HOLDEN WITH THE CORDS

BY W. M. L. JAY

Author of "Shiloh," etc.

"Sin will pluck on sin."
King Richard III.

NEW YORK
E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY,
713 BROADWAY
1874

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by
E. P. DUTTON & CO.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

PREFACE.

In sending forth another book belonging to the class known as religious novels, the author is moved to say a word to the critics who received a former one with so pleasant a mixture of praise and deprecation. As one of them frankly explained, "they like a pill none the better for being sugar-coated." It is not necessary to remind them that there may be younger (and possibly older) people who do. It is more to the point to state that persons to whom religion is a pill—a bitter, nauseous compound, to be bolted in sickness, and kept out of sight in health—are not the persons for whom the author writes.

There is another class of objectors. They talk solemnly of Art and its canons; they make a religion of it, having little other. One of these remarks, that "a tract in the hands of the Venus di Medici would be an impertinence." I quite agree with him. But why need he ignore the fact that the Venus is also the outcome of a religion? To the ancient sculptor, it was a goddess, not a woman, that grew under his hands; it was Devotion, working together with Genius, that produced the two or three statues which the world agrees to admire. So the few great poems of the world are religious poems. Why, then, should not the great novel of the world be a religious novel? Some day, be sure, a genius sweeter than Hawthorne's, more genial than Dickens', and subtler than Thackeray's, will arise to give it to us. Let me humbly help to prepare the way for him! Meanwhile, be it also understood that the persons to whom Art is a sufficing end, instead of a noble means, are not the persons for whom I write.

I do write for the "gentle reader" who enjoys religion in novels, as elsewhere. Be thus much said for his liking, even from the art side. There are two classes of novels—the descriptive and the analytical; one pictures real life, the other passions and motives. Religion has its rightful place in both, because it is an important part of real life, and controls both passions and motives. Finally (for the subject is much too wide for a preface), the modern novel being so potent a power,—for evil on the one hand, for social and civil reform on the other,—it is fair to suppose that it may do good service for religion.

In conclusion, I have to make two acknowledgments. The first to an unknown coadjutor, a hand that is doubtless mouldering into dust. Some years ago, a yellow, time-worn manuscript, purporting to be a veritable family history, fell into my hands. I am indebted to it for the main outline of my story. The second is to MISS FREEBORNE,—the only sculptor of our day, so far as I know, who has consecrated her genius to Christian Art. From her studio I have quietly abstracted the sculpture which lends its white grace to these pages. I should also have seized upon the slender figure of her St. Agnes, and the bowed head of her Martyr, had they been available to my purpose.

NEW YORK, July, 1874.

CONTENTS.

[INTRODUCTION]

PART FIRST.

A WAY THAT SEEMETH RIGHT.

I.—[Proverbs and the Interpretation]
II.—[Studying to Answer]
III.—[Pattern of Old Fidelity]
IV.—[A Goodly Heritage]
V.—[Waste Places]
VI.—[The Day of Temptation]
VII.—[A Bitter Draught]
VIII.—[As a Dream when one Awaketh]
IX.—[The Blot Cleaves]

PART SECOND.

THE FRUIT OF THE WAY.

I.—[Through a Mist]
II.—[Strengthened out of Zion]
III.—[Seeing, but Understanding Not]
IV.—[Patient Waiting]
V.—[Under the Oaks]
VI.—[Of Clay]
VII.—[Hidden Riches]
VIII.—[The Wind Changes]
IX.—[The First Links of a Chain]
X.—[Feeling His Way]
XI.—[Sleepless Nights Appointed]
XII.—[A Consultation]
XIII.—[Dinner-Table Talk]

PART THIRD.

THE IN-GATHERING.

I.—[Unfoldings]
II.—[The Foundations Fail]
III.—[Building Anew]
IV.—[A Sermon]
V.—[Partings]
VI.—[With a Double Heart]
VII.—[Overburdened]
VIII.—[A Business Letter]
IX.—[Smoother Than Butter]
X.—[A Wicked Device]
XI.—[A Clue]
XII.—[Too Late]
XIII.—[Escaped]
XIV.—[The Way Stopped]

PART FOURTH.

A NEW FIELD.

I.—[Alive in Famine]
II.—[New Acquaintances]
III.—[Farview]
IV.—[A Word in Due Season]
V.—[Intercepted]
VI.—[An Aimless Stroll]
VII.—[Ordered Steps]
VIII.—[Though He Slay]
IX.—[Mistakes]
X.—[Like a Thief in the Night]
XI.—[After Many Days]

PART FIFTH.

A BETTER HARVEST.

I.—[A Cloud for a Covering]
II.—[Swift Feet]
III.—[Fatality or Temptation]
IV.—[Blind]
V.—[More Mystery]
VI.—[A Clue]
VII.—[The Set Time]
VIII.—[Gift and Giver]
IX.—[Faithful unto Death]

HOLDEN WITH THE CORDS.

INTRODUCTION.

Very beautiful was the long vista of the elm-arched street. So irresistibly did it woo the eye to linger among its gray columns and green arches, or wander adown its fair, temple-like perspective to the hazy vanishing point, that the wayfarer might easily forget to observe what sort of dwellings were ranged along its sides. Nor did they seek to force themselves upon his notice. They were all plain, substantial structures, with no obtrusive marks of ostentation or of meanness about them; and they all stood a little back from the street, leaving room for a trim grass-plot, or a thicket of flowering shrubs, between them and the passer-by. They would impress him, collectively, as genuine, well-to-do homes, free alike from the struggles of poverty and the temptations of wealth, without troubling him to recognize them individually, or diverting his gaze from the over-arching elms that were so much better worth his looking at.

Such, at least, would be the fact, until he came to a certain corner; where a large square structure of stuccoed brick, coming boldly forward to the pavement, and planting its heavy steps thereon, would be sure to arrest his glance, and, perhaps, faintly stir his curiosity. It was too large for a private building, and too unpretending for a public one,—what was it? If he had put the inquiry into audible words, he would have been told that it was the Medical College. And if his interlocutor had chanced to be a white-haired, genial-faced old man, long ago flung aside from the stream of active life, and, consequently, with time on his hands for a little chat with a stranger,—he would, doubtless, have woven into his answer the popular witticism;—

"Everything here, sir, is arranged just as it should be. The divinity school is on the road to the poorhouse; the law-school adjoins the jail; and the medical college—this building before you, sir—is hard by the cemetery;—you can see the monuments rising above the hedge yonder."

But the young man now coming up the street, through the pleasant play of sunshine and shadow beneath the elms, would neither have asked the question, nor smiled at the answer. He knew the stuccoed building well, as a three years' occupant thereof must needs do; and he had heard and repeated the witticism too many times to leave it the faintest sparkle. It was doubtful, too, whether he gave a thought to the loveliness of the elm-arched vista that stretched before him,—partly by reason of his familiarity therewith, partly on account of a preoccupied mind, and still more, perhaps, because his bright, brisk, energetic temperament was not of the sort which is quickest to feel subtile charm, and recognize the delicate outline, of the spirit of beauty. He came on rapidly, with an elastic step and a cheery whistle, and, as he neared the college, he cast a quick glance at one of its upper windows. What he saw there would have been a pretty enough sight to most people,—merely a tiny brown bird hopping to and fro on the window-sill, and turning its small head briskly from side to side in its search for infinitesimal crumbs,—but it brought a shadow to his broad, frank brow.

"Not yet up," he muttered, "or that wren wouldn't be trotting up and down there so complacently! To be sure, he may have gone out, but it isn't likely."

Neither for the look nor the thought did he pause, but strode straight up two flights of stairs, his firm tread resounding loudly through the empty, uncarpeted halls, and knocked at the door of a front room. There was no response. He knocked again, with a somewhat impatient hand, tried the door and found it locked, waited a moment, beat a third emphatic rat-tat-too upon the panel, without eliciting other reply than a faint and dreary echo from the attic above; and, finally, turned on his heel, and walked down-stairs. At the head of the second flight, a thought seemed to strike him; after a moment of hesitation, he turned and knocked at a door close at hand. Scarcely waiting for the prompt "Come in!" he opened it, with the question,—"Have you seen Arling this morning?"

The occupant of the room was a broad-shouldered young man, sitting at a table covered with books and papers, and deeply absorbed in study. He only half turned his head, showing a regular, clear-cut profile, as he answered,—

"No. I left him so late last night that I overslept this morning, and have thought of nothing but making up lost time. And really, Trubie, a man might be excused for forgetting his best friend—if he had one—in examination week. But, is Arling any worse?"

"That's what I should like to know, Roath," returned Trubie, planting himself a little more firmly on the threshold, but taking no notice of the chair that the other had carelessly pushed toward him. "At any rate, he's out."

Roath started, and turned completely round, giving a view of a square-featured, somewhat moody, but still handsome, face. "Out!" he repeated, looking both amazed and startled.

"So it would seem. The door is locked, and I rapped and rattled loud enough to wake the dead."

"Oh," said Roath, with a prolonged falling inflection. And after a moment's consideration, he turned back to his books, as if there were no more to be said.

Trubie lingered. Not, evidently, from any special liking for Roath's society, but because he was undecided what to do next. "I don't understand it, Roath," he said slowly. "You know Arling was to have kept his room to-day, by way of gaining strength, and guarding against a relapse. And we were to have gone over 'Barnes' together this morning, so as to be all primed for Professor Beers to-morrow. What can he have done with himself?"

"Perhaps," said Roath, absently, with his eyes on his book, "some of the others may have seen him."

Trubie took the hint—if such it was meant to be—and withdrew. He spent the next half hour in knocking at sundry doors, and repeating, with slight variation, the questions and remarks wherewith he had favored Roath. No one had seen Arling; no one knew anything about him. All seemed surprised to learn that he had gone out; but all were laboriously cramming for the examinations in progress, and the surprise made but a faint and transient ripple on the surface of their troubled minds. Trubie's persistency impressed them much more strongly; they wondered that he had leisure to bestow upon any anxiety not connected with those dreaded examinations, any fear save that of failing to secure the right to sign himself, "Frank Trubie, M.D."

Nor—to represent him fairly—was the young man himself wholly insensible of his absurdity. "Well!" said he, at last, "I can't afford to spend my morning in this way. I must go back to my room, and set to work. When Arling comes in, tell him I've been here." And away he went through the dancing elm-shadows, more quickly than he had come.

Two hours passed. Then Roath closed his books, gathered up his papers, and took his way to the examination room, amid the groups of assembling students. Many eyes followed him, some with admiration, some with envy,—few or none, it was plain to see, with affection.

"No question but that he'll pass!" said one. "He's all brain,—I'd be content with half as much."

"And his memory!" exclaimed another. "It appears to be constructed on the principle of a rat-trap; ingress is easy, egress—not provided for!"

"No one can keep step with him but Arling," remarked a third; "if he gets well enough, there will be a close race between them."

"I bet on Arling," said a fourth,—a somewhat slender young man, with an easy, almost careless air, but a thoughtful face,—Mark Tracey by name.

"Eh! why?" asked the first speaker.

"Because, as you said just now, Roath is all brain. Whereas Arling, while he does not want for brain, has also a heart and a conscience. And in medicine, as in everything else, that wonderful trio are too strong for brain alone."

"Moralizing, as usual," returned the other with a light laugh.

"Not at all. It is plain common-sense. The history of the world shows it. Perhaps there is no better type of pure intellect than Satan. And Michael the archangel does very well for a representative of love, duty, and intellect, combined. You remember which beat?"

"It is not possible, Tracey, that you believe that fable!"

"Grant that it is a fable," replied Tracey, lifting his eyebrows;—"it nevertheless stands for the concrete wisdom of the ages which preceded it."

The last words were spoken on the threshold of the examination room, and, of necessity, closed the discussion.

Roath's examination, on this day, did not disappoint the general expectation. Although somewhat paler than ordinary, he was thoroughly self-possessed; his answers were clear and to the point; not once did his memory play him false; scarcely once did he hesitate for a word. He gave evidence not only of close study, but of careful analysis, and profound, sagacious thought. But he looked worn when it was over, as if the mental strain had been severe; and seemed scarcely to hear the comments and congratulations showered upon him.

Into the midst of these burst Trubie, with the old question, "Have you seen anything of Arling?" and hardly waiting for the general "No" which answered it, upstairs he rushed, three steps at a time, to the room of his friend. The stream of talk had scarcely resumed its flow, ere he was back again, with a hurried step, and a perturbed face.

"It's odd about Arling," he began, abruptly. "I can't get any answer, and there's nothing stirring in the room. But I looked into the keyhole, and the key is certainly inside."

Some few of the students, startled by his words, and the deep gravity of his look, gathered around him to discuss the matter, when a stout, gray-haired professor came out from the examination room.

"Good day, Mr. Trubie," said he, as he passed the group. "I hope your patient is doing well."

"I—I don't know, sir," faltered Trubie; "I have not seen him since yesterday, at dusk. And he is unaccountably missing this morning;—at least, I thought he must be out when I went to his room, at eight o'clock, and couldn't get in. But I have just been up again, and—and the door is certainly locked on the inside."

Being already in possession of the main facts of the case,—namely, that Alec Arling, one of the class of medical students now undergoing examination for their degree, had been suffering for some days from severe and increasing intestinal trouble, and had been advised by the faculty to keep his room for a day or two, under the care of his friend, Frank Trubie;—the professor now, by means of a few rapid questions, elicited the additional facts, that Trubie had been suddenly called away, on the previous evening, by family affliction, to his home in a near suburb, and had spent the night there, and that Edmund Roath, who had volunteered to keep a little watch over the sick-room during his absence, had remained with Arling till past midnight, engaged in comparing notes of clinical lectures, and in psychological talk (with which matters Arling would busy himself, in spite of remonstrance), and had then left him, recommending him to go to sleep at once, and had heard the door duly locked on his exit. Roath further stated that, in consequence of this protracted sitting, and previous hard work, he had slept late this morning; and, taking it for granted that Trubie, according to promise, was already back at his post, he had seated himself at his books, immediately upon rising. Very shortly after, Trubie had appeared, and informed him that Arling had gone out, whereat he had been considerably surprised,—not that the young man was unable to leave his room, but because it was inexpedient to do so. Nevertheless, he frankly acknowledged that his mind was too much preoccupied to give more than a passing thought to the matter, especially as he knew well that any remissness on his part was sure to be amply atoned for by Trubie,—he and Arling being, as everybody knew, the Damon and Pythias of the class.

The professor was a man of few words, quick conclusions, and prompt action. "There is but one way of getting at the bottom of the matter," said he, at the end of this rapid statement. "Let somebody bring a crowbar, and pry open the door."

Scarce sooner said than done. The door yielded easily to the rude implement, in Trubie's impetuous hands, and was followed by a rush of the assembled students toward the opening,—though, even in this moment of eager curiosity, the instinct of subordination allowed the professor to in first. He went straight to the bed, where was seen a human form, lying on its side, in an easy attitude of slumber. He bent for a moment above this form, while a sudden silence fell upon the startled spectators,—he touched the brow, lifted the hand, and then, turning slowly round, said, in deep, serious tones;—

"He is dead."

Trubie let fall the crowbar, darted forward, and caught the hand of his dead friend, with a kind of indignant incredulity. But the icy touch, the marble pallor, the lifeless weight, brought instant conviction. He stood as if stunned.

The professor had turned from the bed to the table, where a glass, a spoon, and four or five phials, stood within easy reach of the dead man's hand. He held the spoon to his nostrils, and then examined the phials, holding them up to the light. In one, labelled "Mag. Sol. Morph.," he seemed to find what he sought.

"Mr. Trubie," said he, turning round, with the open phial in his hand, "did your friend ever say anything to you, that indicated a disposition to suicide?"

The question roused the young man from his stupor, although it was a moment or two ere he seemed to comprehend its purport fully. "Never, sir!" he exclaimed, indignantly, a hot flush rising to his brow,—"Alec Arling would have scorned to do such a thing! He was neither a fool nor a coward, sir! Besides, there was no earthly reason why he should do it."

The professor shook his head. "He seems to have done it, nevertheless," said he, thoughtfully. "To be sure," he added, after a moment, "it is barely possible that he took it by mistake."

"Most likely, that is the real state of the case," remarked Roath, who was standing on the other side of the table, calmly and gravely observant of the scene.

In temperaments like Trubie's, the transition from grief to anger is often curiously direct; the one is the natural outlet of the other; and in this instance, the sound of Roath's voice seemed to afford the bereaved and horrified young man the object of indignation that he so sorely needed. Springing quickly forward, and clenching his fist, he confronted the speaker with a convulsive rage and excitement in strong contrast with Roath's grave composure.

"You know better!" he shouted. "It was neither a suicide nor a mistake. You killed him!"

Roath gave a violent start, and seemed about to speak, but his lips only trembled nervously. He was evidently confounded, almost bewildered, by the suddenness and fierceness of the accusation.

Trubie went on with scarce a moment's pause, and with, still hotter indignation, "You were last in his room—you acknowledge it. And you hated him."

Roath had regained his self-command,—which, to do him justice, he had but for an instant lost. "If you were not beside yourself with grief," said he, coldly, "there could be but one answer to such a charge as that. As it is—"

"'As it is,' I repeat it," interrupted Trubie, with bitter scorn. "I repeat it, and am ready to maintain it, always—anywhere—anyhow!"

Roath drew himself up. "I, too, am ready,"—he began, haughtily, but the professor interposed. "Mr. Roath," said he, with dignity, "I command you to be silent. Mr. Trubie,"—laying his hand on the shoulder of the agitated young man, and speaking in a tone of grave rebuke,—"much may be forgiven to the first excitement of sorrow and horror, but this is going too far. Such an accusation is not to be made lightly."

"Lightly!" repeated the frantic Trubie;—"he hated Alec, I tell you! He couldn't forgive him for rivalling him—aye, and beating him, too—everywhere; in scholarship, in popularity, in"—he hesitated for an instant,—"in love."

Roath's face grew dark; a frown traced a deep, vertical line between his brows; he set his teeth, and made a quick stride forward. But a dozen hands seized him, a dozen others laid hold of Trubie, and both were half forced, half led away to their rooms; while the faculty of the college, hastily called together, gathered around the corpse, to examine more minutely into the cause of death.

A coroner's jury was duly summoned. It examined the body, weighed the evidence, and being about equally divided in regard to the question of suicide, finally agreed upon "Accidental Death by Poison," as, upon the whole, the safer and less objectionable verdict. There seemed to be no good reason to suspect murder, nor any ground whatever for implicating Roath, or anybody else, as a perpetrator thereof.

Trubie, to be sure, persisted in his accusation; but it was with a vehemence and a dogmatism so unlike his wonted careless good nature, as to suggest the idea that his mind had been temporarily thrown off its balance by the shock of his friend's death. This idea gained color from the fact that all which he could offer, in support of so grave a charge, was the statement that he had long seen or suspected, in Roath a secret hatred of Arling, and a willingness to do him covert mischief. He had even mentioned the suspicion to his friend; but Arling—being of the most candid and generous, as well as unsuspecting temper, unable to conceive of any but an open, honorable enemy—had refused to entertain it for a moment. Trubie also solemnly affirmed that his passionate accusation of Roath, by the side of the newly-discovered corpse, was the involuntary result of an intuition so sudden, so clear, and so powerful, that, though little given to look for supernatural agencies in human affairs, he could not rid himself of the conviction that it was the direct inspiration of his dead friend. But it may readily be imagined how much weight a statement of this sort was likely to have with men of plain minds and sturdy understanding, searching among the external phenomena of the event for grounds upon which to base a reasonable verdict.

On the other hand, the theory of accidental poisoning was supported, negatively, by the lack of apparent cause for self-destruction; and positively, by the fact that on the dead man's table, side by side with the potent narcotic before mentioned, stood a phial of exactly the same size, and with equally colorless contents. Of this Arling had been accustomed to take two or three spoonfuls, mixed with a few drops of a third preparation of exceeding bitter flavor. A careless hand might have mistaken the one phial for the other. The taste of the morphine, so swallowed, would be much disguised; while the dose was sufficient, under the circumstances, to produce death. It will be seen, therefore, that the verdict rendered was the only one upon which a coroner's jury could well have been expected to agree.

The body was next solemnly laid in a vault, to await the disposal of the parents, who lived in a western state; and the widening circles of excitement, horror, curiosity, and regret, of which it had been the unconscious centre, rapidly subsided, or were effaced by the growing interests of the now imminent closing examination.

Even Trubie, though he flatly refused to acquiesce in the coroner's verdict, was forced tacitly to accept its results. He took refuge in a complete personal proscription of Roath; he neither spoke to him nor looked at him; he treated him precisely as if he did not exist. To a person of Roath's cold, hard, steely temper, and obtuse sensibilities, this demeanor was, perhaps, the most tolerable of which the circumstances admitted. It spared him the necessity of being either conciliatory or resentful; he was well content to ignore Trubie as completely as Trubie ignored him.

He soon found, however, that he had greatly underestimated the moral force of an abhorrence deeply rooted in immitigable distrust. Though largely given to psychological studies, and profoundly learned, for his years, in the intricacies and tendencies of the human mind, he was astonished to find how soon the atmosphere grew heavy around him, how quickly Trubie's dogged dislike communicated itself, more or less strongly, to others; while the increased cordiality of a few, though kindly intended to offset it, only served to point him out more clearly as one set apart, for the time, from life's ordinary course and level, by the force of an unenviable, if undeserved, notoriety. Not that he ever appeared to be conscious of either of these manifestations, or of their ultimate effect. Nature had given him a moral and intellectual fibre so tough, and he had trained himself to a control so perfect, that the keenest observer could not detect the least variation from his usual composed, concentrated, somewhat moody demeanor. Whatever of suffering, or of sin, lay at the bottom of his heart, not a shadow thereof was seen in his face.

It might well be, however, that he was glad when the examination was over, his degree obtained, and himself left free to depart by any one of the many paths which life opened before him.

Yet he was in no suspicious haste to be gone. His departure was fixed for an early hour on the following morning. Meanwhile, at dusk, he went out for his habitual solitary stroll. Never had he invited companionship, and was it thrust upon him. He had no intimate friend. Though he had been not only admired, but respected, by many, for his intellectual gifts, and for a certain firm, even texture of character, and dispassionateness of judgment, that often looked like virtue, whether such in reality or not, he was beloved by none.

Where he went, what he thought, is not to the purpose of our narrative. His walk was long, however; he did not return until dusk had deepened into clear and starry, but moonless night. As he came up through the great, dim elm-arches, with their solemn resemblance to a vast cathedral nave, a strange tremor seized him. A complete sceptic in regard to all superstitions and forebodings, he yet felt his nerves shaking with an undefined fear; he could not rid himself of the impression that something unprecedented and sinister was at that moment taking place. Reaching the college, he ascended the steps with a strange mixture of eagerness and reluctance; and immediately became aware of a subdued but excited murmur of voices in the upper hall. At the same moment, Mark Tracey came rushing down the stairs, carpet-bag in hand.

"What's up?" asked Roath, in a voice that trembled in spite of himself.

"I don't rightly know," responded Tracey, hurriedly,—"I am so late for the train, that I couldn't stop to hear. Something about a diamond that Trubie has found in Arling's glass—the one from which the poor fellow drank his death-draught, I believe. Good-by!" And away he went.

Had he waited but for an instant, he would have been startled and spellbound by the deadly whiteness of Roath's face. Through all the glimmering indistinctness of the dimly-lighted hall, his features were clearly discernible, by reason of that marble pallor. For the moment, he seemed to lose sense and consciousness; he would have fallen, except for the friendly support of the wall against which he leaned.

But it was only for a moment. The man's hard energy of character, his iron will, his rigid self-control, though they had gone down before the suddenness and severity of the shock, quickly rose again. With a mighty effort, he rallied his broken forces; back into his face came the look of purpose, the sense of power, the sternness of immitigable resolve; and this with so rapid and almost imperceptible a change, that it seemed as if the granite man must have stood there from the first, and the weak man not at all. While Tracey's receding footsteps still echoed faintly from without, going swiftly in the direction of the city's principal thoroughfare,—while the murmur of voices from above was still at its eager, wondering height,—he had turned, noiselessly descended the steps, and was gliding down through the sombre elm-arches, swift and stealthy as a phantom. The street was shadowy at best, but he chose the darker side; it was wellnigh deserted, at that hour, but he soon turned into a still less frequented one, and then struck into a more assured and less noiseless, as well as swifter, pace.

As he went, he drew a ring from his finger, and glancing hastily round, to make sure that he was unobserved, he flung it far into the dusky shadow of a garden thicket. Only the day before, a friend had said to him,—"Roath, do you know that the stone is gone from your ring?" and he had answered,—"Yes; and I am sorry to have lost it, for it was my father's." And he had proceeded to point out the antique setting, and to describe the peculiar shape and tint of the gem which it had inclosed. He gnashed his teeth as he recalled the short, but momentous conversation. But for that, he would not have fled.

The garden into which he had flung the ring adjoined a small cottage; and, at one of the open windows, a gray-haired dame sat in a high-backed chair, listening to the clear, musical voice of an invisible reader. This fragment of a sentence floated out to him on the dim night air,—"He shall be holden with the cords of—"

Even at that moment, the words struck him sharply. Involuntarily he slackened his pace, and half-turned to catch the remainder of the sentence, but it was inaudible. The uncertainty before him, the terror behind, were, for the time, almost forgotten in a certain chill curiosity. "Holden with the cords—holden with the cords," he repeated to himself, as he hurried on,—"I wonder what book she was reading! I should really like to hear the end of that sentence!"

Still keeping up his swift pace and vigilant glance, he nevertheless sank into a partial abstraction. Some disconnected sentences, breaking at intervals from his lips, served to show the current of his thoughts.

"Set it down, once for all," he muttered, "that crime—absolute crime, of which the law can take hold—is a mistake.—Into the best-laid scheme, the one most carefully framed and skilfully executed, Chance—many would say, Providence (can there be a Providence after all?)—drops some trivial, fortuitous circumstance, which disconcerts or betrays everything.—The question is, could it have been foreseen?—I have worn that ring for sixteen years.—No! no! it is too subtile and too intricate a matter to think about now. I have more pressing subjects of reflection.—Only, set it down, for future use, that the essential thing is to keep clear of crime."

"Holden with the cords!" echoed suddenly and pertinaciously through his memory, as if by way of defiant answer to the conclusion that he had reached. He set his teeth, and dashed more swiftly onward.

Ere long, he reached the railway depot. In a large, underground space, half-filled with smoke and steam, a train stood on the track, the engine fretting and snorting like a steed impatient to be off, and the bell ringing out a hasty summons, curiously typifying the sharp call to leap on to some favorable train of circumstances, and be borne away to fortune or to ruin, which life often gives us, at certain fateful moments of its rapid career. Roath sprang to the rear platform, and, on the instant, the train moved.

Swiftly it left the depot behind: decayed fences, rickety outhouses, heaps of rubbish and offal, quickly receded into a dingy perspective of backside city life; scattered coal-yards, and freight and engine-houses, succeeded; and then, the cool, moist air coming in at the windows, and a swift-gliding panorama of what looked like a terrestrial sky and stars, told him that he was being borne rapidly along the causeway that traversed the broad bay,—in the tranquil waters of which the fair night-heavens were faithfully mirrored. Hastily running his eye over his fifty or sixty fellow-passengers, and finding no familiar face, he settled himself back in his seat with a long-drawn breath of relief. He remembered that he was on an express train, with twenty miles between him and the next station; he could count upon a safe half hour, at least, for the working out of the difficult problem before him. To that problem he at once addressed himself, with the whole force of his intellect and will;—though ever and anon, that perplexing fragment of a sentence would float distractingly through his mind, saying itself over and over to the accompaniment of the sharp click of the rails,—"Holden with the cords—Holden with the cords!"

From that night, for many years, Edmund Roath disappeared as completely from the sight and search of all who had known him, as if the train wherein he sat had suddenly flung itself headlong from that narrow causeway, and those deep, silent, star-mirroring waters, closing above him, had steadfastly refused to give up their dead. In brief space of time, his very name, as well as the circumstances that had made it notorious, was forgotten by those who had been most diligent in passing it from mouth to mouth. Seldom was it recalled even by the few who had known him best, and had yielded the heartiest admiration to his rare intellectual gifts. Having never taken any real hold of any human heart, it was but natural that he should pass behind the first intervening cloud, and leave no vacancy.

Did he thereby escape the worst consequences of his sin?

PART FIRST.
A WAY THAT SEEMETH RIGHT.

I.
"PROVERBS, AND THE INTERPRETATION."

The road was straight, level, and monotonous. It seemed to stretch on for miles, walled in, on either hand, by the rank and profuse foliage of the South. Great cotton woods and water-oaks, walnuts, cypresses, larches, and junipers, stood side by side, with their brawny arms interlaced, and their trunks hidden in a dense and varied undergrowth; while jessamines and wild grapevines climbed up to meet the sunshine at their tops, and pendent moss hung their boughs with swaying drapery of gray-green leaves and filaments.

What lay beyond these walls of verdure was only to be guessed at from occasional and indistinct glimpses. Here, a transient view of corn or vegetable rows, and a sound of voices, gave token of the vicinity of a small plantation or market garden. There, a scarcity of deciduous trees and a predominance of evergreens, a more lush and succulent character of undergrowth, and a dark gleam of stagnant water, betrayed the proximity of an extensive morass. Frequently, the eye lost itself in the complicated vistas of thick pine-barrens, stretching far away to right and left. And, ever and anon, a sudden break in the long line of verdure, and the sight of a diverging wheel-track, quickly lost amid overhanging boughs, served to show in what direction some large rice or cotton estate lay hidden in the circumjacent forest.

It scarcely needs to be added that the road was pleasantly cool and shadowy in the late September afternoon. Even at midday, its track would present but few and scant patches of sunshine, alternating with dense masses of shadow or spots of flickering light and shade. Now, therefore, with the sun hanging red and low in the western horizon, scarce a fitful orange gleam fell athwart the path of the only traveller in sight,—a young man, of thoughtful face and stalwart figure, striding on at a firm, even pace, with a portmanteau strapped across his shoulder. Both the face and the portmanteau seemed to indicate that his walk was not for pleasure merely, but tended to some definite, anticipated goal; while the keen, observant glance with which he noted, not only every object of interest along his route, but the character of the soil beneath and the foliage overhead, showed that his road was as unfamiliar as it had been, for the most part, solitary. Since he left the outskirts of the city of Savalla behind, more than two hours ago, he had seen but three human faces. First, an old negro woman, wrinkled and white-haired, had ducked her decrepit form to him in what would have been, but for the stiffness of her joints, a most deferential courtesy. Later on, a teamster, of the same dependent and obsequious race, had doffed to him the ragged remnant of a palm-leaf hat, and uttered a civil, "Good ebenin', Massa." Lastly, a lank, listless, unkempt, sallow-skinned personage, in a white covered wagon, snapping a long-lashed whip at a nondescript team, and belonging to the curious class known as "crackers," had suddenly nodded to him, after a prolonged, and, at first, contemptuous stare, as if finally convinced of his claim to the civility.

For some time past, the road had led through a monotonous pine barren, and the traveller had fallen into a fit of thought. Raising his eyes, at last, from the path on which they had been fixed in abstraction, he saw that the long vista before him was once more enlivened by a moving object. His keen, far sight, trained in western wilds, easily made it out to be a half-obsolete kind of chaise, moving in the same direction as himself, but moving so slowly that he gained on it at every step. In a few moments, he was close behind it, quietly observing its superannuated style and condition, as well as the skinny little horse that furnished its motive power. Hearing the sound of his quick, firm tread, its occupant lifted his eyes from the tattered volume over which he was poring, and turned to look at him.

He himself, in a very different way, was well worthy of observation. He was small and spare, probably not more than sixty years of age, but looking much older. He had that parched and wizened look, oftenest the work of circumstances rather than years, which makes it difficult to realize that the possessor was ever young. His hair and complexion had once been light; the one was now gray, the other sallow, except for a faint suggestion of red at the tip of an otherwise handsome nose. His breath exhaled a perceptible odor of strong drink, surrounding him as with an atmosphere of inflammable gas. His dress was made up of divers ill-fitting garments that had doubtless accrued to him from cast-off wardrobes; not one of them bearing any relation to the other, but all being in an advanced stage of seediness well suited to the wearer. Something of the same fusing of special incongruities into general fitness also characterized his manner; wherein the mean and furtive air of the shiftless old vagabond was curiously blended with the pathetic dignity of the decayed gentleman.

He eyed the young foot traveller narrowly for a moment, though with a sidelong rather than a straightforward glance; then, bringing his willing horse to a stand by a jerk of the reins, and a sonorous "Whoa!" he lifted his hat and gravely accosted him:—

"Manus manum lavat. Men were meant to help each other. Have a ride, sir?"

The stranger hesitated, perhaps trying to reconcile the address and the speaker, perhaps with a natural enough doubt as to the character of the companionship thus offered. "Thank you," said he, at last, "but I doubt if it be worth while."

"'Good and Quickly seldom meet,'" responded the other, sententiously. "Besides," he added, seeing that the traveller was puzzled to understand the drift of his saw, "Pegasus—I call him Pegasus because he's not winged—is 'like a singed cat, better than he looks.' Moreover, Compagnon bien parlant vaut en chemin chariot branlant. Which may be freely translated, 'Good company shortens the road as much as a swift horse.'"

"Oh! I meant no disrespect to your equipage, I assure you," returned the young man, smiling. "Only, I supposed that I must be near my journey's end. Is it far to Berganton?"

"That depends. 'The last straw breaks the camel's back.' It is three miles, more or less. But I should have said, from your face, that you would want to stop this side of that."

"Do I look so tired? Indeed I am not."

"Um—no, I should say not. But faces show something besides weariness,—'like father, like son,' you know. If your looks are to be trusted, there's an old mansion about a quarter of a mile farther on, whose door ought to open to you of its own accord—if it can open at all."

The young man smiled and shook his head. "I am sorry that my looks should belie me," said he, "but I have no claim upon the said mansion's hospitality."

"Umph! 'tis a wise child that knows its own father. Tush, tush, man!" he added, hastily, seeing the young man's cheek flush, "I meant no harm; proverbs run from my tongue like water from a Dutch roof. Besides, Nao ha palavra maldita se naõ fora mal entendida,—that is to say, 'No word is ill-spoken which is not ill-taken.' But come! come! jump in! I'll carry you to Berganton, since that's your goal, and welcome. The night is drawing on apace; you'll be glad of my pilotage before we get there."

The young man glanced down the darkening road, from which the last ray of sunlight had vanished, and seemed still to hesitate; but finally sprang lightly into the chaise, and the horse jogged on.

"Proverbs," continued the old man, treating his three last sentences as mere parentheses, "have been the study of my life. I know Lord Chesterfield bans them as vulgar, but is he wiser than Solomon? or better authority than Cicero and Scaliger and Erasmus and Bacon and Bentley? Bah! the whole gist of his writings might be compressed into two or three of the maxims that he affects to despise. 'Fair-and-Softly goes far in a day,' will live when his 'Letters' are forgotten. And a good reason why. Proverbs are the royal road to wisdom. They're the crystallized experience of the ages. They epitomize the minds and manners of the people that brought them forth. Who but a 'smooth, fause' Lowland Scot, for instance, would have said 'Rot him awa' wi' butter an' eggs?' Who but a marauding Hielander would have declared, 'It's a bare moor that ane goes o'er and gets na a coo?' Who but poor priest-ridden, king-ridden Spain would have said, Fraile que pide par Dios, pide por dos, 'The friar that begs for God, begs for two;' Quien la vaca del rey come flaca, gorda la paga, 'He who eats the king's cow lean, pays for it fat;'—but I ought to beg your pardon, perhaps you know Spanish?"

"Not very well," good-naturedly replied the young man, taking pity on his companion's inveterate habit of translation, and the delight which it plainly afforded him.

"Well enough, I suppose, to know that it's a mine of wealth to the proverb-hunter," rejoined the old man graciously. "Here, now, is a good one, of a different character,—Adonde vas, mal? Adonde mas hay, 'Whither goest thou, misfortune? To where there is more?' And here is a pertinent question for people who live well without visible resources,—Los que cabras no tienen, y cabritos venden, de donde les vienen? 'They who keep no goats, and yet sell kids, where do they get them?' But, after all, for right sharp and serviceable proverbs, commend me to the Danish. Here is an old collection that I've lately picked up, printed at Copenhagen, in 1761;—-just let me read you two or three."

He opened the dingy volume aforementioned, and proceeded to read, translate, and comment, with infinite zest. "Ingen kommer i Skaden, uden han selv hielper til, 'No man gets into trouble without his own help'—(a moral which no one can point better than your humble servant); Naar det regner Voelling, saa har Stodderen ingen Skee, 'When it rains porridge, the beggar has no spoon'—(there's no contenting discontented people); Ingen Ko kaldes broget uden hun haver en Flek, 'A cow is not called dappled unless she has a spot'—(most gossip has some small foundation); Hvo som vil gjöre et stort Spring, skal gaae vel tilbage, 'He that would leap high must take a long run'—(else we should have bishops and judges without gray hairs); Det kommer igien, sagde Manden, han gav sin So Floesk, 'It will come back again, said the man, when he gave his sow pork:'—don't you see how the patient, shrewd, humorous character of the Danes peeps through them all?

"Yet, if some proverbs are national, others are cosmopolitan, and fit all generations, and all countries. For instance, there's the Greek saw, Archè êmisu pantós,—see how it comes down through every language under the sun, till, at last, it settles into terse English rhyme,

'Well begun
Is half done.'

Or, take that common saying, 'To carry coals to Newcastle,' which seems to have originated in the East. At least, we find it first in the Persian of Saadi, 'To carry pepper to Hindostan;' then the Hebrews have it, 'To carry oil to the City of Olives;' the Greeks, 'owls to Athens;' the Latins, 'wood to the forest;' the French, 'water to the river;' the Dutch, 'firs to Norway;' the Danish—Hallo! Pegasus! what are you about?"

The horse, being left to his own guidance while his master was riding his favorite hobby, had taken occasion to shoot off from the main road into an apparently little-used track, cut through a thick pine-barren at the left. He had made several lengths before his driver, taken at a disadvantage, could pull him up.

"Pegasus is of the opinion that 'the longest way round is the surest way home,'" remarked the old man, apologetically, as he scanned the narrow, tree-lined track, with a view to the possibility of turning safely around. "Or," he added, with a glance of sly humor at the traveller, "perhaps he thinks, as I did just now, that Bergan Hall is your natural destination."

"Bergan Hall," repeated the young man, in a tone of extreme surprise,—"is this the way to Bergan Hall? I thought you came to the village first, from Savalla."

"So you did, once," rejoined the old man, looking surprised, in his turn; "but that must have been before you were born, if your face doesn't belie your age. The road used to make a long elbow, to get round that swamp which you crossed a mile back. But it was straightened thirty years ago at least,—Autre temps, autre chemin,—a different time, a different road. And so you are going to Bergan Hall? Well, thanks to luck and Pegasus, you're in the right way."

"But I must not take you out of yours," responded the young man, good-naturedly. And he had jumped out of the chaise before its owner was well aware of his intention.

"Canis festinans coecos parit catulos," muttered the old man, in a tone of chagrin. "In other words, 'Look before you leap.' I'd as soon have gone this way as the other. My place lies between the Hall and the village, and the choice of roads isn't worth shucks,—at least, in comparison with a pleasant chat. However, you're out, and I suppose it's no use to ask you to get in again, since the Hall is but a few rods away. Keep straight ahead till you come to the old avenue, then turn to the left. Good day, il n'y a si bons compagnons qui ne se separent,—the best friends must part."

"Yes—to meet again," said the young man, pleasantly.

"Very true; les beaux esprits se rencontrent," returned the old man, slowly and cautiously backing his crazy vehicle around. And with another "Good day," and a parting gesture, he quickly disappeared among the fast-falling shadows.

The young man stood looking after him for a moment, with a smile half of amusement, half, of pity, upon his lips. But his features soon settled into something more than their accustomed gravity, and suddenly facing about, he pursued his way.

Ere long the tall, crowded pines of the barren gave place to various stubble and fallow grounds, with here and there a late crop waiting to be harvested; and shortly after, the narrow, irregular track that he had been following encountered a broader and more beaten one. Recognizing this, with some difficulty, as the "avenue" of which his late companion had spoken, he stopped, and gazed up and down with a look of surprise and pain.

It was bare of trees; but on either side extended a long row of live oak stumps, the size of which showed what massive trunks and far-reaching branches had once columned and arched it like a temple. Here and there, some forgotten bole or bough lay and rotted upon the very spot which it had formerly overhung with a soft canopy of verdure, and made beautiful with pleasant play of sunshine and leaf-shadow; while around it gathered a rank luxuriance of weeds, transmuting its slow aristocratic decay into teeming, plebeian life. In one or two cases, as if moved by an almost human sympathy, vines had sprung up around the bereaved stumps, and sought to soften their hard outlines with clinging drapery of leaves and tendrils. They had also done their best to cover up various unsightly gaps in the long lines of ruinous fence that divided the avenue from the open fields on either side. Yet the final effect of these gentle touches was only to deepen the painful impression of the scene. Where they did not reach, the bareness was so much more bare, the dilapidation so much uglier!

The young observer felt this bareness and dilapidation to his heart's core,—felt it all the more keenly because an image of the avenue's pristine grandeur, derived from the surrounding fragments (or from some other source), continually rose before his mind's eye, to heighten its present desolation by contrast. His brow contracted as he gazed; and the expression of his face changed rapidly from surprise to dissatisfaction, from dissatisfaction to perplexity, from perplexity to doubt. Once, he turned as if half-minded to retrace his steps; but the next moment, he shook off his irresolution with a gesture of disdain, and immediately hastened forward.

The avenue terminated in an open, circular space. Evidently, it had once been a lawn; but it was now covered with half-obliterated furrows, showing that at some not very remote period, it had been planted with corn. Around it stood a number of gigantic live-oaks, heavily draped with moss, and brooding dusky shadows under their massive boughs. Fronting upon it, was a large mansion of dark brick, consisting of an upright, two-story main building, with a huge, clustered chimney in the midst, and long, low, rambling wings on either side.

The whole place had a deserted and melancholy appearance. The moss on the live-oaks swayed slowly to and fro in the evening breeze, with a wonderfully sombre and funereal effect; and the mansion was dark and silent as any ruin. Not a light shone from the closed windows; not a sound came from the deep, shadowy doorway; and the unsteady stone steps, slippery with damp and green with moss, gave the impression of a spot where no human foot had left its print for many years.

The young man halted at a little distance from the dark building, and surveyed it moodily. "Can this be Bergan Hall?" he murmured. "Can this gloomy old ruin be the open, cheery, hospitable mansion, full of light and life, that my mother has so often described to me? It looks a habitation for ghosts—and for ghosts only! I wonder if any living being—"

Breaking off abruptly, he ascended the moss-grown steps, only to find that the vines which so heavily draped the portico, had woven a thick network across the door. It was plain that it had not been opened for months, perhaps years. Nevertheless, not to be easily daunted, he found and lifted the knocker. It fell with a dull lifeless sound, that smote the young man's heart like a sudden chill. A dreary reverberation came from within, and then died away into silence. He knocked again, and, listening intently, he fancied that he heard the sound of stealthy footsteps within, and a slight creaking of the floor. But so dead a silence followed upon these imaginary sounds, that he soon became convinced of his involuntary self-deception.

Turning from the door, he now noticed a little footpath running round the end of one of the long wings. Committing himself to this timely guide, he soon came in sight of the rear of the mansion, which looked upon a sort of court; where a few ornamental shrubs still held an uncertain tenure against the encroachments of divers sorts of lawless and vagrant vegetation. At a little distance, was a long range of dilapidated offices, showing upon what an almost princely scale the housekeeping had once been administered. But this part of the premises was not less dark, silent, and deserted, than the other.

The footpath still held on, however, past the court and the offices, toward a bright light at a considerable distance, "The negro quarter!" muttered the young man, recognizing the whereabout of one of the most salient features of his mother's well-remembered descriptions. "At least, I may learn there what it all means." And, quickening his steps, he soon came upon a busy and picturesque scene.

In the midst of a large, quadrangular space, flanked on three sides by double rows of negro-cabins, and on the fourth apparently sloping down to a water-course, was a rough sort of threshing-mill, now idle, but showing satisfactory results of its day's labor in a large heap of rice by its side. A crowd of negroes, of both sexes, coarsely and uncouthly clad, were busily filling odd, shallow baskets from this heap, which they then poised on their heads, and bore off down the slope to some unseen goal. There were two regular, silent files, the one coming, the other going; and the heap of grain steadily and even swiftly diminished. Near the mill, stood the only white person visible,—a large, powerfully-framed man, carelessly and even shabbily dressed, yet with the unmistakable air of ownership about him. At his left hand, a half-naked, impish looking negro boy was holding a blazing pitch-pine torch, by the light of which he seemed to be jotting down some sort of memoranda in a small book.

The scene was even more strange and weird than picturesque. The dark figures of the negroes, filing noiselessly up the shadowed slope, suddenly grew distinct, wild, and fantastic, within the circle of enchantment made by the flaring light of the torch, only to become dim and spectral again when received back into the dusk. They might have passed for embodiments of those vagaries of the mind, which come from no one knows whither, play their fitful parts within the illuminated circle of the imagination, and vanish as they came. The young man would almost have taken it as a matter of course, had the whole spectacle suddenly melted into thin air.

Yet, even in that case, he would have expected the masterful personage aforementioned to have remained, as the one tangible link between the phantasms and the earth. In truth, a single glance at his massive figure, which seemed to have been hewn out of the rock, rather than moulded from any softer material, went far to disenchant the scene. Here was a touch of the actual, the substantial, and the dogmatic, not to be mistaken; and serving as a clue to the reality of everything else.

Toward this personage, after a moment's scrutiny, the young man unhesitatingly made his way, with the air of one who has found something certain amid much that is confused, illusory, and perplexing. He was immediately spied by the negroes, and followed by their curious gaze; albeit, they ventured not to intermit their labor for an instant, but contented themselves with slowly and stiffly turning their burdened heads toward him as they marched on, and keeping their shining black eyes fixed on him to the last, in such that the heads of the retreating file seemed to have been set on backwards. The boy with the torch was perhaps the most wondering, open-mouthed gazer of them all.

As yet, the master of the premises had not been made aware of the stranger's approach; but, looking up to reprimand his torch-bearer for inattention, he observed the imp's dumbfounded gaze, and turned to see what had caused it.

"My uncle, Mr. Bergan, I presume," said the young man, taking off his hat, and bowing low: "I am Bergan Arling." And he added, after a moment, seeing that the other did not speak, "I bring you a letter from my mother."

II.
STUDYING TO ANSWER.

Major Bergan—to give him the title by which he was known throughout the country round—displayed no alacrity of welcome. He first scanned his visitor closely from head to foot, and then silently extended his hand for the letter which the young man had drawn forth from an inner pocket.

"Hold that light here!" were his first words, in a tone deep as a thunder-peal, and addressed not to Bergan Arling, but to the aforesaid torch-bearer. "And quit your staring, and mind your business, or I'll—"

The sentence died away in an inarticulate growl, but the boy was plainly at no loss to understand its purport. With a startled look, he fixed his eyes on the torch, and only ventured to withdraw them for an occasional, furtive glance at the object of his curiosity. Meanwhile, his master opened the letter, and read it deliberately from beginning to end. The light of the torch fell full upon his face as he did so, giving Bergan Arling an opportunity to study him, in his turn.

His face was a striking one; in youth it had doubtless been handsome. Now, his brow was too massive, his mouth too stern, his eyes too cold, his beard too gray and heavy, to bear any relation to mere personal beauty. All soft lights and lines had long gone out of them; what remained was hard, bold, and rugged, as a rocky headland in winter. The rude strength which was the marked characteristic of his form, repeated itself emphatically in his face. Comparing it with the mental portrait, carefully touched and retouched by his mother's hand, which Bergan had carried in his mind since childhood, he felt that the one resembled the other only as a tree in autumn, stripped bare of its foliage and its blossoms, resembles the same tree in its gracious summer bloom and verdure. Little trace of the frank, proud lineaments, the warm, yet generous temper, of that ideal picture, was to be found in this harsh, stubborn, sarcastic face; the face of a man long given over to the hardening influences of a solitary and a selfish life. In short, Major Bergan confirmed anew the old truth that no man can live long for himself alone, shutting out all gentler ties and amenities, and driving straight at his own practical ends, unmindful of either the ways, the opinions, or the feelings of others, without reaping his due reward in a loss of moral health, and a gradual decay of all his finer sensibilities and higher instincts.

The only point wherein the real man resembled the ideal one, was in a certain ineffaceable pride of birth, showing itself not only in his port, but darkening his harsh features with a heavy shade of hauteur.

Yet a smile might do much to light up and soften the Major's face; and the smile came when he had finished the letter, and did its work all the more effectually because it was a somewhat sad one.

"Forty and two years," said he, musingly, "since Eleanor went! Yet I can see her now, with her bright face and her arch ways! She was the sunshine of the old Hall; it has never been the same place since she left it. And she would hardly know it, if she were to come back now! But times change; and we are fools if we do not change with them. Well, my boy! I'm glad to see you, and that is not what I would say to many,—I'm not much in the way of having visitors. But Eleanor's son is heartily welcome to the old place."

He took his nephew's hand, shook it cordially, and continued to hold it in a vice-like grasp, while he once more attentively scanned the young man's features.

"You are a true Bergan," he said, at length, "I'm glad to see that! And you have her eyes, too. Ah, what eyes they used to be! as soft and bright as any fawn's! Well! well! it's no use to think of the old times—they can't come back. But I am right glad to see you, my boy; and I take it very kind of Eleanor to have sent you to me. Is she much changed?"

"I suppose so," said Bergan, smiling,—"that is, since you knew her. She has not changed greatly during my remembrance. She is a young-looking woman yet, for her years; her eyes are still bright, and her cheeks rosy. Our western climate and life have agreed with her well. Yet I cannot fancy her a young lady."

"Ah, but you shall see her as a young lady! There's a portrait of her in the old house, taken not long before she went away, that does everything but speak and move. Indeed, I used to imagine that it did both, when I had it in my quarters out here, as I did for a time. But it gave me the blues so, to look at it, and think how things used to be, and see how they had altered, that I finally sent it back to its old place in the portrait gallery. But how did you get here, at this hour?"

"I walked from Savalla, leaving my baggage—except this portmanteau—to come on by stage to-morrow."

"Walked! A nice little tramp of thirteen miles or more! Why in the name of sense didn't you ride?"

"I was too late for the stage, and could not readily find a hack. To be sure, I wasted but little time in looking for one; I do not mind walking, I am used to it."

"That may do very well for the West. But you'll lose caste, my boy, if you walk here. You must have a horse."

"When I can afford it," replied the young man, lightly shrugging his shoulders. "Meanwhile, doubtless I shall find my western habit useful, if vulgar. But I am not prepared to admit that it is vulgar. A young English nobleman, who spent some months in our neighborhood, was a practised walker; he thought nothing of fifteen or twenty miles, on occasion. And if it was 'caste' for him, why not for me?"

"Humph! we Southerners boast a good deal of our English ancestors, but we don't feel called upon to imitate them!"

With the softening recollections of his youth, the Major had also laid aside his unwonted gentleness of manner; and the freezing satire of his last words, though it was doubtful whether he meant it for himself or his nephew, pained the young man's ear. Instinctively he dropped the discussion.

"I forgot to mention," said he, "that I did not walk quite the whole distance. A queer old character whom I overtook, insisted upon giving me a lift to Berganton."

"To Berganton! What had you to do with Berganton, I should like to know?"

"I was not aware that the road had been changed; I supposed that I must needs pass through the village on my way to Bergan Hall. I intended to stay there over night, and come to you early in the morning,—I did not think it right to descend upon you suddenly, late at night. But finding myself unexpectedly on the road hither, and almost in sight of the Hall, I regarded it as an indication of Providence not to be misunderstood."

"And well you did!" returned the Major, with rude emphasis, "well you did! I should have taken it as a direct insult if my sister's son had slept anywhere in this region, but on the old place. I wish I could say, under the old roof," he went on, in a friendlier tone, "but that leaks like a sieve, and I quitted it long ago. Of course, it might have been mended; but, to tell the truth, the old house was much too big and gloomy and damp and disagreeable to keep bachelor's hall in comfortably, and I was glad to get out of it. Besides, I'd had all sorts of trouble with my overseers, and I decided that the only way to have things managed to my mind was to manage them myself. In order to do that, it was necessary to be on the spot. So I fixed up my overseer's cottage into a snug little box for myself, where I'm as cosey and comfortable as a rat in a rice-heap. But come in, and see for yourself how it looks. Jip, you rascal! why don't you take your young master's portmanteau?"

The torch-boy caught the portmanteau, and Bergan followed his uncle into a small cottage at one corner of the quadrangle, so situated as to command a view both of the mill and the cabins. The room into which he was ushered was plainly but comfortably furnished. A fire of pitch-pine knots blazed on the hearth, reddening the rough walls and the bare floor with its pleasant glow. A slipshod negress, with a gay turban, was busy laying the table for supper. The effect was, upon the whole, cheery, and ought to have been especially so to a tired and hungry traveller; yet Bergan looked around him with a manifest air of disappointment. His uncle noticed it, and remarked, apologetically,

"You would prefer to see the Hall, eh? Well, you shall see it in the morning, and I reckon you'll agree with me that it's anything but a cheerful-looking abode. Though, if I had known that a nephew of mine was coming to keep me company, I don't know but I should have stayed there."

The negress now signified that supper was on the table, the food having been brought in, ready cooked, from the nearest cabin; and Major Bergan pointed to a chair opposite his own.

"Sit down, Harry, and fall to. Your tramp must have given you a right sharp appetite."

"Thank you. But, uncle, my name is Bergan, not Harry."

"Not Harry!" repeated the Major, sharply,—"I should like to know the reason why! Didn't your mother write that she had named you for me?"

"Yes, certainly. But she regarded you as the head of the family, and in giving me the family name—"

"She named you for the whole breed—my degenerate half-brother and all!" interrupted the Major, bringing his clenched fist down upon the table with a force that threatened to demolish it. "I tell you what it is, sir, I shall not stand any half-way work! If you are named after me, you've got to go the whole figure. Harry Bergan Arling you are, and Harry Bergan Arling you shall be,—at least as long as you stay in these parts."

The imperious tone of this speech was by no means agreeable to Bergan's ear; it was not without an effort that he replied, pleasantly;—

"Call me what you like, uncle. I shall not refuse to answer to any name that you are pleased to give me."

Major Bergan was evidently much gratified. "That's right, my boy!—we'll shake hands upon that!" he exclaimed, heartily. "I'm glad to see that Eleanor has raised her son in the good old fashion of submission to elders. Bless my soul! I thought it was entirely obsolete. Young men round here know more at twenty than the fathers that begot them. As for obedience, they leave that to the negroes."

The meal was abundant and substantial. It consisted of a single course, of bacon, vegetables, and corn-bread, very simply, not to say rudely, served. It would seem that the master of the feast cared no more for refinements of table than of manner. Here, as elsewhere, were to be seen the pernicious effects of his solitary mode of life. He ate greedily; he forgot his duties as host, or they came but tardily to his remembrance; he fell into fits of abstraction, and started as from a dream at the sound of his nephew's voice. Yet tokens were not wanting that he had once been well versed in the art of external manners. At intervals, answering involuntarily, as it were, to the touch of Bergan's fine, natural courtesy, the gentlemanly instincts of earlier days revived, and flung a momentary grace around his words and actions. It was like the sunbeams that occasionally glimmer out over a cloudy landscape, attracting the gaze even more surely than any full blaze of splendor, yet causing a certain impatience, as if they ought either to kindle into satisfactory brightness, or be wholly extinguished. The rudeness of his ordinary manner was only thrown into bolder relief by these flashes of a half-extinct good breeding.

To meet the demands of thirst, a bottle of brandy, and another of water, stood by Major Bergan's plate; which, after filling his own glass, he pushed over to his nephew.

"There, Harry! that is what will put new life into you, after your journey."

"Thank you; but I seldom use brandy."

"A little too strong for you, eh?" returned the Major, indulgently. "Well, there's a stock of wine in the cellar of the Hall,—I reckon some of it must be fifty or sixty years old, it has been there ever since I can remember,—I'll send for a bottle or two of that." And he uplifted a stentorian call of "Jip," which brought that urchin-of-all-work to the door, in breathless haste.

"Uncle,"—began Bergan, but the Major was thundering out minute directions about cellars, and keys, and tiers, and labels, and either could not, or would not, hear.

"I am sorry that you have given yourself the trouble," said Bergan, when quiet was restored. "I do not care for wine."

Major Bergan set down his glass, and looked at his nephew sternly and gloomily. "Don't tell me that you are a mean-spirited teetotaller," he growled. "I can't say how I might take it. There never was a milksop in the family yet."

"No, I am hardly that. But I am not accustomed to use spirituous liquors of any sort. And I certainly do not need them. I am in perfect health; I hardly know what it is to feel tired."

"I wish I didn't!" muttered his uncle, a little less savagely. "I'm pretty hearty, for my years, to be sure. But an ache gets into my bones now and then, just to remind me that I am not so young as I was once. And the best thing to rout it is a good glass of brandy. Better take one?"

"Not if you will be so good as to excuse me," replied Bergan, with a smile so frank, and a gesture so courteous, that the Major was irresistibly mollified.

"A guest's wish is a command," said he, with one of his rare glimmers of courtesy. "But here comes the wine! I really cannot excuse you from that,—at least, I should be very loath to do so. I'll even join you in a glass. Here's to your mother's health and happiness!—you won't refuse to drink that, not on the place where she was raised."

If Bergan was annoyed by his uncle's persistency, he forebore to show it. But, having duly honored the toast, he pushed his glass aside, and declined every invitation to have it refilled.

"Well, well," said his uncle, at last, in a tone of resignation, "we won't quarrel about it now. But I see that your education is incomplete, and I shall take it upon myself to finish it. If I don't teach you to drink like a gentleman, in a month, I shall know that you are no true Bergan, in spite of your looks."

Bergan only smiled.

"Your temperance is the one thing I don't like about you," pursued his uncle, filling his own glass to the brim. "Ah, yes, there's one more;—your mother writes that you have studied law, and mean to practise it."

"Yes; I received my license just two months ago."

"Humph! it's well named! 'License,' indeed! Licensed to lie, cheat, steal,—or, at least, to help others to do so, which amounts to the same thing. No, no, Harry; it may be well to know law enough to keep from being imposed upon, but a Bergan can't stoop to practise it. Lawyers are, without exception, a set of miserable, lying, sneaking pettifoggers. You could drop the souls of a dozen into a child's thimble, and they'd rattle in the end of it after she had put it on her finger."

Bergan's cheek flushed a little, but he was more impressed by the comic than the provoking side of his uncle's dogged prejudice, and he only answered, good-humoredly;—

"I am sorry that you should have had occasion to think so badly of the profession. I shall feel that it is incumbent upon me to make you change your opinion."

"Never!" growled Major Bergan, with an oath. "You would find it easier to lift the Gibraltar rock on the point of a needle. Unless," he added, after a moment, "you can tell me how to make a suit lie against Godfrey Bergan. I've been trying it for ten years, and I've spent money enough to buy another plantation as large as this."

"My uncle Godfrey!" exclaimed Bergan, in much surprise. "Why, what has he done?"

"You had better not call him your 'uncle Godfrey' in my hearing," responded the Major, grimly. "In ceasing to be my half-brother, he ceased to be your uncle. Done! What hasn't he done? First, he got his head filled with cursed abolitionist notions, and freed all his slaves. Next, he offered the greater part of his land for sale at public auction;—just think of it! some of the old lands of Bergan Hall put up to be knocked down to the highest bidder! But I settled that business, by proclaiming far and wide that whoever bid for them might expect to reckon with me for his impertinence; and as I'm known to be a man of my word, no one dared to lift his voice at the sale, and I got them at my own price. Finally Godfrey capped the climax of his degeneracy by opening a hardware store in Berganton. Think of that, Hairy!—a Bergan of Bergan Hall, with a long pedigree of warriors and nobles at his back, standing behind a counter, selling hoes and tea-kettles to negroes and crackers!"

Bergan was silent. Though not without some touch of family pride, derived from his mother, he had nevertheless been taught to believe all upright labor honorable, to hold that life was ennobled from within, by its motive and aim, rather than from without, by its place and form. He could not help suspecting, therefore, that his host, deliberately leading the narrow life of an overseer of slaves, on his ancestral estate, was in reality a more degenerate son of his house than the relative whom he so bitterly contemned. Yet he foresaw that any attempt to defend Godfrey Bergan would but result in bringing down upon himself a torrent of fierce, half-drunken vituperation. Seasoned vessel though he were, the Major's repeated draughts of brandy, very little diluted, had not been without effect, in flushing his face, and inflaming his habitually irritable temper. His present mood would ill brook contradiction.

Fortunately, he neither expected nor waited for an answer. Hastily emptying his glass and filling it again, he went on.

"Now, Harry, if you can tell me any way by which I can ruin his business, turn him out of his house, and make him quit the country, I'll own that I've done the law an injustice, and give you a handsome fee besides. Can the thing be done?"

Bergan silently shook his head; he would not trust himself to speak.

"Just as I told you!" exclaimed the Major, with great virulence of expression. "The law has plenty of quibbles and quirks for the help of rogues and scoundrels, but it can't lend a hand to an honest cause, at a pinch! I'll none of it, Harry! I'll none of it! Get what you know of it out of your head as soon as you can."

The Major paused long enough to empty his glass, and then resumed, in a more amiable tone. "The best thing you can do, Harry, is to stay here with me; I'll make a rice-planter of you. It doesn't take a ninny for that, by any means; your talents will not be thrown away. And if we suit each other,—as I think we shall,—I'll give you Bergan Hall when my title to it expires. To be sure, I'm strong and hearty yet; but no one lasts forever. And as you are named for me, and I like your looks, I would rather give it to you than anybody else. In fact, I've had it in my mind, for some time, to write to Eleanor and ask her to do just what she has done,—send one of her boys to live with me, and be my heir."

"You mistake," said Bergan, quickly, "neither my mother nor myself had any such idea. She merely wished me to consult you about commencing my profession in—"

"Tut! tut! Harry," interrupted his uncle, "I meant it, if you and she did not. And I mean it more than ever now; that is, if you'll yield to my wish about the law. But if you persist in sticking to that, I give you up, once for all—mind, I give you up!"

"I should deserve to be given up," replied Bergan, smiling, "if I were lightly to forsake a vocation for which I am fitted both by taste and education, to enter upon one of which I know absolutely nothing. I may reasonably hope to succeed as a lawyer; I fear I should make but a poor planter. Moreover, it would not suit me to be dependent upon any one."

"Stuff! nonsense!" exclaimed Major Bergan, bluntly. "I defy you to make a poor planter under my tuition,—I claim to understand that business. As for dependence, never you fear but that I shall get aid and comfort enough out of you to make our accounts square. For, after all, Harry, it is a dreary kind of a life that I'm leading, without chick or child, kith or kin, to speak to, or to care for. I cannot help asking myself, sometimes, what is the good of it all, and how Is it to end. But with a fine young fellow like you here, to enter into my plans now, and carry them out after I'm gone,—why, it would be like a fresh lease of life to me! We'll rebuild the old house, you shall drop the 'Arling,' and behold the seventh Harry Bergan of Bergan Hall, on this side the water! And really, I don't see how you can do better, Harry. Here are wealth, position, influence, and a chance to oblige your old uncle,—ready to your hand. Stay, my boy, stay!"

The Major's bluff voice had sunken to a hoarse tone of sadness, in his confession of loneliness, and finally, to one of entreaty, that touched his nephew's heart. Nor was the prospect held up before him without its own peculiar and powerful attraction. He looked thoughtfully into the fire, debating with himself what and how he should reply. His uncle watched him keenly for a moment, and then said, in his kindest tone and manner;—

"Well, Harry, I won't press you for an answer, now. Stay here a month or two, and look around you; and then, we'll talk the matter over again, and see if we cannot settle upon something that shall be mutually satisfactory. For so long, surely, you can afford to be my guest."

III.
"PATTERN OF OLD FIDELITY."

Before Bergan could answer, there came a low tap at the door. A negro woman, of unusual height, and singularly venerable and dignified aspect, stood, courtesying slightly, on the threshold. She was plainly of great age,—her face was deeply furrowed, and her hair, where it could be seen under the dark blue kerchief that covered her head, was white as snow,—yet her shoulders had not bent under the burden of years, her tall frame, though gaunt, was little palsied by the touch of actual infirmity. Although she carried a cane, it was not so much for its support, as for its aid in feeling out her way along her accustomed paths; she had been blind for many years.

"Master Harry," said she, clasping her hands over the head of her cane, and speaking in slow, somewhat tremulous tones, but with neither the slovenly utterance nor the vicious pronunciation of the ordinary slave,—"Master Harry, excuse me if I interrupt you, but I could not wait any longer,—I wanted so much to see Miss Eleanor's son!"

"It is Maumer Rue," said Major Bergan, not only with unwonted kindness of tone, but with something akin to respect in his manner;—"your mother must have spoken to you of our old nurse, Harry?"

"Indeed she has!" exclaimed Bergan, earnestly, starting up to take the blind woman's hand. "Your name has always been a household word with us. The story of your devotion to my mother, in saving her from the flames, at the risk of your own life, and with the ultimate loss of your sight, was the one story of which we children never used to tire. Probably we felt, in our vague, childish way, that it was the one which came from the profoundest depth in her own heart,—since she could never tell it to us without a little tremor in her voice, and a soft dewiness in her eyes,—and that was the secret of its charm for us. You may be sure that she has never forgotten how much she owes you!"

The old woman's lips trembled, and large tears gathered in her sightless eyes. "The Lord bless my dear young lady!" she ejaculated fervently,—"I knew she would never forget her old maumer. And it's like her to make much of my little service; but I did nothing but what was my duty—nothing."

"She thinks otherwise," replied Bergan, kindly. "She regards it as one of those rare instances of courage and devotion, for which the whole world is better and brighter. She bade me give you her kindest love, and tell you that you must not despair of meeting her once more, even on this side the grave. When the new railroad is finished, as far as our place,—which it promises to be in a year or two,—she fully intends to revisit her childhood's home, and look once more upon the faces of her childhood's friends. She furthermore charged me to pay you an early visit, in your own quarters, and tell you everything about her western home and life that you might care to hear."

"How kind of Miss Eleanor to think of that!" responded the blind woman, delightedly. "It shows that she's just her own old self, always trying to think what everybody would like, and then doing her best to give it to them. Of course, there's a hundred questions that I should like to ask about her; and if you really don't mind answering them, and will do me the honor to step into my little cabin, some day when you're passing by, I shall be more obliged to you than I can rightly tell. But as to my ever seeing Miss Eleanor again,—I beg your pardon, sir; you see I've not yet learned to say Mrs. Arling,—though there's nothing on earth that would make me so glad as to meet her again, and hear the sound of her sweet, cheery voice, yet I'm getting to be too old to dare to reckon much upon the future. But the next best thing to meeting her, is to meet her son, here on the old place; and I thank the Lord that He has let me live long enough for that."

The old negress bent her head devoutly for a moment, and then turned to Major Bergan. "Does he favor Miss Eleanor much, Master Harry?" she asked.

"Yes, he is a good deal like her, maumer; he has her eyes exactly. But he is even more like what I was forty years ago; it really makes me feel young again to look at him. He's a real Bergan, I can tell you that."

Maumer Rue smiled as if well pleased; yet the smile seemed a little burdened with sadness, too; and Bergan saw that it was followed by a look of extreme wistfulness.

"Can I do anything for you?" he asked, kindly.

"Nothing, master,—unless—if it is not asking too much,—and if you would not mind the touch of an old woman's fingers, that have to serve her instead of eyes, I could get so much clearer an idea of your looks,—" and she finished the sentence by raising her hand significantly toward his face.

Bergan was much moved. "Of course I should not mind," said he, drawing near to her;—"examine me as closely as you like. It would be strange indeed if there were anything unpleasant to me in the touch of hands that have done so much for my mother!"

"It's easy to see that you are Miss Eleanor's son, you have just her kind, pleasant ways," responded the blind woman, gratefully. "He is a little taller than you, Master Harry," she continued, turning toward the Major, as she laid her hand on Bergan's head,—"yes, just a little taller, though not much."

"All the better for that," remarked the Major, parenthetically, "the Bergans must not degenerate."

Maumer Rue went on, without noticing the interruption; passing her fingers lightly over Bergan's features, as she spoke. "His brow is square and full, like yours, and he has the same straight nose; but his eyes are not so deep-set, nor his eyebrows so heavy. His jaw is like yours, too,—the set, square jaw of the Bergans,—but his mouth is more like Miss Eleanor's:—a sweet, pleasant mouth she had, the mouth of the Habershams, her mother's family. Yet it could be firm enough, too, when there was need; our Miss Eleanor had plenty of character. And I'm right glad to see that you are so much like her; you couldn't resemble any one better or handsomer."

She made a slight pause, and then added, in a half-humorous way,—"I reckon she couldn't give you any spice of the 'black Bergan temper,' as she had none of it herself."

"I am afraid she did," answered Bergan, laughing, yet coloring, too; "and many a scrape it has gotten me into, before now. But I hope that I am learning to control it a little."

"I don't see why you should," broke in the Major, gruffly. "The Bergan temper is an heir-loom to be proud of; it identifies the breed. It has run in the blood from time immemorial. A Bergan without it—that is, a male, of course a woman counts for nothing—would be no Bergan at all."

"You say true, Master Harry," rejoined Rue, composedly; "it's always run in the blood, and heated it more than was good for it, many a time. Yet, now and then, there has been a Bergan who has learned how to keep it under, and been all the better for doing it. You surely must recollect what a mild, kind gentleman your father was, young as you were when he died; and I've heard say that there never was a truer Bergan, or one more respected all the country through."

The Major made a grimace, and muttered something unintelligible, in a tone half of acquiescence, half of irritation.

Rue turned again to Bergan. "You have been very patient with an old woman's talk, and an old woman's infirmity," said she, with a kind of natural dignity,—"I will not trouble you any longer. Good night, and thank you, Master—what name shall I say?"

Bergan hesitated, and looked doubtfully at his uncle.

"He says his name is Bergan," explained the Major, shortly; "but I have given him to understand that he is to be known by my own name, Harry, while he stays here."

Rue shook her head. "There can be but one Master Harry for me," she said quietly,—"the one that I nursed as a babe and petted as a child, the one that I have lived with so many years, and who has always been so kind to me—kinder even than he has been to himself. So please let me call him Master Bergan; but, of course, the rest of the people will give him any name that you say."

"Of course they will," returned the Major, haughtily, "or I'll know the reason why. As for you, maumer, I shall let you do as you please; you've had your own way too long to be balked of it now. But take care that the others don't hear and imitate you,—or you know what they'll get.".

"Thank you, Master Harry," replied Rue, as gratefully as if the assent had been more graciously given,—"you are always good to your poor old maumer. Good night." And she turned to go.

But on the threshold, she paused, and lifted her sightless face toward the dim night-sky, across which dark clouds were swiftly scudding.

"Master Harry," said she, suddenly, "do you remember how I told you, six months ago, that the Bergan star was set, and how angry you were?"

"Yes, yes, I remember," exclaimed the Major, hoarsely and eagerly,—"what of it?"

She slowly raised her right hand, and pointed skyward, with a strange, intent, watchful expression in her uplifted "See! it is rising!" said she; "it comes up through the clouds,—they try to hold it back, but they cannot,—it grows brighter! it rises higher!—ah!"—drawing her breath hard and gaspingly,—"it stops—it goes down again!—the clouds cover it!—it is—No! it is not gone! it shines faintly behind the clouds—it breaks through—slowly, slowly, slowly,—it rises! it rises!"

Yielding, half-unconsciously, to the powerful influence of the blind woman's rapt, ecstatic manner, Bergan had drawn near to her, and now saw, with surprise, a single star shining for a moment through the rifts of the clouds. Glancing at the Major, whom he had before seen to be hanging with breathless interest upon the words of the old negress, he perceived that his eyes were fixed upon it also, with a gaze that was half-awed, half-triumphant. He knew not what to think.

Maumer Rue still stood in the same commanding attitude, with raised hand, and intent, uplooking face. Suddenly, her arm fell by her side; her head drooped on her breast; the majesty that had informed her pose and gesture went out like an expiring flame; she shivered, tottered, and would have fallen but for the Major's prompt support. Without a word, he guided her safely to the door of her cabin.

Coming back, he reseated himself at the table, which had been cleared of everything but the bottles and glasses, and hastily poured out and swallowed some raw brandy. Then he remarked, in a half-explanatory and half-apologetic tone,—

"She enjoys the reputation of a seer, or prophetess, among the negroes; and I really think she has some faith in it herself. Certainly, she seems to have strange visions now and then; and some of her predictions have come true; I confess she puzzles even me. At all events, she is the best and most faithful old creature that ever lived. She was born on the estate, brought up in the Hall with my father and his sisters, shared their education, is thoroughly steeped in the family traditions, duly infected with the family pride, and entirely devoted to the family interests. She is the only person that I allow to do pretty much as she pleases; her long and faithful services to my father, Eleanor, and myself, deserve that much, I think. And really, she is of great use to me; I scarcely know what I should do without her. The negroes all believe her to be a hundred years old—undoubtedly she is past ninety—and that, together with her reputation as a prophetess, gives her great power over them, and saves me a heap of trouble in managing them. She has very good judgment, too, in many things; I frequently take her advice, and never yet had occasion to regret doing so. Indeed, it was chiefly at her instigation and entreaty that I had made up my mind, as I told you, to write to your mother about sending me one of her sons."

He paused for a moment, and then asked, in a careless tone, but with a quick, keen glance at his nephew, from under his shaggy brows,—"Did you see that star?"

"Yes," answered Bergan. "It was a curious coincidence."

"Hum—very," returned his uncle, evidently not quite satisfied with this view of the matter. But he said no more.

The conversation now turned into various other channels. It touched for a brief space upon the indefatigable quoter of proverbs whom Bergan had overtaken on his way to the Hall; and whom the Major declared to be the only living representative of one of the oldest and most influential families in the county. He had been reared in affluence, had been educated in Europe, and had inherited a large fortune and a fine estate. But he had early fallen into bad habits,—not so much from viciousness of temper and taste, as from weakness of will and consequent inability to resist temptation,—had run a short, rapid career of folly, extravagance, and dissipation, in which he had frittered away his inheritance, and so had gradually sunken into his present state of semi-vagabondage. He lived, by sufferance, in a little cabin, on one corner of the estate which he had formerly owned. From his wholesale shipwreck of fortune, position, will, energy, and hope, he had saved but one thing—his love of proverbs. It had even grown stronger in proportion as other things wasted and failed,—like a plant striking deep root into soil enriched by the decay of many sister plants. He had learned several languages solely for the sake of their proverbs; he had even been seen to hesitate and waver long between the diverse, but powerful, attractions of a bottle of ardent spirits and a dingy, old collection of saws, when but one came within the compass of his purse; and he was known far and wide by the sobriquet of "Proverb Dick." His real name was Richard Causton.

In listening to this history, Bergan could not but be struck by the curiously discriminating character of the Major's animadversion. He had little, or nothing, to say in disapproval of the depraved and ungovernable appetite for strong drink which, it was easy to see, had played so important part in ruining poor Richard Causton; while he could find no words strong enough to express his bitter contempt for the flabby will, the pitiable irresolution, and the insane extravagance, which had joined hands with that appetite for his complete destruction. Tender, as a mother to her babe, over the fault which he knew himself to possess (if he secretly acknowledged it to be a fault), Major Bergan was merciless to the weaknesses from which he was saved by a hardier will and a more energetic temperament.

But as the evening wore on, and the brandy slowly worked its way up to the stronghold of his brain, the Major's talk grew discursive, profane, and incoherent; until Bergan, shocked and pained, and anxious to escape from the mortifying spectacle, pleaded fatigue, and begged permission to retire. Jip was accordingly summoned, and he was conducted to a little, low room under the cottage roof, where his portmanteau had been bestowed, and some little provision made for his comfort.

Here Bergan quickly threw himself on the bed, to find, for the first time in his life, that it was one thing to woo the fair maiden Sleep, and another to win her. Recollections of his western home, of his mother, of the ancestral traditions on which his childish imagination had fed, of his youthful studies and aspirations, of his recent journey, and the disappointment in which it had ended, mingled with half-conceived plans and half-acknowledged hopes,—a vague, changeable, teasing, tireless procession of thoughts and images,—filed slowly through his mind, compelling his reluctant gaze, and blocking up every avenue to Slumberland. And if, for an instant, the vexing march stopped, and the importunate images began to waver and blend, sounds of stamping feet, of jingling glass, of muttered oaths and sentences, or two or three half-sung, half-shouted lines of a drunken ditty, coming up from below, startled him once more into wakefulness, and told him that his uncle's solitary debauch was not yet ended. It was already gray dawn when, worn out with restlessness, he fell into a brief slumber, and dreamed that old Rue, with the Bergan star in her hand, was beckoning him to follow her over a dreary, desolate country, full of briers and pitfalls, wherein he was so constantly entangled that, in spite of his best endeavors, he could never get any nearer to her. Turning suddenly, she flashed the star into his eyes, and:—oh, horror of horrors!—he was blind!

Starting up, all in a tremble, he found that the risen sun was shining full in his face, through the uncurtained window. It was morning.

IV.
A GOODLY HERITAGE.

Early as was the hour, Bergan found the table already laid for breakfast in the room below, where he was soon joined by the Major. He brought with him (besides a noticeable odor of brandy), a cordial morning greeting, and a temper which, though by no means urbane, had a certain, flavor of bluff good nature, in pleasing contrast with his extreme irritability of the preceding evening. Encouraged by these and similar signs of a clearer mental atmosphere, Bergan ventured to mention his uncle Godfrey, and to remark that he had been charged with a letter to him from his mother, which he must take an early opportunity to deliver.

"Eh! what?" asked the Major, laying down his knife and fork, with the look and tone of a man who doubts the evidence of his own senses.

Bergan quietly repeated his words.

The Major's face grew dark, and his eyebrows met in a heavy frown. "I shall take it mighty hard of you, if you do," said he, sternly and gloomily. "I tell you, Harry, he is no Bergan at all, and he ought not to be treated like one. Eleanor would never have written to him, nor desired you to visit him, if she had known the true state of affairs;—you can safely take that for granted, and act accordingly. Besides," he went on, after a slight pause, "it is only fair to warn you that any one who goes from Bergan Hall over to Oakstead (that's what he calls his place), doesn't come back again,—with my consent. There's no relation, nor commerce, nor sympathy, nor liking, between the two places; and there never can be any while I live,—nor after I am dead, either, if I can help it. So just put that matter out of your head, Harry, and say no more about it."

Bergan looked down, and the color rose to his brow. Without seeking to know the merits of the quarrel between his two uncles, he nevertheless felt that the abject submission, the complete surrender of principle and will, expected of him by Major Bergan, was simply impossible; and he began to wonder if it were not his wisest course to place himself at once on tenable ground, by saying that, while he should always be glad of his uncle's advice, and ready to give all due and respectful consideration to his wishes, yet, in matters involving questions of right and duty, the final appeal must needs be to his own conscience. Something of this sort was upon his lips, when the Major spoke again, and in a more amiable tone.

"I am really sorry, for your sake, Harry, that things are just as they are," said he. "Of course, it is not agreeable to you to run thus unexpectedly against a family feud;—I really ought to have written Eleanor about it, but I thought to spare her the knowledge of her half-brother's disgrace. Besides, as Godfrey is our nearest neighbor, it might be pleasant to be on visiting terms, if he and his were only the right sort of company to keep."

"I think he has children near my own age," remarked Bergan.

"Not now. His two eldest died a few years ago."

"Ah, yes; I remember hearing of it when I was in college."

"He has but one left—a daughter," pursued the Major. "A pretty, bright little thing she was, too, as a child; I was really quite fond of her, and she used to spend half her time here,—that is, in the old Hall;—and Maumer Rue almost idolized her, because she fancied that she was something like what Eleanor was at her age. She even used to run away and come over here, after the trouble began; but I reckon they must have found it out, and put a stop to it." And the Major ground his teeth at the recollection, as if he owed his brother an especial grudge on this very head. "However," he went on, "it is better so; for though I could never have found it in my heart to be unkind to the child,—so fond of me as she was, too!—yet I want nothing to do with anybody, or anything, that belongs to Godfrey; and so I am glad, on the whole, that she stopped coming. Doubtless, she will soon merge the name of Bergan into Smith, or Brown, or something equally desirable; and as Godfrey has no son, to bear his patronymic and carry on his business, we may hope that there will be an end of them."

The last words were spoken with ineffable contempt. Then, suddenly rising, as if to dismiss the subject, the Major remarked, with an entire change of tone and manner:—

"But I must not sit here chatting any longer, for I suspect that Ben—that's my head driver—is waiting for instructions. Will you come with me, or do you prefer to amuse yourself about home?"

"I will go with you, uncle, if you are willing."

"Both willing and glad. Come on."

Bergan followed his uncle out into the quadrangle,—here called the "street,"—and found it to be, for the most part, silent and deserted. The cabins, many of which, on the evening previous, had been brightened by a little gleam of firelight within, or vivified by moving figures, were now closed and locked, the occupants being away at work in the fields. They were all neatly whitewashed; and they stood well apart from each other, leaving room for little gardens between, where vegetables, and, occasionally, flowers, were growing. Here and there, too, a pig rooted and grunted in a rude sty; or hens and chickens fluttered and cackled, in their busy, enlivening fashion, around the door.

One of the buildings, of considerable size, and two stories high, where several women and children, with peculiar haggard, heavy, listless, and withal resigned faces, were lying or sitting around the porch, Bergan easily recognized as the infirmary. Another, seemingly stuffed with babies and young children, under the charge of several half-grown girls and one superannuated old woman, he knew to be the day-nursery; for the safe bestowal of the infant population of the quarter, during their mothers' absence in the fields. Here, Maumer Rue seemed to be making a visit of inspection; though invisible herself, the slow tones of her voice, exhorting one of the young nurses to greater watchfulness, sounded distinctly from within; and becoming quickly aware of the approach of her master and his guest, she came to the door, and made them a stately courtesy, as they passed.

Quite apart from the quarter, yet within sight, stood a cabin of especially rude and forlorn aspect; the open door of which disclosed a strong stake driven into the ground in its centre, and divers rusty chains, handcuffs, padlocks, et cetera, hanging round its sides. This was the prison. Human justice being thus provided with a fitting abode, Bergan involuntarily looked around in search of a corresponding dwelling for Heaven's mercy, in the shape of a little cross-tipped church or chapel,—but saw none.

Major Bergan first stopped at the threshing-mill, where Engine (that is to say "Engineer") Jack, a remarkably intelligent negro,—and an exceedingly black one as well,—was waiting to bring to his master's notice certain slight repairs necessary to the machinery. While the needful discussion was going on, Bergan looked around him, the better to understand the topography of the place.

He observed that Bergan Hall, the roof of which he saw afar off, rising among the trees, was situated upon a considerable elevation,—a sort of bluff, overlooking a small inlet, or arm of the sea. To this circumstance, Major Bergan owed his ability to live upon his plantation throughout the year, instead of fleeing therefrom, like most of his class, at the approach of summer. For, just when the home-scenery takes on its most tender and fascinating grace,—when the rice-fields are green as the meadows of paradise,—when the temple-like oak-glades are most beautiful with gentle gloom and glinting sunshine,—when every thicket has its garland of bloom, and every tree has its clinging, flowering vine,—when the sweet-smelling pine-woods are glittering with the gorgeous coloring, and melodious with the multifarious voice, of thousands of birds and insects;—Just then, the rice-planter has to flee for his life from its final, treacherous charm—-the soft-shining mist, the deadly malaria, that creeps up at night from the marshes, and covers the land like a sea. If he lingers for but one ramble in the fair, moon-lighted, and moss-festooned avenues, through that silver haze, fever walks by his side under the grand arches, and death waits for him at the end of the alluring vistas.

From this terror and this necessity, the owner of Bergan Hall was free. His vast plantation stretched across the border-line which divides the pestilential rice-swamps from the healthful sea-islands; one extremity touching the river, and the other the ocean. At one time, its chief revenue was derived from the far-famed sea-island cotton, to the production of which its sea-board portion was well-adapted, but as that crop declined, and the rice-crop rose, in value, its neglected swamp-lands were gradually reclaimed and brought under cultivation; and were now the most valuable portion of the estate. Too remote from Bergan Hall to poison it, or its vicinity, with their malaria, they were yet quite near enough for necessary superintendence.

The negro quarter lay somewhat lower than the Hall. On its left, the ground sloped gradually down to a little creek; where lay several flat-boats loaded with rice, to show what had been the goal of the negro procession of the previous evening. Along the opposite bank ran a dark fringe of pines.

Horses were now brought. The one assigned to Bergan was a superb blooded filly, full of life and fire. While he stood taking delighted note of her many fine points, she sniffed round him in half-wild, half-curious fashion,—now starting quickly back, now timidly drawing near,—and ended by frankly putting her nose in his hand, as if in token of amity. Nor had he been long on her back, ere he felt, with an electric thrill of pleasure, that perfect sympathy between horse and rider, that singular blending of their identity, which is the purest delight of horsemanship, and best explains the fable of the Centaur.

"How do you like her?" asked his uncle, at this juncture.

"Exceedingly," replied Bergan, with enthusiastic emphasis. "I think that I never rode anything more admirable."

"Henceforth, then, she belongs to you. And never mind the thanks,—I am really glad to hand her over to a fitting master. She is too much given to dancing and frolicking for my use,—-my sober-paced stallion meets my wants a great deal better;—consequently, Vic—that's her name, short for Victoria,—Vic stands in the stable, eating her head and kicking her heels off, for the greater part of the time. She will be much happier in the hands of a master young enough to sympathize with her."