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Amelius explained that his past night had been a wakeful one, and that the events of the day had not allowed him any opportunities of repose. 'Since the morning,' he said, things have hurried so, one on the top of the other, that I am beginning to feel a little dazed and weary.' Without a word of remark, Rufus produced the remedy. The materials

were

ere ready on the sideboard-he made a cocktail.

'Another?' asked the New Englander, after a reasonable lapse of time.

Amelius declined taking another. He stretched himself on the sofa; his good friend considerately took up a newspaper. For the first time that day, he had now the prospect of a quiet interval for rest and thought. In less than a minute, the delusive prospect vanished. He started to his feet again, disturbed by a new anxiety. Having leisure to think, he had thought of Regina. Good heavens !' he exclaimed; she's waiting to see me-and I never remembered it till this moment!' He looked at his watch; it was five o'clock. 'What am I to do?' he said, helplessly.

Rufus laid down the newspaper, and considered the new difficulty in its various aspects.

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'We are bound to go with Mrs. Payson to the Home,' he said; and I tell you this, Amelius, the matter of Sally is not a matter to be played with; it's a thing that's got to be done. In your place, I should write politely to Miss Regina, and put it off till to-morrow.'

In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, a man who took Rufus for his counsellor was a man who acted wisely in every sense of the word. Events, however (of which Amelius and his friend were both ignorant alike), had so ordered it that the American's wellmeant advice, in this one exceptional case, was the very worst advice that could have been given. In an hour more, Jervy and Mrs. Sowler were to

meet at the tavern-door. The one last hope of protecting Mrs. Farnaby from the abominable conspiracy of which she was the destined victim, rested solely on the fulfilment by Amelius of his engagement with Regina for that day. Always ready to interfere with the progress of the courtship, Mrs. Farnaby would be especially eager to seize the first opportunity of speaking to her young Socialist friend on the subject of his lecture. In the course of the talk between them, the idea which, in the present disturbed state of his mind, had not struck him yet-the idea that the outcast of the streets might, by the barest conceivable possibility, be identified with the lost daughterwould, in one way or another, be almost infallibly suggested to Amelius; and, at the eleventh hour, the conspiracy would be foiled. If, on the other hand, the American's fatal advice was followed, the next morning's post might bring a letter from Jervy to Mrs. Farnaby-with this disastrous result. At the first words spoken by Amelius she would put an end to all further interest in the subject on his part, by telling him that the lost girl had been found, and found by another person.

Rufus pointed to the writing-materials on a side table, which he had himself used earlier in the day. The needful excuse was, unhappily, quite easy to find. A misunderstanding

with his landlady had obliged Amelius to leave his lodgings at an hour's notice, and had occupied him in trying to find a residence for the rest of the day. The note was written. Rufus, who was nearest to the bell, stretched out his hand to ring for the messenger. Amelius suddenly stopped him.

'She doesn't like me to disappoint her,' he said. I needn't stay longI might get there and back in half an hour, in a fast cab.'

His conscience was not quite easy. The sense of having forgotten Regina -no matter how naturally and ex

cusably- oppressed him with a feeling of self-reproach. Rufus raised no objection; the hesitation of Amelius was unquestionably creditable to him. 'If you must do it, my son,' he said, 'do it right away-and we'll wait for you.'

Amelius took up his hat. The door opened as he approached it, and Mrs. Payson entered the room, leading Simple Sally by the hand.

'We are all going together,' said the genial old lady, to see my large family of daughters at the Home. We can have our talk in the carriage. It's an hour's drive from this place--and I must be back again to dinner at half-past seven.'

Amelius and Rufus looked at each other. Amelius thought of pleading an engagement, and asking to be excused. Under the circumstances, it was assuredly not a very gracious thing to do. Before he could make up his mind, one way or the other, Sally stole to his side, and put her hand on his arm. Mrs. Payson had done wonders in conquering the girl's inveterate distrust of strangers, and, to a certain extent at least, winning her confidence. But no earthly influence could shake Sally's dog-like devotion to Amelius. Her jealous instinct discovered something suspicious in his sudden silence. 'You must go with us,' she said; 'I won't go without You.'

'Certainly not,' Mrs. Payson added; 'I promised her that, of course, beforehand.'

Rufus rang the bell, and despatched the messenger to Regina. 'That's the one way out of it, my son,' he whis pered to Amelius, as they followed. Mrs. Payson and Sally down the stairs of the hotel.

They had just driven up to the gates of the Home, when Jervy and his accomplice met at the tavern, and entered on their consultation in a private

room.

In spite of her poverty-stricken appearance, Mrs. Sowler was not absolutely destitute. In various and un

derhand and wicked ways she contrived to put a few shillings in her pocket from week to week. If she was half starved, it was for the very ordinary reason (among persons of her vicious class) that she preferred spending her money on drink. Stating his business with her, as reservedly and as cunningly as usual, Jervy found to his astonishment that even this squalid old creature presumed to bargain with him. The two wretches were on the point of a quarrel which might have delayed the execution of the plot against Mrs. Farnaby, but for the vile self-control which made Jervy one of the most formidable criminals living. He gave way on the question of money-and, from that moment, he held Mrs. Sowler absolutely at his disposal.

'Meet me to-morrow morning, to receive your instructions,' he said. 'The time is ten sharp; and the place is the powder-magazine in Hyde Park. And mind this! You must be decently dressed-you know where to hire the things. If I smell you of spirits to-morrow morning, I shall employ somebody else. No! not a farthing now. You will have your money tomorrow at ten.'

Left by himself, Jervy sent for pen, ink and paper. Using his left hand, which was just as serviceable to him as his right, he traced these lines:

'You are informed, by an unknown friend, that a certain lost young lady is now living in a foreign country, and may be restored to her afflicted mother on receipt of a sufficient sum to pay expenses and to reward the writer of this letter, who is (undeservedly) in distressed circumstances.

'Are you, madam, the mother? I ask the question in the strictest confidence, knowing nothing certainly but that your husband was the person who put the young lady out to nurse in her infancy.

'I don't address your husband, because his inhuman desertion of the poor baby does not incline me to trust him. I run the risk of trusting you

starting.

-to a certain extent at Shall I drop a hint which may help you to identify the child, in your own mind? It would be inexcusably foolish on my part to speak too plainly, just yet. The hint must be a vague one. Suppose I use a poetical expression, and say the young lady is enveloped in mystery from head to footespecially the foot?

In the event of my addressing the right person, I beg to offer a suggestion for a preliminary interview.

'If you will take a walk on the

bridge over the Serpentine River, on the Kensington Gardens side, at halfpast ten o'clock to-morrow morning, holding a white handkerchief in your left hand, you will meet the muchinjured woman, who was deceived into taking charge of the infant child at Ramsgate, and will be satisfied so far that you are giving your confidence to persons who really deserve it.'

Jervy addressed this infamous letter to Mrs. Farnaby, in an ordinary envelope, marked 'Private.' He posted it, that night, with his own hand.

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ECKERMANN AND GOETHE.

OF

BY FIDELIS, KINGSTON.

PART II.

F all Goethe's literary conversations,his affectionate reminiscences of Schiller are the most interesting, in themselves, and as a proof that human sympathy was not really the matter of indifference to him which he supposed. He speaks with some amusement of the rivalry which the public had set up between himself and Schiller. 'For twenty years, the public has been disputing which is the greatest, Schiller or I, and it ought to be glad that it has got a couple of fellows about whom it can dispute.' He tells us that Schiller could not work instinctively, and that he liked to discuss the works on which he was engaged, scene after scene. Goethe, on the contrary, said nothing to any one till his work was finished, an indication in itself of the different quality of their genius. Yet, different as their natures were, Goethe tells us that their tendencies 6 were still to. wards one point, which made our connexion so intimate that one really would not live without the other.' He tells us how the subject of William Tell' had been suggested to Schiller by himself that he, inspired by the enchanting scenery of the Lake of the Four Cantons (Lucerne), had for some time contemplated such a drama, but, having many other things to do, had communicated his thoughts to Schiller, and described to him the scenery which had so impressed him. In Schiller's soul, he tells us, his landscapes and his acting figures formed themselves into a drama,-Goethe

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gave up his subject entirely to him, and thus we have the origin of Schiller's Wilhelm Tell.' Of Wallenstein,' on the other hand, he says that if Schiller had asked him about it before he had written it he would certainly have advised him against it, for he could never have dreamed that from such a subject so excellent a drama could be made,' which he gives in illustration of the wise maxim that 'one should never ask anybody if one means to write anything.' A memorial of Schiller, which he received on his seventy-eighth birthday, consisting of a transcribed conversation, seemed to give Goethe much pleasure. Schiller appears here, as always, in perfect possession of his sublime nature. He was a true man, such as one ought to be.' In another conversation, he speaks regretfully of over-work having in Schiller's later years impaired his health and productive powers. Being obliged to

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write on days when he was not well, and being determined that his talent should obey him at any hour, he was obliged to stimulate his powers by the use of spirituous liquors. The habit impaired his health, and was likewise injurious to his productions. The faults which some wise-acres find in his works I deduce from this source. All the passages which they say are not what they ought to be I would call pathological passages, for he wrote them on days when he had not strength to find the right and true motives.' Would that authors gen

erally could find such considerate critics!

In another conversation, some years later, he refers again to the danger of forcing production by recourse to stimulants, remarking that if an author should do this, 'the method would certainly answer, but it would be discoverable in all the scenes which he had written under such an influence, to their great disadvantage.' 'My counsel,' he says, 'is to force nothing, and rather to trifle and sleep away all unproductive days and hours, than on such days to compose something which will afterwards give no pleasure.' To which we may imagine hard-driven writers, chained to the relentless press of this hurrying age, responding, with a sigh, Happy indeed are they who can avail themselves of such excellent advice!' But the lesson is a good one, for all!

In the same conversation, he makes an interesting distinction between the higher kind of productiveness, which is a gift, and the lower kind, which man can himself control-both being required for the production of any great work.

'No productiveness of the highest kind, no remarkable discovery, no great thought which bears fruit and has results, is in the power of any one; but such things are elevated above all earthly control. Man must consider them as an unexpected gift from above, as pure children of God, which he must receive and venerate with joyful thanks. They are akin to the daemon (Socratic), which does with him what it pleases, and to which he unconsciously resigns himself, whilst he believes he is acting from his own impulse. There is, however, a productiveness of another kind, subjected to earthly influences, and which man has more in his power, although he here, also, finds cause to bow before something divine. Under this category I place all that appertains to the execution of a plan, all the links of a

chain of thought, the ends of which already shine forth; I also place there all that constitutes the visible body of a work of art. Thus Shakespeare was inspired with his first thought of his Hamlet when the spirit of the whole presented itself to his mind as an unexpected impression, and he surveyed the several situations, characters and conclusions, in an elevated mood, as a pure gift from above, on which he had no immediate influence, although the possibility of conceiving such a thought certainly pre-supposed such a mind as his. But the individual scenes, and the dialogue of the characters, he had completely in his own power, so that he might produce them daily and hourly, and work at them for weeks if he liked.'

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To Shakespeare Goethe again and again recurs with unbounded admiration, We cannot talk about Shakespeare,' he says at one time, in despair; everything is inadequate.' Goetz' and Egmont,' he admits to be the expression of his influence on his own genius, which he says he did well to get rid of by writing them.' Elsewhere he speaks of Shakespeare as having 'already exhausted the whole of human nature in all its tendencies, in all its heights and depths, and that, in fact, there remains for him the aftercome, nothing more to do! And how could one get courage to put pen to paper, if one were conscious in an earnest, appreciating spirit, that such unfathomable and unattainable excellencies were already in existence!' He believed that, had he been born an Englishman, the master-pieces of English literature, brought before him at the first dawn of youthful consciousness, would have overpowered him, and he would not have known what to do. At another time, he says, dwelling on the same thought: Had I earlier known how many excellent things have been in existence for hundreds and thousands of years, I should not have written a line, but have done something else.' In a similar mood,

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