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The Brussels Post, 1891-10-23, Page 3Om. 23, 1191, 011 The Wing, Sweet Summer',3 avail 1 Ah, ye Soutlestneelng swallows, Rath the day come then for mayltig (loud bye/ lei), than, ye rovIno :Tow ! Windt will :mono oc ytni lifity to bravo IV int ov 1 hrongh d Neither would 1: Swea Wns the snug. Singer, j ton: as you sang 11 oneo; kindles 10 the lip, you brought tears to the eye; "Sing, sing ngein," wo sighed, Lightly yeu turned 161111 0, "Wise little witch!" I cried, Neither would 1 l Pass round Lilo tankerd, boys, while the tap news foe yo, Mad, merey hearts, let the foarffingjest fly1 out in Ilfo's burning sun, 0100. with 0 mums work done, Wuuld 601 1(1>00 missed the fun, Neither weuld How 1 lo the revel done Bedtime alreadv. Ntiree Ayo, Soma:, now 00)1160 1,110 sweet hush•n-byol Cool the freali piliow lies, He that, shun.: weary oyes Would not sleep otherwise, Neither would 11 ANGUS AND JOAN THE BRUSSELS POST. 3 111.1111161=101 .011114111302Elig41.141•111{0911116111914.6ttlpillil would, tdullc oil to l.;,o mut our czytanti begun the (amp, Ile. and unable to sneak..•knoWio, 100, OW 411 BURYING' HIS BAUBILOR LIFE. the heather. had ovule a mintake In bringing hon. trout ifieriog before ter— .1 inidenetiv,•ly de. tee the first he skewed a profoued contempt vi,,y thing 1 .111W,!0 19 14,1%11 11,y 011111111M Or 11 Ereece elleeninn Wfs. The very day before I left there happened to be a, turfing/sr tiff than usual, so 1 1,11- ler the traffic, mud beforo Mug we got inte When he erept around the rock to timsh not Wen About do me Married, hayed him on to the brae, sat 111/1011 by hti places where it was 0 tossmp whether we ')I 1 simply 11111 my hatel ant. looked Cilw I )eintal., It highly respeetable member Mae, lit my pipe, muldiseourced to him 1.1o, were to pi headloog 000>111*' 10000 11 11 m ol)'nlily 1> he face. li 16441 the lint al'ormpaa„ writ", a parb., a brother, I flattered inytlelf 1 eauld put or eitiele Isnemdeop in the Idiotic peat mud, time our t,,t es had )300.,- and the effect wan madders right, in a jitly by simply pointing MOO pant t hat !roe 'Mooting lodge we need eleetriedl, lie paused, he gasped, The Mit, With my superior worldly experunee, that the boot girl's were ni ways wayward and flighty, and every inie of then) fond of showieg off holm streamer... An for Joan, everybody know her to res trim an steel, and I mnild ansWer for my friend being the very soul of honor, I thought this would mend the rift, but I am not sure it did not, widen it. " Any way, master, he replied gloomily, " will bo a very avenge thing that Mr. Burgon has taken half .11 dozen sketchee of her—aye, and more—unbeknown to me, and yet she wan miler for having the pho- tograph taken, neer 8eo you :low ! Thera she stands brazening it oat with him at the door That will by a strange thing, too, whateffer 1" " Pooh 1 That is just because she knows you nate watehing her. That's the way with them. Man alive 1 can't you see that if oho slid not care for you, she would not be taking her fah off you ?" " Fun 1" he cried, manrn10113, ; " and you think it will be right thet she should be takieg her fun 011 mo before 81431,000m 'not will be what [she tvould be doing the now. I ask you, mister, how you would like it ?" " Yon must net eall us strangers, Angus," " 3.1 is the stranger that has acme between us," he droned on mournfully, without heed- ing my words. " ISTeffer before has it hap- pened. Tho gentlemen have boon hero to shoot, and 10 810,116, arid she noires. bad a word for them. Neese before has the stranger come between us, and now—" All this time he hod never once taken his eyes off the inn door ; and just then, as Bur - gen and Joan disappeorod stopped abruptly and strode down after them. Joan opened lire the moment we got into the bar parlor. Something that Angus had said to her before he took refuge on the hill was evidently ranidiug in her broast—f or a more wilful, perverse, irritating young per: son then Miss Joan was then could not have been forted in her Majemty's dominions. Purposely ignoring Angus's presonoe, she laughed and giggled and tattled on bow she would dress as the real Derthula, aud be taken on the mountain side with a dirk in her hocid. Would Me. Burgun not like to make another sketch of her then and there by the window, with the sunlight flickering in? What tho minx could do to irritate and drive Angus mad with joelousy she did ; and when at last he interposed by saying gruffly they had had enough of picture melt- ing, she at once resented his assumption of proprietorship by turning on him like a tigress, and saying with a fine gesture of disdain : " Look yon to yourself, Mister Maolean, and I will look to myself 1" " I've a mind to be taking you at your word, my lass I" said be, jumping up and turning polo. "Go your ways and don't • my lass '1118," she retorted, just as red as he was white. Angus bounced out. "Don't be a fool," 861)1 1, following him, " The stranger has come between us, and let 1310 stranger look to hisself ;" and with this lie clapped on his bonnet and marabed off to Inveroran. This was by. no means the end of therm, pus. When .E returned Miss Joan was en- gaged tooth and nail with her 110010—so fiercely, too, that Burgon and I 1)801 )> hasty vetreat. Hell an hour later the battle fin ished by the cart drawing up at the door, dunl Miss Joon, still defiant, being driven off with her box to her mother's house at Ballaelmlish. I was sorry the row had run ta this length, but Burgon mado light of it. "Never fent," ho sang ant cheerily when said gond bye to him next day ; " Vapour oil on the troubled waters Patience and gumption will do it ; Dud what is more, my boy," he added, waving his ban1 toward the grey horizon, " I shall walk across that moor." And to mo, ma drove off, this same mom looked more terribly dreary and inhospit- able then ever. In the course of a week came a letter, Things went just the same. He had done his level best, but could do no good with the sulky lovers. The weather too, was on the change, so altogether he began to think he had better make tracks for the South. A fortnight later omne anethor, this time from Bonn. Business had called .1thn there, and there he would likely remain for a month er more, When he got back he would let me know. Weeorrosponded occasionally, but it was not until the Spring. was well advanc: ed and Rannoah Moor had almost Blipped out of ray memory that I got a. note asking me to dine with him that evening in Jer- tnyn Street, If I had met Burgon in the street I should not have known blin, so hideously altered was be. From Beauty Burgon" had become something like lingo's " L'Ilomme qui Rit," His features were contorted by a curious cicatvix on the cheek, which drew up ono of.rner of his mouth into a permaneno grin. The lower eyelid, too, Wne drown 6I0N011 and everted. So transfigured was ho that for a time I could only hold his hand and stare, " You shall boar ea aliout it presently," told he, oheerily. After dinner I had it out, chapter and verS0, " \Ye must go back to the time when I wrote you. my last letter from King's House,' he began, "In that I told you I had failed in making 1110 sweethearts bet- ter -tempered, I tried, but Limy shirked me, Angus WM having a &inking bout at Inver- oran, where he maundered on in his' oups about the r tromger that had come between him and his Joan, Joan wits stubboth, 'so there wo were—Angns on one side, Joan on the other, and I the i nnoeent cause of it n.11, stranded between them. .As I :Auld do no good, the best course for mo was to make myself seam. I was determined to walk across that moor. though 1 I knew it WaS lcmg tral, end not a very lively one in Coneema.1,aa? made iny calculations, sent my luggage on to Perth, and timed it with tho greatest nicety, Well the 'Vevy evening before I Imre° tvrallt by smutting th 43101100 fl'0111 fere tV4, 1001 1f111111 111101111111 1/1' ini1013 11,11 1 a 000lome's dirk )V.111t1 1,11 I believe it was liurgon a handsome Mee that first attraeted me, He etood so near 1110 at the Blade that I could hot help teking stock of him, and so ovivy dav became more aware of the faultless shape his features and the utter badness of his drawing. Being rich, friendless, and a trifle " stand-offish," he was at once invested by the other fellows with 1411 absurd halo 01 103(0181'>', Ho wee a Nihilist who bad joined the class for some inscrutable and deadly objeot, a German Prince, a hinatic ; short, enything, but. what he really was—the son of a welt -to-do dry -salter, who bad died, leaving him a hendsome fortune. The only inistake Bev- gon pere had mado was in sending his son to be edueated at 13nun without giving him the ohance of keeping ep home Mends. Ile ame back to his patrimony knowing no one, end Was so completely isolated in his dainty suite of rooms in :1 ormyn 8 trent that he could not make enough of me and my visits. I liked lam ; so, from fellow workers, we became close comptinions—bot his art was amentable I • He talked well, but it seemed an ab- solute impossibility for him to expreas himself either with brush or pencil. The failure was complete, and he knew it—not only knew it, but felt it keetily ; for, with all his airy nonchalance and all that seem- ingly reckless contempt with which he spoke about, art, he was a true poet at heart, and ono who reverently regarded the true func- tion of the utast. I believe he would have bartered his good oks and fortune for the pewee to give one 11111)11)10 protest against the landscepe nting of the day, but he could not ; and it seemed as if, by some sport of ohanee, his handsome head had been placed on his shoulders by way of compensation. 3.1 worried him aud set him at odds with the world, and the world dubbed him a cynical, conceited fellow, posing for a particular sort of sympathy, which had to be evolved on purpoee foe him. As matter of foot, a more un- selfish, tender-hearted fellow than 13urgon never breathed. But he fretted over his failures. " I'm sick of this 1" he said one day to me at the Royal Acadomy—" sick of exhibi- tions, sick of London ! there is not s, picture here tbet raiiieS a genubie emotion within you. The pity of 11 1" .And, pray, what's the use of bothering about it ? Round it oomos every year like. O remorseless tovthre, and nine-tentlis of the men you speak to about it persist in mistak- ing dexterity for genius. Let us get auto! it, Let ns do Batmen& Moor, as we said we would, where there is space, freedom, and reality." We had. harboured a, theign on this big, desolate, eniteMtInsway moor for many a day. Now the day had come. I too was sick of Lonlon, and longing to gel into sketching quarters. So it, happened that a week later wo were in the tiny inn at Fing's Home, with Glencoe and Glee Etive on one side of us and our dreary limitless space of moss and wider on the other. Bergen had never been in Scotland before. He knew the romantic part auto history— its poetry and wild legends. Ho know the shameful story ot Glencoe and the touching old Celtic romance connected with Glen Etive, but I doubt if he could have told whether these glens wersteen the east or west side of Scotland ; and as for the people he had es much notion of them as he hall of Laplanders. Had he known them better and understood the spirit, of their proud nationality—their independence and fierce jealousy—he might have kept his good looks and never become O painter, .At King's House the moor he had come 500 miles to see wits at once forgotteu the superior attractions of the hills and Wen Btive. The wild glen, with its purple conies, brawling Mums, and romantic associations, fascinated him. He was °razed about it. He would people it with the SODS of 'Mee- naoh and point out triumphantly to mo how 'the old Gaelic names ot certain spots corroborated the truth of the legends. He got Celtic romance on the brain. It was 0 ileW field for the artist. We were in the midst of tho veritable backgrounds, and lo 1 here was a living Darthula end a living Najd in the persons of Joan, our landlord's niece, and young Angus, the forester. With rod -hot enthusiasm lie made friends with these two lovers end planned innumer- able pictures with them in the foregromaL There Wag little to be sold against Burgon makieg studies for his Darthula, but when it had gone on for a couple of weeks T. boom to have misgivings. intW that this sante countrified Miss Joan was a true daughter of Eve—a ' born ooquette. No seasoned young lady of May- fair (mad have played off the handsome young stranger against her somewhat dour swootheat with more skill and dexterity than she. Moue then onoe I had seen Angus scowl and ling savagely ot his beard, and the more he scowled and tugged the more saucily With jean smiled and chattered nonsense to Burgon about his pictures. In these pictures, too, Bergen became mote deeply buried evoey day—more patient on posing and drawing his heroine, and more elaborate in the details of the rain -beaten hills thitt wore to form his background. Ho had a fine time 0( 11, and the weather was glorious. But ovary day the dreary moot. we had come so 1st for the express plumose of crossing, and as 3(01 11011 scarcely sot a foot on, Beamed to confront 118 IVith a sort of menaoe. It so happened 1 nom did oross it, foe wo had scerco entered upon our third week when I WM hastily summoned back by tho death of a relative. Now the little comedy OA WU going on had been fine fun for overt/hotly but Angus:, night, Oantonts elmuls were mottling on s. '1 len, determined to make an end of it, and Angus'e temper not being of the bland- Buchaillo letive—the day looked ugly, and If Ant up my beok and WM in the act of est, the 140441013011 00011 110041010 10111414 poll.. So did .(1.110.10, His red oyes, 111%ton:toil clipping off the rook when he sprang on nio tioians term " etrained," Aligns was a Marl b000d, and refilAcen illeVementS told of like cat and Bent me sprawling on tho you could neither reason with noe chaff. At oight's debauch. Thero was no drawing ground with the blood gushing from rt: big fled be mado a sorry pretense of laughing back, though. Tin was in a feverish haste it off. Then Ito sulked, aud now, 11 flouted to start, and before 8 o'clock 100 had sob 10 0)13' mit 10 the distuneo, It simply beccine murder dreim„,i ej ,,y„ mid gm, 4.4 01003 of imp, 5101p, 141141 j1111111, 101 40, 14104'0 40 11061 40'. 11 00y 01 1061,40 the easional exit it spurt to ...leer the num:items „.,„ („1. „„ 0„t, 110 little burns that croseed 006 140111. 1`10W 360 eh:telt:el Ilei /WW1, Owl 11:10113, full ou Ino would Menai, some height and vetch eight ef knee, mid prayed, thome lovely little lochlets you perm " atrauge eerie sight it was to see this flaehing at the foot of the Black Mount, big red:bearded fellow kneeling bareheaded Then WO would suddenly descend iuto it there on the moor, praying loudly te Cod sable sea 01 >11008, with the rugged purple io hie Coolie toegue for forgi venoms for the tops of the Untruth range pooping over the terrible act, I could not take in/ eyos Ulf horizon. Tho stomper we got into the moult, him. So extraordinarily picturesque W110 the wilder and weirder beesune our surround, 11, that for a minute or two 1(1011)0113' forgot. loge. No sign of life 1 Truly this a wonder- any pain and danger in watching Mtn, Those ful place 1 Not till you get is, to the midst. of few minutes made him a changed man ! The it, far out of the Icon of Gen, Wade and crisis hail cleared hie brain 00,1 taken hint Mr. Miteadain, do you recoguize its ex- out of himself. If e saw with eliudder the Unordinary beauty, Quite suddeoly you awful ptt he had escaped, :del was quivoriog seem to recognize the truo meaning of with reniorse When he mgain approached urea] perimeetive ; quite suddenly you 1160 me, 001110011 Led with 1101V 1061118--1401V M11011100 " He would not take my hand, but he of color tool a broad, digit Hied simplicity of looked me full in the face as I spluttered out broken horizontal lines which fill you with my words through a montlifol of blood. delight and despair. " Anges 1' said 1, " I would sonner you loll find contrasts In the 111.1ge rounded cut my throat, hove—now-11M be the crowns of golden sphagnum and gaunt blackguard you hinted at 1" bleached tree trunke, sticking out of the " ' W11138 mad 1 ay, mad that w:11 be black peat like fossil bones. In that huge what I wpm I and now I will be thoultful to spew they seem (0 0(1)361>1 to yon att 1111.111000 take your hand, Sir." mementoes of the past. cm must remember " One word more, Angus 1 Joan most that this moor is near a thousand feet above 0eget knew you doubted her,' semlevel, and a, fair 'trudge of twenty miles ‘" You will be the better num, Mr. l3u.r. must and west. To me on that novemto-be ! you will be furry much the bettor forgotten day, when we were practically man than me whateffer. I was ined, the lost on it:, and the inereasing gloom blotted drink moths lcilling tny brain—but I will be out the distance, it seemed a huge waste, for believing you the now, and I will bo for gashed through ita centre by a chain of thanking the good God that He has spared stagnant pools linked together by sinuous me the, gm. channels, and that the only thine on it " With thio he proeeeded to help me up. were the mahoganymolored treat thatanoved lt, was an ugly gash, but fortunately the lazily oft' when we came suddenly upon the bleeding had ceased. My shoulder had come pitch -like water, to grief too, in the fall, but Angus was equal " Now all this time Angus strode off to the occasion, It WaS 1101 the first time without uttering kb single word. He never by many that he had doctored a wottuded even vouchsafed an answer if i spoke. He man in the open. So, with tny handkerchief simply sloughed steadily aheaq, taking n deftly bound consul my face, and his necktie beed itte duo east. regardless of any track and ronnd my arm by way of a sling, I managed utterly oblivious to my peesenee. 1 noticed to stagger up oriel prospect the situation his suppressed exeitement, end began to with him, think what a lively lefficout it, would be ., Curiously enough, after that blackest to be alone in the middle of the moor with a part of the dity the mists began to lift off man 'leadenly clutched with the homes or the face of the 11100r, the sunlight struggled D.T. I saw he was bound to become trouble- through the thin clouds, and from a neigh- SOIlle, 101 4 4110 leers of his becomingclangerous boring height we joyfully 0i8N6 that we were novee mitered ley head. Anyhow, the suoner 0001 the end of the long, dreary Loch Lydon NVO got *0 001' jotteney's end the better, so I and very close to the lost track. We had let him forge ahead, little dreaming that come further than wo thought. Angus's with every step his Muddled brain was friend, the keeper, lived within five miles of planning murder. us, so We at mum determined to make for " The day oarkened. The miets fell and his cottage and there rest, instead of at. crept. uncannily past us, Ulutting 011b the tempting to push on to Loch Rannock. distance, and inalcMg queer forme which Cleaver and. clearer grew the day every step seemed to sway to and fro in the foreground, we took, At tho end of Loch Lydon we got One moment Angus's figure would dwindle the lost peep of our Glencoe hills. There away in the fog, and in the eetet loom out they were ' Shepherds and Sisters," in gaunt and gigantic like some gray monster. cloudless blue aganst a saffron sky 180 clear Suddenly lie stopped, I thought to pause 04 now that I could oven make 006 617 hack - little for the fog to lift, so that we might, grounds. Henceforth the scene was to make regain the traCk. We were M the very a tragic little chapter in my life. heart of the I0000—in,1 sort of .place where " We plodded on slowly, and presently it seemed as if the face of It had been 00010 upon Loch. Eaghach, where I was savagely torn off to the bone, leaving bare dimly conseious of oazy pictures of rocks, patches of it bleeding and rotting before us, reeds, scrubby birches, and poaching heroes, Stretching away in themist V.01$ an irregular. all reflected in the shallow water. There shaped umbermolored depression, broken by mit wky lagged through what appeared to huge round bosses of yellow.red.andmiay me an interminable group of huge de - sphagnum and bleached skeleton teem tacked rocks, looking for all the world like trunks. Hero and there a few vivid patches the buried ground of some nitans of old. of grass sprung up amid the pnr.ple rooks Angus called them the ' riddlings of crest - and scanty heather. Put all this on the Lion.' Then at the next turn came tho wel- rich brown•black peaty wound you painted come sight of the keeper's cottage, and once so muoh of up there, aud 34011 may form inside it WaS not long before I got rid of some ides, of its weirdness. So weird, so some of my travel stains and tumbled to beautiful, so extraordinary was it, WI 1.11 4110 boa, mist wreaths hanging about it, that, ill spite s, mutt kindnoss could de 1001016001]> for of the discom(ort, 1 jumped on to a dry the mishap, Angus and that good fellow, rock tun) began to jot down tho points in my the keeper, dist ; but the gash in my cheek sketch book, did not h ealkindly, so I cuuningly resolved to " .1 never fittished that sketch, but, you'll slip quietly across t 1 Bonn, where I happen soon know why the place has so bitten it- to have a doctor friend mighty skillful in self into my memory. Mee wounds. I went to Leith, pieking up "I date eay you will say I ought to have my leggago at Perth en voute. My friend known that a wild nature like Angns's did eat make a good job of me, as yona can could not be judged by our standard—that see, mg account is that 00100 of the nerve the passions run ou swifter and more direct branches W060 severed, and that this, own - linos up them in Glencoe than they do here billed with the , shock,' has lad to pmenam in London, anel that Angus, silent and ent disfigurement." receptive, was the very sort of it mau to " You don't seem to care nauth about:It,' brood over and magnify his troubles till said I, whon he finished, they mastered him. Perhaps I out to have " I don't care 011011011 ! Besides, I have known. Anyway, it was peocisely what gained something. I have made a, friend of happened. He brooded and drank, and Angus r drank and brooded, over the loss of hie " He has given you a souvenir, at all Joan in that little inn at Inveroran, till he events,. thought It was a right and proper thing to " He has—you ere leaning against it I revenge himself ou the stranger ' that had Ho bad seen 111 Joan and he are married, and I found that come between ' them.' y red door skin waiting for me here on my I 3. i to leave and. walked. over 1 : I hell o and see them But return. It Is their peace offering. One of luggage pass Invororan, found out. wheu and respondent, was tine week to be married to NI Ile, Anna Terrier, a pretty laundry tnahl. On the ON Haul day tho 1461410, Wall 1106 " Wituesn," Went to the Mairie itecording Lo the arrangement, shortly heifer,' 11 o'clock. 5100011 0 11100k 0141.110k, 4.11011 11110, then 1 1 : 30, mid so on till 1 o'clock in the after. eon», and there was no sign of the bride. grunt)). There was nothiug foe it but to go home agate, the bride sobbing bitterly in the 'meantime. At last it was suggested that. the giere relations should go and hunt lip the trnant wooer. They did ao, and found Mtn asleep at his lodgings, snoriug loudly. First they shook him, he made not the slightest eigu of awakening ; then they pinched his arms with no move satiafactory result, 00 that more energetic. measures were recommended, A feather NVIIS 434 1W8t in hie nostrils, his feet were tickled, brown paper was burnt undee his nose, his hair was pulled, and then by way of a elimax Homebody shouted in Ids ear : "Here is the inspector," levets this, however, did not have the de- sired 6011111 1, no Out the attempt to wake '6110 sleeper had lo be abandoned, It was not until I I o'clock at night that he began to open his eyes, to late too fulfil his matte. moitol en.,,elgemeut. llis explanation was very simple, The night before there had been a lit tle festivity at his lodgings, when Ito " buried "1110 bachelor life, and tt cruel practical joke had been played upon him. He had been drugged by one of him eompati. ions, The weddieg, if the fates are propiti- ous, will take place soon. low WU go lig 111050 1103*01 s the hill to seo about it. ,1 don't befleve he noiv I have told you my story, I want you had any definite object in coming. He was to look at my work." simply impelled by the general idea of I was fairly staggered by what he showed having it, out ' mo. And my unfortun- me, so clItTerent, was it from the old, halt. ate invitation, given 011 1.110 01404. of the ing, incomplete, and undecided stuff he moment out of pure good will offered him an used to produce. Whether it W110 that dor. lilleXp:setecl mud tempting olutece of carrying Mg that, terrible half-hour on the moor out his murderous vendetta in the heart some tension had bean removed, and the of the moor. .• power he had so long and earnestly striven "Even when) he broke his long silence and for came to 1)101 then withont effort, I don't began droning on about his fancied vice alio°, know. Certainly, however those sketches I had no ideti ho moaut mischief. I °haired never would have bean recognized as his. him and made light of it, About the worst There N1'05 all 311[101)00(1001 thotglit abont thing I oould have done 1 It was adding insult thorn—a hoe yet deliberate method of 06- 10 funny, and piling on eel to his smoulder- pressing the motive, The touch was no ing passion. .As his rage increased, ho got no lougur meaningless, the hand. worked up and began to pace monotonously by the with the brain now, rook on which 1 sat. When I looked up front them to his hap- " Ay 1" he said, never once looking me py though disfigured face, I knew Ina flash in the face, mud addressing his words to the why lie said he did not cave, barren space around no, " there will 1)0 00>110 Burgon was going to be a painter. that are so clean. that they will be laughing ot their oleffeeness ; hut tho time will be Founded. on Fact, coining when they will be °leer no more, and laughing no more Before the strangoe The old belief that rats will leave a doom. 001>10 and oast his evil eye on her, wass there ed ship seems to be blinded on fact. It is offer a word between ? Wass she offer well known that when, a few years ago, a for havering and chattering with the gentle- Canadian steamer WaS about leaving her men like other lassos? Wass oho offer for wharf, Clio rats' on boarll were seen leaving having the picture taken %Vass she env her by the cables and rope's, and every pots - for Routing tne 111>0 that would be knowing Bible means of escape. Some persons on her sinoe she was a 1000.11 1 me, too, that board 811004 and accepted the omen. Having would be epeaking ber mother—ay, and full faith in the wonderful 1110110ot of the to Broadffibarie hisself—about the 001101)0 01 dopartitut rodents, they caused their luggage, stowed on board, to be sent ashore, 101 6110 steamer sail withoat them, and saved their 'lives, for the 01111) 10001 down with almost every soul on board. It is iwell authenti. ealed, that rats will leave a doomed house, Tho wayfarer on a dark night is sometimes startled at meeting a teoop of these animals marching in. regular order from .isonto dwel- ling, their former homes and be will be 'much snore startled in a short timo Lo hoer of the destruution of the habitation by some elemontarwatt, or of 80010 fright. MI crime committed there, or the arrest of the family head for tho perpetration of some dark deed, perhaps long cemented. Some have also 'saved themselves front n. terrible fete by taking warping betimes NOM the omen of Om departing rat, Thus was it, as is well known, with tho rats In the house of Eugene Aram, that left ill a body hut, the eight before tho ()alcove I he 111W had neized him, to expiate on the gallows a lung hidden Thustit,was rIVene 01 LIW Coonars before fiesaminitif tq.liis Noe kende. Uwe.% thitS, 100, Wftlt i:los "Half stamped, unable to raise myself 1, of England, and with others, Smudging Verses Frost. The harvest of 1891 has demonstrated more clarly thau ever the inlinetine import - once of every effort being niedo to discover some means of neutralising the effect at frost upen the crops. Many plans have been suggested and many theories advanced, but so far they have been largely of a epee- lative nature and laek the authority of sat- isfactory results. Among the most popular of tho methods suggested is that of " smudging" the crops, which in reality moans smoking them. This has been tried by a large number of the farmers in Mani. tabs and Dakota, but their reports as to ist effect has been so contradictory that, it is as yet impossible to say whether tho plan is really beneficial or not. The mode usually adopted for smudging Is to place heaps of damp straw and manure at short distancee along the north and northwestern sides of the field, those being the quarters from 10111011 frost is most generally expected. When the fak- ing thermometer indicates the near approach if frost, these heaps are ghted, creating a dense smoke, which, spreading across the field, hangs over the wheat like tt pall. The idea is that the smoke, beinp, nomeonduct. or, is impeevious to the influence of frost and that it tends also to increase the tem- perature, thus saving the grain. How much truth these is in this theory 11 (8 as yet difficult to say. Some farmers state that the nights when frost is most to be feared are generally colm and still, and, as there is little or no breeze, it is impossible to get the smoke to spread, so that, in suet). cases smudges are quite useless. On the other hand, if the breeze is at all. strong, it is said that the dangee of frost is greatly lessened, if indeed it is not neutralised al- together. The variations of temperature are also so extremely rapid in 51anitobit (the thertnometer being known to vary eight degrees within an hour! that farmers are often at a loss'to know -when to light their smutiges, fearing to start them early in the night lest their full power 011001,1 be. lost he. fore the critieal time arrives, and equally afraid that by hesitating to do so !hey may lot Gm frost do its work This diffieulty 06049, however, overcome to 51)00111 extent by the Portage la Prairie farmers, who adopted the novel plan of flashing an electric light from tho top of one of their grain elevators whenever the Cl 3vernment obserVatory thermotneter indicated a danger of frost. Thouountry being flat thereabouts, these signals were seen for miles across the plains, giving the anxious farmers timely notiee, Ent all this is only labor in vain unless it can be thoroughly established that smoke prevents er diminishes frost, It has become an imperative necessity that steps should be taken to solve thisproblem, The Dominion Government could not do bettor than take the matter in hand and appoint seieniste to make proper tests of the smudg- ing premiss, (tiny woat mr, but it had to be done. I " You 4460 talking arrant nonense,, Angus." • " Ay 1 one mister will be wiling nonsense and another mister will be calling. started, who should appear bat Mr. Angus I It fun 1 Fine fun to be 'saying soft words to was glad to 800 the men --right glad to her behind my hack, and misleading het' think he had come book to his sense's, and with fair promises. Fine ftm bo Bending that now we should paet without eny bad 10e to Ino proven and her to 13allaehttlish. blood between us. 140 much so that RS 8he eau fake the sthainee fine there majohs shook hands with I pressed him to the mister in London. 011, ay that was 001115 001,000 1110 Meer WWI me. Not that I wanted. a gnide,. but I thought it would tickle his vanity to be asked. So it did. There woe a little hesitation, a wild. look or two to the right and left but fitially he as- mentod, "I told you the weather NVOS 011 1110 change. When I woko tho glens were blaelt very clear, whatellet. 1" " Imust own to being angry as he atopped eudelonly before mo and hissed. Mit those last words without rathing his eyes to mine, You're a blitehguard to talk like that 1" said I holly. " If you weren't, sodden with drink ou weuld be ashamed of yourself." wound in mymbeek. 111.1110111 .1119141054104161111016111144110011110 FUNNY NAMES, Curious Prsenemens Itemlowtd !Own Their^ children by British Pore:At& A Somerset house elerk hats lately declar- ed that the million of hie labor on the rogie- try of birth:: and deellim is often relieved by coming.acrosn a litunorone justapositton of Hamm. There is, indeed, a good deal of humor in the Somerset house registry, the fun consisting in an odd 01' b0.61.0160U8 (tope- caticm ef 114111100, For hours the eye of the zlerk 10111 (001(1 over reams of doll propriety in well names as Henry Withon, Georges Williams, or Samuel Smith, and then the face 0) 11>0 clerk will become:0d with a smile ae he comes 006000 " Ether" for the front name attached to tho surname of " Spray." I may yearn strange, but it is certainly true, that entered in the books is " footbath," which 'must he written in capitals, Foot liath," ad really the name of a fellow -crea- ture. " River Jordau" is another ease in point. Mr. Jordan had. a ehild to name, and, like a free born liriton, lie claimed his right to name it as he ph:toted. Unfortum ately the mane Ile selected has left the sex of the child rather doubtful, Mr. " An - thistle" had a daughter to name, and. he must be forgiven for giving bee the ffiristlan names Hose Shamrock." " Rose Shamrock Alithistle" in youug lady whose nacos: must please any patriotic Man Another happy father who gave his in- tuit:old ffilkpring the names " Arthue Wel- lesley Wellington Waterloo Cox " behaved rather unfairly to the infant, ae he pledged him to a armor of greatnese. The baby must have had some difficulty in understand- ing the obligations imposed upon him. I'ro- biddy Master " Arthur," etc., etc, found It difficult to live up to his names and despairingly ended an existence WIliell gave no promise bo3 ond mediocrity. Miss. " Fanny Amelia Limy Ann Rebecca Frost O'Connor Douai( Luck Holberry Do try Oast - ler" Hill it is to hehoped has realieed all the expectation's formed of her when she receiv- ed her baptismal names, eoinewhere about the time of the Chartist agitatiom One lady is actually going about with six and twenty " front names "—one for each letter of the alphabet in its proper order. as " Ano Bertha Cecilia," ander' on down to " Xeno- phon, Yetty, and Zeue." Seine children have been rather cruelly - named, in a manner a Huh forever reminds them that they have made 10(010)6>0166 01' corn- mitted a fault in owning into the world. Thus, "(inc Too Many Harry," or " Not Wauted James " may be happy young men ; but, if they are, it is in spite of their names. • "That's lt, Charlie," or " Who'd. Have Thought It Too," are names which certainly give utterance to a mild surprise. Some Economies. The following:10count is given of a good way of oireumventing those household pests the ants and mice, whose inroads reduce so many house -wives to despair : " I wish I knew some way to avoid tide hand•to-mouth business," said a prudent housekeeper, as she emptiql a throe-and-a- half•pound package of eager into a stone pot. "1 am desperately tired of buying in little dabs, but I haven't a place in my cup- board or pantries where I can safely keep any amount of sugar and similar articles. The ants seem to have pre-empted this es- tablishment, and ever since I have been here they have been one of the plagues of my life. I have tried everything 1 ever heard of to get rid of them, until it seems to me that for every one I kill ten to fif- teen more come to the funeral. So I simply buy sugar and things of this sort as I want them from day to day, mid Ibis a serious inconvenience. "Well," said her friend, " I think Iran give you a single suggestion that wiil settle this perplexing question. If you itvill get some rather fine strong cotton—unbleached will answer—and titmice three or four bags about the 0106 (111)1 shape of small pillowmases, put your nuger in them, and hang them up In any available place in the npper part, of your house, you will not have the least (4061)10 10 keeping your sugar safely. For years I was greatly annoyed by ants, and. unspeakably astonished on one occasion to find that the mice had carried of two or three pounds of cut sugar. I charged its loss to the servants, and made quite an ado until I discovered that the mice had carried. the eugar 01003', as 1 found pieces of it half - devoured in their runways. "Now, when I want sugar, I fold up my bogs and send them to my grocer. He puts twenty-five pounds of sugar in eaoh bag, wraps them up, and sends them home. Then I hang them in an out-of-the-way place upstairs, and they are ready for any emer- gency, Indeed I may say that I follow this practice with a great many attioles. Hominy, granulated corn -meal, fruits, and many other things I buy in quentity, tints, saving not only. the difference in price, but the inconvemence of getting or sending every time I need en article, and it is sure to be wanted at the mostinconvonient season," Fifteen Times a Wife. Mrs. Alice F. Henderson, aged 45, 901148 last week sentenced to prison at New York for three months for abusing Helen Dennis, aged 0, the daughter of her fourteenth hueband. Mrs. Hendereon is at present married to her fifteenth husband. Her matrimonial reaord is a remarkable one. Born to Havana of Spanish parents, she was educated at Paris and there first married. Following is a list of her husbands in order :- 1, John T. Clayton, married 506ee 10, 1862, died jely 9, 1863. 2. T. C. Maher, married September 16, 1863, died May 26, 1865, 6. Wilbur F. Correy, married Februaty 0, 1806, died February 14, 1867. 4. 0, W. Matson, married Olay no, 1867, d led January 2, 1860. 5, James I. Thibaudeau, married Marsh 10, 1839, died April 1.5, 1870. 6. Andrew P. &Oakland, married Sep. tembor, 5, 1870, died July 29, 1871. 7. Alton G. Hansoombe, married Decem- ber 14, 187!, died. September 17, 1878. 8. M. J. Pereival, married February 19, 1814, 0. William L. Poulson, married April 11, 1871, died Juno 23, 1877. 10, Marcus T. Pryor, maliried May 1,1878, died February 7, 1870. 11. G. W. LI:molten, married may 21, 1879, died November 11, 1 88 1. 12. A. Z. van Riper, married March 9, 1882, died November 29, 1884, 13. H. Morrison, married January 2, 1 885, died Octobee 11!, 1885. 14. Konward T. Dennis, married Febru- ary, 1886, died November 16, 1887. 1.5. Phoning J Henderson, married Aug - 19, 1801). The more ote endeavors to sound the depths of his ignorance, the deeper the c1)310111 appeare.--(Alcott. The picturesque village of Refel, sitmated on the side of a mountaiu overloolchig the valley of the Tyrol, was on Sunday almost reduced to &shoe by an outbreak of tire, the cause of which is at present shrouded it mystery. The population is Onmet wholly Catholio, and the Majority had loft home for 1110 11111>1000 of taking port in soon) religious fosiivities 8(1.V0V11.1 Miles away, It NVOS 41311.- 111# 431304.10 tervul that the lire took place, and outhe villagyra' return very low of their dw011inge eenutinsa Standing, The West Afrioan Tarantula, In the car loads of bananas which come into Toronto every season are frequently found speelmens of the S'outh American tarantula, and we have heard of several city grocers being bitten by these ugly members ofthespidertribe. Uglyandrepulsiveasthese eveaturesare, they areattractiveandharmless compered with the West African variety. This part of the Dark Continent possesses the most terrible of spiders, a being so foul and malignant that no reptile compare with it for horror. It dwells in the woods, but by one chance or another it too often finds its way into dwellings. This is addled the tarantula ; with legs spread, it covers a dinner plata, clothed in pretty fur very like a tabby eat's. Its beak is the shape of e, parrot's, and the size of a sparrow's; the venom 01 11) fatal to women and children— often to strong men, as the natives say, Its pews end in suckers, clinging so tight that they must be plotted off When the legs have been cut away. They say that the brute springs a great distence, and alights with its suckers together in a bunch ; the frightful beak is imerted quick as thought, and no huan mstrength can move that hideous ex- eres 1 co n mlikely that a creature Which t,esell 010.s 1 has no elawe, but holds on by expelling the air >10 1100 its feet, could jump I but, after studying the tarantula, one =lines to be- lieve any fiendish habit attributed to it A magnificent, but comparatively harmlese, spider of the West Coast, almost as big, spins a web twelve foot or 6100011> diatneter, so strong as to inconvenience tho traveler who walks into it. AIM We Must Have It. 1?Irst Clerk—. I don't see why old Jones - '1'\*.rio)leja:';:nt know, brie.a. keeps Fleecy around here, lie pays him 0. big salary and the follow is of no more 1106 11161, *111(000 07,11t1n,w brae comes high." tt rtmettre a that Russia has 0013,010ed protectorate 0080 Persia.