Part 11 — CHAPTER XV. (continued 2)

“Tell them to us, little one,” said his intimate. “The romantic tale will flavor the coffee.”

The general related all the preliminaries and particulars of his relations with Lucia.

“Don’t you see, general,” said the imitator of the tone Parisian, “that it was all a farce, very well got up, by those fourbes rustics to set you on; alarm you; interest you in the girl, and oblige you to take her?”

“That it was all an intrigue of las étage?” added the copy of the copy.

“Apropos of impositions,” said the capitalist, “I must tell you what happened to me yesterday. A fellow came into my office—”

“Don’t omit,” said Boni, “that you were counting an immense sum of money at the time, for that is what heightens the joke.”

“He asked me,” continued Creseus, “if I would lend him two doubloons. I told him that it cost me the greatest pain to be obliged to refuse, but that I had not sixpence by me.”

“If I had not wished to give, I would have sought another reply,” said an old general—uncle to ours—who had lost a leg in the battle of Bailen.

“General,” replied the narrator, “among us, I have not is synonymous I will not; even sucking-babes understand it.”

“A synonym which Huertas has omitted, but which is known in these days, even in the Batuecas,” chimed the repeater.

“It could not have existed when he composed his work,” said the general.

“The fellow,” proceeded the narrator, “begged and implored, lowering his demand to the most insignificant sum. I was as inexorable as destiny.” And the millionaire cast around him a look worthy of Cato.

“He was, then, in real need, and not an impostor?” questioned the old general.

“O sir!—general rule—every one that asks is an impostor.”

“Unless he is an intimate friend,” said Boni, speaking this time with unaccustomed personality.

“Ma foi,”[59] answered the Gaulish Spaniard, “I except no one. Seeing that he was not going to desist, and always with the amiability and delicacy that must be used in such cases—”

“Sans doute, the same as in affairs of honor,” said the bad copy of a worse original.

“I told him that, since his necessity was so extreme, I would venture to lend him—not money, for I had none—but something that would be of more use to him in his circumstances. The imbecile thought, perhaps, that it was going to be my signature.”

“Your signature! What one might call the only and unique sanctum sanctorum of the disciples of Mercury. A thing so sacred!”

“My dear Boni,” said his friend, “veuillez ne pas m’interrompre?[60] The fellow’s countenance lighted up. I believe, upon my word, that he had not eaten in three days. Laughing within myself, although my face denoted the gravest sympathy for his situation, I led him to a closet, took out a case of pistols, which I opened, and, handing him a weapon, said, as I bowed his dismissal, ‘Here is a remedy for all your troubles.’ My mendicant turned upon his heel and left; and you may be sure that I have rid myself of him, une bonne fois pour toutes.”[61]

Boni’s mirth was overpowering.

Gallardo and the rest of the Spaniards were silent.

“You must positively put this joke into some paper,” said the capitalist’s admirer, between his paroxysms of laughter.

“Mon cher, à quoi bon?”[62] responded the hero of the anecdote, with an air of modesty.

“To show people how to get rid of impostors,” answered Boni; “to furnish a specimen of your humor—to let it be seen that you are as richly endowed by nature as by fortune—to give circulation to an entertaining item—and to—”

“And could a paper be found that would print such an iniquity as an entertaining item!” shouted the old general, no longer able to contain his wrath. “Is it the mission of the press to propagate such ideas and sentiments? God help us, sirs, if there is no one left in Spain capable of a blush! Can the press parade infamy shamelessly, and no one be found to repudiate the impudence that relates such a scandal in terms of laudation; or appeal from it to the noble and generous instincts, and sense of public decorum, of good and true Spaniards? Have we become as positive as the written law? In former times, gentlemen, not all gave, but the few that denied did not boast of their refusal. Charity made men

“Uncle, for God’s sake!” entreated Gallardo.

“For God’s sake what, nephew?”

“Speak with more moderation.”

“When I do, look towards Antequera for sunrise.”

“Don’t feel apprehensive, general,” said the capitalist, “Je sais vivre.[63] I respect your family, and know how to make allowance for gray hairs and the ill-humor of advanced age.”

“Yes,” instantly added the speaking shadow, “carte blanche belongs to ladies, children, and—”

He was going to add old men, but a look from the general silenced him.

“No, nephew, don’t be apprehensive,” said the latter. “The weapons of a gentleman are for nobler uses than the punishment of insults.”

“Come, let us talk of something else,” said Gallardo’s intimate, anxious to change the subject, but glad in his heart, as were all the other guests, of the lesson the braggart had received from so worthy and authorized an antagonist.

“It is not possible, Gallardo, that you will allow Lucia to be an irredeemable lien upon you. Let me tell you, my boy, that it would be a pretty piece of folly on your part to create an obstacle to your future establishment.”

“I don’t see that—in order to be a deputy, senator, or—”

“Oh! you’re on the wrong tack. Your political ideas absorb all your thoughts; but I have been told—by one of her friends—that the daughter of Don Juan de Moneda,[64] the banker, is quite smitten with your person.”

Gallardo straightened himself, and caressed his curled locks.

“Her mother is completely taken with the title of Marquis de Monte Gallardo, which they say you are about to receive, and her father with your capacity.”

“We are even there,” said the general, “for I am as much impressed with his. To buy—”

“But,” proceeded the friend, “he is equally so with your sash and rent-roll. Here, boy, is an opportunity to settle in life.”

“Really, I hardly know the kind and amiable young lady who has been so condescending as to think of me!” drawled the extremely flattered Gallardo, privately resolving to tighten his stays again.

“She is very beautiful,” affirmed his friend, “and you must know that she rides like a Cossack.”

“Oh! Athenaïs la Moneda has the most elegant figure and complexion—so pale!—and the fiercest glances” (he meant haughtiest) “of all the belles of Madrid. She is delicious!” exclaimed the Parisian.

“She has the neck of a swan, with such serpentine undulating,” said Bonifacio, quite at a loss for another comparison.

“The most desirable parte, ma foi! Her father is worth forty millions, and she is the only daughter,” continued the capitalist, who did not allow his appreciation of beauty to interfere with his devotion to dollars.

“You ought to improve your opportunity, and marry at once,” advised the friend. “These girls with forty millions are more capricious than the wind. They change oftener than weather-cocks, and do just as they please; for millionaire fathers who know only the Castilian have the highest consideration for daughters

“An heiress’s whim is like a flash of lightning. In losing time, you expose yourself to a—”

“To a deception,” said the capitalist, concluding the sentence.

“To a disabusement,” said the copy, thinking, with profound satisfaction, that he had, for once, surpassed the original.

“What is your opinion of all this?” asked Gallardo of his uncle, with a laugh, intended to appear jesting, but which betrayed his interior satisfaction.

“Yes, give us the benefit of your wisdom,” said the capitalist, covering his ill-humor with a tone of light irony. “In matrimonial as well as martial councils, the Nestors should be heard.

“Une vieux de la vieille,”[66] confirmed Boni, “is a California of experience; a barometrical and chronometrical counsellor; a universal grammar bound in gold; a—”

“Hush, Boni!” whispered the capitalist in the ear of his friend, who, less accustomed to champagne than the others, began to feel its emancipating influence.

Meantime, the old officer stroked his gray moustache in silence.

“Well, what do you think, general!” questioned Gallardo.

“I think that you ought to marry.”

“C’est clair,” said the Parisian.

“It is clear,” repeated Boni—“as clear as detestable water; and they think of bringing it into Madrid! Will spend millions to do it!”

“Taisez vous, mon cher,” entreated the model, in a low tone.

“I am not in the humor,” replied the copy, in excellent Spanish.

“Of course he ought to marry,” said all the rest.

“Let us understand each other, gentlemen,” said the old general. “I think, Gallardo, that you ought to marry, not the mushroom of the millions, but Lucia.”

These words were received with clamorous disapprobation.

“You take advantage of your rôle of Nestor, general,” exclaimed the capitalist.

“The hero of former times dotes—I would say radote. I propose a vote of censure!” hiccoughed the copy.

“S-s-s, Boni. Le vous en prie![67] Do you want to get another broadside from the disabled old pontoon? Don’t provoke him, for the next time neither prudence nor contempt will enable me to keep my temper,” murmured his patron.

“The general is jesting. A gentleman of his fine delicacy cannot mean to counsel one, in Gallardo’s position, to marry a woman of light reputation,” said Gallardo’s friend.

“I do it because I have delicacy—a plant that strikes so deep when once it has taken root, that neither the silver plough nor the golden spade which cultivates the field of ideas of the present day can turn it out. I counsel a man who has done a wrong to repair it. I advise one who has been the ruin of an honest girl to become her defender. And the more public he has made her position, the more he is bound to set her right in the eyes of others. If the future looks smiling, I counsel it all the more earnestly, that the past may not reproach him. In my days, gentlemen, marriages were not discussed

With these words the noble veteran took his leave.

“Style of an epic poem,” said the pseudo-Parisian.

“Tone of an elegiac lyric,” stammered the copy. “One would think the governor had been drinking some kind of palate-skinning Catalan wine, instead of the excellent, exquisite, delectable, delicious—”

“Enough, Boni,” interrupted his friend, indicating to him with his foot the urgent necessity of more discretion.

“The general has, so to speak, one foot in the grave, and, naturally, all looks to him de profundis color,” observed Gallardo’s intimate. “But we live in a positive age, and must conform to the step of its march; to do otherwise would be to make ourselves antiquated and ridiculous.”

Days followed days, each one bringing to our hero its business, novelty, interest, and forgetfulness of those that had preceded it. Lucia, in the meantime, saw her means of subsistence failing without informing him; for, with the reawakened sentiments of duty and shame, came the comprehension of her guilty dependence, and sense of the double humiliation of soliciting and receiving. She had lived for some time by the sale of her valuables, but this resource was almost exhausted.

“What is to become of me?” she questioned, with more of weakness than inquietude, more inertia than anguish, as she sat one day alone, her head drooping upon her breast. “In forgetting how to work, I have been like the sailor that forgets in a calm how to handle the ropes. What shall I do when all is gone? What can he who has brought me to this be thinking of?”

Her questionings were interrupted by the entrance of the woman of the house with a letter.

“It is from Madrid,” she said, with a fawning smile. “I’ll bet that the general tells when he is coming, and confirms the report of his appointment as captain-general of this province.”

Lucia opened and read the following epistle:

“Dear Lucia: Nothing can last for ever. Mature age brings serious ideas; the life of a man, obligations, circumstances, compromises, and position, duties, which force us to make, in favor of reason and morality, sacrifices that are not the less painful because they are necessary.

“My family has undertaken to negotiate a marriage for me, which will assure me a certain and brilliant future; and matters have proceeded so far that I cannot oppose myself to the arrangement without offending a powerful and respectable family, compromising my own, and causing grave inconveniences, inconveniences which you would be the first to deplore.

“I believe that you will understand the necessity of my establishing myself in life, and will feel neither surprised nor pained. I am equally persuaded, having noticed for a long time how unhappy you seemed at my side, and how little pleasure my presence gave you, that you will not miss me. It may be that another already occupies in your heart the

“Adieu. It is likely that we may not meet again; but, believe me, I shall never forget you; and, if I can serve you in any way, command me.”

“Well,” asked the woman, eagerly, “does he say anything about coming?”

“No,” answered Lucia, with the tears raining down her cheeks, “he says that he is not coming.”

Lucia did not feel for Gallardo that which can properly be called love; but, during four years, her naturally affectionate heart had attached itself to him, and could not but be wounded by the cold insensibility with which he had abandoned her.

The harpy’s face, manner, and tone changed at once; for this grief confirmed her suspicions. Lucia’s lover had cast her off.

“Madam,” she said, “certain exigencies, in which I unfortunately find myself, have obliged me to introduce a rule into my house, requiring my boarders to pay in advance. All the rest have agreed to it, and I trust that you will do the same.”

“No, madam,” replied Lucia, “for I am going away to-morrow, and so shall have to give you only what is already due.”

The poor forsaken girl went out that night and sold her wardrobe to a pawnbroker. After satisfying her creditor, she had enough left to pay some wine-carriers for a ride upon one of their mules as far as Jerez, and from there she meant to go to Arcos on foot. At dawn, on the following morning, she passed through the Carmona gate, casting a long, sad look upon the sleeping city—the city that the Bitis serves as a page; La Giralda for insignia, and the verdure of its orange groves for adornment; the city that is at once gay as a village maiden and imposing as a queen; beautiful as a young girl, and full of wisdom and memories as a matron; graceful as the Andalusian of to-day, and chaste and noble as the Castilian dame of olden time.

Lucia found herself in Jerez alone and without resource, but, by favor of her good angel, met Uncle Bartolo at the inn where she alighted. The visible presence of the former would not have rejoiced her more than did the sight of this old friend of her family, to whom she told the whole of her sad story, adding that now she knew not what to do, since she dared not seek even a servant’s place.

“My daughter,” said the old guerilla, “you grew vain in the fiend’s own house of Leona, and forgot that wings were given to the ant for its destruction. If you had shown that wretch a repulsive face, he would not have ventured to do what he did. What motive, will you tell me, could a You Sir have for playing clucking fox to a little country girl, but to make of her a mark for shame?

“However,” he continued, seeing that Lucia’s tears began to flow, “far be it from me to hack at the fallen tree, or double the burden of the ass that is down. The baptism of repentance opens the fold, and your repentance is sincere, because you return to poverty, when, if you had chosen otherwise, profligates would not have been wanting, in the great city, to complete your ruin. Come with me, and I will talk to Lucas. It is his duty to take care of you.”

“He will never forgive me, Uncle Bartolo!” exclaimed Lucia sadly. “He has said that he had no sister, and no one can make him say the contrary.”

La Leona. But this is another thing, for, notwithstanding that your father did so badly, Lucas has turned out well. And it is a great deal easier to yoke two that are united by blood than to unyoke two that the devil has united. We will see, God helping us, and, in the meantime, you shall come to my house; there is no great abundance, but good-will is not wanting.”

The next day saw Uncle Bartolo and Lucia travelling along the road which we described at the commencement of our story; Lucia mounted upon a little ass, and the agile good old man following on foot. At nightfall they reached Arcos.

Alas! for the one who, returning to his native place, instead of experiencing pure happiness, feels his heart torn by grief and shame; finds his parents dead, the house where he was born the property of strangers, and sees, in the looks of neighbors, cold disdain instead of the joyful smile of recognition and welcome!

Uncle Bartolo took Lucia to his own house, and, while they were preparing supper, went himself to that of Lucas, who, on receiving his discharge, had returned to Arcos and to his post among the day-laborers, and had, by his aptness and diligence, won so much credit that several profitable jobs and positions had already been offered him. As will be supposed, he had found his father’s house sold. But as his kinswoman still lived in it, he hired his former habitation, and she assisted him.

Uncle Bartolo entered, just as Lucas had finished his supper.

“Sit by, Uncle Bartolo,” said the young man.

“No, thank you. May what you have taken profit you! Will you have a cigar?”

“It wouldn’t come amiss.”

Uncle Bartolo handed Lucas a paper cigar, lighted his own, and, with characteristic bluntness, plunged into his subject.

“Lucas, man, will you tell me why you never speak of your sister? Does it appear to you that a sister is a patch sewed on to be ripped at pleasure?”

Lucas, disagreeably surprised, contracted his brows as he answered:

“I have no sister, Uncle Bartolo.”

“What! what do you say?”

“I have already said it. ‘In my manse they bestow but one loaf.’”

“Go a-walking with your grand talk! I’d like to know what right you have to deny your sister, even though her life has not been what it ought to be?”

Lucas had turned pale, and his beard trembled with repressed indignation.

“Uncle Bartolo,” he replied, affecting an air of indifference, “the saying is, ‘He that goes away is not counted.’ Let us drop this conversation.”

“I don’t feel disposed to; you may as well understand that. And now, let me tell you that this face of a judge, though it may be the correct one to show to a sinner, is not by any means the one to show to a penitent. Do you comprehend? Your poor little sister is penitent; and you know that

“I have said that I had no sister.”

“Don’t be stubborn, for God’s sake! Look here now, soul of an ape! How can you say you have no sister, if he has given you one? Lucas, I have come, and I shall not go away until you forgive Lucia.”

“You are your father’s own son—the one and the other harder-headed than oxen. Juan Garcia and Lucas Garcia: there’s a pair fit for a cart!”

“Why fall upon me, sir, in such a shower of sarcasms? Is it necessary to give so many punches to say that the bull is coming?”

“Because he comes with a purpose, and, ‘when things come with a purpose, more than the ass may fall to the ground.’ I tell you only the pure truth, and you, with your devil’s motto of ‘few words and bad ones,’ what you say has neither form nor sense! But to come back to the subject, for I don’t let go the handle this way when I am defending the right. As I was going to say, your stubbornness is worse than your father’s; because it is not so bad to be determined upon marrying one’s girl as to be determined not to forgive one’s sister. It’s better to do more than your duty than to do less. If your father lacked puncto, you have half a share too much. Your mother committed your sister to you; and you are disobeying the last will of her that bore you!”

“She committed my sister to me, but not the kept miss of a villain.”

“You are soaring as the eagle, which is a royal bird; you pronounce your sentences like a judge of the Audiencia, and make yourself believe that you are wiser than the Regency. But you are greatly out of the way, my son. It ill becomes you to go before God in casting out your sister; your own mother’s daughter, when her misfortune was partly your fault.”

“Mine, sir?”

“Yes, yours; for you threw off the burden like an untamed colt; cast behind you the trust you received from your mother, and, without commending yourself either to God or the devil, shouldered your gun and made off; knowing that for six years, walled up in a uniform, you must lose sight of your charge; knowing, besides, that you were leaving her in a house where wickedness was well established. And so what happened, happened. The past is past, and can’t be mended now; but after this, do you think it is right, Christian, that your sister should have no one to turn to when she leaves her sinful life?”

“She ought to have remembered in time that every uphill has its down.”

“But, my son, is not this to

This is to have bowels of a pagan toward a poor creature that they pushed and pushed—a child that did not know what they were doing.”

“Uncle Bartolo, ignorance does not take away sin.”

“Do you think, if you had had your evil hour—suppose it for instance, only—and had robbed or done something that had dishonored you, and had gone to your sister, that she would refuse to own you? I’ll be bound she wouldn’t!”

“Well, I should have acted badly. But the case is impossible, for it would have been my care not to put myself in her way. ‘He that touches his own with his leprosy, gives it to them, and does not cure himself.’”

“Lucas, my son, the sentence says, ‘Act with good intention, and not with passion!’”

“And the proverb says that ‘blood boils without fire,’ Uncle Bartolo.”

“Lucas, for the love of the Blessed Virgin! How can he who shows no mercy hope for the mercy of

“You are wasting words, Uncle Bartolo. Even if I am condemned for it, I will not hear that vile thing spoken of, and so—stop!”

“Go to, then, Cain!” exclaimed the good old man as he rose to leave, “and God set a mark on you as he did on the cruel brother that he cursed! I’d rather have her, with her sin and her repentance, than you, with your virtue and your pride.”

To paint the grief of the wretched Lucia when Uncle Bartolo informed her of the no-result of his mission, would be impossible.

“Holy God!” she exclaimed between her sobs, “only with thee shall I find mercy! Ah! how I loved this brother in the days of my happy childhood, when I was innocent, and he was all my consolation! Then he could not do enough to please me, and used to swear never to abandon me!”

“Come, come, dry your tears, my daughter,” said Uncle Bartolo. “‘The frightened partridge is the first to get skewered.’ What do you want of an unnatural, without bowels of compassion? You have me, and the roof of my house is not so small that it cannot shelter you. What I have you shall share, and you can help my poor Josefa. She has become a potsherd, and don’t get much rest, for ‘woman’s work is done and to be done again.’”

When the other inmates of the house slept, Lucia kept lonely vigil, and wept the things that had formerly made her happiness—her poverty, her innocence, and her brother’s affection. Wandering in the vast field of her recollections, she found both affliction and consolation in recalling all the particulars of her simple life; every proof of tenderness that she had received from her brother; every hope, withered or dead. With the deepening silence and shadows of the night, her anguish increased. “What shall I do? What shall I do?” she cried, wringing her hands. “I cannot be a burden to this good old man! I cannot stay in this neighborhood, for my own brother’s rejection of me will encourage others to outrage me! What shall I do? I must beg if I cannot find work! Where shall I go? Wherever God may lead me!”

Without waiting for daylight, and silently, in order that her departure might not be perceived by her protector, Lucia opened the door, and stepped into the street.

But she could not leave, for ever, a place so dear to her, without lingering for a moment before the adjacent house. It was the one in which her mother died; its roof had sheltered her tranquil infancy: in it she was leaving the brother that she still loved, in spite of her guilt and his inhumanity.

Lucas was not asleep. Exasperation, a disquieted conscience, and heavy heart had driven repose from him.

All at once, he was startled by the tones of a sweet and tremulous voice near to the street door, singing the romance that he had taught his sister

The voice sang:

Struggling with mingled emotions of rage and grief, Lucas seated himself upon his couch, and beat upon the ground with his feet.

The voice, becoming all the while more low and quivering, proceeded:

The brother’s heart was choking him, yet, still resisting, he covered his now tear-stained face with both hands. But when the voice, broken by sobs, continued,

he rushed to the door, and, dashing it open, ran out; and Lucia, with a cry of joy, threw herself into his extended arms.

The next day, Uncle Bartolo remarked to his wife:

“When the devil enters into one, he locks all the doors behind him. But until the last hour, his divine Majesty keeps a postern open in the sinner’s heart.”

THE LIQUEFACTION OF THE BLOOD OF ST. JANUARIUS.

NO. III.

It is narrated that the liquid blood has been known to solidify instantly, whenever the reliquary passed into the hands of a particular canon, in his turn of office, to be presented by him to the people, or when certain persons approached to venerate and kiss it, and would as quickly liquefy again when they withdrew. A notorious case is mentioned by the Bollandists, and by other authorities, of a prince, whose name, for family reasons, was not given—for the matter was published in his lifetime. At his approach the liquid blood used to become solid. His personal character left no doubt on the minds of the Neapolitans why this happened.

We have already spoken of the notable differences of color, on various days, or parts of the same day. The diary registers them as bright, beautiful, vermilion, rubicund, or as dense or dark, or blackish, or ash-colored, or, again, pale or yellowish. Sometimes the whole mass was of

Again, the liquid blood is sometimes quite quiescent, yielding, indeed, to every movement of the ampulla, as water would, but when the ampulla is at rest on its stand, remaining in it as tranquil as water, with a level and smooth surface, and without the least indication of internal movement. Yet often it gives forth a froth or foam, which covers a part or all of the surface, which stains the glass dark or vermilion, and the remains or traces of which may be noticed on the mass when indurated afterwards; that is, if this foaming has continued until a solidification on the altar, or until the reliquary is locked up in the evening. Very often this foaming will cease after lasting half-an-hour or an hour. Its ending and disappearance is as fitful as its beginning.

Sometimes the motion is greater, and of a different character—an ebullition or boiling, as the Italians call it. Portions of the liquid blood are thrown up a quarter of an inch, or more. Sometimes this bubbling has been very violent, some of the liquid being thrown up into the neck of the ampulla to the very top.

On December 16, 1717, it is recorded that, before the liquefaction took place, and while the blood was still hard and solid, “an exhalation was seen to rise from the hard mass, like to a little cloud, and to ascend to the top of the neck.” On 24th September, 1725, “the blood was taken out hard, and immediately liquefied; and three or four times, of itself, it moved round in a circle within the ampulla, although the ampulla was then in its place on the altar, and motionless.”

It is needless to cite any more of the thousand-and-one items of such character scattered through the diary. They all show the sincerity and good faith of the writers, and the care with which the minutest facts were observed, and accurately recorded on the day of their occurrence.

Next to the occurrence of the liquefaction, the most important fact, in our judgment, is the frequent change of volume which the mass undergoes while liquid. We say while liquid, for we do not discover, either in the diary or in our researches elsewhere, any indication of such a change taking place while the blood is in its solid condition. But, while liquid, such changes are so frequent and so great that the diary, as we saw, noticed their absence or quasi-absence, during one octave, as something remarkable. The blood is said to be at its ordinary or normal level when it fills about four-fifths of the space in the ampulla, or vial. It has been known to sink below this, but very rarely. Ordinarily it is oscillating in volume, sometimes reaching the neck, or entering it so high as to leave only a thread of light, or even filling the neck up to where it enters the mass of soldering. The extreme distance between the two levels is about an inch and a half, and the volume must increase over twenty per cent. in order to rise from the ordinary level so as to fill completely the ampulla. The days are comparatively rare when in un colpo, in un tratto.

These ordinary oscillations or changes of volume, which occur at any time, may be looked on as the usual and minor form of one general and striking trait or mode of action. When the increase is carried to its utmost extent, the vial is seen to be completely filled; and this fulness, in turn, presents many variations to be studied. We may divide them into two classes. The first embraces all those cases in which the fulness terminates, and the blood commences to diminish in volume, at any time before the close of the octave; we may call these completed periods. The second embraces all those in which the fulness continues to the end, so that, on the last day of the octave, the blood is replaced in its closet still completely filling the ampulla; these we call incomplete periods.

To the prior class belong, first, all those many instances in which the blood swelled up and filled the ampulla and commenced to sink again in volume on the same day, whether after a few moments or after several hours of fulness. Again, the diary records three cases in which it so rose one day and sank the next; four cases in which it rose one day and sank the second day after, keeping the ampulla completely full for the entire intermediate day; six cases in which there were two such intermediate days; two with three, and four with four such intermediate days of complete fulness. We have thus nineteen cases recorded in the diary, to which we should add, perhaps, an equal number for the first category. A complete period, so to call it, of the fulness may vary, therefore, from a few moments to five consecutive days.

The second class comprises ninety-four instances of fulness opened and not completed during the octave. The varieties in these are even greater than in the former class. In nineteen cases the fulness, or, at least, its last phase, commenced on the closing day; in five cases, on the day before; in nine, on the third last day; in eleven, on the fourth; and in twenty-two on the fifth day, counting from the closing of the octave; in twenty-six cases, the fulness began on the sixth day; and in two cases, as far back as the seventh day, counting from the close of the octave. We have here twenty-eight of these incomplete periods, longer than the longest of the closed or complete periods, just mentioned, still further complicating any question as to the lengths of these periods of fulness.

Whenever, during an octave, the ampulla is locked up at night full, it will be found full the next morning. When it is locked up at the close of an octave in that state, it will be found in the same at the first opening of the next celebration, months afterwards. We said that the mass changed its volume only when in a fluid condition. We may now venture to add that such changes take place only in public, and never while the blood is closed up in the closet, or armoire. In examining the diary very carefully, we find that, in the vast majority of cases, the level of the mass as stated when taken out—whether it be at the ordinary level, or somewhat elevated, or very high, or full—perfectly agrees with the level at which it was

These ninety-four unclosed periods were, therefore, prolonged to the next festival, when the ampulla was taken out still full. Some of these periods had just commenced on the last day; others had lasted six full days after the day of their commencement. Is there any marked difference in their closing? Not in the day; for they all, with three exceptions, closed on the first day of the incoming octave, if they had run over to May or September, or on December 16, if that was the next exposition. In regard to time, there is no rule. The most numerous class, containing twenty-six instances, varied from immediately to nine hours and a half; nine times the liquefaction occurred in less than one hour, and nine times it delayed more than three hours—the other eight times it lay between the two. The twenty-two cases of the next highest class present the same diversities of time, from immediately to nine hours and a half. Nine instances were under an hour, eight were over three hours, the remaining five lay between the two divisions.

The more those periods of fulness are examined, the more clearly does it appear that they follow no system, and can be classified or accounted for by no law. We see the mass swelling and increasing its volume and filling the ampulla, and continuing to fill it for some moments, or hours, or days. We can note the facts; but why this increase? why does it rise so high? why to-day, and not yesterday, or to-morrow? why so long, or not longer? Physical science is as utterly unable to answer these questions as it is to assign a cause for the liquefaction itself, or for the various and varying phases of the blood of St. Januarius.

As was stated in our preceding article, the Neapolitans hold that the proximity of the relics of the head and the reliquary with the vials of the blood to each other, is ordinarily the sufficient and determining cause of the liquefaction. Their whole ritual of the expositions is based upon this principle. The separation of the relics, or their quasi-separation, by a veil thrown over the reliquary of the blood, is ordinarily sufficient to terminate the liquefaction and to indurate the blood anew. But, on the other hand, the diary records a number of instances in which the blood, having been found hard, liquefied at once, even before the reliquary was placed near the bust. Several times, too, it has liquefied in the streets, while carried aloft in the afternoon procession of the vigil in May towards Santa Chiara or a seggia, although the bust had already been carried thither in the forenoon. So, too, a liquefaction, partially commenced in the Tesoro chapel or in the cathedral, has often continued or been completed during the outdoor procession through the streets, on the festival of the patronage, in December.

Another cause or condition, perhaps as important as the proximity of the relics, is, in our judgment, the strong faith and the earnest devotion of the attendants—a faith and devotion in which the Neapolitans, clergy and people, are not surpassed. It Il miracolo era bellissimo. The devout strangers to whom the favor was granted brought to it faith and piety. On the few occasions when it was tardy—on none did it entirely fail—there may have been too strong an ingredient of mere profane curiosity. Kings, and princes, and nobles of high worldly standing have often visited Naples, and sometimes sought and obtained this favor of an extraordinary exposition of the relics in their presences, that, apart and with less danger of any intrusion on their personal dignity or comfort, and in the company of their chosen attendants only, they might have an opportunity of witnessing the miracle at their ease. This was the length of their privilege. As for the liquefaction itself, they had to wait as others waited, and, perhaps, because they did not pray as others prayed, they were sometimes disappointed.

In 1702, Philip V., King of Spain, to whom Naples was then subject, visited the city, reaching it on the afternoon of Easter Sunday. On Easter Tuesday, April 18, he was present at a Pontifical High Mass celebrated in the cathedral. After that long ceremony, his majesty passed into the Tesoro chapel, where there was to be a special exposition of the relics, that he might venerate them and might witness the liquefaction. “The blood was brought out hard; four Masses were celebrated in succession (about two hours); but the saint was not pleased to work it. The king departed, and the Masses continued. At the sixth Mass, and as the king had entered his carriage at the cathedral door, the blood liquefied. The king returned at 22 o’clock, and kissed the relics in the hands of his eminence in the Tesoro.”

However, the diary mentions that he did witness the liquefaction itself at the next regular day in May, with all the people.

Other instances are given in which viceroys and nobles and princes waited until they were tired out. Soon after their departure, when the faithful and fervent people might freely crowd the chapel and pray, the liquefaction would occur.

It is impossible to exaggerate the firmness of their faith or the depth and tenacity of the affection of the Neapolitans for this their miracle. Whatever else happens to their fair city, nothing must interfere with their devotion to St. Januarius and the proper celebration of these festivals—neither wars nor pestilence, nor eruptions nor earthquakes, nor change of rulers. Once a battle raging in the streets prevented an outdoor procession. But, within the cathedral, there was a procession through the aisles and nave, and all things else went on as usual.

Oddly enough, the greatest disturber, to judge by the simple-minded writers of the diary, has been—rain. Not that the weather has any direct influence on the liquefaction or its circumstances. Quite the contrary. The blood liquefies all the same, and with as many attendant variations, whether the day be fair or rainy, whether the season be so dry that the farmers are complaining of drought, and prayers have been ordered for rain, or whether it has been raining incessantly for weeks and months, to the injury of the crops, and in the churches they are praying for fair weather; in summer, when the sun is pouring down his almost tropical beams; and in winter, when the procession is confined to the cathedral because it is too cold to go

But at Naples they sometimes have terrible deluges of rain—steady downpourings such as one may witness only within or close to the tropics. Sometimes these have come on just at the hour to interfere with the grand afternoon procession of the vigil in May, forbidding it, or ludicrously disarranging it, and forcing monks, friars, priests, seminarians, canons, and people alike to break the ranks and seek immediate shelter in the neighboring shops and houses. However, come what might, at the worst, his eminence, or the highest ecclesiastical dignitary present, with a few attendants of waterproof hearts, would carry the relic, in a sedan chair or a carriage, it might be, to the appointed place. Is it not all punctually set down in the diary; at what corner, or in what street, the procession was broken up, and who then carried the relic on, and whether still on foot or in a carriage, and how many courageously accompanied him? We may be sure that on arriving at their destination they never failed to find the church, despite the rain, and despite the absence of fashionable ones, filled by devout souls, who loved their saint more than they feared even such weather.

Passages in the extracts we have made from the diary, and many other passages we might quote, indicate the feelings of alarm which fill the hearts of the Neapolitans when the liquefaction fails to occur, or is attended by circumstances which they traditionally dread. St. Januarius is their patron saint. This ever-recurring liquefaction is, in their eyes, a perpetual and miraculous sign or evidence of his care and protection. When it occurs regularly, when the liquefaction is complete and the color of the liquid blood a bright vermilion, and when there are no sudden disturbances and only slight variations of level, the Neapolitans are happy. “It is a blessed octave.” They think they have evidence that all will go well with them. If, on the contrary, the hard mass does not liquefy at all, or if the liquid blood appear turbid, dark or ash-colored, or if it rises and falls rapidly, or if it presents other unusual and sinister appearances, their hearts sink, and they are filled with alarm and anxiety. They fear that this is an indication of the displeasure of heaven, and that the chastisements they deserve for their sins may soon come on them. We once heard a learned Neapolitan enlarge on this theme, and cite various instances in the history of his city in which he showed a remarkable coincidence, at least, between such facts of the liquefactions and the occurrence of wars, pestilence, famine, and disastrous earthquakes, or of other signal chastisements from heaven. We were not sufficiently conversant with the history of Naples either to controvert his statements or to allege other facts to the contrary. It is a subject on which one might go astray, almost as easily as if he undertook to interpret the Apocalypse. But our friend professed to have the history at his finger-ends, and certainly was himself thoroughly convinced of the truth of his opinion.

Travellers are accustomed to tell amusing stories of the impatience and irreverence of the Neapolitans during the exposition, whenever there is an unusual delay in the liquefaction. They charge them with addressing the saint alternately in expressions of religious homage and of

We have been assured by many respectable clergymen of Naples, who, of course, know their own people, and often have to chide them, that there is not a word of truth in this charge.

The clergy and the laity of Naples, of all classes, learned and unlearned alike, believe most steadfastly and earnestly in the miraculous character of the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius. Many strangers who have seen it and have examined it critically have come to the same conclusion. Although the church has not spoken authoritatively on the matter, still the consensus of so many learned, intelligent, and pious persons who have so accepted it—the fact that during so many centuries it has stood the test of time, and that science has not been able to explain it away or to reproduce it artificially—and the very character of the liquefaction itself, with its attendant circumstances, so clear, so plain, and so decisive—all leave no room for reasonable doubt.

To complete our statement, we must, perhaps, go still further back, and inquire how it has come about that a portion of the blood of a Christian bishop, beheaded in the year 305, under Diocletian, and in virtue of edicts by that emperor for the suppression of Christianity, should, after the lapse of so many centuries, be now found in a glass ampulla, or vial, at Naples. To some, this primary fact may, at first sight, appear as strange and as extraordinary, if not as unaccountable, as the subsequent liquefaction itself.

To an Italian Catholic, indeed, a doubt on this head would scarcely present itself. The usages and the thoughts of his ancestors in the faith have come down to him so naturally that they form, as it were, part of his being. He thinks, and feels, and knows as his fathers did before him. In such cradle-lands of Christianity, and among a people that has never swerved from the faith since the early ages of the church, there is what we might term an inherited Catholic instinct, a readiness and a correctness of Catholic thought in religious matters, which those of other lands that received the light of Christianity only at a later period, and consequently have not such a bond of ancestral connection with the Christians of the days of persecution, can only reach by study and cultivated piety. However, even a moderate acquaintance with the usages and customs of those early ages will show in many instances that what some have considered peculiar national traits of perhaps later growth are in reality deeply rooted in the customs of those ancient times; and that many a point, often set down as a fond fancy or a singular product of superstition, is firmly established as a truth, by historical research into their records.

As we study the daily life of those early Christians, passed under circumstances so very different from those of our modern life, and strive to realize to ourselves their thoughts and aspirations, their motives and modes of action, nothing stands out in bolder relief than their exalted conception of the honor and glory of martyrdom. In the exquisite pages of Fabiola and of Callista, the learned Cardinal Wiseman and Dr. Newman have made these early Christians live again before us; and we catch some insight into their enthusiasm on this subject. To them, a martyr, dying for the faith of Christ, was—and truthfully—a hero of the highest grade. Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John xv. 13.

They could never sufficiently honor him. For, honor him as they might, all they could do would fall infinitely short of the honor which God had already bestowed on his soul in heaven, and that which he would bestow on his body in the resurrection. A martyr’s blood, in their view, stood next in rank to the blood of the Saviour.

Their daily life made martyrdom the prominent subject of their thoughts. Day after day, they saw their brethren seized, imprisoned, tortured, and put to death for the faith. Each day, any one of themselves might be seized and led to martyrdom. The greatest of all triumphs, and the surest passport to everlasting bliss, was to persevere unto the end in that conflict; the greatest of all misfortunes was to fail and renounce or deny the faith for fear of death. Each one strove to hold himself ever ready for the trial. Their pastoral injunctions; their mutual exhortations; their most precious literature—the Acta Martyrum; the ornamentation of their chapels and crypts, still visible in the frescoes of the catacombs; the site of their chosen sanctuaries, amid the tombs of their martyred brethren; the very altars at which they worshipped; the tombs of their more glorious martyrs—everything co-operated to keep alive this high esteem of martyrdom, and to stir up their hearts to courage, and even to a yearning for so glorious a crown, and so happy an ending of this life of trials and sorrow.

While a confessor of Christ, as they called him, lay still in chains, they used every means to enter the prison and to visit him—sometimes availing themselves of legal rights, sometimes under various pretexts, sometimes by bribery; when these would all fail, then by stealth and at every risk. For he was to be strengthened by the sacraments and encouraged by their words, or they were to be strengthened by his example; and especially they would not lose the opportunity of commending themselves to his prayers, and of seeking the blessing of a chosen friend of God.

When he was led forth to trial, or to torture, or to death, they would glide in among the crowd pressing around him, that he might be cheered and sustained by the sight of Christian faces or by their outspoken exhortations, and that they might catch and embalm in their hearts every courageous word of faith he spoke to his judges, to the executioners, and to themselves or to the crowd, and afterward be able to bear testimony and to record the heroic triumph of another martyr.

After his death, they spared no effort to obtain possession of his mortal remains, as of a most precious treasure. Their very earnestness on

At times this was successfully done. Often, however—even despite these orders—entreaties and bribes to the soldiers and executioners would prevail to obtain the body, or at least the fragments of it. If they failed, stratagems would be used, and persevering search made, even at great personal risk, to recover it. Very often, as the martyrologies and Acta Martyrum tell us, it was in such attempts that the Christians were discovered, apprehended, and themselves condemned as fresh victims.

When the execution was by beheading or dismemberment, or such other mode as caused the effusion of blood, the Christians were careful to gather this up in any way they could. Not unfrequently it was all they could recover. Cloths and sponges sucked it up from the hard pavement of wood or stones. The earth saturated with it was carefully gathered up and borne away, that at home and at leisure they might carefully separate the blood from the earthy matter, and place it reverently in some vase, ordinarily of glass, sometimes of earthen ware, and in a few instances of bronze. Sometimes a portion of sponge or of cloth so saturated would be kept as a precious jewel in a locket of silver or gold, and be preserved in the oratory or chapel of a Christian household, or even be reverently borne on the person. Ordinarily, however, the vials or vases into which the martyrs’ blood had been gathered, or the open vases containing the saturated sponge or the bundle of blood-stained cloths, would be placed with the body in the tomb; or the vials might be built into the masonry of the tomb, near the head, in such a way as to be partially visible from without.

The Acta Martyrum—the official records of the sufferings, death, and deposition or burial of the martyrs, written out at the time by appointed officers of the church—bear frequent testimony to the widespread existence of this custom. Other Christian writings, in prose and in poetry, refer to it frequently. We find it prevailing at Rome and in all Italy, in Carthage, in Sebaste, in Nicomedia, in Gaul, and throughout the church. It was the universal custom.

About the time when the body of St. Januarius was transported from the original tomb where it had been laid during the persecution, to the church of St. Januarius, extra muros, at Naples, similar translations of the bodies of martyrs took place elsewhere. St. Ambrose, the great Bishop of Milan, gives an account of such a ceremony for the martyrs St. Gervase and St. Protasius, and again for the martyrs St. Vitalis and St. Agricola. He mentions finding in the tombs, in both cases, the blood of the martyrs which had been gathered and placed there. St. Gaudentius, Bishop of Brixia, about the same time, mentions a similar fact. Some centuries later, the northern barbarians were making raids into remains firmly set in the mortar, and contains or is covered to some extent by a thin, dry, reddish crust adhering to it. This crust or film is all that is left of the blood the vase originally contained. Vials, or ampullæ, in the interior of the tombs are of course perfectly preserved. It is indeed interesting to look on one of them, and to mark exactly the line to which the liquid blood once reached, and the purple hue of the sediment or crust now left, with its brighter or darker shades of color, perhaps from the character of the blood, more probably from the thickness or thinness of the crust itself. Under all the accumulated evidence, one scarcely needs to read the rude inscription found and still legible, although only scratched in the mortar when it was soft: Sanguis, or Sang: Saturnini, The blood of Saturninus. We know that this is blood which once flowed from a martyr’s veins, in testimony of his faith in Christ our Lord.

In the 17th century, when Bosio, Boldetti, and others brought out such vases from the catacombs, and special attention was directed to them, the nature of this dry reddish crust adhering to the interior was examined chemically. There was no discordance in the results obtained.

Among those who made such an examination was the celebrated Leibnitz, a Protestant, among the ablest and most learned men of that age. He gives an account of his process, and the decision at which he arrived: This coloring matter on the glass is sanguineous. Some years ago, the present Pontiff, Pius IX., had a new analysis made according to the fullest and most accurate tests of modern chemistry. The answer was still the same: This substance is, so far as chemistry can decide, precisely what

It is clear that, both as to the custom of the early Christians of carefully gathering up the blood of their martyrs, of placing it in ampullæ, or vases, and religiously preserving it, and likewise as to the identification of the ampullæ themselves, the testimony is all that can be desired. Bosio, Aringhi, Boldetti, Mamachi, Gaume, Marchi, Raoul-Rochette, De Rossi, Perret—all who have studied the question, are unanimous in recognizing these numerous old Roman vials, or ampullæ, still found in the catacombs and tombs or preserved in the churches, as the identical vials, or ampullæ, so used by the ancient Christians. On this point, there remains not the slightest room for doubt.

It is therefore but reasonable that there should exist in Naples a vial, or ampulla, of the blood of St. Januarius. He was in his day a distinguished bishop of the church. His martyrdom was public, and attracted the attention of the Christians. It was by beheading. There was no conceivable reason why the Christians should omit in that instance what they were universally so careful to do in such cases. On the contrary, to judge from the ancient accounts we have of the martyrdom of St. Januarius and his six companions, the Christians found no extraordinary difficulty in obtaining the bodies, and entombing them in their usual mode. When, eighty or ninety years later, the church had been firmly established in peace, the body of St. Januarius was taken from the original tomb and brought to Naples, as the bodies of the others were taken to the various churches which claimed them.

The very presence, therefore, of an ampulla in the custody of the church of Naples, together with the other relics of St. Januarius, is under the circumstances prima facie evidence of its own authenticity—evidence which cannot be impugned, except by attempting to overturn a well-known and universally admitted usage of the early Christian church, or else by a supposition, equally gratuitous and absurd, that the ampulla which originally was in existence, and was prized beyond measure and carefully preserved, was somehow lost, and another fraudulently substituted in its stead. We need not recur to the olden traditions of the church of Naples or its legends concerning this relic—traditions and legends found, too, we believe, among the Greeks, whose intercourse with Magna Grecia, as Southern Italy was called, was more intimate and continued longer than with any other portion of Italy. We scarcely need the testimony of Fabius Jordanus, quoted by Caraccioli, going to show that, so far back as A.D. 685, it was the custom of the clergy of Naples to bear the relics of the head.

The historical evidence in favor of the genuineness of the relic is ample and satisfactory. There would not be a moment’s hesitation on the point but for the very vain hope which some minds may entertain that, by declining to admit the genuineness of the blood, they will somehow escape the difficulties of the liquefaction. As if the liquefaction of any other substance, with all the circumstances which characterize the liquefaction at Naples, as we have set them forth in our previous articles, would not be for them as hard if not a harder nut to crack than the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius!

Having, therefore, established the genuineness of the relic, the next question which presents itself is this:

We know pretty accurately the composition of human blood. The proportions of the several ingredients going to constitute it may vary somewhat according to the health and the food of individuals. Without entering into the refined, and as yet not fully accepted results of the latest qualitative analysis, it will be sufficient to give the following table of the constituents of the healthy blood of man:

serum,869·15

Water,790·37

Albumen,67·80

Oxygen,

Nitrogen,

Carbonic acid,10·98

Extractive matters,

Salts,

Coloring matter,

clot,130·85

Fibrine,2·95

Hæmatine,2·27

Globuline,125·63

Blood globules,127·90

1,000·00 1,000·00

Water constitutes nearly four-fifths of the entire quantity. If it be driven off by evaporation, only a dry mass would remain behind.

When blood issues from the veins, it first passes through the process of coagulation, the successive steps of which have been carefully examined. Perfectly liquid as it comes out, the blood soon thickens, through the action of the fibrine it contains, into a firm, elastic, uniform, jelly-like mass. Soon drops of clear, amber-colored fluid begin to exude from the mass of jelly, and accumulate until the whole mass is divided into two parts—the serum, a transparent, nearly colorless fluid, in which there floats the clot, or crassamentum, a firm, red and opaque mass. In time, the clot is further divided. The fibrine is seen at top, forming a layer of considerable consistence, soft, elastic, tenacious, and of a yellowish white color; the under portion, consisting of the heavier parts of the clot which have gradually settled down to that position, is a red mass, made up chiefly of the blood globules.

Further exposure would by degrees eliminate the aqueous portion by evaporation, and the progress of decomposition would tend to free the gases in the other constituents, and thus still further to diminish the mass. But no experiments, instituted by physicists, can compare, in time at least, with the instances presented to us in the vases of the catacombs. There, traces on the glass still show clearly to what level the blood, or at least the clot, originally reached; and we see what has remained after a lapse of sixteen hundred years—a crust of dry reddish powder adhering to and coating the sides and bottom of the vessel.

Boldetti, however, mentions three instances in which such ampullæ were found in the catacombs containing a residuum of the blood still thick and slightly liquid. And, if we are not mistaken, something similar may be seen in some other vials preserved here and there, and held to contain a portion of the blood of certain martyrs.

The early Christians of Italy gave up the old Roman custom of incremation, or burning the bodies of the dead, and adopted instead the Eastern rite of sepulture. In some instances, at least, they seem to have used spices and ointments, as the

Something may be due, also, to the mode in which they would sometimes close a narrow-necked vessel of glass. When it had received its contents, the glass of the neck would be heated, probably by the flame of a blowpipe, until it became soft and pliable. The sides would then be pressed together until they coalesced and became united, thus obliterating the orifice; or else molten glass would be carefully dropped on the lips of the mouth, until the whole was entirely coated over and perfectly closed. When either was followed and the work was done perfectly, the ampulla would be, in fact, hermetically sealed. The air would thus be excluded, and evaporation nearly arrested. Placed in a loculus or grave in the dry earth of the catacombs, twenty-five or thirty-five feet beneath the surface of the earth, the ampulla would also be subjected to an ever-equable temperature of about 58° Fahr. Under such circumstances, especially if we admit the presence of some antiseptic ingredient, it may be possible that decomposition would be very slow. But, after all, the glass sides of these ampullæ are thin, and glass is porous, and sixteen centuries is a very long time. Even were the sides far thicker than they are, evaporation would have slowly taken place, the gaseous products of decomposition would have gradually passed through into the outer atmosphere, and only the dry solid residuum would be left, as we ordinarily find it in the ampullæ from the catacombs. The case of the ampulla containing the blood of St. Januarius is not open to these doubts. We are not able to say, indeed, whether it was actually closed in either of the modes we have indicated. As it stands in the present reliquary, of which we have given an account, the mouth enters so deeply into the upper mass of soldering within the case that the eye cannot discover the manner of closure. Before it was placed in this reliquary, five hundred and seventy or seven hundred and thirty years ago, this could probably have been seen; but we have found no record throwing light on the subject. We presume it was done in one or the other of the modes we have described. It is certainly so tightly closed that not a drop of the liquid blood within has ever been known to ooze out.

But this ampulla has not been lying in the low and equable temperature of an underground vault of the catacombs. It has been preserved in the upper and variable atmosphere of a city, subject for many centuries to the excessive heats of almost tropical summers, and to the cold winds that blow down at times from mountains covered with snow. By no law of physics could a mass of blood so

That the larger ampulla should, on the contrary, have lost nothing in the volume of its contents—that it should still be four-fifths filled, although for centuries exposed, as we have said, to heat and cold—that this general permanence of bulk and of character should be maintained, although eighteen or twenty times a year the mass alternates from a solid to a fluid condition, and passes through many subordinate changes of color and volume—these facts seem to us not only utterly inexplicable, but directly contrary to all we know of physical laws. We place them along side the grand fact of the liquefaction itself, as being in some measure its characteristic concomitants. Still, should any one deem these questions too obscure to be peremptorily decided, we shall not now discuss them. We are quite willing to let them stand or fall with the more prominent and important and more tangible question of the liquefaction itself. Of that we shall now proceed to treat.

THE WAYSIDE SPRING.

FROM THE FRENCH OF ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE.

VALENTINE.

FROM THE REVUE DU MONDE CATHOLIQUE.

I.

“Frankly, my dear friend, tell me, is she not charming? Does she not lend a certain grace to her white dress, and a brilliancy to her blue ribbons? Is she not the prettiest flower in my garden?”

“And my Alfred, dear Madame de Guers, does he not look well by her side? Are there many young men in our village who appear to such advantage near this fair and graceful darling, now in the flower of her youth?”

“What you say is true, my friend. We have both of us, thank God, fine children—noble, virtuous, and good; and I hope they will be happy.”

“They will make a very handsome couple, at all events,” concluded M. Maubars, rubbing his hands and smiling contentedly.

Thus spoke two old friends, as they sat quietly, one summer evening, in the shadow of the hop-vines of a pretty green arbor, and talked away in this simple, lively, and joyous manner, while they observed their children as they appeared here and there in the garden-walks.

When people have passed fifty, and known each other since they went to the same school in childhood, and during the long succeeding years have resided pretty much in the same place, they are very apt, when talking together, to speak openly from their hearts, especially if those hearts are filled to the brim and running over with justifiable paternal pride and motherly tenderness. noise”—this his precise and solemn declaration. The little Valentine seemed to understand what was expected of her, and, though stirring, vigorous, and lively, rarely a rent was seen in her little Indian silk, never a spot on her red lips nor her cherubic forehead. When she happened to fall, she smothered her sobs and cries; when she remembered the past, she wept low for her mother—and all this not to displease the old gentleman, shut up in his close parlor, where he contemplated with astonishment mingled with pity and respect his two unfortunate legs—done up in flannel. Time, childhood, and natural gaiety combining, the little girl began even to find herself perfectly happy in this old house, where she was cherished, and nothing left undone for her needs, her games, or her repose.

Need we say that her adopted mother was happy? At the end of the long nights of want of sleep and suffering that she passed with the ill and impatient old man, she ran for a moment to the little chamber above, and watched the sweet pet, with brown eyes and rosy cheeks, as she woke to her morning’s happiness; she felt the dear little round arms press her neck, the sweet tender lips imprinted on her own, and she thanked God for this blessing. The little toilet made, and the breakfast over, she carried down-stairs happiness enough for half-a-day. Later, when her voice trembled at the end of some long lecture, or her arms were wearied at some endless rubbing, she looked out the window, saw the little one disporting in the sun, playing hide-and-seek among the lilacs, or smiling to her from amidst the roses, and, at this sight, it seemed her cup of joy was full, that the spring light played even in the sick man’s chamber, and for the time she forgot

From this moment, Madame de Guers gave Valentine all her time, her heart, her cares, her tenderness. I leave you to imagine how such precious gifts, with the aid of years, added to everything lovely and noble in the child. Of all the young girls of C——, Valentine at eighteen was not only one of the most beautiful, but, better still, the best, the simplest, the most tender, the humblest, the most joyous, and the best loved: the most ill-natured of the citizens could not refuse her their homage, and her adopted mother loved her to excess and with pride and delight; M. Maubars, too, the oldest friend of the house, and his son, the elegant Alfred, saw in her perfection a treasure, and their united wonder. Then at eighteen the future is so beautiful, the horizon so pure, dreams so sweet, and friends so tender! How happy, then, was our Valentine at this moment, when, joyous under the eyes of her mother, gay and confiding in the presence of her future husband, and gracious and pretty as she always was in her simple and quiet toilet, she wandered hither and thither in the garden, breathing the air, gathering the flowers, and breaking from the trees the large snow-balls that shed their petals on her lustrous brown hair.

We do not know exactly what Alfred and Valentine were talking about in the garden-walk, as running from side to side to form their bouquet they chanced so often to meet. But, under the arbor, they were more grave, calmer, and certainly more mature, and they spoke of business.

“If you will permit it, my dear friend, I should like the young couple to live in my house,” said M. Maubars. “It is, I may say, without vanity, one of the most comfortable and best furnished in the town. As to me, you know, I am becoming a monk, or a bear, or a house-rat. The rolling of the half-dozen coaches and the three or four cabs our town possesses is sufficient to trouble my digestion, and almost deafens me; so I think, in order to plant my cabbages in peace, I had better lodge in the pavilion of my large garden at Vaux, which is not more than a league from the town. My good old Baptistine will accompany me, and keep the pot boiling. Every evening the children can come and see me, that is, every fine evening; and you can have them right by you—nothing to do but cross the street, and walk a few steps on the quay, ring the little bell, the latch will fly up, and there will be Valentine in a clean dress and red ribbon coming to meet you, for her delicate hearing would distinguish your step among a thousand others on the same pavement.”

“Poor dear child! I don’t want to be selfish, and yet it is hard to part with her,” murmured Madame de Guers, while stifling a sigh.

“Do you call that parting with her, when I tell you she will be right under your eye? And then, my dear friend, I must tell you you have become very worldly of late. You are obliged to accompany Valentine to this and that soirée, and it fatigues you, absorbs and puts you out altogether. When it comes my

“Alas, yes! poor good old people!” replied the respectable lady, with a sweet smile. “Yet every morning, after Mass, I stop to see them. True, my child monopolizes much of the time I should give to them, but she loves them too: she has so excellent a heart! How often I have seen her, when quite a child, take from her weekly allowance to buy jujube for old Manou, who has catarrh so badly, and tobacco for Périne, whose happiness is in smoking! And how she takes care of them when necessary, my friend! How merry she makes them, and consoles them, and reads them good books, and the Scripture she explains so prettily! In truth, this humble work will not perish with me: I have some one to whom I can confide it.”

This demands an explanation. Madame de Guers was not only an excellent, tender, and devoted mother, a constant and generous friend, but she was, at the same time, profoundly pious and sincerely charitable. The death of M. de Guers had left in her soul a bitter and secret sorrow, which she had never been able to console. The former lieutenant of the service, in spite of the solicitations and tears of his Christian and devoted wife, had bid farewell to this world in a manner far from exemplary, dying, without doubt, peaceably and bravely enough, but without repentance, without hope, without penitence, neither fixing his eyes on the cross nor listening to the absolution of the curé. So, for the poor, tender soul of the wife there remained a gnawing regret, a continual terror, and at the price of any austerities, of any sacrifices, she wished to secure the eternal salvation of this obstinate husband. God only knows what mortifications she practised in secret, to gain a little every day towards the tender and sublime end she proposed; and, above all, she openly redoubled her works of fervor and charity. A part of the money left her by her husband had been employed by her in a house of refuge, where ten or twelve old, infirm women, the very poorest of the department, could live comfortably and in peace until the end of their days, and at the low price of reciting every day from their bench in the chapel a prayer for the repose and salvation of the soul of Jean Louis de Guers, former officer of the king’s fleet. We said before that Madame de Guers had given Valentine all her heart, her time, and her life: we should, nevertheless, have remarked that she reserved a portion for the poor old recluses of her little hospital, not finding it a difficult matter to reconcile, in her humble and peaceable existence, happiness and duty, charity and love.

“My dear old pensioners,” she said again, while regarding from a distance her charming adopted daughter, who smiled on her from amidst the shady trees, “they will be truly happy to find after me this dear child, who will, I am sure, possess the courage and strength to replace me. Good little Valentine! she has already given them, in my name, a portion of her heart, and to do so she needs to be as generous as in truth she is, for I could have given a much more brilliant heritage to this dear child had I not already adopted my old people. Her mother, alas! died without fortune, and for me, I have still remaining forty

“Well, well, my dear friend, don’t trouble yourself. The whole will amount to sixty thousand francs, at the lowest figure. Valentine is treasure enough in herself, and don’t need any more.”

“A treasure! Yes, indeed, you have spoken the truth!” replied the noble woman, fixing on her interlocutor a look radiant with joy, happiness, and confidence; “and as you make me so happy, my brave Maubars, in speaking as you do, I am not ashamed to confess I have often thought—have often feared—well, don’t blame me; nothing, you know, is so restless and timid as a mother—I have feared that a dowry so small could not respond to the legitimate views of a young man like Alfred, who can aspire to the best match in the country. I dare not tell you how this secret doubt has tortured my heart. It would have been so painful, so frightful to think that my want of foresight might have prepared so bitter a disappointment for my dearly loved Valentine.”

“And who speaks of disappointment, cowardly mamma that you are?” replied M. Maubars, with the good hearty laugh of the retired successful merchant. “Of course I do not mean that any dowry is to be despised, and, I will add, if this were larger, it were so much the better. But the moment that the question is between it and you and Valentine, Alfred and I will accept what you have in all confidence. Let there be no more mention of these things between us any more than there is just now in the conversation of that happy couple smiling and babbling among the roses.”

“How good you are, Maubars,” replied the adopted mother with a sigh of relief. “Assuredly,” she continued with a sweet and mischievous smile, “I am very sure that it is not with dowry or business that they are entertaining themselves just now.”

This you may be assured of, my readers, for, just then, Valentine, spreading into a sweet smile her fine and delicate lips, while her brilliant eyes sparkled above the cheeks as rounded and satiny as the petals of her roses, said to her partner, who was coming toward her:

“You had better believe me, Mr. Alfred. We will not go to Paris. Paris is very far off, and it costs a great deal to go there. But we will go every evening and see dear papa in his little pavilion at Vaux. Won’t it be charming to do just as we did when we were little, ten years ago, just us two alone, you and I, running through the ruts and the fields, gathering the new hay and the herbs covered with dew?”

And the simple child, clapping her white hands, gently smiled still more joyously at the innocent, truant projects with which she proposed to inaugurate their future housekeeping. Then, Alfred having offered his arm, she accepted it a moment in order to adjust with her young intended some other detail of great importance, which she must tell her mamma immediately—mamma holding her breath meanwhile, hearing vaguely the murmur of the wind in the arbor and smiling with tenderness as her child approached.

“Mamma,” cried Valentine, throwing her arms around her mother’s neck, and with a caressing and infantine movement mingling the waves of her lustrous hair with the fine, heavy gray curls, “did you not say that the anniversary of your birth would come in two weeks, the second of next

“Yes, my darling,” replied Madame de Guers gently.

“Very well, dear mamma, it is all arranged; we will exchange our rings on the same day that gave me so dear a mamma. But have you decided anything about the invitations?”

“I have at least thought of them, my child. We will have, I think, the greater part of those of our own society, and especially, you understand, all your young friends.”

“Yes, just as you wish. But is it to be only for the evening, dear mamma?”

“Ah! my little ambitious one wishes to give a whole day to her fête.”

“Indeed I do, mamma; I have dreamed of it even, so I may as well confess. I want particularly in the morning to have those I invite al to myself; I will receive them, lodge them, and serve them with my own hands. O mamma! it will be so nice, in the shady part of the garden, among the flowers, to set the long tables, and have an excellent breakfast, good wine, cakes, a roast, and Pierrot the violinist with his violin, and the baskets all filled with flowers! And my guests will be so surprised, and so pleased, my dear good mamma!”

“But who are they, then?”

“Your old women, dear mamma.”

Madame de Guers’s response was to take the pretty brown head of the charming child in her trembling hands, and to press it tenderly and long upon her lips, while a gentle shivering of admiration and love made her heart beat.

“It is said,” she replied at last; “the table shall be set for fifteen, and there shall be cakes and violins, and wine and flowers. You shall serve them, my child, and my old people will believe they are at the wedding.”

Then, as the first stars began to dot the pure sky, and the happy and united group rose to leave the perfumed shelter of the garden, Madame de Guers, more joyous and prouder than ever, held back on purpose to let the young people pass before her, while she whispered in the ear of her old friend, who was philosophically taking in the whole scene:

“My good Maubars, did you not say, just now, my Valentine is a treasure?”

II.

Two weeks afterward, the air being of the softest, and the sky most radiant, Valentine received with great joy and pomp her morning guests on this the day of her betrothal. Everything passed conformably to the announced programme: the large table was ornamented and covered with a long white cloth; the light wine of the country filled the glasses; the cakes appeared large and gilded; and the roast was cooked to perfection. At this succulent and cordial banquet the twelve old women arranged themselves in order, and Valentine waited on them, cutting up the mutton in rosy slices, distributing the pieces of cake with her pretty little white hand, upon which shone the golden ring, with its blue stone, that Alfred had sent her that morning to wear until she took the other that would enchain her for life. The poor old gossips feasted with a good heart, and laughed as they tippled, their glasses tumbling against each other; while the sparrows, somewhat ousted, piped in the branches, astonished at so much noise, then dropped gently to the earth to peck at the crumbs of cake

You can judge of the gratitude and general joy.

“God will take you to his holy paradise, good and beautiful young lady!” said mother Périne, as she received from the hands of the pretty child her third slice of mutton.

“What are you saying there, mother Périne?” cried Babet, her usual antagonist. “What kind of wish is that you are making? Better hope for Miss Valentine, as for many others, that paradise will come as late as possible, and that here the dear good young lady will become a great and good matron, and enjoy herself as much as she can in this world.”

“True enough,” said Manou, “for there is the scraping of the violin; and just listen to that pretty gavotte! Oh! in those days when I was but twenty, how I hopped about like a young goat at the first note of the music. Dear me! Miss Valentine, how this good wine makes you young again, and puts the gaiety into you! I do believe, if Pierrot begins that flourish once more, I shall jump up and dance a minuet in your honor.”

So Valentine laughed, and the other old women applauded, and Manou fluttered about in true dancing style. Madame de Guers herself, who was rarely gay, wiped away a joyous tear from her eyes, while a tender and proud smile spread over her countenance. There was only the very, very old Genevieve, who could not laugh, because she had lost her five sons and grown blind in weeping for them. But, with her old wrinkled hand, she had groped for the pretty little one of her young friend and protectress, pressed it between her own, and repeated in mourning accents:

“Miss Valentine, you deserve to be truly happy; you know how to give blessings like the good God, whose care and pleasure it is to think of the poor.”

Thanks to the pleasure of such a repast and so much time so happily spent, the old guests lingered around the table in the garden, and exceeded the limits of the morning hours. When at last they wended their way homeward, accompanied by the good sister who took care of them, they met on the road several of those invited for the afternoon, friends of Valentine mostly, accompanied by their mothers, in elegant toilets, and coming in great pomp to offer their compliments.

“Why, how is this, my dear? Have the old pensioners of Madame de Guers come to congratulate you?” asked Rosine Martin, one of the young ladies, as she entered and embraced her friend.

“Yes, Rosette, on this occasion I gave them a little fête. They breakfasted here and drank my health; and, do you know, Pierrot played the violin, and old Manou was so excited she actually danced a minuet.”

“Do you hear what Valentine is saying?” whispered Madame Martin to her friend and confidante, Madame Fremieux. “I always thought Madame de Guers put on the airs of a great lady, and, of course, will leave the same to Valentine, as foundress of charitable institutions. Insupportable, is it not? And charity costs something too. It is well to make a parade of it, whether one has it or not; and the question is, whether it is prudent to put such ideas into the child’s head, when she will give her at the very most two poor thousand francs?”

“What an odd fancy you have for these old gossips, Valentine!” said Adeline de Malers, another good friend, a pretty young woman with two handsome children, whom she led gaily into the garden. “There they go, charmed with your reception, and repeating your name to all the echoes of the town. Well, it is a good idea while you are waiting and have so little to do, and nothing much to love. See what will become of them when you will be mamma in your turn, my dear!”

“Do you think so, Adeline? I cannot agree with you,” replied Valentine, blushing a little. “My dear good mamma Marie always found time to give me all her care, her love, and her watchfulness, and yet I am sure she never neglected these poor old friends. It seems to me that when one becomes a mother, one desires to heap up a treasure of good actions, and multiply one’s merits and virtues, in order that God may requite the little good one does in graces and benedictions on these dear little heads.”

“You always have a sentimental way of seeing things,” replied Adeline, stooping and arranging with her rosy fingers the white plume that graced the hat of baby; “but I doubt if Mr. Alfred Maubars will give the same light to the chapter; for, my little one, husbands are not nonentities in the future organization of a household; their decrees are inevitable, and must be listened to.”

“O Adeline! do you really think that Alfred would wish to prevent my doing a little good in assisting the unfortunate?” said Valentine, deeply moved and almost indignant. “He who gave up his project of going to Paris, which we were to do immediately after our marriage? He who promised to give me one-half of what it would cost to make this trip to make a present to dear mamma, and furnish woollen stockings and aprons for the poor little parish children in the winter?”

“O my good Valentine! where you are just now, all this may be. But later, it will not, my dear. Do you see? The most part of the good husbands I know—and there are none too many of them—think charity begins at home. The wife, if she pleases, may give away the old boots and slippers, but woe to her if, in a fit of generous imprudence, she parts with the half of the chicken or the little glass of port that belongs to my lord.”

The joyous Adeline laughed with all her heart as she finished these words, and for a moment Valentine smiled at the lively raillery of her friend. But, M. Maubars and Alfred appearing at the same time at the end of the walk, she fixed on her intended a disturbed, timid, and sad look, asking herself if it could be true, if it could ever be possible, that he who should be her natural confidant in all the sweet and tender inspirations of her heart, in all the Christian aspirations of her innocent and pious soul, should consider it a crime in her to continue to obey the great and holy law of Christ that she had seen practised, every day from her infancy, in her own humble home.

However, this passing distrust of the sweet and charming betrothed was soon dispelled. Alfred approached and presented her a rich and graceful bouquet, and his words as he handed it were so respectful and tender, and his look so subdued and fête and smile at the other living stars, the young girls their sisters. M. Maubars had charged himself with this part of the entertainment—an offering not of charity, but one made to youth and pleasure. So, everything passed off as brilliantly as could be wished on such a day; and quadrille after quadrille succeeded each other on the same spot where, a few hours earlier, Manou, recalling her twenty years, had so valiantly executed the rhythmical and bounding steps of the ancient minuet of Auvergne.

And while the young people danced, the older ones talked in the parlor, or complacently looked on while their children enjoyed themselves from the little fringed pavilion with velvet benches that had been prepared for them in front of the greensward. Madame Martin, while admiring from afar her brown and pretty Rosette, had insensibly approached the father of Alfred—and of all the ladies in the town, she had the least sympathy for Valentine, having for a long time nourished very sweet maternal hopes on the possibility of a marriage between Rosette and the young Maubars.

“In truth, dear neighbor,” said she, accosting with an amiable smile the honorable retired merchant, “one must confess you do things royally. It certainly cannot be these ladies, with their small, very small fortune, who have by themselves given us such a fête as this. And then, it is not according to their tastes. If by accident they should have a little too much money, they would have less pleasure in offering a ball to their friends than a breakfast to their old poor.”

“My dear Madame Martin, when one does as one can, one does as one should,” replied, with a deep bow, M. Maubars, responding to her compliment to himself. “As to these ideas of our excellent friend Madame de Guers, you see, we must not be surprised at them. She has always lived a little above our so-called middle society; she is a woman—how shall I say it?—well, of the old régime. In her devotions, in good works, and perseverance, she has grand ideas; the commandments of Christ, the love of her neighbor, the good of the poor. It is all beautiful, Madame Martin, and sits superbly on a woman like her, grave and dignified, with such handsome white hair.”

“But for the little one—for Valentine—do you think, M. Maubars, that it will suit her as well?” replied, quickly, the lady, with a mocking smile.

“Oh! why not? Everything becomes a child. All these fine devotions are an occupation for the widow and an amusement for the little one. It is much better to direct her by caring for the poor than by ruining the reputations of others and seeking false excitements. Wait till Valentine becomes the wife of Alfred; that will change everything, you know, neighbor. The dear child will only have one end, one duty, one love—her husband.”

“Do you really think so, neighbor?”

“It is, at least, what all women promise at the altar, madame. And Valentine will do as she promises, I am certain. A child so docile, a nature so pliable, and a heart of gold. Yes, madame; I do not doubt, if my Alfred wishes it, she will prefer the road to the market or the grocery in preference to that of the church. And as to the refuge of which you speak, Madame de Guers will take care of that, as it will be her only occupation. My daughter-in-law will visit it occasionally in her leisure moments.”

“It will become her well to adapt her household to his wishes; for every one knows, neighbor, your son brings her a fortune far superior to her own.”

“Alas! yes, you say truly; her dowry is the only weak point.”

“The little one will have scarcely anything, will she, M. Maubars?” asked the lady precipitately, in her ardent, almost joyous curiosity.

“Oh! a modest cipher, but enough. There is nothing to complain of. If it had been less, I confess I do not know what Alfred would have done. The needs of luxury are so numerous nowadays, and it costs so much to live, my dear lady!”

“Yes, we all know that,” replied the prudent mother. “This is the reason I calculate, and economize, and stint myself every day for the love I bear Rosette. According to my ideas, it is a culpable charity that does not consider one’s own first.”

At the enunciation of this wise maxim, M. Maubars sighed profoundly. At the bottom of his heart he could not help wishing, in the interest of Valentine and Alfred also, that Madame de Guers, his dear old friend, had less tenderness and greatness of soul, less generous devotion, and a little more worldly prudence and solicitude for the material side of life. Nevertheless, he was careful not to express aloud the secret preoccupations which now and then disquieted him a little; and just then Valentine, leaving the joyous group of dancers, approached him, sweet and charming in her innocent joy and unaffected simplicity. Her steps, delicate and modest, slid silently over the grass, and the golden reflection of the long garlands of light made her muslin dress appear whiter and more transparent, while her brown hair, simply raised and half-crowned with a bouquet of small roses, glittered browner and more lustrous as the tiny lamps threw their rays upon it as she passed. The smile alone of such a charming daughter-in-law could dispel a host of deceptions and fears. In Valentine’s eyes beamed so much candor, love, sweetness, and virtue that in admiring her one forgot the more or less respectable cipher of the promised dowry.