go and teaze Launce. It is really too stupid here !-- me. Launcelot had not been accustomed to this style of address; and, for the first few moments, was completely at fault. Ella looked frightened. She touched Violet, and whispered, "Don't hurt his feelings!" as if he had been a baby, and Violet an assassin. “And what am I to do to please Miss Tudor?" Launcelot asked with an impertinent voice; "what herculean exertion must I go through to win favor in the eyes of my strong, brave, manly cousin?". Be a man yourself, Cousin Launce," answered Violet; don't spend all your time dawdling over stupid poetry, which I am sure you don't understand. Take exercise-good strong exercise. Ride, hunt, shoot, take interest in something and in some one, and don't think yourself too good for everybody's society but your own. You give up your happiness for pride, I am sure you do; yet, you are perfectly unconscious of how ridiculous you make yourself." "You are severe, Miss Tudor," said Launcelot, with his face crimson. Violet was so small and so frank, he could not be angry with her. "I tell you the truth," she persisted, "and you don't often hear the truth. Better for you if you did. You must not let it be a quarrel between us; for I speak only for your own good; and, if you will only condescend to be a little more like other men I will never say a word to you again. Let us go to the stables. I want to see your horses. You have horses?" ** "Yes," said Launcelot; "but, as I remarked at breakfast, no ladies' horses." "I don't care for ladies' horses; men's horses will suit me better!" said Violet, with a toss of her little head that was charming in its assertion of equality. "I would undertake to ride horses, Cousin Launce, you dare not mount; for I am sure you cannot be good at riding, lying on the grass all your life!" 66 Launcelot was excessively piqued. His blood made his face tingle, his brows contracted, and he felt humbled and annoyed; but roused. Tears came into Ella's eyes. She went up to her friend and said :"Oh, Violet, how cruel you are!" : So poor Launcelot saw this little bye-scene. He was a man and a spoilt child in one; and hated pity on the one side, as much as interference on the other. Ella did not advance herself much in his eyes by her championship. On the contrary, he felt more humiliated by her tears than by Violet's rebukes; and, drawing himself up proudly, he said to Violet, as if he were giving away a kingdom, "If you please we will ride to-day." lovers together, hoping they would improve the oppor-cut with her whip, which sent it off at a hand gallop. They arrived at the stable in time to hear some of Violet's candid criticisms. "That cob's off-fetlock wants looking to. The stupid groom! who ever saw a beast's head tied up like that? Why he wasn't a crib-biter, was he?" and with a "Wo-ho, poor fellow ! steady there, steady!" Violet went dauntlessly up to the big carriage horse's head, and loosened the strain of his halter before Launcelot knew what she was about. She was in her element. She wandered in and out of the stalls, and did not mind how much the horses fidgetted; nor, even if they turned themselves sideways as if they meant to crush her against the manger. Launcelot thought all this vulgar beyond words; and he thought Ella Limple, who stood just at the door and looked frightened, infinitely the superior of the two ladies; and thanked his good star again that had risen on Ella and not on Violet. Violet chose the biggest and the most spirited horse of all, Ella selecting an old grey that was as steady as a camel, and both went into the house to dress for the ride. When they came back, even Launcelot-very much disapproving of Amazons in general-could not but confess that they made a beautiful pair. Ella so fair and graceful, and Violet so full of life and beauty. He was obliged to allow that she was beautiful; but of course not so beautiful as Ella. With this thought he threw himself cleverly into the saddle, and off the three started, Ella holding her pummel tightly. All that evening he was sulky to Violet, and peculiarly affectionate to Ella; making the poor child's heart flutter like a caged bird. "Cousin," whispered Violet, the next morning, laying her little hand on his shoulder, "have you a rifle in the house-or a pair of pistols?" Launcelot was so taken by surprise that he hurriedly confessed to having guns and pistols and rifles, and all other murderous weapons necessary for the fit equipment of a gentleman. "We will have some fun, then," she said, looking happy and full of mischief. Violet and Ella-Ella dragged sorely against her will, for the very sight of a pistol nearly threw her into hysterics-went into the shrubbery; and there Violet challenged Launcelot to shoot with her at a mark at twenty paces; then, as she grew vain, at thirty. Launcelot was too proud to refuse this challenge; believing of course that a little black-eyed girl, whose waist he could span between his thumb and little finger, and with hands that could hardly find gloves small enough for them, could not shoot so well as he. Launcelot was nervous-that must be confessed; and Violet was excited. Launcelot's nervousness They ambled down the avenue together; but, when helped his failure; but Violet's excitement helped her they got a short distance on the road, Violet raised success. Her bullet hit the mark every time straight herself in the saddle; and, waving her small hand lost in the centre, and Launcelot never hit once; which in its white gauntlets, darted off; tearing along the was not very pleasant in their respective conditions of road, till she became a mere speck in the distance. lord and subject; for so Launcelot classed men and Launcelot's blood came up into his face. Something women-especially little women with small waists— stirred his heart, strung his nerves up to their natural in his own magnificent mind. tone, and made him envy and long and hate and admire all in a breath. "He had not shot for a long time," he said, "and he was out of practice. He drank coffee for breakHe turned to Ella and said hurriedly, "Shall we ride fast, and that had made his hand unsteady—” faster, Miss Limple?" "If you please," answered Ella, timidly; "but I can't ride very fast, you know." Launcelot bit his lip. "Oh, I remember; yet I hate to see women riding like jockeys; you are quite right;" but he frotted his horse, and frowned. Then he observed very loudly, "Violet Tudor is a very vulgar little girl." After a time Violet came back; her black horse foaming, his head well up, his neck arched, his large eyes wild and bright; she flushed, animated, bright; full of life and health. Launcelot sat negligently on his bay-one hand on the crupper as lazy men do sit on horseback-walking slowly. Ella's dozing gray hanging down his head and sleeping, with the flies settling on his twinkling pink eyelids. "Dearest Violet, I thought you would have been killed," said Ella; "what made you rush away in that manner?" "And confess, too, Cousin Launce," said Violet, "that you were never very good at shooting, any time of your life, without coffee or with it. Why, you don't even load properly; how can you shoot if you don't know how to load? We can't read without an alphabet!" In the prettiest manner possible she took the pistol from her cousin's hand and loaded it for him -first drawing his charge. "Now try again!" she said, speaking as if to a child; "nothing like perseverance." Launcelot was provoked, but subdued, and he did as his little instructress bade him; to fail, once more. His bullet went wide of the target, and Violet's lodged in the bull's eye. So Launcelot flung the pistols on the grass and said, "It is a very unladylike amusement, Miss Tudor; and I was much to blame to encourage you in such nonsense." Offering his arm to Ella, he walked sulkily away. Violet looked after them both for some time, watch"And what makes you both ride as if you were in ing them through the trees. There was a peculiar a procession, and were afrald of trampling on the expression in her face—a mixture of whimsical humor, "Cousin Launcelot you are of pain, of triumph, and of a wistful kind of longing, crowd?" retorted Violet. something wonderful. A strong man like you to ride that perhaps she was, in her own heart, unconscious in that manner. Are you made of jelly that would of. She then turned away; and, with a half sigh, For shame. Have a canter. Your said softly to herself: "It is a pity Cousin Launcelot break if shaken ? bay won't beat my black; although my black is blown has such a bad temper!" "Bravo! bravo, Cousin Launce!" Violet left the and your mare is fresh." Violet gave the bay a smart After this, Launcelot became more and more re served to Violet, and more and more affectionate to and dislike-and so little of the other. Ella's husband hated her. self. He talked a great deal, and had not opened her little hands. She bent her face till her breath Shelley for a fortnight. He was more natural and less came warm on his forehead, and spoke a few innocent vain; and sometimes even condescended to laugh so words which might have been said to a brother. But as to be heard, and to appreciate a jest. But this was they conjured up a strange world in both." Violet tried very rare, and always had the appearance of a conde- to disengage herself; for it was Launcelot now now who scension, as when men talk to child.en. He still held her. She hid her face; but he forced her to look hated Violet; and they quarrelled every day regularly, up. Jion el 915. but were seldom apart. They hated each other so For a long time, she besought only to be released much that they could not be happy without bickering. when suddenly, as if conquered by something stronger Although to do Violet justice, it was all on Launcelot's than herself, she flung herself from him, and darted side. Left to herself, she would never have said a into the house, se, in a state of excitement and tumult. cross word to him. But what could she do when he An agony of reflection succeeded to this agony of was so impertinent? Thus they rode, and shot, and feeling; and Launcelot and Violet both felt as if they played at chess, and quarrelled, and sulked, and be- had committed, or were about to commit, some fearful came reconciled and quarrelled again; and Ella, still sin. Could Violet betray her friend? Could she who and calm, looked on with her soft blue eyes; and often had always upheld truth and honor, accept Ella's "wondered they were such children together." fidence only to deprive her of her lover? It was One day, the three found themselves together on a worse than guilt! Poor Violet wept the bitterest bench under a fine old purple beech, which bent down tears her bright eyes ever shed; for she labored under its great branches like bowers about them. Ella a sense of sin that was insupportable. She dared not gathered a few of the most beautiful leaves, and placed look at Ella, but feigned a headache, and went into her them in her hair. They did not look very well; her own room to weep. Launcelot was shocked too; but hair was too light; and Launclot said so. Launcelot was a man; and the sense of a half-deve loped triumph somewhat deadened his sense of remorse. A certain dim unravelling of the mystery of the past was also pleasant. Without being dishonorable, he was less overcome. ;; each On that dreadful day Launcelot and Violet spoke no more to each other. They did not eve even look at other. Ella thought that some new quarrel had burst forth in her absence, and tried to make it up between them, in her amiable way. But ineffectually. Violet rushed away when Launcelot came near her, and she besought of Ella to leave her alone so pathetically, that the poor girl, bewildered, only sighed at the dread of being unable to connect together the two greatest lovea of her life. This was after Violet had beaten Cousin Launcelot three games of chess consecutively. Launcelot had been furiously humiliated; for he was accounted the best chess-player of the neighborhood. But Violet was "Perhaps they will look better on you, Miss Tudor," really a good player, and had won the prize at a chess he added, picking a broad and ruddy leaf, and laying club, where she had been admitted by extraordinary it Bacchante fashion on her curly, thick black bands. courtesy; it not being the custom of that reputable His hand touched her cheek. He started, and dropped institution to suffer womanhood within its sacred it suddenly, as if that round fresh face had been burnwalls. But she was very unhappy about cousin ing iron. Violet blushed deeply, and felt distressed, Launce for all that; and the next day looked quite and ashamed, and angry. Trembling, and with a pale and cast down. Even Launcelot noticed his ob- strange difficulty of breathing, she got up and ran noxious cousin's changed looks and asked her, rather away; saying, that she was going for her parasol graciously, "If she were ill?" To which question although she had it in her hand-and would be back Violet replied by a blush, a glad smile bursting out immediately. But she stayed away a long time, wonlike a song, and a pretty pout, "No, I am not ill, dering at cousin Launcelot's impertinence. When she thank you." Which ended their interchange of civil- came back, no one was to be seen. Ella and Launcelot ities for the day. had gone into the shrubbery to look after a hare that had run across the path; and Violet sat down on the The day after, Violet chanced to receive a letter bench, waiting for them, and very pleased they had from her mother, in which that poor woman, having gone. She heard a footstep. It was Launcelot with-had an attack of spasms in her chest, and being otherout his cousin. "Ella had gone into the house," he wise quite out of sorts, expressed her firm belief that said, "not quite understanding that Miss Tudor was she should never see her sweet child again. The dear coming back to the seat." old lady consequently bade her adieu resignedly. On Violet instantly rose; a kind of terror was in her ordinary days Violet would have known what all this face, and she trembled more than ever. pathos meant; to-day she was glad to turn it to a "I must go and look for her," she said, taking up count, and to appear to believe it. She spoke to her her parasol. aunt and to Ella, and told them that she must abso"I am sorry, Miss Tudor, that my presence is so lutely leave by the forenoon train-poor mamma was excessively disagreeable to you!" Launcelot said, mov-ill, and she could not let her be nursed by servants. ing aside to let her pass. There was nothing to oppose to this argument. Mrs. Chumley ordered the brougham to take her to the sta tion precisely at two o'clock. Launcelot was not in the room when these arrangements were made; nor did he know anything that was taking place until he came down to luncheon, pale and haggard, to find Vielet in her travelling dress, standing by her boxes. Launcelot became restless, feverish, melancholy, cross; at times boisterously gay, at times the very echo of despair. He was kind to Ella, and confessed to himself how fortunate he was in having chosen her; that he could not understand-knowing how much he loved her--the extraordinary effect she had upon his nerves. Her passiveness irritated him. Her soft and musical voice made him wretched; for he was incessantly watching for a change of intonation or an emphasis which never came. Her manners were certainly the perfection of manners-he desired none other in his wife-but, if she would sometimes move a little quicker, or look interested and pleased when he tried to amuse her, she would make him infinitely happier. And oh! if she would only do something more than work those eternal slippers, how glad he would "There they are," he exclaimed aloud, as the two cousins passed before his window. "By Jove, what a foot that Violet has; and her hair, what a lustrous black; and what eyes. Pshaw! what is it to me what hair or eyes she has?" And he closed his window and turned away. But, in a minute after, he was watching the two girls again, seeing only Violet. "The strange strength of hate," he said, as he stepped out on the lawn, to follow them. be. " Violet looked full in his face, in utter astonishment. "You know the contrary," said Launcelot, hurriedly. I Launcelot's life was very different now to what it had been. He wondered at himself. He had become passionately fond of riding, and was looking forward to the hunting season with delight. He rode every day with his two cousins; and he and Violet had races Launcelot became suddenly afflicted with a choking together, which made them sometimes leave Ella and sensation; there was a sense of fullness in his head, her grey for half an hour in the lanes. He used to and his limbs shook. Suddenly tears came into his shoot too-practising secretly—until one day he aston- eyes. Yes, man as he was, he wept. Violet flung ished Violet by hitting the bull's eye as often as her- her arms round his neck; and took his head between 17 ac "What is all this, Violet ?" he cried, taken off bis guard, and seizing her hands as he spoke. "I am going away," said Violet, as quietly abst could, but without looking at him. He started as if an electric shock had passed through him. chych vu Violet, going!" he cried, in a suffocated voice. He was pale; and his hands, clasped on the back of the chair, were white with the strain. Going ! Why?" -1921 gat vaad is 25 Ja 66 · Mamma is ill,” said Violet. It was all she could say. "I am sorry we are to lose you," he then said, very slowly-each word as if ground from him, as words are ground out, when they are the masks of intense passion: 5 His mother looked at him with surprise. Ella turn-to tone down the whole household to its own sobered to Violet. Every one felt there was a mystery they ness. did not not know of.. Ella went to her cousin. It was a very old-fashioned time-keeper, encased in "Dear Violet, what does all this mean!" she asked,oak, with a dingy face, and a picture of a ship riding her arm round the little one's neck, caressingly. on the waves just above it; and with each long swing "Nothing," answered Violet, with great difficulty.of the pendulum, the ship rose and fell as with the • There is nothing." Big drops stood on Launcelot's forehead. 7:1 1 116 ལ། rolling of the waves. I have stood alone and looked at that picture by the hour: filling my head with all Ought you not to write first to your mother, to sorts of notions about the ocean, and the sailing and her notice before you go?" he said. pitching of vessels, and the strange life of "them that "No," she answered, her flushed face quivering go down to the sea in ships." from brow to lip; "I must go at once. give At that moment a servant entered hurriedly, to say the latest moment t had arrived to enable them to catch the train. Adieux were given in all haste. Violet's tears, beginning to gather-but only to gather as yet, not to flow-kept bravely back for love and for pride. "Good bye" to Ella, warmly, tenderly, with her heart filled with self-reproach. Good bye" to aunt; aunt herself very sad; and then "Good bye" to Launcelot. "Good bye, Mr. Chumley," she said, holding out her hand, but not looking into his face. He could not speak. He tried to bid her adieu; but his lips were dry, and his voice would he not come. Alf he did was to press in his features such exquisite suffering, that Violet for a te a moment was overcome herself, and could scarcely draw away her hand. The hour struck; and duty brave Violet before all. Launcelot stood where she left him. She ran down the lawn; she was almost most out of sight, when "Violet ! Violet !" rang from the house like cry of death. most 44 In the dead of the night, when the whole house was hushed in silence, and no noises were to be heard without doors, the steady tick of the old clock sounded clearly through the rooms below and along the passages above; notching off the hours with its restless tongue even while others slept, as if it would make them sternly account for the very rest their weakness forced them to enjoy. We always looked at the face of the old clock before going to bed, from the time we first learned to tell the hours by its two hands. And we looked wistfully up at it sometimes on Sundays, I ween, impatient for the time to come when they called it "sundown." It was company for us all, in the long winter evenings, when we sat round the blazing hearth; whether listening to bits of chimney-corner tales, or dreaming among the golden castles and palaces built up by the fire-coals, or thinking of what was to come on the morrow. Its ticking was drowsy and soothing; as potent, perhaps, to the over-worked spirit as the syrup of poppies or mandragora. Listening to its lulling sound, I have let slip by some of the calmest and sweetest moments of a life that has, perhaps, already had its full share of such. Violet-a moment irresolute-returned; then alunconsciously she found herself kneeling beside Launcelot, who lay senseless in a chair; and saying, Launcelot, I will not leave 199 you The burden of pain was shifted now. From Launce- I came somehow to always associate the sight of the lot and her to Ella. But Ella-sentimental and con- old clock with my grandfather. They were both of ventional as she might be was a girl who, like many, them nearly of the same age, and I thought each can perform great sacrifices with an unruffled brow; seemed to keep pace with the other. Neither was who can ice over their hearts, and feel without ex-ever guilty of being caught in a hurry, and both bore pression; who can consume their sorrows inwardly, the world the while believing them happy.. indisputable marks of age. Both kept a bundle of hoarded secrets within them, on which they seemed to feed their long-drawn lives. There was an oracular Many years after by the time her graceful girlhood look upon the face of both of them alike; an appearhad waned into a faded womanhood, and when Launce-ance of unusual wisdom, as if they would continually shake their heads at us, and tell us that we hadn't seen what they had. a lot had become an active country gentleman and Violet staid wife-Ella lost her sorrows, and came to her peace in the love ol in the love of a disabled Indian officer, whom she had known many years ago—and whose sunset days she made days of de days of warmth and joy; persuading herself and him too, that the Cornet Dampier she had flirted with when a girl, she had always loved. To this day, I love to sit and dream of the ancient clock; just as I once dreamed, with my eyes in the fire, to the ticking of its slow pendulum. It looms up in my memory like a great truth breaking through the mists and fogs of doubt. All is spread out plainly again; the old times of childhood, the home-joys, the white-haired grandsire, the magic circle, And if such memories start tears from the lids, where is he that rails at the weakness? Whose heart has not at least a corner where such feelings may find safe shelter from the storms of ridicule?.. It was a great time with us when we were told that the old clock had seen a full hundred years. We gazed at it with very much more than ordinary interest Nay, we had a secret sort of sympathy for a thing so old; as if, forsooth, it felt age, and grew wrinkled with griefs. In a genial moment, then, were these verses written. IT stood there and did nothing but tick. The pendu- They belong properly to nothing but the clock and its lum was long, and swung but slowly; and its mea- memories. Would that they could all be embalmed in sured and deliberate "click-click." sometimes seemed verse more worthy of them' An hundred years! an hundred years' 'Mid the eating rust, and the gathering dust, What countless eyes, in deep surprise, And the blissful bride, at her loved one's side, An hundred years! An hundred years! Their sounds have died within the hall- As when it rung, and the pendulum swung, And moons keep growing old- An hundred years! an hundred years! No thought can bridge the stream, Still sleep, ye dead' Still slumber, tones, A CHILD'S ADDRESS TO THE SNOW IN flakes of a feathery white. It is falling so gently and slow; Snow snow, snow! With a mantle of radiant show; Would you think, little Ella, it's so ? The curious warm coat of the snow! Happy birds that delight in the snow! They stretched out their branches I know, The trees with their branches all curling with snow! I wish that my spirit were so ! And that while my soul shall endure It might shine far more bright than the snow' Were my heart but as pure and as bright as the snow ' It shall go with the breath of Spring! Bright flowers shall spring on the grave of the snow LIFE SCENES IN NEW YORK. BY Here the woman, who had been silent and rather I must take another name, I did not know what for moody burst into a violent flood of tears, crying, then; and so they called me Mag, and that is the name "Mother! mother! I know not whether she is alive he knows me by, and I never would have told him my or not, and dare not inquire; but, if we were mar- right name, only that we are going to get married, and ried and reformed, I would make her happy once reform." more." Y the generous permission of Messrs. Dewitt and Davenport we are enabled to present our readers with a couple of extracts, with their accompanying engravings, from the new work just published by them "I could no longer resist the appeal," said Mr. P., entitled, "Hot Corn, or New York Life Scenes Illus-" and determined to give them a trial. I have married trated." Several of the sketches which comprise this volume originally appeared in the New York Tribune, where they excited a wide interest as vivid pictures of the depravity and misery existing at the Five Points. They served also to enlist the sympathy of the public for the labors of Mr. Pease and others in their efforts to reform this notorious 'ocality "Yes, yes, I see you have been talking over the matter over the bottle, and have come to a sort of drunken conclusion to get married. When you get sober, you will both repent it, probably." "No, sir, we are not very drunk now, not so drunk but what we can think, and we don't think we are doing right-we are not doing as we were brought up to do by pious parents. We have been reading about the good things you have done for just such poor outcasts as we are, and we want you to try and do something for us." "Read! Can you read? Do you read the Bible?" "Well, not much lately, but we read the newspapers, and sometimes we read something good in them. How can we read the Bible when we are drunk?" "Do you think getting married wil keep you from getting drunk?" "Yes, for we are going to take the pledge too, and we shall keep it, depend upon that." "Suppose you take the pledge, and try that first; and if you can keep it till you can wash some of the dirt away, and get some clothes on; then I will marry you." a good many poor, wretched-looking couples, but none that looked quite so much so as this. The man was hatless and shoeless, without coat or vest, with long hair and beard grimed with dust. He was by trade a bricklayer, one of the best in the city. The woman wore the last remains of a silk bonnet, and something that might pass for shoes, and an old, very old dress, once a rich merino, apparently without any under-garments." "Your name is Thomas-Thomas what?" THE TWO PENNY MARRIAGE COUPLE.-Page 360. Elting, sir. Thomas Elting-a good, true name and true man; that is, shall be, if you marry us.” "Well, well. I am going to marry you." "Are you? There, Mag, I told you so." "Don't call me Mag. If I am going to be married, it shall be by my right name-the one my mother gave me." "Not Mag? Well, I never knew that." Could they do it? Could beings sunk so low reform? We shall see. "It is a bad thing, sir, for a girl to give up her name unless for that of a good husband. Matilda Morgan. Nobody that is good knows me by any other name in this bad city.".. "Matilda and Thomas, take each other by the right hand, look at me, while I unite you in the holy bonds of marriage by God's ordinance. Do you think you are sufficiently sober to comprehend its solemnity?” "Yes, sir." "Marriage being one of God's holy ordinances, cannot be kept in sin, misery, filth, and drunkenness. Thomas, will you take Matilda to be your lawful, true, only wedded wife?" "Yes, sir." It was a woman's "I will," spoken right out with a good, hearty emphasis, that told, as it always tells, the faith and truth of woman, when she says, "I will.” "Then I pronounce you man and wife." "Now, Thomas," says the new wife, after I had made out the certificate and given it to her with an injunction to keep it safely. "Now pay Mr. Pease, and let us go home and break the bottle." Thomas felt in the right pocket, then the left, then back to the right, then he examined the watch fob. It is probable that the former owner of this principal article of his wardrobe, owned a watch. It is more likely that the present owner had been oftener in the "Now, Thomas, hold your tongue; you talk too hands of the watch, than that he had a watch in his hands. He was evidently searching for lost treasures. Why, where is it?" says she. "You had two dollars this morning." "No; that won't do. I shall get to thinking what a poor, dirty, miserable wretch I am, and how I am living with this woman, who is not a bad woman by nature; and then I will drink, and then she will drink. O, cursed rum! And what is to prevent us? But if much. What is your name?" we were married, my wife-yes, Mr. Pease, my wife -would say: 'Thomas'-she would not say, 'Tom, you dirty brute,'-' don't be tempted;' and who knows but we might be somebody yet-somebody that our own mothers would not be ashamed of?" "Matilda. Must I tell you the other? Yes, I will, and I never will disgrace it. I don't think I should ever have been as bad if I had kept it. That bad woman who first tempted me to ruin, made me take a false name. They always do that, sir, and so she said 66 "Yes, I know it; but I have only got two cents this evening. There, Mr. Pease, take them. It is all I have got in the world. What more can I give ?" Sure enough. What could he do more? He took was just as neatly and tidily dressed as anybody's them and prayed over them, that, in parting with the wife, and her face beamed with intelligence, and last penny, this couple might have parted with a vice the way in which she clung to the arm of her -a wicked, foolish practice-which had reduced them husband, as she seemed to shrink out of sight, to such a degree of poverty and wretchedness, that the told very plainly that she was a loving as well as a monster power of rum could hardly send its victims pretty wife. lower. So, by a few words-I hope words of power to do good-Thomas and Matilda, long known as drunken Tom and Mag, were transformed into Mr. and Mrs. Elting; and having grown somewhat more sober while in the house, seemed to fully understand their new position and all the obligations they had taken upon themselves. "For a few days," said Mr. P., "I thought occasionally of this two-penny marriage, and then it became absorbed with a thousand other scenes of wretchedness which I have witnessed since I have lived in this centre of city misery. Time wore on, and I married many other couples; often those who came in their carriage and left a golden carriage fee-a delicate way of giving to the needy-but among all, I had never performed the rite for a couple quite so low as that of this twopenny fee, and I resolved I never would again. At length, however, I had a call from a full match to them, which I refused." "Why do you come to me to be married, my friend?" said I to the man. "You are both too poor to live separate; and, besides, you are both terrible drunkårds, I know you are." "That is just what we want to get married for, and take the pledge." "Take that first." "No; we must take all togethernothing else will save us." "Will that?" "It did one of my friends." "Well, then, go and bring that friend here; let me see and hear how much it saved him, and then I will make up my mind what to do. If I can do you any good, I want to do it." "My friend is at work-he has got good job and several hands working for him, and is making money, and won't quit till night. Shall I come this evening?" "Yes, I will stay at home and was for you." He He little expected to see him again, but about eight o'clock the servant said that a man and his girl, with a gentleman and lady, were waiting in the reception room. told him to ask the lady and gentleman to walk up to the parlor and sit a moment, while he sent the candidates for marriage away, being determined never to unite another drunken couple, not dreaming that there was any sympathy between the parties. But they would not come up; they wanted to see that couple married. "This couple," said the gentleman, "have come to be married." good advice you gave us. Look at this suit of clothes. and her dress-all Matilda's work, every stitch of it. Come and look at our house-as neat as she is. Every thing in it to make a comfortable home; and oh, sir, there is a cradle in our bedroom. Five hundred dollars already in bank, and I shall add as much more next week, when I finish my job. So much for one year of a sober life, and a faithful, honest, good wife. Now, this man is as good a workman as I am, only he is bound down with the galling fetters of drunkenness, and living with a woman as I did, only worse, for they have two children. What will they be, if they chance to live, and grow up to womanhood in Cow Bay? Now he has made up his mind to try to be a man againhe is a beast now. He thinks that he can reform just as well as me; but he thinks he must take the pledge of the same man, and have his first effort sanctified The woman shrunk back a little more out of sight. with the same blessing; and then, with a good reso "Yes, I know it," said Mr. P.; "and I have refused. Look at them. Do they look like fit subjects for such a holy ordinance? God never intended those, whom he created in his own image, should live in matrimony like this man and woman. I cannot marry them." "Cannot ! Why not? You married us when we were worse off-more dirty-worse clothed, and more intoxicated." THE DEATH-BED OF MADALINA -Page 361. I saw she trembled violently, and put her clean cambric handkerchief up to her eyes. What could it mean? Married them when worse off! Who were they? "Have you forgotten us?" said the woman, taking my hand in hers, and dropping on her knees. "Have you forgotten drunken Tom and Mag? We have never forgotten you; but pray for you every day!" So he went down, and found the squalidly wretched "If you have forgotten them, you have not forgotpair, that had been there in the morning, in con- ten the two-penny marriage. No wonder you did not versation, and apparently very friendly and inti- know us. I told Matilda she need not be afraid or mate, with the lady and gentleman. He had the ap- ashamed, if you did know her. But I knew you would pearance of a well-dressed laboring man, for he wore not. How could you? We were in rags and dirt a fine black coat, silk vest, gold watch-chain, clean then. Look at us now. All your work, sir. All the shirt and cravat, polished calf-skin boots; and his wife blessing of the pledge, and that marriage, and that lution, and Matilda and me to watch over them, I do believe they will succeed." So they did So many others, by the same means. They were married, solemnly, impressively, solemnly married; and pledged to total abstinence in the most earnest manner; and promised most faithfully, not only to keep the pledge, but to do unto others, as Elting had done unto them. Both promises you have seen that they have kept well. As they were parting, Elting slipped something into Nolan's hand, and told him to pay the marriage fee. "I thought," said the missionary, "of the two pennies, and expected nothing more, and therefore was not disappointed when he handed me the two reddish-looking coins. I thought, well, they are bright, new-looking cents, at any rate, and I hope their lives will be like them. I was in hopes that it might have been a couple of dollars this time, but I said nothing, and we parted with a mutual God bless you. When I went up stairs, I tossed the coin into my wife's lap, with the remark, "two pennies again, my dear." DEATH OF THE RAG-PICKER'S DAUGHTER. Up-up again; one more flight of creaking stairs, without bannisters, the thin, worn steps bending beneath our tread, and we are on the upper floor of this one of a hundred, just alike, "tenant houses." Along the dark, narrow passage, opening by that low door at the end, into a room under the roof, ten by fifteen feet, lighted by one dormer window, and we are in the home of Madalina, the rag-picker's daughter. Home! Can it be that that holy name has been so desecrated? that this child, with sylph-like form and angel face, must call this room home? 'Tis only for a little while! She will soon have another! |