AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL VALENTINE.

BY RICHARD BARRY.

A very strange old room it was, in a very strange old house, part of which was brick, and part of which was wood. The wood had been cut from the neighboring hill-sides, and the brick had traversed many thousands of miles from across the Atlantic in a little ship with a strange Dutch name. There was but one older house in the street, and from the corner window of the room one could just catch a glimpse of the spires of the college chapel; on winter days when the leaves were off the trees the college buildings could be seen.

The Professor, when he came in, announced his arrival by noisily scraping the soles of his boots against the metal foot-scraper that had been worn down to a thin blade, like an aged razor. The Professor was tall and angular, but it was impossible to tell his age within a dozen years, for his thin hair was very dark, and his face was always very smooth shaven. His position in college was a most peculiar one. He had an endowed professorship, which, odd to relate, he had endowed himself, and there was a term in college parlance that was often applied to the Professor's course in the electives (Sanscrit and archæology), it was known as a "snap." But the Professor was a very interesting and well-liked man. He had taken honors at Oxford in the early fifties, and had spent a great deal of money making deep researches into the great libraries of Europe.

But to come back to the room.

It was not dark or dingy, as one might suppose the room of a student would be, but was very bright, with a number of windows. The pattern of the oil-cloth that covered the floor was worn out in regular paths before the big shelves that reached up to the ceiling. There were two large oaken cupboards and a long desk. The only thing that could be called an attempt at ornament was a china figure on the top of one of the cupboards. The Professor had picked this up in France. It was an unmistakable likeness to Benjamin Franklin, but, nevertheless, it had the name "George Washington" on it in gold lettering. The Professor had bought it as an example of humor in French pottery, which showed that he had a sense of humor himself.

A fat old negro woman was dusting off the table. As she lifted anything—a paper, or a book, or an inkstand, for instance—she would replace it exactly on the same spot. In fact, the desk was a perpetual tableau, and the Professor never got the mucilage and the inkstand mixed up; he could have found anything on that table in the dark.

Hearing the sound of prolonged scraping at the front door, the old colored woman knew two things. First, that the Professor had arrived, and, secondly, that it was a muddy day. She dusted off Benjamin Franklin Washington, and opened the door in time to meet the Professor at the head of the stairs.

"Do you think, Hannah," began the Professor, "that the spare room could be kept warm in cold weather?"

Hannah looked quite frightened; no one had slept in the spare room since the Professor had been in the house.

"I never heerd no one complain, sir," she said, which was non-committal in Hannah.

"Make up the bed to-night there," said the Professor. "I'll sleep in it myself." It struck him this was a brilliant way to find out.

"Youse spectin' some folks, sir?"

"Yes, Hannah," returned the Professor. "My two nephews are going to spend a fortnight with me."

"Is dey youn' gen'lemen?" inquired the old negress.

"I hope so," answered the Professor, with a smile.

"I means is dey youn'?" corrected Hannah.

"Let me see. Upon my soul, I have forgotten." The Professor wrinkled his forehead. "One's twelve, and one's thirteen years of age," he said, after a mental calculation.

Hannah left the room, and the Professor seated himself at the desk.

"I reckin we's gwine hab some trubble," said the old woman, as she waddled into the kitchen. "Twelve and thirteen is a rampanxious age for boys."

On the second day of February Bill Alton and Todd, his younger brother, were met by the Professor at the station. They had seen him only once or twice before, but seeing they were the Professor's only nephews, their mother had insisted upon their making this long-promised visit, frankly to state, much to their disgust.

The Professor had decided, after his trial of the spare bedchamber, that it would be very cold; so when the youngsters arrived at their room, they found it presided over by a very small and very hot stove that ticked and snapped like a hard-worked bit of machinery.

Much to their agreeable surprise, the two Alton boys now for the first time found themselves enjoying absolute freedom. In the first place, they had succeeded in getting into the attic, where they had found an old single-barrelled fowling-piece. They had asked the Professor if they could have it to "play with," and, upon his acquiescence, had purchased powder and shot at the hardware-store, and had gone out and bagged a rabbit and a hen in one afternoon. It was well known that the rabbit was tame, and the hen might not have been free from suspicion, as they had stalked her close to Farmer Belknap's chicken-yard back on the hill.

The Professor met the boys at breakfast and at supper. His mid-day meal was generally neglected; he carried it off with him to the college building in a tin box, like a school-boy.

At the end of the first week two rainy days came in succession. Billy and Todd were in the Professor's attic. That morning, for the first time, the Professor had taken the boys into his study. He knew so little about youths of this age in general that he was quite embarrassed. He thought they were very well behaved youngsters, because they apparently gave him no trouble, and the story of the hen and the rabbit, and several escapades of like character, had never reached his ears, but he felt it incumbent upon himself to make up for the lack of attention to his guests.

"Now, boys," he said, opening one of the cupboards, "I am going to show you some very wonderful things. This is an illuminated MS. of the fourteenth century, very rare and fine, done by the Franciscan monks, you see." The Professor read the Latin inscription with an air of triumph. "And this is an old cryptogram. This is an old copy of one of the early saint's lives in Hebrew, and here is another—both very old and very valuable."

It was not very interesting, but the boys listened politely. The college bell ringing at this moment, their uncle closed a most interesting description of how one of the valuable parchments had come into his possession, shut the cupboard, locked the door of the study, and left the boys to play in the attic.

"I say, Todd," remarked the elder Alton, "let's see if there's anything in here." He lifted the lid of an aged trunk and disclosed a lot of papers and old worn books that filled the garret with a musty odor. It was a collection of stuff that the Professor had designated as "rubbish," but yet had been loath to feed into the fire. There's not a professor's attic in the world that does not possess this same sort of a trunk, I verily believe. None of the books appeared very interesting, and a great many of the papers were very commonplace in appearance.

Todd picked up a tightly rolled bit of very aged vellum, and spreading it out, looked over an imaginary pair of spectacles at his brother, and began:

"This is a very old and rare specimen of a kickograph. You can see how beautiful it is."

As there was nothing apparent on the blank sheet of parchment, his brother burst into mock rhapsodies.

"How much will you take for it?" he inquired.

"One million dollars," said Todd.

The idea seemed to take, and he sold the rest of the contents of the trunk at fabulous prices, an old copy of Fox's Christian Martyrs going at enough to pay the national debt, for the simple reason that it had pictures in it.

"Hold on," said Billy at last; "let's stop this. I have an idea."

"What is it?" said Todd.

"Let's send Uncle Passmore" (the Professor's name was Passmore Webster Bibby) "a valentine. To-morrow's Valentine day, you know. Let's write him out a kickogram."

"Kickograph," corrected the other.

"Do you know he says he can read all those things?" said Todd. "So let's make him a 'sticker.'"

"And here's the very thing to write it on," exclaimed Billy, flourishing the roll of parchment.

They procured a pen, and diluting the ink with water to make it faint, they spread the valentine out upon the floor.

"Let's get a book and copy those funny-looking words out of it," suggested Todd.

"Why not make 'em up?" answered Billy. "They look just like this." He made some weird hieroglyphics on the top of the parchment. It was most interesting when it was once started, and it was completed by drawing largely upon the characters in a Greek Testament, taking some few words from an old Xenophon, and interspersing freely and frequently wiggles and cabalistic signs of their own manufacture. When they had covered the vellum they made it look quite aged by means of dirty finger-marks, and then regarded the work of art with eyes of admiration.

"It's a sort of an April-fool valentine," said Todd. "I wonder what he will think of it? I suppose he'll read it right off; looks just like the others."

But how to send it—that was the question. If they gave it to him themselves, there would be no fun in it at all.

Suddenly there came a whoop from Billy, who was delving once more into the trunk.

"Here's the thing to wrap it in!" he said, triumphantly.

It was a roll of thick brown paper that had once been sealed with sealing-wax. It had the Professor's address on it, and some very foreign looking stamps. They rolled the MS. inside of it, and, securing some sealing-wax, sealed it up tightly.

"Now," said Billy, "won't he be tickled when he reads it—eh?"

Professor Bibby's mail was always placed upon the newel-post at the bottom of the stairway, and he gathered it on his return from his first class in the morning. The boys placed the long package with one or two letters which were already there. The next morning, as we remarked, was St. Valentine's day.

The Professor came in, and when he saw the long package, he left the other letters, and bounded up the stairway two steps at a time. The boys heard him hurriedly unlock the door of his study. He broke open the seals nervously, and spread out the parchment. As he had not closed the door behind him, the boys could see everything very plainly through the banisters. The Professor wrinkled his forehead; he turned the package sideways and upside down; he looked off into space with a curious expression; he followed a line with his finger, and made a note (evidently of some of the puzzling characters) on a bit of paper. Then he walked to the window, and held the parchment up to the light with the wrong side to him. Suddenly he peered closer and closer, until it looked to the boys, as Todd expressed it, as if he were "trying to bore holes through it." All at once he whirled to the table again; he reached into one of the cupboards and brought out a large magnifying-glass. As the Professor spread out the young Alton's masterpiece, his hand was trembling. What did it mean? thought the boys from their hiding-place. They had never seen anything so strange in all their lives, for, after reading for a few minutes, their uncle sank back, or, better, collapsed, into the arm-chair. There was an ecstatic look on his face, and the boys caught the words he was repeating. It was a very plain and homely expression, but, under the circumstances, Uncle Passmore felt that he must give vent to his feelings. "Well, by gum!" he repeated.

Todd coughed at this moment; the Professor heard the sound and came to the door.

"Boys," he said, "I have made a most remarkable discovery." The success of their valentine hoax was almost overwhelming to the two young Altons. They had never suspected that they were to be successful, and, in fact, their position was most embarrassing. "Come here, young gentlemen," continued the Professor. "Do you see that aged manuscript?" He stroked it with an affectionate touch. "That, my dear nephews, has been sent to me from some strange source. It is a palimpsest."

Billy looked at Todd. Had their uncle gone crazy? He shook the wrapping-paper in which the boys had rolled the valentine and looked at it. For some reason the post-mark was Constantinople, and, to all appearances, it might really have come through the mails that very day, instead of, as the case was, a dozen years before.

"Strange," said the Professor. "It came from Constantinople. Now who could have sent it?" Then he heaved a sigh. "Some dear and most beloved friend."

The boys were becoming frightened now, but Todd plucked Billy by the sleeve.

"Don't let on," he said, in a whisper. "He's an old fraud, that's what he is." They walked out into the hallway. "He can't read those words at all."

"Maybe he can," said Billy. "I wonder what it was we wrote?"

But the Professor had called them back. "Nephews," he said, "let me read you what this says."

The boys, hand in hand, came back, and the Professor, waving a finger in gesticulation, translated slowly, using all the time, the magnifying-glass. What he said sounded to the boys like what they had often heard in church.

"He's making up as he goes ahead," whispered Todd.

Then an idea came from Billy. "He's just trying to fool us; that's what he's doing," replied the latter.

But the Professor was much in earnest. "Well," he at last remarked, "I am going to take this right up to the president of the college. It's a most important discovery. It's a palimpsest letter, probably one of the earliest transcriptions of the Epistles. Boys, this wonderful parchment is eighteen hundred years of age, perhaps."

Billy whistled, and Todd, seeing that his uncle did not object, whistled also. But when they were left alone, and their uncle had hurried out into the rain without an umbrella, they again held a consultation.

"We'd better tell him," said Todd, "that we only meant it for a valentine."

"He'll be awful mad," said Billy, quietly; "but I guess we had better tell him, as you say."

So they waited until their uncle returned. At supper he was still elated, and when the table had been cleared Todd opened the subject.

"Uncle Passmore," he inquired, "what is a palimpsest?"

"A palimpsest is a parchment that has once been written on, then used a second time; after the erasure of the first copy, however, very often the original shows through. It is the case with this."

"But what do those letters mean?"

"Oh, that is a hodgepodge," replied the Professor, pedanticly, "of Greek, Hebrew, Sanscrit, and something resembling Arabic. It means nothing; evidently some scribbles to pass away the time."

The boys looked relieved, and cast an admiring glance at the old gentleman, who was continuing:

"Of course it was not sent to me on account of this latter inscription; it was sent to me merely because it was a palimpsest. But I wonder who indulged in all that scribbling?"

"We did," said the boys, in chorus.

Again the Professor appeared quite astonished, but not in the least angered. He listened to the story of how they found the screed in the old trunk in the attic, and commented upon this fact.

"So-so," he said. "I remember keeping that bit when I was in Turkey. I thought it blank, but a very aged sheet. Why did you send it to me?" he inquired.

"Oh, for a valentine," replied Todd.

"Well," said the Professor, smiling, "I'd give a great deal for another one." Then he paused. "There's a minstrel show in town to-night, boys," he added. "Let's go down to it."