{545}

THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER

[Transcriber’s Note: This Table of Contents was not present in the original.]

THE HOUSE WITH THE VERANDAH.
A HAPPY HEALTHY GIRLHOOD.
“OUR HERO.”
FROCKS FOR TO-MORROW.
IN THE TWILIGHT SIDE BY SIDE.
SHEILA.
OUR PUZZLE POEM REPORT: AN ACCIDENTAL CYCLE II.
ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.
OUR NEW PUZZLE POEM.
OUR SUPPLEMENT STORY COMPETITION.

AT THE HELM.

All rights reserved.]

{546}

THE HOUSE WITH THE VERANDAH.

By ISABELLA FYVIE MAYO, Author of “Other People’s Stairs,” “Her Object in Life,” etc.

CHAPTER IX

A WORM AT THE ROOTS.

ach looked at the other, aghast. An expression as of sudden enlightenment flitted across the boyish face of Tom Black; but nobody noticed that.

“That sound means some accident!” exclaimed Lucy, hurrying out of the room. Miss Latimer followed her. Mr. Somerset and young Black stayed behind, Mr. Somerset holding back little Hugh.

But they only lingered for a moment. A cry from Lucy and a pungent smell of burning which saluted their nostrils set them too running downstairs.

Mrs. Challoner and Miss Latimer were bending over the body of Mrs. Morison, prostrate just outside the dining-room door. A japanned tray containing knives and forks and spoons, scattered over the floor, explained the crash which had followed the heavy fall. Little Hugh shrieked, “Mrs. Morison is dead!” and began to cry. But she breathed stertorously.

“She has had a fit,” Lucy said. “Working over the big fire has brought it on.”

Wilfrid Somerset caught up his hat.

“I know the nearest doctor’s!” he exclaimed, and, putting young Black aside, he hirpled off, self-consciousness suspended in his eager desire to be of service.

“Mrs. Morison isn’t dead, dear,” Miss Latimer reassured little Hugh; “but she is very ill, and you must not interrupt us while we take care of her.”

She led him into the dining-room and bade him watch at the window for the coming of Mr. Somerset and the doctor. Then she returned to Lucy. Young Black had got some water, and Lucy was dashing it on her servant’s face. But, though she struggled and writhed under the chill, it did not rouse her.

“What was she bringing up these things for?” asked Lucy, looking round at the scattered cutlery. “She knew I had set out the table already.”

“It’s likely there was a good deal of mental confusion before the fit came,” suggested the old governess.

Tom Black stood over the prostrate figure and the kneeling ladies. It was true he had fetched the water, but otherwise he did not seem eagerly sympathetic. Suddenly he said—

“There’s something on fire somewhere!”

“Certainly there is,” assented Lucy, her senses regaining their power of attention. “I think it must be downstairs. I can’t move.” (She was trying to support the heavy, tossing head.) “Will you both go and see what is burning, and do your best with it?”

As the old lady and the youth descended the kitchen stair he whispered to her—

“That woman is tipsy.”

“Oh, surely not!” Miss Latimer replied. “Mrs. Challoner has told me she is an excellent servant and a respectable person.”

“She is tipsy,” he repeated. “I saw it when I came in. But I didn’t think she was quite so bad as this.”

It was a terrible picture that met their eyes as they entered that kitchen, which only a few hours before had been so bright and trim. A big fire was burning, and a clothes-rail—covered with damask table-napkins, among which hung an old rag mat—had been put so close to the bars that one of the napkins was nearly consumed, two or three were scorched, and the rag rug was smouldering. To draw back the clothes-rail and to throw the burning mat into the sink was the work of a moment, and effectually ended a great danger.

The hearth was blurred with trodden cinders and spotted with grease. There were two pots standing on the range, one containing burnt-up porridge, and the other full of water with something floating in it which looked like a rag. Miss Latimer hurriedly opened the oven door, fully expecting to see a cindered fowl; but the oven was empty. Going to a cupboard she discovered the little turkey nicely trussed. That had been done the previous night, and it had not been touched since. Miss Latimer quietly lifted it down and put it into the oven. Dinner would be certainly late; but it would be the earlier the sooner one made a beginning.

“I fear you are right, after all,” she said to Tom Black. “Yet this fit may have been coming on, and that may have stopped her work, and—— Ah!”

Tom had also been making an investigation, and as she was speaking, he held up before her shocked eyes a bottle of whisky. It was still in the paper in which it had been sold; but it was almost empty.

“There’s the doctor and Mr. Somerset!” Miss Latimer exclaimed with a tone of relief. “Now we shall soon know the truth. Anyway, we’re not wanted upstairs just this minute—we’d be only in the way. So let us try to get a little to the bottom of things down here. I know how keenly Mrs. Challoner will feel all this,” she said, confiding in the youth whom she had never seen till half an hour before, but for whose domestic help she now appealed as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Will you just see what is in that basin beside you?”

Tom lifted the cover, peering gingerly.

“I believe this is the pudding,” he said.

“Dear me; very likely,” said Miss Latimer.

She went back to the fireplace, and, dipping her fingers into the pot of water, drew forth the floating rag. It was the pudding-cloth neatly fastened up; only the pudding had never been inside!

“And what is that strange noise I hear?” asked the old lady, gazing around.

“It is the cat,” said Tom. “She is under the dresser, and she keeps ‘swearing.’”

The young man seemed rather afraid to approach the indignant animal; but the old lady bravely put in her hand and drew pussy out.

“No wonder she ‘swears,’ poor dear!” she observed. “Hot oil or grease has been dropped on her, and has burned away about an inch of fur. I don’t know what we can do for her, especially just now. But, at least, we’ll give her a saucer of milk as a sign of sympathy.”

At that moment the uncertain step of Wilfrid Somerset was heard on the kitchen stair.

“Mrs. Challoner asks me to get the cushions off the armchair,” he said, “and I’m afraid you’ll be wanted,” he added, addressing Tom, “for I’m a poor, useless creature where bodily strength is required.”

Without a moment’s hesitation the doctor had diagnosed Mrs. Morison’s “fit.”

“She’s been drinking,” he said laconically.

“But there is no smell of spirit,” pleaded Lucy, reluctant to lose faith in the unhappy woman.

“No,” said the doctor; “but there’s the scent of the little lozenges which gentlemen take to hide the smell of tobacco. That’s the secret, ma’am. This case doesn’t want any treatment save to be put on a safe couch and allowed ‘to sleep it off,’ when I trust she will awake properly ashamed of herself.”

It was impossible to carry the heavy inert body to the servant’s bedroom upstairs. But there was a little closet-like room at the back of the hall, empty save for a few ferns and polled plants which Lucy kept there. In that room Mr. Somerset arranged all the cushions he could find in the kitchen, which were not a few, since they included the mattress of a chair-bedstead which stood there in its chair capacity. Then the doctor and Tom Black carried in the unconscious woman, while poor Lucy gathered up the scattered cutlery,{547} which included a broken knife, a toasting-fork, and an oyster opener.

“I am so sorry to have called you out on Christmas Day, and for what, after all, was no work of yours,” said Lucy to the doctor as he came back through the hall, drawing down his cuffs and straightening his coat.

He gave his head a queer little shake.

“It’s hard to know what is a doctor’s work and what isn’t,” he said. “But it’s always a doctor’s work to be useful, if not to the case, why, then, to its caretaker. Get rid of that woman directly she wakes, Mrs. Challoner. Such as she are at the bottom of two-thirds of the awful accidents which happen in the world.”

“She might have broken her neck if she had fallen on the stairs,” observed Lucy.

“And as she didn’t, she may live to break some other body’s neck,” said the doctor as he went away.

Lucy opened the dining-room door and went in, to find poor little Hugh still dutifully watching at the window as Miss Latimer had bidden him. And there was the dining-table, with its gleaming napery and sparkling crystal, standing there as in mockery of the squalid scene which had just been enacted.

“And is it to this misery that I have invited my guests?” cried Lucy. Even as she spoke her eye fell on her little desk, with her unfinished letter to Charlie peeping out of the blotting-case. That letter could not be finished now. It could never be sent. Then the memory of all she had believed and hoped rolled back on her. If there is anything calculated to give us the sensation of despair, it is the recollection of thanksgiving offered for what in the end has proved disastrous!

For one moment Lucy sat down on a chair, covered her face and wept. She might have had “a good cry,” but for her sudden realisation that she was not alone, that her guests were in the house, and that she had a duty to discharge towards them. She sprang up and dashed away her tears. Where had the guests gone? What were they doing? She had been so occupied with the unhappy drunkard that she had not realised what else had gone on around her. In her confusion she went first to the drawing-room. The door was wide open and the room was empty, an album lying on the floor just as she had dropped it. She paused, puzzled. Then she heard sounds below. It was evident that her friends were all in the kitchen.

There she found them, busy. The pudding was already in the pot. The burned serviettes were put aside. Tom Black had carried the rag mat out to the scullery, and Wilfrid Somerset was washing plates.

Lucy cried out in dismay; but they all laughed good-humouredly. The disaster had happened, they said, and now they’d got to make the best of it.

“What is the use of having old friends, if they can’t do such a thing as this?” asked Miss Latimer.

But Mr. Black, anyhow, was not an old friend, protested Lucy.

No, Mr. Somerset admitted that—at least, he hadn’t been only an hour ago. “I think he is now,” he added. “Hours count for years sometimes.”

Lucy resolutely pulled herself together. She, too, must make the best of it. Though, as a hostess, she was humiliated and defeated, she must still be the hostess, and try to extract a smile out of the cruel situation. For the time she must put this unhappy woman out of her thoughts, along with what might come on the morrow and the utter upset of all her plans for the future. She must try to turn the household wreck into an impromptu picnic.

She tried and succeeded perfectly, so far at least as Tom Black and Hugh were concerned. In half an hour those two were laughing and running to and fro as if there could not be a better Christmas game than tidying a disordered room and pushing on a belated dinner.

Tom Black thought in his own mind what a jolly woman Mrs. Challoner was not to be a bit put out by what would have utterly upset some people.

Miss Latimer and Wilfrid Somerset knew better than that; they knew what dramatisations life sometimes forces upon us, and how costly such performances are.

But they nobly seconded Lucy in her determination to put a fair face on things. The dinner was cooked in time and set upon the table with the informal decency which prevails in houses where “the family do their own work.”

Tom Black really enjoyed himself a great deal more than he had expected he would when in prospect of the ordinary dinner-party. He actually took courage to say that he thought it would be far better fun if people always came prepared to get ready their own festivity, instead of sitting talking about nothing and looking through stereoscopes.

Wilfrid Somerset replied that he believed something of the sort was regularly done in some parts of Canada and the New England States.

“But where it is done, the whole construction of society is different from what it is in London,” said Miss Latimer. “And it is where things are half one way and half another that somebody has to suffer cruelly,” she added.

She, a breadwinning woman all her days, knew the strain which had come upon Lucy, and could understand how these few hours were wasting forces which should have been conserved to suffice for the productive labour of weeks. For Lucy’s sake, she was truly thankful when the effort was over—when little Hugh had gone to bed, when Tom Black had said good-bye and had departed in the best of spirits, and when, left only to her two old and trusted friends, Lucy could drop the mask of cheerfulness and be the anxious, shaken creature she really was.

“Well,” sighed Lucy, “Charlie is sure to have thought of us to-day; but certainly his imagination has never pictured the reality!”

The miserable Mrs. Morison was sleeping quietly now, and was not likely to waken until morning. Miss Latimer declared that she would remain with Lucy if Mr. Somerset would leave word at her lodgings that she was not to be expected that night.

He urged the two ladies to go to bed directly he departed. They both needed rest, and he felt sure they would not be disturbed. It was good advice; but they were too nervous to take it. They might sleep heavily in their upper chamber, and the culprit might waken and steal out, or she might rise and commit suicide.

So they made themselves as comfortable as they could in the dining-room, dozing off and waking and talking in whispers to each other, till suddenly they roused with a start. The house was full of the dull grey light of winter dawn. There was a slow heavy footfall in the passage.

The culprit stood before them, unkempt, dishevelled, pale, but once more in her right mind.

“Oh, Mrs. Morison!” cried Lucy. “How could you do this thing? How could you?” and Lucy began to weep bitterly.

“I’ve nothing to say for myself, mem, nothing at all!” said the woman heavily, with no sign of feeling except what was conveyed in the utter absence of such sign. “But I’m just going to get your breakfasts for you. You shall have them all right. Then you can do what you like with me.”

The coffee she set before them was dainty, and the yellow fish savoury, and the toast brown and crisp. The breakfast almost choked Lucy. She still liked this woman—still felt drawn to the something good and kind which again looked out of the grey eyes even to-day, dim and reddened as they were. She would have liked to give her another chance, surrounded by strict conditions and solemn pledges; but she knew that could not be done in the little house with the verandah. For there was no doubt that this was no first and abnormal outbreak, but simply the crisis of a constant tendency—the tumultuous outbreak of restrained craving.

This would take years to cure, if in a woman of this one’s age it could be ever wholly cured. Clearly this could not be Lucy’s work, since it was absolutely incompatible with her direct duties as Charlie’s wife and Hugh’s mother.

She shuddered to realise how easily she might have been so lulled into false security as to have left Hugh for an hour or two in the charge of this well-behaved, kindly woman, perhaps to find her home a heap of cinders and her child a charred corpse!

They had scarcely finished breakfast when Wilfrid Somerset drove up in his cab. He had felt anxious lest morning might bring some violent and distressing scene. He was soon satisfied that there was little to fear on that head. But he was urgent that Mrs. Morison should leave the house at once. Lucy feared she had but a few shillings left, and in her present depressed state was only too likely to spend those in bringing more shame upon herself. So Mr. Somerset’s advice was that the cousin,{548} the Willesden plumber, should be communicated with. Mr. Somerset charged himself with the transmission of the telegram, and worded it with much tact and policy.

Before evening, just as the shadows were deepening, the cousin’s wife arrived.

She expressed great disgust at “Jessie’s” lapse. But she did not need it to be explained. She evidently knew what was to be expected. All that she could say was that she had really hoped “Jessie” had learned more wisdom at last. They had done all they could for her. They had thought her cured. She had “kept straight” for so many weeks. They had never let her go out without one of their children with her, and they had kept all her money from her. She had called on Jessie, poor body, on the day she thought she would get her wages, and had taken them away, and was keeping them for her. Jessie was quite willing for one to do that, if one took her at the right time. She could not think what “Jessie” had done to get money, for she had said she gave up all.

“I paid her a month’s wages a few days in advance,” explained Mrs. Challoner; “and, when I did so, she told me that you had called to borrow money from her, and how gladly she had spared it.”

The cousin looked up at Mrs. Challoner, hesitated for a moment, and said—

“She didn’t say that till she knew you were going to pay her in advance, did she?”

“No, she did not,” Mrs. Challoner admitted. “Nor did she ask me for the advance. I offered it.”

“That’s it,” said the cousin. “The craving was on her, and the moment she saw a way to satisfy it, she began to tell lies. She’s as true as daylight at any other time, and as honest.”

“I’m so sorry I gave her that money,” sighed Lucy, forgetting for the moment that if such a revelation was to come, then the sooner it came the better.

“Oh, it wasn’t having the money that did it!” answered the other reassuringly. “As she told a lie the fit had come, and if she hadn’t got drunk one way, why, she would another! Once she actually pawned my little girl’s boots. And she so fond of the child! ’Tisn’t her fault, poor dear! We mustn’t judge her. It’s just like a disease.”

“But how could you think of allowing her to use you as a reference, and yet of not warning me of her terrible weakness?” said Mrs. Challoner.

The woman’s eyes wandered a little.

“Well, we didn’t want her to mention us!” she answered. “I’ll engage she didn’t till after you’d seen the Edinburgh letters. Jessie came home so full of you and the little gentleman that I thought, ‘Here’s a place where she’ll be happy and will keep right if ever she will.’ And when the lady came to inquire, my husband he kep’ out of the way. He said he wasn’t going to mix hisself in it; but I said to him, ‘It’s our Christian duty to do the best we can for our own. Ain’t we told we’ve got to bear each other’s burdens?’ says I.”

Lucy drew her breath hard. How was one to meet this perverted sentiment, this putting of “charity,” as it were, upside down?

“But don’t you see you were wrong to further her coming into my house without telling me the truth about her?” she urged. “She might have burned my house, she might have killed my boy! Could you not see that you were not dealing justly by me?”

“I don’t know about ‘justly,’” said the woman tartly, with a sneer on the last word. “It’s our Christian duty to have charity and cover a multitude of sins. If I’d told about Jessie’s weakness, nobody would have taken her; and, as she’s spent her bit of money already, there’s nothing and nobody between her and the workhouse but just ourselves, and my husband doesn’t like to have his flesh and blood made a pauper. Yet it’s rather hard he should have to take from me and his own children to keep her.”

Lucy’s heart fainted within her at this strange mixture of warped exegesis, perverted family pride, and private self-interest. Yet she made another attempt to get the matter set in a right light.

“It is very kind of you and your husband to wish to help Jessie,” she said; “but then, if you are willing to sacrifice yourselves in this direction, it must really be yourselves whom you do sacrifice, and not other people, whom you mislead into being sacrificed blindfold. Our sacrifices must be costly to ourselves and not to others. If poor Jessie is really, as you seem to say, the irresponsible victim of her vice, just as if it was a disease, it would be truer kindness on your part to sacrifice your pride for her real good. You are only giving her freedom to do some great harm to other people, even if you feel it right to endure such an example as hers among your own children. But I do not think you need let her go to the workhouse. I believe there are people willing and able to undertake the care and cure of such cases. If you like, I will write to some of these. But meantime, as you helped Jessie to get into my house, I must really ask you to take her away with you at once.”

“Oh, yes, that’s the way burdens are always thrown back on poor folk!” muttered the woman.

“I am throwing no burden on you,” said Lucy, with a firmness which surprised herself. “I am simply handing back a great risk which you deceitfully imposed upon me. I think we have nothing more to discuss,” and thereupon she rang the kitchen bell, and summoned Jessie into the presence of her mistress and her cousin.

(To be continued.)

A HAPPY HEALTHY GIRLHOOD.

By “MEDICUS” (Dr. GORDON-STABLES, R.N.).

PART II.

he rose is a sweetly beautiful flower, and no matter where it grows it somehow always charms the human eye, always appeals to the human heart. Lovely it is in the garden, especially perhaps at early morning when gemmed by dew, the crystalline tears left by the dying night, or at eventide, when the colour in a rose-garden seems to reflect the tints of the sunset clouds. Roses of all classes and kinds are lovely, grow they where they may, on castle lawn or draping the walls of the humblest cottage. And just as sweet and tender are those lovely buds and blossoms of the crimson rosa canina that bedeck and mantle our hedges in the month of June.

Children are ofttimes comparable to roses—girl-children I mean—mere opening buds, and they ought to be none the less beautiful and innocent-looking when older, but still in their teens. Ah, those “teens,” would we not all prefer to remain that age and never to grow older! I suppose angels are all and always in their teens, and the saints in Heaven too!

But descending from romance, with which a medical man ought to have nothing to do, the stern reality, life, to a girl in her teens is often a trying time. This, for many reasons which I shall now briefly consider and advise upon.

Every mother, if not her children, has often heard the word “heredity” mentioned. The offspring is part and parcel of the parents, and inherits, somewhat changed or modified perhaps, not only their good qualities, their strength of body, brain, and constitution, but their diseases also, if they have any. There is no mystery about that, as some medical men tell us. It would be a mystery if it were the reverse. If you take a cutting off a pure red rose, you could scarcely expect it when grown into a bush to develop yellow roses. It is part and parcel of the parent, and so is the child. But separate life and the mode or manner of living may alter even inherited complaints, or prevent their showing forth at all. It does not follow as a constant rule that the children of, say, scrofulous parents shall be consumptive, or that those of parents addicted to drink and dishonesty shall follow the parental lead. It is this fact that gives one such hope in treating{549} the ailments and guiding the young lives of those who may be supposed to be born with a taint of impure blood.

Note, mother, please, that I have said “young lives” in my last sentence, because it is when young, and only then, that much good can be done to combat the evils of heredity.

We are sometimes told that the particular ailment handed down may skip one generation and appear in the next. This should only give us additional certainty that the trouble may be eradicated entirely. For Nature does not skip generations in the manner some scientists would have us believe. If an ailment, say phthisis or consumption, is the trouble in one family and the children thereof escape, while the grandchildren are attacked, one of two things may have happened; the first generation of the afflicted ones had been reared in circumstances inimical to the dispersing of the disorder, it lay latent in their blood and revivified under circumstances favourable to it, in the grandchildren, or—this is just as likely—the seed of the disease died in the first generation, and the second were infected by ordinary means. Phthisis is infectious: this should always be born in mind, and a consumptive person should invariably sleep alone in the airiest and best ventilated room in the house.

When I say that consumption is hereditary, I am of course showing you that I am a believer in the microbe doctrine. So is every sensible man. The microbes of phthisis may be carried in the breath from the sick to the sound; or dried sputa—ever so little—may form dust and be breathed, thus inoculating, as it were, the person who inhales it. Not of a certainty, however, for there are many chances against those microbes, even if breathed, finding their way into the blood. Healthy blood is in itself a protection, for the white corpuscles thereof are veritable tigers in miniature, and fall upon and destroy organisms that are dangerous to the life or health of the individual. Moreover a disease germ or seed of consumption cannot, in every case, even reach the mucous membrance of the lungs, owing to the secretions therein which sweep it away, if they do not actually destroy it. On the other hand a weakly subject is far more likely to fall a victim to infection of any kind than a strong. A consumptive mother may have several children, all of which, bar one, are safe enough, though all must have inherited the evil microbe or bacillus. And this is chiefly because one is more delicate than the others.

But I deem it my duty to say here at once that a consumptive person should never marry.

All mothers know, or ought to know, that consumption is caused by a particular sort of matter called tubercle which, by way of getting rid of it perhaps, Nature deposits in, say, the lungs of the young person. This acts like a foreign body; that is, it may lie quiescent for a long time, and as the child gets stronger, it may even be absorbed, but if she catches cold, that wicked little lump of deposit is sought out and, becoming inflamed, sets up mischief all around. It is coughed up, but leaves an ulcer, and this forms a cavity, after which the end is not far distant. But consumption in children, or the young either, is more often caused by the deposit of tubercle in other parts of the body, especially in the glands.

Now, the probability being that I shall devote a whole article to a consideration of consumption, I need not do more here than generalise and give a few words of good advice. I think, mater, that if this advice proves of service to you and gives you hope, this health sermon shall not have been written in vain.

“I’m afraid that my lassie is dwining,” said a Scottish mother to me once. “What think you, doctor?”

I was only a very young fellow then, but had inherited a modicum of common sense from most intelligent parents, so I took Mary in hand.

Mary was then sixteen, I but twenty, and although a medical student, I could not have known a deal. The mother and daughter were country cottagers, and being poor, the family doctor did not, probably could not, devote overmuch time to the case. One thing, however, I objected to: he kept pouring cod-liver oil into his patient, completely deranging the stomach and rendering the digestion of the food a complete impossibility.

From the very first week that Mary stopped the oil her appetite improved, and—the old doctor stopped away. The case was mine therefore, and I took no small pains with it. I thought that if there was any chance of getting the girl over her trouble at all, it was by making her strong. We live by food and not by physic, I argued—food and fresh air.

Mary’s bedroom was a small one and downstairs; but there happened to be a large attic or garret above, and the father being a handy man—and Mary the only girl-child—he did as I told him, and made a large window on the south side of the attic. Then it was completely cleared out and cleaned out, the walls whitewashed and the floor well scrubbed. When mats were put down here and there, and a nice bed at one side on which the morning light could fall, the room was so far ready for occupation.

The mother wanted bed curtains and window curtains. I would hear of neither. I shook my young head with an air of awe-inspiring profundity as I tabooed the curtains. But I permitted any amount of artistic though rural decoration. Mary had much taste, and the hours she spent in making that attic into a boudoir were the best investment of time possible, because they occupied her mind, and I would not let her believe she was ill, or had the seeds of consumption in her system. All she wanted, I said, was strength. And I really was not far wrong. I gave her Hope instead of cod-liver oil. But I insisted upon her being out of doors nearly all day long, wearing clothing to accord with the state of the weather, but never fearing the cold. She was to sleep, not in a draught, but with her window open. Her mother said, “My conscience, doctor laddie!” at first, but I insisted.

All the medicine Mary had for the next twelve months could have been placed inside a walnut shell. Her mental medicine was not neglected, and this consisted of books to read—I gave her these—and light work to do, chiefly out of doors, also pleasant quiet companionship.

Fresh air was the most important weapon I used to fight the trouble. Next came food. Cream, butter, good milk, nice bacon, and suet dumplings were ten thousand times better than expensive and fulsome cod-liver oil. She had meat too, as much as she could take, with vegetables—potatoes and greens—and bread.

Hygienic rules were most strictly carried out. The cottage, luckily, was surrounded by bonnie country gardens, in which Mary spent much of her time, not even fearing rain, because she wore a cloak—not an india-rubber mackintosh, be assured—and strong boots, without disease-producing goloshes. From top to bottom, from one end to another, the house was kept spotlessly clean, free from dust, and dry.

Mary was no worse at the end of a month! Mary was better at the end of three months!! Mary was well, and the blush of health was on her cheeks, at the end of eighteen months!!!

The old-fashioned doctor never spoke to me after I put my foot on his cod-liver oil. He used to pass me on the road like a speck of March dust, and he told a friend of mine I was an insolent young dog. No doubt he was right. I had all the faith and arrogance of youth, but—I cured Mary.

It was at the end of the eighteen months I went to sea, and seven long years elapsed before I saw her again. She was married, and had two bonnie healthy children. She is living still, and her family too.

Now, mother, this is a true story, and I have only told it as a proof of the benefits derivable from fatty and flesh-forming foods, perfect hygiene, and fresh air indoors and out in cases of incipient consumption; and not in these alone are such health-giving and curative agents beneficial, but in all cases of chronic ill-health in young girls.

In relating my little story of Mary, I may have seemed to disparage cod-liver oil. I merely wish, however, to imply that it is only in cases where it can be easily digested that it can do any good, and that in all others it is positively injurious.

Mind this, mater, that the days have long gone past when people pinned their faith on medicine alone in the cure of diseases. Indeed, mostly every ailment of a chronic nature, if curable at all, has a better chance if physic is left severely alone and a thorough system of hygiene and dietetics adopted; for if medicine is taken, people as a rule think that this is of greater consequence than good food and a life spent in the fresh and open air.

What are called “peptonised foods” are often beneficial where there is want of proper digestive power, or pepsin in the form of tablets may be used. These are to be had at most respectable chemists, and the dose is marked on the bottle.

The new food-medicines called vivol and marrol, so highly spoken of in medical journals, should in many cases supersede the use of cod-liver oil, or even shark-liver oil, in the case of a girl who does not seem to be thriving.

The Scotch word “dwining” is very expressive. It was usually applied to girls just entered on their teens, who do not appear to be healthy, and are but little likely to make old bones. They are rather poor in flesh, growing rather rapidly, perhaps, but not “building as they go,” as the farmers say about rick-making. They have but little appetite, are pale in face, flabby in substance, have little real life about them, and are very thick-headed of a morning. They feel the cold much, and therefore seldom have their bedrooms properly ventilated. Moreover, they do not make bone. It is as if Nature said to herself, “I need not bone in the case of this girl, for it will never be wanted.”

Well, in all cases of “dwining,” the fresh air and food treatment works wonders.

I must call the attention of mothers of delicate girls to the fact that there are in the market, and very largely advertised, pills containing iron which kill thousands yearly. Iron, in the hands of a skilful physician, who knows how and when to prescribe it, is often a valuable tonic, but taken without precaution, as people do who see things advertised and shored up with lies and so-called cures, it is a most dangerous and poisonous drug.

What is called anæmia or bloodlessness in girls sometimes gets the name of “chlorosis” or “green sickness” from the peculiar appearance of the skin. It is an exceedingly common complaint, and really the number of white faces one sees in the streets of great cities, as girls hurry to and from their work, is saddening. When one notices a face of this kind in a beautiful carriage, the girl who owns it being perhaps wrapped up in furs, one may put it down as a bad case. There is either{550} some real disease to account for it, or the girl is over-coddled, the laws of hygiene and dietetics ruthlessly broken, and faith pinned on medicine alone—a broken reed.

When the working girl is anæmic, her mother or whoever owns her must see that she gets good food, that the system is kept regular in every way, and that her room is clean, tidy and well-ventilated, with no curtains on bed or windows.

All the weariness, all the heaviness, tiredness in the morning, the low spirits, and even the neuralgic pains from which she suffers, will vanish before a better diet if it is well regulated. But in such a case, the daily bath—cold before breakfast—will often be the very first thing to set her to rights.

If she can get down into the country and keep out of doors nearly all day, so much the better, only hard exercise should be avoided.

Red meat does good in these cases. If this is too expensive to be had in any quantity, plenty of milk should be used. Oatmeal is a cure in itself in many cases. Bacon is good, especially the fat, and a teaspoonful of Bovril should supplement this.

Peas meal, if it can be got in bulk and fresh, makes an excellent staple of diet for many hard-working girls. It can be made into porridge (thick), and eaten with butter and milk it is most nourishing and delicious. The Aberdeen girls (factory hands, etc.) use a deal of this, and no more wholesome, blooming and bonnie lassies are to be found anywhere. Indeed, I have never yet seen any to match them. The fresh and bracing sea air may account to some extent for their “caller” looks, but, believe me, the diet has a deal to do with their health.

Nervousness is another hereditary complaint. Now although there are a great many medicines that have an effect for good on the nervous system, they need to be used with caution, and only in conjunction with a well-regulated diet.

Rheumatism is still another heirloom that descends in families.

On both these subjects and others I shall speak at length in early numbers of The Girl’s Own Paper, so those interested should look out for my papers.

“OUR HERO.”

A TALE OF THE FRANCO-ENGLISH WAR NINETY YEARS AGO.

By AGNES GIBERNE, Author of “Sun, Moon and Stars,” “The Girl at the Dower House,” etc.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

s a heavy stone falling into a pond sends waves circling outward to a distance, so the death of Sir John Moore at Coruña sent many a wave of sorrow to the hearts of men, north and south, east and west. One such wave found its way to the distant town of Verdun, where still languished the détenus, taken captive in 1803, together with many later Prisoners of War on parole, sent thither.

News in those days travelled slowly, and prisoners travelled more slowly still. But a day arrived, though not till very many weeks after the Battle of Coruña, when Jack Keene found himself within the ramparts of Verdun.

It was spring; and he carried his right arm in a sling, and when he moved a distinct limp might be seen. He had just been to report himself at the citadel, and he now stood outside, meditating on his next move.

A rather young man, with a keen clever face, passed him quickly, then pulled up, turning in his direction.

“I beg your pardon. Have you just arrived here?”

“Yes. You’re English. That’s right,” said Jack heartily. “I’m a prisoner.”

“Can I be of service to you? Have you friends in the place?”

“Could you direct me to Colonel Baron’s house or lodgings?”

“Certainly. I know them all. My name is Curtis.”

“Ah! I have heard that name from Roy Baron.”

“Roy and I were great friends, when he was here. Anything you can tell me about him will be welcome.”

Curtis looked questioningly, and Jack answered the look.

“My name is Keene. Roy and I have been through the Campaign in Spain together, and on the retreat I was wounded and taken prisoner.”

Curtis held out his hand, to be grasped by Jack’s left.

“You have travelled all the way from Spain.”

“With a convoy of prisoners. Yes. Been a good while about it, too. First part of the way in a waggon, after that on horseback. Tell me how they all are here. I have heard nothing for ages.”

“I’ll come and show you the way. The Colonel keeps all right. Looks older than he used, that’s all. Mrs. Baron is well. One fancied at the time that Roy’s being sent to Bitche would kill her outright; but it didn’t. Having to devote herself to Ivor was a mercy in disguise, I don’t doubt. Kept her from dwelling on her own trouble. It was a vast relief to them all, when the kind fellow, who got Roy away, came and told them he’d seen the boy safe on board a vessel for England. He was well rewarded by the Colonel, as you may suppose—not that he did it for reward! But, of course, we don’t breathe a word about it in Verdun, for the fellow’s own sake. Only, as I know them well, and as I know you belong to them——”

Jack made a gesture of assent.

“Ivor was ill, was he not?”

“I daresay he would have been so anyhow, after the march from Valenciennes; but the arrest of Roy was a finishing stroke. You won’t find him looking good for much now. I suppose hardly anything could have knocked him down like the death of Sir John Moore. It is a fearful loss to the country. No man living could have been worse spared.”

Curtis paused, cast a glance at Jack, and changed the subject.

Presently they reached the house, where still the Barons lived, as ever since their first arrival in Verdun.

“By-the-by, I’m not sure whether you’ll find them in,” he said. “The Colonel at appel said he was going to take Ivor with his wife for a drive in the country, hoping it might do him good. It was worth trying. But I think they may have returned before now.”

“You’re allowed to go where you will?”

“Why, no! Douceurs are efficacious, however. Will you let me show you the way upstairs?”

Jack hesitated.

“No, I understand. Of course, you’d rather see them first alone; and I didn’t mean to go in. But you can’t mistake the room. First landing, first door to the right.”

Curtis vanished, and Jack, obeying the directions, came to a door slightly ajar. He pushed it wider, and went softly through.

It was a good-sized salon; empty, except for the presence of one man, writing at a side table. By build and bearing, Jack recognised Ivor instantly; but, finding himself unnoticed, he had a fancy not at once to make his presence known. He drew a few steps nearer, and then stood motionless. He had a good side-view of the other.

Jack studied him gravely, recalling the splendid physique and health of the young Guardsman six years earlier. The physique was in a sense the same; and the fine bearing of head and shoulders remained unaltered; but the sharpened delicacy and pallor of the face impressed Jack painfully, as did a streak of grey hair above the temple, a stamp of habitual lassitude upon the brow, and the thinness of the strongly-made right hand, which moved the pen. Jack began dimly to understand what the long waiting and patience of these years had been.

Ivor seemed to become conscious of Jack’s gaze. He laid down his pen, glanced round, and started up.

“Jack! Is it possible?”

“Just arrived,” remarked Jack, with an insouciance which he was far from feeling. “Come across Spain and{551} France. Yes, wounded; but I’m getting all right. Always was a tough subject, you know.”

“Where were you taken?”

“On the march, at Lugo. Two days off from Coruña. Got too far ahead of my men. Wounded in the leg first; then, as I was defending myself, a musket-ball broke my right arm. So I had to give in.”

“You are lame still. Sit down. You a prisoner, too! I hardly know how to believe it.”

“Fortune of war, as our French friends would say. I’ve no right to complain. Had my share, though ’tis a shame to be cut off from more of it. Den, you’re looking very far from well.”

Denham did not heed the words.

“What of Roy?” he asked. “We have had no home-news for ages.”

“Roy is Ensign in my Regiment. Didn’t you know even that? Been with me through this Campaign. He and I were in the Reserve—under his eye”—in a lower voice. “You have heard——”

“No particulars. The fact of a battle at Coruña—and—— Tell me all you can.”

“You know that it was victory.”

“I know!”—in a stirred deep tone. “Not from the papers. French papers never admit defeat. But—under him—how could it be otherwise?”

“It never was otherwise. Never—once!”

Denham rested his face on both hands.

“Tell me all you know. We are cut off from everything here.”

Jack’s information was but partial. Before starting for France, he had been kept by his wounds some time in the neighbourhood of Lugo; and thus a few details of that heroic death had filtered round to him. It was hard work for Jack to repeat them in a steady voice. Once Ivor raised his head; and the dumb white sorrow of his look all but overcame Jack’s fortitude. Then Ivor returned to his former position, and Jack went on resolutely.

“That’s about all,” he said at length. “As much as I’ve heard yet.... He was his own grand self to the last!... It was the death he would have chosen to die.... He always wished for it.... On the field—in the moment of victory! But the loss to us—to England!... The best—the noblest——”

Jack could say no more. Silence followed.

“Soult is a brave fellow. I heard that he was going to put up a memorial stone[1]—to him! The French know what he was.”

Silence again. Denham had not stirred.

“He saved the Army—and baulked Napoleon. None except we who were there could know the true state of things—the hopeless inefficiency of the Spaniards. If he had had treble the number of men, and sufficient supplies, England might have told a very different tale to-day. What could be done by mortal man, under such circumstances, he did.”

Renewed silence. Jack studied the other gravely.

“You’re not fit for any more of this! When did you hear last from home? So long? And you actually didn’t know that Roy was in Spain? Smart young officer, too. He came in more than once for particular notice.” Jack found himself verging on another allusion to the name which filled their thoughts, and he turned to a fresh subject. “This Commandant of yours at Verdun—Wirion—must be a queer chap, judging from reports of him in the English papers.”

“He—was.”

“Not here now?”

“Courcelles is the present Commandant. Wirion went too far. There were some scandalous cases—young Englishmen fleeced to the tune of five thousand pounds.”

“What a vile shame!”

“Some of us made a stir, and facts were carried to headquarters. Wirion was suspended, and he received a hint that he might as well put himself out of the way. He acted upon the hint.”

“You mean that he——?”

“Shot himself.”

“Present man any improvement?”

“Oppressions are a degree more carefully veiled.”

Denham lifted his face from his hands with a sudden movement.

“What am I thinking about? You must be in want of food.”

“No, it’s all right. I went to a café on arrival. Your next meal is soon enough for me.”

The absence of any inquiry after Polly was arousing Jack’s wonder. At first, in the engrossing interest of that other subject, he had not so much noticed Denham’s reticence, but now each minute it grew more marked. Should he speak of Polly himself? No, that would not do. The first mention ought to be from Ivor. So Jack decided, not realising that his own silence might be misconstrued. Some questions as to his wounds followed. Denham had moved to the large arm-chair, and was leaning back with a spiritless look. Jack wondered anew, and at length he could not resist putting forth a slight feeler.

“Are there no folks at home of whom you would fain hear?”

Ivor took the hint, looked straight at him, and said—

“Is Polly married yet?”

Jack’s breath was taken away. He was like one who has received a slap in the face. This—from Ivor!

“Upon—my—word!” he ejaculated. “You take it coolly. Uncommon coolly!”

“I have at least a right to ask the question.”

For a moment Jack was very nearly in a passion, but the anger went down as fast as it had arisen.

“Of course you don’t mean—— But, I say, what in the wide world made you think of such a thing? Polly married! No, nor like to be.”

“I heard that she was engaged.”

“To whom?”

“The Admiral’s nephew—Peirce.”

“Who told you the lie?”

“Then—it was a lie!”

“You might have known it. Who told you?”

“One whom I should have counted trustworthy.”

“When did you hear the tale?”

“The year I was in Valenciennes.”

Jack recalled Roy’s description of Ivor’s return from that absence, and he began to grasp the state of the case.

“When did you hear last from Polly herself?”

“Over two years ago. A letter which had been written before the date when she was said to have become engaged.”

The last remnants of Jack’s anger died out. Two years of silence following upon such a report!

“You have not writ yourself to Polly, this great while.”

“How could I—not speaking of this? And—how speak of it—if it were not true?”

Silence again. Jack observed slowly, as he watched the other’s colourless lips—

“Den, I’m going to be frank. ’Tis no case for half confidences. There was a time, I’ll confess, when I had a doubt in my own mind of Polly’s constancy. She’s a pretty creature, and she has had an uncommon lot of admiration. But I wronged her, for she has been ever faithful to you, and she has cared for none other. And the night before I started for Spain, she and I talked together, and she spoke out plainly. She said that, if you but asked her to come to Verdun she would come—and gladly. She wondered, if indeed you cared for her still, that you had not so done.”

A flush came, and Denham’s hand was held hard against his forehead.

“Never!” he said, in a low voice.

“You would not wish to have her out?”—incredulously.

“Never! If Polly were here, I might be taken from her in a week—sent to a dungeon, leaving her unprotected.”

“I see! Nay, that would not do. Polly and you must wait a while longer. But you will know now that she is waiting too.”

“It might be better for her—not——” Denham broke off.

“Your head is not often like this, I hope,” Jack said, in a concerned tone.

“Not much respite lately.”

“Have you had medical advice? Can nothing be done?”

“One infallible remedy—if it might be had.”

“And that is?”

“Freedom—and Home.”

There was a short breath between the words, which said much, for Denham was not given to sighing. Then voices outside told of the return of Colonel and Mrs. Baron. Denham stood up, murmured a hasty apology, and left the room.

“Poor fellow!” Jack said aloud.

(To be continued.)

{552}

FROCKS FOR TO-MORROW.

By “THE LADY DRESSMAKER”

I have seen nothing more wonderful this season than the combinations of colour in dress. To hear the suggestions of your dressmaker on the subject is to hear all your preconceived notions disputed and set at naught. The other day I went with a friend to order a dress, and she selected one of the new canvas grenadines, blue with a white silk spot. The blue was rather a bright one, and the material very transparent, and open in its meshes. There were several suggestions made for the silken lining by the very clever woman who was attending to us—white, pale blue, a darker blue, emerald green, pink, rose, red, lemon, orange, and, finally, a mauve—and mauve it was—being the latest colour combination and newer than the rest. But violet or heliotrope goes best, to my mind, with crimson; and that is a colour combination which came in as long ago as the early seventies, after the Franco-Prussian war; and nothing can exceed its effectiveness if you get the right shades for your mixture. Then heliotrope and light blue is very pretty; but much less so than the other. The favourite mixture of this season is, without doubt, black and white, and a very useful one it is. One of the favourite materials for the everyday wear of the season is alpaca, and next to that, for best gowns, comes canvas grenadines, and a new make of crepon. Nothing can exceed the beauty of the satin-faced foulards, which everyone seems to be ordering; and there is a great return to spots, either placed at regular distances over the material, or else arranged in irregularly-shaped masses. The new nun’s veilings are{553} also very pretty, and make delightful summer frocks for girls.

SOME SUMMER GOWNS.

There is much to be said on the subject of linings, and on all sides you will probably hear it said that no silk, or, at least, no rustling silk linings are used now; and that all dresses are so soft and clinging that only very soft linings are used, such as batiste, which is either watered or plain, muslin, or any kind of unstiffened material. Alpaca is lined with the same material, and not with silk, but canvas must be silk-lined, so a new kind of foulard silk is to be found which is non-rustling and flows in straight lines in the skirt.

Instead of a braid at the edge of your skirt, you must now use velvet, which is to be obtained at all the shops for that purpose, and black velvet is most used for the purpose.

The attenuation of the quite up-to-date woman is very remarkable, and her skirts are so long and so unstiffened that they wrap round her feet, and make her look “like a mermaid,” as one of our many fashion-writers assures us; but, whatever the creature is that she may be like, the effect is startling; it is so long and so unshapely when the new style is applied to a thin figure.

TWO HARMONIES IN BLACK AND WHITE.

The group of figures which I have called “Two harmonies in black and white,” are two pretty gowns in the two hues which are the most fashionable of all. The figure on the left holding a bird wears a gown of white lace over black satin, which is trimmed with crescent-shaped pieces of silk, shading from black to grey and white. These are laid on in regular sequence of size on the skirt as well as on the bodice. The other dress is of plainer character, and is of black, with a white design. It is, in fact, one of the new satin-faced foulards, the pattern being of small leaves and dots. The vest is of pleated white satin, with revers of the same covered with lace. The{554} bodice and skirt are also trimmed with ruches of cream-coloured lace, which are laid over the dress in pannier fashion, and go round the skirt at the back. These small ruchings, made of ribbon, narrow lace, or pinked-out silk, are quite one of the features of this season’s gowns and mantles.

MUSLIN FROCK FOR A YOUNG GIRL.

The frocks for young girls are especially pretty this season, and the use of muslin makes them always youthful-looking and light. The frock illustrated in our sketch is made of a dotted muslin, which may be of cream or écru, or even of a colour. It is lined with either a good sateen or a silk, rose, pink, or blue being pretty colours; and the bodice has a deep yoke of silk of the colour of the lining, which has a ruching of lace round it, or else one of silk gauze, which is almost equally popular. The muslin which covers the bodice is tucked, and also that on the pointed tunic, which is edged with deep muslin frills, having lines of narrow pink or blue ribbon on them. The sash is of the same colour, tied at the back, the ends of which are fringed, and trimmed with bands of a deeper shade of the same colour. This might be made in an easier manner by tucking the skirt, as shown in the drawing, in a pointed shape, and then putting the muslin flounce on as a trimming to it. This frock could, of course, be copied in any other material, such as cambric nun’s veiling or a grenadine. Pale grey grenadine over pink or blue silk is a very fashionable gown for young people this season.

The second figure of this group wears a black corded silk jacket, made very short, with white revers, and cordings of white satin. It is quite tight-fitting, and has an under vest of white satin, and a high collar at the back. A large scarf of lace is worn with a big bow under the chin. These last-named are donned by everyone this year, and they are also universally becoming, and lend much softness to the face. They are very easy to make for oneself at home, with the aid of a yard or so of net and a little pretty lace. But beware of getting either of these too cheap, for cheapness here would destroy the good effect; and poor materials will not wash. The skirt worn by this figure is of pale grey, trimmed with flat bands of silk, and made with a pointed tunic. The hat is a very pretty one, of white chip, trimmed with black tulle, ruched. A gold buckle and black feathers are worn with it. The edge is bound with black velvet, and underneath the brim is a bunch of pink roses.

In the hair-dressing of the present moment there is an enormous amount of frizzing and waving; in fact, too much of it for the symmetry of the head, and the work of the curling-irons is all too evident. One thing of which everyone complains is, that all heads are alike, and it is much to be desired that more individual thought should be devoted to the dressing of the head. The back hair is dressed in coils, winding round and round smoothly, except when the door-knocker style is still retained; but this form of hair-dressing is fast going out. Then the head is covered with a mass of frizzled hair, which is too disorderly to be beautiful, and in which the beauty of its colour is lost.

A great many women and girls have deserted the use of hot irons, and have gone back to curl-papers, and hair-pins, to wave the hair. In order to avoid the use of either of these, an inventive genius has found out a way of winding a ribbon round with the hair-pin, so that, after the hair is wound in and out on it, the hair-pin can be slipped out, and the two ends of the ribbon which have been left out are tied tightly together, and the hair is then held on the ribbon only. The little bunch thus made is far less ugly than the spiky wire-fencing made by the hairpin ends. The ribbon used is baby ribbon, of course, and when a becoming colour is selected, the effect is quite pretty. Silk pieces of various colours are used also, on which to curl the hair, and in some measure do away with the ugliness of the usual papers. I have heard lately of a young married lady who had a false front made, to put on at night over her hair-wavers, which, she said, were so ugly, she could not bear to look at herself in them, and so tried this way to surmount the difficulty.

In the group of three figures called “Some Summer Gowns,” the first figure on the right wears a light-grey gown, with trimmings of coffee-coloured lace. The flounces are edged with the same, and the vest has alternate stripings of grey and black. There is a draping of white satin on the vest, which is like a sash from the side of the bodice. There are revers of the same lace, and upstanding frilling at the back of the neck. The sleeves are fluted in puffs, from the shoulder to the elbow, with rows of coffee-coloured lace insertion between them, and are finished with a pointed cuff over the hand. The centre figure wears a blouse of écru silk, the sleeves and yoke being mitred, and a pointed epaulette at the shoulder. With this a white muslin collar is worn. The last figure, at the extreme left, wears a cape of white silk with a cover of black net, and ruches of black and white satin ribbon; small black rosettes round the collar, and a ruche of black and white lace at the neck. A white hat, bound at the edge of the brim with a black velvet, the trimming being of black tulle, with pale-pink roses, and brownish leaves and buds; the same flowers under the brim at the back.

I do not think, in spite of Viscountess Harberton, that the majority of English women desire to wear knickerbockers, nor even the divided skirt with which her name has been so much associated in the past; and I hear that French women of the better classes are adopting the skirt of the English women, which they consider much more becoming. After all, there is no need of complaint, for several English firms supply a most ingenious skirt, which—though divided, and giving all the advantages of that shape—when on the bicycle, falls into the usual folds of the skirt which is not divided, and looks just the same. I must confess that this appears to me to meet all requirements, and that the extreme ugliness of the knickerbockers, when worn, need not make them an object of attraction to any woman who values her appearance. There seems to be a universal consensus of opinion that nothing can look better than an Englishwoman in a tailor-made and carefully-fitted dress, quiet in colour, and of the suitable length and shape of skirt. She looks one with her machine, and has nothing flying in the way of decorations to make her untidy.

{555}

IN THE TWILIGHT SIDE BY SIDE.

By RUTH LAMB.

PART VIII.

SUNDAY AND REST.

his evening, my dear girls, we will try to realise as far as possible how Jesus, our one perfect pattern, spent His Sabbaths. We get glimpses of them, here and there, in the history of His life on earth, and because they are only glimpses they are all the more precious.

It is an astonishing fact that the events of only one complete day of Christ’s life are recorded, and that day was the last of all, and ended on the cross. But we know well what sort of working days Jesus spent. Days of temptation, but no yielding, though the keenness of it was sharpened by hunger. Days of ceaseless work and weariness, but also of uncomplaining perseverance in doing what the Father had given Him to do. Nights spent in secluded spots or on the mountains, in prayer, and in communion with God, after days passed in healing, blessing, teaching and feeding the hungry multitude. Jesus was always ready to help all who sought His aid, or who needed it without expressing their wants. Words were not necessary to the Son of God, Who could read the heart-longings of His brethren according to the flesh.

Do you wish to know whether Jesus set the example of attending public worship on the Sabbath? Here is the answer: “And He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up: and, as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.” On this and on other occasions we find Him teaching and preaching, as well as reading, and it is certain that the presence of Jesus at public worship was no fitful thing, but the habit of His life.

It was in the synagogue that Christ healed the man with the withered hand, and taught the sweet lesson that acts of mercy and good doing are lawful on all days and at all times. There, also, He loosed from her infirmity the poor woman who had been bowed together for eighteen years and could in no wise lift up herself.

It was on the Sabbath day that Jesus made clay, anointed the eyes of the blind man, and sent him to wash in the pool of Siloam, whence he returned seeing, and full of gladness.

We get other glimpses of the Sabbaths of Jesus besides these which have shown Him in the synagogue. They were not days of gloom or unsocial isolation. See Him walking through the cornfields on the Sabbath day with His hungry disciples, who satisfied their craving by plucking a few ears and rubbing them in their hands. This picture leaves a sweet thought. Christ’s followers may even want bread, yet be blessed with a sense of their Master’s presence and sympathy, in every time of need.

Jesus accepted an invitation to eat bread with one of the chief Pharisees on the Sabbath day; thus we see that He did not abstain from social intercourse on the day of rest. The Jews were most particular in buying and preparing beforehand the best food for the Sabbath day, in order to do it honour. An old writer, in alluding to this, says, “The Sabbath should not be a day of austerity. The most nutritive food should be procured, if possible, that both body and soul may feel the influence of this Divine appointment, and give God the glory of His grace. On this blessed day let every man eat his bread with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God. If the Sabbath be a festival, let it be observed unto the Lord; and let no unnecessary acts be done.”

It was whilst partaking of the chief Pharisee’s hospitality that another suffering man came under the notice of the Great Physician, and was healed, and sent away rejoicing on the Sabbath day. In like manner, the impotent man, who had been thirty-eight years helpless, was bidden to take up his bed and walk. With the command came the power to obey, and “the same day was the Sabbath.”

What have we learned from these glimpses of Jesus on the day of rest? Surely that it was a happy day which included attendance at public worship, the study of the Scriptures, the teaching of them to others, healthful outdoor exercise, indoor social intercourse, and the acceptance of hospitality, together with the instant seizure of every opportunity for good doing. There is no trace of gloom in connection with the Sabbaths of Jesus. So you and I, dear ones, when in God’s house, can say, “Coming here regularly, I follow Christ’s example.” If teaching the little ones of the flock, “My master taught in the synagogue. In my humble way I can pass on to those younger than myself the lessons He gave. I can work no miracle of healing, but, if the mind is in me that was in Christ, I can and I will make some poor sufferer’s Sunday the brighter for my presence and my help.”

If I am walking by the way, or a guest at the table of another, my conduct shall be in harmony with the day. I will neither act nor speak so that I should be ashamed to think, “My Master knows the thoughts of my heart, and has heard my words and seen my actions.”

We can do, or leave undone, many things in the home which will be helpful to the servants. We can save them trouble without any effort to ourselves, and thus give them a fair share of Sabbath privileges. It is sad when servants have to say “Sunday is the hardest day of the week to us,” yet this often happens, not because of necessary work, but owing to the indolence and self-indulgence of the family, and the extra labour entailed by many visitors. Believe me, only those can truly enjoy God’s gift of a day of rest who are His servants, and who have in them the spirit of love, which comes from Him Who “is love.” With it they will need no written rules. They will be a law to themselves. The Sabbath will be looked forward to with gladness as a day to be dedicated to God and our neighbour, by worship, good doing, occupation without toil or weariness, and happy intercourse with those we love. We shall not say, “I can make the fields my church, and worship the Creator in the midst of His works as well as I could under the roof of a cathedral.” We shall love to join with those who are gathered in His name and house, but we shall not on that account forget to praise Him when we walk by the way and discern Him in His works. We shall be glad to put the toils and cares of the workaday world as far out of sight and mind as possible, that Monday may find us strong and ready to bear the heat and burden of the six coming days.

I was once deeply touched by the words of a dear woman, a cottager’s wife, of whom it might be said she just “knew, but knew no more, her Bible true,” for she could read it, and that was all, and it was her one book. How real it was to her! How she dwelt on its messages of cheer and hope, and was gladdened as she spelled out the words of some sweet promise! How she revelled in Sunday as a gift that only those who toiled week in, week out, could fitly value! She would not have the worries of the other days intruding themselves upon the hours sacred to joy, and peace, and rest.

It happened that she and her husband had been passing through a time of trouble and anxiety. There had been sickness in the home, and this meant suspended work and wages, more need for money and less to meet it. The week-end saw them in sore straits for quite a little sum, and the thought of what might happen on the Monday, if it were not forthcoming, troubled the mother’s mind for a moment.

“But it was Sunday,” she said, when speaking of it afterwards, “and I wouldn’t have that spoiled. There was the rest day for us, whatever Monday might bring, and bread for so long, anyway. Every now and then I seemed to hear those words, ‘The Lord will provide,’ and I took the message and put the worry right out of my mind. I had got into a way of never asking for money or anything of that sort on Sundays, and I didn’t on that one. I just enjoyed it in the reg’lar way with my John and the children, and, though I did see a bit of a cloud on his face now and then, I never pretended to notice, but smiled back, and it went. I never slept better than I did that Sunday night.”

“And when Monday came?” I asked.

“Help came, in quite a nateral sort of way, as it seemed, through John’s old master. He said we had been on his mind all Sunday, and he’d brought us the loan of a sovereign. We could pay it back at sixpence a week, but there was no hurry. We must be a bit behindhand through John’s illness. The master was always just, but he was reckoned a hard man, and he went out of his way when he lent that sovereign. Didn’t my heart go up to God in thankfulness that Monday morning, and wasn’t I glad to tell my John, ‘He has provided.’”

I have always thought that this dear woman realised the privileges and preciousness of the Sabbath in a greater degree than anyone else I ever knew.

Let us cull a thought or two from the utterances of George Herbert, the country parson, who was, in 1630, inducted into the parsonage of Pemberton, and who has been called the “Keble of the age which boasted of Shakespeare, Bacon, Spenser, and Ben Jonson.” I could wish that his life (written by Izaak Walton) and his works, in prose and poetry, were in every girl’s bookcase. It is passing from the unlettered peasant woman to the cultured divine, but the quotations I will give you show how the same spirit actuates high and low, the ignorant and the learned, when, as the children of God, they express their sense of the infinite preciousness of the Sabbath. Herbert’s poem called “Sunday”{556} is too long to quote as a whole, but you will enjoy reading some quotations from it.

In alluding to the change from the seventh to the first day of the week, now observed as the Christian’s Sunday, the poet uses very beautiful and expressive imagery to account for the alteration.

It is related that, on the Sunday before his death, Mr. Herbert rose suddenly from his bed, called for one of his instruments, and, having tuned it, sang the following verse from the same poem.

Our poet-pastor was no gloomy ascetic. He revelled, so to speak, in this good gift of God, and sang His praises with a joyful heart. Whilst picturing all the varied aspects of the country parson’s life, and noting its sad experiences, he gives us a picture of him “In mirth.” “As knowing that nature will not bear everlasting droppings, and that pleasantness of disposition is a great key to do good;” and “Instructions seasoned with pleasantness both enter sooner and root deeper. Wherefore he condescends to human frailties, both in himself and others, and intermingles some mirth in his discourses occasionally, according to the pulse of the hearer.” Other duties ended, “At night he thinks it a very fit time, suitable to the joy of the day, either to entertain some of his neighbours or be entertained by them, and to discourse of things profitable and pleasant. As he opened the day with prayer, so he closeth it, humbly beseeching the Almighty to pardon and accept our poor services and to improve them, that we may grow therein, and that our feet may be like hinds’ feet, ever climbing up higher and higher unto Him.”

I feel sure, my dear girls, that in giving you these beautiful pictures of Sabbath joy, I have done you a real service. I have never forgotten either the words of my village friend or the effect produced on me by the first reading of the country parson’s “Sunday.” Both reflected the mind of the Master they served, and to-day their example and words are well worthy of our imitation.

Thus far I have said little about “Rest,” except in connection with the “Day of Rest.” It is delightful to note that from the very beginning there was a Divine recognition of the need for rest, and that the Creator’s plan for bestowing the blessing was so wide in its application. It was ordained for man in the first instance, then extended to the animals that had been subdued to service under him, and, later still, to the land. Long before the children of Israel had ended their wanderings in the desert, the command was given to them by Moses, “When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a Sabbath unto the Lord.” “In the seventh year shall be a Sabbath of rest unto the land.”

The Israelites, who had been for so many generations the bondsmen of Egypt, and then for forty years wanderers in the desert, had to be divinely taught what pertained to a settled mode of life. As landowners, they had to learn that each crop yielded takes something out of the ground, and that it must have a period of rest, or its power of production will be exhausted. Hence the Sabbath for the land. In our time the chemist has taught the farmer that by putting certain substances into the ground, he can restore what the crop has taken from it; but in times within my own memory the remedy was to let the land lie fallow—that is, at rest for a year before it was sown again.

What a delightful word “rest” is! It has so many meanings in everyday use, and in the Bible also; and all of them are suggestive of benefit and good to soul, mind, and body. Glance for instance at Psalm cxvi., and you will find a picture of one who had “found trouble and sorrow,” and been full of fears and anxieties; but he had gone with crying and prayers to God, who heard and answered. So, bursting into a hymn of gratitude and triumph, he exclaims—

“I love the Lord, because He hath heard my voice and my supplications. I was brought low, and He helped me. Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee.”

Here, my dear ones, you see that rest means the calm confidence in God which brings the soul a peace which passeth all understanding. This is the rest which Jesus linked with those sweetly familiar words of invitation so often quoted: “Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

This rest means “peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,” which those who love and trust in Him enjoy even in this troublesome world. With this soul restfulness all the trials of life lose much of their keenness; without it they pierce more deeply and are doubly hard to bear. Yet there are so many worries and anxieties in daily life to give us unquiet minds. Even when our own paths are fairly smooth, we often have uneasy minds and sleepless nights on account of those we love, or we are harassed by mental visions of coming evil, till we are ready to cry, as David did, “O that I had wings like a dove! for then would I flee away and be at rest.”

A little later, in the same Psalm, comes the remedy: “Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee.”

From Psalmist, Apostle, and, better than all, from the lips of Jesus Himself, we receive unfailing guidance to the one source of rest, both for troubled souls and disquieted minds. When all the world fails us, let us, my dear ones, try to remember that He is faithful Who promised, “I will give you rest.”

Then there are these poor frail bodies of ours that have to bear weariness and the pain which makes the rest they cry out for impossible. How many of us have felt our utter helplessness at the sight of suffering which we could not relieve, though we would gladly have borne it for a while in order to purchase an interval of rest for one we loved?

One of you, who asked that the subject of “Rest” might be considered at a Twilight gathering, told me that she was an invalid, crippled with sciatica and muscular rheumatism, only able to move from place to place by means of a wheeled chair, seldom free from pain, and sleeping but little. Yet she was able to show me that her mind was active in planning for the good of others, and that her thoughts shaped themselves into songs of thankfulness and longings for a more complete submission to God’s will. So, as I read, I said to myself, “Thank God for this record! Though it tells of pain, it also tells of patience. The body suffers, and the burden is a heavy one; but it is borne by means of God-given strength, and ‘There is a rest that remaineth’ for His people.”

When this world, with its sorrow, suffering, trouble, and weariness, shall have passed away they shall find eternal rest in the Father’s home above. “And God shall wipe away all tears from their faces, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain.”

(To be continued.)

SHEILA.

By EVELYN EVERETT-GREEN, Author of “Greyfriars,” “Half-a-dozen Sisters,” etc.

CHAPTER VIII.

MONCKTON MANOR.

“They ought to have asked me too,” said Effie, looking rather black. “I call it quite rude; but these grand county people always are so rude.”

“Oh, but, Effie, I am only going to practise accompaniments! I go to River Street for that, and you don’t mind. Why should you mind this? We never can get those difficult passages right without a proper, long, steady practice, and one can’t get it at the hall. Everybody is wanting their turn; and I get flurried with so much chattering and noise. I thought it such a good idea when Miss Lawrence asked me to come to the Manor.”

“She should have asked me too, then,” said Effie, with a pout. “Not{557} that I care about going. I’m not such a great admirer of May Lawrence or her voice; it’s too low and gruff for me.”

“Oh, not gruff; it’s a beautiful, rich contralto. It’s quite a pleasure to hear her.”

“Oh, you think so because she likes your playing, and butters you up! But, anyhow, I don’t think much of it, and I do say she ought to have asked me too.”

“People know you are delicate; they don’t like to bother you to take long drives,” suggested Sheila pacifically; but Effie was cross and would not be amiable, though she ceased to make complaints about not being asked with Sheila to the Manor.

“How are you going?”

“I thought I would ride Shamrock. Then I should be quite independent. Cyril is going there for a day’s fishing, and he can bring me back.”

Again Effie’s face darkened. She did not say anything this time, but she had a feeling as though Sheila was cutting her out of everything. She was keenly alive to the fact that, though Cyril’s visits were paid more frequently now, it was Sheila who engrossed the bulk of his notice. Effie, with all her tendency to selfishness, fostered by her mode of life, had not naturally an ignoble disposition, and her ideals were high. She fought rather hard against the tide of rising jealousy, and had never betrayed it either to Sheila or to her mother; but the pain of seeing another preferred to herself rankled rather keenly; and during these past days—indeed for a week or two now—it had been hard work to keep down the unworthy feeling.

All the young people of Isingford were keenly excited about the forthcoming effort which was to extinguish the debt upon the two churches. All were eager to help, and Effie herself had been roused to desire to do something. She had practised with new energy, so as to be able to take part in the concert of local talent, and her song was already selected and placed in the programme. But she did not think anybody showed any enthusiasm over her performance. Perhaps her voice had deteriorated somewhat, though nobody said so. She was listened to quite kindly, and her friends said her song would be certain to “go down”; but that was all. Whereas, over May Lawrence’s performance there was a little furore, and she was entreated to sing twice, and was called quite openly the prima donna. Effie had not expected that title for herself, yet she was not quite pleased by the treatment she received.

And then Sheila was in such request. Sheila was so popular. It was quickly discovered that, though no very brilliant performer on the piano as a soloist, she had a very pretty gift for accompanying. Her touch was soft and sympathetic; she never played wrong notes, even if she missed the right ones. It became quite the usual thing for the soloists to beg her to play for them, and, as she was delighted to please and very fond of this sort of work, she soon became the acknowledged accompanist of the concert, and a person in great demand.

May Lawrence was one of those who had taken a great fancy to her, and this invitation to Monckton Manor, a place Effie had only seen once upon a formal call, was rather galling to her.

Sheila started out a little depressed in spirits, for she disliked the feeling that Effie was “cross with her.” She was sensitive, like all young things, to the disapproval of those about her, and thought it very hard to be blamed when she had really done no harm. Sheila was for the first time tasting a little of the discipline of life, and she did not enjoy the experience. She wanted it always to be sunshine about her. She liked to be petted and caressed. She was ready to love everybody, if they would only love her. It seemed to her very hard when she was criticised for something that was not the least wrong. It had never been so in old days, and why should it be now?

However, upon her arrival at the Manor House all troubled thoughts were quickly dissipated by the warm reception she met with. May Lawrence met her with a kiss. The two girls fell into Christian names almost at once. The pleasant old semi-Tudor house was delightful to Sheila, reminding her in many ways of her own home. Mrs. Lawrence welcomed her kindly, saying she had heard a great deal about her and her pretty playing, and May took her into the orchard-house and regaled her with delicious peaches before they did a note of practising.

“And we have such a nice visitor here now, Sheila,” she explained, “an old friend of mother’s, though she is not really old—Miss Adene; only she makes me call her Cousin Mary. She had a very lovely voice when she was young, and it’s quite pretty still, though she laughs when I tell her so. She has given me a lot of hints about my songs. She sings little bits to show me how to do it. She must have been splendidly taught herself! Let’s come to the music-room! Perhaps she will come and listen.”

Sheila followed her willingly, and on their way to the house May exclaimed, “Oh, there she is!” and the next minute Sheila was shaking hands with Miss Adene.

Somehow Sheila’s heart went out at once to this stranger lady. She could not say how it was, but she felt at home with her almost immediately; and Miss Adene seemed to take a liking for the big-eyed, soft-voiced Sheila. She asked her questions about herself, gave her hints about her playing, and was altogether so friendly and kindly that Sheila felt almost more at home in this house after two hours than she had done at Cossart Place after two months.

Cyril appeared at luncheon in company with some of the Lawrence sons. They had known each other at Cambridge, and saw a fair amount of one another in the vacation. May was the only daughter; but she had several brothers, and was good at most games herself, and would have liked to play tennis with Sheila, only that her habit was rather against any such plan.

“But you must come another day—you must come often. I have so few girl-friends here. There are not many houses where mother cares for me to be intimate. But I should like to have you for a friend! I hope you will come often!”

“I should like to,” said Sheila eagerly, “but I don’t know if I can. There is Effie! I am supposed to be her companion. I could not leave her very often.”

“I don’t see why not,” said May, with some of the frank and unconscious selfishness of the present-day girl. “You’re not her nurse or her white slave, I suppose?”

Sheila laughed and blushed, and Miss Adene came unexpectedly to her assistance.

“One need not be a nurse or a white slave, and yet one may have duties and little kindly offices to fulfil. The happy people in this world, May, are those who do their duty from a sense of love, and not compulsion; and we idle people must not tempt them away from the place where they are wanted.”

Sheila looked up with a heightened colour to say—

“I’m afraid I don’t always love my duties. Sometimes they seem very tiresome. And I’m sure you’re not an idle person, Miss Adene; but I am very often. Sometimes I think I’m no real good to anybody.”

“Then you must make yourself some good, dear; though I do not think that any of us can quite help being of some service to our friends and fellow-creatures. You have a delicate cousin to cheer up and help back to health and strength; and you must do your best to be kind and patient. And you will soon find how much pleasure there is in such a task, and gain yourself a sister, since you say you have never had one of your own.”

Sheila’s day at the Manor was a very happy one, and she particularly enjoyed her bits of talk with Miss Adene, who promised to help at the bazaar and, if needed, to give some assistance at the glee club, where extra voices were wanted with a view to the coming concert.

May and one of her brothers rode part of the way back with Sheila and Cyril, the girls in front, the young men behind.

“Do you like your cousin Cyril?” asked May with the freedom only possible between quite young people.

“Yes, rather,” answered Sheila. “I liked him very much at first. He seemed more like the people I had been used to, but I think I get rather tired of him. Do you like him?”

“Not very much,” answered candid May. “The boys get on pretty well with him; but they call him rather a bounder all the same.”

“What’s that?” asked Sheila, laughing.

“Well, I’m not quite sure if I know; but it’s not a thing he’d like to be called. What the boys mean about him is that he’s half ashamed of his own{558} family, and the way in which his father has made his money, and that’s always awfully snobbish. Why, to my thinking, the other brother, North, is much more a true gentleman. I despise people who are ashamed of their origin. It is nice to be a landed proprietor and a country gentleman, of course; but there’s no disgrace in honest trade. Why, three of our boys have had to go into business in some of its forms; but do you think they’d be ashamed of it, or that we should be ashamed of them? I should despise myself for ever if I were!”

“Yes, I suppose he is rather ashamed of the works,” said Sheila slowly. “He never would have anything to do with them. I don’t quite know what he does want for himself. Sometimes he talks about the Bar, and sometimes the Church, and sometimes he thinks he’ll take up literature. I suppose he’s clever.”

“The boys don’t think so; he only got a pass, you know. And I don’t think I like men to take to the Church just for a profession. I’ve got a brother a clergyman; but I know how he felt about it before he took Orders. He used sometimes to talk to me. He felt that he had been called; that is a very different thing from choosing for yourself, and shilly-shallying as Cyril is doing.”

Sheila began to see that May, although not much older than herself, thought things out more deeply than she had ever done.

“The boys have always talked to me, you know,” she said, “and Arnold in particular. He is the clergyman, you know. That made one think. It would be nicer to believe in everybody; but perhaps it’s better sometimes to see below the surface. Sometimes I wish almost that something would happen just to try the metal we and our friends are made of. In olden times, when there were wars and dangers, it must have been so much easier to know what they were like; but nothing ever does happen in the nineteenth century—not in that sort of way.”

Nevertheless, a good deal was happening in other ways, and the excitement increased as the time for the bazaar arrived.

The town hall was a spacious building, and it was decorated in an effective fashion with festoons of greenery and paper and tinsel flowers. Some people called it trumpery stuff; but it looked well, and was cheap, and to keep down expenses was one of the chief aims of the assistants.

The bazaar was held in the great hall; but there were two smaller rooms, off-shoots from this, reached by short wide flights of steps, and in these rooms the supplementary entertainments were to be held.

One was a museum of curiosities and beautiful things lent, for which extra admission was charged; the other was given over to entertainments. On the first day there was to be a phonograph and some experiments with electrical apparatus, in which Oscar was to assist. On the second the concert, and on the third some tableaux.

The whole town was in excitement over the affair, and upon the first day the thoroughfares were quite crowded with carriages and foot passengers. Everything went off beautifully. A great deal was sold; the refreshments were excellent, the band good; and the people went away declaring they should come again upon the morrow, which accordingly they did.

The concert was almost the most exciting experience for Sheila—she had so much accompanying to do; but she soon lost her first feeling of nervousness, and forgot everything in the effort to help everything to go well.

It was all a great success. Effie sang her song very creditably, and got an encore; though some people did say it was her father who so stubbornly led the rounds of applause. May’s singing delighted everybody, and the glees went beautifully; Miss Adene was there, kindly and encouraging, giving steadiness to any wavering part by her clear rounded tones, and taking the greatest interest in everything.

Indeed, all the Monckton Manor party had come in force; and they were to appear also upon the next day, for May had a part in several of the tableaux, and two of the brothers also, and they were both very clever and helpful as scene shifters. For everything was done as far as possible by volunteers, and there was no professional aid which could possibly be dispensed with.

The third day was in some sort the grandest, for, though the things from the bazaar were mostly sold off, there was great interest over the tableaux; and there was to be a troop of performing dogs in the great hall for the young folks, since the upper room would not hold everybody, and all must be entertained. Also the tea was to be on a grander scale; and the hall was early thronged with eager buyers and spectators.

There was nothing, perhaps, very original in the tableaux, but they were very prettily got up, and it was interesting to the spectators because they knew the actors in them.

One of the most effective ones was the presentation of the French ambassadors at Queen Elizabeth’s court after the massacre of St. Bartholomew. Effie was the sharp-featured Queen in sable robes, and the stage was crowded by her black-robed courtiers and ladies-in-waiting; whilst Oscar, Cyril, Fred Monckton, and a few more, in their gorgeous frippery, stood evidently taken aback and confounded by the unwonted sight of this evidence of stern woe and regal horror and offence.

The applause for this picture was loud and long, and the curtain was just rising again when in the hush that had succeeded the clamour there penetrated a sound of noise and confusion from the hall below, and then the clear terrible cry:

“Fire! Fire!”

(To be continued.)

OUR PUZZLE POEM REPORT: AN ACCIDENTAL CYCLE II.

SOLUTION.

An Accidental Cycle II.

3. When Bathing.

4. Earthquakes.

Prize Winners.

Ten Shillings Each.

• Rebecca Clarke, 130, Newland Street West, Lincoln.
• Alison H. Halden, 13, Duke Street, Edinburgh.
• Margaret S. Hall, 13, Roseneath Terrace, Edinburgh.
• Carlina V. M. Leggett, Burgh Hall, Burgh, Lincolnshire.
• Florence Lush, 26, Scotland Street, Edinburgh.
• Mrs. Mason, 30, Cambridge Street, Great Horton, Bradford.
• Robina Potts, Aln Lodge, Blacket Avenue, Edinburgh.
• Isabel Snell, 51, Mere Street, Leicester.
• Helen B. Younger, 5, Comiston Gardens, Edinburgh.

Seven Shillings Each.

• Rev. J. Chambers, Woodhead Vicarage, Manchester.
• E. M. Dickson, 2, Bank Parade, Preston.

Very Highly Commended.

Eliza Acworth, Annie A. Arnott, Frances A. Baker, Rose S. Bracey, Louie Bull, Kate Campsall, Amy T. Child, Agnes Dewhurst, Katie Doyle, Margaret A. Fisk, E. J. Friend, Caroline Gundry, Mrs. Jenks, Agnes McConnell, Marie McQueen, Susan F. Manderson, Mrs. E. J. May, Isobel S. Neill, E. A. O’Donoghue, Charles Parr, Nina E. Purvey, Annie Roberson, S. A. Sanderson, Violet Shoberl, Helen Singleton, Mrs. G. W. Smith, R. Majorie Thomas, Eva Waites, Florence Whitlock, Mrs. Wilson, Mrs. A. J. Wilson, Emily M. P. Wood, Agnes M. Vincent.

Highly Commended.

May Adamson, “Annis,” Edith Ashworth, Alice M. Cooper, M. A. C. Crabb, Edith E. Grundy, Percy H. Home, E. Marian Jupe, Eliza Learmount, John Lush, John Marshall, E. Mastin, Edith A. Newbould, Kate Robinson, Mildred M. Skrine, Frederick W. Southey, Chas. Stephens, Constance Taylor, C. E. Thurgar, Elizabeth Yarwood.

Honourable Mention.

Maud Abbott, Mrs. Acheson, Eva M. Allport, Agnes Amis, Mary S. Arnold, Rev. S. Bell, S. Ballard, Lily Belling, Isabel Borrow,{559} Margaret E. Bourne, Nellie D. Bourne, Edith Burfield, E. Burrell, R. E. M. Button, A. C. Carter, Muriel L. Clague, Dora Clarke, J. Ethel Collingham, Maggie Coombes, Rev. Joseph Corkey, R. Swan Coulthard, E. Vivian Davies, Mrs. Frank Dickson, Rev. F. Dobbin, Jessie F. Dulley, Winefride Ellison, Eleanor Elsey, A. and F. Fooks, F. Fuller, Annie M. Goss, A. Grainger, Ellie Hanlon, Bessie Hine, Carrie Hine, Gertrude Hire, Ethel W. Hodgkinson, L. Holt, Edith C. Hoon, Arthur W. Howse, Annie M. Hutchens, Lizzie M. Iggulden, “Iseult,” Margaret Jaques, Alice E. Johnson, Edith B. Jowett, A. Kilburn, Clara E. Law, Fred Lindley, E. E. Lockyear, Gertrude Longbottom, Jennie M. McCall, Ethel C. McMaster, M. G. Mill, F. Miller, J. D. Musgrave, Jessie Neighbour, Rev. V. Odom, G. de Courcy Peach, Ernest Plater, Hannah E. Powell, A. O. Prentice, Ellen M. Price, Lucy Richardson, Katherine M. Scott, Ellen Shattock, A. A. L. Shave, A. C. Sharp, Mrs. Sherring, Wm. Dunford-Smith, Norah M. Sullivan, G. Swaine, G. Thomas, Ellen Thurtell, Wm. J. Trim, May Tutte, Mary F. Wakelin, Mabel Wearing, Frances H. Webb-Gillman, Gertrude West, Eleanor Whitcher, Mrs. E. A. Wilson, Adelaide Wright, Edith M. Younge.

EXAMINERS’ REPORT.

Nearly nine hundred competitors tried their skill upon this puzzle, and with such good effect that our award is long enough to excite editorial remonstrance. To make room for it we must cut down our report to the verge of terseness.

Many solvers left out the “An” in the heading. In a way it was only a trifling error, but as it could only be attributed to carelessness, it did not commend itself to our sympathy. It was less wonderful that the unwonted exercise of the hen in the first title was not correctly interpreted by all. Let us say at once that the excited fowl was not “drowning” nor “in danger of drowning;” the water was too shallow. “When in water” was not quite explicit enough either as a title or as an interpretation of the picture. The hen was in a bath, and therefore presumably bathing.

In the first line we often found “big” and “large” instead of great. It is more customary to speak of big and great waves than of large waves, and we gave slight preference to the former readings.

In the title of the second puzzle a few solvers failed to notice the s and wrote “An earthquake.” It was a pity. Likewise in the first line the s was sometimes missing, and more often the apostrophe. But it was in the fourth line that the real trouble was found. Was the h under the w, or was it inside or was it outside? Opinions widely differed, but the majority voted it to be beneath, appreciating the sense of the advice in spite of poetic obscurity of expression.

While we were wrestling with the point a learned professor came into our room. We read the lines to him, and asked what impression they conveyed to his mind. Without an instant’s hesitation he threw open the door and stood beneath the lintel, and we returned to our work with much comfort and increased admiration for learned professors.

The advice may seem to be strange to those unacquainted with earthquakes and their ways, but it is based upon wide experience. However great the “tumult,” the framework of the doorway generally affords ample protection.

In the same line “whatere” was sometimes erroneously substituted for whate’er. Here we must call attention to the fact that whatever is one word, and that the contraction is one word also.

In very many solutions tho’ appeared in place of “though.” On this point one competitor very clearly puts the correct ruling. He writes—“‘Tho’’ for ‘though’ phonetically (as ‘ma’ for ‘may’ in line following). ‘Tho’’ is not admissible, nor any shortenings by an apostrophe of the spelling of a word where, abbreviated or unabbreviated, the pronunciation remains the same.”

In writing, these abbreviations are sometimes used, but they indicate a lack of refinement in style, and are much to be deprecated.

It only remains for us to say that absolute perfection was attained by the first prize-winners, and by no one else. As to the mention lists, those solvers who took the trouble to indent the lines of the first verse, as in the published solution, will find their names in a higher class than those who did not. The rhyming lines of the second puzzle run in pairs, hence no grouping by indentation was necessary.

An expert and critical solver has written a letter about the puzzle, “An Ideal Garden,” which deserves attention. He first contends that he “sent in a perfectly correct solution,” but we have been able to set his mind at rest on that point by returning it to him. He next maintains that in punctuation “the printed solution is wrong.” According to him the first line should read “A garden, like a room, should be,” and not “A garden like a room should be,”.

But it all depends upon the meaning of the lines. In our version it is that a garden should be like a room, it should have a green carpet, and for furniture, a few trees.

In our correspondent’s version the sense is altogether different. It is that a garden should have a green carpet like a room, and we feel inclined to apply to it Euclid’s most popular utterance. And yet indifferent as the reading is, we let it pass, for as we have before remarked, we only take punctuation into account when it is absolutely wrong.

Again, our critic complains of the absence of commas in line 4, which should, in his opinion, read—“And on it, here and there, a tree.” Here we prefer the amended version to that printed, but it is entirely a question of taste and not of accuracy. He further asserts that the note of exclamation can correctly follow either the interjection or “happiness” in line 10. So it can, and our only crime is that we did not print it in both places. Finally he complains that while his solution was not mentioned, some solutions which owed their perfection to his help were more fortunate. The information is no surprise to us, for we have often traced our correspondent’s hand in solutions under another name. He says—“I suppose this is allowable.” It is allowable inasmuch as we have no rule forbidding it, but we do not think that help ought to be asked from a rival competitor. It does not accord with our notions of strict fairness, and a less generously-minded solver would not place his ingenuity at the disposal of his friends.

And this is the way in which we cut down a report!

CONSOLATION PRIZE 1897-8.

The highest number of marks, in accordance with the conditions laid down, was obtained by Mrs. J. Champneys, Croft House, Winchester, to whom one guinea has been sent.

FOREIGN AWARDS.

A Well-bred Girl (No. 2).

Prize Winners (Half-a-Guinea Each).

• Amy and Ethel Beven, Rose Cottage, Kandy, Ceylon.
• Miss L. Gamlen, École Normale d’Institutrices, La Rochelle, Charente Inferiéure, France.

Very Highly Commended.

Elsie V. Davies (Australia), Elizabeth M. Lang (France), Helen Shilstone (Barbados).

Highly Commended.

Louis E. Blazé (Ceylon), Nellie M. Daft (Portugal), Frank, Hugh, and Robert Glass (India), Polly Lawrance (Barbados), Mrs. Hastings Ogilvie, Mrs. G. Marrett (India), Winifred Bizzey (Canada).

Honourable Mention.

Grace Carmichael, Fontilla Greaves (Barbados), Harriet Kettle (France), M. R. Laurie (Barbados), M. E. Lewis (Hungary), Alice J. Moffitt (Switzerland), Gladys D. G. Peacock (France), Anne G. Taylor (Australia), Herbert Traill (India).

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

MISCELLANEOUS.

OUR NEW PUZZLE POEM.

⁂ Prizes to the amount of six guineas (one of which will be reserved for competitors living abroad) are offered for the best solutions of the above Puzzle Poem. The following conditions must be observed:—

1. Solutions to be written on one side of the paper only.

2. Each paper to be headed with the name and address of the competitor.

3. Attention must be paid to spelling, punctuation, and neatness.

4. Send by post to Editor, Girl’s Own Paper, 56, Paternoster Row, London. “Puzzle Poem” to be written on the top left-hand corner of the envelope.

5. The last day for receiving solutions from Great Britain and Ireland will be July 17, 1899; from Abroad, September 16, 1899.

The competition is open to all without any restrictions as to sex or age.

OUR SUPPLEMENT STORY COMPETITION.

ONLY A SHOP-GIRL: A STORY IN MINIATURE.

First Prize (£2 2s.).

• May Shawyer, Penrith.

Second Prize (£1 1s.).

• Mabel Gibson, Wandsworth Common, S.W.

Third Prize (10s. 6d.).

• Lucy Bourne, Winchester.

Honourable Mention.

Rose Cooke, Lowestoft; Lily Chamberlain, Forest Hill, S.E.; Letitia E. May, Alton, Hants.; Kate Betts, Kemp Town, Brighton; Mabel Jenks, Cambridge; Kate Nora Norris, Stoke Newington; Elsie Olver, Brockley; Bessie Hine, South Tottenham; Jane Bailey German, West Bromwich; Ethel G. Goulden, Finsbury Park Road, N.; Jessie Elizabeth Jackson, Beverley; Relda Hofman, Fontenay-sous-Bois, France; Maggie Bisset, Aberdeen; W. Bruin, Greenwich; Jessie Middlemiss, Ripon; Laura Johnson, Richmond, S.W.; Edith Alice Hague, Stockport; “Little Nell,” Lincs.; Violet C. Todd, Cornhill-on-Tweed; Winifred Botterill, Driffield, East Yorks; Mabel Moscrop, Saltburn-by-Sea; Margaret W. Rudd, Anerley; Jessie H. Hughes, Croydon; May Adele Venn, West Kensington Park, W.; Gertrude Borrow, Goldhurst Terrace, N.W.; Jessie Aitchison, Wandsworth, S.W.

SUNDROPS,[3]

Our Extra Summer Number, is now published (price 6d.), and our readers must order it at once from their booksellers, if they wish to possess a copy, as the Number cannot be reprinted.

CONTENTS.

Frontispiece: Sweet Summer Eve.