of complete toleration, in the story of soup to poor old Widow Reynolds, From Temple Bar. THE DEVIL'S OWN. BY LILLIAS CAMPBELL DAVIDSON. The clouds had gathered thicker and blacker as we reached Mrs. Reynolds's moss-grown, thatched cottage, and we To every life there comes its con- were barely inside when the big drops summation of bliss the very crown-began to patter down. Privately, I ing and pinnacle of well-being; looking don't think Mrs. Reynolds felt all the back at which, 'twixt smiles and tears, regret she expressed at our being we say, with yearning and regretful caught in a summer shower, for she heart, "Ah! then, at least, for however brief a space, I was perfectly happy." That consummation was mine one radiant day in June, as I walked over the springing heather on Aulus Moor with Harry Curzon. For we had been engaged three days three golden days snatched from Paradise; but it was only the night before that my dear old father gave his careful consent, and this was our very first walk together as openly declared lovers. What a walk it was! Far off, beyond the verge of farthest moorland, the burnished line of sea gleamed like a band of molten gold. Overhead, the piled-up banks of cloud had a lining of lurid pink, and hung heavily against their background of liquid blue. There was a storm coming; but what is a thunder-storm when you've just promised to marry the man you love with all your whole heart? Harry carried the basket. I was taking some of mamma's famous lentil dearly loved a little gossip, and seldom I had to answer no end of inquiries "And how's the new housemaid I 66 Perhaps not," said I, not wishing thatched cottages as stood just inside to commit myself over even what the Jews' Camp, a mile or more from seemed an evident enough proposition. here-you may see the pile of ruins "But Pinnick isn't such a bad name, now. I wouldn't have lived in a dree Mrs. Reynolds-not very pretty, per-spot like that, let alone Pinnicks for haps; but that doesn't much matter." neighbors in the other house, only pov"Matter? Not a farthing, miss, as erty sends strange bedfellows, as the to beauty; but a deal of matter other sayin' is, and the rent was low. Noways. Never did I know a Pinnick body had a good word for they Pinthat hadn't a bad strain. There was nicks, and I kept myself to myself, for Job Pinnick, the sheep-stealer, as was there was strange tales afloat. Folks hanged on the moor here by the head- said as there'd been a child by a marstone cross when I was a gell; and riage afore she was a widow when Hannah Copley, as was a Pinnick Seth Pinnick married her fine before she married, and poisoned her likely little chap as died strange, somehusband after; and them two Pinnicks how; and folks fought shy of Pinnick, as lived neighbors to me at the Jews' as was a surly brute, and hedged and Camp, and sold theyselves to the Old ditched for Squire Berthon. Well, One." they did me no harm, and I'd lived there three months or more, quiet enough, but for the shrieks and cries when Seth came home o' Saturday nights from the Doncaster Arms, and had it out o' her after, when all at once the black death broke out in the houses down by the stagnant pool betwixt this and Aulus' ford, and the place was in a a Really!" said Harry, who, perched on a rush-bottomed chair, and holding his hat in that attitude of instant departure peculiar to the morning caller, had hitherto been engaged in meditative study of the mourning cards with which the cottage walls were lavishly decorated; "that was a mild thing to do. What price did they get-any-panic. Seth Pinnick had been drinkthing worth while ?" ing with some of they men from down The widow Reynolds declined to there, and the next thing was, he and treat the subject with any levity. Sally was both down with it too. Miss Kitty, there wasn't a soul as would go anigh their cottage; and I thinks, thinks I, 'I'm a lone woman, and a neighbor; and if the Almighty means me die, I'll get it as soon livin' next door as a-tending them;' so I went in and nursed 'em both. "The gentleman may believe me, or he may not believe me," she remarked, with deep solemnity. "What I went through and experienced myself I must hold with, was it never so. Which I'll tell you, Miss Kitty," she went on, turning her look of reproach from Harry to me. "And your own father as is a reverend can tell you as I told the tale to him the very same thirty years ago come Martinmas - the year it took place, when both of us was a deal younger than to-day.' "Laws, my dear! it was as bad a time as ever I did see! Both of 'em was ravin' out of their heads when I got in, and not a bit or drop in the house, nor a soul to help one. My niece Eliza promised to come up every day to the headstone cross and bring me a basket of bread and such-like, but save for that I didn't see a livin' soul. Less 'n two days Seth died—he was a'most past speech when I went in but he shrieked wild-like without stop"It was thirty year this midsummer, pin' till his breath was well-nigh out of and I hadn't long been a widow of my him, and all his strength. Mercy on first, poor Joe Bowers, as likely a lad us! it chilled my blood! and that as ever walked at the plough-tail. I night I saw Sally was goin' too. I'll was a-livin' then in one of them two never forget that night till my own I'm afraid I did not hail the relation with any wild joy; but that appeared to matter little to Mrs. Reynolds, whose cap frills rose and fell as her head began to waggle to and fro, in the excitement of her narration. death-bed comes! There was a storm | but my haud shook so it dropped from outside rain and thunder, and wind it, and fell on the open Book instead. enough to lift the roof; and there that poor sinful woman lay, ravin' and mutterin' and singin' — enough to turn you cold! - I just saw as how it was a Jew's penny, and not a real shillin' at all, when there came the most terrible clap of thunder as ever I heard and a flashi as filled the room. There was a roar of bricks fallin', and timbers givin', and a smell of burnin' and sulphur. Sally Pinnick gave one great cry, and fell back dead on the pillow; and as for me, I just tore out o' the house, and ran through the rain and the blast to Dewsbury, three mile or more away. I was drenched and tore and sore bemired as ever I got there; but there I found shelter and a roof with my niece Elizabeth. And betimes, next morn, I was ashamed o' my fears, in the sunlight, and I fared back to do the last for the poor dead creature, and see to my own empty house. Will you believe, Miss Kitty, I found the place a heap o' bricks and timbers? They said the lightning had struck the roof, and the gale did the rest; but anyhow, I made way to creep to poor Sally's deathroom, and that was not so rent as the rest. "Miss Kitty, the words seemed to pass me in my dread, but as sure as I sit here I made out, while my teeth chattered, and I shook so I nearly dropped the rushlight, a tale that struck me dumb with horror. It was all about a child- -a little lad-and as how Squire Berthon swore he'd have no children in them cottages to harry the game; and as how Seth came home and told her as he wasn't a-goin' to lose a good place for a brat's sake, and there'd be a way to settle. Then there came something about starving, and a strong lad, long to die that way, and Only the bed, and she in it, lay Seth in a temper, and out of patience piled with bricks from the chimney, to wait-and a black mark round a that you couldn't see it. "Yet,' thinks thin little neck and how he'd bound I, 'she laid a charge on me with her her by a Jew's shillin' never to tell. last words, and I'll keep it;' so I Miss Kitty, my child! I fair turned sought for that Jew's penny high and sick with fright. Not for a hundred low. They're real siller, I heard Squire pounds would I have stopped a minute Berthon's lady say once, and worth a longer in that room! I got up to turn mint; but though I moved the sticks, and fly, never heedin' the storm and and lifted the rag carpet-ay, and the wind-anywhere out of that place swept out the room, and even scoured of blood! But just as I stood up out o' it; and peered into every chink and my chair, as it might be just so as I'm cranny- - not a sign of that bit o' money doing now, Sally flung out her hand saw I from that day to this. No, Miss and clutched tight hold on my gown, Kitty, nor ever shall; for if ever the and sat up sudden, strong and straight, Old One claimed his own, he came and with her eyes wide open. 'Mrs. Bow-fetched away the shillin' she bound ers,' she says, wild-like, 'you're a good her soul by, that blessed midsummer woman, I doubt. Take this shillin'' night." -and she reached one from under her pillow and give it to lame Billy when I'm gone. He begged at my door last Easter-tide, and I drove him with a curse,' she says, 'and now I'm sorry,' says she, 'and I'd like to do one good deed afore I die.' And with that she reached me out the shillin', Camp for me, Miss Kitty! VOL. LXXXIV. 4330 LIVING AGE. "But what did you do for a house, Mrs. Reynolds ?" I murmured, when my lips could find their use. "Yours was ruined too, wasn't it ? " "Eh, I bid with my niece Elizabeth till Reynolds asked me, and then I came out here. No more o' the Jews' But just you tell the mistress at the rectory not | but the ones here are still found, from to put too much faith in a Piunick, my time to time, and always there has been dear, and to count the knobs of sugar some horrible story connected with now and again." every one that sees the light. My father says it is the large number of Roman coins found about Dewcaster that gave rise to the legend; like Onion's pennies at Silchester. But the poor people believe it firmly, and say that the real names of the places about are Judasbury, and Judas-camp, or the Jews' Camp. It's very odd, Harry. And here's the camp itself." "Odd," said Harry, when we were once more ou our way over the moorland, where every sprig of heather now glistened with its diamond drop, and the hot sun was drawing up a quivering mist from the soaked earth- "odd what a lot of superstition still lingers about in country districts. Rum little story, wasn't it, Kitty ? I didn't dare catch your eye, for fear of laughing.' 66 'Laughing?" -I gave a little shudder "I thought it perfectly awful. And a Jew's penny, it was, too. How very strange. One could almost believe there's something in it, after all." "Something in what?" Oh, the old legend about the Jews' Camp. Did you never hear it? Why, you know there's a Roman camp here -you'll see it in another minute Dewcaster its real name is; but all the country people call it the Jews' Camp, and papa says the corrupted name gave rise to the story. Any way, the legend runs that when the Romans under Aulus Plautius conquered this place, there was a soldier of the legion who had taken part in the sacking of Jerusalem and got, as part of his booty, the thirty pieces of silver, which had been ever since in the family of the man who sold the Potter's Field. They say that money is the devil's own, and whoever possesses it is ruined, body and soul. The soldier who had it was murdered by his comrades for his hoard, and with it they bribed their fellow warriors to kill their own centurion in battle, and place one of themselves in his stead. He turned on his confederates, once he was in power, and would have put them to death, but they fled, carrying the money with them; and finally returned with an army of British, and enough of the pieces of silver still unsquandered to buy from a traitor inside the camp its betrayal, and the slaughter of all its defenders. The other pieces were melted down, or passed into other circulation, still carrying the curse with them to this day; "A gruesome hole," said Harry. And certainly the square depression on the barren hilltop, without a tree to break the wide brown sea of moor, was desolate and wild enough for any tale of tragedy. The pile of grass-grown ruins that still marked the scene of Mrs. Reynolds's story lay under the shadow of tangled gorse and broom. We strolled across the weird enclosure, to see how the little spring, swollen by the heavy rain, had burst its banks and torn a channel through the ground below. There had been a sort of miniature landslip, and the fresh wet earth was upturned for several yards. As I stood talking to Harry I wondered what was the strange round object I idly turned over with the toe of my shoe. Suddenly I stooped, and picked it up. "There!" I said 66 ; why that's one of the very coins I was telling you about. Papa says they're as plentiful as blackberries." And I held it out to Harry as I spoke. "That's "Jove, so it is!" said he. queer.' He rubbed it on his coatsleeve, and stuck knowingly in his eye the little magnifying glass he examines flowers through. "It's a genuine antique. I can just make out Ti Cæsar. I believe you've had a real find, Kits, and the first thing you ever gave me is really worth having. I'll put it on my watch-chain, and wear it as long as I live-your first, dear little present." "Oh, Harry! you mustn't please don't. Suppose it were to be a Jew's penny ! "You dear little goose! really a superstitious kitten? Are you Is our future household to be conducted on non-Friday principles, and are all our dinner-parties to collapse if there's a fear of our sitting down thirteen to table? Oh, Kitty! Never mind, even a Jew's penny would bring good luck if it came from you; and wild horses shan't tear from me your very first gift. You never gave me a single thing before-except your darling self, and that sweet something last night at the garden gate. I've given you dozens and a ring-but you never gave me but that one, and refused me that rose I begged for from your gown at Mrs. Jacob's tennis-fight. Kitty, give me your little hand. One ring looks too meagre there-let me get the other one, and put it on to make it look balanced." "Nonsense, Harry!" I blushed violently, and tried to snatch my fingers away, but he held them fast. "What rubbish to say such things! That needn't be talked about for ages." could I ever have said such a thing! How could I be such a brute! I don't know what possessed me. Say you forgive me, my own little love." Of course I forgave him, and we walked on over the moor hand-in-hand, talking gently and tenderly at first, though by and by Harry began to grow silent and abstracted. It was very unlike Harry as unlike him as his sudden burst of temper- he had the gayest, sunniest spirits, and a mood that was generally unruffled and serene. But I knew men have often things to worry them that we girls know nothing of; and I knew too that beginning to bother him now was not the way to make him a good wife by and by. So I said nothing, and was only very kind to him when we parted, to show him that my silence had not been resentment. I thought he would have walked over from Dewsbury the next day; but it was Friday before I saw him swing open the little gate into the meadow, what and come up the side path under the perfumed lime-blossoms. He looked pale and rather worried, and I anxiously asked if there were anything amiss, when our first greetings were over. "I Ages the days are ageson earth have we to wait for? Thank fortune I'm not a beggar, and you won't mind a sub for a husband, will you, darling? I haven't any people for you to be introduced to, and you don't need any gown but that you play tennis in - I'd like you to wear that always. When will you wear it to be married in, Kits? Next Tuesday? come, dear, say which day." "Harry!" I cried, startled and hor-weight on me that I can't shake off. rified, "don't be so silly. It isn't time to talk of that yet-indeed, it isn't. You mustn't be so peremptory. You never talked like this before." "Peremptory!" He spoke quite shortly. "I don't believe you understand. I don't want any waiting, whatever you may do. I don't believe you love me as I do you, or you couldn't even talk of it. That isn't love worth having." "I think I must have caught a chill that day on the moor," he said. haven't felt quite myself ever since. I'm restless and out of sorts altogether somehow, and feel as if there were a Fancy my being such a duffer, when I ought to be the happiest fellow in the whole world! But somehow I can't help it, Kitty." Before he went away he showed me the Roman coin, cleaned and burnished, and hanging on his watch-chain beside the new sixpence he wore there for a joke "for luck," he always said. "It's really a good coin, Kitten," he “Oh, Harry "" I was all I could say, said—" one of Tiberius's, and in capand the tears sprang to my eyes. ital condition. How about the Jew's penny, eh, little girl ? ” In an instant his arms were round me, and he was begging me to forgive "No," I said, "I know it isn't. I him. asked papa, and he told me all about "Good heavens !" he said, "how it; and though it's commonly supposed |