TREASURE TROVE.
A STORY IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAP. IV.
Upon Jasper Rodley’s entrance into the house, Bertha had retired to her own room, pleading that she was suffering from the excitement, the fatigue, and the exposure she had undergone; but she could hear a conversation kept up in the dining-room until a late hour, and instinctively felt that Rodley had not come again without a reason. To her surprise, the next morning she found that both her father and his visitor were already downstairs, Jasper Rodley looking out of the window and whistling to himself, the captain with evident agitation marked on his movements and face.
‘Bertha,’ he said, without even giving her the usual morning greeting, ‘Mr Rodley has come here especially to say that from information he has received, it will be necessary for you at once to decide what course you intend to adopt. There is a chance, he says, that the great evil hanging over our heads may be averted, but it depends upon your answer.’
‘Mr Rodley must give me until this evening to think over the matter. I am going into Saint Quinians, if possible to see Harry—that is, Mr Symonds, for even Mr Rodley will admit that plighted troths are not to be broken in this abrupt manner. I shall be home before dark.’
‘Then I will see you on your road,’ said Rodley, ‘as I am going into the town.’
‘You need not trouble,’ said Bertha. ‘The road is quite familiar to me, and I have no fear of being molested.’ Then, without waiting to hear whether Jasper Rodley objected or not to the arrangement, she left the house.
In exactly an hour’s time, she walked into the town. At the old gate she was confronted by rather a pretty girl, who laid a hand gently on her arm, and said: ‘You are Miss West, I believe?’
Bertha replied in the affirmative.
‘You are in an unhappy and terrible position, and you have very little time to spare, I think?’ added the girl.
Bertha looked at her wonderingly, for she could not recall ever having seen her before.
‘I mean,’ explained the girl, who observed that Bertha was surprised at this acquaintance on the part of a stranger with her affairs—‘I mean with regard to that man, Jasper Rodley.—Yes, I know all about it; and I want, not only to be your friend, but to see that evil-doing meets with its just reward.’
The girl was poorly dressed; but her accent and mode of expression were those of an educated woman, and, moreover, she had such a thin, sorrow-lined face, that Bertha felt she could trust her.
‘Let me be with you to-day,’ continued the girl, ‘and you may thank me for it some day. I have long wanted to see you, and have waited here for you often. Never mind who I am—that you shall find out later.’
‘Very well,’ said Bertha, who naturally clung to the friendship of one of her own sex. ‘I am going to see Mr Symonds—my betrothed.’
‘The gentleman who was obliged to leave Faraday’s Bank, four years ago; yes, I remember,’ said the girl.
They crossed the market-place together, and were soon at Harry Symonds’ lodgings. The servant, in reply to Bertha’s inquiries, said that the young man was so far recovered as to be able to sit up, but that the doctor had ordered him to keep perfectly quiet and to be free from all excitement. So Bertha wrote him a note describing all that had taken place, and begging for an immediate answer. In the course of twenty minutes, the servant handed her a piece of paper, on which was scrawled as follows:
My dearest Love—This is written with my left hand, as my right is yet in a sling. I wish I could say all that I want to; but as every moment is of value to you, I will simply keep to business. Take a postchaise home; get the money out of the cavern, and send it here. John Sargent the fisherman is to be trusted; let him come back with it in the postchaise. I will return it to the bank, making up out of my savings whatever difference there is from the original amount stolen. Lose no time, my darling, and God bless you!—Ever your affectionate
Harry.
Bertha and the girl hurried away; and just as they entered the Dolphin Inn to order the chaise, they espied Jasper Rodley entering the town watchhouse, the local headquarters of the civil force which in those days performed, or rather was supposed to perform, the duties of our modern constabulary.
‘Miss West,’ said the girl, ‘I had better remain in the town for the present. At what hour to-day is Jasper Rodley coming to your house?’
‘I said I would be home by dark. He will be there before then, to receive my final answer.’
‘Very well, then; I will be there about that time,’ continued the girl.
‘Will you not even tell me your name?’ asked Bertha.
‘Yes. My name is Patience Crowell. Till to-night, good-bye. Keep up your spirits; all will end well.’
In a few minutes the postchaise was ready, and in order to escape the notice of Jasper Rodley, was driven round to the town gate, where Bertha jumped in. She stopped at John Sargent’s cottage, and mentioned her errand.
‘Why,’ said the old fisherman, ‘I’m too glad to do anythin’ for Master Symonds. He saved my life once at Saint Quinians’ jetty, and I’ve never had no chance of doin’ suthin’ for him in return like.—Come along, miss; if it’s to the end of the world, come along!’
As Jasper Rodley might pass by at any moment, Bertha thought it best to keep the chaise out of sight, whilst she and the fisherman, provided with a large net-basket, proceeded to the cliffs. In half an hour’s time the bags of coin were safely stowed away in the postchaise; John Sargent jumped in, the chaise rattled off; and Bertha, with a light heart and a heightened colour, returned home.
The captain was stumping up and down the little gravelled space in his garden, which from the presence there of half-a-dozen old cannon and a flagstaff, he delighted to call the Battery. When he beheld Bertha, he welcomed her with a sad smile, and putting her arm in his, said: ‘Bertha, lass, I’ve been thinking over this business ever since you went away this morning, and the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve called myself a mean, cowardly, selfish old fool.’
‘Why, father?’
‘Because, look here. I’ve been telling you to make yourself miserable for life by marrying a man you despise and dislike, just so that I may get off the punishment that’s due to me. I’m an old man, and in the ordinary course of things, I can’t have many years before me. You’re a girl with all your life before you, and yet I’m wicked enough to tell you to give up all your long life so that my few years shouldn’t be disturbed.’
‘But father’—— began Bertha.
‘Let me speak!’ interposed the old man. ‘I’ve been doing a wicked thing all these four years; but I know what’s right. When this man asks you to be his wife to-night, you say “No;” mind, you say “No.” If you don’t, I will; and you won’t marry without my permission.’
‘Dear father, you leave it to me. I do not promise anything except that by no act of mine shall one hair of your head be touched.—Let us talk of other things, for Jasper Rodley will be here soon.’
So they walked up and down until the sun began to sink behind the hills inland and the air grew chilly. They had scarcely got into the house, when Jasper Rodley appeared. He bowed formally to Bertha, and offered his hand to the captain, which was declined. ‘Miss West,’ he said, ‘I think I have given you fair time for decision. I have not been so exacting as circumstances justified.’
Bertha said nothing in reply, but sat in a chair by the window, and looked out on the sea as if nothing unusual was taking place.
So Jasper Rodley continued: ‘I will speak then at once, and to the point. Miss West, will you accept me for your husband?’
‘No, I will not,’ replied Bertha, in a low, firm voice.
Mr Rodley was evidently unprepared for this, and looked at her with open mouth. ‘That is your final answer?’ he asked, after a pause. ‘You are prepared to see your father, whom you love so dearly, taken from here in custody to be brought up as a common felon?’
‘Yes. That is, Mr Rodley, if you can prove anything against him. Of what do you accuse him?’
‘I accuse him of having lived during the past four years upon money which was not his, but which was stolen from Faraday’s Bank in Saint Quinians, which was taken off in a vessel called the Fancy Lass, the said vessel being wrecked off this coast.’
‘Very well,’ continued Bertha. ‘What is your proof that he knows anything about this money?’
‘One moment before I answer that. You refuse to marry me if I can bring no proof. You will marry me if I do?’
‘Show me the proof first,’ answered Bertha.
‘You must follow me, then.’
‘Not alone.—Father, you must come with me.’
So the trio proceeded out into the dusk, and, conducted by Jasper Rodley, followed the path leading to the cliffs. Bertha observed that they were followed at a little distance by a man closely enveloped in a long coat, and as they ascended the ledge of rock communicating with the shore, noticed two other figures—those of a man and a woman—watching them.
‘It’s a very nice little hiding-place,’ remarked Rodley, when they arrived at the bushes—‘a very nice little hiding-place, and it seems almost a pity to make it public property; but a proof is demanded, and sentimental feelings must give way.’ He smiled as he said this, and kicked the bush aside with his feet, thus uncovering the cavern entrance. They entered the hole, which was now quite dark; but Rodley had come prepared, and struck a light. He then rolled away the stone, and without looking himself, gave Bertha the light and bade her satisfy her doubts.
‘There is nothing here,’ she said.
‘Nothing!’ exclaimed Rodley, taking the light from her hand and examining the cavity. ‘Why!—Gracious powers! no more there is! There has been robbery! Some one has been here and has sacked the bank!’ His face was positively ghastly in the weird light as he said this, and under his breath he continued a fire of horrible execrations.
‘Well, Mr Rodley,’ said Bertha, smiling, ‘and the proof?’
Rodley did not answer, but moved as if to leave the cavern, when a woman’s figure confronted him at the entrance, and a ringing voice said: ‘Proof! No! He has no proof!’
Rodley staggered back with a cry of rage and surprise. ‘Patience! Why—how have you got here? I left you at Yarmouth!—Ha! I see it all now!’
‘Yes,’ cried the girl, ‘of course you do. I gave you fair warning, when I found out that you were beginning to forsake me for another; but not until after I had begged and entreated you, with tears in my eyes, to remember the solemn protestations of love you had made me, and the solemn troth which we had plighted together.’
‘Let me go!’ roared Rodley; ‘you’re mad!’
‘No, no—not so fast!’ cried the girl. She made a signal to some one without, and a man entered.
‘Jasper Rodley,’ continued Patience, ‘this constable has a warrant for your apprehension on the charge of having been concerned in the bank robbery four years ago.—Yes, you may look fiercely at me. I swore that the secret in my keeping should never be divulged. I loved you so much, that I was ready even to marry a thief. But as you have broken your faith with me, I consider myself free of all obligations.—Captain West, it was this man who planned the robbery, who had the coin conveyed to his boat, the Fancy Lass, and who alone was saved from the wreck.’
Rodley made a desperate rush for the cave entrance; but the constable held him fast, and took him off.
‘There, Miss West!’ cried the girl; ‘I have done my duty, and I have satisfied my revenge. My mission is accomplished. Good-bye, and all happiness be with you.’ And before Bertha could stop her, she had disappeared.
Jasper Rodley was convicted on the charge of robbery, and received a heavy sentence, which he did not live to fulfil. Harry Symonds paid in to the bank the entire sum stolen, the authorities of which offered him immediately the position of manager, which he declined. He and Bertha were married shortly afterwards; but they could not induce the old captain to move to the house they had taken, for he could not get over the shame of the exposure, and declared that he was only fit for the hermit life he had chosen; but no one outside the little circle ever knew that he had been indirectly concerned in the robbery; and neither Harry nor Bertha alluded to it after.
Of Patience Crowell, who had so opportunely appeared on the scene, nothing was ever known.
THE MONTH:
SCIENCE AND ARTS.
Dr Gustav Jaeger, whose sanitary clothing reform made some little stir a year or two back, seeks to apply the principle involved in his theory to furniture. This theory teaches that cotton, linen, and other stuffs of vegetable origin retain a power of absorbing those noxious animal exhalations which as plants they digest. Dead fibre, or wood, will, he maintains, act in the same manner, and will throw off the deleterious matter, to the prejudice of living beings, whenever there is a change of temperature. This, he holds, is the reason why a room which has been shut up for some days has an unpleasant odour attaching to it, and which is very apparent in German government offices, which are fitted with innumerable shelves and pigeon-holes made of plain unpainted wood. For sanitary reasons, therefore, the back and unseen parts of furniture should be varnished, painted, or treated with some kind of composition, to fill the pores of the wood; hence it is that so-called sanitary furniture has in Germany become an article of commerce, and is likely to find its way to this and other countries.
Such large quantities of ice are now made by various artificial processes, that ice is no longer a luxury which can only be procured by the rich, but is an article of commerce which can be purchased at a very low price in all large towns in the kingdom. It is not generally known that the artificial product is far purer than natural ice, but such, according to M. Bischoff of Berlin, who has made a scientific analysis of specimens, is the case.
All honest persons rejoice greatly when a notorious evil-doer is run to earth, and much the same satisfaction is experienced when science points with unerring finger to the source of disease, for then the first step has been taken in its eradication. Many, therefore, will rejoice when they read the recently issued Report of Mr W. H. Power, the Inspector of the Local Government Board, concerning an epidemic of scarlatina which occurred in London last year. The story is most interesting, but too long to quote in full. Suffice it to say that the disease in question has, after the most painstaking inquiries, been traced to the milk given by certain cows which were affected with a skin disease showing itself in the region of the teats and udders. We know to our cost that certain diseases can be transferred from the lower animals to man. ‘Woolsorters’ disease’ is traced to the same germ which produces splenic fever in cattle and sheep, a malady which has been so ably dealt with by M. Pasteur. The terrible glanders in horses is transferable to man. Jenner was led to the splendid discovery of vaccination from observing the effects of cowpox on milkmaids; and now we have scarlatina traced directly to the cowhouse. Dr Klein, the famous pathologist, has been engaged to report upon this new revelation concerning milk, and we may reasonably hope that his researches will bear fruitful results.
A new method of etching on glass has been devised. The ink is of a waxy composition, and requires to be heated to render it fluid. It is applied to the glass with a special form of pen, which can be kept in a hot condition by a gas or electrical attachment. When the drawing is complete, the plate is etched by fluoric acid, which of course only attacks and dissolves those portions not covered by the protective ink. The result is a drawing in raised lines, which can be made to furnish an electrotype, or can, if required, be used direct as a block to print from.
Springs in mid-ocean are not unknown, and, if we remember rightly, there is more than one of the kind at which ships have endeavoured to renew their stores of fresh water. But an ocean oil-well is certainly a rarity. The captain of a British schooner reports that in March last, while bound for New Orleans, his vessel passed over a submarine spring of petroleum, which bubbled up all round the ship, and extended over the surface of the sea for some hundred yards. It seems to be a moot-point whether this phenomenon is a mere freak of nature, or whether it is caused by the sunken cargo of some ill-fated oil-ship. In the latter case, the gradual leakage of casks would account for the strange appearance.
Inventors of gas apparatus should note that the municipal authorities of Brussels have decided upon holding a competition, with a view to ascertain the best means of using gas for heating and cooking purposes. A large sum is to be offered in prizes to the successful competitors. Apparatus for trial must be forwarded not later than September next, and all particulars regarding the matter may be obtained from the chief engineer, M. Wybauw, Rue de l’Etuve, Brussels.
In the island of Skye, large deposits of the very useful mineral called diatomite have recently been found. Under the German name of kieselguhr, this absorbent earth has been extensively used in the manufacture of dynamite, which consists of nitro-glycerine rendered more safe for handling by admixture with this porous body. It is also used as a non-conducting compound for coating the exterior of steam-pipes and boilers, as a siliceous glaze for pottery, for the manufacture of silicate paints, and for many minor purposes. In this particular deposit the varieties of diatoms are singularly few, only sixteen species of these wonderful microscopic organisms being represented. The deposit is estimated to yield a total of between one and two hundred tons.
At a recent meeting of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Dr A. B. Griffiths read a most instructive paper on ‘The Effect of Ferrous Sulphate in destroying the Spores of Parasitic Fungi.’ The value of this salt—the common ‘green vitriol’ of commerce—as a plant-food has long ago been established; but Dr Griffiths points out the important antiseptic property it possesses in destroying certain low forms of plant-life. As a preventive of potato disease, it is most effectual, although the spores of that fungus possess such vitality that they may be kept as dry dust for eight months without losing their power for mischief. Dr Griffiths also notes that in damp warm weather, the potato disease is actually encouraged by the use of potash manures. He advocates the treatment of manure with a weak solution of the iron salt before its application to the land. Wheat when treated with the sulphate is rendered proof against mildew.
A clever method of damascening metals by electrolysis is described in a French technical journal. The process consists of two distinct operations, and is based on the well-known fact, that when two copper plates are hung in a bath of sulphate of copper and connected with the opposite poles of a battery, a transfer of metal from one to the other will take place. In the case before us, a copper plate is covered with a thin layer of insulating material, as in the etching process, and this is drawn upon with an etching needle so as to lay bare the metal beneath. This is now submitted to the action of the electric current, so that the metal is eaten away to a certain depth in the exposed parts. The plate is next washed with acid, to remove all traces of oxide of copper in the bitten-in lines, and is then transferred to another bath by which metallic silver or nickel is deposited in the etched parts, with the result that the sunk lines are ultimately completely filled with the new metal. When the plate is relieved of its waxy coating and is polished, it is impossible to say whether or not the beautiful inlaid appearance has been produced by a mechanical process or by skilled handiwork.
Two remarkable finds of old coins have lately occurred—one at Milverton, a suburb of Leamington; and the other at Aberdeen. In the first case, some labourers were digging foundations, when they found a Roman amphora, which they immediately smashed to ascertain its contents. It contained nearly three hundred coins in silver and copper. These were of very early date, and in a state of excellent preservation. The Aberdeen treasure trove came to light in excavating Ross’s Court, one of the oldest parts of the city. Here the labourers found a bronze urn filled with a large number of silver coins. These coins also are well preserved. They are all English, and are mostly of the reigns of Edward I. and Edward II. Some of these coins are of extreme rarity, and the discovery has great antiquarian interest.
The largest installation of the electric light, worked from a central point, which this country has yet seen has been recently completed at the Paddington terminus of the Great Western Railway. The lights, which are equivalent to thirty thousand ordinary gas jets, are distributed between the Paddington passenger and goods stations, the ‘Royal Oak,’ and Westbourne Park Stations, the terminus hotel, and all the various offices, yards, and approaches to the railway Company’s premises. The district covers no fewer than sixty-seven acres of ground, and is one mile and a half long. The two Gordon dynamos which are used to generate the current weigh forty-five tons each, and give sufficient power to serve four thousand one hundred and fifteen Swan glow lamps, each of twenty-five candle-power; ninety-eight arc lamps, each of three thousand five hundred candle-power; and two of twelve thousand candle-power each. The current is kept on day and night, except for a few hours on Sunday morning, and each individual lamp is under separate control by a switch, so that it can be turned off and on just like a gas jet. Every detail has been well thought out, and the vast scheme is a success in every way. We understand that the contractors, the Telegraph Maintenance and Construction Company, have undertaken to supply the light at the same price as would have been charged for gas lamps giving the same light-value.
From a paper read by Mr C. Harding before the Royal Meteorological Society on ‘The Severe Weather of the Past Winter,’ we learn that the cold lately experienced has been of the most exceptional character. The persistency with which frost continued for long periods was quite remarkable. In south-west England, there was not a single week from October to the end of March in which the temperature did not fall below the freezing-point; and in one town in Hertfordshire, frost occurred on the grass on seventy-three consecutive nights. Since the formation of the London Skating Club, nearly sixty years ago, the past season has been the only one in which skating has been possible in each of the four months December to March. We therefore must note that we have just passed through an unusually severe season.
Fresh fruit from the antipodes, of which two large consignments have recently reached London, is now being daily sold to eager purchasers in the Australian fruit-market at the Indian and Colonial Exhibition. Grapes, apples, pears, and other fruits, in splendid condition, and with their flavour unaltered by their long separation from their parent stems, can now be conveyed by the shipload, packed in cool chambers, in the same way that meat is imported from the same distant lands. The success of the enterprise opens up a wide field of promise to those in temperate lands who have been dazzled by the reports of travellers as to the luscious nature of foreign fruits, which hitherto have been quite out of reach of stay-at-home Britons. We seem to be fast coming to the time when fairy tales will be considered tame and uninteresting, from being so far eclipsed by current events.
A correspondent of the Times notes a most important means of escape from suffocation by smoke, a fatality by which many lives are lost annually. He points out that if a handkerchief be placed beneath the pillow on retiring to rest so as to be within easy reach of the hand, it can, in case of an alarm of fire, be readily dipped in water and tied over the mouth and nostrils. As an amateur fireman, he has gone through the densest smoke protected in that manner, and he alleges that such a respirator will enable its wearer to breathe freely in an otherwise irrespirable atmosphere.
Professor Dewar lately exhibited at the Royal Institution, London, the apparatus he employs for the production of solid oxygen. If we refer to the physical text-books of only three or four years back, we find oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen described as permanent gases, for no one had ever produced either in any other form. At length all three had to give way before scientific research, and they were by special appliances reduced to the liquid state. Professor Dewar is the first experimenter who has taken the further step of producing one of these gases in a solid form. His method consists in allowing liquid oxygen to expand into a partial vacuum, when the great absorption of heat which accompanies the operation causes the liquid to assume a solid state. It is said to resemble snow in appearance, with a temperature greatly below the freezing-point of water. It is believed that a means of producing such a degree of cold will be of great service to experimental chemistry.
Mr W. Thomson, F.R.S.E., has devised a new process for determining the calorific power of fuel by direct combustion in oxygen, which promises to supersede, by reason of its greater accuracy, the methods hitherto in use. The process consists in placing a gramme of the coal or fuel to be tested in a platinum crucible covered with an inverted glass vessel. The whole arrangement is placed under water in a suitable receptacle; and the fuel, burnt in oxygen, burns away in a very few minutes, giving off much heated gas, which escapes through the water. The temperature of the water, compared with its temperature before the operation, gives the data upon which the heating power of the coal can be calculated. The question of heat-value in fuel is of course one of first importance to railway Companies and other large consumers of coal. It is, too, in a minor way of importance to householders, who often find, by painful experience, the little heat-value of the fuel which has been shot into their cellars. If coal-merchants were to furnish some guarantee based on a scientific test as above described, they would find it to their own profit, as well as to the advantage of their customers.
We do not hear very much in these days of mummy wheat and barley, but many people firmly believe that the seeds of both plants found with Egyptian mummies, and supposed to be three or four thousand years old, will sprout if put in the ground. A few years ago, such wheat was commonly sold as a curiosity; and we believe that many purchasers succeeded in raising a small crop from it. Professor Bentley, who has recently commenced a series of lectures on the Physiology of Plants, asserts most emphatically that no grains which with certainty have been identified as contemporaneous with the deposit of the mummified corpse, have ever come to life. In cases where the so-called mummy wheat has germinated, it has been introduced into the coffin shortly before, or at the time of discovery of the body. Professor Bentley does not name a limit to the time during which seeds retain their vitality, but he says that very few will germinate after being three years old.
Dr Kosmann of Breslau has designed a safety cartridge for use in fiery mines, but it has not yet passed the ordeal of practical employment. It depends for its efficiency upon the sudden evolution of a large volume of hydrogen gas, which is brought about by the action of dilute acid upon finely divided zinc. The ‘cartridge’ consists of a glass cylinder pinched into a narrow tube at the centre, so that interiorly it is divided into two compartments. One of these contains the powdered zinc, and the other the dilute acid, the passage between them being closed by a rubber cork. The borehole into which it is inserted is first of all made gas-tight by a lining of clay; then the cartridge is put in position, with an iron rod in connection with it so placed that, when struck with a hammer from the outside of the hole, it will drive in the rubber cork, and so bring the acid into contact with the zinc. We shall be interested to hear how the method answers in practice.