"Yes," answered his wife, brightly; "and I remember, too, that you lost your way, and pretended that you had not, and wouldn't ask, for fear I should suspect it."
The Major laughed, feebly, but with enjoyment. "I didn't want you to know that I didn't know everything—even the country roads," he answered. "For I was old enough to be your father, and you were such a little thing; I had my dignity to keep up, you see." He laughed again. "That spring was very cold, wasn't it?" he said, and he lay thinking of it for a minute or two. Then slowly his eyes closed; he had fallen asleep. They waited, but he did not waken. His sleep was peaceful, and they went back again to their watch in the outer room.
"It is two o'clock, mamma. Won't you lie down for a while? I am strong, and not at all tired; if he should waken, I will at once call you."
"I could not sleep," answered Madam Carroll, taking her former seat. "We could neither of us sleep, I fancy, while there was the least danger of the fever's returning—as the doctor said it might."
"I thought perhaps you might rest, even if you did not sleep."
"I shall never be any more rested than I am now," answered the Major's wife. After a silence of some length she spoke again; "In all this we should not forget Mr. Owen," she said, as though taking up a task which must be performed. "I feel sure that he is suffering deeply. You know what he must be thinking?"
"So long as he does not speak, what he thinks is of small consequence," said Miss Carroll.
"It may be so to you. It is not to him." She paused. "I can remember that I once liked him," she went on, in a monotonous tone. "And I can even believe that I shall like him again. But not now, not now. Now it is too near—those cruel words he spoke about my boy."
"He did not know—"
"Of course he did not; and I try to be just. He was angry, hurt, alarmed; he was hurt that I should treat him as I did—I treated him horribly—and he was alarmed about you. I have never thanked you for what you did that day, Sara—the day he came to warn us; I could not. For I knew how you loathed it—the expedient you took. You only took it because there was no other."
"You are very hard to me, mamma."
"About your feeling I am; how can I help it? But not about the deed: that was noble. In order to help me you let Mr. Owen suppose that you were engaged to a man he—he utterly despised. Well, you helped me. But you hurt him; you hurt Frederick Owen that morning about as deeply as you could." She moved to Sara's side in the darkness, took her hand with a quick grasp and held it in both her own. "And you are so proud," she whispered softly, "that you will never acknowledge that you hurt yourself too; that the sacrifice you then made in lowering yourself by your own act in his eyes was as great a one as a woman can make; for he loves you devotedly, jealously, and you—you know how much you care for him."
Without leaving time for reply, she moved back to her former place, and went on with what she had been saying, as though that sudden soft interpolated whisper had not existed. "Yes—this strange double feeling that I have about Frederick Owen makes me even feel sorry for him at times, sorry to have him suffer as I know he must be suffering, sorry to have him think what I know he must be thinking of you; and also of me. For he thinks that you had a liking for a man whom he considered unworthy to speak your name (oh, detestable arrogance!); he thinks that it was clandestine, that you dared not tell your father; and that I was protecting you in it as well as I could; all this, of course, he must believe. Death has put an end to it, and now it will never be known; this also he is thinking. But, meanwhile, he knows it. And he cannot forget it. He thinks you have in your heart the same feeling still. But I remembered—I did what I could for you by telling him that it was but a fancy of the moment, that it would pass."
"Oh!" murmured Sara, with a quick, involuntary gesture of repulsion; then she stopped.
"I was trying to pave a way out of it for you. You do not like the way, because it includes—includes the supposition that you—But one can never please you, Sara Carroll!"
She rose and began to walk swiftly to and fro across the room, her footsteps making no sound on the thick, faded, old-fashioned carpet—a relic from the days of the Sea Island Carrolls.
"What do you want me to do?" she said, abruptly, as she passed Sara for the fourth time.
"If you are alluding to Mr. Owen, I don't want you to do anything," answered Miss Carroll.
"Oh, you are proud! For the present nothing can be done. But let me tell you one thing—do not be too repellent. 'Tis good in me to warn you, to take his part, when I hate him so—hate him for what he said. Do you suppose I would have had him reading prayers over my poor dead boy after what had passed? Never in the world. No one who despised him should come near him. So I had the Baptist minister. I was a Baptist myself when I was a girl—if I ever was a girl! All this hurts you, of course; but I cannot help it. Be patient. Some day I shall forgive him. Perhaps soon." She had paused in front of Sara as she said this, for they had both been guardedly careful to speak in the lowest tones.
The girl left her place on the sofa; she rose and walked beside her stepmother as she resumed her quick, restless journey to and fro across the floor. They came and went in silence for many minutes. Then Sara put her arm round Madam Carroll, and drew her towards the sofa again.
"Rest awhile, mamma," she said, placing the cushions so that she could lie easily; "you do not know how very tired you are." And Madam Carroll for a half-hour yielded.
"We must bear with each other, Sara," she said, as she lay with her eyes closed. "For amid all our other feelings, there is one which we have in common, our love for your father. That is and always must be a tie between you and me."
"Always," answered Sara.
A little after daylight the Major woke. There had been no return of the fever; he had slept in peace while they kept the vigil near him; his illness was over. As he opened his eyes, his wife came to the bedside; she had just risen—or so it seemed, for she wore a rose-colored wrapper, and on her head a little lace cap adorned with rose-colored ribbon. The Major had not seen the cap before; he thought it very pretty.
"Trying to be old, are you, Madam Carroll?" he said; "old and matronly?"
Sara came in not long afterwards; she, too, was freshly dressed in a white wrapper.
"I have brought you your breakfast, papa," she said.
"Isn't it earlier than usual?" asked the Major, turning his dim eyes towards the window. But he could not see the light of the sunrise on the peaks.
"I am afraid, Major, that you are growing indolent," said Madam Carroll, with pretended severity, as she poured out his tea.
"Indolent?" said the Major—"indolent? Indolence is nothing to vanity. And you and Sara, in your pink and white gowns, are living images of vanity this morning, Madam Carroll."
"I AM AFRAID, MAJOR, THAT YOU ARE GROWING INDOLENT."
CHAPTER VIII.
AUTUMN at last came over the mountains; she decked them in her most sumptuous colors, and passed slowly on towards the south. The winds followed the goddess, eight of them; they came sounding their long trumpets through the defiles; they held carnival in the high green valleys; they attacked the forests and routed the lighter foliage, but could not do much against the stiff, dark ranks of the firs. They careered over all the peaks; sometimes they joined hands on Chillawassee's head, and whirled round in a great circle, laughing loudly, for half a day; and then the little people who lived on the ground said to each other that it "blew from all round the sky."
They came to Far Edgerley more than once; they blew through Edgerley Street; at night the villagers in their beds heard the long trumpets through the near gorges, and felt their houses shake. But they were accustomed to these autumn visitors; they had a theory, too, that this great sweeping of their peaks and sky was excellent for their mountain air. And upon the subject of their air there was much conceit in Far Edgerley.
When at length the winds had betaken themselves to the lowlands, with the intention of blowing across the levels of Georgia and Florida, and coming round to surprise the northerners at Indian River and St. Augustine, the quiet winter opened in the mountains they had left behind them. The Major had had no return of his October illness; he came to church on Sundays as usual, and appeared at his wife's receptions. It was noticed, although no one spoke of it, that he did not hold himself quite so erect as formerly, and that perhaps his eyesight was not quite so good; but he still remained to his village the exemplar of all that was noble and distinguished, and they admired him and talked about him as much as ever. He was their legend, their escutcheon; so long as they had him they felt distinguished themselves.
The winter amusements began about Christmastime. They consisted principally of the Sewing Society and the Musical Afternoons. To these entertainments "the gentlemen" came in the evening—F. Kenneway, Mr. Phipps, the junior warden, and the rector, when they could get him. A Whist Club had, indeed, been proposed. There was a double motive in this proposal. There were persons in the congregation who considered whist-playing a test of the best churchmanship; these were secretly desirous to see the test applied to the new rector, or rather the new rector applied to it. But the thoughtful Mrs. Greer, having foreseen this very possibility at an early date in the summer, had herself sounded the rector upon the subject, and brought back a negative upon the end of her delicate conversational line. She had asked him if he thought that the sociability engendered by card-tables at small parties could, in his opinion, counterbalance the danger which familiarity with the pasteboard squares might bring to their young men (Phipps and Kenneway); and whether he himself, at moments of leisure, and when he wished to rest from intellectual fatigue, of which, of course, he must have so much, ever whiled away the time with these same gilded symbols, not with others, but by himself.
Owen, who had not for the moment paid that attention to the eloquence of Mrs. Greer which he should have done, did not understand her. He had received an impression of cymbals. This was no surprise to him; he had found Mrs. Greer capable of the widest range of subjects.
"I mean the painted emblems, you know—cards," explained Mrs. Greer; "clubs, diamonds, and spades, Mr. Owen. Nor should we leave out hearts. I was referring, when I spoke, to solitaire. But there is also whist. Whist is, in its way, a climate by itself—a climate of geniality."
This was a phrase of Madam Carroll's. Mrs. Greer had collected a large assortment of phrases from the overflow of the Farms. These she treasured, and dealt out one by one; her conversation was richly adorned with them. She had excellent opportunities for collecting, as Madam Carroll had long been in the habit of telling her any little item which she wished to have put in circulation through the village in a certain guise. She always knew that her exact phrase would be repeated, but not as hers; it would be repeated as if it were original with the lady who spoke it. This was precisely what Madam Carroll intended. To have said herself, for instance, that the new chintz curtains of her drawing-room combined delicacy and durability, and a bower-like brightness, was too apparent; but for Mrs. Greer to say it (in every house on Edgerley Street) was perfectly proper, and accomplished the same result. The whole town remarked upon the delicacy and the durability and the bower-like brightness; and the curtains, which she had made and put up herself at small expense, took their place among the many other peculiarly admirable things possessed by the Farms. Upon the present occasion, however, Mrs. Greer gave Madam Carroll's name to the phrase she had repeated; she thought it would have more influence. "Yes, that is what our dear Madam Carroll used to call it—a climate of geniality," she said, looking at the rector with an inquiring smile.
But, ignoring the phrase of the Farms, none the less did Owen bring out his negative; with the gilded symbols he did not amuse himself, either alone or in company.
Armed, therefore, with this knowledge, Mrs. Greer was ready; she met the project of the Whist Club in its bud, and vanquished it with a Literary Society, whose first four meetings she gave herself, with a delicate little hot supper thrown in. The Whist Club could not stand against this, Miss Honoria Ashley, who was its chief supporter, offering only apples and conversation. But a large cold apple on a winter night is not calculated to rouse enthusiasm; while, as to conversation, everybody knew that hot coffee promoted it. So the Literary Society conquered, and the whist test was not, for that season at least, applied to the churchmanship of the rector.
During these winter months Owen kept himself constantly busy. It was thought that he worked too hard. He looked tired; sometimes, young and strong as he was, he looked worn. There was a good deal of motherly anxiety about this; some sisterly, too. Ferdinand Kenneway said that he felt towards him like a brother. But Owen pursued his own course, unmindful of these sympathetic feelings. He came to Madam Carroll's receptions as usual, but did not stay long: he was the last to come and the first to go. He called at the Farms, though not often; and when he went there, he did not go alone.
So the winter passed on and departed, and spring came. Then a sorrow fell upon the little mountain town. Early one soft morning in March, when the cinnamon-colored tassels were out on the trees, and the air was warm and gray, with the smell of rain in it, word came down Edgerley Street, passing from house to house, that Carroll Farms had been visited in the night: the Major, their Major, had wakened quiet and content, but like a little child; the powers of his mind had been taken from him.
Every one had loved him, and now there was real mourning. They all said to each other and to themselves that they should never look upon his like again. The poor nation had greatly retrograded since his day; even their state was not what it had been; under these circumstances it could not be expected that the world should soon produce another Scarborough Carroll. They went over all the history of his life: his generous sharing of his fortune with his half-brother; his silence under the forgetfulness of that half-brother's children; his high position and many friends in the old army; his brilliant record in the later army, their own army, vanquished, but still dear to them, the army of the South; they told again the story of his gallant ride round the enemy's forces in the Valley, of his charge up the hill at Fredericksburg, his last brave defence of the bridge on the way to Appomattox. His wounds were recalled, his shattered arm, the loss of his money, so uncomplainingly borne; they spoke of his beautiful courtesy to every one, and of his unfailing kindness to all the poor. And then, how handsome he was, how noble in bearing and expression, how polished in manner! such a devoted husband and father, so pure a patriot! Their dear old Major: they could not say enough.
The junior warden kept his room all day; he could not bear to hear it talked about. Then the next morning out he went at an early hour to see everybody he knew, and he told them all how very imprudent Carroll had always been, recklessly so, recklessly. He was up and down Edgerley Street all day, swinging his cane more than usual as he walked, thus giving a light and juvenile air to his arms and shoulders, which was perhaps somewhat contradicted by the uncertain tread of his little old feet. In the afternoon Frederick Owen went to the Farms; for the first time since the preceding October he went alone. Miss Carroll was in the drawing-room when he came in; she was receiving a visit of general inquiry and condolence from the three Miss Rendleshams. They went away after a while, and then, before he had had time to speak—as he stood there realizing that he had not been alone with her since that day, now six months in the past, when she had told him of her engagement to Dupont—he saw through the open door of the drawing-room the small figure of Madam Carroll. She had not come down to see the three Miss Rendleshams. But she did come down to see the rector. She came straight to him, with her quick, light step. "I heard that you were here, and came down. I am anxious to see you, Mr. Owen. Not to-day, but soon. I thought I would come down myself and ask you; I did not want to write a note."
"At any time you will name," answered Owen. He had risen as she entered. Miss Carroll had seemed to him unchanged, save that her eyes showed that she had been crying; but the Major's wife, he said to himself, with almost awe-struck astonishment—the Major's wife, had he met her elsewhere, he should hardly have known. Her veil of golden hair, no longer curled, was put plainly back, and fastened in a close knot behind; her eyes, the blue eyes he had always thought so pretty, looked tired and sunken and dim, with crows'-feet at their corners; all her lovely bloom was gone, and the whole of her little faded face was a net-work of minute wrinkles. She was still small and slender, and she still had her pretty features; but this was an old woman who was talking to him, and Madam Carroll had been so young.
"It will not be for some days yet, I think," she was saying. "I shall wait until the doctor has made up his mind. He wants more time, though I want none; when he does make it up, it will be as mine is now. But I prefer to wait until he sees clearly; will you ask him from day to day what he thinks, and, when he has decided, then will you come?"
"Yes," replied Owen. "But do you mean that the Major—"
"I mean that the Major is in no immediate danger; that he will continue about the same. He will not grow better, but neither will he grow much worse. He may be brighter at times, but he will not regain his memory; that is gone. But we shall not lose him, Mr. Owen, that is our great happiness. We shall not lose him, Sara and I, as we had at first feared."
Two tears rolled down her cheeks as she spoke. "It is because I am so thankful," she said, wiping them away. Her long lace-bordered sleeves had been turned back, and Owen was struck with the old, withered look of her small wrists and hands.
"I could not have borne it to lose him now," she went on, as if explaining. "You may think that existence such as his will be is no blessing, nothing to be desired for him or for me. But he is not suffering, he is even happy as a child is happy, and he knows me. He would be content himself to wait a little, if he could know how much it was to me, how much to have him with me, so that I can devote myself to him, devote myself entirely."
"You have always done that, Madam Carroll," said Owen, touched by her emotion.
"You will come, then—on whatever day the doctor makes up his mind," she said, controlling herself, and returning to her subject.
Here Miss Carroll spoke. "Isn't it better not to make engagements for the present, mamma?" she said, warningly. "You will overtax your strength."
"It is overtaxed at this moment far less than it has been for many a long month," answered Madam Carroll, as it seemed to Owen, strangely. She passed her hand over her forehead, and then, as if putting herself aside in order to consider her companions for a moment, she looked first at Sara, then turned and looked at Owen. "Do not stay any longer now," she said to him, gently, in an advising tone. He obeyed her, and went away.
On the tenth day after this the doctor, whose conclusions, if slowly made, were sure, announced his decision: it tallied exactly with that of Madam Carroll. The Major was in no present danger; his physical health was fairly good; his condition would not change much, and he might linger on in this state for several years. And then the Far Edgerley people, knowing that no more pain would come to him, and that he was tranquil and even happy, that he recognized his wife, and that she gave to him the most beautiful and tender devotion—then these Far Edgerley people were glad and thankful to have him with them still; not wholly gone, though lying unseen in his peaceful room, which faced the west, so that the sunset could shine every day upon the quiet sunset of his life. And they thought, some of them, that thanksgiving prayers should be offered for this in the church. And they all prayed for him at home, each family in its own way.
On the afternoon of the day when the doctor had made up his mind, Frederick Owen went to the Farms. Madam Carroll came down to see him; she took him to the library, now unused, and when they had entered, she closed the door. "Will you sit here beside me?" she said, indicating a sofa opposite the window. Again he was struck by the great—as it seemed to him, the marvellous—change in her. She looked even older than before; her hair was put back in the same plain way; there was the same absence of color, the same tired look in her eyes, the same fine net-work of wrinkles over all her small face; but added to these there was now a settled sadness of expression which he felt would never pass away. He missed, too, all the changing inflections and gestures, the pretty little manner and attitudes, and even the pronunciation, which he had supposed to belong inseparably to her, which he had thought entirely her own. He missed likewise, though unconsciously, the prettiness of the bright little gowns she had always worn; she was dressed now in black, without color or ornament.
She seemed to divine his thoughts. "The Major can no longer see me," she said, quietly; "that is, with any distinctness. It is no longer anything to him—what I wear."
He had taken the seat she had offered; she sat beside him, with her hands folded, her eyes on the opposite wall. "I have a story to tell you," she said. "But I can make no prefaces; I cannot speak of feelings. I hope for your interest, Mr. Owen, even for your sympathy; but if I get them it will be accomplished by a narrative of facts alone, and not by any pathos in the words themselves. I got beyond pathos long ago. My name was Marion More. My father was a missionary in the Southwest—the exact localities I need not give. At sixteen I married. My father died within the year; my mother had died long before. My first child was a son, born when I was seventeen; I called him Julian. Later there came to me a daughter, my little Cecilia. When she was still a baby, and Julian was seven, my husband, in a brawl at a town some miles from our house, killed a man who was well known and liked in the neighborhood; they had both fired, and the other man was the better shot, but upon this occasion his ball happened to miss, and my husband's did not. I was sitting at home, sewing; the baby was in the cradle at my feet, and Julian was playing with his little top on the floor. My husband rode rapidly into the yard on his fast black horse, Tom, sprang down, came into the house, and went into the inner room. He soon came back and went out. He called Julian. The child ran into the yard; then hurried back to get the little overcoat I had made for him. 'Where are you going?' I said. 'To ride with papa,' he answered, and, eager as he was to go, he did not forget to come and kiss me good-by. Then he ran out, and I heard them start; I heard Tom's hoofs on the hard road farther and farther away; then all was still. But less than half an hour afterwards there was noise enough; the garden was full of armed men. The whole country-side were out after him. They hunted him for three days. But he knew the woods and swamps better than they did, and they could not find him. They knew that he would in time make for the river, and they kept a watch along shore. He reached it on the fourth day, at a lonely point; he turned Tom loose, took a skiff which he knew was there, and started out with my little boy upon the swollen tide—for the river was high. They were soon discovered by the watch on shore. Shots were fired at them. But the skiff was out in the centre of the stream, which was very wide just there, and the shots missed. They followed the skiff along shore. They knew what he did not—that the river narrowed below the bend, and that there were rapids there. He reached the bend, and saw that he was lost; the current carried the boat down towards the narrows; and they began to shoot again; one shot struck Julian. Then his father took him in his arms and jumped overboard with him. That, they knew, was death. They saw the dark bodies whirled round and round, and amused themselves by shooting at them once or twice; they saw them sucked under. Then, farther away, they saw them again swept along like logs, inert, dead; on and on; two black dots; out of sight. Then they rode back, that hunting party; and their wives came and told me, as mercifully as they could, that my husband and my little boy were drowned. I could not bury my dead; on the rapid current of the river they were already miles away; in that country no one cared for the dead. They cared but little for the living. I took my baby and went away; I left that horrible land. I came eastward. I had no money, or very little; my husband had taken what—what he needed for his flight, and there was nothing left. I tried to teach little day schools for children. I gave music lessons. I did my best. But I was not strong; my little girl, too, was very delicate: there was something the matter with her spine. When this life of ours—hers and mine—had lasted ten years (for I am much older than you have supposed), I met Major Carroll. He was so good as to love me; he was so good as to marry me; he took as his own my poor little girl, and gave her all the comforts and luxuries she needed—things I could not give. She died soon afterwards, in spite of all. But in our new home she had had happy days, and when the end came she did not suffer: she went back to God in sleep. On the 6th of last July I was in the garden here, gathering some roses; it was below the slope of the knoll, out of sight from the house. The gate opened, and a young man came in. He came across to me. He introduced himself as a stranger in Far Edgerley, who had admired our flowers. He spoke several sentences while I stood looking at him. I was frightened; I knew not why. At last, recovering myself, I turned to walk towards the house. Then it was that he put his hand on my arm, and said: 'Don't you know me, mother? I am Julian, the little boy you thought dead.' He was thirty-one years old, and I had lost him before he was eight. What had startled me was his likeness to his father. They had escaped, after all. His father had feigned death; he had let himself be swept along, keeping hold of the child, who was unconscious. It was a desperate expedient. But he was desperate. He was an expert swimmer, and he succeeded, though barely, with life just fluttering within them. They lay hid in a canebrake for some days, and then, after much difficulty, they made their way out of the country. They went to Mexico. Then they went to the West India Islands. They lived in Martinique, and they took the name of Dupont. My husband did not try to come back; a reward had been offered for him before he fled; there was a price on his head. He knew that I supposed him dead, and he was quite willing to be dead—to me. He was tired of me. I was only a burden to him. I was always talking about little things. My son thought that we were dead—his little sister and I; his father had told him so. But after his father's death he found among his papers some memoranda which made him think that perhaps we were not, that perhaps he could even find us. He did not try immediately; it was but a chance, and he was interested in other things. But later he did try; that is, in his way; he was never sharp and energetic—as you are. He found me; but his little sister had gone to heaven. My son had had only the education of the islands, and he was, besides, a musician. The temperament of musicians is peculiar. You will allow me to say that I think you do not understand it. He wished to go back to the islands; he had been in the United States for a year, and he did not like the life or climate. I helped him as much as I could. It was not much; but he started. Then he had that illness in New York, and came back. It was most important that he should start again, and soon—before the return of winter. I had nothing to give him, and so I went to my daughter—I mean my step-daughter, Sara. She has, you know, a small income of her own, left her by her uncle. You are asking yourself why I did not go to the Major; why there should have been any secret about it from the first. It was because I had not told him at the time of our marriage, or at any time, that I had ever had a son. He thought when he married me that Cecilia was my only child; he thought me twenty-three, when I was in reality over thirty-five. It would have been a great shock and pain to him to know that I had deceived him—a shock which, in his state of health at that time, he could not have borne. When Sara knew, she helped me; she helped me nobly. But the time for the semi-annual payment of her income was not until the 12th of October, and by the terms of her uncle's will she could not anticipate it; we were therefore obliged to wait. Before the 12th of October my son was taken ill, as I had feared. And the rest—you know. The time when I could tell you this has now come. It has come because nothing can again disturb the Major's peace. He is near us in touch, and close to our love, but earth's sorrows and pains can trouble him no more. I can therefore tell you, and I do it for two reasons. One is that it will explain to you the course we took; it will explain to you what Sara said that afternoon, for I think that it has grieved you—what Sara said. It was an expedient that she thought of to divert your attention, to stop further action on your part. We knew—from your having tried to see the Major, and see him alone—that you had learned something; how much, we could not tell. And when you came again the next day, and spoke as you did, first to me, and then to her, and I was frightened and lost my courage, fearing lest you should speak to others also; then Sara took the only expedient she could think of to silence you, to stop you effectually, and thus secure her father's peace. But it was only an expedient, Mr. Owen. It was never true." She paused for the first time in the utterance of her brief sentences, turned her head, and looked at him with her faded, tired eyes.
Owen's own eyes were wet. "Even before that," he said, "and I do not deny how important it is to me—more important than anything else in the world—even before that, Madam Carroll, I beg you to say that you forgive me, that you forgive what I did and said. I did not know—how could I?—and I was greatly troubled."
"I think I can say that I have forgiven you," answered Madam Carroll. "I did not at first; I did not for a long time. It is all over now; and of course you did not know. But you never understood my son—you could not; and therefore—if you will be so good—I should prefer that you should not speak to me of him again; it is much the easiest way for us both." She turned her eyes back to the wall. "About Sara," she continued, without pause, "it was a pity. It has been a long time for you to wait—with that—that mistaken belief on your mind. But, while the Major was still with us in his consciousness and his memory, I could not tell to you, a stranger, what I was not able to tell him."
"You were afraid to trust me!" said Owen, a pained expression coming into his face.
"Yes," answered Madam Carroll, simply.
"You did not know then that I felt as far as possible from being a stranger? That I wished—that I have tried—"
"That is later; I was coming to that. Yes—since I have known that you cared so much for her (though I knew it long ago!)—since you have spoken, rather, I have felt that I wished to tell you, that I would gladly tell you, as soon as I could. The time has come, and it came earlier than I expected, though I knew it could not be long delayed. I have taken the earliest hour."
"Then she—then Miss Carroll told you that I—that I had spoken?" said Owen.
"She told me because I asked her, pressed her. I knew that you had been here—a week ago, wasn't it?—I had caught a glimpse of your face as you left the house. And so I asked her. She is very reticent, very proud; she would never have told me, in spite of my asking, if her wish to show me that I had been mistaken in something I had said to her long before had not been stronger even than her reserve."
"What was it that you were mistaken in?" said Owen, quickly.
"I was not mistaken. But she wished to prove to me that I was. I had told her in October that she cared for you, and that she had made the greatest sacrifice a woman could make in voluntarily lowering herself in your eyes by allowing you to suppose—to suppose what you did."
"You were mistaken, after all, Madam Carroll," said Owen, sadly. "She cares nothing for me."
"Men are dull," answered the mistress of the Farms, wearily. "They have to have everything explained to them. Don't you see that it was inevitable that she should refuse you? As things stood—as you let them stand—she could not stoop to any other course. She knew that you believed that she had cared for—for Louis Dupont" (Madam Carroll's face had here a strange, set sternness, but her soft voice went on unchanged), "and she knew your opinion of him. She knew, moreover, that you believed it clandestine, that she had not dared to tell her father. For you to come, then, at this late day, believing all this, and tell her that you loved her—that seemed to her an insult. Your tone was, I presume (if not your words), that you loved her in spite of all."
"Yes," Owen answered. "For that was my feeling. I did love her in spite of all. I had fought against it. I had thought—I don't know what. But it was over; whatever it had been it was ended forever, and my love had conquered. I knew that very well!"
"And you told her so, I suppose—'I love you in spite of all'—when you should have said 'I love you; and it never existed.'"
"But had she not told me with her own lips that it did exist, that she was engaged to him?"
"You should not have believed her own lips; you should have risen above that. You should have told her to her face that you did not believe, and never would believe, anything that was, or even seemed to be, against her. I see you know very little about women. You will have to learn. I am taking all this pains for you because I want her to be happy. Her nature is a very noble one, in spite of an overweight of pride. She could not explain to you, even at that time, without betraying me, and that she would never do. But I doubt whether she would have explained in any case; it would have been doing too much for you."
"All she did was done for her father," said Owen; "and it was the same with you, Madam Carroll. Seldom has man been so loved. My place with her will be but a second one."
"That should content you."
"Ah, you do not like me, though you try to help me," cried the young man. "But give me time, Madam Carroll; give me time."
"To make me like you? Take as much as you please. But do not take it with Sara."
"I shall take five minutes," Owen answered. Then he lifted her hand to his lips. "Forgive me for thinking of my own happiness," he said, with the gentlest respect.
"I like you to think of it; it gives me pleasure. And now I must come to my second reason for telling you. You remember I said that there were two. This is something which even Sara does not know—I would not give her any of that burden; she could not help me, and she had enough to bear. She could not help me; but now you can. It is something I want you to do for me. It could not be done before, it could not be done until the Major became as he is at present. No one now living knows; still, as you are to be one of us, I should like to have you do it for me."
CHAPTER IX.
ON Easter Sunday morning Far Edgerley people woke to find their village robed in blossoms; in one night the fruit trees had burst into bloom, so that all the knolls and Edgerley Street itself stood in bridal array, and walking to church was like taking part in a beautiful procession.
Nearly a month had passed since the Major's attack; but all his old friends in the congregation of St. John's missed him more than ever on this Easter morning. Sara and Scar were in the Carroll pew at the head of the aisle; but it looked very empty, nevertheless. During this month there had not been much change in the Major, save that for two weeks after the doctor's decision he had not been so well; restlessness had troubled him. But for the preceding few days he had been much better, and every one was cheered by this; every one was interested in hearing that he had talked quite at length with his wife on simple local subjects, that he enjoyed little things, and thought about them. He lived entirely in the present, the present of the passing moment; everything in the past he had forgotten, and he speedily forgot the moment itself as soon as it was gone. What his wife said to him he understood, and he always knew when she was near, though his blind eyes could not see her; he felt for a fold of her dress or the ruffle of her sleeve, and held it; the sense of touch had taken the place of the vanished sight. He listened for Scar's voice too, and seemed to like to have him in the room, to hold the child's hand in his. In the same way he always smiled and was pleased when Sara spoke to him.
When the morning service was over, every one waited to ask how the Major was on this lovely Easter Sunday. Lately they had come to like his daughter far better than they had liked her at first; they said she talked more, that she was not so cold. Certainly there was nothing cold in her face, but a beautiful sweetness, as she rose from her knees and, taking Scar's hand, turned to go down the aisle. She answered their questions on the steps and in the church-yard. For on Easter morning Far Edgerley people always brought many flowers to church; then, after service, they took them out and laid them upon all the graves, so that, as Scar once said, "they could have their Easter Sunday too." Every mound had its blossoms to-day, and there were many upon the grave of the young stranger, Louis Dupont; this was because there was no one, they said, to remember him. So they all remembered him.
A little before sunset Frederick Owen, having officiated at the Easter service of the Sunday-school and at one of his mission stations, was on his way to Carroll Farms. As he came up Carroll Lane and crossed the little bridge over the brook, he saw that there was more bloom here than anywhere else in all the blooming town. For the whole orchard was out behind the house, and all the flowering almonds in front of it; the old stone walls rose close pressed in blossoms. Sara opened the door before he had time to knock. "I was watching for you," she said. "Judith Inches and Caleb have gone up the mountain to see their mother, as they always do on Easter afternoon, and they have taken Scar."
Owen paused in the hall to greet her; he was very proud of this proud, reserved girl whose love he had won.
"Do not wait, Frederick. Mamma has such a pleadingly sorrowful look to-day that I want to have it over."
"Only a moment," said Owen. He was standing with his arm round her, holding her close. "Do you remember that afternoon when I spoke to you of your mother, of the sisterly kindness she had shown to that poor woman who had lost her crippled boy? And do you remember that you said that no one save those who were in the house with her all the time could comprehend the one hundredth part of her tenderness, her constant thought for others? Your answer put me in a glow of pleasure, I did not then comprehend why. I asked myself as I walked home if I cared so much to hear Madam Carroll praised. I know now what I cared for—it was because you had said it. For I had been afraid, unconsciously to myself, perhaps, that you did not fully appreciate her, appreciate her as she seemed to me."
"And I had not until then. I shall always reproach myself—"
"You need not; you have made up for it a hundredfold," answered Owen. Then, coming back to himself, with love's unfailing egotism—"I wonder if you realize all the suffering I went through?" he continued. "You made me wait in my pain so long, so long!"
"We suffer more than you do, always," answered, after a moment, the woman he held in his arms. And then into her beautiful eyes, raised to meet his, there came such a world of feeling, some of it beyond his ken, that touched, stirred, feeling himself unworthy, yet exultant in his happiness, the man who loved her rested his lips on hers without attempting further reply.
A moment later he went up the stairs, and Sara turned the key of the front door. The Major, his wife and daughter, and the clergyman were now alone in the flower-encircled house. All its windows were open, and the flowers fairly seemed to be coming in, so near were they to the casements; outside the Major's windows two great apple-trees, a mass of bloom, stretched out their long, flowering arms until they touched the sills.
The sun, now low down, was sinking towards Lonely mountain; he sent horizontal rays full into the mass of apple-blossoms, but could not penetrate them save as a faintly pink radiance, which fell upon the figure of Madam Carroll as she stood beside the bed. She wore one of her white dresses, but her face looked worn and old as the radiance brought out all its lines, and showed the many silver threads in her faded hair. The Major was sitting up in bed; he had on a new dressing-gown, and was propped with cushions.
"Has the clergyman come?" he said. He spoke indistinctly, but his wife could always understand him.
"Yes, he is here, Scarborough," she answered, bending over him.
"He is welcome. Let him be seated," said the Major, in his old ceremonial manner. Then he felt for his wife's arm, and pulled her sleeve. "Am I dressed?" he asked, anxiously. "Did you see to it? Is my hair smooth?" He supposed himself to be speaking in a whisper.
"Yes, Major, you have on your new dressing-gown, and it is of a beautiful color, and your hair is quite smooth."
"I don't feel sure about the hair," said the Major, still, as he supposed, confidentially. "I don't remember that I brushed it."
Madam Carroll took a brush from the table and gently smoothed the thin white locks.
"That is better," he murmured. "And my clean white silk handkerchief?"
"It is by your side, close to your hand."
He thought for a moment. "I ought to have a flower for my button-hole, oughtn't I?" he added, looking about the room with his darkened eyes as if to find one.
Sara went to the window and broke off a spray of apple-blossoms from the tree outside. His wife gave it to him, and he tried to put it into the button-hole of his dressing-gown; she did it for him, and then he was content. "I am ready now," he said, folding his hands.
Frederick Owen came forward; he wore his white robes of office. "Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God to join together this man and this woman in holy matrimony," he read, standing close to the Major, so that he could hear.
The Major listened with serenity; and of his own accord, when the time came, he answered, "I will."
When the longer answer was reached, Owen repeated it first, then Madam Carroll repeated it to the Major, as he could hear her voice more easily. "I, Scarborough, take thee, Marion, to my wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto I plight thee my troth," said the Major, in his indistinct tones, following her word by word, and holding the hand she had placed in his.
Then the wife drew off her own wedding-ring, and guided his feeble fingers to put it back in its place again. "With this ring I thee wed," said the Major, repeating after her in a voice that was growing tired.
"Let us pray," said Owen. They knelt, and the Major bowed his head, and put his hand over his eyes. "Our Father, who art in heaven," prayed Owen, "hallowed be thy name."
As he came to the benediction, the sun's last rays, sent from the golden line of Lonely Mountain, shot triumphantly under the apple-blossoms and entered the room; they shone on Madam Carroll's kneeling figure, and lighted up the old Major's silver hair—"that in the world to come, ye may have life everlasting. Amen."
There was a silence. Then the Major took down his hand and tried to look from one to the other as they stood round his bed. His wife kissed him. And then Sara, her eyes full of tears, came and kissed him also.
"Where is the clergyman?" said the Major to his wife, again supposing himself to be speaking apart. "I ought to shake hands with him, you know."
Owen came forward, and the Major bowed and put out his hand. Then he seemed to be forgetting all that had occurred. "I am very tired, Marion," he said, not complainingly, but as if surprised. "I don't know what is the reason, but I am very tired." They took out the cushions, and he put his head down upon the pillow. In a few minutes he was asleep.
At late twilight Scar came back in the wagon with Judith Inches and Caleb. His mother was waiting for him on the piazza; she took him in her arms and kissed him several times. "Why, mamma, you are crying!" said the boy, surprised. "Are you sorry about anything, mamma?"
"Yes, Scar. But it is over now. Come up-stairs."
The Major was awake; he looked very tranquil. Sara was sitting beside him. Scar went up to the bedside. "It is Scar," said Madam Carroll. "Don't you remember him, Major? Little Scar?"
"Certainly," said the Major. "Of course I remember him; a little child."
She took his hand and put it on the boy's head. The Major stroked the fair hair gently. "Little Scar," he murmured softly to himself. "Yes, certainly I remember; little Scar."
THE END.
ANNE.
A Novel.
BY CONSTANCE FENIMORE WOOLSON.
ILLUSTRATED BY REINHART.
16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
EXTRACTS FROM NOTICES OF "ANNE."
It proves the author's right to stand without question at the head of American women novelists.—N.Y. Tribune.
The appearance of "Anne" may be regarded as a fact worth special notice, for Miss Woolson adds to her observation of scenes and localities an unusual insight into the human heart. Sometimes one is ready to say that a fragment, and not an inferior fragment, of the mantle of George Eliot is resting on her capable shoulders.—Century, N.Y.
The scenery is fine, the characterization excellent, and the purpose true. * * * It has fine touches. * * * It has admirable sketches from nature. * * * The book has humor, also, and plenty of it.* * * Anne is full of power, and will not soon be forgotten.—Literary World, Boston.
A very vigorous story. * * * Anne is very well drawn, and is an attractive study.—Zion's Herald, Boston.
A rich contribution to American fiction.—Christian Intelligencer, N.Y.
It is one of the most remarkable combinations of feminine delicacy and acuteness with masculine strength and breadth furnished by a lady novelist since "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was given to the public. * * * Of the heroine we can only say she is wholly admirable—a perfect woman. The plot is unique, of increasing interest, presenting many varied and novel scenes, and alternating artistically between the lighter and deeper emotions. The author exerts her dramatic powers to the utmost toward the close, and the result is something rarely paralleled in modern fiction.—Pittsburgh Christian Advocate.
Its wealth of plot, its rare bits of humor, its well-marked characterization, and its many fine pieces of description of natural scenery.—San Francisco Chronicle.
Its characters are marvels. They are not portraits nor statues, but living persons among and of us. Anne is a type, first of girlhood, then womanhood, of wondrous beauty—an imperishable flower of that wild, almost uncivilized, rugged region whence alone she could have sprung.—Cleveland Leader.
A strong, fresh, vigorous story, American in scene, people, and tone. * * * Few novels contain more striking incidents.—Louisville Courier-Journal.
One of the cleverest of recent American novels.—N. Y. World.
The publication of a book like Miss Woolson's "Anne" is really a literary event. * * * The plot is carefully studied, and is worked out with an honest patience and a conscientious faithfulness in details which merit the name of genius.—Dial, Chicago.
Clearly a work of genius.—Boston Traveller.
A book which has excited more interest and expectation during its appearance in serial form than any American novel published for years. * * * "Anne" is a work of real power; its characters are painted with a master hand; its literary style calls for the warmest praise; and the story has pre-eminently that sympathetic quality which is the chief charm of what may be called the novel of domestic life.—Saturday Evening Gazette, Boston.
"Anne" has produced a very marked impression—more so, indeed, than any other recent work of fiction. * * * It certainly is a delightful and refreshing novel.—Albany Evening Journal.
A delightful novel of American life.—Portland Transcript.
A charming domestic story, interesting in plot and incident, and fresh in the telling.—St. Louis Republican.
It is one of the strongest and most perfectly finished American novels ever written.—New England Farmer, Boston.
To take up this volume is to hold it until every page has been read. The interest is kept up without intermission from beginning to end, for new complications and developments arise so constantly that the reader is kept on the qui vive.—Pittsburgh Telegraph.
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
=>Sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States, on receipt of the price.
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| Lord Kilgobbin.Illustrated. | 50 | |
| Luttrell of Arran | 60 | |
| Maurice Tiernay | 50 | |
| One of Them | 50 | |
| Roland Cashel.Illustrated. | 75 | |
| Sir Brook Fosbrooke | 50 | |
| Sir Jasper Carew | 50 | |
| That Boy of Norcott's.Illustrated. | 25 | |
| The Bramleighs of Bishop's Folly | 50 | |
| The Daltons | 75 | |
| The Dodd Family Abroad | 60 | |
| The Fortunes of Glencore | 50 | |
| The Martins of Cro' Martin | 60 | |
| Tony Butler | 60 | |
| McCARTHY'S Comet of a Season | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Donna Quixote | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| My Enemy's Daughter.Illustrated. | 50 | |
| The Commander's Statue | 32mo, Paper 15 | |
| The Waterdale Neighbors | 35 | |
| MACDONALD'S Alec Forbes | 50 | |
| Annals of a Quiet Neighborhood | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Guild Court | 40 | |
| Warlock o' Glenwarlock | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Weighed and Wanting | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| MULOCK'S (Miss) A Brave Lady. Illustrated | 60 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| A French Country Family. Translated.Illustrated. 12mo 1 50 | ||
| Agatha's Husband | 35 | |
| Illustrated. 12mo 1 25 | ||
| A Hero, &c. | 12mo 1 25 | |
| A Life for a Life | 40 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| A Noble Life | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Avillion, and Other Tales | 60 | |
| Christian's Mistake | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Hannah.Illustrated. | 35 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| Head of the Family | 50 | |
| Illustrated. 12mo 1 25 | ||
| His Little Mother | 12mo 1 25 | |
| 4to, Paper 10 | ||
| John Halifax, Gentleman | 50 | |
| Illustrated. 12mo 1 25 | ||
| 4to, Paper 15 | ||
| Mistress and Maid | 30 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| Motherless. Translated. Illustrated | 12mo 1 50 | |
| My Mother and I. Illustrated | 40 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| Nothing New | 30 | |
| Ogilvies | 35 | |
| Illustrated. 12mo 1 25 | ||
| Olive | 35 | |
| Illustrated. 12mo 1 25 | ||
| The Laurel Bush. Illustrated | 25 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| The Woman's Kingdom. Illustrated | 60 | |
| 12mo 1 25 | ||
| Two Marriages | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Unkind Word, and Other Stories | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Young Mrs. Jardine | 12mo 1 25 | |
| Young Mrs. Jardine | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| NORRIS'S Heaps of Money | 15 | |
| OLIPHANT'S (Mrs.) Agnes | 50 | |
| A Son of the Soil | 50 | |
| Athelings | 50 | |
| Brownlows | 50 | |
| Carità | 50 | |
| Chronicles of Carlingford | 60 | |
| Days of My Life | 12mo 1 50 | |
| For Love and Life | 50 | |
| Harry Joscelyn | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| He That Will Not when He May | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Innocent. Illustrated | 50 | |
| It was a Lover and His Lass | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| John: a Love Story | 25 | |
| Katie Stewart | 20 | |
| Lady Jane | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| Lucy Crofton | 12mo 1 50 | |
| Madonna Mary | 50 | |
| Miss Marjoribanks | 50 | |
| Mrs. Arthur | 40 | |
| Ombra | 50 | |
| Phœbe, Junior | 35 | |
| Squire Arden | 50 | |
| The Curate in Charge | 20 | |
| The Fugitives | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| The Greatest Heiress in England | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| The House on the Moor | 12mo 1 50 | |
| The Laird of Norlaw | 12mo 1 50 | |
| The Last of the Mortimers | 12mo 1 50 | |
| The Minister's Wife | 50 | |
| The Perpetual Curate | 50 | |
| The Primrose Path | 50 | |
| The Quiet Heart | 20 | |
| The Story of Valentine and his Brother | 50 | |
| Within the Precincts | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Young Musgrave | 40 | |
| PATRICK'S (Mary) Christine Brownlee's Ordeal | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Marjorie Bruce's Lovers | 25 | |
| Mr. Leslie of Underwood | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| PAYN'S (James) A Beggar on Horseback | 35 | |
| A Confidential Agent | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| A Grape from a Thorn | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| A Woman's Vengeance | 35 | |
| At Her Mercy | 30 | |
| Bred in the Bone | 40 | |
| By Proxy | 35 | |
| Carlyon's Year | 25 | |
| Cecil's Tryst | 30 | |
| For Cash Only | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Found Dead | 25 | |
| From Exile | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Gwendoline's Harvest | 25 | |
| Halves | 30 | |
| High Spirits | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Kit. Illustrated | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Less Black than We're Painted | 35 | |
| Murphy's Master | 20 | |
| One of the Family | 25 | |
| The Best of Husbands | 25 | |
| Under One Roof | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Walter's Word | 50 | |
| What He Cost Her | 40 | |
| Won—Not Wooed | 35 | |
| READE'S Novels: Household Edition. Ill'd | 12mo, per vol. 1 00 | |
| A Simpleton and the Wandering | ||
| Heir. | ||
| A Terrible Temptation. | ||
| A Woman-Hater. | ||
| Foul Play. | ||
| Griffith Gaunt. | ||
| Hard Cash. | ||
| It is Never Too Late to Mend. | ||
| Love me Little, Love me Long. | ||
| Peg Woffington, Christie Johnstone, &c. | ||
| Put Yourself in His Place. | ||
| The Cloister and the Hearth. | ||
| White Lies. | ||
| READE'S (Charles) A Hero and a Martyr | 15 | |
| A Simpleton | 35 | |
| A Terrible Temptation. Illustrated | 40 | |
| A Woman-Hater. Illustrated | 60 | |
| Foul Play | 35 | |
| Griffith Gaunt. Illustrated | 40 | |
| Hard Cash. Illustrated | 50 | |
| It is Never Too Late to Mend | 50 | |
| Love Me Little, Love Me Long | 35 | |
| Multum in Parvo | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Peg Woffington, &c. | 50 | |
| Put Yourself in His Place. Illustrated | 50 | |
| The Cloister and the Hearth | 50 | |
| The Jilt | 32mo, Paper 20 | |
| The Wandering Heir. Illustrated | 25 | |
| White Lies | 40 | |
| RICE & BESANT'S All Sorts and Conditions of Men | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| By Celia's Arbor. Illustrated | 8vo, Paper 50 | |
| Shepherds All and Maidens Fair | 32mo, Paper 25 | |
| "So they were Married!" Illustrated | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Sweet Nelly, My Heart's Delight | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| The Captains' Room | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| The Chaplain of the Fleet | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| The Golden Butterfly | 40 | |
| 'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay | 32mo, Paper 20 | |
| When the Ship Comes Home | 32mo, Paper 25 | |
| ROBINSON'S (F. W.) A Bridge of Glass | 30 | |
| A Girl's Romance, and Other Stories | 30 | |
| As Long as She Lived | 50 | |
| Carry's Confession | 50 | |
| Christie's Faith | 12mo 1 75 | |
| Coward Conscience | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| For Her Sake. Illustrated | 60 | |
| Her Face was Her Fortune | 40 | |
| Little Kate Kirby. Illustrated | 50 | |
| Mattie: a Stray | 40 | |
| No Man's Friend | 50 | |
| Othello the Second | 32mo, Paper 20 | |
| Poor Humanity | 50 | |
| Poor Zeph | 32mo, Paper 20 | |
| Romance on Four Wheels | 15 | |
| Second-Cousin Sarah. Illustrated | 50 | |
| Stern Necessity | 40 | |
| The Barmaid at Battleton | 32mo, Paper 15 | |
| The Black Speck | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| The Hands of Justice | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| The Romance of a Back Street | 32mo, Paper 15 | |
| True to Herself | 50 | |
| RUSSELL'S (W. Clarke) Auld Lang Syne | 4to, Paper 10 | |
| A Sailor's Sweetheart | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| A Sea Queen | 16mo, Cloth 1 00 | |
| 4to, Paper | ||
| An Ocean Free Lance | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| My Watch Below | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| The "Lady Maud:" Schooner Yacht. Ill'd | 4to, Paper 20 | |
| Wreck of the "Grosvenor | 30 | |
| 4to, Paper 15 | ||
| SHERWOOD'S (Mrs. John) A Transplanted Rose | 12mo, Cloth 1 00 | |
| TABOR'S (Eliza) Eglantine | 40 | |
| Hope Meredith | 35 | |
| Jeanie's Quiet Life | 30 | |
| Little Miss Primrose | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Meta's Faith | 35 | |
| St. Olave's | 40 | |
| The Blue Ribbon | 40 | |
| The Last of Her Line | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| THACKERAY'S (Miss) Bluebeard's Keys | 35 | |
| Da Capo | 32mo, Paper 20 | |
| Miscellaneous Works | 90 | |
| Miss Angel.Illustrated. | 50 | |
| Miss Williamson's Divagations | 4to, Paper 15 | |
| Old Kensington. Illustrated | 60 | |
| Village on the Cliff. Illustrated | 25 | |
| THACKERAY'S (W. M.) Denis Duval. Illustrated | 25 | |
| Henry Esmond, and Lovel the Widower. 12 Illustrations | 60 | |
| Henry Esmond | 50 | |
| 4to, Paper 15 | ||
| Lovel the Widower | 20 | |
| Pendennis. 179 Illustrations | 75 | |
| The Adventures of Philip. 64 Illustrations | 60 | |
| The Great Hoggarty Diamond | 20 | |
| The Newcomes. 162 Illustrations | 90 | |
| The Virginians. 150 Illustrations | 90 | |
| Vanity Fair. 32 Illustrations | 80 | |
| THACKERAY'S Works: Household Edition | 12mo, per vol. 1 25 | |
| Novels: Vanity Fair.—Pendennis.—The Newcomes.—The Virginians.—Philip.—Esmond, and Lovel the Widower. 6 vols. Ill'd. Miscellaneous: Barry Lyndon, Hoggarty Diamond, &c.—Paris and Irish Sketch-Books, &c.—Book of Snobs, Sketches, &c.—Four Georges, English Humorists, Roundabout Papers, &c.—Catharine, &c. 5 vols. Ill'd. | ||
| Thistle Edition: 48 Vols., Green Cloth, with 2000 Illustrations, $1 00 per vol.; Half Morocco, Gilt Tops, $1 50 per vol.; Half Morocco, Extra, $2 25 per vol. | ||
| Holyrood Edition: 48 Vols., Brown Cloth, with 2000 Illustrations, 75 cents per vol.; Half Morocco, Gilt Tops, $1 50 per vol.; Half Morocco, Extra, $2 25 per vol. | ||
| Popular Edition: 24 Vols. (two vols. in one), Green Cloth, with 2000 Illustrations, $1 25 per vol.; Half Morocco, $2 25 per vol.; Half Morocco, Extra, $3 00 per vol. | ||
| Waverley; Guy Mannering; The Antiquary; Rob Roy; Old Mortality; The Heart of Mid-Lothian; A Legend of Montrose; The Bride of Lammermoor; The Black Dwarf; Ivanhoe; The Monastery; The Abbot; Kenilworth; The Pirate; The Fortunes of Nigel; Peveril of the Peak; Quentin Durward; St. Ronan's Well; Redgauntlet; The Betrothed; The Talisman; Woodstock; Chronicles of the Canongate, The Highland Widow, &c.; The Fair Maid of Perth; Anne of Geierstein; Count Robert of Paris; Castle Dangerous; The Surgeon's Daughter; Glossary. | ||
| WOOLSON'S (C. F.) | ||
| Anne. Illustrated | 16mo, Cloth 1 25 | |
| For the Major. Illustrated. 16mo, Cloth | ||
| YATES'S (Edmund) | ||
| Black Sheep. | 40 | |
| Kissing the Rod. | 40 | |
| Land at Last. | 40 | |
| Wrecked in Port. | 35 | |
| Dr. Wainwright's Patient. | 30 | |
| =>Harper & Brothers will send any of the above works by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States, on receipt of the price. | ||