan and proceed by rail to Verona. On our way we were captivated by the charming manners of the peasantry; for we travelled third class, and thus had a capital opportunity of judging. It was a fête day at some of the towns our train called at, and there were fireworks, and every evidence of village festivity. But although there was great demand for seats in the train, we saw nothing of drunkenness nor heard coarse language, or anything resembling a vulgar cockney crowd—or, for the matter of that, the vulgar, well-dressed competitors for best seats who visit such civilising entertainments as the Monday or Saturday Popular and other London concerts! No, the Italian peasantry could teach wonderful lessons in kindness and self-respect to their betters of England! We reached Verona at midnight, and put up at a delightfully old world hotel and slept the sleep of—well, the tired, until the sun next morning reminded us of another happy day in store for us.

And now there arises before us a scene which will never be absent from the recollection of either bachelor. A broad and rapidly-flowing river, spanned by a lofty bridge, pierced by a great circle between the centremost arches, like the eye of some vast Cyclops. Banks covered with ancient tiled-roofed houses, above which rise an indescribable mass of domes, towers, spires, pinnacles, and lofty walls, crowned by forked battlements; the whole backed up by undulating hills, clad with the deep green of the cypress groves, amongst which arise the round towers of a strange-looking castle. Is this the recollection of some picture we have seen, some place we have dreamt of, or is it a reality?

The question seems further from being solved as we wander through the streets and squares of the poetical city. Every step brings us in the presence of some wondrous recollection of the past, and there is nothing to fasten down our ideas to the present time. Fresh dreams arise in every street. What is this vast oval structure, with its countless arches, reminding one of the great Colosseum at Rome? Ruinous, it is true; but as we enter it, strange to say, it seems to have suddenly awakened from its dream of sixteen centuries. Alas! it awakens us also, for what do we see but in the centre of this great arena the hanky-panky tricks of modern horsemanship and hear the stale jokes of a modern English clown! Let us, however, leave this singular scene of anachronism and again wander and dream.

This time there rises before us a series of lofty sculptured tombs, each crowned by a spire, surmounted by the figure of a man on horseback, separated from the roadway by some delicate metal work, wrought by the hand of a thirteenth-century blacksmith into a bewildering combination of quatrefoils, and supported by graceful marble columns, each bearing the image of a saint or angel. To complete the picture, the whole is backed up by a venerable-looking church, with a low, tile-covered steeple and roof, plain enough but for a beautiful marble monument placed above the doorway. It is difficult to imagine anything more enchanting in the way of architecture than this extraordinary cemetery, filling up the centre of one of the small squares of the city.

We wander on again, and find ourselves in front of a noble Gothic church, with a façade shaded by two mighty arches, one over the other, and beneath the lowermost a richly-carved doorway. We enter, and a superb picture is presented to our view. A Gothic church of exquisite proportion and rich detail, gleaming with coloured decoration, to which the softening touch of time has lent harmony and mellow tints. A pavement of variegated marble is beneath our feet. Two queer little statues, supporting holy water basins, attract our attention, and a voice seems to whisper in our ear, “I Gobbi.” Need we say that this is the Church of St. Anastasia in Verona.

It would be impossible to give our girls anything like a description of the very interesting objects in this beautiful city, or adequately to express the feelings with which one wanders about its streets. It is said that “Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast,” and the man must indeed be a savage who would not feel the same soothing influence in looking at Verona.

Everything, from its sweet-sounding name, seems to breathe poetry and music into the mind.

One seems to exist in a realm of fancy, and little imagination is required to people it again with Montagues and Capulets.

How strange it is that our great poet should have managed to have so thoroughly embodied the ideas which Verona impresses upon the mind in Romeo and Juliet, without having seen the place! When one reads the play who has seen Verona, it seems almost impossible to believe that Shakespeare did not draw his picture from the place itself.

CHAPTER I.

hat this world is only a very small part of the universe, and that the life of man upon this globe is but a very small part of that eternity to which he is heir, is indicated by a thousand circumstances in the life of every day, and by none more strikingly than by the failures, the disappointments, the total eclipses which sweep from our sight into the undiscovered country many a soul resplendent in promise, leaving no record of them but in the faithful memories of the few who knew and loved them.

“He whom God loveth, dieth early,” said the thoughtful heathen, and it must be confessed that we are all disposed to hang garlands on our tombstones and to make heroes of our dead. Flaws of temper and other foibles which marred the perfection of those who were most familiar to us while they were tossed to and fro on the billows of this troublesome world, are forgotten for ever when the lines of care and thought are smoothed from the brow on which Death has laid his finger.

No young soldier left the Crimea with greater distinction or greater promise than Michael Fenner, the son of a house which traced back its ancestors to the reign of Elizabeth, and to which honour and piety had always been dearer than riches. He had entered the army with the true chivalrous desire to fight for the right, to help the weak, and confound the tyrant, and, a Christian in heart and soul, he had maintained the simplicity and purity of his life alike in the battlefield, in weary marches, and in seasons of sickness and depression.

Self-denying, gracious, and cheery, he was welcome as the sun in springtime, and many a groan was stifled and many a muttered curse was turned into a blessing at the sight of his kindly blue eyes, at the sound of his brotherly voice, so that no one grumbled when he was gazetted captain in his eight and twentieth year.

Captain Michael Fenner in active service, and with the modest fortune which he had inherited from his parents, thought it no indiscretion to marry the lady of his love, Margaret Echlin, the daughter of the Rector of Oldborough, a village in Warwickshire, which his family had lived in for many years, and people called her a lucky woman; for what distinction was impossible to a man who had already done so much and done it so well? Nor was the promise of happiness altogether belied. Eight years of happy wedded life followed the happy marriage; two healthy children, Mark and Eveline, brightened their home; and as those were years of peace, Michael was seldom long absent from his family.

The Fenners were not rich; but as they neither of them desired riches, and both had the happy knack of enjoying what they had without pining for what they had not, they took their lives as the gift of the Good Father, and so all was good to them.

But there came a day of sore trial, of bitter sorrow to Margaret, of trial and sorrow which Michael could not share. It was a day of a great review, and Michael and his regiment were to take part in it. His children will remember to their dying day the bright face that kissed them, the gay plumes, the flash of gold and steel, and all the brilliant show that rode forth from the barrack yard.

Half an hour, and the accident had happened which made them orphans and their mother a widow. Captain Fenner was riding a young horse unaccustomed to the London streets; he had ridden it in the country for some months, and being a perfect horseman, mounted without apprehension, but, unhappily, the nervous creature took fright, and, after a wild rush of some two or three hundred{237} yards, flung his rider heavily on the pavement. To the amazement and horror of everyone he was taken up lifeless. Without a word, without a look, he was gone for ever from among men.

The event was too solemn to be mourned in the ordinary way. Men gazed at each other with white, awestruck faces, and spoke beneath their breath, as he was borne back to the home which he had just quitted in full health and strength. How many weak-hearted, weak-willed men, who lived for their own pleasure, with scarce a consciousness of the higher life, might have been taken and the world not palpably the worse; but this strong-hearted, strongwilled man, on the very threshold of a noble career, lay slain by what seemed the merest accident in the heart of his native country, almost within sound of his children’s voices. “Truly the Lord’s ways are not our ways, and they are wonderful in our eyes.”

Margaret sat stunned in her sorrow. Deep in her smitten heart lay the consciousness that with him all was well; softly in the sleepless night she whispered his name, softly her cold hands lingered on the heads and hair of her children; but her eyes were dry, her voice dead within her, until her friends, in a mistaken hope of helping her, consulted together in her hearing about taking away the children. Then the strong chill gave way, the blood rushed into her pale cheeks, she stood up, and, holding each child by the shoulder, she looked into the faces of her amazed friends.

“Bear with me,” she said; and her voice was dry and hard, but it became more natural as she proceeded. “Bear with me for awhile; I am weak, but I shall be strong in time. These are Michael’s children; you must not take them from me.” Then bending down to her children she kissed them, praying them also to be patient with her, and said they would help each other, and, from that day forward she was first in their thoughts, they in hers. With patient care she devoted herself to all the duties of that sad time, and when Michael Fenner was laid to rest in the country churchyard, where many of his forefathers slept, she set herself to master all the circumstances of her position, and to ascertain the means at her disposal for her own maintenance and the maintenance and education of her children. Friends shook their heads and pitied “those poor Fenners,” but there was not one with whom Margaret would have changed lots; for had she not the memory of her love and the care of those little children who were his as well as hers?

A careful consideration of her circumstances convinced Mrs. Fenner that it would not be desirable for her to inhabit the house at Oldborough, for though it was a modest house enough for a family to live in, she felt herself unequal to manage the farm which belonged to it, and she knew that her pension would not enable her to keep it up comfortably, besides, before long it would be necessary for Mark at least to go to school, and the nearest town was ten miles from Oldborough. So Oldborough Lodge was let to an Indian family who were in search of just such a home, and the farm was retained by the farmer, who had held it ever since Michael’s father had died, some fifteen years before; while Mrs. Fenner and her children moved to a pretty little cottage, which was fortunately to let, near the ancient city of Sunbridge, in the parish adjacent to which her brother was rector, because she was deeply attached to her brother, and because both he and his wife were of opinion that it would be a great advantage to Mark to study with their son Gilbert, until the boys should be old enough to go to school.

The Rev. James Echlin, Rector of Rosenhurst, near Sunbridge, was one of those amiable and accomplished men, to whom, in their curate period, everything seems possible, everything probable; and when it was announced that Lady Elgitha Manners, aunt to the young Earl of Seven Beeches, had determined to bestow her inestimable self and all the weight of her aristocratic connections upon him, it was accepted as an event quite within the range of the proprieties, and the favoured few among his congregation to whom the great news was first communicated, assured each other that it was no wonder, and that they should see him a bishop before many years were over their heads. The Reverend James, who, like his sister, was disposed to think rather too humbly of himself, was amazed at his own good fortune, and meekly submitted himself to it; but his wise father shook his head, and his mother, though rather dazzled by the brilliancy of the connection, felt that it would have been more comfortable if James had married a woman more in their own rank. Indeed, the man who marries a wife, who condescends to his alliance, is seldom to be envied, and, though James Echlin’s sweet nature prevented his chafing under it, it was by no means good for him or for his children that the Lady Elgitha, in right of her superior knowledge of the world, and of her family connections, exercised the summum imperium in all household arrangements.

Of their eight children only two, Gilbert Manners, the eldest, and Elgitha Manners, the youngest, lived past infancy. Gilbert was a handsome boy, well grown and vigorous enough, but Elgitha was long a frail, little maid, who seemed likely to be added to the row of tiny mounds under the chancel window, which were all that remained to tell of the six infant Manners Echlins who had spread their wings and joined the innumerable throng of infant angels.

Like most ruling ladies, the Lady Elgitha had her favourite, and this favourite was—as was but natural—her son: for had he not paid her the initiatory compliment of inheriting her aquiline features? and as he grew up were not his tastes and feelings in charming harmony with her own? While a child in the nursery he eschewed fairy tales “as rubbish,” and when he became a boy, and went to school, learning as learning was a bore; and he early adopted it as a maxim to give his attention to nothing that “didn’t pay”—an expression which charmed his mother by its shrewdness, but strangely chilled his father, who, in all his life, had never taken such a consideration into account.

With a sense of the vital importance of modern languages which is impressed on the brain of our female aristocracy, Lady Elgitha had imported to Sunbridge first a Parisian bonne, then a German; and Gilbert, Mark, and Eveline had the opportunity of acquiring a patois which familiarised them with the names of ordinary things, and, it may be, facilitated their subsequent studies in both languages; but little Elgitha was too delicate in the early years of her life to be trusted either to bonne or fräulein, and she was permitted to repose on the ample bosom of a comfortable Englishwoman, who was as sweet as a clover-field and about as intelligent; and while she nursed and tended the frail little body, had not the remotest notion of in any way disturbing the little brain, but was more than satisfied to see repeated in his little daughter the features and the sweetness of her father.

When Gilbert had attained his seventh year, Lady Elgitha decreed that an erudite curate should be sought out, who, in addition to his clerical duties, should instruct both boys in the mysteries of the Latin grammar, and should prepare Gilbert for Eton, and Mark for the local grammar school, which had a very good reputation; and so, for three years, the boys worked together under the guidance of the Rev. Theophilus Wilkins, who, having rather overtaxed his brain by taking a “double first” at Oxford, was not sorry to rest a little by going back to first principles with the cousins, the elder of whom was interesting as the grandson of an earl, while the orphanage of the younger could hardly fail to awaken his sympathy.

As was natural, Gilbert took the lead, and was always the person most considered, but Mark had an innate love of learning, which made him accept with eagerness whatever was offered to him. From the day when a six years’ child he spelt out the mysteries of “haec musa” to that when he gave proof of accomplished scholarship by carrying off the first honours of his school, it never occurred to Mark to clip his studies by a careful selection of what would carry him through an examination, too much engrossed by learning to count personal profit or want of profit in the matter; while Gilbert from his tenderest years showed a precocious esteem for “what would pay” and a profound unwillingness to learn anything for its own sake; so that when he was ten years old, it being found that Mark was in all respects in advance of his cousin, Lady Elgitha decreed that it was waste of time for Mark to study at home any longer, and that Gilbert had better be sent to one of those feeders of Eton where the subjects of study are strictly narrowed to suit the demands of that seat of learning; and in due course Gilbert Manners Echlin, having passed through the congenial mill of the Rev. Edward Thornborough, at Staines, took a good place on his entrance, and was fairly launched into the sea of public school life. His grandfather and his uncle being earls, and his father a parson, he was not particularly badgered on his first coming; he was sufficiently aristocratic in countenance and bearing to pass muster with the boys, and sufficiently ready with his lessons to escape the censure of masters.

Mark Fenner, meanwhile, diligently attended the Grammar School at Sunbridge, walking to and fro summer and winter, wet and dry, and, with his bright, cheery face and steady ways, won the love of masters and of boys, and worked his way with quiet perseverance to the top of the school. It never occurred to him to envy Gilbert his fine clothes or the guineas he jingled in his pockets when he came to the cottage to say good-bye; and he submitted with an easy grace to the airs of patronage which his cousin assumed. It was natural, he thought, that his Aunt Elgitha’s son should go to Eton, and it was equally natural and right that he himself should work out his lessons without other aid than that of dictionary and grammar by the light of his mother’s lamp in the cottage parlour, occasionally refreshing himself by a half-unconscious glance at the enlarged photograph over the mantelpiece, which was the only portrait they had of their father, and which, dull and poor as it was in comparison with the bright presence which had passed away, was yet an outward visible sign of it very dear to the three who called the cottage home.

In countenance Mark was not at all like his father, resembling his mother in feature and complexion; but many a time and oft the widow’s heart beat and tears rose in her eyes as she recognised in her boy traits which assured her of that higher affinity of heart and mind which is infinitely deeper than any trick of feature or complexion. It is a mistake to suppose that because boys are often rough in speech and careless in manner there is any reason for it in their boyhood, and though the braggart and the bully naturally attract most attention, and do what they can to spoil the beauty of the little republics in which they live, we confidently believe that there are hundreds of boys who have no taste for bullying and coarse talking any more than for lying and thieving, and who pass through their school career pure in speech and gentle in{238} nature. Certainly Mark Fenner never need have blushed if his mother had heard all he said any more than if she had read the thoughts of his heart; yet Mark was almost as good in the cricket-field as in the school-room, he was an adroit swimmer, a stout wrestler, and, better than all, an excellent walker.

Eveline, who was just two years younger than her brother, was a bright, healthy damsel, not specially clever, but one of those girls who have a truly feminine and harmonising influence in families, modest and happy in temper, always more occupied by care for others than for herself. She had acquired most of her knowledge from her mother, and would have been pronounced by many a young lady of the nineteenth century “frightfully ignorant.” I am afraid it would have cost her some thought to define what is meant by physical, political, and commercial geography; physiology as a science was unknown to her, but she had been an apt pupil in those graces which no board of examiners can gauge, but without which English homes would never have been the desire and the admiration of foreigners, the safety and the comfort of her sons.

Eveline was sufficiently well-read to take an interest in wholesome books and understand political questions, when they were discussed; and for this she was much indebted to her uncle, with whom she was a great favourite, and whom she often accompanied on his parish rambles, when he beguiled the way and relieved his own heart by gently philosophising after a fashion too ideal to find favour with Lady Elgitha, but which sounded very sweetly in the ears of the young Eveline.

And so the years sped on. Gilbert had left Eton with fair credit, but without having attained any distinction, and was making up his mind what he should do next—a process that occupied him some months, and which, but for the pressure of circumstances, which his mother regarded as cruel, he might never have achieved; but she was well aware that his father could not live for ever, that her fortune would be too small to support him, when divided, as by her father’s will it must be, between her children. The church, the army, the bar, which was it to be? The church was perhaps the easiest; it would not cost Gilbert much trouble to take a respectable degree, and there was a good living in the family; but the living was in Northamptonshire, in a part of the country which Gilbert knew and did not admire; besides, a country life, even with all the amenities of Sunbridge within easy reach, did not suit him. He would have preferred the army if he could have been guaranteed against heavy campaigning, and if the examinations for the higher branches of the service had not been so stiff. As to law, it was horrid all round, absolutely nothing to be got without burning the midnight oil, a process to which, in its classic sense, Gilbert had a special objection, though he testified no aversion to midnight gas. So the months passed, until the time came for Mark to leave school, which he did after having been captain for a couple of years, with a long row of charmingly-bound prize books and a very good scholarship to Trinity College, Cambridge.

Then Lady Elgitha, finding her son no nearer to a conclusion, decreed that he also should go to Cambridge; all her family who were not in the army had gone to Cambridge; but as Gilbert had not the gift of plodding, a smaller college, his father’s, Corpus, was chosen for him. Boys of his age seldom cared for the church; he would probably come round in a year or two, and then he would be in the right road for it.

Mark was sure to do well. He had had nothing to do at Sunbridge but work, whereas poor Gilbert had been so distracted at Eton by games, society, etc., etc. Mark would distinguish himself. He could hardly help doing so, and no doubt would be glad of the opportunity to do his cousin a service in return for the many benefits he and his mother and sister had received from his uncle.

The seven years which the boys had spent apart, except during holidays, had widened the natural gulf between them; and when Mark, in obedience to his aunt’s wish, offered to read with Gilbert, he found the task no easy one. Gilbert professed an abomination for mathematics, and by his ignorance of the first principles, seemed to justify the opinion generally entertained of the perfection in which the study is ignored in the old schools.

“It’s just horrid, old man!” he exclaimed one morning, after half-an-hour’s study, thrusting his long fingers through his fair hair. “I’m awfully sorry for you having to grind away at it.”

“But I like it!” said Mark, mind and eyes deep in his geometry. “Just listen, Gilbert. I do think I see another solution.”

“Another solution!” cried Gilbert, in despair. “Just as if one was not enough.”

“But it’s so interesting,” persisted Mark. “If you’d only give your mind to it, I’m sure you’d like it; it is so pretty.”

“Where’s the good? I’m not going in for a don. I shall scrape through when the time comes, never fear. Hullo! There’s St. Maur and Tullietudlem in a tandem. Splendid, isn’t it? How will Tullie ever get that wild filly of his round the corner? There! I knew it. Down goes the old woman—wagon, Tullie, and St. Maur on the top of her. There’ll be a row!”

“They’ll have something to pay, at all events,” said Mark, looking up, but still deep in his problem.

“Never a bit. A sovereign to the old woman. She’s used to it. Nothing will ever teach Tullie to handle the ribbons. Never could at Eton; and his sister’s such a splendid whip. I wonder where they were going to! Newmarket, perhaps. St. Maur’s uncle is running a two-year-old. O, bother, Mark! I can’t be worried now. The very look of those figures makes me sick! I shall get up enough to scrape through, never fear. I’m strong in classics.”

“All right, old fellow,” said Mark, shutting up his book. “Then you won’t want me. Tell me if you do, you know. I’ll come in any day.”

“Thanks, a thousand times. It is no good working against the grain, is it? My head is all in a whirl with that stupid geometry.”

Internally wondering at the stupefying effect of the geometry he had not done on his cousin’s brain, but too happy to escape to his own quiet room, Mark Fenner ran with the speed of a lover across the familiar flags, and buried himself until lunch time in his favourite study.

At half-past one his friend, John Mildmay, came in for lunch and for a chat; and the lads ate their bread-and-butter and pressed beef, flanked with a jug of college ale, with a keen appetite and much pleasant talk about men and things. The meal ended, they started for their afternoon walk along the banks of the Cam, interchanging many a cheery greeting with friends on land and river, invigorating mind and body by sufficient and temperate exercise, and taking care to be back in time for “chapel,” which they attended in the loveliest of chapels—aëry and exquisite King’s.

So to Mark Fenner Cambridge was what it should be—a home of intellectual effort, of happy and reposeful thought, sweetened by the companionship of chosen friends, mostly men of very moderate means like himself, to whom the Alma Mater was holding out her protecting arms. Some men of his cousin’s set made overtures to him—men whose fathers remembered his father; but Mark had the courage to decline their invitations, and to keep to the work he had set himself to do; and when the term was ended, and the lads went home, Mark’s cheeks were round and rosy, while Gilbert looked so thin and pale that his mother was alarmed lest he had been doing too much.

“Very possibly, my dear,” said the rector, to whom she imparted her fears, with his sweet sad smile, “but not too much work; Gilbert is innocent of that, I am sure.”

“I do not think you ever have understood the poor boy, James. He is not a book-worm, like Mark, of course, no Manners ever was; it is unfortunate for him that he does take so much after my family.”

“You are the best judge of that, Elgitha; he certainly does not appear to me much to resemble any of my people. Perhaps, as far as this world is concerned, it is all the better for him.”

“I don’t know why you should say that, James,” said Lady Elgitha, rather reproachfully; “surely your lot has fallen in pleasant places.”

“I did not mean to complain, my dear; my fortune is much above my deserts. If I should like to see Gilbert more studious, it is perhaps from a selfish wish to have him more in sympathy with myself—not that I am much of a student, I am but an idle fellow, God help me, enjoying my pleasant, easy life here with you, Margaret, and the girls.”

“Everybody must be happy in his own way,” said Lady Elgitha. “Gilbert would never be happy as a parson; it is my belief that he wants an active life. I must write to the Earl about him—something in the Treasury now.”

“My dear, your nephew cannot nominate as your father and grandfather did. Gilbert must stand the test of an examination; if he cannot satisfy the examiners, no amount of blue blood will avail him.”

“And everywhere else,” said the rector. “I only wish our Gilbert had half the chances of Margaret’s fatherless boy. Michael Fenner, though dead, has done more for his son than I for mine. Gilbert is selfish, idle, almost illiterate, and I look with shame on the virtues of my nephew who has had so much less done for him.”

“Why, Rector, what has given you such a fit of the blues this afternoon?” exclaimed Lady Elgitha, regarding him with amazed alarm.

The rector attempted some jest, and calling his little daughter, set out on his usual afternoon peregrination, while Lady Elgitha, seriously disturbed, reflected whether it would be advisable to calm his troubled mind by a course of globules, or to divert his thoughts by a dinner party or a tennis tournament.

Other People’s Vanity.—What renders the vanity of others insupportable is that it wounds our own.—La Rochefoucauld.

Busy with Trifles.—Those who bestow too much application on trifling things become generally incapable of great ones.—La Rochefoucauld.

Heads and Hearts.—A man with a bad heart has been sometimes saved by a strong head, but a corrupt woman is lost for ever.—Coleridge.

Love-Letters.—To write a good love-letter, you ought to begin without knowing what you mean to say and to finish without knowing what you have written.—Rousseau.

Lovers’ Talk.—The reason why lovers are never weary of being together is because they are always talking of themselves.

The Yorkshire people of the West Riding, according to Mrs. Gaskell, are “sleuth hounds” after money, and in illustration of this characteristic we may take the following anecdote:—

Not far from Bradford an old couple lived on their farm. The good man had been ill for some time, when the practitioner who attended him advised that a physician should be summoned from Bradford for a consultation.

The doctor came, looked into the case, gave his opinion, and, descending from the sick-room to the kitchen, was there accosted by the old woman with “Well, doctor, what is your charge?”

“A guinea, doctor! a guinea! And if you come again will it be another guinea?”

The old woman rose and went upstairs to her husband’s bedroom, and the doctor, who waited below, heard her say—

“He charges a guinea, and if he comes again it’ll be another guinea. Now, what do you say? If I were ye I’d say no, like a Britoner; and I’d die first.”

Pleasant Surprises.—Human nature is pliable, and perhaps the pleasantest surprises of life are found in discovering the things we can do when forced.

An Obstacle to Happiness.—There is in all of us an impediment to perfect happiness—namely, weariness of the things which we possess and a desire for the things which we have not.

EDUCATIONAL.

ART.

MISCELLANEOUS.

Young Inquirer.—1. Yes, there is such a thing as a “singing flame,” and it is not like a singing kettle nor a windy gaspipe, and is as great a wonder as the fabulous “singing tree,” had that been real. A very delicate jet of flame, introduced through a small pipe into a narrow glass tube of a foot long, will respond to the singing of any one note, if set in tune to it. Professor Tyndall says, “With a little practice, one is able to command a flame to sing and to stop singing, while it strictly obeys the injunction. When the proper pitch has been ascertained the experiment is sure to succeed; and, from a distance of twenty or thirty feet, the flame when sung to is caused to sing responsively. If it do not respond, it is because it has not been spoken to in the proper tone; but a note of somewhat higher pitch causes it to stretch its tongue and sing vigorously.” 2. The 1st of April, 1869, was a Thursday.

Faith, Hope, and Charity.—See “Practical Hints About the Growth of the Hair,” in our part for July, 1885. The name Thames is derived from the Attic word Tamh, signifying “quiet,” the Saxon Temese, the Latin Tamesis. Possibly the latter may contain the origin of the name Isis, as given to the river at Oxford.

Eileen.—Yes, Ireland was anciently called Insula Sacra, so Festus Airenus affirmed; but it must be noted that this author wrote in the fourth century, and this was before St. Patrick established Christianity there. Also, the name given to Ireland was not exclusively a distinctive one, for the Isle of Samothrace was also entitled the Sacred Isle. Another name for Ireland was Muic Innis, or Isle of Muc, Muc being the name applied to the divinity as worshipped by them, and signified “sacred.” Beautiful as much of the country is, any visitor would be struck with the appropriate selection of the latter name (according to its English sound and meaning) after seeing the filthy surroundings and habits of the natives, the pigs, poultry, and human kind wallowing together within the same mud walls, and by preference!

Zearn.—A butler has the care of the wine cellar, decants the wine, and serves it at table. He places the chief dish on the table, or carves it at the side table, and his place is behind his master’s chair, while the footman (if one) stands behind his mistress. The butler also stands behind the footman when the latter opens the hall door to visitors. The servant, improperly called a butler, who holds a single-handed place combines the duties of both butler and footman, with the exception of the care of the wine cellar, unless in exceptional cases of special trust.

A Reader.—The initials R.S.V.P. are those of the French phrase Répondez, s’il vous plaît, “Answer, if you please.” Painting in oils is much easier than in water-colours, as mistakes can be rectified and improvements made.

Honolulu.—The quotation you give—

“Alas! how easily things go wrong;

A sigh too deep, or a kiss too long,

And then comes a mist and a weeping rain,

And life is never the same again,”

is taken from “Planlastes,” a fairy story, by George McDonald.

Marandana.—Introduce the inferior to the superior, the young to the older, and, in due courtesy, the man to the woman. Read our series of articles on good breeding, especially that entitled “The Habits of Polite Society.”

G. N. Oetzmann.—You might arrange your meals thus:—A cup of tea, coffee, or cocoa, and a slice of bread and butter before starting, and put a captain’s biscuit or two in your pocket for 11 a.m.; dine at 1 p.m.; take a cup of chocolate or tea at 4 p.m., and a substantial tea at 7 p.m. No supper is needed after that.

Battenberg.—Your handwriting is clear, but not pretty, and you must beware of flourishes.

A Scotch Sunbeam.—We are sorry to hear that you suffer so much. Accept our thanks for so kind and grateful a letter, and sincere wishes for your speedy restoration. Your handwriting shows a good foundation for a nice running hand by-and-by.

English Churchman.—The Orders as now existing in the Established Church are derived from St. Augustine of Canterbury. Although St. Joseph of Arimathea brought the Christian faith to Britain in the first century, the reception of it was very partial, and the mission of St. Eleutherius in the second century established a line of sixteen archbishops, the last of whom, Theanus, was driven from his see into Wales about 587. Here a Primitive church of Eastern origin was already in existence, and when the second Roman mission was sent over by Gregory, through Augustine, and established Christianity in the south-eastern part of Britain, the little mission church in North Wales was still existing, and protested against any usurpation of authority by the newly-planted Church of Canterbury. At the same time we cannot trace any Orders in the Established Church derived from them, although we have historic evidence of a primacy in the reign of King Arthur being removed from Caerleon to Llandaff, and thence to St. David’s.

Daisy.—We think if you belong to the Young Women’s Christian Association you should apply to Miss A. Gough, 17, Old Cavendish-street, W., for information. Most of the homes of rest are open on payment of 10s. a week. There is one at about that price at Cobham, Surrey; Church-stile House. Apply to Miss Blunt, 3, Portman-square, W. You might also apply to the sister in charge of St. Gabriel’s Home of Rest, Lennard-road, Folkestone,{240} where the terms are moderate; or St. Mary’s Home, near Uckfield, Fletching. Apply to the lady superintendent. Designed for ladies requiring rest or change, 10s. a week.

Miss Goudge.—The phrase you give appears to be made up of certain passages of Holy Writ. See 1st Tim. vi. 4, 5, 20, and 2nd Tim. ii. 23.

E. A. L.—We think you had better look out the word “supernatural” in the dictionary.

Bishop.—Canons are residentiary members of a cathedral chapter, of which the dean is the chief. The office was instituted in the eighth century, and their duty is to act as the advisers of the bishop. They do receive salaries, varying in amount. Archdeacons take precedence of them. They act as the representatives and delegates of the bishops, especially in the duty of parochial visitation. Their office dates from the fifth century. Their salary is very trifling, supposed only to cover the cost of their journeys. A prebendary has a right to a stall in the choir of a cathedral church and vote in the chapter, and to the receipt of certain revenues for the performance of certain duties in that or a collegiate church. The office was instituted in the eleventh century, and may be held by a layman, although such cases are rare, if actually existing. A rural dean is a beneficed clergyman charged with the inspection of a deanery, or sub-division of an archdeaconry, under the supervision of his bishop. The original duties of the office are for the most part practically transferred to the archdeacon.

W. L.—The first voyage made all round the world was by a Portuguese commander, who sailed from San Lucas on September 20th, 1519, in the ship Vittoria. The name of this pioneer navigator was Ferdinand Magellan, giving the straits through which he passed their name. He was killed on the Philippine Islands the following year, and Sebastian del Cano brought the ship round the Cape of Good Hope, and arrived at San Lucas six days within the three years’ expedition, September 6th, 1522. Five ships formed the fleet; three lived to go through the straits with Magellan and his crew; the Vittoria was the only one that reached home.

An Italian Girl.—The 30th April, 1866, was a Monday. The letters i.e. represent the Latin words id est, or, in English, “that is,” or, more freely translated, “that means, in other words,” when an explanation of the words employed is required. The Jesuits were banished from Portugal in 1759, suppressed in France 1764, in Spain 1767, and subsequently in Naples, Parma, and Modena, and in 1773 Pope Clement XIV. issued a bull, concluding with the words, “We do extirpate and abolish the Society of Jesus.” In 1814 Pope Pius VII. re-established it. A large number of Jesuit priests were executed at the time you name on account of real or supposed political intrigues. You write a beautiful hand, and you have our best wishes.

Seeker of Light.—Our blessed Lord’s atonement on the Cross was of infinite efficacy, and our sins—even the most heinous—are those of mere finite creatures. Thus, “He is able to save to the uttermost.” The term “scarlet,” as applied to sin, is a figure of speech. It is not only glaring and conspicuous, but, as produced in ancient times, it was exceedingly durable. The Phœnicians were famous for it, and the Tyrian purple and scarlet were produced from two little shellfish, the Buccinum and Murex, only found in perfection on the rocky coast of their country. The dye when exposed to a bright light became successively green, blue, red, and deep purple; and, by washing it in soap and water, of a bright and permanent crimson. Costly fabrics were twice dyed, and made so beautiful and so very durable that they brought fabulous prices. Thus, the allusion made to a scarlet dye is explained. However deeply dyed and stained with sin, the precious blood of Christ can wash the sinner as white as snow. There is no limit to its cleansing power.

S. A. Gray.—You would do well to advertise your autographs and take what you can get for them from the trade, or else dispose of them by arrangement with private friends. The Exchange and Mart would be a good advertising medium.

Three Ignorant Schoolgirls.—You cannot say you play by hear, but by ear.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Translation of an old and very popular Swedish ballad supposed to date from the days of the first introduction of Christianity, and to record the constancy of a Christian girl—proof against both the allurements and the threats of her heathen master.

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THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER

MERLE’S CRUSADE.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE HISTORY OF HOME
OR
DOMESTIC WAYS SINCE THE TIMES OF HENRY VIII.

PART I.

THE SHEPHERD’S FAIRY.

CHAPTER XIV.

OUR TOUR IN NORTH ITALY.

LITTLE KARIN.[1]

THE INHERITANCE OF A GOOD NAME.

CHAPTER I.

VARIETIES.

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

EDUCATIONAL.

ART.

MISCELLANEOUS.

THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER

MERLE’S CRUSADE.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE HISTORY OF HOME OR DOMESTIC WAYS SINCE THE TIMES OF HENRY VIII.

PART I.

THE SHEPHERD’S FAIRY.

CHAPTER XIV.

OUR TOUR IN NORTH ITALY.

LITTLE KARIN.[1]

THE INHERITANCE OF A GOOD NAME.

CHAPTER I.

VARIETIES.

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

EDUCATIONAL.

ART.

MISCELLANEOUS.

THE HISTORY OF HOME
OR
DOMESTIC WAYS SINCE THE TIMES OF HENRY VIII.