Chambers’s Journal, by Various—A Project Gutenberg eBook

Hampstead Heath! What a world of delight seemed concentrated in that name in the days of childhood, when donkey-riding was not yet too undignified an amusement, and a gallop ‘cross country’ through the bracken and furze struck terror into the heart of nurse or parent, and covered the rider with glory! Such feats of horsemanship now belong to the irrevocable past; but yet no part of the great ‘province of houses’ known as London brings such pleasant memories as the quaint old village on its northern outskirts and the wild breezy heath that bounds it. Even now, Hampstead is rather in London, than of it, and keeps up customs that have died out elsewhere. There, on the fifth of November, a gallant procession takes its way through its steep winding streets, and the centuries mingle with as little regard to accuracy as they might do in a schoolboy’s dream the night before an examination in history. Gallant Crusaders in chain-mail, with the red cross embroidered on their flowing white mantles, jostle very nineteenth-century Guardsmen, who in their turn seem to feel no surprise at seeing Charles I. in velvet doublet and lace collar talking amicably to a motley, spangled harlequin. But were the inhabitants in this their yearly carnival to picture the history of their village and of the notable personages who have lived in it, they might make a pageant as long and varied as any that imagination can invent.

The manor of Hampstead was given by Edward the Confessor to the monks of Westminster; and subsequent monarchs conferred on them the neighbouring manors of Belsize and Hendon. It was at Hendon Manor-house that Cardinal Wolsey made his first halt when journeying from Richmond to York after his disgrace. At that time, however, Hampstead itself had no great claim to notice, its inhabitants being, we are told, chiefly washerwomen, whose services were in great demand among the inhabitants of London. That this peaceful if humble occupation could be carried on, proves at least that the wolves which, according to Dame Juliana Berners’s Boke of St Albans, abounded among the northern heights of London in the fifteenth century, had been exterminated by the end of the sixteenth. The wild-boar lingered longer; and so late as 1772, we hear of the hunting of a deer in Belsize Park. This, however, can scarcely be regarded as genuine sport, as it is advertised to take place among other amusements intended to allure visitors to Belsize House, which had been opened as a pleasure-house by an energetic individual of the name of Howell. He describes in his advertisement all the attractions of the place, and promises for the protection of visitors that ‘twelve stout fellows completely armed will patrol between Belsize and London.’

Early in the eighteenth century chalybeate wells were discovered at Hampstead, and as they were recommended by several physicians, the hitherto quiet village became a fashionable and dissipated watering-place. Idle London flocked there: youths who were delighted to show their finery in a new place; girls who were young enough to delight in the prospect of dancing all night; gamblers of both sexes; wits and fops. They danced, lost their money at cards and dice, talked scandal of each other, and drank of the chalybeate well, which Sam Weller has characterised for all generations as ‘water with a taste of warm flat-irons,’ till Hampstead lost its novelty, and the company went elsewhere to go through the same programme.

Among the crowd of nonentities that frequent the Hampstead Wells there is one notable figure, that of Richard Steele. In 1712, Steele retired from London to a small house on Haverstock Hill, on the road to Hampstead. Here, doubtless, his friend and fellow-labourer Addison visited him; and the two would find in the humours and follies of the company at the Wells material for the next number of the Tatler, the publication of which had now been going on for three years. Let us picture the two friends passing together through the gay company—Steele, radiant, we may be sure,{66} in gay apparel, seizing at once on the humorous characteristics of the scene; while Addison would tone down his companion’s exuberant fancy, and draw his own thoughtful moralisings from the follies he witnessed. On summer evenings they would walk on the Heath, and admire the view across the swelling green slopes to the town of Harrow, where one day was to be educated my Lord Byron, a young gentleman who would win greater fame as a poet than even Addison’s acquaintance—a protégé to begin with, an enemy at last—the lame Catholic gentleman, Mr Alexander Pope.

The friendship between Steele and Addison must ever remain a puzzle. They had talent in common, Steele having the more original genius, Addison the more cultivated taste; but otherwise there seems no point of contact between the natures of graceless, impulsive, erring, loving Dick, and his cold, conscientious, methodical comrade. To our century, as to his own, Steele is ‘Dicky;’ the king made him Sir Richard, and on the strength of his title he took a fine house in Soho Square, and swaggered more than ever, and increased his expenses and his debts, but to all the world he was Dicky Steele still; whereas, had the honour of a baronetcy befallen Mr Secretary Addison, can we doubt that to all posterity he would have been known as ‘Sir Joseph?’ Yet these two men, unlike each other as they were, united to perform in an unobtrusive fashion a great work; they purified English literature, and did much to reform English manners. In a society which had learned to regard truth, honesty, and virtue as absurd, they showed, not the wickedness of vice—no one would have listened to that—but its folly. When the fops and gamblers found that they, as well as the honest men they sneered at, could be made the subject of satire, they began to doubt if their cherished amusements were such essential characteristics of ‘men of spirit’ as they had fancied. The gulf that lies between the comedies of Wycherley and those of Sheridan was first opened by the gentle raillery of the Tatler and the Spectator. The later dramatist had no keener moral sense than the earlier, but he lived in an atmosphere which, though by no means pure, was healthier than that breathed by his predecessor; and in which it was necessary that virtue, however weak, should in the end defeat the vice that tried to trade upon its feebleness.

Of the clear-cut grace of style that distinguished the writing of the Spectator there is no need to speak; it still remains the model of English prose, while the tiny, whitish-brown sheet, the perusal of which used to add to the flavour of Belinda’s morning chocolate, was the progenitor of the immense mass of periodical literature that surrounds us to-day. But if the two friends had done nothing more than give us—Steele the first sketch, Addison the finished portrait, of old-fashioned, kind, eccentric Sir Roger de Coverley, they would have deserved a high and loving place in our memory.

Thirty years later, the figure of another literary man was to be seen at Hampstead. Not so gorgeous as Dick, not so precise as Addison, is slovenly, tea-drinking, long-worded Samuel Johnson; but he is their legitimate successor, nevertheless. He, too, is a man of letters, living by the produce of his pen, and appealing for support to the public, and not to the kindness or charity of private patrons. Indeed, he scorns such condescending patronage, as a certain stinging letter to Lord Chesterfield remains to testify. In 1748, Mrs Johnson, for the sake of the country air, took lodgings at Hampstead; and there her husband wrote his satire, The Vanity of Human Wishes. Johnson did not spend all his time at Hampstead, for he was obliged to return and drudge in smoky London in order to provide for her comfort. Boswell tells us that ‘she indulged in country air and good living at an unsuitable expense; and she by no means treated her husband with that complacency which is the most engaging quality in a wife.’ Yet Johnson loved faithfully and mourned sincerely the querulous, exacting woman, a quarter of a century older than himself, and cherished an undoubting belief in her beauty; while all save him perceived that if she had ever possessed any—which they doubted—it had long disappeared.

Towards the end of the eighteenth century, Hampstead became the dwelling-place of two famous lawyers, both of them Scotch—Lords Erskine and Mansfield. Thomas Erskine, youngest son of the tenth Earl of Buchan, and ‘a penniless lad with a lang pedigree,’ began life as a midshipman; but disliking the service, he, after his father’s death, invested the whole of his little patrimony in the purchase of an ensigncy in the 1st Foot. When, some years later, he felt his true vocation to be the bar, he was burdened with the responsibility of a wife and children; and it was only by the exercise of economy nearly approaching privation that he succeeded in maintaining himself during the three years’ study that must elapse before he was called to the bar. Even when he received his qualification, it seemed that he was to fail through lack of opportunity to display his talents; but opportunity came at last, and his brilliant career led to the Lord Chancellorship of England, a peerage, and the Order of the Thistle. All the power of his oratory and of his ever-increasing influence was devoted to the promotion of freedom, civil and religious. He stood up boldly for the independence of juries against the bullying of judges; he advocated concessions to the Catholics; and carrying his love of mercy and justice beyond the human race, he brought into parliament a bill for the prevention of cruelty to animals. The measure failed; for popular feeling on the subject was then such as is expressed in the famous couplet—

William Murray, Earl of Mansfield, was the eleventh of the fourteen children of Viscount Stormont, of the castle of Scone, in Perthshire. So poor was his lordship, that, as we are told by Mansfield’s biographer, the only fare he could provide for those fourteen mouths—which though high-born, were every whit as hungry as if they had been peasants’—was oatmeal porridge. The family was Jacobite in politics, so its fortunes were little likely to improve; but by the influence of Bishop Atterbury, who was at heart a Jacobite too, little Willie was admitted to Westminster School. He made good use of{67} his time there; and by listening to the debates in Westminster Hall he became enamoured of the law, and resolved to devote himself to it. Difficulties enough lay before him; but by the aid of an indomitable perseverance, a gentle manner, and a voice so musical that none could listen to it unmoved, he conquered them all. Throughout his legal career he was noted for strict integrity and justice. He advocated free trade and religious toleration, and used every effort in his power to decrease the waste of time and money in the business of law-courts; but his greatest title to honour is that he was the first to decide that no slave could remain a slave on English soil.

Early in this century, the year after Waterloo was fought, Hampstead was familiar with the forms of three men to whom life gave only scorn, insult, and disappointment, yet whose memory lingers about it and makes it hallowed ground. In 1816, Leigh Hunt lived at Hampstead in a part called the Vale of Health; and there Keats, who lodged in the village, and Shelley were his frequent visitors. Each of the three was more or less a martyr. For the crime of describing the Prince Regent—whose memory as George IV. is not highly honoured—as an ‘Adonis of fifty,’ Hunt was thrown into prison; while the political reviews and journals abused his graceful poems and scholarly essays as if they had been firebrands, to extinguish which every exertion must be made. They succeeded in torturing him, in reducing him to poverty and dependence, but they did not succeed in changing Leigh Hunt’s convictions. He would not bow down to the Adonis of fifty.

Shelley was rather a visitor than a resident at Hampstead Heath; but Keats composed not a few of his poems here. The sorrows of his sorrowful life had not yet reached their climax in 1816. Already he was struggling with poverty, disease, and hopeless, passionate love; but he had not yet published those poems which were to rouse such wrath in the bosoms of a few critics, and such delight in thousands of readers. But at Hampstead most of them were written. Here he breathed life into the long dead myth of Endymion, surrounding it with such a wealth of description as seems scarcely possible to a youth of such limited experience. Can commonplace Hampstead Heath, the chosen resort of Bank-holiday excursionists, be the prototype of that Grecian valley where the goddess of night stooped to kiss Endymion! Here were written the sad story of The Pot of Basil and the legend of The Eve of St Agnes; here, in 1819, was composed that most exquisite Ode to a Nightingale, which, even were it his only production, might place Keats among our greater poets.

The memory loves to trace the footsteps of departed greatness; but even did no such recollections as these endear Hampstead Heath, it would still be precious as a spot where half-asphyxiated Londoners may inhale a fresh untainted breeze, and children may romp to their hearts’ content. ‘I like Hampstead Heath much better than Switzerland,’ says a small boy in one of Du Maurier’s sketches in Punch. ‘But you haven’t seen Switzerland,’ objects his sister, a practical young lady a year or two older. ‘O yes; I have seen it on the map,’ is his reply. And if he had really visited Switzerland, the little fellow would perhaps still have preferred the broken, sandy soil, the grass and ferns, of Hampstead Heath.

Du Maurier is the Heath’s own artist. He lives on its borders, and most of the backgrounds of his out-of-door sketches are borrowed from its scenery. He may daily be seen there—till lately accompanied by his dog Chang, the great St Bernard whose portrait has so often appeared in the pages of Punch. But, alas! Chang is no more; he has fallen a victim to consumption and heart-disease, and Hampstead weeps for him. Seldom has any dog been so widely lamented. ‘He is mourned by a large circle of friends,’ said the World, ‘and the family of which he was so long a member is inconsolable for his loss.’

CHAPTER VII.—AN UNLOVED LIFE.

It was a little time before the father spoke again. But without being able to see his face, even without being able to hear him breathe, Philip felt that he was struggling with something in himself. Perhaps it was only a struggle to regain that composure of manner which he had temporarily lost. In this he succeeded. But was that all Mr Hadleigh was struggling with in those few moments of silence? At anyrate, when he spoke, his voice was steadier than before; more like its ordinary tone, but without its hardness.

‘Before I proceed, may I ask what was the purport of the two letters you received?’

‘The one was simply urging me on no account to fail to start in the Hertford Castle as arranged, and assuring me of such welcome as I might desire.’

‘The other inclosed a note which I am to deliver personally to a firm of solicitors in the City, and requesting that I should bring with me the packet they would intrust to my care.’

‘One question more. Are you very anxious to make this journey, which may end in nothing? Is there no one here who could persuade you to give it up altogether?’

Philip was a good deal perplexed as to how he should answer this question. There was Some one who could have persuaded him to stay at home; but the sweet voice of that Some one was again whispering in his ear, ‘It was your mother’s wish that you should go;’ and besides, there was the natural desire of youth to see strange countries and peoples.

‘I thought, sir, that this question of my going out to Uncle Shield had been all settled long ago,’ he replied awkwardly, for he knew that any reference to the command laid upon him by his mother always disturbed his father.

‘I do—now. Even setting aside the prospects he holds out to me, I feel that I must go.’

The father made a mental note of the fact that his son gave no reply to the second question; but he did not press it farther at this moment. He seemed to draw breath, and then went on in a low voice: ‘I think, Philip, you have not found me an exacting parent. Although I have never failed to point out to you the way in which it would please me most to see you walk, I have never insisted upon it. And I will own that on your part your conduct has been up to a certain point satisfactory.’

‘That certain point is your procrastination in the choice of your future career. You have shown that you do not care about business—and my own conviction is that you are unfitted for it—and you will not decide upon a profession. Although you have dabbled in medicine and law, you have not entered earnestly upon the study of either. I have been patient with this wavering state of mind which you have displayed ever since you left the university. I do not wish to force you into any occupation which you may dislike, and would, therefore, certainly fail in; for then you would console yourself by blaming me for being the cause of your failure.’

‘But I did hope,’ continued the father calmly, without heeding the interruption, ‘that before you came to think of marriage, you would have settled with yourself upon some definite course of action in the future.’

‘Your reproaches are just, sir,’ answered Philip earnestly and with some agitation, ‘and I deserve them. But this journey will decide what I am to be and do.’

‘I did not mean to reproach you,’ said the father, and again there was that distant note of sadness which sounded so strangely in his voice; ‘but it seemed to me right to remind you of these things before telling you the rest. I reproach myself more than you.’

‘Listen. My young life was passed in a home which had been suddenly stricken down from wealth and ease to poverty. On every hand I heard the one explanation given for my father’s haggard looks, my mother’s wasting illness, for my poor sister’s white face and constant drudgery with her needle, and for my own unsatisfied hunger; and that explanation was—the want of money.... I resolved that I should conquer this demon that was destroying us all—I resolved that I should have money.’

Here he paused, as if the memory of that time of misery proved too painful for him. Philip’s sympathetic nature was drawn closer to his father at that moment than it had ever been before. He rose impulsively and grasped his arm. In the darkness the forms of the two men were indistinguishable to each other; but with that sympathetic touch each saw the other clearly in a new light.

‘My poor father,’ murmured Philip, clenching his teeth to keep down the sob that was in his throat.

There was silence; and at that moment a pale gleam of moonlight stole across the room. But it seemed only to darken the corner in which the two men stood.

Philip walked quietly to a place opposite the window, and putting his hands behind him, rested them on the ledge of a bookcase, leaning back so that the light fell full upon his frank, handsome face, making it look very pale in his anxiety. He knew that his father was gazing earnestly at him, and as he could not see him, he was glad to hear his voice again, which in some measure took away the uncomfortable feeling produced by the singular position.

‘You know that I gained my object,’ Mr Hadleigh proceeded, with a mingling of bitterness and regret in his voice; ‘but at what a cost!... All the lightness of heart which makes the lives of even the poorest children happy at times—all the warmth of hope and enthusiasm which brightens the humblest youth, were gone. It was not hope that led me on: it was determination. All emotion was dead within me: at twenty I was an old man; and in the hard grasping struggle with which I fought against the demon Poverty, and won the favour of the greater demon, Wealth—even love itself was sacrificed.’

He paused again; but this time Philip did not speak or move. There was something so pitiful as well as painful in this confession that he was dumb.

‘They—father, mother, sister—all died before I had broken down the first barrier between me and fortune. I shed no tears: each death in poverty hardened me more and more.... It was—your mother who enabled me to break down the first barrier’——

‘Wait. I did not know what love was: I did not love her.’ (Philip started, but remained silent.) ‘She had money: I married her for it. She did not love me; but she had quarrelled with the man she did love, and accepted me in her mad chagrin. We understood each other, and I was content—she was not. From the day of her marriage to the day of her death, her life was one weary lamentation that in her moment of passion I had crossed her path—a life of self-scourging and regret for the man she loved. I saw it, and knew it; but I did not know what love was, and I could not pity it. I did know something of hate; and I believed she hated me.... Had she only cared for me a little, it might have been different,’ he added in a lower voice, and as if speaking to himself.

‘You wrong her, father, you wrong her,’ said Philip in a husky, tremulous voice.

‘It may be; but I did not know then, what I understand too well now. A pity, a pity—for it might have been so different! As it was, her brother turned from her too, and would not forgive her. He hated me—he hates me: because the lover she had deserted was his close friend; and whilst I prospered, his friend failed. In a few years the man had lost everything he possessed, and died—some say by his own hand: killed by me, as your mother seemed to believe, and as Austin Shield does believe. I had ruined his life, he said, and I was as much responsible{69} for his death, as if I had given him poison or shot him. These were the last words Shield ever spoke to me.’

‘It must have been in mere passion. He cannot believe that now, or he would not send for me.’

‘I do not know. I went on my way, unheeding his words, and would have forgotten him, but for your mother’s grief. I had no home-life; but I did my duty, as it seemed to me. The money which had been brought to me was repaid with compound interest: all that money could buy was at your mother’s command: all that she could wish for her children was supplied to them, and you all seemed satisfied. But I was not with you—you were hushed and lifeless in my presence, and seemed only happy in my absence. Sitting in this room, I have heard your voices raised in gladness, and if I passed in amongst you, seeking for that strange something which the Demon Wealth with all his gold could not supply, it seemed as if the Demon sat upon my shoulder, frightening you and rendering you speechless. So I lived alone, although so near you, and my Familiar became kinder and kinder to me, until I wearied of him. I sought I did not know what, and could not find it.’

‘Oh, if you had only spoken to us as you are speaking to me now, father!’ cried Philip, so earnestly that it sounded like a reproach.

‘It would have been better,’ was the sad reply. ‘I tell you these things that you may understand the proposal I am about to make to you. I now know what love is, and as too often happens, the knowledge comes too late. But it will help me in my effort to make two people happy. Can you guess who they are?’

‘Yourself and Ma—Miss Heathcote. I propose that you should stay at home and marry as soon as may be agreeable to the lady. I shall settle upon you a sufficient fortune to enable you to live comfortably; but I shall expect you to enter some profession. Do you consent?’

Here was a proposal at which Philip’s whole nature jumped gleefully. But that voice was in his ears, and he overcame the temptation.

‘It was my mother’s wish that I should go, if my uncle ever summoned me,’ he said in a respectful but decisive voice, ‘and I must go.’

‘So be it,’ rejoined the father, and there was a note of bitterness in his tone; ‘I shall not again attempt to alter your plans.’

CHAPTER VIII.—‘WILL YOU SPEAK THAT WORD?’

Madge was singing as she dressed in her pretty little room, filled with the exhilarating breath of the early morning, which the wide open window admitted freely. This was no dainty lady’s chamber full of costly nick-knacks. Everything in it was useful, and everything was so bright and simple, that glancing into it on a winter’s day, one might have imagined that summer still lingered here.

As she stood at the chintz-draped toilet-table she could see the green glades apparently rising amidst the trees, one glade half in shadow, another with its dewdrops glistening like diamonds in the morning sunshine. Beyond that on the high ground were yellow plains of ripe grain, relieved by black and gray patches, which she knew to be fields of beans and tares. Down below there, at the foot of the meadows, the calmly flowing river sent silver flashes through every space left by the willows and elms. Farther on, she saw the stumpy tower of the old village church struggling to raise its head through a mass of ivy. And to all this her window, with its surrounding network of rose-tree branches, formed a suitable frame.

It was not a blithe song she was singing, and yet the hope that was in her voice and in her eyes took away from it all thought of sadness. It was that now old-fashioned but once popular song of the Soldier’s Tear, and she dwelt with sympathy on the lines, ‘Upon the hill he turned, to take a last fond look.’ She repeated them dreamily again and again, and then her face would brighten into smiles when the happier picture presented itself of the time when she should stand on the top of the hill, or at the more probable although more prosaic railway station, welcoming Philip home.

Ah, it was much better to think of that. And then, what was a year, or what were two years, to reckon in their young lives, when all the succeeding years would be theirs to pass together—always together—no matter what Aunt Hessy might say? Besides, there would be his letters! He would speak to her in them every day, and she would speak to him every day. Of course, the ridiculous postal arrangements would not permit them to receive the letters on the day they were written; but when they were delivered, they would contain a full record of their daily lives.

Up from the barnyard came the loud voice of one of the labourers, rising above the obstreperous squeaking of the pigs he was feeding, as he drawled out a verse of some rustic ballad—

Then came the other sounds which intimated that another day’s work of the farm had begun. The milk-cans rattled as they were whirled out of the dairy to the waiting carts; merry jests were passed between the men and maids; harness clattered and clanked as the horses were put into the carts or reaping-machine; and there was much horse-language mingling with the confusion of dialects as the harvest hands turned out to the fields. The melancholy ‘moo’ of the cows rose from the barn as, having been milked, they were driven out to the meadows; the cocks, although they had been crowing since daybreak, crowed with louder defiance than ever, now that their hens were cackling and clucking around them; and the ducks emitted their curious self-satisfied ‘quack’ as they waggled off to the pond.

All these sounds warned Madge that she was somewhat later than usual in getting downstairs.

She was a little startled when she discovered on the hall table a letter bearing the Ringsford Manor crest; for she knew at once it was not from Philip, and feared that some mishap might have befallen him. She knew it was not from him, because he never used this crest, although all the other members of the family did. It had been the outcome of Miss Hadleigh’s vanity, to which the others took kindly, whilst Philip laughed at it.

She learned that the note had been delivered about half an hour ago by young Jerry Mogridge, who left a special message that the ‘flunkey’ who gave it to him said it was to be given to her the moment she came down. She was surprised to find that it was from Philip’s father, and still more surprised by its contents.

My Dear Miss Heathcote—The unusual hour at which this will be delivered will at once apprise you that the motive which prompts it is an important one. I cannot tell you how important it is in my eyes; and I hope and believe that you will not only appreciate the motive, but cordially sympathise with it.

Only a few hours ago I had to ask your assistance in a matter which entirely concerned myself; in the present instance I have to ask your assistance in a matter on which, I believe, your own happiness depends. You shall judge for yourself; and your answer will enable me to decide a question which has of late occupied my mind a great deal.

You have not hitherto heard me raise any objection to the journey Philip is about to make. To-day I decided that he ought not to go away. But after a long and painful conversation with him, I find that no words of mine can move him from his purpose.

Now, my dear Miss Heathcote, will you help me to hold him back from this useless enterprise?

I think you will—unless I am mistaken as to the nature of your feelings in regard to him.

My first and chief reason for desiring to keep him at home is my anxiety to see you and him happy—to see you two united, and him, under your influence, working earnestly in some profession.

I fear there is much danger that this desire of mine will never be realised, if he is permitted to spend a year with one who would delight in thwarting any wish of mine. You know his impulsive and impressionable nature. You are too young for experience to have taught you—and I earnestly trust it may never teach you—that absence, change of scene, and adverse counsels are not the most favourable conditions for keeping the most honest man steadfast.

Pray, do not misunderstand me. I do not doubt Philip. He is honest; but with such a nature as his, I think the trial of his honesty is too severe; and I object to it all the more because it is absolutely unnecessary. My proposal to him is that he should abandon this journey, that he should enter a profession at once, and that you should be married at as early a date as you may be inclined to fix. I need not say that you will be provided with ample means.

In the course of my life, few of the desires springing from my affections have been gratified. I beg of you to gratify this one. Although he resolutely declines to forego his purpose for my sake, I feel assured that you have only to speak one word—‘stay’—and he will forego it for yours.

Will you speak that word?

Believe me, your humble servant,
Lloyd Hadleigh.

There was something so pathetic and yet so strange in this appeal of the father that she should keep his son near him, that Madge was pained as well as bewildered. Keep Philip at home!—marry him!—be happy!—help to steady his impulsive nature and influence him in some good work! What else was there that she could desire more? How beautiful the visions were that these suggestions conjured up. Her face brightened as if a blaze of sunshine fell upon it ... and then it suddenly darkened.

She, too, like Philip remembered the dead mother’s wish, and hesitated. But the question presented itself: if his mother had been alive now and had understood all the circumstances, would she have insisted upon this wish—which seemed to cause the father so much anxiety—being carried out?

She read the letter again, and this time her cheeks flushed a little at the doubt of her implied in the words, ‘unless I am mistaken as to the nature of your feelings.’ The unpleasant sensation was only momentary. How could he—how even could Philip—realise her feelings? But she also became conscious of a certain vagueness in the reasons given for the anxiety expressed by Mr Hadleigh. Were she to grant the appeal, would it not be a proof of her want of faith in Philip? That idea was enough to make her answer ‘no’ at once.

And yet she hesitated. The poor old man was evidently very much in earnest. (She always thought of Mr Hadleigh as an old man, older than Uncle Dick, although he was twenty years younger than the latter.) To say ‘no’ would cause him much pain: to say ‘yes’ would afford him much happiness, and at the same time bring about the completion of her own.

There was a yelping of dogs, and above it the stentorian voice of her uncle shouting: ‘Down, Dash, down—here, Rover, here—be quiet, Tip, you brute.’

The door opened, dogs rushed in and bounded round Madge in wild delight. They were followed by Uncle Dick, his fresh ruddy face beaming with the happiness of health and content.

‘What are you dreaming about, Madge? Breakfast ready? We are as hungry as if we had been starving for a week. Thought I should have met you in the meadow as usual. What’s the matter?’

‘What!’ he exclaimed with a burst of laughter, ‘at this time in the morning. O ho! I see Master Philip was here too long yesterday.’

‘Suppose somebody asked you to do something that you wanted to do yourself, what would you say?’

‘But, suppose there were reasons connected with other people on account of which you ought to say “no,” what would you do?’

‘Please myself.—Now, let’s have our victuals, and confound your riddles, or I’ll send for the doctor and the parson at once.’

There was not much help to Madge in this easy settlement of the difficulty. But she had a maxim which did help her: whenever you have a doubt as to which of two courses you should take, choose the one which is least agreeable to yourself. She decided to follow it in this instance, as she had done in many others of less importance.

Reader, are you of those who cannot tolerate their favourite authors or their favourite poems being parodied? A lady-friend of the writer’s lately said, in regard to one of the best-known poems of a distinguished poet: ‘I admired and liked it once; but I can hardly read it now, since I saw that dreadful parody of it that appeared in Punch.’ If you are of this sensitive class, we fear this article is not for you. But we feel pretty sure of an audience; for we know that the large majority of readers can relish a clever parody without in the least losing their enjoyment in or respect for the thing parodied. And it is well that it is so; for parody in some shape and to some extent is early as the beginnings of literature itself; and if the fame of poets depended on their immunity from travesty, every poet that has ever won his bays, and whose reputation now rests secure and impregnable, would have been laughed out of court long since.

In speaking of modern English parody, one’s thoughts turn first, almost inevitably, to the brothers Horace and James Smith, who, in Rejected Addresses, may be regarded as the first to practise parody in a systematised fashion, as a vehicle of fun and humour. The Rejected Addresses won high praise from Jeffrey, who pronounced the parody on Crabbe ‘an exquisite and masterly imitation;’ while the poet himself declared it to be ‘admirably done.’ We shall give a short extract from it, which we think hits off Crabbe’s manner in a way that fully justifies Jeffrey’s criticism:

In regard to the parody of Sir Walter Scott in Rejected Addresses, the poet himself said: ‘I must have done it myself, though I forget on what occasion.’ Here are a few lines descriptive of the Drury Lane Theatre on fire:

Thackeray was especially happy and especially funny in his Irish burlesques. Larry O’Toole, a parody of the rollicking Irish bacchanalian songs with which Charles Lever made us so familiar, admirably hits the medium between close imitation and high burlesque. There is a dash in it both of Larry O’Hale and the Widow Malone. We quote two of the three verses:

have been frequently parodied. Here is one version which, we think, is not very familiar:

In those two delightful volumes, Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-glass, ‘Lewis Carroll’ gives us some capital travesties. Mr Southey’s poem beginning ‘“You are old, Father William,” the young man said,’ is so familiar, that every reader will appreciate the point of the burlesque, without needing the original before him:

The old nursery song, ‘“Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly,’ the same writer has likewise burlesqued:

The late Mr J. R. Planché, whose innumerable fairy extravaganzas were so full of fun and humour, was also an expert in parody. We give the first verse of a burlesque by him of the once popular song, When other Lips:

The funniest burlesque of Wordsworth’s We are Seven, with which we are acquainted, is by Mr H. S. Leigh:

It is not necessary to name the original of the following. We quote two of the three verses which compose the whole:

Tennyson’s well-known lyric, Home they brought her warrior dead, has been thus amusingly parodied by Mr Sawyer:

The following clever parody of Wordsworth’s Lucy is but little known. It was written by Hartley Coleridge, and reappeared some years ago in Notes and Queries. We shall quote the first verse of the original:

From a parody of Tennyson’s Mariana, which appeared in an Australian paper, we take the concluding verse. The burden of the original ballad, it will be remembered, runs:

An American magazine published some years ago a series of burlesques of the old nursery rhymes, of which we give specimens:

The case for the evolutionists is thus tersely put by an American poet, parodying Sing a song of Sixpence:

has been thus travestied by Miss Catherine Fanshawe, who accomplishes the step from the sublime to the ridiculous by the change of two words only:

Among living parodists, few, if any, excel Mr C. S. Calverley, who seems to possess every qualification for success in this sort of work. The reader will at once recognise how happily he has caught Tennyson’s method and manner in the following parody of The Brook, especially in the blank-verse portion. We quote two verses and the conclusion:

We had noted down several other examples of parody by different authors, which might have served further to illustrate our subject. Our selections have necessarily lost something of force and pertinence, from the fragmentary condition in which we have been obliged to present them; but the reader, if he be sufficiently interested in the matter, may easily go to the original sources.

It needs not to be pointed out that there are limits to parody, as to all other forms of light and sportive literature, whose main object is, after all, to divert and amuse. Good taste should guide the course of parody, in fact should never be absent from it. Let the parodist hit as hard as he pleases, but let him deal no foul blow, nor aim his strokes at aught that tradition and the world’s verdict have made sacred and to be revered. Parody may be as clever, laughable, and amusing as you can make it; but it should always be good-natured, fair, and gentlemanly.

CHAPTER V.

After his rebuff by Lady Dimsdale, the Baronet made up his mind to set off home as soon as possible. He was stung as he had rarely been stung in his life before, and was in no humour for the company of any one. But before he could get away, an almost incredible rumour reached his ears that Mr Boyd’s long-lost wife had unexpectedly appeared at Rosemount. This was enough to induce Sir Frederick to change his plans, especially when backed up by the Captain’s pressing invitation to stay for dinner, for who could tell what unexpected turn events might now take? So he sent his groom in the dogcart to fetch his dress clothes, and made up his mind to remain where he was till the following morning.

Sir Frederick had easily discovered, by questioning one of the servants, in which particular room Mr Boyd and his wife had located themselves. It was the room next the library. So into the library went Sir Frederick, on the pretext of having some letters to write, and there he sat with the door a little way open—waiting. A certain strange idea was fermenting in his brain, which he could not get rid of till he had satisfied himself whether it had any foundation in fact or otherwise. The moment he saw Boyd pass the library door, he knew that the opportunity for which he had been waiting had come.

Sir Frederick advanced a step or two, and looked round, as if in search of some one. ‘Pardon my intrusion,’ he said with a bow; ‘but—Mr Boyd—is he not here?’

The Baronet gave a well-simulated start at the first sound of Mrs Boyd’s voice. Then he seemed to regard her attentively for a moment or two, with his head a little on one side. ‘Pardon me,’ he said with a half-smile of inquiry, ‘but have I not the honour of addressing Mrs Boyd?’

At this question she seemed to freeze suddenly. Her eyes traversed him from head to foot before she answered him; then in cold clear tones she said: ‘I am the wife of Oscar Boyd.’

‘I thought I could not be mistaken,’ replied the Baronet, with his most insinuating smile.—‘I am Sir Frederick Pinkerton. But it is so long since I had the pleasure of seeing you last, that in all probability you have quite forgotten me.’

There was something about him that had evidently aroused her suspicions. She was at a loss to know what ground to take with him. ‘Yes—I cannot quite call you to mind,’ she said hesitatingly, after a little pause. ‘And yet? No. Tell me where I have seen you before.’

‘I met you on two or three occasions in society, a few months after your marriage.’

‘Yes—I think I remember you now. But it is a long time ago, monsieur, and I was introduced to so many people about that time.’

‘I am indeed flattered, monsieur.’ She smiled a little set smile, which came and went as if it were produced by clockwork. She was evidently far from being at her ease.

‘Your unexpected appearance must have been a great surprise to Mr Boyd—a surprise and a pleasure in one. The return of a wife whom he believed to have been lost to him for ever several years ago! What a unique experience!’

‘An experience, monsieur, which very few husbands, I am afraid, would care to have brought home to themselves. You have an English proverb, “Out of sight, out of mind.” That is a very true proverb.’

‘Fie, fie! Mrs Boyd. You must not be so severe on us poor men. We are not all alike. Take your own case as an instance. You come back, from the tomb as it were, after I know not how many years, and find your husband still faithful to your memory.—Ah no; you must not malign us all.’

Was he mocking her, or what, this smiling, smooth-faced man? She was becoming more vaguely uneasy every minute, she scarcely knew why.

‘The sight of you this morning, Mrs Boyd,’ resumed the Baronet, ‘brings to my memory a certain little incident which I had all but forgotten. In those days, I was something of a traveller. About a year subsequently to my introduction to you, madam, I found myself in Mexico.’

‘While there, singular to say, I made the acquaintance of a certain relative of yours, who inquired most particularly concerning your welfare.’

Mrs Boyd’s face might have been seen to pale even under its artificial colouring. She steadied her voice by an effort. ‘Of a relation of mine, monsieur! May I ask his name?’

‘Don Diego Riaz.’ He pronounced the name slowly, looking fixedly at her the while.

‘Ha!’ She fell back a step, as if some one had aimed a blow at her, and then one hand went up quickly to her heart. Both hatred and fear shone out of the eyes with which she stared at him.

‘A spasm; a mere nothing,’ she answered.—‘To return to what you were saying. I have neither seen nor heard anything of Don Diego Riaz for many years, and I hope neither to see nor hear anything of him in time to come. There was no love lost between him and me.’

‘His was a singular character, and strange tales were told of him. For instance, it was whispered that on one occasion when a certain member of his family left home without his knowledge or consent, he’——

‘Spare me the recital, I pray of you. The mere mention of that man’s name is hateful to me! utterly hateful!’ Her voice was charged with passion, her black eyes seemed to strike fire. She walked across to the window and then came back again.

Sir Frederick felt that he had pursued the topic as far as it was safe to do so. ‘’Tis she; I can no longer doubt,’ he murmured to himself. ‘I have not forgotten what I was told in Mexico.’

‘How much or how little does this man know?’ Estelle kept asking herself. She was seriously uneasy.

‘Do you purpose making a long stay in England, Mrs Boyd?’ asked the Baronet in his most matter-of-fact tone.

‘I think not, Sir Frederick. My husband talks about sailing for South America in a few days. He has lost nearly the whole of his fortune. N’est ce pas?’

‘I believe so. I was prodigiously sorry to hear of it.—Do you accompany your husband abroad, Mrs Boyd?’

‘Monsieur! Is it not a wife’s duty to accompany her husband anywhere and everywhere? And consider for how many years Oscar and I have been separated! He would not leave me behind him for the world.’

‘Yours must be a romantic story, Mrs Boyd. I hope we shall have the pleasure of hearing from your lips some particulars of your marvellous escape.’

At this moment Mrs Bowood entered the room. She could contain herself no longer. What was Mr Boyd about, that he did not at once introduce his wife to herself and the Captain? Then she was dying to apologise for her mistake of the morning; besides which, her sense of hospitality was outraged by the fact that Mrs Boyd had been all this time in the house without having been shown to her rooms or asked to partake of refreshments of any kind. Such a state of affairs must be put an end to forthwith.

Mrs Bowood came forward with her most genial smile. ‘I am come to apologise for my absurd mistake of this morning, though it was partly your own fault, my dear Mrs Boyd.’ She had hold of both Estelle’s hands by this time. ‘How do you do? How do you do? Allow me to welcome you to Rosemount.—Ah, Sir Frederick, you here?’ This was said with some surprise.

‘Wonders will never cease.’ Then turning to Estelle, she went on: ‘Only to think that I mistook you for a French governess! But you ought to have let me know at first who you were, and then matters would have been set right at once.’

‘I wanted to surprise my husband,’ answered Estelle, with downcast eyes. ‘I wanted to see whether he would know me again, after so long a time.’

‘As if he could help knowing you and he your husband! I can imagine how overjoyed he must have been to see you again.’

‘Cher Oscar! He was distracted with joy. He could scarcely speak to me at first for emotion.’

‘No chance for Laura now,’ said Mrs Bowood to herself. ‘How fortunate this woman did not come a day later.’

Mrs Bowood had left the room-door wide open, and at this juncture her eye caught sight of Lady Dimsdale, who was passing along the corridor on her way to the side-door that opened into the grounds. ‘Laura, Laura! come here,’ she called. ‘I want to introduce you to Mrs Boyd.’

‘Checkmate for my Lady Disdain,’ remarked Sir Frederick to himself with a shrug.

Lady Dimsdale hearing herself called by name turned back, and entered the room. She looked a little paler than ordinary, but was perfectly composed. Going straight up to Estelle, she held out her hand. ‘Mrs Boyd and I have met already,’ she said in her most matter-of-fact tone.

‘Ah, oui,’ answered Estelle with a shrug, as she took the proffered hand for a moment and then let it drop.

‘Then I must introduce you.—This is Lady Dimsdale, one of my dearest friends.—Laura—Mrs Boyd.’

‘’Tis a pity Lady D. cannot return the compliment,’ muttered Sir Frederick to himself.

Mrs Bowood turned to him. ‘By-the-bye, Sir Frederick, have you seen the Captain since luncheon?’ With that the two crossed over to the window and began to talk together.

‘Mrs Boyd, I feel that some explanation is due to you,’ said Lady Dimsdale in a low voice to the other.

‘As you please,’ answered the other, with a little lifting of her shoulders; and with that she sat down and yawned unmistakably behind her handkerchief.

‘Mr Boyd and I were acquainted many years ago, before he went abroad,’ began Lady Dimsdale. ‘He was a frequent visitor at my father’s vicarage. After he went away, I never saw him again till yesterday. This morning, fully believing that you had been dead for many years, he asked me to become his wife.’

‘It was very bad taste on my part, I confess. Had I known how you were engaged, I would have waited five minutes longer.’

‘I told you that I did not require any explanation. Now that you have chosen to press one on me, what is the value of it? Absolument rien! The world is wide, and one kiss more or less is of little consequence.’ She rose, and crossed to the table and opened a book of photographs.

‘And that woman is Oscar Boyd’s wife!’ said Lady Dimsdale to herself as she looked after her. Her heart was very, very bitter.

Mrs Bowood turned as Estelle crossed to the table. ‘I am afraid you will think us all very inhospitable, Mrs Boyd,’ she said; ‘but it is your husband’s fault that you did not come in to luncheon. However, a tray will be ready for you in a few minutes. By-the-bye, has any one shown you your rooms?’

‘My rooms, madame! We—that is, my husband and I—are going to London by the next train. At least, that is what Oscar says.’

‘Going away by the next train! Mr Boyd had promised to stay a week, and why need he go away because you have arrived?’

‘That will never do. I must talk to him; and Captain Bowood must talk to him; and you, Lady Dimsdale, and you, Sir Frederick, must add your persuasions to ours to induce Mr Boyd not to run away from us in this sudden fashion. Next week we have two picnics and an archery meeting—and Mrs Boyd has been so long away from England!’

‘I am sure Mr Boyd can’t be hard-hearted enough to resist all our entreaties,’ said the Baronet. ‘The influence of Lady Dimsdale alone might’——

‘You rate my influence too highly, Sir Frederick,’ interrupted Laura hastily, while a warm flush mounted to her cheek. ‘In a matter like this, Mr Boyd probably knows his own business better than any one.’

The Baronet, in nowise disconcerted, turned to Estelle: ‘To run away from us so soon would be cruel indeed.’ Then to Mrs Bowood: ‘I am sure we are all anxious for the pleasure of Mrs Boyd’s further acquaintance. We want to know her better—we want to hear the story of her adventures, of her wonderful escape from shipwreck.’

‘Yes—of course—the story of the shipwreck,’ cried impulsive Mrs Bowood. ‘I had forgotten that for the moment. We are all dying to hear it.’

Estelle’s eyes were on Lady Dimsdale. ‘The woman he kissed says nothing,’ was her unspoken comment. Then turning to Mrs Bowood, she said: ‘The shipwreck? O yes, I will tell you all about the shipwreck—but not to-day. I am a little tired.’

‘I am sure you must be, and hungry too. We have all been very remiss,’ replied the mistress of Rosemount. Then putting her arm into that of Estelle, she added: ‘But your tray will be ready by this time, and Mr Boyd must join you when he comes down. Meanwhile, I want to introduce you to Captain Bowood.—Laura, dear, you are coming?’

‘I will join you in a few minutes,’ was Lady Dimsdale’s reply. She wanted to be alone.

Mrs Bowood and Estelle quitted the room together. Sir Frederick lingered behind for a moment.

‘What a happy man our friend Boyd must be to-day.—Don’t you think so, dear Lady Dimsdale?’ he said with a smirk.

‘Very happy, Sir Frederick,’ answered Laura, looking him steadily in the eyes. ‘Who can doubt it?’

‘Lucky dog! lucky dog!’ ejaculated the Baronet as he followed the other ladies from the room.

Lady Dimsdale sank into an easy-chair. ‘His wife! His wife!’ How the words kept ringing in her brain. ‘Thank heaven she came at the moment she did, and not five minutes later! And yet if she had come an hour sooner, that would have been better still. Would it? I don’t know. I cannot tell. His words were so sweet to me! Did I answer him? No. He looked into my eyes and read his answer there. And now I must never see him or think of him more! Oh, my darling—the love of my girlhood—the only love of my life—it is hard to bear, hard to bear!’ She felt as if her heart were surcharged with tears; they glistened in her eyes.

At this moment Oscar Boyd entered the room. He gave a little start when he saw who was in it. He had not expected to find her there. From the head of the staircase, just as he was on the point of coming down, he had seen his wife and Mrs Bowood enter the dining-room, and he guessed what had happened during his absence. The hard set look on his pale face softened inexpressibly as his eyes rested on Lady Dimsdale. ‘Laura!’ he said, pausing for an instant with the handle of the door in his hand.

She neither looked up nor answered him; for a moment or two she was afraid to trust either her eyes or her voice.

He shut the door, and went forward and took one of her hands. ‘Laura!’ he said again, and there was a world of tenderness in the way he pronounced that one little word.

Then she looked up, and he saw the tears shining in her eyes. ‘Oscar!—I may call you so for the last time—we ought to have parted without another word.’

‘I could not have gone away without seeing you again, if only for a few minutes.’

‘Laura! when I spoke to you this morning, it was in the full belief that I was a free man—that no tie existed on earth to debar me from saying the words I said then.’

‘The woman—my wife—whom I had every reason to believe had died long ago, will accompany me when I leave this place. But to-morrow she and I will part for ever. Her future will be duly cared for, and after that I shall never see her again. Laura! you and I may never meet again after to-day. Think of me sometimes when I am far away.’

‘O heavens, when I think how happy we might have been! And now!’ Strong man though he was, it was all he could do to keep himself from breaking down. He was possessed by an almost irresistible impulse to fling his arms round her and press her passionately to his heart.

Love’s fine instinct told Laura something of what was passing in his breast. She stood up and laid one hand softly on his arm. ‘You had better go now,’ she said very gently. ‘No more words are needed between you and me. We know what we know, and no one can deprive us of that knowledge.’

He felt the wisdom of her words. To delay that which was inevitable was merely to prolong her misery and his own. Besides, his wife might enter the room at any moment. And yet—and yet it was so hard to have his treasure torn from him at the very moment he had made it his own!

Laura had a rose in the bosom of her dress. She took it out and fixed it in his button-hole. ‘Now go. Not another word,’ she whispered.

He did not dispute the point, but took each of her hands in one of his. For the space of a few seconds they stood heart to heart, as it were, gazing into each other’s eyes. Then Oscar lifted first one hand and then the other, and pressed them to his lips with a sort of reverent passionate tenderness. ‘Farewell, my darling, farewell!’

The words struck a chill to her heart. They were the last anguished cry of love and happiness lost for ever.

A few years ago, I was what is called a ‘globe-trotter,’ by which title, as the reader knows, is meant that distinctively modern personage—the world-tourist. He is the creation of the steamboat and the rail, and of all the Ariel-like capabilities due to recent discoveries and improvements in locomotion by land and sea. The term globe-trotter is suggestive. One conjures up a traveller, knapsack on back, poking his nose into the Himalayas, sauntering across Sahara, brushing past the Pyramids, leaving his card at Calcutta, scampering over the American prairie, lunching at Rome, and dropping in to see the Seven Churches of Asia. The voyager of to-day can buttonhole Old Father Time, and be on familiar terms with his primal relative Space. It was thus that in the course of two or three years I was fortunate enough to visit most of the embryo kingdoms which make up our colonial empire, as well as Britain’s great dependency in the East. As need scarcely be said, I boasted a note-book, for what traveller of this era is without one, wherewith on his return to publish Passages, Reminiscences, Fly-leaves, or Jottings of his unique wanderings? From the memoranda made during this tour round the world, I have compiled several incidents connected with the Scot abroad. These pretend to be nothing more than ripples on the current of colonial life, giving slight hints as to moods and bearing of the Scot abroad, in the varying scenes of his exile.

It is a truism to say that Scotsmen are to be found in every corner of the habitable globe. As I once heard a Melbourne Englishman remark: ‘If there were no Scotchmen, what would the world do for bank-managers?’ They have been noted as enterprising emigrants, and, in a large number of cases, successful colonists. I met with few instances of Scotchmen complaining in respect of their material welfare. One man in Queensland had a somewhat unique grievance, which, however, he set forth with a twinkle in the eye: ‘There’s the government spendin’ pounds upon pounds in bringin’ oot folk to this country, while here’s me wi’ fifteen bairns, maistly a’ born here, an’ I’ve never got a penny for ony o’ them!’

Otago is perhaps the most Scottish of any portion of the colonial empire, though Ontario runs it very close. Dunedin is almost undiluted in its Scottish nationality, and is a city of considerable stir. Sabbatarian questions, as well as the question of instrumental music in the church, are warmly discussed in Otago. At a certain gathering of Presbyterian clergymen, one of them urged that organs should be introduced in order to draw more young people to the church; upon which an old minister remarked that this was acting on the principle of ‘O whistle, an’ I’ll come to ye, my lad!’ The Scot abroad has a great love for the institutions of his native country, and endeavours to transplant as many of them as circumstances will allow. Even the winter weather of Scotland induces kindly recollections in the breasts of old settlers. I remember, after a phenomenal fall of snow in Dunedin, the like of which had not been seen for twenty years, an elder of the kirk exclaiming, as he rubbed his hands: ‘Sic glorious snaw-ba’ fechts we had—it mindit me o’ langsyne! Man, I was sorry when the thaw cam’ on.’ Caledonian Societies flourish all over New Zealand as much as does the thistle itself. On the Thames gold-field, in the province of Auckland, there was a corps of Highland Volunteers. Whenever they marched through the town, they were invariably followed by numbers of Maories, who tied blankets round their waists, like kilts, and no doubt imagined themselves sufficiently Celtic.

The national dishes are much in vogue in New Zealand. An English lady in Wellington, the capital of that colony, on one occasion detailed how she had tried to make a haggis in order to please her husband, who hailed from north of the Tweed. With the help of a cookery-book, the numerous ingredients were collected and prepared, and at last inserted in a big pot. Alas! the haggis would not sink, despite renewed efforts. The lady, in despair, called in an experienced neighbour, who pierced the haggis with a fork, and successfully ‘scuttled’ it. I am sorry to add that after all the wife’s trouble and anxiety, the dish proved a total failure. It is to be hoped that her husband was not so difficult to please as the well-to-do tradesman in Auckland, who grumbled sorely as to New Zealand ‘not being fit for a Scotsman to live in.’ ‘How’s that?’ ‘Weel, the fact is I—I—canna get my parritch made to please me!’ Talking of porridge, the dish was a favourite in the Christchurch Hotel, province of Canterbury, where it was cooked by a Frenchman who now and again actually spoke broken Scotch with a Parisian accent; while at Wanganui, in the North Island, the ‘parritch’ was prepared by a Chinese cook.

To say that Scotsmen abroad are still fond of their national music is simply to say that they do not cease to be Scotsmen. If anything, the fondness becomes intensified. I once heard an enthusiast in South Africa observe: ‘My Ain Fireside—Ye Banks and Braes—The Land o’ the Leal—eh! a body could be fit to gang to heaven hearing thae sangs sung!’ At a mission-school connected with the Scotch Church in Cape Town I once listened to Weel may the Boatie row, sung as a duet by a Dutch girl and a Malay, a result attained by the enthusiasm of the Scottish schoolmaster. It seemed to me as incongruous as hearing the Old Hundred in the ‘Scots Kirk’ of Calcutta, unwittingly accompanied by the tom-toms of a Hindu festival transpiring in the street. Now that I have taken the reader so far as India, let me note also that in the Church of Scotland College at Calcutta I saw an advanced class of Bengali youths reading Scott’s Lady of the Lake and making marginal notes. Returning to Australia, a pleasant memory is that of an afternoon spent in a school at Sandhurst, the aforetime ‘Bendigo.’ Here, after the ordinary class-duties had been performed, the scholars were initiated into the mysteries of Highland reels and strathspeys, under the tutorship of an Aberdonian dame, the Aberdonian schoolmaster accompanying on the fiddle. I recollect, too, how an Irish grocer in Adelaide, South Australia, was moved to stand outside his door in the bright moonlight evenings and play Monymusk on a tin whistle. A vision of Canada now rises before me, with its host of local bards, each with his wallet of poems on his back, trudging from village to village—the troubadours of the backwoods. Their warblings were not of the snow-laden forest, the subdued glory of the Indian summer, the autumn-gilded maple, or the swift, miraculous dawn of the Columbian spring. Their strains were those of exile; strains of Scotia, of ‘hame,’ of rippling burnies, of the purple heather, of the thousand-and-one historic and sympathetic memories of the dear old land. But hark! what sounds do we hear echoing from a Sabbath school in Sacramento, California? Scottish tunes, but linked to religious words, the children singing a hymn of the church militant to the melody of Scots wha hae; while Ye Banks and Braes served as the tender medium for stanzas of a more devotional character.

The farmer is a notable figure in one’s Canadian remembrances, the agricultural class comprising about half the population. In Ontario you will find many old Scotch settlers, and much could be written upon their present and past experiences. The times are considerably altered from the days when the rough pioneering work had to be done. I once met two aged farmers, one of whom had seen eighty-three winters, who had emigrated to Canada together about forty years ago, and might have been taken for typical old settlers. In telling their primitive toils and privations, their weather-beaten faces were lit up with an animation that was almost joyous in its character. One related, as if it were some rare humour, that his first log-hut in the backwoods was at many places open to the heavens, and that frequently he had to dust the snow off his blankets before he went to bed. The wintry theme suggests the story of a Scottish Canadian who, on a voyage to the mother-country, was one day found sleeping on deck, when the captain roused him with a natural caution against sunstroke. ‘Sunstroke!’ scornfully replied the awakened one. ‘It wad tak’ a’ the sun atween here an’ Greenock to thaw the Canada frost oot o’ my head.’

In Salt Lake City there are not a few Scottish Mormons. I chanced to have a brief conversation there with a middle-aged Scotchwoman, who was a follower of Brigham Young, and who did not hesitate to magnify the virtues of polygamy. It turned out, however, that her zeal was largely of a theoretical nature, as the good lady did not seem{78} to believe in the system so far as it might entail any discomfort upon herself. At Omaha I was acquainted with a Highlander who in the first days of Mormonism became converted to polygamy, but who ultimately abjured the faith. Many a time and oft, in Celtic daring, had he stood on the banks of the Missouri River, lifting up his voice in the wilderness like the Baptist of old, denouncing Mormonism to the bands of converts as they passed over the stream to the ostensible Land of Canaan. His life was in daily peril, but he escaped scathless from his self-imposed mission. In San Francisco I saw Elder Stenhouse, who had been until lately a chief among the Utah Saints. He and his wife, both Scotch people, had dedicated themselves honestly to the new faith, but finding out its hollowness, they shook off the dust of the desert—there is plenty of it—from their shoes, and took farewell of Salt Lake.

In travelling about from place to place you make acquaintance with a most interesting type of character—that of the veteran Scotchman. In Christchurch, New Zealand, I met a Waterloo veteran, eighty-four years of age, yet with erect, military carriage. With vivacious garrulity he told that he was born in Fife; that he had lodged at the house of Mrs Grant of Laggan; that he knew ‘Jamie Hogg’ and Nathaniel Gow; that he had been all through the Peninsular War, had fought at Waterloo, and had been on half-pay since 1817. A companion-figure was that of the venerable Highlander of King William’s Town, Cape Colony—a genial-hearted man, of stern brow and with war-worn features—whose talk was a strange blending of pleasant Scottish reminiscence and weird stories of Kaffir campaigns in which he had taken part. Again, while sailing up the Suez Canal, on the voyage home from India, one of my fellow-passengers was an old Scotsman who had fought at Waterloo, and was then engaged making a tour of the world. As he said, with pleasant pathos: ‘I want to see all that’s to be seen before I’m happit up in the mools’—a phrase that can only be inadequately rendered in English as ‘lying snug beneath the sod.’ He left the steamer at Port Saïd, as he was bound on an excursion to the Holy Land, and as the quarter-master offered to carry his portmanteau, the old fellow elbowed him aside, exclaiming: ‘Pooh, pooh; I’m a young man yet!’ Last and not least notable of this class was an old and well-preserved gentleman I met at Wellington, New Zealand. He was an Edinburgh man, and had been educated at the university there. He had been acquainted with friends of Burns, had known the poet’s ‘Chloris’ and ‘Clarinda,’ and in speaking of the Potterrow always seemed to regard it as still a fashionable street. To gossip with him was like shaking hands with the past.

In going round the world, one is sure to find relatives and souvenirs of famous men and women. At Hobart-Town, Tasmania, there resided, when I visited the town, the granddaughter of Neil Gow and daughter of Nathaniel Gow, the composer of Caller Herrin’. In the Waikato district of the North Island of New Zealand, about a hundred miles from the city of Auckland, lives, I still trust, old Mrs Nicol, mother of the late Robert Nicol, the celebrated Perthshire poet. During a stormy passage in a small steamer on the New Zealand coast, I had some interesting chats with an Irish gentleman who had met and talked with Sir Walter Scott in a chapel in Italy, during the closing scenes of that busy life. I may add also that at Listowel, in Ontario, I was privileged to meet the brother of Dr Livingstone, and was much struck with the facial resemblance between him and the great traveller. In the University of Dunedin the visitor can see, in a gilt frame, a lock of Burns’s hair, labelled ‘A genuine relic of the Poet, and modicum of a larger lock owned by Jean Armour.’ A certain country hotel in Tasmania lives in my memory from its having distributed through its rooms an extraordinary number of pictures of John Knox, the religious character of the house being increased by the fact that one of the apartments was used as the ‘study’ of the Presbyterian clergyman of the village. The name of John Knox, by association, recalls to my mind the incident of the eccentric Scot of Kaffraria, South Africa, who had a portrait of Mary Queen of Scots hung in his bedroom, and who, every morning on rising, stretched his hands towards it, crying: ‘O my poor murdered queen!’

The visitor fresh from home is certain of meeting with a kind welcome from his countrymen abroad. The welcome need not be on personal grounds. An Edinburgh man in Canada once shook my hand warmly, saying: ‘I dinna ken ye; I never met ye before; but I just want to see a man that’s seen Arthur Seat since I saw it.’ The love of home sometimes reaches an intense pitch, as in the case of the Scotsman at Fort Beaufort, in Cape Colony, who ejaculated: ‘I’d rather gang hame and be hanged, than dee here a natural death!’ Again, an old man in New Zealand remarked: ‘I doot I’ll no get hame to Scotland again; but if onybody said: “Ye shall not go,” I’d be off the morn’s mornin’!’ With which forcible yet touching deliverance let these glimpses conclude.

I am afraid that during our brief bird’s-eye view of colonial life, the reader has been dragged hither and thither in a somewhat erratic course. The irregularity, however, has been more apparent than real. Whether amid Canadian snows, New Zealand mountains, Australian bush, or South African veldt, you meet with the same shrewd, persevering Scotsman, steadily moving in his colonial orbit, and moving none the less regularly because of the tender gravitation of his heart towards the central sphere of patriotic affection—dear though distant Scotland.

Although the above important question is so frequently asked, more especially of medical men, yet their replies are as a general rule either of a vague or dogmatic nature that is anything but satisfactory. There has been unlimited discussion respecting the injurious effects of smoking, ever since the first introduction of tobacco, and a great deal of nonsense has unfortunately been urged by enthusiasts on both sides. Some have praised tobacco far beyond its merits; while others have so enlarged upon its injurious and poisonous qualities as to make one wonder that anybody who smokes should be left alive at all.{79} Hitherto, however, no satisfactory solution of the problem appears to have been arrived at. Our object in this paper will be to deal as concisely as possible with the subject upon its merits.

In the first place, we may inform our readers that smoking is and is not injurious. This apparently contradictory assertion admits, however, of the following explanation. In New England, it has been with truth alleged that the thirst induced by smoking is an active incentive to alcoholic excess and its attendant evils. Now, on the other hand, amongst Asiatic nations the reverse holds good. Mr Lane—translator of the Arabian Nights—when in the East, noticed that smoking appeared to possess a soothing effect, attended with slight exhilaration, and that it supplied the place of alcoholic beverages. Mr Layard, whose knowledge of eastern nations is most extensive, was also of the same opinion. Mr Crawford, again, an authority of high repute as regards Asiatic habits, believes the use of tobacco has contributed to the sobriety both of Asiatic and European nations. Here we have two entirely contradictory results, as, in North America smoking produces dissipation; whilst in the East it not only restrains, but takes its place. It is therefore to climate, temperament, and bodily constitution acting and reacting upon each other, that we may trace so opposite an effect.

The chemical constituents of tobacco are three, the due consideration of which is highly important. They are: (1) A volatile oil; (2) a volatile alkali; (3) an empyreumatic oil. The volatile oil, although in minute quantities, has a most powerful action on the physical system, even in the smallest dose; and when taken internally, gives rise to nausea with giddiness. The volatile alkali is nicotine, possessing narcotic and very poisonous qualities; so much so indeed, that a single drop of it is sufficient to kill a dog. The proportion of this substance in the dry tobacco-leaf varies from two to eight per cent., according to Professor Johnston, who states that ‘in smoking a quarter of an ounce of tobacco, two grains or more of one of the most subtle poisons known may be drawn into the smoker’s mouth;’ the reason why he is not poisoned being because this deadly juice is not concentrated. Empyreumatic oil (from Gr. empyreuo, I kindle), the third active ingredient of tobacco, is so called to express the burned smell and acrid taste which result from the combustion of the tobacco during smoking. This oil closely resembles in its action that which is produced from poisonous foxglove leaf (Digitalis purpurea). A drop of empyreumatic oil when applied to the tongue of a cat has produced convulsions and death in a few minutes. Reptiles are destroyed by it as through an electric shock. It must be borne in mind that these three chemical ingredients are united when smoking, and produce to a greater or less degree their respective effects. A cigar when smoked to the end effectually discharges into the smoker’s mouth everything produced by its combustion. When saliva is retained in the mouth, the effects of tobacco in one sense become more markedly developed on the nervous system. On the other hand, when constant expectoration takes place, digestion becomes impaired, from the diminution of saliva, which plays an important part in this function. We have heard medical men, who were themselves smokers, aver that the former is the least of the two evils; which we hope is the case, as the habit of constant expectoration in which many smokers indulge, is certainly one of the most unpleasant concomitants of the pipe or cigar.

In a purely physiological sense, smoking acts as follows: (1) The heart’s action becomes lowered; (2) the elimination of carbonic acid is diminished, thus interfering with the respiratory power; (3) the waste of the body is checked, and digestion to a certain extent impeded. Excessive smoking disorders digestion, and, where the heart is weak, often induces disease of that organ. It is by no means uncommon to find habitual smokers troubled with dyspepsia. Dr Leared considers excessive smoking decidedly productive of indigestion. Dr Pereira, who was a high authority on such matters, when alluding to habitual smokers in his celebrated Materia Medica, observes: ‘The practice, when moderately indulged in, provokes thirst, increases the secretion of saliva, and produces that remarkably soothing and tranquillising effect upon the mind which has caused it to be so much admired and adopted by all classes of society, and by all nations civilised and barbarous.’ Later on, the same eminent authority states that ‘when indulged in to excess, and especially by those unaccustomed to its use, smoking causes nausea, trembling, and in some cases paralysis and death.’ Instances are recorded of persons killing themselves by smoking seventeen or eighteen pipes at a sitting!

In his luminous Treatise on Poisons, Dr Christison states that ‘no well-ascertained ill effects have been shown to result from the habitual practice of smoking.’ On the other hand, Dr Prout, a late distinguished physician and chemist, was of a different opinion. He observes: ‘Tobacco disorders the assimilating functions in general, but particularly, I believe, the assimilation of saccharine principle. It is the weak and those predisposed to disease who fall victims to its poisonous operation, whilst the strong and healthy suffer comparatively little therefrom.’ So even this learned physician’s opinion is to a certain extent thus modified.

The researches of Dr Richardson, F.R.S., are of immense value with regard to the action of tobacco upon the health. He is of opinion that there are no grounds for believing that smoking—of course, we infer, when indulged in with moderation—can produce organic change. Functional disturbances of the heart, brain, and vision, he tells us, may be traced to its excessive use. It is universally, however, admitted that tobacco, like alcohol—in minute doses—arrests oxidation of living tissues, thus checking their disintegration. Dr Richardson, for this reason, justly considers smoking highly injurious to the young, causing impairment of growth.

In the course of an important discussion which took place between Sir Ranald Martin, Mr Solly, Dr Ranking, and other scientific physicians, the following important results were arrived at respecting smoking: (1) That the habit is only prejudicial when carried to excess; (2) that tobacco is innocuous as compared with alcohol, and in no case worse than tea, and by the side of high living, contrasts most favourably. Whether smoking is or is not injurious to health depends principally upon the{80} following conditions: (1) The kind of tobacco smoked; (2) the manner in which it is consumed; (3) the amount of tobacco smoked; and lastly, when it is indulged in. The great object is to obtain a tobacco which possesses the smallest percentage of nicotine. It was formerly believed that the best varieties of Havana and Turkish tobacco were the most innocuous. According, however, to the recent exhaustive researches of Dr George Harley, F.R.S., it appears that the more delicate the aroma of tobacco, the more poisonous it becomes. Dr Harley is also of opinion that ‘Caporal’ tobacco contains least nicotine, and is consequently to be preferred by those desirous of health. Pipes made of clay, and meerschaums—not foul—are, Dr Richardson considers, in a hygienic point of view, superior to cigars and cigarettes. Neither cigars nor cigarettes should ever be smoked near the end, as the nicotine then is discharged into the mouth in larger proportions. M. Melsens, a very distinguished chemist, is of opinion that a plug of cotton-wool saturated with a solution of strong citric or tannic acid should be inserted in the stem of the pipe, cigar, or cigarette holder. By this precaution, the smoke is effectually filtered, ere reaching the mouth, as the nicotine would then be seized by and combined with the acid. Those who object to this plan on account of its trouble, might with advantage place a small piece of plain cotton-wool in the stem of their pipe as a filtering agent. This should on each occasion be removed and replaced by a fresh one. A more convenient, and probably not less effective plug, is a bit of paper crumpled into a soft ball and placed in the bottom of the pipe. It acts as an absorbent of the objectionable juices which might otherwise find their way into the mouth, and can be changed, if the smoker chooses, every time he fills his pipe.

From a review of the scientific testimony and physiological facts bearing upon this subject, we may safely arrive at the following conclusions: (1) That smoking in excess is decidedly an injurious habit, frequently causing dyspepsia, and functional diseases of the heart, brain, and nervous system. (2) That smoking, even when in moderation, is pernicious in early life, also to certain constitutions, and in particular conditions of the body. (3) That in adult life and in ordinary health, no well-ascertained ill effects have been demonstrated as owing their causation to moderate smoking. (4) That the moderate use of tobacco is not only in many cases a harmless luxury, but occasionally, from its soothing and tranquillising influence, a useful adjunct. Smoking, even in the strictest moderation, with some persons of peculiar idiosyncrasies, acts as a poison, and should therefore be avoided, when feelings of discomfort are entailed by its use.

It is impossible to lay down any rule as to the amount of tobacco which may be consumed without a deleterious effect upon the health. What would be moderation to one is often excess to another, according to temperament, habit, and individual peculiarities. Each person ought to be able to judge for himself as to what is moderation. The best time for smoking is undoubtedly after a meal; and the most injurious, on an empty stomach.

In drawing this paper to a close, we cannot do better than by appending the following extract, taken from Mr Dawson’s valuable little work on longevity. On page sixty-nine of How to Prolong Life, when speaking of smoking, Mr Dawson observes: ‘All things taken into account, it is evident that tobacco in excess is certainly prejudicial to good health; in moderation, however, it may be indulged in with comparative impunity; but under any circumstances, it should be known that a man in health is much better without it. How much more so in the case of those who are weakly! Lastly, I desire to impress upon all smokers that moderation in this habit is of no small moment, the ill effects being proportioned to indulgence.’

Printed and Published by W. & R. Chambers, 47 Paternoster Row, London, and 339 High Street, Edinburgh.

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.

CONTENTS

HAMPSTEAD HEATH.

BY MEAD AND STREAM.

CHAPTER VII.—AN UNLOVED LIFE.

CHAPTER VIII.—‘WILL YOU SPEAK THAT WORD?’

THE MUSE OF PARODY.

TWO DAYS IN A LIFETIME.

CHAPTER V.

GLIMPSES OF THE SCOT ABROAD.

IS SMOKING INJURIOUS TO HEALTH?

TO A CHILD.

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL OF POPULAR LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.

CONTENTS

HAMPSTEAD HEATH.

BY MEAD AND STREAM.

CHAPTER VII.—AN UNLOVED LIFE.

CHAPTER VIII.—‘WILL YOU SPEAK THAT WORD?’

THE MUSE OF PARODY.

TWO DAYS IN A LIFETIME.

CHAPTER V.

GLIMPSES OF THE SCOT ABROAD.

IS SMOKING INJURIOUS TO HEALTH?

TO A CHILD.

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.