CHAPTER I.

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LIPPINCOTT'S MAGAZINE OF POPULAR LITERATURE AND SCIENCE

January, 1873

Volume XI, No. 22

CONTENTS.

IRON BRIDGES, AND THEIR CONSTRUCTION by EDWARD ROWLAND.

SEARCHING FOR THE QUININE-PLANT IN PERU.

PROBATIONER LEONHARD; OR, THREE NIGHTS IN THE HAPPY VALLEY

by CAROLINE CHESEBRO'.

CHAPTER I. OUR HERO.

CHAPTER II. IN THE HAPPY VALLEY.

CHAPTER III. HIGH ART.

THE IRISH CAPITAL by REGINALD WYNFORD.

THE MAESTRO'S CONFESSION (ANDREA DAL CASTAGNO--1460.)

by MARGARET J. PRESTON.

MONSIEUR FOURNIER'S EXPERIMENT by CORNELIUS DEWEES.

A VISIT TO THE KING OF AURORA (FROM THE GERMAN OF THEODORE KIRSCHOFF.)

by ELIZABETH SILL.

GRAY EYES by ELLA WILLIAMS THOMPSON.

REMINISCENCES OF FLORENCE by MARIE HOWLAND.

THE SOUTHERN PLANTER by WILL WALLACE HARNEY.

BABES IN THE WOOD by EDGAR FAWCETT.

MY CHARGE ON THE LIFE-GUARDS by CHARLES L. NORTON.

PAINTING AND A PAINTER.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

WILHELMINE VON HILLERN.

HIS NAME? by M. J. P.

UNPUBLISHED LETTER FROM LORD NELSON TO LADY HAMILTON.

"WHITE-HAT" DAY by K. H.

MR. SOTHERN AS GARRICK by M. M.

NOTES.

LITERATURE OF THE DAY.

Forster, John--The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. II

Gautier, Théophile--Émaux et Camées

Alcott, A. Bronson--Concord Days

Hanum, Melek--Thirty Years in the Harem

Gale, Ethel C.--Hints on Dress

Sketch Map of the Nile Sources and Lake Region of Central

Africa, showing Dr. Livingstone's Discoveries and Mr. Stanley's

Route

Books Received

ILLUSTRATIONS

WILHELMINE VON HILLERN, Author of "Only a Girl," "By His Own Might," etc.

[See Our Monthly Gossip.]

"ASSEMBLING" BRIDGE UNDER SHED.

THE LYMAN VIADUCT.

BLAST-FURNACES.

DUMPING ORE AND COAL INTO BLAST-FURNACES.

ELEVATOR.

THE ENGINE-ROOM.

RUNNING METAL INTO PIGS.

CARRYING THE IRON BALLS.

ROTARY SQUEEZER.

BOILING-FURNACE.

THE ROLLS.

COLD SAW.

HOT SAW.

RIVETING A COLUMN.

FURNACE AND HYDRAULIC DIE.

VIEW OF MACHINE-SHOP

NEW RIVER BRIDGE ON ITS STAGING.

BRIDGE AT ALBANY.

LA SALLE BRIDGE.

BRIDGE AT AUGUSTA, MAINE.

SACO BRIDGE.

PHOENIX WORKS.

"THE FIRST FORD OF THE CCONI WAS PASSED JUST OUTSIDE THE TOWN."

"GENTLEMEN, I AM JUAN THE NEPHEW OF ARAGON."

"THE STRAW SHEDS AND GRASSY PLAZA OF CHILE-CHILE."

"CHAUPICHACA WAS MARKED WITH A SQUARE TERMINAL PILLAR."

"THE MAMABAMBA WAS CROSSED BY AN EXTEMPORIZED BRIDGE."

"THE EXAMINADOR AND THE COLONEL HOPPED VALIANTLY OVER THE MENDOZA".

"THE REPUTED GOLD-BEARING RIVER OR OUITUBAMBA ROLLED FROM ITS TUNNEL."

[Illustration: WILHELMINE VON HILLERN, Author of "Only a Girl," "By

His Own Might," etc. (See Our Monthly Gossip.)]

IRON BRIDGES, AND THEIR CONSTRUCTION.

[Illustration: "ASSEMBLING" BRIDGE UNDER SHED.]

In a graveyard in Watertown, a village near Boston, Massachusetts, there

is a tombstone commemorating the claims of the departed worthy who lies

below to the eternal gratitude of posterity. The inscription is dated in

the early part of this century (about 1810), but the name of him who was

thus immortalized has faded like the date of his death from my memory,

while the deed for which he was distinguished, and which was recorded

upon his tombstone, remains clear. "He built the famous bridge over the

Charles River in this town," says the record. The Charles River is here

a small stream, about twenty to thirty feet wide, and the bridge was a

simple wooden structure.

[Illustration: THE LYMAN VIADUCT.]

Doubtless in its day this structure was considered an engineering feat

worthy of such posthumous immortality as is gained by an epitaph, and

afforded such convenience for transportation as was needed by the

commercial activity of that era. From that time, however, to this, the

changes which have occurred in our commercial and industrial methods are

so fully indicated by the changes of our manner and method of

bridge-building that it will not be a loss of time to investigate the

present condition of our abilities in this most useful branch of

engineering skill.

In the usual archaeological classification of eras the Stone Age

precedes that of Iron, and in the history of bridge-building the same

sequence has been preserved. Though the knowledge of working iron was

acquired by many nations at a pre-historic period, yet in quite modern

times--within this century, even--the invention of new processes and the

experience gained of new methods have so completely revolutionized this

branch of industry, and given us such a mastery over this material,

enabling us to apply it to such new uses, that for the future the real

Age of Iron will date from the present century.

The knowledge of the arch as a method of construction with stone or

brick--both of them materials aptly fitted for resistance under

pressure, but of comparatively no tensile strength--enabled the Romans

to surpass all nations that had preceded them in the course of history

in building bridges. The bridge across the Danube, erected by

Apollodorus, the architect of Trajan's Column, was the largest bridge

built by the Romans. It was more than three hundred feet in height,

composed of twenty-one arches resting upon twenty piers, and was about

eight hundred feet in length. It was after a few years destroyed by the

emperor Adrian, lest it should afford a means of passage to the

barbarians, and its ruins are still to be seen in Lower Hungary.

With the advent of railroads bridge-building became even a greater

necessity than it had ever been before, and the use of iron has enabled

engineers to grapple with and overcome difficulties which only fifty

years ago would have been considered hopelessly insurmountable. In this

modern use of iron advantage is taken of its great tensile strength, and

many iron bridges, over which enormous trains of heavily-loaded cars

pass hourly, look as though they were spun from gossamer threads, and

yet are stronger than any structure of wood or stone would be.

[Illustration: BLAST-FURNACES.]

Another great advantage of an iron bridge over one constructed of wood

or stone is the greater ease with which it can, in every part of it, be

constantly observed, and every failing part replaced. Whatever material

may be used, every edifice is always subject to the slow disintegrating

influence of time and the elements. In every such edifice as a bridge,

use is a process of constant weakening, which, if not as constantly

guarded against, must inevitably, in time, lead to its destruction.

[Illustration: DUMPING ORE AND COAL INTO BLAST-FURNACES.]

In a wooden or stone bridge a beam affected by dry rot or a stone

weakened by the effects of frost may lie hidden from the inspection of

even the most vigilant observer until, when the process has gone far

enough, the bridge suddenly gives way under a not unusual strain, and

death and disaster shock the community into a sense of the inherent

defects of these materials for such structures.

The introduction of the railroad has brought about also another change

in the bridge-building of modern times, compared with that of all the

ages which have preceded this nineteenth century. The chief bridges of

ancient times were built as great public conveniences upon thoroughways

over which there was a large amount of travel, and consequently were

near the cities or commercial centres which attracted such travel, and

were therefore placed where they were seen by great numbers. Now,

however, the connection between the chief commercial centres is made by

the railroads, and these penetrate immense distances, through

comparatively unsettled districts, in order to bring about the needed

distribution; and in consequence many of the great railroad bridges are

built in the most unfrequented spots, and are unseen by the numerous

passengers who traverse them, unconscious that they are thus easily

passing over specimens of engineering skill which surpass, as objects of

intelligent interest, many of the sights they may be traveling to see.

[Illustration: ELEVATOR.]

The various processes by which the iron is prepared to be used in

bridge-building are many of them as new as is the use of this material

for this purpose, and it will not be amiss to spend a few moments in

examining them before presenting to our readers illustrations of some of

the most remarkable structures of this kind. Taking a train by the

Reading Railroad from Philadelphia, we arrive, in about an hour, at

Phoenixville, in the Schuylkill Valley, where the Phoenix Iron-and

Bridge-works are situated. In this establishment we can follow the iron

from its original condition of ore to a finished bridge, and it is the

only establishment in this country, and most probably in the world,

where this can be seen.

[Illustration: THE ENGINE-ROOM.]

These works were established in 1790. In 1827 they came into the

possession of the late David Reeves, who by his energy and enterprise

increased their capacity to meet the growing demands of the time, until

they reached their present extent, employing constantly over fifteen

hundred hands.

[Illustration: RUNNING METAL INTO PIGS.]

The first process is melting the ore in the blast-furnace. Here the ore,

with coal and a flux of limestone, is piled in and subjected to the heat

of the fires, driven by a hot blast and kept burning night and day. The

iron, as it becomes melted, flows to the bottom of the furnace, and is

drawn off below in a glowing stream. Into the top of the blast-furnaces

the ore and coal are dumped, having been raised to the top by an

elevator worked by a blast of air. It is curious to notice how slowly

the experience was gathered from which has re suited the ability to

work iron as it is done here. Though even at the first settlement of

this country the forests of England had been so much thinned by their

consumption in the form of charcoal in her iron industry as to make a

demand for timber from this country a flourishing trade for the new

settlers, yet it was not until 1612 that a patent was granted to Simon

Sturtevant for smelting iron by the consumption of bituminous coal.

Another patent for the same invention was granted to John Ravenson the

next year, and in 1619 another to Lord Dudley; yet the process did not

come into general use until nearly a hundred years later.

[Illustration: CARRYING THE IRON BALLS.]

The blast for the furnace is driven by two enormous engines, each of

three hundred horse-power. The blast used here is, as we have said, a

hot one, the air being heated by the consumption of the gases evolved

from the material itself. The gradual steps by which these successive

modifications were introduced is an evidence of how slowly industrial

processes have been perfected by the collective experience of

generations, and shows us how much we of the present day owe to our

predecessors. From the earliest times, as among the native smiths of

Africa to-day, the blast of a bellows has been used in working iron to

increase the heat of the combustion by a more plentiful supply of

oxygen. The blast-furnace is supposed to have been first used in

Belgium, and to have been introduced into England in 1558. Next came the

use of bituminous coal, urged with a blast of cold air. But it was not

until 1829 that Neilson, an Englishman, conceived the idea of heating

the air of the blast, and carried it out at the Muirkirk furnaces. In

that year he obtained a patent for this process, and found that he could

from the same quantity of fuel make three times as much iron. His patent

made him very rich: in one single case of infringement he received a

cheque for damages for one hundred and fifty thousand pounds. In his

method, however, he used an extra fire for heating the air of his blast.

In 1837 the idea of heating the air for the blast by the gases generated

in the process was first practically introduced by M. Faber Dufour at

Wasseralfingen in the kingdom of Würtemberg.

In this country, charcoal was at first used universally for smelting

iron, anthracite coal being considered unfit for the purpose. In 1820 an

unsuccessful attempt to use it was made at Mauch Chunk. In 1833,

Frederick W. Geisenhainer of Schuylkill obtained a patent for the use of

the hot blast with anthracite, and in 1835 produced the first iron made

with this process. In 1841, C.E. Detmold adapted the consumption of the

gases produced by the smelting to the use of anthracite; and since then

it has become quite general, and has caused an almost incalculable

saving to the community in the price of iron.

The view of the engines which pump the blast will give an idea of the

immense power which the Phoenix company has at command. Twice every day

the furnace is tapped, and the stream of liquid iron flows out into

moulds formed in the sand, making the iron into pigs--so called from a

fancied resemblance to the form of these animals. This makes the first

process, and in many smelting-establishments this is all that is done,

the iron in this form being sold and entering into the general

consumption.

The next process is "boiling," which is a modification of "puddling,"

and is generally used in the best iron-works in this country. The

process of puddling was invented by Henry Cort, an Englishman, and

patented by him in 1783 and 1784 as a new process for "shingling,

welding and manufacturing iron and steel into bars, plates and rods of

purer quality and in larger quantity than heretofore, by a more

effectual application of fire and machinery." For this invention Cort

has been called "the father of the iron-trade of the British nation,"

and it is estimated that his invention has, during this century, given

employment to six millions of persons, and increased the wealth of Great

Britain by three thousand millions of dollars. In his experiments for

perfecting his process Mr. Cort spent his fortune, and though it proved

so valuable, he died poor, having been involved by the government in a

lawsuit concerning his patent which beggared him. Six years before his

death, the government, as an acknowledgment of their wrong, granted him

a yearly pension of a thousand dollars, and at his death this miserly

recompense was reduced to his widow to six hundred and twenty-five

dollars.

[Illustration: ROTARY SQUEEZER.]

[Illustration: BOILING-FURNACE.]

When iron is simply melted and run into any mould, its texture is

granular, and it is so brittle as to be quite unreliable for any use

requiring much tensile strength. The process of puddling consisted in

stirring the molten iron run out in a puddle, and had the effect of so

changing its atomic arrangement as to render the process of rolling it

more efficacious. The process of boiling is considered an improvement

upon this. The boiling-furnace is an oven heated to an intense heat by a

fire urged with a blast. The cast-iron sides are double, and a constant

circulation of water is kept passing through the chamber thus made, in

order to preserve the structure from fusion by the heat. The inside is

lined with fire-brick covered with metallic ore and slag over the bottom

and sides, and then, the oven being charged with the pigs of iron, the

heat is let on. The pigs melt, and the oven is filled with molten iron.

The puddler constantly stirs this mass with a bar let through a hole in

the door, until the iron boils up, or "ferments," as it is called. This

fermentation is caused by the combustion of a portion of the carbon in

the iron, and as soon as the excess of this is consumed, the cinders

and slag sink to the bottom of the oven, leaving the semi-fluid mass on

the top. Stirring this about, the puddler forms it into balls of such a

size as he can conveniently handle, which are taken out and carried on

little cars, made to receive them, to "the squeezer."

[Illustration: THE ROLLS.]

To carry on this process properly requires great skill and judgment in

the puddler. The heat necessarily generated by the operation is so great

that very few persons have the physical endurance to stand it. So great

is it that the clothes upon the person frequently catch fire. Such a

strain upon the physical powers naturally leads those subjected to it to

indulge in excesses. The perspiration which flows from the puddlers in

streams while engaged in their work is caused by the natural effort of

their bodies to preserve themselves from injury by keeping their normal

temperature. Such a consumption of the fluids of the body causes great

thirst, and the exhaustion of the labor, both bodily and mental, leads

often to the excessive use of stimulants. In fact, the work is too

laborious. Its conditions are such that no one should be subjected to

them. The necessity, however, for judgment, experience and skill on the

part of the operator has up to this time prevented the introduction of

machinery to take the place of human labor in this process. The

successful substitution in modern times of machines for performing

various operations which formerly seemed to require the intelligence and

dexterity of a living being for their execution, justifies the

expectation that the study now being given to the organization of

industry will lead to the invention of machines which will obviate the

necessity for human suffering in the process of puddling. Such a

consummation would be an advantage to all classes concerned. The

attempts which have been made in this direction have not as yet proved

entirely successful.

In the squeezer the glowing ball of white-hot iron is placed, and forced

with a rotary motion through a spiral passage, the diameter of which is

constantly diminishing. The effect of this operation is to squeeze all

the slag and cinder out of the ball, and force the iron to assume the

shape of a short thick cylinder, called "a bloom." This process was

formerly performed by striking the ball of iron repeatedly with a

tilt-hammer.

[Illustration: COLD SAW.]

The bloom is now re-heated and subjected to the process of rolling. "The

rolls" are heavy cylinders of cast iron placed almost in contact, and

revolving rapidly by steam-power. The bloom is caught between these

rollers, and passed backward and forward until it is pressed into a flat

bar, averaging from four to six inches in width, and about an inch and a

half thick. These bars are then cut into short lengths, piled, heated

again in a furnace, and re-rolled. After going through this process they

form the bar iron of commerce. From the iron reduced into this form the

various parts used in the construction of iron bridges are made by being

rolled into shape, the rolls through which the various parts pass having

grooves of the form it is desired to give to the pieces.

[Illustration: HOT SAW.]

[Illustration: RIVETING A COLUMN.]

These rolls, when they are driven by steam, obtain this generally from a

boiler placed over the heating-or puddling-furnace, and heated by the

waste gases from the furnace. This arrangement was first made by John

Griffin, the superintendent of the Phoenix Iron-works, under whose

direction the first rolled iron beams over nine inches thick that were

ever made were produced at these works. The process of rolling toughens

the iron, seeming to draw out its fibres; and iron that has been twice

rolled is considered fit for ordinary uses. For the various parts of a

bridge, however, where great toughness and tensile strength are

necessary, as well as uniformity of texture, the iron is rolled a third

time. The bars are therefore cut again into pieces, piled, re-heated and

rolled again. A bar of iron which has been rolled twice is formed from

a pile of fourteen separate pieces of iron that have been rolled only

once, or "muck bar," as it is called; while the thrice-rolled bar is

made from a pile of eight separate pieces of double-rolled iron. If,

therefore, one of the original pieces of iron has any flaw or defect, it

will form only a hundred and twelfth part of the thrice-rolled bar. The

uniformity of texture and the toughness of the bars which have been

thrice rolled are so great that they may be twisted, cold, into a knot

without showing any signs of fracture. The bars of iron, whether hot or

cold, are sawn to the various required lengths by the hot or cold saws

shown in the illustrations, which revolve with great rapidity.

[Illustration: FURNACE AND HYDRAULIC DIE.]

For the columns intended to sustain the compressive thrust of heavy

weights a form is used in this establishment of their own design, and to

which the name of the "Phoenix column" has been given. They are tubes

made from four or from eight sections rolled in the usual way and

riveted together at their flanges. When necessary, such columns are

joined together by cast-iron joint-blocks, with circular tenons which

fit into the hollows of each tube.

To join two bars to resist a strain of tension, links or eye-bars are

used from three to six inches wide, and as long as may be needed. At

each end is an enlargement with a hole to receive a pin. In this way any

number of bars can be joined together, and the result of numerous

experiments made at this establishment has shown that under sufficient

strain they will part as often in the body of the bar as at the joint.

The heads upon these bars are made by a process known as die-forging.

The bar is heated to a white heat, and under a die worked by hydraulic

pressure the head is shaped and the hole struck at one operation. This

method of joining by pins is much more reliable than welding. The pins

are made of cold-rolled shafting, and fit to a nicety.

The general view of the machine-shop, which covers more than an acre of

ground, shows the various machines and tools by which iron is planed,

turned, drilled and handled as though it were one of the softest of

materials. Such a machine-shop is one of the wonders of this century.

Most of the operations performed there, and all of the tools with which

they are done, are due entirely to modern invention, many of them within

the last ten years. By means of this application of machines great

accuracy of work is obtained, and each part of an iron bridge can be

exactly duplicated if necessary. This method of construction is entirely

American, the English still building their iron bridges mostly with

hand-labor. In consequence also of this method of working, American iron

bridges, despite the higher price of our iron, can successfully compete

in Canada with bridges of English or Belgian construction. The American

iron bridges are lighter than those of other nations, but their absolute

strength is as great, since the weight which is saved is all dead

weight, and not necessary to the solidity of the structure. The same

difference is displayed here that is seen in our carriages with their

slender wheels, compared with the lumbering, heavy wagons of European

construction.

[Illustration: VIEW OF MACHINE-SHOP.]

Before any practical work upon the construction of a bridge is begun the

data and specifications are made, and a plan of the structure is drawn,

whether it is for a railroad or for ordinary travel, whether for a

double or single track, whether the train is to pass on top or below,

and so on. The calculations and plans are then made for the use of such

dimensions of iron that the strain upon any part of the structure shall

not exceed a certain maximum, usually fixed at ten thousand pounds to

the square inch. As the weight of the iron is known, and its tensile

strength is estimated at sixty thousand pounds per square inch, this

estimate, which is technically called "a factor of safety" of six, is a

very safe one. In other words, the bridge is planned and so constructed

that in supporting its own weight, together with any load of locomotives

or cars which can be placed upon it, it shall not be subjected to a

strain over one-sixth of its estimated strength.

[Illustration: NEW RIVER BRIDGE ON ITS STAGING.]

After the plan is made, working drawings are prepared and the process of

manufacture commences. The eye-bars, when made, are tested in a

testing-machine at double the strain which by any possibility they can

be put to in the bridge itself. The elasticity of the iron is such that

after being submitted to a tension of about thirty thousand pounds to

the square inch it will return to its original dimensions; while it is

so tough that the bars, as large as two inches in diameter, can be bent

double, when cold, without showing any signs of fracture. Having stood

these tests, the parts of the bridge are considered fit to be used.

[Illustration: BRIDGE AT ALBANY.]

When completed the parts are put together--or "assembled," as the

technical phrase is--in order to see that they are right in length, etc.

Then they are marked with letters or numbers, according to the working

plan, and shipped to the spot where the bridge is to be permanently

erected. Before the erection can be begun, however, a staging or

scaffolding of wood, strong enough to support the iron structure until

it is finished, has to be raised on the spot. When the bridge is a large

one this staging is of necessity an important and costly structure. An

illustration on another page shows the staging erected for the support

of the New River bridge in West Virginia, on the line of the Chesapeake

and Ohio Railway, near a romantic spot known as Hawksnest. About two

hundred yards below this bridge is a waterfall, and while the staging

was still in use for its construction, the river, which is very

treacherous, suddenly rose about twenty feet in a few hours, and became

a roaring torrent.

[Illustration: LA SALLE BRIDGE.]

The method of making all the parts of a bridge to fit exactly, and

securing the ties by pins, is peculiarly American. The plan still

followed in Europe is that of using rivets, which makes the erection of

a bridge take much more time, and cost, consequently, much more. A

riveted lattice bridge one hundred and sixty feet in span would require

ten or twelve days for its erection, while one of the Phoenixville

bridges of this size has been erected in eight and a half hours.

The view of the Albany bridge will show the style which is technically

called a "through" bridge, having the track at the level of the lower

chords. This view of the bridge is taken from the west side of the

Hudson, near the Delavan House in Albany. The curved portion crosses the

Albany basin, or outlet of the Erie Canal, and consists of seven spans

of seventy-three feet each, one of sixty-three, and one of one hundred

and ten. That part of the bridge which crosses the river consists of

four spans of one hundred and eighty-five feet each, and a draw two

hundred and seventy-four feet wide. The iron-work in this bridge cost

about three hundred and twenty thousand dollars.

The bridge over the Illinois River at La Salle, on the Illinois Central

Railroad, shows the style of bridge technically called a "deck" bridge,

in which the train is on the top. This bridge consists of eighteen spans

of one hundred and sixty feet each, and cost one hundred and eighty

thousand dollars. The bridge over the Kennebec River, on the line of the

Maine Central Railroad, at Augusta, Maine, is another instance of a

"through" bridge. It cost seventy-five thousand dollars, has five spans

of one hundred and eighty-five feet each, and was built to replace a

wooden deck bridge which was carried away by a freshet.

[Illustration: BRIDGE AT AUGUSTA, MAINE.]

The bridge on the Portland and Ogdensburg Railroad which crosses the

Saco River is a very general type of a through railway bridge. It

consists of two spans of one hundred and eighty-five feet each, and cost

twenty thousand dollars. The New River bridge in West Virginia consists

of two spans of two hundred and fifty feet each, and two others of

seventy-five feet each. Its cost was about seventy thousand dollars.

The Lyman Viaduct, on the Connecticut Air-line Railway, at East Hampton,

Connecticut, is one hundred and thirty-five feet high and eleven

thousand feet long.

These specimens will show the general character of the iron bridges

erected in this country. When iron was first used in constructions of

this kind, cast iron was employed, but its brittleness and unreliability

have led to its rejection for the main portions of bridges. Experience

has also led the best iron bridge-builders of America to quite generally

employ girders with parallel top and bottom members, vertical posts

(except at the ends, where they are made inclined toward the centre of

the span), and tie-rods inclined at nearly forty-five degrees. This

form takes the least material for the required strength.

[Illustration: SACO BRIDGE.]

The safety of a bridge depends quite as much upon the design and

proportions of its details and connections as upon its general shape.

The strain which will compress or extend the ties, chords and other

parts can be calculated with mathematical exactness. But the strains

coming upon the connections are very often indeterminate, and no

mathematical formula has yet been found for them. They are like the

strains which come upon the wheels, axles and moving parts of

carriages, cars and machinery. Yet experience and judgment have led the

best builders to a singular uniformity in their treatment of these

parts. Each bridge has been an experiment, the lessons of which have

been studied and turned to the best effect.

[Illustration: PHOENIX WORKS.]

There is no doubt that iron bridges can be made perfectly safe. Their

margin is greater than that of the boiler, the axles or the rail. To

make them safe, European governments depend upon rigid rules, and

careful inspection to see that they are carried out. In this country

government inspection is not relied on with such certainty, and the

spirit of our institutions leads us to depend more upon the action of

self-interest and the inherent trustworthiness of mankind when indulged

with freedom of action. Though at times this confidence may seem vain,

and "rings" in industrial pursuits, as in politics, appear to corrupt

the honesty which forms the very foundation of freedom, yet their

influence is but temporary, and as soon as the best public sentiment

becomes convinced of the need for their removal their influence is

destroyed. Such evils are necessary incidents of our transitional

movement toward an industrial, social and political organization in

which the best intelligence and the most trustworthy honesty shall

control these interests for the best advantage of society at large. In

the mean time, the best security for the safety of iron bridges is to be

found in the self-interest of the railway corporations, who certainly do

not desire to waste their money or to render themselves liable to

damages from the breaking of their bridges, and who consequently will

employ for such constructions those whose reputation has been fairly

earned, and whose character is such that reliance can be placed in the

honesty of their work. Experience has given the world the knowledge

needed to build bridges of iron which shall in all possible

contingencies be safe, and there is no excuse for a penny-wise and

pound-foolish policy when it leads to disaster.

EDWARD ROWLAND.

* * * * *

SEARCHING FOR THE QUININE-PLANT IN PERU.

SECOND PAPER.

The crystal peaks of the Andes were behind our explorers: before, were

their eastward-stretching spurs and their eastward-falling rivers. On

the mountain-flanks, as the last landmark of Christian civilization,

nestled the village of Marcapata, whose square, thatched belfry faded

gradually from sight, reminding the travelers of the ghostly

ministrations of the padre and the secular protection of the gobernador.

Neither priest nor edile would they encounter until their return to the

same church-tower. Their patron, Don Juan Sanz de Santo Domingo, was

already picking his way along the snowy defiles of the mountains to

attain again his luxurious home in Cuzco. Behind the adventurers lay

companionship and society--represented by the dubious orgies of the

House of Austria--and the security of civil government--represented by

the mortal ennui of a Peruvian city. Before them lay difficulties and

perhaps dangers, but also at least variety, novelty and possible wealth.

Colonel Perez, Marcoy and the examinador retained their horses, and a

couple of the mozos their mules, the remainder of the beasts being kept

at livery in Marcapata, and the muleteers volunteering to accompany the

troupe as far as Chile-Chile: at this point the bridle-path came to an

end, and the gentlemen would have to dismount, accompanying thenceforth

their peons on a literal "footing" of equality.

Two torrents which fall in perpendicular cataracts from the mountains,

the Kellunu ("yellow water") and the Cca-chi ("salt"), run together at

the distance of a league from their place of precipitation. They enclose

in their approach the hill on which Marcapata is perched, and they form

by their confluence the considerable river which our travelers were

about to trace, and which is called by the Indians Cconi ("warm"), but

on the Spanish maps is termed the river of Marcapata.

[Illustration: "THE FIRST FORD OF THE CCONI WAS PASSED JUST OUTSIDE THE

TOWN."]

The first ford of the Cconi was passed just outside the town, at a point

where the right bank of the river, growing steeper and steeper, became

impracticable, and necessitated a crossing to the left. The ford allowed

the peons to stagger through at mid-leg on the uneven pavement afforded

by the large pebbles of the bed. At this point the valley of the Cconi

was seen stretching indefinitely outward toward the east, enclosed in

two chains of conical peaks: their regular forms, running into each

other at the middle of their height, clothed with interminable forests

and bathed with light, melted regularly away into the perspective.

Indian huts buried in gardens of the white lily which had seemed so

beautiful in the chapel of Lauramarca, hedges of aloe menacing the

intruder with their millions of steely-looking swords, slender bamboos

daintily rocking themselves over the water, and enormous curtains of

creepers hanging from the hillsides and waving to the wind in vast

breadths of green, were the decorations of this Peruvian paradise.

The pretty lilies gradually disappeared, and the thatched cabins became

more and more sparse, when from one of the latter, at a hundred paces

from the caravan, issued a human figure. The man struck an attitude in

the pathway of the travelers, his carbine on his shoulder, his fist on

his hip and his nose saucily turned up in the air. Neither his

Metamora-like posture nor his dress inspired confidence.

"He is evidently waiting for us," remarked Colonel Perez, an heroic yet

prudent personage: "fortunately, it is broad day. I would not grant an

interview to such a _salteador_ (brigand) alone at night and in a

desert."

The salteador wore a low broad felt, on whose ample brim the rain and

sun had sketched a variety of vague designs. A gray sack buttoned to the

throat and confined by a leathern belt, and trowsers of the same stuffed

into his long coarse woolen stockings, completed his costume. He was

shod, like an Indian, in _ojotas_, or sandals cut out of raw leather and

laced to his legs with thongs. Two ox-horns hanging at his side

contained his ammunition, and a light haversack was slung over his back.

This mozo, who at a distance would have passed for a man of forty,

appeared on examination to be under twenty-two years of age. It was

likewise observable on a nearer view that his skin was brown and clear

like a chestnut, and that his lively eye, perfect teeth and air of

decision were calculated to please an Indian girl of his vicinity. To

complete his rehabilitation in the eyes of the party, his introductory

address was delivered with the grace of a Spanish cavalier.

"The gentlemen," said he, gracefully getting rid of his superabundant

hat, "will voluntarily excuse me for having waited so long with my

respects and offers of service. I should have gone to meet them at

Marcapata, but my uncle the gobernador forbade me to do so for fear of

displeasing the priest. Gentlemen, I am Juan the nephew of Aragon. It is

by the advice of my uncle that I have come to place myself in your way,

and ask if you will admit me to your company as mozo-assistant and

interpreter."

The colonel, whose antipathy to the salteador did not yield on a closer

acquaintance, roughly asked the youth what he meant by his assurance.

Mr. Marcoy, however, was disposed to temporize.

"If you are Juan the nephew of Aragon," said he, "you must have already

learned from your uncle that we have engaged an interpreter, Pepe Garcia

of Chile-Chile."

"Precisely what he told me, señor," replied the young man; "but, for my

part, I thought that if one interpreter would be useful to these

gentlemen on their journey, two interpreters would be a good deal

better, on account of the fact that we walk better with two legs than

with one: that is the reason I have intercepted you, gentlemen."

This opinion made everybody laugh, and as Juan considered it his

privilege to laugh five times louder than any one, a quasi engagement

resulted from this sudden harmony of temper. Colonel Perez shrugged his

shoulders: Marcoy, as literary man, took down the name of the new-comer.

The nephew of Aragon was so delighted that he gave vent to a little cry

of pleasure, at the same time cutting a pirouette. This harmless caper

allowed the party to detect; tied to his haversack, the local banjo, or

_charango_, an instrument which the Paganinis of the country make for

themselves out of half a calabash and the unfeeling bowels of the cat.

[Illustration: "GENTLEMEN, I AM JUAN THE NEPHEW OF ARAGON."]

The priest, who had recommended Pepe Garcia, had made mention of that

person's fine voice, with which the church of Marcapata was edified

every Sunday. The gobernador, while putting in a word for his nephew,

and particularizing the beauty of his execution on the guitar, had

insinuated doubts of the baritone favored by the padre. Happy land,

whose disputes are like the disputes of an opera company, and where

people are recommended for business on the strength of their musical

execution!

Aragon quickly understood that his friend in the expedition was not

Colonel Perez, who had insultingly dubbed him the Second Fiddle (or

Charango). He attached himself therefore with the fidelity of a spaniel

to Mr. Marcoy, walking alongside and resting his arm on the pommel of

his saddle. After an hour's traverse of a comparatively desert plateau

called the Pedregal, covered with rocks and smelling of the

patchouli-scented flowers of the mimosa, Aragon pointed out the straw

sheds and grassy plaza of Chile-Chile. This rustic metropolis is not

indicated on many maps, but for the travelers it had a special

importance, bearing upon the inca history and etymological roots of

Peru, for it was the residence of their interpreter-in-chief, Pepe

Garcia.

Introduced by the latter, our explorers made a kind of triumphal entry

into the village. The old Indian women dropped their spinning, the naked

children ceased to play with the pigs and began to play with the

garments and equipage of the visitors, and a couple of blind men, who

were leading each other, remarked that they were glad to see them.

Garcia the polyglot, radiant with importance, lost no time in dragging

his guests toward his own residence, a large straw thatch surmounting

walls of open-work, which took the fancy of the travelers from the

singular trophy attached above the door. This trophy was composed of the

heads of bucks and rams, with those of the fox and the ounce, where the

shrunken skin displayed the pointed _sierra_ of the teeth, while the

horns of oxen and goats, set end to end around the borders, formed dark

and rigid festoons: all vacancies were filled up with the forms of bats,

spread-eagled and nailed fast, from the smallest variety to the large,

man-attacking _vespertilio_. As a contrast to this exterior decoration,

the inside was severely simple: it was even a little bare. A partition

of bamboo divided the hut into kitchen and bed-room, and that was all.

Into the latter of these apartments Pepe Garcia dragged the saddles of

his guests, and in the former his two twin-daughters, melancholy little

half-breeds in ragged petticoats, assisted their father to prepare for

the wanderers a hunter's supper.

Every moment, in a dark corner or behind the backs of the company,

Garcia was observed caressing these little girls in secret. Being

rallied on his tenderness, he observed that the twins were the double

pledge of a union "longer happy than was usual," and the only survivors

of fifteen darlings whom he had given to the world in the various

countries whither his wandering fortunes had led him. Still explaining

and multiplying his caresses, the man of family went on with his

exertions as cook, and in due time announced the meal.

This festival consisted of sweet potatoes baked in the ashes, and steaks

of bear broiled over the coals. The latter viand was repulsed with

horror by the colonel, who in the effeminacy of a city life at Cuzeo had

never tasted anything more outlandish than monkey. Seeing his companions

eating without scruple, however, the valiant warrior extended his tin

plate with a silent gesture of application. The first mouthful appeared

hard to swallow, but at the second, looking round at his

fellow-travelers with surprise and joy, he gave up his prejudices, and

marked off the remainder of his steak with wonderful swiftness. Standing

behind his boarders, Pepe Garcia had been watching the play of jaws and

expressions of face with some uneasiness, but when the colonel gave in

his adhesion his doubts were removed, and he smiled agreeably, flattered

in his double quality of hunter and cook.

The beds of the gentlemen-travelers were spread side by side in the

adjoining room, and Garcia gravely assured them that they would sleep

like the Three Wise Men of the East. Unable to see any personal analogy

between themselves and the ancient Gaspar, Melchior and Balthazar, the

tired cavaliers turned in without remarking on the subject. They paused

a moment, however, before taking up their candle, to set forth to Garcia

in full the circumstances and nature of Juan of Aragon's engagement.

This explanation, which the close quarters of the troop had made

impossible during the journey, was received in excellent part by the

interpreter-in-chief.

[Illustration: "THE STRAW SHEDS AND GRASSY PLAZA OF CHILE-CHILE."]

"Oh, I am not at all jealous of Aragon," said he, "and the gentlemen

have done very well in taking him along. He will be of great use. He is

a bright, capable mozo, who would walk twenty miles on his hands to gain

a piastre. As an interpreter, I think he is almost as good as I am."

Having thus smoothed away all grounds of rivalry, the colonel, the

examinador and Marcoy took possession of their sleeping-room. Here, long

after their light was put out, they watched the scene going on in the

apartment they had just left, whose interior, illuminated by a candle

and a lingering fire, was perfectly visible through the partition of

bamboo. The dark-skinned girls, on their knees in a corner, were

gathering together the shirts and stockings destined for the parental

traveling-bag. Garcia, for his part, was occupied in cleaning with a bit

of rag a portentous, long-barreled carbine, apparently dating back to

the time of Pizarro, which he had been exhibiting during the day as his

hunting rifle, and which he intended to carry along with him.

The sleep under the thatched roof of Pepe Garcia, though somewhat less

sound than that of the Three Magi in their tomb at Cologne, lasted until

a ray of the morning sun had penetrated the open-work walls of the hut.

The colonel rapidly dressed himself, and aroused the others. A

disquieting silence reigned around the modest mansions of Chile-Chile.

The interpreter was away, Juan of Aragon was away, the muleteers had

returned, according to instructions received over-night, to Marcapata

with the animals, and the peons were found dead-drunk behind the mud

wall of the last house in the village.

After three hours of impatient waiting there appeared--not Garcia and

Aragon, whose absence was inexplicable, but--the faithful Bolivian

bark-hunters in a body. Not caring to stupefy themselves with the peons,

they had gone out for a reconnoissance in the environs. Contemplating

the nodding forms of their comrades, they now let out the discouraging

fact that these tame Indians, madly afraid of their wild brothers the

Chunchos, had been fortifying themselves steadily with brandy and chicha

all the way from Marcapata. Disgusted and helpless, Perez and the

examinador betook themselves to reading tattered newspapers issued at

Lima a month before, and Marcoy to his note-book. Suddenly a ferocious

wild-beast cry was heard coming from the woods, and while the Indian

porters tried to run away, and the white men looked at each other with

apprehension, Pepe Garcia and Aragon appeared in the distance. Their

arms were interlaced in a brother-like manner, they were poising

themselves with much care on their legs, and they were drunk. Well had

the elder interpreter said that he was not jealous of Aragon. They

rolled forward toward the party, repeating their outrageous duet, whose

reception by the staring peons appeared to gratify them immensely.

The mozo, feeling his secondary position, had enervated himself

slightly--the superior was magisterially tipsy. He wore a remarkable hat

entirely without a brim, and patched all over the top with a lid of

leather. His face, marked up to the eyes with the blue stubble of that

beard which filled him with pride as a sign of European extraction, was

swollen and hideous with drunkenness. He carried, besides the fearful

blunder-buss of the night before, a belt full of pistols and hatchets. A

short infantry-sword was banging away at his calves, and two long

ox-horns rattled at his waist. The interpreters had been partaking of a

little complimentary breakfast with the muleteers in whose care the

animals had gone off to Marcapata.

[Illustration: "CHAUPICHACA WAS MARKED WITH A SQUARE TERMINAL PILLAR."]

A concentration of energy on the part of the chiefs of the expedition

was required to set in movement this unpromising assemblage. The

examinador undertook the peons: he rapped them smartly and repeatedly

about the head and shoulders, until they staggered to their feet and

declared that they were a match for whole hordes of Indians: this

courage, borrowed from the flask, gave strong assurance that at the

first alarm from genuine Chunchos they would take to their heels. Mr.

Marcoy, feeling unable to do justice to the case of the nephew, turned

him over to Perez, whose undisguised dislike made the work of correction

at once grateful and thorough. Marcoy himself confronted the stolid and

sullen Pepe Garcia, insisting upon the example he owed to the Indian

porters and the responsibility of his Caucasian blood. The half-breed

listened for a minute, his eyes fixed upon the ground: he then shook

himself, looked an instant at his employer, and planted himself firmly

on his legs. Then, determined to prove by a supreme effort that he was

clear-headed and master of his motions, he suddenly drew his sword,

hustled the Indians in a line by two and two, pointed out to Aragon his

position as rear-guard, and cried with a voice of thunder, "_Adelante_!"

The porters and peons staggered forward, knocking against each other's

elbows and tottering on their stout legs. The three white men,

burdenless, but regretting their horses, walked as they pleased, keeping

the train in sight. And John the nephew of Aragon's guitar, dangling at

his back, brought up the rear, with its suggestions of harmony and the

amenities of life.

The first trait of aboriginal character (after this parenthetical

alacrity at drunkenness) was shown after some hours of marching and the

passage of a dozen streams. The porters, weakened by their drink and the

extreme heat, squatted down on the side of a hill by their own consent

and with a single impulse. With that lamb-like placidity and that

mule-like obstinacy which characterize the antique race of Quechuas,

they observed to the chief interpreter that they were weary of falling

on their backs or their stomachs at every other step, and that they were

resolved to go no farther. Pepe Garcia caused the remark to be repeated

once more, as if he had not understood it: then, convinced that an

incipient rebellion was brewing, he sprang upon the fellow who happened

to be nearest, haled him up from the ground by the ears, and, shaking

him vigorously, proceeded to do as much for the rest of the band. In the

flash of an eye, much to their astonishment, they found themselves on

their feet.

A judicious if not very discriminating award of blows from the sabre

then followed, causing the Indians to change their resolve of remaining

in that particular spot, and to show a lively determination to get away

from it as quickly as possible. Each porter, forgetting his fatigue, and

seeming never to have felt any, began to trot along, no longer languidly

as before, but with a precision of step and a firmness in his round

calves which surprised and charmed the travelers. Pepe Garcia, much

refreshed by this exercise of discipline, and perspiring away his

intoxication as he marched, began to give grounds for confidence from

his steady and authoritative manner. By nightfall the whole troop was in

harmony, and the strangers retired with hopeful hearts to the privacy of

the hammocks which Juan of Aragon slung amongst the trees on the side of

Mount Morayaca.

No effect could seem finer, to wanderers from another latitude, than

this first night-bivouac in the absolute wilderness. The moon, seeming

to race through the clouds, and the camp-fire flashing in the wind,

appeared to give movement and animation to the landscape. The Indians,

grouped around the flame, seemed like swarthy imps tending the furnace

of some fantastic pandemonium. Meanwhile, amidst the constant murmurs of

the trees, the nephew of Aragon was heard drawing the notes of some kind

of amorous despair from the hollow of his melodious calabash. The

examinador and Colonel Perez lulled themselves to sleep with a

conversation about the beauties and beatitudes of their wives, now

playing the part of Penelopes in their absence. To hear the eulogies of

the examinador, an angel fallen perpendicularly from heaven could hardly

have realized the physical and moral qualities of the spouse he had left

in Sorata. The Castilian tongue lent wonderful pomp and magnificence to

this portrait, and as the metaphors thickened and the superb phrases

lost themselves in hyperbole, one would have thought the lady in

question was about to fly back to her native stars on a pair of

resplendent wings. Colonel Perez furnished an equally elaborate

delineation of his own fair helpmate. As for the wife of Lorenzo, nobody

knew what she was like, and the panegyric from the lips of her faithful

lord rolled on in safety and success. But the personage called by Perez

"his Theresa" was a female whom anybody who had passed through the small

shopkeeping quarters of Cuzco might have seen every day, as well as

heard designated by her common nickname (given no one knows why) of

Malignant Quinsy; and, arguing in algebraic fashion from the known to

the unknown, it was not difficult to be convinced that the poetic

flights of the examinador were equally the work of fond flattery.

Surprised by a midnight storm, the camp was broken up before the early

daylight, and our explorers' caravan moved on without breakfast. This

necessary stop-gap was arranged for at the first pleasant spot on the

route. An old clearing soon appeared, provided with the welcome

accommodation of an _ajoupa_, or shed built upon four posts. At the

command of _Alto alli!_--"Halt there!"--uttered by Perez in the tone he

had formerly used in governing his troops, the whole band stopped as one

person; the porters dumped their bales with a significant _ugh!_ the

Bolivian bark-hunters laid down their axes; and the gentlemen arranged

themselves around the parallelogram of the hut, attending the

commissariat developments of Colonel Perez. The site which hazard had so

conveniently offered was named Chaupichaca. It was the scene of an

ancient wood-cutting, around which the trunks of the antique forests

showed themselves in a warm soft light, like the columns of a temple or

the shafts of a mosque.

A detail which struck the travelers in arriving was very characteristic

of these lands, filled so full of old traditions and inca customs.

Chaupichaca was marked with a square terminal pillar, one of those

boundaries of mud and stones, called _apachectas_, which Peruvian

masonry lavishes over the country of Manco Capac. A rude cross of sticks

surmounted this stone altar, on which some pious hand had laid a

nosegay, now dried--signifying, in the language of flowers proper to

masons and stone-cutters, that the work was finished and left. A little

water and spirits spared from the travelers' meal gave a slight air of

restoration to these mysterious offerings, and a couple of splendid

butterflies, whether attracted by the flowers or the alcoholic perfume,

commenced to waltz around the bouquet; but the corollas contained no

honey for their diminutive trunks, and after a slight examination they

danced contemptuously away.

At seven or eight miles' distance another streamlet was reached, named

the Mamabamba. It is a slender affluent of the Cconi, to be called a

rivulet in any country but South America, but here named a river with

the same proud effrontery which designates as a _city_ any collection of

a dozen huts thrown into the ravine of a mountain. The Mamabamba was

crossed by an extemporized bridge, constructed on the spot by the

ingenuity of Garcia and his men. Strange and incalculable was the

engineering of Pepe Garcia. Sometimes, across one of these

continually-occurring streams, he would throw a hastily-felled tree,

over which, glazed as it was by a night's rain or by the humidity of the

forest, he would invite the travelers to pass. Sometimes, to a couple of

logs rotting on the banks he would nail cross-strips like the rungs of a

ladder, and, while the torrent boiled at a distance below, pass jauntily

with his Indians, more sure-footed than goats. The wider the abyss the

more insecure the causeway; and the terrible rope-bridges of South

America, or the still more conjectural throw of a line of woven roots,

would meet the travelers wherever the cleft was so wide as to render

timbering an inconvenient trouble. Occasionally, on one of these damp

and moss-grown ladders, a peon's foot would slip, and down he would go,

the load strapped on his back catching him as he was passing through the

aperture: then, using his hands to hold on by, he would compose, on the

spur of the moment, a new and original language or telegraphy of the

legs, _kicking_ for assistance with all his might. Juan of Aragon was

usually the hero to extricate these poor estrays from the false step

they had taken, the other peons regarding the scene with their tranquil

stolidity. A glass of brandy to the unfortunate would always compose

his nerves again, and make him hope for a few more accidents of a like

nature and bringing a like consolation.

[Illustration: "THE MAMABAMBA WAS CROSSED BY AN EXTEMPORIZED BRIDGE."]

The bridge of the Mamabamba conducted the party to a site of the same

name, through an interval of forest where might be counted most of the

varieties of tree proper to the equatorial highlands. Up to this point

the vegetation everywhere abounding had not indicated the presence, or

even the vicinage, of the cinchona. The only circumstance which brought

it to the notice of the inexperienced leaders of the expedition would be

a halt made from time to time by the Bolivian bark-hunters. The

examinador and his cascarilleros, touching one tree or another with

their hatchets, would exchange remarks full of meaning and

mysteriousness; but when the colonel or Mr. Marcoy came to ask the

significance of so many hints and signals, they got the invariable

answer of Sister Anna to the wife of Bluebeard: "I see nothing but the

forest turning green and the sun turning red." The most practical

reminder of the quest of cinchona which the travelers found was an

occasional _ajoupa_ alone in the wilderness, with a broken pot and a

rusted knife or axe beneath it--witness that some eager searcher had

traveled the road before themselves. The cascarilleros are very

avaricious and very brave, going out alone, setting up a hut in a

probable-looking spot, and diverging from their head-quarters in every

direction. If by any accident they get lost or their provisions are

destroyed, they die of hunger. Doctor Weddell, on one occasion in

Bolivia, landed on the beach of a river well shaded with trees. Here he

found the cabin of a cascarillero, and near it a man stretched out upon

the ground in the agonies of death. He was nearly naked, and covered

with myriads of insects, whose stings had hastened his end. On the

leaves which formed the roof of the hut were the remains of the

unfortunate man's clothes, a straw hat and some rags, with a knife, an

earthen pot containing the remains of his last meal, a little maize and

two or three _chuñus_. Such is the end to which their hazardous

occupation exposes the bark-collectors--death in the midst of the

forests, far from home; a death without help and without consolation.

It was not until after passing the elevated site of San Pedro, and

clambering up the slippery shoulders of the hill called Huaynapata--the

crossing of half a dozen intervening streamlets going for nothing--that

the explorers were rewarded with a sight of their Canaan, the

bark-producing region. To attain this summit of Huaynapata, however, the

little tributary of Mendoza had to be first got over. This affluent of

the Cconi, flowing in from the south-south-west, was very sluggish as

far as it could be seen. Its banks, interrupted by large rocks clothed

with moss, offered now and then promontories surrounded at the base with

a bluish shade. At the end of the vista, a not very extensive one, a

quantity of blocks of sandstone piled together resembled a crumbling

wall. Other blocks were sprinkled over the bed of the stream; and by

their aid the examinador and the colonel hopped valiantly over the

Mendoza, leaving the peons, who were less afraid of rheumatism and more

in danger of slipping, to ford the current at the depth of their

suspender-buttons.

It was on the top of Huaynapata, while the interpreters built a fire and

prepared for supper a peccary killed upon the road, that Marcoy observed

the examinador holding with his Bolivians a conversation in the Aymara

dialect, in which could be detected such words as _anaranjada_ and

_morada_. These were the well-known commercial names of two species of

cinchona. The historiographer interrupted their conversation to ask if

anything had yet been discovered.

"Nothing yet," replied the examinador; "and this valley of the Cconi

must be bewitched, for with the course that we have taken we should long

ago have discovered what we are after. But this place looks more

favorable than any we have met. I shall beat up the woods to-morrow with

my men, and may my patron, Saint Lorenzo, return again to his gridiron

if we do not date our first success in quinine-hunting from this very

hillock of Huaynapata!"

[Illustration: "THE EXAMINADOR AND THE COLONEL HOPPED VALIANTLY OVER THE

MENDOZA."]

The above style of threatening the saints is thought very efficacious in

all Spanish countries. Whether or not Saint Lawrence really dreaded

another experience of broiling, at the end of certain hours the

Bolivians reappeared, and their chief deposited in the hands of the

colonel a few green and tender branches. At the joyful shout of Perez,

the man of letters, who had been occupied in making a sketch, came

running up. Two different species of cinchona were the trophy brought

back by Lorenzo, like the olive-leaves in the beak of Noah's dove. One

of these specimens was a variety of the _Carua-carua,_ with large

leaves heavily veined: the other was an individual resembling those

quinquinas which the botanists Ruiz and Pavon have discriminated from

the cinchonas, to make a separate family called the _Quinquina

cosmibuena._ After all, the discovery was rather an indication than a

conquest of value. The examinador admitted as much, but observed that

the presence of these baser species always argued the neighborhood of

genuine quinine-yielding plants near by.

In the presence of this first success on the part of the exploration set

on foot by Don Juan Sanz de Santo Domingo, we may insert a few words on

the nature of the wonderful plant toward which its researches were

directed.

It is doubtful whether the aboriginal inhabitants of Peru, Bolivia and

Ecuador were acquainted with the virtues of the cinchona plant as a

febrifuge. It seems probable, nevertheless, that the Indians of Loxa,

two hundred and thirty miles south of Peru, were aware of the qualities

of the bark, for there its use was first made known to Europeans. It was

forty years after the pacification of Peru however, before any

communication of the remedial secret was made to the Spaniards. Joseph

de Jussieu reports that in 1600 a Jesuit, who had a fever at Malacotas,

was cured by Peruvian bark. In 1638 the countess Ana of Chinchon was

suffering from tertian fever and ague at Lima, whither she had

accompanied the viceroy, her husband. The corregidor of Loxa, Don Juan

Lopez de Canizares, sent a parcel of powdered quinquina bark to her

physician, Juan de Vega, assuring him that it was a sovereign and

infallible remedy for "tertiana." It was administered to the countess,

who was sixty-two years of age, and effected a complete cure. This

countess, returning with her husband to Spain in 1640, brought with her

a quantity of the healing bark. Hence it was sometimes called

"countess's bark" and "countess's powder." Her famous cure induced

Linnaeus, long after, to name the whole genus of quinine-bearing trees,

in her honor, _Cinchona_. By modern writers the first _h_ has usually

been dropped, and the word is now almost invariably spelled in that way,

instead of the more etymological _Chinchona_. The Jesuits afterward made

great and effective use of it in their missionary expeditions, and it

was a ludicrous result of their patronage that its use should have been

for a long time opposed by Protestants and favored by Catholics. In

1679, Louis XIV. bought the secret of preparing quinquina from Sir

Robert Talbor, an English doctor, for two thousand louis-d'or, a large

pension and a title. Under the Grand Monarch it was used at dessert,

mingled with Spanish wine. The delay of its discovery until the

seventeenth century has probably lost to the world numbers of valuable

lives. Had Alexander the Great, who died of the common remittent fever

of Babylon, been acquainted with cinchona bark, his death would have

been averted and the partition of the Macedonian empire indefinitely

postponed. Oliver Cromwell was carried off by an ague, which the

administration of quinine would easily have cured. The bigotry of

medical science, even after its efficacy was known and proved, for a

long time retarded its dissemination. In 1726, La Fontaine, at the

instance of a lady who owed her life to it, the countess of Bouillon,

composed a poem in two cantos to celebrate its virtues; but the

remarkable beauty of the leaves of the cinchona and the delicious

fragrance of its flowers, with allusions to which he might have adorned

his verses, were still unknown in Europe.

The cinchonas under favorable circumstances become large trees: at

present, however, in any of the explored and exploited regions of their

growth, the shoots or suckers of the plants are all that remain.

Wherever they abound they form the handsomest foliage of the forest. The

leaves are lanceolate, glossy and vividly green, traversed by rich

crimson veins: the flowers hang in clustering pellicles, like lilacs, of

deep rose-color, and fill the vicinity with rich perfume. Nineteen

varieties of cinchonae have been established by Doctor Weddell. The

cascarilleros of South America divide the species into a category of

colors, according to the tinge of the bark: there are yellow, red,

orange, violet, gray and white cinchonas. The yellow, among which figure

the _Cinchona calisaya, lancifolia, condaminea, micrantha, pubescens,_

etc., are placed in the first rank: the red, orange and gray are less

esteemed. This arrangement is in proportion to the abundance of the

alkaloid _quinine,_ now used in medicine instead of the bark itself.

The specimens found by the examinador were carefully wrapped in

blankets, and the march was resumed. After a slippery descent of the

side of Huaynapata and the passage of a considerable number of babbling

streams--each of which gave new occasion for the colonel to show his

ingenuity in getting over dry shod, and so sparing his threatening

rheumatism--the cry of "Sausipata!" was uttered by Pepe Garcia. Two neat

mud cabins, each provided with a door furnished with the unusual luxury

of a wooden latch, marked the plantation of Sausipata. The situation was

level, and within the enclosing walls of the forest could be seen a

plantation of bananas, a field of sugar-cane, with groves of coffee,

orange-orchards and gardens of sweet potato and pineapple. The white

visitors could not refrain from an exclamation of surprise at the

neatness and civilization of such an Eden in the desert. At this point,

Juan of Aragon, who had been going on ahead, turned around with an air

of splendid welcome, and explained that the farm belonged to his uncle,

the gobernador of Marcapata, who prayed them to make themselves at home.

Introducing his guests into the largest of the houses, Juan presented

them with some fine ripe fruit which he culled from the garden. Colonel

Perez, who never lost occasion to give a sly stab to the mozo, asked, as

he peeled a banana, if he was duly authorized to dispose so readily of

the property of his uncle: the youth, without losing a particle of his

magnificent adolescent courtesy, replied that as nephew and direct heir

of the governor of Marcapata it was a right which he exercised in

anticipation of inheritance; and that just as Pepe Garcia, the

interpreter-in-chief, had regaled the party in his residence, he, Juan

of Aragon, proposed to do in the family grange of Sausipata.

Meantime, the examinador, who had pushed forward with his men, returned

with a couple more specimens of quinquina, which they had discovered

close by in clambering amongst the forest. Neither had flowers, but the

one was recognizable by its flat leaf as the species called by the

Indians _ichu-cascarilla,_ from the grain _ichu_ amongst which it is

usually found at the base of the Cordilleras; and the other, from its

fruit-capsules two inches in length, as the _Cinchona acutifolia_ of

Ruiz and Pavon. To moderate the pleasures of this discovery, the

examinador came up leaning upon the shoulder of his principal assistant,

Eusebio, complaining of a frightful headache, and a weakness so extreme

that he could not put one foot before the other.

The sudden illness of their botanist-in-chief cast a gloom upon the

party, and utterly spoiled the festive intentions of young Aragon.

Lorenzo was put to bed, from which retreat, at midnight, his fearful

groans summoned the colonel to his side. The latter found him tossing

and murmuring, but incapable of uttering a word. His faithful Eusebio,

at the head of the bed, answered for him. The honest fellow feared lest

his master might have caught again a touch of the old fever which had

formerly attacked him in searching for cascarillas in the environs of

Tipoani in Bolivia. These symptoms, recurring in the lower valleys of

the Cconi, would make it impossible for the brave explorer safely to

continue with the party. As the mestizo propounded this inconvenient

theory, a new burst of groans from the examinador seemed to confirm it.

The grave news brought all the party to the sick bed. Colonel Perez,

whom the touching comparison of wives made in the hammocks of Morayaca

had sensibly attached to Lorenzo, endeavored to feel his pulse; but the

patient, drawing in his hand by a peevish movement, only rolled himself

more tightly in his blanket, and increased his groans to roars.

Presently, exhausted by so much agony, he fell into a slumber.

In the morning the examinador, in a dolorous voice, announced that he

should be obliged to return to Cuzco. This resolution might have seemed

the obstinate delirium of the fever but for the mournful and pathetic

calmness of the victim. Eusebio, he said, should return with him as far

as Chile-Chile, where a conveyance could be had; and he himself would

give such explicit instructions to the cascarilleros that nothing would

be lost by his absence to the purposes of the expedition. Yielding to

pity and friendship, the colonel gave in his adhesion to the plan, and

even proposed his own hammock as a sort of palanquin, and the loan of a

pair of the peons for bearers. They could return with Eusebio to

Sausipata, where the party would be obliged to wait for the three. After

sketching out his plan, Colonel Perez looked for approval to Mr. Marcoy,

and received an affirmative nod. The proposition seemed so agreeable to

the sick man that already an alleviation of his misery appeared to be

superinduced. He even smiled intelligently as he rolled into the

hammock. In a very short time he made a sort of theatrical exit, borne

in the hammock like an invalid princess, and fanned with a palm branch

out of the garden by the faithful Eusebio.

"Poor devil!" said Perez as the mournful procession departed: "who knows

if he will ever see his dear wife at Sorata, or if he will even live to

reach Chile-Chile?"

"Do you really think him in any such danger?" asked the more suspicious

Marcoy.

"Danger! Did you not see his miserable appearance as he left us?"

"I saw an appearance far from miserable, and therefore I am convinced

that the man is no more sick than you or I."

On hearing such a heartless heresy the colonel stepped back from his

comrade with a shocked expression, and asked what had given him such an

idea.

"A number of things, of which I need only mention the principal. In the

first place, the man's sickness falling on him like a thunder-clap;

next, his haste in catching back his hand when you tried to feel his

pulse; and then his smile, at once happy and mischievous, when you

offered him the peons and he found his stratagem succeeding beyond his

hopes."

"Why, now, to think of it!" said the colonel sadly; "but what could have

been his motive?"

"This gentleman is too delicate to sustain our kind of life," suggested

Marcoy. "He is tired of skinning his hands and legs in our service, and

eating peccary, monkey and snails as we do. His Bolivians are perhaps

quite as useful for our service, and while he is rioting at Cuzco we may

be enriching ourselves with cinchonas."

In effect, on the return of the peons ten days after, the examinador was

reported to have got quit of his fever shortly after leaving Sausipata,

and to have borne the journey to Chile-Chile remarkably well. He charged

his men to take back his compliments and the regrets he felt, at not

being able to keep with the company.

Nothing detained the band longer at Sausipata. The ten days of hunting,

botanizing, butterfly-catching and sketching had been an agreeable

relief, and young Aragon had assumed, with sufficient grace, the task of

attentive host and first player on the charango. The returning porters

had scarcely enjoyed two hours of repose when the caravan took up its

march once more.

As usual, the interpreters assumed the head of the command: the Indians

followed pellmell. Observing that some of them lingered behind, Mr.

Marcoy had the curiosity to return on his steps. What was his surprise

to find these honest fellows running furiously through the farm, and

devastating with all their might those plantations which were the pride

and the hope of the nephew of Aragon! They had already laid low several

cocoa groves, torn up the sugar-canes, broken down the bananas, and

sliced off the green pineapples.

Indignant at such vandalism, Marcoy caught the first offender by the

plaited tails at the back of the neck. "What are you doing?" he cried.

"I am neither crazy nor drunk, Taytachay" (dear little father), calmly

explained the peon with his placid smile. "But my fellows and I don't

want to be sent any more to work at Sausipata." As the white man

regarded him with stupefaction, "Thou art strange here," pursued the

Indian, "and canst know nothing about us. Promise not to tell Aragon,

and I will make thee wise."

"Why Aragon more than anybody else?" asked Marcoy.

"Because Senor Aragon is nephew to Don Rebollido, the governor, and

Sausipata belongs to Rebollido; and if he were to learn what we have

done, we should be flogged and sent to prison to rot."

The explanation, drawn out with many threats when the Indians had been

driven from their work of ruin and placed once more in line of march,

was curious.

The able gobernador of Marcapata had had the sagacious idea of making

the local penitentiary out of his farm of Sausipata! It was cultivated

entirely by the labor of his culprits. When culprits were scarce, the

chicha-drinkers, the corner-loungers, became criminals and disturbers of

the peace, for whom a sojourn at Sausipata was the obvious cure. Aragon,

the nephew, shared his uncle's ability, and visited the plantation month

by month. But the life in this paradise was not relished by the

convicts. The regimen was strict, the food everywhere abounding, was not

for them, and the vicinity of the wild Chunchos was not reassuring.

Often a peon would appear in the market-place of Marcapata wrapped

merely in a banana leaf, which, cracking in the sun, reduced all

pretence of decent covering to an irony. This evidence of the spoliation

of a Chuncho would be received in the worst possible part by the

gobernador, who would beat the complainant back to his servitude,

remarking with ingenuity that Providence was more responsible for the

acts of the savages than he was.

This strange history, told with profound earnestness, was enough to

make any one laugh, but Marcoy could not be blind to its side of

oppression and tyranny. This was the way, then, that the humble and

primitive gobernador, who had presented himself to the travelers

barefoot, was enriching himself by the knaveries of office! Marcoy could

not take heart to inform Juan of Aragon of the devastation behind him,

but on the other hand he resolved to correct the abuse on his return by

appeal, if necessary, to the prefect of Cuzco.

A frightful night in a deserted hut on a site called Jimiro--where

Marcoy had for mattress the legs of one of the porters, and for pillow

the back of a bark-hunter--followed the exodus from Sausipata. The

Guarapascana, the Saniaca, the Chuntapunco, flowing into the Cconi on

opposite sides, were successively left behind our adventurers, and they

bowed for an instant before the tomb of a stranger, "a German from

Germany," as Pepe Garcia said, "who pretended to know the language of

the Chunchos, and who interpreted for himself, but who starved in the

wilderness near the heap of stones you see." Leaving this resting-place

of an interpreter who had interpreted so little, the party attained a

stream of rather unusual importance. The reputed gold-bearing river of

Ouitubamba rolled from its tunnel before them, exciting the most

visionary schemes in the mind of Colonel Perez, to whom its auriferous

reputation was familiar. Nothing would do but that the California

process of "panning" must be carried out in these Peruvian waters, and

the peons, _multum reluctantes,_ were summoned to the task, with all the

crow-bars and shovels possessed by the expedition, supplemented by

certain sauce-pans and dishes hypothecated from the culinary department.

The issue of the stream from under a crown of indigenous growths was the

site of this financial speculation. Pepe Garcia was placed at the head

of the enterprise. A long ditch was dug, revealing milky quartz, ochres

and clay. The deceptive hue of the yellow earth made the search a long

and tantalizing one. At the moment when the colonel, attracted by

something glistening in the large frying-pan which he was agitating at

the edge of the stream, uttered an exclamation which drew all heads into

the cavity of his receptacle, an answering sound from the heavens caused

everybody suddenly to look up. An equatorial storm had gathered

unnoticed over their heads. In a few minutes a solid sheet of warm

rain, accompanied by a furious tornado sweeping through the valley,

caused whites and Indians to scatter as if for their lives. The golden

dream of Colonel Perez and the similar vision entertained by Pepe Garcia

were dissipated promptly by this answer of the elements. On attaining

the neighboring sheds of Maniri the gold--seekers abandoned their

implements without remark to the services of the cooks, and betook

themselves to wringing out their stockings as if they had never dreamed

of walking in silver slippers through the streets of Cuzco. They made no

further attempt to wring gold from the mouth of the Ouitubamba. As for

Maniri, it was the last site or human resting-place of any, the very

most trivial, kind before the opening of the utter wilderness which

proceeded to accompany the course of the Cconi River.

[Illustration: "THE REPUTED GOLD-BEARING RIVER OR OUITUBAMBA ROLLED FROM

ITS TUNNEL."]

The Bolivians imagined an exploration of a little stream on the left

bank, the Chuntapunco, which they thought might issue from a

quinine-bearing region. They built a little raft, and departed with

provisions for three or four days. They returned, in fact, after a

week's absence, with seven varieties of cinchona--the _hirsuta,

lanceolata, purpurea_ and _ovata_ of Ruiz and Pavon, and three more of

little value and unknown names.

During the absence of the cascarilleros a flat calm reigned in the

ajoupa of Maniri. Garcia and the colonel, the day after their

unproductive gold-hunt, betook themselves into the forest, ostensibly

for game, but in reality to review their hopeful labors by the banks of

the Ouitubamba. Aragon was detailed by Mr. Marcoy to accompany him in

his botanical and entomological tours. On these excursions the

acquaintance between the mozo and the señor was considerably developed.

The youth had naturally a gay and confident disposition, and added not a

little to the liveliness of the trips. Marcoy profited by their stricter

connection to converse with him about the cultivation of the farm at

Sausipata, making use of a venial deception to let him think that the

plan of operations had been communicated by the governor himself.

Aragon modestly replied that the plantation in question was only the

first of a series of similar clearings contemplated by his uncle at

various points in the valley. Arrangements made for this purpose with

the governors of Ocongata and Asaroma, who were pledged with their

support in return for heavy presents, would enable him soon to cultivate

coffee and sugar and cocoa at once in a number of haciendas. The

enterprise was a splendid one; and if God--Aragon pronounced the name

without a particle of diffidence--deigned to bless it, the day was

coming when the fortune of his uncle, solidly established, would make

him the pride and the joy of the region.

It may as well be mentioned here that the subsequent career of the

chest-nut-colored interpreter is not entirely unknown. In 1860, Mr.

Clement Markham, collecting quinine-plants for the British government,

came upon a splendid hacienda thirty miles from the village of Ayapata,

in a valley of the Andes near the scene of this exploration. Here, on

the sugar-cane estate named San José de Bellavista, he discovered "an

intelligent and enterprising Peruvian" named Aragon, who appears to have

been none other than our interpreter escaped from the chrysalis. His

establishment was very large, and protected from the savages by two

rivers, Aragon had made a mule-road of thirty miles to the village. He

found the manufacture of spirits for the sugar-cane more profitable than

digging for gold in the Ouitubamba or hunting for cascarillas along the

Cconi. In 1860 he sent an expedition into the forest after wild

cocoa-plants. An india-rubber manufactory had only failed for want of

government assistance. He contemplated the establishment of a line of

steamers on the neighboring rivers to carry off the commerce of his

plantations. "Any scheme for developing the resources of the country is

sure to receive his advocacy," says Mr. Markham: "it would be well for

Peru if she contained many such men."

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

PROBATIONER LEONHARD;

OR, THREE NIGHTS IN THE HAPPY VALLEY.

CHAPTER I.

OUR HERO.

Young Mr. Leonhard Marten walked out on the promenade at the usual hour

one afternoon, after a good deal of hesitation, for there was quite as

little doubt in his mind as there is in mine that the thing to do was to

remain within-doors and answer the letters--or rather the letter--lying

on his table. The brief epistle which conveyed to him the regrets of the

new female college building committee, that his plans were too elaborate

and costly, and must therefore be declined, really demanded no reply,

and would probably never have one. It was the hurried scrawl from his

friend Wilberforce which claimed of his sense of honor an answer by the

next mail. The letter from Wilberforce was dated Philadelphia, and ran

thus:

"DEAR LENNY: Please deposit five thousand for me in some good bank of

Pennsylvania or New York. I shall want it, maybe, within a week or so. I

am talking hard about going abroad. Why can't you go along? Say we sail

on the first of next month. Richards is going, and I shall make enough

out of the trip to pay expenses for all hands. You'll never know

anything about your business, Mart, till you have studied in one of

those old towns. Answer. Thine,

"WIL."

When I say that Leonhard had, or _had_ had, ten thousand dollars of

Wilberforce's money, and that he was now about as unprepared to meet the

demand recorded as he would have been if he had never seen a cent of the

sum mentioned, the assertion, I think, is justified that his place was

at his office-table, and not on the promenade. What if the town-clock

had struck four? what if at this hour Miss Ayres usually rounded the

corner of Granby street on her way home? But, poor fellow! he _had_

tried to think his way through the difficulty. Every day for a week he

had exercised himself in letter--writing: he had practiced every style,

from the jocular to the gravely interrogative, and had succeeded pretty

well as a stylist, but the point, the point, the bank deposit, remained

still insurmountable and unapproachable.

Once or twice he had thought that probably the best thing to do was to

go off on a long journey, and by and by, when things had righted

themselves somehow, find out where Wilberforce was and acknowledge his

letter with regrets and explanations. He was considering this course

when he destroyed his last effort, and went out on the promenade to get

rid of his thoughts and himself and to meet Miss Ayres. The present

contained Miss Ayres; as to the future, it was dark as midnight; for the

past, it was not in the least pleasant to think of it, and how it had

come to pass that Wilberforce trusted him.

The days when he and Wilberforce were lads, poor, sad-hearted, all but

homeless, returned upon him with their shadows. It was in those days

that his friend formed so lofty an estimate of his exactness in figures

and his skill in saving, and thus it had happened that when the engine

constructed by Wilberforce began to pay him so past belief, he was

really in the perplexity concerning places of deposit which he had

expressed to Marten. Leonhard chanced to be with this young Croesus--who

had begun life by dipping water for invalids at the springs--when the

ten thousand dollars alluded to were paid him by a dealer; and the

instant transfer of the money to his hands was one of those off-hand

performances which, apparently trivial, in the end search a man to the

foundations.

What had become of the money? Seven thousand dollars were swallowed up

in a gulf which never gives back its treasure. And oh on the verge of

that same gulf how the siren had sung! A chance of clearing five

thousand dollars by investing that amount presented itself to Leonhard:

it was one of those investments which will double a man's money for him

within three months, or six months at latest. The best men of A---- were

in the enterprise, and by going into it Leonhard would reap every sort

of advantage. He might give up teaching music, and confine himself to

the studies which as an architect he ought to pursue; and to be known

among the A--- landers as a young gentleman who had money to invest

would secure to him that social position which the music-lessons he gave

did no doubt in some quarters embarrass.

It was while buoyed up by his "great expectations," and flattered by the

attentions which strangely enough began to be extended toward him by

some of the "best men"--who also were stockholders in the new

sugar-refining process--that Leonhard took a room at the Granby House,

and began to manifest a waning interest in his work as a music-master.

This display of himself, modest though it was, cost money. Before the

letter quoted was written Leonhard had begun to feel a little troubled:

he had been obliged to add two thousand dollars to his original

investment, and the thought that possibly there might be a demand for a

yet further sum--for some unforeseen difficulty had arisen in the matter

of machinery--had fixed in his mind a misgiving to which at odd moments

he returned with a flutter of spirits amounting almost to panic.

On the promenade he met Miss Ayres. She stood before the window of a

music-dealer's shop, looking at the photograph of some celebrity--a tall

and not too slightly-formed young lady, attired in a buff suit with

brown trimmings, and a brown hat from which a pretty brown feather

depended. On her round cheeks was a healthy glow, deepened perhaps by

exercise on that warm afternoon, and a trifle in addition, it may be, by

the sound of footsteps advancing. Yet as Leonhard approached, she,

chancing to look around, did not seem surprised that he was so near. Not

that she expected him! What reason had she for supposing that from his

office-window he would see her the instant she turned the corner of

Granby street and walked down the avenue fronting the parade-ground? No

reason of course; but this had happened so many times that the meeting

of the two somewhere in this vicinity was daily predicted by the wise

prophets of the street.

A rumor was going about A---- in those days which occasioned the mother

of our young lady a little uneasiness. When Leonhard came to A---- it

was to live by his profession--music. He was an enthusiast in the

science, and the best people patronized him. He might have all the

pupils he pleased now, and at his own prices, thought Mrs. Washington

Ayres, who had herself taught music: why doesn't he stick to his

business? But then, she reminded herself, they say he has money; and he

is so bewitched about architecture that he can't let it alone. Too many

irons in the fire to please me! Perhaps, though, if he has money, it

makes not so much difference. But I don't like to see a young man

dabbling in too many things: it looks as if he would never do anything

to speak of. It is the only thing I ever heard of against him; but if he

can't make up his mind, I don't know as there could be anything much

worse to tell of a man.

She was not far wrong in her thinking, and she had seen the great fault

in the character of young Mr. Marten. It was his nature to take up and

embrace cordially, as if for life, the objects that pleased him. Perhaps

the tendency conduced to his popularity and reputation as a

music-master, for his acquaintance with the works of composers was

really vast; but the effect of it was not so hopeful when it set him to

studying a difficult art almost without instruction, in the confidence

that he should soon by his works take rank with Angelo, Wren and other

great masters.

At the music-dealer's window Mr. Leonhard stood for a moment beside

Miss Marion, and then said with a queer smile, "How cool it looks over

yonder among the trees! I wish somebody would like to walk there with an

escort."

"Anybody might, I should think," answered the young lady. "I have waded

through hot dust, red-hot dust, all the afternoon. Besides, I want to

ask you, Mr. Marten, what it means. Everybody is coming to me for

lessons. Are you refusing instruction, or are you growing so unpopular

of late? I have vexed myself trying to answer the question."

"They all come to you, do they? Yes, I think I am growing unpopular. And

I am rather glad of it, on the whole," answered Leonhard, not quite

clear as to her meaning, but not at all disturbed by it.

"I know they must all have gone to you first," she said. "Of course they

all went to you first, and you wouldn't have them."

Leonhard smiled on. Her odd talk was pleasant to him, and to look at her

bright face was to forget every disagreeable thing in the world. "You

know I have been thinking that I would give up instruction altogether,"

said he; "but I suppose that unless I actually go away to get rid of my

pupils, I shall have a few devoted followers to the last. The more you

take off my hands the better I shall like it."

"But how should everybody know that you _think_ of giving up

instruction?" Miss Marion inquired.

"Oh, I dare say I have told everybody," he answered carelessly.

"Ah!" said she; and two or three thoughts passed through the mind of the

young lady quite worthy the brain of her mother. "I am half sorry," she

continued. "But at least you cannot forget what you know. That is a

comfort. And I am sure you love music too well to let me go on

committing barbarisms with my hands or voice without telling me."

Leonhard hesitated. How far might he take this dear girl into his

secrets? "My friend Wilberforce is always saying that I ought to study

abroad in the old European towns before I launch out in earnest," said

he finally.

"As architect or musician?" asked the "dear girl."

"As architect, of course," he answered, without manifesting surprise at

the question. "He is going himself now, and he wants me to go with him."

"Why don't you go?" The quick look with which he followed this question

made Miss Marion add: "It would be the best thing in the world for--for

a student, I should think. You said once that your indecision was the

bane of your life. I beg your pardon for remembering it. When you have

heard the best music and seen the best architecture, you can put an end

to this 'thirty years' war,' and come back and settle down."

"All very well," said he, "but please to tell me where I shall find you

when I come home."

"Oh, I shall be jogging along somewhere, depend."

"With your mind made up concerning every event five years before it

happens? If you had my choice to make, you think, I suppose, that you

would decide in a minute which road to fame and fortune you would

choose." Mr. Leonhard used his cane as vehemently while he spoke as if

he were a conductor swinging his baton through the most exciting

movement.

"I don't understand your perplexity, that is the fact," said she with

wonderful candor; "but then I have been trained to do one thing from the

time I could wink."

"It was expected of me that I should rival the greatest performers,"

said Leonhard with a half-sad smile. "If I go abroad now, as you

advise--"

"Advise? I advise!"

"Did you not?"

"Not the least creature moving. Never!"

"If you did you would say, 'Keep to music.'"

"I should say, 'Keep to architecture.' Then--don't you see?--I should

have all your pupils."

"That would matter little: you have long had all that I could give you

worth the giving, Miss Ayres."

Were these words intent on having utterance, and seeking their

opportunity?

In the midst of her lightness and seeming unconcern the young lady found

herself challenged, as it were, by the stern voice of a sentinel on

guard. But she answered on the instant: "The most delicious music I have

ever heard, for which I owe you endless thanks. I have said

architecture; but I never advise, you know."

"She has not understood me," thought Leonhard, but instead of taking

advantage of that conclusion and retiring from the ground, he said,

"Perhaps I must speak more clearly. I don't care what I do or where I

go, Miss Marion, if you are indifferent. I love you."

What did he read in the face which his dark eyes scanned as they turned

full upon it? Was it "I love you"? Was it "Alas!"? He could not tell.

"You are pledged to love 'the True and the Beautiful,'" said she quite

gayly, "and so I am not surprised."

Leonhard looked mortified and angry. A man of twenty-two declaring love

for the first time to a woman had a right to expect better treatment.

"I have offended you," she said instantly. "I only followed out your own

train of thought. You may have half a dozen professions, and--"

"I am at least clear that I love only you," he said. "I hoped you would

feel that. It is certain, I think, that I shall confine myself to the

studies of an architect hereafter. I will give no more lessons. And

shall you care to know whether I go or stay?"

Miss Ayres answered--almost as if in spite of herself and that good

judgment for which she had been sufficiently praised during her eighteen

years of existence--"Yes, I shall care a vast deal. That is the reason

why I say, 'Go, if it seems best to you'--'Stay, if you think it more

wise.' I have the confidence in you that sees you can conduct your own

affairs."

"If I go," he cried in a happy voice, in strong contrast with his words,

"it will be to leave everything behind me that can make life sweet."

"But if you go it will be to gain everything that can make life

honorable. I did not understand that you thought of going for pleasure."

Ah, how almost tender now her look and tone!

"Say but once to me what I have said to you," said Leonhard joyfully,

confident now that he had won the great prize.

"Now? No: don't talk about it. Wait a while, and we will see if there is

anything in it." What queer lover's mood was this? Miss Marion looked as

if she had passed her fortieth birthday when she spoke in this wise.

"Oh for a soft sweet breeze from the north-east to temper such cruel

blasts!" exclaimed Leonhard. "Was ever man so treated as I am by this

strong-minded young woman?"

"Everybody on the grounds is looking, and wondering how she will get

home with the intemperate young gentleman she is escorting. Did you say

you were going to talk with your friend Mr. Wilberforce about going

abroad with him for a year or two?"

"I said no such thing, but perhaps I may. I was going to write, but it

may be as easy to run down to Philadelphia."

"Easier, I should say."

So they talked, and when they parted Leonhard said: "If you do not see

me to-morrow evening, you will know that I have gone to Philadelphia. I

shall not write to let you know. You might feel that an answer was

expected of you."

"I have never been taught the arts of a correspondent, and it is quite

too late to learn them," she answered.

Miss Marion will probably never again feel as old as she does this

afternoon, when she has half snubbed, half flattered and half accepted

the man she admires and loves, but whose one fault she clearly perceives

and is seriously afraid of.

The next day Leonhard sat staring at Wilberforce's letter with a face as

wrinkled as a young ape's in a cold morning fog. After one long serious

effort he sprang from his seat, and I am afraid swore that he would go

down to Philadelphia that very afternoon. Therefore (and because he

clung to the determination all day) at six o'clock behold him passing

with his satchel from the steps of the Granby House to the Grand

Division Dépôt. He was always going to and fro, so his departure

occasioned no remark. He supposed, for his own part, that he was going

to talk with his friend Wilberforce, and his ticket ensured his passage

to Philadelphia; and yet at eight o'clock he found himself standing on

the steps of the Spenersberg Station, and saw the train move on. At the

moment when his will seemed to him to be completely demoralized the

engine-whistle sounded and the engine stopped. Utterly unnerved by his

doubts, he slunk from the car like an escaping convict, and looked

toward the narrow moonlit valley which was as a gate leading into this

unknown Spenersberg. The path looked obscure and inviting, and so,

without exchanging a word with any one, he walked forward, a more

pitiable object than is pleasant to consider, for he was no coward and

no fool.