Chapter III: High Art (3)

While he had been lying there much had happened. Life and death had battled over him, and life had triumphed. When he recovered from the effects of his fall and found himself bleeding, he tried to rise and stanch the flow, but, already exhausted, he fell back almost fainting from the effort. He called repeatedly for help, but his only reply was the hideous face of his guard, silently leering at him for a moment, then disappearing without a word, At last it occurred to him that he had been left there to die, and he roused all his energies to his aid. How we strive for our lives! But Shirley accomplished nothing, he could not even raise his hand to the bleeding shoulder, with every effort the blood flowed more copiously. His mind was rapidly becoming benumbed like his body, which shivered as though it were mid winter. Darkness came over his eyes, and as he listened to the din of the battle he fell into a dreamy state that soon passed into seeming unconsciousness again. Nevertheless, while the doctor came and went and did his work, and the savage scowled at him, yet gave his life's blood to save him, though he lay like a dead man and saw them not, nor heard them, nor even felt the needle in his flesh, his mind was not idle. Strange doubts and fears, wild longings and regrets, sweet thoughts of long-forgotten happiness, and fair visions of the future, busied his brain. Memory unrolled her scroll and breathed upon the letters of his story that lapse of time and press of circumstance had made dim, till they grew clear, and with himself he lived his life again, and nothing was lost out of it or forgotten. There was his mother's face again, with the old, old loving smile upon her lips and the tender mother-love in the depths of her beautiful blue eyes--lips that had so oven kissed away his childish tears, and had taught him to say at evening, "Our Father" and "Now I lay me down to sleep," eyes that had never looked upon him without something of the heavenly light of which they were now so full. There before him, bright and clear as ever, were the scenes of his boyhood--the school-forms defaced with many a rude cutting of names and dates, the master knitting his shaggy brows and tapping meaningly with his ruler upon the awful desk while some white haired urchin floundered through an ill-learned task and his classmates tittered at his blunders. Dear old classmates! How their faces shone and gladdened as they chased the bounding football! How merrily they flushed and glowed when the clear frosty air of the Northern winter quivered with the ring of their skates upon the hard ice! How soberly side by side they solved problems and looked up _sesquipedalia verba_ in big lexicons! And how happily the late evening hours wore away as they read _Ivanhoe_ and the _Leather Stocking Tales_ by the fireside with shellbarks and pippins!

Then the college days flew by with all their romance and delight. Again there were bells ringing to morning prayers, recitations and lectures, examinations and prizes, speeches and medals, and the glorious friendships, pure, earnest, almost holy. Would there were more such friendships in the outer, wider world! Commencement with its "pomp and circumstance," its tedious ceremony and scholarly display, its friends from home--mothers, sisters, sweethearts, all bright eyes and fond hearts, its music and flowers, its caps, gowns, dress-coats and "spreads," and, last and worst of all, its sorrowful "good-byes," some of them, alas! for ever! Once more he trembled as he rose to make his commencement speech, but slowly, as he went on, his voice grew steady and his manner calmer, for, lad as he was, and tyro at "orations," he was in earnest. "May my light hand forget its cunning, O my brother! may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, O ye oppressed! if ever there comes to me an opportunity to help you win your way to freedom and I fail you!" He, the aristocrat of his class, had chosen to speak "Against Caste," and though he spoke with the enthusiasm of an untried man, it was with devoted honesty of purpose, of which his earnestness was witness, and of which his future was to give ample proof. Again in vision he stood before that assembly and spoke for the lowly and oppressed. "Let every man have place and honor as he proves himself worthy. Make the way clear for all."

Through the bewilderment of applause that greeted him as he finished he saw only the glad, smiling face of Alice Wentworth nodding approval of the rest, hundreds though they were, he saw nothing. Her congratulation was enough.

Then came tenderer scenes, and Alice Wentworth was to be his wife. Another change, and he is in the midst of ruder scenes. There is war, civil war, and he is a soldier, once more he seems to be in Virginia, and there are marches and counter-marches, camps and barracks, battles and retreats, and all the great and little miseries of long campaigns. The silver leaflets of a major are exchanged for the golden eagles of a colonel, and all the time, amid sterner duties, he finds time to write to Alice Wentworth, and never a mail comes into camp but he is sure of letters dated 'Home' and full of words that make him hopeful and brave, "'Home!' Yes hers and mine too, if home's where the heart is!'" he thinks, and he loves her more dearly every day.

Negro troops are raised, and, true to his principles and to himself, he resigns his commission to take a lower rank in a colored regiment. Now the scenes grow dim, confused sounds far off disturb him, low music, familiar yet strange, now distant, now at his very ear, attracts him, a weird, shadowy mist encloses him, concealing even the things which were visible to the mind's eye, and memory and thought have almost ceased. Yet while all else fades away, clear and beautiful before him are two faces that cannot be forgotten--his mother's face, and that other, which he loves, if that can be, even more. Thus, with the 'Our Father' not on his lips, but fixed in his mind, he feels himself drifting away--drifting away like a boat that has broken its moorings and drifts out with the ebbing tide--whither?

But the rich, warm, lusty blood of the African quickly does its work. The heart, which had almost ceased to beat, because there was not blood enough for it to contract upon, reacted to the stimulus, and as it revived and sent the new life pulsating through all the body the whole man revived, and again:

The fever called _living_ burned in his brain.

Fournier, under one pretext or another, but really by the force of his relentless will, kept his victim by him for years after their escape from the South. He noted from time to time certain curious changes that took place in his physical nature, and recorded his observations with scientific precision in a book kept for the purpose, for the renewal of life had entailed results of an extraordinary character, as the reader may have already anticipated. At length he wrote 'My hypothesis is verified, it has become a theory. My theory is proved, it is a physiological law. _Climatic influences, acting upon man, bring about physical changes exceedingly slowly, because they are resisted by an inveterate habit of assimilation which pertains to the blood._'

That day Shirley was free. His rescuer had finished his experiment.

Alice Wentworth had never believed that her lover was dead. She had heard all with a troubled heart, but while his distant kinsmen, who were heirs-at-law, put on the deepest mourning and grew impatient of the law's delay, she simply said, "I will wait until there is some proof before I give him up! Proof! proof! Shall I be quicker than the law to give up every hope?" And in her heart she said, "He is not dead." Even when years had passed and the war was over, and her agent had searched everywhere and found no trace of him, she did not cease to hope that he would yet appear. So, when at length a letter came, it was welcome and expected. Not surprise but joy made her start and tremble as the old familiar superscription met her eyes.

Such a letter!--filled with the spirit of his love, breathing in every word the tender, passionate devotion of an earlier day, and yet so sad. Tears dropped down through her smiles of joy and blurred the lines she read at first, but smiles and tears alike ceased as she read on. He had written many, many times, but he knew she had not got his letters. He had been a prisoner--not only prisoner of war, but afterward prisoner to a man whose will was iron. It could hardly be explained. This man had not only saved his life, but he had also rescued him from the horrors of a Southern prison--would God he had let him die!--and they had been living together in a ranch in a far off Mexican valley.

Then the letter went on:

"In my heart I am unchanged; my love for you is ever the same; yet I am no longer the Robert Shirley whom you knew. That has come upon me which will separate me from you for ever: I cannot ask you now to be my wife. You are free. It is through no fault of mine. It is my burden, the price of life, and I must bear it. God bless you and give you all happiness!

"ROBERT SHIRLEY:"

When she had read it all she bowed her head and wept again, and the face that had grown more and more beautiful with the years of waiting was radiant. Who can fathom the depths of a woman's love? Who can follow the subtle workings of a woman's thought? Who can comprehend a woman's boundless faith? Her course was clear. If misfortune had befallen him, if he were maimed, disfigured, crazed, even if he were loathsome to her eyes, she loved him, and she must see him: she would see him and speak to him, and love him still, even if she could not be his wife. What would she have done if she could have guessed the truth? As it was, she wrote upon her card, "If you love me, come to me," and sent it to him. And in answer to the summons he stood before her--not disfigured, not maimed, not crazed, not loathsome in any way, yet irrevocably separated from her for Dr. Fournier's experiment had succeeded, and Robert Shirley was a mulatto!

CORNELIUS DEWEES.

A VISIT TO THE KING OF AURORA.

(FROM THE GERMAN OF THEODORE KIRSCHOFF.)

On the Oregon and California Railroad, twenty-eight miles south of the city of Portland in Oregon, lies the German colony of Aurora, a communist settlement under the direction of Doctor William Keil. In September, 1871, I made a second journey from San Francisco to Oregon, on which occasion I found both time and opportunity to carry out a long-cherished desire to visit this colony, already famous throughout all Oregon, and to make the acquaintance of the still more famous doctor, the so-called "king of Aurora." During the years in which I had formerly resided in Oregon, and especially on this last journey thither, I had frequently heard this settlement and its autocrat spoken of, and had been told the strangest stories as to the government of its self-made potentate. All reports agreed in stating that "Dutchtown," the generic appellation of German colonies among Americans, was an example to all settlements, and was distinguished above any other place in Oregon for order and prosperity. The hotel of "Dutchtown," which stands on the old Overland stage-route, and is now a station on the Oregon and California Railroad, has attained an enviable reputation, and is regarded by all travelers as the best in the State; and as to the colony itself, I heard nothing but praise. On the other hand, with regard to Doctor Keil the strangest reports were in circulation. He had been described to me in Portland as a most inaccessible person, showing himself extremely reserved toward strangers, and declining to give them the slightest satisfaction as to the interior management of the prosperous community over which he reigned a sovereign prince. The initiated maintained that this important personage had formerly been a tailor in Germany. He was at once the spiritual and secular head of the community: he solemnized marriages (much against his will, for, according to the rules of the society, he was obliged to provide a house for every newly-married couple); he was physician and preacher, judge, law-giver, secretary of state, administrator, and unlimited and irresponsible minister of finance to the colony; and held all the very valuable landed property of the settlement, with the consent of the colonists, in his own name; and while he certainly provided for his voluntarily obedient subjects an excellent maintenance for life, he reserved to himself the entire profits of the labor of all and the value of the joint property, notwithstanding that the colony was established on the broadest principles as a communist association.

I had a great desire to see this original man--a kindred spirit of the renowned Mormon leader, Brigham Young--with my own eyes, and, so to speak, to visit the lion in his den. From Portland, where I was staying, the colony was easily accessible by rail, and before leaving I made the acquaintance of a. German life-insurance agent of a Chicago company--Körner by name--who, like myself, wished to visit Aurora, and in whom I found a very agreeable traveling companion. He had procured in Portland letters of introduction to Doctor Keil, and had conceived the bold plan of doing a stroke of business in life insurance with him; indeed, his main object in going to Aurora was to induce the doctor to insure the lives of the entire colony--that is to say, of all his voluntary subjects--in the Chicago company, pay, as irresponsible treasurer of the association, the legal premiums, and upon the occurrence of a death pocket the amount of the policy.

My fellow-traveler had great hopes of making the doctor see this project in the light of an advantageous speculation, and accordingly provided himself amply with the necessary tables of mortality and other statistics. It had been carefully impressed upon us in Portland always to address the _ci-devant_ tailor, now "king of Aurora," as "Doctor," of which title he was extremely vain, and to treat him with all the reverence which as sovereign republicans we could muster; otherwise he would probably turn his back on us without ceremony.

On a pleasant September morning the steam ferry-boat conveyed us from Portland across the Willamette River to the dépôt of the Oregon and California Railroad, and soon afterward we were rushing southward in the train along the right shore of that stream--here as broad as the Rhine--the rival of the mighty Columbia. After a pleasant and interesting journey through giant forests and over fertile prairies, some large, some small, embellished here and there with farms, villages and orchards, we reached Oregon City, which lies in a romantic region close to the Willamette: then leaving the river, we thundered on some miles farther through the majestic primitive forest, and soon entered upon a broad, wood-skirted prairie, over which here and there pretty farm-houses and groves are scattered; and presently beheld, peeping out from swelling hills and standing in the middle of a prosperous settlement embowered in verdure, the slender white church-tower of Aurora, and were at the end of our journey.

Our first course after we left the cars was to the tavern, standing close to the railroad on a little hill, whither the passengers hurried for lunch. This so-called "hotel," the best known and most famous, as has already been said, in all Oregon, I might compare to an old-fashioned inn. The long table with its spotless table-cloth was lavishly spread with genuine German dishes, excellently cooked, and we were waited on by comely and neatly-dressed German girls; and though the dinner would not perhaps compare with the same meal at the club-house of the "San Francisco" I must confess that it was incomparably the best I ever tasted in Oregon, in which region neither the cooks nor the bills of fare are usually of the highest order.

Dinner being over, we made inquiry for Doctor Keil, to whom we were now ready to pay our respects. Our host pointed out to us the doctor's dwelling-house, which looked, in the distance, like the premises of a well-to-do Low-Dutch farmer; and after passing over a long stretch of plank-road, we turned in the direction of the royal residence. On the way we met several laborers just coming from the field, who looked as if life went well with them--girls in short frocks with rake in hand, and boys comfortably smoking their clay pipes--and received from all an honest German greeting. Everything here had a German aspect--the houses pleasantly shaded by foliage, the barns, stables and well-cultivated fields, the flower and kitchen-gardens, the white church-steeple rising from a green hill: nothing but the fences which enclose the fields reminded us that we were in America.

The doctor's residence was surrounded by a high white picket-fence: stately, widespreading live-oaks shaded it, and the spacious courtyard had a neat and carefully-kept aspect. Crowing cocks, and hens each with her brood, were scratching and picking about, the geese cackled, and several well-trained dogs gave us a noisy welcome. Upon our asking for the doctor, a friendly German matron directed us to the orchard, whither we immediately turned our steps. A really magnificent sight met our eyes--thousands of trees, whose branches, covered with the finest fruit, were so loaded that it had been necessary to place props under many of them, lest they should break beneath the weight of their luscious burden.

Here we soon discovered the renowned doctor, in a toilette the very opposite of regal, zealously engaged in gathering his apples. He was standing on a high ladder, in his shirt sleeves, a cotton apron, a straw hat, picking the rosy-cheeked fruit in a hand-basket. Several laborers were busy under the trees assorting the gathered apples, and carefully packing in boxes the choicest of them--really splendid specimens of this fruit, which attains its utmost perfection in Oregon. As soon as the doctor perceived us he came down from the ladder, and asked somewhat sharply what our business there might be. My companion handed him the letters of introduction he had brought with him, which the doctor read attentively through: he then introduced my humble self as a literary man and assistant editor of a well-known magazine, who had come to Oregon for the special purpose of visiting Dr. Keil, and of inspecting his colony, of which such favorable reports had reached us. Without waiting for the doctor's reply, I asked him whether he were not a relative of K----, the principal editor of the magazine to which I was attached. I could scarcely, as it appeared, have hit upon a more opportune question, for the doctor was evidently flattered, and became at once extremely affable toward us. The relationship to which I had alluded he was obliged unwillingly to disclaim. I learned from him that his name was William Keil, and that he was born at Bleicherode in Prussian Saxony. He now left the apple-gathering to his men, and offered to show us whatever was interesting about the colony: as to the life-insurance project, he said he would take some more convenient opportunity to speak with Mr. Körner about it.

The doctor, who after this showed himself somewhat loquacious, was a man of agreeable appearance, perhaps of about sixty years of age, with white hair, a broad high forehead and an intelligent countenance. Sound as a nut, powerfully built, of vigorous constitution and with an air of authority, he gave the idea of a man born to rule. He seemed to wish to make a good impression on us, and I remarked several times in him a searching side-glance, as though he were trying to read our thoughts. He sustained the entire conversation himself, and it was somewhat difficult to follow his meaning: he spoke in an unctuous, oratorical tone, with extreme suavity, in very general terms, and evaded all direct questions. When I had listened to him for ten minutes I was not one whit wiser than before. His language was not remarkably choice, and he used liberally a mixture of words half English, half German, as uneducated German-Americans are apt to do.

While we wandered through the orchard, the beauty and practical utility of which astonished me, the doctor, gave us a lecture on colonization, agriculture, gardening, horticulture, etc., which he flavored here and there with pious reflections. He pointed out with pride that all this was his own work, and described how he had transformed the wilderness into a garden. In the year 1856 he came with forty followers to Oregon, as a delegate from the parent association of Bethel in Missouri, in order to found in the far West, then so little known, a branch colony. At present the doctor is president both of Aurora and of the original settlement at Bethel: the latter consists of about four hundred members, the former of four hundred and ten.

When he first came into this region he found the whole district now owned by his flourishing colony covered with marsh and forest. Instead, however, of establishing himself on the prairies lying farther south, in the midst of foreign settlers, he preferred a home shared only with his German brethren in the primitive woods; and here, having at that time very small means, he obtained from the government, gratis, land enough to provide homes for his colonists, and found in the timber a source of capital, which he at once made productive. He next proceeded to build a block-house as a defence against the Indians, who at that time were hostile in Oregon: then he erected a saw-mill and cleared off the timber, part of which he used to build houses for his colonists, and with part opened an advantageous trade with his American neighbors, who, living on the prairie, were soon entirely dependent on him for all their timber. The land, once cleared, was soon cultivated and planted, with orchards: the finer varieties of fruit he shipped for sale to Portland and San Francisco, and from the sour apples he either made vinegar or sold them to the older settlers, who very soon made themselves sick on them. He then attended them in the character of physician, and cured them of their ailments at a good round charge. This joke the good doctor related with especial satisfaction.

By degrees, the doctor continued to say, the number of colonists increased; and his means and strength being thus enlarged, he established a tannery, a factory, looms, flouring-mills, built more houses for his colonists, cleared more land and drained the marshes, increased his orchards, laid out new farms, gave some attention to adornment, erected a church and school-houses, and purchased from the American settlers in the neighborhood their best lands for a song. He did everything systematically. He always assigned his colonists the sort of labor that they appeared to him best fitted for, and each one found the place best suited to his capabilities. If any one objected to doing his will and obeying his orders, he was driven out of the colony, for he would endure no opposition. He made the best leather, the best hams and gathered the best crops in all Oregon. The possessions of the colony, which he added to as he was able, extended already over twenty sections (a section contains six hundred and forty acres, or an English square mile), and the most perfect order and industry existed everywhere.

Thus the doctor; and amid this and the like conversation we walked over an orchard covering forty acres. The eight thousand trees it contained yielded annually five thousand bushels of choice apples and eight thousand of the finest pears, and the crop increased yearly. The doctor pointed out repeatedly the excellence of his culture in contrast with the American mode, which leaves the weeds to grow undisturbed among the trees, and disregards entirely all regularity and beauty. He, on the contrary, insisted no less on embellishment than on neatness and order; and this was no vain boast. Carefully-kept walks led through the grounds; verdant turf, flowerbeds and charming shady arbors met us at every turn; there were long beds planted with flourishing currant, raspberry and blackberry bushes, and large tracts set with rows of bearing vines, on which luscious grapes hung invitingly. Order also reigned among the fruit trees: here were several acres of nothing but apples, again a plantation of pears or apricots, beneath which not a weed was to be seen: the hoe and the rake had done their work thoroughly. Everything was in the most perfect order: the courtgardener of a German prince might have been proud of it.

We seated ourselves in a shady arbor, where the doctor entertained us further with an account of his religious belief. He had, he said, no fixed creed and no established religion: there were in the colony Protestants, Catholics, Methodists, Baptists, indeed Christians of every name, and even Jews. Every one was at liberty to hold what faith he pleased: he preached only natural religion, and whoever shaped his life according to that would be happy. After this he enlarged on the prosperity of the colony, which was founded on the principles of natural religion, and prosed about humility, love to our neighbor, kindness and carrying religion into everything; and then back he came to Nature and himself, until my head was perfectly bewildered. I had given up long before this, in despair, any questions as to the interior organization of the colony, for the doctor either gave me evasive answers or none at all. His colonists, he asserted, loved him as a father, and he cared for them accordingly: both these assertions were undoubtedly true. The deep respect with which those whom we occasionally met lifted their hats to "the doctor"--a form of greeting by no means universal in America--bore witness to their unbounded esteem for him. Toward us also they demeaned themselves with great respect, as to noble strangers whom the doctor deigned to honor with his society. As to his care for them, no one who witnessed it could deny the exceedingly flourishing condition of the settlement. Whether, however, in all this the doctor had not a keen eye to his own interest was an afterthought which involuntarily presented itself.

As we left the orchard, the doctor pointed out to us several wheat-fields in the neighborhood, cultivated with true German love for neatness, which formed, with the pleasant dwellings adjoining, separate farms. The average yield per acre, he observed, was from twenty-five to forty bushels of wheat, and from forty to fifty of oats. He then took us into a neighboring grove, to a place where the pic-nics and holiday feasts of the colony are held: here we paused near a grassy knoll shaded by a sort of awning and surrounded by a moat. This, which bears the name of "The Temple Hill," forms the centre of a number of straight roads, which branch out from it into the woods in the shape of a fan. Not far from it I noticed a dancing ground covered by a circular open roof, and a pavilion for the music.

"At our public feasts," said the doctor, "I have all these branching roads lighted with colored lanterns, and illuminate the temple, which, with its brilliant lamps, makes quite an imposing spectacle. When we celebrate our May-day festival it looks, after dark, like a scene out of the _Arabian Nights_; and when, added to this, we have beautiful music and fine singing, and the young folks are enjoying the dance, it is really very pleasant. But none are permitted to set foot on the Temple Hill, nor can they do it very easily if they would. Do you know the reason, gentlemen?" Körner opined that it might be on account of the ditch, which would be difficult to pass, in which view I agreed. "Exactly so," remarked the doctor. "This Temple Hill has an especial significance: it represents the sovereign ruler of the people, on whose head no one may tread: on that account the ditch is there."

After a walk of several hours we returned to the doctor's house, where he invited us to take a glass of homemade wine. As we had been informed that the sale and use of wine and spirits were strictly forbidden in the colony, this invitation was certainly an unprecedented exception. The wine, of which two kinds were placed before us--one made of wild grapes, and the other of currants--was very good, and was partaken of in the doctor's office. Here Mr. Körner again brought forward his life-insurance project: the doctor gave him hopes that he would go into it, but he wished to give the matter due consideration, and to subject the advantages and disadvantages of the speculation to a strict investigation, before giving a definite answer; and with this ended our visit to the "king of Aurora."

Before leaving the colony we obtained considerable information from the members as to their interior organization and government, the results of which, as well as what I further learned respecting Doctor Keil, I will state briefly.

Should any one wish to become a member of the colony, he must, in the first place, put all his ready money into the hands of Doctor Keil: he will then be taken on trial. If the candidate satisfies the doctor, he can remain and become one of the community: should this, however, not be the case, he receives again the capital he paid in, but without interest. How long he must remain "on probation" in the colony, and work there, depends entirely on the doctor's pleasure. If a member leaves the community voluntarily--a thing almost unheard of--he receives back his capital without interest, together with a _pro rata_ share of the earnings of the community during his membership, as appraised by the doctor.

All the ordinary necessaries of life are supplied gratuitously to the members of the community. The doctor holds the common purse, out of which all purchases are paid for, and into which go the profits from the agricultural and industrial products of the colony. If any member needs a coat or other article of clothing, flour, sugar or tobacco, he can get whatever he wants, without paying for it, at the "store:" in the same way he procures meat from the butcher and bread from the baker: spirits are forbidden except in case of sickness. The doctor also appoints the occupation of each member, so as to contribute to the best welfare of the colony--whether he shall be a farmer, a mechanic, a common laborer, or whatever he can be most usefully employed in; and the time and talents of each are regarded as belonging to the whole community, subject only to the doctor's judgment. If a member marries, a separate dwelling-house and a certain amount of land are assigned him, so that the families of the settlement are scattered about on farms. The elders of the colony support the doctor in the duties of his office by counsel and assistance.

The lands of the colony are collectively recorded in Doctor Keil's name, in order, as he says, to avoid intricate and complicated law-papers. It would, however, be for the interest of the colonists to make, a speedy change in this respect, so that the members of the community, in case of the doctor's death, might obtain each his share of the lands without litigation. Should the doctor's decease occur soon, before this alteration is made, his natural heirs could claim the whole property of the colony, and the members would be left in the lurch. He does not appear, however, to be in great haste to effect this change, though it ought to have been done long ago. It is always said among the colonists, naturally enough, that all the ground is the common property of the community. Whether the doctor fully subscribes to this opinion in his secret heart might be a question.

Doctor Keil is at the same time the religious head and the unlimited secular ruler of the colony of Aurora, and can ordain, with the consent of the elders (who very naturally uphold his authority), what he pleases. A life free from care and responsibility, such as the members of the community (who, for the most part, belong to the lower and uncultivated class) lead--a life in regard to which no one but the doctor has the trouble of thinking--is the main ground of the undisturbed continuance of the colony. The pre-eminent talent for organization, combined with the unlimited powers of command, which the doctor--justly named "king of Aurora"--possesses, together with the inborn industry peculiar to Germans, is the cause of the prosperity of the settlement, which calls itself communistic, but is certainly nothing more than a vast farm belonging to its talented founder. It has its schools, its churches, newspapers and books--the selection and tendency of which the doctor sees to--and no lack of social pleasures, music and singing. Taken together with an easily-procured livelihood, all this satisfies the desires of the colonists entirely, and the good doctor takes care of everything else.

ELIZABETH SILL.

GRAY EYES.

I have always counted it among the larger blessings of Providence that a woman can bear up year after year under a weight of dullness which would drive a man of the same mental calibre to desperation in a month.

I had no idea what a heavy burden mine had been until one day my brother asked me to go to sea with him on his next voyage. He and his wife were at the farm on their wedding-tour, and only the happiness of a bridegroom could have led him to hold out to me this way of escape. Christian's heart when he dropped his pack was not lighter than mine. Butter and cheese are good things in their way--the world would miss them if all the farmers' daughters went suddenly down to the sea in ships--but it is possible to have too much of a good thing, and such had been my feeling for some years.

So suddenly and completely did my threadbare endurance give way that if Frank had revoked his words the next minute, I must have gone away at once to some crowded place and drawn a few deep breaths of excitement before I could have joined again the broken ends of my patience.

No bride-elect poor in this world's goods ever went about the preparations for her wedding with more delicious awe than I felt in turning one old gown upside down, and another inside out, for seafaring use. There was excitement enough in the departure, the inevitable sea-changes, and finally the memory of it all, to keep my mind busy for a few weeks, but when we settled into the grooves of a tropical voyage, wafted along as easily by the trade winds as if some gigantic hand, unseen and steady, had us in its grasp, my life was wholly changed, and yet it bore an odd family resemblance to the days at the farm. It was a pleasant dullness, because, in the nature of things, it must soon have an end.

I went on deck to look at a passing ship about as often as I used to run to the window at the sound of carriagewheels. One can't take a very intimate interest in whales and the other seamonsters unless one is scientific. Time died with me a slow but by no means a painful death. I used to fold my hands and look at them by the hour, internally rollicking over the idea that there was no milk to skim or dishes to wash, or any earthly wheel in motion that required my shoulder to turn it. I spent much time in a half-awake state in the long warm days, out of sheer delight in wasting time after saving it all my life.

So it came about that I slept lightly o' nights. Every morning the steward came into the cabin with the first dawn of day to scour his floors before the captain should appear. He had a habit of talking to himself over this early labor, and one morning, more awake than usual, I found that he was praying. "O Lord, be good to me! I wasn't to blame. I would have helped her if I could. O Lord, be good to me!" and other homely entreaties were repeated again and again.

He was a meek, bowed old negro, with snowy hair, and so many wrinkles that all expression was shrunk out of his face. He was an excellent cook, but he waited on table with a manner so utterly despairing that it took away one's appetite to look at him.

For many mornings after this I listened to his prayers, which grew more and more earnest and importunate. I could not think he had done any harm with his own will. He must have been more sinned against than sinning.

He brought me a shawl one cool evening as if it were my death-warrant, and I said, in the sepulchral tone that wins confidence, "Pedro, do you always say your prayers when you are alone?"

"Yes, miss, 'board _this_ ship."

"What's the matter with, this ship?"

"I s'pose you don't have no faith in ghosts?"

"Not much."

"White folks mostly don't," said Pedro with aggravating meekness, and turned into his pantry.

I followed him to the door, and stood in it so that he had no escape: "What has that to do with your prayers?"

"This cabin has got a ghost in it."

I looked over my shoulder into the dusk, and shivered a little, which was not lost on Pedro. He grew more solemn if possible than before: "I see her 'most every morning, and if my back is to the door, I see her all the same. She don't never touch me, but I keep at the prayers for fear she will."

"Do you never see her except in the morning?"

"Once or twice she has just put her head out of the door of the middle state-room when I was waitin' on table."

"In broad daylight?"

"Sartin. Them as sees ghosts sees 'em any time. Every morning, just at peep o' day, she comes out of that door and makes a dive for the stairs. She just gives me one look, and holds up her hand, and I don't see no more of her till next time."

"How does she look?" I almost hoped he would not tell, but he did.

"She's got hair as black as a coal, kind o' pushed back, as if she'd been runnin' her hands through it; she has big shiny eyes, swelled up as she'd been cryin' a great while; and she's always got on a gray dress, silvery-like, with a tear in one sleeve. There ain't nothin' more, only a handkerchief tied round her wrist, as if it had been hurt."

"Is she handsome?"

"Mebbe white folks'd think so."

"Why does she show herself to you and no one else, do you suppose?"

"Didn't I tell you the reason before?"

"Of course you didn't."

"Well, you see, she looked just so the last time I seen her alive. I must go and put in the biscuit now, miss."

I submitted, knowing that white folks may be hurried, but black ones never; and I could not but admire the natural talent which Pedro shared with the authors of continued stories, of always dropping the thread at the most thrilling moment.

"Who was she?" said I, lying in wait for him on his return.

"She was cap'n's wife, miss--a young woman, and the cap'n was old, with a blazing kind of temper. He was dreffle sweet on her for about a month, and mebbe she was happy, mebbe she wa'n't: how should I know about white folks' feelin's? All of a suddent he said she was sick and couldn't go out of the middle state-room. The old man took in plenty of stuff to eat, but he never let me go near her. We was on just such a v'y'ge as this, only hotter. The cap'n would come out of that room lookin' black as thunder, and everybody scudded out of his sight when he put his head out of the gangway.

"He was always bad enough, but he got wuss and wuss, and nothin' couldn't please him. Sometimes I'd hear the poor thing a-moaning to herself like a baby that's beat out with loud cryin' and hain't got no noise left. She was always cryin' in them days. Once the supercargo (he was a cool hand, any way) give me a bit of paper very private to give to her, and I slipped it under the door, but the old man had nailed somethin' down inside, an' he found it afore she did. Then there was a regular knockdown fight, and the supercargo was put in irons. The old man was in the middle room a long time that day, talkin' in a hissin' kind of a way, and the missus got a blow. Just after that a sort of a white squall struck the ship, and the old man give just the wrong orders. You see, he was clean out of his head. He got so worked up at last that he fell down in a fit, and they bundled him into his state-room and left him, 'cause nobody cared whether he was dead or alive. The mate took the irons off the supercargo first thing, and broke open the middle room. The supercargo went in there and stayed a long time, whispering to the missus, and she cried more'n ever, only it sounded different.

"Toward night the old man come to, and begun to ask questions--as ugly as ever, only as weak as a baby. 'Bout midnight I was comin' out of his room, and I seen the missus in a gray dress, with her eyes shinin' like coals of fire, dive out of her room and up the stairs, and nobody never seen her afterward. The next morning the supercargo was gone too, and I think they just drownded themselves, 'cause they couldn't bear to live any more without each other. Mebbe the mate knew somethin' about it, but he never let on, and I dunno no more about it; only the old man had another fit when he heard it, and died without no mourners."

"It might be she was saved, after all," I said, with true Yankee skepticism.

"Then why should I see her ghost, if she ain't dead-drownded?"

"Did you never find anything in the state-room that would explain?"

"Well, I did find some bits of paper, but I couldn't read writin'."

"Oh, what did you do with them?" I insisted, quivering with excitement.

"You won't tell the cap'n?"

"No, never."

"You'll give 'em back to me?"

"Yes, yes--of course."

"Here they be," he said, opening his shirt, and showing a little bag hung round his neck like an amulet. He took out a little wad of brown paper, and gave it jealously into my hand.

"I will give it back to you to-night," I said with the solemnity of an oath, and carried it to my room.

It proved to be a short and fragmentary account of the sufferings which the "missus" had endured in the middle room, written in pencil on coarse wrapping-paper, and bearing marks of trembling hands and frequent tears. I thought I might copy the papers without breaking faith with Pedro. The outside paper bore these words:

"Whoever finds this is besought for pity's sake, by its most unhappy writer, to send it as soon as possible to Mrs. Jane Atwood of Davidsville, Connecticut, United States of America."

Then followed a letter to her mother:

Dearest Mother: If I never see your blessed face again, I know you will not believe me guilty of what my husband accuses me of. I married Captain Eliot for your sake, believing, since Herbert had proved faithless, that no comfort was left to me except in pleasing others. I meant to be a good wife to Captain Eliot, and I believe I should have kept my vow all my days if the most unfortunate thing had not wakened his jealousy. Since then he has been almost or quite crazed.

I knew we had a supercargo of whom Captain Eliot spoke highly. He kept his room for a month from sea-sickness, and when he came out it was Herbert. Of course I knew him, every line of his face had been so long written on my heart. I strove to treat him as if I had never seen him before, but the old familiar looks and tones were very hard to bear. If Herbert could only have submitted patiently to our fate! But it was not in him to be patient under anything, and one evening, when I was sitting alone on deck, he must needs pour out his soul in one great burst, trying to prove that he had never deserted me, but only circumstances had been cruel. I longed to believe him, but I could only keep repeating that it was too late.

When I went down, Captain Eliot dragged me into the middle state-room, and gave vent to his jealous feelings. He must have listened to all that Herbert had said. His last words were that I should never leave that room alive. I had a wretched night, and the first time I fell into an uneasy sleep I started suddenly up to find my husband flashing the light of a lantern across my eyes. "Handsome and wicked," he muttered--"they always go together."

I begged him to listen to the story of my engagement to Herbert, and he did listen, but it did not soften his heart. If he ever loved me, his jealousy has swallowed it up.

I have been in this room just a week. My husband does not starve or beat me, but his taunts and threats are fearful, and his eyes when he looks at me grow wild, as if he had the longing of a beast to tear me in pieces.

* * * * *

_May_ 10. I placed a copy of the paper that is pinned to this letter in a little bottle that had escaped my husband's search, and threw it out of my window.

I am Waitstill Atwood Eliot, wife of Captain Eliot of the ship Sapphire. I have been kept in solitary confinement and threatened with death for four weeks, for no just cause. I believe him to be insane, as he constantly threatens to burn or sink the ship. I pray that this paper may be picked up by some one who will board this ship and bring me help.

Of course it is a most forlorn hope, but it keeps me from utter despair.

20. Herbert tried to communicate with me by slipping a paper under the door, but I did not get it, and he has been put in irons. Captain Eliot boasts of it. I wish he would bind us together and let us drown in one another's arms, as they did in the Huguenot persecution.

28. A little paper tied to a string hung in front of my bull's-eye window to-day: I took it in. The first officer had lowered it down: "Captain Eliot says you are ill, but I don't believe it. If he tries violence, scream, and I will break open the door. I am always on the watch. Keep your heart up."

This is a drop of comfort in my black cup, but my little window was screwed down within an hour after I had read the paper.

_June_ 10. My spirit is worn out: I can endure no more. I have begged my husband to kill me and end my misery. I don't know why he hesitated. He means to do it some time, but perhaps he cannot think of torture exquisite enough for his purpose.

11. My husband came in about four in the afternoon, looking so vindictive that my heart stood still. He gradually worked himself into a frenzy, and aimed a blow at my head: instinct, rather than the love of life, made me parry it, and I got the stroke on my wrist.

I screamed, and at the same moment there was a tumult on deck, and the ship quivered as if she too had been violently struck. Captain Eliot rushed on deck, and began to give hurried orders. I could hear the first officer contradict them, and then there was a heavy fall, and two or three men stumbled down the cabin stairs, carrying some weight between them.

_Later_. My husband is helpless, and Herbert has been with me, urging me passionately to trust myself to him in a little boat at midnight. He says there are several ships in sight, and one of them will be almost sure to pick us up. He swears that he will leave me, and never see me again (if I say so), so soon as he has placed me in safety, but he will save me, by force if need be, from the brute into whose hands I fell so innocently. If the ship does not see us, it is but dying, after all.

Good-bye, mother! I pray that this paper will reach you before Captain Eliot can send you his own account, but if it does not, you will believe me innocent all the same.

This was the last, and I folded up the papers as they had come to me. That night I read them all to Pedro.

"They was drownded--I knew it," said Pedro; and nothing could remove that opinion. A ghost is more convincing than logic.

Our voyage wore on, with one day just like another: my brother looked at the sun every day, and put down a few cabalistic figures on a slate, but his steady business was reading novels to his wife and drinking weak claret and water.

The sea was always the same, smiling and smooth, and the "man at the wheel" seemed to be always holding us back by main strength from the place where we wanted to go. I had a growing belief that we should sail for ever on this rippling mirror and never touch the frame of it. It struck me with a sense of intense surprise when a dark line loomed far ahead, and they told me quietly that that line meant Bombay.

It seemed a matter of course to my brother that the desired port should heave in sight just when he expected it, but to me the efforts that he had made to accomplish this tremendous result were ridiculously small.

"I have done more work in a week, and had nothing to show for it at last," said I, "than you have seemed to do in all this voyage."

"Poor sister! don't you wish you were a man?"

"Certainly, all women do who have any sense. I hold with that ancient Father of the Church who maintained that all women are changed into men on the judgment-day. The council said it was heresy, but that don't alter my faith."

"I shouldn't like you half as well if you had been born a boy," said Frank.

"But I should like myself vastly better," said I, clinging to the last word.

Bombay is a city by itself: there is none like it on earth, whatever there may be in the heaven above or in the waters under it. From Sir Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy's hospital for sick animals to the Olympian conceit of the English residents, there are infinite variations of people and things that I am persuaded can be matched nowhere else. I felt myself living in a series of pictures, a sort of supernumerary in a theatre, where they changed the play every night.

One of the first who boarded our ship was Mr. Rayne, an old friend of Frank's. He insisted on our going to his house for a few days in a warm-hearted way that was irresistible.

"Are you quite sure you want _me_?" I said dubiously. "Young married people make a kind of heaven for themselves, and do not want old maids looking over the wall."

"But you _must_ go with us," said Frank, man-like, never seeing anything but the uppermost surface of a question.

"Not at all. I'm quite strong-minded enough to stay on board ship; or, if that would not do in this heathen place, the missionaries are always ready to entertain strangers. A week in the missionhouse would make me for ever a shining light in the sewing circle at home.

"A woman of so many resources would be welcome anywhere. For my part, an old maid is a perfect Godsend. The genus is unknown here, and the loss to society immense," said Mr. Rayne.