LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1256, 16 March 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

LEE, THE LETTER-MAN. By Johnnv Lip low. In a side lane of Timberdale, just off the churchyard, was the cottage of Jael Batty, whose name you have heard before. Side by side with it stood another cottage, inhabited by Lee, the assistant letter-carrier; or, as Timberdale generally called him, the letter-man. These cottages had a lively look out, the farrier's shop and a few thatched hayricks opposite ; sideways, the tombstones in the graveyards. Some men are lucky in life, others are unlucky. Andrew Lee was in the lattor category. Ho had begun life as a promising farmer, but came down in the world First of all, he had to pay a heap of money for some man who had persuaded him to become his security, that stripped him of his means. Afterwards a series of ill-fortune set in on the farm : crops failed, cattle died, and Lee was sold up. Since then he had tried at this, and tried at that; been, in turn a farmer's laborer, an agent for coal, and the proprietor of a shop devoted to the benefit of the younger members of the community, its speciality being bull's-eyes and besoms for birch-rods. For some few years now he had settled down in this cottage next door to Jael Batty's, and carried out the letters at fourteen shillings a week.

There were two letter-men, Spicer and Lee. But there need not have been two, only that Timberdale was so straggling a pariah, the houses in it lying far and wide. Like other things in tbw world, fortune, even in so trifling a matter as these two postmen, was not deal- out equally. Spicer had the least work, for he took the home delivery, and had the most pay : Lee did all the country tramping, and had only the fourteen shillings. But when the place was offered to Lee he was at a very low ebb iudeed, and took it thankfully, and thought he was set up in riches for life, for, as you know, we estimate things by contrast. Andrew Lee was not unlucky in his fortunes only. Of his three children not any had prospered. The son married all too young ; within a year he and his wife were both dead, leaving a baby boy to Lee as a legacy. The elder daughter had emigrated to the other end of the world with her husband ; and the younger daughter, had a history. She was pretty and good and gentle, but just a goose. Goose that she was, though, all the parish liked Mamie Lee. About four years before the time I am telling of, there came a soldier to Timberdale, on a visit to Spicer the letter-carrier, one James West. He was related to Spicer's wife; her nephew, or cousin, or 3omt:thinjr of that; a tall, good looking, merry-tempered dragoon with a dashing carriage and a dashing tongue; and he ran away with the heart of Mamie Lee. That might not so much have mattered in the long run, for such privilege is universally allowed to the sons of Mars ; but he also ran away with her. One fine morning Mr James West was missing from Timberdale, and Mamie Lee was missing also. The parish went into a rapture of indignation over it, not so much with him as with her; called her a 'baggage.' and hoped her folly would come to her. Poor old Lee thought he had got his death-blow, and his hair turned suddenly grey. Not more than twelve months had gone by when she was back again. Jael Batty was running out one evening to get a pound of sugar at Salmon's shop, when she met a young woman with a bundle staggering down the lane, and keeping under the side of the hedge as if she were afraid of falling, or else did not want to be seen. Too weak to carry the bundle, she seemed really to sink at every step. Jael Batty, who had her curiosity like other people, though she was deaf, peered into the bent face, and brought herself up with a shriek. ' What, is it you, Mamie Lee ! Well, the impudence of this. How on earth could you pick up the brass to come here ?' ' Are my poor father and mother alive ? Do they still live here?' faltered Mamie, turning her piteous white face to Jael. * They be ; both alive; but it's no thanks to you. If they Oh, if I don't believe What have you got in that ragged old shawl?'

1 It's my baby,' answered Mamie; and she passed on. Andrew Lee took her in amidst sobs ai.d tears, and thanked Heaven she was come back, and welcomed her unreasonably. The parish went on at him for it, showering down plenty of abuse, and asking whether he did not feel ashamed of himself. There was even a talk of his post as letter-carrier being taken from him, but it came to nothing. Rymer was postmaster then ; and he was a man of too much sorrow himself to inflict ib needlessly upon another. On the contrary, he sent down cordials and tonics and things for Mamie, who had had a fever and come dilapidated as to strength, and never charged for them. Thomas Rymer's own heart was slowly breaking, so he could feel for her The best or worst of it was, that Mamie said she was married. W hich assertion was of course not believed, and only added to her sin in the eyes of Timberdale. The tale she told was this. That James West had taken her straight to some town, where he had previously had the banns put up, and married her there. The day after the marriage they had sailed for Ireland, whither he had to hasten to join his regiment, his leave of absence having expired. At the end of some seven or eight months, the regiment was ordered to India, and he departed with it, leaving her in her obscure lodging at Cork. By-aud-by her baby was born; she was very ill then, very; had fever and a cough, and sundry other comp ications; and what with lying ill eight weeks, and being obliged to pay a doctor and a nurse all that while, besides other expenses, she spent all the money Mr James West left with her, and had no choice between starvation and coming back to Timberdale.

You should have heard how this account was scoffed at. The illness, and the baby, and the poverty nobody disputed—they were plain enough to be seen by all Timberdale ; and what else could she expect, they'd like to know. But when she came to talk about the church (or rather, old Lee for her, second-hand, for she was not at all a person now to be spoken to by Timberdale) then their tongues were let loose in all kinds of inconvenient questions. Which was the town ?- and which was the church in it ? and where were her 'marriage lines V Mamie could give no answer at all. She did not know thenameof the town, or where it was situated. James had taken her with him in the train to it, and that was all she knew; and she did not know the name of the church or the clergyman; and as to the marriage Hoes, she had never heard of any. So, as Timberdale said, what could you make out of this, save one thing that Mr Jim West had been a deep rogue, and taken her in. At best, it could have been but a factitious ceremony; perhaps in some barn, got up like a church for the occasion, said the more tolerant, willing to give excuse for pretty Mamie if they could ; but the chief portion of Timberdale looked upon the whole as an out-and-out invention.

Poor Andrew Lee had never taken a hopeful view of the affair from the first; but he held to the more tolerant opinion that Mamie had been herself deceive J, and he could not help being cool to Spicer in consequence. Spicer in retaliation threw all the blame upon Mamie, and held up Mr James West as a shining paragon of virtue. But, as the time went on, and no news, no letter, or other token arrived from West, M>imie herself gave in. That he had de ceived her. she slowly became convinced of, and despair tookholdof her heart Timberdale might have the satisfaction of knowiug that she judged herself just as humbly and bitterly as they judged her, and was grieving herself to a shadow. Three years han passed now since her return, and the aftair was an event of the past; and Mamie wore, metaphorically, the v-bite sheet of penitence, and hardly dated to show her face outside the cottage door. But you may easily see how all this, liesides the sorrow, told upon Lee. Fourteen shillings a week for a man and his wife to exist upoa cannot be called much, especially if they hrfve mu. better daya and been used

to better living. When the first grandchild, poor little orphan, arrived to be kept, he and his wife both thought it hard, shoußh quite willmg to take him ; and now they had Mamie and another grandchild. This young ! one was named Jemima, for Mamie had called her after her faithless husband. Five people and fourteen shillings a week, and provisions dear, and house rent to pay, and Lee s shoes perpetually wanting to be mended. One or two generous individuals grew rather fond of telling Lee that he would be better off in the union. It was November weather. A cold, dark, biting, sharp, drizzly morning. Andrew Lee got up betimes, as usual: he had to be out soon after seven to be ready for his letter delivery. In the kitchen, when he entered it. he found his daughter there before him, coaxing the kettle to boil on the handful of fire, that she might make him his cup of tea to give him his breakfast. She was getting uncommonly weak and shadowy looking now: a little woman, not much more than a girl, with a shawl folded about her shivering shoulders, a hacking cough, and a mild, non-resisting face. Her father had lately told her that he would not have her get up in a morning, she was not fit for it; what he anted done he could do himself. ' .Now, Mamie, why are you here ? You should attend to what I say, child.' She got up from her knees and turned her sad brown eyes towards him : bright and sweet eyes once, but now dimmed with the tears and sorrow of the last three years. ' I am better up; lam indeed, father. Not sleeping much, I get tired of lying : and my cough is worse a-bed.' He sat down to his cup of tea and to the bread she placed before him. Some morn ings there was a little butter, or dripping, or, mayhap, bacon fat; but this morning he had to eat his bread dry. It was getting near the end of the week, and the purae ran low. Lee had a horror of debt, and would never let his people run into it for the smallest sum if he knew it.

'lt's a p or fare for you this morning, father ; but I'll try and get a morsel of boiled pork for dinner and we'll have it ready early. I expect to be paid ,to-day for the bit of work I have been doing for young Mrs Ashton. Some of those greens down by the apple trees want cutting; they'll be nice with a bit of pork.' Lee turned his eyes in the direction of the greens and the apple trees ; but the window was misty, and he could only see the drizzle of rain-drops on the panes. As he sat there a thought came into his head that he was beginning rapidly to feel old ; old, and worn, and shakv. Trouble ages a man more than work, more than time ; and Leo never looked at the wan face of his daughter, a-jd at its marks of sad repentance, but he felt anew the sting which was always pricking him more or less. What with that, and his difficulty to keep the pot boiling, and his general state of shakiness, Lee was older than his years. Timberdale had got in the habit of calling him old Lee, you see; but he was not sixty yet. He had a nice face; when it was a young face it must have been like Mamie's It had furrows in it now, and his scanty grey locks hung down on each side of it. Putting on his top-coat, which was about a" thin as those remarkable sheets told of by Brian O'Linn, Lee went out buttoning it. The rain had ceased, but the cold wind took him as he went down the narrow garden path, and he could not help shivering. 1 It's a bitter wind, father; in the northeast, I think,' said Mamie, standing at the door to shut it after him. ' I hope there'll be no letters for Crabb.'

Lee, as he pressed along in the teeth of the cruel wind, was hoping the same. Salmon the grocer, who had taken the post-office when the late Thomas Viymer gave it up, was sorting the letters in the room behind the shop when Lee went in. Spicer, a lithe active, dark-eyed man of forty-five, stood at the end of the table waiting for his bag. Lee went and stood beside him, giving him a brief good morning: he had not taken kindly to the man since West ran away with Mamie.

• A light load this morning,' remarked Mr Salmon to Spicer, as he handed him an appropriate bag. 'And here's yours, Lee,' he added a minute after : ' not heavy, either. Too cold for people to write, I Buppose.' ' Anything for Crabb, sir?' 1 For Crabb ? Well, yes, I think there is. For the Rector.' v To he continued,')