Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

They were, moreover, now greatly disposed to lament the fate of Welland and his wife, who had been transported for life for having killed Luke when he was not killed, and were very near being hanged for it. The whole of Monnycrofts was in a state of ferment on this great discovery, and all the neighbouring villages soon partook of the excitement; and it very soon communicated itself to the county papers, and very wise reflections were attached to it on the dangers of condemning people on circumstantial evidence. It was thought that no time should be lost in recommending to Government to send out an order to recal Welland and his wife home. Meantime old Beckey herself had managed to hobble up to the mill, and thence to the Marlpool, where the story made the most amazing stir. All the people were soon out of doors discussing the affair, and those who had seen the chase on that memorable day pointed out all the incidents of it. They showed where little Luke was running when old Luke rushed down from the mill, and where he knocked down Welland and about twenty more, according to their account, and so they went through the whole story.

Beckey, and so indeed all the neighbourhood, was impatient for the return of the young man, but he had sent back Mrs. Widdiwicket's horse, and was staying a week with Sam Birchin's relations. When he re-appeared he was beset on all sides with questions regarding Luke, but he assured them he could not give them much further information, than that Luke was alive three years ago. He soon went to visit old Beckey again, who was delighted to see him, and had hoarded up a whole budget of questions to put to him. He informed her that his name was John Webster, that he came from Liverpool, and that he had sailed to many wonderful countries. He had been in the Indies, in North and South America, in China and Australia. As old Beckey sat and plied her knitting-needles, he asked her all the particulars about Luke, and about his death, as it was supposed to have been, and he assured her that he had written to Birchin to let him know all that he knew; everything about Luke Barnicott.

He continued to lodge at the Dog and Partridge, and had many conversations with Roddibottom, the schoolmaster, Nasal Longdrawn, the clerk, and all the rest of the village politicians who frequented that house; and he heard many different versions of the story of Luke from them, who all declared that, though he was very mischievous, he really had no ill in him, though they could not account for it why he had never let his poor grandmother know of his being alive. John Webster hired widow Widdiwicket's horse and rode about, and commended very much the country. The clergyman and Squire Flaggimore invited him to dine with them, and were greatly entertained with his account of foreign countries. But Webster used to go up to the Reckoning House as much as ever, and talk to the old widow Barnicott, who was never tired of hearing about the sea and foreign parts, because then she could imagine what Luke had seen. Webster told her all about the enormous whales at sea; how they used to see them come up near the ship, huge and black, and rear themselves up almost as high as a house, and then souse down again, and spout water up from their nostrils ever so high. And all about sharks, and flying-fish, and dolphins, and the beautiful nautiluses, and Portuguese men-of-war, that resemble the nautilus, but are only like little ships of gristle, but are beautifully painted as a rainbow, and they float about when the sea is calm as glass in the hot climates, and look like beautiful flowers on a plain of crystal. And of the sea-fire that rushes and flickers all round the ship at night, and sails past like great lamps in the dark blue water; and of storms; and wonderful birds; and of the mountains and great islands of ice that float about as white as snow in the solitary ocean, thousands of miles from land. And Beckey would drink it all in with hungry ears, and say, "And all that Luke has seen! How wonderful! But I wonder whether he has quite forgotten his poor old grandmother?"

Webster did not believe that he had. Sailors did not forget their relations; but most likely he thought his grandfather and grandmother were dead, and so he thought he had no connexions left. Then Webster told her about all the wonders of India, of grand towns, and palaces, and temples; and of its great nations of black people, and their pearls and jewels; of elephants, and tigers, and serpents; of palm-trees; and of the wonderful flowers and birds. He told her of the rich fruits, bananas, and pine-apples growing in the fields, and wonderful orange-groves and fig-trees. And then he told her of China and Japan, and the strange swarming yellow people, and all about the tea-plantations, where the tea she drank came from; and of the people who always live in boats; and of birds' nests that they make soup of. He told her at another time of the beautiful countries of South America and the West Indies, and all their palm and cocoa-nut, and bread-fruit trees; of their custard apples and sweet mangoes, and yams instead of potatoes, and a hundred of luscious fruits, and such beautiful flowers in the hedges--finer by far than in our gardens, or those Squire Flaggimore had in his conservatory.

"All these," said the wondering Beckey, "thou has seen, and my Luke has seen!"

"To be sure he has," said Webster; "and then the monkeys and apes as big as men, and great snakes that wrap themselves round bullocks, and squeeze them to death; and all the black men that are brought to those countries from Africa to cultivate the cotton, and sugar, and coffee, and spices, because it is too hot for white men."

Old Beckey was in a dream of wonder and of delight to hear what a world this was--how big, and strange, and beautiful, and how little the people of Monnycrofts and Marlpool knew about it; and yet Luke had seen it all. "And I would not be surprised if Luke had got a good deal of gold, for Birchin said he talked of going to Australia when he left the ship they had sailed in together to India." Beckey did not know exactly, nor Amy Beckumshire, who was always an eager listener to these stories, whereabouts Australia was, and Webster told them that it was down on the other side of the world, just under their feet.

"Lauks!" the women exclaimed, "why, the folks must stand on their heads there, or at least with their heads downwards;" and it was in vain that he endeavoured to explain to them, by showing them an apple, that if you stick little pegs in it they would all have their heads outwards at least. Beckey could not see this, but she felt very particularly at the apple and the pegs, and she insisted that the Australians _must_ have their heads downwards, because ours always _were_ upwards. It was useless endeavouring to make them understand that anybody's head was always upwards, except when they were in bed; and so Webster told them all about the strange things in Australia. The kangaroos, with tails as big as bedposts, and that could leap across Beckey Barnicott's garden at two leaps. He told them all about the trees that never shed their leaves, but shed their bark instead; about the black swans, and the cherries with stones outside, and possums and flying-squirrels and flying-mice, and a kind of cuckoo that sings at nights instead of days, and of all the gold that lies in the ground, and in the rivers there; and Beckey and Amy wondered that everybody was not as rich as the Queen of England, if they could dig up gold out of the ground, and fish it up out of the brooks. Beckey was proud to think that Luke had seen all this too; and she felt sure that he would manage to bring home a ship-load of gold, for he was, as a lad, as sharp as a needle with two points.

One day old Beckey had a nice jug of curds sent her up from farmer Flamstead's, of Langlee, and she said, "Ah! that is that good Sally Flamstead's doing. She is always very good to me." And she made Amy get some sugar, and they had a delicious dish of cherry-curds, all three of them, under the old elder. "Flamstead!" said Webster, that reminds me that Birchin used to say, "Why, she must be as handsome as Sally Flamstead," when any handsome woman was spoken of. And when I asked him who Sally Flamstead was, he said, "Oh, that he had learned of Luke Barnicott." For, whenever he saw a pretty woman, he was sure to say, "Why, she is almost as handsome as Sally Flamstead." And now, I remember Birchin told me that Barnicott had stated to him often when they were on the night-watch together, quite a romantic story of his falling in love with this Sally Flamstead when he was quite a little boy. He used to go to Flamstead's farm at--at--where did he say? Lang--Lang--Lang--what was it?

"Langlee?" asked old Beckey.

"Langlee! Langlee! ah, that was the name," exclaimed Webster. "He used to go to Langlee, wherever that is."

"Oh," said Beckey, "you may see it as you sit here. There, down the slope, all amongst a mass of apple-trees. You may see the chimneys and the thatch-roof. I can't see them; only in my mind's eye I see them there well enough."

Webster stood up and said, "Yes, he saw the place." Well, Barnicott told Birchin that he used to go there to scare birds off the corn, and to gather stones in spring off the pastures, and to watch young turkeys as they fed in the field, and to fetch and carry in harvest time, and all sort of things of that kind. And there was little Sally Flamstead, just about his own age, something younger; and she Luke thought a regular cherubim. All the ideas of angelic beauty that ever he had he got, he said, by looking at Sally Flamstead. And she was such a good, kind, little thing. You know, Luke used to say, that she was far above a poor lad like me; she was the farmer's only child, and the old man was rich for a farmer; he had flocks of sheep and cattle, and great fat teams, and such corn and hay-stacks, and geese, and turkeys, and fowls, and pigeons. Oh, he seemed to Luke quite a king. Yet little Sally Flamstead took quite a fancy for Luke, and used to give him good advice; for, she said, everybody said he was wild. Luke used to collect nuts and mushrooms for her, and she used to give him ripe cherries and plums, and often she would save her plum-cake and give him. She could always find him, without seeming to seek him, when he was about the yard; for she used to go skipping about to feed the pigeons, and ducks, and to chase round and round with her little dog Tiny. Sometimes when he was going out to scare birds on a very cold day in the wheat fields, she would put some matches in his hat, that he might light a fire; or she would be standing inside of the orchard hedge as he went by, and say, "Luke, look under the bramble-bush by the paddock-gate," and there he would find a good piece of pork-pie, or a little bottle of beer, or something of that sort. Luke would have run his legs off to have obliged little Sally Flamstead, and a regular courtship grew between these children. He used to be sent to Monnycrofts to fetch Sally on an evening when she went to take tea with her Aunt Heritage and her cousins, and Sally, as they walked along, used to tell him wonderful stories about the Babes in the Wood, and Robinson Crusoe, and Luke said that he declared he should like nothing so well as to be on a desolate island, and have Sally there for his man Friday. At length he got so enamoured that he vowed if ever he should become a king, which did not seem at all improbable after the wonderful things that happened in the world, according to what Sally Flamstead told him, he would marry Sally, and that she should be his queen. And Sally said she should like nothing so well. "But, Lord bless you!" Luke used to say, "only to think of my foolishness. Why, Sally Flamstead was far enough above me, and if she's grown up half as handsome as she was then, she's married some great gentleman since then, and rides a coach."

When Webster had finished telling this, old Beckey suddenly started up, laid hold of him, and put her hand on his face and felt down it, and then, as suddenly, she gave a great cry, "It's my Luke! it's Luke! it's Luke!" and she hugged him with a force that he did not think had been in her old arms. The next moment she released her grasp, gave a deep sigh and a sort of groan, and fell in a swoon. Luke--for it was Luke sure enough--caught her up and set her on the bench, and while he held her, he shouted with all his might for Amy. Amy came running, and was greatly frightened; but Luke told her not to be alarmed: she had only fainted, and would come round by and by. He bade her fetch a cup of water, and by the time it came poor old Beckey was recovering. She never stayed to drink the water, but she laid hold on Luke again, and began to laugh and cry; and Amy said, "So! so! Mrs. Barnicott, restrain yourself, or you'll go into high-sterics. And, mi! don't pull the young gentleman so; he'll think you are going 'utick,'" meaning lunatic.

Beckey took no notice, but catching Luke round the neck, to Amy's great horror, for she thought now she was gone "utick" in reality, she began kissing him, and then she laughed and said, "Amy, woman, it is Luke--my own lad Luke. Oh! where were my eyes?"--Beckey always talked of seeing, though she could not see--"where were my ears? But I reckon it's because my own Luke has now gotten his man's voice and his man's look, and he had only his lad's voice and his lad's look when he went. Black is his hair, says thou, Amy? and it was as light and shiney as tow when he was a lad. But so was his father's. When he began to tell me about Sally Flamstead, all at once I heard his father speaking and himself speaking, and my heart went with a great jump, and I knew it all. Ay, I'm blind and deaf too, or I should ha' fun' that out before this. Luke, lad! Luke, it is thee; thou wunna deny it?"

"No, dear granny," said Luke, using the old familiar term, "I won't deny it; I am your own Luke, and I am come to live near you while you are left to us."

"And yet, Luke," said the trembling old grandmother, "thou went away and left us to think thou was dead, drowned, murdered; and all these years, thou has neither written nor asked after me."

"Oh, granny," said Luke, "that's been a bitter thing to me. I was forced to run away, for I saw that those Wellands would never cease till they had made an end of me. I went right off, and begged till I found myself at Hull. There a ship captain met me in the street, and eyeing me awhile, he said, 'For shame, young scamp, to go about begging, a clever-looking, active lad like you. Come, I'll take you with me to sea. Eh? what say you?' I thanked him heartily, for of all things I was delighted to go to sea, where I expected to find some Robinson Crusoe's island, or the like fine country, such as Sally Flamstead had told me of. He took me on board a great ship, and there I was stripped and tumbled into a great tub of water, and well washed, and my old rags were flung overboard, and I was togged out in a sailor's suit, and set to work to sweep out the cabin and swab the deck, and do all that kind of thing, with two or three lads of my own age. In a short time we set sail for the Cape of Good Hope; but before I went I told the captain that I wanted my grandad and grandmam to know where I was, and I begged him earnestly to write for me, and he said he would; but one day he called me into the cabin, and said, 'I have seen a gentleman here from Derby, who has come to buy whale oil to light his factory with, and he says, 'That young fellow's history is known all over our part of the country. Look to it, captain, for he is the very imp of mischief, and had to run away for trying to kill a collier down a pit with a brick, and when he was missing the collier was charged with having murdered him, and he's transported for it, and his wife too. I heard him tried at Derby Assizes, and the young rogue's grandfather and grandmother are both dead of grief.'

"When the captain told me this I was ready to sink on the floor. Nobody can tell how I felt. To think I had killed both my grandfather and grandmother by my foolishness! As for Welland and his giant wife, I was glad that they were transported, for they seemed to me to be so malicious, and to have caused your deaths. At first I was stunned, and then I burst out crying, and I thought my heart would break. I had killed my only friends in the world; I was a wretch without a relative or soul on earth that cared for me.

"'Don't stand blubbering there,' said the captain, 'but go and show yourself handy, and turn out a farrently fellow. You may if you will; and if not, there's a rope-end and the yard-arm for you. Quick! make yourself scarce!' That was a bitter voyage for me. I suffered dreadfully from sickness and from cold in the southern latitudes; and I got plenty of kicks and cuffs from the mates and the sailors, and plenty of dousing and sousing with salt water that came sweeping over the ship's sides, and with hail and rain as we had to turn out of our hammocks at night when storms were raging, and we had to go up into the shrouds, and out along the slippering, reeling yards, hanging over the dark, boiling, roaring seas below. Oh! I often thought of these pleasant fields and farms, and all my old favourite nooks in the woods and dells, at those times, and I was often tempted just to drop off the yard-end, and bury all my troubles in the raging ocean. But I got better of that; the captain began to notice me for an active, and, as he said, clever fellow, and I began to like the sea. I've told you, granny, of some of my wanderings in India, and America, and Australia, and we can talk these over at our leisure now."

"But," said Beckey, "what made thee think of coming here if thou thought us dead?'

"I thought I'd come and see your graves, dear granny. That was all I could do; and I thought I'd put a handsome stone at your heads, such as I used to see, when I was a lad, in Monnycrofts churchyard, with a nice verse at the bottom, and a golden angel at the top, with a long golden trumpet blowing for the resurrection. But when I got to Mrs. Widdiwicket's, and began to ask about the old people that used to be here in my time, just in a roundabout way, that I might not be known by asking about you too soon, I really thought all the people in the place were dead. Old Squire Flaggimore and Madame Flaggimore, and old Parson Simion and Mrs. Simion, and old Johnson, and Broadbent, and Cullycamp the mole-catcher, and Shears the tailor, and Kettlebender the cobbler, and such a tribe,--all gone! And the Barnicotts of the Reckoning House, I said, are, of course, gone too. But what a start went through me when the landlady said, 'Nay, poor old Luke died directly after the affair about his grandson, which is a long story, but the old grandmother is living still.'

"Living still!" said I, starting up so that the landlady gave a jump, and then she looked at me with such a look.

"'You seem acquainted, sir,' she said, 'with these parts;' and she continued looking at me, as much as to say, Who in the world are you?

"I said, 'Oh, yes! I once was through here, and I was but a lad then, and I heard an extraordinary story of a boy being killed by a collier, or drowned in a dam or something.'

"'Ay, drowned, sure enough!' said Mrs. Widdiwicket, or smothered and buried alive somewhere--he never was found--no, never.'

"I said I should take a walk and have some talk with you, for I was curious about such things, and I inquired the way here. Now, I wonder that Derby man never thought of telling somebody here about his having heard of me being alive and on shipboard; but such men, with their great mills and businesses, have so much to think of, they don't trouble their memories with such things."

"We never heard a rumour of such a thing," said poor old Beckey, who kept fast hold of Luke's hand, as if she could not be sure enough that she had him.

"And what made thee pretend to be another, Luke, when thou came here?" asked Beckey.

"Oh, granny! that was only to break it easy to you. I did not want to frighten you all at once with the news, when you thought me dead so long. That was all."

"Ah! that was good of thee, my Luke. 'And now, Lord, let me depart in peace, since my eyes have seen thy salvation;'" and the happy old woman again kissed her grandson, and shed some quiet tears.

"Luke! Luke!" she then said, "as soon as thou began to talk of Sally Flamstead, that's my Luke's voice, I said--it's him, it's him, and nobody else, for how should anybody else know all about those things? And dost ta know, Luke, Sally has not forgotten thee? She has aullis been kind to me, and often comes up with a bit or a sup, a nice pot of preserves, or a jug of cream, or a nice plate of pickelets; and she will bring her sewing, and sit and talk for hours, and she is sure to turn the subject to the time when you were children. She's never married, though she's as handsome a wench as any lady in all the country-side, and rich she is, and manages her farm like a man, for the old Flamsteads are dead; and as for followers and sweethearts, heaven love me! she has had them all, I think, dangling after her in their turns. Nay, there came a very fine gentleman from London here, and he offered to keep her a coach and settle a fine estate on her; but no, thank you, she would not have him. No, she'll never marry, Luke, unless thou marries her. She has often said, 'Luke would be a fine young fellow if he was alive, and a good fellow too. They say he was wild and mischievous, but he never was with me. No, he was always as good as pie, and would have jumped into a coal-pit to do me any kindness.'"

Luke said, "God bless her! I knew she was one in ten thousand, and if I were----," but here Amy, who was as full of the news of Luke's being alive and being come as an egg is of yolk, and had been out at the garden gate to catch the first person going down the field-path and let off her steam, came running out of breath, "Wist! wist! here is Miss Flamstead coming up the field with a little basket in her hand, and a nice white cloth on it. She's bringing you something nice, Missis Barnicott; don't let us say who the young gentleman is, and see what she will say. I warrant you she'll soon have an inkling of it."

Sally Flamstead was already in the garden. She came on lightly in her nice light muslin dress, and her pretty white bonnet with a red rose in it, and her little blue parasol dangling loosely in her left hand. But as soon as she saw the stranger she blushed, and coming forward timidly, she said, "Oh! Mrs. Barnicott, I did not know you had company." Her sweet face was all blushes and roses, but it was smiling and charming. Luke rose, took off his hat, and made her a polite bow. Sally returned a respectful curtsey, and going up to Mrs. Barnicott, kissed her, and sat down beside her. Poor old Beckey had hard work to contain herself. She trembled, and tears rushed from her blind eyes, and she kissed Miss Flamstead again and again. Luke and Amy stood; Luke gazing with a respectful but fascinated gaze on the smart young farmeress, and Amy looking nobody could tell how--half smiling a suppressed smile, and half curious, and fit to burst out with, "It's Luke, Miss Flamstead, it's Luke!"

"I hope you have no bad news, my dear Mrs. Barnicott," said Miss Flamstead, wondering at her agitation.

"No! no!" said old Beckey. "Good news! good news!" and she shook her head as with an agony of emotion, and then burst out, "Luke's alive! I've heard of him--this--this--oh! he's seen him! he's seen him in th' Indies!"

Miss Flamstead sprang to her feet, gave a look at Luke, and then uttering a sort of shriek, she clasped her hands, and crying, "Oh! it is he!" she sank on the seat. Luke sprang forward, seized her clasped hands, kissed them passionately; and then Miss Flamstead standing up and looking at him in wonder and as in a dream, they thus stood for some time holding each others hands, while poor old Beckey and Amy cried silently and plentifully for joy.

We may leave them awhile under the old hanging elder tree, and let some days and weeks roll on, as they did roll joyously at the Reckoning House, and at Langlee farm. All the old courtship of childhood was renewed. Luke and Sally Flamstead have strolled about the old farm-yard and the old fields. They have laughed as they stepped by the old bramble-bush, by the paddock-gate, and remembered the hidden pork-pie, and the hidden little bottle of beer, and of cold days there. The bells have rung out merrily from the tall stone tower of Monnycrofts church, and a gay wedding party has descended the long churchyard steps, and taken its way through the swarming villagers, along the village street, and down the lane to Langlee farm. There Luke and Sally live as happily as if they were in a Robinson Crusoe's island, or more so; and more so than if he had been a king and had made Sally a queen. Luke has bought the old mill on the hill, Ives's old mill, and it still swings its great arms as if beckoning everybody up to see something wonderful. Old Beckey still lives in the Reckoning House, and Luke always looks in as he goes up the hill to the mill, and often the old woman is fetched down to Langlee farm to pass whole days and weeks with him. There she has a nice tall-backed cushioned chair set for her in a sunny corner, and she delights to ramble about the garden and smell the flowers, and about the farm-yard, and listen to the fowls and ducks and geese and pigeons, and fancy that she sees them.

"There's only one thing that troubles me," said old Beckey soon after Luke had been recognised, "and that is, that Welland and his wife were transported for nothing. Thou'st plenty of money, Luke, and if I were thee, I'd send for them back."

"Granny," said Luke, "they would not thank me to do that. If I sent, they would not come."

"No!" said Beckey, "do they like slavery better than Old England?"

"Slavery!" said Luke. "Why, granny, they live in a finer house than Squire Flaggimore, keep a fine carriage, and their children are finer gentlemen and ladies than the Flaggimores by half."

"Ah, say'st thou so!" exclaimed old Beckey in wonder. "How in the world have they managed that?"

"I will tell you, granny," said Luke. "When I was in Australia, and had got a good lump of gold, the first thing I did was to set sail for Sydney in order to find out the Wellands and set them free, and send them home. When I got there I found a very fine city, fine as London, though not so big. There were fine shops, and carriages driving about, and fine ladies and gentlemen riding and walking about, and fine streets; and all round the city were the most beautiful gardens and plantations, and houses like palaces, with beautiful lawns running down to the sea-side. 'This a fine city,' I said to a decent man who stood at a shop-door, 'but where are the convicts lodged?' The man smiled and said, 'It just makes all the difference as to what convicts you mean. If you mean those who are lately come, you may find some in the convict barracks in the old town there, and some everywhere working on the quays, and in warehouses, and many are up the country farming and shepherding. But if you mean the convicts that came out ten or twenty years ago, look round. They inhabit the greater part of the palaces you see. 'There!' said he, pointing to a very fine carriage with a handsome pair of greys, and a coachman and two footmen before and behind in rich liveries, 'that is the equipage of a convict of past days. There! and there! and there! all those are carriages of quondam convicts.'

"I was astounded. I then asked him if he knew a convict of the name of Welland.

"'Do I know him?' said the man. 'Do I know the governor, or the chief-justice? Do you want to see him?'

"I replied I did.

"'Come along then,' said he, 'I want a little walk; and he led the way across a very fine street, called George Street, and up a hill, and past the governor's castle, and so along the parks and garden beyond, and then he stopped at a grand gate with a grand lodge, and said, 'Here lives your man.'

"I stood in astonishment. 'Can it be true?' I said.

"'How long has he been out?' asked the man.

"Something like fourteen years," I replied.

"'Just so,' said he; 'and has he a very little wife?'

"A very great one," I said.

"'That's your man then,' he rejoined, and he bowed and bade me good day.

"I stood some time in doubt what I should do. I questioned how I might be received by my old enemy, who had manifested to me so much malice, and whom I had been the occasion of banishing into slavery. But I thought, well, the transportation has been a lucky thing for him, and so I will venture. I went in at the lodge gate, a woman told me the family were at home. I advanced up a very fine gravel coach road, through the most beautiful woods, and came at length into an open lawn and fine flower-garden, where stood a grand white stone palace. 'Can this be the mansion of Welland of the Marlpool?' I said to myself. 'Can the collier have developed into a grandee like this, and through the chain-gang too?'

"But I ascended a fine flight of steps, and rang the bell. A servant in rich embroidered livery, and profusely powdered, came to the door. I inquired for Mr. Welland, and was shown into a noble library, where an old white-haired gentleman sat reading the papers. A magnificent Highland greyhound, here called the kangaroo hound, crouched on the superb Turkey carpet near his feet, and the spaces of the walls which were not covered with books were filled with fine paintings. The old gentleman politely rose, and bowing, begged me to take a seat on the opposite side of the magnificent marble mantelpiece.

"I was puzzled how to begin my reason for calling. I looked in the old gentleman's face, now calm and grave, and I was at a loss to determine whether I was not mistaken after all. I thought I could trace a likeness to the collier of the Marlpool, even amid that handsome suit of clothes, that delicately fine linen, and under that snowy hair, but--could it be? The old gentleman interrupted my speculations by mildly requesting that I would oblige him by stating why I honoured him with a call. I paused again for a moment. I grew still more confused, but I broke through my restraint by an effort, and said, 'Was I right in opining that Mr. Welland was a countryman of mine--from Derbyshire?'

"A cloud fell on his brow, and he replied, but coldly, 'I am from that county.'

"'Then,' said I, reassured, 'you will not have forgotten the name of Barnicott?'

"A flush passed over his features--a fierce one, it seemed to me. His eyes flashed, and he demanded, in a short, stern tone, what was the purport of my inquiry.

"'Because,' I said, 'I am that Luke Barnicott who was supposed to be drowned in Hillmarton dam.'

"As I said these words, the old gentleman gave me a startled look, turned unusually pale, and then springing towards me, seized my hands convulsively, and exclaimed, 'Thank God! what a weight you fling from my soul! Is it, can it be true, that you are that boy?'

"'I am he,' I said, 'and I have come six hundred miles to seek to make amends for the unintentional misfortune of causing you'--I hesitated to bring out the words of ignominy.

"'Of causing my transportation!' he said promptly. 'Thank God for that, now I know that I am not guilty of your death; but all these years I have borne in my soul the feeling that you were rotting in the bottom of that dam.'

"The old man shook me vehemently by the hand. 'Thank God!' he ejaculated again. 'Now all is right; now I shall live and die in peace. Now I can say, Luke Barnicott, you did me the grandest day's work imaginable when you caused my transportation, or rather when I caused it myself by mad anger against you.' I asked his pardon a thousand times for my folly in tantalizing him with the brick at the pit.

"'Don't mention it,' he said; 'we have both of us something to forget and to forgive. God, I trust, has forgiven us both. He has prospered me beyond all conception. I am one of the richest men in this colony. I have lands that would make estates for half-a-dozen noblemen, and I have ships on half-a-dozen seas. My story is no secret; everybody knows who are emancipists here, and who are not But we have wealth, and friends, and rising families who will one day rank with the first people of the colony in education and worth. As for me, I feel I am no longer the poor collier of the Marlpool. By trade, by study, by associating with men of intelligence and mind, my own mind and views have expanded. I have grown out of a black, crawling, ignorant caterpillar into a something more noble--into a man and a Christian. I rank with a marked class here, it is true, but I have wealth and friends, and a fine virtuous family; and I have laboured hard to subdue that fierceness and rancour which once disgraced me. You are the cause of this, and I bid you ten times welcome. But come, I must introduce you to Mrs. Welland.'

"He led the way through a spacious hall into an equally spacious and richly-furnished drawing-room, where I saw sitting a venerable lady, reading with spectacles, and, like her husband, with hair white as snow. She rose at our entrance, and I instantly recognised that remarkable stature. But it was no longer the lofty, strapping figure, with a bold, handsome face, and with an old slouched man's hat on, and arrayed in dirty and negligent dress, as I recollected Doll Welland. The old and venerable lady had the air of an ancient dowager empress. I could have fancied her the Czarina of all the Russias.

"'My dear,' said Mr. Welland, 'I introduce to you a friend, who comes, as it were, from the dead. You must go back to past times, to the Marlpool, to the windmill, to--Luke Barnicott.'

"The venerable and stately lady stood in silent wonder. She gazed on her husband, and then on me. 'What words, my dear, are these?' she said 'You tear open old and very deep wounds.'

"'Let them all be closed and healed for ever, for this is the boy Barnicott, who "was dead and is alive, who was lost and is found."'

"I will not," said Luke, "attempt to describe the venerable lady's agitation, and, as that subsided, her joy. Like her husband, she seized and held my hands, and wet them with streaming tears, and kissed them in her emotion. All bitter feeling had long passed out of her bosom. They had made a sharp expiation for their crime in persecuting me, during their early years in the colony, and in the deep-lying sense of my destruction in their souls up to this moment. This had softened and ameliorated their hearts; they had become strongly religious; prosperity had not spoiled them; and my arrival, and my errand to make a full amends for my folly, now needless, cast a stream of heavenly sunshine on the evening of their days.

"I was constrained to take up my quarters with them during my stay. They explained to their sons and daughters, now all grown up, and some of them married, and with mansions and equipages of great splendour, who I was,--for my story was familiar to them all. I found myself at once amongst a set of fine young men and women, highly educated, and in every respect most estimable and charming. I visited them at their houses, and accompanied them to those of their friends situated on the woody shores and promontories that surround the delightful Bay of Sydney. I rode with them across the sandy tract, carpeted with flowers and thicketed with blooming shrubs of rare beauty, to Botany Bay. There we sometimes took boats, and enjoyed the dangerous and exciting sport of killing sharks. In that water, clear as crystal, we could see the terrible monsters come with rapid sweeps up to the sides of our boats, which they would seek to overturn, in which case we should probably all have been snapped asunder and devoured. But throwing them a piece of meat on a hook, they caught at that, and we drew them up to the boat, and stunned them by striking them on the nose with the boat-hooks, and dragged them in triumph to land.

"Sometimes we made a party at snake-hunting in the woods and thickets around the houses of Mr. Welland, or of his sons or daughters, leading down to the bay. Armed with whips, the ladies as well as the gentlemen, and our legs defended with tall boots, we rushed into the wilderness of shrubs, and starting the lurking serpents, most of them of deadly venom, we gave chase, and soon cut them to pieces with our whips. Sometimes we made long rides into the forests and encamped there in huts, and spent whole days in shooting and in hunting the kangaroo. We visited the palmy hills of Illawara, and saw the giant nettle trees, large as oaks, and capable of killing a horse very quickly by their stings; or we roved amongst the orange and lemon groves of Paramatta, and wondered how all this enchanted life had sprung out of the collieries and the events of the Marlpool, in Derbyshire. I can only say," Luke added when he closed his narrative, "that I quitted my old cronies, the Wellands and their children, with profound regret, and I feel that the regret was mutual. The old collier of the Marlpool, now the millionnaire of Sydney, has not forgotten his old friends and native place. I have brought with me £500 to build and partly endow a school on the spot where his humble cottage once stood; and I shall feel it my duty and my pleasure to state the facts that this is the gift of the Wellands, fifteen years ago transported on the charge of having murdered me in consequence of my disappearance. That, innocent of the charge, God has wonderfully prospered them in their distant exile; that they have grown rich and esteemed, and have sent by me, whom they were supposed to have destroyed, this handsome token of their remembrance to their native place. That is due to their justification, and to the wonderful means of compensation existing in the immensely-extended British empire, where even the man unjustly condemned at home, can find, in his unjust punishment, the way to far superior fortune; and where those justly condemned may expiate their offences against society by returning to virtue, and by attaining to a position and a power which enables them to diffuse the most salutary hopes and the most substantial benefits around them."

This is the story of Welland the collier and Luke Barnicott, whom may Heaven long preserve!

THE CASTLE EAST OF THE SUN.

AN OLD STORY, FROM THE DANISH.

There was once a king who had been very prosperous and happy, but he was growing old. He had six sons and one daughter. His sons were very gay and jovial young men, who spent their days very merrily; and when the old king saw their vigorous sports and their enjoyment of life, he sighed to think that he could not be young once more. His daughter was beautiful and mild, and devoted all her days to amuse the old king, and to make him forget that he was growing old. But there came a very handsome prince from a far-off country, and he fell in love with the old king's daughter, and asked her in marriage, and desired to take her away with him to his own kingdom.

Now, the prince was very handsome, and had a very beautiful carriage, and very fine horses, and many servants, and plenty of gold and jewels, and everything which belongs to a prince. But the old king desired to know where lay the kingdom of the prince, and what was its name. But the prince said that it was the island which lay east of the sun and west of the world, and that was its name; and that it was so far off that nobody had ever been to it from this country, nor had any one come to this country from it besides himself.

Then the old king was not willing that his daughter should marry a prince from a country so far off that nobody ever before heard of it. The young princes, his sons, were also opposed to the marriage. They did not like the prince because he was so much handsomer than themselves, and had more money, and appeared with so much more splendour than they could. They said he was probably some adventurer and impostor, for no one had ever heard of the country he pretended to come from, nor could they see how any one could get thither from a place east of the sun and west of the world.

Now, the princess felt a great affection for the strange prince, for he was the handsomest man who had ever come to her father's court, and was passionately in love with her; but she would not consent to leave her father in his old age. Then said the prince, that he was bound not to return to his own country, nor to take upon him its government, for three years, and for that time he would stay in this country; and when they went away at length, he would send the old king some of the water which played in the fountain in the court of his castle, and some of the apples which grew over the sides of the fountain, and were wetted daily with the dew of its spray. This fountain was the fountain of immortality, and the apples were the apples of youth; and whoever drank of that water and ate one of those apples would be instantly young again, and enjoy once more all the buoyancy and ardour of his freshest years.

When the old king heard that, he was very glad, and gave his consent for the prince to marry his daughter, for above all things he wished to be young again, and to enjoy his life as he had done in his youthful years. The princess, too, on learning this, was willing to marry the prince, for she thought if her father could be young again he would find plenty of sources of happiness, and she herself would not grieve to go away to such a far-off country, if by that means she could thus purchase for her father the great desire of his heart, and the renewal of his life.

So the prince and princess were married, and they lived in a splendid palace near the old king, and were very happy. Every day the princess found the prince more amiable and sensible, and desirous to add to her felicity, and he promised himself a long and joyous life with her in his own beautiful island east of the sun and west of the world--so long, that nobody could tell the end of it, for they could drink of the fountain of life and eat of the apples of youth daily.

But the old king was so impatient for a draught of this water, and a taste of one of those apples, that he forgot that the prince said that he was bound not to return to his kingdom for three years. He was impatient for the prince and princess to begone, and to send some of the apples and the water, for he longed with a longing unto death for the renewal of his youth, which in his memory seemed so beautiful.

When the prince heard this he was very sorrowful, and said it could not be done, for no one knew the way to his kingdom but himself, and that if he returned before his time he should become a captive instead of a king, and be miserable for ever. But the old king became very angry, and redoubled his demands that the prince and princess should set out. The old king's sons also insinuated that the prince did not go because he had no kingdom to go to, but that he was what they had always asserted, an adventurer and impostor.

The princess was very unhappy, and besought the prince to tell her the way to his kingdom, and let her go and bring the apples of youth and the water of life; but he told her that it could not be done. It was more than both their lives were worth. He begged the princess to promise him that she would never urge this again till the three years were up, or it would cost them then happiness for ever. But the old king was very pressing. He said he might be dead in less than three years, and then he should lose the beautiful renewal of his youth for which his soul longed, and of which he had made himself sure when he consented that his daughter should marry the prince. He urged his daughter to prevail on her husband to set out, and the princess, between the commands of the old king and the assurance of the prince that to press him further was the total ruin of their happiness, was the most miserable of women, and wept day and night. For many months she resisted, however, all desire to penetrate into the secret of the prince, and all the importunities of the old king, her father, and the taunts of the princes, her brothers. But when she saw how the gloom of despair hung heavier and heavier on the king's brow, and heard him say that if she loved him she could help him, she was ready to break her heart of grief. But her brothers' words sank deeper into her soul, for they derided the prince, her husband, as a mock prince and a pretender, and said that he was the Prince of Nowhere, for no one had ever heard of his pretended country. At length her anguish grew to that pitch that she burst out in her husband's presence with the words, "O that I could but know where your kingdom is, that I might go and save the life of my father!"

At these words the prince turned deadly pale, sprang up, and embraced his wife passionately, saying, "Alas! alas! it is all true! We must part, and for ever!"

With a deep groan he escaped from her arms, and issuing out of the door was seen no more. It was a dark, wild night, but he passed hastily out of the palace, followed by all his servants. The princess, in a state of distraction, ran after him to detain him, but he and his followers had already disappeared, and from that day no man saw them again.

Then the old king and the princes said that the pretended prince was in reality a troll (wizard) or an evil spirit, and that they were well rid of him. But the princess would not believe anything but that he was a true and noble prince, who was bound by some solemn oath, and she was overwhelmed with sorrow that she had thus broken his commands, and lost him for ever. She hid herself long in the depths of her palace, and wished that she were dead.

But the old king, though he had said that the prince was a troll or an evil spirit, began soon again to hanker after the golden apples and the water of life, and bade his sons go and seek for the island east of the sun and west of the world. The sons declared that they did not believe there was any such island, or any such apples or water, but that they were willing to go forth and make a quest after them. They were indeed glad to have plenty of money put into their hands, and to be able thus to go from country to country, and see the world.

So the old king furnished two of them with money, and sent them out, and they went away but never returned. Weeks and months, and then a whole year went round, and the two sons neither returned, nor did there come any news of them. Then the old king sent out two more, and they also went out, but never returned. Weeks and months, and a whole year went round, and they neither came back, nor any news of them. Then the old king, whose desire for the golden apples and the water of life was only become the stronger from his longings and disappointments, sent out his last two sons, and bade them in Heaven's name to do their utmost, for if they failed all failed him, and he had no son left to succeed him. So they went, and, like the rest, they neither returned nor was there any news of them.