"Let her go."

"Please, sir, may I go with her?"

"Who is this."

"Juliana, sir. I want to go and see my cousin Madalina, sir."

"Oh, yes, I remember. You are the little Italian tambourine girl. Yes,

you may go. See if you can get that pretty cousin of yours to come and

live here."

"She would like to, sir, but her mother won't let her."

"Very well. Go."

And he resumed his work. "7 and 5 are 12, and 8 are 20; two 1's are 2--"

"Yes, but two ones want to be made one."

"How is that--what do you want?"

Reader, will you just turn to the illustration of the couple that now

presented themselves as candidates for matrimony. The delineator and

engraver have made one of the most perfect daguerreian pictures ever got

up from description.

"What do you want of me?"

"We want to be married, sir."

"Want to be married--what for?"

"Why, you see, we don't think it is right for us to be living together

this way any longer, and we have been talking over the matter to-day,

and you see----"

"Yes, yes, I see you have been talking over the matter over the bottle,

and have come to a sort of drunken conclusion to get married. When you

get sober, you will both repent it, probably."

"No, sir, we are not very drunk now, not so drunk but what we can think,

and we don't think we are doing right--we are not doing as we were

brought up to do by pious parents. We have been reading about the good

things you have done for just such poor outcasts as we are, and we want

you to try and do something for us."

"Read! can you read? Do you read the Bible?"

"Well, not much lately, but we read the newspapers, and sometimes we

read something good in them. How can we read the Bible when we are

drunk?"

"Do you think getting married will keep you from getting drunk?"

"Yes, for we are going to take the pledge too, and we shall keep it,

depend upon that."

"Suppose you take the pledge and try that first, and if you can keep it

till you can wash some of the dirt away, and get some clothes on, then I

will marry you."

[Illustration: THE TWO PENNY MARRIAGE COUPLE.--_Page 95._]

"No; that won't do. I shall get to thinking what a poor, dirty,

miserable wretch I am, and how I am living with this woman, who is not a

bad woman by nature; and then I will drink, and then she will drink--oh,

cursed rum!--and what is to prevent us? But if we were married, my wife,

yes, Mr. Pease, my wife, would say, 'Thomas'--she would not say, 'Tom,

you dirty brute,'--'don't be tempted;' and who knows but we might be

somebody yet--somebody that our own mothers would not be ashamed of?"

Here the woman, who had been silent and rather moody, burst into a

violent flood of tears, crying, "Mother, mother, I know not whether she

is alive or not, and dare not inquire; but if we were married and

reformed, I would make her happy once more."

"I could no longer resist the appeal," said Mr. P., "and determined to

give them a trial. I have married a good many poor, wretched-looking

couples, but none that looked quite so much so as this. The man was

hatless and shoeless, without coat or vest, with long hair and beard

grimed with dirt. He was by trade a bricklayer, one of the best in the

city. The woman wore the last remains of a silk bonnet, and something

that might pass for shoes, and an old, very old dress, once a rich

merino, apparently without any under garments."

"Your name is Thomas--Thomas what?"

"Elting, sir. Thomas Elting, a good, true name and true man; that is,

shall be, if you marry us."

"Well, well. I am going to marry you."

"Are you? There, Mag, I told you so."

"Don't call me Mag. If I am going to be married, it shall be by my right

name, the one my mother gave me."

"Not Mag? Well, I never knew that."

"Now, Thomas, hold your tongue, you talk too much. What is your name?"

"Matilda. Must I tell you the other? Yes, I will, and I never will

disgrace it. I don't think, I should ever have been as bad if I had kept

it. That bad woman who first tempted me to ruin, made me take a false

name. They always do that, sir, and so she said I must take another

name, I did not know what for then; and so they called me Mag, and that

is the name he knows me by, and I never would have told him my right

name, only that we are going to get married, and reform."

Could they do it--could beings sunk so low, reform? We shall see.

"It is a bad thing, sir, for a girl to give up her name unless for that

of a good husband. Matilda Morgan. Nobody that is good knows me by any

other name in this bad city."

Yes, it is a bad thing for a girl to give up her own name for a

fictitious one. I could tell a touching story of an instance of a poor

sewing woman, who went to one of these name-changing houses to work, not

to sin, who was coaxed to be called Lucy, instead of her own sweet name

of Athalia, and how she was accidentally discovered and rescued from the

very jaws of ruin by her own uncle. But not now, I must go on with

the marriage. The bride and bridegroom are waiting, and the reader for a

share of the feast.

"Now I am going to join you two in wedlock; it cannot make you worse, it

may better. Look me in the face. Now, Matilda and Thomas, take each

other by the right hand, look at me, while I unite you in the holy bonds

of marriage by God's ordinance. Do you think you are sufficiently sober

to comprehend its solemnity?"

"Yes, sir."

"Marriage being one of God's holy ordinances, cannot be kept in sin,

misery, filth, and drunkenness. Thomas, will you take Matilda to be your

lawful, true, only, wedded wife?"

"Yes, sir."

"You promise that you will live with her, in sickness as well as health,

and nourish, protect, and comfort her as your true and faithful wife;

that you will be to her a true and faithful husband; that you will not

get drunk, and will clothe yourself and keep clean?"

"So I will."

"Never mind answering until I get through. You promise to abstain

totally from every kind of drink that intoxicates, and treat this woman

kindly, affectionately, and love her as a husband should love his wedded

wife. Now, all of this will you, here before me as the servant of the

Most High,--here, in the sight of God, in heaven, most faithfully

promise, if I give you this woman to be your wedded wife?"

"Yes, I will."

"And you, Matilda, on your part, will you promise the same, and be a

true wife to this man?"

"I will try, sir."

"But do you promise all this faithfully?"

"Yes, sir, I will."

It was a woman's "I will," spoken right out with a good, hearty

emphasis, that told, as it always tells, the faith and truth of woman,

when she says, "I will."

"Then I pronounce you man and wife."

"Now, Thomas," says the new wife, after I had made out the certificate

and given it to her, with an injunction to keep it safely--"now pay Mr.

Pease, and let us go home and break the bottle." Thomas felt first in

the right pocket, then the left, then back to the right, then he

examined the watch fob.

It is probable that the former owner of this principal article of his

wardrobe, owned a watch. It is more likely that the present owner had

been often in the hands of the watch, than that he had often had a watch

in his hands. He was evidently searching for lost treasures.

"Why, where is it?" says she. "You had two dollars this morning."

"Yes, I know it; but I have only got two cents this evening. There, Mr.

Pease, take them. It is all I have got in the world--what more can I

give?"

Sure enough; what could he do more? He took them and prayed over them,

that in parting with the last penny, this couple might have parted with

a vice--a wicked, foolish practice, which had reduced them to such a

degree of poverty and wretchedness, that the monster power of rum could

hardly send its victims lower.

So, by a few words, I hope, words of power to do good, Thomas and

Matilda, long known as, drunken Tom and Mag, were transformed into Mr.

and Mrs. Elting, and having grown somewhat more sober while in the

house, seemed to fully understand their new position, and all the

obligations they had taken upon themselves.

"For a few days," said Mr. P., "I thought occasionally of this two-penny

marriage, and then it became absorbed with a thousand other scenes of

wretchedness which I have witnessed since I have lived in this centre of

city misery. Time wore on, and I married many other couples; often those

who came in their carriage and left a golden marriage fee--a delicate

way of giving to the needy--but among all, I had never performed the

rite for a couple quite so low as that of this two-penny fee, and I

resolved I never would again. At length, however, I had a call from a

full match to them, which I refused."

"Why do you come to me to be married, my friend?" said I to the man.

"You are both too poor to live separate; and, besides, you are both

terrible drunkards, I know you are."

"That is just what we want to get married for, and take the pledge."

"Take that first."

"No; we must take all together--nothing else will save us."

"Will that?"

"It did one of my friends."

"Well, then, go and bring that friend here; let me see and hear how much

it saved him, and then I will make up my mind what to do. If I can do

you any good, I want to do it."

"My friend is at work--he has got a good job and several hands working

for him, and is making money, and won't quit till night. Shall I come

this evening?"

"Yes, I will stay at home and wait for you."

He little expected to see him again, but about eight o'clock the servant

said that man and his girl, with a _gentleman_ and _lady_, were waiting

in the reception room. He told him to ask the lady and gentleman to walk

up to the parlor and sit a moment, while he sent the candidates for

marriage away, being determined never to unite another drunken couple,

not dreaming that there was any sympathy between the parties. But they

would not come up; they wanted to see that couple married. So he went

down, and found the squalidly wretched pair, that had been there in the

morning, in conversation, and apparently very friendly and intimate,

with the lady and gentleman. He had the appearance of a well dressed

laboring man, for he wore a fine black coat, silk vest, gold

watch-chain, clean white shirt and cravat, polished calf-skin boots; and

his wife was just as neat and tidily dressed as anybody's wife, and her

face beamed with intelligence, and the way in which she clung to the arm

of her husband, as she seemed to shrink out of sight, told that she was

a loving as well as a pretty wife.

"This couple," said the gentleman, "have come to be married."

"Yes, I know it," said Mr. P., "and I have refused. Look at them; do

they look like fit subjects for such a holy ordinance? God never

intended those, whom he created in his own image, should live in

matrimony like this man and woman. I cannot marry them."

"Cannot! Why not? You married us when we were worse off--more

dirty--worse clothed, and more intoxicated."

"The woman shrunk back a little more out of sight. I saw she trembled

violently, and put her clean cambric handkerchief up to her eyes."

"What could it mean? Married them when worse off? Who were they?"

"Have you forgotten us?" said the woman, taking my hands in hers, and

dropping on her knees; "have you forgotten drunken Tom and Mag? We have

never forgotten you, but pray for you every day!"

"If you have forgotten them, you have not forgotten the two-penny

marriage. No wonder you did not know us. I told Matilda she need not be

afraid, or ashamed, if you did know her. But I knew you would not. How

could you? We were in rags and dirt then. Look at us now. All your work,

sir. All the blessing of the pledge and that marriage, and that good

advice you gave us. Look at this suit of clothes, and her dress--all

Matilda's work, every stitch of it. Come and look at our house, as neat

as she is. Everything in it to make a comfortable home; and, oh! sir,

there is a cradle in our bedroom. Five hundred dollars already in bank,

and I shall add as much more next week when I finish my job. So much for

one year of a sober life, and a faithful, honest, good wife. Now, this

man is as good a workman as I am, only he is bound down with the galling

fetters of drunkenness, and living with a woman as I did, only worse,

for they have two children. What will they be, if they chance to live,

and grow up to womanhood in Cow Bay? Now he has made up his mind to try

to be a man again--he is a beast now--he thinks that he can reform just

as well as me; but he thinks he must take the pledge of the same man,

and have his first effort sanctified with the same blessing, and then,

with a good resolution, and Matilda and me to watch over them, I do

believe they will succeed."

So they did. So may others, by the same means.

They were married, solemnly, impressively, solemnly married; and pledged

to total abstinence in the most earnest manner; and promised most

faithfully, not only to keep the pledge, but to do unto others, as

Elting had done unto them. Both promises you have seen that they have

kept well.

As they were parting, Elting slipped something into Nolan's hand, and

told him to pay the marriage fee.

"I thought," said the missionary, "of the two pennies, and expected

nothing more, and therefore was not disappointed when he handed me the

two reddish-looking coins. I thought, well, they are bright, new looking

cents, at any rate, and I hope their lives will be like them. I was in

hopes that it might have been a couple of dollars this time, but I said

nothing, and we parted with a mutual God bless you. When I went up

stairs, I tossed the coin into my wife's lap, with the remark, 'two

pennies again, my dear.'"

"Two pennies! Why, husband, they are eagles--real golden eagles. What a

deal of good they will do. What blessings have followed that act."

And what blessings did follow the last one; will always follow the

pledge faithfully kept; will always follow a well formed, faithfully

kept union, even if it is a "two-penny marriage."

CHAPTER VI.

THE HOME OF LITTLE KATY.

"There is a special Providence in the fall of a sparrow."

"He, that of the greatest works is finisher,

Oft does them by the weakest minister."

I have still another little episode in this life drama--a scene in one

of the acts, which we may as well put upon the stage at this point of

the story, though it is quite unconnected with those that immediately

precede it; yet you will find a character here, in whom you have,

perhaps, taken some interest. It is the termination of the story of the

Hot Corn girl, whom you read about in chapter second, whose portrait you

have already looked at in the frontispiece of this volume.

You have read in the story of Little Katy, what a world of cheap

happiness can be bought with a shilling. No one of the thousand silver

coins wasted that night in hotel, saloon, bar-room, grocery, or rum

hole, gave the waster half the pleasure that that shilling gave to three

individuals--he that gave and those who received. No ice-cream, cake,

jelly, or health-destroying candy, tasted half so sweet as the bread

purchased with that sixpence.

No man ever made so small an investment, that paid so well, both in a

pecuniary point of view and large increase of human happiness, for it

has been the means of waking up benevolence, not dead but sleeping, to

look about and inquire, what shall I do to remove this misery-producing

curse from among us? Thousands have read the story of Little Katy, and

thousands of little hearts have been touched. Many hands have been

opened--more will be. These little stories, detailing some of the

sufferings which crime and misery bring upon the poor of this city, will

be, as some of them already have been, read with tearful eyes. You have

read the story of a poor neglected child of a drunken mother--not always

so--wasting her young life away with no object but to live, with no

thought of death. It is a sad tale, and it is not yet finished. The next

night after the interview with that neglected, ill-used little girl, the

same plaintive cry of "Hot corn, hot corn!--here's your nice hot corn!"

came up through our open window, on the midnight air, while the rain

came dripping down from the overcharged clouds, in just sufficient

quantities to wet the thin single garment of the owner of that sweet

young voice, without giving her an acceptable excuse for leaving her

post before her hard task was completed.

At length the voice grew faint, and then ceased altogether, and then I

knew that exhausted nature slept--that a tender house-plant was exposed

to the chilling influence of a night rain--that an innocent girl had the

curb-stone for a bed and an iron post for a pillow--that by and by she

would awaken, not invigorated with refreshing slumber, but poisoned with

the sleep-inhaled miasma of the filth-reeking gutter at her feet, which

may he breathed with impunity awake, but like the malaria of our

southern coast, is death to the sleeper.[B] Not soothed by a dreamy

consciousness of hearing a mother's voice tuning a soft lullaby of

"Hush, my child, lie still and slumber;"

but starting like a sentinel upon a savage frontier post, with alarm at

having slept; shivering with night air and fear, and, finally, compelled

to go home, trembling like a culprit, to hear the harsh words of a

mother--yes, a mother--but oh! what a mother--cursing her for not

performing an impossibility, because exhausted nature slept--because her

child had not made a profit which would have enabled her more freely to

indulge in the soul and body-destroying vice of drunkenness, to which

she had fallen from an estate, when "my carriage" was one of the

"household words" which used to greet the young ears of that poor little

death-stricken, neglected, street sufferer.

[B] On many of the Rice and Sea Island plantations in South Carolina and

Georgia, in fact upon almost all the coast lands of these States, the

malaria is so deadly in its effects upon the sleeper, that every effort

is made to keep awake by those who are accidentally exposed for a single

night to its influence. Many of the most beautiful residences in the

vicinity of Charleston, are uninhabited by white persons in summer. The

negroes are not at all, or only slightly affected. The overseers often

have a little cabin in the most convenient pine woods, to which they

retire before nightfall.

No doubt, though to a less deadly degree, the malaria arises from the

filth in our dirty streets, killing its thousands of little children

every year.

It was past midnight when she awoke, and found herself, with a desperate

effort, just able to reach the bottom of the rickety stairs which led to

her _home_. We shall not go up now. In a little while, reader, you shall

see where live the city poor.

You shall go with me at midnight to the _Home of little Katy_. You shall

see where she lies upon her straw pallet in a miserable garret; yet she

was born in as rich a chamber as you or you, who tread upon soft Turkey

carpets when you go to your downy couches.

Wait a little.

Tired--worn with the daily toil--for such is the work of an editor who

caters for the appetites of his morning readers--I was not present the

next night to note the absence of that cry from its accustomed spot; but

the next and next, and still on, I listened in vain--that voice was not

there. True, the same hot-corn cry came floating upon the evening breeze

across the park, or wormed its way from some cracked-fiddle voice down

the street, up and around the corner, or out of some dark alley, with a

broken English accent, that sounded almost as much like "lager bier" as

it did like the commodity the immigrant, struggling to eke out his

precarious existence, wished to sell. All over this great

poverty-burdened, and wicked waste, extravagant city, at this season,

that cry goes up, nightly proclaiming one of the habits of this

late-supper eating people.

Yes, I missed that cry. "Hot Corn" was no longer like the music of a

stringed instrument to a weary man, for the treble-string was broken,

and, for me the harmony spoiled.

Who shall say there is not music in those two little words? "Hot Corn"

shall yet be trilled from boudoir and parlor, as fairy fingers run over

the piano keys. Hot Corn! Hot Corn! shall yet be the chorus of the

minstrel's song, and hot tears shall flow at the remembrance of "Little

Katy." But that one song had ceased. That voice came not upon my

listening ear.

What was that voice to me? It was but one in a thousand, just as

miserable, which may be daily heard where human misery has its abode.

That voice, as some others have, did not haunt me, but its absence, in

spite of all reasoning, made me feel uneasy. I do not believe in

spiritual manifestations half as strongly as some of the costermongers

of the fruits of other men's brains, who eke out their existence by

retailing petty scandal to long-eared listeners, would have them

believe; yet I do believe there is a spirit in man, not yet made

manifest, which makes us yearn after coexisting spirits in this sphere

and in this life, and that there is no need of going beyond it, after

strange idols.

I shall not stop to inquire whether it was a spirit of "the first, third

or sixth sphere," that prompted me, as I left my desk one evening, to go

down among the abodes of the poor, with a feeling of certainty that I

should see or hear something of the lost voice, or what spirit led me

on; perhaps it was the spirit of curiosity; no matter, it led, and I

followed, in the road I had seen that little one go before--it was my

only cue--I knew no name--had no number, nor knew any one that knew her

whom I was going to find. Yes, I knew that good Missionary; and she had

told me of the good words which he had spoken; but would he know her

from the hundred just like her? Perhaps. It will cost nothing to

inquire. I went down Centre street with a light heart; I turned into

Cross street with a step buoyed with hope; I stood at the corner of

Little-Water street, and looked around inquiringly of the spirit, and

mentally said, "which way now?" The answer was a far-off scream of

despair. I stood still with an open ear, for the sound of prayer,

followed by a sweet hymn of praise to God, went up from the site of the

Old Brewery, in which I joined, thankful that that was no longer the

abode of all the worst crimes ever concentrated under one roof. Hark! a

step approaches. My unseen guide whispered, "ask him." It were a curious

question to ask a stranger, in such a strange place, particularly one

like him, haggard with over much care, toil, or mental labor.

Prematurely old, his days shortened by overwork in his young years, as

his furrowed face and almost frenzied eye hurriedly indicate, as we see

the flash of the lamp upon his dark visage, as he approaches with that

peculiar American step which impels the body forward at railroad speed.

Shall I get out of his way before he walks over me? What if he is a

crazy man? No; the spirit was right--no false raps here. It is that good

missionary. That man who has done more to reform that den of crime, the

Five Points of New-York, than all the Municipal Authorities of this

Police-hunting, and Prison-punishing city, where misfortune is deemed a

crime, or the unfortunate driven to it, by the way they are treated with

harsh words, damp cells--death cells--and cold prison-bars, instead of

being reformed, or strengthened in their resolution to reform, by kind

words; means to earn food, rather than forced to steal it; by schools

and infant-teaching, rather than old offenders-punishing.

"Sir," said Mr. Pease, "what brings you here at this time of night, for

I know there is an object; can I aid you?"

"Perhaps, I don't know--a foolish whim--a little child--one of the

miserable, with a drunken mother."

"Come with me, then. There are many such. I am just going to visit one,

who will die before morning--a sweet little girl, born in better days,

and dying now--but you shall see, and then we will talk about the one

you would seek to save."

We were soon treading a narrow alley, where pestilence walketh in

darkness; and crime, wretched poverty, and filthy misery, go hand in

hand to destruction.

"Behold," said my friend, "the fruits of our city excise. Here is the

profit of money spent for license to kill the body and damn the soul."

Proven by the awful curses and loud blows of a drunken husband upon a

wife, once an ornament of society, and exemplary member of a Christian

church, that came up out of one of the low cellars, which human beings

call by the holy name of home!

The fetid odor of this filthy lane had been made more fetid by the late

and almost scalding hot rains, until it seemed to us that such an air

was only fit for a charnel house. With the thermometer at 86, at

midnight, how could men live in such a place, below the surface of the

earth? Has rum rendered them proof against the effect of carbonic acid

gas?

We groped our way along to the foot of an outside stair-case, where our

conductor paused for a moment, calling my attention to the spot. "Here,"

said Mr. Pease, "the little sufferer we are going to see, fainted a few

nights ago, and lay all night exposed to the rain, where she was found

and beaten in the morning by her miserable mother, just then coming home

from a night of debauch and licentiousness, with a man who would be

ashamed to visit her in her habitation, or have 'the world' know that he

consorted with a street wanderer."

"Beat her! for what?"

"Because she had not sold all her corn, which she had been sent out with

the evening before. Poor thing, she had fallen asleep, and some villain

had robbed her of her little store, and, as it is with greater crimes,

the wicked escaped and the innocent suffered."

I thought aloud:

"Great and unknown cause, hast thou brought me to her very door?"

My friend stared, but did not comprehend the expression. "Be careful,"

said he, "the stairs are very old, and slippery."

"Beat her?" said I, without regarding what he was saying.

"Yes, beat her, while she was in a fever of delirium, from which she has

never rallied. She has never spoken rationally, since she was taken.

Her constant prayer seems to be to see some particular person before she

dies.

"'Oh, if I could see him once more--there--there--that is him--no, no,

he did not speak that way to me--he did not curse and beat me.'

"Such is her conversation, and that induced her mother to send for me,

but I was not the man. 'Will he come?' she says, every time I visit her;

for, thinking to soothe and comfort her, I promised to bring him."

We had reached the top of the stairs, and stood a moment at the open

door, where sin and misery dwelt, where sickness had come, and where

death would soon enter.

"Will he come?"

A faint voice came up from a low bed in one corner, seen by the very dim

light of a miserable lamp.

That voice. I could not be mistaken. I could not enter. Let me wait a

moment in the open air, for there is a choking sensation coming over me.

"Come in," said my friend.

"Will he come?"

Two hands were stretched out imploringly towards the Missionary, as the

sound of his voice was recognised.

"She is much weaker to-night," said her mother, in quite a lady-like

manner, for the sense of her drunken wrong to her dying child had kept

her sober, ever since she had been sick; "but she is quite delirious,

and all the time talking about that man who spoke kindly to her one

night in the Park, and gave her money to buy bread."

"Will he come?"

"Yes, yes; through the guidance of the good spirit that rules the world,

and leads us by unseen paths, through dark places, for His own wise

purposes, _he has come_."

The little emaciated form started up in bed, and a pair of beautiful,

soft blue eyes glanced around the room, peering through the

semi-darkness, as if in search of something heard but unseen.

"Katy, darling," said the mother, "what is the matter?"

"Where is he, mother? He is here. I heard him speak."

"Yes, yes, sweet little innocent, he is here, kneeling by your bedside.

There, lay down, you are very sick."

"Only once, just once, let me put my arms around your neck, and kiss

you, just as I used to kiss papa. I had a papa once, when we lived in

the big house--there, there. Oh, I did want to see you, to thank you for

the bread and the cakes; I was very hungry, and it did taste so

good--and little Sis, she waked up, and she eat and eat, and after a

while she went to sleep with a piece in her hand, and I went to sleep;

hav'n't I been asleep a good while? I thought I was asleep in the Park,

and somebody stole all my corn, and my mother whipt me for it, but I

could not help it. Oh dear, I feel sleepy now. I can't talk any more. I

am very tired. I cannot see; the candle has gone out. I think I am going

to die. I thank you; I wanted to thank you for the bread--I thought you

would not come. Good bye--Sissy, good bye. Sissy--you will

come--mother--don't--drink--any more--Mother--good b--."

"'Tis the last of earth," said the good man at our side--"let us pray."

Reader, Christian reader, little Katy is in her grave. Prayers for her

are unavailing. There are in this city a thousand just such cases.

Prayers for them are unavailing. Faith without works, works not reform.

A faithful, prayerful resolution, to work out that reform which will

save you from reading the recital of such scenes--such fruits of the rum

trade as this before you, will work together for your own and others'

good. Go forth and listen. If you hear a little voice crying _Hot Corn!_

think of poor Katy, and of the hosts of innocents slain by that

remorseless tyrant--rum. Go forth and seek a better spirit to rule over

us. Cry aloud, "Will he come," and the answer will be, "Yes, yes, he is

here."

* * * * *

The commendation given to these stories, as they were published

in the _Tribune_, was an inducement for me to "keep the cry of

_Hot Corn_ before the people," for I saw that they appreciated

my labors; and I set about collecting other materials, and

writing out notes made during many a night-watch among the

habitations of men, yet the abodes of misery, with which this

city abounds.

Many an anxious mind, after conning the preceding chapters, has

yearned after further knowledge touching the things therein

hinted at. Many have asked to know more of "Sissy," and Little

Katy's mother. It is a laudable curiosity: it shall be

gratified in due time. I have other stories--other scenes where

you may stop a moment and drop a tear, and then we will walk on

with our Life Scenes. First we will finish that of Maggie's

mother.

CHAPTER VII.

MAGGIE'S MOTHER.

Let go thy hold--the glass has run out its sands--the wheel goes

down hill.

There is a time to mourn.

Reagan took the pledge, and took up his residence at that house of the

destitute. At first, he did not ask to live with his wife. He said, he

was not worthy of her. He begged Tom to write to Maggie: "I know it will

make her happy to learn that I am here." So it did. The rose had another

rival now. Her cheeks blossomed afresh. Reagan worked busily--he did up

a great many little jobs of joiner-work; and when there was nothing more

to do at that, he said, let me go into the bake-shop, shoe-shop,

anywhere. I will sit down with those women and use the needle, rather

than be idle, or venture out where tempters will beset me. So he went on

for some time, till he grew stronger and gained more confidence--his

wife strengthened him by her counsel, and then he ventured out to work

where he could earn good wages. It was curious to see him go quite out

of his way, around a whole square, perhaps, to avoid going by one of his

old haunts.

"I have suffered so much," said he to me one day, "from the temptation

of these places, where the liquor is placed in our sight on purpose to

allure and whet our depraved appetites, that it is no wonder that the

poor inebriate loses his balance and falls into the abyss. If there was

no liquor in sight, there would be no danger of our falling back into

old habits. I never should think of going to look after it. The danger

is when it is thrust right under my nose. Oh, that these rum shops might

be shut up, or at least, kept out of sight!"

This was the earnest prayer of one who knew the demon power of

temptation which one, who is trying to reform, has constantly to combat

with.

Those who sell liquor know the advantage to them of this temptation. So

they fix up the street corners with all the enticing attractions of

artistic skill. The cool ice water; the free lunch; the ever-burning

light for the smoker's convenience; the arm-chair and easy lounge, and

cool room in summer, or well heated one in winter; the ever open, always

free resting-place for the tired walker, or ennui-tormented genteel

loafer, are only a few of the inducements to just "step in a moment;"

and then the old appetite is aroused by the sight and smell of liquor in

the glistening array of cut glass, and by the influence of a score of

old companions standing before the bar--they will stand before another

bar hereafter--or sitting at the little white marble tables, sipping or

sucking "sherry cobblers" and "mint juleps" through a glass "straw."

Woe to the tired walker who has been tempted into one of these

invitingly open rooms. If he has the power to resist his own

inclination to drink, he may not have enough to resist the persuasion of

half a dozen of his acquaintances, or the force of crazed brains and

strong hands, by which he is dragged up and held, while they merit the

curse denounced upon those who "put the cup to their neighbor's lips."

Perhaps he will be taunted with meanness for coming in to drink water

and rest himself, "and not patronise the house."

From this, those of us who desire to see those places of temptation shut

up, may take the hint.

Let reading rooms be opened, free to all who choose to come in and read

the papers, drink ice water, and enjoy their rest in the shade, or

partake of the comforts of a warm room, for a five cent fee. A coffee

and tea room, strictly so, may be attached. How much better than

drinking such liquor as those who visit all our public places must do,

or be set down as mean. "Let them stay at home," is a common answer to

those who say they fell by the temptations of such places.

"Suppose," said Jim Reagan to me one day, "that we have no home. That

was my case when I was a young man. I lived in a common boarding-house;

in my little uncomfortable room I would not stay; where else had I to go

but the public bar room, and there I learned to drink; I was a good

fellow then; a genteel young man, and married a genteel young girl; I

did not go down all at once--it was step by step, slow but sure--to Cale

Jones's grocery and the Centre street cellar."

True, thought I, as I entered the front door of the first hotel in this

great metropolis, the largest in America, and looked through the

splendid marble hall, two hundred feet long, lighted by glittering

chandeliers, into the immense drinking saloon of that fashionable place

of resort; and I said to myself, "some of these fine forms of men,

clothed in fine linen and rich broad cloth, may some day fall as low as

thee, poor Jim Reagan. You began your course in just such a genteel

drinking room."

"Yes," says he, "and the first drink I ever took in one, for I was

brought up a temperance boy, I was dragged up by the strength of two

companions, and held while the bar-keeper baptised me, as he called it,

by pouring the liquor down my throat, over my head, and saturating my

clothes till the smell made me sick, and then they gave me more to

settle it. 'A hair of the same dog,' said they, 'will cure the bite.'

Bite it was. No mad dog's bite ever caused more sin and sorrow than that

bite did me. We cry, 'mad dog,' and kill the poor brute; the worse than

brute we 'license' to live."

Thus he would sit and talk by the hour. "If I can only keep out of the

way of the tempters," said he, "I never shall drink again."

He was now accumulating money; he always came home to sleep, "for," says

he, "I feel, as sure as I enter this door, that I am safe."

It was determined, as soon as Maggie came again, that they would go to

keeping house. "If that blessed child was only with me," said the

father, as the tears rolled down his furrowed cheeks, "I should feel as

though I had a shield--through which none of these traffickers in human

souls could reach me. My wife is like an aged counsellor, there is

wisdom in her every word, but she cannot go out through the streets,

leaning upon my arm, still full of manly strength, like Maggie, while I

lean upon her still greater strength--the strength and might of a strong

mind."

"Here is a letter from our dear child," said Mrs. Reagan to her husband,

one evening as he came in from work. "Sit down and read it aloud, for

some how, my old eyes get dim every time I try; I cannot imagine what is

the matter with them."

I can. They were full of tears. Strange, that we shed bitter and sweet

water from the same fountain.

Reagan put on his spectacles, took the letter, looked at the first

words, took them off, wiped the glasses, looked again, repeated the

operation, laid both letter and spectacles upon the table, got up and

walked the room back and forth, then he tried to speak--to utter the

first words of that letter; if he could get over that he could go on,

but he could not, they stuck in his throat. At length he got them

up--"Dear father and mother, I am coming home to kiss you both." Simple

words! Common every-day words. But they were strong words, for they had

overcome the strength of a strong man, and he fell upon his wife's neck

and wept like a child.

"Such words to me--me who have kicked, and cuffed, and froze, and

starved, and abused that child for years. Oh, God, preserve my life to

make her ample amends for my wrongs and her love! Oh, God, preserve her

life to make us both happy, and drop a tear at our grave!"

Prayer calms the spirit. Realization and acknowledgment of sin soothes

the soul.

Reagan could now read the letter without difficulty. His spectacles did

not need wiping again. It was dated,

"Near KATONA, Westchester County, New York.

"DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER:

"I am coming home to kiss you both. I don't know but I shall

kiss Tom, for he has written me all about it--I know it all--I

know how you was brought in, and how you took the pledge, and

how you have kept it, and how industrious you have been, and

how you have saved your money, and how you want to go to

housekeeping again, and all about it--I know it all. Tom writes

me every week. He is a good boy. Well, in two months I am

coming down. You need not look for me before, and then, if you

want me, I will come and live with you."

"If we want her! Did you ever hear the like? But, then, what is she to

do? She is a big girl now, and must not be idle. I wish she had a trade.

Every child ought to have a trade."

"Well, well, wife, let us have the balance of the letter."

"Yes, yes, go on; you need not mind what I say. Go on."

"Let me see; where was I? 'Come and live with you,' that's it."

"And now I must tell you such a piece of news--good news. Oh,

it was a good thing I came up here. I have got a trade--a

trade that will support us all when you get so you cannot

work."

"Heaven bless the girl, what is it?"

"Do wait, wife, and you shall hear."

"It is a nice, genteel trade, too. Now we will take a house,

and father will work at his trade, and mother will do the

house-work, and I will work at my trade, and we shall live so

happy."

"So we shall. But, dear me, why don't she tell what it is?"

"So she will if you let me alone. A girl must have her own way to tell

it; probably she will do that in a postscript."

"Well, read on. I am so impatient."

"Perhaps you would like to know what my trade is?"

"Why to be sure we should. Why don't she tell?"

"So I will tell you. I am a stock-maker--those things the

gentlemen wear round their necks. And it is very curious how I

learned the trade. A lady from New York--oh, she is a

lady!--came up here on a visit, and for work she brought along

some stocks to make. She lives in New York. I believe she keeps

a few boarders, and makes stocks. She is a widow lady, quite

young, and very pretty, only she is in bad health; she has no

family, only her uncle, who is an old bachelor--a nice old

gentleman, who has adopted her as his daughter, and is going to

give her all he has when he dies. She has no father and mother,

as I have, and no brothers and sisters; nobody to love but the

old uncle--he does love her, so do I. I did not at first. I was

afraid of her. I thought she was some grand city lady; and she

used to sit and sew in her room, only when her uncle--Papa she

calls him, and he calls her daughter--'Athalia, daughter,' so

sweet; is it not a sweet name? Her name is Athalia Morgan--"

"Morgan, Morgan--Athalia Morgan. I will warrant it is she. Don't you

remember, wife, that old Morgan, the great shipping merchant? his son

married a sewing girl, and his sister married George Wendall."

"Oh, oh, how singular! It was she that was talking when Maggie took me

into the temperance meeting that night, telling how her husband died.

And now Maggie has met with another of the family. And her husband must

be dead too."

"Yes, he died just as miserable a death as Wendall. Let us read on and

see what of his wife. I hope he did not drag her down with him as I did

mine."

"James, James, you are not to speak of anything that is past."

"Well, well," and he brushed away another tear and read on:

"After she had been here a few days, our folks told her about

me, and how I used to run the streets, and how I got into the

House of Industry, and how they got me from there, and what a

good girl I had been--yes, they did--and then Mrs. Morgan, she

began to talk to me so kindly; and then I told her everything

about myself, and some about you, and she told me a great many

things about herself. Oh, it would be such a story to put in a

book. And then she grew as fond of me as I was of her. And

every day when I had my work done, and every evening, I used to

be up in her room, and she showed me all about her work, and I

used to help her, and now she declares that I can make just as

good a stock as she can, and almost as fast. She can make eight

in a day; when I help her, odd times and evenings, she can make

twelve. Last week she made, with what I did, seventy-two, and

put them all in a box. How nice they do look! That is

seventy-two York shillings--nine dollars! And she says when I

come home to live, she will recommend me--I must have a good

recommend to get work--when I can get just as much such work as

I can do. Oh, but she is a good woman! I guess you would cry

though as much as I have, to hear her story. I will tell it you

some day. Mrs. Morgan is going down to-morrow. I wish I was.

But I cannot. In two months my time is up; then you will see

me. Now, good night. Say 'good by' to Tom for me. Kiss mother,

father, and ever love your

"MAGGIE."

"Oh, James, something tells me that if she don't come before that, I

never shall see her. But you will be happy with her. You will live a

long life, I hope, for her to bless and comfort you in your old age. You

are not so old and so broken down as I am."

"All my fault, all my fault. If I had treated you as a rational man

should treat a wife, you would not be so broken down now."

"You must not look back. Look ahead and aloft. Think what a treasure of

a daughter you have got. How I should like to see her once more before I

go to my rest, and give her my blessing; and oh! how I should like to

see that blessed woman, that Mrs. Morgan. I want to bring her and Elsie

together, and make peace on earth as there will be in heaven, where I

hope to meet them both. They will soon follow. This life, at best, is

short. Mine will be, I am sure."

"Don't have such gloomy forebodings, wife; it seems to me that you were

never in better health."

"I know it, and never more happy."

This was on Thursday evening. On Saturday evening everybody was

astonished to see Maggie come bounding in, with a step as light and

quick as a playful lamb.

"Where's mother? Is she well? Has anything happened? Where is father? Is

everything all right with him?" were the questions she asked, in such

rapid succession that nobody could answer any one of them.

"Where is Tom? Is he well? Where is Mr. Pease and Mrs. Pease? Are they

well? Is mother in the kitchen?"

"Yes, yes, yes, yes, to the whole string."

Away she went, three stairs at a time, and then she almost overwhelmed

her mother with kisses and questions; and up she went to the third

story, and there was father in his room, reading the Bible. When had she

ever seen that before? The last time she saw him, he was so dreadfully

intoxicated that he did not know his own child, that was lifting him

out of the gutter. Now he was sober, well clothed, cheerful, and happy.

As she opened the door he read:

"Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? who hath babbling?

who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes?

"They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine.

"Look not thou upon the wine when it is red; when it giveth his color in

the cup; when it moveth itself aright.

"At the last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder.

"Thine eyes shall behold strange women, and--"

And he looked up, as his ear caught a little rustle of a woman's

clothes, and his eyes beheld a strange woman--a beautiful,

neatly-dressed young woman, with laughing, bright eyes and rosy cheeks,

and such a saucy little straw hat, so tastily trimmed--Mrs. Morgan did

that--and altogether such a lady-like girl, that he did not recognise

her, and he turned his eyes again to the book and repeated:

"Thine eyes shall behold strange women--"

"Father!"

The book dropped from his knees to the floor, as he sprang towards her.

"Am I so strange, father, that you did not know me?"

"Indeed, my daughter, I was afraid to speak; I did not know but a

strange woman had been sent to punish me, to 'sting me like an adder.'

Oh, Maggie, you don't know how I feel that I deserve it. And yet you are

so good. You are a strange woman. It is strange, passing strange, to

think that my daughter, my little neglected, dirty, ragged,

mischievous--"

"Wild Maggie, father."

"Yes, she had run wild; should be the lovely--you do look lovely,

Maggie--girl now in my arms. Oh, Maggie! Maggie! this is all your work."

"No, no, father; you must give the good Missionary his share of the

credit; and the good people all over the country who have sent him money

and clothes to feed and clothe the naked, and reform the drunkard. What

should we have been to-day, if he had not come to live in the Five

Points, father?"

"I should have been in my grave; a poor, miserable drunkard's grave; it

is awful to think where else I should have been."

"Well, well, father, you are happy now,"

"Yes, I am, and so is mother, and we shall be more so when we get a home

of our own, and all live together. Why, Maggie, why, who did dress you

up so neat?"

"Oh, my new friend I wrote you about, Mrs. Morgan--you got my

letter--yes--well, I do wish you could see her, she is such a good

woman."

So they talked on, and then the old lady came up, and then Maggie told

how they had arranged it all. On Monday, father was to see if he could

find a couple of nice rooms, and Maggie was going to see Mrs. Morgan,

for Mrs. Morgan's old uncle had told Maggie, that whenever she wanted to

go to keeping house, to come to him, she did not know what for, but she

was sure it was something good, for he was a good man, but he never let

anybody know what he did for poor folks, he did love to do things in his

own way. And Mrs. Morgan was going to write up to the people where she

lived, and if father and mother wanted her, they would let her come

before her time was up.

"Your father will want you."

"Will you, too? Do not you want me, mother?"

"I do not know, Maggie, I can hardly tell. Who can tell what a day may

bring forth. I am glad to see you; I have been praying all day, that the

good Spirit would direct your steps hither to-day."

"Did you pray that last night?"

"Yes."

"And this morning?"

"Yes."

"I thought so--I felt it, all night, all the morning, just as though a

little stream of fire was running through me, all over; now in my head,

now, in my heart, now in my very fingers' ends; now I started at a

whisper in my ear, that sounded just like mother, saying, 'Oh, Maggie!

Oh, that she would come! Oh, that I could see her once more!' and then I

felt as though I must come. I was afraid something was going to happen.

But now I find you all well, I see what a foolish girl I have been."

"No, Maggie, not foolish, not foolish; something tells me that you have

only obeyed the dictates of a good heart, guided by an invisible power.

But we will not talk about it any more now. I have arranged a place for

you to sleep to-night, for the house is very full, and we can scarcely

find beds for those we have, and there are applications for more poor

children every day. Do you remember that pretty little Italian beggar

girl, Madalina, that you used to go out with sometimes? She is going to

sleep in that little room, and you may sleep with her."

"Oh, mother, she is so dirty!"

"She used to be, she is not so now. She was so when she ran the streets,

just like another little girl."

"Oh, mother, I know who you mean, but I did not know that she had been

improved."

The next day, the father and mother and daughter were sitting side by

side in the chapel, and it was the remark of more than one, "Oh, what a

change!" "Is it possible that that is old drunken Reagan and his wife,

that used to live in that Centre street cellar, and that that is 'Wild

Maggie?' What a change! Why she is real pretty, and so bright, and so

affectionate--see how she looks out the hymn for her mother; and now

they all kneel together. Well well, that is better than all drunk

together."

After morning service, Mrs. Reagan went into the kitchen to assist about

dinner.

"I cannot tell how it is," said she, "but I feel as though this was the

last meal I shall ever eat with my husband and Maggie; perhaps I shall

not eat this."

She never did.

Half an hour after that, the house was in wild commotion. "Where is Mr.

Reagan?--where is Maggie?--call the doctor!--oh, dear!--oh, dear! Mrs.

Reagan is in a fit."

It was a fit which all must have sooner or later. Her forebodings, from

whatever cause they came, had given her prescience of her death.

The husband and daughter were soon kneeling over her where she had

fallen upon the floor, vainly trying to revive animation. The physician

vainly essayed his skill.

"It is too late. My mother is in heaven."

"It is certain she is in the hands of God, and she died with a blessing

on her lips for her child," said one of the women who were present when

she fell.

"What did she say, Angeline?"

"Sally, how was it? you heard it best."

This is drunken Sal and old Angeline, whom you have seen before. They,

too, are inmates; sober, industrious ones, of the House of Industry.

"She said, 'Oh, God, forgive me all my sins! And my husband, forgive

him, oh, Lord! as I do. Margaret, oh, God! I thank thee for sending her

to see me once more--God bless as I do my dear Maggie. I die in peace, I

die--dying--hap--Oh!' and she fell forward; I caught her in my arms, and

laid her down gently, but she never breathed again."

"Oh, mother, mother, are you dead, dead, dead! Will you never, never

speak to your Maggie again? Oh! it is so hard to part with you now, just

as we were going to be so happy, and all live together."

"Yes," said Angeline, "and that reminds me to tell you that she said

just before she died, but I thought she was talking wild like, that if

she did not see you again, that I must tell you not to go back to

Westchester, but you must be sure to stay with your father, he would be

so lonesome when she was gone."

The poor husband was lonesome; he already felt it. Then he felt what

blessings he had left. He had good health and strength, and a most

affectionate good child to comfort him in his old age. And then he

poured out such a prayer, as all ought to hear who lack courage to go on

in the glorious work of lifting up the fallen, and giving strength to

the feeble, and forgiveness to the erring. The day closed in sadness,

yet there were some who witnessed the sad scene who felt that "it is

good to be afflicted."

The next day after these events I was in Greenwood Cemetery, that lovely

resting-place for the dead. It is a landmark in this progressive age,

that shows the good fruits of an improved state of society. If any of

the readers of these Life Scenes, are curious to know what becomes of

the falling leaves of this great forest of human beings, let them go

over the Brooklyn South ferry, and follow some of the score of mourning

trains that go every day to put away some dead trunk, or lopped limb, or

twig, leaf, or flower, perhaps nothing but a bud, which they will plant

in earth to blossom in heaven; and they will see where a portion of the

fallen go to decay. It is a place for a day, not of gloom, but sweet

meditations, such as does the soul good.

I was meditating over a late made grave. It was by the side of one

almost old enough to be forgotten, and yet the number of years since it

was made were very few, and very, very short. There was a rose bush

growing at the head, but I saw through the green leaves the name of

"Morgan, AEt. 62." I was not curious to know what Morgan, for my thoughts

were far away. I did wonder, it is natural to do so, if that was Mrs.

Morgan by his side, and if they had always lain so quiet, without words

of contention, or "Caudle Lectures." My doubts were soon to be solved,

for now came a cart and a couple of stone setters. How quick, and how

carelessly they work; now the hole is dug, now they lift the little

stone out of the cart, now they set it upright, now they fill in the

dirt around it, now they give a few stamps with heavy boots just over

the head of the sleeper--he hears them not--now the stone is planted,

now they jump into the cart, slash the whip, and curse the poor old

horse for his laziness, and rattle away with a whistle and merry glee.

Now we can read the name on the new stone. Ah, it is not his wife--it is

"Walter Morgan, AEt. 27." His son--perhaps, an only son--how soon he has

come after his father. It is a common name, or I might moralize farther

upon what I know of that name. I am interrupted, and walk off a little

way and turn to look again. A fine, benevolent looking gentleman--faces

do look benevolent--is getting out of a carriage. He is about the age of

the elder Morgan. His brother, perhaps. Now, he lifts out a rose bush,

in bloom, in its little world, all its own, in an earthen pot. Ah, ha!

that is to be planted at the new stone just put in its place. Now he

lifts out a lovelier flower. It is a young widow. Fancy is at work now;

it says, "Is she pretty?" We are too far off to discern features, but we

can think. We do think that a widow who comes to plant a flower at her

husband's grave, is a flower of a woman, let her face be what it may.

So I sat down with pencil in hand, writing, "Musings at the Tomb." I had

just written, "Benevolent old gent and beautiful young widow," and was

going to add, rose bush planted at husband's grave, and all that sort of

thing, when somebody slapped me on the back--that knocks out the

sentimental--with a clear hearty expression of, "my old friend."

"Why, Lovetree, is this you? Athalia--Mrs. Morgan, I should say."

"No; always call me by the name you first knew me by."

"Then I should call you Lucy."

"No, no, not that, not that."

"Forgive me, but I did not intend to call up unpleasant reminiscences.

Ah, what have we here? A little train of mourners, with a tenant for

that open grave. See, that is the Missionary from the Five Points."

"And, oh, uncle, that is Maggie, our little Maggie from up the country.

It must be her mother. Yes, it is, for she takes the arm of a man with a

crape on his hat--it is her father. Her mother has her wish. He will

drop a tear at her grave. See, he does; his handkerchief is at his eyes.

Oh, it is a sad thing for a husband to follow the wife he has lived with

forty years, to such an end as this. Poor Maggie, how she weeps. I must

go and see her as soon as the ceremony is over. Suppose, uncle, that we

take them in our carriage home with us, it will not be quite so

melancholy as it will be to go back to the house of death."

"So we will, and then I will arrange the plan for them to go to

housekeeping together. I have already got a place in view."

So they met, and so Athalia said, "Come with us."

And so they went. Maggie looked upon it as another remarkable

interposition, or something, at any rate, that she could not account

for, that Mrs. Morgan should have felt impelled to come over here

to-day, of all other days, and that they should meet so singularly;

"for," said she, "fifty different parties might be riding about among

these hills, and dales, and groves, looking at this lonely poor grave,

and at that twenty thousand dollar monument, and yet no one know that

the other was so near. Well, it is a place where all must come. I hope

we shall all meet our friends as happily as I have mine to-day."

So they went home with Mrs. Morgan, and three days after they went to a

house of their own.

You have already seen how they were able afterwards to say to others,

"Come with us," when a houseless widow and her two children stood in the

street the night of the fire--the night that rum and its effects made

Mrs. Eaton a widow.

Perhaps you would like to see the benevolent gentleman that clothed the

naked after that fire? You have seen him. Turn back a leaf and look at

him again as he lifts that rose-bush out of the carriage, to plant at

that grave. You did not see him in the crowd at the fire, but he was

there, and heard his protege say, "Come with us." He was just going to

say it, but he liked it better that Maggie had said it first. Then he

said to himself--it was one of his odd freaks of benevolence--I will

surprise the dear girl directly, and make her remember those golden

words to her dying day.

You have seen him. It was Athalia's uncle.

Who is Athalia?

Turn over. Read.

CHAPTER VIII.

ATHALIA, THE SEWING GIRL.

"How full of briars is this working day world."

"With fingers weary and worn,

With eyelids heavy and red,

A woman sat in unwomanly rags,

Plying her needle and thread."

Athalia wore not unwomanly rags at the period when I shall commence her

history. She was clad in the garb of a country girl, just arrived in the

city, in the full expectation that fortune awaited her, just as soon as

she could learn the trade of a dress-maker. Oh, how she worked, and

laughed, and sung! She was the life of the shop. Sometimes she thought

of home--home where mother was--and then she wept. But the sunshine of

youth soon sends the clouds and dew drops that dim the eye away to

forgetfulness.

Athalia was sixteen--sweet sixteen in face and mind. What a bright blue

eye, what soft brown hair, what wit, and oh, what a voice in song! and

such a heart, 'twas tuned for others' woes, and not her own.

Why comes this mountain flower from her country home?

Her father was a farmer--ah! _was_--would be still, only that he had

swallowed his farm. The mortgage to the store at the cross roads, the

damage paid in a law suit for a fight, and the cost of throwing his

neighbor's horse down his well, had left him without a home for himself,

and so his children went forth into the world to seek bread; the

daughter, of course, by the needle, the sons at sea.

Athalia chose the city. How little she knew the danger. She would have

shuddered to see a man sit carelessly down upon a powder keg with a pipe

in his mouth. Not half so dangerous is that, as for a young country

girl, with a beautiful face, to come here.

Oh, how she worked one whole year to learn her dress-maker's trade,

without one cent of compensation. Such is the law. The law of custom

with milliners' apprentices.

Then she went home. How joyfully her mother opened her arms; how sweet

was that kiss--a loved mother's kiss. Did she love her father? How could

she love a man who often cursed, and sometimes beat that mother? She

went home to stay, to ply her new trade among her old neighbors. How

could she love her father when he would not let her stay, and, like a

drunken brute as he was, drove her back again to the city?

"You have learnt a city trade, and you have got city airs; nobody wants

you here."

It was not so. Everybody wanted her there but her miserable father.

Everybody else loved Athalia. They saw no city airs; all they saw was

that a rough diamond had been polished. What is it worth without?

So she came back to the city with a heavy heart. What was she to do? She

could go back to her old shop and work eighteen hours a day, for

twenty-five cents, and scanty food; lodging, as she had done during her

long year of apprenticeship, three in a narrow bed, in a room with just

air and space enough for the decent accommodation of a cat, nothing

more. What hope in such a life? What would she have at the end of the

year? Just what she had at the beginning? No; for one year of youth

would be gone.

She could not go back; there was no hope there. So, with another girl

just as poor, but just as willing to work, she took a room, and took in

work, or went out to do it. Then how she was exposed, how in danger.

Libertines live in genteel families. Ah, and are pet sons of mothers who

would give dollars to dissipated rakes, and grudge shillings to poor

dress-makers. And if the poor girl should be caught in the snare of such

a son, how the mother would rave and drive her away unpaid, because she

had disgraced her "respectable boy."

Mrs. Morgan was one of Athalia's lady "patrons." Haughtily proud, yet

not, like some of her class, positively dishonest, cruelly dishonest.

She wanted the labor of the poor sewing girl, because she possessed

great taste, and could dress her daughters better, and what was still

more, though so little practised by the rich, cheaper, than she could

get their dresses at a "regular establishment." That was just what the

daughters most disliked. They knew that none of their acquaintances wore

such neat-fitting dresses, but when the question was put, "Where did you

get them made?" they could not answer, "Oh, we always get everything at

Madame Chalambeau's fashionable establishment in Broadway."

They could not change their mother's policy, and so they determined to

drive poor Athalia out of the house.

They had another object. Athalia was beautiful. Her face was such as we

are apt to conceive that an angel must have. And everybody who came in

the house while she was there, and saw her, said, "Oh, what a sweet

face!"

This was gall and wormwood to the "young ladies," for their faces were

just such as you would suppose were made out of those two ingredients,

and they were true indications of their minds. So they hated the poor

seamstress for double cause.

At first she came to the table with the family. But the girls could not

help observing that she was the diamond, they the setting, to all eyes.

She was better bred than they, with all their boarding-school education.

Where had she got it? In a country school house, and her mother's

kitchen.

Once, once only, after tea she was invited to sing. Who supposed that

she could touch a piano note. She accepted the invitation, as all

well-bred girls do, who know that they can sing, and Walter offered his

arm to lead her to the piano.

Walter was the brother, the only "son and heir of our family." He had

just returned from a lady-killing Niagara tour, and met Athalia for the

first time at the tea table. It was the last time, the sisters said,

that he should meet her there. She went home that evening; she had

finished her job and received her poor pay. That was one of Mrs.

Morgan's virtues; she paid the stipulated price to those who worked for

her.

What daggers, scorpions' stings, and poisoned darts, poor Athalia and

Walter would have felt, while he stood over her at the piano, if they

could have felt the glances of scornful, angry eyes. How he was taken to

task afterwards for paying attention to "a sewing girl," particularly

for waiting upon her home.

How he justified himself. Just as though there was need of it. But

aristocracy had stept down to the level of one who

"Plied her needle and thread,

In poverty, hunger, and toil;"

Who sang with a voice of saddening song,

Of the home on her own native soil.

Of the spring and the brook where it flow'd,

Of the plums and the pears where they grew,

Of the meadows and hay lately mow'd.

And the roses all dripping with dew.

And her heart it went journeying back,

While her fingers plied needle and thread,

Till the morning came in at a crack,

Where it found her still out of her bed.

Shall I ever work thus like a slave,

With the scorn of the rich and the proud?

For they think that a seamstress must crave

For the work that is making her shroud.

Walter justified, apologised, for he was bound in the iron fetters,

"polite custom."

"I found," says he, "when I came home, a beautiful, well-dressed,

well-behaved girl, to all appearance a young lady, at your tea table."

"Well, she shall never come there again. I always told mother that she

might know better than to bring her to the table; and the pert minx, if

she knew her place, would never try to stick herself into genteel

company. So much for having a dress-maker in the house."

"Elsie, Elsie, I am ashamed of you."

"I think you had better be ashamed of yourself, mother."

"I found her," resumed Walter, "at your table, and I took the only

vacant seat, by her side. I did not find her pert, but on the contrary,

I must say it, better behaved, better spoken, than my sister Elsie, when

speaking of or to her mother."

"You had better insult me, by your comparison, Sir Walter."

"No; I do not intend that. But I was only explaining why I paid

attention to the lady."

"The lady--lady! That to a sewing girl who goes out to work by day's

work. Did you learn that at college or at Saratoga?"

"I have learned to call every female lady, who looks, acts, and talks

like one. I hope my sister Elsie will not unlearn me. I found the lady

at your table. I found her polite and diffident. She is not a forward

minx. I walked with her to the parlor."

"Yes, and she should have known better than to go there. Why did she not

go back to her work?"

"Elsie, she had done her work, and was waiting for your father to come

home, so I could get some money to pay her; for I should be ashamed to

keep her out of her money, or oblige her to call again. You had spent

all the change I had in the house in your afternoon shopping. It was me

that asked her to stay. It was me that asked her into the parlor. It was

me, your mother, that asked her to sing one of those plaintive, sweet

songs, I had heard her sing to the children while at work. It was you

that urged her. What for? That she might fail. Elsie, Elsie, there is

envy in your heart."

"And she did sing. Was ever anything sweeter? I can repeat every word,

for every note went down into my soul, and printed itself like the

magnetic telegraph. Listen:

"Oh, I was born where waters leaping,

Cascade down the green, green hill;

Oh, I was born where lambkins bleating,

Leap along the clear, clear rill.

Oh, I was born where lightning flashes,

'Luminate the green, green trees;

Oh, I was born where the wild wind dashes,

Raging o'er the deep, deep seas.

"Oh, now I live amid confusion,

Commerce wears an ugly frown;

Oh, who would give that sweet seclusion,

For all the pleasures of the town?

Oh, how I love my native mountain,

Hills and glens and all their flocks,

Oh, how I love that sweet sweet fountain,

Every tree, and all the rocks."

"Smitten--smitten--my brother Walter smitten with my dress-maker! Faugh!

I wonder if he went home with her, for he went out at the same time?"

Yes, he did go home with her. It was her first false step. But ye that

stand fast, do not censure this first step of her fall. She was young

and handsome; so was he. Theirs were such hearts as nature sports with.

Both were touched. He went home with her. They got into a stage at

Seventeenth street to ride to Broome, for there was the home of the

sewing girl. At Broome street he forgot to pull the check string. She

did not notice it till the crowd of cars, carriages, and swarms of human

beings, which fill up that great wide thoroughfare, Canal street,

awakened her, from her reverie of wild thoughts, to the fact that they

were already too far down. Before he could stop her she had pulled the

string, and the driver held up and looked down through his little peep

hole at his passengers, ready for his sixpenny fare, which he will

contrive to make seven cents, if he makes change for you.

Walter acknowledged that he did not mean to stop the stage; he wanted

Athalia to go to Taylor's, and take an ice cream with him. But she was

inexorable. He plead, she said, no; she said it sweetly, and, finally,

they compromised by her agreeing to go to-morrow evening.

The second false step!

Then he walked home with her. She said, good night, at the door, he

said, "Oh, let me see you up these dim stairs."

"Oh, no, I am used to them, I can find my room in the dark. If

Jeannette is at home, she will hear a little signal upon the wall, and

open the door, then it will be light."

"Give it then."

She did; Jeannette was not at home.

"Oh, let me go up, and just look in, and see where angels live."

Oh, flattery! thy power is great. Why should she refuse, since he was to

come again, she had promised that? So she said, "come up, then," and

away she tripped into the darkness, her step so light that he could not

tell where it fell. Directly there was a little scratch, a flash, a blue

flame, very small, and then a full white light, and a match, and then a

lamp was burning.

"Come up. Take care of the narrow, crooked steps, they are not like your

broad easy stair-case."

She had made another false step. Did far off visions of fancy revel in

her brain, that she might some day go up that broad stair-case, arm in

arm with that handsome young man? What if they did? you too have dreamed

more unlikely day dreams.

"Come up, can you see?"

Yes, he could see,

"By the lamp dimly burning,"

just up there above him, one of the houris he had often read of, often

dreamed of, never before seen. He went up, to her little heaven of a

room. How could she sing that,

"Commerce wears an ugly frown,"

while everything looked so smiling in her mart? How could she long for

the sweet seclusion of her country home, with such a bijou of a hermit's

cell here? He stood amazed. He spoke not, but he thought. Did she divine

his thoughts?--she answered them--how did she know them? The magnetic

telegraph of the soul was at work.

"Yes, sir, we are obliged to keep our room neat, because ladies come

here to get work done, and they would not give us their custom if we

lived in a plain room."

Plain room! What would his sisters say to a plainly furnished room, if

that was not one?

"True, it is plainer than theirs--I mean--but you did not speak--I

thought you spoke--yes it is plain compared with rooms that ladies

occupy. We pay enough though for the furniture to have good."

"Do you hire it then?"

"Yes, we neither of us had money enough to furnish a room, only a few

things, and pay the rent in advance. So we hired a furniture man to put

in the things, and we pay him for the use of them."

"How much?"

"Five dollars a month."

"Five dollars! Why there is not over a hundred dollars worth."

"No, sir; that is just what it was counted at. They are all second-hand

articles. There is the bedstead; we furnished the bed and bedding; my

mother gave me that; Jeannette has no mother; and the table, and the

other little pine table, the bureau, the wash-stand, the six chairs,

the rocker, and the sofa; we made those ottomans, and the curtains; and

in that pantry----. Oh, I declare how I am running on."

"Pray, tell me, Miss----, I really have not learned your name yet."

"Athalia. I am sure you heard your mother call me that."

"Yes, but I was going to call you by your sirname."

"Lovetree, sir. Athalia Lovetree."

"Oh, that is a very sweet, pretty name."

"Yes, sir, so much so that I think I shall always keep it."

"So all the young ladies say. But it hardly ever proves true with one

who owns so pretty a name, and a face prettier still."

More flattery. She did not hear it. No. She felt it though.

"Well, I am very sure I never shall change my first name. I never shall

be called by any other than Athalia."

She thought so then; I wonder if she ever thought of it in after years?

"But you have not told me what is in that pantry."

"Oh, no matter; that is where we keep all our dishes and cooking

utensils. We have a stove in winter; in summer, a little charcoal

furnace behind the fire-board."

"And is your room warm in winter?"

"Why yes, sir, if we have plenty of work."

"Does work keep you warm?"

"Oh, no; but work gives us money to buy coal. There was a time last

winter, when we were out of work, that----"

"You had no fire?"

"Yes, sir, but only a few days, we had to make up the month's rent,

eight dollars for the room, and five for the furniture."

Walter put his hand in his pocket. What for? He felt how easy it would

be to take out a hundred dollars, and tell her, to go and pay for that

furniture, and not pay rent for it any longer. Then he thought how

ridiculous, to be so affected by the woes and wants of a sewing girl.

How his proud sisters would laugh at him. Pride conquered a heart prone

to a good action.

"And so you went without fire, to pay that usurious old miser who owns

this furniture, sixty per cent per annum, for the use of it. Sixty, yes,

more than a hundred upon what it would sell for at auction. And what did

you do for food in the meantime?"

"Well, we did not need much, and should not have suffered any, if Mrs.

Jenkins had paid me for my work. Oh, if she only knew how much we did

need it. Jeannette was sick, and what little money I had, I spent for

her; I had almost ten dollars due me for work, and could not get one. It

is wicked to keep poor girls out of their money; indeed it is, when they

are sick and suffering for it."

"And you suffered, while Mrs. Jenkins, with her thirteen servants, and

coach and horses owed you for work?"

"Well, we did not suffer much, except I had to pawn my black silk

dress, the very one too that I needed most when it was cold, and had to

do without fire when Jeannette was sick, and should, by all means, have

had one. She is a sweet, good girl; I wish she was at home."

"Wish again, and you will see her."

Both started as though caught in something they were ashamed of. Why

should they be? True he had approached very close to Athalia, as she

stood watering her flowers and feeding her bird--both windows were full

of flowers, and over each a canary bird; and he was watching all her

operations with as much interest as though they were all his own.

"Poor things," she said, "they look neglected."

She loved flowers. So did he. He loved their owner, but he had not said

so yet. He hardly knew it; he would not let any one know it; hence he

started when Jeannette spoke, for he thought she must have seen it. He

blushed and turned round, and then she blushed; there was a trio of

blushes. What for? Jeannette did not think it was a stranger. She

thought it was Charley Vail. Charley was a sort of beau, yet not a beau.

He was Jeannette's cousin; and though he did not love her exactly, he

liked her, and I guess that she liked him; Athalia thought more than

liked him. Charley would have loved Athalia if she had given him the

least encouragement, but she would not, for she hoped he would love his

cousin and marry her. He was a good fellow, always ready to do anything

on earth for "the girls"--in short he was Charley.

Jeannette blushed. She had reason to, for, thinking it was cousin

Charley--who else could it be, there in their room alone with Athalia,

in the evening--she tripped up behind him and gave him a good hearty

slap on the back. He turned around, she almost felt him hugging and

kissing her, but he did not. She looked again, the light now shone in

his face, and there she stood before a stranger. Is it any wonder she

blushed? is it any wonder he blushed? is it any wonder they all blushed?

She played with her bonnet strings; he twirled his hat; Athalia could

not play with any thing. She had the lamp in one hand, and the bird cage

in the other. But she could laugh, and she burst out in such clear,

musical tones, as she said, "Why, Jeannette, did you think it was

Charley?"

That explained the whole. He understood the blow now. Did he also

understand what Charley would have done, if it had been him that got the

blow. Perhaps he thought, for he said, "You have struck me, miss. I

never take a blow without giving one back. There."

Did he strike her? What! strike a woman! Shame! Oh, no; but he caught

her in his arms, before she could be aware of the movement, and such a

kiss! such, a good, hearty kiss as he gave her. Ah, well! who would not?

She was a nice, sweet girl, not quite so pretty as Athalia, but one that

a colder heart than his might relish in just such a case. She pouted a

little, and talked about great liberty in a stranger; but who took the

first liberty? True; but "that was a mistake."

"Then count the other a mistake too."

"No, that was done on purpose."

"So it was, and I should like to do it again, but I will not, so rudely.

Pray forgive me."

What had she to forgive? what to be angry about. How could she hold out

against that, "I should like to do it again?"

After all she was not half so angry as Athalia. And what was she angry

about? That he had kissed Jeannette instead of her? Take care, little

heart, jealousy is creeping in among thy pulsations. Take care, big

heart, for just now Charley enters the scene, and before he has observed

that a stranger is in the room, he has kissed Athalia.

Mischief has broke loose to-night. What is in the men? What is in Walter

Morgan, that a kiss given to that girl, for the first time seen that

night, should send a pang to his heart? How it goes throbbing through

every nerve, and pricks into the very core of sensation. Take care, big

heart and little heart, nature is at her sports and she always makes

pleasures sweet by contrast with pain.

Finally, all are reconciled. How they do laugh over the queer mistakes.

Jeannette would have sooner struck a bear than him, yet he did not bite

her. Charley would have sooner kissed that same bear, and risked the

hug, than have kissed Athalia before a stranger, for he is a good boy, a

little mischievous, but would never do a thing to hurt the feelings of

another, particularly a woman.

How they did sit, and talk, and laugh, and enjoy happiness, such as

Walter had never found in rose-wood furnished parlors. What would his

proud sisters say, if they knew how "low he had sunk himself, to keep

company with sewing girls?" But he would not tell them. Take care, young

man, you are breaking in upon the conventionalities of life. You must

stick to your _caste_, in America as well as India. You may lay your

heart at the feet of anything that is old and ugly, even as your

sisters, so that she is _ton_ and of the _ton_--the upper _ton_. But

offer to love one who lives, barely lives, by her needle, and see how

your own flesh and blood will hate you.

So passed the evening away. Then Walter would go. But he wanted to hear

Athalia sing once more. No. She had no piano. His hand was in his pocket

again. How he would like to send her one to-morrow, but he dared not say

so. He did look around the room, to see where he could set it. There was

no room. She could not sing any more to-night. Ask Jeannette. She sings

a beautiful little song while we are at work. No, she could not. She was

afraid to sing before strangers. But Charley asked her, in his blandest

manner, and then she would sing one verse if he would go right home. How

anxious she was to get rid of him. So she sung:

"Why bitter life with useless tears,

With mourning unavailing?

Why bitter hope with ceaseless fears,

Of shoals where we are sailing?

With lively song and music peals,

Make life just like the ocean,

When flapping sails a zephyr steals,

To toss us with its motion,

Motion, motion, motion.

To toss us with its motion."

"There now, I hope you are satisfied. If not you may go, for I shall not

sing another word to-night. I don't know how I came to do that."

No, they were not satisfied. Who ever knew a man that was? Who ever got

one favor of a woman, that did not ask for two more? So they both asked

both the girls to go to the theatre to-morrow night, and both promised.

More false steps. How many will it take to reach the end?

Walter went home, never more happy. You have seen how he was taken to

task. He had defied the laws of caste.

It did not require stronger Argus eyes than his two sisters possessed to

see how deeply he was enamored with Athalia. How they did wish they knew

whether she had dared to look up to him, as he had down to her. How

should they find out. It does not take mischief-makers long to contrive

their plot. If one woman wants to ruin another one, there is one always

ready to assist her in her wicked design. No doubt he was the father of

millinery, for he caused the first apron to be made, and he has assisted

largely in all the designs of female apparel from that day to this.

Sometimes his fashion is very fig-leafish, barely hiding a portion of

the body, while the limbs, head, neck, shoulders, and other

"excitements," are left exposed to Adam's rude gaze. Then he contrives

his fashion of so much cloth, that those who follow it may lose their

souls in its attainment, and those who make them may feel, as they

"Work, work, work,

Till the stars shine through the roof,"

That they are weaving a web with sin for the woof,

"Till the brain begins to swim,

Till the eyes grow heavy and dim,

Sewing at once, with a double thread,

A dress for the living and dead."

Mischief is always busy. It must be so with an envious wicked woman.

The Morgans changed their tactics, and adopted those more wicked than I

could invent.

They soon found that they wanted more dresses, and what was very

remarkable, they did not want to go to the French dress-maker. What

could be the reason? They had watched their brother; they had seen him

go to Athalia's; they had seen him in the theatre with her; they had met

them walking, arm in arm, in Broadway, "the shameless hussey;" and once

they had entered Thompson's, and walked upstairs to take ice cream,

"actually over our heads." Walter Morgan, the richest merchant's son, in

New York, gallanting a seamstress--their own dress-maker. And every day

some of their acquaintance were asking them, "Who is that beautiful girl

I saw with Walter?" Of course they did not know; how could they tell

that he had taken up with "such a thing?" In vain they talk to him, he

was mum, or if he spoke of her, it was with the highest respect. Would

he marry her? Ah, there was the rub.

"It is a pity," said Elsie, "that he would not ruin her, and that would

be the end of it."

Did a spirit furnish that cue, or was it a wicked woman's own conceit?

At any rate, it was a cue upon which they acted. Athalia was sent for,

and the young ladies never were so affable before. Every opportunity was

contrived for Walter to accomplish the purpose of a villain. Their

schemes had the exact contrary effect desired. He had made such advances

at first as "men about town" do make, and had met with such a decided

repulse, not an angry one, but a virtuous one, that he never would try

again.

"I expected it," said she to his proposals, "I am used to it--I am

almost every day exposed to such tempting offers, to escape a life of

poverty--I have ceased to look upon them as insulting--nature, and

fashion, and the state of society, are such in this city, that a girl

with an unfortunate face like mine, must fall, unless she is possessed

of such fortitude as but few young girls are naturally gifted with. You

may ask me that question every day; every day you may, if you feel like

wounding the feelings of a poor girl, repeat your question, and every

day you will get the same answer."

"Athalia, forgive me. Oh, forgive me; I never will repeat the question

again; whether you forgive me or not, you need have no fear of that."

What a failure then had his sisters made. They did just what they did

not intend to do; they led Walter to think, that his family would

approve a match with one so virtuous, so beautiful, so lovely, even if

she was a sewing girl, and he began to build castles in the air upon

this foundation. They were very sandy, and a storm was approaching that

would soon beat upon the frail walls, and like all such fabrics, down

they will tumble.

CHAPTER IX.

ATHALIA, THE SEWING GIRL.

"One sorrow never comes but brings an heir,

That may succeed as its inheritor."

"Proper deformity seems not in the fiend

So horrid, as in woman."

Marriage, death, bankruptcy, poverty, sin, and, finally, "plucked like a

brand from the burning," are the contents, the introduction, and

peroration, of this chapter. If you are satisfied at a glance, you can

pass on, the filling up, is but the shading of the sketch. But if you

are curious to know who marries, who dies, and who does worse--read.

"It is but a step from the palace to the tomb," yet the road sometimes

seems a long and dreary one, leading through strange, dark places.

I have come to the conclusion, that lovers of romance, and those who

cater for them, writing tales of fiction, have mistaken their vocation.

Let them gather up and detail a few of the incidents of real Life Scenes

as they occur, and there will be no occasion for fiction. So let us on

with our narration of events.

Mr. Morgan was a merchant, wealthy as Croesus, perhaps more so; and he

had more need to be, for he lived "up town," in "up town" style. The

simple interest upon the cost of his house and furniture was seven

thousand dollars a year, and his annual expenses double that sum.

Of course his daughters had never taken a stitch in their lives. They

had been to school, where nothing useful is taught; and learned what is

called music, and could waltz to perfection. Walter, had been to

college. What had he learnt? To drink a bottle of wine every day after

dinner, and "fill up," with mint juleps, sherry coblers, and brandy

smashes, the intermediate time. Not one useful thing had either of them

been taught, not one lesson in the art of self-support; all was

self-indulgence. They laughed, or would have laughed at the idea, if any

one had dared to mention it, that the time would ever come, that they

would have occasion to lift a hand to procure their own bread.

It is a bad school--it has many scholars.

Mr. Morgan came home one day in unusual glee; he was naturally a stern

man. He had heard of the very successful voyage of the Matilda--named

after his daughter--to China, where she would load with teas and silks

for a home voyage. She was insured in a very rich London office. Some of

his cautious friends advised him to "hedge," by insuring also in other

offices; he had never met with a single loss in his life; he had often

been his own insurer, and took about half the value of the Matilda now

on his own insurance book, which showed a great many thousand dollars in

his favor.

"Yes," said a Paul Pry, of my acquaintance, "more thousands than he is

now worth, if his debts were paid."

Who believed it? Not the banks, which loaned him any amount he desired.

Not the wife, and son, and daughters, for that stern husband and father

never told them of his business.

"That is my business," was the cut-off valve which always shut down upon

every question as certain as that of the steam engine at the point where

it must change the motion.

After dinner and the second bottle, the family were startled by the

sudden announcement he made for to-morrow.

"We start for Lake George to-morrow morning; come, get ready."

"Why, father, what has started you all of a sudden?"

"That's my business."

"Well, we cannot get ready, no way in the world."

"Pshaw! I could get a ship ready before ten o'clock."

"But we cannot get new hats."

"Plenty of time. Start right out."

"To-night? Buy a hat in the evening, who ever heard of such a thing?

What would Mrs. Grundy say?"

"Ask her, she is going with us; or rather, we are going with them.

Grundy is in shoal water, and wants to get out of sight a few days; and

I want he should, for I am on his paper heavy."

"Oh, it is absolutely impossible for us to go to our milliner to-night."

"Go in the morning, then. Time enough."

"What? before ten o'clock. How vulgar you are, father."

"Very well: if you cannot get up new flying gibs, go to sea with the old

ones."

"Well, I suppose we might send for Madam Pantanosi to call in the

morning; but, dear me, there are our dresses all in the work-room, not

one of them done. You don't expect Athalia is going to finish them

to-night, do you?"

"Have you no others?"

"What if we have? the Grundys know that we have new ones making, and of

course, will expect to see them. You don't expect your daughters, I

hope, to wear old dresses, on a tour to the Lakes?"

"Why not? That is the place to wear them."

"You may talk, father, but it is out of the question."

"Well, settle it your own way. I go to-morrow, and if you are going with

me, you had better be getting ready; besides, let me tell you, young

Wendall is going up too. We are going to have some great sport,

fishing."

That decided Elsie. If George Wendall and the Grundys were going, she

must go, for he and Minnie Grundy needed watching. She would go, if she

wore the old hat, and a dress that had been worn twice before.

"Where is that seamstress? she must work all night, and get my dress

done any way."

"Elsie, daughter, she cannot do that, her eyes are very weak. You had

better take her along with us, the poor girl; give her a little country

air, and let her finish your dresses there."

"Yes, yes, that's it, wife, let her go along. She appears to be a right,

tight little craft. A sail will do her good. What a pity she did not

hail from the right port."

"You have very curious notions, father."

"That is my business."

"Well, for my part," says Matilda, "I think she can go just as well as

not; our maid and she can have a room together, and nobody need to know

that we have brought a seamstress along with us; if they did, they would

think it very vulgar. Of course, she won't come to the table with us, at

the hotel."

"No, indeed; I guess she will not; though, I suppose, we shall have a

private table; shall we not, father?"

"That is my business."

But as it was settled that she was to go, it was, finally, thought

necessary to tell her so, and she was sent for, and told of the

arrangement.

How could she go? How start so sudden? How leave Jeannette? She could

not go. Yet she would like to. Perhaps she never would have another

opportunity. She would go down and see Jeannette, and if she could go,

she would come up very early. Away she ran upstairs for her little straw

hat and black mantilla. Walter had been a "silent member" of the party.

What wild thoughts ran through his brain, when he found that Athalia was

to be one of the party. Did he dream of the shady walk, the moonlit

lake, and egg-shell boat, with only two in it, floating upon the glassy

surface of the water? Did he think that he should climb the rocks with

her, and wander through the ruins of old Ticonderoga? Yes, he did dream;

youth do dream. Did she dream, while she stood before the glass, tying

her bonnet strings? What of? Of the hook that he would bait and put in

her hands, and the fish that would be caught. Fish! It is not fish alone

that young girls catch, when young men bait hooks for them, in wild

woods, and lonely glens, where mountain streams murmur soft music.

As she came down upon the steps, Walter was waiting there. What for? For

a poor sewing girl. He wanted, he said, that she should stop with him

and pick out a hat and some little articles, a toilet box, and sundry

conveniences or necessaries, to one on a journey, for his sister

Matilda.

Oh yes, she would do that, with pleasure, if he wished it. He did wish

it. The selections were made with great taste and without regard to

expense. The hat was a little treasure.

What was that sigh for? Can a woman--a young girl--just on the eve, too,

of a journey to a watering place, see such a hat shut up in its paper

case, without a sigh? It is more than human nature ever could do.

Athalia is human, and that hat is just such a one as she would like

herself. She is too poor. So she sighed and went home.

"Shall I send it?"

"Let it be until I return, and then I will give directions."

It is no matter what Walter said to her on the way home, but she had

determined to go with the Morgans, to Lake George, and so she told him.

"Good night then, I must go home and get ready, you know what the word

is with father--'that is my business.'"

He had a little other business. He went back to the store, and gave the

necessary orders about the purchase.

"Would the lady be kind enough to write a little note that he would

dictate, and put it in the bonnet box?"

"Certainly, anything to oblige the gentleman. Was that his sister? His

cousin perhaps? Well, she is very pretty, at any rate. Was that her

name? What a sweet name."

What sweet words to Walter. How we do like to hear those we love spoken

of in such words.

How Athalia busied herself getting her few things ready. What she

lacked, Jeannette, the good soul, lent her. She never thought how lonely

the room would be for the two or three weeks she would be away.

"I wish I had a few dollars to spare, Jeannette, I certainly would go

and buy just such a hat as I picked out this evening for Matilda Morgan.

It was very pretty. And Walter, he admired it too. He said it was so

tasty, when I tried it on, to let him see how it looked."

Just then there was a rap at the door.

"Oh there comes cousin Charley."

No, it could not be Charley, it was a little rap. The door was opened,

and there stood a little girl with a bandbox and bundle.--It is a shame

to send such little girls out late in the evening with such heavy

bundles.

"Does Miss Lovetree live here?"

"Yes."

"Then this is the place."

"Oh dear," says Jeannette, "more work. Who can this be from? Why,

Athalia, what is the matter, you look amazed?"

"I am amazed. Is there no mistake in the direction?"

"No, it is Miss Athalia Lovetree. No.--Broome street, up-stairs."

"Oh! I cannot take it, indeed I cannot. Accept such a present from him?

No, no, no."

He had thought of that. Jeannette by this time had the bandbox open. Did

woman ever resist that temptation?

"Ah here is a note. This will explain the mystery."

"TO MISS LOVETREE:--

"As it is decided that you will go with us to Lake George,

please accept a few things that you will need, which I have

commissioned my son to buy.

"From your friend,

"MRS. MORGAN."

"Oh that is a different thing, if they come from her. And then for him

to pretend all the time that they were for his sister. It is too bad.

Oh, but it is a love of a hat though! is it not, Jeannette?"

Yes, it was; that was settled. First one tried it on, and then the

other. Jeannette said it was a _bride's_ hat. Athalia said she ought to

be ashamed of herself to say so. Then all the other little bijouterie

were overhauled, and looked at, and talked over, and praised, and then

the note was read again, and the postscript; there was a postscript,

there always is a postscript to a woman's letter. It was the postscript

that gave it the air of genuineness. It read:

"P. S.--Don't say a word to me, or hint where the hat came

from, for I don't want Mr. Morgan or the girls ever to know;

nobody knows but Walter."

No, nobody knows but Walter. There was no fiction in that.

In the morning there was another rap--louder this time. It did not

disturb any sleep though; there had been none in that room that night.

It was John, come for the trunk and bandbox--two things that a modern

lady never travels without. There was a wagon load of them left the

Morgan and Grundy mansions that morning, and they and their owners all

arrived, in due course of cars and locomotives, at Lake George.

Mr. Morgan and George Wendall fished, the girls flirted, Athalia sewed

and sighed, and walked out evenings, slyly, with Walter Morgan.

More false steps. Sly walks in town are bad--in the country, dangerous.

There are a great many precipices, down which such a couple may tumble.

George was a glorious fishing companion for the shipping merchant. He

could row and drive, and get up all the fixings; and, after dinner,

talk, and laugh, and drink, till both went to bed "glorious."

"Mr. Morgan, you drink one bottle too many."

"Pshaw. What if I do? that is my business."

It is sometimes the wife's business.

George was a boon companion, that was all. He had nothing, did nothing,

lived somehow, dressed well--ill-natured folks said he did not pay his

tailor.

Who ever thought that he would be Mr. Morgan's son-in-law? He did, and

so had his daughter, Elsie, lately concluded, for the country air and

scenery are provocatives to that end.

"Ask father."

"Enough said."

He did. He took care to ask him just at the right time.

"Why, George, my boy, good fellow to fish. Did not think you had your

hook there. Got any bait? No. Well I have. Enough for both of us. I will

bait your hook, boy. That is my business."

"Thank you, sir. When shall it be?"

George knew the art of fishing with a fresh bait, and never losing sight

of the fish after he had tasted it, until he had him safe bagged.

"When shall it be? Now, now--right off to-night. Nothing like going to

sea while the tide serves."

He was a prompt man always. It was no use to say no, after he had said

yes, or, "that is my business;" so in half an hour after that, Elsie

Morgan was Elsie Wendall.

Of course more wine was drank, after which a letter was brought to him,

from his head clerk, marked, "Important--in haste." So Mrs. Morgan told

him.

"That is my business; take it up to my room. Do you think I am going to

read the stupid letters of old Precision at this time of the evening,

and my daughter just married?"

At ten o'clock next morning, after the mail had gone, he read:

"Sir:--

"We have advices by telegraph from London, just as the steamer

was leaving port, of the failure of the London insurance

office, in Which the Matilda is insured. She is now over-due,

and not yet reported. Shall I insure her? Be sure to answer by

first mail.

"JAMES PRECISION."

How the bell did ring; how he stamped, and swore, and wrote, and yet he

could not send his letter till next morning.

"Why did not old Precision insure at once? Every dollar on earth would

be swallowed up if that ship were lost."

Simply because he was Precision, and the merchant, who had directed him

for forty years, had never given him leave to act, upon his own

discretion, in an emergency like this.

"That is my business," was the unvarying answer.

Two days after, he had another letter from his precise clerk. He did not

order it up to his room, to wait till next morning, for he was in a

tearing passion when it was handed him; and he felt as though he would

have opened it if the biggest rocks in that mountainous region had been

piled upon it.

What had so disturbed the rich merchant? Those who have them not, are

apt to fancy that, riches and happiness are handmaids. What was the

matter? His son, his only son, had just approached him, taking

advantage, as Wendall had, of a propitious hour, when wine had done its

work--he drank brandy since the news in that letter, and that fired, not

soothed him--he approached him with a beautiful sweet girl upon his arm,

to ask his consent to their marriage.

Mrs. Wendall screamed and fainted--that is, in appearance.

Matilda said,

"Why, Walter! to that girl--marry that thing--a dressmaker"

Mrs. Morgan simply said, "Walter, you have disgraced yourself and the

mother that bore you. And I never wish to see you again."

Athalia trembled and quailed before the storm of angry words and

envenomed looks that surrounded her. How gladly would she have escaped.

It was too late.

"Father, your consent."

"Never! You, my only son, marry a common sewing girl, never."

"It is too late. Here is my marriage certificate."

His father opened his mouth to curse him. What for? He had married a

girl he loved--a girl, handsome, virtuous, industrious, but poor--a

seamstress.

"A letter, sir;" said a servant.

"Give it me."

He tore it open and read;

"SIR:--

"Yours of the 12th inst. came too late. News reached the city

an hour before that the Matilda was----"

He did not say lost. He looked it. He looked at his son and his poor

trembling little wife, as though he wished them both at the bottom of

the sea, with the Matilda and her cargo--all his fortune! He felt all

the envenomed bitterness that a violent natural temper can feel, when

heated and inflamed by drunkenness; for he was drunk, fashionably

drunk; but not so much so but he could feel how irretrievably ruined he

was, and that the failure to insure was occasioned by drunkenness, such

drunkenness as the highest class of society indulge in, when they take

an "extra bottle," after dinner, upon extraordinary occasions. He knew

the fault was all his own. He had said, when urged to open the letter,

an answer to which would have saved all, "that is my business."

It was a sad, sad business. That one more bottle had beggared himself,

and all that were dependant upon him. He had just married one daughter

to a man whose only qualification was "a good fellow," who could shoot,

fish, smoke, drink, drive fast horses, cheat his tailor, and the poor

widow boarding-house keeper, and, finally, take advantage of a besotted

old rich merchant, when he had drunk just to the point of

good-nature--when the indulger in strong drink feels like hugging

everybody and "all the rest of mankind,"--to get his consent for him to

marry his ugly daughter. It was a marriage of convenience, the

obligations of which he intended to keep just as many other such

obligations are kept in this city. All this ran through his mind upon

the electric telegraph of the brain. Flash after flash it went through,

and then came the heavy thunderbolt. He could have endured all the rest;

he could not endure that his son should marry a sewing girl. Why? His

father was a tailor, and he married a tailor's daughter, and he hated

everything that could remind him of his own needle-and-thread origin. He

hated her too, because she was so much more lovely than his own

daughters.

For five minutes he sat with the letter in his hand, glaring at that,

then at his wife and Matilda with a look of sorrow; then at Elsie and

her half-drunken husband, with contempt; then his eye came back with a

fixidity of hatred upon Walter and Athalia.

At length Walter ventured to break the awful silence.

"Father."

"Don't call me father again. I disown you, you poor milliner's

apprentice. Beggar! Don't speak to me."

Walter paid no heed to the order, but said mildly, "is the Matilda

lost."

"That is my business. Leave the room."

His sisters took up the cue.

"Yes, you had better go now. Go, and set up shop. You can carry home

dresses for your wife."

He came to that afterwards. Then Elsie's husband put in a word of

insult.

"I say, Walter, it strikes me, that is rather a costly topsail for a

beggar's wife. I hope she gets her bonnets in an honest way. Who pays

the milliners' bills?"

Walter raised his cane to strike the villain that could utter such a

vile insinuation upon the character of a virtuous girl, and would have

paid all his tailors' bills at one blow, but Athalia sprung upon his

arm, and held it down. His father either thought, or pretended to think,

that he raised his cane to strike him; probably not having heard the

remark of Wendall, and thinking only of his own wrongs. He seized a

bottle--a weapon that has knocked down its thousands--and sprang

forward to strike down his son. His arm was already up, a horrid oath

was struggling in his throat, his face turned black from the effects of

suffocation, he reeled, the bottle fell to the floor with a crash, and

he would have fallen down among the broken glass and spilt wine, but for

Walter, who caught him in his arms, and bore him from the room towards

his chamber. Athalia rushed out for a physician. It was too late!--Death

had already said, "That is my business."

* * * * *

While these events were transpiring in the country, others of great

import to the rich merchant's family were enacting in the city.

Creditors are not slow when they see misfortune fall upon one, whom they

were ready to bow to yesterday, to tread upon him to-day. Creditors and

their ministers,--the judges, attorneys, sheriffs,--are all ready for a

share of the pound of the broken merchant's flesh. Shylocks still live,

and Antonios still fail.