THE GALAXY. (continued 4)

Alfred de Musset, like Mr. Murray's fastidious correspondent, wrote poetry as an amateur—wrote it, as they say in France, en gentilhomme. It is the fashion, I believe, in some circles, to be on one's guard against speaking foreign tongues too well (the precaution is perhaps superfluous) lest a marked proficiency should expose one to be taken for a teacher of languages. It was a feeling of this kind, perhaps, that led Alfred de Musset to a certain affectation of negligence and laxity; though he wrote for the magazines, he could boast a long pedigree, and he had nothing in common with the natives of Grub street. Since his death a new school of poets has sprung up—of which, indeed, his contemporary, Théophile Gautier, may be regarded as the founder. These gentlemen have taught French poetry a multitude of paces of which so sober-footed a damsel was scarcely to have been supposed capable; they have discovered a great many secrets which Musset appears never to have suspected, or (if he did suspect them) to have thought not worth finding out. They have sounded the depths of versification, and beside their refined, consummate facture Musset's simple devices and good-natured prosody seem to belong to a primitive stage of art. It is the difference between a clever performer on the tight rope and a gentleman strolling along on soft turf with his hands in his pockets. If people care supremely for form, Musset will always but half satisfy them. It is very pretty, they will say; but it is confoundedly unbusinesslike. His verse is not chiselled and pondered, and in spite of an ineffable natural grace, it lacks the positive qualities of cunning workmanship—those qualities which are found in such high perfection in Théophile Gautier. To our own sense Musset's exquisite feeling more than makes up for one-half the absence of "chiselling," and the ineffable grace we spoke of just now makes up for the other half. His sweetness of passion, of which the poets who have succeeded him have so little, is a more precious property than their superior science. His grace is often something divine; it is in his grace that we must look for his style. Herr Lindau says that Heine speaks of "truth, harmony, and grace" being his salient qualities. (By the first, we take it, he meant what we have called Musset's passion.) His harmony, from the first, was often admirable; the rhythm of even some of his earliest verses makes them haunt the ear after one has murmured them aloud.

Musset's grace, in its suavity, freedom, and unaffectedness, is altogether peculiar; though it must be said that it is only in the poems of his middle period that it is at its best. His latest things are, according to Sainte-Beuve, califichets—baubles; they are too much in the rococo, the Dresden china style. But as we have said before, with his youth Musset's inspiration failed him. It failed him in his prose as well as in his verse. "Il faut qu'une Porte soit ouverte ou fermée," one of the last of his dramatic proverbs, is very charming, very perfect in its way; but compared with the tones of the "Caprices de Marianne," the "Chandelier," "Fantasio," the sentiment is thin and the style has rather a simper. It is what the French call marivaudage. There can, however, be no better example of the absoluteness of the poetic sentiment, of its justifying itself as it goes, of lyrical expression being as it were not only a means, but an end, than the irresistible beauty of such effusions as the "Lettre à Lamartine" and the "Nuit d'Aout."

—that is all, literally, that Musset has to say to the "amant d'Elvire"; and it would be easy to make merry at the expense of so simply candid a piece of "gush." But the confidence is made with a transparent ardor, a sublime good faith, an audible, touching tremor of voice, which, added to the enchanting harmony of the verse, make the thing one of the most splendid poems of our day.

Musset has never risen higher. He has, in strictness, only one idea—the idea that the passion of love and the act of loving are the divinest things in a miserable world; that love has a thousand disappointments, deceptions, and pangs, but that for its sake they are all worth enduring, and that, as Tennyson has said, more curtly and reservedly,

Sometimes he expresses this idea in the simple epicurean fashion, with gayety and with a more or less cynical indifference to the moral side of the divine passion. Then he is often pretty, picturesque, fanciful, but he remains essentially light. At other times he feels its relation to the other things that make up man's destiny, and the sense of aspiration meets with the sense of enjoyment or of regret. Then he is at his best; then he seems an image of universally sentient youth.

While we may suspect that there is something a little over-colored in M. Paul de Musset's account of the degree to which his brother was haunted by the religious sentiment—by the impulse to grope for some philosophy of life—we may also feel that with the poet's sense of the "divineness" of love there went a conviction that ideal love implies a divine object. This is the feeling expressed in the finest lines of the "Lettre à Lamartine"—in lines at least which, if they are not the finest, are fine enough to quote:

And the rest of the poem is a lyrical declaration of belief in immortality.

We have called the "Lettre à Lamartine" Musset's highest flight, but the "Nuit de Mai" is almost as fine a poem—full of imaginative splendor and melancholy ecstasy. The series of the "Nuits" is altogether superb; with an exception made, perhaps, for the "Nuit de Décembre," which has a great deal of sombre beauty, but which is not, like the others, in the form of a dialogue between the Muse and the poet—the Muse striving to console the world-wounded bard for his troubles, and urging him to take refuge in hope and production:

That is impregnated with the breath of a vernal night. The same poem (the "Nuit de Mai") contains the famous passage about the pelican—the passage beginning

in which the legend of the pelican opening his breast to feed his starving young is made an image of what the poet does to entertain his readers:

This passage is perhaps—unless we except the opening verses of "Rolla"—Musset's noblest piece of poetic writing. We must place next to it—next to the three "Nuits"—the admirably passionate and genuine "Stanzas to Malibran"—a beautiful characterization of the artistic disinterestedness of the singer who suffered her genius to consume her—who sang herself to death. The closing verses of the poem have a wonderful purity; to rise so high, and yet in form, in accent, to remain so still and temperate, belongs only to great poetry; as it would be well to remind the critic who thinks the author of the "Stanzas to Malibran" dwarfish. There is another sort of verse in which violence of movement is more sensible than upwardness of direction.

So far in relation to Musset's lyric genius—though we have given but a brief and inadequate account of it. He had besides a dramatic genius of the highest beauty, to which we have left ourself space to devote only a few words. It is true that the drama with Musset has a decidedly lyrical element, and that though his persons always talk prose, they are constantly saying things which would need very little help to fall into the mould of a stanza or a sonnet. In his dramas as in his verses, his weakness is that he is amateurish; they lack construction; their merit is not in their plots, but in what, for want of a better term, one may call their sentimental perfume. The earliest of them failed upon the stage, and for many years it was supposed they could not be played. Musset supposed so himself, and took no trouble to encourage the experiment. He made no concessions to contemporary "realism." But at last they were taken up—almost by accident—and it was found that, in the hands of actors whose education enabled them to appreciate their delicacy, this delicacy might become wonderfully effective. If feeling is the great quality in his verses, the case is the same in his strange, fantastic, exquisite little comédies; comedies in the literal English sense of the word we can hardly call them, for they have almost always a melancholy or a tragical termination. They are thoroughly sentimental; he puts before us people who convince us that they really feel; the drama is simply the history of their feeling. In the emotions of Valentin and Perdican, of Fantasio and Fortunio, of Célio and Octave, of Carmosine and Bettine, there is something contagious, irresistibly touching. But the great charm is Musset's dramatic world itself, the atmosphere in which his figures move, the element they breathe.

It seems at first like a reckless thing to say, but we will risk it: in the quality of his fancy Musset always reminds us of Shakespeare. His little dramas go on in the country of "As you Like It" and the "Winter's Tale"; the author is at home there, like Shakespeare himself, and he moves with something of the Shakespearian lightness and freedom. His fancy loves to play with human life, and in the tiny mirror which it holds up we find something of the depth and mystery of the object. Musset's dialogue, in its mingled gayety and melancholy, its sweetness and irony, its allusions to real things and its kinship with a romantic world, has an altogether indefinable magic. To speak it on the stage is almost to make it coarse. Once Musset attempted a larger theme than usual; in "Lorenzaccio" he wrote an historical drama on the scale of Shakespeare's histories; that is, with multitudes of figures, scenes, incidents, and illustrations. He laid his hand on an admirable subject—the story of a certain Lorenzino de' Medici, who played at being a debauchee and a poltroon in order better to put the tyrant of Florence (his own cousin) off his guard, and serve his country by ridding her of him. The play shows an extraordinary abundance and vivacity of imagination, and really, out of those same "histories" of Shakespeare, it is hard to see where one should find an equal spontaneity in dealing with the whole human furniture of a period. Alfred de Musset, in "Lorenzaccio," has the air of being as ready to handle a hundred figures as a dozen—of having imagination enough for them all. The thing has the real creative souffle, and if it is not the most perfect of his productions, it is probably the most vigorous.

We have not spoken of his tales; their merit is the same as of the comédies—that of spontaneous feeling, and of putting people before us in whose feelings we believe. Besides this, they have Musset's grace and delicacy in a perhaps excessive degree; they are the most mannered of his productions. Two or three of them, however—"Emmeline," "Les Deux Maîtresses," "Frédéric et Bernerette"—are masterpieces; this last epithet is especially to be bestowed upon the letter written by the heroine of the last-mentioned tale (an incorrigibly volage grisette) to her former lover on the occasion of his marrying and settling. The incoherency, the garrulity, the mingled resignation and regret of an amiable flirt of the lower orders, divided between the vivacity of her emotion and the levity of her nature, are caught in the act; and yet it is not fair to say of anything represented by Musset that it is caught in the act. Just the beauty and charm of it is that it is not the exact reality, but a something seen by the imagination—a tinge of the ideal, a touch of poetry. We must try to see Musset himself in the same way; his own figure needs to a certain extent the help of our imagination. And yet, even with such help taken, we cannot but feel that he is an example of the wasteful way in which nature and history sometimes work—of their cruel indifference to our personal standards of economy—of the vast amount of material they take to produce a little result.

Alfred de Musset's exquisite organization, his exaltations and weaknesses, his pangs and tears, his passions and debaucheries, his intemperance and idleness, his years of unproductiveness, his innumerable mistresses (with whatever pangs and miseries it may seem proper to attribute to them), his quarrel with a woman of genius, and the scandals, exposures, and recriminations that are so ungracefully bound up with it—all this was necessary in order that we should have the two or three little volumes into which his best could be compressed. It takes certainly a great deal of life to make a little art! In this case, however, we must remember, that little is exquisite.

Henry James, Jr.

REFLECTED LIGHT.

Mary Ainge De Vere.

LIFE INSURANCE.—II.

The companies organized under the general law of the State of New York are the mere creatures of that statute. Their organization, management, powers for good or evil, opportunities for mismanagement and corruption, are all to be traced directly to the law to which they owe their being. It will be necessary, therefore, for an intelligent understanding of the condition to which the business has come, to examine the act particularly. It is chapter 463 of the laws of 1853. It provides that any number of persons not less than thirteen may form a corporation for the purpose of making insurance on the lives of individuals, or against accidents, or on the health of persons, or on live stock. Such corporators are allowed to draw their own charter, and upon its approval by the Attorney General, that document has all the force of positive law. It is of course subject to the provisions of the act itself, but those provisions are so few and meagre that it is practically left to the promoters of the scheme to draw their own charter of incorporation. The capital stock is to be not less than $100,000, and no provision is made for the incorporating of any company without a capital. The rate of dividends to the stockholders, the proportion of profits to be paid the policy-holders, and the time of payment, are not provided for in the law, and are left to be settled by the associates. The consequence is that no two companies are alike in this respect. In some of them the stockholder receives an interest of seven per cent. upon his stock, and is entitled to no more under any circumstances, the whole surplus or profits being divided among the policy-holders. In others, in addition to interest, the stock is entitled to participate with the policies in the surplus. The extent of this participation varies; in some it is fixed at ten per cent. of the whole profits, to the stock-holders, in others twenty, and in others thirty per cent. In all of them, however, with one exception, participation by the policy-holders in the profits of the business is a rule. To a greater or lesser extent, in some to the whole profits, it is the recognized rule that the holders of policies are to receive dividends or bonuses from the companies out of the profits. In effect, therefore, so far as participation in the profits of the business goes, all our companies, with the one exception before mentioned, are mutual companies.

The act makes no provision for the government of the corporations it allows to be created. It leaves it to the promoters to state the mode and manner in which the corporate powers shall be exercised, and the manner of electing trustees, or directors, and officers. The natural consequence of this provision is, that the manner of electing trustees and directors varies in different companies. In some of them the stock-holders alone have any voice or vote, in others the policy-holders are allowed, under certain restrictions, to vote, but it is safe to say that in all of them the power is kept in the hands of the stock-holders as far as it possibly can be; and the policy-holders are allowed as little voice in the management of the company as the stock-holders can permit.

The result of this vice in the formation of the company is shown in corporations which have amassed a large reserve. There it will be seen that the owners of one hundred thousand dollars of stock absolutely control the entire management and disposition of twenty, thirty, or forty millions of accumulations, as the case may be; and the real owners of this fund—the policy-holders—have no voice in its management and no vote for the body or board which exercises the powers of the corporation.

It is contended by very prominent gentlemen in the life insurance business, that this plan is the only safe one; that interference in the management of the company by uninstructed policy-holders, not versed in the business, would be productive of nothing but evil. They contend that the necessary unity of management required for a business, covering as this does long periods of time, and requiring carefully laid plans extending into the distant future, would be greatly endangered by the existence of a right to participate in the management by representation on the part of so numerous and so widely scattered a constituency. In other words, the managers of companies which have retained in the hands of the stock-holders all the powers of the corporation think that those powers are more safely exercised by that small body than they would be if participated in by all the holders of policies. It may be doubted, however, whether a constituency small in number and capable of manipulation, and their votes of concentration into the hands of a few men, is the safest body to manage a corporation whose chief business is the care of the accumulations arising from the trust imposed upon the corporation by the contract of life insurance. The power of wielding a mass of capital amounting to many millions of dollars is an enormous power, and it should be reposed only in a body which should be responsible for the careful, honest administration of the trust, at stated intervals, to the persons most interested—that is, to the policy-holders—the owners of the trust fund. One of the chief characteristics of English companies is, that at the annual meeting of the interested persons a full statement of the affairs of the company is laid before the meeting, and an opportunity offered of critical examination and comment. Discontent is thus allowed a safety valve to express itself through, and the managers an opportunity of explaining their action and accounting for their conduct. Public opinion—the public opinion of the persons interested—is allowed a chance of expression, and all misunderstandings and misconceptions an opportunity for examination and refutation. The right to interrogate the managers, and ask and obtain information as to the business at such regularly recurring intervals, is an inestimable one. It can hardly be conceived possible that great abuses could grow up if such a right existed; but at any rate it is apparent that the probability of such abuses is lessened to a great extent.

But this English practice is not known among us. In life insurance affairs we have nothing remotely approaching it. It seems to have been the policy of our companies to restrict participation in their management to the smallest possible number, to avoid opportunities for questioning or explanation, and to shroud the business in the deepest mystery.

The officers of companies responsible for this policy justify themselves upon the broad ground that they know better what is good for the policy-holders than they do themselves. In the light of the evidence given before the Committee of the Assembly by life insurance officers, and in the light of the affairs of the Continental, Security, and Popular, it may be doubted whether this assertion proves itself. It has the merit, however, that every honest avowal has, and it is entitled to examination.

Why should a self-electing, self-perpetuating proprietary board, resting upon a constituency composed solely of owners of the capital stock, be a safer or better management than one elected by the votes of the policy-holders at large? The only answer you can get to that query is this: The board elected by the stock-holders are sure of their position, and it is not in the power of a few malcontents to get up a secret movement to oust them at the election. The more stable management is to be preferred to one which is dependent on the popularity of the officers with the policy-holders. It is in the nature of things that the officers should become more or less unpopular. The business depends for success upon the enforcement of strict rules in dealing with the policy-holders, and the enforcement of these strict rules, although absolutely necessary for the success of the business, naturally tends to give fancied grievances to the persons against whom they are enforced. If, therefore, the tenure of office of the management depends upon the policy-holders, there is the constant danger of frequent attempts at revolution arising from this cause, and the consequent weakness of the officers in enforcing rules the enforcement of which may tend to shorten their tenure of office.

I think I have fairly stated the argument. Is there anything in it? Is the reason given any reason at all? Is it not rather a positive argument against the system. Perhaps the best government for men and companies is an absolute monarchy, without accountability or restraint; there are large masses of the human race who are so governed; and it is an open question yet whether government by the people be or be not the best government. But certainly one thing is assured. In this day and in this country the monarchical and the oligarchical systems are out of date and out of place; and all attempts to introduce them or the principles which underlie them into our system of free government by the representatives of the governed will be failures. The doctrine of paternal government is "played out" in affairs of nations, and it is not to be supposed that the principle has in it any greater efficacy when applied to the affairs of corporations. The fact is, we have too much of this thing in all our relations political and social. The idea that there is a class who are in their own estimation better able to govern than the rest of mankind has been exploded by the experience of the people of this country, and it is intolerable that we should be forced to do homage in our private affairs to a principle which we have, as regards public business, exploded long ago as a traditional fallacy.

Most of the evil practices which have made the whole system of life insurance a by-word and the scorn of the people, have arisen under this irresponsible management. Investments in extravagant buildings, the enormous expenditures for payments of salaries to officers and to agents, are all the result of the secret plan of management. Does any one suppose that if the affairs of the companies were fully and completely exposed to the public, such payments would be permitted or tolerated? Men are entitled to be paid for services rendered the full equivalent of those services, but they ought not to be allowed to be the sole judges of the value of those services, and they ought to be at all times ready and willing to come before the persons interested, and submit a full, fair, and clear account of their stewardship. Human nature is of the same quality in the managers of life insurance companies as in other men. Responsibility to some power, accountability to some persons or body, is absolutely essential to honest management. Men who know that they cannot or will not be called to account will fall into loose and unbusinesslike methods and practices. Nothing can be more dangerous to the honesty of a man than to place him in charge of immense interests without a system of periodical accountability. A man may be ever so honest, yet he will, if this accountability be absent, be led to do things which he never would do if he were sure that at a fixed period his doings would become known and he would be required to justify them.

From these considerations and on these grounds, I come to the conclusion that the management of a life insurance company by a board of directors elected solely by the stock-holders is a management which contains within itself the germs of a fatal disease, which will sooner or later develop itself. In this respect legislation is needed. Such a management ought to be forbidden, and a provision made for the election of trustees by the policy-holders as well as the stock-holders, upon a basis as to the vote and the amount of interest it should represent which would be equitable and just.

Complaints have been made against the use of proxies in elections. Notably these complaints have been made respecting elections in the Mutual Life Insurance Company, a corporation which has no stock-holders, but which consists in a membership of its policy-holders. These policy-holders have the supreme control of the corporation in their own hands. Its government is by them delegated to a board of trustees thirty-six in number, divided into four classes of nine in each class. The term of office is four years, so that nine trustees go out of office in each year. This classification prevents the possibility of any sudden change of management, while it leaves all needed control in the hands of the policy-holders. If, for instance, dissatisfaction with the management exists, and nine new trustees are elected, it is not to be doubted but that the warning would be listened to and the necessary change of policy effected to satisfy the constituency. On the other hand, should the change of trustees be the result of a combination to seize the management of the company for any improper purpose, the first election would unmask the design and insure its defeat by an appeal to the voters.

The objections to the use of proxies come entirely from those policy-holders who have been defeated by their use, or fear they will be defeated by their use, in an attempt to change the management. Does not this prove that the great body of policy-holders believe in the management and are determined to sustain it. In a free company based upon the liberal principles upon which the Mutual Life is established, any attempt to limit the franchise would be an unparalleled wrong. The policy-holder in Chicago or in San Francisco has the same right to exercise his right to a voice in the election of trustees as the policy-holder who resides in New York, and there can be no reason why he should not cast his vote by proxy, since it would result in his disfranchisement to require him to do it in person. Be sure that if real trouble arose, and there was an abuse to rectify, if there were officers unmindful of their duties to rebuke, or trustees regardless of their trust to set aside, the votes cast by proxy would be as intelligently given as those of the residents immediately near the office who could attend in person. Every effort to limit the right to vote by proxy is an attempt to perpetuate power in the hands of the policy-holders resident here, which would be quite as obnoxious to sound principles as the government of companies solely by the stockholders.

It would appear, on every principle of fairness and justice, that the more full and perfect the right of the policy-holder to participate in the election of trustees, the more stable and conservative will be the management. On the other hand, it is quite as apparent that the limitation of such right is attended with consequences the reverse of those just stated, and those consequences attained in proportion to the limitation of the right.

With the broad superstructure of a body of voting policy-holders, the selling out of the control of a company is impossible, because no one will be willing to pay for the possession which the next election may deprive him of. Of all the mean and contemptible methods of robbery as yet discovered, the selling out of a life insurance company is the meanest and most contemptible. Too cowardly to wreck it themselves and personally rob the widows and orphans, the trustees, who quietly receive a bonus for their stock and retire from the management, sell the opportunity of robbery to others. This they do too in the full knowledge of the purpose for which they are asked to retire. When the crash comes they may say they did not know the purpose of the purchasers, but they did know they were to receive for their stock two or three times its value, and that no man could afford to pay such a price to obtain control of the company except for the purpose of making money by irregular and questionable means. It will not do for men entrusted with positions of a fiduciary character to make the holding of such positions the lever for obtaining a large price for their stock, and then claim exemption from responsibility for the misdeeds of their successors. They were there in charge of a sacred trust, and they have sold and betrayed that trust—for what? Why, for the enhanced price which they got for their stock. This is the great evil of the close corporation system. It enables one or more men to own complete control of a company and to sell it to the highest bidder. Of course the highly respectable gentlemen who sell, and those also who buy, will be shocked at having imputed to them any crime or breach of trust. But how can such sums of money be lawfully made out of life insurance stock as to justify the price the records of the Committee on Insurance show have been paid for it? Life insurance is or ought to be a benevolent institution. Its management is or ought to be a trust, and every trustee who makes use of his position to make money for himself is false to his trust, and should never be appointed to another. Life insurance is not to be made the sport of speculators, and the only reliance of the unfortunate made the football of gambling operations. Most if not all of the troubles which have arisen in the business are to be traced to this attempt to make money out of it, honestly if possible, but to make money at all hazards. The way to end this for ever is to allow the policy-holders to vote, not for a minority of the trustees, but for all of them. Representation should be equal, or it is worthless. The representation which would leave the power to elect a majority still in the hands of the stock-holders is not equal or just. Money paid for premiums is as good as money paid for stock, and should have equal voice in the management. But when you have given the policy-holders votes, you should also see that the opportunity was afforded to them of voting. Most of the elections are held without any other notice than an advertisement in the corner of a crowded column of one or two newspapers. Every policy should have printed on it the date of the annual election, and all the information necessary to enable the holder to be present and vote, or to be represented by proxy. Under the present practice, few holders of policies know whether they have votes or not, and hardly any of them ever heard of the time of holding the election. If the present discussion of life insurance affairs does no other good than to awaken the policy-holders to a sense of their own responsibility for abuses of management, it will not have been in vain. It is safe to say that watchfulness on their part would have prevented the lavish expenditures, the unwise real estate investments, the enormous salaries, which the investigation of the Assembly committee has discovered. The same conservative power held over managers would be a constant check upon any tendency to depart from the safe and regular open pathway of honorable dealings. Under its influence there would be few if any cases of commissions in addition to salary of officers, less tendency to make loans to the trustees and their friends, and a general adhesion to business rules and traditions. But above and beyond all other reforms, the control of the company by the policy-holders would make it impossible for greedy and scoundrel officers to gather into their hands the entire control of the company, and then sell it out to a rival company for four or five times what the stock cost, and an annuity for life to the traitor who had betrayed his trust. This has been, is now, and will be, if not prevented, the fruitful mother of all the ills of life insurance. Just as soon as any clique get possession of the majority of the stock, there is danger. Nay, there is always danger; any clique may, at any time, get possession of the stock by paying enough for it. If one price will not bring it, another will, and the value to the wrecker depends upon the amount of assets. It is the assets which are to pay the profit of the transaction. The money of the policy-holders is what is sold, not the mere pittance which belongs to the stock-holders, and it is the money of the policy-holders which is stolen to pay the purchase money. Honorable gentlemen, prominent in social life, elders, deacons, and vestrymen who in the past few years have quietly pocketed two hundred for your stock and retired from the management of life insurance companies, how are you pleased with your own conduct? In the light of recent disclosures, does not the ill-gotten money burn in your pockets? Truly you would not wreck a company yourselves by transferring it to any man or number of men; but you accomplish the same purpose by retiring. A captain who will not himself surrender to the enemy, but who retires from the command of his fortification knowing that the subaltern who will succeed him intends to strike his flag, may deceive himself, but he does not long succeed in deceiving any one else.

The evidence taken before the referee in the Continental case fully describes and explains the methods of wrecking. A company is sold out or reinsured in another; that is, the stock has been bought up at two or three hundred per centum, the officers have been promised good places, or paid in cash for their silence. Immediately the operations of the wreckers begin. The agents of both companies go into the work with a single aim, and that aim is to obtain the surrender of the policies in the old company in exchange for new policies in the purchasing corporation. The old policies represent an actual liability; the company which has issued them is obliged to hold a certain sum against each of them. The aggregate of these sums makes up the "reserve" or reinsurance fund. As fast as the old policies are cancelled this reserve is released, and when all the policies are cancelled there is no liability at all. The new policies of course have no liability. This is in short the whole operation of wrecking. By such means a million or two of assets will be distributed, and in the process the policy-holders will receive a little—a very little—and the agents a good deal, and the officers composing the ring all that is left. The arts, the deceptions, the false representations made in the course of the proceeding to induce the policy-holder to give up his policy have been fully disclosed by the evidence in question. Of course it is suggested that the company is in a bad way, and that there is probably no other way of securing anything unless an opportunity now offered of changing is embraced.

Reinsurance was abandoned as a means of wrecking because it was found the policy-holders preferred to keep the old policy and the new guarantee together. So in the later transactions they are told that if they do not change, they will get nothing.

The lesson of all this to the policy-holder may be written in large letters and kept as a maxim:

DO NOT SURRENDER YOUR POLICY.

You will never make a mistake by keeping to this motto. And particularly the more should it be kept to when you are urged by agents to a contrary action. You never get one-third its value even in companies honestly managed; what you get in companies dishonestly managed no one can tell.

FALLEN AMONG THIEVES.

Brussels!

Is it not written that good Americans, when they die, go to Paris? So Elysium to all righteous sons of Cockayne is Brussels. And yet I was weary of it. No charms for me had the perpetual sabots and blouses, the braves Belges in jaunty uniform, the bejewelled saunterers in the Galerie St. Hubert, the gauche tourists desecrating the sombre stillness of the St. Gudule, la belle Anglaise seeing for the first time the outrageous little manikin, the homely phaëton of good old King Leopold with its pair of very unroyal plugs, the tirailleurs in Lincoln green, the Parc with its music, fountains and maitrank, the Jardin des Plantes, the boulevard, and the Ecole d'Equitation.

All lost on me. I stood at a window of the Hôtel de Flandres gazing on the ever-moving panorama of the Grande Place with as little interest as though my eye rested on a vacant lot in Pumpkinville.

Was it bile? No. Was it love? Yes.

Another scene was ever before my eyes: An old red-brick house on the cliffs of Devonshire, half hid by giant oaks and elms, fragrant with honeysuckle and jessamine, stately with avenue, lawn, and rookery; and I saw leaning on the rustic gate beneath the chestnut trees Gwendoline Grey: her straw hat dangling by her side, her fresh young face set in a glory of light brown hair, her—— But it had all passed away now. The light was gone out of my life, for but three days ago I had received a letter from her mother deploring my altered prospects, returning my billets and love tokens, and assuring me that Gwendoline acquiesced in this painful decision.

My altered prospects—hinc illæ lacrymæ. Nine months ago I was heir to a wealthy man, and now I was but bear-leader to the son of the Earl of Tottenbridge. Upon the loss of my father's property, which had come like an avalanche on us, I had left college and assumed the tutorship of the Hon. Nigel Fairleigh, as good a lad as ever handled a cricket bat.

After a brief run through southern Europe, I had just delivered him up to his aunt, my lady Milton, who was to take him to Scotland, while I was free, according to compact, to enjoy a couple of months' vacation.

How I had longed for this vacation—and now, where to go, what to do, I knew not. For three days I had stayed with a dull uncertainty on the spot where the blow had fallen on me.

My meditations were broken by the entrance of a garçon announcing,

"A gentleman for monsieur."

"Ah, M. Danneris, I am glad to see you. Be seated."

To say how I became acquainted with the chatty little Frenchman who sat before me would be a difficult matter. The offer of a cigar, an exchange of newspapers at the reading room, a passing bon jour on the stairs, had ripened under his friendly gayety into a familiarity which had extended so far as to my passing more than one evening at his snug office in the Rue des Allumettes, where François Danneris, advocate, spun toils for litigious Flemish bourgeoises.

"My friend," he said, "you look ennuyé, triste, dull; you need change. What do you say to a scamper over the continent?"

"I have done scampering enough lately," I replied, "and moreover my funds——"

"Tiens, mon ami. Do not talk of money. It is my great happiness to offer you an opportunity to combine business with pleasure, and take a most delightful trip without the expenditure of a sou."

"You surprise me—and where?"

"To a beautiful manorial residence at the village of Kioske, twenty miles beyond Buda, on the banks of the Danube—one of the most romantic spots of eastern Europe."

"And the object?"

"To take temporary charge of the only son of the wealthy Baron von Dressdorf. Jules von Dressdorf," added the advocate in his bland, pleasant way, "is a boy of fifteen, who, after spending a year in an academy in England, has been placed in a pension in Brussels; but, hélas! an hereditary disease, which has developed itself more strongly of late, has determined his father to recall him immediately. Pericardiac, my dear sir—pericardiac; and it is most important that he should without delay seek the quiet of his native valley."

"The terms?"

"Two hundred and fifty francs a week, and all expenses paid. When could you start?"

"To-morrow—to-day—when you will."

"Bien! There is a little difficulty I would mention; the journey is not without small perils. Hungary, as you are aware, is now under the ban of an Austrian tyranny."

I assured him of my sympathy.

"Hold," he cried. "It is exactly that you have no sympathy that I select you. The Baron is already suspect, and the son, inheriting his father's sentiments, has small discretion of speech. Keep Austria in the background, I implore you."

"And are you sure that the Baron will approve of your choice of an escort?"

"The mere fact, Monsieur Mortimer, that you were in the service—I beg your pardon—in the family of the Earl of Tottenbridge would be sufficient, but I am proud to say that the recommendation of François Danneris would be a carte blanche to any one to the confidence of Baron Dressdorf. He is a noble man," he added with emotion, "and to him I owe all I have in the world."

And then for half an hour the advocate poured into my ear the glories of the house of Dressdorf and stories of Austrian oppression that made me eager to serve his protégé. Nay, I was so interested in his case that I believe I would have seen the youth home, if I had had to bear all the expenses of the journey myself.

"Have you a passport?"

"It is here," I said, handing it to him—"a Foreign Office passport that protects me all over the continent."

"Ah, I see. And this permit?"

"Ah, that belongs to my pupil, Nigel Fairleigh. We can cut that off. Lady Milton should have had it with her, but they are not very strict at Ostend, and I suppose her rank proved an open sesame."

"Black eyes," he read, "black hair, sharp features, high forehead, height, five feet three. My dear Monsieur Mortimer," and he turned eagerly toward me, "you would do me a real service, you would lay the noble Dressdorf under the greatest obligation, if you would permit our young charge to use this passport. It describes him to a T. The critical nature of events, the necessity for caution, the delicate health of the boy—nay, do not look shocked; such things are done every day—will excuse the trifling impropriety——"

"Impossible!"

Taking no notice of the interruption, he continued. "And to tell the truth, it was just this that bothered me. A Belgian passport is looked upon with much suspicion, and is likely to lead to inquiry; but armed with this, you may go from here to the Oural mountains without a question."

At first I refused point-blank, but at last resigned myself to his sophistry, and the bargain was closed.

"When can I see the youth?" I asked.

"Now, monsieur. I will at once escort you to the pension of the Porte de Schaerbeck, and introduce him to you."

Fifty boys of Belgian, French, American, and English extraction, seated at a long table enjoying their afternoon's "goûté"—a post-meridian lunch of weak brandy-and-water and grapes; a bald maître d'école periodically crying, "Si-i-i-lence, messieurs. Restez-vous tranquilles!" like a sheriff in a court of law. Such a scene met my view. I recognized my youth in a moment; there was no mistaking the clear, well-defined features, raven hair, and black eyes of the gentle lad who rose to greet my companion with a grace and assurance that checked remonstrance on the part of the half-offended usher, who simply solaced himself with a shrug of the shoulders and a more than usually prolonged "Si-i-i-i-i-lence, messieurs. Restez-vous tranquilles!"

"This is the gentleman, Jules, who has kindly consented to take you home, and it is arranged that you start to-morrow," said the advocate.

The boy's big eyes looked into mine with an inquiring gaze, and then, taking my hand, he quaintly said:

"I like you."

There was nothing impertinent in the tone or manner; it was the hearty expression of his unsophisticated thought.

"He is an Englishman," continued M. Danneris, "and will be very kind to you. Remember that you owe him respect and implicit obedience."

"Then he hates the Austrians—he whose country is free knows how to give sympathy to a poor Hungarian. This good Englishman shall see for himself how our noble people suffer at the hands of tyrants."

"Hush, hush, Jules! You must not talk like this. Is it not extraordinary," said M. Danneris, turning to me, "that even the very children of this oppressed race fill their minds with a sense of wrong?"

"No wonder," I replied, "if but half you have told me is true."

"When I am a man," flashed Jules, "I will kill the Austrians—they are not worthy to live."

"Jules," I said soothingly, "I am just going for a stroll over the fields toward Louvain. Ask permission from monsieur, your professor, to join me."

Danneris smiled. "That was well done," he said. "You cannot too soon become acquainted. Call here for the boy to-morrow midday. I will see that he is prepared."

When I said adieu to Jules that evening, after a long ramble over the endless corn fields that bordered the "road to Waterloo," I saw with pleasure that I had awakened in him a generous confidence. He too had, by his artless manner, inspired in me no common interest.

We started. Six days' journey to reach Vienna, a hundred-mile trip up the Danube to Buda, seven leagues in a calèche, and we should be at Dressdorf Castle.

Uneventful the days were. Poor Jules, weary with travel, talked but little, for which I was appropriately thankful. It was painful to see how he shrank from the gaze of any official who might question us a little closely as to our destination, and to watch his quivering lips as he muttered in response to my assurances of safety, "I trust all to the good Englishman."

As we neared the Austrian frontier he harped more on the subject of his Austrian wrongs, and I was frequently obliged to check him. A fire seemed consuming the boy, a burning vengeance toward the oppressor.

We reached Vienna at dusk on the sixth day, and put up at the Hôtel d'Hollande, according to the suggestions of Danneris. Jules complained of sick headache, and I was somewhat relieved to hear him suggest bed.

It was not till I had seen him safely settled, and had extracted a promise from him not to leave his room, that I felt at liberty to call a few hours my own.

Having dined, I stood on the doorstep of the hotel smoking a cigar and revolving in my mind where I should spend my evening, when I was accosted by a police agent making some inquiry about my passport.

"By the way," said I, "I never was in Austria before, but in France I have been accustomed to give a gensdarme a couple of francs to take my passport to the bureau of the police to be visé."

"Herr Engländer can pursue the same plan here," was the polite rejoinder. "I shall be happy to oblige him."

Glad to be relieved of the bother, I handed him the document. He briefly compared my person with the description, and then queried:

"And the boy?"

"He is sick and has retired; but if you desire it, you shall see him."

"No need—a boy is no great matter"; and the courteous official, with a bow that would have graced a D'Orsay, was gone.

To the Grand Opera House, the largest in the world, I bent my steps, and in an hour was revelling in Mme. Garcia's thrilling notes, when a hand was laid on my shoulder and a grim, moustached, soldier-like fellow whispered in my ear:

"Your passport, Herr Engländer."

"It is gone to the police bureau to be visé. I sent it from the Hôtel d'Hollande by an officer."

For the moment he withdrew, and burning with shame, for every eye was upon me, I turned defiantly to the stage.

"Will the Herr ride or walk?" came again the voice in my ear.

"What do you mean?"

"The Herr must go immediately to the Hôtel d'Hollande. That is all."

I expostulated, but a storm of hisses from those near enough to be interrupted in their enjoyment of the music decided me, and I angrily rose.

"I am at your service, sir."

We walked on without a word.

Never shall I forget the face of the fat little Dutch landlord as we entered—surprise, sympathy, fear alternately lighting his countenance as he poured forth a polyglot expression of his excited feelings. In French, English, Dutch, and German he assured us he was desolated, miserable, abandoned. Ah, but it was a good young Engländer. It was true he had never seen the passport; he knew he should have asked for it himself when his noble friend first came to the house; but, bête brouillant that he was, he had forgotten it.

Then followed a conference between the landlord and the officer, resulting in my being called aside by the former and receiving the following valuable advice:

"My dear sir, you have made a most never-to-be-sufficiently deplored mistake. But see. Satisfy this zealous officer with a bottle of good Stein wine, and all will be well in the morning; only do not leave the house again to-night."

It was a bitter pill, but I swallowed it gracefully, and Herr Polizeidiener and I clicked glasses fraternally with protestations of mutual regard.

In the morning I was awakened by Jules, whose night's rest had done him a world of good. Bright, vivacious, and noisy, he bounded into my room.

"Oh, Herr Mortimer, such an idea! There is a grand review of the soldiery. Come, get up. We must go and see it. I would not miss it for the world."

"Do not be so excited, Jules; it is the last place to which I would dream of taking you. Your father——"

"Wrote me not to fail to see the Austrian troops if I had an opportunity."

Perhaps there was some object in that, and to Jules's delight I consented to take seats on the lumbering stage-coach that was to leave the hotel with other guests bent on the same holiday excursion. I was the more complacent as I reflected that the steamer did not leave Vienna till five o'clock, and I thus saw a means of keeping Jules out of further mischief.

We reached the review ground. It was indeed a gorgeous scene. Crimson and gold, blue and silver flashed back the sun's rays, bugles sounded, and cannon roared.

I was not quite at my ease, however, as I noticed the interest I was exciting in a resplendent official, whose eyes were continually on me. At last, to my dismay, he beckoned to me.

"Sir, your passport?"

"It is gone to the bureau to be visé," and then followed a pathetic recital of the annoyances I had been subjected to.

"Will the Herr ride or walk?" was the stereotyped response.

"Where?"

"To Vienna. Until this passport is found the Herr must consider himself under arrest."

In vain I pleaded the unprotected position of my young companion. All the concession I could get was permission to speak a few words with him, which I did with much caution, simply assuring him of my speedy return, and extracting his promise that, if I were detained by my "friend," he would return with the fiacre to the hotel, and quietly await my arrival.

"I will do all the good Englishman asks of me"; and a warm pressure of the hand made me feel that Jules understood the extremity of the case.

At once to the bureau.

I was so confident of finding the passport and utterly confounding the officer who had given me all this trouble, that I am afraid my manner was rather supercilious, to say the least of it.

The commissaire heard my story somewhat impatiently.

"The officer's number to whom you say you gave your passport?"

"I did not notice it."

"His name?"

"I never demanded it."

A grin on the face of the commissaire, a very sarcastic curl of the lip, a shrug of the shoulders, an ominous silence.

"Sir," said I, somewhat sobered by the course events had taken, "I am a British subject!"

"Zo?"

"A graduate of the University of Oxford."

"Zo?"

"Tutor in the family of the Earl of Tottenbridge."

"Zo?"

"Son of a county magistrate."

"Zo? And nevertheless you are arrested for wandering about like a rogue and vagabond without a passport. We know not who you are, what you are, where you come from. The question with us is, Where is your passport? It is enough." And before I could reply his back was turned.

A whitewashed room, sixteen feet square, one barred window, one iron bedstead, one wooden bench—such was my apartment and the inventory of its furniture; and I felt my heart sink as the key in the door turned with an ominous click, and I was left to enjoy my solitary meditations.

What could I do? For an hour I racked my brain. Dared I apply to the English embassy? I would, come what might of it. A few blows on the panel of my door brought the officer.

"I wish to make immediate application to Lord Cowley."

"I will see."

He returned in a few minutes.

"Lord Cowley is not in Vienna now. He is at the Grand Baths."

"Still, there is somebody at the embassy office. I must go there."

After a brief interview with his superior, the permission was accorded.

The officer and I reached the embassy building, and as I passed the jovial English porter at the door, my heart rose, for already I felt the shadow of the British lion over me.

A pale, emaciated, gentlemanly youth, with a gold eyeglass, was standing with his back to the fire, reading a copy of the "Times," while at his feet lay a magnificent bull-and-mastiff, by far the more dignified animal of the two. The exquisite gave no sign of his knowledge of our presence.

"Ahem!"

No attention.

The dog yawned, the great clock on the wall ticked with an aggravating loudness, and at last I broke out—

"Sir, I am in a terrible dilemma. I have lost my passport. I trusted it to a rascally policeman to take to the bureau to get visé, and now I am apprehended, put in a miserable prison, called a rogue and vagabond by a confounded commissaire." The effect of my eloquence on the attaché was amusing. Down went the paper.

"Oh, I say—you know—you mustn't—indeed, you mustn't. The office can't be approached in this manner—very irregular, by Jove, very irregular."

"What must I do? The consequences may be fearful——"

"Write to Lord John Russell at the F. O. If he knows anything about you, you can petition Lord Cowley, and in the course of a few weeks——"

"A few weeks! a cycle of years! I must be liberated at once. The safety, nay, the very life of a helpless boy depends upon it."

"Oh, I say, you know, you mustn't get so excited, by Jove, you know; you mustn't indeed. Very irregular—'pon honor, I never saw such irregularity."

The Adam was aroused in me—I couldn't help it.

"Sir!" I roared, "you are here for the protection of the British subject——"

"No, you know," he interrupted. "Consul, that sort of thing. By Jove, never saw such a fellow."

"You are placed here for use or ornament. You are, sir, a failure in either capacity."

"John!"—oh, the superciliously grand air of that little mite!—"John, show this person the door!"

Once more in prison.

Another hour's mental rack, another resource—send for the landlord of the Hôtel d'Hollande.

He came.

I fancy I see before me now the paunchy Dutchman, rubbing his fat hands and condoling with me in hybrid accents.

"But now, Herr Engländer, an inspiration!" He approached me, placed his pursy lips to my ears, and whispered: "Offer—delicately as you can—but offer the commissaire a few of your English gold pieces, and see the passport, he return, he come back—vite, quick. Voilà tout."

"Bribe the commissaire?"

"Hush! yes, it is your only chance."

Heavens! what a country! Well might poor Jules rave at the Austrians!

The Dutchman left, and after a few minutes' hesitation, I summoned up courage to knock at the door, which was promptly opened by the officer, who respectfully demanded my requirements.

"I wish to see the commissaire."

"Surely. Will the Herr follow me?"

Where were the frowns gone? The commissaire received me in a most gracious manner. Would I be seated?

"Sir," I stammered, for it went sorely against the grain, "my carelessness has brought me into considerable trouble, and I feel that with your aid alone I can rectify matters. At the same time I am aware that I should pay some penalty for my lack of discretion. If therefore you would give these five sovereigns to some charitable institution in Vienna, and use some effort to find my passport, you will lay me under a great obligation."

The great official said he would do so, and the English sovereigns chinked in his capacious vest-pocket.

"And now, if the Herr will go to his hotel, all Vienna shall be searched. The passport cannot be lost, and in a few hours it shall be in his hands."

Free! It was the only time I was ever under lock and key, but I shall never forget the exhilarating delight of that moment.

I had hardly gone twenty rods when I remembered that the boat left at five o'clock, and I thought that I would return and tell the commissaire to hurry up.

As I opened the door of the bureau I saw him deliberately take from a pigeon-hole my passport, and handing it to the agent, say, "Here, take this stupid Englishman his passport!"

"Sir," I said, stepping forward, "I will relieve you of the trouble."

Not a blush, not an apology. With a profusion of compliments and hopes for my bon voyage, the commisaaire graciously bowed me out, and with all haste I sought the Hôtel d'Hollande.

The fiacre was just driving up to the door as I arrived. I saw it all in one moment. The boy was not there.

I questioned the driver and passengers. It appeared that Jules had left the carriage shortly after my departure, and as three hours had elapsed before their return to Vienna, they concluded that he had joined me.

My excitement threw the landlord into a further convulsion of hand-rubbing and general perplexity.

"Get me a strong saddle horse," I impetuously demanded.

"It shall be at the door in five minutes. Will not the Herr dine before he leaves?"

"Dine! No; but let me have a flask of brandy."

Out through the paved streets to the plain. I scoured the whole country round, peered into every carriage, searched every bush and brier, rode up and down the neighboring lanes and highways, inquired of all I met, and only trotted back to Vienna when darkness came on and my jaded horse could hardly bear me home.

Then I ate and drank, and, taking a calèche, visited every police station and hospital in Vienna. All in vain; and at three o'clock in the morning I threw myself on my bed to snatch a few hours' sleep ere my search should be again renewed.

I will not dwell upon the horrors of that time. Day succeeded day, and nearly a week passed in my frantic efforts to discover the whereabouts of the poor young Hungarian. How my heart bled for the gentle boy, perhaps languishing in an Austrian dungeon and calling on the good Englishman to rescue him. I lived a year in that week. At last I resolved to telegraph to M. Danneris. "Jules is lost. For God's sake, come at once," flashed along the wires. The answer was equally terse. The operator at Brussels replied, "Danneris gone. Left no address."

Was ever anything so unfortunate? Ah, yes, he did talk of visiting England, and that was the reason he could not himself escort Jules home.

Then I knew that I must brace my nerves to the terrible effort of telling that poor father that his child was lost; that I, by my cursed carelessness, had been the destroyer of his peace.

"Your son has mysteriously disappeared from my charge. Hasten here."

The answer was more perplexing than the one from Brussels: "Baron von Dressdorf not known—no such place as Kioske."

Heavens! Was I in a dream?

For three weeks I continued my search, wandering about in a haggard, broken manner, dreading every day to be stricken with brain fever. I could not sleep for thinking of the poor lad, whose big, pleading eyes seemed to look up into mine from every side. He haunted me.

One day I was watching the crowd pass the corner of the Thun Strasse, when my hand was clasped, and a cheery voice rang in my ear:

"Mortimer, old fellow, by all that's glorious! Who would ever have thought of meeting you here?"

It was Harvey Lawson, my old college chum.

"But you are sick, man. You look clean out of condition. Come up into my den—mind those stairs—here you are—take that arm-chair. You see I'm 'own correspondent' to the 'Daily Growler.' There's a pipe. Will you have beer or wine? And, now, what have you been doing with yourself?"

I told him all, and my story certainly awakened much interest in him.

"What was the date of your leaving Brussels?"

"Wednesday, September 17."

"Just a month ago. Hand me that file of papers at your elbow."

He selected one, glanced at it a moment. "Ah, yes, here it is."

"What?" I cried eagerly, the blood flying to my face.

"What was the name of the advocate?" he persisted with all the gravity of a judge.

"Auguste Danneris."

"And his office, 170 Rue des Allumettes?"

"Yes, yes!"

"The pension in the Porte de Schaerbeck?"

"Yes."

"The youth—black eyes, black hair, high forehead, projecting chin, height five feet three?"

"Yes."

"Spoke English well?"

"Remarkably well for a foreigner—and so young."

"Had a slight impediment in pronouncing the letter p."

"Yes, I tried to correct the dear boy of the habit."

"Did, eh?"

"I did, and with some success too."

"And went by the name of Jules von Dressdorf?"

"Yes."

"Then, by the lord Harry! Master Mortimer, you've immortalized yourself. You've abducted the most accomplished little dame d'industrie Paris ever produced—you've snatched from under the very noses of a cordon of French and Flemish police the princess of adventuresses, Adèle de la Voix, spy, thief, forger—ay, and if suspicion points truly, murderess—for she is believed to have poisoned an accomplice at Ghent after consummating the robbery of the Comtesse de Nemour's jewels. A pretty piece of business truly."

I was dazed. He handed me the journal, and I read for myself the whole of the infamous plot.

"By George, that boarding-school dodge was an excellent one, worthy of her greatness—threw the police off the scent for ten days," said Harvey with a grin.

"Then, when the police got on the right track again," he continued, "it was too late; she had eloped with you. O Lord, it's too good," and he lay back in his chair and roared.

"By heavens, if you are not quiet, I'll pitch you out of the window."

"No, you won't. If you move a finger, I'll write and tell Gwennie Grey all about your elopement. Why, man, if you were a child of grace, you'd go down on your knees and implore me not to give you two columns in the 'Growler.' There, I was only joking. Don't look so blue. But I confess it's a strong temptation. Such sensations don't crop up every day; besides, messieurs the police are dying to know how la belle Adèle crossed the frontier."

"Do you think," I said wearily, "that the proprietor of the pension was an accomplice?"

"Most assuredly not. He is an old resident, and gave his testimony with tears in his eyes, assuring the court that Jules von Dressdorf was one of the most docile, intelligent pupils he ever had under his roof."

"And M. Danneris?"

"Her father, I believe. His rôle was the man of reference, the respectable 'fence' who directs the game while others do the work."

"Had my trouble with the police here anything to do with the matter?"

"Not a bit of it. They are infernal rascals, reaping where they do not sow, and looking on careless travellers as legitimate game. Under the present régime they make half their living out of passport irregularities."

"I suppose," I added, "I had better notify the police at Brussels."

"And be the laughing stock of Europe for your pains. No, Mortimer, lie quiet here for a week or two, then take steamer through the Mediterranean home. By the by, did Danneris advance you money for the journey?"

"He gave me five hundred francs."

"Then you are not so badly off after all. Make your mind easy about Mlle. Adèle. She is hundreds of miles away by this."

"I wonder why she did not run away from the hotel the night I went to the theatre."

"Quien sabe? Let the dead past bury its dead."

Seventeen years have passed since the occurrence of the events I have recorded, and never till yesterday have I seen or heard one word of Adèle de la Voix.

"Gwennie," said I to my dear little wife, on reaching my home in southern Michigan after a visit on business to Detroit, "you remember the heroine of my trip to Dressdorf castle, just before we were married?"

"Surely," said the wife.

"Well, I saw Adèle de la Voix yesterday."

"You didn't! When? Where?"

"At a store in Gratiot avenue. I was making a purchase, when a woman entered—old-looking, homely, shabby; but there was no mistaking those black eyes, nor the sniff of the left nostril. When she was gone, I made some inquiries about her, and here is her business card:

"Mme. Julienne, from Paris, reveals the past, the present, and the future. Can be consulted on all affairs of love, business, or law, and overcomes trouble of any kind. She brings together the separated, causes speedy marriages, and sells infallible love powders. Go and see for yourself. No humbug here.

"Rooms, etc."

"And what are you going to do?"

"Do? I don't know."

"I do."

"You wise woman, what is it?"

"Write the whole story for your favorite magazine. It is as interesting as half the fiction one reads, and contains a good moral."

THE BATTALION.

J. W. De Forest.

THE FASCINATIONS OF ANGLING.

I.

It is the cheerful verdict of all anglers that they find no other pastime so fascinating. This conclusion is not based upon the mere mechanism of the art, but upon the fact that it is eminently healthful, rational, and elevating, blending the picturesque and exhilarating in such equal proportions as to exactly meet the demands of the quiet student, the contemplative philosopher, and the care-worn man of business, whose wearied or exhausted nature covets just the solitude and repose which no other recreation so abundantly furnishes.

This of course could not be said of angling if it had no other attraction than the excitement it affords. But I am sure no one ever became an enthusiastic angler who had no other or higher conceptions of its possibilities. The mere act of taking fish is but a minor note in the full volume of harmony which comes to its appreciative disciples amid the vast solitudes where they find their best sport and highest pleasure. Ask any true angler what pictures come up most vividly before him as "the time of the singing of birds" draweth nigh, when it is right to "go a-fishing." His answer will not be, "The rise and strike of trout or salmon," although both will pass upon the canvas like rays of sunshine upon the quiet repose of a forest landscape. He will rather discourse to you of flowing river, of murmuring brook, of cloud-capped mountain, of waving forest, of sunshine and shadow, of rapid and cascade, of tent and camp fire, of silence and solitude, of cozy nook, of undisturbed repose, of refreshing slumber, of invigorated health, and the abandon of delight which neither word nor pencil can adequately portray. I have heard such "simple wise men" talk of their favorite pastime until they glowed with ecstasy, without once naming fish or fishing. That is but the body of the art. Its spirit consists in what is seen and felt. An angler, "born so," as Walton hath it, retains a more vivid recollection of the foam-encircled pool where salmon love to congregate than of the "rise" and "strike" which gave him his early morning's exhilaration. While he soon forgets the "play" and weight of the fish captured, he never forgets the picturesque surroundings of the struggle. He may forget the last homily he read, or the last sermon to which he listened, but never the thrill of devout ecstasy which came to him while wandering along some forest pathway, or while gently floating with the current of his favorite river, bathed in sunshine and fanned by summer zephyrs. After many days, these blissful moments come back to him like divine benedictions. Be sure, O carping critic, the gentle art has its spiritual and æsthetic as well as its physical and intellectual attributes.

As a mere physical pastime, angling stands foremost among all the known sources of pleasurable recreation. It blends active exercise with fascinating excitement in such healthful proportions as to ensure the fortunate participant equally against wearisome monotony and excessive fatigue. The pure mountain air in which he is constantly enveloped is a perpetual tonic, while the exercise it compels gives steadiness to the nerves and solidity to the muscles.

As a mental renovator it is equally effective. There can be no protracted lassitude while the brain is constantly quickened into refreshing vitality by the novel and exhilarating surroundings of mountain and forest and river, and the rise and strike and struggle of trout or salmon.

And to those who have neither physical nor mental ailment, but who are conscious of a spiritual need—of some more vivid appreciation of the goodness and beneficence of the Heavenly Father than most men attain unto while writhing under the harrow of business or bewildered by the shallow superficialities or noisy clatter of artificial life—the quiet places where the pursuit of the gentle art takes them, the silence and shadow of the sombre forest, the twitter and song of the solitary woodbird, the clear shining stars, which hang like silver lamps above his tent or cabin, and the reposeful hush which comes to his soul like whispered benedictions—these all tend to intensify his gratitude, to quicken his spiritual pulse, and to give to him a higher and a keener appreciation of his spiritual obligations.

There may be those who engage in angling only as they engage in the coarser amusements which, for a time, divert the mind and banish ennui. But all such soon weary of it, and never reach the higher plane of the pleasant pastime. To do so requires a placid temper, a thoughtful if not a poetic appreciation of the picturesque, a moderate love of solitude, a patient habit, and a quiet disposition. To find delectation in his walks, the angler need not be an ascetic or a stickler for creeds; but I do not think the heart of Gallio, who "cared for none of these things," would have been made glad when "the voice of the turtle was heard in the land," and it was right to "go a-fishing," because I cannot imagine him a man of a teachable disposition or of a lovable nature, who took pleasure in the society or teachings of the gentle Master of the Galilean fishermen. Izaak Walton might have had equal skill with rod and reel without his saintly faith; but his "Complete Angler" never would have attained the high place it has held and will ever hold in the affections of the contemplative men of all time had he not been imbued with the spirit of reverent humility and such a loving sense of the Infinite Beneficence as to find in all the beauty and sublimity of Nature evidence of His great goodness and loving kindness to the children of men. He may not, like Enoch, have "walked with God," but in all his walks he saw God's handiwork; and this consciousness multiplied many fold the pleasure he sought and always found in the pursuit of his favorite recreation.

II.

There are times and seasons for salmon fishing as for all things. But all times and all seasons are not alike. Nor are all places. The best time to fish for salmon, where salmon are to be fished for, is the first hour the water is in condition; that is, as soon as the spring freshets have subsided, and the water, by falling back into its natural channel, has become freed from the surface rubbish washed into it, and sufficiently settled to render your line visible to the eye of the fish. This time varies on different rivers, according to their length, their volume, and the character of the soil through which they flow. On some rivers the drainage is so limited that a fly may be cast successfully so soon as the ice disappears. There are, however, but few rivers on either side the Gulf, or in either of the Provinces, where the best fishing is attainable before the first of June. The "season" continues from that time on to the middle of August, although there is often good sport into September, when the last "run" begin their journey. But no "posted" angler would care to be compelled to take the chances of sport after the close of August, as only very few fish come up from the sea later, and those remaining in the river are wearied from their long journeyings, or are torpid from their protracted absence from the sea.

Within the period named—June to the middle of August—salmon are gamy and muscular, wherever found, whether one or fifty miles from the ocean. But the pools most coveted are those in closest proximity to salt water. Salmon are at their best when they begin their upward journey. The fresh element in which they find themselves seems to give them new life and friskiness, and when hooked they fight with a strength and fierceness not exhibited in the same measure afterward. A twenty-pound salmon fresh from the sea gives you the play of a thirty-pound fish taken weeks after he has made his way far up toward the headwaters of a fifty or a hundred-mile river.

This fact, however, is not only not perceptible to the novice, but the sport furnished by the capture of a salmon at any point in a river, or at any stage of his sojourn in fresh water, is so grandly exhilarating and so full of the intensest excitement, that it is a matter of but trifling moment where a fish is struck so long as the angler strikes him.

But the season is important. The earlier weeks on any river are to be preferred, not alone because the fish have more vitality, but because, as a rule, they are more abundant. With an unerring instinct which is as mysterious as it is wonderful, they seek the rivers where they were born upon the return of every spring. If the rivers are in condition for their ascent, they begin their journey at once. But the rivers are not always in this condition when salmon first come to them; and if they are not, they wait their opportunity, and then move forward with the regularity and steadiness of an army under marching orders. Hence they are ordinarily found in greatest numbers at the first rush; and they are most fortunate who are duly placed, at favorite pools, to bid them welcome.

What I know of this phase of salmon angling I have learned from experience and observation, under circumstances which enable me to speak with more confidence than would be otherwise becoming. I have fished for three years on what I believe to be one of the very best rivers on the continent; best not merely because of the abundance and weight of its fish, but because also of its size and length, the magnificence of its scenery, and the great number of its splendid pools. My first two seasons extended from July 10 to August 10; and they are seasons which will be for ever remembered with delight. I did not deem it possible that I should ever experience any higher pleasure this side that "pure river of water, clear as crystal," which fills so large a place in the entrancing picture of the bright hereafter. My catch exceeded my highest expectations, the sport from first to last was magnificent and kingly, and the river, and the scenery, and the surroundings embodied so much of beauty and grandeur, that my cup of joy was filled to overflowing. If I had left the river with no other knowledge than I then possessed of what had been and of what might be, I would have lived on content with the happy impression that I had experienced the highest possibilities of the gentle art. Every hour was an hour of sunshine—whether casting, or striking, or killing—whether slowly ascending or swiftly schuting the rapids—whether shouting in very ecstasy of delight or quietly discoursing of the pleasures of angling, around the camp fire, grateful to a kind Providence which had "cast my lines in such pleasant places," and filled with devout thanksgiving that time and opportunity had been given me to understand why the good men, and the thoughtful men, and the simple wise men of all ages had written so enthusiastically and sung so glowingly of the gentle art.

But, while thus pluming myself upon what I had achieved and experienced, fancying that I had reached the highest pleasure attainable from the art of angling, I learned that while I had done well I could do much better earlier in the season. And so I found; for by a combination of circumstances as fortunate as they were gratifying, my third season gave me the first "run" and such experience and sport as will for ever remain a golden memory.

III.

With a companion as venerable in years and as full of enthusiasm as myself, we set our faces toward the bay of Chaleur on as bright and beautiful a June morning as ever gladdened the world. Hitherto the journey had been tedious and circuitous—by rail and steamer. But, like the world in general, the Provinces are progressive, and on this occasion an "all-rail" route enabled us to do in two days what it formerly took six to accomplish, and the 10th of June found us encamped in a beautiful valley encircled by magnificent mountains, with a majestic river at our feet grandly marching to the sea, but in unwelcome volume and raging with frightful turbulence. The melted snow was pouring down from the hills in such torrents as to overflow banks and lowlands, and to preclude all hope of angling until an abatement of the flood. It only remained for us to imitate the patriotic Germans on the Rhine, and "watch and wait." And for ten days we watched and waited with such patience as we could muster, and with such diversion as could be found in casting for trout in a neighboring brook which found its way to the river in our immediate neighborhood.

IV.

It was the tenth day of our waiting, and while the river was rushing with such fury as to render holding a canoe in the current with any appliances at our command impracticable, that I succeeded in reaching an eddy caused by a huge bowlder still buried beneath the waters. I could not anchor, and my frail bark was kept in constant motion by the swirling eddy, when, after repeated casts, I had a rise. The fish leaped to such an unusual height, and with such seeming determination that the lure should not escape him, that I was startled and barely escaped a backward plunge in my anxiety to make a sure "strike." From the "feel," which ran like electricity from my submerged fly to the tips of my fingers, I knew that the hook had effectively performed its work, and was "fastened in a sure place." With this conviction I felt bold to begin the work resolutely, although I knew that if I succeeded in making a capture, I must do so under circumstances more difficult than any I had ever before encountered in any waters or with any fish. I was literally hemmed in. I dared not allow the monster to get outside the restricted circle of the eddy, for if he should reach the current, which was sweeping downward at the rate of ten miles an hour, I would be utterly powerless to check him, because it would be impossible to prevent him from rushing over the boiling rapids, which were thundering within fifty feet of the lower edge of the eddy. My only hope of fish or canoe was to hold both under the shelter of the rock which caused the eddy. To do this required a shorter line than it is ever wise to retain at the opening of a fight with a thirty-pound salmon. But everything—fish, rod, and line—had to be risked. It was hold all or lose everything; and with a shout which made the whole camp lookers-on, I began the fight; now hopeful, now in despair; now with the fish leaping within fifty feet of the canoe, and now lashing the water with the fierceness of a tiger; now dashing toward the current as if determined to break off or drag the canoe with him, and anon sullenly permitting himself to be reeled up to within ten feet of the gaff; now sinking and sulking, and now rushing and leaping as if he would twist off his own neck in his attempts to shake the cruel barb from his lacerated jaw; now at handsome holding distance, peaceful as a lamb, and seemingly ready for the coup de grace, and anon dashing hither and thither, as if looking for some open door to freedom; but all in vain. If his mettle was up, so was mine, and at that moment I would sooner have lost a fortune than that fish. I had kept him within bounds and well in hand; had got him within a foot of the gaff, sure of victory, and was shouting to my gaffer, "Now then, let him have it!" when, like a flash, he shot under the canoe, and would have smashed everything in a moment had not my watchful guide, seeing the situation and the danger in the twinkling of an eye, swung round our boat so that I could place the tip of my rod beyond the stern of the canoe, and thus escaped the greatest misfortune that can befall a salmon angler. It was quickly and skilfully done, and in five minutes more the first salmon of the season was gaffed, and the first victory achieved. The shout from my own canoe was caught up by the excited lookers-on, and we paddled to camp thrilled with the excitement of the contest, and happy as it is possible for an angler to be—and there are possibilities of happiness to anglers inconceivable to any who have never killed a salmon.

We accepted this first fish as the forerunner of the good time hoped for. And the good time came of which, for the delectation of those who have been or would like to be "there" themselves, I subjoin a few samples.

V.

I had as my immediate companion an enthusiastic angler in all waters, but who had not as yet had the good fortune to take a salmon. The flood had somewhat receded; but it was still necessary to place our canoes in the eddies, and cast crosswise into the edges of the current. I had landed a fish of moderate size, and was watching my friend trying his 'prentice hand, at salmon casting, occasionally directing him by my fancied superior knowledge of the art, when a very large fish rose to his fly, and he struck him with a suddenness and force which was certainly complimentary to his muscle if not so illustrative of his skill. For it is always dangerous to strike too hard. It does not require a great pressure to force the barb home, while a heavy strike or a too sudden twitch is apt either to break something or tear the hook from the fish's jaw. In this case the hook held. For a moment fish and fisher seemed alike astonished, and neither stirred; but it was only for a moment. Directly away flew the fish—the line spinning from the reel as if harnessed to a locomotive. Fortunately the eddy, which made out from the point of an island, extended some quarter of a mile, and before it was passed over, the Judge began to appreciate the situation, the magnitude of the work in hand, and the difficulties he was likely to encounter before he could call the fish his own. He held him with a steady hand. He answered every call for line with a promptness and caution which indicated great tact, and he lost no opportunity to reel in when practicable. For a time it seemed probable that he would kill his fish without being carried into the central current. But no such luck awaited him; for after two hours of patient waiting and working—of rushing, and leaping, and sulking—the frenzied fish made for the centre of the river with such impetuosity that it would have been as easy to stop the flow of the river itself as to check him in his mad career. Where he led the canoe was obliged to follow; and follow it did for more than two miles, with occasional respites at available eddies, and occasional dashes up stream, putting the canoe men to their best trumps to prevent the reel from becoming exhausted by these upward flights.

Thus the battle progressed for more than three hours, when the fish approached the canoe of one of the party, which was anchored near a bank covered with overhanging brush. He rushed with such speed that the Indians in the anchored canoe had barely time to get out of the way, when the fish dashed between them and the bank, but so closely that when he halted for an instant near the surface, one of the Indians, whose movements were as quick as those of the fish himself, gaffed him and so saved him "as by fire," for in an instant more he would have been caught in the overhanging brush toward which he was moving, and where, had he reached it, he would have been inevitably lost. He weighed thirty-six pounds—the largest fish taken during our month's sojourn on the river. But the most marvelous part of the story is that the brute was hooked foul in the side, rendering the fight and the capture of so large a fish a double victory.

Many events in the Judge's life will be forgotten, but this first fight with his first salmon will remain a pleasant memory for ever.

VI.

Here is another experience which all anglers will appreciate. I was anchored in an eddy at the head of a favorite pool while the current in the channel of the river was so strong that it was deemed impossible to make headway against it. The pool in which I was casting was full of hidden rocks; but for that very reason it was one of the very best on the river. After an unusually long cast, a fish rose to my fly and was hooked. On the instant he dashed for the head of the pool, but by the time the anchor was shipped he reversed his movement with a rush, carrying with him more than two hundred feet of line. The canoe, having been forced into the channel, was sweeping downward with great rapidity, when I became conscious that my line was hitched. The only hope of rescue was to force the canoe back against the heavy current—and the order to do so was answered by such a display of skill and muscle as I had never before and have never since witnessed. The paddles bent like withs, and for a moment not an inch of headway was obtained. "We can't move her," was the mournful wail of my faithful Indians. "You can and must. Away with her!" was all I could say to them; and "away" it was. After a desperate struggle the canoe reached a point on a line with the rock on which I was caught, when off the line flew with a spring which indicated the great tension to which it had been subjected. "Now let her go!" and down we went, swept by the current, past rocks, into eddies and over rapids for a mile before I succeeded in getting the fish in a position where I could check him or place him where I desired. This I did, however, in time, by getting below him and holding the canoe broadside to the current. This enabled me to handle him at will, and the gaffer soon brought him to book. He weighed twenty-nine pounds.

VII.

One other incident. To have it appreciated, however, I must premise that the manner in which an angler plays a fish depends largely upon the condition of the river. Where, after a strike, you can pass into still water or into a moderate current, the position of your canoe is of no great moment. But if you are forced into very swift water, to allow a fish to have his way, and to make no attempt to gaff him until he is exhausted or until you can force him up to within gaffing distance against the current, is to find yourself at the end of the battle so far from your pool as to render a return unpleasantly tedious. Under such circumstances the order of battle with experts is as follows: The moment the fish starts down stream push below him with all possible despatch, reeling up the attained slack as the distance decreases. When the desired position is reached the canoe is thrown across the current and allowed to float with it. As the fish is above you, it is comparatively easy, with the aid of the current, to guide him downward with a very moderate pressure. In this position, with the exercise of proper caution and skill, the fish can generally be brought near enough to be gaffed long before he is the least exhausted.