"The two branches of literature are com- | her to him. Willingly would they break every bined sometimes, I have heard." article of the moral law in order to get rid of her. Well, the poor young man proposes-is accepted-all goes merry as the marriage-bell. by the piper that played before Moses! that girl will throw off her veil of hypocrisy before her wedding-day is twelve hours old, and the luckless bridegroom will go to the nuptial chamber with the melancholy conviction that his wife has the devil's own temper. I don't want to interfere with the infernal theories of Dante and Quevedo, but I suspect all women of this type will be locked up together in one jail. Among them will be Mrs. and Miss Blogg.

a confectioner's shop. Both ladies had a mania for ices: Arabella Blogg was wont to eat so many that she was always in arrears with her dressmaker. But now there were a couple of cavaliers to pay for them, and Arabella was happy.

"Don't mention this to your sister-in-law at present," said Vionnet. "She is a silly, flighty, gossiping little thing."

ment.

ness. Of course matters were arranged as Vionnet had proposed. Miss Blogg made her round among the parents of pupils, who were greatly edified by her sincere grief (a trifle too vociferous, perhaps) for Madame de Longueville's death. Blogg got the property valued, and drew up an agreement whereby his sister had to pay for it in half-yearly installments. Meanwhile Mrs. Blogg was occupied in weaning her Bohemian.

As the Blogg family are not the most interesting characters in this romance, I think it may be as well to relate with sufficient brevity what occurred-and to return to them no more. Miss Blogg was very successful in collecting together Madame de Longueville's pupils, and for some time strove to imitate Madame de Longueville's style of dealing with them. But it was not natural to her. She must be either tyrannical or servile. Now that her servile period was over, and she was her own mistress, the tyrannic tendency was developed. She wor

"Oh, indeed she is," replied Miss Blogg. "Amiable creature!" thought the mouchard. To eat inferior ices in a stuffy tart - shop, looking out on a dull, dusty suburban street, in company with a couple of women neither beautiful nor refined, does not seem a lively employTom Harington did it as if he liked it, and drank the fiery sherry of the place with an appearance of real delight. But then, you see, he was wildly in love with Mrs. Blogg-not, of course, that he meant any harm, for Blogg was the best fellow he had ever known, and association with him and his charming wife had begun to wean Tom from his Bohemian recklessness. | ried her little pupils, and bullied her female asSuch, at least, was the Bohemian's own state- sistants, and insulted her "professors." Hence ment. There can be few occupations more in- it may be supposed that the Sydenham seminary teresting for a young married woman than wean- gradually fell off in its popularity. ing a Bohemian. I think it ought to be warranted not dangerous.

women.

Then of course there was a difficulty in making the payments to Vionnet. And, oddly

The young ladies ate a great many ices-enough, he demanded punctual payment. It more than any sane man would take in six was not his fault. Marshal Dessalino had months. But nothing nice ever disagrees with made so unfavorable a report of his conduct at When they had run up a tolerable head-quarters that he was abruptly dismissed, score, which Vionnet paid en prince, they started and informed that he had better remain beyond homeward. It was close on the time for Blogg's the limits of France. Very well did Vionnet advent-indeed, when the party returned to his know what that meant, and much too wise was residence they found him at the door. He re- he to run the risk of returning. But, as a received his visitors rather sulkily, but brightened sult, he found himself in pecuniary difficulty. into something like good temper when he heard Supplies were stopped. He had been living Vionnet's proposal about Miss Blogg. That | like a prince, and now was suddenly a pauper. young person's career in life seemed dubious; but her brother felt sure that all would go well if she once became a school-mistress. It is generally known that the dullest individual can obtain success in that particular line.

"But this French lady deceased," said the attorney. "Who inherits her property?"

I am the representative of her family," said Vionnet, "and I shall be happy to deal with Miss Blogg on easy terms."

"You will have no difficulty in proving your title?"

"I fancy not," he replied. "I have been Madame de Longueville's sole agent in England, and the only person who knows her affairs. From me, indeed, she obtained the money with which she purchased the school." Which was quite true. "Oh, I see," said Blogg. "Then I may consider you as the actual proprietor of the establishment."

|

Of course he had debts-people who fancy they possess unlimited incomes always have debtsand he saw no way of paying them. So he was compelled to persecute the unlucky Miss Blogg: and the last I heard of the young person is tragical indeed. It was a Saturday afternoon; and, having worried her few remaining pupils all the week, she was about to take them to the Crystal Palace by way of compensation. About a fortnight previously an ill-looking man, with a red comforter round his neck, had called and delivered to her an oblong slip of blue paperwhich, as it looked dangerous, she had sent on to her brother the attorney. But that gentleman was occupied in quarrelling with his wife, and quite forgot his sister's troubles.

Hence was it that on the afternoon in question, just as the little party were about to start, there drove up to the gate a heavy phaeton drawn by a heavy quadruped, and containing two thick-set men, who had evidently forgotten the chief use of water. Somehow or other, this arrival struck dismay into Miss Blogg. Not without reason. These two burly fellows had come to convey her to prison, and they seemed rather to enjoy the fun. Taking a lady was of course a rare event, and therefore the pleasant

er. Poor Miss Blogg, utterly bewildered, was driven off behind the heavy quadruped to Cripplegate, and consigned to dirty, dreary, uncomfortable quarters.

England was once [tempore Edward III. perhaps] a chivalrous country. It is now above all things a commercial country. The law regards a man's property as more important than the man himself: you may half kill him with less risk than you may steal a penny from his person or a turnip from his field. Laws are made in the House of Commons, and the majority of that House are tradesmen. We have seen within a month or two girls under age committed to prison for the costs of some suit in which they were interested: one child, of fifteen or so, was taken from an orphan-school to be shut up in Whitecross Street. And why? Because the attorneys wanted their money. For this reason alone an innocent girl, incapable of understanding what the quarrel is about, may be thrown into a sordid den, and the beauty of her young life lost forever. If the intelligent foreigner should ever ask you what is the most sacred thing in England, you can tell him in two words-not the courage of men, or the honor of women, or the sanctity of religionNo: law costs.

look after his wife. Even an attorney may be enraged at last on a question of feminine honor. Blogg determined to have it out with his wife.

He was routed, horse and foot. Mrs. Blogg scolded him with frightful severity: these angular women have a fine command of language, with shrill shrieking voices, which have evidently been imitated by the artist who contrived the railway whistle. After a fine series of objurgations, she went deliberately into hysterics, which is a woman's last resource, in difficult casesand which invariably succeeds, even with an attorney.

However, if his wife was too much for him, he determined to have it out with Tom Harington: so he wrote that gentleman a savage letter, requesting him never to come near his house again. Tom, who was beginning to find his visits expensive, did not even answer the letter. Blogg thought he had triumphed. Ah, how many a foolish husband prematurely thinks likewise!

I have heard let us hope it is not true-that when Mrs. Blogg found Tom Harington's visits ceased, she attacked her husband, made him confess what he had done, and caused him to send an abject apology to our gallant friend. I have even heard that Tom Harington is on visMiss Blogg did not remain long in confine-iting terms at Mrs. Blogg's to this day. For ment: her brother, being one of the holy craft, the sake of male human nature, let us hope this extricated her without much difficulty. Still, is untrue. Still, it takes some time to wean a her absence was long enough to ruin her "sem- Bohemian. inary" for ill news travels fast, and the deserted governesses did not know what to do, and the parents came and took away their little ones. Hence, when the Blogg emerged into the light of day, she found herself penniless, and her occupation gone.

CHAPTER XLVII.

A VOICE FROM THE DEAD. "Atque in perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale." LIONEL REDFERN was not devoid of information concerning Valentine Vivian's long and strange illness. He had a somewhat exciting communication to make to him, and he took M. Catelan into council on the subject, asking him whether he deemed it safe to lead Vivian back to any of the incidents which had troubled his brain.

It is needless to say that, Vionnet's affairs having got into so complete a muddle, his liberal offer to Tom Harington came to nothing. In fact, the Frenchman had vanished: he was not to be found in that pleasantly mysterious hostel where the Champagne-cup was so drinkable; and poor Harington was forced to the conclusion that the ten pounds a week on which he had set his heart would never reach his pocket. A con- "I think his intellect is quite sound and founded shame, he thought it: this little addi- clear," replied Catelan. "At any rate, I tion to his income would have enabled him to should risk it; for the circumstances of his past quench his thirst in a more elegant and expen-life must be recalled occasionally, and it is well sive manner. However, it was not to be: so he surrendered his poetic dreams of iced Roederer, and returned to his old friend flavored with the berries of a plant which Linnæus places in the Diacia Monadelphia.

And, on the other hand, Tom Harington was in hot water with George Blogg. That young gentleman was long-suffering-pachydermatous, in fact, as to every thing save money. But he lived in a street that talked; and Tom Harington's hansom was very frequently outside his front door for a considerable time, causing such excitement that female heads were thrust through every window on both sides of the way; and Blogg received at intervals anonymous letters from kind friends, who thought it their duty to

that he should learn to endure their recall. But I apprehended no danger: I never saw so complete a recovery: it is a marvellous triumph of French medical art."

Redfern, fortified by Catelan's advice, sought an early interview with Valentine, and broached the subject.

"You must forgive me," he said, "if I pain you, but it is necessary for me to refer to the death of my cousin, and of his wife, Lady Eva."

"I can bear any thing you have to say," re"I plied Vivian, with a melancholy smile. have passed through the furnace, and survived. Nothing can harm me now."

"You and Lady Eva were great friends," said Redfern.

"Old playmates in her childhood. There all day. And I must tell you-he has a were ten years between us. We were on the strange influence over Eva. most intimate terms possible. We were brother and sister."

"Forgive me if I seem impertinent-but there was nothing like flirtation between you-nothing, I mean, that poor Rupert could complain of.

"I assume, Mr. Redfern," said Vivian, "that you would not make these suggestions without valid reason?"

"They ought to have married-perhaps hereafter they will marry. They were young together. I cast no blame on Valentine; if he has influenced Eva, it is, in my. belief, unconsciously. But she is always happier in his presence, always thinking of him in his absence. Only last night I came up late to our chamber: a night-lamp was burning, and she lay asleep, with lips half open, and her abundant brown hair loose upon the white pillow. She was murmuring something in her sleep-I bent down to listen. It was

"Valentine! Valentine!'

"Certainly not," he said promptly. "I have a letter of my cousin Rupert's, which I wish to communicate to you. But let me first venture to ask what were the exact relations between Lady Eva and yourself?" "Yes, she always thinks of him, always dreams "Well," replied Vivian, "I will be frank of him. And I have made a resolve which is with you. I looked upon Eva as my sister, foolish, I know-which is wicked, you and all and always treated her as such. But she, poor the world will say. I can not help it. I am little girl, did not quite appreciate Redfern-in the way here. I will not go on day after who was the best fellow in the world, but did not thoroughly understand his wife-and she had no children to occupy her mind and she certainly had a strange liking for me.' I should not have thought much of it but for a very curious incident. I was half mad in those days, you know-in consequence of a sun-stroke I had, out in the Ægean-and I did a good many wild things."

And then he told Redfern the story of the confessional with perfect accuracy. His memory had returned to him, even of that period when his mood was wildest; and he often laughed himself over the mad days of highway robbery, and wondered whether he should ever be found out.

"Now, see," said the Squire. "I have a letter here from poor old Rupert, which you must read before its contents are known to any one else. And you and I must between us decide to whom its contents should be made known."

He handed to Vivian the letter which he had read in his quiet retreat at Damascus, and which had brought him to England. A part of this letter has already been printed. It proceeded thus:

I

*** I married, my dear Lionel, the most loving and lovable woman in the world. This by some strange means I know, though I have never had the power to break through a kind of magic partition which exists between us. can not love her as she needs to be loved, and she can not see that I long to do so, but am unable. Do you understand? I fear not. It must seem so absurd to a by-stander, this foolish game of cross-purposes. I would give all Broadoak Avon-if it were not entailed upon you, Lionel-to be able to talk to Eva as I know her cousin Valentine can talk to a woman. That boy has a magnetic power. There is not a horse in my stables that does not whinny when he comes near; my big mastiff, Thor, walks about the grounds after me when Vivian is not here; when he is, the dog lies at his feet

day, and year after year, just managing my estates, and breeding shorthorns, and riding to hounds, and shooting pheasants. I am weary of such a monotonous life. I intend to go into the next world, and leave this one free for Eva and her cousin to be happy. I have got a new French poison from a chemist in the Palais Royal; it is vegetable, acts slowly, weakens you gradually, so he says. I mean to take itand go.

"I know all you will say. I am a fool. I am a coward. I am committing a crime of the worst kind. If I were only to talk lovingly to Eva my difficulties would be over. This, and much more, you would say, if you were here instead of in Asia. Happily, my dear Lionel, I am beyond reach of your argument. do as I please, although I know it is wrong. But my resolve is fixed: and now, stretching my spirit towards yours through the thick darkness, across immeasurable spaces of sea and of land, I simply say, Farewell.

I can

"These last words of mine are for yourself, and for whomsoever else you think right.

"RUPERT REDFERN."

After reading through this strange document, Vivian sat silent for a while. Then he said:

"Redfern was the very last man I could have conceived doing such a thing as this. He must have been mad.”

"We are all mad sometimes," said the Squire. "Rupert would scarcely have done this thing if he could have foreseen its terrible consequences."

"No, indeed. Poor Eva! It broke her heart to lose him, and be accused of murdering him. I wonder if they are together now, and understand each other. There ought to be another world, to redress the evils of this."

"What had better be done as to making the contents of this letter public ?"

"My impression is that the facts should be stated to every one connected with the family. Then they will soon spread farther. Eva's memory must be cleared from the stain upon it.

There was also a Frenchwoman suspected

1

1

-but she is dead-drowned, strange to say, in this very lake."

"I quite agree with you," said Redfern. "The contents of the letter should be made known at once to your father and his friends, and you will know to whom the intelligence should be communicated by post."

are much too old for Miss Sheldon-and that I have been mad-and that I don't know my wife's name. She doesn't know it herself. De l'Isle is a good fancy name enough; but one ought to have further information. Perhaps she is a pirate's daughter."

"Confound you, Val," said Sir Alured, "Lord Alvescott, first of all," said Vivian. "there is no making you serious. Don't hesi"Eva's father, you know. He will be quite tate any longer. Do you mean to desert Easure to make the thing known. Indeed, I rine, and make her break her heart? She is my should not be surprised if he were to make | daughter, sir, whether she becomes your wife or more fuss than is at all necessary or desirable." When the conference was over, Redfern and Vivian joined the rest of the party, and the Squire's letter was read to them.

"One less crime for Teresa Moretti," said Catelan. “I am glad she was not a murderess, at any rate."

And then he told what he knew of the history of that Corsican woman who had met her doom in the waters of an English mere.

"She was very cruel to me," said Earine, "but I have long ago forgiven her, and I think we ought to put a head-stone to her grave."

"So do I," said Emily Sheldon. "She was very good to me, only she persuaded me to do something very mean. But I am forgiven," she went on, looking at Sir Alured, "and so I can forgive her freely."

not."

"Well," replied Vivian, "you know why I have hesitated. When you remember how you found me, can you wonder that I hesitated? But you shall have your way. Fix time and place with Miss Sheldon-and Earine and I will be dutiful children, and accompany you to the altar."

'Jack," he said, "we shall want you to drive us to church very soon. The governor and I are going to be married."

Eastlake, who never saw any thing that was going on before his eyes, expressed extreme astonishment.

66 'Ah," said Catelan, "we must not blame her. She was a Corsican. I have studied that island and its race. Love first made her a traitress; better so than to be traitorous through hate. She has been the enemy of us all-all at least whom she knew-and so let us "Yes, old boy, it's a fact. Sir Alured is goerect a stone in her memory. Colonel Traffording to marry the little American." and his wife will join us. I will write the epitaph in very choice Italian; and I will say therein that though she was wicked, even for a Corsican, yet Corsicans more wicked have filled imperial thrones."

"You are bitter, Catelan," said Valentine. "She was outmanœuvred, you know. Well do I remember that day when I let loose a rat in the hall at Broadoak, and she ran up stairs so fast that I got possession of her letters. She was Madame de Petigny Garnuchot then."

"She shall have her head-stone," said Sir Alured. "She has been able to do little harm; and, from all we hear, she was getting better of late. And if you won't write an amiable epitaph in Italian, Catelan, my daughter here shall write one in Greek."

Sir Alured Vivian, you see, had accepted Earine as his daughter, and was anxious to see her placed in that position. And Valentine, when in a gay humor, was wont wickedly to address Miss Sheldon as "Mamma." And, when father and son were alone together, Sir Alured was always urging Valentine to arrange his marriage. “Let us be married on the same day, Val," he would say. "It will astonish the natives

and disarm the critics."

"Why, surely, he is rather older than she is." "Rather. Fifty years, more or less.

I'm going to marry Miss Delisle."

And

"Oh, of course, of course," said Jack, knowingly. "I was sure of that, long ago-else I should have proposed to her myself." "D-d glad you didn't, Jack. Girls are fickle-and you're such a confoundedly goodlooking fellow, you know."

"Do you think so, really ?"

"Of course I do. But there's another couple to be married-Powys and Miss Eastlake."

"Why," exclaimed Jack, "you don't mean to say they have been going on with one another."

"Going on! I like the phrase. My dear Jack, you are a young widower with a pretty daughter. Let me advise you. Marry her off, and marry again. Powys, Fellow and Tutor of Oriel-Powys of Powysland, they tell me lots of livings in the family-sure of a college living, at any rate-egad, those spectacles of his are worth five hundred a year."

"I like him very much," said Eastlake.

"So does Clara. Come, old fellow, consider it settled and then think of a wife for yourself."

Therewith Vivian walked rapidly off, and "I don't know, sir. They will find out you wandered into the grounds-gardens you could