LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2166, 3 February 1881, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A STOBY OP A COSY.

[From the Christmas Number of “ London Society. ”3 ( Concluded .l ’No.’ said he, ‘it’s no fresh misfortune. It’s respecting my family. You never asked me anything about them, except about my father, and £ never told you ; but I’m sore I ought.’ ‘ I thought yon always spoke so well of yonr mother,’ I said.

* My mother was one of the best people I ever knew. It’s my grandfather I want to tell yon about.'

‘ How can your grandfather affect ns ?’ said Eliza. 1 tie isn’t living, is be ?’ ‘No,’ said John, ‘he’s dead; but when he was living, and when he was young, he disgraced his family; and that’s what 1-d to his being sent to Australia and his never showing himself here again,’ ‘ Do yon mean,’ said I,’ that ho was— ’ ‘Transported,’ said Joho, and stopped short, and we both looked ot Eliza. All she said was, ‘ Well ?’ ‘ Are yon ashamed of me, Lizzie ?’ said John,

* Ashamed of yon—why ?' * Beoouse of what I told yon,’ * I knew it before,’ she said. ‘ Yon knew I’ said John, and quite changed color. * I guessed as much as you’ve told ns ; partly from what you had said; partly from what you didn’t say.’ Well, I was astonished; but Eliza really is a clever woman. 411 John did was to take Eliza’s hand in his. and say—- ‘ Well, now. I’ll tell yon both about it. I expected Lizzie to take what I said pretty bravely, but I never thought she wonld take It as she has done. My grandfather, I must tell you, was a clerk in a bank in London, a very well known firm ; and being left alone in early life, he became great friends with two other yonng men in the bank, who were not quite the companions he ought to have had. Aftei some months of very irregular living, these two young 'friends of my grandfather's determined on a plan for getting money to pay some of their most pressing debts. My grandfather, rather unwillingly, as he always said, was induced to join them The scheme, however, included forging the name of one of the customers of the bank; and though my grandfather bad no aotn&l concern in this, still he was sufficiently implicated to be arrested (when the plot came oat, as of course it did) with the others, to be tried, sentenced, and as I said transported ' He was only twenty-two when this happened, and before he had worked out bis sentence had had ample time to be heartily sorry, and heartily ashamed of his folly in being so led away. Well, be got out at last, and went away into the country, where, like many another young scapegrace, he got on from being an assistant on a sheepfarm to baying sheep on his own account, and so on till he got money enough to go away to Canada and bny a share in a good business. ‘ Be got on exceedingly well, and in iime bought a good honse, and s bit of ground round it, and lived in really comfortable style, ‘ I must tell yon now an important thing. When he left Australia he changed his name, as most men perhaps would have done in similar circumstances, from Honsego, his real name, Hananiah Honsego it waa, to Whiting. Why Whiting, 1 don’t know; bnt of coarse I’m not wrong to call mjself Whiting, as my father had the name, and bis brother and sister too. For my grandfather had married in Canada ; bnt, however, he didn’t get on very well with his wife ; and after his death, without a will she squandered pretty well all his money that enght to have oome to my father and nncle and annt. As I was saying, he didn’t lead a very happy life, and this was partly owing to a rather strange circumstance which I must now tell yon abont.

4 Any one might have thonght that my grandfather, having left Australia and gone far away, and having changed bis name, and living under altogether new cmumstanoes, might have got rid of all associations connected with his conviction. Well, now, there was one person in Canada who found out or knew all about him ; and this unknown person, fo • some reason never discovered, perseonted my grandfather In the strangest manner. • Yon know that the Government mark on all things which belong to them, inolnding, of course, everything connected with convicts or convict labor, is what they call a broad arrow. Well, this broad arrow pursued my grandfather. He found it first, 1 believe, one day marked on his gate post; he quietly rubbed it off, and in a few days it reappeared. Then it turned up, ss he walked out early one morning, scratched in the dust before his gate. At times he would find it maked on the palings and other boundaries of his estate. At other times he would receive a letter through the post with the mark on the outside, and on opening it he found nothing but the same repeated. Of course it annoyed and irritated him immensely, the more so as he could take no open measures to discover the author of the persecution, nor take any one into his confidence. He tried hard enough, you may be sure, iu a quiet way to find out who did it. But he never had the slightest cine to who It was; it must have been spite, of course. * It went on for years, and it was supposed after bis death that this worry must really have undermined his health ; for he met with an accident that did not seem to have any serions consequences, but he sickened and died. Before his death, however, he told my father, his eldest child, all about it, and his real name, which my father had never known, enjoining on him strict secrecy except to his own children, who, he said, ought to know the truth. ‘That,’ said John, ‘is the whole of the story, rather a sad one, and not very interesting ; still, as I said, I thought you ought to know it, as it so concerns myself. At the same time 1 did’nt see why 1 was bound to run any risk of prejudicing poseib'e friends against me when 1 first came over, since it is so many years now since my grandfather died, and all this has been at an end for a long time, * ‘For my part John,’ I said, ‘I think you’re right; what you’ve said can’t make any difference in my opinion of you ; and Blfz* seems to have taken yon with her eyes open But I think it’s right of yon to hare t'ld ns, for all that.’

We talked a little more over the curious story ; but John himself had n thing more to tell ns than just what I’ve told you, and then he left.

Next morning, as we were sitling at breakfast, Eliza said to me, • I’ve been thinking about John— ’ * Have you really ? ’ said I. ‘ How odd! ’

4 Nonsense,’ she said ; ‘ I don’t mean abont him, but about his odd story and his carious name, for of course it is his name,’

4 Don’t you think,’ said I, ‘that you’ve heard the name before ? ’

4 I’m sure of It; but where I can’t the least remember.’

How wo puzzled over that name, and what it was associated with in onr minds : It seemed to have taken possession of us bath, and although it was such an unimportant thing, we could not rest for thinking of it. However, all we could think of was that it seemed connected with our last visit to the country. I dare say you will have guessed long ago where it was that wo bad seen it; but it wrsn’t till after several days had passed that Eliza said to me suddenly one evening

‘ Antony, that name was on the cosy, I’m sure of it.'

4 Of course it was, ’ said I; * but in com nection with what ? ’

Do you know lhat nothing would content ns but we must find out what it was ; f r, don't you see, it was such an uncommon name, none such appearing even in the Directory, and we had got quite excited about It.

I think it wao clever of Eliza to have remembered where it was. I’m sure I never should ; but then, as I think I said, she is olevor.

Well, at last we thonght of a plan ; and El za, having hunted up the date of our stay in the country, and knoniag that that ‘‘Times’’ wos sent ns a few days after we lift I-hndon, I went one afternoon to the Times office, and said 1 wanted to look through the file for that month.

I hadn’t looked through many before suddenly I saw the who’e cofy before me. 1 aeetrud to know every line and word of it. Really by this time I had got so interested

in the chase that I felt quite eager about it g but looking down the columns I couldn’t' see the name anywhere. So then I began carefully at the beginning end read straightthrough, and then I found it. It was an advertisement for next of kin, and began •To Thomas Honsego,’ and further down had the name that had s» bothered os, Bananiah Honsego. Thinking this really must concern young' John, I soon bought a copy and took It home to Eliza. 'When I got home I found John sitting with Flizt, Now we hadn’t aeon much of John for some days, he being very much occupied, and when we di'’, it so happened that wo hadn’t talked about this ; so yon may thick he was astonished when 1 ran into the room, spread out the paper, and began to read the advertisement (I out it out, and hero it is) :

* 1 o Thomas Honsego, formerly of Norwich, in the county of Norfolk, his next of kin, or legal personal representatives. Wherecs the abovecamed Thomas Bousego, who was one of the children of Jonathan Honsego, Iste of Norwich aforesaid,gentleman, deceased, left England in the lifetime of his father, and has not since been heard of ; and whereas tboeaid Jonathan Honsego had two sons, named respectively Jonathan Honsego and Hananiah Honsego, and whereas the said Jonathan, son of Jonathan Housego aforesaid, died, on the 31st of March last— ’ and—But there, I needn’t read yon the whole of it ; it’s wordy, and I can’t bear anything wordy. The effect of it waa that there was a sum of money standing unclaimed that might be claimed by any living representative of Hananiah Honsego, who was of courseJohn’s grandfather. Weil, it's not much good telling yon more than that John W biting went straight to a lawyer, and that the lawyer said that if only certain links were complete it wonld be easy to get the money. The links he wanted were soon forthcoming ; and after a lot of correspondence and formality it brought in for John, certainly not a fortune, but enough to make him independent of his then employers, and to enable him to bay a share In a going concern, and soon after that to marry Eiiza.

It was a great uncle of his who bad died and left the money. As I said, it was only a modest sum ; bnt how happy that small sum made ns I should find it difficult to tell yon.

They live close by me, and we see each other every day. I don’t know that there's much else te tell. John said to me only this morning—‘Well, Antony, I haven’t yet quite got over the strangeness of it ail. ‘lt is odd, I said ; ‘ and none the leas odd that It all cams abont through the cosy. ’