man stopped. Then, before Marian had recovered her senses sufficiently to speak, she became aware that her aunt had fallen forward in her chair, and was leaning heavily against her shoulder. There was an unnatural flush and a strange look on her face, as they raised her up, and she seemed heavy and helpless in their hands. She was laid on the sofa, and the doctor was sent for. Before he came, she had sunk into a dull, lethargic slumber. CHAPTER XX. 'What on earth does the girl mean?' said Everard Crawford, as he stood by the fire in his wife's dressing-room, looking over his morning letters. Mrs Everard, lying on the sofa, was taking her late breakfast, and grumbling at the weather, and the misery of being detained still in this dreary place.' 'What girl?' said she. 'Marian Keir. Here is a letter from her, asking me-and putting it in a very odd way, I thinkto tell her plainly if two letters which she wrote to Frank and me on the 15th of July last, ever reached us. Frank's letter, she says, was inclosed in mine. I got no letter from her with an inclosure. Here, Harriet, what do you say to this?' He handed the letter to his wife; but though she was usually eager enough to overlook his correspondence, she did not seize it with her ordinary curiosity, but allowed it to drop from her hand. As he picked it up and gave it her again, he saw that she was looking even paler than usual. 'It's no use, my dear, to talk of your being able to travel,' he said, not much displeased himself to have an excuse for delaying the journey which it did not quite suit him to make at that time. 'We had better fix to remain here for another week.' To his surprise, she received this proposition without murmuring. She was reading Marian's letter. 'Very odd, isn't it?' Everard continued thoughtfully. She wrote to me! She doesn't say about what. Could it have been some new proposal from Miss Gilmour? Very awkward, if any letters have miscarried. We've been mistaken in one thing, that's evident. You see she says that this report of her engagement to her cousin is false. I wonder if that's what he wanted to tell me the other day when I stopped him, thinking he was going to inform me of his marriage, and to claim acquaintanceship with me as a neighbour. Of course I want neither his acquaintance nor his neighbourhood, and I thought the sooner I cut him short the better, for they say he's a needy, greedy sort of fellow. But now, I should like to know what was in this letter of hers that I never got. She talks of there not being "the shadow of an engagement still remaining between her and Frank," and says she's going to leave Holly Bank. All very well; but if Frank hears that she wrote to him after all, and that this story of her marriage is nonsense, he'll never rest until she is engaged to him again. And I should like to know exactly how she has arranged matters with her aunt. I'll tell you what, Harriet, I'll ride over to Holly Bank this morning Stay; let me look at her letter again.' Ride to Holly Bank! No, no; don't go,' said his wife, in a low, nervous, flurried tone, different from her usual imperious one. 'But, my dear, I must answer her questions. And I must look into this business.' 'Send her an answer. Write. Don't go to see her.' 'But what am I to write? No, no; it will be better to see her. Why, she almost seems to hint that she suspects me of having wilfully suppressed her letters! I'm not given to tricks of that kind, I hope,' said Everard with gentlemanly indignation. Harriet burst into tears. 'Pshaw! my dear; don't worry yourself about it,' said he. The girl has been excited, and has written nonsense. I'll go to see her, and have an explanation. My dear Harriet, pray, compose yourself. You'll bring on one of your nervous attacks. Where are these drops that you take? You keep them here, don't you?' He went to a Florentine inlaid cabinet, one of their wedding-tour purchases, of which she was specially proud, and began hastily to ransack its miniature shelves and drawers for the bottle he wanted. In a moment, springing from the sofa, she was at his side, catching his wrist with an hysterical cry, as he pulled at the gilt handle of one of the lower drawers, which seemed to be kept from opening by some thick substance which had been inadvertently stuffed into it. But before she could stop him, he had given the drawer a successful jerk. It came out altogether in his hand, and he started back with an exclamation of astonishment, as he saw before him a thick, solid-looking letter addressed to himself! The first thing to be done, however, was to attend to his wife, who had sunk on the ground in a fit of violent hysterics. He carried her to the sofa, rang for the maid, and seeing that his presence only seemed to make her redouble her sobs and shrieks, withdrew to his own room, carrying with him the letter which he had so unexpectedly discovered, and which he now opened and read with annoyance and mortification, at finding that such a chance for a favourable reopening of negotiations had been lost, but with far deeper vexation at his wife's conduct. He had not much difficulty in understanding it. He remembered her violent jealousy of Marian, and her senseless, obstinate opposition to every plan for an arrangement of their difficulties. As he noticed the date of the letter, and remembered some scenes and conversations which had taken place about that time at Ellisdean, he knew that she had just then been in a particularly sullen and bitter humour. It would be easy for her to take possession of his letters. When he was absent, they were sometimes taken to her room, and seeing Marian's handwriting, she might have thought herself at liberty to open this one. He knew her sudden fits of temper, her childish ebullitions of jealous rage, and guessed that in one of these she had determined on keeping back the letter to him; and, of course, the one to Frank had to share the same fate, having been inclosed in the other. But now the question was-what was to be done? and never before had Everard Crawford found himself in such an embarrassing dilemma. He would gladly have seized the chance of effecting a reconciliation between his brother and Marian, on the terms proposed by her aunt. Frank's gloomy letters made them all painfully anxious about his welfare, and made Everard himself not a little anxious to see him reputably and soberly settled in life. There was no saying what trouble his possible recklessness might bring on his family, and Everard knew that he himself might be held partly accountable for his brother's misfortunes. Now, if there could be an explanation with Marian, an arrangement with Miss Gilmour, all might be set right. But then, how was this to be managed without betraying his wife's conduct? and he shrank from doing so, with a feeling more creditable to his heart than any which usually influenced him. No; whatever was to be done, she must be screened. He took the letters, and locked them safely away in the meantime amongst his own private papers, and then returned to his wife's room. He was very angry with her. He could not, he thought, easily forgive her for the mischief she had done. But he knew by experience that, angry or not, it was wisest not to shew his anger. Besides, he felt that it would be needful to take counsel with her-to get what information he could from her. How did he know that she had not secreted other letters ? doctor had laughingly prophesied that this new purchase of Mr Crawford's would give him a job some day. She rang her bell sharply, and ordered out messengers immediately. She got out of bed | herself, and watched at her window for her husband's return. Poor, weak, frivolous, ill-tempered woman! There was hope for her still, for there was yet one tender corner of her heart, gradually hardening and narrowing though it might be, where something like a pure unselfish love lingered, and where it lingered for many a year after she had become, to all appearance, nearly as selfish and heartless as before. She stood at her window, and saw the dark, sad, little procession of searchers, carrying, what they had found, back to the house. They had not had to seek far away; and it was a comfort afterwards to the sorrowing family to know that the accident could not have happened more than a few minutes before the servants sent by poor Everard's wife had reached the spot. It was near where his horse had fallen before. The animal was unhurt now, as then, but this time the rider lay stunned and motionless. At first, they thought He found her in no state to be questioned, or at he was dead; but though he never recovered conleast she was resolved not to allow him an oppor-sciousness, he lived long enough for his mother and tunity of speaking to her alone. She was still ill, or pretended to be so, and kept her maid constantly at her side. He made various attempts to quiet her, and to soothe her evident dread of him. At last, as the bewildered maid, who had never seen her troublesome mistress so unmanageable before, vainly offered one remedy after another, Everard said: 'Shall I go and order that new London prescription to be made up for you? You don't like to trust the Whiteford chemists; but if go and speak to them about it, they will be careful enough, I daresay.' I To this she agreed. Her chief desire at the moment was to get rid of his company, to put off the interrogation which was awaiting her. Everard, glad, too, to have a little time to think over matters before he entered on his disagreeable investigations, and hoping to find her in a calmer and more reasonable mood when he returned from his long ride, bade her good-bye. Try to get some sleep,' he said kindly; and as he stooped and kissed her pale, thin cheek, some real tenderness mingled with his carefully assumed gentleness. 'I'll come back with the medicine as quickly as I can.' She lay quiet enough after he was gone. She was wearied, and she was also soothed by his parting kiss, for she loved him as much as it was in her shallow, selfish nature to love anybody besides herself. As she lay thinking, she began not so much to repent of the action which she had committed-any self-reproach for that troubled her very little as to repent that she had made such a fuss about his discovery of it. 'I daresay I could have explained it all to him, and he wouldn't have minded. I wish he hadn't gone away; I wish I hadn't let him go. He will be away so long, and I shall be alone all day.' The day wore on. She began impatiently to count the hours-the minutes till his return. Had he been detained in Whiteford? Had he' Suddenly, a vague dread came over her; she remembered his telling her that he had met with a little accident, that his horse had slipped and fallen the other day, and that the Whiteford sister, and even his invalid father, to see him again; and his wife had the satisfaction of recollecting afterwards-and, it must be said, the satisfaction of describing to her sympathising friends-how devotedly she had watched by him during his last hours. THE KOO-TOO. THE performance of the koo-too or kow-tow, a degrading ceremonial on being formally presented to the emperor of China, has been a fertile source of discord, few ambassadors from any European court being willing to submit to so very odious an act of abasement. Lord Macartney, in 1793, condescended to go through the ceremony in a perfunctory way, which was accepted as sufficient. Lord Amherst, however, in 1816, declined to do even so much; and it is doubtful if any English ambassador will ever again be expected to perform the koo-too in proper style. Any one wishing to know what the ceremony really is, may satisfy his curiosity by perusing the account given of the reception of an ambassador from the Czar Peter of Russia, in 1719, the writer being John Bell of Autremoney, a Scottish gentleman attached to the Russian court. 'On the day,' says this amusing chronicler, 'appointed for the publick audience of the emperor, horses were brought to our lodgings for the ambassador and his retinue; the emperor being then at a country house, called Tzanshuyang, about six miles westward from Pekin. We mounted at eight in the morning, and about ten arrived at court; where we alighted at the gate, which was guarded by a strong party of soldiers. The commanding officers conducted us into a large room, where we drank tea, and staid about half an hour till the emperor was ready to receive us. We then entered a spacious court, inclosed with high brick walls, and regularly planted with several rows of forest-trees, about eight inches diameter, which I took to be limes. The walks are spread with small gravel; and the great walk is terminated by the hall of audience, behind which are the emperor's private apartments. On each side of the great walk are flower-plots and canals. As we advanced, we found all the ministers of state, and officers belonging to the court, seated upon fur cushions, cross-legged, before the hall, in the open air; among these, places were appointed for the ambassador and his retinue; and in this situation we remained, in a cold frosty morning, till the emperor came into the hall. During this interval, there were only two or three servants in the hall, and not the least noise was heard from any quarter. The entry to the hall is by seven marble steps, the whole length of the building. The floor is finely paved with a neat checker-work of white and black marble. The edifice is quite open to the south; and the roof supported by a row of handsome wooden pillars, octangular, and finely polished; before which is hung a large canvas, as a shelter from the heat of the sun or inclemencies of the weather. 'After we had waited about a quarter of an hour, the emperor entered the hall at the back-door, and seated himself upon the throne; upon which all the company stood. The master of the ceremonies now desired the ambassador, who was at some distance from the rest, to walk into the hall; and conducted him by one hand, while he held his credentials in the other. Having ascended the steps, the letter was laid on a table placed for that purpose, as had been previously agreed; but the emperor beckoned to the ambassador, and directed him to approach; which he no sooner perceived, than he took up the credentials, and attended by Aloy, walked up to the throne and, kneeling, laid them before the emperor, who touched them with his hand, and inquired after his Czarish majesty's health. He then told the ambassador that the love and friendship he entertained for his majesty were such that he had even dispensed with an established custom of the empire in receiving his letter. 'During this part of the ceremony, which was not long, the retinue continued standing without the hall; and we imagined, the letter being delivered, all was over. But the master of the ceremonies brought back the ambassador, and then ordered all the company to kneel and make obeisance nine times to the emperor. At every third time we stood up and kneeled again. Great pains were taken to avoid this piece of homage, but without success. The master of the ceremonies stood by and delivered his orders in the Tartar language, by pronouncing the words Morgu and boss; the first meaning to bow, and the other to stand; two words which I cannot soon forget.' Nor would the friends of the writer soon allow him to forget them, we should think. Human nature is very much changed if they omitted slightly to chaff him ever afterwards on his performance of the koo-too. Picture to yourself the dignified gentlemen of the embassy clad in the somewhat cumbrous garments of the period, with their broad-tailed coats, their wide lappets, their pigtails carefully arranged, and their best wigs; realise their embarrassment and torture, their clumsy gyrations - imagine the circle described by their pigtails in the air-and your pity for the unfortunates will be not unmixed with amusement. UNDER THE PANSIES. ACROSS the kirkyard path I go; The air is delicate and sweet; Yet, somehow, as I pass, the blood Subdues its fervour and its heat, For there's a grave beside the tower, And there are pansies at my feet. A little grave, cut off from all, From whose green core the shilfa calls; And where, when summer eve is low, The mavis pipes sweet madrigals. It was a brief, mysterious life Her life, whom late we buried here; It saw the promise of the spring, But not the harvest of the year; The sweet head drooped beneath the sun, Ere yet the sun had turned it sere. A spirit entered at our door, In fairest vestiments of clay; The lamp was lit, the board was spread, And we entreated it to stay; But, voiceless as the phantom came, So voicelessly it passed away. It knew us not-we knew it not; How could we hope to penetrate Upon its limbs unwrinkled sate- Weak words were ours-vague forms of thought, And hers the angel's reticence. Yet, when the starry Christmas morn And, silent, passed into the sky, And here we laid her, underneath The quiet of the changing skies, She did not know us-0 so young!— Our darling may remember all. Printed and Pablished by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Pater noster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, Edinburgh. Also sold by all Booksellers. No. 494. POPULAR LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART. Fourth Sexies CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS. SATURDAY, JUNE 14, 1873. THE HAUNTED CASK AFTERNOON on a bright, warm, voluptuous day, such as only the tropics can produce; in the foreground, the great panorama of Bombay outspread in the dazzling sunshine; behind, the broad blue sweep of the encircling sea, now in one of its holiday humours, dancing and sparkling as if nothing so wicked as a storm had ever entered its mind; and in the centre of the picture, the good ship Australian, bound from Bombay to Southampton, with freight and passengers as per advertise ment. The packet's time and steam are both very nearly up, and most of the 'homeward-bound' are already on board. Several bronzed and bearded shekarries, laden with skins, not of wine, but of bears and tigers, and nervously anxious about the comfortable stowage of their favourite rifles; a good many very yellow-looking disciples of the H.E.I.C.S. overwhelmed by an avalanche of pugree; swarms of picturesque native servants, looking wofully chop-fallen at the prospect of a voyage across the black water' to that dismal island where there is no sun, and a great deal too much fog; a statistical M.P. who has been out here to gather materials for a book upon the cost of the Indian Army, extracts from which he insists upon reading to every one he meets, a practice which has already earned him the name of the 'Ancient Mariner;' a diplomatic young engineer, who, having brought on board a huge and ferocious cockatoo, as a present for his rich aunt at home, has just had his thumb nearly bitten off by the savage animal, and is trying to look as if it didn't hurt him; two or three clergymen of various denominations, sedulously avoiding each other; sundry officers going home on leave; and, better than all, an abundance of ladies. Sprightly ladies who have lost their husbands, comforting forlorn ladies who have not yet found them; enterprising ladies who have been all over the world, patronising timid ladies who 'daren't go anywhere by themselves;' strong-minded ladies who have come out with the intention of extirpating heathenism PRICE 1d. altogether (and are coming home without having done it), declaiming against the wicked obstinacy of the 'benighted idolaters;' and others besides, too numerous to mention. But, although the packet might seem to be pretty well filled, the captain evidently does not think the tale complete, to judge by the way in which he is leaning over the side and looking shoreward. Plainly, there is something more coming,' as children say towards the end of a Christmas dinner; and here, sure enough, comes the 'something more at last, in the form of a slight, girlish-looking, very pretty young lady, in deep mourning, attended by two maids and a whole boatful of luggage, conspicuous amid which, to the visible amazement of the lookers-on, is a huge, punchy, substantial-looking cask, capable of containing enough liquor to elevate the entire ship's company. 'Glad to see you again, Mrs Errington; hope you'll be comfortable with us,' says the captain heartily, as his new passenger comes timidly up the side. I've got all ready for you down below, and if there's anything else you'd like, you've only to name it.' Thank you very much, Captain Prescott,' answers the lady, in a timid little voice like the chirp of a shy canary. 'Will you be so very kind as to have these things taken down to my statecabin-and-and that cask, please, along with them?" 'This moment, ma'am,' answers the gallant skipper, manfully keeping down the shade of surprise that struggles into his face at this unexpected postscript.-George, just pass that cask down along with the lady's luggage, and see that it don't get hurt on the road.' Fortunately, most of the passengers were too fully engrossed with their own concerns to notice the astounding 'lady's companion' which Mrs Errington thus commended to the captain's good offices; but the sailors were more observant. They exchanged looks big with solemn meaning; and a few hours later, when the shores of India had already begun to fade into the purple shadows of the evening sky, the 'cask-question' was brought forward for serious consideration by the Conscript my dog,' was in this case anything but verified. Fathers of the forecastle. 'Did yer ever?' 'Ain't that a pretty start, just!' 'Who'd ever ha' thought it?' 'Well, I am blowed! To think o' a niminypiminy little creetur like that 'ere, what yer might blow away wi' a puff out o' a baccy-pipe, layin' in as much grog as 'ud sarve a foremast-man for a twelvemonth!' 'Well, what o' that?' remarks sententiously old Jack Davitt, the Solomon of the forecastle. Mark my words, my bo's: it's just them as yer wouldn't expect to do things, what allus does do 'em!' It's a burnin' shame, anyhow-that's what it is!' strikes in Bill Sawyer, whose fiery complexion shews that his interest in the liquor question is not purely theoretical. To think o' one little bit of a 'ooman a-keepin' all that 'ere good stuff to herself, while there's hundreds o' God's creeturs a-pinin' (as one may say) for want on't!' Ay, Bill, yer may well be grumpy! sitch a lot o' lush aboard, and you not a-goin' to get none!' 'And then they talks o' our drinkin'!' pursues Bill, too indignant to notice this innuendo. 'Who ever seed one o' us drink a whole cask to once? And yet, I'll bet ye a week's grog, as that 'ere young 'ooman, when she gets ashore at Sou'ampton, 'ull be a-goin' on to everybody 'bout "the habitooal 'tostication o' English sailors!" Now what, I axes yer, what kind o' fair play d'ye call that 'ere?' Ánd the orator, overwhelmed by the thought of such monstrous injustice, relapses into gloomy silence. Three-fourths of the bachelor passengers loved Mrs Errington, or said they did; but they were very far from loving her cask likewise. Their only feeling towards it was one of direct personal hostress, and involving a secret which she refused to tility. An article so closely guarded by its misimpart to them, was clearly a dangerous rival; and but for the manner in which this unpopular talisman was entombed beneath unnumbered packages, some of these audacious spirits would very probably have attempted its destruction, or, at anyrate, the probing of the mystery of its contents. Too bad, sir-altogether too bad!' said Mr Chutney to his friend and confidant Noliver, of captain about it; 'pon my word, we ought. It's the H.E.I.C.S. 'We ought to memorialise the intolerable that a community of respectable Englishmen should be hag-ridden in this way by a confounded cask, that nobody knows anything about.' During the first part of the voyage-namely, from Bombay to the Cape-this novel kind of bustle of settling down had subsided, the monPandora's box had a clear field; for after the first otony of the passage was unbroken. No shark was obliging enough to catch himself for the general amusement. The albicores and flying-fish obstinately declined to 'break the glittering surface with their elfin gambols,' according to the form prescribed for them by would-be nautical novelists. Not a single waterspout could be induced to shew its face; and considerable excitement was created one morning by the M.P. announcing that 'the the second engineer say that one of the men steward had just mentioned to him having heard thought he had seen a sail.' In this universal dearth of events, it was not surprising that Mrs Errington's mysterious possession should assume as prominent an interest as if it had been the casque of Mambrino himself, or that which crushed Master Conrad so unexpectedly in the Castle of Otranto. The Letters of Junius, the Man with the Iron Mask, were not more absorbingly interesting, or more hopelessly unfathomable. It became the subject of more wagers than the Derby or Mr Wilkie Collins' Dead Secret. The captain and firstmate discussed it nightly over their eight o'clock grog; the blue-jacketed parliament in the cook's galley resolved itself into a perpetual Committee of Inquiry on the subject, and always ended by moving that 'there must be summut wrong 'bout it'-John Bull's invariable verdict upon anything which he cannot understand. Fisher, from Poonah, being 'surprised by a wholly The pretty Miss unexpected proposal' from Captain Veriphast of the th Native Infantry, accepted him conditionally upon his 'finding out all about that horrid cask.' The literary M.P. gave it a place in his book upon the Indian Army. Judge Uppinlaw of the High Court, who was as fond of technical definitions as he was of brandy-pawnee, 'summed up' Mrs Errington as a positive angel modified by a latent cask.' Young Melloughdey, the poet of the Mullagatawny Club (going home on leave), actually worked it into a song, which he wrote off the Mauritius, commencing: But this theory speedily proves to be as unfounded as popular theories usually are. The way in which the obnoxious cask, when once fairly ensconced in a corner of Mrs Errington's state cabin, is walled in, or rather buried, by a mountain of trunks, boxes, and bags, amply vindicates the sobriety of its charming owner; for the most confirmed toper would hardly have taken the trouble to pull down and rebuild such a barricade every time that he might feel the need of a drop of comfort.' But the failure of this solution only enhanced the interest of the puzzle, not merely with the sailors, but among the passengers likewise. And, moreover, the mystery seemed to concentrate itself exclusively upon the cask; for with regard to herself, Mrs Errington (whose winning ways and delicate beauty speedily made her a universal favourite) had no reserve whatever. It was soon known that she had come out from England about three years before with her husband, a wealthy civilian, considerably older than herself; that Mr Errington had died in one of the upcountry stations, bequeathing her the whole of his property; and that she was now returning to England, with the intention of remaining there. This union of wealth, beauty, and friendlessness, combined with the charmingly helpless timidity of her manner, at once laid the whole masculine section of the community at her feet-from pompous old Mr Chutney, of the great Calcutta house of Chutney and Currie, down to mischievous little Ensign O'Naughtie, who was three years younger than herself-but the old adage of 'Love me, love and Mr Chutney, after supping upon cold pork My soul is like a spacious cask, |