Chapter VI: Part 6

"I daresay you can't, poor dear," he said. Then he lay back in his chair and laughed. "To think of me," he chuckled, "falling in love."

I sat down at the other side of the fire and lit a pipe.

"But you've been in love ever since I knew you."

"The others didn't count; this does."

I begged him to explain.

"Well, it's like this. When I saw her often I wasn't quite sure about it, but now that I can't see her at all the thing's dead certain."

I again begged him to be more explicit. "You talk in the dark," I said.

"Then why don't you light a lamp?"

I did as he suggested and sat down again.

"Is there anything else I can do for you?" I asked.

"Yes," he said, "you're coming over to Ireland with me to-morrow."

"I'll see you hanged first," I said.

"The train leaves Euston at 8.45 p.m."

"It can leave when it likes. I shan't be there."

"By eleven o'clock on Thursday we shall be in Stromore."

"Well?" I said, weakly.

"I knew you'd come!" he said.

"But I won't," I said.

He smiled tenderly upon me.

"And yet," he said, "I endured that dragon Mrs. Vivian for your sake for full ten minutes."

"If you'll explain what it's all about," I said, "I'll do anything I can to help you, but as to--"

He tapped me on the knee with the poker.

"Listen!" he said. "In my opinion, my cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan, is mad."

"I'm not surprised to hear it," I said.

He tapped me again with the poker.

"My cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan, has a daughter, and in any decent man's home," he added, "there'd be something to drink Norah's health in."

I got up wearily and produced what was required, and we drank solemnly to Norah O'Callaghan.

"That's better," said St. Alleyne. "Now Mrs. O'Callaghan has her heart set on Norah's going into a convent, and Norah, poor child, thinks she has a leaning towards the religious life, and that before she has seen any other life at all. When I heard of this folly I went over, but never a sight of the girl could I get except with her mother. The old woman never lets her outside the grounds, and there they walk up and down for an hour every day."

I was becoming seriously interested, and St. Alleyne saw it.

"Does Miss O'Callaghan know you care for her?" I asked.

"I suppose any girl knows," he said.

"Did you ever speak to her about it?"

"Not seriously," he said.

"Isn't it possible she thinks you were playing with her and may be playing still; and, granted she cares for you, mayn't that be driving her into the convent?"

His face was suddenly flushed with a kind of pitying shame.

"By Jove!" he said. "It may be so, Phil; I never meant to play with her, I swear that."

"I believe you," I said, "but it looks as though there might be something in what I suggest."

"It does," he answered.

"Have you written to her?"

He tapped me once more with the poker.

"No, and if I did she'd never get the letter. I know my cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan. She thinks all the St. Alleynes are a bad lot, because, I suppose, my grandfather was a wild devil once. That's where I have to suffer for my name."

"But you could convince her otherwise, I suppose?"

"I'd undertake to do it, if I were sure of Norah."

I knocked the ashes from my pipe and stood up. The situation interested me; my own happiness was so near that I was prepared to do a great deal for my friend.

"Well," I said, "suppose I go over with you, how am I to help?"

He rose and stood by my side, putting his right arm round my shoulder. He was quite his old cheerful self again.

"We'll think of that when we get there," he said. "You must draw Mrs. O'Callaghan off while I talk to the girl somehow. If I have a sure friend at hand the thing can be managed. I knew you'd come, old man. My cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan," he added, "has burnt her own boats; if she hadn't played me this trick I might never have discovered that I wanted Norah."

"Oh, yes, you would," I said.

"You know, of course," he said, pinching my ear.

When I awoke the next morning I confess that our project did not look particularly hopeful, but I had undoubted faith in St. Alleyne's ingenuity, and it was a great satisfaction to me to see Lucy, and let her into the secret of our expedition. Her eagerness, indeed, was much greater than mine, and she made me promise to send her a telegram directly there was any good news to communicate.

It was a bitterly cold night in January when St. Alleyne and I crossed, and I am not a particularly good sailor. I remained on deck for the sake of the air, the saloon being hopeless, and made what efforts I could to keep myself warm. Every now and then I looked into the smoking-room, where my friend was consuming large cigars; I envied him his occupation, but rejected all his invitations to join him. After a time he came out and wrapped me up in half a dozen rugs on a seat. By the time we reached Dublin I was numb to the heart, and knew I was in for a violent cold.

However, we made no delay, but caught the mail for the south. The carriage was warmer than the boat, and by a judicious arrangement of rugs I managed to bring back some heat into my blood, and with it came a revived interest in our expedition. St. Alleyne had said nothing about his plan since starting, but as I looked across at him I could see that he was thinking hard. He caught my eye and smiled.

"Feel better?" he asked.

"Much," I said.

"You look a poor starved rat of a man, even now."

"I'm sorry," I said, "that I haven't your terrific constitution."

"It hasn't been much good to me so far," he said, "and I'll thank you, Mr. Mildmay, for one of those excellent cigars of yours."

"I think I could manage one myself," said I, sitting up.

"Bravo! Now we can talk seriously.... I've been thinking, Phil."

"I could see that!"

"You could, could you? Well, I've hit on a plan--a beautiful plan."

"Capital!" I said.

"But the carrying through depends upon you."

"Am I in fit condition?" I asked.

"Faith, you'll be in too good condition presently. It depends on your sickness."

It was always necessary to beg St. Alleyne to explain: I did this forcibly, and he brought his head close to mine.

"I told you, I think," he said, "that in my opinion my cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan, is mad?"

"You did."

"Well," he said, "she's not so mad, neither. She has some idea of true charity. Now Norah is a great hand with the sick; she has a way with her, as we say over here, and Mrs. O'Callaghan encourages her to visit them; it's all part of the convent scheme."

"I begin to see," I said; "I'm to be sick."

"And who," said he, "would you rather see in your suffering than an angel like Norah?"

"I'd rather see Lucy," I said.

"Well, well, you're a constant creature. I have a little place over here near Stromore, as you know; but you mustn't be ill there; you must go to the hotel." He paused and looked at me.

"Go on," I said.

"And being very low," he continued, very slowly, "you'll speak to Biddy about it."

"Who's Biddy?" I asked.

"Mahony's daughter; he runs the hotel. And you'll say that you'd like to see someone--a woman for choice--as you have something weighing on your mind; and then you might drop Miss O'Callaghan's name. Now Biddy was Norah's maid for a time, and what more natural than that she should suggest bringing her old mistress to the poor sick guest?"

"You're a rogue," I said.

"Then Norah will come to you," he went on, "and I shall be in the next room, and after a time you'll speak of me, and then--"

"We must wait for the rest," I said, "But what will your cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan, be doing all the time?"

"She'll be talking to Mahony about the price of oats downstairs."

"This is a very charming plan," I said, "but will it work? And do you think me humbug enough to mix myself up in such an affair?"

"You're humbug enough for anything," he said, "but have you the nerve?"

"It doesn't need much nerve," I said.

"You haven't seen Norah," he replied.

"Well, I'll risk it; I came over here to help you, and I may as well do it, little as the job suits me."

"Oh," he laughed, "it'll be grand to see my cousin Mrs. O'Callaghan's face!"

It was important to our plan that St. Alleyne and I should not seem to be together, so he gave me final instructions before we reached Stromore Station. "You must get the bedroom over the door," he said, "because there's a sitting-room next to it, and we must have them both."

"Suppose it's already occupied?" I said.

"You don't know Stromore in the winter," he said; "there won't be a soul in the place, and Mahony will kneel at your feet."

"I hope he won't," I said, "because I might feel inclined to kick him."

"Kick Mahony!" he cried, "the man's six feet two, and as strong as an ox. You'd better begin to be sick almost at once, hadn't you?"

"I feel bad enough," I said.

We shook hands in the carriage as the train pulled up at Stromore; on the platform we did not know each other.

I secured a car at once, and told the man to drive to the St. Alleyne Arms, and as we swung up the road from the station I looked back and saw his lordship coming slowly down the steps.

"Do ye know," asked my driver, "how long his lordship's come for?"

"His lordship!--whose lordship?"

"Lord St. Alleyne," he said, looking at me incredulously.

"What do I know about the man?" I asked. "Where is he?"

"He's there, sure, comin' down the shteps."

"Indeed," I said, and told the man to hurry, as I was cold.

I had no difficulty in securing the two rooms I wanted, and as I took possession of them I felt some of the pangs of a conspirator. I was also, as a matter of fact, quite sufficiently unwell to see things rather gloomily, and as I sat by my window after lunch, and looked out into the grey street, I confess that I wished myself engaged in a less dubious enterprise.

And then, as I sat there, I heard the brisk sound of wheels, and a carriage drove by, and in it there sat a lady of a rather severe aspect and a girl. The girl glanced up at the inn as she passed; from out of a nest of white fur, there looked a face that made me come nearer to forgetting Lucy than anything I could have imagined. "That," said I to myself, "is Norah, and the other is Mrs. O'Callaghan. My dear St. Alleyne, I'll begin my part of the game this minute if it's to help you to win that child."

And indeed there was no time to be lost, for we had arranged that St. Alleyne was to call at eleven o'clock the next morning to see how things were getting on. I accordingly looked for a bell-rope, but, being unable to find one, I opened the door and called downstairs. Biddy came up light as a bird, and with a merry engaging smile on her face.

"Biddy," I said, "I feel ill, and I think I'll go to bed. I've caught a bad cold, and it may turn to fever with me."

"Lord save us!" she cried, "will I send for the docther?"

"No, I'll see how I am later. And, Biddy, at six o'clock, I might try to eat some dinner."

"To be sure, sorr," she said. "Can I do anythin' for ye now?"

"No," said I, pressing my hand against my forehead, "but if I want anything I'll ring."

"There's no bell," she said, "so you must just knock on the flure, an' I'll hear ye."

With that she departed, and I made up the fire and got slowly into bed. My head did ache a little, but not enough to make me unhappy, and it seemed to me, as I lay in the midst of that apparently dead Irish town, that I was coming perilously near to playing the fool. But my confidence in St. Alleyne was unbounded, and under all his lightness of manner it was plain that he was in deadly earnest; so presently, thinking of him and of the face I had seen, and being horribly tired after the previous night, I fell comfortably asleep.

When I awoke it was dark outside and there was only the red glow of firelight in the room. I got up to light a candle, and felt rather lightheaded and feverish; it gave me some satisfaction to realise that I should not have to altogether act my part. I looked at my watch and found that it was a quarter to six. I lay down again and listened; beyond the slight movement in the house there was not a sound to be heard; I might have been in a lodge in the wilderness.

Presently I heard Biddy's light step on the stairs, and there was a tentative knock at the door.

"Come in," I cried, and she entered with dinner and a lamp.

"Are you betther, sorr?" she asked.

"No," said I, "but worse."

"Will I send for Docther Nolan now?"

"No, Biddy, I'll try to eat some dinner."

"Do, poor soul!" she said. She drew a little table to the bedside, and, having set the food on it, left me. It was not a good dinner; a healthy appetite and an easy conscience might have been satisfied with it, but neither of these was mine at the moment, so I did no more than just play with it. Then I knocked on the floor for Biddy, who came up at once. She was always smiling; she had one of those faces to which only laughter or tears seem natural.

"Have ye done, sorr?" she asked, in undisguised surprise.

"Yes," I said, "I can't eat."

She suggested Doctor Nolan again.

"No, I'm afraid a doctor could do no good until I've got something off my mind."

"Will I sind for a priest, thin?" she asked.

"At present, Biddy, it's not a matter for a priest, but if you knew of some good woman, not a nun, but still in the world--" I paused from sheer inability to go on; I was so unused to this kind of thing that any sign of suspicion on Biddy's part would have meant disaster. But Biddy had a kind heart, and instantly scented a romance.

"Ah," she said, "I see how it is wid ye."

I said nothing, but lay still, watching her face. I tried once or twice to mention Miss O'Callaghan's name, but my lips refused to approach it without a weakness that might have betrayed me. And then, all at once, Biddy did it for me.

"I might ast Miss O'Callaghan to see ye," she said.

My face burned. "And who's Miss O'Callaghan?" I asked.

"A dear, dear heart," said Biddy, "an' just the lady to help ye if it's love you're throubled about. She's had throuble herself," she added, "an' may his lordship be made to pay for it!"

"What do you mean about Miss O'Callaghan and his lordship?"

"Was I her maid for three years and not know her secrets?"

I begged Biddy to explain, which she refused to do; but I gathered enough from her to judge that my surmise had been correct, and that Norah was wholly his lordship's if he could get fair speech with her.

"Biddy," said I, "you're a good girl, and if you can bring Miss O'Callaghan to see me at half-past eleven to-morrow I'll dance at your wedding."

"I'll go to her now," she said; "rest quiet, now, till I come back."

When Biddy had gone I was almost sorry that I had not taken her completely into my confidence, but her interest seemed so deeply engaged on my behalf that I felt sure she would work strongly on Miss O'Callaghan's feelings; and so it proved, for she returned in an hour to say that the lady would come on the following morning. After this piece of news I calmly went to sleep again, and only awoke to find Biddy once more at my bedside with breakfast.

I assured her that I felt somewhat better, and would be ready for Miss O'Callaghan when she came. Just as I had finished breakfast I heard St. Alleyne's voice below. Presently Biddy came up with curiosity shining from her face.

"Why didn't ye tell me," she said, "that ye knew his lordship?"

"Biddy, can I trust you?" I asked.

She tossed her head. "Thrust me," she said, "an' why not, sure?"

"I knew I could. Well, you'll show Lord St. Alleyne up, and he won't go down again until after Miss O'Callaghan has seen me."

"Lord save us!" cried Biddy.

"I know," I went on, "that you have your late mistress's happiness at heart, and this will make it safe. It depends upon you whether there is to be a great wedding at Stromore, or the convent for Miss O'Callaghan."

"Lord save us!" Biddy cried again, between laughter and tears.

"Mrs. O'Callaghan," I said, "is a strange woman, I understand."

"She is that!" Biddy interjected.

"And therefore this interview must be arranged as best it can. On your life, don't say a word to either of them about his lordship being here!"

Biddy's hesitation was only momentary; she promised, and fled from the room.

When St. Alleyne came in I saw he had not had much sleep and that his nerves were on the rack, but his manner was as unperturbed as ever. He sat down on the side of my bed and looked at me curiously.

"How are you?" he asked.

"Perfectly well," I answered; "don't I look it?"

"You look a bit flushed, that's all."

"And with good cause. Miss O'Callaghan will be here in half an hour."

"Thank God!" he said, and walked to the window. He stood silently with his back to me for some time, looking down into the street. Then he said, "How are you going to manage the interview?"

"I don't know; if you worry me I shall make a mess of it."

"I'm not going to worry you, old chap," he said; "you must just do it your own way."

"I saw her yesterday."

He swung round and faced me.

"What did you think of her?" he asked.

"I think," said I, "that you must have been born for each other."

His face lit up with a sudden, boyish smile.

"Thanks," he said, and turned to the window again. A moment later he stepped back quickly.

"There she is," he said, "and my cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan, with her."

"It was just like you," I cried, "to stand there where the whole street could see you."

"Don't be angry, Phil," he said, humbly, "she didn't look up."

"For heaven's sake get into the next room and shut the door."

He came over to me swiftly and rested his hands on my shoulders.

"Play up, Phil," he whispered, "for the sake of old times." Then he left me, and the door of the sitting-room closed softly behind him.

When I heard footsteps on the stairs and realised that the game had really commenced, the ambiguity of my position overwhelmed me; I wished myself, for a moment, well out of the affair at any price. But the thought of the greater strain upon St. Alleyne, and what it meant to him, restored my composure, and I waited with closed eyes. The door opened, and I heard Biddy's voice say, "Here's Miss O'Callaghan to see ye, sorr." When I looked up, a vision of loveliness greeted my eyes.

Miss O'Callaghan came towards me with a face full of the tenderest solicitude. She was wearing a tailor-made dress that fitted her to perfection, and on her head she had a large hat, from under which tiny tendrils of dark hair had escaped; her skin was of the whiteness of rose petals except where the blood flushed, her eyes had the look of wet violets in spring. My lips murmured incoherent thanks and welcome. I could not force my mind away from the waiting figure in the next room.

"You wished to see me," she said, in a soft voice that had an under-note of sadness. "If I can help you, please be quite free with me. It's to be my life's work to help those who are in trouble."

"Your life's work?" I repeated.

"Yes," she said, "I'm to go into a convent."

"My trouble will seem very small to you, but to me it seems great, and it has to do with so worldly a thing as love."

Her face flushed and paled again before she answered--

"True love can never be small--it is always beautiful."

"That is my thought of it, too," I said; "but however much one wants to do the right thing, it is sometimes terribly hard to decide."

"I know," she said, "I know."

"Now suppose," I said, "that I loved a girl with all my heart--as I do," I added, thinking of Lucy, "but had never told her so; and suppose that her friends, for some foolish reason, did not like me, and wished her to devote her life to a calling which she herself had some leaning to----"

"Yes," she said, breathlessly, and I could see she was applying the case to herself.

"And suppose," I went on, "I had been blind in the past, and perhaps unknowingly allowed the time to go by when I should have spoken: would I be justified in coming into her life again, drawing her away from the peace that this calling might already have given her, and asking her to come back with me into the world where love is?"

For an instant she turned her head aside, and I saw the tears heavy under her eyelids.

"It would be for her to decide," she said; "you should tell her."

"That's just what my friend Lord St. Alleyne thinks," I said.

"You know him?" she cried. The look in her eyes at that moment was certainly not for me.

"He is my very dear friend," I said, "and I have often heard him speak of you. I know him for one of the best men alive."

She slipped down on her knees by the bed, and if I had not already known all about the matter her eyes would have told me.

"I believe he is, I believe he is," she said. "Tell me about him. Is he well? When did you see him last?"

"No longer ago than this morning," I said.

She hid her face and was silent for a time; I could see that she loved him beyond the ordinary love of women, and the sight sent such a wave of content through me that I believe I laughed softly. At any rate she looked up and I could not bear to see her unhappy any longer.

"My dear Miss O'Callaghan," I said, taking into my hand the warm little gloved fingers that lay on the coverlid, "will you forgive me for being a conspirator and a humbug? Remember I did it for the sake of my friend, and I knew he was worth it. I spoke of him and not of myself."

"What do you mean?" she cried. And then, with a hand at her bosom, "Oh, tell me, tell me!"

"St. Alleyne," I said, "loves you, and he's here to tell you himself." And with that I raised my voice and called his name. The door opened instantly--he must have had his hand on the latch the whole time--and there he stood, with his arms stretched out to her and the name, "Norah," on his lips. She sprang to her feet and ran to him with so joyful a cry that I knew my part in the comedy was over, and just as they embraced I turned away and closed my eyes.

Ten minutes later they came back; she was leaning on his shoulder and he had an arm about her waist.

"This conspiracy has been so successful," I said, "that I shall never engage in another. It would never do to spoil my record."

"You have two friends now instead of one," Miss O'Callaghan said.

"Phil," said St. Alleyne, "get up, you old dear, while Norah and I go downstairs to see my cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan."

They left me once more, and as I dressed I felt so absurdly light-hearted that I had to sing to myself; I forget what the song was, but I know, there was something about lovers' meetings in it. As I reached the foot of the stairs I heard voices in the dining-room; one of them was rather high-pitched and hard, but it sounded pleasant enough as it said, "Well, St. Alleyne, you've beaten me this time, and I suppose I must give in, but it will take you long years to make me believe in your family."

And I concluded it was the voice of his lordship's cousin, Mrs. O'Callaghan.

TO KEEP THE DOGS DOWNSTAIRS.

Here is an interesting photograph of a pair of "dog gates" which may be seen at Slyfield Manor, near Leatherhead, in Surrey.

Slyfield Manor, Leatherhead, Surrey.]

These gates were very common in country houses in the days of Queen Elizabeth, but there are not many to be seen to-day. Dogs know how to behave now, and there is no need for them.

As their name implies, the gates were used to keep the dogs of the house from wandering upstairs into bedrooms and other places where they had no right.

But many people like to hear their dogs scratching at the door in the morning.

The gates shown in our photograph are in excellent condition. They were photographed by Mr. S. H. Wrightson, of Aldershot.

_Pictures by Mr. "Rip."_

_Words by M. Randall Roberts_

Why is it, in these days of up-to-date cricket reporting, no one has noticed the most striking characteristic of Ranjitsinhji's play? The pose of W. G. Grace's tip-tilted foot as he stands at the wicket, Abel's serio-comic expression as he cocks his eye and ambles from the pavilion, and Mr. Key's rotundity, are as familiar as Mr. Chamberlain's eye-glass even to the non-cricketing public; but the ballooning of Prince Ranjitsinhji's silk shirt has hitherto been allowed to lie in obscurity.

About the silk shirt itself there is no particular mystery; dozens of other cricketers wear one exactly like it; but none of these garments "balloon" with the same unvarying persistence as Ranji's. Whether half a gale is blowing on the Hove ground, or there is not enough wind to move the flag at Lord's, the Indian prince's cricket shirt always presents the appearance of the mainsail of a six-tonner on a breezy day in the Solent. Anyone can satisfy himself as to the truth of this assertion by glancing at the first illustration on page 213. The batsman's face is concealed by his arm, and his attitude in playing the ball is almost identical with that of hundreds of other cricketers. Yet there is no mistaking the player. It's Ranji as plainly as if his name was printed all over it; the curve in his shirt gives him away at once. Unkind critics, indeed, declared that the secret of his success in Australia was that, while the rest of Mr. Stoddart's team were panting for a breath of fresh air with the thermometer at 100° in the shade, some mysterious Indian deity was perpetually blowing on Ranji with a thousand cooling zephyrs. Nowadays, Ranjitsinhji's critics are becoming more sane; but when first he burst into splendour, many of his weird strokes were attributed to some supernatural agency. Ranji's most telling stroke, as every cricketer knows, is what is technically known as the "hook" stroke. Most fine batsmen are content to stop short straight balls on a fast wicket. Ranji is more ambitious. When he sees a ball of this kind coming, he stands directly in front of his wicket, and at the moment when the ball is apparently on the point of going through his body, he "hooks" it round to leg.

How hazardous this proceeding is may be gathered from the obvious fact that if the batsman fails to get his bat exactly in the proper place in exactly the proper fraction of a second, he will infallibly have to retire either with a fractured skull or "leg before wicket."

While the cricket scribes used to regard Ranjitsinhji's good fortune in escaping a violent end while playing this speciality of his as a supernatural gift, practical cricketers consider the stroke bad form. "That leg stroke of yours," said an old player to him in the pavilion at Lord's, "is all very well now and then, but it's not cricket; it's far too risky. If you miss the ball, you're bound to be out leg before." "Quite so," replied Ranji; "but one would be out pretty frequently, clean bowled, if one missed the ball--every time a straight ball came, in fact."

Ranjitsinhji's batting has been variously described as satanic, electric, and elusive. "Serpentine" would be far more accurate. Anyone in the least familiar with the famous Indian's style will at once see the point of the epithet.

The line of beauty, we all know, is a curve; and the real secret of the attractiveness of Ranji's batting (from the spectators' point of view) is that every position he assumes seems to be laid out in a curve.

In the illustration on page 215 "Rip" has but very slightly exaggerated the effect of the sinuous curves into which Ranji's body resolves itself before he makes a stroke. That he can unbend faster than any other cricketer past or present is an incontestable fact. The yarn of how in a match at Cambridge he once brought off a catch with such amazing rapidity that the batsman, under the impression that the ball had travelled near the boundary, continued running till Ranji extracted the ball from his pocket, is most likely apocryphal; but to anyone who has seen him fielding slip the feat ascribed to him won't seem impossible.

By the way, it's an odd thing that while Ranjitsinhji's batting owes its attractiveness to the "curves" of the batsman, an equally graceful player--to wit, the lengthy William Gunn--is built on uncompromisingly straight lines. Somebody said that if Gunn were to model his style on Ranji's the result would be a sea-serpent--six and a half feet of curves.

Briggs has so many attitudes and antics of his own that he can't be said to have any characteristic pose. In everything he does he's "Johnny." Briggs may be said to have just missed greatness by a lack of seriousness. According to George Giffen, if he had only taken batting more seriously Briggs would have been, after W. G. Grace, the second best all-round cricketer in England. There's a deadly earnestness about his bowling and fielding, but as a batsman he always seems more anxious to amuse the spectators than to improve his average. Like other famous men, Johnny Briggs may be often misunderstood, but at any rate this is the impression he creates. About six years ago, in the middle of the cricket season, Briggs appeared to have suddenly gone "stale," and the Lancashire Committee suggested to him that he should take a week's holiday. Briggs selected a remote village in Wiltshire; but, as luck would have it, the villagers were particularly keen cricketers, and when the news got about that the great Briggs was in their midst, the captain of the local team at once waited on him to ask what would be his terms for playing in a match against a neighbouring town.

"I asked," says Briggs, "what I thought were absolutely prohibitive terms, namely, £10; but the terms were accepted, so of course I had to play. My side lost the toss, and I had to begin the bowling. My first ball was hit out of the ground for six, and in a short time 100 went up with no wicket down. I suggested to the captain that he had better let someone else bowl, but he said that if he took me off, the spectators who kept pouring into the ground would want their money back, and would see that they got it, too. Finally, I had two wickets for about 120 runs. The crowd looked a trifle nasty, but what finished them was when I went in to bat and was bowled second ball.

"As I left the ground I heard, 'That's him. 'E's no blooming Briggs, 'e's a blooming fraud. Let's give him a jolly hiding.' Only the railway station and a couple of stalwart policemen saved me from the jolly good hiding, and I have never tried village cricket since."

A. G. Steel declares that the secret of Dr. Grace's phenomenal success against young batsmen is the terror inspired by the sight of his beard. Batsmen meeting the champion for the first time see an enormous man, with a great black beard waving in the breeze, rushing up to the wickets. They expect something quite different from the gently lobbed-up ball which this black-bearded giant delivers; before they can recover from the shock of surprise they find themselves clean bowled.

But W. G.'s beard does something more than frighten young cricketers. As Maurice Read says, "it talks to you." Other human beings wag their heads; Grace wags his beard when things are going wrong. It is even said that, with a team that knows him, he can indicate to the fieldsmen to change their positions by merely moving his beard.

There are dozens of persons all over the country who pose as cricket authorities on the strength of having once watched the champion practising at the nets. At a cricket match in a small Welsh town one of these gentlemen was acting as umpire, and could not agree with his fellow umpire as to whether a certain batsman was run out.

The argument waxed very fierce, until the umpire of the visiting team called out--

"What do you know about cricket? You 'aven't shook 'ands with Lord Hawke, 'ave yer?"

"No."

"Well, I 'ave," triumphantly declared the other, as the crowd dispersed.

And the batsman was declared out.

FAMOUS LONDON DOOR-KNOCKERS

What souvenir of a great man can compete with the knocker of his door? A door-knocker is to a man's house what a sign is to a shop or tavern; but it is also something more. Take, for instance, the knocker on the door of the official residence of the Prime Minister, No. 10, Downing Street. No less a person than Lord Beaconsfield once described to a friend this particular knocker as having a marked resemblance to the features of his political opponent, Mr. Gladstone. There is no knocker in existence, we may fairly state, that has been handled by so many distinguished people as this one. If only the friends of Mr. Gladstone were enumerated, they would make up a long list of illustrious names, and many Prime Ministers have resided at the unpretentious, old-fashioned mansion so conveniently situated for the Houses of Parliament.

The knocker on the door of Carlyle's house, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, a house which was occupied by him for half a century, is another very interesting specimen. Scarcely was the young ex-schoolmaster and author of "Sartor Resartus" well settled in his new abode than he began to receive callers, who, if not very famous then, have since achieved considerable renown.

Among them was young Mr. Charles Dickens, then the blushing "Boz," who, with Mrs. Dickens, stepped out of a gorgeous green hackney coach to administer a knock on the door, having driven all the way from Doughty Street, Brunswick Square, to pay a call. Forster, Serjeant Talfourd, Maclise, Macready, Landor, Leigh Hunt, and Thackeray were frequent knockers during the first decade.

It is not difficult to imagine some youthful admirer of Carlyle giving a timid knock at the door, and then wishing that he had the courage to run away from the house before being ushered into the presence of the irascible Philosopher. Mr. Alma Tadema's knocker is forbidding enough in appearance, and holds out but little promise of the beauties of that wonderful house where the artist resides in St. John's Wood. No doubt it is, like everything else about his home, from a design by the great painter himself.

The most beautiful knocker in this collection, if not the most beautiful in London, is that of the Duke of Devonshire, at No. 80, Piccadilly. It represents a head of classic contour set in a circular disc, chiselled with an exquisite border. Not a few among the Duke's guests have so far expressed their admiration of this work of art as to desire duplicates for themselves, but it is not known if any exist, it having been done by the Duke's own command from his own designs.

It is to be wished that the Duke would follow up his artistic success in this particular by designing a wall for Devonshire House to replace the existing hideous structure.

Dickens' door-knocker recalls the residence of the happy couple who removed to Doughty Street from Furnival's Inn shortly after their marriage. It was here that Charles Dickens the younger was born, and where the author of "Pickwick" first became on terms of friendship with many of the brilliant men of letters of his day. The knocker is held in its place by a fleur-de-lis of the same metal, and it was Serjeant Talfourd who humorously rallied Dickens on his supposed predilection for the French, who at that time were in the midst of preparing that series of more or less revolutionary movements which preceded the downfall of Louis Philippe and the ascendency of the third Napoleon.

But an older and more characteristic door-knocker may be found well within a mile of Doughty Street, still on the door of a house once inhabited by the great sage Dr. Samuel Johnson himself. Surely if any knocker is characteristic of its owner this one is. It represents a sturdy fist clenching a baton from which depends a bulky wreath of laurel fastened in the middle by a lion's head. The worthy doctor, as we are told by Boswell, carried no key, nor did he permit any member of his oddly-selected household to possess one. At all times and seasons the house in Bolt Court was inhabited, and unquestionably the burly knocker resounded in the ears of the inhabitants of the court often enough, and at unseemly hours, for the sage was not at all scrupulous as to what hours he kept, and many a time would talk irregularly on at the club until some of his neighbours had serious thoughts of rising.

The contemporaries of the great caricaturist George Cruikshank during a fruitful period of his life will gaze not without feelings of emotion on the accompanying representation of the familiar knocker on his house in the Hampstead Road.

It was Clarkson Stanfield who, calling upon his friend Cruikshank one day, had much ado in making the artist's aged servant aware that a visitor awaited at the portals; again and again he knocked, but in vain; the servant's deafness was proof against the onslaughts of a vigorous if not wholly artistic door implement. At last, losing all patience, he picked up the foot-scraper and was about to impetuously hammer away at the panels, when the caricaturist, hastily throwing up an upper window sash, recognised and appeased his indignant visitor.

"You should," remarked Stanfield, "get a younger servant, or a heavier knocker, or else build your house in Turkish fashion--that is, without doors."

In every article which deals with the curiosities of London, the name of Dickens must figure very largely. The last knocker of our collection is the most remarkable one of all, inasmuch as Dickens derived his idea of Scrooge in "A Christmas Carol" from its hideous lineaments. Look at our photograph and then read Dickens' own description of the unamiable Scrooge:

"Oh! but he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge; a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old Sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait.... He carried his own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas."

OUR MONTHLY GALLERY OF BEAUTIFUL AND INTERESTING PAINTINGS.

_From the Painting by Gabriel Ferrier._

_By Permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]

_From the Painting by W. Reynolds Stephens._

_By permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]

_From the Painting by A. T. Vernon._

_By permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]

_From the Painting by J. W. Godward._

[_By Permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]

_From the Painting by Arthur J. Elsley._

_By Permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]

_From the Painting by N. Sichel._

_By Permission of the Berlin Photographic Co., London, W._]