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[Illustration: THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER]

VOL. XX.—NO. 1030.]       SEPTEMBER 23, 1899.       [PRICE ONE PENNY.




[Illustration: SOLITUDE.

    [_From photo: By Photographic Union, Munich._]

_All rights reserved._]




SOLITUDE.

BY W. T. SAWARD.


    The wind is singing a lonely song,
      Down in the forest deep!
    And I watch and watch the whole day long,
      Till the evening shadows creep.
    O flowers of the dying autumn day,
    How can you bloom when my love’s away!

    The golden grain of the harvest falls
      Under the sickle’s breath;
    And along the wood a spirit calls,
      Telling there is no death!
    For be it autumn, or be it spring,
    Some flowers will bloom, and some birds will sing!

    The night falls dark o’er the Fatherland,
      Down to the stretching sea!
    O Star of Hope! with your silver wand,
      Guide him to home and me!
    That the morning may find us hand in hand
    In the light of the well-loved Fatherland.




THE HOUSE WITH THE VERANDAH.

BY ISABELLA FYVIE MAYO, Author of “Other People’s Stairs,” “Her Object
in Life,” etc.


CHAPTER XXVI.

DESIRE FULFILLED.

The great joy grew more credible when all its story was told.

The glad tidings had been brought in by an Atlantic liner. It appeared
that when the _Slains Castle_ had got well over half of her Pacific
voyage, she had encountered a great storm, and had foundered upon
the reefs among a small group of islands, all her boats being lost
or destroyed. The captain, disabled, with his crew and the solitary
passenger, had however managed to land on one of the larger islands,
whose simple natives received them kindly, and put them into the way
of subsisting after their own fashion. There they had lived, roughly
and hardly indeed, and cut off from all communication with home, or
with civilisation, upheld only by the hope that some ship, in some way
diverted from its course, might eventually discover them and take them
off. Instead of such a ship, however, their party was reinforced by a
solitary white man, who made his way to them from his own refuge on
one of the smaller islands. How had he got there? they asked eagerly.
He told them the truth: he was “a bad character”—a man who had done
desperate deeds of many sorts, and he was there because he was “a
castaway” from an American ship—he could scarcely tell whether by
accident or design. He seemed to think the latter the most likely and
the most natural alternative in his case. Hunger and solitude on a bare
rock in the wide ocean, had somewhat tamed him, and the consciousness
of a common fate soon absorbed him into the little brotherhood of the
_Slains Castle_.

He had been with them some months when some of the party secured a
half-broken empty open boat, which seemed to have been washed off
from a passing schooner. This they patched up, and then they began
to think whether some of them might not make one last dash for the
release of themselves and the rest. The “castaway” was quite ready to
take to the sea again; he did not seem to know fear, or he believed he
held a charmed life. He was an expert seaman, and of really powerful
physique. Another must go with him, and another only. The captain’s arm
being still disabled, the man selected as fittest for the expedition
was the first mate. Despite all dangers their wild voyage was safely
accomplished; a civilised port was reached, and a little steamer was at
once despatched to the island to bring off the rest of the shipwrecked
party. The ship owners had determined not to be premature in giving
this good news. They had waited till every report was verified. Now,
any hour might bring telegrams from Captain Grant and Charlie that they
were safe on American soil, and hastening across the continent to take
their Atlantic passage home.[1]

Of course there was wild and glad excitement in the little house with
the verandah. But Lucy’s own joy was still and solemn. The others
thought her very strong and calm. But she knew that she often asked
herself whether she were waking or dreaming? She knew that she realised
anew the distance and the dangers between herself and her beloved.
After the glad telegram duly arrived and she knew the very name of the
Atlantic liner on which Charlie was speeding towards her, a clouded sky
or a rising wind would suffice to make her tremble! Ah, she had learned

        “to love as the angels may
    With the breadth of Heaven between,”

and the next lesson of her life was to be the bringing-down of that
mountain-top vision of serenity and security, and the possessing of it
still among the mists and twists of the level lands. She had learned
that love is eternal, that love is safe when out of sight—now she had
to learn that time is only a part of Eternity, and that what is safe
out of our reach, cannot be in danger while it is within it.

She thought often in those days of Mary and Martha, the sisters of
Lazarus. They, too, like her, had been through the bitterness of death.
Was it henceforth abolished for them, so that they could say, “O
grave, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?” Or did the
impression wear off their souls, so that they had to live through all
their grief again?

She went on, wondering. When we are told that in the mysterious future
there “is to be no more sea,” we feel that the language is only used
as a powerful image, to show us that there shall be no more danger,
no more parting. But after all, what are danger and parting, but for
their fear and pain? Is it not really those that “shall be no more”? It
seemed to Lucy that haply in the highest ministries of life’s immortal
service the paths of those who would be “about their Father’s business”
must still sometimes swerve from one another. If “no more sea” was a
symbol of no more danger, and no more parting, did not that in turn
mean an abiding sense that all is secure, a present consciousness that
all parting involves joyful reunion? Then if our souls, still clad in
mortal weakness, can but attain to this “perfect love which casts out
fear,” should we not be in Heaven’s peace already?

Lucy resolved to go to Liverpool to meet the steamer which had Charlie
on board. She resolved to go alone. For the first time since his father
went away she would leave Hugh, assured now that he was surrounded
by wise kindness. She longed for absolute silence and solitude on
her journey to this reunion, well nigh as sacred and solemn as those
generally guarded by the secrecy of death.

She preferred to go without any “seeing off.” Those in her home, those
who loved her best, probed her feeling on this head, and yielded to it.
They parted from her on her own threshold.

“We will come to meet you both when you return,” they said.

       *       *       *       *       *

Husband and wife met. It was in a crowd of strangers, and nobody there
took particular notice of the brown, lean, sinewy man, who clasped a
silvery-haired young woman in his arms. Then they held each other apart
for one moment, and gazed at each other, noting all that was gone—all
that was changed, and all—ay, all!—that remained for ever!

As for the conversation—the questions, the answers, the narrations—that
interrupted the rapt silences of this single day reserved for
themselves only, what was it but simply the story which has been
already told?

“They will be all at home to receive us,” Lucy said, as, her hand
clasped in her husband’s, she told of the loyal friendships which had
closed around her terrible waiting-time. “They are all still there,
just as they have been. The house may be small for us all, yet I felt
sure this would be your wish.”

“You knew your husband,” said Charlie, “and if our friends will stay,
they shall stay as we are—for another year. By that time we shall have
got our lives into their regular grooves again—and then, maybe, we
shall all move together into a larger house. As it is God’s will that
the solitary shall be set in families, Lucy, surely it is never more so
than when the solitary have upheld the family.”

(_To be concluded._)




“UPS AND DOWNS.”

A TRUE STORY OF NEW YORK LIFE.

BY N. O. LORIMER.


CHAPTER IV.

When the hard frost had broken, and the streets were full of slush
and melting snow, Ada had to spend her five cents going in the Fifth
Avenue stage-coach to and from her business, for, even with rubbers
on, she had got her feet so wet and her skirts so destroyed that
she found that it was in the end cheaper to drive than to walk. The
children, too, had found it necessary to drive to school. Marjory had
been very troublesome of late; she had been grumbling and repining at
her restricted life, saying that she would rather make friends with
the girls whom Ada considered vulgar and beneath her, than have such
a dull, cheerless time. Ada had noticed that her eccentric old man
had not been in the stage-coach for some time past, and she wondered
what had become of him. She was sitting waiting for the boarding-house
dinner-bell to ring (in the public sitting-room), when the fat lady,
who took such an inquisitive interest in her and her little sisters,
came in.

“Well, Ada Nicoli,” she said in her rough friendly way, “don’t you wish
you were the young lady.”

“What young lady?” said Ada.

The fat lady put the _New York Herald_ down on Ada’s lap.

“Read it,” she said. “It’s the maddest thing you ever heard. The crazy
old man whom you’ve often seen in the Fifth Avenue stage-coach, and who
ate his bit of bread and cheese every day on the public seat in Madison
Square, and looked as poor as any tramp, died a week ago.”

“Oh,” said Ada regretfully; “is he dead?”

She had grown to look upon him as one of her friends in the big cruel
city, and now he had gone too.

“Yes, he’s dead,” the fat woman said emphatically; “and he’s left
a mighty pile of dollars behind him. He used to stint himself of
house-fuel, and go to bed whenever he got home from business on a
winter’s day to save light, and wore clothes a coloured man wouldn’t
give to his father. What’s the use of saving like that if you’re going
to leave all your fortune to a total stranger.”

“Poor old man,” the girl said; “he was really rather mad, but somehow I
liked him; he seemed to belong more to the last century than to this.”

“Well, it appears he’s left every dollar he’s got to some girl that he
thought deserved some money, a milliner’s girl, the papers say, who
once saved his life in a snowstorm or something like that.”

Ada read the long and highly-dramatic account of the old man’s curious
will.

“Yes, I wish I were the girl,” she said; “but I fear there’s no fairy
prince in disguise watching my poor trivial round and common task. But
just fancy, a girl earning her own living suddenly to find herself an
heiress!”

The boarding-house bell sounded, and the hungry children came bounding
down to dinner.

“Ada,” whispered Marjory at table, “a man came to see you this morning,
and I said you were out. He asked me a lot of questions, and I answered
before I remembered that perhaps you would rather I didn’t.”

“What sort of questions?” Ada said smiling, and hoping that at last
they were going to receive news of their father.

“Where you worked, and how you went to work, and if we were your only
sisters. He was quite a nice sort of man.”

“A gentleman, I think,” Sadie said with a great air of worldly wisdom.
“He said he would call again after dinner to-night.”

“Did he not tell you what he wanted,” Ada asked.

“No,” Marjory said, “and it was only after he had gone that we found
out how much we had told him, all about mother, and everything. Do you
mind, Ada?”

“No,” Ada replied; “but try in future, Marjory, to remember that
you are getting too big a girl to talk to strange gentlemen in that
confidential way.”

       *       *       *       *       *

After dinner that night the Irish servant toiled up to the top of
the high house to tell Ada Nicoli that there was a strange gentleman
waiting to see her down below.

“And sure and I can’t think why you want to come up to this attic
in the evenin’, instead of joining with the company in the parlour.
It would save my poor legs toiling up to tell you when your friends
arrive.”

“It’s the first time anyone has come to see me, Bridget,” Ada answered,
“and I like having the children with me in the evening.”

Ada might more truthfully have remarked that she did not wish her
little sisters to enjoy the company of the young business men who
frequented the boarding-house parlour in the evening.

When she entered the parlour, a keen-looking elderly man rose from his
seat and bowed to her. “Have I the pleasure of addressing Miss Ada
Nicoli?”

Ada bowed.

“I am Mr. Riggs.” He looked round the room. “Have you any place where I
could talk to you in private, ma’am?”

Ada grew nervous from fear of some bad news, but she had learnt to
control her feelings before the curious eyes of the boarders.

“I have no private sitting-room,” she said, “but perhaps I might take
you into the bureau.”

“Thank you, ma’am, I will not detain you long.” When they were seated
in the bureau, which the lady of the house had willingly vacated on
hearing Ada’s reason, he said, “I have come to tell you a piece of news
which I think will greatly astonish you. I came here this morning and
learnt the information from your little sisters which identifies you in
my mind with the young lady I was seeking.”

Ada was turning from hot to cold and her hands were tightly clasped
together.

“My dear young lady,” he continued, “I am Mr. Riggs of the firm of
Jefferson Riggs & Co., lawyers, No. 10054, Broadway. Perhaps you have
read in the papers of the death of an eccentric old gentleman who was
a well-known figure in the Fifth stage-coach, and in Madison Square
Gardens?”

Ada nodded her head. Her heart was beating too quickly to allow her
brain to seize the points of the lawyer’s story.

“I was his lawyer,” he said, “and for many years transacted all his
business matters, but I had no idea of his personal wealth. He had
altered his will many times during the last few years, leaving his
money first to one charitable institution and then to another; but in
his last will, which he made as far back as eight months ago, he has
left you his entire fortune.”

“Me?” Ada gasped. “Me? What do you mean? He didn’t even know my name.”

“Yes, he did. He found it out quite easily. Yes, my dear young lady.
You will now be almost as wealthy as if your father had never failed.”

“Oh, stop a minute,” Ada cried, “till I can really understand it. Am I
the milliner’s girl that was mentioned in the papers? Oh, I’m quite,
quite certain you have made some mistake. Do have pity on me, sir; I
have suffered so much,” and she put up her hand to her head and swayed
a little backwards and forwards.

“Oh, please don’t faint, my dear young lady. I am no ladies’ man, and I
don’t know what to do.”

“No, I will not faint,” replied Ada. “It is really wonderful what a
girl can bear. But I hope you are not deceiving me.”

“I am quite sure I am not, if you are not deceiving me, and personating
Ada Nicoli. I wish I could have broken it to you more gently; but I am
no ladies’ man.”

“You have done it very kindly,” the girl said, with a great sob of joy
in her throat, “only I wish the old man was alive, that I could thank
him, and love him a little. He was very lonely, I think.”

“Yes, he was very lonely,” the lawyer said, “and it is strange what an
impression you made upon him.”

“I don’t see how I could,” Ada replied simply. “I never did anything.”

“I think I can understand,” the lawyer said with a touch of gallantry
which showed that he was not such a poor ladies’ man as he had
asserted, bringing a pretty flush to her cheek.

After they had talked a few minutes, Ada said—

“May I call the children down to tell them?”

“Certainly,” the lawyer replied. “The affair is no secret.”

When Ada told the children that they were no longer poor, and that they
need not live in the top attic-room in a boarding-house, they took the
news more complacently than their sister had done.

“I’m glad we can go to a decent school,” Marjory said, little knowing
how her words hurt Ada, who had worked her fingers to the bone to pay
for her middle-class schooling.

“I wish we had been left a new poppa, instead of some money,” Sadie
said regretfully. “If we’re rich again, you’ll drive about with mumma,
I suppose, and we won’t have any fun. I like being poor.”

“And living in a hen-roost?” Ada asked laughingly.

Sadie had always called their low-roofed attic a hen-roost.

“Yes, ’cause I like sleeping with you better than with a cross nurse.”

The old lawyer got up. He had to take his spectacles off and rub them
before he could see his way across the room.

“My dear young lady,” he said, “you have made their poverty so
attractive that the old gentleman’s fortune is scarcely appreciated.”

“I must spend it very wisely,” the girl said, “as it was so carefully
hoarded together. It is all so wonderful that I cannot believe it is
true.”

“I should like the old man to have had the pleasure that has been mine
in bringing you the good news,” the lawyer said, bowing himself out.
“We shall have many business matters to discuss later on, but I will
leave you now to enjoy the new good fortune with your sisters.” He came
back and said rather nervously, “Remember, my dear, that you can draw
on me for any ready money you may require. I will leave you a hundred
dollars now just to pay for immediate expenses, and to-morrow you can
have ten hundred more if you like.”

When Ada Nicoli was going upstairs, as if floating on wings rather than
walking, she met the fat lady boarder coming down.

“Well, I declare, Ada Nicoli, you look as if the world wasn’t good
enough for you to-night. There’s enough happiness in your eyes to light
a whole street. Has your strange visitor brought you good news?”

“Yes,” Ada replied, “wonderful news. He has just told me that I am
the little milliner’s girl whom the eccentric old gentleman thought
deserved some money.”

“Sakes alive!” the fat boarder exclaimed. “Let me look at you,”—and she
took the girl by her shoulders and scanned her face.

“Are you the girl he left all the money to?”

“Yes,” answered Ada; “isn’t it extraordinary? I can’t quite believe it
is true! It’s just like a fairy story.”

In another moment the girl was clasped in the arms of the good-natured
woman, and was so cried over and petted that all the boarders came out
to hear the news, which Ada could not tell them for the fulness of her
heart, and the fat boarder did it but badly, for she was laughing and
crying at one and the same time.

[THE END.]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] It may be interesting to readers to know that the adventure of the
_Slains Castle_ and the unexpected return of those who had been mourned
as dead, is, in almost every detail, the true history of a British
vessel called _The Wandering Minstrel_, which sailed from Hong Kong in
1887 and was not heard of again for more than two years, when her first
mate and “a castaway” suddenly appeared in Honolulu, and a steamer was
sent off to rescue the remainder of the party.




CHRONICLES OF AN ANGLO-CALIFORNIAN RANCH.

BY MARGARET INNES.


CHAPTER XII.

THE RESERVOIR—CHINESE MEDICINES—DUST—ADVANTAGES OF THE LIFE—THE
RAINS—FLOODS.

That summer, our first on the ranch, we made a large reservoir to hold
200,000 gallons. There was a convenient gulch or dip, which drained a
fair stretch of hill slope, and which lent itself well for the purpose.
We meant also to run our share of the flume water into this reservoir
whenever it was not being used on the ranch.

Many waggon loads of sand from the Silvero Valley had to be hauled
up by the little grey team, and endless barrels of cement from the
station at El Barco five miles away. It was a long tiresome job.
There was plenty of rock, with which to build the dam, lying about on
the hills, but to lift these pieces on to the sledge, improvised for
this purpose, and bring them over hill and dale to the reservoir site
and there unload them, was both very hard work and at times a little
dangerous, for the rocks were often so large that they were not easily
controlled, and were always threatening to roll over on to the feet or
hands of the “master builder” and his men.

There were some bad bruises before all the names of the workers were
written on the cement top of the wall as an artistic finish to the dam.

That was a very dry year, the summer extending till December 5th, and
after a dry winter too. For this reason the breaking up of the ground
was all the harder, especially that part which had been trodden hard by
cattle grazing for many years.

Again the ranchers went to work to manufacture some implement that
would help in this difficulty, and a “clod masher” was made out of some
of the furniture cases, and it did very good work.

We planted cypress trees too, all along the windswept side of the
ranch, as these grow very fast, and we wanted to break the face of the
wind.

The rabbits, squirrels, and gophers gave us some anxiety that first
year by nibbling at the bark of the young lemon trees. This had to be
stopped at once, for if the bark is badly peeled off right round the
stem of a young tree, the tree will probably die. The approved remedy
is to paint the bark with blood, a most disagreeable job, especially in
glaring hot weather. However, the trees were not touched after that,
for the rabbits are dainty people.

A good store of firewood had to be hauled from the Silvero Valley
before the rains should come, and some months earlier we had stored
away our winter supply of hay in the barn. In the winter we also
planted an orchard of all varieties of fruit for our own use—pears,
apples, prunes, figs, apricots, peaches, vines, strawberries, and
raspberries. Altogether we were very busy and worked very hard, though
we took our pleasures too, sandwiched in between. We did a great deal
of driving and riding about among the different mountain paths, and we
still enjoy this distraction as much as ever.

To take our lunch with us and stay away all day, the boys riding ahead,
with the dogs following them, darting in among the brush, wildly happy
over every pretence of a scent, leaping high over every obstacle, and
adding so much to our enjoyment by their evident delight, is a pleasure
without flaw. I must not forget also a gun or two, stowed away in the
bottom of the carriage, for something worth killing may cross our
path. Jack-rabbits are not good eating but are good sport, and as they
injure the trees, every rancher shoots them when he gets the chance.
The dainty elegant road-runner must never be hurt, and woe be to the
“tenderfoot” who is tempted to shoot that pretty, impudent-looking
little fellow, the skunk, who flourishes his handsome black and white
tail in your very face. If you were a Chinaman, you would secure him
on any terms, even his own. All Celestial medicines and cordials
seem to be compounded of the most offensive abominations that can be
discovered; it follows, of course, that the skunk is a highly-prized
treasure in their pharmacopœia. What deceits we have practised and what
lies we have told during Wing’s reign in the kitchen! He was for ever
wanting to doctor us, and had always just the right remedy by him for
whatever complaint was to the fore. We soon became very wary indeed of
showing any sign of physical trouble before him, for we were at once
pounced upon with hot drinks of villainous compounds and rank smell,
and we had to be very diplomatic so as to escape drinking them there
and then, and thus get the chance of pouring them down the bath sink
when his back was turned.

We always felt this to be a very dangerous business, for the smell
threatened to betray us.

For rheumatic pains he eagerly recommended a sort of rattlesnake jam,
which is made with chunks of that attractive reptile cooked in whisky,
and potted for seven years, when it is ready for use, and, according to
Wing, is an infallible cure.

But though these various animals are spared for different reasons on
our little excursions, the Californian quail are very delicate food,
and a most welcome addition to the ranch larder, where variety is a
little difficult to get. They also are very good sport. Wild pigeons,
too, are not to be despised.

These driving expeditions are best, however, in the winter, spring, and
early summer, when the sun is not so hot, and when the roads have been
rained upon, and the terrible dust is laid. Is there any dust like the
Californian dust after a dry season, I wonder? My husband insists that
in Australia and the Cape, and other places where he and I have never
been, the dust is infinitely worse than in California; he also reminds
me of the dust in railway travelling at home, and insists that this
was quite as disagreeable and much more dirty. We do not agree on this
point. But as I said before, one accustoms oneself to almost anything,
and though we certainly take fewer pleasure drives at the end of the
summer, waiting rather always for the first rains, yet when I remember
my first horror at San Sebastian, on driving through waves, and clouds,
and curtains of dust, then I know by comparison that I have reached a
very philosophical state of mind about this, one of the necessary and
undeniable evils.

What one enjoys most in this life is, I think, the absolute freedom;
that and the great stretches of space around one are a constantly
increasing delight. To look across these great sweeps of mountains,
range after range, and see in the distance the silver line of the
Pacific, and to feel the clean, pure wind in one’s face, is like a
baptism of new life.

At first the strange bareness of these mountains almost wounds one’s
eyes, and their true beauty is not recognised. But as one learns to
know them better, their charm grows more and more striking, and I
almost doubt if after a few years one would wish for any change in
their bold bare lines. In the full midday sun they are not lovely, and
in some moods one would call them almost ugly, so uncompromising are
they in their grimness and bareness: but their time of triumph is when
the changing lights of sunset begin, when they are flooded with such
matchless colouring, so delicate and rich, that they seem positively
unreal.

During the winter rains all the odd jobs of repairing are done:
soldering, harness-cleaning and mending, painting of waggons or carts,
and carpentering.

Most Americans are clever-handed, and can turn from one job to another
with unusual facility. To see a man, who earns his living by driving
a delivery waggon, turn to in his spare time and build a neat and
comfortable addition to his house, an extra bedroom, and perhaps an
enlargement of the sitting-room, with a nice bit of verandah out of
this, and all well planned and well finished, is apt to knock the
conceit out of the young fellow from home, who prides himself on being
so “clever with his tools.”

Our first winter was a very dry one, to our great regret. The rainfall
was much below the average and much below what was needed for the land.
Less than seven inches fell during the whole season, and an average
good fall is about fourteen inches. So the land was never thoroughly
soaked, and what was a more anxious matter still, the storage of water
“way back” in the mountains was too scant, and pretty certain to run
short before the long dry season should be over. So, indeed, it proved,
and we were greatly harassed, when the water company began to cut down
our rations, leaving us barely enough to keep our young trees going;
and certainly not enough to give them a chance of doing their best,
however diligently the “cultivator” might be kept at work.

All that summer we were busy, tending the trees and adding further
improvements to the ranch. When the second winter came, we were hopeful
then all our anxieties about water would be set at rest by a good
generous rainfall.

The dry season had extended unusually far into the winter months, no
rain having fallen till December 5th, when we had a few small showers.
Within three weeks of this, it seemed as though we were to get our
desires to the full, for the rain came down in torrents.

The Silvero river, which was supposed to flow in the pretty valley
below us, of which we got such a charming glimpse from our verandahs,
had hitherto appeared to be a dry sandy stretch more like a rough
country road than a river, and we had laughed at the very notion of a
bridge being ever needed to cross its dangerous waters.

Wonderful tales of the miraculous possibilities of the land are of
course told here to the credulous tenderfoot, and we did not feel
inclined to believe our friends’ accounts of that very river’s deep and
dangerous waters during some rainy winters.

We had to make an apology that second winter. For nine days the waters
poured down in an almost solid sheet; and with hardly any cessation
night or day. We were all anxious and excited over this storm; and
constantly on the watch to see what would happen. At the end of the
first twenty-four hours, we had rather a scare over our reservoir. The
sudden inrush of water from the hill slopes around had filled it so
quickly that when my husband went up in the driving rain to see what
state it was in, he found, to his dismay, that the water had reached
the very tops of the dam, and was just beginning to sweep over, making
at once a deep and widening cut all along the lemon trees below.

The new wooden floodgate was so swollen with the rain that it was as
though riveted into its place, and refused to open. In a few moments
my husband had darted down to the barn, and returning with an axe,
broke the floodgate in pieces, when the danger was over, and the water
rushing away in a great heavy mass found its way into a gully where it
could do no mischief. We saw, from the deep cutting made in those few
moments by the water when it swept over the dam, what terrible damage
might be worked by these rains. But we could hardly believe our eyes or
ears however, when we saw in the valley the glistening of the water in
the broad river-bed, and heard the roar as though of a cataract.

During the first lull that occurred we all hurried down to the valley
to examine more closely what was going on. We found such a turbulent,
dangerous-looking river tearing down the valley, that we were perfectly
fascinated, and would fain have stayed and watched it for hours.

The river had already cut a great deep bed for itself out of the
wheat-sown meadows of the valley, and every moment a great slice of
the bank would give way and silently slide down into the water, which
swallowed it up relentlessly as it rushed past.

Great trees were lying in the river, in some places all across it,
making rough dams where the water fought and leapt even more fiercely;
and as we stood there, we were horrified to see one of the dear trees,
so highly prized in this bare land, go trembling down into the flood.
The sound of their roots straining and cracking as the rushing floods
tried to sweep them away from their last bit of anchorage, was most
painful; it seemed almost like a human struggle. All the ground was
more or less like quicksand, and we had to be careful where we stepped,
lest we should be “mired.” As the rain came on again heavily, we were
forced to return home, though very unwillingly; it was a scene of such
wonderful excitement.

We were very anxious, too, about friends whose ranches were some miles
further up the valley, and whose land lay mostly rather low down
and near the river-bed. We found afterwards that both had suffered
considerable loss, besides great anxiety. On one ranch the river had
in one night swept away eight acres of beautiful olive-trees that were
in full bearing. This was a very cruel blow, over which the whole
neighbourhood, I think, mourned, but which the young rancher and his
wife bore with the brave cheery spirit which is, I think, a noticeable
charm in most Americans. The young wife gallantly carried the heavier
share of the blow, by dismissing her servant, and herself doing the
housework and cooking.

(_To be concluded._)

[Illustration]




IN THE TWILIGHT SIDE BY SIDE.

BY RUTH LAMB.


PART XII.

THE LITTLE ONES OF THE FAMILY AND THE GLORY OF MOTHERHOOD—CONCLUSION.

    “Like olive plants round about thy table.”—Psa. cxxviii. 3.

Those of you, my dear girl friends, who are members of large families,
know how very soon the little ones begin to observe what is passing
around them. One never-ending marvel, in connection with infant life,
is the amount of knowledge gained during the first year of a child’s
existence.

The little creatures come into an unknown world where everything is
strange. Even the mother’s face has to be studied and learned off by
heart.

How quickly the baby eyes begin to follow the movements of those around
them! How soon they learn to discriminate between one face and another,
one object that is pleasant to the sight and a second that inspires
fear or dislike!

How marvellous is that instinct of self-preservation which moves the
little hand to twine itself round an outstretched finger, or to clutch
at any object within its reach!

Has it not been to you, baby’s sister, almost as much as to the
mother, a source of pride and delight to observe that the new-comer
was “beginning to take notice”? If the downy head is turned in your
direction, there is quite a ring of triumph in your voice as you say,
“I am sure he knows me.”

You see, I picture my girls as loving sisters with tender, motherly
instincts, and I decline to believe that there is one amongst them who
does not love these little ones.

If children begin to observe so soon, how important it is that those
who are round and about the life-path, on which, as yet, they can
only place a little tottering foot, should be careful that they see
only what is worthy of imitation. We, who are, perforce, the patterns
which the children are certain to copy, should be doubly watchful over
ourselves for their dear sakes.

You and I need to be ever on the watch on our own account, and the
prayer “Lord, I cry unto thee. Keep the door of my lips. Incline not
my heart to any evil thing. Deliver my feet from falling,” must often
go up from our hearts to God, if we are sensible of our needs and
weaknesses.

Have you not a double reason for the prayer that you may be kept from
sin, whether in word or deed, if you are elder sisters in homes where
the children must certainly learn by your example? I would not only
urge you never to utter a wrong or impure expression, but also to avoid
the foolish talk which even some older people think the only kind
suited to children. Use habitually the best words you know, so that
the little ones may have nothing to unlearn that they have heard from
your lips. Speak clearly and distinctly, avoid shrieking, boisterous
laughter, and discordant tones, so that baby’s voice, imitating yours,
may be clear and even musical from the first.

Be gentle and graceful in your movements. Do not throw yourselves about
or be rough, careless or boisterous in manner, for if you are, you
will soon see a little reflection of your doings in the toddling thing
who smashes his toys and laughs at the destruction he has wrought.

Be orderly in your own habits, and teach the little ones to put away
their toys when done with, in places provided for them. I may note here
that children are often untidy and needlessly destructive of their toys
because no provision is made for orderly ways, and no settled places
given for their childish treasures. Let them thoroughly enjoy the use
of these, but teach them that their toys are worth something, and that
wilful destruction results in loss to themselves.

Turn a bright, happy face for a child to study, that your smile may be
reflected in his. Cultivate a cheerful disposition and an even temper,
that you may rejoice in seeing joyous little ones in your homes.

Apart from ill-health and the consequent bodily suffering which
naturally makes the poor little people fretful and peevish, I honestly
believe that many mothers are responsible for the ill-tempers of their
children. If they had always cultivated habits of self-restraint, and
prayerfully watched against and checked every tendency to discontent,
angry passions, selfishness, etc., I am convinced they would have had
less cause to mourn over peevish, passionate, ill-tempered, exacting
children.

I have used the word _always_ advisedly.

The cultivation of every pure, right, holy habit, temper and method of
speech, should begin long before a young mother actually clasps her
child to her breast, if he is to come into the world such as she would
have him to be.

With what widely differing feelings do parents look forward to the gift
of a child! In some cases it is in the hope of keeping property in the
direct line, so that others may not inherit it.

Dear ones, it may be that none amongst you have need to cherish such
thoughts, or to expect any great share of this world’s wealth, for
those who may some day call you by the sweet name of mother. On all
who bear it will devolve the solemn responsibility of training your
children for something greater, higher and better than the richest
earthly inheritance.

It must never be forgotten that it is the children of human mothers who
are the heirs of immortality. It is the glorious privilege and duty of
the mother to teach her little ones the old, old story of God’s love in
Christ Jesus, and to put before them the precious truth that in Him and
through Him they become children of God. “And if children, heirs of God
and joint-heirs with Christ.”

Children are sometimes used as outlets for a mother’s vanity and love
of display. She delights to clothe them in the richest and costliest
of silks and laces, less for their comfort than to show that she is
wealthy enough to do so. These things are of little real account.

The soft woollen garments knitted and fashioned by the loving hands
of a poor mother, and the mere scraps of material adorned with pretty
stitching by her busy fingers, and kept in snowy purity, will be just
as comfortable and becoming as the more costly clothing.

In choosing a nurse to be associated with you in the care of your
children, think of what you would fain be for their sakes, and try to
find one who will work with you in a like spirit. Never give up your
own share in the work or the supervision of the nurse’s, except from
dire necessity. I would be the last to suggest that you should show
a suspicious, prying spirit; but let it be understood that the nurse
is your co-worker, and that, in trusting her with your children, you
place your greatest treasures in her partial keeping. My own practice
has always been to trust those who served in my home, unless something
occurred to justify a change of opinion.

In dealing with the little ones be absolutely true. Let there be
no shams or make-believes on your part, and allow none in others.
Children are wonderfully quick to detect shams, or even an approach
to untruth, and how keenly they study their elders! I hope it is not
derogatory to the child for me to say that they and dogs are curiously
alike in judging character. The child will meet the advances of one
stranger with open arms, whilst no bribes or blandishments will induce
her to look at another. The dog will generally make a like choice.
Before reason can have much to say in the matter, the child exercises
its God-given instinct in making or refusing to make friends with a
new-comer.

I was in a room with a number of people one day, when a little girl of
four was brought to see the visitors. All but one tried to coax her
into friendliness but in vain. The exception was a sea-captain, rugged,
sunburnt, and with a face seamed by small-pox. He made no attempt to
entice the child, beyond smiling in response to her frequent gaze. At
length she went quietly to him, laid her hand on his knee and bade him
lift her up. The rugged face looked beautiful in its kindliness as he
raised the child in his arms, and a moment after felt a soft kiss on
his cheek, and a curly head nestling on his breast. A more lovable
nature than that which dwelt beneath that man’s unpromising exterior,
it would have been hard to find; and so evidently the dog of the
household decided, for he followed the child and tried to push his nose
beneath the captain’s one free hand.

I often think that our four-footed friends set us examples worthy of
imitation in dealing with our little ones. Most of us would rather
bear pain than see a child suffer, even if not impelled to pity and
tenderness by motherly love. But we are not always sympathetic in
matters which are very real trials to the children. I have heard
people say, “How can one be expected to do anything but laugh at the
ridiculous things children cry and grieve about?” If the trouble is
a real one to the child, we may sympathise with the sorrow, though
we may smile at the cause of it. Only do not let us spoil everything
by allowing the child to see us smile whilst professing to pity and
condole.

It is harder for some natures to sympathise with the little ones in
their play than in their grievances. To do the latter is natural to
every kindly heart, but very often we find it the hardest possible task
to be a child with a child. The healthy little one is not often quiet
in play-time, and busy mothers, weary with very real work, are glad to
confine all romps within nursery walls, or to banish the players to
any place out of sight and hearing. Believe me, there is no time when
a mother’s supervision is more needed than during play-time. I was
brought to realise this, as I had never done before, quite lately.

A young mother, herself one of a large family, said to me, “My
childhood would have been one of the happiest possible, if only my
mother had been oftener with us in play-hours, but she had no idea
how miserable I was then. One of my sisters, younger than I, had a
passionate temper, a will of iron, and a selfish, exacting disposition
combined with unusual beauty and—when she chose—with the most winsome
ways imaginable. By these combined qualities she dominated the nursery,
got all her own way, and generally succeeded in making everyone appear
to be in the wrong but herself. My mother knew this too late to prevent
my childish happiness from being spoiled, and both she and my father
grieved over it. ‘Why did you not speak?’ they said. ‘We should have
believed you, for you were always true.’

“The fact was, I felt powerless before the strong will of my sister,
who succeeded in making me think myself of no account in comparison
with herself. I was not beautiful like her, and she was constantly
taunting me with what she called my ugliness. Well, I can thank God
that whilst my parents still lived, things were put right with them,
and no one was so near to them as I was. And, if I possessed a less
share of good looks, I had enough to win the love of a true heart and
keep it; so I must not complain. Only I cannot quite forget that I lost
the happy childhood my parents meant me to have, for want of my dear
mother’s more frequent presence during our play-time.”

When you attain to the glory of motherhood, beloved girl friends, let
each of you learn to be a child with your children. You will not lose
by this, and they will gain enormously.

I spoke of our four-footed friends. Look at puss with her kittens. Does
she stand on her dignity at play-time? Or the mother doggie. Does she
disdain a game at romps with her fat, roll-about puppies? Both these
furnish examples for human mothers, and depend on it, such will learn
far more of their children’s real dispositions during play-hours than
at any other time.

Years ago I saw an outdoor picture which I have never forgotten. A
little lamb had been born very late in the season, and, after all the
rest of the flock had been removed, it remained with its mother the
only occupants of a field. As soon as it was old enough, it showed all
the ordinary tendencies of its kind, and began to skip and frolic about
the field. But it had no playfellows, and would soon return, quiet and
disheartened, to its mother’s side.

The ewe rose to the occasion. She still carried her winter coat which
made active movements somewhat difficult, but in spite of this, she
joined in a game at romps with her little one. Anything funnier, more
ungainly than her efforts at skipping and prancing round, I never
expect to see, but she persevered to the delight of her lamb, so long
as the two remained in the field. She left in my memory one of the
sweetest pictures of motherly sympathy I ever witnessed.

It is not possible to do more than touch on the duties as well as the
glory of motherhood, for the subject is equally vast and important. In
all our talks in the twilight our object has been rather to suggest
future thought on matters of importance, than to exhaust the subject
during a sitting. You, my dear ones, if spared to be mothers, will have
to study many things, if you are to be worthy of such a sacred trust.
You will need loving and sympathetic natures, great self-control and
constant watchfulness over self, in order that your example may be
good for the little ones to follow. You will need tender, enlightened
consciences to keep Duty ever to the front, and Inclination subservient
to its call. You will find that you must unlearn as well as learn many
things in order that you may only teach what is best. You will have to
study the parts that others fill in the environment of your children
so that they may have pure companionship, friends and teachers whose
influence shall be second only to your own in doing them good. You
will have to plan in ways small and great for the growth, health and
general well-being of their bodies, but above and beyond all you must
never forget that something more precious than all the world has been
entrusted to you—an immortal soul with each child.

I need not say that if you realise the vastness of this trust, you
will be a prayerful mother. Very conscious of your own weakness and
inability rightly to fulfil your God-given work, you will constantly
seek the grace which is sufficient for you and for all: the strength
which is made perfect in the weakness of His believing servants. “For
the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

You will be ever prayerfully striving after greater nearness to the
Source of strength, and so, taking your little ones in your arms or
by the hand, you will lead them into the Presence, and as you lift up
heart and voice in supplication and prayer, teach them to realise from
their earliest days the Divine Fatherhood, and the saving love of God
in Christ Jesus.

It seems coming down from the greater to the less when, leaving for a
moment the teaching of the Bible about the glory and responsibility of
motherhood, I open another book and quote a few words from the writings
of a high-souled poetess, one who without knowing the glory, the bliss,
the responsibility of hearing a child call her mother, has yet grasped,
in a higher degree than any other writer I know, the reality of all
these things.

It was fitting to place first of all the testimony of Bible history and
teaching on the value of a child and the glories and responsibilities
of motherhood. But in these days it will do us good to read some words
from one of Mrs. Browning’s poems and to find that along with her great
mental and poetic powers, there dwelt in her fragile frame the warmest
of motherly hearts, the strongest motherly instincts. As Aurora Leigh,
she writes—

    “I might have been a common woman now,
    And happier, less known and less left alone;
    Perhaps a better woman after all,
    With chubby children hanging on my neck
    To keep me low and wise. Ah me, the vines
    That bear such fruit are proud to stoop with it:
    The palm stands upright in a realm of sand.

           *       *       *       *       *

    I thought a child was given to sanctify
    A woman, set her in the sight of all
    The clear-eyed Heavens, a chosen minister
    To do their business and lead spirits up
    The difficult blue heights. A woman lives,
    Not quickened towards the truth and good
    Through being a mother?

           *       *       *       *       *

                    I’m nothing more
    But just a mother. Only for the child
    I’m warm, and cold, and hungry, and afraid,
    And smell the flowers a little, and see the sun,
    And speak still, and am silent, just for him.”

I will not multiply quotations. These are more than enough to justify
what I have said of the writer. I hope many of you are already familiar
with the whole poem.

And now, my dear girl friends, I must close our talk to-night with the
announcement that in one sense it is to be our last, but not in another.

Three years have come and gone since our Twilight Circle was first
formed. Some of us met then as old acquaintances, but we have become
far more than mere acquaintances to each other. I believe we shall
remain true and lifelong friends. One of you, looking regretfully
forward to the probable cessation of our meetings, asks quite
pathetically—

“Have you nothing more to say to us, your girls?”

I feel that I still have many things to speak about, and yet that it
would not be advisable to arrange for meeting at stated periods for
the present. Yet I look forward to our keeping in regular touch with
each other; for our dear friend the Editor has suggested a “Twilight
Circle Correspondence Column” for us. In it I hope to answer some of
the letters already received, and others which you may address to me
in the future about our Twilight Talks. It has always been to me a
source of great regret that many of your letters have perforce remained
unanswered so long. I also hope to bring some of you, dear ones, into
touch with each other during the coming year by means of these letters.

I pray that God will add His blessing to what has been said, and that
you may all be better daughters, sisters, friends, wives, and, in due
time, mothers through our many happy meetings “In the Twilight Side by
Side.”

[THE END.]




HOUSEHOLD HINTS.


IT is not safe to use common cheap enamelled saucepans after they have
been chipped inside. The glaze that is used is often poisonous, and
the material comes off in such small pieces, that if absorbed with the
food they may act as a serious irritant to the intestines and set up
inflammation.


A BOOK should be kept for cuttings of interest from newspapers and
journals. These form very interesting reading.


AN accomplishment which everyone should cultivate is that of writing
clearly, especially one’s signature. It causes a great deal of trouble
and even serious mistakes to write illegibly. While staying with a
friend on a visit, a letter was handed round the table for us each to
try and decipher, and all that could be read of it was the concluding
sentence, “_Please reply by return of post._” The signature and address
were totally illegible.


SOUFFLÉ AU CHOCOLAT.—Take three eggs and beat the yolks and whites
separately. Add to the yolk a tablespoonful of pounded sugar and about
two ounces of chocolate. Stir all these ingredients well together,
adding a teaspoonful of flour. Whisk the whites of the eggs until they
form a stiff paste, and then mix lightly with the other substances.
Butter a tin and bake in a moderate oven for a quarter of an hour.
Serve up immediately in the tin.




[Illustration: AYONT THAE HILLS.]


AYONT THAE HILLS.


    Glendevon banks are bonny,
      Glendevon braes are braw;
    But burn an’ tree are nocht to me—
      My heart is far awa’.
    Ayont thae hills, thae bonny hills,
      Thae blue, blue hills o’ Blair,
    It’s there bides he wha’s a’ to me,
      An’ oh! my heart is there!

    The lark may sing his blithest,
      The throstle fill the breeze,
    But ilka strain is poured in vain—
      Nae heart hae I for these.
    For ower thae hills, thae bonny hills,
      Thae blue, blue hills o’ Blair,
    It’s there bides he wha’s a’ to me,
      An’ oh! my heart is there!

            G. K. M.




SHEILA’S COUSIN EFFIE.

A STORY FOR GIRLS.

BY EVELYN EVERETT-GREEN, Author of “Greyfriars,” “Half-a-dozen
Sisters,” etc.


CHAPTER XXV.

MAY’S INVITATION.

“I should like to go, Aunt Cossart, of course; but I will not accept
unless you can really spare me. Now that Effie is away, I know it is
dull for you, except in the evenings when Oscar is here.”

Mrs. Cossart held in her hands the note of invitation, which a servant
from Monckton Manor had just brought.

“Do you know who these friends are that Miss Lawrence thinks you would
like to meet?”

“No,” answered Sheila simply. “They have a good many summer visitors at
the Manor, and they are all nice people; but May does not say whether
they are any I have seen before.”

“Well, I think you had better go. It is only for three days; and I’ll
ask Ray to come and spend the time with me. She had half promised me a
visit before this. And Oscar need not go to the office regularly—that
was quite understood. Only he is such a boy for his duty that there
seems no keeping him back. However, your uncle will soon be home now;
and then perhaps we shall settle something different. But write your
note to Miss Lawrence, and say you will be there to-morrow. I will
drive you across. I want to go and see Mrs. Frost, and so it will all
be on the way.”

“Oh, thank you so much, Aunt Cossart, you are very good. I shall like
it very much if you are not left alone.”

Sheila ran to write her note with a light heart. Effie was away on a
visit to her friends the Murchisons. It had been a great advance that
she should pay a visit by herself, with only Susan in attendance. It
seemed quite a step in her recovery, and all had been pleased that she
wished it and felt able for it. In her absence Sheila and Oscar had
become quite like the children of the house, and the girl was often
surprised at the warmth of her affection towards her aunt, despite
the little fussiness and lack of tact and judgment which had so often
irritated her in old days.

Still, the thought of a few days with May was quite a treat. She had
not been over to the Manor very often of late. May had been visiting
some friends, and the girls had not met since. It was delightful of May
to think of asking her for a night or two. That kind of visit was so
much more satisfactory than just going over for the day.

Truth to tell, Sheila thought little of the “friends” she was asked to
meet. It was May she chiefly cared to see, although the house party at
the Manor when it was full of guests, was always a very pleasant one.

“May will be thinking about her wedding,” Sheila observed to her aunt
as they drove along in the bright June sunshine. “Ray says that North
does not see the use of waiting; and now that he has found that nice
house over the bridge, and in the country, though not too far away,
there doesn’t seem anything to wait for. I think he and May will be
very happy together; and it will be nice to have her so much nearer.”

“Yes, North is a steady good boy, and deserves a nice wife; but I
should never have guessed that he would marry into the county, as
people call it. That always seemed more in Cyril’s line.”

Sheila laughed. She had seen through Cyril’s veneer long ago, and
thought much more of North’s sterling worth and perfect sincerity and
simplicity. It was these qualities which had attracted May, and Sheila
thought she showed her sense and good feeling in being so quick to
appreciate them.

May received her with open arms; and in a short time they were
ensconced in one of their favourite retreats, pouring girlish
confidences into each other’s ears.

May told of her approaching marriage, which was to take place in
September, so that they would get a run on the continent a little later
than the August rush, and yet be settled at home comfortably for the
winter.

“You must come and see the house to-morrow,” cried May. “It is such a
dear old place; not big, you know, but quite old-fashioned; and such a
quaint old walled garden that shuts us out from the world. It is away
from other houses now, close to the village of Twick; but as North
says, Isingford is creeping out that way, and it won’t be country many
more years; but our walls will keep us secluded, and inside it is all
quite delightful. We have two acres altogether, and it is so well
planted and laid out that you would think it was much more.”

Sheila was keenly interested in her friend’s prospects; and time
slipped away fast. The softened light told of a westering sun, and May
suddenly sprang up crying—

“I am sure it must be tea-time and past. Come along, Sheila. You must
be introduced to our other guests!”

They threaded the garden paths, crossed the blazing lawns, towards the
group of stately cedars beneath which several persons were seated.
Sheila could not see their faces distinctly through the sweeping
boughs; but suddenly somebody rose and made a few forward steps,
uttering a pleased little exclamation, whilst the girl gave a joyful
cry and sprang forward.

“Miss Adene! Oof—how delightful! Oh, May, why did you not say that Miss
Adene was here?”

The meeting was a warm one on both sides. Sheila’s glance swept round
the little group, but there was no other familiar face, except that of
the hostess. She was introduced to the other guests; but was quickly
seated beside Miss Adene asking questions in her eager way, and telling
of herself in turn.

“Yes, we think that Guy is quite recovered now,” said Miss Adene. “He
is wonderfully better, even since you saw him. We went to Oratava for
a little while, and then when it grew too hot there we returned to
Madeira; and before we left he seemed as strong as ever, and has not
lost a bit of ground since he got home. He begins to ride and drive,
and walk about just as he did before his illness. Ronald declares that
he will soon be quite a superfluity at the Priory. Guy is able to take
everything into his own hands again.”

“I am so glad! How happy Lady Dumaresq must be! And dear little Guy,
how is he?”

“Oh, as well as possible, the rogue! And he has not forgotten you. He
sent you lots of kisses, and an injunction that you were to come and
see him very soon. ‘Tell her if she doesn’t come soon,’ he said, ‘I
shall go mad.’”

“He didn’t,” cried Sheila, laughing, “Oh, how utterly sweet of him! He
is a darling; I should so like to see him again!”

Miss Adene asked after Effie, and time flew quickly by. It was so nice
to have lost all that old miserable feeling Sheila once thought she
must always experience if she met again these friends, whose kindness
towards her had been the immediate cause of her banishment from
Madeira, and who must, she knew, have guessed in some measure at the
cause of it.

But Miss Adene seemed to have put that memory right away, and there was
nothing but pleasure in meeting her again. It was May’s voice which
interrupted the talk at last.

“Sheila, I want to get some forget-me-nots from the stream to decorate
the dinner-table with. They are so lovely just now, and look exquisite
with moss on the white cloth. Do come with me!”

Sheila jumped up at once, and the two girls hastened away together.
May’s face was rather flushed, and her eyes were shining brightly.
The stream which ran through the park was famed for its beds of blue
forget-me-not, and there was no trouble in finding flowers enough and
to spare.

Presently the sound of voices, men’s voices, broke upon their ears, and
May jumped up, exclaiming—

“Here is North! And he is bringing back a guest of ours, who wanted to
see the works. You talk to him, Sheila, and let me have a few words
with North. I have so much to say.”

There was a merry gleam in May’s eyes, but Sheila suspected nothing
until a sudden bend in the path brought them face to face with the
approaching pair, and she saw that North’s companion was none other
than Ronald Dumaresq.

Then for a moment astonishment robbed her of her self-control, and the
flowers she was holding in her arm slipped in a mass to the ground.
Laughingly Ronald sprang forward, picked them up, and took possession
of the load.

“I hope you and your flowers are alike in nature, Miss Cholmondeley,
and that I am not quite forgotten.”

He stretched out his hand and took hers, and she, looking up into the
bright manly face, forgot her tremors and her embarrassment, and felt
nothing but a sense of pure happiness in being face to face with him
again.

“I see you do not need an introduction,” said May’s voice, with a
mischievous ring in it; and then the four began pacing back slowly
towards the house, falling naturally into two and two.

“You have seen my aunt?” asked Ronald.

“Yes; but she did not say that you had come too.”

“No, I asked her not. I wanted to give you a surprise. I hope it has
not been a very disagreeable one.”

Sheila’s old clear laugh rang out through the wood.

“If you are fishing for compliments, sir, you won’t get any out of me!”

“And I am so fond of them,” said Ronald pathetically. “Don’t you think
you might be nice and kind, and say how much you have missed me since
we parted?”

“Oof!” cried Sheila, “what next am I to say?”

“Well, if you won’t say the pretty thing, I must. Do you know, Miss
Cholmondeley, that after the sudden departure of a certain nameless
person from Madeira, everything got so stale and unprofitable to me
that I seriously threatened to come home alone; and I should have done
so if they hadn’t moved on elsewhere.”

Sheila’s face was glowing, but she answered by a gay laugh; and the
laugh was not forced, for was she not very, very happy?

“You may laugh, but I assure you it was no laughing matter to me.
Sheila, did you want to go off in that sudden fashion? Did you go of
your own accord?”

He stopped suddenly and took her hand; she gave one swift upward
glance, and then dropped her eyes.

“It was arranged for me,” she said.

“You did not want to go yourself?”

“No, not then. I was very angry about it. I had a great many wicked
thoughts, which I was very much ashamed of afterwards, because it was
such a good thing that I did go exactly at that time. It might just
have been settled for me in the very best way possible.”

“What do you mean?” asked Ronald quickly.

“You know Oscar, my brother, fell ill of typhoid fever just as I got
back. If it had not been for—for—that, I might not have been with him,
and I don’t know what I should have done then.”

Ronald’s face cleared; for a moment he had looked anxious.

“I saw Oscar just now at the works,” he said. “I liked him very much
indeed. You are not much alike, but there was something in his voice
and expression which reminded me of you.”

“I wish I were more like Oscar,” said Sheila humbly. “He is much better
than I shall ever be.”

“Don’t wish to be anything but yourself, Sheila,” said Ronald with
sudden impetuosity, “for I want you just as you are.”

The blood surged up into Sheila’s face; this was taking the bull by the
horns with a vengeance. Ronald seemed to know he had committed himself,
and stood his ground, holding her hands fast in his, and again letting
the poor forget-me-nots drop to the ground.

“Sheila, I did not mean to be so sudden, I promised not to be in such
haste; they all tell me I must not expect to carry everything before
me. But when I see you, I forget everything except that I love you. Oh,
Sheila, won’t you try and love me too? I am so sure I could make you
happy, if you would only give yourself into my keeping.”

Her eyes were on the ground, but there was that in her down-bent
quivering face that gave Ronald hope and courage. He bent over her and
touched her cheek with his lips.

“Sheila, won’t you say you will try to care for me a little?”

“Oh, Ronald, I do!” she suddenly exclaimed; and then they forgot
everything else in that wonderful first embrace of love, in which the
gates of a new world seemed flung open before them, and they walked
alone in that new world, as though it were their own for evermore.

“But, Ronald,” said Sheila gravely, after those first golden moments
had passed, and they began to awake to the realities of life, “you must
not ask me to be impatient or selfish. I must think of other people as
well, and I must not promise anything without the consent of my uncles.”

“But you are nearly of age, my darling; you will soon be your own
mistress.”

“Yes, but that is not quite it, Ronald. My uncles have been very kind
to me; my home is with one of them, and my aunt begins to depend upon
me. I must not be selfish; you would not like me if I were. We may have
to wait a little perhaps, but you won’t mind that, will you, Ronald?”

“I don’t know,” answered Ronald. “And I have an idea your aunt will
set herself against this, and she rules your uncle. I won’t have you
spirited away from me again, Sheila. That I can’t stand!”

She laughed and put her hand upon his lips.

“Don’t say rude things of my nice aunt and uncle. They are a great
deal kinder to me than I deserve, for I did not always treat them very
nicely.”

“Stuff! you were an angel; it was they who bullied you, and that Effie
always wanted to come between us.”

“No, she didn’t; that is all your fancy. Effie is much nicer than you
think, and is getting more sensible and stronger every week. She will
be on our side, I know. And, Ronald, I only want us to be reasonable
and unselfish, and not put ourselves and our affairs first. If you
asked Miss Adene, she would tell you just the same.”

“I know she would,” said Ronald, laughing, and then in a graver voice
he added, “Yes, Sheila, you are quite right; one must learn to take
the second place, and think of other people as well as oneself. If
you can be patient, so can I; and I love you all the better for your
unselfishness.”

“I wish I were unselfish,” said Sheila with a sigh. “I am only trying
to be, and it does not seem quite so hard when one is very, very happy.”

Then Ronald bent over her, kissed her once more, picked up the fallen
flowers, and walked towards the house.

(_To be concluded._)




THE PLEASURES OF BEE-KEEPING.

BY F. W. L. SLADEN.


PART VI.

Carrying out the directions given last month for preparing the hives
for winter, must not be delayed later than the middle of September.
All our colonies being strong and having plenty of stores, they should
now be wrapped up warmly and left undisturbed until next spring. Two
American flour bags placed over the quilts will be quite enough extra
covering, or one of these stuffed with a little dry barley straw will
answer the purpose even better, providing a warm covering over the
frames from two to three inches thick. An inspection should be made of
the roofs of the hives, and if they are not thoroughly weather-proof,
two coats of good white-lead paint should be applied to them. The size
of the entrance must not be reduced to less than three inches.

The quieter bees are kept during the winter the better they come out
in the spring. Being snowed up will not hurt them as long as they get
sufficient air to breathe, which they will do through two or three feet
of light snow. In the middle of a warm day in February, when the bees
are flying freely, it will do no harm to lift a corner of the quilts
and take note of the amount of sealed stores they still possess, if
care be taken not to expose and disturb them more than is necessary.
If they seem to be running short of food, a box containing soft candy
should be given to them over the feed-hole. Feeding liquid food would
excite the bees too much so early in the year, and it should not be
done until the beginning of April. If the stores are almost exhausted,
feeding with candy or syrup will have to be kept up until the bees
are able to find enough honey in the fields to support themselves. In
some districts this may not be until June. On the other hand, it is a
mistake to keep feeding our bees unless they really require it.

March and April are often trying months for the bees, the sudden
changes of temperature being very unfavourable to bee-life. Colonies
that are not very strong may become so reduced in numbers that they
“pull through” only with difficulty, and afterwards require the whole
of the following season to regain their full strength, yielding neither
honey nor swarms.

On the other hand, strong colonies, under favourable conditions, during
the latter part of April and May, will increase so rapidly that, unless
they are given plenty of room inside the hive in good time, they will
make preparations for swarming, which the bee-keeper, who wishes to
work for honey and not swarm, will find it difficult to check. The
usual way to give the bees more room in the spring is by inserting a
frame or foundation, or of empty comb in the centre of the brood-nest.
If, however, the bees are not quite strong enough to take it, and a
spell of cold weather follows, some of the brood may get chilled and
this will be a worse disaster than an over-crowded hive.

The spring, then, is a period which calls for constant attention and
vigilance on the part of the bee-keeper, who must not be satisfied, as
many are, that all is going on right because the bees show activity on
a warm day, but must be acquainted with their exact condition, so that
prompt assistance may be given when it is required.

Having completed my sketch of the chief events in the bee-keeper’s
calendar, it only remains to add a few details which may be of use or
interest.

The subject of bee diseases is one that claims our attention. There
is only one serious disease that bees are subject to; but that,
unfortunately, is rather common. It is known as _foul brood_. It is
caused by a micro-organism, which attacks the brood in the combs,
causing it to putrefy and die. In its earlier stages, the presence
of foul brood can only be detected by a careful examination of the
brood combs, in which here and there a larva or two will be found
to be decomposing into a coffee-coloured ropy mass, and some of the
capped cells containing pupæ will have their cappings sunken and
perforated. As the disease advances, much of the brood gets affected,
and a foul smell issues from the entrance of the hive, which may often
be perceived several yards away. The colony becomes rapidly weak and
profitless, and in the end frequently perishes altogether.

Foul brood is very contagious, and strong measures must be taken to
stamp it out directly its presence is discovered. In a bad case the
whole colony must be burnt. If the hive is a good one, it may be
preserved, but then it must be thoroughly disinfected by being scalded
and painted inside and out with carbolic acid. When the disease is
discovered in an early stage the combs only need be destroyed, the
bees being shaken off them and treated as a swarm. They should be put
into a new hive on frames of foundation, and fed with syrup medicated
with Naphthol-beta. This drug is supplied in packets by the principal
dealers in bee-appliances, and full directions for use are printed on
each packet. The old hive and everything connected with the diseased
colony must be burnt or thoroughly disinfected. If the combs contain
much honey it may be utilised for human consumption without fear; but
on no account must it be given back to the bees. When fresh brood
develops in the new combs, a sharp look-out must be maintained for the
reappearance of the disease; if it should manifest itself, in however
slight a degree, the operation of renewing hive and combs must be gone
through again. The disease must be looked for in other hives, and
these, if found to be affected, must at once be dealt with in a similar
way. The source of infection should be ascertained, and if it be found
that a neighbouring bee-keeper has any diseased colonies, he should be
persuaded to take immediate steps to cure or destroy them.

Bees do not suffer from the attacks of many enemies in this country.
Wasps are sometimes troublesome around the hive entrances in the
autumn, and titmice are rather too fond of making a meal on a bee or
two in the winter. The latter have an amusing way of bringing the bees
out of the hive by tapping with their beaks on the alighting board,
until a worker appears to see what the matter is, for which act it
is immediately seized and swallowed. Field-mice like honey, and will
sometimes play havoc with the combs of a weak colony; but if the
entrance is not more than 3/8 inch deep, they will find it difficult to
force a passage in the hive.

The most troublesome pests, when they get in the hives, are the
caterpillars or the wax-moth. They riddle the combs with their numerous
silk-lined tunnels, devouring all the pollen brood and honey that
come in their way. It is difficult to get rid of these caterpillars
without destroying the combs. All moths found in the quilts should be
destroyed, for they lay the eggs which produce the caterpillars. The
wax-moth is very destructive in bee-hives in America, but one seldom
hears of its doing much damage in England, except in badly-kept or
neglected hives. Two balls of naphthaline placed on the quilts will
help to keep the wax-moth away.

A curious parasite called the bee-louse (_Branla cocca_) is sometimes
found attached to the body of the queen, and occasionally also the
workers. Though it belongs to the order of flies, it is blind and
wingless, and most resembles a tiny reddish-brown spider. A few of
these parasites do not seem to inconvenience the queen-bee.

Ants may be kept out of the hive by placing the legs in saucers
containing water. Earwigs do no harm in the hive.

Experienced bee-keepers are often able to increase their colonies
cheaply in the autumn by _driving_ their neighbour’s bees. Unhappily
there are still many owners of bees in this enlightened country to whom
the hive is as a sealed book that they have never attempted to open.
They do not trouble to look after their bees, and, when wanting the
honey, would destroy them to obtain it, if some practical bee-keeper
did not come forward and offer to do the work for them, asking to be
allowed to take the bees he has saved from destruction in return for
his services, a request which the owner is generally willing enough
to grant. It requires a man of some little experience to drive bees
successfully, so we will not go into the details of the operation here.
Suffice it to say that the straw hive or skep from which the bees are
to be driven is fixed in an inverted position, and another skep placed
over it into which the bees, by repeated rapping, are driven. Driven
bees can generally be bought fairly cheaply in the autumn. Several lots
of driven bees should be put together into a wooden hive provided with
frames fitted with foundation, or better still, ready drawn-out combs
if you have them. Rapid feeding must then be commenced at once, and
sufficient food for winter stores should be taken down and sealed over
before the middle of September.

We must not be surprised if our extracted honey becomes opaque and
solid on the approach of cold weather. This process is called candying
or granulation, and is, in fact, a proof of the purity of the honey,
though some kinds granulate much sooner than others. Well-ripened
honey, when granulated, will keep good for years.

In concluding these papers a few words on the natural history of bees
may be of interest. Some of my readers will be surprised when I tell
them that there are about two hundred different kinds of bees to be
found in England. Up to the present I have been talking only about one
of these, and this one, properly speaking, is a honey-bee. Almost all
the other bees are solitary in their habits, that is, they do not live
in large colonies in hives, but singly or in pairs in holes in the
ground, in old stumps or walls, or in the hollow stems of plants. Still
they are, many of them, very interesting, and well worth studying.
They all feed on honey, and may be found on various kinds of flowers
throughout the spring and summer. Some of them are large and beautiful
like the well-known humble-bees; others are small and inconspicuous.
Some resemble our honey-bee so closely that none but an expert could
tell them apart; others again have such a strong likeness to wasps that
a novice would scarcely give them credit for sweeter relationships.

[Illustration: QUEEN HUMBLE-BEE (_Bombus terrestris_).]

But readers of this magazine, who happen to reside abroad, might come
across other kinds of honey-bees, wild perhaps, but to which, if put
in hives, all the foregoing remarks would more or less apply. Several
of the foreign races of the honey-bee have been tried in this country
and have been found to do very well. One of these, the Italian bee, is
quite naturalised, and has spread so extensively over the country that
it is hard to find a colony of pure English bees now, most of our bees
being a cross between the English and the Italian races. Italian bees
may be readily recognised by the pale semi-transparent, orange-yellow
markings on the tail, true English bees being entirely black all over.
The Italian bees are more prolific than the English race and they are
easier to handle because they remain quietly on their combs when the
hive is opened. A good cross between the English and Italian races is
generally acknowledged to be the best honey-bee for all purposes in
this country, but it has acquired a name for being rather bad-tempered.

Books that will be helpful to those who are “going in” for bee-keeping
are _The British Beekeeper’s Guide Book_ (paper, 1s. 6d.), and _Modern
Bee-keeping_ (6d.), published by the British Bee-keepers’ Association.

Finally, the beginner must not be disheartened by a few difficulties
and failures. They should, on the contrary, spur on to greater
efforts in seeking to avoid them in the future, for it is chiefly by
first failures that experience, that most important factor in every
successful pursuit, is gained. Persistent effort will bring its reward,
and the bees will soon become a greater source of interest than we ever
thought could be possible.




GIRLS AS I HAVE KNOWN THEM.

BY ELSA D’ESTERRE-KEELING, Author of “Old Maids and Young.”


PART IX.

THE TALL GIRL AND THE SMALL GIRL.

[Illustration: EXTREMES MEET AND KISS]

“Often the cockloft is empty in those whom Nature has built many
storeys high,” says quaint old Fuller.

“Long and lazy,” says the proverb.

“Divinely tall,” says Tennyson.

Now in thought go over the tall girls whom you have known. Perhaps they
were not unlike the tall girls known to me.

Cicely—by herself called Thithily—is one of these. She has a little
head atop of a long body, and when she laughs, which she does much,
displays to view two rows of foolishly small teeth. Cicely laughs to
keep herself from crying, for she has a very hard time of it.

_Poor?_

No. She has everything that money can buy, but lacks a thing that money
cannot buy.

Muriel is the poor long girl known to me.

Muriel’s wail is, _There is so much of me to dress_.

When last I saw Muriel, her boots were down at heel, and to
shamefacedness she added—shamefootedness.

Dearest to me of long girls is one Dorothy, big and beautiful and kind,
knowing some things—not many—and wanting to know more.

Said Dorothy one day—

“Is there not such a word as ‘magnanimosity’ for ‘kindness’?”

It was hard to have to tell her that there was not, and that, if ever
such a word as “magnanimosity” shall be, it will certainly not be a
word for “kindness.”

Have you noticed that a big girl mostly has a small girl for her
friend, and _vice versâ_? Shakespeare, who noticed all things, noticed
that. With Helena he puts Hermia, and with Rosalind Celia.

The tall girls of prose-fiction are numerous. For _A_ there is
Blackmore’s Annie, who “never tried to look away when honest people
gazed at her.” For _B_ there is Thackeray’s Beatrix, and there is one
for every other letter in the alphabet.

The “towering big” girl—to put the matter Hibernically—had a great
vogue a few years ago as the heroine of _Trilby_, but, on the whole,
the small girl has been more singled out for loving treatment by
novelists than the tall girl. Dickens had a known preference for her,
and his “little Nell” has eclipsed all big Nells. In the description of
one Ruth, too, it may be noticed that he uses with loving iteration the
word “little”—“pleasant little Ruth! cheerful, tidy, bustling, quiet
little Ruth!”

In fiction subsequent to that of Dickens there is a Mary described
thus—“a little dumpty body, with a yellow face and a red nose, the
smile of an angel, and a heart full of many little secrets of other
people’s, and of one great one of her own, which is no business of any
man’s.”

[Illustration: A TALL STORY]

All readers of Kingsley’s _Two Years Ago_ will remember that Mary.

The poets no less than the prose-writers have busied themselves with
the small girl. The mere word _Duchess_ to most people calls up a
picture of stateliness, yet Browning describes a duchess as follows:—

    “She was the smallest lady alive.”

In these days of tall girls small girls are apt to fret. There is one
known to me whose case is pitifuller than that of the little fir-tree
in Andersen.

That little fir-tree, you will remember, thought of nothing so much
as growing. The children sitting beside it would often exclaim, “How
pretty and little it is!” _It could not bear to hear that_, says
Andersen.

[Illustration:

    It is not growing like a tree
    In bulk, doth make men better be

            BEN JONSON]

The case of the little girl known to me is just by so much sadder than
that of the little fir-tree that she knows that her growing days are
over. When last I saw her she was trying to give length to herself
by a long tail to her dress, but the world was not deluded thus, and
measured her, as naturalists measure the mouse, “not including the
tail.”

Happily a major number of small girls still carry a high heart, knowing
that maids, as well as men, may be “little, very little, but not
insignificant.”

Those words are Sir Walter Scott’s in reference to Thomas Moore, whose
pseudonym, it may be remembered, was at one time Thomas Little.

This is perhaps the place in which to say a word about the persons
whose littleness is bound up with their fame. One of the greatest
generals of all time had for his best known soubriquet “the little
corporal.” Omit the “little” in that case, and the appellation is
robbed of all that gives piquancy to it.

How much there may be in the mere word “little” is shown in the
following—true—story.

A living sculptor of note, a foreigner residing in London, made a
tender group composed of a mother and her child. The mother was
counting the baby’s toes, and beneath the group was carved a legend
which the artist conceived to embody a familiar nursery rhyme. The
legend ran, “One pig went to market.”

[Illustration: _Ah, von leettle peeg—oui, oui!_]

“Sir, sir!” remonstrated an Irishwoman, to whose inspection the group
was subjected, “you’ve made a terrible omission. You’ve left out
‘little.’ No human mother would sing to her babe, ‘One pig went to
market.’”

The foreign sculptor beat his breast.

The ironical use of big for small and small for big is a thing of old
custom. Thus one of the biggest English Johns who ever lived was known
to his contemporaries, and is still known to those who cherish his
memory, as Little John, and it is by a similar pleasantry, according
to a learned writer, that Maria, who in Shakespeare’s play of _Twelfth
Night_ is represented as _a little woman_, is called by Viola “Olivia’s
giant,” and that Sir Toby says to her “Good-night, Penthesilea,”
meaning by Penthesilea _amazon_, if his meaning was not merely (and to
me this seems to be the more likely thing) to twit the little woman by
giving her a long name.

Indubitably there is a beauty in tall stature. On the other hand the
case of small girls _versus_ tall girls is in one agreeable respect
analogous to that of ants _versus_ elephants. Though an ant is not the
smallest creature that is, it looks very small beside an elephant; yet
it has long been voted mentally superior to the elephant; in fact,
Coleridge was wont to speak of the ant as the most “intellectual” of
animals. That may be so, or may not be so; it is established fact,
however, that the majority of women who have distinguished themselves
by their intellectuality have been little women. This is true of
the poetesses, from Sappho to Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Among
women-writers of imaginative prose it would be easy, but would be
invidious, to name living ones. Of the great dead it is enough to name
Charlotte Brontë and Jane Austen, both of them little women.

Among the many women who have distinguished themselves as rulers Queen
Elizabeth made good in high dignity what she lacked in high stature,
and the same thing is true of the queen who to-day occupies the throne
of England.

[Illustration: TWO GREAT LITTLE QUEENS]

To give one more instance of the great in the little, it was a little
woman who worked the prison reforms which make the name of Elizabeth
Fry a deathless one. The list of great little women is indeed very long.

A word must be said here in reference to a charge much levelled at
small persons, especially small girls and women. They have been said to
be unduly self-assertive, and their sisters have been praised for their
superior meekness. It is not always, but it is sometimes, the case of
the high holly branches and the low. The high holly branches put out
no prickles, because, as the botanists explain, they do not need them.
Above a certain height there is no danger of attack.

In fairness to tall girls it must be allowed that they are sometimes
attacked. Said a little Irishman to a big English girl whom he met
under the stars one summer night—

“I’m wantin’ to light me pipe, miss. _Will ye kindly hand me down a
star?_”

The nonplussed English girl was silent, and Pat the saucy went on his
way unpunished.

[Illustration: The O’Prometheus and his hollow tube]

Gentleness and bigness often go together, but lest any long Meg who may
chance to read this paper lay the too-flattering unction to her soul
that there was never shrew that was bigger than a mouse, be it here
set down that the famous Long Meg of Westminster was a dreaded virago.
There is also no reason to believe that the shrew of Shakespeare’s
comedy—the lady ironically styled “the kindest Kate”—was of small body
dimensions.

It may be allowed, however, that vehemence is more often a
distinguishing mark of little persons than of big ones. Similarly,
little persons are, as a rule, more prone to indulge in a scornful
vein, and here there shall be a thing whispered to the small girl.
The tall are rarely so contemptuous to the small as the small are to
the—smaller. This appears to have been so from of old. Thus it was,
according to an old Greek fable, the ant that said of the mite when
the beasts—including the elephant and the whale—were summoned before
Jupiter, that she—the mite—was so small as to be beneath notice. This
objection—coming from the ant—must have surprised the elephant and the
whale.

To conclude. Since (as the proverb has it) they are not all big men who
reap the harvest, and since, equally, they are not all small men who
do this, the thing of main importance would appear to be not a man’s
physical height; and, as is the case with men in this matter, so is, it
may safely be assumed, the case with the daughters of men.

[THE END.]




DIET IN REASON AND IN MODERATION.

BY “THE NEW DOCTOR.”


PART III.

THE DINNER.

At what time do you dine? Dinner is the chief physiological event in
the day. Therefore the answer to the question “At what time do you
dine?” is a very important one, although the true reason for the answer
is not often understood.

There are really but two ways of arranging the day’s meals; the one,
the more rational, we may call the French way; the other, the less
rational, we may call the English labourer’s way. The first arrangement
is carried out by nearly every nation except ourselves. It consists in
a very light breakfast, a fair meal after noon, and the chief meal in
the evening.

The second arrangement consists of a fair breakfast, the chief meal at
about one o’clock, and a small meal in the evening.

And then there is our own, the irrational method of feeding—a big
breakfast, a scrap for lunch, and the dinner in the evening.

But if this division of meals is not physiologically correct, why do we
adhere to it?

The answer to this is that we choose the least harmful of several
very wrong methods. The man in the middle class in England does not
apportion out for himself any definite time for meals; if he did not
dine in the evening, he would never properly digest any meal. Take a
busy City man, for instance. He arranges his time in such a manner
that he swallows down his last teaspoonful of tea at breakfast about a
quarter of a second before he runs to catch his train. If it were not
that he has to keep still while in the train, he would never digest his
meal at all.

And then he rushes out of his office to snatch a bit of lunch between
two items of business. He may play a game of chess over his lunch, but
such a gross waste of time as sitting down for five minutes after his
meal is never tolerated until he becomes a martyr to dyspepsia.

But after dinner he does rest, because he has nothing else to do. His
business for the day is over, and he digests his meal in peace.

But with the working-classes the case is very different. They have
certain hours given to them for their meals, during which time they are
not allowed to work, and for such persons it is advisable to dine in
the middle of the day.

It would be of little good for us to describe the few advantages and
overwhelming abuses of a sumptuous banquet, for, most fortunately
for themselves, extremely few of our readers are ever likely to be
present at one. Nor would it suit our purpose to describe a one-course
dinner, so we will take the chief meal of a well-to-do man of the upper
middle-class as the subject of our remarks.

Here is the menu:—

              Tomato Soup.
        Turbot and Lobster Sauce.
      Mutton Cutlets and Tomatoes.
    Roast Ribs of Beef. Horse-radish.
           Spinach. Potatoes.
            Cabinet Pudding.
            Caviare on Toast.
                 Coffee.

We will first criticise the dinner as a whole and then dilate
separately upon each item.

In the first place the meal is much too long. Dinner should never last
more than half an hour, whereas this meal will take a full hour at
least.

The second point is a most important one and one which is frequently
overlooked, yet it is one of the most important causes of ill-health.
It is this. There are six courses in this dinner, and every one of
them contains animal food. Every item in the list is a concentrated
food, rich in nourishment, and readily digestible. Consequently nearly
the whole of what is eaten will get into the blood, and there, being
greatly in excess of what is needed, it will irritate the organs by
which it must be got rid of.

One word about the drinks. The stomach of man is made to digest solids,
and one of the most fertile causes of indigestion is taking excess of
fluids with meals. Drinking between meals or when the stomach is empty
is not such an important cause of indigestion as is drinking largely
with meals, because drinking large quantities dilutes the gastric
secretion, which loses its digestive power if freely diluted.

At no meal should more than half a pint of fluid be taken, and that is
best taken at the end of the repast.

The pernicious habit of serving different wines with each course is one
of the most harmful customs of modern dieting. If you have wine at all,
have light wines only, and never change the drinks with the various
courses.

Of course, the dinner we are criticising is excellently served and
there is no waiting between the courses. But when people whose purses
are strictly limited give dinners, they are not content with an
ordinary two-course meal, but must ape the doings of their more wealthy
neighbours and give elaborate dinners, which for obvious reasons are
badly served.

Waiting between the courses of a meal is very injurious to the stomach.
A little wait after the soup does no harm at all. Soup is more a
digestive stimulant than a food, and therefore it is advisable to wait
a little between the soup and the next course. But after that there
should be no delay, and the meal should be finished as soon as possible.

There are thirty persons sitting down to this dinner, and we notice
that they have all washed their hands. Here is the first thing that
we should all do well to copy. Everybody should wash her hands before
sitting down to a meal. Don’t laugh and say that everybody does do so!
We know such is not the case, and it is just those persons for whom
it is most necessary to wash before eating who neglect this hygienic
measure.

Workers in factories, especially those who have to work with lead
or other poisonous materials, should be scrupulously careful never
to touch food with dirty hands. Neglect of this precaution is the
commonest method by which chronic poisoning is produced.

Legislation has been doing all in its power to limit the deleterious
effects of poisons upon those who are compelled to work in them. Yet
it is exceedingly difficult to get factory workers to wash their hands
before eating, and many firms have been severely censured when cases
of chronic poisoning have occurred in their works, when the sufferers
themselves were entirely to blame because they would not wash their
hands.

To return to the dinner. At the table, soups are divided into two
groups—thick and clear. Dietetically, the division is extremely well
marked, for the actions and uses of the two are totally different.

Clear soup—that is, soup which is quite free from floating particles—is
not a food and contains no nourishment. This may seem a strong
statement to make and you may disbelieve it; but still it is a fact.
Clear soup is a solution of the _débris_ of animal tissue. The
nourishing part of animal flesh is insoluble in boiling water and
therefore is not present in clear soup. The only fluid which contains
nutritive animal matter after it has been boiled is milk.[2] But if it
is not a food, clear soup is a powerful stimulant and is a good opening
to a big meal. But it should only be taken in very small quantities,
and by most persons beyond middle age it is better not taken at all!

Thick soup is a nutritious preparation owing its nourishing power
entirely to the solid particles suspended in it. Like clear soup,
however, it is chiefly a solution of animal _débris_—the waste products
of life.

It used to be the rule to give beef-tea and other meat extractives in
all illnesses, but fortunately the custom is dying out as our knowledge
increases. There are many diseases—for instance, gout—which are due to
excess of waste products in the blood; or, to put it in an intelligible
form, they are due to substances identical with beef-tea circulating
in the blood. And yet these people used to be fed on soup, when of all
things in the world it is that which they should avoid.

Before we continue the dinner, we wish to say a few words about this
custom of giving beef-teas, etc., to invalids. The ordinary soups,
beef-teas, meat essences and suchlike, which are commonly given to
the sick, are inappropriate for their purpose and are frequently
exceedingly injurious. You cannot feed anybody on beef-tea. It is
a fairly useful stimulant, but as a food it is worthless. But you
can make a liquid food which contains a considerable part of the
nourishment of meat and is, moreover, not indigestible.

Meat-juice is the fluid obtained by squeezing raw beef. If you hang
up a large piece of raw meat, a reddish opalescent liquid will drop
from it. This is raw meat-juice and is practically a solution of blood
albumen. It is exceedingly nutritious and is very useful in many kinds
of disease. It is frequently ordered nowadays by physicians. It must
be made only from beef which you are perfectly certain is quite sound.
There is really danger in giving this meat-juice or raw meat of any
kind, and a girl must be pretty certain of her butcher before she
attempts to give it to an invalid.

Another less unpleasant way of making the same or nearly the same
preparation is the following. Take a pound of rump steak and shred it
up with a knife. Put it into warm water and let it digest in a very
cool oven for four hours. You must be certain that the oven never
reaches a temperature above 160° F., for at about twenty degrees above
this albumen coagulates, and instead of meat-juice you will only have
beef-tea. After the preparation has been in the oven for four hours,
take it out and strain it.

When you are feeding an invalid, a time in convalescence arrives when
the patient wants the nourishment of meat, but cannot digest so solid a
substance as beef or mutton. Then you can give her the following broth—

Take half a pound of the best rump steak, and having shredded it up
finely, boil it in a pint of water for four hours, and then press
the whole through a sieve. If necessary or desirable, vegetables may
be added, or chicken may be used in place of beef. The great point
to remember in making this is to press everything through the sieve.
This forms the most nourishing of all liquids; yet it is not liquid
nourishment, for the nutritive portion exists in the solid particles
which float about in the liquid.

The fish course is usually a very digestible one. On the whole, boiled
fish is more digestible than fried fish, and may be given to invalids
earlier in convalescence. Boiled sole is the most readily digested of
all fish, but with the exception of herrings, mackerel, salmon, eel,
and some other fresh-water fish, all fish is good wholesome food. The
fish mentioned as being indigestible must never be given to anybody
whose stomach is in any way delicate or readily upset.

Excepting oysters, all shellfish are indigestible. Mussels have always
had an unfair amount of abuse. It is true that they cause more deaths
than any other kind of shellfish, but then they are eaten in much
larger quantities. No shellfish should ever be eaten raw, for they all
feed on carrion and filth of very description, and so may contain large
numbers of very virulent germs.

It is well to remember that fish is meat diet. People make absurd
mistakes about this, and look upon fish as part of a milk diet. Fish
has essentially the same composition as butcher’s meat, but it contains
more water and fewer extractives.

It is well known to everybody that the medical profession has for ages
urged upon the public the dangers of excessive flesh-eating, yet has it
never clearly stated why eating too much meat is so far more injurious
than eating too much bread or vegetables. But the explanation is really
very simple.

Meat is more readily soluble and digestible than farinaceous foods.
If you fill your stomach with meat, all of it will be digested;
practically the whole of it will get into the blood, and there being in
excess of what is needed, it gives the various organs of the body great
trouble to get rid of it.

On the other hand, if you take a big meal of cabbage, only a very small
proportion of it is digestible, and so very little will get into the
blood. After eating excess of vegetables or farinaceous food you will
probably be sick, and there is an end of the matter.

But besides nourishment, meat contains a large quantity of
extractives—substances which are waste products of vital action; which
are practically animal poisons, and which enter the blood without
requiring digestion, but which are useless to the animal economy, and
have to be got rid of at once.

It is to extractives that meats owe their flavour, and the more tasty
and succulent your dishes are, the greater is the amount of extractives
that they contain.

It is in the _entrée_ that meat flavourings are carried to their
highest pitch, and it is the _entrée_ which is usually the most harmful
course at the dinner.

If the _entrée_ were discarded in favour of a vegetable course, it
would indeed be a blessing. If you have _entrées_ at all, let them
be absolutely simple, such as the one which has been chosen for our
specimen dinner.

You may be surprised when we say that meat is more digestible than
farinaceous food, and yet that when treating dyspepsia we avoid meat as
far as possible. But the apparent contradiction is readily dispelled.

Indigestion is usually due to disease of the stomach, and failure of
its power for digestion. Meat is digested practically only in the
stomach; farinaceous foods are not digested in the stomach, but lower
down in the alimentary canal. It is only when indigestion is due to
failure of the stomach that it is benefited by the avoidance of meat.
In many forms of dyspepsia a farinaceous diet gives the greatest
trouble of all.

Of the joint we will say nothing at present. Horse-radish is a good
aromatic digestive stimulant. It used to be used much more frequently
than it is, because of its anti-scorbutic properties.

Not many years ago a whole dinner-party was poisoned by eating aconite
root in mistake for horse-radish. Nor has this accident happened but
once; many cases of poisoning in this way have been recorded. And it
is a very terrible thing, for a little aconite root may kill a dozen
persons at a time. Aconite root is the root of the blue monk’s-hood
(_Aconitum Napellus_), one of our native English plants. It is rare
in the wild state, but is frequently grown in gardens for the sake of
its fine spikes of dark blue blossoms. How the aconite root can be
mistaken for horse-radish we cannot quite see, for the poisonous root
is carrot-shaped, rarely more than three inches long, almost scentless,
and with a bitter “mawkish” taste. The smallest quantity of the root
produces, when chewed, tingling, followed by prolonged numbness of
the tongue and cheeks. All parts of the monk’s-hood are extremely
poisonous, but the root is the most deadly part.

And now for a few words about vegetables, the most neglected, yet one
of the most important food-stuffs.

It is impossible to over-estimate the value of the potato as an article
of diet. Alone it is not a good food, but it is the ideal vegetable to
have with meat.

An Irishman asked a companion to dinner, and in answer to the question
as to the fare, replied, “Just an illigant pace of corned bafe and
pertaters.” To which his friend replied, “My own dinner to a tay,
barring the bafe.” Let us hope that he accepted the invitation, for
corned beef and potatoes make a good, if rough, meal, but potatoes
alone are not sufficient.

It has been questioned by many persons if the introduction of the
potato has proved an advantage, for it has driven out the older
vegetables, such as salsify and celeriac. But if we look upon the
potato merely in the light of a usurper of the place formerly occupied
by other vegetables, we must still consider it as an immense boon to
mankind.

That the potato is not very easily digested we grant, and it should be
avoided by the subjects of dyspepsia. But in the dietary of perfectly
healthy persons, the digestibility of the food is of secondary
importance to that of over-strong and rich food. For as we have over
and over again said, the great fault in modern diet is not that we eat
too much, but that we take our food too strong.

All vegetables, especially spinach and Brussels sprouts, have lately
been shown to produce marked improvement in gouty conditions; and
experimental evidence has proved that their action upon gout is a
definite chemical one. That gout is often in some way connected with an
excessive meat diet has long been known, but it is not even now certain
what it is in meat which tends to cause gout. But that the condition is
markedly benefited by a vegetable diet, there is no question. The only
difficulty in applying this observation to practice—and it is a real
difficulty, although enthusiasts will persist in shutting their eyes to
it—is that a vegetable diet is far more difficult to digest than a meat
diet, and gouty persons are frequently dyspeptic.

Sweets served after dinner should always be simple. Stewed fruit,
cabinet puddings, farinaceous or milk puddings, or pancakes, etc.; but
not rich plum puddings or highly flavoured concoctions of any kind.
Rich sweets are worse than rich _entrées_, for besides being equally
rich in extractives, they are exceedingly indigestible.

The question as to whether ices and iced water are good to take with
dinner is worth a moment’s consideration.

In very small quantities iced water is the best of all fluids to take
with dinner, but the quantity taken should be very small. And the same
is true of ices. A very little ice after dinner helps digestion, but a
large quantity seriously injures the stomach.

Coffee in small quantities is a digestive stimulant. If taken it should
be drunk immediately the dinner is completed.

Having thoroughly considered the subject, we have come to the decided
conclusion that by far the best dinner for those who can afford it,
with very few exceptions, is one of two courses. The first course to
consist of light fish _with vegetables_, or a very simple _entrée with
vegetables_; and the second to consist of a joint of meat or some
equivalent also _with vegetables_. This may be followed by a simple
sweet or savoury.

Also, we believe that the average person does not eat too much, but
that she takes too much meat, far too much extractives, and too little
vegetable.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Peptones and pre-digested albumens are also soluble in boiling
water; but these substances do not naturally occur in our food stuffs.
Some, but very few, of the patent meat extracts, consist of peptones or
altered albumens soluble in boiling water.




[Illustration]




QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.


GIRLS’ EMPLOYMENTS.

MOTHER’S HELP.—“_I am twenty-six, and for the last six years have
occupied, at a very small salary, a situation—or rather three
situations—as mother’s help. I am heartily tired of being neither
one thing nor another, and wish I knew some way of qualifying myself
for some less wearing and more remunerative work. I have thought of
entering the Norland Institute to be trained for a children’s nurse,
but I fear I am not well enough educated. Typewriting I have also
considered, as that would leave me the evenings free for study. I
should be willing to spend a little time and money on some sort of
training._—PERPLEXED.”

Our correspondent has come to a most sensible decision, and we wish
that some of our readers could profit by her experience that such
positions as those of mother’s help, useful companion, etc., are
“neither one thing nor another.” “Perplexed” tells us in her letter,
which we have not published in its entirety, that she understands the
management of children, and can make their clothes well. Under these
circumstances it seems to us that she hardly needs to undergo a full
course of training to become a children’s nurse. But what she lacks at
present is some knowledge of the treatment a baby requires, and some
general experience of infantile ailments and their cure. As “Perplexed”
lives in Scotland we would suggest that she should try to obtain by
payment some short course of training in a hospital of a special
character. The Glasgow Maternity Hospital, 37, North Portland Street,
Glasgow, offers an arrangement which might suit the case. Pupils are
received for a course of sixteen weeks for £13 13s. 6d. This pays all
expenses except laundry and uniform. Possessed of such experience as
this, and having been in attendance on children before, “Perplexed”
ought to obtain some fairly well paid situation as children’s nurse
to begin with, and could then avoid the disagreeableness of having to
commence life again as an under-nurse. If Edinburgh suited “Perplexed”
better, the Royal Maternity Hospital, 79, Lauriston Place, might
advisably be selected. Here a course of three months’ training at a
cost of £11 10s. may be entered upon on the first day of February,
May, August or November in each year. Pupils have the advantage of
attending lectures. Training in a children’s hospital would no doubt
be preferable, because the patients would be children of all ages, but
“Perplexed” could hardly enter any such institution for less than three
years, and the number of applicants at these favourite hospitals is
always very great. Typewriting we do not advise to “Perplexed” as it
seems to us that she has many practical accomplishments which are in
constant request among employers. She would therefore do better as a
nurse or in some other capacity in a private household.


PHOTOGRAPHY.—1. “_Do any well-known West End photographers take girls
as articled pupils? About what premium do they require? I know very
little about it, but I have had a camera for a year. I suppose it is
a profession for girls which is not at present overcrowded.—2. Would
it be wise for me to take a diploma at one of the Schools of Cookery?
Would cookery or photography be the more expensive to learn, and which
would pay best in the end? I like both photography and cooking, but
prefer the former._—A WOULD-BE PHOTOGRAPHER.”

1. Several firms, and notably those conducted by ladies, take girls
as apprentices. A premium of not less than £30 is usually asked, and
sometimes no payment is given for two years. In other cases, part
of the premium is returnable in salary at an earlier date. Girls
are usually employed as “spotters and finishers” of the prints, and
earn in this manner from 10s. to £1 a week. An ambitious clever girl
ought not, however, to be content to do this kind of work always, but
should try to do the retouching of negatives, a business by which
from £100 to £300 a year may be earned. We have found that there is a
considerable demand also for girls who can paint magic lantern slides;
and altogether there are many ways by which a girl who understands
photography can earn a sufficient livelihood.

2. To take a diploma at a school of cookery would not occupy so long
as learning photography nor would it be so expensive. The length of
the course at the principal schools varies from six to fifteen months,
ten months or a year being usual. The cost ranges from nine guineas,
charged at Leicester, to thirty guineas, the full cost of the course at
the National Training School of Cookery in London. The Liverpool and
Manchester schools—both of which are excellent—charge twelve guineas
for courses of nine and eight months respectively. Cookery teacherships
are pretty well paid, the salaries varying from £50 to £80 per annum,
but they are not easy to obtain. As daily cooks or cooks in private
households, where ladies are employed, a woman with a knowledge of
cookery can always do well. But to compare photography with cookery is
almost impossible, and the desirability of one occupation or the other
can best be determined by a girl’s own aptitude.




ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.


MEDICAL.

AN ANGLO-INDIAN.—It is not necessary for Englishmen to eat as much in
India as they do in England, and the reason for this is very easy to
explain. We eat to produce energy. That energy is of two kinds—heat and
work. Four-fifths of the energy of an Englishman in England—four-fifths
of what he eats—produce heat, one-fifth only produces work. The
normal temperature of the body is 98.6° F. If we lived in a constant
temperature of 98.6° F., it would be unnecessary for the body to
produce heat at all, and so four-fifths of its energy would be saved.
Therefore if man had been constructed to live in a temperature of
98.6° F., he would only require one-fifth of his ordinary diet. But
even in the hottest countries the body does produce heat, because it
is its nature to do so; but it has to dispose of that heat at once,
because the temperature of the body in health is constant. In very
hot countries the body has to keep itself cooler than the surrounding
air—it has to dispose of more heat than it produces. It is therefore
not difficult to understand why persons in hot countries need, and
should take, considerably less food than those in England; and,
conversely, the inhabitants of cold countries require a very liberal
diet. Also, that Europeans in a hot country require more food than the
natives, because the bodies of the latter have learnt, through many
generations, not to produce so much excessive heat as the bodies of the
Europeans who are “green” to the climate.

KARAMEA.—1. To cure corns, first wash your feet in hot water and soap
and leave them soaking for fifteen minutes. Then take them out of the
water; thoroughly dry them and paint the corn with “solvent.” You must
not let the solvent touch the surrounding skin. The solvent is made
by mixing together salicylic acid, twenty grains; tincture of Indian
hemp, five drops; alcohol, two drams; and collodion to the ounce. Paint
the corn with this preparation every evening for some days, until the
corn drops off. With very hard corns the treatment may take some weeks,
but we have never known it to fail, and it is absolutely safe.—2. The
sensation of a hand or foot going to sleep is almost always due to
pressure upon a nerve, such as occurs from sitting on a hard chair for
many minutes at a time.

CURIOUS.—Yawning is a deep and prolonged inspiration (drawing air
into the lungs). It occurs commonly when the person is too tired or
too lazy to breathe properly. Cough is a sudden spasmodic expiration
(forcing air out of the lungs) with the mouth open, following a deep
inspiration. During coughing the glottis (the slit through which
the air has to pass in order to enter or leave the lungs) is closed
at first and then opened. Cough is the natural and only method of
clearing the lungs. Sneezing is a short, sudden expiration following a
deep inspiration with the mouth shut. Its object is to clear the nose
from something “tickling” it. Hiccough is an irregular involuntary
expiration usually due to irritation of the lungs by a stomach
distended with gas.

AN INQUIRING SISTER.—Your brother is indeed unfortunate, for the
condition of his face is one which is most difficult to eradicate. The
disease is known as “sycosis,” and often follows the use of a razor
which has been inoculated with very virulent germs. Abroad all barbers
are compelled to disinfect their razors after using them, and this
disease is consequently less common than it is with us. In England a
careless barber shaves one man with some skin disease and very often
communicates the disease to his next customer. The disease is, as we
said, a very chronic one. The only treatment which ever completely
cures it is to pick out every hair in the beard and moustache—not all
at once, but only those which have pustules at their roots. This is not
such a painful undertaking as it reads, for the hairs are loose and
come out easily. The face should afterwards be covered with sulphur
ointment. It is a formidable disease and needs careful and energetic
treatment.

EILEEN.—The best treatment for warts is to wash the hand thoroughly
with soap and hot water and leave the hand soaking for ten minutes.
Then dry the hand and surround the wart with vaseline. The vaseline is
to protect the healthy skin from the caustic, and must not be placed
upon the wart itself. Now drop one drop of glacial acetic acid upon the
wart, leave it a couple of minutes and then drop on another drop of the
acid. Finally rub the wart all over with a stick of nitrate of silver
(lunar caustic). This treatment may have to be repeated. Warts are
usually due to irritation of the skin. They are practically the same
thing as corns.

A GIRL OF TWENTY.—It is difficult to be certain what causes your
baldness, but probably it is “alopœcia areata.” But if it is this, it
has existed for a considerably longer time than is usual. We advise
you to paint the bald spots with tincture of iodine every day until
the places feel slightly sore. As soon as this occurs, leave off the
treatment till the places become well again.

A SUFFOLK BUNNY.—The condition of your face is analogous to chaps on
the hands. It is caused by rough winds. Always wear a veil when you go
out in a cold wind. A little glycerine and rose-water, or glycerine and
lime-water, or a very little cold cream will relieve the roughness.

BONNE.—The pneumonia which follows influenza is of a most fatal
character, and the majority of subjects attacked never recover. In
January-March, 1895, pneumonia was a very common complication of the
influenza which was then exceedingly prevalent. We believe that at
that time every single patient attacked with this complication died.
Now, although very serious, the presence of pneumonia and influenza
together is by no means hopeless. The pneumonia in these cases is not
a separate disease, but is a manifestation of the influenzal poison.
There are three broad types of influenza: that which chiefly affects
the lungs; that which mainly attacks the digestive organs; and the type
in which the nervous system bears the chief brunt of the affection.
Usually, in one epidemic, one type chiefly prevails, although all
may occur. In 1894-1895 the respiratory type of the decease was most
prevalent; in 1895-1896 the nervous type; in 1896-1898 the digestive
type was most prevalent. And, so far, this year the respiratory type is
having another innings. Influenza is a most serious disease, and its
death-rate is extremely high; but a very large number of complaints
put down to influenza have no connection whatever with that disease.
As a rule, when a person says that she has had “a slight touch of
influenza,” she means either that she has had a common head-cold or
else that she has given herself indigestion from trying to feed herself
up as a preventive against influenza!

MORLEENA K.—You are quite right to have your rupture operated upon,
for it is the only way to cure it, and to go about with a rupture
untreated is one of the greatest possible physical dangers. Any surgeon
is competent to perform the operation, for though it is not very easy,
still he must have seen so many “radical cures of hernia” performed as
to be thoroughly capable of performing the operation himself. Although
in former times the operation was a very fatal one, ill-effects rarely
follow nowadays, and cure usually results. But occasionally the rupture
does recur. Surgery is always expensive, unfortunately; but any person
who cannot afford to have an operation performed upon her by a private
surgeon can obtain proper treatment at a hospital. We fully understand
that there are objections to going to a hospital to be treated, but
with most persons it is the only chance they possess of obtaining the
benefits of surgery. We think it is our duty to remind you and others
who obtain hospital relief that you must contribute towards the support
of the institution, and that if you obtain treatment in a hospital
which would have cost you £30 in private, you must not think that you
have done your duty by putting half-a-crown into the box.

A WORKING WOMAN.—Before you marry you should ask your intended husband
to insure himself against accidents. There are many clubs in every town
which a working man can join, and by paying a few pence weekly obtain
so much a week when he is incapacitated by illness or accident. Most
working men do this, and considering how liable they are to be disabled
for a time, it is only right that they should insure themselves before
marrying. In hospital practice if a patient does not belong to a club,
the usual reason is either that he is single or else that he has once
belonged to a club, the treasurer of which bolted. Unfortunately this
is a very common method of swindling, but if a man looks out for a
thoroughly well-going company and pays a reasonable premium he may
feel fairly sure of getting his money if he should become incapable of
work. If your husband does not belong to a club, what are you to do if
he breaks his arm or his leg, an accident to which he is particularly
liable?

PLEASE HELP ME.—One teaspoonful of Eau de Cologne to every four ounces
of water. Sponge the hands with this preparation. You must not use soap
with Eau de Cologne.

PEGGIE.—Perhaps it would be better to tell you how to prevent
chilblains first, before going on to describe how they can be cured.
Always wash your hands in warm water, and use a good toilet soap. After
washing, dry your hands well. Always wear woollen gloves throughout
the winter, and, lastly, try by general hygienic measures to improve
your circulation. When the chilblains first begin to show, sponge
the fingers with equal parts of spirit and water, or apply a little
tincture of benzoin, and wrap the hands up in cotton-wool. By these
measures you may prevent the chilblains from bursting. If, in spite of
all precautions, the chilblains do break, they should be treated as any
other kind of open wound. Above all, they should be kept scrupulously
clean, and bathed in hot solution of carbolic acid (1 in 60). They may
then be thickly dusted over with powdered boracic acid and bandaged.


STUDY AND STUDIO.

J. M. ELLIS.—The address of your letter was the correct one. If you
do not receive a reply, we advise you to write again, as it is always
possible for secretaries to overlook letters or make mistakes. Let us
know if a second appeal produces no result.

MRS. C. L. JACKSON can inform “AILSA” (July) of a blind musician who
will set her words to music for moderate remuneration. Address for
information, Mrs. Jackson, Lyttleton House, Lower Wick, Worcester.

N. M.—Cardiff Castle was the scene of the tedious captivity of Robert,
Duke of Normandy. In 1106 he fell into the hands of his brother Henry
I., with whom he had long been at strife, and he was confined in this
fortress, which had recently been conquered from the Welsh. At first
Robert was allowed to take exercise among the fields and woods of the
neighbourhood. He attempted to make his escape on horseback, and,
having been pursued and taken back, was condemned to closer durance.
Some historians say that his eyes were put out by his brother’s orders;
certain it is that he lingered a prisoner for twenty-eight years, and
died at Cardiff Castle in 1135.

DISAPPOINTED.—The difficulty you mention is only a temporary one,
and need not discourage you at all. It is only the difference in the
keyboard that bewilders you at first, and practice on both instruments
will set things right.

A PILGRIM IN A SUNNY LAND (Beyrout, Syria).—The lines you quote are by
“George Eliot,” and may be found in her collected poems. The

                      “Choir invisible,
    Whose music is the gladness of the world,”

is the great company of heroic departed souls who have done work for
the sake of mankind: their “music” is the added happiness of humanity
which their efforts have secured. We think, as you suggest, that your
explanations mean much the same thing. This fine poem will repay close
study.

A QUEENSLAND GIRL.—What prettily painted note paper you send us from
your distant home!—1. The competition you speak of is over.—2. Your
writing is admirable, distinct, well formed, and most pleasant to look
at and to read.

OLIVE CAMBUS.—It is not necessary in writing for the press to leave
any extra space at the top of foolscap paper. It is better to leave a
margin on your left hand as you write. The sheets should be fastened
together in the top left-hand corner, not by a “clip,” but by a
paper-fastener that goes through a hole pierced in the sheets; any
stationer will sell you a box. Foolscap is, we think, preferable to
sermon paper. The great matter is to have your MS. perfectly distinct
and clear to read, and only to write on one side of the page.


MISCELLANEOUS.

YUM-YUM.—It is quite possible that the pain over your eye may proceed
from a little congestion, if in the hollow over the ball of the
eye. Perhaps your spectacles are unsuitable, and there should be a
difference between the two glasses. There is often a different focus in
one eye from that of the other, and the left one may be overstrained.
We advise you to consult an oculist or a good optician, to test the
sight of each. We are glad to give our correspondent “SEATON DEVON” the
benefit of your information respecting the song, “Please have You seen
my Dolly?” It is (you say) composed by F. W. Lancelott, and the words
are by E. Cympson. The publisher is F. Pitman, 20, Paternoster Row, E.C.

MISERABLE.—We are never told in the Bible that “to those who do not
marry He will give a rich reward.” No such thing. But during those
terrible persecutions, already begun, and to continue subsequently
to St. Paul’s time, women unmarried and without children were in a
preferable condition to those who had them. Of course, to marry without
a very special bond of affection between you and your husband, would
be not only a bar to any happiness, but also very wrong; and to marry
without suitable means to support and educate a family must entail much
suffering, mental and physical. From what you say of your feelings,
and that you only “care for him in a way,” you would act wisely in
declining his offer. You say “the thought of living unloved _unmans_
me!” We hope you have no pretensions to manliness!

MARCH GIRL.—Hares are said to be specially wild in the month of March,
and thence has arisen the term, “Mad as a March hare.” According to
Dr. Brewer, the name “Neddy” was transferred from the little low cart
for which donkeys are employed in Dublin, to the animals themselves.
And the meaning of the term as used for the cart refers to the jolting
which results from the lack of springs, and makes those who drive in
them to nod perpetually. These, or a much similar description of cart
was also termed a “Noddy.”

       *       *       *       *       *

[Transcriber’s note—the following changes have been made to this text.

Page 827: purtrefy to putrefy—“putrefy and die”.

Page 832: decease to disease—“disease was most prevalent”.]