the wicked cause of it all!" "I?" stammered Joey.

"O, God punish you! God requite you! You have killed him, girl,-you and he between you! Ah, I pray Heaven - " "O, hush! hush! cried Joey. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that my boy 's dead, drowned, murdered at sea! And that her boy is safe

"Thank Heaven for that!" cried Mrs. Hazard before she thought, and beginning to rock to and fro again.

"For that? Ah, if you can! It's less, less, less than I have to be thankful for. Ah then, I came for my woman, your boy killed

revenge, him!"

"Never in this world!" said Joey, clutching at a seat, but feeling as though for that one moment she were called upon to asseverate the truth to God.

Mrs. Hazard sat upright and icy. The little slender creature was towering in the middle of the room, like a flame, in her wild white wrath. When at last Lucian's mother spoke, it was with no assertion of his innocence, her mind had coursed over all the possibilities, and measured them; she knew his moods and methods of old. But in a dull, dead, rough voice, as if she were speaking into some hollow thing: "How do you know that?" said she, sharply.

"How do I know it?" responded the other. "Why the winds know it, and the waves. And men and women know it, and are babbling at the corners of it. And four stone walls of a prison know it!"

This was too much. Mrs. Hazard sprung to her feet, and begun to walk up and down. As she walked, there stood the woman in her way. She stopped before her, glaring at her.

"What have I ever done to you," exclaimed Mrs. Hazard, "that you come to me now like a devil in your glee?"

"In my glee?" cried she, throwing

up her arms. "In my glee? O my boy, my boy!" And she sunk down on the floor by a chair, covering her face with her shawl, and drenching it in gusty tears. "O, we knew trouble together!" cried she. "He was all I had. When he was a baby he had such blue eyes! And his little hair crept round my finger of itself, in its pretty yellow curl. Geordie, Geordie, will I never lean on your strong arm again? will I never hear your step? What a laugh you had! ah, what comfort it could send through me now! And you suffered so! and I never shall know!

ah, that staggering moment, that one breath, that horror, -no help. O my darling, my boy, my boy!" And with her head upon her knees, and her hands along the floor, she went on wailing aloud.

Mrs. Hazard looked down at her a moment, and made as if she would stir her with her foot, gave a glance at the panic-stricken Joey, and then suddenly stooped to Mrs. Romilly's side, lifted her head and laid it on her own shoulder, stroking it with her hard hand. "We're mothers together, dear," said she; "let us help one another. If you've lost your child, I'm likely to lose mine. I never had one of my own. I wanted one; I'd have liked a tender little thing that had been a part of my own self and of him, — to have held my love and my life in my arms. But there was Lucian, and I just filled my hungry heart with him. And now and now" And Mrs. Hazard herself broke down, and the little woman in her arms put up a hand to still her sorrow in turn, and the two mingled their tears together.

After that they kept Mrs. Romilly among them, and her fire having fallen to ashes, she was as eager as they for Lucian's acquittal, and the defence intended to make the fact a strong point of the argument.

"Joey," said the Doctor, when she had told him all this, "I am glad to see you quiet yourself. But you must n't use so much control as to occasion a reaction by and by. Tears are secur

ity, just as fever is remedy. Still, I 'confess, I don't—"

sure Mrs. Hazard would n't like itdeposed that her mistress had often

"Seen Lucian?"

to the place

one

- he

"Yes. I went day. And they let me - I obtained permission to go in. And when he saw me, he cried out, and checked himself, and held his arms to me, always kissed me when he came home, you know," said Joey, simply. "But Mrs. Romilly was with me, and she held me back. It was of no use for mother to go, of course; she thinks he -did it. She won't see him till-till afterward. And there were men with him, two lawyers. And I looked at him where I stood, and I said in a whisper, I could n't speak any loud

er,

ད

-Lucian, did you kill Geordie?' And he raised his — his eyes, and rested them full on mine, and his voice was clear and steady. 'No, Joey,' said he. And he never told a lie. Never, you know. And he and Mrs. Romilly spoke together; and he was so tender and compassionate to her; and she believed him. And he made me sit down in the only chair; and though he was thin and white, he was as smiling and calm as here at home, and O, shall I ever see him here again?" and Joey threw her apron over her head, and ran from the room.

when the two should be one, up to the hour of Mr. Romilly's arrival, when the said mistress had been heard to say she wished him drowned in the Red Sea before he ever set foot in Netherby. Mr. Thurlow and others were then introduced in witness of Joey's volatile behavior on the night when Lucian was in such danger from having attempted to set the Doctor across the bay; and how she threw herself into Geordie's arms, walked, singing, up the hill with him, went to ride with him next morning, and other similar items, were all rehearsed, although not without much sarcasm and objection on the part of the defence, and ruling on the part of the court. The Doctor was then called, as an expert, and a person whose words were of weight, to detail something of the incidents that had passed under his eyes, and to give his opinion with reference to the passions evinced by the prisoner. You may be sure the Doctor shortened matters, and was as close-mouthed and crusty as he dared to be, and would have said nothing at all of Lucian's disposition but for examination; but on being asked if he did not consider the circumstances narrated to evince a violent temper, subject to uncontrollable paroxysms, he was obliged to admit that such certainly appeared to be the fact, and to declare, moreover, in reply to the narrow questioning to which he was subjected, that he believed Geordie to be the possessor of Joey's favor, and that intense jealousy existed on the part of the prisoner. And although not an iota had been gained from him without questions from the prosecuting attorney himself, the Doctor retired with a crestfallen conviction that he was no better than a street-corner gossip. The next witnesses were called to prove that Lucian and Geordie had shipped together on the bark Josephine, Lucian as mate and Geordie as captain of the foretop; that during all the voyage out the former's conduct

had been variable, now cheerful, and now sullen; that once, being becalmed and discipline lax, there had been a wrestling-match between the two, begun perhaps in sport, but ending in such serious earnest that each had borne the marks for a week; that the voyage having been accomplished in less time than usual, the first mail from home had been given them by an outward-bound ship; that Lucian had received no letter, but Geordie had one that seemed to contain a daguerreotype, which he made off with, going forward, and then catching Lucian's eye as he looked back he raised his hand in his prankish way, and shook it in the air, and immediately Lucian, growing black as a thunderbolt, had seized a marline-spike in his paroxysm of rage and flung after him, and the spike had missed him, but struck the letter in his hand, and had gone with it into the sea. And Geordie, with an oath, had sprung back at him, but Lucian had cried out between his set teeth, "Don't tackle me now, or I shall kill you!" and Geordie had returned, "Kill and be damned! The letter was from her!" And then, "Who, Geordie?" called a half-dozen.

"From pretty Joey Hazard!" laughed he. And at that, as if her name were too good to be bandied, Lucian had flamed up again; he was just going below, but he came back and shook his fist at Geordie, crying, "Say your prayers to-night, my man! For, by God, we'll have a settlement before morning!" Several witnesses substantiated this. John Tarbox, having then been called, testified that, being very short of hands through sickness, on the night following this day, he having the helm, Geordie Romilly and one other were called for the last watch before sunrise; that the mate, Jouvency, had excused the other, saying he would take his place himself; that then, it being a clear starlight night, and the ship sailing on a straight course, the first he knew was a bucket of salt water dashed upon him, and he saw the sun coming up the horizon, and the mate standing

over him, grim as death,-for he always kept the men up to the mark when on duty, but above or below they two were all there was between the deck and the sky, and Geordie Romilly never trod those planks again, unless it was his ghost that played in the foretop all the rest of the voyage; and that while he was asleep Lucian had mastered and made away with Geordie, he was as ready to swear as that his own name was Jacky Tar. Since he could not swear it, it was of no consequence how ready he was to swear it, the defence remarked, and, inquiring as to how he remembered he was asleep on that night, the witness replied that the cat-o-nine-tails printed it on his back next morning; and being asked if the prisoner had been in the habit of carrying weapons, he replied that the mate always wore his knife in his belt, and being without it that morning, it had been found for him behind a pile of cordage, where he said he had thrown it lest he should use it. Being further questioned as to why the captain had not taken cognizance of these affairs, he gave answer that the captain thought the mate too good an officer to lose, and he was not capable of noticing the occurrence, moreover, having that night and the day before been rather set up.

"Set up?" asked the counsel for the defence, willing to badger the man a bit.

"Too near the wind, maybe," said the witness, unsuspiciously. "He was very happy all the time; but for a day or two had been half-snapt, - what we call rather over the bay."

"Explain yourself, sir!"

66

'Well, pretty tight, I should say.” "That would be ? "

"A little sprung, sir," was the puzzled reply.

"How could one be pretty tight if he were a little sprung?"

"By seeing double !"

"How am I to understand your meaning?"

"You must be a green-hand if you don't know what it is to be half-seasover!" cried Jacky Tar. "I mean the captain had been drinking!"

The evidence for the defence was brief, a few persons being summoned to swear to the prisoner's unblemished reputation hitherto, and especially as to his temper and humanity. The captain of the bark Josephine bore witness that he was an invaluable officer; but the effect of what testimony he had to offer was sensibly diminished by his forced admission of the fact that he had been, as John Tarbox had testified, unable to attend to his business of sailing the ship upon the night in question. Testimony was then entered that no noise of scuffling or contention had been heard by any on board during that time, and there rested. And with all the current of opinion setting with him, the prosecutor rose for his argument.

After giving the reasons for the dark deed, he summed up conclusively such evidence as he had, and then made an argument that nothing less than an elaborate special plea could overcome,

as he was himself convinced, bringing the responsibility home to each personally, presenting the enormity of the crime in all its force, and the fatal consequences of such flagitiousness once left unpunished. That done, he took his seat contentedly, borrowed a leaf from the grave-diggers in Hamlet, and enlivened the gloom with a jest; he had wrought out his points to his own satisfaction, all his solicitude ceased at once, and he was as ready to compassionate Mrs. Hazard as Mrs. Romilly. The jury looked as solemn as if they already saw the scaffold, and the senior counsel for the defence whispered to his junior that the case looked black as murder. Everything now depended on his own eloquence merely, and even his well-known power of making black appear white must tell against the pris

something was going wrong; and from the time of our first encounter until we had crept into our tent to sleep, I was conscious that the Doctor had lost something of his usual gayety. He had become thoughtful, and evidently a little anxious. What it was all about I could not pretend to guess.

For myself, the meeting with Sipsu was simply a novel experience, and one of great interest to me. It soon became clear, however, that our journey, undertaken for the gratification of curiosity, had acquired a serious aspect.

The Doctor's reticence puzzled me, and to judge from that I might have thought something particularly dreadful was going to happen. I did not, however, care to question him, seeing that he was not inclined to talk about the matter of his own free will, if, indeed, there was anything to talk about at all. In proportion, however, as I put this restraint upon myself, my curiosity very naturally increased; and how long after we had crawled out of our fur beds I should have found myself able to keep entirely quiet I cannot pretend to say.

But the Doctor spoke at last. We had just finished an excellent breakfast that Adam had set out for us upon the flat rock where he had served the supper on the previous evening.. "I have been thinking," said he, "a great deal about the behavior of Sipsu. Ordinarily the fellow is lively enough, and I thought that I should be able to show you a simple savage in his savage retreat, and give you one more novelty to carry home with you. But, although he is really acting his character perfectly, he does not reveal the side of it that I wanted you to see. To cut a long story short, I am pretty well convinced that he would cause trouble, if he only could, to some people in whom I have much interest. I am not sure of it, by any means; yet the feeling is so strong upon me that I think those people ought to know what we have seen."

'Ought to know what we have seen?" I repeated in my mind. "Ought to know what we have seen?- an oddlooking savage, with an odd-looking boat, in an odd sort of place! That is what I have seen. If the Doctor has seen more, then the plot thickens! If the Doctor is serious, are we likely to have some work on hand?" But for the life of me I could not make out what harm this skin-clad and unwashed dweller in the ice forest, called Sipsu, could do to anybody, or what possible motive he could have for doing it.

"I feel obliged, therefore," continued the Doctor, "to go somewhat out of

my way in returning home, and I hope you will not find it greatly to your inconvenience."

The Doctor was really serious, after all! There was not the least room for doubting it.

"By no means," I answered promptly. "It will not inconvenience me in the least.. On the contrary, the further the journey is prolonged the better I shall be pleased. You know I am enlisted for the war,' and will see you through." "Then you would not mind seeing another of my friends?"

"Certainly not; and if he is as interesting a specimen of humanity as this fur-bound barbarian friend of yours, then my debt of thanks will be doubled."

"I think," replied the Doctor, "you will find him quite as interesting, though in a very different way."

"But let me ask, is this other friend another savage?"

"No, not a savage this time, but an honest gentleman"; and without further ado the Doctor called Adam, and told him to prepare for starting with all possible despatch.

And so, after finding a luxury-loving man, and starting a savage, I was to seek an honest gentleman! Truly," thought I, "this home of the icebergs, and land of the glaciers, and realm of everlasting frost, is not so bad a place to come to, after all!" and thus wondering what was next going to happen, I followed the Doctor up to Sipsu's tent, while Adam got the breakfast ready.

Sipsu had not once come near our camp, and he seemed wholly indisposed (as well he might) to have anything to do with us. But if he was angry with Doctor Molke for bringing him back to the island, why should he stay there nursing his wrath? why did he not start off again while we were sleeping? I put these questions to the Doctor.

"That's easily explained," was his reply. "He knew that he was watched, or thought he was, which is pretty much the same, and would not risk a second humiliation and the chance of being shot to boot!"