more. "Were you present when he told them?" "But they might suspect something." observation of character - he could make "How nervous you are! They know bis influence felt at home, and much of that Mrs. Collingwood is your mother. his talk was seasoned with a peculiar Father told them. They know nothing humor. The friends of the family considered him to be a youth of great promise; so he was in a certain sense, and a thorough good fellow; but though he worked fairly well at school, and may almost be said to have done his best, he never brought home one prize during his whole career excepting for good conduct, while Lancy scarcely ever came home without one or two. "Yes, and they all behaved like country bumpkins as they are. They held up their hands, and some of them said, 'Lawk, you don't say so, sir.'" "And none of them said anything about her having lost anything?" "I particularly remember that not one said a word about it." "Well, then, I think that was rather odd!" "No, there was nothing odd in the manner of any of them. If they had known, they must have betrayed the knowledge." "I consider that the poor are far better actors than we are. They knew father must hope they had found out nothing (I always hate myself when I think of the shame he felt about it). They like both father and mother; they may have known, and yet have spared them." Nobody knows anything," repeated Don John, yet more decidedly; "you're saved, dear old fellow, this once. Only hold your head up, or you'll excite surprise, and make people think there is something wrong." CHAPTER XVII. LANCY was still glad to be at home. He admired his two sisters; he thought his mother more beautiful than ever, and yet the pleasure of those holidays was made dim by his growing certainty that "the lodger's" loss and his disappearance were in some way connected together in the minds of his humble friends. Don John was of an open, joyous nature. He was devoted and most dutiful to his father and mother; his abilities were not by any means above the average, but he was blest with a strong desire to do his best. He was to leave school and be articled to his father; there was no talk of his going to the university. He was delighted at this, but he well knew that it arose from a change in his father's circumstances, not from any desire to please him that he was to escape from the hated Latin and Greek, and take to more congenial studies. Don John accepted all his father's decisions as if they had been the decrees of fate; he was no whit more thoughtful than most youths of his age, but he had somewhat unusual And Mr. Johnstone, having looked over their papers, always expressed himself to the full as much pleased with Don John as with Lancy, sometimes more so. Neither boy was surprised. This was only justice, and they forthwith subsided into the places that nature had intended for them. In the schoolroom Don John ruled just as naturally as he took the head of the table; he headed the expeditions; if there was any blame, it all fell on him. If any treat was to be obtained he went and asked for it. If any one of the party in childhood had committed an accidental piece of mischief of a flagrant nature, such as letting a pony down and breaking its knees, or making a great smash of greenhouse glass, Don John, whoever had been the delinquent, was always deputed to go and make confession, and he generally began thus: "Father, I'm sorry to say we've done so and so." Lancy was almost as much loved as Don John, but he was neither feared nor looked up to; he did as he liked, and was great in criticism, but not in command. Lancy spent many an hour in thought during those holidays. He perceived that circumstances gave him a certain power. There was a great deal of cunning in his nature, he felt a little ashamed of Mrs. Collingwood because, as he perceived, "she was not a lady." He had always been told that in the course of time he should be articled to the father who had adopted him; but he had hoped for several years at Cambridge, where he should do much as he liked. Still he wished to be under Mr. Johnstone's charge rather than under Mrs. Collingwood's. Such love as he had in his na ture he bestowed on the Johnstones, specially on Mrs. Johnstone and Don John. But his first visit to "the houses changed everything. He could not bear to think of being so near to those people, feeling sure as he did that they were aware of his delinquency. e Another inevitable visit soon took place, and set the matter at rest in his opinion. He was sure they knew, just as sure as that his sisters did not. And the servants? Had they, too, been made partakers of Mrs. Clarboy's and Mrs. Salisbury's suspicions? He longed to live "at home" again, but his fault had risen up and faced him when he hoped it was dead and buried. Why, rather than walk home through that field three or four times every week, he thought he could almost find it in his heart to run away again! But there would be no need for that; he would write to Mrs. Collingwood, and make use of her to get his own way. So he did; he never called her mother, and he was not base enough to use more expressions of affection than just enough as he thought to serve his end. This was his letter: "MY DEAR MAMMA, "When you wrote to me about going on the Continent to travel with you for a whole year, I did not consent to ask father's leave, for in the first place I knew from Don John that he would not give it, for he meant to article me to himself; and in the next, of course I like better to be with my own family- the Johnstones, I mean of course - -than with you. "But you are very kind, and I am not so happy here as I expected - because I am quite sure those people in the houses know about IT. You understand what I mean. And so, mamma, if you like, I'll go the tour with you. I know I shall be disagreeable and cross to you sometimes when I think that I'm away from them, but that I can't help, and I can hardly bear to write this letter, but I Street. I am not nearly so well off, my 'No; I shall never go back to Harley boy, as I was in your childhood." more than four hundred a year.” "And yet you say that I shall have There was a long pause. Then Lancy said, 66 And before any answer could be made, he went on : wish one thing and I wish the same, "I am, yours affectionately, In a few days a letter was written to Mr. Johnstone by Mrs. Collingwood, just such a letter as Lancy had suggested, and when the adopted son was told that the plan was out of the question he seemed much disappointed. 1708 LIVING AGE. VOL. XXXIII, if he had been taken at a disadvantage by "No," said Mr. Johnstone. He felt as this sudden question, but he little supposed that Lancy had long meditated asking it. Then he must have done you some some very great kindness, surely, "No," said Mr. Johnstone, "he did great father." not." "When you last saw him, did you promise him that you would bring me | you should be so fond of me. Why, when up?" I was a little fellow I used always to think you were even more fond of me than of Donald." Had the secret been kept so long to be drawn forth by such a simple question as that; such a natural question, one that it seemed a son might surely have a right to ask? Donald Johnstone scarcely knew, but he looked at Lancy; he was impelled to answer, and could not help it. "I never made Lancelot Aird any promise of any sort." "He was not brought up with you?" said Lancy in a faintly questioning tone. "No." "When did you first meet with him, then, father?" "I never met with him at all." Lancy, on hearing this, hung his head. It was not for his father's sake, then, that he had been brought up. "You have made a mistake, you see," said Donald Johnstone, in a low voice. "You have got an answer to a question which sooner or later you almost must have asked, and it is a shock to you. | There is another that you now desire to ask, but it pleases me to observe that you cannot do it. I will ask it and answer it for you. It is, I think, 'When did you first meet with Lancelot Aird's wife?""" Lancy, who had colored deeply, did not move or lift up his face. "I first met with her at a time of deep distress, when my son was about ten days old, and there was every reason to fear that I should lose his mother. I went once into her darkened room to look at her, and as my eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, I saw seated at the foot of her bed a young woman in a widow's dress who had my poor little infant son in her arms. She rose and curtseyed when she saw me, and I perceived at once that she was the wet-nurse of whom I had been told, and who had been engaged. She was nursing Donald. The first time, then, that I saw her, was when her child was about two months old." Lancy, for the moment, was overcome with bashfulness, but when Mr. Johnstone said with a sigh, "I am not displeased with you, my boy," he put his two hands on the adopted father's hand as it was lying near there on the table, and leaned his face on it and kissed it. Then he said with a better, sweeter expression than had dawned on his face for a long time, "I am glad you are such a good man, father, but but that only makes it more wonderful that I should be here, and that "Did you, my dear boy? I am exceedingly attached to you, Lancy; and when you went wrong, and I was told of that former delinquency, I lost my spirits. I became ill." "But I'm cured," pleaded Lancy, with a sob. "Yes, I thank God for that hope. And now you perceive that by this conversation you have learned certain things; you took me at a disadvantage, and I spoke. You had meditated for some time asking these questions? "Yes, father," said Lancy. "I advise you, as loving you, which I have proved, and as deserving well of you "I advise you not to ask any more, but rather to court ignorance. Let things be, my boy. Even Donald is not more welcome to everything I can do for him than you are. Let that satisfy you, Lancy." "I will let things be," said Lancy, in a low voice. "Father, if I never thanked you and mother for all this all these years, it must have been because till Mrs. Collingwood appeared it seemed so natural I should have it, that I never thought about it any more than the others did." "Nothing else that you could possibly have said nothing! would have pleased me as much as this does!" exclaimed Mr. Johnstone. Lancy was surprised. He saw bow true his father's words were, that he had given him great pleasure. He could not but look inquiringly at him, and thereupon, with an effort, Donald Johnstone recalled his usual expression; and when Lancy went on, "But I want to thank you now, and to say that I am grateful," he answered, "That is enough, my dearest boy. Now go, I am about to write to Mrs. Collingwood. I am sorry she ever proposed to you to take this tour without first consulting me, and I must tell her it would not suit my views respecting you." So Lancy left Mr. Johnstone, and even in the going, though his heart was warmed towards him, and he respected him more than for some time past, yet a certain ease of mind with which he had of late accepted his benefits was now gone. He wondered, as he had not been adopted for Lancelot Aird's sake, for whose sake it could be. His opinion had been highly "Oh, a promise goes for very little, my star, in such a case as this. There is nothing that we ought not to do for Lancy, even to the point of telling him ourselves, if he was in temptation, or seemed likely to fall again, and to know of such a possible part in us might help to keep him upright for our sake-only "Only," she went on, when he paused, "only that, for the chance of elevating him, we should be sacrificing Donald. We should break Donald's heart." "A boy's heart is not so easily broken," he replied. "But he is our good boy. a very loving son," she answered almost reproachfully, "who has never made us ashamed of him. Shall we take everything away from him, and fill him with doubt and distress in order to give almost nothing to the other?" "Not if we can help it, my dear," and at that moment Lancy came into the room. "I've got a letter from my mamma," he said, he would not call her mother. "She says you do not like me to take a long tour with her, dear father and mother, but will I ask if I may go for one month?" The letter was duly read; one month or six weeks was the phrase used, and the letter was both urgent and humble. So Donald Johnstone wrote to Mrs. Collingwood, and told her that he did not consider a lengthened period of idleness and pleasure at all suitable for Lancy at his early age; that he did not approve of mere feminine supervision for a highspirited youth; and that he trusted to her known affection for him not to damage his prospects by making the restraints of professional life irksome to him. The first step was now to be taken towards fitting him for his profession. When Mrs. Collingwood got this letter she was excessively disappointed; and then on reading it a second time, she was exceedingly wrath. She felt the galling nature of this yoke under which she had put her neck. Lancy had made her so sure she should get her own way, that she was resolved to do battle for it; and she wrote, urging her claim to his company, and begging that he might not be forced against his will to be frequently among people who knew of "the childish faults which he had been so long and so severely punished for." "And besides, sir," she continued, "you are quite wrong if you think my dear boy has no natural feelings towards me, his mother. He knows his duty to you, and he strives to do it; but he takes it hard that he is never to be with me, and you may depend that I do." Then she went on: "And I think it is but right, sir, that you should ask Mrs. Johnstone whether she thinks I ought to Mr. Johnstone looked at him deliberbe always kept out of seeing my dear boy.ately, and without any tenderness of She knows what a mother's feelings are; and, though she is always so high with me, she will tell you that no mother could put up with what I am putting up with much longer." Of course Mrs. Johnstone saw this letter. She sighed as she folded it up. Donald, I am afraid if she will have him, she must have him. When we met, you carried things with a high hand, and I hoped she did not see her own power. Now, on reflection, I believe she does." Yes," he answered, "she is sure, you are sure, and I am almost sure, Lancy is hers. Let her take him for a while, and I think she will be appeased; but withstand her, and she will tell him all." "You might exact a promise from her as the price of your consent." 66 "You wish to go?" "Yes, father, if you don't mind." Then observing that the tender woman whom he called mother was moved, and that her eyes, more moist and bright than usual, seemed to dwell on his face attentively, Lancy blushed and said, "I think I ought to pity her, for, as she often says, I am her only child." aspect; he seemed to take a moment's "" "Oh, mother, you always wish me to have treats-mother, you'll let ine go?" "Yes," she said, without looking at him. He scarcely observed her emotion, certainly never divined that it was on his From The London Times. account, but he gave her the customary | born on the 4th of December, 1795. He kiss they always bestowed when thanking was the eldest son of a family of eight her for any favor, and he took out of the children; his brothers were all men of room with him a vivid recollection of what character and ability; one of them, Dr. Donald Johnstone had said. He felt a John Carlyle, was destined to make a little daunted by it. He knew it would be name in literature as the translator of a restraint upon him. But it was no re- Dante. Mr. Carlyle's father, James Carstraint as regarded that only point at lyle, was the son of Thomas Carlyle, tenwhich just then he was in danger. ant of Brown-Knowes, a small farm in Annandale, and of Margaret Aitken. At the time of his eldest son's birth James Carlyle was a stone-mason, and resided in Ecclefechan; but he became afterwards tenant of Scotsberg, a farm of two or three hundred acres, which, is now occuTHOMAS CARLYLE died at half past pied by Mr. Carlyle's youngest and only eight on Saturday morning, February 5th, surviving brother. James Carlyle was a at his house in Cheyne Row, Chelsea. He man of rectitude, worth, and intelligence, had been for some years in feeble health, and in many ways remarkable. His son and more than once in 1879 and 1880 his once said, "I never heard tell of any recovery seemed doubtful. Of late even clever man that came of entirely stupid his friends saw little of him. He could people," and his own lineage might well not bear the strain of prolonged or excit- have suggested this saying. Carlyle never ing conversation, and growing weakness, spoke of his father and mother except approaching, as he himself said, almost with veneration and affection. Of the constant pain, had compelled him to give former especially he liked to talk, and he up very much his old habit of taking long once made the remark that he thought walks every day. But since early man- his father, all things considered, the best hood he had been frequently subject to man whom he had ever known. There ailments; dyspepsia and kindred weak- were points of strong likeness between nesses had been his scourge since his them. The father was a man of energy college days; he had rallied more than and strong will; and he had in no small once from severe attacks of illness; and measure the picturesque and vivid powit was not supposed until quite recently ers of speech of the son, and liked to use that his end was near. The announce- out-of-the-way, old-fashioned, sharp, and ment of his death will bring home to every educated Englishman its significance. A chasm opens between the present and the past of our literature, a whole world of associations disappears. No recent man of letters has held in England a place comparable to that which for at least a quarter of a century has been his without dispute, and authors of all kinds and schools will feel that they have lost their venerable doyen. A great man of letters, quite as heroic as any of those whom he depicted, has passed away amid universal regret. The close has come of a well-ordered, full, stately, and complete life. About eight months before Robert Burns died, and within but a few miles of Dumfries, the scene of his death, was born the most penetrating and sympathetic interpreter of his genius. Carlyle's birthplace was Ecclefechan, an insignificant Dumfriesshire village, in the parish of Hoddam, known by name, at least, to readers of Burns, and memorable for an alehouse which was loved only too well by the poet. There Carlyle was pungent words. His pithy sayings, occasionally prickly and sharp, ran through the country-side. His favorite books were the Bible and an old Puritan divine. He was, said his son on one occasion to a friend, "a far cleverer man than I am, or ever will be." An elder in the kirk, and a man of established character for probity, he was one who, to use again his son's description of him, "like Enoch of old, walked with God." All extant testimony goes to show that Mr. Carlyle's father and mother were of the finest type of Scotch country folk-simple, upright, and with family traditions of honest worth. Carlyle learned to read and write in the parish school of Hoddam, where he remained until his ninth year. The parish minister, his father's friend, taught him the elements of Latin. From the parish school he passed to the burgh school of Annan, six miles distant, where he saw Edward Irving, "his first friend," as he once called him, who was some years his senior. Lads still go very young to Scotch universities; sixty years ago they went still younger, and were wont to quit them |