Papurau Newydd Cymru
Chwiliwch 15 miliwn o erthyglau papurau newydd Cymru
6 erthygl ar y dudalen hon
MISTRESSI BETTY CAIIEW: BEING…
MISTRESS I BETTY CAIIEW: BEING SOME PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF MR. GEORGE BASS, SURGEON OF H.M.S. "RELIANCE." By Mary Gaunt. BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR: "Da.ve's Sweet- heart Kirkham's Pind"; The Moving Finger"; Deadman's," &c. CHAPTER XVIII.-(Contintted.) I She stood still a moment, and her heart sank, tor she wondered what next. Then a hand was laid on her arm, and a voice said, not at all unkindly— "Now, madam, this way. You won't have much of a dossing place to-night; by and by you'll be better off." For a moment Betty considered should she try and break away, and Orleans seemed to divine her thoughts, for he held her firmly, and led her round to Eunice's little room off the mud flbuilding that did duty as a stable. There was not another man visible, and she felt that her theory was right. In all probability these two Convicts were playing a game of bluff. Perhaps ieven Crane had gone off to the woods in search of Simon Burton to tell him the game had begun. But she was wrong there. As the first man held her in the darkness, Crane came bearing a rush- light, guarding it from the wind with his other hand. They looked so peaceable and common- place by its dim light that Betty, sitting on Eunice's rough stretcher, could hardly believe they were meditating rapine and violence. She iknew, too, that the house must be unguarded, and that if he wished Williams might have got away easily enough. "Jacky Bluecoat sit down alonga door," said jCrane, as if he guessed her thoughts, ne'll make things lively one time quick if the lootenant tries to make a bolt for it." "It seems to llee he ought to be a match for 'all three of you," said Betty, for Jacky Bluecoat ,was only a lad. Still, he had the ears and the yes of the savage, and his aid was by no means ffco be despised. "But you see, ma'am, he ain't. Now, ma'am, We must just be lockin' you up, fear you'd give as leg-bail and off to Parramatta to get help. It's this cove's belief as you'd help him if you could get through; you had oughter to be jumpin' mad for joy at the chanst to get rid of him." "For God's sake," pleaded Betty, "don't kill him, for your own sakes don't do murder. You haven't done much wrong yet; go away, and don't do murder." Both men looked at her and shook their heads, and their faces looked hard and cruel. "How often have we been triced up just acos he lost his temper. You've sent out ointment and rags, and that's why you're here, and we .ain't agoin' to do you no harm, nor let any other cove so much as look at you, but we're agoin' to fasten you in here so as you shan't do us any harm," and sticking the rushlight, which was in a piece of wet mud, against the wall, Crane backed to the door, and Orleans followed him. .The door was shut, and then Betty heard bars of wood being nailed across, because there was no proper fastening. She went to the window, but that had already been nailed up on the out- side, and now there was nothing to do but to lie on the truckle bed and gaze up at the -thatched roof, and wonder what next. It was a narrow slip of a room, bare mud walls, with nothing to break the monotony save the rush- light and1 one small mirror, and a dress or two Eunice's. Once the wall between it and the stable had reached a man's height only from the ground, but Eunice had complained that the horses kept her awake, and so Simon Burton had built it up right into the roof. There vas no escape that way, and if they forgot her, a :more than probable thing, her doom was sealed. She lay down on the bed with a sigh. She thoug-ic. of every possible plan of, escape, and rejected them one by one. She wondered wearily what her future would be like suppos- ing they did not forget her, and she almost envied Eunice her sudden death, and the candle seemed to go further and further away, the horse in the stable the other side of the wall was moving restlessly, and she felt her eyes closing, though it seemed strange to her that sleep should claim her at such a crisis. Surely so many lives hanging in the balance, and she was sleeping, why, black Tulip, the mare next door, had more human kindliness than that. She could hear her moving hestlessly, something had frightened her, she was kicking against the wall, and Betty eat up, rubbing her eyes. She actually had dozed, then, for though she could hear Tulip, she was not very restless, and she certainly had not kicked against the wall. If she had, would she kick a hole ? Betty rose to her feet as the thought over- powered her. There was only a mud wall betwen her and Tulip, and Tulip would carry her to Elizabeth Farm in half an hour. Did she want to be saved? Did she want to begin the weary round of life again? She had promised Williams to save him if she could, and, after all, she was not yet twenty, surely life must hold some good thing in it for her yet. She thought of George Bass's dark eyes. Williams had freed her surely when he put her up for sale this after- noon, and the longing for life and action came back to her. She felt in her bundle for her little work bag, and drawing out a pair of scissors began to pick at the wall. A flake or two of 'brown mud fell off, and the desire for freedom grew hot in the girl's breast. She would escape if she could. But what if they should come in suddenly upon her? It would never do. She began to fear eyes at all the cracks and crannies, and she chose a spot to begin her work just behind one of Eunice's dresses, hastily noted that tinder and steel were on a box in the corner, and blew out the light. Then she listened till the night seemed to cry out, a wind came sighing round the eves, and the straw in the thatch made a rustling sound. It might almost be on fire, it might be someone peering down. The scrape, scrape of her scissors rang out dangerously loud, and she tried to do her work more quietly. Then she brought all her common-sense to her aid, and remembered that the scissors could hardly make more noise than a gnawing mouse, and she would hear footsteps long before they would hear her. The powdered clay was cover- ing the front of her gown, but she could wrap herself in the bedclothes at the first alarm, and he took off her shoes to facilitate the movement. As for the clay on the floor, she, every now and a again, swept it under the bed with her hands. Once she did hear footsteps stealthily crossing the yard, and a voice almost whispered- "Are you all right?" "Yes," she said, and then she added for effect, etDo let me out. I am afraid you will forget me and burn the stable." "You bet your life, no," said the voice, and the footsteps went quietly back again. She wondered why they came so quietly, did they -suspect her of. anything, or did they wish to keep Williams in ignorance of their actions. She wondered what time it was, but she could not guess, and the room was in pitchy darkness. It seemed to her she had worked hours and hours, her fingers and her arms ached, and one blade of the scissors was broken before the other slipped into open space beyond the wall, and she knew the first step was accomplished. It was so easy, so very easy to scrape round that hole. Then again she heard the stealthy footsteps, she called out to know the time. Three or four nights might have passed, she thought, if she was to judge by her own feelings. "I dunno," said Crane's voice, cwell, maybe, it mQut be three hours to the dawn. "And what time-" Youll know soon enough," and the footsteps retreated. She was working with feverish haste now. The mud was hard, but the sharp blade of the scissors cut round the hole easily enough, and though her nails were broken, her hands sore, and her arms aching, the hole was growing momentarily larger and larger. She could get •tier head through now, and H was only three hours to the dawning. And now she could get 1"(\ua entirely; she nushed her bundle through, and her cloak and hood, and taking tinder and steel and rushlight, was in the stable alongside Black Tulip. She put her hand up, and stroked her neck. Tulip was quiet enough, that was not where her difficulty lay. The half-door was open, and she could see the dark sky and the brilliant stars. It was a wonderful night, and the sky was powdered with them, clear, and bright, and silvery, if she could have chosen she would rather it had been darker. She did not dare use her light, and how was she to find saddle and bridle without a light. How, indeed, was she to get a horse out of the yard without calling attention to her presence. She leaned against the door lintel a moment and considered, while her eyes looked out into the magnificent Australian night. "Impossible, impossible," a cricket in the ground was shrieking out. the very rustle in the eves said, "impossible, impossible." And yet how otherwise get help. She would not have i, dared face the dangers of the way alone and on foot in daylight. But now Well, there was no greater danger in going than in staying where she was. They had promised her life, but in the heat of the fight the chance was they might forget that promise, and assuredly if she did not go Mr. Williams would be killed. And then she sighed. Because she felt such hatred and loathing for him she must save him. And Jacky Bluecoat was with them, and Jacky Bluecoat had ears like a hare. She could not hope to get a horse out of the stable. She might just as well try to get Williams o.ut of the house unseen and otTer him a mount. No, if she would be sure of saving him, then she must walk the seven miles to Elizabeth Farm. Seven miles through the woods, and it was only three hours to the dawning. What she had to do she must do quickly. She put on her shoes, they were thin soled light little things, quite unfitted for a tramp along a bush track, but ladies at the end of the eighteenth century were not supposed to go for long walks, and then she gathered her things together, and with her heart beating to suffocation, slipped the bolt and opened the stable door. The horse behind her turned at the sound, and she slipped outside, and shot the bolt again quickly. And Jacky Bluecoat had the ears of a hare! She stood a moment leaning up against the stable wall, and her knees trembled, and the beating of her heart made her ache in all her limbs. Then, very softly and quickly, because there was no time to waste, she crept round the stable wall. She turned the corner, and her courage grew. Yet if they caught her, they would assuredly kill her. She trembled when she thought what these men would do to her if they caught her betraying them. And for all she knew the little farm might be surrounded. There was a bush fence made up of stumps and logs behind the stable, it ran right round the ten acres of cleared land, and the ground sloped a little towards it. Behind stood up the forest looming dark against the starry sky. So often had she looked out on it, gum-trees and feathery wattle, and black currajong, that she called "may." Now thev were all one dark blurr, and the cleared space between the stable and the log fence looked light as day in comparison. There came the mournful cry of a black swan out of the sky above, and it made her start painfully. Was this the forerunner of the dawn? She had no time to waste, if death lay behind that pile of logs she must face it, and she darted over the rough ground that hurt her feet through her thin shoes, and climbed the fence. Another moment she was crouching on the dewy grass on the other side, hidden, she felt, in the darkness of the forest. She looked back at the farm. The buildings loomed up in the darkness, still and silent. There was not a light, not a sound anywhere. Who could tell it was the scene of a tragedy, so commonplace it all seemed. A dead woman lay within those walls, a man awaiting death stood there on watch, and two others watched that he did not escape his fate. Betty gave a little sob, for the weary pass her life had come to, and then stowing away her bundle, which she felt it was impossible for her to carry, began with free hands to move slowly round the fence on her way to the track that led down to Parramatta and Elizabeth Farm. CHAPTER XIX. I ON THE WAY TO ELIZABETH FARM. I Our dangers and delights are dear allies From the same steni the rose and prickle rise. And when Bass left Betty, he went straight to Elizabeth Farm as fast as a good stout horse could carry him. The autumn day was glorious, the heavens were blue and cloudless, and the earth was clothed in green. A flight of white cockatoos flew scream- ing over his head, and a great kingfisher, a bird the settlers called the laughing jackass, shrieked and sobbed with laughter. Bass was a man who noticed, and in spite of his own trouble his ears and eyes were open. The town was growing, and the beautiful bush was receding. The huts of the convicts were UIl- beautiful things, with thatched roofs and piles of rubbish at their doors, but the Governor's Farm at the end of the long street was already like a bit of England, and the leaves of the peach and apricot trees were yellow and red with the autumn tints. Up and down the streets strolled the soldiers in red, and a team of men in brown frocks were harnessed to a log which they were straining to bring down to the water's edge. The log was stuck right across the roadwa' and the men pulled in vain while a convict overseer brought down his whip heavily on their ragged backs. Bass laid hands on the end of the log. "One or two of you lift with me and get it straight. Why, man," he said to the overseer, "there's no need to haul all New Holland. That's what thev're doing at present." The man looked at him rather sullenly. These beasts of burden should haul as he willed, but on second thoughts he did not like to cross a man wearing his Majesty's uniform, and in five minutes the log was pointing down the road, and the men were hauling with a "Hilly haully, hilly haully" that founded utterly hopeless and dreary. In the stocks sat a man, and the cramp had got into his legs and he was moaning with pain, but Bass could not interfere here. He could only pass on. He was not so shocked as we in this twentieth century might be, but he did not won- der there were so many bolters. At least, there was freedom in the woods. And at Elizabeth Farm, Mistress MacArthur sat on a low chair in the shade of the overhanging thatched roof that made a verandah, with her white-faced little daughter in her arms. She held out her hand when she saw Bass walking up through her zinnias and Cape gera- niUmS. 1 ~HT J 1 He bowed low over her hand. Now that he was here, he wondered how he had best put the case. You are very welcome, Mr. Bass. Do you see my little daughter. She has been sick. A catarrh or a fever? I know not which." The mother looked anxious and Bass touched the little white cheek with a kindly hand. "It has left her now, I think, whatever it was. Plenty of milk and this good country air will set her all right." "Do you think so?" "I am sure of it," said the surgeon. "You are so busy finding out new tracks to the mountains and new harbours, one wonders whether you remember how a, child should be treated," said the mother, wistfully. "It was part of my training, and I shall not. forget, even though I find a way through the mountains to the country beyond," smiled Bass. "You must see for yourself she is on the mend." She looked down reassured. "Ah, Mr. Bass, I have been so anxious. I thought I should lose my baby, and my heart was like to break. "Ah, madam, I sympathise, I understand." She looked at him with a quick little smile, his voice was tender and sympathetic. "And how comes it that a ship's surgeon accus- tomed to tending rough sailors can understand and sympathise with a mother's anxiety." "Because, after all, love spells the same thing, madam, does it not, whether it be the love of a mother for her babe, or the love of a man for a woman," and Bass looked away down the gar- den at the distant blue hills. She looked at him thoughtfully. "Tell me," she said, "tell me," and leaning up against the verandah post there he told her the whole story. His eyes glowed and he clenched his hands. "I would have killed him," he said, "I ought to have killed him. If she had not been his wife I swear I would have. Mistress MacArthur, you will help her." "Indeed, indeed, I will. Shame on him, he is not fit to live. Why did you not bring her to me." "She would not come," said Bass, "not with me alone. She is mine, mine," he said, "no power shall part us, but she—she thought if you heard the whole story you would-you would- "What can I do?" asked Mistress MacArthur, sadly. "She is his wife, fast as Church and State can make her. and even offering her for sale will not-Mr. Bass, Mr. Bass, don't look like that. "I thought," said Bass, savagely, "that you, a tender woman, would understand. She is mine. If you will countenance our union the whole settlement will follow suit." "I can't," she said in distress, "I can't, I can't. God knows I would help poor Betty to the best of my power, but I cannot say wrong is right even for you whom I respect and her whom I love." "Then what is to become of her?" asked Bass, grinding his heel into the ground. "Become of whom? asked Captain MacArthur coming up, and then the whole story had to be gone over again. Bass listened impatiently while Mistress MacArthur told it to her husband, with many exclamations of pity and sympathy. The older man listened in silence, then he swore an oath condemning Williams to the bot- tomless pit, and putting his hand on Bass's shoulder drew him away into the garden. "It's out of the question, old man, quite out of the question. If she is to keep her good name among the women she can't go to you while her husband is alive. The men would be all right, it is the women who will point scorn at her long after the provocation is forgot. Let it alone, Bass, my man. Williams can't last long at this rate. He will drink himself to death in six months if one of his assigned servants don't save him the trouble. Bass groaned. "I can't leave her there, he said. "You shan't," said the other. "My wife will go down to-morrow and she shall be welcome as a daughter in our house." Bass made an impatient movement. "No, man, it is too late to go to-night. Look at the shadows. See how long they are. The sun will be down before we could get the horses ready. Leave it till to-morrow and my wife shall go herself and tell her how welcome she is. And then when you have seen her safe, you may go away in the "Reliance" and come you not here till I tell you Williams has run his course." Bass stood moodily silent, his back to the speaker. He was debating whether he in his turn should not carry Betty off and let the world do and say its worst. Perhaps MacArthur under- stood his thoughts. He put a kindly hand on his shoulder. "Think how bad you would feel, man, if you took her away with you and heard next month that Williams was dead and you could have mar- ried her openly. Here, come into supper, man, and my wife shall talk to you." And so she did, kindly and tenderly, while Bass gazed moodily on the ground and thought of Betty-Betty, who was slowly creeping round that fence, for she could not but remember that Jacky Bluecoat was on the look out. She did not crouch, for she rightly judged that it would be impossible to distinguish her from the house against the background of forest. What she feared was that they should hear her, or that she should meet someone hidden in the bush. It would not have surprised her if Simon Burton, or one of the bolters, or even one of his savage allies should be on the look out here. It would have been simpler to cut straight across the bush meeting the road further down, but she was by no means sure of her bushcraft, and she felt the first wasted time would be the best. It would be very easy to lose herself in the thirty acres of uncleared ground that lay between Williams' farm and McNeil's, and so she chose the longer and more dangerous route round by the log fence. She tore her dress on a thorny shrub, she bruised her feet against a stone, and she trod on a sharp stick that made her feel sick with pain, but still she pushed on, and after what seemed to her hours she found herself on the track that led down to Parramatta. She had been so long feeling her way through the forest that once she was on fairly smooth ground she began to run, and she ran till she was opposite the slip panels on McNeil's farm, panting and breathless. Then she sat down and the rush of blood in her ears made her fancy she heard footsteps pursuing her. She stepped back into the shade of the forest that came up to the track on one hand and lay flat down on the ground. She had a horror of snakes, but she had to risk them as she listened for the footsteps. Certainly, certainly, there were footsteps, and her heart stood still as a man came up the track, the way she bad come, and climbed the panels into McNeil's. How narrow had been her es- cape she dared not think. If he had been five minutes earlier or she five minutes later, she trembled as to what would have been her fate. Whether the man was Crane or Orleans, or even one of McNeil's servants she could not say, only it confirmed her in her determination not to ask help at any of the farms. McNeil, she knew was not there, the chances were not one of the others were, and it would be worse than useless to trust any of the convicts. They would not give their own class away, and even if they did her no harm they would contrive to detain and delay her. She listened to the man's footsteps dying away, and then she rose to her feet, but she dared not trust herself in the middle of the track now. She crept along close against the fringe of forest, and when it was thinner she slipped in among the tree trunks. And the time went on remorselessly. Surely it must be at least an hour since she had climbed through the hole into the stable, and she looked up into the starry sky in dread of the fading stars and the dawning. But they were bright as dia- monds still, and their faint light showed her the track winding down among the trees. It was down hill now, down, down, down, and she ran a portion of the way again till her foot slipped, she twisted her ankle, and she sat down, involun- tarily rocking herself backwards and forwards with the pain. If she had sprained her ankle now indeed was she undone. She rose up and it hurt her to put her foot to the ground, still she could walk a little with a. limp, with a pain that made her laugh and cry aloud, and there was a stream at the bottom of the hilL Perhaps if she bathed it it would be better. Her own voice sounded so weird and unearthly in this desolate place she hardly dared sigh above her breath. And yet the night was full of sound, the wind sighed through the trees, everv now and again she heard the sound of breaking twigs as if something were 9 in forcing a way through the trees and bushes. It might be the oppossums, but she could not be sure, and the cry of the curlews, weird, mourn- ful, hopeless, like a soul in pain, denominated everything. There was a quavering whimper of dingoes, too, now loud and clear, as if the pack were in full hunt, now dying away, and she re- membered ghastly tales of human skeletons found with the bones picked clean. But before she reached the foot of the hill, she felt her ankle was better, it was only a twist after all. Still she paused to lave her hot feet in the water of the creek. She grudged the time, but they were so hot and swollen she had to do something. There was no bridge, only a ford, muddy now after the long summer, and she took off her shoes and stockings and waded a little further up, where the water was clear and cool to her hot feet. Out on the grass again she lay down a moment to re- cruit her strength and to put on her shoes and stockings, for though they were torn now they were at least some protection from the roughness of the way. She rested as long as her impatience woud allow, every moment she stayed it seemed she was giving away a life, a life she hated, a life that stood in the way of her happiness, and therefore a life she must strain every nerve to save unless she would have blood on her soul. (To be continued.)
[No title]
According to the census taken by the Prefec- ture of the Seine, there are at present in Paris 41,390 Italians, 42,000 Belgians, and 32,500 Ger- mans. Forty-three pastors in Finland have simultane- ously been deprived of their livings because they refused to co-operate in carrying out the new military service law.
I HOME HINTS.
I HOME HINTS. After cooking onions, to prevent the saucepan smelling, fill up with water, and drop into it a live cinder. To take away smell of stale cigar smoke in a room, burn a little coffee on a shovel, and carry it through the room. A smoky lamp may be cured by soaking the wick in strong vinegar, and thoroughly drying before usa. This will ensure a bright and clear light. If rice that is to be boiled is soaked in water over-night, it is much lighter, and requires less time, as the grains seperate more readily when boiling. To stop blood flowing from a cut on the hands, first burn a newspaper then apply the black dust to the wound, when the skin will heal up in. stantly. To prevent damp and rust catching the wires of a piano, tack a small bag of unslaked lime inside, just underneath the cover, and it will absorb all moisture. To Take Rust Out of Steel.—Cover the steel with some sweet oil, well rubbed in, and in 43 hours use unslaked lime, finely powdered, and rub until all the dust disappears. To clean and polish leather suites, mix equal parts of vinegar and linseed oil together ;rub with a piece of flannel, and palish with a duster. This not only makes the leather look like new, but pre- serves it also. Stop cracks in walls with plaster of Paris, but mix it with vinegar and not with water. The reason of this is that it sets too quickly to be easily manipulated if mixed with water, but with vinegar it forms a putty-like paste which will re- main soft for about half an hour. Finally becom- ing very hard. Patent-leather boots should never be cleaned with blacking. They should first be wiped with a damp sponge to remove dirt, and then thoroughly dried and polished with a soft cloth. A very little oil or fresh butter may occasionally be used as a dressing. How To Prevent White Silk Handkerchiefs Turning Yellow when Washed.—No soap should be rubbed on to the silk, no soda should be mixed with the water, and the handkerchief should on no account be boiled. A hot, thick soapy lather should be used for cleaning the handkerchief, which should afterwards be freed of all soap by rinsing in plenty of cold water. It should be dried, if possible, in the sun. To Remove Ink Stains from a Carpet.—If the have become dry, the best plan is to rub them with milk, taking fresh as it becomes inky. The spot should afterwards be washed with ammonia water to remove the grease. Fresh ink stains on a carpet should be taken up as far as possible with blotting paper to prevent their spreading, or salt may be put on them for the same purpose. The salt will absorb the ink and it can then be swept up. To Wash a Mackintosh.—A dirty mackintosh can be quickly cleaned by spreading it on a table and then scrubbing it with yellow soap and soft water. The brush used should be a nail brush. When the dirty spots are all removed rinse the mackin- tosh in cold water till quite free of soap, and then hang out in the shade to dry. Do not wring it or place it near the fire, but content yourself with giving it a good shake and then allowing the air to complete the drying process. Care of Sewing Machines.—When a sewing machine irJ heavy to work take out the cotton and thoroughly oil every part of the machine with paraffin. Work it briskly for a few minutes, that the oil may penetrate thoroughly, and extract all dirt and grit, and then wipe every part of the machine carefully with a soft old duster. When the paraffin has been removed, oil the machine again with the proper lubricating oil. Paraffin i should never be allowed to remain on the machine, for it heats the bearings and causes them to wear out. To Soften Ivory.—Slice half a pound of man- drake and put it into a quart of the best vinegar, I into which immerce your ivory Jet it stand in a warm place for 48 hours, and you will then be en- abled to bend the ivory into any required form. Cheap Filter.—Take a common flower-pot, and press a piece of clean sponge into the hole as firmly as possible then put in a layer of very fine gravel, from half an inch to an inch thick, according to the size of the vessel. This pot being then filled with water, and placed in such a manner as to allow the water to pass through it into a larger jug, it will be found that all the grosser impurities of the water will be removed, and the water at the same time will be much softer and purer to drink. To Clean Paper-Hangings.—First blow off all the dust with the bellows, and then take a verv stale loaf of wheaten bread; cut it in eight parts, so that each shall be of a size that the hand can grasp, and leave the crust by way of handle. Begin at the top of the room, and lightly wipe down- wards in one direction half a yard at a stroke. Thus go round and round the room till you get to the bottom. The dirt of the paper will fall with the crumbs. Washing Glasses in Cold Water.—Although glasses can be beautifully washed in cold water, it takes twice the time and number of cloths to dry them, and being so much harder to wine dry they are more likely to be broken. Fruit Biscuits.—Scald any kind of fruit in a jar closely covered then pulp it through a course sieve, and put to it an equal weight of fine sugar sifted; beat together for two hours: then put into little forms of stiff white paper, and dry them all night in a cool oven; next day turn them and dry again. In two or three days, when quite hard and dry, put them in tin boxes or glass cases, and keep in a very dry place. Orange Jelly.—Take twelve sweet and juicy oranges and two lemons, half a pound (or, if liked sweet, a little more) of loaf sugar. With some pieces of sugar rub off the rind of the lemons and two oranges. Dissolve a sixpenny packet of gela- tine with as much water mixed with a glass of sherry as is required strain the orange and lemon juice through a muslin cloth inside a tammy into the pan; let the whole boil' and pour into a mould. It should be made a day before using. Potato Rolls.—Boil or steam mealy potatoes; mash with butter, milk, and salt, and rub through a colander. Mix the whole, while warm, with an equal weight of dried flour. To three pounds of meal allow a quarter of a pint of solid yeast, which mix with a quarter of a pint or rather more of warm milk, or milk and water. Mix the whole thoroughly well together. Having kneaded the mass, cover it up, and set it before the fire for half an hour to rise. Then make up into rolls, and bake half an hour in a quick oven. Cheese Tartlets.—Line some tart tins with short crust and bake with a filling of uncooked rice. Make the following ingredients into a thick paste. Two tablespoonfuls of grated Parmesan cheese, the beaten yolks of two eggs with a seasoning of made mustard and cayenne pepper. Empty the rice out of the tartlet cases, put a spoonful of the mixture in each, and bake for ten minutes. Serve very hot on a pretty d'oyley. Mayonnaise Dressing.—Put the yolks of two eggs into a cold, clean soup-dish; with a silver or wooden fork slightly break them; add half a salt- spoonful of salt; now add, drop by drop, stirring all the while, half a pint of olive oil. After adding the first gill of oil add at the same time a drop or two of vinegar. It is better to measure two table- spoonfuls of vinegar into a small dish by your side, so that you will be sure to get the proper amount. Season the salards, but do not add any more seasoning to the dressing. This dressing may be kept for a day if covered and put in a cold place. Macaroons.—To half a pound of almond paste add palf a pound of sifted powdered sugar. Put this into a bowl and with the back of a wocden spoon or with a palette knife rub and mix urtil you have both thoroughly incorporated and smooth. Add the whites of four eggs gradually when all are in turn the mixture into a pastry-bag and press out into the baking-pan that has been covered with waxed or buttered paper. See that the Macaroons are at least one inch apart, so that they will not touch in baking. A teaspoonful is quite a sufficient quantity for one macaroon. When they are dry and slightly brown lift the paper and brush the wrong side with water and they will drop off, or they may bA easily loosened with a thin-bladel knife.
I THE NV, OMAN',S WORLD. I
I THE NV, OMAN',S WORLD. FASHION'S FURS. We are bidden to believe that the fancy of fashionable folk in furs for the winter of 3903-4 will run very largely in the direction of otter and lynx. The price of both of these ran high at the great sale of the Hudson Bay Company of Canada, held in London the other day. As much as a five pound note was realised for lynx fur, the usual price being from 10s. to 34s. Buyers of every nationality gathered to barter for the 300,000 pieces, valued at about a quarter of a million sterling. A furrier present remarked that the demand for the beautiful coat of the compara- tively scarce lynx and otter cannot fail to raise these furs to greater fashionable favour, for when a five pound fur is made up it will be a costly thing to purchase. One hundred and forty-six thousand and twenty-six furs were disposed in one dav's selling, including 66,360 mink, 9021 lynx, 1790 wolf. 695 wolverine, 5206 skunk, 1024 raccoon, 33,883 ermine, 1413 beaver, and 5617 musquash, &c. The mere thought of such a sale is enough to make one covetous. MOTOR HATS. A novelty in motor hats is tricorne in shape, and so arranged that the piece which turns up at the back may turn down and feacli over the nape of the neck. The motor veils are of chiffon and net and are very effective if tightly pulled over the hat, crossed at the back and tied in a bow under the chin. A wise young lady of my acquaintance, remarks a writer in the "Delineator," always goes for her motor car drives in Russian fur trimmed boots, and pretty enough these are, made of patent leather with the fur up the fronts and around the top, the lining being of lamb's wool. LATEST IN COIFFURES. Many women well to the fore in fashionable circles are taking up a new style altogether of coiffure in which the hair is parted in the centre at tront, and is putted out becomingly over the ears while the back hair is arranged in rolls in two tiers, exposing a small portion of the crown. A ribbon, brought about two inches from the brow over the parting in the front, through the rolls, and bowed under the left ear, completes this style, which is best suited to a young face. m 4 CHIFFON WAISTS. Chiffon waists to match cloth gowns are in great demand just now. Many prefer these waists to be in the exact shade of the eloth, and they must be accordion-pleated—very closely pleated—and trimmed with bands of gold or of Persian embroidery, or with lace applique. The colourings are in great variety, but the black, white and ivory shades are far and away in the lead. TAKE CARE OF YOUR RINGS. The growing fancy for wearing an abundance of rings during the daytime as well as for evening affairs makes special care of the gems they encase very necessary. If you want your rings to last well, do not wear them under gloves. That is what an eminent jeweller says. But if you decide that gloves are a necessity, as probably you will, he adds, then send your rings twice a year to be overhauled. The reason for this warning is that the constant fric- tion of the gloves wears the tiny points that hold the stones in place, and the result is that the stones fall out unless they are constantly looked after. The wearer might not detect a loose stone, but a jeweller would at once, and a little timely intervention might prevent the loss of a valuable gem. It is said that many a sovereign's worth of precious stones might be saved if the wearers would only take these trifling precautions. PURPLE UPHOLSTERY. Royal purple, and of the deepest, most unforgivable shade of this particularly trying colour is, gradually being urged upon us in numerous ways. Chairs of white enamelled wood are seen in many of the smartest shops covered in this shade of purple brocade. Far more terrifying are draperies and even wall papers of this colour., Now neckwear and hosiery also show symptoms of this undesirable appearance of a long banished colour, and before the season advances much farther it will have made inroads in many other directions. < FORTUNES TOLD BY TEACUPS. The old pnstime of reading one's fortune in a teacup has not gone If wholly out of fashion, and still furnishes a merry hour. The girl whose fortune is to be told should drink a little of the tea while it is hot, and then pour away the rest, being careful not to turn out the grounds in doing so, and also not to look at them, as that would be bad luck. Then she must turn the cup over so that no water remains, for drops of water in the tea grounds signify tears. Next, she must turn the cup around slowly towards her three times, wishing the wish of her heart 1).8 she turns it. After this she must rest it a mini <te against the edge of a saucer-to court luck. Then the fortune may be read. Three small dots in a row stand for the wish. If near the top of the cup it will soon be realised. If at the bottom, some time will elapse or it will never come true. If the grounds are bunched together it signifies that all will be well with the fortune seeker; but if they are scattered it remains the reverse. A tmail speck near the top is a letter. A large speck a present of some kind. The sticks are poople with whom one will soon be brought in cont.,ict- light or dark, short or tall, according to the colour and length of the sticks. A small one means a child, a thick one a woman. If they lie crosswise, they are enemies. If straight up, inti- mate friends or pleasant acquaintances to be made. A stick with a bunch of grounds on its back is a bearer of bad news. A line of leaves with no openings between foretells a journey by water. If openings, by rail. A large ring closed means an offer of marriage to an unmarried woman. To a married one it means a fortunate undertaking. To a man, success in business. A small ring of leaves or grounds is an invitation. Dust-like grounds bunched together at the bottom or side are a sum of money. A half moon or star to married people means a pay- ing investment. To unmarried, a new lover or sweetheart. A hand, warning, if the fingers are spread. If closed, an offer of friendship or mar- riage. A heart is the most propitious sign of all, as it means happiness, fidelity, long life, health and wealth. How TO CURE A HUSBAND. A wife, if she be a wise woman, will set herself to find out her husband's best side, and having found it, persuade the man to live I up to it. Set up an ideal before a man, let him think that to you he is that ideal, and the chances are a thousand to one that he will try to live up to it. If he is mean and selfish make him think he is generous, and you will have cured half his meanness before he knows it. If he is bad tempered and full of crotchets, din it into him morning, noon and night that he is good temper itself, and (always supposing that the original bad temper does not arise from ill-health and physical suffering) it will not take very long to sweeten it. If he is morbidly jealous, don't be a fool and show him that you are afraid to speak civilly to any other man in his presence. He will begin to think he has good grounds for his jealousy then. But let him see that in your eyes at least no man can possibly come up to him in point of physical and mental attractions. Place him on a pedestal, make a hero of him, and in his own despite he will be forced to live up to the character, and will feel himself, without any words of yours, how absurd his jealousy is. If a man's wife thinks him per- fection he need fear no envy of lesser mortals. If he is one of those fussy, interfering domestic sort of men just try to make him feel that in your eyes he is the quintessence of everything manly, and that such small details are quite beneath his notice. He will soon give up interfering. If he is prodigal and reckless coax him to save don't always be taunting him with his extravagance. Above all, if you are a wise woman, don t try to argue a husband-or, for the matter of that, anybody-out of any of the above, or any other faults. Moreover, let it not be forgotten that matrimonial arguing is but too apt to degenerate into nagging, and a nagging wife never had any real influence over a husband yet.
I ART AXD LITERATURE.
I ART AXD LITERATURE. THE AKTIST, hard used as he is often by his paymaster, sometimes gets the last word. In his recent book on China and the Chinese," Dr. Giles tells of a very stingy Chinaman who took a paltry sum of money to an artist—payment is always exacted in advance—and asked him to paint his portrait. The artist at once complied with the request, but when the portrait was finished nothing was visible save the back of the sitter's head. u What does this mean?" cried the sitter, indignantly. Well," replied the artist, I thought a man who paid so little as you paid wouldn't care to show his face." GOLF is not a game of yesterday, and those who proudly speak of it as an ancient and royal game" are not without their warrant. Among the illuminated miniatures in a fifteenth-century Hours" Prayer-book, sold the other day in London for EIIO, was one of the Presentation in the Temple," the borders of which had illustra- tions of golf-playing. Q." 's NEW STORY is on the eve of publication by Cassell and Company. Limited. Harry Revel, the hero of this delightful tale—for such it indubit- ably is—begins life as a foundling at a Plymouth school, and then is apprenticed to a sweep. This leads to mysteries, which find him taking the King's shilling and going to the Peninsular war. There he has a brave time altogether, and he con- trives to take with him some of the atmosphere and much of the accent of the West Country. There is pride of place in this story, as in most of Mr. Quiller-Couch's writings. Miss BEATRICE EAIIRADEN, who came into fame with Ships that Pass in the Night," has written a new novel, which she entitles" Katherine Freesham." It is a tale of modern life, and its drift is indicated in the lines by Mr. George Meredith: To them it was revealed how they had found The kindred nature and the needed mind. They were two hungry souls that needed it." Miss Harraden's latest tale will have a serial run before production in the orthodox volume- guise. IN ARCHITECTURE there lies in the Classic Orders a certain claim upon the respect of artists which is out of all reasonable relation to their con- ventional nature, and their apparently arbitrary origin. Any but the most frivolous of musicians will acknowledge the analogy which his art affords, and as for the poet, he will admit that the im- mutable necessity of fourteen lines to make a sonnet, and the delicate by-laws of prosody, are instances of the hold which precedent pure and simple has upon the very essence of art. In fact, says the Builder," as we have begun to deal in axioms over this matter of Palladio, we may as well invent another to the effect that in all art there is as a necessary factor a certain reference to previous art. "COUNTRY-SIDE READERS" is the attractive title of a series of books now being published in London, striking a note sung by Shelley— Away, away from men and towns To the wild world and the downs." The readers are meant especially for schools in rural and suburban districts. They deal with the sights and sounds of rural life. Some of them are frankly informing, but all are written in an inte- resting manner, and often in the form of a story, They are volumes such a teacher, taking his pupils for walks at the various seasons of the year, would wish to have for their instruction. A feature of them is their illustrations, which include plates in colours, from drawings by well-known artists. THE BRITISH ACADEMY expands. The follow- ing more or less eminent persons have been elected Fellows, raising the number of those thus distinguished from forty-eight to seventy Mr. B. Bosanquet, Professor E. G. Browne, Mr. Arthur Cohen, K.C., Mr. F. C. Conybeare, Professor F. Y. Edgeworth, Dr. C. H. Firth, Professor A. Campbell Fraser, the Right Hon. Sir Edward Fry, Dr. F. J. Furnivall, Professor P. Gardner, Dr. Henry Jackson, Dr. M. R. James, Dr. F. G. Kenyon, Professor W. P. Ker, Lord Lindley, the Right Hon. Sir A. Lyall, K.C.B., G.C.I.E.. Pro- fessor W. R. Morfill, Dr. A. S. Murray, Professor J. S. Nicholson, Dr. G. W. Prothero, the Very Rev. Dr. J. Armitage Robinson (Dean of West* minster), and Dr. G. F. Stout. A NEW and revised edition of The Love of an Uncrowned Queen," by Mr. W. H. Wilkins, is about to be published. Since the earlier editions appeared the author has seen many unpublished letters of Sophie Dorothea of Celle, but in revising his work he has found little to add and little to take away. In the new preface to this successful book Mr. Wilkins says with reference to a series of letters which, it now appears, are preserved in the secret State archives in Berlin: It is certain that the letters at Berlin and those at Lund spring from the same source—the exact similarity of the writing, the use of the same cipher and the same nicknames, the identity of sentiment and style, and the fact that some of the Berlin letters seem to be answers to some of those at Lund and vice versa, prove this beyond doubt. Clearly they stand or fall together. Applying to the Berlin letters the same tests as applied to those at Lund, they yield absolutely the same results." MACLISE'S portrait of Dickens is now in the National Portrait Gallery, but an excellent copy of the picture, by Harry Allen, has been presented by Mr. J. C. Parkinson to the Reform Club. This was painted in 1839, and at the dinner which Dickens gave at the Albion to celebrate the com- pletion of "Nicholas Nickleby the picture was exhibited to the guests. It shows the novelist with the flowing hair of seven-and-twenty, and the exuberant optimism of his outlook on life. At the Reform, Mr. Allen's copy faces Samuel Law- rence's portrait of Thackeray in his most sombre humour. THE TRAFFIC in spurious antiquities-of which the discredited Tiara of Saitapharnes, just with- drawn from the Louvre, is alleged to be an ex- ample --constantly calls for the exercise of the utmost vigilance by art collectors and museum authorities. So clever are some of the forgeries," said an authority the other day, that only the ex- pert can detect them. They may impose on the credulous millionaire, but the expert makes short work of them. Dr. Murray's exposure of the fraudu- lent 'tiari' is a case in point. The only genuine portion of it is the band encircling the top of the headpiece, and Dr. Murray's conclusions were mainly influenced by the conviction that this band never formed part of a tiara but of some kind of cup. That is the way forgeries are discovered, but only men who have spent a lifetime studying art of "a certain period can possibly pronounce an authoritative judgment. The difficulty of detection is increased in gold forgeries, owing to the absence of oxidisation." Lead and other common metal forgeries have been and are still very common in England. Hardly a week passes but the authorities at the British Museum are asked to certify to the genuineness of the most flagrant imitations. There are as many antique shops as tea shops in some parts of London and Paris," said the expert above quoted, and the same rule applies to both-as long as there is a demand there will be a supply. I do not see that museum authorities can be ex- pected to put a value on antiquities. Dealers in the antique would have a right to complain of beincr Ringlet out." 0
[No title]
Because his eyesight was failing him a Leicester man aged seventy-three drowned himself. Japanese tea, says an official report at Tokio, is now being extensively imitated at Ceylon. To show appreciation of their employes' work during the busy periods of last year, a, large Lon- don firm has decided to add the succeeding Tues- day to each of this year's Easter Whitsuntide, and August bank holidays. Sentences of three months' imprisonment have been passed on the bride and bridegroom who were arrested just before their wedding in Edin- burgh on a charge of stealing £ 200 from a man who had visited the prospective bride. On her way from Pembroke the torpedo-boat Zebra, which has arrived at Plymouth, had her forebridge carried away. She also shipped several tons of water, and for a while it was feared she would not weather the gale. At the age of sixty-six a Senghenydd (South Wales) collier has failed for £ 113. He was, he said, the father of twenty-nine children, but twenty were dead, and but for ill-health and the strike he would not have become bankrupt.