Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

And so the carpenter and the writer have gone, and the boy is going; but it seems so strange, their all asking to go at the same time, that I suspect that at least part of them had some untold reason for it, and, when I remind myself that it is now the last of August, that it is the time of the full moon, and that last night our Chinese neighbors were going about out of doors carrying bowls of boiled rice, and that in front of the houses in the street near by were little fires with those thin, filmy ash-flakes that remain from burned paper scattered about them, I feel sure that I have guessed the reason, and that it is a wish to celebrate at their own homes the Festival of Burning Clothes, and the Friendless Ghost’s Feast.

The Chinese think that persons after they are dead need the same things as when they are alive, and that if they are not supplied with them they can revenge themselves upon people in this world, bringing them ill-health or bad luck in business. This being the case, of course people try to keep the ghosts of their relations in as comfortable and quiet a state as they can.

If a father should die, his friends, while he remained unburied, would every day put a dish of rice and, perhaps, a basin of water, by his coffin, so that his ghost might eat and wash. Afterwards, they would at times carry food and drink to his grave, or place it before the wooden tablet, which, to honor him, would be set up in his house. To supply him with clothes and money, or anything else he might need, like a house, a boat or a chair, paper imitations of these things would be made and burned, after which it would be thought the ghost could make use of them. Fifteen days at this season of the year are considered the most lucky time for making these offerings. Large quantities of clothes and other paper articles are then sold, and there is a great burning of them all over the country.

Besides these well-to-do family ghosts, there is another class of whom people are dreadfully afraid. These are the spirits of very wicked men, and of childless persons who have left nobody behind them in this world to care for them. They are supposed to be wandering about in a most forlorn condition and to be able to do a great deal of mischief. To put them in good humor, and to induce them to keep out of the way of the living, a Feast is made for them every summer.

For several years past, this feast has been given in an open plot of ground just outside our yard and under our sitting-room windows, so that I have often seen it, though I am obliged to say I have never spied any ghosts coming to eat of it.

Every year the ceremonies are the same. Early in the day four tall poles are planted in the ground about a dozen feet apart, and so placed as to mark a square; about twenty feet from the ground a wooden floor is built between the poles. A few men who stand upon this platform direct everything. Usually, one or two of them seem to be priests; once, I recognized the leader as an expert juggler whose tricks I had witnessed only a short time before. A part of the Feast has been made ready beforehand and is at once arranged on the platform. At two corners are placed ornamented cones, six or eight feet high, which, I suppose, it is expected will appear to the ghosts to be solid cakes, but which are, in reality, only bamboo frames, thinly plastered over with a mixture of flour and sugar; besides these are green oranges, other fresh fruits, and articles of different kinds. Soon, offerings of food begin to come in from the neighborhood, and are drawn up by ropes to the platform; these are, mostly, baskets of boiled rice, and have a bit of wood holding a red paper stuck in the middle of the rice. I suppose the giver’s name is upon the paper, and after the Feast the baskets seem to be restored to the persons who brought them; the rice can then be taken away, and eaten at home.

At length, the platform is well laden with food, which remains exposed in the sun and wind for several hours, during which time a great noise is kept up with gongs and other musical instruments, partly, I suppose, like a dinner bell to call the ghosts, and partly to amuse the men and boys who gather in an interested crowd around the platform.

Late in the afternoon the head men begin to distribute the Feast. The baskets of food are carefully lowered; the cakes are broken up, and the pieces, with the oranges and other fruits, are flung hither and thither among the crowd, who scramble merrily after them, sometimes half a dozen rushing after the same fragment, and now and then a man trying to clamber up the poles to secure a portion before it falls. When the stage is cleared the crowd disperses, and the Ghosts’ Feast is ended.

In this region the people are very poor, but in a large and rich community this festivity would be kept with splendor even, and with much cost.

Last year, a part of the wooden frame-work fell, and one man was injured. I think this may make the old ground seem unlucky to the Chinese, and lead them to seek a new place for this year’s Feast.

Let us hope that they will do so, for to have a set of the most wicked and unhappy ghosts asked to dinner under one’s windows, is not, after all, so amusing as it is noisy and sadly foolish.

THE CHILDREN OF THE KOPPENBERG.

FROM Hanover to Hameln is a good twenty-five mile walk, with a mountain at the end: to go over which, however, shortens the journey by several miles.

In the case of Tom Osgood and Fred Taylor, who reached the foot of the mountain towards the close of what had been to them a long and weary day, the one—that is, Tom—concluded to go around the mountain, while Fred chose the shorter if rougher path over the top. Why the boys should have taken this long and tiresome tramp when a railroad runs the whole way in sight of the road which they travelled, or why they should not have walked to Hildesheim, or Minden, or Nienburg, or any other of the equally unattractive places within the same distance from Hanover, I am sure I do not know. If they had, though—and for that matter if one of them had not chosen to climb the Koppenberg rather than go around it—this story would most likely have never been written.

For my own part I am very glad they did it; and Fred Taylor as long as he lives will never cease to be glad that he was the one to take the mountain path, though with the pleasure—as indeed is the case with nearly all our best pleasures—there will always come a little sudden thrill of pain.

Why the mountain was called the Koppenberg does not concern this story at all. It is quite enough to know that it was a pretty tough mountain to climb and that before Fred was a quarter of the way up he began to be sorry he had not taken the longer route with Tom. It was too late now however to turn back; and besides unless he made good time Tom would beat him in the race, which considering the greater distance Tom had to travel would be humiliating in the extreme. So putting a little extra steam in his legs, and whistling a tune his quick ear had picked up on the way, he trudged on, up the steep road, through the terraced vineyards, past an old ruin here and a herdsman’s hut there, until finally the road lost itself in a path and went winding up into the woods which covered the mountain for more than half the distance from its top.

It was late in the afternoon; but in Hanover on the 26th of June the sun does not set until nearly half-past eight, so that Fred had no fear of being overtaken by the dark.

For some time Fred had not heard a sound but his own whistle. Indeed now that he was fairly in the solitude of the woods he did not expect to hear or meet any one, and he was accordingly startled when suddenly out of the deeper woods came a sound that seemed to be another whistle answering his own.

Fred stopped and listened.

Was it a whistle? or were they the notes of a flute?

At any rate it could be nothing dangerous. Highwaymen and banditti do not usually whistle or play musical instruments, and Fred felt that it would be perfectly safe to push on. As he drew nearer, the tones became louder and with them were mixed what were unmistakably the voices of children. Fred, with increasing curiosity, hastened his steps; and in another moment a sight that was as odd as it was pretty met his eyes.

Yes, they were children—as many as a hundred of them, Fred thought—funny little old-fashioned German children; the girls with long flaxen braids and dresses that might have been their grandmothers’, and the boys with garments so extraordinary that Fred, who thought he could never be astonished by what a German boy might have on, was fairly lost in surprise.

But more odd than all the rest was the musician himself—a tall, thin, smooth-faced man, with blue eyes and scanty hair and an astonishing cloak, half of yellow and half of red, that reached from his shoulders to his heels. He was playing, on what seemed to be a flageolet, a brisk enlivening tune, and was lightly beating time with his feet.

Fred looked on in amazement. “It must be a Sunday-school picnic,” he said to himself at last, “only I never heard of such a thing in Germany, and what a queer-looking man for a superintendent.”

If it were a Sunday-school picnic it was a very remarkable one. There were no grown-up people at all but the one man, and the children seemed to be having no end of a good time. There were two little girls, it is true, standing quietly and soberly not far from Fred, but all of the others were either dancing or playing some lively game.

Fred could not help wondering why the two were left out; and going up to them he asked in his politest manner and best German: “Why aren’t you dancing and why do you look so sad when everybody else is so happy?”

The little things looked up curiously. They were pretty, Fred thought, but not so pretty as another and older girl who came out of the crowd just then and overheard Fred’s question.

“They’ve been sad all day,” she answered in a pretty, motherly way; “their little brothers were left behind and they can’t enjoy it because their brothers aren’t enjoying it too.”

“Mine was lame,” said one of the little girls sadly.

“And mine was dumb,” said the other.

“Oh come!” said Fred, “you’d better go in and have a dance. It will be getting dark before long and you’ll have to go home and then you can tell your little brothers all about it.”

The little children seemed puzzled and a grave look came on the elder girl’s face.

“It is never dark,” she said. “It is always light here.”

It seemed indeed to be lighter than before. Where it had come from, Fred could not tell, but all the forest was lit up with a strange warm glow. There were beautiful flowers too growing at his feet and birds singing in the air that Fred had not noticed before.

“Won’t you come and dance?” the girl went on.

Fred was very fond of dancing, and it was hard to refrain, especially since the music was now fairly exhilarating; but he was very tired and had still before him a tedious climb. Under the circumstances he would rather rest himself by talking to this pretty sweet-voiced German girl—if she would only stay.

“Well, to tell the truth,” he said apologetically, “I’ve walked from Hanover to-day and I’m rather tired. But I’d like awfully to talk to you. Can’t you stay away from them for a few minutes? You aren’t a teacher, are you?”

“A teacher?” inquiringly.

“Yes. Isn’t it a Sunday-school?”

“I don’t think I understand.”

Fred thought his German must be at fault.

“Well, I don’t know,” he said, “‘_Sontags-schule_,’ that’s what they call it in New York. I’ve seen it on the German churches.”

“New York? what is that?”

Fred gazed in greater astonishment.

“Now you don’t mean to say you don’t know where New York is?”

The girl shook her head in a dreamy, abstracted way.

“I have heard of Hameln,” she said, “and Hanover, and Jerusalem where the Holy Sepulchre is. It was there the Count Rudolph went to war against the Turks. But he never came back. Do you know,” eagerly, “whether the Christians have taken Jerusalem?”

“My gracious!” exclaimed Fred below his breath, “it must be a lunatic asylum!” Then aloud: “Why there hasn’t been a war in Jerusalem for five hundred years—not since the crusades.”

She passed her hand across her forehead in a bewildered way.

“I don’t know,” she said, “it seems as though I had forgotten. Perhaps it’s because I don’t talk. I’m the eldest, and all the others dance and play games, and the _Piper_, he plays all the time and so I don’t have anybody to talk to at all.”

Fred was now quite confirmed in his new idea; and yet the girl was so pretty and gentle that he could not bear to think of her being out of her mind.

“Why don’t you go back,” he asked kindly, “if you’re unhappy? Was it Hameln you came from?”

She shook her head.

“It was so long ago,” she said, “I can’t recollect.”

“Well, it couldn’t have been much over fourteen years. I’m only fifteen myself. Perhaps I’d ought to have introduced myself. I’m Fred Taylor, of New York and I’m studying German at Hanover. It’s purer there, you know, than it is most anywhere else.”

Fred was uncertain how much she understood. Her own language, he had noticed, was very simple, and when he used an unaccustomed word her forehead would contract as though she could not follow him. Her next words, though, showed that she had understood his introduction.

“I am Gretchen Haffelfinger,” she said simply; “and you must not think I am not happy, because I am. The _Piper_ is very kind to us.”

“And do you live up here all the time?”

Her forehead contracted again.

“What is time?” she asked.

This was a problem that Fred wasn’t prepared to solve and he discreetly changed the form of his question.

“Do you live near here?”

The girl’s look turned toward a long glade in the forest, through which Fred fancied he could see a lofty castle with battlemented walls and windows that gleamed in the strange, rich glow.

“Is that the asylum?” he cried.

“I don’t think I understand,” wistfully.

What was there she did understand? Fred’s heart warmed compassionately toward the simple-minded child, while a sudden thought came into his head. Once back in her own place—if Hameln were her own place—might not the familiar scenes bring back her scattered wits? Of the difficulties in the way he did not think.

“Say, Gretchen!” he whispered, eagerly, “wouldn’t you like to go back with me to Hameln?”

A sudden light gleamed in the soft eyes and her breath came and went quickly as she moved a step nearer and looked beseechingly into his face. Fred will always insist that if they had started at that moment she would have gotten off. He reached forward, and for one instant her warm little hand lay in his. But before he could fairly grasp it, the _Piper_ had sounded one clear, sharp note; the fingers that he so nearly held drew themselves away; the blue eyes which had been fixed on his, turned with a troubled look to the _Piper_; the slight form moved back, at first a single step, then slowly retreated from Fred’s side, while the children, attracted by the same call, came running from all directions and formed in a double column behind their curiously dressed leader. In another moment the whole procession was in motion. Fred counted them mechanically as they filed by. Without Gretchen, who still delayed, or the _Piper_, there were just one hundred and twenty-nine.

What a weird intoxicating march it was! The children, for their part, laughed and sang; the _Piper_ played as though he, too, were insane; and even Fred could scarcely resist the impulse to join in. If he did not get away he felt that he should be carried off by the music in spite of himself. But he would make at least one more effort to save his little friend.

“Gretchen!” he cried, holding out his hands.

She smiled, half sadly, and shook her head.

“Gretchen!” he cried once more, “come!”

There was no answer. The music had suddenly stopped, the _Piper_ with the children had vanished; and, while Fred looked, the little maiden with the soft eyes and tender wistful smile faded out of his sight. The glow had gone, too, with the birds and the flowers; there was no longer any battlemented castle in the distance: it was the shade of the forest, and Fred was all alone.

* * * * *

Tom Osgood meanwhile had trudged his scarcely less weary way along the road around the foot of the mountain, and about seven o’clock had reached the city gate. Not that there was any gate—that had been gone for generations—but there was an old stone archway overgrown with ivy, in and out of which the birds fluttered and under which Tom had to walk to enter the city. Just before reaching it, he stopped for a moment and looked down into the river that flowed swiftly below the city walls. The sight struck a chord of recollection.

“What was it I used to read about this place?” he asked himself. “Seems to me it was in a piece I spoke once at school.”

He waited a minute, but memory made no response. Then picking up his satchel he pushed on into the town.

To his surprise, when he had reached the hotel where they had agreed to meet, Fred was not there nor had anything been heard of him. The _Portier_ assured Tom that the road was perfectly plain and nothing could have happened; but this did not altogether relieve him and it was with a good deal of anxiety, having ordered supper, that he sat down to wait. His suspense, however, did not last long. In fifteen minutes the door opened and Fred came in.

That something had happened, Tom guessed at once. There was a strange look of excitement on Fred’s face, and his step was more active, Tom thought, than a boy’s ought to be who had just walked over the Koppenberg.

“Feel my pulse, won’t you, Tom?” he cried nervously, throwing down his satchel, “and see if I’ve got a fever. Did I seem out of my head when I left you? Did I talk wild, Tom? Did you ever hear of insanity in my family? Really and truly, Tom, I don’t know whether I’m crazy or not.”

Tom was gazing at his friend in speechless astonishment.

“What in the world’s got into you?” he gasped.

“It didn’t get into me. I got into it; and it was a lunatic asylum as near as I could make out. Only the keeper looked like a clown in a circus and the rest were all children. I tried to get one of them away, Tom”—Fred’s voice broke a little—“but just then the whole thing vanished, just like people do in a dream, you know. I don’t know where she went. I could see the spot where she stood, but she wasn’t there—”

“Are you sure you weren’t dreaming?” interrupted Tom.

“Dreaming!” indignantly. “Do I generally dream in daylight? Would I stop to dream when I was in such a hurry to get here ahead of you? and besides, Tom, I can whistle the march the man played. Just listen.”

Fred was a good whistler and never had to hear a tune more than once to remember it perfectly. Now his excitement lent strength and clearness to his notes so that any one might have taken them for those of the _Piper_ himself. So loud and clear were they indeed that the _Portier_ was drawn by them from his desk, the _Ober-kellner_ from the dining-room, the Director from the office, and most of the guests from the reading and smoking rooms. In fact, before Fred was through he had quite an audience, most of whom, he noticed, had a puzzled, inquiring look on their faces as though something about the whistle or the tune were out of the way. What the look meant he did not have to wait long to find out.

“You whistle very well, sir,” the Director remarked, almost before Fred was fairly through; “but perhaps you are not aware that that tune is forbidden in Hameln.”

Fred was surprised, and a little frightened.

“Why,” he stammered, “I only learned it to-day.”

“Not from any one in Hameln?”

“No, I don’t suppose it was. He was on the other side of the mountain.”

The Director shook his head sagaciously.

“It is not allowed in Hameln,” he repeated; “I wouldn’t whistle it again if I were you.”

“But why not?” demanded Fred. “Why can’t a man whistle what he likes?”

“For the same reason,” gravely, “that it is forbidden to play music of any kind in the _Bungenstrasse_.”

Fred stared.

“What is the _Bungenstrasse_?” he asked; “and why may not one play in it?”

“Do not the young _herren_ know the story?”

The young _herren_ did not know the story, or if they did had forgotten it.

“Is there a story?” cried Tom. “Tell it to us, won’t you, Herr Director?”

The Director bowed gravely.

“Probably the young _herren_ will recall it, for one of their English poets has written about it. It happened nearly six hundred years ago that the town of Hameln was overrun with rats—”

That was enough. Tom had found his clue.

“Of course I’ve read it!” he cried. “That was what I’ve been trying to remember all day:

“‘Hamelin town’s in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover city;
The River Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its wall on the southern side’—

Don’t you recollect, Fred? They couldn’t get rid of them, and one day an old fellow came into town and offered to pipe them out for a thousand dollars or whatever it was, and they took him up. But when he had done it, and the rats were all drowned in the river, they wouldn’t stick to the bargain, and so he struck up his pipe again, and this time all the children followed him—why, what’s the matter, Fred?”

“The young gentleman is ill,” exclaimed the _Portier_, and would have rushed off for a doctor, had not Fred interfered.

“No! no!” impatiently, “I’m not sick, Tom; but don’t you see? Is it so?” turning to the Director, “Is that the story?”

The Director nodded. He was flattered by their interest, and besides nothing that an American did ever surprised him.

“Evidently the young gentleman has read it,” he said. “All the children in town followed him as far as the mountain side, and then, when their fathers and mothers thought they could go no further, the mountain opened and they were all swallowed up—all, that is, but one little boy who was dumb, and another who was lame. This was the street they went down. On the _Rattenfangerhauser_ opposite is a tablet commemorating the event; and ever since that time there has been no music played in the _Bungenstrasse_. Even if a bridal procession goes through the street the music must not play. And the tune which you were whistling was the tune the Piper played. It was scored at the time by the _Kapellmeister_, and every one in Hameln knows it, just as one knows the _Wacht am Rhein_; but no one may play it, or whistle it, or sing it on the streets. Of course, if the young gentleman had known it was forbidden he would not have whistled it.”

“Of course not,” said Fred, abstractedly. “Where is the house with the inscription on it? Can we see it?”

“Certainly,” said the Director. “It is not yet too dark. The house is yonder on the corner of the _Osterstrasse_.”

By this time Tom was burning with curiosity, and longing for a chance to speak with Fred alone.

“Come along,” he cried, “let’s go over to the old place and look at it.”

Fred was not unwilling, and tired and hungry though they were, both boys rushed out of the hall across the Platz. The hotel people interchanged smiles and shrugs, the _Ober-kellner_ went back to the dining-room, the _Portier_ to his desk, the Director to his office and the guests to their rooms. “Americans!” one said to the other, quite as though that dismissed the subject.

In the few minutes which it took to cross the square, Fred gave his friend all the particulars of the story which in his excitement he had not before supplied, and for lack of which Tom had not been able until now to obtain a clear idea of what had happened. “Then your idea is,” he said soberly, when Fred had finished, “that those were the children who were lost?”

Fred nodded gravely. “I suppose they must have been,” he said.

“And that the man was the Pied Piper of Hameln?”

Fred nodded as before. By this time they were in front of the house and had discovered the inscription, which was written in queer old characters, once gilded, but now so weather beaten as to be scarcely legible.

“What in the world does it say?” asked Tom.

Fred scanned it as closely as he could in the fading light.

“It’s hard to tell,” he said. “Part of it is Latin and part German; but it’s badly spelled, and there is some of it that must be Dutch. As near as I can make out it reads like this:

“_Anno 1284 am dage Johannis et Pauli war der 26 Junii dorch einen Piper mit allerei farve bekledet gewesen 130 Kinder verledet binnen Hameln gebon to Calvarie, bi den Koppen verloren!_”

“What gibberish!” Tom exclaimed. “Do you suppose you can translate it?”

Fred looked uncertain; but began word by word, as one construes a Latin lesson in school.

“_Anno_ 1284, in the year 1284, _am dage Johannis et Pauli_, on the day of St. John and St. Paul, _war der 26 Junii_, which was the 26th of June—this very day, Tom—a piper with _allerlei farve bekledet_—that must be parti-colored clothes—led 130 children born in Hameln by the Koppenberg to Calvary. That means to their death I suppose.”

Tom nodded, and for a minute the boys looked at one another without speaking.

“Well, what are you going to do about it?” asked Tom at length.

With another look at the tablet Fred turned towards the hotel.

“There’s nothing to be done about it,” he said. “I don’t think I had better tell anybody here.”

Tom deliberated a minute.

“No, I don’t think you had,” he said. “It happened five hundred and ninety-five years ago: there aren’t any of their relatives alive, and nobody would believe you anyhow. Besides, they seemed to be having a good time, didn’t they?”

Fred’s thoughtful gaze was turned down the street toward the mountain, where so many years ago the little feet had pattered to their grave.

But _was_ it to their grave?

He wondered if instead of dying they had not lived all that time, and whether any one else had ever seen them besides himself. He was so absorbed indeed that he did not hear Tom’s question until it was repeated.

“Oh, did you speak?” he asked. “Yes, I suppose they were. She said so.”

“Well, I’m glad of that. I always felt sorry for the poor little beggars and wondered if they got out of the other side of the hill. It’s a great relief, Fred, to think of their having a good time. The Piper couldn’t have been a bad sort of fellow. As it turned out, Fred, you might say as the little lame boy—it must have been his sister, by the way, you spoke to—did in the poem:

‘The music stopped and I stood still,
And found myself outside the hill,
Left alone against my will,
To go now limping as before,
And never hear of that country more.’”

Fred drew a long breath of relief as he brought his thoughts back from the mountain.

“Well,” he said, “I’m glad I know who they were. I couldn’t bear to think of their being lunatics. And if Gretchen and the two little girls had been as happy as all the rest, I should have thought—”

“What would you have thought?”

Fred hesitated an instant.

“That I was getting a little glimpse into heaven. But then, it couldn’t be that, you know.”

Tom shook his head wisely.

“Oh, no,” he said; “of course it couldn’t be that.”

A DAY AT THE BUTTS.

IT was the fourth day of August, more than a hundred years ago, and the whole road between London and the little village of Harrow was thronged with people. It was hot and dusty enough that summer morning, but nobody seemed to mind in the eager scramble for the best seats; and it was not long before the little green knoll, just at the west of the London road, seemed fairly alive with spectators.

It was a lovely spot—this well-known Butts of Harrow—with its crown of tall forest trees waving like so many banners, and its tiers of grassy seats terracing the slope. From time immemorial it had been the scene of annual contests in archery, and there was not a boy in Harrow School who did not look forward all the year to this fourth day of August.

When John Lyon founded the school it was made a condition of entrance, that every pupil should be furnished with the proper implements of archery; and among the school ordinances drawn up in the year 1592 there was one to the effect that every child should, at all times, be allowed bow-shafts, bow-strings, and a bracer.

No wonder the men of those days were tall, and straight, and strong!

But hark! The church clock down in the village is striking the appointed hour. A little figure, clad in red satin from head to foot, darts out from the thicket of trees below, and now a procession of twelve boys, some in white, some in red, and some in green satin, take their places in the open ring that has been left for the competitors. All the little archers have sashes and caps of bright-colored silk, and, looking down from the green knoll, the whole scene is a kaleidoscope of color.

A silver arrow—the victor’s prize—glitters temptingly in the sunlight; and a tall lad, who stands among the waiting twelve, bends eagerly forward to examine it.

“Just look at Percival!” whispers one little archer to his neighbor. “He’s bound to get that arrow, isn’t he?”

“Pooh! who cares for the arrow?” responds the other, disdainfully. “It’s nothing but a plaything, anyway! What I think about is winning the game, not the arrow!”

“Yes; but you see it’s different with Percival!” said the first speaker. “His three older brothers, three years in succession, won the arrows while they were here at the Harrow School, and the father says that Percival must win the fourth for the one empty corner in the drawing-room, or he shall be ashamed to call him his son!”

Just here the boys were interrupted in their talk, for the target was ready, and, at a signal, the contest began. At first, one shot after another fell quite outside the third circle that surrounded the bull’s-eye, then came a shaft that glanced just to one side of the inner circle; but at last, after many fruitless attempts, the bull’s-eye was fairly pierced, and the feat was greeted with a gay concert from the French horns.

Now, it so happened—at least this is one of the traditions of Harrow—that the name of this last boy was “Love,” and when his arrow touched the bulls-eye a number of his school-fellows shouted high above the horns:

“_Omnia vincit Amor!_”

“Not so!” said another boy who stood close by. “_Nos non cedamus Amori!_” And, carefully adjusting his shaft, he shot it into the bull’s-eye a whole inch nearer the centre than his rival.

But each boy among the twelve competitors must have his own trial shot twelve times repeated, before the final award can be given. Meanwhile a careful tally is kept, and not until the one hundred and forty-fourth arrow springs from its bow is the victor’s name announced:

“Thomas Reginald Percival.”

That first victory seems to have given a magic impulse to his bow, for all twelve of his arrows have pierced the charmed inner circle of the target; and now, at the head of an excited procession of boys, he is borne triumphantly from the Butts to the village. One little fellow in white satin runs far ahead, waving the silver arrow with many flourishes; and, when the school-buildings of Harrow are reached, a grand reception is given to all the neighboring country-folk.

Young Percival, with bright eyes and flushed cheeks, is the hero of the evening. There are games and dancing, and all sorts of merry-making until the “wee sma” hours, but the victorious boy can think of nothing save the coveted arrow he has won. That empty corner no longer troubles his excited brain.

He has ably vindicated his right to the old family name, and henceforward, the father can point with pride to four trophies, won by his four sons at the famous Butts of Harrow.

That was in 1766. In 1771 the annual shootings at Harrow were abolished; for Dr. Heath, who was then head-master of the school, thought they interfered with the boys’ studies. The silver arrow prepared for the following year, 1772, was never used, but is still preserved at Harrow as a relic of the past. In the school-library may be seen one of the archer’s elaborate suits, which is nearly a hundred years old; and the fourth of August, though no longer an exciting day at the Butts, is still kept as a holiday at Harrow School, and commemorated with appropriate speeches.

TINY FEET OF CHINESE LADIES.

JUST imagine the foot of a full grown lady but five inches in length! Yet even this is large, and in highly aristocratic families four inches is the standard.

This queer custom of compressing the feet of Chinese girls is of very ancient date, and in our day is almost universal—only nuns, slaves, boat-women, and others who are obliged to perform out-door drudgery, being exempt. As to the origin of the custom, the Chinese themselves are not agreed. Many suppose that it is a fashion intended to draw a line between the higher and lower classes. Others say that its object was to keep _ladies_ within doors, where they would not be subjected, like common market or boat-women, to the gaze of the other sex; and some boldly declare that to cripple them was known to be the only way by which women could be kept at home, and rendered of use working for their husbands or fathers, instead of spending their time in gadding and gossip. Some of the most reliable native historians state that the custom began during the reign of Take, somewhere about the year 1123, with a whim of the last Empress of the Shang dynasty.

The time for putting on the first bandages varies in different families. In some, the process is commenced when the baby is only a few weeks old, others defer the ceremony for a year or two but all begin before the little one has reached the age of four years.

No iron or wooden shoe is used, as some travelers have stated; but a strip of cotton cloth, some three inches wide, and about six feet long, is wound around the toes, over the instep, and then behind the heel, after which it is brought back again over the foot and drawn so tightly around the toes as to press them into a point—all except the first and second having been previously doubled under the sole.

These bandages are never removed, except for purposes of cleanliness, perhaps once a month; and they are replaced as quickly as possible, each time being drawn tighter, until the instep bends into a bow and the ball of the foot is forced against the heel.

The stockings are made of white cotton or silk. The dainty little shoes are of silk, richly embroidered and often beautifully adorned with tiny pearls or rubies. The soles are of white satin, quilted, and stiffened with a lining of pasteboard. The heels are very high and pointed, and the white satin that entirely covers them, as well as the upturned toes, presents a pretty contrast to the blue or crimson silk uppers.

White satin seems to us an odd material for shoe soles; but they are intended only for carpeted floors.

When one of these tiny satin-soled slippers is cast off as “worn out,” it has probably never for a single time come in contact with _terra firma_; and probably the wearer, when robed in the white slippers for her last sleep, has not from her infancy had one gleeful romp out-doors.

This compression produces, during all the years of childhood, the most excruciating pain, followed at length by a sort of numbness. I never saw one of these compressed feet entirely without covering, but I saw enough when the outer bandages had been removed to excite both pity and disgust; and a lady who had seen the bare foot of one of their greatest belles told me that she had never even conceived of a spectacle so shockingly revolting as this tiny foot when divested of all that could hide its deformity. Although the young lady was full grown, the sole of her foot was but three and three-quarters inches in length. The great toe formed a point that was bent upwards and backwards, while the heel, of natural size, seemed by contrast disproportionately large.

Chinese ladies of rank are seldom seen abroad unless in closely curtained Sedan-chairs; but we used occasionally to meet those of the middle class making short excursions in the immediate vicinity of their homes. Their attempts at walking were pitiable in the extreme, as they hobbled along, leaning on an umbrella, or the shoulder of a servant, for support, or with hands outstretched against the houses as they passed, endeavoring to keep their balance.

SHETLAND PONIES.

FAR north from Scotland, and but seldom visited by southern travelers are the Shetland Islands. From these rock-bound, treeless islands come the Shetland ponies that we so often see at the circus, or pulling little phaetons patiently along. A Shetland pony is almost a child’s first desire, unless, perhaps, it may be to own a monkey. To have a pony to ride, or to drive, and especially a _real_ Shetland, long-haired, short-legged pony is a dream of perfect happiness, indeed.

But have the readers of this little sketch ever thought about the home of these ponies? If you never have, then take a map of the British Isles, and in the far North you will see the small group of islands called the Shetlands, and from there the first ponies came; and to-day they are raised there in great numbers.

Shetland is a very different country than many see. There are no green fields and trees, and the children living there hardly believe it when you tell them that in England or Scotland there are green lanes, and that birds build nests among green leaves. All the birds they see, hover about the great, rocky cliffs, and build nests in the crevices of rocks, perhaps a thousand feet above the sea. All their fields are covered with black peat or brown heather; and instead of houses of wood to live in, they only have huts made of stone with a roof of straw, mud and refuse wood. In some of the houses there are no windows, only one room, and a low door. Then there is no chimney to let the smoke out, but only a small hole in the roof. Of course these huts are for the very poor people living out among the hills of Shetland, and away from the coast. But near the sea, on the shores of some secluded bay, are quite good towns, such as Lerwick and Scolloway. These towns have little stone houses with very pointed roofs and deep-set windows, that almost seem to rest in the water itself, they are built so near it. Then the streets are very narrow, and have been paved with great stones. You can almost touch either side of the street it is so narrow.

Now the people of the Shetland Islands are very quiet, orderly and industrious. They live by many means. Some of them have shops in the towns, where they sell groceries, and dress-goods and cured meats. Others live by catching fish to send south. Some let themselves down by ropes over the edge of a great high cliff, and gather the eggs of birds. Then the women knit shawls and hoods and veils and socks, and so gain a few pennies to buy food with. But there is yet another class of people who have to make a living, and this class raise ponies and sheep, to send to England and even to America. And before we speak or describe carefully the making of shawls and gathering of eggs, we will imagine ourselves in the town of Lerwick and all ready for a start to Noss Island, where a man lives who has a large herd of real Shetland ponies.

I remember the morning perfectly. The bay was all dotted with the white sails of the fishing boats. The town was all awake carrying dried fish to the boats at anchor, and on the corners of the streets were gathered women and young girls selling potatoes they had just brought in from the distant field. We took a row boat, and rowed across Bressay Sound to Bressay Island, and then walking across it, and after looking back at the town and out at sea, we came to a small strait, and had to hire another boat to take us across the water to Noss Island. This island is not very large, but has more green grass than any other of the Shetland group. One end of it almost buries itself in the sea, and then it gradually rises higher and higher, until the opposite end rises a thousand feet right up from the sea. There is only one house on the island, and in that lives the keeper of the ponies and his two children. I wish you could have seen these children when they saw us coming in the boat. They hardly ever leave the island themselves, and so when any strangers come to see their ponies, how happy it makes them! They were very pretty and bright children, too. They had light hair and bright blue eyes, and cheeks as red as roses. Running down with them, was their pet dog, who seemed just as glad as any of the rest to see strangers. The house the man lived in was very lonely-looking to us. It was built of stone, and then painted white, and stood on a little knoll overlooking the blue waters of the cold North Sea.

After a short rest we walked out to explore the island and see the ponies. Here was their home and we should see them here in their real life. As we walked along, we came to a part of the island where it was rather sandy, and there found such a nest of rabbits. We almost stumbled into their holes, there were so many of them when we came upon them. There must have been fully a hundred nibbling the short grass, or standing up to see who was coming to disturb them. The keeper said they were a great nuisance to the island, they undermined it so.

But a sight that interested us more than that of the rabbits was the great herd of ponies we saw before us.

There must have been fully two hundred of the shaggy-maned little fellows. Some were eating, some biting one another, some running as though having a race, and others stood still looking at us. When we came nearer the whole herd pricked up their ears, gave little snorts of anger, and galloped away as fast as their short legs could carry them.

The keeper told us that when one wishes a pony, to ride or sell, he must take the one he keeps near his house, mount him, and then riding out to the herd, lassoo one at a time until you obtain all you wish. In winter the ponies of Noss Island have rather a hard time of it. Though there is not much snow on the island, still the winds often blow very fiercely, and poor pony has no warm barn to go to. Sometimes the keeper builds a wall about a square piece of ground, and pony can go into the enclosure and so be somewhat sheltered. But usually he must face the wind and storm, no matter what the weather.

Among the ponies we saw on our visit, were some little wee fellows, hardly larger than Newfoundland dogs. When we saw them scampering about so free from care, we couldn’t help wondering how long it would be before they would be carrying some little lady up and down Rotten Row, or about New York Central Park. The case is not unlikely, for a great many of them each year are sent away from their island home to England.

But a pony in the Shetland Islands, even, has often hard work to perform. If a poor person is possessed of a pony, then, indeed, he feels rich. Now on certain days in the week, there are market days at Lerwick. From all about come the people bringing things to sell. Some walk to the town, some sail, and others come riding on their ponies. Just inside of Lerwick is a narrow path leading over the hills. I have often seen, coming along this narrow way, a long line of ponies and women. And such a curious appearance they present! The ponies seem only legs. They have no bridle, only a cord about the neck, and each follows the one in front. You can’t make them go at the side of one another. On either side of each one are two immense saddle-bags filled with peat, or potatoes; on his back are piled other goods, and even his neck has a cloth or other saddle-bags strapped, so that seen from a short distance it seems just as though the bags had legs, and poor pony seems buried out of sight. Sometimes, too, if there is room to keep seated, his mistress, with shoeless feet, and short dress and white cap, seats herself in great state, and away goes pony, bags and woman, off to Lerwick. Sometimes, when on these pilgrimages, pony will watch his chance, and if his mistress should be absent, will dart away down the steep hill-side, to nibble a bite of something good he has seen; and then when the mistress sees him such a pounding as pony gets as she leads him back to his proper place! But he only looks meek and will no doubt do the same thing again when he gets the chance.

Shetland ponies are very sure-footed. They will walk along the very edge of a high cliff, and before putting a foot down will carefully feel if the ground is firm or not. Some of them are driven by their riders down steep passes where one misstep would send both rider and pony down to the depths below. Ponies of Shetland, too, are not always very well behaved. Near our cottage was an old lady’s garden, filled with cabbages. One day her pony walked into it, and enjoyed himself feasting on forbidden fruit. We never asked him, but should imagine the beating he received when discovered would help him to digest his stolen dinner. Then a Shetland pony on his native heath is extremely wilful. If they dislike a rider they will spare no pains to unseat him. I rode one once who expended a great deal of unnecessary strength in this manner. He would sit down suddenly and rise up more so. He would bite, shake himself and roll over, if allowed. As he was almost small enough to be carried by his rider, these antics were more amusing than dangerous.

And so the ponies of the Shetland Islands live and wait for masters in the South. In the cold winter of fog and rain, when there is almost no day, or in the summer time, when the sun does not set, they run wild about the Noss, take burdens to Lerwick, or carry the stranger over the bogs and dreary hills.

MR. SWEET POTATOES.

OUR milkman has a very odd name,—translated into English it is “Sweet Potatoes.” His Chinese neighbors call him “Old Father Sweet Potatoes.”

Some persons think him a good man; others say that he is a very bad one. Just how that is I do not know—his business brings him great temptation.

He is accused of putting water into the milk. He himself says, that he only does it when he has not enough milk to supply all his customers; then he does not know what else he _can_ do. When we engaged him to bring milk to us we took him into our yard and showed him that we had a well of our own.

The Chinese in their own country do not make any use of milk or butter. They have a perfect horror of cheese, and in this part of China, perhaps, not more than one man in a hundred will taste of beef. Only a few cows and bullocks are kept, and these are needed to plough the fields and turn the rude machinery of the sugar mills.

I suppose “Father Sweet Potatoes” had never thought of such a thing as owning a cow, until foreign ships began to come to his part of the country. Of course the ships brought foreign men and women, and these all wanted beef to eat—sometimes the Chinese, wishing to speak contemptuously of them, would call them “beef-eating foreigners,”—and they also wanted milk for their cooking and for their children.

So Mr. Sweet Potatoes bought some cows, hoping to make some money in the milk business. They all had long ropes laced about their horns or threaded through their noses, and he got some little children to hold the ropes and guide the cows in search of food; for there are no grass fields in this part of the country, and all the pastures the cows have are the little green places on the rocky hills and the grassy patches along the brooks; and the children sit by and watch them while they graze, for there are no fences, and, left to themselves, the cows might stray into the rice fields or wander away into places where they would be stolen.

Strange to say, we have our best milk when the winter has almost killed the grass, or when the weather is too stormy for the cows to go out; for then they are fed with the tops of pea-nut plants, either green, or dried like hay, and up for sale in great bundles. This is delicious food for the cows, and when they have it then we have good milk indeed, with a thick, white cream upon it.

Sometimes they have cut grass to eat, which has been brought from steep places on the hills to which the cows cannot go. Very poor boys go out with baskets and knives to gather this grass, and are paid only three or four cents for the work of a day.

Mr. Sweet Potatoes has two kinds of cows. Some of them are the native humpback cows, of very small size, very gentle; sometimes red and sometimes brown, with hair that is smooth and glossy quite down to the tiny little hoofs, which look far smaller and cleaner than do the feet of cows in colder climates where they walk out in snow and stand in frosty barns.