LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2712, 18 December 1882, Page 4

LITERATURE.

808 AND I—‘ARCADES AMBO.’ A Story of London Bohemia, in TWO PARTS. Part I. ( Continued .) As I look at it lazily, thinking partly of it, partly of the res angustoe domi, and partly on things in general, it occurs to me that it has been altered. Yes ; Bob has certaiuly taken it in hand again. A few fresh touches have been given here and there to the painting itself, and the figure of a sturdy backswoodman, seated, axe in hand, on a fallen pine stem, has been sketched out ou paper, and is evidently intended to be introduced into the clearing. A thought strikes me ; I will paint in the backwoodsman, and Bob on his return shall find his idea carried out. No sooner thought than begun. I seize a£ palette, rummage out a fairly clean brush or two, and squeeze out the colors I need. But just as I have fixed myself comfortably on the stool, and am about to give the first touch, my arms are seized from behind and pinned to my sides, while a well-known voice, in a rich Milesian brogue, calls out.

‘Villain, .spare that tree ! Touch not a single stump, or by the holy poker, I’ll ■brain ye with the mahlstick !’ It is Bob. I drop the brush and release myself. Bob looks down at me, smiling, mirthful. I wonder where he has borrowed that jovial air, for, to my knowledge, when I saw him in the morning, he was in anything but a merry mood. * Well. Bob, my boy, you seem exceeding merry over something. Have you an/ .of your mirth to spare for me !’ Bob’s smile becomes more jovial still.

‘ What's the use of always being melancholy ?’ he says. ‘ Care killed a cat.’ ‘lt will never kill you, that’s certain ; you don’t give it a chance. ’ Bob grins, but makes no reply, and I feel certain ho has some good news. Looking at him, my eyes fall upon his hat. I start. ‘ Do my eyes deceive me, or is that old hat new ?’

Bob smiles inscrutably. ‘ Faith ! it’s time it was. I’ve known it long enough to get tired of it.’ This in a very jaunty manner. My eyes, travelling downward, light upon his waistcoat. The next moment with a cry of astonishment, 1 stagger off the stool, and point frantically at his vest. In the centrv of it gleams a chain of gold. ‘ Bob, what is this ?’ I cry. ‘ What has happened?’ For all answer Bob puts his finger and thumb into his waistcoat pocket, and produces therefrom a coin, which he places before his left eye after the manner of an eyeglass, and which I discern to be a sovereign. ‘Ye gods t’ I say; ‘how is this thus t How come ye by these goods ? Is that your chain? Is your watch at the end of it 1 Is that a sovereign, or is it all—bo.us ?’ Bob grins and replies, ‘Be these bogus ?’ Whereupon he puts his hands into his trousers pockets, and, withdrawing from each a folded paper, displays to my wondering gaze two new, crisp, cracking five pound notes. These he lays on a stool, and looks at me. ‘ What d’ye say to that, Sandy, my boy ?’ ‘ Robert Daly,’ I reply sternly, ‘ how come you by these moneys V But Bob is still tardy of speech. _ ‘ Have you eased a luckless citizen of his purse ; or have you emptied the till of that thrice accursed butcher ?’ Bob looks at me with a mysterious triumph. He is determined to make the most of the situation. At that moment a heavy tread his heard on the stairs. The crisis is at hand : Nemesis is near.

‘ Wretched youth!’ I cry melodramatically, ‘ I hear the steps of the ‘ pursuer. ’ Confess your horrid crime ! Confess at once (it is your only chance of safety), and I’ll help you through the skylight ere the minister of justice shall arrive.’ ‘ Bosh !’ says Bob undauntedly; ‘ it’s the minister of the cookshop.’ And he opens the door to admit the satellite of the spit, who lays a tray of steaming proviant on the table and departs. ‘And now, my hoy,’ continues he, as if nothing had happened, ‘let’s walk into the victuals, for, hy the powers, I’m as hungry as a friar in Lent.’

‘Never,’ I reply sternly. ‘ Tempter, avaunt! Not until I knew the truth will I taste of your ill-gotton food. How come you hy your watch, this money, and. above all, how come you by this dinner ? Speak, I conjure yon, by the ghosts of all the Barmecides !’

Faith, Sandy,’ says Bob at last, sitting down and beginning to attack the mutton, ‘ it’s not such a terrible matter as that. I’ve been spoiling an Amalekite ; I’ve sold a picture.’ ‘ Sold a picture! Which ?’ I cry in astonishment. ‘ The one on the easel, to be sure. But sit down man; the meat’s getting cold. We’ll punish the provisions first, and discourse afterwards.’

And not until he had made a clean sweep of his mutton, vegetables, pudding, and cheese, and washed it all down with plentiful potations of half-and-half, would Boh say another word on the subject of his sud-denly-acquired wealth. When the feast was over, the tray placed outside the door, and the pipes lighted, Bob took up a commanding position with his hack against the mantelshelf, and began. ROBERT DALY HIS STORY. I was sitting there on the stool, after you went out to visit your uncle, you know, looking at the picture. It seemed to me a trifle brown, as it were ; and I just thought I’d put a little moss on the shady side of one of the trees, to see how it looked, for it was precious dull and deadlike as it was, and you know I’m partial to green. So I took up a brush and laid on a bit of color, and was leaning back to enjoy the effect, when I heard a voice behind me say, ‘ I guess ye’re wrong there, sir.’ I turned round, and saw a man standing behind me. The rummiest chap you ever set eyes on. A brown-faced, long-jawed old fellow, with a chin-beard, and a topper on his head a dozen sizes too big for him. He had an unlighted cigar in his mouth ; he was churning it round and round, and his hands were stuck in his breeches pockets. I stared at him, he stared at me ; he was a queer specimen. ‘ How did you come here ?’ I said when I had waited for him to be off, and saw no signs of it. ‘Up the stairs,’ replied the specimen, * how in thunder else V

Cool, wasn’t it? *By the powers, you’re a cool hand; perhaps you’ll go down the stairs now,’ said I.

‘ Guess I will when I’ve got slung, but not bfore. Where’s the housekeeper. ?’ * How should I know ?’ ‘ Why, ain’t this where she stops ?’ ‘ No; she lives downstairs, in the basement. ’

‘Underground, I guess you mean; poor critter. Well, I’ve got a parcel for her from her sistar in Chicago, and I thought I’d bring it around myself.’ What the deuce did I care about the housekeeper, or the sister in Chicago, or the parcel, or the Yankee that carried it? Why on earth didn’t he hook it ?

* Well, now, what are you ?’ says this extraordinary creature. Pretty calm, eh, Sandy ? ‘ I’m a painter.’ ‘ Ah, I’ve never seen a painter, as I know of, exceptin’ the house-decoratin’ chaps; I guess you’re a cut above them, eh ?’ Did you ever hear impudence to beat that ? But I kept cool, my boy. ‘ Eeally. sir, I must ask you to be kind enough to pay your visit to the housekeeper, whom you will find in the basement, and not to me.’

* I guess you want me to quit,’ says this specimen of thick skinnedness. ‘ When I’m done. I’ll slide. What’s that ye’re painting ? A clearin’ ?’ ‘ Yes, it is a clearing.’ ‘ Out West ?’

‘Yes, it is ‘out West,’ as you call it,’ and I looked at the illustration in my book. ‘ A Forest Clearing in the Far West.’ The specimen cocked his hat on one side and looked at it—positively looked at it and smiled, ’Pon my soul, Sandy, I felt my dander rising. * It’s not so durned bad, after all/ he said slowly, turning his cigar round in his mouth between whiles. * Them trees are like, and that stump’s true to Natur’; but but what under the sun are ye putting’ in there ? What’s that t-reen patch on the side of that pine there ?’ ‘ Moss,’ I said laconically. The beggar’s very impudence began to tickle me again. To he continued.