LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2716, 22 December 1882, Page 4

LITERATURE.

808 AND I—‘ARCADES AMBO.’ A Story of London Boiikitja. IN TWO PARTS. Part 11. (Continued. ) On my way up I conned over a little speech of considerable neatness, which I had arranged should be my opening address to Miss Capen. It was at ouoe elegant and witty, easy and epigrammatic. I was not going to be overawed by this specimen of female Young America ; on the contrary, female Young America should be impressed by mo. Mr Capon opened the door, and wo walked in, A young woman, sitting at the other end of the room, rose as we entered. ‘ Patience,’ said her father, * these are my two friends, come to sup with us. This is Mr Macpherson, and this is Mr Daly.’ She came forward, looking at me, holding out her hand. The next moment I was shaking hands in a blundering confused sort of way with tho loveliest woman I had ever seen, and all speech had fled from me.

* I’m glad to meet you, sir,’ said Miss Patience, with a kindliness of accent that said more than the words. ‘ Father has been talking to mo about you.’ I stammered out something to the effect that I hoped her father’s account of me had been a satisfactory one, and contrived to find my way to whore Mr Capen was standing ; while his daughter turned to Bob, who, although surprised, did not lose his self-possession, and commenced a conversation with her.

I remembered afterwards that Mr Capen seemed a good deal amused, in his one-sided way, at the impression his daughter made upon me. It was as though he had anticipated something of the kind, and was tickled at finding his expectations realised. As for me, 1 could only stand, and look at her. What a splendid woman! How different from what I had expected ! The expressions I had made use of in describing her flashed upon me. Gawky, sallow-faced, vulgar ! Heavens, how could I ? It seemed like blasphemy. She was perfect, simply perfect. A tall finely-proportioned figure ; a small shapely head ; dark hair, with just a suspicion of curl; aud a soft low voice, that excellent thing in woman. Her very accent (that Transatlantic twang we had inveighed against) seemed to add a special meaning to all she said, and to imbue the most ordinary words and phrases with heartiness and cordiality. By the way. Patience is a sweet name.

The impression she had made on me, and the train of thought induced by it, rendered me unusually silent all through dinner. Bob, on his part, was more than usually talkative. Both of us were strongly affected, bat the manifestations were different, I was drawn in, he was drawn out; he became eloquent, I lapsed almost into silence. His nature is not so delicate, so sensitive as mine.

‘ Say, Patience,’ said ber father, during dinner, ‘ where did ye say Jake was ?’ * He said he was going to a lecture, father, and would be back at tea.’

‘ Who is Jake V I said to myself, in a tremor of suspicion. I was prepared to be jealous already. Was he a brother, a cousin, or —horrid thought—a lover ? I happened to glance at Bob ; our eyes met, and I saw the same uneasiness in his as doubtless showed itself in mine.

I could not rest long iu this horrible uncertainty, and after Miss .Patience, in deference to our English customs, had left us to our wine and walnuts, I determined to settle the identity of this troublesome Jake. ‘You have a young friend staying with you ?’ I said, as soon as a convenient opportunity offered. ‘Who—l? O, you mean Jake. Yes, he’s stopping with us; that is, he’s come right along from Chicago. We’re goiu’ to make this European tour together.’ ‘O, a relative, I presume T I faltered with sinking heart. ‘No : he ain’t any relative, but he’s a friend, and that’s more, I guess. When I know Jake first, he wasa boy in a printin’ office ; tow he’s correspondent to one of our first papers, sir, and draws'a fine salary. He’ll make his mark one of these days. 1 I thanked Mr Capen verbally, and changed the subject. I had no desire to pursue it, but I anathematised the invisible Jake most heartily. ‘Well, gentlemen, suppose we go upstairs, eh ?’ said our host, seeing me sitting silent on my chair. We responded with alacrity. At her father’s request Patience went to the piano. She played a few simple tunes, which seemed to please her father, and then sang—Heavens, how she sang !—I can’t write about it: the remembrance overcomes me.

After we had done our duty at the piano, for Boh and I both sing and play (indeed I have a delicate tenor voice, which, if not robust, is really very sweet, and although poor Bob’s is a bass, yet he manages it very well). Miss Patience came and sat down beside me, while Bob was talking to her father.

‘Father tells me,’ she said, looking at mo very pleasantly, ‘that he wants you to come over to America.’

‘Tot, it is so,’ I replied;* and, indeed, he has made us a most generous offer, but I am afraid we cannot accept it.’ ‘Well, but won’t you think it over again ?’ she said kindly. ‘ Father has taken an interest in you, and I think it would be well if you accepted his offer.’ It certainly was very pleasant to have this lovely girl taking an interest in us, too, I thought. The sensation was very delightful, although Mr Capen’s offer was as impossible of acceptance as ever. ‘You see, it is something entirely different from anything we have been accustomed to. We are not used to manual labor.’ I could have said, I did not think it the proper kind of employment for a scion of the Clan Kattan, but I did not like to-

‘ Well, what does that matter ? You will have four years to get used to it ia. I wish I could persuade you.’ ‘ Do you really wish me to go ?’ I asked, as my foolish heart began to beat [wildly. Did this glorious creature really taka an interest in me ? The thought was bewildering, entrancing. * I do, indeed. I want every one to come to America who is worthy of her. It is the land for men. Why, you would make more progress in a few years ia the States than in your whole life hero.’ * And you really would like me to go out to America —to your country ?’ I asked again, gazing admiringly upon this lovely, bewitching, emigration agent. 4 To l)e sure I would, and father too. I would be really glad to have you out West, on a good farm, making your way, and getting on. Now, will you think it over again? Do.’

I stammered out something that might be taken to mean that I would do so, and so she left me. I sat thinking it all over, and endeavoring to compose myself. And so she really was interested in me : wanted to see me out West—in her own country. The idea was simply intoxicating. Viewed under this new aspect, the ‘emigration scheme,’ as Bob had called it, did not seem so utterly impracticable after all. The matter was gradually assuming a a different complexion. Life on a farm—rural, decidedly rural; but still, under circumstances enjoyable. I drew a mental picture of wliat might happen one day, nay should, if the flattering tale Hope was telling me turned out a true one. A low twostoried house, with the brown cross-beams showing on the walls, gable ended, dormerwindowed, with diamond-pan ed lattices. A multitude of gay-blossoming sweet-scented creeping plants climbing up the walls, and peeping in at the old-fashioned windows ; a thatched roof, brown and green with age, with here and there a patch of moss or lichen ; that was my ideal of a farmhouse. The farmyard—l supposed there would have to l>e a farmyard ; but that would be removed to a convenient distance, so that no objectionable sights should offend our eyes, or disagreeable effluvium disgust our noses. Myself, a horny-handed tiller of the soil, in s. picturesque costume of flannel or serge, my shirt linked at the neck with a silver clasp, and a broad-leaved sombrero on my head, would be reclining in a graceful attitude (but all my attitudes are graceful) on the grassy bank in the foreground. Through the half-opened window behind

me would come, mellowed by the distance, the notes of a piano, touched by a woman's hand, and the sweet sound of a rich contralto voice, warbling some old German ditty, or perhaps a harvest song. I would turn my head towards the window whence the sweet souuds, and softly call, ‘ Patience, my love, I want you.’ It was a very pleasant picture. Farming, under such an aspect, might bo endurable, even enjoyable, after all. Patience and I. Mrs Patience Macpherson. How sweet it sounded!

No thought of Bob intruded itself into my picture of Arcadia, or, if it did, only to be driven away. Of course he would stay behind, working at his pot-boilers, for which he was cut out by Nature. The special invitation, the interest betrayed by the lovely Patience, had no reference to him. Of course I would not forget him ; he need not think that. When his friend Aluasoh—l mean Macpherson —should be rich iu flocks and herds, he would deal generously with his old chum ; but, in the meantime, he must stay behind. Ten o’clock came, and brought Jake with it. The sight of him was a relief to my mind. Unknown, I had feared him as a possible rival; on seeing him I felt comforted. No one but an idiot could feel jealous of such a specimen as Jake. Long limbed, loose joint 3d, with a capacious mouth and extensive cars, he was not an object to excite the alarm of a lover. Nature had been very generous to him, too, in the matter of hands and feet; and I quite agreed with Mr Capen that Jake would make his mark, and that a large one, wherever he put his foot. His ill-cut ‘ store ’ clothes, too, hung badly on him, in woful contrast with our well fitting evening garments. He was evidently perfectly at home with the Capens, father and daughter; but there was no special empressement in his greeting; of Patience to rekindle the expiring fire of my jealousy. In reply to her question as to how he had liked the lecture, he replied, ‘Pretty well. But the lecturer didn’t say half as much as I could have told him ; didn’t make nearly as good a case of it as he might have done.’ ‘ What was the subject ?’ I asked. ‘ Emigration, with special reference to the Western States, such as Missouri, Wisconsin, and lowa' I stared ; the very subject. I wondered if there would be another. ‘ Will there be an'other lecture ?’ asked Bob suddenly. I started at him. What business was it of his ? ‘Yes, to-morrow,’ replied Jake; and I silently determined, unless I broke a leg or killed a man in the interim, to attend that lecture.

We scarcely spoke all the way home. I was wrapped up in my own thoughts, and I presume Boh had matters of his own to think about, for he was very silent too. When we reached Newman street, I remembered to have seen on the table of the man who lives on the second floor a book of travels in the West, half light reading, half statistical ; so, making an excuse to Bob, I went in and borrowed it. When I got to Bob’s room, I found him deep in the perusal of a green-covered pamphlet, which he covered with his hand as I came in. I was too much taken up with my own scheme to notice this at the time, however. As I had no intention that Bob should discover what kind of literature I had got hold of, I feigned an excuse to leave him to himself.

‘ I say, old fellow, I think I shall go into my own room. I’ve got a letter or two to write.’ * ‘ Have you? Oh, all right,’ said Bob, making no effort to detain me, and lighting his pipe very coolly. As I rose to go, I caught sight of the title of the green covered book, from which Bob had removed his hand for a moment. It is ‘ Nahum P. Porter on Western Immigration.’

Can she have spoken to him too ? Horrible, harrassing, distracting thought! By dint of diligent inquiry on the following day, I found out where the lecture was to be given, for I had not cared to ask the question openly. I feigned an engagement for the evening, so as to be able to be absent myself without arousing Bob’s suspicions; but I need not have given myself the trouble, for it seemed ho was going out too, and did not even ask whither I was hound. For myself, I felt his destination to be a matter of complete indifference to me; and, as he did not inform me of it, I did not inquire. I set out early in order to secure a good place, and soon found myself one of a group of some seven or eight people standing at the door of the hall where the lecture was announced to take place. After waiting for some time, staring at the door, I turned round, and found myself face to face with Bob ! We stared at each other in astonishment. Bob found his tongue’first. ‘ What in creation brings you here ?’ he asked rudely. ‘ What brings you here ?’ I replied angrily. ‘You have notuing to do with this. You go home, and don’t meddle with what doesn’t concern you.’ ‘ Doesn’t concern me ? Well, that’s good I Wasn’t I spoken to by Miss Capen herself ? Didn’t her father give me a hook on immigration ? And didn’t Jake give me the address of the hall ? Doesn't concern me ! Put that cap on your own head, young man. ‘ She spoke to me before you !’ ‘ Did she ? When was that ?’ ‘ After dinner, in the drawing-room.’ * Well, she spoke to me before we went down to dinner at all.’ * Anyhow, I was here first, and here I’ll stay.’ ‘ Faith, you may do that same for all I care. There’s room for both of us.’ The rest of the crowd began to take a lively interest in the discussion, but I heeded them not. ‘ Bob, this is perfectly ridiculous. Either you go, or I go.’ ‘ I’ve no objection ; only it’s myself that’ll stay. * I came first!’ ‘ Well, you can go first.’ A titter from the crowd. (To he continued .)