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HomeMy WebLinkAboutExeter Advocate, 1906-12-20, Page 60+0„ ;.Q4o+.o.04,0 ,.04.04.04.04.0+0nniw here t have found earth betletiful luxurious seat upon which to depoeit'a 1 and delightful enough for rile t” h heli-swoonhig worinuh but the joint ex - Ile looks. back at her, hardly hearing erlions of .her dauglitor and of 13urgoyne p:resentlu • sueceod la replacing her on her rickety resting -place; their arms in- terlace each other round lace book, and their anxious, ares look interrogation, at one another above her head, half drop - reed on Elizabeth's slight shoulder, "Does she often faint? Is she apt to do it?" asks Jim, fn a whisper. y f 7 • 'x. 1t � i It • l ee+0-404 0404 040., 04040401>4 x404040-,"--004 a -Po -4-�+ C1IAPTEI3 XIII,—{Continued). show what forms his dciily dining -table except on the happy Sunday, to which he must look forward so wvaernly. OR, A SAD 'LIFE STORY Burgoyne has chartered a nacre with a horse as little lame as is ever to be found in Florence, and in this .vehicle they are presently rolling along. None of thele are In very exuberant spirits. Burgoyne is as wen aware as if her sen- sitive lips had put the fact into words, that for Elizabeth the pleasu:'e of the • outing -has evaporated with the absence of Lyng, and that it is only- .the soft- hearted. ofthearted shrinking of a sweet nature from initiating mortification -on. a 1eliow- creahue that set her opposite to hien in her while 'gown. He has never seen her dressed in white before, and says to hiniself••that it was for Byng's sake that she has made herself so sulmner-tine. But even if it be so, it is not Byng who• is profiting by it, It is for him, not By -ng, that the large Italian light is glorifying its thin fabric. Lily -pure, snow -clean she looks, sitting under her sunshade, and he sits over against her in a stupid silence, as if, did he speak at all. he must put into brutal words the brutal questions that are dinging in his head. that seem knocking for utterance against the gate of his set teeth. "What is the `screw loose'? How is she an `unfortunate girl'? Why have they `never held up -their heads since'? "Must not he love Sunday ?" cries Elizabeth, with sparkling eyes. "t)o not you -king to know what they have for dinner on Sundays? 1)o you think he would Blind telling us? Elizabeth's spirits are going up like quicksilver. It is evident, despite the delicate melancholy of her face, that she is naturally of an extremely joyous and enjoying nature, and • gifted- with a freshness of sensation which belongs ordinarily rather to .the green age, at which Jim first remembers her, than to the mature ane which he knows for a certainty that sho naw leas reecho&. She is filled with such a lively and sur- prised delight at all the little details of arrangement of lee monastic life .that he is at last impelled to say to her, some- thing wonderingly : ' "13111 you must have peen hundreds :Of monasteries. before?" "Not. one." "But there are, or were, such swamis of them all over Italy." "I dare say. 1 was never In Italy be- fore." "Not really?" She lifts up her hand, and waves it at Since what?" He looks in a fierce per- him with an air of hasty deprecation of plexity, from one to the other of those delicately poised heads, held aloft with such modest dignity. Surely it is be- yond the, bounds of possibility that any heavily hideous shame or leaden dis- grace can ever have weighed upon then 1 Probably the intensity of his thought has given an intensity to his look, of which he is unaware, for he presently finds the soft veiled voice of Elizabeth—Elizabeth who has hitherto been as mute as himself --addressing him : "How very grave you look 1 I wonder what you are thinking of?" The question, striking in so strangely pat, brings him back with a start, For a second an almost overpowering tempts: tion assails him to tell her what Is the object of his thought, to answer her with that whole and naked truth which we can so seldom employ in our intercourse with our fellow men. But one glance at her innocent face, which has a vague trouble in it, chases the lunatic impulse, though he dallies with the temptation to the extent of saying : "Would you really like to know? Do you really wish me to tell you•?" Iie looks at her penetratingly as he puts the question. Before either his eyes or his manner she shrinks. • - "Oh, no—no t" she cries with tremu- lous haste, "of course not 1 I was only joking. What business have I with your thoughts? I never wish to know people's thoughts ; if their looks and words are kind, that is all that concerns mel" IIe relapses into silence; but her words, and still more the agitated man- ner in which they are pronounced, make a vague yet definite addition to the dis- quiet of his soul. By setting off at. so judiciously late an hour as five o'clock, they have avoided the greater part of the flood of tourists which daily sets towards Certosa, and which they meet, tightly packed in crowded vehicles. sweeping Florence, wards in a choking cloud of white dust; so that on reaching the Certosa Monas- tery, sitting so grandly on its hill -top, they have the satisfaction of finding that, it is temporarily all their own—a11 their own but for the few white-frocked figures and tonsured heeds which an economico-deniocrn 14n Gev i'rnment has left to hint what in 118 palmy, days was the slate of that which is now only a Government museum. A burly monk receives them. IIe does not look at all a prey to the pensive sor- row one would expect at the desecra- tion of his holy things and the disper- sion of his fraternity. Probably, in hi?; slow peasant mind there is room for no- thing but self-congratulation at his be- ing one of the few—only fifteen in all— left to end their days 'in the old home. He leads thcnl stolidly through chapels and refectory—the now too roomy refec- tory, where the poor remnant of Car- thusinns cline together only on Semdays —through meagrely -furnished cells, In one of which he matter-of-factly lots down the front flap of a cuLlboard to further question, growing suddenly grave. "Don't ask me whether I have been here or there. or whether I have done this or that. i have never' been any- where or done anything." Her desire for a cessation of all in- quiries nquiries as to her doings is obviously 80 earnest that Jim of course complies with it. Once or twice before he has been struck by her strange want of acquain- tance cquaintance with facts and phenomena, which would have come as a matter of course within the range of observation of every woman of her age and station. -Against his will, a horrid recollection flashes upon hint of a novel he had once read in' Which the hero exhibits a singular ignorance of any events or incidents that had occurred within the ten years preceding the -opening of the story—an ignorance which towards the end of the third volume was accounted for. by its transpiring that he has spend the .inter- vening period in a convict prison! Ile drives the grotesque and monstrous idea with scourges nut of his mind; but it re- curs, and recurs to be displaced by another hardly less painful if in some degree more probable. Can it be possi- ble that the crushing blow which yaps fallen upon the Lo Marchant family, and upon Elizabeth in particular, whitening, the mother's hair, and giving that tear - washed look to the daughter's sweet eyes—can it be possible that that heavy stroke was insanity? Cnn Elizabeth have been out of her mind? Can she have spent in congfinement any of the past, from all allusion to which she shies away with a sensitiveness more shrinking than that of "The tender horns of cockled snails."•. Ho is so much absorbedin his tor- menting speculations about her that for the moment he forgets her bodily, jite- senee; and -it is only her voice, her -soft sane voice, that brings lien back to a consciousness of it. They have been led into a salon, to which, as their guide tells them, the confraternity used to re- ceive any "personage" that came. to visit them. Alas, ne 'personage ever visits the 'rocked remnant now 1 It is a charming, lightsome room, that gives one no monastic idea, with. pretty airy fancies of flower -wreaths and -, arabes- ques; and dainty dancing figures painted. on wall .and ceiling and doors. One of these latter :is heif open, and through fl comes an exquishe sudden viesv of the hills, with their sharp cutshadows and their sunlit slopes; of shining Plorence al their feet, of the laugh of young ver- dure, and the wedded gloom and glouy of cypress and poplar filling the fore- ground. Upon Elizabeth's small face, turned suddenly towards him, seems re- flected sorne of the ineffable radiance of the Tuscan light. "When next l dream of Heaven,:' she srys, in her !ender vibrating voice, "it will be like this. Tio you ever dream of heaven? I often do, and 1 always wake crying because it is not, true; but"—with a joyful change of I.ej"—"l `will not cry any more without better cause. Since I her words, but chiding himself fiercely for the disloyal thought lvhiclh he has entertained, however umwrllingty ; the thought that the foul fiend of madaess could .ever, oven ternpoharily;>have de- filed the temple of those eyes, whence reason and feeling, so sweetly wedded, are shining out moon hire, uuworthy+ 08 lie is of their rays. "Since you conte here? he repeats in a sort of dreamy interrogation.; "only since you calve here?" "You must not take me up' so sharp- ly 1" she eries in a voice of •plsyf}il re- znoustrance, in which. there is a lilt of young gaiety. "I warn you that 1 will not be taken up so sharply 1. I did not say `only since I came hero i' I said 'Since I came here 1' " CHAPTER XIV. Presently they `pass into the still,- cloisleeed garden, in whose unmown grass -squares gray -blue tlo'vers are 044/44044900041400604004361/01606 44) Don't neglect your cough. Statistics 'show Eat `in. New York -City alone ne over 200 people die every week from consumption. v And most of these- consarir tares might ht be living now if they had exist neglected the wh7Arlesileg cough You know how quiclly . 'colt ' Ener 'z n enables you to throw_off a cough or olds 0 0, 0124, blowing, beside whose \yolks • pale pink peonies are flashing, and round whose well the grave rosemary bushes are set. Through. the whole place is an atmos- phere of deep peace, of silence, leisure, dignity. It is virtually a tete-a-tete, as their tonsured guide, seeing their evi- dent harmlessness, has left them to their own devices; tmd Mrs. Le Marchant has sat down 11: rest upon a camp -stool which Elizabeth has been carrying ever since they left the cai'rlago. It has fidget- ed idgeted Jinh to see her burdened with it; for Id a man be ever so little in love with a woman, his .tendency always is to think her 'as brittle ns spun glass,' to believe that any weight, however light, will bruise her arm—any pebble, however tiny, wound her tender foot: - He has offered to relieve her of it --but she has refused—playfully at first -telling hini she • is sure that be wilt lose it; wind, afterwards, when he insists, more gravely, though with gentle gratitude, saying that it would never do for her to get tato the habil of being waited upon, and that she always carried mammy's things. It is. perhaps absurd that -a woman, of six -and -twenty should speak of her mother as "mammy," yet the homely and childish abbreviation seems to him to come "most fair and featously" from her lips. - They stay :a long time' in the sun - kissed garden, considering that there is after all not very much to see There. But Elizabeth's light steps, that to -day seem set to some innocent dancing - tune, are loath to leave it ; she must smell the great new peonies, monthly - rose -colored, faintly perfumed; she must 'steal a sprig 0f rosemary to pht - into her coffin when shades," •at which he catches his breath, shuddering; she must peep into the. well. He insists on her holding his hand. for safety as she leans over to do so; her little fingers grip --his tight as she cranes her neck and bends her. lissom .body. • But what a small handful they- are compared • to those other fingers,• those kind, useful, but un- doubtedly solid fingers, which he has held perhenctorily through many a. mat- ter -of -feet hour. ,By -and -bye they stray away together out of the bounteous air of the hill -top into a semi -underground church, to see the fifteenth, and sixteenth. century monuments, which look as fresh as if their marble had left its home in;. Carrara but yesterday. They stand. looking down at those three kin who lie side by side before the high altar,' each with head dropped a little sideways on the shoulder, ' as if overcome by sudden sleep. They step on into the side cha- pet, -where that yet nobler mitred. figure, fashioned by Donatetbh's hand, stretches his prone length above his border of fruit and flowers, among which lies a carved skull, through whose empty eye-, holes—strange and grisly fancy con- trasting with so much beauty—a mock- ing ribbon runs. Elizabeth is perfectly silent the whole time, but no flood of talk could make Jim half so conscious of her presence, palpitating with sym- pathy and feeling, could give half the confidence he enjoys that shear ill intro- duce no allusion to either-Kensal Green or Woking, as it • is but too ,probable that the excellent companion of most of bis Florentine' rambles would have done. - Elizabeth has been perfectly silent, yet at last she speaks. It is in the Chapter House, where, as most of us have done, they: have suddenly• come upon another tomb, the tomb of one lying hall -length on the pavement before the attar; with no separating edge of rearbte or wrought-irori'railing to keep hire from . the foot of the passer-hy. Ile lies there, . portrayed with such an extraordinary vividness of life 'about, his prostrate figure and his severe, powerfdl face, .that one feels inclined to speak low, lest he should lift his white lids and look rebuke at us. hi the lines about his mouth' there Is a hint of. sardonic mirth. Is4ie-hear- ing our foolish chatter—touched w Ih grave contemptuous amusement at .it? Or is he keeping in htssleep the mem- ory of - some four hundred years' old jest? Elizabeth bas involuntarily crept close to Bupgo,"lie s side, with the ges- ture of a frightened child. • "rare you sure that he did not stir?" she asks tremulously under her breath. Her next thought is that .her mother - must see. hilt too, this wonderful living dead man. end they presently set forth toreturn to the garden to fetch her. But apparently she has groccnn tired of wait- ing for them, for, as they enter the dors tered. enceinte, they see her advancing•to Meet them. e "i would not lie left alone with hini at night for ' the wealth of the Indies," Elizabeth is saying, with a half -nervous laugh—"Oh, mammy, you would never have forgiven me if I had let you gow]thotlt seeing bile 1• Why, what is this?"—With a sudden change of key- "what has happened?" For as they draw xlear.Ip Mrs. Le Merchant they see that her walk is a staggering one, and that the us ally healthy, clear pallor of her face is exohangerl for livid white- ness.. "Whet is it, darling l" cries Elizabeth, in an accent of terror. "Oh, Sim, she is going to faint 1" hi ;the agi- tation of the Moment sho has uncon- sciously returned to the familiar ad- dress which- she used always to deploy towards hire in their boy -and -girl days. "Put. ydur arm round her on that side, £ can hold her tip' on this', Let us gat her back to the camp -stool." - A canlp-stool is':.:•'Uhes, an easy nor '°, ALL DRUGGIST,".: 50c. AND $1.00. ' ' a 400044004400044440410 ."Novel' -never 1" replies the girl in a heart -rent voice, raining kisses on her mother's while face.- "Oh,- darling, dar- 11ng,., what. has ;happened to you ?" Perhaps it is through the vivifying rain of those warm kisses, but a little color' is certainly beginning to steal back into rho ' elder woman's cheek, and she draws a long breath, "Oh, if she could have, a glass of wa- ter!" -cries Elizabeth, greedily, verifying these slight signs of returning con- seiousnoss. 'Vet her a glass of water 1 Oh, please get her a glass of water— quick ! (Mick 1" T3urgoyne •tomplies, though it- is not without h'eluctant misgivings that.. he draws the ellicacious support of his owr solid arm, and leaves Elizabeth's poor little limb to bear the whole weight of her mother's inert body. Their ,guide has, as before mentioned, disappeared; and Jim has not the slight- est hien :in which direction to seek him. It is five -good minutes before he dis- covers him, Standing near the door of the monastery, in - conversation with a visitor who. is apparently just in the act or departure. The stranger is in clerical dress; and as ho turns to nod farewell to the monk, Jim. recognizes :fn his fea- tures those of the Devonshire. clergy-. Man, whom he had last seen, and so un- willingly heard, by the well -brim of the flellosguarda Villa. In a second a, light has flashed into his mind. Mrs. Lo Mer- chant, too, has seen that sirapger-has seen him for the first time for ten years,. since it is evident that:: the recognition of mother and daughter in the Via Tor- nabuoni, to which the Moat's late rec- tor had referred, could not have been reciprocal. It is to the fact of her hav- ing been brought suddenly and unpre- paredly face to face with that mysterious past, which seems to be `always block- ing his own path to her friendship, that is to be attributed the . poor woman's collapse.. A rush of .puzzled. compassion flows 'over • him tis he realizes the fact, and his one impatient wish is to return with all speed. he may to the forlorn couple he has left,- to reassure them as to the removal(eventhough it may only be a temporary one) out of their path, of the object of their unexplained terror. Will the mother have imparted to lier child the cause of her fainting, or will she have tried to keep it froyh her? The first glimpse he gats, when, hav- ing at length procured the desired glass of water, he comes into sight of them, answers the question for .him. Mrs. Le Marchant is ,evidently recovered.. She is silting up, no longer supported by .her daughter'''s arm, . and that daughter is -lying •ort her knees, with her head buried in her mother's lap. As he nears them, he sees the elder' woman hurriedly pressing her daughter's arm towetrn her Every Leaf is Full of Virtua � Every Infusion ip eliciotos CEYLQN . GREEN TEA. Has such a fine flavor that you will use I always after a triad. Lead packets only.' 40o, 50o and 60o per Ib. At all groo:re. of his approach, and Elizabeth obedient- ly lits her face. But such a face 1 fie can scareely believe it is the same that laid itself -hardly less bbooniily lair than they—against the faint peony buds half an hour ago; a face out of which the irinecent glad shining ihas been blown by some gust of brutal wind -scared, blanched; miserable. • "Oh, yos, I am: better, much better— quite well, in fact," says Mrs. Le Mer- chant, pushing away the offered glass, and speaking with a ghastly shadow of her former -oven cheerfulness. .` 0-ive it to Elizabeth, she needs it more that's I dot You see, 1 gave her a terrible fright 1" (To be continued); • . ,.�... .• OLDEST DIAMOND FIELDS. Kohinoor Probably Caine From 'chem ,About J50 Years Ago. In a recent .report of the geological survey' of India .there is an interesting account of the farina diamond fields of Central India. Ilistorically this coun- try is believed to be the original home et_ the diamond, and from them it is sup- posed that the famous Kobinoor was extracted some three and a half centuri- es ago; the .earliest diamonds. dating some twenty-five years .previously. Of late years India has quite retired from the field es a precious stone pro- ducer to an extent or value, but from the account given it should be worth. the while of a small syndicate to telae up these diamonds,, says the Pioneer, and work there systematically, though it is said that neither in lustre nor price do the stones found compare wlth the yield of the South African fields. , The methods, however, now in vogue mean merely superficial treatment, fol. - `lowing the lines which have been in vogue for centuries, with the probable result that the strata containing the most valuable deposits of stones are not reached. From a geological : point of view there are said, to be diamond bear- ing conglomerates over several areas, which would admit of deep shaft sink leg, and systematic hnining under com- petent control being carried on profitab- ly. S'roluhis ABOUT WORDS,, Curious Origin of . Words Cur s 0 Sl and Phrases Commonly Used. • According to. etymology` 'a "retail grocer" as it used to :be spelt, is really a trader "in gross'—that is to say, in; • large quantities, wholesale. English- rnen 01 other days spoke of "grossers of ash" and "grossers Of wine," and en act of Edward EL, expressly mentions that '"grossers dealt ill ail, reamler el goods. In those days "spoer" was the word for "grocer" in the modern sense. But; it happened that.tlie Grocers': Com- pany, founded in the fourteenth cen• fury; speeialized in spicery, and .90 "gro- cer" gradually took the place of "spieer." "Blatherskite is generallyTown:dead as an American word, but its origin is Scotch, 'really lha old "bleteerskate," Cram "blether," to. talk nonsense > (old 'Norse "bladhe," nonsense) anal "skate," a term of opprobrium. In the song, "Maggie Lauder," written about '1651), occur ,14he words, "Jag on your gait, ye 1betherskate"; and (this song was a very popular one in the ?merican camp dea- th the war of independence. Hence the vogue of the expressive word„ "in its . Araericanized for.n. "Bletherumskitc," was rho Irish version early in the 'nine- teenth century. "Etiquette" is a French word which origtnaliy meant a label . indicating the price or quality the English "ticket"— and in old French ryas usually special- ized to inchin "a soldier's billet,. • The phrase"that's the ticket" stows the change of the present moaning of Man- ners acoording to code. Burke solemn- ly olemnly explained -that "etiquette had its ori- ginal application to those ceremonies and formal observances practiced at courts. The term Caine afterward to signify certain 'formal methods used ia. the • transaotions between sovereign States." Sergeant-Isfhjor: "Now, Private Smith you know- very well none but officers and non-conmlissioned officers are al. lowed .to walk achoss this grams." .Pri. vale Smith: "But= Sergeant -Majora 1'v< 'Captain Graham's verbal orders Sergeant-Major : "None o' that, sir Show rue the captain's verbal orders i h0w'n1, t0 nip, sir t'' ality in Farm Ma Are you interesteu in Farm Machinery? If so, the above illustration must appeal to you. It shows the, fine new plant or The Frost Sc Wood Company, Limited, at Smith's Falls, Ontario, in which'the famous Quality Lane of Agricultural Implements is built. About a year ago,fire destroyed our Manufacturing Plant and these are the buildings we have erected to re- place it. The demand from all pai'is of the Dominion far our machinery was so urgent that we have erected a plant of Double the Capacity of our former one. That means thatiyou. areassured of tkne highest grade of Machinery and Prompt Delivery. Everything ,about our plant is new and right up to date. A better and more -111VA IVA Jegia 01 iu3Ludrnbe uaepotu able experience in the construction • of Agricultural Imple- ments, will enable us to put into your hands Machines of the highest grade. FR{QST & WOOD. machinery is used by Canada's best and most prosperous farmers—you cannot do better than follow their example. They, Are Getting Satisfaction And So Can You. We have the goods, and if you will give us an opportunity,, we will prove that they cannot' be surpassed by anyon tht market. .Every machine that•aeaves our factory Is puaranteed =we never ask a marl to keep anything that is not sa factory. Our agents are in -every secliori of the country and tier information•.they and our travellers can give you, .witl prove useful, Whether you want: machinery now or not, We mit always glad to answer que,,tion. about any • of out gouda Cet in touch with 'Us --Lour experience may prove valrlault to you. Prop us a card asking for catalogue "R"—we will also send you ono at our handsome 1907 calendars. Head Office and Works. re- rl