LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 256, 7 April 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

CHARLES VAN RHEYN. {From the Argosy .) ( Continued .) ‘This? Oh, it is nothing: it is not an idol. It does me good.’ ‘ Good! ’ fiercely repeated Hall. * Does you good to wear a brazen image next the skin!—right under the flannel waistcoat. I wonder what the school will come to next! ’

‘Why should I not wear it?’ said Van Rheyn, ‘ What harm does it do me, this?’ It was my poor Aunt Annette’s. The last time we went to the Aunt Olaribelle’s to see her, when the hope of her was gone, she put the cross into my hand, and bade me keep it for her sake. ’

‘ I tell you, Master Van Rheyn, it’s just a brazen image,’ persisted Hall. ‘lt is a keepsake,’ dissented Van Rheyn. ‘ I showed it to Monsieur Mons one day when he was calling on mamma, and told him it was the gift to me of the poor Tante Annette. M. Mons thought it very pretty, and said it would remind me of the Great Sacrifice. ’

‘ But to wear it again’ your skin!’ went on Hall, not giving in. Giving in on the matter of graven images was not in her nature. Or on any matter, as far as that went, that concerned us boys. ‘ I’ve heard of poor misdeluded people putting horsehair next ’em. And fine torment it must be!’

‘ I have worn it since mamma died,’ quietly answered Van Rheyn who seemed not to understand Hall’s zeal. * She kept it for me always in her little shell-box that had the silver crest upon it; but when she died, I said I would put the cross round my neck, for fear of losing it: and Aunt Claribelle, who took the shell-box then, bought me the blue ribbon. ’

‘ Well, it’s a horrid heathenish thing to do, Master Van Rheyn, and I don’t believe Miss Fruma. Aberleigh would ever have given countenance to it. Leastways afore she lived amid them foreign Frenchfolks,’ added Hall, virtually dropping the contest, as Van Rheyn slipped the cross out of view within his nightshirt. ‘ What she might have come to, after she went off there, Heaven alone knows. Be you a-going to drink this tea, sir, or be you not ?’

Van Rheyn drank the tea and thanked her gratefully for bringing it, the gratitude shining as well out of his nice grey eyes. Hall took back the cup and tucked him up again, telling him to get a bit more sleep and he would be all right in the morning. With all her prejudices and sourness, she was [as good as gold when any of us were ill.

‘ Not bathe! Not bathe ! I say, you fellows, here’s a lark! Bristles thinks he’d better not try the water !’ It was a terribly hot evening, close upon sunset. Finding ourselves, some half dozen of us, near the river, Van Rheyn being one, the water looked too pleasant not to be plunged into. The rule at Dr Frost’s was that no boy should be compelled to bathe against his inclination. Van Rheyn was the only one who had availed himself of the exception. It was Parker who spoke :we were all undressing quickly. ‘What’s your objection, Miss Charlotte? Girds bathe.’

‘ They never let me go into cold water at home,’was the patient answer. ‘We take warm baths there. ’ ‘ Afraid of cold water ! well, I never ! What an everlasting big pussy-cat you are, Miss Charlotte! I’ve heard before that pussies don’t like to wet their feet,’ ‘ Our doctor at Rouen used to say I must not plunge into cold water,’ said poor Van Rheyn, nearly driven wild. ‘The shock would not be good for me.’ ‘ I say, who’ll write off to Evesham for a pair of water-proofs to put over his shoes ? Just give us the measure of your foot, Miss Charlotte. ’

‘Oh bother ! Shut him up in a feather bed !’

‘ Why, the water’s not cold, you donkey!’ cried out Bill Whitney, who had just leaped in. ‘ It’s as warm as new milk. What on earth will you befit for, Bristles? You’ll never make a man. ’

‘ Make a man ! What are you thinking of, Whitney ? Miss Charlotte has no ambition that way. Girls prefer to grow up into young ladies, not into men. ’ <ls it truly warm ?’ asked Van Rheyn, looking at the river irresolutely, and thinking that if he went in the mockery might cease.

I looked up at him from the water. ‘lt is indeed, Van Rheyn, quite warm.’ He knew he might trust me, and began slowly to undress. We had continued to be the best of comrades, and I never went infer teasing him as the rest did ; rather shielded him when I could, and took his part. By the time he was ready to go in—for he did nothing nimbly, and the undressing made no exception—some of us were ready to come out. One of Dr Frost’s rules in regard to bathing was stringent—that no boy should remain in the water more than three minutes at the very extent. He held that a great deal of harm was done by prolonged bathing. Van Rheyn plunged in—and liked it. * It is warm and pleasant,” he exclaimed. ‘ This cannot hurt me. ’

‘ Hurt you, you great baby!’ shouted Parker.

Van Rheyn had put his clothes in the tidiest manner upon the grass—not like ours, which were flung down any way ; waistcoats here, stockings yonder. His things were laid smoothly one upon another, in the order he took them off —the jacket first, the flannel waistcoat uppermost. Though I daresay I should not have noticed this but for a shout from Jessup. ‘ Halloa ! What’s that ?’

Those of us who were out, and in the several stages of drying or dressing, turned round at the wojrds. Jessup, buttoning his

braces, was standing by Van Eheyn’s heap, looking down at it. On the top of the flannel singlet, lay the gold cross with the blue ribbon.

‘ What on earth is it?’ cried Jessup, picking it up ; and at the moment Van Rheyn, finding all the rest out of the water, came out himself. ‘lsit a charm ?’

‘lt is mine—it is my gold cross,’ spoke Van Rheyn, catching up one of the wet towels to rub himself with. The bath this evening had been impromptu, and we had but two towels between us, that Parker and Whitney had brought. In point of fact, it had been against rules also, for we were not expected to go into the river without the presence of a master. But just at this bend it was perfectly safe. Jessup passed the blue ribbon round his neck, letting the cross hang behind. This done, he turned himself about for general inspection, and the boys crowded round to look.

‘ What do you say it is, Bristles ?’ ‘ My gold cross. ’ * You don’t mean to tell us to our faces that you wear it ?’ ‘ I wear it always,’ freely answered Van Rheyn. Jessup took it off his neck, and the boys passed it about from one to another. They did not ridicule the cross—l jthink the emblem on it prevented that—but they ridiculed Van Rheyn. * A friend of mine went over to the tar-and-feather islands,’ saidMillichip, executing an aggravating war dance round and about Charley. ‘He found the natives sporting no end of charms and amulets—nearly all the attire they did sport—rings in the nose and chains in the ears. What relations are those natives to you, Miss Charlotte?’ ‘ Don’t injure it, please,’ pleaded Van Rheyn.

‘ We’ve got an ancient nurse at home that carries the tip of a calf’s tongue in her pocket for luck,’ shrieked out Thorne. * And I’ve heard—l have heard, Bristles—that any fellow who arms himself with a pen’orth of blue-stone from the druggist’s, could’nt have the yellow jaundice if he tried. What might you wear this for, pray?’ ‘My Aunt Annette gave it me as a present when she was dying,’ answered poor helpless Charley; who had never the smallest notion of taking the chaff otherwise than seriously, or of giving chaff back again. He had dressed himself to his trousers and shirt, and stood with his hand stretched out, waiting for his cross. ‘ln the Worcester Journal, one day last June, I read an advertisement as big as a house, offering a child’s caul for sale,’ cried Snepp. ‘Any gentleman or lady buying that caul and taking it to sea, could never be drowned. Bristles thinks as long as he wears this, he’ll not come to be hanged. ’ * How’s your grandmother, Miss Charlotte? ’

* I wish you would please to let me alone,’ said he patiently. ‘My father would not have placed me here had he known.’ ‘ Why don’t you write and tell him. Bristles?’

* I would not like to grieve him,’ simply answered Charley. ‘ I can bear. And he does so much want me to learn the good English.’ ‘This crosses gold,’ said Bill Whitney, who now had it. ‘ I’d not advise you to fall amid thieves, Van Rheyn. They might ease you of it. The carving must be worth something. ’ * It cost a great deal to buy, I have heard my aunt say. Will you be so good as to give it me, that I may finish to dress myself?’

Whitney handed him the cross. Time was up, in fact; and we had to make a race for the house. Van Rheyn was catching it hot and sharp, all the way. One might have thought that his very meekness, the non-resisting spirit in which he took things, would have disarmed the mockery. But it did not. Once go in wholesale for putting upon some particular fellow in a school, and the fun gains with use. I don’t think any of them meant to be really unkind to Van Rheyn ; but the play had begun, and they enjoyed it. 1 once saw him in tears. It was at the dusk of evening. Charley had come in for it awfully at tea time, I forget what about, and afterwards disappeared. An hour later, going into Whitney’s room for something Bill asked me to fetch, I came upon Van Rheyn —who also slept there. He was sitting at the foot of his low bed, his cheek leaning on .one of his hands, and the tears running down swiftly. One might have thought his heart was broken.

* What is the grievance, Charley? ’ ‘Do not say to them that you saw me,’ returned he, dashing away his tears. ‘ I did not expect any of you would come up. ’ ‘ Look here, old fellow. I know it’s rather hard lines for you just now. But they don’t mean anything; it is done in sport, not malice. They don’t think, you see. You will be sure to live it down.’

‘Yes,’ he sighed, ‘I hope I shall. But it is so different here from what it used to be. I had the happiest time; I never had one sorrow when my mother was alive. Nobody cares for me now; nobody is kind to me; it is a great change. ’ ‘ Take heart, Charley,’ I said, holding out mv hand. ‘ I know you will live it down in time. ’ Of all the fellows I ever met, I think he was the most grateful for a word of kindness. As he thanked me with a look of hope in his tyes, I saw that he had been holding the cross clasped in his palm; for it dropped as he put his hand into mine. ‘ It helps me to bear,’ he said, in a whisper. ‘ My mother, who loved me so, is in heaven; my father has married Mademoiselle Theresine de Tocqueville. I have no one now. ‘ Your father has not married that Theresine de Tocqueville! ’ ‘ But, yes. I had the letter just after dinner.

So perhaps ho was crying for the home unhappiness as much as for his school grievances. It all reads strange, no doubt, and just the opposite of what might bo expected of one of us English boys. The French bringing up is different from ours; perhaps it lay in that. On the other hand, a French boy, generally speaking, possesses a very shallow sense of religion. But Van Rheyn had been reared by his English mother; and his disposition seemed to be naturally serious and uncommonly pliable and gentle. At any rate, whether it reads improbable or probable, it is the truth. ( To be continued.')