LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1649, 3 June 1879, Page 3

LITERATURE.

MILLICENT’S DOWRY. fFrom “Weekly Alta California.”] ( Concluded.) Love’s sweet words are said in lonely places, and to those that love, the world is full of light and glory. ‘You must not go before my birthday,’ Millicent said at last, after an hour of rich pleasure spent in talking over the plans that were to be perfected and performed in the fmture. ‘ 1 can wait till then,’ he answered, and so it was settled. Millicent’s birthday came —a dark day, full of great masses of sober gray clouds. The jwind rose when the sun set, and its notes sang loudly in the tld elms, and went sweeping inland, laden with the wind melodies of the sea.

The old house seemed full of strange sounds, and the two young people soon became aware of a weird power that pervaded the building. They could see nothing, and no sound s reached them save those made by the wind. They were sitting near a ruddy and crackling wood fire, which blazed on the br ad hearth, and sent its rose-colored light out into the gathering shadows. As the darkness increased, the feel’ng that affected them grew more intense, and made their conversation sink to lowly-mur umred words.

They had wandered through the deserted rooms, talking of the old house and the people who had lived in it. Millicent said they had left no room unvisited, and, after this survey, they ate supper, and then settled themselves by the fire for a long chat, as Simon was to leave for Boston the next day, there to try his strength in the battle and turmoil of life.

As they sat thus, Millicent’a low voice making sweet echoes for the sweet stormsongs of the wind, this strange foeliog came and grew so intense that they thought that someone was with them.

Millicent was first to speak of it ‘Do you not feel oddly ?’ she said. ‘ There seem to he others b sides ourselves in the room, and yet I can see no one.’ ‘ I have the same impression, and yet, as you say, can see nothing. The house must be haunted,’ ‘ There are stories to that effect current among the neighbors, and 1 surely believe wo have some one in the r >om with us, though I have no faith In either ghosts or spirits.’ ‘ Nor have I; so we will talk of other things, and perhaps this feeling will then pass away,’ and the condition of tho old house

‘Oh, I do so wish that we had m mey enough to redeem tho land and restore the building, for it is the home of the Berkeleys,’

said Millicent; ‘then we could come here every sumner, and make it a haven of rest and you know the railroad brings it ve near the city.’ ‘ I know that it dees/ and, st g abruptly, Simon Berkeley sprang to his feet.

‘ Do you know that there is some one in this room?’ he said j ‘ 1 felt their garments brushing past me. Millicent rose and came to him. ‘ I feel the some presence ; what can it mean ?’ she cried.

‘ I do not know ; I can see no one ; but this feeling grows stronger all the while, and it seems to be like one beckoning mo to follow.’

‘I have the same impression. What shall we do ?’

‘Let us see where it will lead ns,’ and he took up the lamp that stood on the table She clung to his arm, and together they went slowly to the door, and out into the the passage leading to the great hall. The wind was waging fiercely outside, and sent wild sounds echoing through the old house. Tho elms swayed about the stone walls, and circling gusts of air came from tho passages by which they walked, and made the lamp’s flame flicker, and made weird shadows in tho gloom that circled close about their way. Slowly but steadily they went on across the great hall and along a passage leading to the eastern wing. They had traversed the same route during the day, and the way was familiar. Through the musty apartments they went, the mouldering tapestries of colonial days fluttering in the storm-filled air that came rushing through tb® broken casements.

Slowly onward they went, led by the strange power whose influence they felt, but which they could not see, and at last came to the great room that finished the suite. The door leading to this they had left closed when they visited it in the morning, but now it was thrown wide open. 1 hey distinctly remembered closing it, and looked at each other in astonishment.

‘ The servants never come here, and wc fastened this door,’ said Millicent. * Yes ; but we are being led, you know.’

‘ I know it, and will go on to tho end.'

They passed though the open doorway, and Simon held the lamp high aloft. As the light flashed along the walls, a cry of surprise escaped them. The wind had torn away the faded hangioga with which the room was decorated, and its force seemed to have opened a heavy, narrow panel door, whose fasteningbolt had rusted loose. This door was fitted to match the wall, and opened on a flight of steps leading up. So closely bad it been set that no one unaquaiuted with its locality would have thought that it existed, Simon led the way up the steps, and soon they came to a small chamber with a thin slit in the wall to admit light and air. A curtained recess was at one end, and, as Simon Berkeley drew the tattered damask, a udder of horror thrilled them.

There, amid the mouldering fragments of rich cloth and linen, lay a skeleton, the fleshless skull enveloped in a mass of shining golden hair. ‘My God! who can this be?’gasped Simon,

‘ I do not know ; but see, here is writing on the wall,’ said Millicent, whose glance had turned from the ghastly picture. Simon followed her look, and saw, cut by some sharp-pointed instrument, several long lines of writing. The letters were the quaint characters of the olden times, and dampness had caused the broken surface to gather a dark green mould, while the rest of the wall was yellow, thus making the letters stand out in bold relief.

The writing, when deciphered, read as iollows :

‘I, Millicent, founder of this house, feeling that death is near, write these words—‘l am the first person born in the Berkeley mansion, and in it I lived, seeing no one but the two old servants and my father for nineteen years. I never saw my mother to remember her, for she died when I was a babe. I was never allowed to go beyond the orchard wall, and did not do so until I was nineteen years old. Then one day, I rambled into the wood north of the house, and there met a young man. *He said that his name was Harold Mortimer, and that he was a distant relative of our family, my father being at enmity with his people He had come to see him, to try and make peace, but had been coldly repulsed. During his visit he had seen me, and he determined to speak to me. ‘ He was very handsome and very kind, and we met frequently after this. Then he told mo of love, and spoke of going away, and I found his presence was dearer to me than life, and that I loved him. Wo knew that our father would never consent to our marriage, and plighted our troth in secret. We could get no one to marry us, he being a stranger, and there was no minister there, so took my mother’s Bible to the woods, and with our hands clasped on the sacred book, we knelt and swore to be husband and wife from that time, till God should part ns bv death. ‘ I had a happy week, meeting my husband every day, and then my father found ua together. He said some hard and cruel words, and I fainted. When I grew conscious again I was in this room, and here I have remained'ever since. Where my husband is, I do not know, though from some strange visions that have come to me, I think he is dead. Were he alive he would find me, for love can unlock all prisons, ‘ Nine months after I was brought here my baby came, and for one year I was happy. My father was the only person I saw. He attended me when sick, never speaking to me, but bringing food and clothing. At the end of the year he took my baby away, and I have never seen it since.

• That is more than eight years ago. I have kept the time by marks on the wall. My father has visited me every day until five days back, and I have had no food since then. He has never spoken to me, though I have prayed for his forgiveness, and ho has seen that I was growing weaker all the time.

* I feel that I am dying of hunger and thirst, and am too weak to call for help with any hope of being heard. I do not know why he should so cruelly let me perish here, but if I die, I shall see my husband and my baby. May God bless them and my father, and forgive me if I have sinned. ‘ Millicent.’

Simon Berkeley had died five days before this was written. When his daughter died cannot be told. Doubtless Hod ended her sufferings very quickly after she wrote out the record of her sad story. The hard old man, who had kept her a prisoner, had not intended that she should die thus, but death chilled his heart ere he cou!d|reveal her secret prison. Beneath the writing stood a heavy oaken chest. The iron lock was rusted away, and when Simon had finished reading the first Millicent’s story he stooped and opened this. It contained caskets and little sacks falling to pieces from age, and these held gold and jewels, the fashion and coinage being senturies old. When these lay revealed the strange feel* ing that had led them on slowly faded away, and the wind that had raged outside the building began to die away. ‘ It is the dowry of the dead Millicent, and she has given it to yon,’ said Simon. ‘There is more than enough to redeem the land, and make Berkeley house the grand old home it once was.’

She clung closer to him, ‘lt will help you, too, for we have no need to wait to be married now,’ she said, ‘ and we will be so happy that the sad soul who lived so lonely here may grow glad from our joy.’ As she spoke, she took up a trees of the golden hair lying on the bed, ‘This shall be an heirloom that must never leave the house,’ she continued, as they turned away and went slowly back to the room they had left to begin their search. The wind had changed when they reached the apartment. The storm clouds were rolling eastward over the wild sea, their great masses edged with a rich silver light. The moon was sailing high in the heavens, and a sweet restfuluess pervaded the room. On Christmas Day they were married, and when spring came workmen repaired the old house, the incumbrances on the land were cleared *way, and the Berkeley mansion was once again the manor of as fine an estate as the country possessed. One wonder that perplexed the people of tho neighborhood was the appearance of a heavy granite shaft in tho Berkeley burial place, on which was cut this inscription : Sacred to the memory of Harold and Millicbnt Mortimer,