with great solemnity and tenderness telling every body farewell.

comfortable leather helmets with horse-tail pendants, and glittering swords, dashed through scampering crowds on sleek, fat, prancing steeds. Drums rattled, fifes shrieked, captains and subordinates roared "Fall into ranks!" "Dress by the right!" "Mark time!" with a dignity and fervor reflecting upon them and their county the highest credit. Then appeared in all his majesty the Colonel, with plumed chapeau, the observed of all observers, a noble looking man, said to resemble the great Wash

dent adjutant; and the spruce young surgeon, casting furtive glances at the pretty faces and bright eyes in those upper windows.

But the stirring times for our village were certain public days of annual occurrence when the country people flocked in, filling the tavern and crowding the street. "Court days" were seasons of general convocation. With few occasions for personal intercourse, the people from different sections availed themselves of these opportunities for settling up business matters. Then customers were dunned, bills paid, the public crier sold worthless horses with high eulogi-ington; there, too, was the stirring, lively, arums on their matchless qualities, and the sheriff brought down his ruthless hammer on the household effects of some poor unfortunate who had failed to make both ends meet, while his busy deputy called the names of tardy jurors or witnesses three times over from the court-house steps; farmers poured doleful plaints into each other's ears over backward seasons, droughts, short crops, and low prices, while family affairs and gossip in general were not neglected. Rich were the stores of news carried at the close of such days to country homes. Oft were the references for weeks afterward to what the goodman had "heard at court."

66

"Forward, march!" at last echoes along the line, and our warriors defile through the village and move off to the parade-ground on a neighboring hill. Let us review them. John Falstaff, what a regiment! Sixteen of the sixty troopers in the full panoply of horse-tail helmets and bullet buttons, the remainder arrayed each as seemed best in his own eyes. Horses jogging along as if going to church, horses standing on their hind legs, horses trotting sidewise, horses with their heads where their tails should have been, horses incontinently charging on applewomen and cake tables. The infantry perform fewer evolutions, but they are fit match for the troopers. Here is a uniform (sic!) coat with short waist and long, narrow skirts that may be a relic of historic Yorktown; here is another of scarlet, probably captured from some unlucky Britisher at the same eventful locality; and there is a jaunty one fresh from a Northern city tailor. Here are all varieties of "citizens" costume; black coats, blue coats, green coats, linsey-woolsey coats, gingham coats, no coats, round jackets, and hunting shorts. Here are shot guns, rifles, old muskets, rusty swords, bludgeons, pea-sticks, and no sticks. Some are keeping step, some running to catch up; talking, laughing, playing tricks, and eating gingercakes.

Election-day," however, was one of our high days. All the voters of the county then assembled, and great was the bustle and the throng. Candidates for Congress and the Legislature, in their best Sunday clothes, were conspicuousshaking hands with young and old, inquiring about the good-wife and children, hoping all were well. On the hustings, too, they stood in imposing array, pouring out their well-conned speeches-some with stammering tongue, others facetious and humorous, making the sober farmers shake their sides over happy hits and oft-told jokes, others polished, classical, eloquent; for some of our orators were men whose splendid declamation thrilled the councils of the nation. Eager were the eyes turned upon each voter, as, according to the custom there, the sheriff grasped his hand, called aloud his name, and demanded, "Whom do you vote for ?" Once on the neighboring hill-our Champs de And when at last the setting sun gave the signal Mars-our regiment "spreads itself." Its mafor closing the polls, and the result was an-nœuvres are miscellaneous and original, not to nounced, great was the joy, and great the disappointment too. Long and deep were the potations of the victors; long and deep were the potations of the vanquished.

But "General Muster" was the day of days. For us young folk, at least, it was first in the calendar. Then from early dawn the crowds began to gather-pouring in from every road and by-way, from farm-house and secluded mountain valley. The court-house sidewalk and the public corners were the property for the time being of thrifty country dames, whose tables were laden with small-beer, apples, chestnuts, and piles of ginger-cakes-particularly aggravating to penniless urchins-round ones a cent apiece, square ones, artistically embossed, four cents. Horse cakes were not yet introduced.

say impromptu. For a while it stands at rest, "grand, gloomy, and peculiar." Some tired of standing lie down on the grass; some achieve various practical jokes. They march, they counter-march; they form hollow squares that are not at all square; the lively adjutant gallops and vociferates in intense excitement; the troopers scour the hill-side and parts adjacent with a desperation and expenditure of horse-flesh and horse-perspiration worthy of the highest admiration. What prodigies of valor would such soldiers not perform had they only the chance!

Our regiment having displayed its powers and prowess to the satisfaction of the admiring public and its own, wound up the eventful day by an extemporaneous charge on the cake-stands and on the taverns too. Some of the heroes not But the soldiers. What an array! Troopers having exhausted their valor, undertook indiwith stub-tailed coats profusely buttoned, un-vidual adventures, or what is popularly known

as "on their own hook," the consequence of which were many black eyes and bloody noses. From the effects of the various "charges" not a few found it difficult to mount their horses when the time came for turning their faces homeward, or to sit erect in their saddles. Wild whoops and hurrahs disturbed our usually quiet village long after nightfall. Not a few of the sturdy countrymen reached their mountain homes through no small perils, and not a little the worse for "General Muster Day."

Another of our village high days was the 22d of February, the birth-day of Washington, for we were a patriotic people. How it was that the Fourth of July was not equally esteemed I can not explain, but such was the fact. On one of the beautiful hills overlooking the village was an institution of learning which had done much toward diffusing the intelligence of which we were no little proud, and which had enabled us to furnish men of renown for both Church and State. Washington's birthday was always the occasion of a grand celebration. Orations were delivered, our cannon was fired—especially the "butt," the remains of an exploded iron cannon -the best music we could command discoursed its enlivening strains, country people came in to gaze and admire, and the young maidens mustered in strength, their rich mountain complexions set off to the best advantage by the latest city fashions. The village belles were accustomed to befriend their respective college favorites by making for them ribbon rosettes, with long streamers, the society badges, blue for the one, white for the other. Fastened to the lapel they decidedly added to the effectiveness of a young gentleman's presence.

glories. Our village at this time, so far as my memory serves me, could boast but one fourwheeled carriage; and this was brought into requisition to transport the young ladies from their homes to the ball. One or more of the "managers" took the houses seriatim, bringing from each its precious contribution to the aggregate female loveliness of the occasion. As we boys stood at the village tavern-door, and saw one after another of these carriage-loads drive up, and youth and beauty in all its charms gracefully and gallantly handed from the steps and tripping merrily into the scene of festivity, it seemed almost too much bliss for mortals. The reader must bear in mind that in those primitive times ladies did not postpone their appearance in the ball-room till from ten o'clock P.M. to midnight; they went before dark, and could, of course, be seen and admired by all curious spectators. When the famous black fiddler at length struck up an old "Virginia Reel," the gayety set in in good earnest, and many a blooming belle and manly beau, as they tripped together "the light fantastic toe,” wished in their hearts that the 22d of February would come every month in the year.

But it must not be supposed that our village was given up to "the pomps and vanities of the world." On the contrary, we were rather uncommonly religious. Hence I must not fail to mention among our high days the meetings of Presbytery and Synod-for our population was chiefly of Scotch-Irish descent, and consequently Presbyterian-Synod did not come except after intervals of some years; but when it did, it was worth while to be there. The writer of this was not much of a judge of the preaching in those With these preliminaries, if the 22d happened days; but of the eating he felt himself authorto be a fair, bright day, not always to be reck-ized to speak in terms of the most unqualified oned upon in February, we were sure of a good approbation. "The big pot was put in the littime. At the appointed hour the societies tle one." Every house was filled with guests, formed in column, two abreast, and marched on the principle of the largest hospitality. Minfrom the classic halls on College Hill to the isters, laymen, and ladies were alike welcome; court-house in the midst of the town. The and they came from every part of the Stateband by which they were preceded usually com- from hundreds of miles away. Great were the prised the very modest allowance of two flutes, crowds. The old church was too small to conand nothing else, played by amateurs. But tain them; and when Sunday came, "the great that procession, that music, those blue-and-white day of the feast," the throng surpassed all destreamers flying in the mountain breezes, the scription. And very good times these were; patriotic orations, the throng of bright faces, many the pleasant acquaintances formed, many and the rounds of rapturous applause, if ever the genial hours passed, many the fine serhuman glory had reached its culminating point, mons, many the pious impressions—to last, it it seemed to us youngsters that this must be it. was to be hoped, forever. It was worth going It has fallen to my lot since to see Kossuth's re- a very long way to participate in these good ception into New York, and Queen Victoria's things. reception into Edinburgh, with the review of 80,000 troops by the Emperor and Empress of France, with numerous other pageants; but these were tame and small affairs compared with that 22d of February turn-out, as I used to see it in our mountain village. This grand gala occasion usually wound up with a ball, which was, of course, in harmony with the splendors of the day-in fact, the very blossom and flower of its VOL. XXXIII.-No. 194.-N

But the times of which I write are long since passed. Our mountain village has so changed that we of the by-gone days returning there would hardly know it. Modern fashions and modern airs have usurped the place of the former simplicity. But it is questionable whether any advance has been made on the real enjoyment of life which attended those unsophisticated "high days" of "auld lang syne."

N

ARMADALE.

BY WILKIE COLLINS, AUTHOR OF "NO NAME," "THE WOMAN IN WHITE," ETC.

BOOK THE LAST.

CHAPTER II.

IN THE HOUSE.

OTICING Mr. Bashwood's confusion (after a moment's glance at the change in his personal appearance), Midwinter spoke first.

"I see I have surprised you," he said. "You were looking, I suppose, for somebody else? Have you heard from Allan? Is he on his way home again already?"

"I am looking," said Midwinter simply, "for my wife."

"Married, Sir!" exclaimed Mr. Bashwood. "Married since I last had the pleasure of seeing you! Might I take the liberty of asking—?” Midwinter's eyes dropped uneasily to the ground.

"You knew the lady in former times," he said. "I have married Miss Gwilt."

The steward started back as he might have started back from a loaded pistol leveled at his His eyes glared as if he had suddenly lost his senses, and the nervous trembling to which he was subject shook him from head to foot.

The inquiry about Allan, though it would naturally have suggested itself to any one in Mid-head. winter's position at that moment, added to Mr. Bashwood's confusion. Not knowing how else to extricate himself from the critical position in which he was placed he took refuge in simple denial.

"I know nothing about Mr. Armadale-oh dear, no, Sir, I know nothing about Mr. Armadale," he answered, with needless cagerness and hurry. "Welcome back to England, Sir," he went on, changing the subject in his nervously talkative manner. "I didn't know you had been abroad. It's so long since we have had the pleasure-since I have had the pleasureHave you enjoyed yourself, Sir, in foreign parts ? Such different manners from oursyes, yes, yes-such different manners from ours! Do you make a long stay in England, now you have come back?"

"I hardly know," said Midwinter. "I have been obliged to alter my plans, and to come to England unexpectedly." He hesitated a little;

"What's the matter?" asked Midwinter. There was no answer. "What is there so very startling," he went on, a little impatiently, “in Miss Gwilt's being my wife?"

"Your wife?" repeated Mr. Bashwood, helplessly. "Mrs. Armadale-!" He checked himself by a desperate effort, and said no more.

The stupor of astonishment which possessed the steward was instantly reflected in Midwinter's face. The name in which he had secretly married his wife had passed the lips of the last man in the world whom he would have dreamed of admitting into his confidence! He took Mr. Bashwood by the arm, and led him away to a quieter part of the terminus than the part of it in which they had hitherto spoken to each other.

breath. What do you mean by that ?"

"You referred to my wife just now," he said; his manner changed, and he added in lower"and you spoke of Mrs. Armadale in the same tones, "A serious anxiety has brought me back. I can't say what my plans will be until that anxiety is set at rest.'

The light of a lamp fell on his face while he spoke, and Mr. Bashwood observed, for the first time, that he looked sadly worn and changed.

Again there was no answer. Utterly incapable of understanding more than that he had involved himself in some serious complication which was a complete mystery to him, Mr. Bashwood struggled to extricate himself from the grasp that was laid on him, and struggled in vain.

Midwinter sternly repeated the question. "I ask you again," he said, "what do you mean by it?"

"I'm sorry, Sir-I'm sure I'm very sorry. If I could be of any use-?" suggested Mr. Bashwood, speaking under the influence in some degree of his nervous politeness, and in some degree of his remembrance of what Midwinter had done for him at Thorpe-Ambrose in the by-gone time. Midwinter thanked him, and turned away sadly. "I am afraid you can be of no use, Mr. Bashwood; but I am obliged to you for your offer, all the same." He stopped, and considered a little: "Suppose she should not be ill? Suppose some misfortune should have happened?" he resumed, speaking to himself, and turning again toward the steward. "If she has left her mother, some trace of her might be|—the capacity to lie. "I only meant to say, found by inquiring at Thorpe-Ambrose."

Mr. Bashwood's curiosity was instantly aroused. The whole sex was interesting to him now for the sake of Miss Gwilt.

"Nothing, Sir! I give you my word of honor I meant nothing!" He felt the hand on his arm tightening its grasp; he saw, even in the obscurity of the remote corner in which they stood, that Midwinter's fiery temper was rising and was not to be trifled with. The extremity of his danger inspired him with the one ready capacity that a timid man possesses when he is compelled by main force to face an emergency

Sir," he burst out, with a desperate effort to look and speak confidently, "that Mr. Armadale would be surprised—”

"You said Mrs. Armadale!"

"No, Sir-on my word of honor, on my sacred word of honor, you are mistaken-you are indeed! I said Mr. Armadale-how could I say any thing else? Please to let me go, SirI'm pressed for time. I do assure you I'm dreadfully pressed for time!"

For a moment longer Midwinter maintained his hold, and in that moment he decided what to do.

of the platform. In an instant Midwinter had crossed, and had passed through the long row of vehicles, so as to skirt it on the side farthest from the platform. He entered the second cab by the left-hand door the moment after Mr. Bashwood had entered the first cab by the righthand door. "Double your fare, whatever it is," he said to the driver, "if you keep the cab before you in view, and follow it wherever it goes." In a minute more both vehicles were on their way out of the station.

The clerk sat in his sentry-box at the gate, taking down the destinations of the cabs as they passed. Midwinter heard the man who was driving him call out "Hampstead!" as he went by the clerk's window.

"Why did you say 'Hampstead?" he asked, when they had left the station. "Because the man before me said 'Hampstead,' Sir," answered the driver.

Over and over again, on the wearisome journey to the northwestern suburb, Midwinter asked if the cab was still in sight. Over and over again the man answered, "Right in front of us."

He had accurately stated his motive for returning to England as proceeding from anxiety about his wife-anxiety naturally caused (after the regular receipt of a letter from her every other, or every third day) by the sudden cessation of the correspondence between them on her side for a whole week. The first vaguely-terrible suspicion of some other reason for her silence than the reason of accident or of illness, to which he had hitherto attributed it, had struck through him like a sudden chill the instant he heard the steward associate the name of "Mrs. Armadale" with the idea of his wife. Little irregularities in her correspondence with him, which he had thus far only thought strange, now came back on his mind and proclaimed themselves to be suspicious as well. He had It was between nine and ten o'clock when the hitherto believed the reasons she had given for driver pulled up his horses at last. Midwinter referring him, when he answered her letters, to got out and saw the cab before them waiting at no more definite address than an address at a a house-door. As soon as he had satisfied himpost-office. Now he suspected her reasons of self that the driver was the man whom Mr. being excuses for the first time. He had hith-Bashwood had hired he paid the promised reerto resolved, on reaching London, to inquire at the only place he knew of at which a clew to her could be found-the address she had given him as the address at which "her mother" lived. Now (with a motive which he was afraid to define even to himself, but which was strong enough to overbear every other consideration in his mind), he determined, before all things, to solve the mystery of Mr. Bashwood's familiarity with a secret, which was a marriage-secret between himself and his wife. Any direct appeal to a man of the steward's disposition, in the steward's present state of mind, would be evidently useless. The weapon of deception was, in this case, a weapon literally forced into Midwinter's hands. He let go of Mr. Bashwood's arm and accepted Mr. Bashwood's explanation.

"I beg your pardon," he said, "I have no doubt you are right. Pray attribute my rudeness to over-anxiety and over-fatigue. I wish you good-evening."

But

The station was by this time almost a solitude; the passengers by the train being assembled at the examination of their luggage in the custom-house waiting-room. It was no easy matter ostensibly to take leave of Mr. Bashwood and really to keep him in view. Midwinter's early life with his gipsy master had been of a nature to practice him in such stratagems as he was now compelled to adopt. He walked away toward the waiting-room by the line of empty carriages, opened the door of one of them as if to look after something that he had left behind, and detected Mr. Bashwood making for the cab-rank on the opposite side

ward and dismissed his own cab.

He took a turn backward and forward before the door. The vaguely terrible suspicion which had risen in his mind at the terminus had forced itself by this time into a definite form which was abhorrent to him. Without the shadow of an assignable reason for it he found himself blindly distrusting his wife's fidelity, and blindly suspecting Mr. Bashwood of serving her in the capacity of gobetween. In sheer horror of his own morbid fancy he determined to take down the number of the house and the name of the street in which it stood; and then, in justice to his wife, to return at once to the address which she had given him as the address at which her mother lived. He had taken out his pocketbook, and was on his way to the corner of the street, when he observed the man who had driven Mr. Bashwood looking at him with an expression of inquisitive surprise. The idea of questioning the cab-driver while he had the opportunity instantly occurred to him. He took a half-crown from his pocket and put it into the man's ready hand.

"Has the gentleman whom you drove from the station gone into that house ?" he asked. "Yes, Sir."

"Did you hear him inquire for any body when the door was opened?"

"He asked for a lady, Sir-Mrs.-" The man hesitated. "It wasn't a common name, Sir; I should know it again if I heard it." "Was it Midwinter?"" "No, Sir." "Armadale ?'"

"That's it, Sir. Mrs. Armadale."

Are you sure it was Mrs.' and not 'Mr. ?" "I'm as sure as a man can be who hasn't taken any particular notice, Sir."

The doubt implied in that last answer decided Midwinter to investigate the matter on the spot. He ascended the house-steps. As he raised his hand to the bell at the side of the door the violence of his agitation mastered him physically for the moment. A strange sensation as of something leaping up from his heart to his brain, turned his head wildly giddy. He held by the house-railings and kept his face to the air, and resolutely waited till he was steady again. Then he rang the bell.

"Is-?" he tried to ask for "Mrs. Armadale" when the maid-servant had opened the door, but not even his resolution could force the name to pass his lips-"Is your mistress at home?" he asked.

question had struck her dead and his pointing hand had petrified her.

He advanced one step nearer and reiterated his words, in a voice even lower and quieter than the voice in which he had spoken first.

One moment more of silence, one moment more of inaction might have been the salvation of her. But the fatal force of her character triumphed at the crisis of her destiny and his. White and still, and haggard and old, she met the dreadful emergency with a dreadful courage, and spoke the irrevocable words which renounced him to his face.

"Mr. Midwinter," she said, in tones unnaturally hard and unnaturally clear, "our acquaintance hardly entitles you to speak to me in that manner." Those were her words. She never lifted her eyes from the ground while she spoke them. When she had done, the last faint vestige of color in her cheeks faded out.

There was a pause. Still steadily looking at her he set himself to fix the language she had used to him in his mind. "She calls me Mr. Midwinter," he said, slowly, in a whisper. "She speaks of 'our acquaintance."" He waited a little and looked round the room. wandering eyes encountered Mr. Bashwood for the first time. He saw the steward standing near the fire-place, trembling and watching him.

His

"I once did you a service," he said; "and you once told me you were not an ungrateful man. Are you grateful enough to answer me if I ask you something?"

He waited a little again. Mr. Bashwood still stood trembling at the fire-place, silently watching him.

"I see you looking at me," he went on. "Is Mr. Bashwood had barely completed his re- there some change in me that I am not conscious port of what had happened at the terminus; of myself? Am I seeing things that you don't Mr. Bashwood's imperious mistress was still sit-see? Am I hearing words that you don't hear? ting speechless under the shock of the discovery Am I looking or speaking like a man out of his that had burst on her-when the door of the senses?" room opened, and, without a word of warning to precede him, Midwinter appeared on the threshold. He took one step into the room, and mechanically pushed the door to behind him.

He stood in dead silence, and confronted his wife with a scrutiny that was terrible in its unnatural self-possession, and that enveloped her steadily in one comprehensive look from head to foot.

In dead silence on her side she rose from her chair. In dead silence she stood erect on the hearth-rug and faced her husband in widow's weeds.

He took one step nearer to her and stopped again. He lifted his hand and pointed with his lean brown finger at her dress.

"What does that mean?" he asked, without losing his terrible self-possession, and without moving his outstretched hand.

At the sound of his voice the quick rise and fall of her bosom-which had been the one outward betrayal thus far of the inner agony that tortured her- suddenly stopped. She stood impenetrably silent, breathlessly still, as if his

Again he waited, and again the silence was unbroken. His eyes began to glitter, and the savage blood that he had inherited from his mother rose dark and slow in his ashy cheeks.

"Is that woman," he asked, "the woman whom you once knew, whose name was Miss Gwilt?"

Once more his wife collected her fatal courage. Once more his wife spoke her fatal words.

"You compel me to repeat," she said, "that you are presuming on our acquaintance, and that you are forgetting what is due to me."

He turned upon her with a savage suddenness which forced a cry of alarm from Mr. Bashwood's lips.

"Are you or are you not My Wife?" he asked through his set teeth.

She raised her eyes to his for the first time. Her lost spirit looked at him, steadily defiant, out of the hell of its own despair.

"I am not your wife," she said.

He staggered back, with his hand groping for something to hold by, like the hands of a man in the dark. He leaned heavily against the