Chapter I: Part 1

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL

OF

POPULAR

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART

Fifth Series

ESTABLISHED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, 1832

CONDUCTED BY R. CHAMBERS (SECUNDUS)

NO. 33.—VOL. I. SATURDAY, AUGUST 16, 1884. PRICE 1½_d._]

CAVE-CHAPELS.

In the biographies of the saints of the early Celtic Church it is frequently recorded that towards the close of their lives they left their monasteries and sought the seclusion of some lonely island or mountain solitude, in order to pass the evening of their days in undisturbed devotion and freedom from worldly cares. Joceline in his _Life of St Kentigern_ also records that it was his custom to retire to a cave during Lent, so that, ‘removed from the strife of tongues and the tumults of this world, he might hide himself in God.’ Such retreats, whether they were used for periodical and temporary seclusion or for permanent retirement, were called in the ecclesiastical language of the day _Deserta_; and the frequent occurrence of this term in the topography of Scotland and Ireland—in its modern form of Dysart or Disert—shows how common the custom must once have been. Sometimes the recluse erected a habitation for himself of stones and turf, as St Cuthbert did in the island of Farne; but frequently he chose the shelter of a natural cavern or crevice in the rocks, as St Cuthbert is also said to have done at Weem in Perthshire. As the veneration for the memory of the saint increased with lapse of time, the sites of such hermitages naturally became places of pilgrimage, and troops of devotees were drawn to visit them by rumours of special benefits accruing to pilgrims of weak health, or peace of mind procured by the performance of special vows. In consequence of the peculiar prevalence of this mode of retirement in the primitive Celtic Church, cave-hermitages must have been exceedingly numerous in Scotland. But the thoroughness of the breach which the Church of the Reformation made with the traditions and especially with the superstitious practices of the past, has obliterated most of the traces of this early devotion; and it is only in a few isolated and exceptional cases that any of its associations have survived to our day.

St Ninian’s Cave, near Physgill, in the parish of Glasserton, Wigtownshire, is situated a little to the west of the wooded valley which terminates in the creek known as Portcastle. It is simply a triangular fissure in the rock, some ten or twelve feet wide at the entrance, and about fifteen feet in height, narrowing inwards until, at a distance of about twenty-five feet from the entrance, the sides of the fissure come gradually together. A rudely-built wall has been constructed across the mouth of the cave, of which the lower part still remains. On the occasion of a visit to the cave by the late Dean Stanley of Westminster, a small cross was discovered carved on a projecting part of the rock, and three others were subsequently made visible by the partial removal of the debris from the face of the rock. The form of these crosses is peculiar. They are equal-limbed crosses, formed by four arcs of circles intersecting the circumference of a circumscribing circle. Similar equal-limbed crosses, but bearing the hook-like curve at the right-hand corner of the upper limb, which constitutes the _chrisma_ or monogram—the combined _Chi_ and _rho_ of the Greek word _Christos_—are found upon early Christian monuments at Kirkmadrine and Whithorn in the same county, but nowhere else in Scotland. These monuments bear inscriptions commemorative of certain ‘holy and distinguished priests’—Viventius, Mavorius, and Florentius. Their names are so different from those of the priesthood of the Columban Church, that they may be regarded as followers if not as contemporaries of St Ninian. But none of the crosses in Ninian’s Cave present this peculiarly ancient characteristic of the _chrisma_, and these crosses may therefore be of a much later date than Ninian’s time. They are not confined to the rock-face, but have also been carved upon several of the loose stones found on the floor of the cave.

In the month of June last the cave was thoroughly explored for the Ayrshire and Wigtownshire Archæological Association, under the superintendence of Sir Herbert Maxwell, M.P., and Mr Cochran-Patrick, M.P., Secretary of the Association and of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. They found that the whole floor of the cave had been regularly paved; and close to the entrance, but outside the external wall which converted the cave into a chapel, there was a large stone basin placed under a natural drip from the rock, which may have served as a holy-water vessel. A number of additional crosses were also discovered. On a stone which had been placed as one of the steps leading down to the paved floor there were four crosses in a line. On one of the stones of the pavement was an inscription in Roman letters, of which the word SANCTI could only be deciphered. Underneath the pavement and throughout the debris of the cave-floor there was a considerable accumulation of shells, consisting chiefly of limpets and periwinkles, mingled with splintered bones, evidently the refuse of the food of some earlier occupants. At a considerable depth immediately outside the wall of the chapel, the decayed remnants of a human skeleton were disentombed. Whether these were the bones of a hermit of the chapel who had chosen to be buried in the spot where he had ended his solitary life, or the remains of some victim of violence placed there for concealment, will probably remain unknown.

St Ninian, to whom the cave was dedicated, was the first who preached Christianity among the southern Picts. His life and labours are briefly related by the Venerable Bede, and more fully by Ailred, a Cistercian monk of Rievaux, in Yorkshire. Ailred, whose _Life of St Ninian_ was written in the second half of the twelfth century, states that he derived his materials from a certain barbarously written manuscript, presumably of much earlier date. He informs us that Ninian was born at Whithorn—then called Rosnat—and that he was the son of a Christian Prince. Having received his education under the care of St Martin of Tours, he subsequently went to Rome, where he remained till he was made a bishop and sent to evangelise the people of his native province. From St Martin he obtained masons to build a stone church in Galloway after the Roman fashion. As this was the first stone church erected in Scotland, the fame of Ninian’s _Candida Casa_ or White House has been perpetuated in the Saxon form of Whitherne or Whithorn. The date of its erection is fixed by the fact that St Martin died in 397 A.D.; and St Ninian, having heard of his death while the church was being built, resolved to dedicate the finished edifice to his memory. Ninian himself, after a life full of labours, was buried in the church of St Martin which he had built; and Ailred mentions the stone sarcophagus which contained his remains as still existing in his day, and much venerated in consequence of the many miraculous cures said to be wrought upon those who devoutly frequented it. Pilgrimages continued to be made to the shrine of St Ninian down to the period of the Reformation. In a letter of King James V. of Scotland to the Pope, the king states that pilgrims from England, Ireland, the Isles, and adjoining countries came yearly in flocks to St Ninian’s shrine at Whithorn. That notable pilgrim King James IV. made special pilgrimages to this famous shrine, and his Treasurer has preserved an account of his disbursements on these occasions. From it we learn that the king made offerings in money ‘at the Rude Altar; at the fertir (or shrine) in the outer kirk; at the reliques at the Hie Altair; at the Lady Altar; and in the chapel on the hill—at ilk place xiiis. 4d.’ And in 1505 he offered also ‘ane relique of the king’s awn silver’ of considerable weight and value.

The number of dedications to St Ninian, scattered over the whole country from the remotest Northern and Western Isles to the Mull of Galloway, bear testimony to the widespread devotion to his memory which once pervaded the Scottish Church. The removal of a portion of the wall of the choir of the old church of St Congan at Turriff in 1861 brought to light a fresco-painting of St Ninian, robed as a bishop, with mitre and pastoral staff—the only relic of pre-Reformation work of the kind that has been discovered in Scotland. Neither in his _Life_ nor in any ancient document has any reference been found to the occupation of the cave at Physgill by St Ninian; but Sulpicius Severus, who wrote a Life of St Martin of Tours, mentions that he had a little cell in the rock at Marmoutier to which he was accustomed to retire for prayer and meditation, and that many of his disciples also dug cells in the rock and took up their abodes in them. St Ninian being a disciple of St Martin, there is reason to conclude that in this respect he would follow the example of his master. But apart from this consideration, it is certain that from a very early period this cave has been traditionally associated with his name, and that this association was the reason for converting it into a chapel, where services would be held on the saint’s anniversaries, pilgrimages performed, vows paid, and offerings presented. It is not unlikely that in its earlier days the chapel may have been ministered to by a resident recluse, as was often the custom in similar circumstances. For instance, we are told by Bower, the continuator of Fordun’s _Chronicle_, that in crossing the Firth of Forth in the year 1123, King Alexander I. was driven by stress of weather to land on the island of Inchcolm, ‘where at that time lived an island hermit, who, belonging to the service of St Columba, devoted himself sedulously to his duties at a little chapel there, content with such poor food as the milk of one cow, and the shells and small sea-fishes he could collect.’ It is suggestive, too, that one of the copies of the _Scotichronicon_—that which belonged to the Abbey of Coupar-Angus—connects the island of Inchcolm with St Columba by saying that he lived in it for a certain time during his ministry among the Picts and Scots, just as the cave at Physgill is connected with St Ninian.

There is another cave-chapel on the Wigtownshire coast, which had a reputation scarcely less famous than that of St Ninian. St Medan’s Cave, still locally known as ‘The Chapel Co’,’ is an irregular rent in the cliff between Maryport and East Tarbert, about four miles from Drumore. In front of it are the remains of a wall about four feet thick, of rough stones and lime, still showing traces of the doorway, and one deeply splayed window. About twelve feet farther in is the back wall of the chapel, reaching to the roof of the cave, but giving access, by a square-headed doorway four feet high and two and a half feet wide, to the small natural cell in which the cave terminates. Near the external entrance there are three pools or rock basins, within the tide-mark, and usually full of sea-water. The largest, which is about four feet in diameter, is known as ‘the Body Pool,’ and was used for the cure of internal and wasting disorders, being specially efficacious in cases of ‘back-gane bairns’. The second pool, of an irregularly triangular shape, and about two feet long, was known as ‘the Knee Pool,’ and was considered effectual for the cure of diseases of the lower limbs. The third pool, a circular basin about six inches diameter and the same in depth, was used for sore eyes. The cave and its pools were largely frequented for curative purposes down almost to the commencement of the present century, and continued to be occasionally visited to a much later period. There are persons yet living who remember large gatherings at St Medan’s Chapel, especially on the first Sunday of May, old style. St Medan, who is commemorated in the dedication of the church of Kirkmaiden, was one of the ‘devout women’ of the early Celtic Church of whom there is no distinct biographic record. The _Breviary of Aberdeen_ states that she came from Ireland to Galloway, and ended her days near the blessed St Ninian. Mr Skene identifies her with Modwena, whose original name was Darerca, a convert of St Patrick, who died on St Columba’s birthday, July 6, 519 A.D.

St Kieran’s Cave is situated in the precipitous cliffs of Achinhoan Head, about three miles south of the site of the church dedicated to him at Kilkerran, in Kintyre, Argyllshire. It is one of many fissures occurring in the limestone rock on this coast, irregularly triangular in shape, spacious and lofty. A substantially built wall three feet thick has been constructed across the entrance. Immediately within the entrance is a rough boulder with an oval basin scooped in its upper surface, which is placed beneath a drip of water from the roof of the cave, and thus forms a reservoir, which may have answered the purposes of a hermit’s well, a holy-water vessel for the pilgrims’ chapel, and a curative or holy well for the superstitious uses of later times. Close by it is another boulder about two feet in diameter, the upper surface of which is prettily carved with a circular border of fretwork, such as is frequently seen on the early sculptured monuments of Scotland and Ireland, inclosing a hexafoil with its points connected by arcs of circles. A writer in the old _Statistical Account of Scotland_ also speaks of the cross which St Kieran had cut upon the rock; but this is no longer visible. Kieran Macantsaor, or the ‘carpenter’s son,’ was Abbot of Clonmacnois. In his youth he was a disciple of St Finan of Clonard; and in proof of the sanctity of his life, it is told of him that ‘he never looked upon a woman, and never told a lie.’ He was held in great esteem by St Columba, who is said to have written a hymn in praise of Kieran. He died at the age of thirty-three, and ‘was likened to Christ, both on account of his age and that his father was a carpenter like Joseph Muire.’

A cave on the western shore of Loch Caolisport, also in Argyllshire, is associated with the name of the great evangelist of Scotland, St Columba. Like most other cave-chapels, it has the remains of a wall, with a doorway, constructed across the entrance. On a kind of rocky shelf close by the doorway is a rude circular basin, which probably served as the holy-water vessel of the chapel. Against the rock forming the east side of the cave is the altar platform, roughly but solidly built, and still standing—or at least till quite recently—to nearly its full height. On the smooth face of the rock above the centre of the altar platform is a cross carved in relief, of the Latin form, but with its arms and summit slightly expanding towards the extremities. This cross is placed a little to one side of the centre; but more nearly in a central position over the altar there are discernible the almost obliterated outlines of a much older cross which has been incised in the rock. At a little distance from the cave are the ruins of an ancient chapel dedicated to St Columba. It is a small plain edifice about forty feet by twenty-two, with one east window, and the remains of a window in each of the side-walls near the eastern end. The tradition is that St Columba, landing here on his way to Iona, established the chapel in the cave, which was ever afterwards held sacred to his memory, and that the chapel near it was subsequently founded in his honour. The cave was cleared out about two years ago by the proprietor; but no record of what might have been a most interesting scientific investigation appears to have been preserved. It is said that a great many burials were found in the floor of the cave—as many as sixteen or eighteen different skeletons are supposed to have been found—and underneath them the traces of a more ancient occupation of the cavern, probably in pagan times.

The cave of St Molio in the Island of Lamlash, or Holy Island, on the east side of Arran, is a natural cavity in the sandstone rock, about twenty-five feet above the present tide-mark. Traces of a rudely-built wall across its entrance are still visible. A shelf of rock within the cave is known as ‘the Saint’s Bed;’ a large flat-topped rock close by with several step-like recesses cut in its circumference is called ‘the Saint’s Chair;’ and a fine spring of pure water, which is known as ‘the Saint’s Well,’ was formerly much resorted to for the healing virtues of its water. The Island of Lamlash appears in ancient documents as Helant-in-laysche or Almeslach, and this form of the name identifies it with St Molaissi or Laisren of Leighlin, a nephew of St Blane of Kingarth in Bute. His mother was a daughter of Aedhan, king of the Scots of Dalriada; and it is told of him, that in order to avoid being made king, he retired to an island in the sea between Alban and Britain—between the country of the Scots and that of the Britons of Strathclyde. This answers precisely to the situation of the Holy Island which is still associated with his name. There was a relic either of St Molaissi or of St Moluag of Lismore preserved in Arran down to the time of Martin’s visit to the island in the beginning of the last century. This was the _Baul Muluy_, a ‘green stone, like a globe in figure, about the bigness of a goose-egg,’ which was much used by the islanders for curing diseases and ‘for swearing decisive oaths upon it.’ It seems to have been in the hereditary custody of a family of Mackintoshes, and had also the reputation of having been anciently a _vexillum_ or battle-ensign of the Macdonalds of the Isles, carried with their host in their conflicts, in the belief that its presence would secure to them victory over their enemies. The cave of St Molio has several Runic inscriptions cut upon its interior—mere _graffiti_ of occasional visitors at the time when the galleys of the Northmen frequented the western seas. Amudar, Ontur, and Sea-elk, who have left their names there, may have been pagans; but Nicolas of Haen, who carved the longest inscription, bears a good Christian name.

St Serf’s Cave at Dysart, in Fife, derived its sanctity—as the town of Dysart has derived its name—from its having been the _desertum_ or place of retirement of the saint during his seasons of meditation and prayer. The _Aberdeen Breviary_ states that ‘once upon a time the devil tempted the blessed St Serf with divers questions in the cave at Dysart; but confounded by the divine virtue, he went away; and from that day the said demon has appeared to no one in that cave, although the place is still held famous in honour of St Serf.’ Andrew of Wyntoun, prior of St Serf’s monastery in Lochleven, as in duty bound, gives, in his _Cronykill of Scotland_, a circumstantial account of this disputation with the Evil One:

Quhill Saynt Serf in till a stede
Lay eftir Maytynis in hys bede,
The devil came in full intent
For til fand him with argument;

proposing to the saint many of the questions of high theological speculation which presented themselves to the cultivated minds of the fifteenth century, and receiving orthodox, and consequently unanswerable replies to them all:

Thane sawe the devil that he coud nocht,
With all the wylis that he socht,
Ourecum Saynt Serf; he sayd than
He kend hym for a wys man;

and the saint becoming impatient of his flattery, commanded him to begone from his cave, and never more to annoy any one in it. This prohibition apparently obtained for the cave a reputation as of a place for ever freed from the temptations of the Evil One, and it continued in consequence to be used as a chapel, and largely frequented by pilgrims down almost to the Reformation.

St Adrian’s Cave at Caiplie, also on the north shore of the Firth of Forth, consists of a cluster of contiguous cavities formed by the sea washing out the softer parts of the rock. The principal cavity bears obvious marks of artificial adaptation. It is somewhat irregular in shape, but large and lofty; and the foundation courses of a wall constructed across its entrance are still visible. Near the mouth of the cave, a kind of platform or seat is shaped in the rock, and a door cut through the rock communicates with a smaller cell on the south side. On the west side, a series of steps led up to a smaller cell, in the inner part of which was a kind of bench cut in the rock, which is said to have been the hermit’s bed. In front of the cave, five human skeletons were found, four of which were regularly buried east and west, the heads to the west, but without coffins. A considerable quantity of bones of oxen, sheep, and swine, and portions of deer-horns, were found mixed with the debris in front of the cave, evidently the refuse of the food of its occupants at some remote period. On the interior of the rocky walls of the cave, many pilgrim crosses are carved, some of the equal-armed form and surrounded with a border, but mostly of the Latin form. St Adrian, whose true name was probably Odran, is represented as having settled and laboured among the Pictish people of the east parts of Scotland. His settlement in the Firth of Forth is thus described by Wyntoun:

Adriane wyth hys cumpany
Togydder cam tyl Caplawchy,
Thare sum in to the Ile off May
Chesyd to byde to thare enday.
And some off thame chesyd be northe
In steddis sere the Wattyr off Forth.

At Pittenweem, St Monance, and other places along the coast as far as Fifeness, there are several caves which have pilgrim crosses and other symbols of archaic character carved upon their rocky walls. All of these seem at one time to have been occupied as places of retreat and devotion by saints or recluses of the early Celtic Church, and doubtless are the _steddis sere_ (that is, the ‘several places’) referred to in Wyntoun’s narrative. At Fifeness is the cave of Constantine, king of the Scots, who, after a reign of forty years, exchanged the sceptre for the pilgrim’s staff, and ‘died in the house of the Apostle;’ that is, of St Andrew. At St Andrews itself is the cave of St Rule, or rather what remains of it, for it has been much destroyed within the last half-century. Sir Walter Scott describes the palmer in _Marmion_ as bound to fair St Andrews:

Within the ocean cave to pray,
Where good St Rule his holy lay,
From midnight to the dawn of day,
Sang to the billows’ sound;

and mentions that on one side of the cave there still remained a sort of stone altar. The _Aberdeen Breviary_ states that St Gernadius, who settled at Kennedor, in Moray, lived in a cell partly natural, but artificially adapted for a habitation, in which he was wont to repose his wearied limbs on a bed of stone. His cave in the neighbourhood of Lossiemouth is distinguished by the holy well close beside it, which had a local reputation until quite recently, and is still known as St Gerardine’s Well. St Baldred of the Bass, who sat upon the rock in Aldhame Bay, and caused it to transport itself out of the fairway, had his cave also in the cliff opposite this rock; and traces have been found both upon the rock itself and in the cave of a long-continued occupation at a remote period.

Although the materials for the illustration of this long-forgotten phase of ecclesiastical life are so few and fragmentary, they suffice to reveal the presence in these early ages of a passionate fervour of devotion and a child-like simplicity of faith to which we are altogether strangers in these times. The systems and institutions by which they were created and fostered ‘are productions of old ages, not to be repeated in the new: they presuppose a certain rudeness of conception, which the progress of mere scientific knowledge puts an end to.’

BY MEAD AND STREAM.

CHAPTER XLII.—A LAND SHIPWRECK.

To be unhappy and alone at night in chambers is to have an opportunity of realising the sense of desolation in its bitterest degree. The double doors and double windows which secure the stillness that is of so much importance for working purposes, seem now to shut you off doubly from the world; from help if you are dying, and from sympathy if you live. The rumble of the heaviest wagon reaches the ears as a faint sound from afar off; no footstep is heard at all; and the adjacent chambers are silent as the tenements of the dead. You welcome the plash of rain against the window-panes—dull as that is—as if it were a friend come to speak to you in your solitude.

That is the time for thoughts of suicide to haunt a man if his mind is disturbed; and that is the time for cynical broodings on the vanity of life, the falsehood of friendship, and the fickleness of love. He sees in what miserable failure his most earnest efforts have resulted; he misinterprets the most trivial word and look of his friend, and he loses grip altogether of that faith which in healthier state enables him to find consolation in love. He recalls all the bitter things that have been written about women, and for the time-being believes them.

How was it, Philip asked himself, that he had fallen into this desperate position? He had laboured with all his might for others rather than for himself; his object was a noble one, and quite feasible, he was still convinced. Yet the social revolution he had dreamed of was as far off as ever, and he suddenly found that he was face to face with absolute ruin. Evidently his blunder lay in his miscalculation of the power of his capital. There had been disappointments with his fellow-workers, who, shrewdly counting the cost of material and the market value of the manufactured article, saw that the latter would barely realise enough to give them a fair ordinary wage in the best of times, to say nothing of the share of profits promised them. The cost of material was too high; and it was natural that they should conclude the cost was so fixed by arrangement with their chief in order to deprive them of what they now called their rights.

Philip saw the force of their argument, and began to inquire about the items of expenditure. Hitherto, he had been so deeply occupied in the organisation of his scheme, that he had left financial matters almost entirely in Wrentham’s hands. Hints were given him that the prices he was charged were not the prices paid for materials, but that a large proportion went in secret commissions. As soon as he began to look into the question closely, he was met by the astounding fact, that he had reached the end of his capital, and had heavy liabilities to meet almost immediately, as well as heavy current expenses to provide for. How to do this without applying to Mr Shield, he had been trying for weeks to find out; and the more harassed he became, the more impossible it appeared to work through the mess without assistance.

Then had come the last humiliation: he must submit to the immediate and entire overthrow of all he had been working for, and in which he had sunk the considerable fortune placed at his disposal, or he must seek the help which only a short time ago had appeared to him as an impossible necessity. He was bewildered, and could not understand how it came about. It should not have been so. He yielded to the necessity, however; but determined that when his course became clear again, his first task should be to institute a thorough investigation into the causes of his failure.

Through all this agitated survey of his position, how was it that the figure of Beecham continually obtruded itself? What could Wrentham have had in his head, when he urged him so strongly to find out from Madge all that she knew of the man’s history and possible friendship with Mr Shield? He had not felt very keenly impressed by the suggestion during Wrentham’s presence; but now, in the silence and alone with his chagrin, he became infected with Wrentham’s suspicion. It had not occurred to him until now that there was something most incongruous and altogether incomprehensible in a girl consenting to accept from an acquaintance of only a few weeks a confidence which she could not disclose to her guardians or the man who was soon to be her husband.

If Beecham had been a younger man than he was, there would have been a ready and most bitter explanation of the mystery; but it was not available in the present case. And yet (so outrageously morbid had he become that he was capable of the thought!) women were such strange creatures, that there was no telling who might win their favour or by what charm it might be done.

Pah!—What madness was this?

He went to the front room and opened a window overlooking Gray’s Inn Road. The stillness of the chambers had become intolerable. This was better; much better. There was more air; he could hear the rattle of cabs, and catch glimpses of hurrying foot-passengers on the opposite side of the way.

Why should he remain indoors, to be haunted by these horrible phantoms of doubt and suspicion? He knew they were phantoms, and yet he could not drive them from his brain. Sleep was impossible, and he was afraid to take more drugs, for he was conscious that they had already impaired his power of self-control. When would the morning come? The active duties he had to discharge would relieve him. He looked at his watch. Very little past midnight. Why, it seemed as if two nights had passed since Wrentham went away!

Well, he would try Dr Joy’s specific, and endeavour to work, or walk off this nervous frenzy. First he tried the work. There was much need that he should master the accounts and compare prices paid with prices quoted in the markets. But the figures performed such strange antics before his eyes, that after an hour of vain endeavour to master their meaning, he impatiently closed the book and rose no wiser, or rather less wise, than he had been before he sat down.

He took himself to task. It was of the utmost importance that in the morning he should be cool and clear-headed; but he could not hope to be so unless he obtained sleep. Well, he would try the second remedy.

He put on his hat and overcoat and went out. It was not of any consequence to him in which direction he should walk, his sole object being to exhaust himself by the physical exercise, in order to induce healthy sleep. To distract his mind from its troublous ruminations, he turned instinctively towards those quarters where he was most likely to encounter signs of life.

He strode along Oxford Street and down Regent Street. But he was walking in a dream. The lights of the lamps were dim in his eyes, the figures which flitted by him were like shadows, and he could not have told whether they were men or women. The voices of those who passed him seemed to be muffled, and he scarcely distinguished any sounds. A hansom cab came rattling at full speed towards him: the horse slipped, staggered, fell. There was a commotion, and although, a minute before, the street seemed to be deserted, figures sprang out of the darkness, and there was a crowd at the scene of disaster.

He passed on, with that insensibility to the fate of others which characterises people when in dreamland. His feelings were numbed as his eyes were dimmed. The sense of humiliation at the utter failure of what he had believed to be so certain of success produced the one pain of which he was conscious, and which no drugs, fatigue, or reason had power to subdue.

If the money had been his own, he could have borne with comparative calmness the overthrow of his hopes and the ridicule of those who had from the first called his project folly.

But despite the assurances of Mr Shield and of Mr Shield’s solicitors, Philip had never regarded the money otherwise than as held in trust; and the loss of it was as bitter as the destruction of the beautiful palace he had built in air.

The only bit of ballast left him was the dogged conviction that the principle which he had endeavoured to carry into practical effect was a right one, and would be turned to good account by some one more fortunate or more careful than he had been.

He set his teeth together and marched on. He began to realise how strangely numbed his sensations were, and how vague everything appeared to him. The rain had ceased, and the tiny pools in the roadway glistening in the lamplight seemed like great white eyes staring at him in pity. He passed down the Haymarket, nor did he slacken his pace until he reached the Embankment. There he halted and leaned over the parapet. He was not fatigued: the rapid walk seemed to have instilled new strength into him and had partially cleared the cobwebs from his brain. He was attracted by the lights gleaming in the dark fast-flowing river. Out there, were black islets of barges, and on the opposite shore the fantastic outlines of buildings, showing like irregular ramparts against the dull gray sky. He was thinking of Madge, and the pain she would suffer on his account, when the worst was made known to her in the morning, perhaps, or next day.

‘Got a copper to spare a poor cove as hasn’t had a crust for two days?’ said a husky voice close to him.

Philip started up. He was aware of the evil reputation of the Embankment and the character of the roughs who infest it after nightfall. A lamp close by showed him a miserable-looking wretch, ragged and hungry-eyed. He did seem to need help, poor fellow. Philip gave him a shilling, and was about to pass on. But a huge hulk of a fellow stood in his way.

‘We want som’at more nor that, guv’nor. So tip us’——

The man went down as if he had been shot. Philip was in the mood for mischief, and he had not forgotten his practice with the gloves. So the first words of the ruffian plainly intimating his purpose, a well-delivered blow straight from the shoulder finished the sentence for him. Philip knew that it would have been madness to have given the man time to attack him, and as it was, the other man was already attempting to rifle his pockets. This one belonged to the sneak tribe, and finding his throat suddenly gripped by fingers that seemed to possess the strength of a vice, his hands went up to loosen them. He was hurled aside; and Philip hurried away with a sort of savage pleasure in having punished the brace of scoundrels, as well as disappointed them of their expected prize.

Near Blackfriars Bridge he met a policeman, to whom he briefly reported the incident. The man listened with stolid indifference.

‘They are a bad lot about here, at nights, sir,’ he said composedly; ‘and it ain’t a place for decent people at this hour.’

The constable’s idea evidently was that decent people should keep out of the way of the roughs, not that it was his duty to keep the roughs from molesting the decent people who might be compelled to use the thoroughfare.

Philip entered his dreary chambers again. He felt better, but still he could not sleep.

LONDON HOSPITALS AND DISPENSARIES.

From the day when Rahere the troubador, in the year 1123 A.D., founded the hospital of St Bartholomew, the number of hospitals, dispensaries, infirmaries, and other institutions for the cure and medical treatment of the sick poor, has gone on increasing, till now it stands at considerably over one hundred and fifty for London and its district alone. This is altogether exclusive of the workhouse infirmaries. Besides hospitals and dispensaries, there are included in the above number institutions for the supply of surgical instruments, &c., either free, or at such reduced prices as bring them within the reach even of the very poor. Twelve of the London hospitals have medical schools attached to them, amongst which is one for the education of lady-doctors. Differences of opinion of course exist as to the medical woman, some no doubt regarding her as a great acquisition, and one of the glories of the nineteenth century; whilst others would speak of her as an institution naturally to be expected in the dark ages, but quite an anomaly in a civilised age. Which of the views may be the correct one, we will not pretend to say. However this may be, in Henrietta Street stands the medical school for women, which is in connection with the Royal Free Hospital, Gray’s Inn Road.

The hospitals with medical schools attached undertake the treatment of almost every form of disease both surgical and medical. Still, there are some diseases which it is necessary should be treated apart in special hospitals, and the chief of these is that terrible scourge of past times, smallpox. Not only smallpox but scarlet fever and other infectious diseases have to be excluded from some of the hospitals of which we are speaking, inasmuch as they are not all provided with wards set apart for infectious cases. To get an idea, however, of the great variety of work undertaken by the largest hospitals, it may be well to glance at the various departments of medicine and surgery represented at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, the oldest of these London institutions. In addition to the out-patients’ rooms, and wards devoted to the treatment of ordinary medical and surgical diseases and accidents, there are the following special departments: A department for skin diseases; for diseases of the eye, ear, and throat; an orthopædic department; a dental department; a department for the special diseases of women; a maternity department; and lastly, in the case of this hospital, a ward for the treatment of cases of infectious disease. The average number of in-patients is estimated at over six thousand annually, and the out-patients at more than one hundred and fifty thousand. It will readily be believed that the work of the physicians and surgeons, both visiting and resident, connected with such an institution is by no means light. There are many other general hospitals in various parts of London, besides those having medical schools attached to them, but we cannot speak of them here. The nature of their work is much the same as that of the others, though of course the extent of it is more limited.

Coming next to the dispensaries—their name is legion. Almost every parish in London has one or more, and they are very abundant in the immediate suburbs also. Some of these dispensaries are free, others are to a greater or less extent self-supporting. It is, we hope, needless to say that the public dispensaries of which we are speaking are not to be confounded with the private dispensaries set up by medical men, quite legitimately, for their own benefit, but which are not unfrequently conducted upon the lowest of commercial principles. The public dispensaries of London, with their committees of management and staffs of physicians and surgeons—who in the case of the free dispensaries are almost invariably honorary—do excellent work, and are worthy of all, and more than all, the support which they obtain. Unlike the majority of hospitals, they undertake the treatment of disease at the patients’ own homes; and by calling in the aid of the nursing institutions, they are able to supply not only medical attendance and medicine, but also trained nurses. Recently, an effort has been made to increase the number of provident dispensaries; and this indeed appears to be one of the best ways of meeting the difficulty of supplying good medical treatment to the poor cheaply, without demanding of medical men more unpaid work. It has been estimated that the medical profession does more work without payment than the rest of the professions put together.

We will now say a few words concerning the special hospitals and dispensaries. And first, it is to be remembered that all are not of the same merit. Many of them may be said to be above praise; but some, it is to be feared, are almost beneath contempt. Indeed, the opinion of those in the medical profession best able to judge of the matter is, we believe, strongly opposed to the multiplication of special hospitals, except of course for those diseases which cannot be advantageously treated in the general hospitals. Enumerating now the special hospitals and dispensaries in their alphabetical order, first of all come those for the treatment of cancer, of which there are two. Then there are eight hospitals for children. A visit to the hospital in Great Ormond Street is calculated to make most persons enthusiastic on the subject of well-managed children’s hospitals; and many readers will remember the glowing description given by Charles Dickens of the East London Hospital for Children. Of hospitals for diseases of the chest there are five. The physicians of the general hospitals do not, if they can avoid it, admit patients suffering from consumption. The air of a hospital in which wounds and diseases of almost every kind are being treated is ill fitted to give any good chance of recovery to a case of consumption, which requires almost more than anything else fresh air and plenty of it; and if such a patient gets no good, he only occupies uselessly the place of some one who might benefit greatly by admission. Chest diseases require, too, arrangements for the securing of appropriate temperature, and this it would not be easy to do in a general hospital. It is well, therefore, that there should be special hospitals for diseases of the chest, and it is to be regretted the number is at present quite insufficient. Still, these chest hospitals contrive to treat a very large number of patients in the course of the year, the average being estimated at considerably over thirty-two thousand.

There are six hospitals and infirmaries for the throat and ear; and three for diseases of the nervous system. Next we come to the fever hospitals—four in number. It is almost impossible to overrate the value of these hospitals. They not only tend to prevent the occurrence of epidemics, by removing the fever-stricken from the healthy, but they also save many from the untimely death that might have befallen them in their own ill-ventilated homes, and with the intermittent nursing which alone they could have secured. And further; even when the danger of death is past, the continuous care which can be given to patients in a hospital may restore many more to sound health, who in their own homes would only have escaped death to remain for the rest of their days miserable invalids.

The hospitals to be next mentioned are one for fistula and one for diseases of the hip. Then there are three buildings for the reception of cases of incurable disease; two hospitals for lunatics; six lying-in hospitals; six for diseases of the eye; three orthopædic hospitals; one specially for accidents; six for skin diseases; four for smallpox—to which the remarks made on the fever hospitals of course apply; one for stone; three for women; and four for women and children.

We have said nothing concerning the convalescent hospitals. Most of them are of course situated in the country; but those anywhere near London are largely supplied with patients from the metropolis. Their value is immense, for they restore many patients to complete health, who, had they gone back to their work immediately after severe illness, and the bad hygienic conditions pertaining to their homes, might have sunk into a state of permanent ill-health.

There are a few other hospitals which may be alluded to, for, though they are not special as regards the diseases treated in them, yet they are special in other ways. Thus, there is the hospital at Greenwich for seamen; the French hospital for all foreigners who speak the French language; and the German hospital ‘for natives of Germany, others speaking the German language and English, in cases of accident;’ and lastly, there are a temperance hospital, a medical mission hospital, and one medical mission dispensary.

And now it might perhaps seem that London has hospitals enough; but those who have had some experience of the matter are not wont to say so. They freely admit that numbers of persons seek and obtain the help of hospitals who have from their circumstances no right to it, and these they would gladly see excluded; but they cannot admit that even then there would be hospital accommodation enough for the legitimate claimants. Nay, they may go further, and declare that there is, through the length and breadth of that ‘great province of houses’ which men call London, an urgent and increasing demand for more. An attempt to meet this demand so far was made a few years ago, when Pay-hospitals were opened in Fitzroy Square and elsewhere (as described in this _Journal_ for October 13, 1880). This class of institutions might well be extended, as there are many patients both able and willing to pay for the treatment they require; and the still further development of such hospitals would greatly relieve the pressure presently felt by the purely charitable institutions.

IN A FLASH.

When first I remember my aunt Barbara, she was over forty years of age; but she could never have been accounted a handsome woman. She was very tall and very angular, with a long thin face, the most remarkable feature of which was a Roman nose of commanding proportions. But as she had one of the kindest hearts in the world, her paucity of good looks seemed a matter of trifling moment to those who had the privilege of knowing her well. It was at my request that, some two or three years before her death, she wrote out the following narrative of an actual occurrence in her early life. I put the manuscript away at the time, and did not come across it again till the other day. On looking over it once more, it seemed to me not unworthy of being transcribed for a wider circle of readers than that comprised by the writer’s immediate friends and acquaintances.

* * * * *

You ask me to go back in memory (begins my aunt) to what seems to me now like a period of remote antiquity, when I, Barbara Waldron, was twenty-four years of age, and my sister Bessie five years younger, and endeavour to put down in writing the little story I told you by word of mouth a few days ago.

You must know, then, that in those far-off days, my sister and I were keeping house for our brother John, who at that time filled the position of steward and land-agent to Lord Dorrington. The house we lived in was a pleasant but somewhat lonely residence, about half a mile from the little country town of Levensfield. The house suited us for several reasons. In the first place, the rent was low; in the next, a large walled garden was attached to it, in which Bessie and I spent many happy hours; and in the third place, there was a side-entrance to Dorrington Park, by which my brother could take a short-cut to the Hall whenever he had business with his lordship, or his lordship had business with him. Our household was a small one, and besides ourselves, comprised only Mary Gibbs, a middle-aged woman, and her niece, a girl of sixteen. John’s horse and gig were looked after by a young man named Reuben Gates, who did not, however, sleep on the premises. An important part of John’s duties was to receive and pay into the Levensfield bank the rents due from the farmers and other tenants of property held under Lord Dorrington. One such tenant was a certain Mr Shillito, a corn and seed merchant, who was noted for his eccentricities. It was only in keeping with Mr Shillito’s aggravating way of doing business that he should never pay his rent at the time other people paid theirs; that he should always pay it in gold and notes, instead of giving a cheque for the amount, as he was quite in a position to have done; and that he should make a point of bringing it himself, instead of naming a time when my brother might have called upon him; and finally, that he seldom arrived with the money till after banking-hours.

We come now to a certain autumn evening. Kitty had just brought in the tea-tray. It was growing dusk, almost too dusk to see clearly without the lamp; but Bessie and I liked to economise the daylight as much as possible, especially now that the long winter nights were so close upon us. John had come in for a cup of tea. This evening, he was going to drive over to Nethercroft, some ten miles away, dine there with some friends, and stay all night. After dinner, there was to be a dance; and I was not without my suspicions as to the nature of the attraction which was taking him so far from home, although he laughingly pooh-poohed the soft impeachment, when I challenged him with it. John was in the act of putting down his cup and saucer, when we heard a noise of wheels outside, which presently came to a stand opposite the house. He crossed the room and peered through the window.

‘It’s old Shillito, come to pay his rent,’ he remarked a moment later. ‘Two hours after banking-time, as usual. What a nuisance he is!’ He went down-stairs; and about ten minutes later we heard Mr Shillito’s trap start off. Presently John came back. ‘Ninety pounds, all in gold and notes,’ he said. ‘I’ve had to lock it up in my desk till morning.’

I may here remark that iron safes for the custody of money and other valuables were by no means so common in those days, especially in out-of-the-way country-places, as they appear to have since become.

‘But the money will be quite safe in your desk, won’t it, John?’ asked Bessie.

‘Safe enough without a doubt, seeing that no one but ourselves knows of its presence there. Only, as a matter of business, I should prefer to have had it in the coffers of the bank.’ Presently he added: ‘The old fellow was half-seas over, as he generally is; and I have no doubt, with so many houses of call by the way, that he will be soaked through and through before he reaches home. I wonder whether he goes to bed sober a night in his life?’

A few minutes later, John kissed us and bade us good-night. Bessie and I went to the window to see him start; but by this time it was nearly dark. He waved his whip at us as soon as he had settled himself in his seat, then he gave the reins a little shake. Black Beryl’s heels struck fire from the stones as she sprang forward, the gravel scrunched beneath the wheels, and a moment later the shadows of evening had swallowed up horse and gig and driver. My sister and I pulled down the blinds and drew the curtains and rang for Kitty to bring in the lamp.

The evening passed after our usual quiet fashion. We worked a little and read a little and played some half-dozen duets, and chatted between times, till the clock pointed to half-past ten, at which hour we generally retired for the night. My last duty every evening was to go the round of the house and satisfy myself that all lights were out, that the fires were safe, and that all the doors and windows were properly secured. When this duty had been duly accomplished to-night, the drawing-room lamp was extinguished, and then Bessie and I took our bed candles and marched up-stairs, leaving darkness and solitude behind us. Mary Gibbs and Kitty had retired long ago.