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[Transcriber’s Note: This Table of Contents was not present in the original.]

OLD ENGLISH COTTAGE HOMES.
VARIETIES.
THE HOUSE WITH THE VERANDAH.
HOUSEHOLD HINTS.
“UPS AND DOWNS.”
THINGS IN SEASON, IN MARKET AND KITCHEN.
THE ROMANTICISM OF BEETHOVEN.
SHEILA’S COUSIN EFFIE.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.
ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.

All rights reserved.]

{786}

At the commencement of these papers we attempted to describe the growth of English villages and their origin as the surrounding adjuncts of the villa, or residence of the proprietor of the district, or lord of the soil. In Roman times this residence was called a villa; in Saxon and Norman times it became a castle, and after that important wave of civilisation which passed over this country in the 13th century, curtailing the power of the barons, it became “the manor house.” Now although the manor house of the 14th century was a less formidable building than the Norman castle, it was generally an important structure, and at times possessed considerable architectural beauty. Very few early manor houses are perfect now, or in any way complete, as they were nearly ruined, if not destroyed, during the “Wars of the Roses.” Sometimes, however, we may still trace fragments of them attached to modern cottages or houses. The finest fragment of the kind we know is to be seen at the little village of Arminghall, about ten miles from Norwich. A cottage or small farmhouse here possesses a doorway which is, perhaps, the finest example of domestic Gothic architecture in the country. It is improbable that it was originally intended to serve its present use as an entrance to a cottage porch, and the traditions of the place point to its having been a fragment of an ancient manor house, called by the people “The Old Hall.” Little or nothing seems to be known about it, and if it really did form a portion of some ancient mansion, with the solitary exception of this arch, everything else has disappeared. As will be seen from our sketch, it is a very elaborate work of remarkable design, and from its style there can be little doubt that it dates from the reign of Edward III. Between the mouldings which enclose the arch runs a broad band of carved foliage chiefly representing a vine, with lizards looking through the leaves. On either side of the arch are very elaborate niches in two ranges filled with statues of knights and ladies. Delicately-treated pinnacles and finials adorn these niches, and the whole work is remarkable for elegance and most finished workmanship, somewhat resembling the fragment of the hall of the bishop’s palace at Norwich. The inner doorway of the porch forms no portion of this beautiful work, as it is late Tudor, and the curious slabs over the doorway look like seventeenth century carvings. Now whether this magnificent doorway is a portion of some mansion which was completed at the same time, or whether no portion of the architectural scheme, except the doorway, was carried out, or, what is perhaps still more probable, whether after the work had been abandoned for centuries, it was again resumed, and carried out in a much plainer and less costly style, of which the inner doorway is the only existing portion, it is quite impossible to say. However the case may be, there can be no doubt that this cottage at Arminghall has the most beautiful doorway of a house in England. There is nothing whatever of interest in the cottage itself apart from its entrance.

Manor houses of the Tudor times are by no means uncommon in our English villages, but it should be pointed out that most of the mansions erected in what is called the “Elizabethan style” are really works of the time of James I., or that of Charles I.

We have now completed our task of describing the cottages and other architectural objects in English villages as they existed in bygone times, a few have escaped destruction down to our own day, but it is too much to be feared even these will, in a few years, have ceased to exist. The last half century, over which our personal recollection extends, has witnessed such a vast amount of destruction that it is difficult to believe in anything remaining at the end of another half century.

The fact is, railways, competition, machinery, the concentration of our “industrial classes” in large cities, the gradual extinction of the yeoman class, and the difficulty to obtain a bare subsistence as a small tenant farmer, have completely changed the condition of country life, and if we are ever again to have pretty villages they will be inhabited by ladies and gentlemen glad to escape occasionally from the toil of town life, and to recruit themselves in pretty cottages amidst charming scenery, pleasant gardens, and all the sweetness of a country life without its sordid toil, losses and vexations. We give a view of a home of this kind situated amidst the exquisite scenery of the Surrey hills as a pattern cottage of the future.

A Lady Physician in the Holy Land.

A Scottish clergyman tells us that when travelling recently in Palestine, not far from the fountains of Banias, he saw the Stars and Stripes fluttering in the breeze.

“Coming up,” he says, “we found a cluster of tents, and standing to welcome us an American lady who is doing a splendid work as a physician in Palestine and northern Syria. For eight months of the year she lives in tents, moving from Acohs in the south to Baalbek in the north. Having a full medical qualification, she is the only lady permitted to practise in Syria, and as she is something of a specialist in eye diseases, she draws patients from far and near.”

Who wants Work?

To which class do you belong?—“The human race is divided,” says Oliver Wendell Holmes, “into two classes: those who go ahead and do something, and those who sit and inquire, ‘Why wasn’t it done the other way?’”

Borrowed Money.

Mrs. Smiley: “I make it a rule never to ask a lady to return money she has borrowed from me.”

Mrs. Dobson: “Then how do you manage to get it?”

Mrs. Smiley: “Oh, after I have waited a considerable time, if she fails to pay up, I conclude that she is not a lady, and then I ask her.”

Musical Performers.—The question has recently been asked whether it is justifiable for a pianist to express to her hearers what she conceives to be the emotional characteristics of the music she is playing by facial play and gesticulations? Certainly not.

By ISABELLA FYVIE MAYO, Author of “Other People’s Stairs,” “Her Object in Life,” etc.

GOOD SAMARITANS.

n this hour of domestic desertion, Miss Latimer, remembering Mrs. Grant’s injunction, allowed Lucy to do most of the necessary housework, while she herself undertook the outdoor errands and the function of “answering” the door bell.

A letter duly arrived from Clementina’s relatives at Hull. It said little more than the telegram, save that she had come there very “worn out and ill,” having found her place “too trying” for her. She would have to take “a long rest.” It was requested that her box should be packed up and forwarded “along with the month’s wage due to her.”

Clementina had taken her departure when only twenty days of that “month” had elapsed. But Lucy resolved to take no notice of that fact, but to send the full sum. She herself packed the box and despatched it. She found therein about half a packet of mourning envelopes of such singular width of border that she showed them to Miss Latimer and Mr. Somerset, who, however, kept their own counsel on this head. Lucy did not accept Mr. Somerset’s advice about the letter in which she enclosed her postal order. He wished her to ignore all that had been discovered since Clementina’s departure and to let the whole matter drop. Lucy could not accept this as her duty. As soon as she knew of Clementina’s safety and whereabouts, she had telegraphed to Mrs. Bray’s Rachel, that her mind too might be set at ease about her old acquaintance. In return she had received a very simple, straightforward letter from Rachel, expressing sincere regret that all this trouble had been caused to Mrs. Challoner through one whom she had introduced. She reiterated the perfect respectability of the Gillespies and the high esteem in which they had been held in their own neighbourhood. Rachel was naturally deeply concerned about Clementina herself. “People can’t help going out of their mind,” she wrote, “but then it ought to be somebody’s duty to keep them from troubling others or disgracing themselves.”

The same point impressed Lucy. She felt herself bound to tell the plain truth to those who were now harbouring Clementina, and whose actions might decide that unhappy woman’s future course. Tom was inclined to say, “Let them find her out for themselves, as we had to do”—a blunt egotism which didn’t influence Lucy for a moment. Mr. Somerset gave counsels of reticence, but did not support them by any moral reasons. In fact he candidly admitted, “I am thinking chiefly of you, Mrs. Challoner, and advising you for your own sake. I don’t want you to have any more trouble. I know how—in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred—such a warning as you wish to give will be received.”

That decided Lucy. If something was right to do, then she was not to be withheld by any self-consideration from doing it.

“How should I feel,” she asked, “if some morning I open the newspaper and find that Clementina has taken another situation and has perhaps killed a baby or set a house on fire? It would be bad enough if she only made others suffer as we have done; but of merely that, of course, we should never hear.”

quoted Miss Latimer, “and I’ve often seen that work in many ways which shallow sentimentalists do not recognise.”

“I know that few lunatics who eventually fall into terrible crime have not given forewarnings which, if heeded, might have spared them and their victims,” Mr. Somerset conceded. “But still, under all the circumstances, I feel as if it is our first duty to consider Mrs. Challoner and to save her from the abuse and insult which her interference on this score may probably bring.”

But Lucy determined on her course, and she wrote a brief account of what had happened during Clementina’s stay and had been discovered since her departure.

“At best there will be no answer,” remarked Mr. Somerset.

“That will be very rude,” said Miss Latimer.

“I shall be quite satisfied with that,” returned the gentleman significantly.

They were still awaiting developments when, a morning or two afterwards, the door bell summoned Miss Latimer to receive a bright-faced, pleasant-voiced woman, who inquired for “Mrs. Challoner,” and asked to be announced as “‘Mrs. May from Deal—Jarvist May’s widow.’ Mrs. Challoner will recollect me.”

No announcement was needed. Lucy, who, according to her new nervous habit, had been listening on the stairs, was instantly sobbing in the arms of this woman, who had gone through all the worst which Lucy had to fear. The blessed tears had come!

To “Jarvist May’s widow” Lucy found it easy to confide the fears—nay, the absolute despair—which now filled her concerning Charlie’s fate. To none of the others had she done this. They had tendered their hopes to her, and she, little knowing how faint they felt them, had made as though she could at least entertain these. In that way they had sought to comfort her, and she had accepted their kind intention, even as gentle hearts accept the little useless gifts of childish good-will. But this widowed woman brought consolation up from great depths lying calm beneath whatever wind might rise.

“God has got you, and God has got your husband, wherever he is. How can you be apart, my dear? Why, dear, if God has taken him to Himself, he may be nearer to you now than in the days when he was living here and had to go out to his business, leaving you at home. And if he’s still somewhere on earth, dear, don’t you hope he’s taking care of himself and keeping bright and cheery in the faith that you are doing the same? If he is living and can’t send word to you, that must feel as bad for him as for you to get no word. Don’t you hope that he trusts you are keeping up? And as he is certainly all right—SOMEWHERE—you’ve just got to keep up for his sake. Yes, my dear, cry, cry”—as Lucy looked up with a piteous attempt to smile. “He wouldn’t mind that so long as it does you good and washes the clouds out of your heart. That’s what tears are meant for—to make us smile the sweeter afterwards.”

Mrs. May’s visit rose out of her having seen the newspaper paragraph concerning the safety of the Slains Castle.

“I came away to see you just as soon as I could,” she narrated simply. “Thought I, poor dear, she’s got to go through for months the waiting and the watching that I had only for a few hours. All I can say to her is, that I know what those few hours were, and that none but God could have helped me through them, and none but God can help her through her longer trial. But that’s enough, for God is over everything, and under everything, and in everything; and if He upholds you, so does everything else.”

She joined with Mrs. Grant’s counsel, in whispering to Miss Latimer that nothing would be so good for Lucy as to proceed with her “regular work,” to keep her life on in a straight line from where her husband left her, and not to have to face any “beginning again.” She was actually glad to find that Lucy’s present absence from her classes arose from a sheer practical necessity, and not from any yielding to grief.

Then Mrs. May had a most unexpected proposal to make. It appeared that she had let her house furnished for a whole year to people who were to provide their own service. She had not quite relished doing this, as it deprived her of her “work,” but she had felt she ought not to refuse a good offer, since her last{788} season had been as a whole but a poor one, while her strength had somewhat failed under a great rush of summer visitors for a few short weeks.

“So I thought I would go into rooms in Deal, and make myself as useful as I could among my neighbours,” she said. “I thought to myself it might even be a bit of training against old age. I do pray I may be of use to somebody till my dying day. But it’s in God’s hands, and when I’ve seen old folks kept alive so long and so helpless that others talk about ‘a happy release,’ it has come into my mind that, after all, maybe God is giving them their rest on this side of the grave instead of the other, and that they’ll be off and up and about their Master’s business, while some who have been working to the end here will be getting their bit of sleep in Paradise.”

When Mrs. May heard of Lucy’s household predicament, a fresh thought had come into her head; and so her suggestion was that she herself should take up her abode in the little house with the verandah, and by “keeping it going” lift a weight of care from its young mistress’s mind.

“I won’t take any wages,” she said. “No, please, I’d rather not. There’s a good income for me for this year at least from my furnished house. After that we might speak of the matter again, when we see how things go—but not before—no, I’ll not hear of it. For, you see, dear Mrs. Challoner, work may be a little harder in this London house than by the sunny sea-shore, and I may need a little help from the outside, and there will be that for you to pay for. I feel you may well look a little downcast at the thought of outside help, for I know the trouble it often gives even in a quiet town, to say nothing of London. But you see I shall be always to the fore, as you could not be yourself; and I am different from young servants, who are often corrupted by charwomen. When a body works with another, one soon finds out what that other is, and how far one’s confidence may go. And we won’t be in any hurry to engage anybody. Maybe we shall just come across the right person.”

As a matter of fact, “the right person” was actually preparing to cross London even while Mrs. May was speaking. Only a hour or two afterwards she presented herself at Mrs. Challoner’s door in the person of her old servant, Pollie!

Pollie did not look quite so blooming as in the days of her service. She had a little baby in her arms. She was candidly crying. She too had seen the sad news of the Slains Castle in the newspaper—her husband had read it to her at breakfast time, and with the rashness of youth and ignorance she had thought the very worst was inevitable. Miss Latimer called Mrs. May to talk to her for awhile before Lucy was told of her arrival. A little talk with the sailor’s widow restored Pollie to calmness and to some modified hope.

“I often wondered why I never heard from you,” said Lucy to her old servant. “If I had known you were again in London, I should have come to see you.”

“Would you really, ma’am?” cried Pollie, delighted. “I thought you were so angry with me for leaving you.”

“No, Pollie,” Lucy answered, “I was not angry, and I am very sorry indeed if I seemed so. I was bitterly disappointed and vexed because I had not dreamed of your leaving, and it meant taking everything up in a different way from what I had thought. I was under a terrible strain too at that time, so that any added pressure made me cry out, and it may have seemed like anger when it was only pain.”

“I know that what I did didn’t look pretty,” Pollie admitted. “I’ve seen that since. But I was in a fine taking. I’d got it into my head there would be changes and that I’d be turned loose of a sudden, and I knew that it wasn’t every place that would suit me after I’d been so long with you and the master. And husband, after he knew more, he didn’t comfort me nor speak no smooth things. I said you were huffed at my marrying, and he thought that was unreasonable——”

“As it would have been,” interjected Lucy.

“But when it came out how you had been situated with the master going away, and how good you’d been to my sisters, when they were so weakly, then husband sang another tune. ‘Them that considers our families,’ says he, ‘we ought to consider theirs, leastways unless we’re such poor stuff that we must be always a-getting and never a-giving.’ And I’m sure I needn’t have been in such a hurry; he’d have waited a bit if I’d promised him, ’twasn’t his own changing he was feared of but mine! And we’ve never got rightly settled, and the poor baby’s suffered a good deal with the moving about, and me getting so tired and worried.”

“But it is a dear little baby,” Lucy said, stroking the grave little white face. “I am so glad to see it, Pollie. It is so kind of you to bring it.”

Pollie was tearful again.

“I’ve got a favour to ask, ma’am,” she said. “We’ve never hit on a name for him yet, and says husband to me, after he read that bit of troublesome news in the paper—‘I wonder if your mistress would let us call him after your master. It would show her that we did know who is good folks, though we didn’t always act like it.’ That’s the best of husband,” Pollie explained, wiping away her tears. “When there’s anything he thinks a bit wrong, he never puts it on ‘you,’ he always says ‘we.’ And says I to him, ‘I’ll go straight off and ask her, and if she thinks it’s too much of a liberty, I’ll ask if she’d like better that we named the boy after her son, little Master Hugh, God bless him!’”

Lucy’s own eyes were full of tears. She had taken the baby and was pressing it to her bosom.

“Call him after Charlie,” she sobbed. “Call him—Charlie. Charlie had Hugh named after my father—and now if Charlie—if——” she could not complete her sentence, but added with a great effort—“there will never be a Charlie Challoner of my own.”

“Oh, Pollie,” she went on presently, “the terrible part of your leaving was that I felt Charlie must not know about it. I do believe he would not have gone for this voyage if he had not firmly believed that you and I could go on happily and safely while he was away. I hated to keep the secret, Pollie, but I had to do it, if Charlie was to have what seemed to be such a chance for his life. And now, after all——” she could say no more.

“And I daresay the master thought pretty hardly of me when he did hear,” said Pollie woefully.

“He never heard,” answered Lucy. “I meant to tell him so soon as I got comfortably settled down with somebody else. But that day never came while he was in reach of letters. Once I thought all was so right that I began my letter, telling the whole story, but before it was finished there was disappointment, and that letter never went. To Charlie it must always seem as if Pollie is taking care of Hugh and me.”

“I only wish it could be true!” cried Pollie. “I only wish I could afford to come over twice a week and help that nice person who tells me she is going to look after your house. I could bring the baby with me, for he is as good as gold.”

Lucy looked up; a bright thought struck her.

“The question is, Pollie,” she said, “could you afford the time? A married woman owes all her time to her husband’s home, except under peculiar circumstances or at a pinch. And I’m sure it is wisest and best so, Pollie, for if a wife’s earnings are not simply an ‘extra,’ evoked to meet some special visitation of God, they don’t add to the household prosperity and comfort. I’m sure I’ve seen enough this year to prove that.”

“Ay, I know it’s true, ma’am,” said Pollie, “but what you say is just our case. Husband had an accident last spring and was out of work three months, and on only half work for a while after, and what with him bringing in nothing, and wanting dainty food, and with a doctor’s bill to pay, we got into debt, and before we left the place we had to pay off, and that meant ‘putting away’ a lot of our things. We’re only in one room now, ma’am, and that does not suit the ways of either of us, and that room is bare enough and does not take long to keep clean. And while I might be helping to get things right again, there I sit with a heavy heart and empty hands. That’s when women take to mischief—to gossiping and drinking. Tom’s out from seven in the morning till six at night. But, of course, I can’t do anything that would take me away from my baby. I wouldn’t do that, and Tom wouldn’t hear of it, not while we have a crust of bread to eat.”

“But, Pollie,” said Lucy, “if you can really afford the time, I can afford to pay you—I really can,” she assured her former servant, seeing that she{789} looked pitifully at her. “First of all, I earn a good deal by my work, if I can get a trustworthy person to work for me in turn; and secondly, my good friend Mrs. May, whom you have seen, refuses to take any wages, because she says she knows she will want outside help. I could afford, Pollie, to give you six shillings a week if you will come here for two days weekly from eight till four, and of course you would dine here.”

“Why, that would pay our rent!” cried Pollie joyfully. “And I know what working in a nice house like this is, with a proper sitting down to good food. Husband, he said to me, ‘If you go charing, it’ll just be cleaning up after slovenly hussies and getting meals o’ broken meat.’ Won’t he be pleased! And, oh, Mrs. Challoner, this makes me quite sure you are friends with me again. I only wish I’d been reasonable, and had treated you friendly, and taken counsel with you, and not been so sudden-like. Yet there’s some ladies make a servant believe she’s of no account, and girls are too ready to listen to ’em,” added Pollie, with a side glance of memory at that conversation with Mrs. Brand which had so disturbed and unsettled her. “But now I’m sure we’re friends again, ma’am.”

“I’m sorry to have ever led you to think otherwise,” said Lucy. “I was sad and sore myself, and it hurt me to think that, after all the time we had been together——”

“And all you’d done for me and my folks,” murmured Pollie.

“You should act so suddenly in such an important matter, with no reference to me or my trying position,” Mrs. Challoner went on. “Perhaps, in my turn, I was not considerate enough of your standpoint. Anyhow, Pollie, as you say, now we know we are friends again.”

That was a pleasant interlude. Better even than its immediate comfort and security was the mystic hint that it seemed to convey not only of a far-off greater “restitution of all things,” but also of a present protecting power—that Fatherly love which takes us up when, in the ways of life or of death, parents and spouses and friends forsake or fail us. “Goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our life.” We have to walk forward in that faith, and only by such walking forward can faith be transformed into sacred, secret knowledge.

It was well, indeed, that there was something pleasant. For, alas for human nature, it is by foreseeing evil as to its doings that one can most easily establish reputation as a far-seeing prophet!

Some days passed before the arrival of Clementina’s box and the receipt of the postal order were acknowledged from Hull. Then a little parcel came.

“I should not wonder but the poor soul, if she has come a little to her senses, has sent some bit of her needlework as a peace-offering,” observed Mrs. Challoner as she unfastened the string.

Far from it! The parcel contained only the half-used packet of mourning envelopes and a letter. It was a comfort to see that the epistle was by another and an apparently saner hand.

The letter was not very long. It began—

At another time the falseness, the selfishness, the greed, the utter injustice of that letter would have pained Lucy. It scarcely hurt her now. She showed it to Miss Latimer, and Mr. Somerset, and Mrs. May, and they were all indignant; but as for Lucy, she only smiled dimly.

“We have done all we can,” she said. “We can’t do any more. And we must not judge these Micklewraths too harshly. We do not know how sane and reasonable Clementina may appear to them, just as she did to us. I should not have been readily incredulous of any story Clementina might have told me about any of our tradespeople or neighbours.”

It was a suspicious circumstance that Clementina’s nearest relations at Inverslain preserved a dead silence so far as the little house with the verandah was concerned. It appeared, however, that they wrote to Mrs. Bray’s Rachel. She forwarded their letter to Mrs. Challoner. It, too, was brief and guarded, but was quite different in its tone. It was written by Clementina’s brother, who deplored the trouble his sister had given everybody—“precisely as she did when she left the Highlands without telling us where she was going or what she meant to do. She is an excitable woman,” he added, “who dwells on things too much and takes violent fancies.” His conclusion was that, “as her aunt and uncle at Hull had taken her in—which was more than he and his wife would dare do, owing to Clementina’s temper—he hoped they would look after her, and she might quiet down after a bit.”

Poor Rachel was quite self-accusatory at the sad failure of her “introduction,” though really it was hard to see how she could blame herself, since her recommendation had not gone one whit beyond very good and reasonable grounds, known to herself. She ended her letter by saying—

“I fear my dear mistress is very ill indeed. I don’t think she believes it of herself. At least, she doesn’t wish us to know she believes it. I don’t imagine she will live to return to her old house. I don’t think she could be moved from here. I shouldn’t be surprised myself if the end came at any moment. Mr. and Mrs. Brand have been most kind. My mistress quite looks forward to see them at almost every week’s end.”

(To be continued.)

To Boil an Egg.

Method.—Have ready a saucepan of boiling water and put in the egg carefully with a spoon, taking care not to break the shell. Boil three minutes and a half for a soft-boiled egg, six minutes for a moderately hard one, and ten minutes for a hard-boiled egg.

To Poach an Egg.

Method.—Break the egg into a cup, take away the tread, slip the egg quickly and carefully into a pan containing boiling water, holding the cup near to the side of the pan as you put it in; see that the egg is well covered with the boiling water; as soon as the white begins to set, raise the egg on a fish-slice, let the water drain away and slip it on to a small piece of hot buttered toast.

Brown Thickening.

Method.—Melt a pound of dripping slowly in a large frying-pan and stir in by degrees a pound of flour; let this cook very gently over a slow fire until it is a good dark brown; stir well from time to time and do not let it burn. This will take about an hour to make. It will keep a very long time.

Browning.

Method.—Put half a pound of brown sugar in an old tin or saucepan and let it burn nearly black over a fire, stir in a gill of boiling water, let it cool, and bottle for use.

To Blanch Barley.

Method.—Put it in a saucepan of cold water, bring to the boil, and throw the water away.

To Boil Rice.

Method.—Wash the rice well, and cook it in fast boiling water with the lid off for twelve minutes. Pour some cold water into the saucepan, and then drain the rice off on to a sieve. Return to the saucepan, and let it dry well on or near the stove. Shake the saucepan well, and take care that the rice does not burn or stick together.

To Make Tea.

Method.—Warm the teapot by pouring in a little boiling water; empty it out and put in the tea, allowing about two teaspoonfuls to every three people, if the number requiring tea be more than three. For two allow three teaspoonfuls. Pour on the boiling water, and let it stand three minutes.

{790}

A TRUE STORY OF NEW YORK LIFE.

By N. O. LORIMER.

In the luxurious house Marjorie and Sadie did not miss their mother as Ada did; indeed it was a delightful change for them to have so much of their sister’s society. She was more amusing than their mother, and understood their games better. When they heard that their mother had gone away to a hospital to be taken care of and made well again they said they were “dreadfully sorry,” but that was partly because sister Ada looked so sad, and partly because it was polite to say so. About a week after her mother had left her home Ada was startled one evening by the old butler, an Englishman, coming up to her while she was waiting for her father to come down to dinner, and saying in a hushed voice, “Will you wait any longer, miss? I don’t think the master will come home to dinner.”

“Then serve it at once,” Ada said; “but why do you think he will not return?”

“He left the house last night, miss, after you had gone to bed, and he has not been seen since.”

Ada’s heart stood still. “Not been seen since! What do you mean? Has he not been at his office? Perhaps he is with my mother?”

“I don’t think so, miss. Have you not seen the evening papers?” The man held a copy behind his back, Ada heard it rustle.

“Give it me,” she cried, as she put one hand on the handsomely carved pedestal which held a statue of the dancing fawn to steady herself.

“I’m sorry, miss, to be the one to hand it to you, but the whole city knows it by this time. It can’t be hid from you much longer.”

The girl looked at him with a kindly pity in her eyes. She was sorrier for him at that moment than for herself. He was a faithful old servant who had been with them since she was a baby. He handed her the paper and went softly from the room, having the delicacy to feel that it was not the place even of an old servant to see his young mistress’s sorrow.

“He’s a low skunking hound,” he said to himself, “if he is my master, to leave the pretty bit of a creature like that with those two children on her hands. Whatever will happen to them, I don’t know. There’s about enough money in the house to pay off all these miserable servants, and not much more. It’s the dirtiest trick I ever saw played. It was the disgrace and shock that sent his poor wife off her head, him living like a prince while he’s been defrauding poor widows and children.”

About a month from that day pretty Ada Nicoli, who had been brought up to look upon herself as an heiress, started out through the city of New York to try and find some means of livelihood for herself and her two little sisters. Her mother’s little fortune brought in just enough money to pay for her residence in the comfortable asylum to which she had gone before the terrible exposure of Mr. Nicoli’s failure had been made public, and to pay the weekly board for Ada and her two sisters at a plain middle-class boarding-house in East Thirty-second Street.

Ada had tried offering herself as a music teacher, for she played well and liked music, but wherever she went she was asked whom she had studied under, and if she had been taught in Germany. So to-day she was bent on another mission. She had put her pride still further down in her pocket, but unconsciously her pretty chin was tilted a little higher. She had to walk now—her tender feet were tired and weary—where she had once dashed along in a smart carriage. When she arrived at a part of the town which was little occupied by shops her steps slackened. She was thinking what she would say when she reached Madame Maude’s, the fashionable milliner from whom she had been accustomed to buy her hats. Madame Maude had only one window to her shop, which was curtained and lined with red velvet. The simple sailor hat, one black toque, and a white feather boa displayed in it gave the ignorant public little idea of the fact that almost every time the door bell rang to admit a customer, it meant that Madame Maude was fifty dollars the richer. Ada stopped a moment and looked at the window. How often she had gone with her mother to the shop and come away with some pretty flowery hat without even asking the price of it. And now she sighed, for the price of one of those hats would pay for a term of Marjorie’s lessons at school. They must be educated, the girl cried in her heart, and they must be brought up as her mother’s children ought to be, even if they had to work afterwards. She would not let them grow up as shop-girls from childhood. She opened the door and found herself inside the shop with no words ready to meet the question of the young girl who came forward.

“Can I see Madame Maude?” she asked nervously. “I wish to speak to her alone.”

The girl stared at Ada’s perfectly-fitting dress, robbed of all its luxurious trimmings, as being unsuitable for her present position. Madame Maude came forward and told the girl to retire.

“What can I do for you?” she said kindly; she knew that the large bill still standing in Mrs. Nicoli’s name would never be paid, but Mrs. Nicoli had been a good customer in the days gone by, and for once a woman was grateful for favours past.

“You have heard of our sad trouble,” Ada began, “the world has painted it even blacker than it is, so there is no need for me to tell you what a terrible position I am in. I must make money somehow. I have tried in so many ways and failed. I came to ask you if you knew of any position in a business house that I could fill. I would not mind how hard I worked.” She looked so unlike hard work that Madame Maude’s heart was touched by her appeal which was so pathetically ignorant.

“What can you do?” she said, wondering what the girl called “hard work.”

“I don’t know,” Ada replied in a shamefaced way, “for I have never tried, but I think I could learn millinery very quickly.”

“My dear child,” the elder woman said, “you don’t know what you are saying. Do you know that my best hand was apprenticed for three years before she received a dollar; the next year she got a little more than a dollar a week, the fifth year she went to Paris and studied for a year and a half. She is not only a milliner but an artist; it takes years to acquire the knowledge, and I pay her accordingly. My hats are not made by girls who have trimmed up their old hats at home.”

Ada looked crestfallen. “I never thought of all that; I only know that your hats are always in perfect taste.”

Madame Maude had been looking at her while she spoke. “If you won’t be offended, I’ll make you an offer,” she said.

Ada bent her head in answer. She was willing to sweep the floors if she had been asked. She had spent her last dollar, and the washing-bill was not paid for last week, and Sadie had started a bad cough which demanded a tonic, and tonics have to be paid for.

“If you will come here and act as saleswoman,” Madame Maude said, “I will pay you well.”

“Oh, how kind of you!” the girl cried. “Of course I can’t be offended.” It was such a nice, quiet little shop, quite a private house; there was nothing to shock her in the suggestion.

“Stop a bit,” Madame Maude said, “till you hear what that means. I won’t pay you fifteen dollars a week for merely handing a customer a hat, and telling her the price—you’ve got to make her buy it.”

“How can I?” Ada said, in a mystified voice.

“I’ll tell you,” Madame Maude explained; and she took a lovely hat from a drawer, and put it on her own head. Her face was broad and homely, and the hat did not suit her either well or badly.

“Look at me in this hat,” she said, “and imagine I am the customer.”

Ada looked.

“Now look at yourself in it,” and she placed the hat on Ada’s head of shining hair.

Ada smiled, a half-pleased, half-bashful smile.

“Now when the customer says she does not think the hat will do—she is afraid it does not suit her—and you have seen that it is the hat she is hankering after, say quite casually, ‘I’m sorry, madam, you don’t like it,’ and put it on your own head. Move about the room in it, and let her see how charming it is. In a few moments she will have forgotten how she herself looked in it, and will fondly imagine that she will look like you, and the hat is sold.”

{791}

Ada’s face had fallen.

“Will you do it?” Madame Maude said. “It will be money easily earned; my saleswoman is leaving next week.”

“I am to make money by my face,” Ada cried, with a choking voice; “it’s so horrible.” But something was saying to her, “You must have money; you have spent your last dollar, except what will pay for your bare board. The children must go to school, and Sadie wants a tonic. She has a cough because she has been denied the luxuries she has been used to, and has had to walk to school in all sorts of weather.”

“Yes, I will come,” she said; “but what if I do not sell them as you expect?”

“I will risk that,” the woman said kindly, “for I know the value of a pretty face below a forty-dollar hat.”

When Ada found herself once again on Fifth Avenue, she could scarcely believe she was the same girl who had lived in the magnificent mansion at the other end of the town a few months ago, and had spent all her days in light-hearted amusement. She felt tired and depressed, and afraid of the position she had undertaken to fill.

When she reached home she found that Sadie and Marjorie had not yet come back from school. She was anxious about their delay, and stood on the doorstep looking up the street to try and catch a sight of them.

“Why do you fret yourself about those two children, bless your dear heart. They’re a deal better able to look after themselves than you are.”

One of the boarders was addressing Ada from the hall.

“They’re so young to be out alone,” Ada said. “They’ve always had someone to bring and take them from school.”

“Time they learnt to come and go alone, I guess. How long do you suppose you can go on working yourself to pieces, anyhow? If you want to do the best you can for these two young ’uns, bring them up to look after themselves. You were brought up like a sugar-plum, and you’re feeling it mighty bad now, I reckon, to be treated like pig-iron.”

“I know you mean kindly,” Ada said, “but at least I have had the benefit of refined surroundings in my youth. I can’t let little Sadie knock about like a street child.”

“Much like a street child she is, with her white starched petticoats, and dainty pinafores. It’s just killing you, child, that’s what it is, and coloured things are just as comfortable.”

“But we have only white things,” Ada said apologetically, “and I’m afraid I can’t buy any more just yet.”

“To be sure. I never thought of that,” the fat, good-natured boarder said laughingly. “What’s going to happen to you, child, when these fine things wear out. It does me good to look at your pretty figure in these well-cut gowns. But they won’t stand rough wear.”

Then Ada told her she was going to earn fifteen dollars a week at Madame Maude’s.

“You’ll have all the young men in the town coming to choose their sisters’ hats,” the boarder said, “and men are a deal more easily taken in than women folk. Madame Maude is a clever woman.”

(To be continued.)

OCTOBER.

By LA MÉNAGÈRE.

Venison and pork are the “novelties” that we note in the markets this month, and also a splendid show of brocoli. It is also a grand time for cheeses, as many old-fashioned country fairs testify. This month dairy farmers will be busy bringing their cheeses into the right markets ready for the Christmas sales, and where cheeses are shown we usually see sausages and pork pies, also gingerbread. All these things are toothsome in October—the month of mellow days and frosty nights. We begin to get ready walnuts and chestnuts for Hallowe’en festivities, and we sort out our apples, some for cider, some for “biffins,” and some for preserving. We must now pickle our red cabbages, too, also onions, and see that potatoes are stored. Those who have good keeping places, even in town, may now invest in sacks of potatoes, and bushels of apples, as this is the time for getting these at a cheaper rate than will be possible later on. Housewives in the country who have piggies to dispose of for bacon will be thinking of turning the poor animals into that useful commodity.

There is also the harvesting of the flower-seeds and roots, and much work is done in the flower garden preparatory for the next spring. Indeed, this is altogether one of the busiest months of all the year. Nature has not yet gone to sleep, although she is preparing for her winter’s rest.

We may now begin to bring into use some of our dishes of heat-giving foods such as we keep for winter days, not as a regular thing, perhaps, but occasionally. For instance, we may commence having porridge for breakfast, warm puddings, good vegetable soups, honey and treacle to our bread. Roast goose and apple sauce will be a favourite dish with many now, and, indeed, geese are better at this time than later, as they are neither so rich nor so fat.

So will also game pie be. Indeed, ever since Friar Tuck feasted the disguised Cœur de Lion upon this dish (which then was called game pasty) in the heart of Sherwood Forest, it has been a dish beloved of all Englishmen. Perhaps it may not be amiss to give it here in detail.

Game Pie.—A very good short or raised crust is used to line the bottom and sides of the mould. For the upper crust it is usual to use puff pastry, although the raised crust is quite good enough. Place first a layer of small pieces of rump steak, then of venison steaks, trimmed and rubbed with spice, salt and pepper. Next some joints of hare, partridge, or other game, and fill up all spaces with highly-flavoured forcemeat. Add a little gravy, and cover the dish closely, but not with the crust; this should be put on when the pie is rather more than half cooked. Glaze this and ornament it when nearly finished cooking.

A very good imitation of a game pie may be made entirely without game, by using veal and steak together, and adding plenty of well-made forcemeat. As the gaminess will depend on this forcemeat, it will be well to show what this is composed of.

Half-a-pound of calf’s liver and as much good ham should be baked in the oven in a covered vessel until perfectly tender. Pound these together in a mortar to a smooth paste. Add a large tablespoonful of finely-powdered herbs—thyme, marjoram, sage, savoury, and tarragon—all these, or as many of them as possible. Add also cayenne pepper, salt, and a few chopped mushrooms. Mix very thoroughly, and place little balls of this and quarters of hard-boiled eggs at intervals with the meat, then put in a little strong gravy, place the top crust on, and bake the pie in a baker’s oven until of a good deep brown. When eaten cold this is uncommonly good.

A breakfast dish met with in Yorkshire, but not, I believe, elsewhere, is a Covered Apple Tart, and very good it is, either hot or cold. The crust would be ordinary short or flaky paste rolled out to about a quarter of an inch thick. On the lower crust a thick layer of stewed, sweetened, and spiced apple is placed, the top crust put on, the edges crimped together, and melted butter brushed over all, then well baked.

Hominy cakes with honey, and oatmeal batter-cakes, are delicious for breakfast also.

We should not omit also to have plenty of roasted apples at all times while they are so good, and the smaller pears and apples will be very good eating indeed if they are baked in a stone jar in a baker’s oven.

A good dinner menu for October would be the following:—

Potato Soup, with Grated Cheese.
Gurnet, Baked and Stuffed.
Roast Loin of Pork. Apple Sauce.
Brocoli and Baked Potatoes.
Wild Duck. Orange Salad. Cranberry Jelly.
Cabinet Pudding.
Cheese. Biscuits. Butter.

Potato Soup.—Peel, boil and mash half-a-dozen potatoes, and slice up a small Spanish onion into a little butter, which should cook while the potatoes are boiling. Put all together, and add a pint of boiling milk, a spoonful of flour mixed smooth with milk, and boil together. Season with pepper and salt, and if not already too thick add a little cream. Serve very hot with grated cheese in a separate dish.

The Gurnet are stuffed with a mixture of chopped shallot, parsley, herbs, breadcrumbs, butter, seasoning, and an egg. Grate breadcrumbs over, and pour on them a little oiled butter, and bake in a fairly quick oven for about twenty minutes or half an hour. Serve in the same dish if it is a nice one.

Wild Duck require very quick roasting and frequent basting. Garnish them with a lemon cut in quarters, and serve any gravy that may have run from them in a tureen.

Orange Salad is made by slicing peeled oranges, freeing them from pips, and covering the slices with a little sugar.

Cabinet Pudding.—Put a pint of new milk on to boil with two spoonfuls of sugar and the rind of a fresh lemon; then add it to three well-beaten eggs. Butter a mould, and decorate the bottom and sides with strips of candied peel, stoned raisins, etc. Fill with alternate layers of sliced sponge cake and raisins. Pour the custard over, and let it soak for an hour or so, then cover with buttered paper, and steam the pudding gently for an hour and a half.

If this pudding were for eating cold (and it is quite as good so), a little dissolved gelatine should be added to the custard before pouring it over the cake. A few macaroons give a nice flavour to a cold pudding.

By ELEONORE D’ESTERRE-KEELING.

The title of this paper will probably surprise many of my readers who have been accustomed to regard Beethoven solely as the king of classic music.

I have not set myself so foolish a task as the attempt to prove that this is not his true position. Undoubtedly Beethoven is king of classic music, but—how much more than that he is!

It must have struck everyone that there is a certain quality in Beethoven’s music which is absent from that of every other classic composer, a quality which appeals to each one of us personally, and which does not appeal in vain.

If we play consecutively three or four Sonates by Haydn or by Mozart, what is almost invariably the result?

In each case we like the first one and probably the second one; at the third we begin to feel bored, and at the fourth we shut up the book. And yet how lovely they all are! Haydn takes us to play with the children; Mozart introduces us to the ballroom. But Haydn did not spend his life’s days on a merry-go-round, and Mozart was not perpetually paying compliments. Quite the contrary. Haydn, as we know, never had any children, and that disagreeable wife of his left little happiness for his home. As for Mozart—well, Mozart had a charming wife, but he was so pitifully poor that one winter’s morning, when the snow lay thick on the ground outside, a friendly neighbour, calling in to see how the young couple were getting on, found them dancing a waltz on the bare boards of their scantily furnished room. They had no fire, and this was the only means that they could devise for keeping themselves warm.

When Mozart went on a journey, he wrote the prettiest love-letters to his Stanzerl. Here is a bit of one of them:—“Dear little wife! If I only had a letter from you! If I were to tell you all that I do with your dear likeness, how you would laugh! For instance, when I take it out of its case, I say ‘God greet thee, Stanzerl, God greet thee, thou rascal, shuttlecock, pointy-nose, nick-nack, bit and sup!’ And when I put it back, I let it slip in very slowly, saying, with each little push, ‘Now—now—now!’ and at the last, quickly—‘Good night, little mouse, sleep well!’” There is nothing in all Mozart’s music the least little bit like that. And why?

Mozart’s music is strictly classical and anti-romantic. His character is stamped upon it, as the character of Haydn is stamped upon his music, but his circumstances, the events of his daily life, have no part in it, and whether he had been rich or poor, successful or despairing, his music would have been exactly the same.

With Beethoven quite the reverse is the case. If it were possible to play the whole volume of Beethoven’s Sonates at one sitting, the last thing player or listener could complain of would be the monotony which culminates in boredom.

There would be Beethoven tender, Beethoven sublime, Beethoven ferocious, Beethoven serene, and as many more Beethovens as there are adjectives in the dictionary. And this is the secret of Beethoven’s popularity.

For the musician there is the perfect form, the exquisite mode of expression; for the amateur there is the man, with all the hopes and fears and aspirations which he shares with his fellow man.

Beethoven wrote the most meagre of letters, but every emotion that swayed him found utterance in his music, and this it is which gives to his music the quality known as Romanticism.

Many definitions have been given of the terms classical and romantic, but the clearest and cleverest definition that I have met is that given by the French writer, Monsieur Brunetière,—“Classicism makes the impersonality of a work of art one of the conditions of its perfection, while Romanticism means Individualism.” In other words, classicism confines itself to the thing done; romanticism is more interested in the doer of that thing.

Beethoven’s earliest works in each branch of his art are purely classical. During their composition he was leaning on Haydn and Mozart. Life had not yet become to him a matter of absorbing interest, for he still regarded it from the standpoint of the student.

The Fantasie Sonate, Op. 27, No. 2 (ignorantly called the “Moonlight Sonata”), opens to us the first page of the tone-poet’s life. It was written in 1801, when Beethoven was thirty-one.

Thirty-one! At this age a man feels life at its best; it is then that his pulse beats strongest, that, his powers being fully developed, he sees the years stretch smiling before{793} him, like the vision of a promised land. All this Beethoven felt, and he was fully conscious of his power. “The Eroica,” the great ‘C Minor,’ “The Choral Symphony,” “Fidelio,” locked within that mighty brain, awaited only the master’s bidding to come forth and delight a world.

But between him and this glorious future there fell a shadow which was destined to rob life of all that made life dear. He plainly saw that shadow.

In a letter to a friend, written at this time, he says, “How sadly must I live! All that I love I must avoid. The years will pass without bringing that which my talent and my art had promised. Mournful resignation, in which alone I can find refuge!”

Already the gates of his ears were closing, and deafness was shutting him out from the world which he had just begun to love.

Then he met the beautiful Countess Julie Guicciardi. She was sixteen, she was poor, and he gave her music lessons without payment, accepting only in return linen which her pretty fingers had stitched.

She was flattered by his homage (what girl would not be flattered by the homage of a Beethoven!) and she encouraged his attentions. Perhaps even she really loved him.

Again he wrote to a friend: “Somewhat more agreeably I live now, going more among people. This change has been wrought by a dear, bewitching girl, who loves me and whom I love. At last after two years’ misery, some happy moments have come, and I feel for the first time that marriage could make me happy.”

Poor Beethoven! Countess Julie’s father had other plans for his young daughter, and her music master was scornfully dismissed.

The mental conflict of this period found expression in the “Fantasie Sonate.” The mournful resignation of the first movement contrasts vividly with the thunder of the finale.

In a letter to his friend Wegeler, Beethoven now wrote:—“If nothing else is possible I will defy my fate, though moments will always come in which I shall be the wretchedest of men.”

He spoke so much more eloquently in music than he did in words, that I should like to take my readers to the piano and tell his story there. But let us beware of playing the Sonate romantically. In interpreting an emotional work this is a danger which must always be carefully avoided. We should not repeat the poet’s story as it affects us, but as it affected him.

The resignation of the first movement must be the resignation of a strong nature—there is fire beneath it. A Beethoven does not shed tears.

In the second movement the poet conjures up before his mind the memory of happy hours, gone for ever. His child-love appears before him in all her grace and witchery. There must be something phantom-like about it, something very tender, almost intangible.

The last movement is a song of anguish and despair. The proud spirit “defies its fate,” but there are moments in which we recognise “the wretchedest of men.”

Thus ended Beethoven’s first love-story. There was no tender parting between him and Julie; the “Fantasie-Sonate,” dedicated to her, was his last love-letter, and with it he dismissed her from his mind. “Strength,” he said proudly, “is the characteristic of men who distinguish themselves above others, and it is mine!” It was his.

All Europe was now ringing with the fame of Napoleon, the only person on earth—except Goethe—whom Beethoven regarded as his equal, while of him, even, he said, when, in 1806, news of Napoleon’s victory at Jena was brought, “What a pity that I don’t understand war as I understand music. I would conquer him!”

In this mood the Eroica Symphony was written. It is a chapter of history.

But I have not space to follow the great Romanticist through all his moods and their outpourings. I must confine myself to a few of them.

In October 1802 Beethoven was sent by his doctors to Heiligenstadt, a quiet village not far from Vienna. He was in a state of the deepest despondency. The shadows were closing round him, and the voices of the world reached him but faintly.

In the stillness of the country he found peace, the exquisite Sonate in D minor, op. 31, no. 2, was written there. Let us take it to the piano too, and listen to its tragic story.

The long drawn out arpeggios with which it opens are the longings of his heart. (He was still only thirty-two!) Joy dances fantastically round him and vanishes. Another sigh,{794} another vision of joy, and then heaven opens and he looks in.

I do not think that even Beethoven ever wrote anything more wonderful, more full of the ecstasy of being, than that glorious first movement.

The second part of the Sonate is very slow, and at first it seems to promise peace for the troubled soul. It is in B flat major, which should and does suggest rest. But after such a struggle as the first movement indicated, peace does not come at once; listen to the throbbing, shuddering triplets in the bass; they begin at the seventeenth bar, and every time that they occur they are followed by a lament in the minor. They accompany that lament. Further on, we find a lovely song-like passage in F major (bar 31), and now see how beautifully Beethoven arrives at that song. Laying a gentle hand on his triplets (bar 27) he smoothes them into even notes, changes the sad C minor for C major, and then brings in his song. But that song is only a rift in the clouds; the storm comes on again, always heralded by the triplets, and note the curious accompaniment given later on to the left hand. Right up at the top of the key-board it begins and slowly it creeps down, always down. Hope would ascend—that passage marks despair. Once again comes the song of comfort, this time in B flat major, and the movement closes calmly in the same key.

The last part of the Sonate had a curious origin. Seated in his silent room, which looked out upon the little-frequented high road leading to the village, the composer became conscious of the trab-trab of a horse whose rider was passing by. The rhythmic movements of the animal’s hoofs, heard as they were but faintly by the half deaf musician, resolved themselves into a phrase in his mind which he jotted down mechanically, and this phrase persistently reiterated, formed the conclusion to the Sonate which was then filling heart and brain.

Only Beethoven would have conceived psychology so good as that. How often in the most crucial moments some trifling, quite irrelevant detail forces itself upon our notice, and absorbs attention which we should be unwilling to acknowledge.

The portrait of the great composer’s soul, which he painted for us in the D minor Sonate,{796} would have been less perfect had he withheld the trivial circumstance which awoke him from his dreams, and gave him again to the world.

At this country retreat the famous Heiligenstadt will was also written.

It shows us another side of Beethoven’s character, and leads to another phase of his Romanticism.

The will begins thus: “Oh, you men, you who have thought of me as defiant, stubborn, misanthropic, what wrong you have done me! Bethink you that for six years an incurable condition has befallen me, made worse by foolish doctors who from year to year deceived me with hopes of improvement. Though born with a fiery temperament, and even susceptible to the charms of society, I have had to separate myself from everyone, and pass my years in loneliness.

“What mortification when someone, standing beside me, caught from afar the sound of a flute and I heard nothing!

“Such incidents brought me to the verge of madness, and little more was wanted to make me put an end to my existence.

“Only my art held me back. Ah, I felt that it was impossible to leave the world before I had accomplished my mission!

“Great God, Thou who lookest down upon me, Thou seest my heart and Thou knowest that love and goodwill abide there.”

Immediately after this will, the six sacred songs, to words by Gellert (op. 48), were composed.

There is something infinitely pathetic in the thought of this great, lonely man, so profoundly ashamed of his bodily infirmity, and so conscious that he was misunderstood by all his fellow-men, turning thus in the hour of his sorest need to the One whom he could trust. The first of the six songs is a Prayer, the last a Song of Repentance. They are all very simple, as such songs should be, and through them the strong, personal note is unmistakable.

The quiet life at Heiligenstadt had another beneficial effect upon Beethoven. Both the Pastoral Symphony and the Pastoral Sonate trace the source of their inspiration to the pine forests, the rustic surroundings and Sabbath stillness of this picturesque village. The Symphony of course was a later work, but it was also composed at this, Beethoven’s favourite holiday resort.

But ardent lover of Nature though he was, he was not the sort of man who could pass his days in sylvan solitude. He was extremely sociable, even, in his way, extremely domestic.

Probably if he had secured the happy home life for which he so often longed, we should have been the losers, for he might truly have said, with Heine—

“Out of my great sorrows I make the little songs.”

When he made his will at Heiligenstadt he believed himself to be dying. At the close of it came this prayer—

“O Providence, let once a day of pure happiness shine upon me!”

That prayer was granted, and he found many days of pure happiness by the side of the Countess Therese of Brunswick, the aunt of the faithless Julie.

Countess Therese was the right woman for him, and nobody knows why their marriage did not take place. They were certainly betrothed, and Therese’s brother Franz was Beethoven’s most intimate friend. To him the Sonate Appassionata was dedicated, surely the grandest tribute that could be paid to any friendship. It was written during the composer’s visit to the Brunswicks’ estate in Hungary in the summer of 1806, and probably was intended as a message for Therese, which her lover could not trust himself to deliver.

Soon after leaving the Brunswicks Beethoven wrote to the Count—

“Dear, dear Franz! Only a line to tell you that I have made good terms with Clementi. Two hundred pounds I am to get, and over and above I can sell the same works again in Germany and France. Further, he has given me other orders, so that I may reasonably hope to attain the dignity of a true artist in early years. Kiss thy sister Therese, and tell her that I am afraid I shall become famous before she has erected a monument to me.”

At the same time, July, 1806, the much-discussed love-letter was written. This letter was found, after his death, among Beethoven’s papers, with the portrait of the Countess Therese, which is reproduced in this number of The Girl’s Own Paper. The original is an oil-painting, and on the back of it is written (in German of course):—

“To the rare genius, the great artist, the good man, from T. B.”

Every biographer of Beethoven has had a different theory as to the love-letter, but it is now generally granted that it must have been addressed to the Countess Therese, whom Beethoven in it calls “meine unsterbliche Geliebte.” (My immortal love). The letter begins:[1] “Mein Leben, mein Alles, mein ich” (My life, my all, my self), and the exquisite Sonate in F sharp, op. 78, which is so seldom played, translates those words into music. This Sonate was written in the autumn of 1809, when Beethoven was again with the Brunswicks in Hungary, and it is dedicated to the Countess Therese.

Rather an amusing incident in connection with it is related in a conversation between Beethoven and his pupil Czerny, at the end of which the composer exclaimed irritably—

“People always talk of the C sharp minor Sonate as if I hadn’t composed much better things. The F sharp Sonate is something very different!”

The C sharp minor Sonate was Julie Guicciardi’s, and it did not please Therese Brunswick’s lover to be reminded so often of that old love-story.

But he was quite right. The F sharp Sonate undoubtedly is a very different thing. It is less passionate, but it is much more finished. There is a sweet serenity about it which suits the noble face of the gracious lady who inspired it. My readers will need no guidance through it;{797} one glance at Therese’s portrait will help them more than anything I could say. “Mein Leben, mein Alles, mein besseres ich” sings the little prelude, and then the piece glides along like a boat on a sunny sea. Lucky Beethoven and lucky Therese, the day of pure happiness has come!

There is one more phase of Beethoven’s character upon which I want briefly to touch. Everyone knows that during his last years he was often in great straits for want of money. Perhaps you, my readers, will not think that money troubles are a feature of Romanticism, but money troubles, like others, may be the cause of anxiety, heart-burning or disappointment, and when these feelings are expressed in any work, the personal element, with them introduced, is the source of Romanticism.

Amongst Beethoven’s MSS. there was found after his death a Rondo inscribed in his own handwriting—

“The rage over a lost penny, worked off in a Rondo.”

That Rondo is one of the prettiest and the wittiest things in music.

The average Englishman will scarcely be able to realise that a man like Beethoven, a genius, could make such a fuss over a lost penny, but those who know Germans will be less incredulous.

Perhaps, too, it was not just the penny; it may have been the principle!

At all times Beethoven was suspicious, and he always thought that he was being cheated. He very often was cheated, and when we remember that by this time he was stone-deaf, and that he had no sympathetic friend to whom he could confide his troubles, we shall begin to understand why he put his rage over a lost penny into his music, with all his other emotions.

The piece (op. 129) is not easy to play, for it requires a reckless self-abandonment which is only possible to those players to whom it offers no technical difficulties. Bülow’s edition of it, published by Cotta, is the best. In one of his notes the editor says, “You can see the papers fly from the table, while the furious hunt proceeds,” and he declares that the man who wrote this brilliant Rondo could have written an opera bouffe if he had tried.

Much more might be said about Beethoven’s Romanticism. I have not touched at all upon his more exalted phases of feeling, the patriotism which was so wonderfully expressed in the seventh Symphony, the philosophy of life which culminated in the Choral Symphony with its impossible “Ode to Joy,” telling in tones what Goethe tried to tell in words at the end of the second part of Faust.

My object had been to show that musical form, or perfect classicism, was the beautiful vessel which Beethoven made use of to carry his own human thoughts and emotions, and that, as Maurice Hewlett says in his book, Pan and the Young Shepherd—

“Life goes to a tune, according as a man is tuneful, hath music.”

A STORY FOR GIRLS

By EVELYN EVERETT-GREEN, Author of “Greyfriars,” “Half-a-Dozen Sisters,” etc.

SUNSHINE.

It was a balmy day at the end of April, and in the great conservatory at Monckton Manor a little group of people had established themselves amongst the tall ferns and flowers, and girlish voices and laughter mingled with the plash of the fountain in the centre of the warm fragrant place.

Upon a cane lounge lay Oscar, white and thin, and frail of aspect, yet with something of the vigour and animation of returning health, which was very visible to those who had watched tremblingly beside him during the weeks of his tedious illness.

Sheila and May Lawrence sat near him, chatting with the ease and familiarity of an intimate friendship. It had long been May’s most cherished plan that so soon as Oscar should be strong enough for the move, he should be transported to Monckton Manor; and her mother had fallen in with the idea so soon as she had been assured on medical testimony that there was no fear of his bringing infection into the house.

So a fortnight ago the move had been made, and out in the pure fresh air of the country, away from the noise and bustle of the streets and a busy household, Oscar had made a fresh start, and had surprised everybody by the rapidity with which he gained ground.

For a week past he had almost lived in the conservatory, which, with its evenly regulated atmosphere, its sweet flower scents and the sensation of airiness and freshness, was almost like a new world to the invalid. He felt as though he were living out of doors “in Madeira,” as he would smilingly say; and then he and May would get Sheila to tell of beautiful Madeira, its rainbows, its flowers, its sunshine and long cloudless days; and Oscar would lie listening and dreaming, till he felt as though he were living the life there himself.

And Sheila, talking with absolute freedom to the brother with whom she had always shared her thoughts, and from whom she had never kept a secret, and to the girl-friend whom she now felt as though she had always known, soon talked away every bit of bitterness or vexation, and would enjoy a hearty laugh with her companions over the little weaknesses of her aunt, and think instead of her devotion to her daughter, which had led her into some comical errors. Since Sheila had learned to forget herself, to lose the sense of her own little wrongs, to feel everything merged in the great ocean of the unchangeable love which had wrapped her round in the hour of her keenest need, and had given her back her brother from the very gates of the grave, it had been so easy to forgive and forget. All the bitterness had been washed away. She was ashamed to think how angry she once had been. Everything else had looked so small, so insignificant, when seen in the light of the solemn realities of life. And although now the graver mood had passed, and with a rebound of nature, Sheila was her own bright laughing self again, yet there was a new sweetness in her smile, and new softness in her manner, and Oscar would lie and look at her in a great content, wondering what the change was and whence it had come.

“Here is North!” cried Sheila, suddenly springing up to get a better view through the palm leaves, whilst a bright flush suddenly rose in May’s cheeks, and the light leaped into her eyes. “I suppose he has come to see Oscar; really he is wonderfully attentive just now. He comes very often.”

May’s eyes were dancing, as she looked eagerly towards the advancing figure; and though his errand was ostensibly to ask for the invalid, it was to her face that his eyes first leapt as he made his way towards them.

Oscar had no need to expatiate upon his progress, his face spoke for him, and North looked satisfied and pleased.

“My father wants to see you, Oscar, when you are a little stronger. He has several things to say to you. That bit of mystery about the bill has all been cleared up. He wants to speak of it to you once, and then bury the miserable business in oblivion.”

Oscar’s colour came and went. Sheila clasped her hands together in excitement, and May’s flush deepened in her cheeks as she asked softly—

“Shall I go away whilst you talk it over?”

But North shook his head.

“There is no need for that, I think. You are Sheila’s friend, and I expect you know all that we have done for some while. Of course, it is very painful for us, but the truth must not be ignored. Suspicion cannot be permitted to attach to Oscar. Even though Cyril is my father’s son, he must not be screened at the expense of another.”

“I am so sorry!” breathed May softly.

“Yes; it has been a heavy blow to both my father and mother. The chief hope is, that having had his eyes thoroughly opened, my father may see that a different method must be pursued with Cyril. Temptation has come to him through opportunity. If the conditions are changed, things may be better, for he is, I trust, sincerely ashamed and repentant at last. It has been a miserable business looking into his affairs this past year, but we have got to the bottom of things now, and I feel sure his eyes have been thoroughly opened, and our mother’s grief has touched his heart. I hope this is the end of trouble.”

“Oh, I hope so—I do hope so!” breathed Sheila softly.

“And I was still to blame,” said Oscar. “I ought never to have let the money out of my hands.”

“Well, so I say,” answered North,{798} with a smile, “but my father exonerates you even there. He says that he would not have hesitated to place it in Cyril’s hands himself, and would have taken a receipt from him without scrutiny; and he cannot blame you for what he would have done himself without a thought. However, that can rest now. What my father wishes is to come and see you, afterwards to briefly explain the matter in the office to those who know the circumstances, during Cyril’s absence, and then to try and forget the whole business and speak of it no more.”

“Is Cyril going away?” asked Sheila quickly.

“Yes, for a time; and to Madeira first. Our uncle has just written, inviting him rather pressingly. It seems that he has been rather bitten by the tales of travel he has heard from the visitors there, and he wants to see a little more of the world before returning home. Aunt Cossart and Effie do not share this desire, and they will shortly come home together in the mail; but he wants to go to the Canary Islands, and then take a boat for the Mediterranean, and see some of the African ports, and Spain and perhaps something of Italy, before he gets back; and he wants Cyril for his travelling companion.”

“Fancy Uncle Cossart turning into a globe-trotter!” cried Sheila merrily. “But how nice for Cyril!”

“Yes, it seems just the thing for the time being. He will be better away for a little while, and we shall know that he is in safe keeping. My father will write a full account of everything to our uncle—that is only right. But he has always been a favourite with them, and they will be glad to help us out of a present difficulty by taking him off, away from his old companions, and giving him something to do in playing courier to Uncle Cossart. Cyril is a good traveller and speaks several languages with a fair fluency. He is as much pleased with the prospect as he could be with anything in his present frame of mind.”

“And are Aunt Cossart and Effie coming home?” asked Sheila with interest.

“Yes, by the next mail after Cyril arrives there. Effie is so much better that there is no need to keep her out any longer, and our aunt is beginning to tire of hotel life, and to want to get back to her own home again. She wants you and Oscar to be there to welcome them, Sheila; and invites Oscar for the whole summer. She thinks he would be much better a little way out of the town after his illness, even when he is well and at the office again; and she says that the dog-cart or a riding horse will always be at his disposal to take him backwards and forwards.”

“Oh, how kind of her!” cried Oscar, with a look of animation and pleasure in his face; and Sheila felt her own cheeks growing hot. She remembered her angry words of a few months back—“I will never forgive Aunt Cossart. I will never, never live at Cossart Place again!”—and a wave of self-reproach and humility swept over her, as she realised how hasty she had been in judging and condemning.

Her aunt might not always be very wise, or even quite just; but she was very kind of heart. If her fondness for her daughter made her foolish sometimes, she could show at others a very tender consideration and thoughtfulness.

“It would be splendid for Oscar,” she said softly; “I should like to send a letter to Aunt Cossart by Cyril. I’m afraid I have not always been quite nice to her and Effie; but I will try to be better now.”

Oscar flashed a look at her that brought sudden tears to her eyes, and May, seeming to divine that they wanted to talk to each other, suggested that North should come and see the daffodils in the copse; they were looking so lovely in this flood of spring sunshine.

“Oh, Oscar,” cried Sheila, as soon as they were alone, “I do feel so ashamed!”

He knew what she meant, and answered smiling—

“Well, you know, it was rather hard lines on you after all; and you only let fly to me. Nobody else knows; and you tell me you said hardly anything to Aunt Cossart before leaving.”

“No, I was too angry, too miserable. I knew if I talked I should cry. But, oh, how furious I was with her in my heart!”

“That was bad; but we all have our falls. You have not been furious now for a long while; and I hope you will not be tempted again.”

“Oh, I hope not—I hope I know better. But, Oscar, if it had not been for your being ill directly, and everything else going out of my head, I should have talked to Ray and everybody as I did to you. My head was full of the things I meant to say; and how I never, never, never would go to Cossart Place, or be with Effie, or do anything they wanted me to any more! Think if I had had it all out to them; and then this kind letter from Aunt Cossart, thinking of such a splendid plan for you! Oh, how miserable and ashamed I should have been. I am rather now; but it would have been ten times worse then!”

“Yes; so I suppose we had better try and learn to keep our hot angry thoughts to ourselves,” said Oscar thoughtfully, “and fight them down, and see what they are really like before we try and let fly! Looking back at things, I’ve often been sorry for speaking hastily; but I don’t think I’ve ever been sorry for holding my tongue, when it would have been rather a satisfaction to let it run away with me!”

“My tongue was always a more unruly member than yours, Oscar,” said Sheila with a smile and a sigh, “but I will try to keep it more under control; and, oh, it will not be difficult when we are together. We shall have such lovely times up there. It really is a nice place; only it was dull before. But if you are there every evening, it will always be something to look forward to. And oh, Oscar, isn’t it good that you are cleared! I had almost forgotten that—because I think in the end nobody at home believed it of you. But I am so glad uncle knows everything; though how could Cyril do it?”

“I suppose he was very much tempted. I am afraid he got into bad company and was in great straits lest exposure should follow. It is easy for us who are not tempted in that way to be very much horrified; but we have our own falls into our besetting sins. That should make us very careful how we judge other people. Should we do better in like case?”

Sheila was silent and thoughtful; she could not believe for a moment that her brother could ever fall into such a transgression; but it came to her that probably Cyril had not fallen all at once, but had given way little by little to what seemed like venial sins, till at last it had been easy to commit one from which at the outset he would have shrunk in horror.

“Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer!” The words seemed to be spoken in her ear; and she realised with a start of shame and horror her own spasms of bitter hatred. If she had given way to her impulses of anger, if she had blindly followed her own impulsive thoughts and purposes, what family breach might not have taken place—what bitterness might not have been aroused? In her heart—in the sight of God—she might have been a murderer!

She buried her face in her hands, and was silent; and Oscar, who was also very thoughtful, spoke no word. He was thinking himself to what proportions his own carelessness and shiftlessness might have grown, had it not been that the sharp lesson met with had pulled him up short.

It seemed long before the other pair rejoined them; and then North had only time to say a hasty farewell and walk off to the works again. He had stolen an opportunity when things were a little slack to make his visit; but he wished to be back before closing time.

“Oscar must have his beef-tea and a nap,” May decreed with an air of sovereignty which became her well. “Ah, and here it comes. And then you and I will take a stroll together, Sheila. It is so lovely out of doors!”

The excitement of North’s visit had disposed Oscar for a rest now that it was over, and he settled himself contentedly after he had taken his kitchen physic. The two girls left him to sleep, and passed out into the sunshine together.

Sheila talked eagerly of the future and her delight in having Oscar with her for the summer. May assented cordially and gladly; but went off into a brown study afterwards, giving her answers at random. At last Sheila stopped short laughing and looked at her. Something in her face bespoke such a vivid happiness that she was half startled.

“May, what is it? What has happened?” she asked; and the smile which broke over May’s face was brighter than the sunshine itself.

“That is what I want to tell you. That is what I got you out here for. I am the happiest girl in all the world. North has told me that he loves me. He has asked me to be his wife!”

(To be continued.)

Girls’ Employments.

Domestic Service.—“I am a lady by birth and up-bringing, but I have always had a sincere desire to be a domestic servant. I should choose a housemaid’s position, as I am fond of housework. When I was a child, playing with my dolls, I always took the part of servant, and, as I have grown older, every story that I could get that had anything about servants in it I have read and re-read. I have tried two other occupations, but have failed for various reasons, and believe I should succeed better as a servant. How could I be trained in a housemaid’s duties? Must I go as an under-housemaid first of all?

“Catherine Nancy.”

Evidently “Catherine Nancy” has a distinct vocation for domestic work, and she would therefore do wisely to follow her natural bent. The important question a girl should ask herself in choosing a career is “What is the best class of work that I am likely to be able to do successfully?” For instance, there are conceivable cases in which a girl might feel that she would make a good dressmaker or a good painter; we should then consider that, if no difficulties presented themselves on the pecuniary side, the painter’s profession should be chosen. Girls nowadays often fall into one of two errors; either they try to do work which stands highest in human esteem and fail because they have not the power to do it, or, from reasons of over-modesty or indolence, they choose to perform mechanical and subordinate work, when with a little effort and determination they could rise to something better. But among girls of the middle class the first mistake, the mistake of over-ambition is the more usual. To return to the practical problem set us by our correspondent, we think there is every argument in favour of “Catherine Nancy’s” entering domestic service. Formerly no doubt there might have been an objection that “Catherine Nancy” would be cut off from association with friends of her own class; but this difficulty is rapidly disappearing. “Catherine Nancy” may like to be informed that “lady servants” are now in great demand, and that employers are often willing to make important concessions in order to obtain them. Many persons employ only ladies in their service, while others are often willing to give training to a well-educated girl in return for services. “Catherine Nancy” could very probably be received into some clergyman’s or other nice household on the footing we have mentioned. It may be worth while to remind “Catherine Nancy” that it might be desirable later to rise from the position of housemaid to that of parlourmaid. The duties of a parlourmaid, comprising as they do the showing-in of visitors, waiting at table and polishing the plate and glass, are peculiarly suitable for a ladylike girl to perform. But it would be time enough later to consider the advisability of such a change as this, and in any case it would be well to begin as a housemaid. We recommend “Catherine Nancy” to advertise for a situation as housemaid in a house where lady-servants are employed.

Laundry Work.—“Is there any place where I could obtain lessons in laundry work? I need to earn some money, and I think I could obtain the washing for one family; but though I wash well, I do not think I am a sufficiently good ironer at present.—C. M.”

“C. M.” could be well taught in the Battersea, Borough Road, or Regent Street, Polytechnic. The last would be most convenient for her in point of locality, but by inquiry at some Board School in her neighbourhood she might hear of evening classes being held still nearer to her home. This would be decidedly advantageous, as omnibus fares from north-west London, where she lives, would cost money, which we are sure from her letter she could ill afford to spend. For some reasons we should have thought it better for “C. M.” to take employment in some large steam laundry until she has learnt all departments of the work thoroughly, for she is doubtless reluctant to leave home for many hours at a time. May we express to “C. M.” our admiration for the thrift displayed in the little account she gives us of her expenditure. There are not many couples who would attempt to spare out of 22s. a week, 2s. 6d. for insurance and sick pay, and 2s. for an aged relative. But we cannot doubt that people who enter on married life in this spirit, determined to be both thrifty and generous, will not want for means or help in days to come.

Dressmaking Question.—“I wish to place a lady, aged twenty-one, in some business or profession to enable her to earn a living. She leans to dressmaking. Do you recommend that trade? How long will it take to learn it in all its branches? What premium will have to be paid by an outdoor apprentice? Presuming that she studies for two years, what ought she to be able to earn at the end of that time? What would be the hours of work of an apprentice who paid a premium? Can you recommend a firm of dressmakers in Brighton who teach?—Stoke.”

To anyone with a taste for dressmaking we undoubtedly recommend the business. We receive intimations continually of good openings for women to establish themselves as dressmakers. We will reply to “Stoke’s” numerous questions in their order. In two years a girl ought to be able to obtain a fair all-round knowledge of dressmaking; but she must be careful to insist on being taught the work of each department, as in some firms there is a tendency to keep a girl at one kind of work only. An outdoor apprentice is not usually asked to pay a premium, but is expected to give services for some little time. The length of this period of free service varies greatly, as much according to the custom of the firm as the ability of the young dressmaker. In any case the outdoor apprentice is not likely to receive more than a shilling or two a week during any portion of the first year. What she would receive at the end of two years is most difficult to foretell, so much depending on the amount of aptitude she had developed in the meantime. The average wages of employees in London dressmaking businesses are, resident fitters, £40 to £100 a year; experienced bodice-hands, 16s. to 20s. a week; ordinary bodice-hands, 12s. to 15s. a week; assistants, 8s. to 10s.; skirt-hands, 8s. to 18s. It is probable that she would have to begin as an improver at 8s. A fashionable and well-paying firm in the West End that is known to us pays its out-workers 11s. to 18s. a week. The maximum fee to indoor hands is £2. Dressmakers’ hours are regulated by the Factories and Workshops Act. The regular day, that is to say, is one of twelve hours, including meal-times. A good deal of overtime is unfortunately worked during the season. An apprentice, whether paying a premium or not, would be expected to work these hours; but it is possible she might be excused the overtime, if special conditions to that effect were made at the time of engagement. We do not happen to be able to recommend a firm of dressmakers in Brighton.

Emigration.—“Will the Australian Agents-General be sending out any more girls from this country to Australia this year, on the same terms as last year? I am a general servant, getting £20 a year. Could I do better in Australia? Do they treat their servants better out there than here? I do not like service, but am very fond of housework and do not mind what I do. Would you recommend the Cape or Canada in preference to Australia? I think many of us girls complain and grumble when we ought to emigrate instead.

“A Would-be Emigrant.”

If it is the conditions of English service that “A Would-be Emigrant” dislikes and not the work itself, we think she might very likely find herself happier in Canada or Australia. The Cape is less to be recommended, as much Kaffir labour is employed there and consequently only very good servants are wanted. Free passages are given to domestic servants of good character between the ages of 18 and 40 who wish to emigrate to Western Australia. Inquiries should be addressed to the Agent-General for Western Australia, 15, Victoria Street, London, S.W. To other parts of Australia there are no free, but some assisted and nominated passages. To Canada there are no assisted passages. The emigrant to Canada should select April as the month in which to leave. Women should communicate with the Women’s Protective Immigration Society, at Quebec, and at 84, Osborne Street, Montreal, if they think of going to Canada. Servants in Canada receive the following wages per month:—Prince Edward Island, £1 to £1 8s.; Nova Scotia, £1 4s. to £2; New Brunswick, £1 4s. to £1 12s.; Quebec and Ontario, £1 4s. to £2 8s.; Manitoba and the North-West, £1 8s. to £3; and in British Columbia—where nurse girls mainly are wanted—£2 8s. to £4.

Employment for Middle-Aged Ladies.—“How can three middle-aged ladies, greatly reduced in circumstances, best obtain a living? They could spend about £30 in preparing for employment, and have an income of £30 per annum. Some persons have suggested that they should take a small house at about £50 per annum, and then let apartments; but these ladies do not feel that they could incur heavy liabilities or have the responsibility of a large establishment. They are educated, and used to keep a ladies’ school.—M. S. S.”

These ladies are quite wise not to spend all they have on the rental of a house, leaving themselves nothing for board or servants’ wages. The profits on lodgers are small and would certainly not cover the expenses of conducting such an establishment for some time to come. In our opinion it would be best for the ladies to separate and to take any posts that they could fill. They should try to obtain some kind of employment in the capacity of matron. Possibly one of them might obtain the matronship of a workhouse, or of one of those homes in which young children are trained. Educated ladies who are equal to doing some housework are much sought after to act as “house-mothers” to small colonies or families of poor children. Matrons are likewise sought for rescue or preventive homes for girls. It is for some occupation of this class that the ladies might wisely offer themselves. If they fail to obtain such posts on immediate application in reply to advertisements, then it would be advisable to spend some portion of the pounds they have by living and working for a few years in one of the London women’s settlements. This is the best advice that can be offered; but the case is certainly both sad and difficult.

[Transcriber’s Note: the following changes have been made to this text.

Page 789: duplicate word “and” corrected—“and let it stand”.

Page 798: horrow to horror—“shame and horror”.

Page 799: recieve to receive—“to receive more than”.

Page 800: your to you—“you enter”.]