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fourd said to me,

fore by no means timid sisterliness, Helen Tal- strings of slaver hung dangling from the serrated edges of his lips in a very ugly manner. And like a man who is at his highest pitch of anger he did not give tongue at all, but every now and then uttered a short spasmodic "ugh!" which expressed the tug it gave him to hold his mad heart in. He had what the prize-fighters call

"I am strong, may I offer you my arm to lean upon, Mr. Remy? That is, if you would like to go up to the house now." And the young girl looked at me with a frank eye full of kind pity, which not even the basest slave of mere etiquette would have dared to call unwo-"business" in his eye at this moment, and I manly boldness. With equal frankness I took the arm which she bent to receive my hand, thanking her, as seemed best, entirely as if it were a matter of course, and trying to lean as lightly as possible upon its delicate soft curve.

As I have said, it was only a very few steps from the gymnasium to the house; but it was my first effort to-day, and I felt quite faint. The talk in the bath-room had tired me. Dressing had tired me. Finally, the walk to the gymnasium and the hard seat there, as well as the conversation with Miss Talfourd and its accompanying excitement, had finished the business for me. I could not help taking a great deal of support from my fair substitute for the Irishman. She looked around at me with some concern and asked, "Dear me! Do you feel very faint, Mr. Remy ?" at the same time bracing herself to be more assistance to me.

"No, not very," I replied, in a tone that carried the denial of the words. At the same time I beheld, about twenty rods in front of us, past the house, and in the large court-yard that extended on each side of it and beyond, a sight which might have made a sicker man than I provoked, and one not quite so sick demonstrative of that emotion.

There was my big Dublin Irishman-who was certainly coming back within the next quarter of an hour-amusing himself as unconcernedly as if there had been no such person in the world as Paul Remy, Esquire-nothing, in fine, connected with that person save an elegant sinecure held by Mr. Michael Dobry, and paying a handsome income in small change, second-hand coats, vests, and so forth.

prayed Heaven silently that the fool who held him might not let him go.

Helen Talfourd caught sight of the group at the same time with myself, and cried out, in undisguised terror,

66

'Oh, look at those dreadful men! They are making the dogs fight!"

"Yes, the rascals! Michael, what are you doing there, Sir? How dare you!"

"Oh, don't speak to him-don't speak to him, Mr. Remy-it always makes men worse! Let's hurry into the house as fast as we can go."

When I called to Michael the backer of the dubious dog slunk away. Podge followed him, with an appearance caricaturing his master'stail slowed and ears close. But Michael, with all the matchless effrontery for which he was celebrated, and to show that he was not all taken aback at being caught in those mere amiable weaknesses of lying and idling, turned square around toward Helen Talfourd and myself, Tobin in front of him, and addressed us familiarly with,

"An' isn't this yer quiet, dacent little darlint to be a pet for a family o'childer?"

And just then the catastrophe I had prayed against came. He was too saucy. His over. impudence made his hold on the dog's collarstrap too loose-it slipped, and almost before Miss Talfourd and I could realize what had happened, the raving beast was rushing straight at us, thinking that we were the victims indicated by the facing us of the fool that had held him!

I felt all the old strength that I ever had possessed coming back to me, in an instant. I felt also at an advantage from my mind having been He and another of the water-cure servants cleared by the typhus. I drew my arm out of were extemporizing a dog-fight. Michael's ani- Miss Talfourd's, and whirled her around behind mal was Tobin, the fiercest and ugliest of all the me. "Hold tight to my waist," said I. She bull-dog kind, and usually kept tightly chained obeyed, clinging there cold, white, and motionat the stable, which it was his duty to watch when less as death. All this might have taken two the hostlers were not attending to their business. seconds. One more was occupied with this The other servant had procured a mangy and thought and its resulting action. The dog, I melancholy-tailed cur, of some nameless hybrid considered, will spring at the foremost object species, whose great virtue was discretion, and which looks menacing. If I hold out my fist who was preserving an armed neutrality on his and shake it quickly up and down he will make own basis in spite of all the efforts of both men for that on his first leap. I advanced my right to awake his soul to victory. This creature-foot a trifling distance, leaned down a little, addressed as Podge-would doubtless have run and began brandishing my right fist, as per proaway but that his backer held his collar firmly. gramme. Helen Talfourd never uttered a cry Tobin, on the other hand, seemed to possess in- or hampered me but just clung as I told her, ternal rage enough to have devoured his antago-giving me the free use of my arms and bending nist at one mouthful, had not Michael restrained over with my inclination while my body covered him in a similar way. I did not like the dog's look. That foolish Dublin had fevered him by hissing him on and then drawing him back, until his eyes glowed with a white light from which all dog-reason had departed, and the snowy

her.

The next moment and the dog, as expected, made a mad plunge at my fist. I was steady and cool of nerve as I had ever been in a ballroom. I let his jaws come down toward my

knuckles for what seemed in that strange coolness quite a perceptible extent of time. And then, quick as lightning, dodged my fist under his throat, knocked up his chin, and had him by the collar.

"Miss Talfourd," said I, "you are perfectly safe now; you can let go of me and go into the house without the slightest danger."

Miss Talfourd loosed her hold, but did not go into the house. Silent and trembling, she stood gazing at me, as if she saw a strange, different, unusual, and not on the average contemptible or pitiable Paul Remy in a dream. Meanwhile I pressed the villainous Tobin's head upon the sod, put my left hand as firmly into his collar as my right was, withdrew that latter, and with it fumbled in my waistcoat-pocket for my knife. Finding that weapon, I opened the stoutest blade with my teeth, and made ready to put all pantaloons, weak nerves, and every other frailty whatsoever, out of danger from Tobin forever more. One quick, resolute gash across the throat would have effected it; and I hated the vile beast enough not to have the slightest compunctions.

But Helen Talfourd saved him. Laying her hand pleadingly on my arm, she spoke for the first time:

"Please wait one minute, Mr. Remy; don't kill the dog, please."

"I will not kill him if you ask his life; but he is a very dangerous animal indeed, and may kill somebody yet. It would look like boasting for us to say that but for our coolness he would have killed us to day; but I don't know that the truth is any otherwise."

Helen. "Oh, thank you! Give him to Michael-if it's necessary let some of the men kill him-but I can't bear to see you do it."

I. "Yes, you pity my poor weak nerves, I suppose."

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Helen. "No, that's not it at all! But the man that could save us from Tobin, as you did, can afford to spare him when he's conquered. It looks consistent not to kill him; it seems like the rest of a brave, noble character. Oh, do you understand me?"

And Helen once more realized her enthusiasm and became silent, her cheeks wearing a most maidenly rose-color. Michael at that moment came up to me. "Take the dog," I said, faintly; and then, the moment I saw the Irishman's stout hand knit into Tobin's collar, my own clutch relaxed; the horizon courtesied backward; Helen Talfourd, earth, sky, all created things, flickered up and down, and then went out. "Dead away!" said Michael; but I did not hear it.

IV. IN WHICH THE REMY STOCK GOES UP. I am not going to dishearten you, good reader, by taking you through a relapse. One good course of fever is enough to test the fidelity of any man's admirers, and I am not selfish enough to carry you through another. At the end of the last chapter I had fainted-and that was, of course, a painful shock to you. I relieve you

as soon as possible by saying that I neither died nor experienced any serious pull-back from the effect of my excitement.

The affair with the dog I believe to have been providential physically as well as spiritually. My very proud and sensitive nature could never have brooked being pitied by any woman whose opinion was worth a straw, with that gently contemptuous pity which I saw, or seemed to sec, accorded to me when I first returned to consciousness. Had I continued to be regarded in that way I believe my recovery would have been much retarded, if not entirely prevented, by sheer mental depression. On my return the second time into the world of conscious life I found altogether a different reception. Not as the captive, led in the rear of Dr. Susan, and swelling the procession of a hydropathic victory, did I return, but myself the hero of the ovation, marching in the van.

No man could have desired a more delicious fur niente than I was fairly forced into by the new-sprung host of my lady-admirers at BeechWold. The dog-story-told by Helen Talfourd with all that eloquence which flowed from her large bumps of language and veneration-raised up for me, by the time that camphor and rubbing had brought me to, a host of devotees whom Guadama the Elephant-Headed might have envied. They set me upon cushions; they bathed my brow with every scent which Lubin knows, or the toilet of civilization possesses, each good and worshipful woman bringing from her treasury the liquid incense which was her favorite, to pour it out lavishly upon my locks. There was contention to settle who should hold the vinaigrette under my nose; fifty sweet voices asked at once only to be told what to do, and it should be done instantly.

"How do

Omnes. "How are you now?" you feel?" "Are you better?" "Can I do any thing for you?" "Sha'n't I shut the blinds ?" "Sha'n't I open the blinds?" "Sha'n't I put the sash down?" "Sha'n't I throw the sash up?" "Shall I go for Doctor Laurence ?" "Wouldn't you like to have us read to you?" "Wouldn't you like to have all this noise stopped?"

"I thank you all very much. I'm bettervery well indeed-a little weak, that's all. Please give me a glass of water."

At this request there was almost a simultaneous rush of every body to the door. In a body they were all going out to the spring to get me fifty tumblers-full. But at the door they met an obstruction. For as they opened it, or rather as it was opened upon them, lo! Helen Talfourd bearing in her hand that for which they were in quest. And behind her towered the tall form of Dr. Susan. The ladies all hovered back to the spot where I lay. Helen Talfourd put the water to my lips-a dozen hands raised my head up on the cushion-I drank—was refreshedand then, in a stately and commanding tone: Dr. Susan. "It is better that Mr. Remy should have quiet now. If he does not this excitement

will do him great ill. Mrs. Hall, you are hurting yourself by overmuch exertion; your congestion will return unless you go and lie down. Miss Pritchard, even in kindness the voice of a laryngitis patient should not be raised so high. The dinner-bell will ring in twenty minutes, and I suppose you would all prefer to be ready. I will do all that is necessary for Mr. Remy, with the assistance of the servants."

I should have felt somewhat nettled, I own, at the imperative manner of Doctor Susan had she been addressing herself to me, and it was evident that a few of the more positive spirits among the ladies very little relished the style in which they were spoken to, but so accustomed do water-cure patients get to being ordered about as if they were children, and so stultifying upon many constitutions is the effect of so much water application, that very little resistance is ever made to commands spoken in a firm tone; and in the present instance the ladies one by one dropped away from my side and out of the door, leaving me alone on the settee in the office with Dr. Susan. I was provoked-though both reserve and sickness prevented me from showing it at the way she had broken up my ovation, and offered no remark of any kind. Doctor Susan broke the silence in a voice so unlike her usual tone that I opened my eyes, which had been quietly shut, with astonishment. In the most musically gentle, womanly tone she said to me: "Ah, my obstinate patient! Is it for this that I have nursed you up from the bed of death -that I have watched you day and night for two weeks-that you should go off and get into dogfights the moment you can leave your room?" So speaking, she put out her hand half-timidly, half-boldly, and caressingly taking my own wan fingers into it, she looked with a playful rebuke out of her great, strange blue-gray eyes. I ceased to be provoked at her for some reason or other. Still holding my hand in hers, with the one at liberty she stroked away my essence-dampened hair from my forehead-not with a graceful ease, as if she had often done so before and were accomplished at it by use, but with a tender unreadiness which was far more fascinating, because it seemed to say, “These fingers are not so kind every day." And I recollect saying to myself, "I wonder whether she ever does this for Rev. Sylverie Beames. He says she's a blessed woman!"

"Bah!" said Doctor Susan, wiping her fingers on her pocket handkerchief with a slight shrug of the shoulders—“how these women do deluge themselves and other people with outlandish smells! What is all this they've been sticking on your head?"

question had given offense-though there was no pique meant in my answer-and directly she began combing back my locks with her fingers again, all the more tenderly than before.

The effect of Doctor Susan on me was very remarkable. I can not tell, at this distance from the circumstances, whether it was because I was very weak, or would have felt so in any condition physically, but I lay perfectly passive to her look and touch, and felt unutterable things in having her gaze at me. Had it been possible for her to be that terrible perversion of God's gift of womanhood-a flirt—she would have been a very dangerous one; but she did not err either on the side of vengeful retaliation upon virile inconstancy or petty-minded good-for-nothingness, one of which is necessary before a woman can be the sinner or the fool which a flirt is.

No, even on the settee with my weak hand grasped in her nervous, life-throbbing one-with her earnest look holding mine with what seemed a grasp as tangible, I did not change the opinion I have elsewhere expressed that she was not beautiful. An enslaving power, not a beauty, was that which she possessed; but for the time being, man as I was, she possessed me utterly. I think it must have been only because I was very feeble--for women seemed to own her sway almost equally with myself-and probably her influence over me increased with the resemblance of my physical condition to that of womanly weakness. And I sometimes have a great mind to believe of her, as of all the few such women that there be, that she was a masculine soul-run by a freak into the feminine mouldand that when she dies she will become a strongwinged man-angel, not a golden-voiced woman one-finding at last her right place in the array of Being.

As she stroked my forehead she kept up that low, Zauberflöte music of her voice.

Dr. Susan. "I scold you for having tired yourself out, to be sure; but don't take that to heart. You are brave enough to bear a little scolding."

I. "Braver men than I have run away from scolding women. We others, the brave ones, are very much afraid of you, considering how we call you the weaker sex.

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Dr. Susan. "Well, I must try and not be very terrible, considering how much I owe you for saving the life of my friend, little Helen. You did bravely, Mr. Remy! Only don't fight dogs every day, but keep out of their reach till you get strong enough to-run away from them. And now I must give you your medicine. Here, take these six pellets of veratrum; and—are you going into the dining-room with the rest? Ah, indeed! It is your first meal down stairs then. Are you sure you feel strong enough-perfectly sure? Well, I will send you a bowl of mutton broth from my end of the table then. There goes the bell; excuse me, as I have to visit Mrs. Burnie before dinner. I'll send a servant to Be careful-don't over-talk or over-listen She seemed to think that her exclamation and and, for the present, good-morning!"

I informed Doctor Susan that if she was able to track the individuality of an odor through all the labyrinth of bergamot, rose, musk, jargonelle, and fifty other named and nameless things combined, I would christen it for her when she brought it out at the other end. Till then I begged to be excused.

you.

"Divil fly away wid thim! An' how could they tell but it might have spilt ?"

So saying, she laid my hand down as tender- | ly as if it had been a child's, arose with a calm, professional dignity, and strode out of the room "It did spill, you goose! It dribbled out like an Amazon queen. slowly all the way up hill, and the boys followed Michael came to take me to dinner. Said I, behind-at safe distance. When the man who "Michael!"

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had the bad habit of swearing came to the top of

Yis, yer honor!" promptly returned the the hill, he looked around of a sudden and saw villain.

"There was once a man—” "And was there, sure?"

"Hold your tongue till I say 'Speak.' There was, as I began to tell you, once a man. He had a dreadful habit of swearing. This used to amuse the bad boys in the neighborhood very much indeed-"

"Bad loock to the nagers! and thim knowin' it wasn't good for his sowl!"

"Keep still, beast! These bad boys one day thought it would be great fun to hear him rip out all sorts of strange, original oaths. So, as he was driving up a long hill, with a heavy load of ashes behind him—"

an empty wagon, with a trail of ashes about
half a mile long behind it. Then the boys said
it was coming, and cocked their ears up for it.
What do ye think it was he did say?"

"Tare an' ages! Hivin only knows, me-
self doesn't."

"He looked first at the wagon, then at the streak of ashes, then at the bad boys. Finally, says he, very solemnly, 'Boys, I can't do justice to that. Get up, Dobbin!' I don't swear at you this morning. Do you understand the reason why?"

"Be all that's howly, Misther Remy, an' it's not me that was to blame! but it was all that blaguard new carriage-grease that got onto the "And was his ould woman afther makin' sthrap, and made it slip jist. If ye don't besoap? Oh, I suppose so-av coorse."

"Never mind what it was for. The wicked boys stole behind his wagon and quietly drew the tail-board out."

lave me, ye can—”

"Never mind-don't let it happen again; or I may do justice to it that time. You may help me in to dinner."

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"It does me please to see him lying there,
With his white favors trampled in the dust.
His plume no more shall take the morning air:
In his old tower shall his armor rust.
And though worms eat me, I am great this day,
In that I slew him in such knightly way:
Cuthbert, who wrought the Lady Agnes wrong,
My sister, in the happy summers fled.

Oh, I have watched, and watched, and waited long-
And now the dead hath gone to wed the dead!

"I came upon him in this little wood-
Him and four stalwart men-at-arms. The blood
Leapt to my heart with joy when I did see
The hateful shield that bears the fleur-de-lis,
VOL. XXVII.-No. 159.-Z

And the gold Scorpion writhing on his crest;
And straight I rode at him and his four men,
Striking as if my single arm were ten;
And two went flying, dastards! to the west,
And two will never couch a spear again;

No more shall I! There stood we, helm to helm,
Alone, save the red oriole swinging from yon elm
Looked down on us. Then mad Prince Cuthbert hurled
His spiked mace at me: right sure it came,
And all the vivid colors of the world
Danced in my helmet: like a purple flame

I saw his sword flash, saw the Scorpion writhe,
Accursed, in the sunshine, fierce and lithe-

There seemed a thousand scorpions, by this cross!-
As he bore down on me in his wild wrath,

Beating a fire from out the very moss.

Jesu! he came; but I blocked not his path,

But spurred aside, and, as he passed me, smote

Down through the Scorpion, through his lying throat.

"What else I know not. Presently I knew
The sky stretched over me, serene and blue,
And then ye came. But I am hurt to death.
Yet great at heart; for I am that Sir Guy
Who ever lightly held this mortal breath
In a just service. Certes, all must die-
This one to-day, and that to-morrow. Though
I fain would see the almond-blossoms blow
About the marble palace where she dwells,
And Lillian, with her stately damosels,
Walking the leafy Pleasaunce-not the less
Do I deem death a special happiness.

"There's an old church in Brittany, wherein
I used to lounge among the carven aisles;
There knights in marble, white and without sin,
Take great content. A Saint Cecilia smiles
From a vast painted window, and the blooms
Of painted roses fall on those still tombs,
And shadowy lilies. Nothing evil comes
Into that place. Whoever lieth there

Is shut from heartache. Even the sweet moan

Of the sad organ brings no sense of care

To those most tranquil sleepers lapped in stone.
And oft I longed to lay me down and rest,

My hands, like theirs, laid cross-wise on my breast,
But dared not, seeing Cuthbert still unslain.
This day my shield is washed of its foul stain;
And oh! good knights, when I nor speak nor move,
Bear me unto that chapel, for God's love!"

So spoke Sir Guy. When he nor moved nor spoke, They wrapped him decently in his long cloak, And bore him on their lances.

To this day,

In that old church, at Pentecost there come
Young girls with violets, and sprays of bloom,
And solemn cypress-leaf, to dress the tomb
And statue of Sir Guy of Brittany.

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