LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume I, Issue 25, 29 June 1874, Page 4

LITERATURE.

JUST HIS DUTY. A STORY OP THE GREAT MINNESOTA SNOWSTORM. Concluded. * Garston,' said old Keith, giving up the past idiocy rbr the present—' it's most dark already, an' the snow falling like wildfire. You'll never get homo with your life this day. Don't be a darned fool, an' risk it.' ' And my children V ' Dodrot the shavers ! If they've empty bellies one day, they can fill 'em the next, an' no harm done, I reckon- Let 'cm be. Why, you're most broke down a'ready, an' as white as a skunk's liver.' This from Abram. Hugh looked at him coldly. These two young men did not " hitch well,' to use Malva's phrase. 'Will you go if I stay?' he asked: 'or •will you come with me and help ?' . With the greatest sincerity, young Keith shook his head, and wished himself at eternal perdition if he were such a fool—- ' He'd keer fur his life, he guessed, ef schoolmaster didn't fur his'n.' The schoolmaster laughed contemptuously. •I thought so. Good night, friends. I care for the children given to my charge. Look after your frost-bitten friend, Abram. You can do that without running the risk of losing your precious life, or freezing your foul tongue either." ' He went out as he spoke, and Abram, " boiling with rage, caught up " Colt's," and ma*de as he would follow. Old Keith held him back. " Let the darned fool go, and be cussed ' to him !" he said. " Look at the snow, boy. He'll never spot home to-night. Malva, bolt the door." u She flew 02? ; but not to obey. Hugh had taken but a few steps, when his arm was caught, and Malva. half-buried in her father's huge bearskin robe, clung panting to his side. " Hugh, dear Hugh, do come back ! Why, for pity's sake, do you flare at Abram so 1 He only wanted to stay you. Come back, do!" " I beg your'pardon, Malva. Your brother always irritates me ; but his selfish ' cowardice just now put my blood up. Go back yourself, child. It isn't safe for you to be here a moment." He put her back as he spoke, pressing ; her into the shelter of the deep porch, and wrapping the mufflers still closer round her. [ She got one arm free, however, and flung it round bis neck. ; " Hugh, don t you now—don't! Look at the snow, it's falling fast.again; an' dusk's drawing in. Don't go to : night, Hugh—for my sake, don't i Listen"—trying to rub her • Boft icheek against his caressingly—" I love you—l 'love you better nor anyone ; an' I'll never speak another word to that drunken ZWitLtgytiU saved, nor no onrif youbidme—never, Hugh I, Do forgive me, old man ! Say ybu l -believe me,' to-night—do I" She was sobbing and crying now, with her -wet, flushed, face hidden on his breast, and ' her.warm,rshapely arms clasped and quivering ,about his", neck. The proprieties of courtship are not a t matter of education in the North-Western States. Hugh lifted her face and kissed it. I J ,! "I. do forgive you," he said. "I would make you my wife to-night if I could, and I believe you would come." " That I would, old man, right away." . , ■,." Do your duty then, child ; and obey me ,r:like:one. Mine is to go to those children ■ this very minute, and I must do it. There," unclasping her hands, and kissing both : them and the trembling lips with long, grave kissesr-';':God.bless you, love, and.good-bye. I've delayed over long already." ■ He opened the door for her, and strode away into the. driving snow, without waiting for an answer.. ..She walked heavily into the house, put up the bolts, and, dropping down ..into a seat, hid her face in her apron, weeping bitterly. .. 1 And ( the snow went on falling. „; It never ceased all that night and the following morning; but. towards evening the •;,-sky cleared, the barometer rose steadily, and ,two of the children's fathers from the village found their way to the, school-house on the hill. The drifts had blocked up the front door and windows, but the back was still clear.; and at the sound of their voices, half a .;.,dozen little faces, white, gaunt, and haggardlooking, appeared in the open doorway, clamouring for food, i, ''Thank the Lord* mine are safe!" Jim i Halkett. said; griping his son's hand, while his other, arm held the sobbing, girl. "Why, where's schoolmaster, my kids ;. an'what's • gone wi' Nathan's little Tommy I ": ~ V Teacher went; away to get somethin' ,t? eat ;yesterday morning', an nevur come back," Seth-said ;. " aa' Tommy, he tuk bad an'died last night. Guess he were sohun- . grybe,couldn't wait. We're most dead wi' . , hunger, father." ,„',. ,:r,!.'.Jim hadbrough; a bagful of bread-stuff, -, on the chance of such need* He hastened ~ now to divide it among.thesick and famished children,, while Tommy's father went into • the back.rqom, where the little white body lay, cold and quiet—not hungry now. Old Oassy stood beside: him. 'He did nothing but cry,' she said, 'after 1 de massa went, till he took sick an' den he qttfet bery soon. He'd been a lyin' still, mout be a couple 0' hours, when all of a suddent he skeered right up, his little face all smilin', an' cries out, ' Teacher's comin'l I see him walkin' up de hill, aside of a man all white an' shinin'. Oh, let me go ! He's holdin' out his hands to me. Let me go ! Dem was his bery last words, massa. He ■ went off plick. that minnit, and ef you ask .!,.my 'pinion, Massa Garston went fust. He'd never ha' stayed away from these 'ere blessed , the snow,hadn't caught him." ~,: She Baid truly. Two days later, a man . and woman, starting from Keith's homestead , for. the. school, found his body half covered with snow,, and lying within a dozen yards of the stick, where the dog, stark and stiff too, crouched guardian-like upon the heap ,of now useless provisions. He must have lost.his way in the blinding drift, and wandered round and round in circles, till he dropped from sheer exhaustion ; for there were marks of his footsteps still visible, crossing and recrossing each other in every direction. But the face was quite peaceful; and pn the stern lips there still lay a smile ■ frozen there by the icy hand of Death, before he rose up to meet the Man whose dazzling whitaess is beyond that of all snows—yea, even of the sun and stars. And even in dying he had tried to carry out that task which, unfulfilled, had troubled his last moments; for one rigid hand still grasped an end of jpeocil, while beside, him lay the-

pocket-book, in which the poor Lozcn fingers had scrawled — " Food —to the children —Quick !" That strong right hand must have grown strangely dead ; for the letters were all but illegible. But what will you? He had done his best. Which of you will do more 1 GBOEGE LOVELA-CB'S TEMPTATION. A Tale in Four Chapters. chapter 1. ' Fortuna srcvo Iteta negotio Ludum insolentcm ludere pertinax.' In a dingy street in the purlieus of Covent Garden there stood, about five years ago, a small house only accessible by a dark passage, into which the light of day scarcely ever penetrated, and which at night received a small portion only of the meagre rays thrown by a struggling gaslamp placed at its entrance. This house, at the time 1 mention, was occupied by an old lady who let lodgings at low rates to needy lodgers. One of her rooms had lately been tenanted by a man of about six-and-twenty, the regularity of whose features showed, in spite of the havoc played by poverty and distress,'that he was of a class higher than his present circumstances seemed to warraut. The room which he had was small and low ; a pinched window in one corner let in whatever light was not obscured by the chimney-pots around, and whatever fresh air was not polluted by the smoke which issued in dense clouds from their tops. In another corner was a small fireplace scarcely able to give heat even to the little room which it was intended to warm. The side of the room opposite to it and next to the window was filled by a low bedstead on which was no pillow — nothing but a mattrass, a blanket, and a torn sheet. Two wooden chairs and a coarse table added to the furniture of the room, which was completed by a sort of halfwardrobe, half-cupboard, in which were a few women's garments and some writings materials of the cheapest description. Here, at the time of which I speak, wore seated George Lovelace and his wife. His was an old story, one which occurs many times in the world, but happily not always with the distressing and over-harsh circumstancesiwhich surrounded his life. His father was the owner of a considerable property in Athertonshire, whose temper had been ruined by the intemperate habits of a profligate youth, and whose judgment not unfrequently showed signs of a taint of insanity, which had been stronger in earlier generations of his family. He had made a hasty marriage when of middle age ; and, judging others by himself, had, when the first burst of passionate attachment was over, first neglected his wife, and then chosen to suspect his honour. His one son, George, was born after he had been married three years, and when this suspicious fit was at its height ; but though never inclined to be fond of his son, he had, during his youth, shown no sighs of any great aversion to him, and had treated' him not unkindly, especially after his mother's death. He had, however, thought that when he had paid for a private tutor first, and sent his son to a public school afterwards, he had done his duty as regards education, and took no further trouble about it except to express a grim satisfaction whenever he, heard that George had been flogged.

George, therefore, as may be imagined, grew up without developing any extraordinary disposition for acquiring knowledge, and on leaving school at eighteen was a fair specimen of the leapt favorable productions of our great English seminaries. He could read and write, of course ; and he knew that Charles I. had been beheaded, and that Wellington had won a great battle with the French at Waterloo, He believed that Milton wrote a poem about Paradise, and was convinced that Shakespeare was the finest poet in the world. But of any language save his own he could not read a line ; and if you asked him what happened in '32 or '4B, he would perhaps have told you what won the Derby, but beyond that his information and, his interest would not have reached. He had not turned his thoughts much on the subject of religion ; he considered Parson Prohser's sermons a bore, but had no knowledge as to what were the doctrines which that orthodox divine so successfully combated. At the same time George was honest. He had often been flogged, but never for anything dishonorable or immoral; and when he left school, and spent the allowance which his father gave him in the society of equals in London, his life was not sullied by any or the yieldings to the temptations of vice which so often triumph over youths of the age at which he was then.

He was not much in the society of his father, and when he was there were little signs of affection shown by either. Sir George, in addition to the peevishness to which I have alluded, was a cold man, combining in a curious way determined doggedness with occasional outbursts of furious passion, which made him an awkward man to be dependent upon. He was a man also of hobbies, and woe to the unhappy wight who crossed him when he bestrode one. One of his hobbies was the English aristocracy, and he was anxious that his son should marry the daughter of a neighboring earl, for whose family he had the greatest respect, and whose political opinions were as conservative as his own. This young lady was twelve years younger than George Lovelace ;| but old Sir George was in no hurry that his son should marry—there was plenty of time, he thought. ' Meanwhile, George can be brought by my teaching to fall in with my views ; and as he is a good-looking fellow, and her father is not averse, the girl will probably be compliant.' ' L'bomme propose.' Affairs might have gone on as Sir George wished,.and this story never been written, had not the younger Lovelace, in a fishing ramble Brecoushire, met with the pretty daughter of a Welsh doctor, i George^,was, like his father, subject to sudden impulses, and also, like him, apt to be resolute in his determinations. One of his impulses was to marry this girl ; not at first, or in a hurry, because he was not sure of her affection ; but after the acquaintance of nearly three years, and when the sudden death of her father had left her dependent on the charity of an aunt whom she disliked, aad the offer of a man whom she had grown to love seemed an easy way out of all her troubles. Ethel Lovelace was very fair, and George had trusted to her extreme beauty to win from his father his f pproval of a marriage of which he had siiid nothing till it was over. , : (To be continued.,)