[to be continued.]
[RICK DALE.]
BY KIRK MUNROE,
Author of "Snow-shoes and Sledges," "The Fur-Seal's Tooth," "The 'Mate' Series," "Flamingo Feather," etc.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
BONNY DISCOVERS HIS FRIEND THE TRAMP.
t was late in the afternoon when the train reached Tacoma, and the logging boss discovered that the lads whom he had been especially instructed to bring with him had disappeared. As he could not imagine any reason why they should do such a thing, he was thoroughly bewildered, and waited about the station for some minutes, expecting them to turn up. He inquired of the train hands and other employees if they had seen anything of such boys as he described, but could gain no information concerning them.
The revenue officer was merely an acquaintance whom he had met by chance on the train, and who now waited a few minutes to see how this affair would turn out. Finally he said:
"Well, Linton, I'm sorry I can't help you, but I really must be getting along. I hope, though, you won't have any such trouble with your missing lads as we had in trying to catch two young rascals of smugglers, whom we lost right here in Tacoma last summer. We wanted them as witnesses, and thought we had our hands on them half a dozen times; but they finally gave us the slip, and the case in which they were expected to testify was dismissed for want of evidence. Good-by."
Thus left to his own devices, the boss could think of nothing better than to call upon the police to aid him in recovering the missing boys, and so powerful was the name of the President of the Northwest Lumber Company, which he did not hesitate to use, that within an hour every policeman in Tacoma was provided with their description, and instructed to capture them if possible. In the hope that they would speedily succeed in so doing, Mr. Linton delayed meeting the President, and telegraphed that he could not reach the hotel to which he had been directed to bring the boys before eight o'clock that evening.
In the mean time Alaric and Bonny, without an idea of the stir their disappearance had created throughout the city, were snugly ensconced in an empty freight car that stood within a hundred yards of the railway station. They had dropped from the rear end of their train when it began to slow down, and slipped into the freight car as a place of temporary concealment while they discussed plans.
"We've got to get out of this town in a hurry, that's certain," said Alaric, "and I propose that we make a start for San Francisco. You know, I told you that was my home, and I still have some friends there, who, I believe, will help us. The only thing is that I don't see how we can travel so far without any money."
"That's easy enough," replied Bonny, "and I would guarantee to land you there in good shape inside of a week. What worries me, though, is the idea of going off and leaving all the money that is due us here. Just think! there's thirty dollars owing to me as a hump-durgin driver, thirty more as interpreter, and fully as much as that for being a smuggler—nearly one hundred dollars in all. That's a terrible lot of money, Rick Dale, and you know it as well as I do."
"Yes," replied Alaric; "if we had it now, we'd be all right. But I'll tell you, Bonny, what I'll do. If you will get me to San Francisco inside of a week, I promise that you shall have one hundred dollars the day we arrive."
"I'll do it!" cried Bonny. "I know you are joking, of course, but I'll do it just to see how you'll manage to crawl out of your bargain when we get there. You mustn't expect to travel in a private car, though, with a French cook, and three square meals a day thrown in."
"Yes, I do," laughed Alaric, "for I never travelled any other way."
"No, I know you haven't, any more'n I have; but just for a change, I think we'd better try freight cars, riding on trucks, and perhaps once in a while in a caboose, for this trip, with meals whenever we can catch 'em. We'll get there, though; I promise you that. Hello! I mustn't lose that ball. We may want to have a game on the road."
This last remark was called forth by Alaric's baseball, which, becoming uncomfortably bulgy in Bonny's pocket as he sat on the car floor, he had taken out, and had been tossing from hand to hand as he talked. At length it slipped from him, rolled across the car, and out of the open door.
Bonny sprang after it, tossed it in to Alaric, and was about to clamber back into the car, when, through the gathering gloom, he spied a familiar figure standing in the glare of one of the station lights.
"Wait here a few minutes, Rick," he said, "while I go and find out when our train starts."
With this he darted up the track, and a moment later advanced, with a smile of recognition and extended hand, toward the stranger whom he had so pitied in the logging camp the day before. The man still wore a shabby suit, and the hat Bonny had given to him. He started at sight of the lad, and exclaimed:
"How came you here so soon? I thought you weren't due until eight o'clock?"
"How did you know we were coming at all?" asked Bonny, in amazement.
"Oh, that's a secret," laughed the other, instantly recovering his self-possession, and assuming his manner of the day before. "We tramps have a way of finding out things, you know."
"Yes, I've always heard so," replied Bonny, "and that's one reason why I'm so glad to meet you again. I thought maybe you could help us."
"Us?" repeated the stranger. "Who is with you?"
"Only my chum, the other hump-durgin driver, you know."
"You mean Richard Dale?"
"Yes—only his name isn't Richard, but Alaric. I say, though, would you mind stepping over in the shadow, where we won't be interrupted?"
"Certainly not," replied the other, with a quiet chuckle. "I expect it will be better, for I'm not anxious to be recognized myself just now."
When they had reached what Bonny considered a safe place, he continued:
"You see, it's this way. My chum and I did a little business in the smuggling line last summer, and got chased for it by the 'beaks.'"
"Just like 'em," growled the other.
"Yes," said Bonny, wrathfully. "We hadn't really done anything wrong, you know; but they made us skip 'round lively, and came mighty near catching us, too. We gave 'em the slip, though, and thought the whole thing had blown over, till to-day, when they got after us again."
"Who did?"
"The revenue fellows. You see, the boss up at camp is one of 'em, and we suspicioned something was wrong as soon as he told us we were wanted in Tacoma. We were certain of it when we saw another revenue man, one of the cutter's officers, join him on the train, and so we just gave them the slip again, and have been hiding ever since over in that freight car."
"Indeed!" remarked the stranger, interestedly. "And what do you propose to do next?"
"That's what I'm coming to, and what we want you to help us about. You see, my chum's folks live in San Francisco, and I rather think he ran away from 'em, though he hasn't ever said so. Anyhow, he wants to get back there, and as we haven't any money, we've got to beat our way, so I thought maybe you could put us up to the racket, or, at any rate, tell us when the first south-bound freight would pull out. Of course, you understand, we've got to start as quick as we can, for it isn't safe for us to be seen around here."
"Of course not," agreed the stranger, with another chuckle; for the whole affair seemed to amuse him greatly. "But what are you going to do for food? You'll be apt to get hungry before long."
"I am already," acknowledged Bonny; "and that was another thing I was going to ask you about. I thought maybe you wouldn't mind giving us some pointers from your own experience in picking up your three little square meals a day when you were on the road."
At this point the stranger burst into what began like uncontrollable laughter, but which proved to be only a severe fit of coughing. When it was over he said, "Your name is Bonny Brooks, isn't it?"
"Yes; but don't speak so loud."
"All right, I won't. But, Bonny Brooks, you were mighty kind to me yesterday—kinder than any one else has been for a long time. By-the-way, did you bring my old hat with you?"
"No, of course not."
"No matter. I said I would redeem it, and I am going to do so by putting you on to a mighty soft snap. I'm bound to the southward myself, and, as it happens, there is a sort of a boarding-car going to pull out of here for somewhere down the line in about half an hour. It is in charge of the cook, and as he and I are on what you might call extra good terms, he is going to let me ride with him as far as he goes. There won't be a soul on board but him and me, unless I can persuade him to let you two boys come along with us. What do you say?"
"I say you are a trump, and if you'll only work that racket for us, I'll share half the money with you that I'm to get from Rick as soon as we reach San Francisco."
"Oh ho! He is to give you money, is he?"
"Yes; that is, he has promised me one hundred dollars to make up for the wages I leave behind, if I'll only get him there."
For the next half-hour that shabbily attired stranger was the busiest man in Tacoma, and he kept a great many other people busy at the same time. Finally, just as the boys were beginning to think he had forgotten them, he appeared at the door of the freight car, and said, in a loud whisper: "Come, quick. I think they are after you."
As the boys scrambled out, he started on a run toward a single car that, with an engine attached, stood on a siding in the darkest corner of the railroad yard. Here he hurriedly whispered to them to crouch low on its rear platform until it started, when the cook would open the door. Then he disappeared.
In another moment the car began to move, and directly afterward the door was opened. There seemed to be no light in the interior, and, without seeing any one, the boys heard a strange voice, evidently that of a negro, bidding them come in out of the cold.
They entered the car, Alaric going first, and were led through a narrow passage into what was evidently a large compartment. They heard their guide retreating through the passage, and were beginning to feel rather uneasy, when suddenly they were surrounded and dazzled by a great flood of electric light.
CHAPTER XI.
A FLOOD OF LIGHT.
ALARIC LOOKED, RUBBED HIS EYES, AND LOOKED AGAIN.
As the brilliant light flooded the place where the boys stood, they were for a minute blinded by its radiance. Bonny was bewildered and frightened, and even Alaric was greatly startled. Gradually, as their eyes grew accustomed to the brightness, they became aware of a single figure standing before them, and regarding them curiously. Alaric looked, rubbed his eyes, and looked again. Then he sprang forward with a great shout.
"Dad! you dear old dad! I never was so glad to see any one in my life!"
"Rick! you young rascal!" cried Amos Todd. "How could you play your old father such a trick? Never mind, though; you've won your game, and at the same time made me the very happiest and proudest man on the coast this night. Stand there, sir, and let me have a good look at you."
With this the proud father held his stalwart son off at arm's-length and gazed at him with loving admiration.
"The very neatest trick I ever heard of—the most impudent, and the most successful," he murmured. "But don't you ever be guilty of such a thing again, you young smuggler."
"Indeed I won't, dad, for I know I shall never have any reason or desire to repeat it," replied Alaric, promptly, his voice trembling with joyful excitement. "But, dad, you mustn't forget Bonny; for whatever I have gained or learned this past summer, I owe to him."
"God bless the lad! Indeed I will never forget what he has done both for you and for me," cried Amos Todd, stepping forward, and seizing Bonny's hand in a grasp that made him wince.
Poor bewildered Bonny, standing amid the glitter of silver and plate-glass, surrounded by furnishings of such luxurious character as he had never imagined could exist in real life, vaguely wondered whether he were under the spell of some beautiful enchantment or merely dreaming. There must be some reality to it all, though, for the stranger in the shabby garments, whom he had befriended only the day before, and still wearing the hat he had given him, was surely holding his hand and saying very pleasant things. But who could he be? He certainly was not acting like a tramp, or one who was greatly in need of charity.
Alaric came to the puzzled lad's relief. "He is my father, Mr. Amos Todd," he cried. "And, Bonny, you will forgive me, won't you, for not telling you before? You see, I was afraid to let even you know that I was the son of a rich man, because I wanted you to like me for myself alone."
"You know I do, Rick Dale! You know I do!" exclaimed Bonny, impulsively, finding his voice at last. "But, Rick," he added, almost in a whisper, "are you sure there isn't any mistake about it all? Amos Todd, you know, is President of the Northwest Company, and the richest man on the coast. They do say he is a millionaire."
"It's all right, Bonny. I expect he is a millionaire," answered Alaric, joyously. "But we won't lay it up against him, will we? And we'll try not to think any the less of him for it. I didn't know he was President of the Northwest Company, though. Are you, dad?"
"I believe I am," laughed Amos Todd. "And I certainly have cause to be grateful that I hold the office, for it was while making my official inspection of the camps yesterday that I ran across you boys. I didn't know you, though, Rick—'pon my word, I didn't. You bore a faint resemblance to my little 'Allie' as you came riding those logs down the skid-road, but I knew you couldn't be he, for I was certain that he was on the other side of the world by this time. And so you shook the Sontaggs, and let them run away from you. It was wrong, Rick, very wrong, but I don't blame you—not one bit, I don't. I'd have done the same thing myself."
"But, dad, how did you come to find me out? I don't understand it at all."
"By your own letter to Esther, lad. She forwarded it to me in France; but I had gone when it reached there, and so it was sent to San Francisco. I left Margaret on the other side for the winter, and came back by way of Montreal and the Canadian Pacific, intending to stop here and inspect the lumber camps on my way home. I telegraphed John to send this car and all my mail up here, and they came last night. As soon as I read your letter I felt pretty certain that it was you whom I had seen doing the circus act on those logs. I wasn't quite sure, though, and didn't want to make any mistake, so I just sent word to Linton to fetch you in, that I might take a good look at you."
"So it was you who sent for us?"
"Certainly. And you thought it was the revenue officers, and so decided to give 'em the slip, and beat your way home to claim protection of your old dad—eh, you rascal? And Bonny here took me for a fellow-tramp who could put him on to the racket. Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho! Oh my! I shall die of laughing yet at thinking of it. It was all the hat, though, wasn't it, Bonny? I hated to cut it up, for I only bought it in Paris the other day, and hadn't another with me; but I wanted to inspect the camp without being known, and it was the only disguise I could think of. But, boys, what do you say to supper? If you are as hungry as I am, you must be more than ready for it."
Indeed they were ready for supper, and when they sat down to that daintily served meal in the exquisitely appointed dining-room of President Todd's own private car, Bonny at last realized why Alaric had ordered that strange lot of supplies for the sloop Fancy.
After supper they returned to the saloon, where Amos Todd lighted a cigar, and listened to the wonderful story of trial and triumph, privation and strange vicissitude, that had transformed his pale-faced weakling into the strong, handsome, self-reliant youth upon whom he now gazed so proudly. When the long story was ended, he asked, quietly,
"How much have you earned by your summer's work, son; and what have you to show for it?"
"If you mean in money, dad, not one cent; and all I have to show, besides what you've already noticed, is this." Here Alaric held out a dilapidated baseball, at which his father gazed curiously. "With that ball," continued Alaric, "I took my first lesson in being a boy, and it has led me on from one thing to another ever since, until finally, this very evening, it brought me back to you. So, dad, I should say that it stood for my whole summer's work."
"I am thankful, Rick, that you haven't earned any money, and that through bitter want of it you have learned its value," said Amos Todd. "I am thankful, too, that there is still one thing for which you have to come to your old dad. More than all am I thankful for what you have gained without his help, or, rather, in spite of him; and had I known last spring what that baseball was to do for you, I would gladly have paid a million of dollars for it."
"You may have it now, dad, for one hundred, which is just the amount I owe Bonny."
"Done!" cried Amos Todd; and thus he came into possession of the well-worn baseball that, set in a plate of silver and enclosed in a superb frame, hung above his private desk for many years afterwards.
Here our story properly ends, but we cannot help telling of two or three things that happened soon after the disappearance of our hump-durgin boys from camp No. 10, and as a direct result of their having lived there. To begin with, Mr. Linton felt himself so insulted by the manner in which President Todd made his inspection that he resigned his position, and, on the recommendation of Alaric, Buck Raulet was given his place. On the strength of this promotion the big "faller" went East to marry the girl of his choice, and both Alaric and Bonny were present at the wedding.
Through the liberality of Amos Todd, the ex-hump-durgin boys were enabled to present the camp with their shack, converted into a neat little library building and filled with carefully selected books, in which the occupants of the camp are greatly pleased to discover many of the tales already told to them by Rick Dale.
A certain famous and badly used up hat, carefully removed from the camp, belongs to Bonny Brooks, and adorns a wall in one of a beautiful suite of rooms that he and Alaric occupy together at Harvard. Here Alaric is taking an academic course, while Bonny, whom Amos Todd regards almost as an own son, is sturdily working his way through the mathematical and chemical labyrinths of the Lawrence Scientific School. They entered the university just one year after completing their studies as hump-durgin boys; and while they were still Freshmen, the splendid baseball-player, who, though only a Sophomore, was captain of the 'varsity nine, happened to be badly in need of a catcher.
"I can tell you of one who can't be beat this side of the Rocky Mountains," suggested his classmate and pitcher, Dave Carncross.
"Who is he?"
"Rick Todd, a Freshman."
"Son of Amos Todd, your San Francisco millionaire?"
"Yes."
"Then I don't want him. Millionaires' sons are no good."
"This one is, though," insisted Carncross; "and I ought to know, for I taught him to catch his first ball. You just come over to Soldiers' Field this afternoon and size him up."
The captain needed a first-class man behind the bat so badly that, in spite of his prejudices, he consented to do as his pitcher desired. He was amazed, delighted, and enthusiastic. Never had he seen such an exhibition of ball-catching as was given by that Freshman. Finally he could contain himself no longer, and rushing up to his classmate, he exclaimed:
"Carncross, I tell you he's a wonder! Introduce me at once."
"Rick Todd," said Dave Carncross, "permit me to present you to my friend Phil Ryder, captain of the 'varsity nine."
As the two lads grasped each other's hands, there came a flash of recognition into each face, and both remembered where they had met each other last.
the end.
[IN THE TOWER OF MANY STORIES.]
THE EARL OF ESSEX AND HIS RING.
BY MRS. LEW. WALLACE.
he name of Queen Elizabeth is dear to loyal English hearts, and her reign is named to-day as second only to that of the gentle and gracious Victoria. She was strong and wise, ready to sacrifice small things for a great end, and all things for the good of her subjects. The many portraits of her I have seen are much like the pictures of George Eliot: red hair, a pale high forehead, keen dark eyes, a nose hooked like the beak of an eagle, sharp chin. Such is not the face to win admiration, much less to waken love; yet, when nearly seventy—an age which no art can conceal—she listened to the soft flatteries of her courtiers as tributes to her beauty which they could not repress. When one shaded his eyes at her approach, as though the lustre of her face dazzled his sight like the sun, and said "he could not behold it with a fixed eye," she was delighted with the foolish speech, as a young girl with the roses of her first ball. One can hardly keep from laughing at the idea of high-born youths of twenty-five or thirty hanging breathless on her withered smiles and pretending worship of her charms. Such was her daily portion from the shining train of courtiers surrounding her, and she never tired of it. One said of her red hair: "A poet, madam, might call it a golden web wrought by Minerva; but to my thinking it was paler than even the purest gold—more like the last parting sunbeam of the softest day of spring."
The great ruler never learned to rule her own spirit. She swore at her maids of honor, and boxed the ears of the Lord-Lieutenant for appearing before her in muddy boots, and sent him in disgrace to the Tower. She vowed that England was her husband, whom she loved with a perfect love, and she would have none other; she had wedded herself to the kingdom at the coronation by the ring then placed upon her finger: in remembrance thereof she wished engraved on her tombstone these words: "Here lies Elizabeth, who lived and died a Maiden Queen."
There was another ring, of which I shall presently tell, more precious than that which went with the crown, because life and death were in its keeping.
It was her custom to select from her courtiers one on whom she lavished a fickle love and transient favor. When the court was beginning to tire of Raleigh, Leicester, a former favorite, introduced his step-son, Robert Devereux, second Earl of Essex, in hope of weakening the influence of Raleigh. Essex was a spirited boy of seventeen, fresh from Oxford, with handsome face and graceful mien. Clad in the pictorial dress of the period, wearing crest and plume, badges and ribbons of honor, he was a figure to claim the glance of a king as he greeted his sovereign, and it is not strange that the susceptible virgin felt the fascination of such a presence, although she was then fifty years old.
Before he was twenty he fought gallantly with the English army in Holland, and was foremost in the battle of Zütphen, where Sir Philip Sidney fell. On his return to court the Queen's fancy deepened into dotage, and, fond and foolish, she would hardly let him quit her presence. This became so irksome that he ran off to the war in Spain, and refused to return when she sent an officer after him. When he was pleased to come back she forgave all, and redoubled her favors in hope of keeping the wanderer; but in a short time he again disappeared, and secretly married the widow of Sir Philip Sidney. The Queen could never endure the marriage of her courtiers, still less that of a favorite. She banished him; but he reappeared in a few months, and only regained the Queen's grace by neglecting his fair, sweet wife, who lived in seclusion in the country while he shone at court.
When Essex was about twenty-nine years old he set out with the royal army for Cadiz, and at parting Elizabeth gave him a ring, telling him, "whatever crimes his enemies might accuse him of, or whatever offences he may have committed against her, if he sent it to her she would forgive him." The precious gift was probably a true-love-knot, set with a gem that means unchanging; for the time was rich with sentiment in trinkets, and we may be sure the compact was sealed with vows and kisses on the proffered hand. He returned from Spain unsuccessful, and although the Queen still petted him, from this time on they quarrelled. Essex was haughty and insolent; and she, violent and exacting with him, yet forgiving in the end.
When she decided to appoint a Lord-Deputy for Ireland, then in a state of revolt, she called to her private room three of her court officers—Cecil, the Clerk of the Seal, and Essex. He expected the appointment, but failed to get it, spoke angrily to the Queen, and turned his back on her. She boxed his ears, and told him to "go and be hanged." So furious was he that his hand reached for his short sword, but Cecil stepped between them; and Essex said, with an oath, "that he would not have taken that blow from King Henry, her father, and it was an indignity he neither could nor would endure from any one." Then muttering something about "a king in petticoats," he rushed madly from her presence. In any one else such conduct would have been death.
Again the Earl disappeared from court, and he and Elizabeth never were good friends afterwards, although a peace was patched up, and she made him Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. His enemies persuaded her that the Lord-Lieutenant wanted to make himself King of Ireland; spies were sent to watch him, but one of them was kind enough to warn Essex of his danger. With his usual rashness, on learning this he at once returned to London, without permission of the Queen—an act in itself treason—and finding court adjourned to "Nonesuch" in the country, he rode at speed through mud and mire to anticipate his enemy, Lord Gray, who had heard of his arrival, and started in haste to give his version of the affair before Essex could reach her. Gray had been closeted with the Queen's councillors a half-hour when he arrived. Hearing this, Essex lost all sense of propriety, hurried unannounced to the Queen's apartments, and not finding her in the outer reception-room, pushed on into her private bedroom. Her maid was combing her hair, which, gray and thin, was hanging about her bony shoulders—for she had not yet made choice of her eighty wigs of many colors for the day—nor were her paint and powder on, and patches pasted over the wrinkled cheek.
He threw himself at her feet, covered her hand with kisses, poured out his story with oaths of fidelity, vowing that he had ever borne in his heart the picture of her beauty, completely winning the "most sweet Queen" to him. He retired to dress, and in an hour was recalled to an audience, and was again well received. But by night the fitful maiden had changed her mind, influenced by the Cecil faction, and perhaps by thinking how ugly she must have looked in the morning. She was then sixty-eight years old, and as vain as in youth. When he again offered respectful homage she received him with great sternness, and commanded him to confine himself in his apartments until sent for to appear before her council the following day. His ever-active enemy Cecil brought against him many charges—not least, "his over-bold going to her Majesty's presence in her bedchamber."
QUEEN ELIZABETH.
The Queen then ordered him to be held a prisoner at York House, where he remained many months. He pretended to be sick—a trick he had to gain forgiveness when his royal mistress was out of humor; but it did not move her this time, although it soon became reality. His wife was not permitted to visit him, nor even write to him. He had only one true friend at court, the gentle Lady Scroope, his cousin, and sister of the Countess of Nottingham. She wore mourning for him, and endured bad treatment from Elizabeth on his account, but stood faithful to the end.
Yet the lovesick woman could not entirely banish thought of her proud favorite, although her mind was constantly filled with suspicions by Cecil and Raleigh. To forget him she had bear-baitings, jousts at the ring, and a splendid tourney in honor of her coronation day. These frivolities filled the weeks that poor Essex passed alone and wretched in one room at York House. Elizabeth would not listen to the prayers of his sisters and Lady Scroope for his release, but she accepted the costly presents they offered, among them a gown worth £500 (about $2500). Essex finally fell so ill that his life was despaired of. On hearing his pitiable state the Queen wept, and sent him her own physician, and had prayers read for him in all the churches of London, but something changed her mood again, and she was harsher than ever. Not until March 16, 1600, did she allow him to go to his own home, Essex House on the river and the Fleet, first sending away his family and all the servants but two. Essex was kept there prisoner for seventeen weeks, when the Queen removed his keeper and allowed him to become a prisoner on parole.
During this time he was examined before a commission of his enemies, appointed for the purpose, and was treated most cruelly. They let him stand, occasionally leaning for rest against a cupboard, from nine in the morning till eight at night; and when accused of treason, he replied:
"I should do God and mine own conscience wrong if I do not justify myself as an honest man. This hand shall pull out this heart when any disloyal thought shall enter it."
The following August his tyrant again summoned him to York House, where he was told that her Majesty was pleased to give him his liberty, but he must not enter her presence nor come to court. Though free, he was constantly spied upon. Through the remainder of the summer his friends appealed to the Queen to restore him to favor. Essex wrote her imploring letters, that brought no answer. He brooded over his fall and loss of power, until he grew desperate, and gathered about him at Essex House all the disaffected people of London, among them a host of Puritans. They formed many wild schemes—at one time a plan to capture the Tower and palace; at another, to march to the court and compel Essex's enemies to give him a hearing. The Queen remained cold and silent. He talked of her and of his own wrongs, and said "she was an old woman crooked both in body and in mind." Sir Walter Raleigh insisted that this speech sealed his doom; for spies reported everything he said and did.
His last piece of folly was to raise a riot one morning in the streets of London with three hundred followers, declaring that "the kingdom was sold to Spain by Cecil and Raleigh." The mob was quickly dispersed, and Essex slipped back to his house alone in a small boat. He had shut up as prisoners there some officers of the court who had been sent to talk with him and bring him to reason. He had hoped to secure his own safety by giving these as hostages, but Sir Ferdinando Georges, one of his own men, had liberated them, and as he had already been proclaimed traitor, there was nothing to be done but to barricade the house. It was surrounded by the Queen's troops, and he held out till 10 o'clock at night, and only surrendered then because "he was sore vexed with the tears and incessant screams of the ladies." He was confined that night in Lambeth Palace, and on Monday, February 9, 1601, together with his followers, was taken to the Tower. When the boat glided through the Traitors' Gate beneath St. Thomas's Tower, he must have realized the hopelessness of his case, for those who went in by that low dark tunnel rarely came out again.
The apartment to which he was committed was only nineteen feet in diameter, the walls eleven feet thick, and, in memory of the chivalric Earl, it is to this day called Devereux Tower. When he passed the ponderous door his brightness of soul was yet undimmed, but a short while in that chill lone chamber would subdue it to silence if not to resignation. Love of life cannot long endure in such a prison, and rapid changes in the career of soldier, statesman, courtier, had taught him the uncertainty of fortune which hangs on the caprice of king or queen.
On the 19th of the same month he and Southampton were brought to trial, and, as usual, he was unfairly treated. Even Lord Bacon, to whom he had given an estate, and who was not of the Queen's counsels, appeared against him. One lawyer compared him to a crocodile; another called him an atheist and papist, when it was well known he was a Puritan. The trial lasted from nine o'clock in the morning to six o'clock in the evening. He was sentenced to death, and on hearing it, said: "I am not a whit dismayed to receive this doom. Death is welcome to me as life. Let my poor quarters, which have done her Majesty true service in divers parts of the world, be sacrificed and disposed of at her pleasure."
As he marched through the streets to the Tower, with the edge of the headsman's axe carried toward him—the custom when prisoners were condemned to die—he walked swiftly, with his head hanging down, and made no answers to persons who frequently spoke to him from the crowds. He was allowed six more days to prepare for death. It is said that Elizabeth signed his death-warrant firmly, and with even more than the customary flourishes, but she wept and hesitated about appointing the execution.
AUTOGRAPH OF QUEEN ELIZABETH.
Meanwhile where was the gay gold ring given to him in the bloom of his youth, as he marched to Spain with the beauty of banners and roll of drums, under no shadow deeper than the folds of the royal standard? Many times Essex must have looked at the amulet, and in the long, slow waiting sickened for gracious message or friendly sign, but none came. And Elizabeth, too, must have wondered what had become of the token; and why did not he, so wildly loved and deeply mourned, send the pledge and claim the pardon?
Early one morning while this time was passing, not knowing whom to trust, he chanced to see from his window, which overlooked the street, a lad with an honest, open face, which so pleased him it won his confidence. He managed to throw down a small bribe and the ring, and told him to take it to his good cousin Lady Scroope, and she would send it to the Queen. The boy took the keepsake, but gave it into the hand of the wife of one of Essex's worst enemies, the Countess of Nottingham, who passed it to her husband.
ESSEX AT THE TIME OF HIS EXECUTION.
How terrible must have been the suspense of Essex, for, in spite of everything, he trusted the word of his sovereign. The day broke that was to see his execution. Still no sign of pardon or reprieve. Calmly he prepared for death, and dressed with his usual care and elegance. He wore a long black cloak of wrought velvet over a satin suit, which consisted of a doublet of brocade with ruffles of lace in the sleeves, a silken scarf confining it at the waist, short breeches of satin, silken hose, and leather buskins. Usually with this costume a jewelled sword was worn, and an immense ruff of lace around the neck. On this occasion both were omitted. His picture shows a well-turned head, with dark curling hair, straight nose, brown eyes, a mustache, and the pointed beard affected at that period.
Essex had begged as a last privilege that he might have a private execution. The poor petition was granted, and he was permitted to suffer death on Tower Hill. The Earl was then in his summer prime—only thirty-three years of age. Valor, beauty, fortune had been his from birth, but failed to avert his fate. The place of execution was hallowed by the best blood of England, and there two fair queens had laid their young heads on the block to satisfy the brutal rage of Elizabeth's father.
Ash-Wednesday, February 25, 1601, at 8 o'clock in the morning, he was led to the fatal block. As he knelt to place his head in position he showed no fear, and three strokes of the axe, the first one mortal, severed his head from his body. They were buried in the Tower Chapel, though some believed the Queen kept the skull in her own private room. Notwithstanding it was a cold gloomy day, one hundred gentlemen sat near the scaffold, and Sir Walter Raleigh secretly watched the execution from a window of the armory, little thinking that thirteen years later he would meet the same fate in the same place. During this tragedy Queen Elizabeth amused herself playing on the spinet. But there came an hour of repentance bitter as death.
About two years afterward the Countess of Nottingham was taken with an illness, which proved her last. She begged to see the Queen; she could not die in peace without it. Elizabeth came, and when the Countess confessed having kept the ring of Essex, the Queen wept, and then flew into a fury, and shook the dying woman in her bed, crying, "God may forgive you, but I never can!"
This disclosure affected her so she could neither sleep nor eat. The dreadful secret pressed on her soul, and the old love and longing came back with remorse for tenderness turned to hate.
Dreams of Devereux in his morning beauty kneeling at her feet must have risen to her sight. The hand whose touch had made her pulses quicken, that never drew sword except for England's glory, was laid low; the brilliant nobleman—a headless corpse—was buried among criminals in Tower Chapel, when a word from her would have saved him.
Who may tell her anguish when she lay on the palace floor ten days and nights, refusing to be comforted, haunted by memories of crime unpardonable, till death came to close the scene?
[FLOWER BORDERS.]
BY EMMA J. GRAY.
"I tell you, Cousin Bess, there is everything in the way garden-beds are arranged. There is that old couple who live next door, so old they have to just hobble out to their flowers, and what do you suppose they've done?"
"I have no idea, but if I may judge from your tone, something very queer," and Cousin Bess laughed lightly, while she laid the book she had been reading on the table, and then looked up at Charlie.
"Well, around each bed they've put white stones, just about the size of this," and the boy picked up an ostrich egg, "and so close that one stone touches the other."
"Have you never seen that before?"
"Never, Cousin Bess; but it makes their yard look fine; and as for ours—well, the contrast is simply awful. I've come to you for points. Our ramshackle fence and half-rotten flower-bed boards are too much. I am ashamed, and simply will not let those two old people outstrip me. I'm bound to go right ahead and even up with them if I can."
And Cousin Bess looked into the boy's eager face before she replied: "That's a good resolution. I am glad to hear you say so." And then followed the words:
"'Go make thy garden fair as thou canst;
Thou workest never alone;
Perchance he whose plot is next to thine
Will see it, and mend his own.'
"But pardon my moralizing. I know, Charlie, you are impatient to get to work. Let's begin with the fence. Cover that with wild-cucumber vine."
"Plant it all around?"
"Oh no. Sow the seed, and almost before you will know it the fence will be a mass of green foliage. And a few days later buds and blossoms will appear, and the yard will be perfumed with sweet-scented flowers.
"Dig up your rotten bed-boards and burn them. Sow a narrow line of sweet-alyssum along the edge. It is of easy culture, and will produce a similar effect to your neighbor's white stones. Should you prefer a complete change, however, edge your beds with low-growing coleus plants. They come in many colors. I would advise bronze.
"You should also group your plants, putting the lilies all together, the pansies, the pinks, and so on. The old-time method of having a patch here, a patch there, divided by other flowers, is not nearly as effective as to mass them.
"The most unique, and also the most beautiful, small garden I ever saw was at Cape Vincent. The owners were French people, and it was altogether of blossoms. There was not a blade of grass nor a foot-path visible anywhere. Nevertheless, there were spaces through which a single individual might walk; but these were wellnigh hidden by the nodding flowers. It was a perfect wilderness of bloom, and the air was laden with sweetness.
"You may have just such a garden, and it will be a beautiful enchantment. But you must be careful about blending complementary colors, and also to place your tall and short plants effectively."