JAMES'S DANISH BRIDE.

CHAPTER I.

ON a wet, cold, dismal afternoon in the December of 1850, I prepared to leave Dublin for my home in a southern county, and reached the terminus at King's Bridge in good time for the evening south-western mail train, by which I purposed to travel. I was alone, and on arriving at the platform looked about for the guard of my train in order to discover if it was a man, of whom, in my many journeys, without the lady-like advantage of an escort, I had made a special friend. My journeys were sometimes made by night, and this guard had often been of great use to me; he frequently secured for me the accommodation of a carriage "all to myself," and always on arriving at my destination he called me a cab, and ordered me the attendance of a porter much more quickly than I could have obtained either convenience by my own exertions. It was a small thing to rely on as a probable benefit in case of accident; but in committing myself to the danger of steam and iron roads, I regarded the acquaintanceship of this functionary in the light of a safe-guard. There is no accounting for one's sensations, and I am not at all a strong-minded woman, and have a horror of tunnels, engines' screams, and all other railway vicissitudes. To my great satisfaction, on the evening in question, the right man was in office. He was as attentive as usual, placed my luggage where it could be easily found, and selected my own seat with care. While I awaited the starting of the train, I walked up and down the gloomy platform, and tried to get thoroughly warm before entering the carriage. I was not long occupied in this way, when the guard interrupted me and said —

      "Pray, madam, do you speak foreign lingos? There are two women in a hobble about their baggage, will you try to make them understand us?"

      I have some knowledge of tongues, so I expressed my readiness to be of use in the case; and for this purpose proceeded with him to join a group, which was evidently engaged in a very serious controversy. Two odd-looking women were standing in the midst of a quantity of luggage. The packages were numerous, large, and weighty; the owners evidently considered them "portable property," and the officials were decidedly of a different opinion.

      "It takes two of us to rise any one of 'em, sir," said a porter to the station master, "and sure, when we weighed 'em they were a ton and ten stone wantin' an ounce; they're stones, or corpses, or somethin' onnatural, I'll be bound, and these women wants to schame 'em on us."

      The superior officer did not deign any reply to these volunteered remarks, but addressed himself very politely to the refractory travellers. Speech he had already found a failure, so he tried print, and handed them the company's rule to read by which the tariff of goods' carriage was fixed. A non-comprehending air still sat on the features of the feminine party; English letters were not the medium through which their intelligence could be reached. The railway staff, master and men, were puzzled how to deal with them; but after the manner of Irish nature would not pretend to be disconcerted, and carried on the one-sided conversation continuously. Every one had something to say on the subject, and most amusing and original comments were called forth on foreigners and their ways. While I listened to these I scanned the enemy, The affair had a belligerent aspect, and the assailed were standing their ground most womanfully. I began to consider to what nation they belonged, and how I could manage to communicate with them. I was retained on the part of the porters (plaintiffs), and had to study the position of the opposite party (defendants), in the action that was taking place. My eyes perceived at a glance that the latter were not "Indies" in our conventional use of the term. There was a certain inelegance in the form of their garments, and in the set of their drapery, that betokened a want of refinement, and an absence of cultivated taste; and though their clothing was by no means poor, its indications were not those of education and of social superiority. "Servants, probably, travelling with their employer's luggage," I thought. I rather pitied their predicament; but as it was very likely that it had occurred through their own neglect, or that somebody else's mismanagement was blamable for its occurrence, I resolved to try to make them sensible that there was culpability in the case, and to give them a lesson on the subject of the imperial nature of railway authority. This was, however, easier to intend than to perform.

      The eldest of my opponents was a tall, high shouldered, bony woman, with prominent features, which were rather canine in their development. She reminded me of a fleshless greyhound of an inquisitive disposition. All through the business she had been poking among the boxes, peering at the porters, and was now sniffing at me, with an action of the nostrils that was very intelligible in the case of the animal she resembled. In youth she had been auburn or sandy coloured; but from a mixture of grey was now decidedly tortoiseshell, and quite the complexion to be regarded by the superstitious as "unlucky to meet the first thing in the morning."

      Strange that any complexion should go out of fashion, yet, in the case of this peculiar one, it is the fact. Specimens of it are, at present, rare, in comparison to the numbers that appeared in the last generation; their occurrence in this is chiefly confined to the rural population to which social division the owner of it before me evidently belonged. Surmounting her unprepossessing face was a close cap very like the big muslin borders worn by widows, and over this topped a huge, black silk bonnet, of an outlandish shape. A tidy shawl of black cloth fell just below the angular elbows of the figure, and the hands were encased in a muff of bluish fur powdered with white. This latter article resembled one made of the skin of the Greenland fox that I had brought from Norway, and it suggested my trying the effect of a few words of Norse, that I had acquired in my travels, on the wearer of it. They elicited no reply, and believing in the power of old Vaterland to solve North European lingual difficulties, I addressed my foe in German. Assuming that there was no necessity for the common introductory question —

      "Sprechen sie Deutsch?" I went on to announce to her the fact, in that language, that she was chargeable with a certain sum for her baggage, over and above the price of her passenger ticket.

      She looked me full in the face, answered not a word, but turned round and spoke to her companion. This was a short, stout person, fat, fair, and twenty years old, I estimated. Her appearance was a contrast to that of her friend; she was soft and agreeable looking; she wore a large woollen cloak with a top cape, such as we used to see commonly thirty winters ago, having a tight piece set in at the neck, with a square collar spreading its corners out on each shoulder. Her face, with its thick regular features, had a calm smile, and her light blue eyes betrayed a disposition which the word "faithful" might be used to convey. I should trust her, and she would return the confidence, if we could but speak to each other; we had a pleasant tacit understanding, which bid fair to put an end to the dilemma. One thing that prepossessed me in her favour was the fact, that she had an ordinary fashionable bonnet on her head, recently purchased, I quickly guessed, for the purpose of endeavouring to make herself as like other people as possible — a most estimable act in my opinion. I formed this conclusion from the fact that she carried in her hand an extraordinary piece of clothing which pretended to be head gear of some sort, but was neither cap, hat, nor bonnet, and, therefore, was properly discarded by a reasonable woman as soon as she came within the circle of our modern British conveniences. The rest of the habiliments of "my friend," as she had become, were in the antique style of her companion; they had both short petticoats, a very small amount of crinoline, but remarkably stiff and offensive in its texture, setting out with the decided air assumed by the "buy-a-brooms" that frequented this country in the days of "Lieber Augustin." Both women Were well decorated on the feet, their fur-top-boots had gilt buttons down the front, and some sort of metallic finishing at the heel that caused their steps to be accompanied by the ring that introduced the polka to English society.

      The words which the delinquents exchanged had a familiar sound to my ears, though they did not belong to any dialect that I could speak; and in their resemblance to the sentence "thirty thousand thieves and thistles," I recognized the language of Denmark. Without exactly understanding their conversation, I knew they were talking of what I had told them. My sympathies were all with my clients; I felt persuaded that the foreigners were wilfully stupid, and I was inclined to agree with an opinion of the porters that their ignorance was feigned — assumed from some sinister motive; so, again, I gave them the unwelcome information that I had recently delivered, and I bestowed it in the same words, but in quite a different tone. I raised my voice as we do to the dumb, and still they heard me in silence; at this, I was provoked into perseverance, and I repeated my words, the third time louder and more emphatically than before, and I accompanied them with such signs as the deaf and dumb require. I was proud of my scholarship, my German pronunciation had always been considered good, and my declensions and syntax irreproachable, so I was determined that my other fellow-travellers should acknowledge my powers, if those for whom I used them remained insensible. A good many persons gathered round us, and began to take an interest in the matter, though evidently there was none that could help. During my final attempt, I perceived that the younger woman understood me perfectly, and this was observable to bystanders, one of whom remarked, with the air of a detective —

      "They can't keep it up much longer, the humbugs and rogues; you're into 'em, ma'am, they know as well as you do yourself what you're saying, only they want to cheat and to escape paying honestly, but the young one will soon split on the trick."

      This sentiment seemed to be unanimously adopted, and I was exhorted to go on and bring them to reason. The scene became irresistibly comic; I could not help smiling when I recommenced the prosecution of my object, and conjured the pleasant-faced girl to explain herself. She nodded assentingly, and spoke to her senior. The latter drew a long leather purse from some hiding-place near her heart, and gave it to the young one; she, in turn, held it for a moment, and then, with a frank, confiding air, handed it to me, telling me, in a sort of Platt Deutsch, to examine their money, and adding a respectful "bitte," and a curtsey, which, though ungraceful, was such an act of homage that I was quite propitiated.

      One end of the purse contained a number of silver coins, and the other several gold ones; all were Danish, and though I had seen some of them before, I had no accurate knowledge of their value. While I was looking at them, a pocket-book was produced from the same receptacle that had contained the purse, and a letter was taken out of it by the older woman which, apparently emboldened by the example of her junior, she timorously put into my hand. The act was one I appreciated greatly; it denoted a struggle with caution, an examination of me and a decision in my favour, which was highly complimentary. I opened the envelope of the inclosure, which I found was a banker's draft for a large sum of money, made payable to Mrs. Catherina James, at the branch of the Provincial Bank of Ireland in the town near which I lived, and with every person connected with which I believed myself to be acquainted, I now turned to the address on the boxes, and I saw that they too were all marked, "Mrs. Catherina James, Post-office, Bally—, Co. —, Ireland."

      It was well known to me that this post-office was a huckster's shop, kept by a poor widow, Mrs. Macarthy, and my surprise at her importation from abroad was excessive. "Could these be relatives coming to endow her with a fortune, for rich they seemed to be?" I questioned within myself. "Had she all along had these people as a resource, while she was exciting our sympathies on account of her desolation and her efforts to maintain her children?" My curiosity was excited to the highest pitch, and I should have required its gratification there and then, but that the guard admonished, "Time's up, ladies;" and the porters inquired, "what we had made up our minds to do?"

      Here, then, lawyer-like, I changed sides — went over altogether to the foreigners! Now, felt I, their affairs are committed to me, and it is my duty to administer them versus the porters. The case was before me concisely; it was very simple, the poor women had no current coin of our realm, and did not know how to state their difficulty. There was no time for deliberation, and but one way to help them, which was, paying the charge on their baggage; this I did, and had it and them safely deposited in the train. Their tickets were second-class, and mine being first, here, by rule, they and I should have parted; but such an arrangement would not have suited me, I could not afford to lose sight of them in that manner, I had my money to make sure of, and my curiosity to gratify, so I seated myself with them, and prepared to secure myself in both respects.

      Notwithstanding the obstacles to our free interchange of words, we had not gone very far on our journey, before I discovered that my companions believed "Post-office, Bally—, Co. —, Ireland," to be the abode of a Mr. James, and that they had never heard of my friend Mrs. Macarthy. They told me they came from Copenhagen, and were bound to the address written in full on their luggage. I learned that the young person was the wife of the said Mr. James, that she was going to join him, and that her companion was an aunt, who had come with her en chaperone, to see her safely reunited to her husband.

      This story was very problematical to me. I knew of no person in the whole district possessing the surname of "James." The matter had a mystery connected with it. I immediately imagined that our post-office was a rendezvous appointed by an individual acting incognito. Of course, I should be more (or less?) than woman, if I did not desire to penetrate further into this business. I did, and I actively pursued my wishes. In my homeward drive, I should pass the trysting-place, so I offered seats in my carriage to the travellers, and recommended them to leave their cumbrous baggage at the station, until they had found Mr. James's quarters. When we drew up at Mrs. Macarthy's door, the little shop was closed for the night, and with it the post-office; the rights of the public to require any duty from it, beyond the reception of letters, being for the time suspended. The exigency of the present case, however, rendered it necessary that we should demand something more than the silent service offered by the open box of this institution, so we knocked at the usual aperture, through which information connected with the vulgar medium was generally granted.

      In reply to our summons, Mrs. Macarthy came out and graciously replied to the questions I put to her on behalf of my fellow-passengers.

      "Did she know any person of the name of Mr. James?"

      "No."

      "Were there any letters or messages for Mrs. James?"

      "Nothing of the kind."

      "Had she ever noticed letters for a Mr. James, marked, Poste restante, passing through her hands?"

      "Yes, frequently."

      "Had she any objection to tell who received them?"

      "Well, she supposed it was no great breach of confidence if she did let me know the destination of the letters, although it was contrary to the rules of the postal service to give information connected with the business of the office; but then, I was a respectable person, and had probably some good reason for the inquiry, and she would waive official regulations in my favour, and let me know that a servant-man from Bogwater Castle had always called for them."

      "Did she know the servant-man's name?"

      "Thought it was Buckley; believed he was discharged about a month ago, by Lord Bogwater, and that he had got a situation in a neighbouring district."

      I told all this to my companions. They could not apparently take it into their minds, and seemed to be examining the piece of news as an abstract curiosity, which could not by any possibility belong to them, and fell back into the manner they had had under the railway opposition. Not a word passed between them, they simply looked into each other's faces and seemed utterly solidified. I commenced a vigorous appeal to their sensations, and it was some time before I excited even a monosyllabic answer to my remarks. They were knocked up and perfectly unable to proceed a step without my assistance. As helpless as babes, and as completely at my mercy, they abandoned themselves entirely to my discretion. The hotel of our town was just opposite the post-office; I made them both alight, and without the least reference to their intelligence, I directed them to remain under the care of its excellent landlord, Mr. Sullivan, until next day, when I undertook to come to them and make further effort on their behalf; they obeyed, me in sullen silence, and I left them seated in speechless dismay, when I returned to my carriage accompanied by Mr. Sullivan, who stood at the door while he and I had a short consultation over the affair. We surmised that Mr. James was a "gallant, gay deceiver," and that some of our neighbours would be presently implicated in an unpleasant transaction.

CHAPTER II.

EARLY next morning I put myself at the service of the foreigners, and found they had scarcely recovered their senses, the stun and shock they had received was so great.

      It was quite clear that, without my aid, they could not stir a step, and they could not choose but commit the whole affair to my discretion. I decided that the first thing to be done was to hunt up Buckley, who had been the receiver of the letters directed to "Mr. James." There was no great difficulty in this. On leaving Bogwater Castle he had been hired by a gentleman who lived about thirty miles off; and though the journey was formidable, and I was by no means without other engagements, I prepared to accompany the now thoroughly miserable women to this gentleman's house, with the determination of confronting Buckley and compelling him to solve our questions as to the identity and whereabouts of Catherina's husband, for on both those points, now, she and her aunt entertained some reasonable doubts.

      A long weary drive brought us to our destination; the house door at which we applied was opened by a man-servant in gorgeous livery, and a somewhat disrespectful manner, our appearance being rather humble and submissive, and not at all that to which he was in the habit of paying deference. I immediately perceived that it would not serve our purpose to maintain an inferiority of position, for that this was Buckley I had no doubt, and I felt sure that the way to deal with him was to assert my dignity.

      "Are either Mr. or Mrs. Hudson at home?" I asked, at the same time opening my card-case and giving him a ticket, by which to announce me to his employer.

      "They're out, ma'am," he said, with a little more respect in his manner.

      "Then is your name Buckley?"

      "Yes," he made no difficulty in replying.

      "We want you to give us some information about Mr. James," I Went on to say, as if it was a mere matter of ordinary importance, and a thing of course that he should be expected to be prepared to do so.

      A smile came over his countenance that seemed to say, "What a fool you take me for!" but his words simply were, "Oh, with all pleasure in life, ladies, walk in and be seated, if you please."

      So saying, he ushered us into the dining-room of the mansion, placed chairs for us, and stood awaiting our next demand. His manner was too complying to be natural. My knowledge of the class of persons to which he belonged warned me that he was determined to baffle us, and predisposed not to believe a word he said, I commenced a series of interrogations.

      Q. — Had he received letters addressed to "Mr. James " at the Bally— post-office?

      A. — Yes.

      Q. — Were they from Denmark?

      A. — Some.

      Q. — Were they not all?

      A. — Well, may-be so.

      Q. — From Copenhagen?

      A. — Of course, where else?

      Q. — Do you not know where they came from?

      A. — Perfectly well, I tell you.

      Q. — Then you are sure they were from Copenhagen?

      A. — Sure as you are.

      Q. — Well, will you now tell us who they were for?

      A. — To be sure I will, I am telling you all along, they were for the person that got 'em, and that's myself.

      Q. — Only as an agent for some person else, doubtless your employer, whoever he was?

      A. — Is it for my master, Lord Bogwater? No, faith, not one of them!

      Q. — Who then were they for?

      A. — I; myself, and for nobody else; what I would part 'em for? They were for me and I got 'em and what more about 'em?

      Q. — Who were they from?

      A. — Why, then, what should I tell you that for? you'd soon have it all out of me.

      Q. — That is what we want; tell us who was the writer?

      A. — A man, an uncle of mine in foreign parts, that had money to leave me by the name of "James."

      Q. — Was that his name?

      A. — Yes, and mine too.

      Q. — Why have you taken another name now?

      A. — Because you gave it to me; there's many calls me Buckley and many calls me James, it don't make a ha'porth of difference, one name was my father's and the other was my mother's; "Norry James" they used to call her, and her brother Tim James was a sea-fisher, making money by whales, and it was he was writing to me to come to him, to take share of his fortune. Now, are you satisfied that I made you as wise as myself?

      Q. — Could you let us see one of the letters about which we were speaking?

      A. — That's what I won't do, nor I won't tell you another word about 'em, for I see you've a bad meaning in what you're saying, laying a trap to catch some knowledge out of me, that I'll lose something by.

      Q. — You shall gain something if you answer us fully and fairly, without any more roundabout talk. Who was Mr. James?

      A. — Myself, I tell you, and I'll swear it on the Gospels. Nothing will ever get any other answer out of me but that, and take it, I'd advise you.

      Q. — Would twenty pounds make you alter that decision?

      A. — No, nor a hundred, now then! You see I'm up to you, and I'm in earnest.

      Q. — Did you ever hear of Mrs. Hansen and Catherina Neilson?

      A. — Oh, the thraitors! of course I did, them are the very women that wanted to come in side of me with my uncle and get his money. Are these they? then I'll be at 'em by law, at once, and make them give up their plunder, the thieves!

      The fellow's language and manner became so insulting and threatening that we were obliged to withdraw; he followed us to our carriage using the most menacing expressions and gestures to the poor women, who shook like aspens, and began to weep in terror, ignorant of what he was saying, and judging from his conduct that they were accused of some great crime. Buckley had the good grace to apologise to me, saying that he knew "I was imposed on, that I meant him no harm, and he bore me no ill-will, but he would be even with those women."

      The Danish women were unfeignedly surprised at this assault, and so clearly ignorant of the matter he alluded to, that I dismissed his charges on their merits, and continued to believe my female friends worthy of all credit.

      They took up their abode at the "Bogwater Arms," the hotel where I placed them, and "Buckley," or "James," or whatever he pleased to call himself, had ample opportunity of following up his accusations.

      He did not do so, and sometime after the hotel-keeper made another effort to test his corruptibility, and induce him to betray his instigator, but without effect; and in a few days he left the country, concealing all trace of his retreat.

      The foreign women did not seem to think his absence was of the least injury to their case; they continued to live at the hotel for no other reason than because it was exactly opposite the post-office, at which place they expected Mr. James would one day make his appearance. But to it no James repaired, and in its dead-letter box lay the document Catherina had prepared, announcing, with unutterable love to him, her anxious desire to join him. Neither he nor his messenger came.

      "Sure, ma'am," said Mrs. Macarthy to me, "the strange women need not stop here to watch, for there's no doubt that I'll hold the man that asks for that letter as if my life was in the grasp, and I'll make him explain his conduct."

      Truly all Bally— knew the tale of James's Danish wife waiting for him at the post-office, and though the gossip excited the usual amount of remark, there were not a few that pitied the creatures far from their home, deceived by a bad man. The poor women were utterly foiled. James's trusty aide-de-camp, no doubt, warned him, and he cut all connection between himself and our little town.

      I consulted many of my friends about the case and told the history of the foreign women far and wide, as much to procure information as to create sympathy in what evidently appeared to me a case of singular wrong.

      Their story was a very simple one: Frau Hansen, the older of the two, was the widow of a Holstiner who had left her in possession of a house in Copenhagen, with furniture and some little property beside, with no children to share the possession of them with her. She had been a servant in one of the royal households, and was of a thrifty nature, given to make and save, and anxious to add to her goods, in order to enable her to provide for the orphan child of a sister which she had adopted — this was the little Catherina, and although full grown and married, she was "little Catherina" still. One of the modes Mrs. Hansen adopted of adding to her substance was that of receiving lodgers into her comfortable home; and in order to attract the attention of strangers to the accommodation she offered, she called her house "The Prins Christian." Not that it was a common guest-house, or open to every one who asked for admittance, and wanted to eat drink, and sleep; no, Mrs. Hansen was reserved, and she closed her door against all but sailors who arrived with some kind of recommendation, and who, beside having the means of paying for their living, were willing to conduct themselves according to the rules of propriety. She never was without a lodger, never; one good man ever sent her another, seldom leaving sufficient time between each inmate to get the rooms properly cleaned. Captain Hogg, an Englishman whose ship traded regularly to Elsinore, lodged with her many times when business required him to remain in Copenhagen, and a very good business it was. A great deal of money came into her house with him and his box, and very safe it always was; what he spent he always got the worth of, and, like all the other Englishmen she had ever known, he was a profitable customer.

      This Captain Hogg was leaving one day, and he said to the little Catherina, who spoke a very pretty bit of German, "Will you walk with me to St. Anna Plads, where I shall take my boat and will take leave of you." Catherina, who had known this good man from a little child, was always glad to see him come, and sorry to see him go, agreed; at the landing-stage the boat of the "British Sovereign" awaited the captain; before he got into it, and while he was saying his last Lebo vohl to Catherina, the sound of English voices attracted his attention; and three gentlemen who had just disembarked from a yacht and were standing near, seemingly holding a discussion as to which way they should turn, looked at him and he at them; Catherina remembers that they appeared greatly pleased to meet him, but never knew whether it was as an old acquaintance, or merely as a countryman who could assist them in a difficulty that they seemed to have met. He told Catherina that they wanted to be directed where to lodge, and that he had told them that her aunt, Frau Hansen, would accommodate them, and that she would conduct them to her aunt's house. Captain Hogg entered his boat and pushed off, and Catherina. was left standing face to face with three strangers.

      By her account they laughed and chatted amongst themselves, rather rudely, for a little bit, but while this was going on she had time to observe them, and the impression they then made on her was never after effaced. Two of these men were quite young, one of them was not so, but he was not old, oh! not at all so, but his countenance told a tale of grief and ill health, that defaced the mark of years and left in its place that of sorrow. He was grave, prematurely grave, as white-faced as a corpse, large features, chiselled and calm, as beautiful as a statue, "as if our Thorvaldsen himself had created him," exclaimed Catherina, when she was enthusiastically describing the member of this trio who had impressed her tender heart with, even at first sight, the strong sense of that which though not love was akin to it; "his Traurigheit was something that one could feel," she said, "it came forth and seemed to wrap him with a cloud."

      "He did not speak to me," she said, "that day not a word, he stood alone, the other two had all the talk to themselves."

      They and Catherina managed a conversation in indifferent German. There was much laughing when they misunderstood each other. One of the gentlemen was dark complexioned, high nose, reserved, and proud looking, the other frank, gay, and fair. The latter walked foremost with Catherina, and the other two followed as she led them to the door of the "Prins Christian." With a triumphant air she introduced them to her aunt, who received them with all the honours of an inn. It was not difficult to make terms between them. They were soon mutually pleased. A few days' experience convinced the travellers that they would be quite as comfortable with their hostess as at the "Royal Hotel," where they bad originally intended to have taken up their abode; the arrangement contented all parties — Catherina particularly, for was she not the means of bringing it about? and had she not probably something to do with keeping it on? She was an orphan; had known no parent's care; her aunt's Sigbrit Hansen had supplied this to her, and the "Prins Christian" was the only home she had ever had; she loved to have this home filled with guests, who should be agreeable and suitable, and not troublesome, keeping her aunt in low spirits, Wilhelmina, their only hand-maiden, in a turmoil of domestic distress, and causing herself to be made everybody's servant, with no time at all to go out and take a walk on the ramparts, and no chance for an hour of conversation With young friends and companions. Of these she had very few. Her aunt Sigbrit's youth had been passed as one of the domestic servants of the Royal house of Denmark; she knew how nobility should be waited on; of this quality she esteemed her English guests to be, and she treated them accordingly.

      "It was well to be the servant of those," she said, "who were born to have servants; they know how to repay you; Catherina must spend her life in earning the friendship of the great as I have done."

      "It is of no use," she said, "to waste one's time on one's equals, who merely want to give and take, and to whom one must share as freely as their receive; there is no living except by receiving from those who want nothing from us but our service; the world would be all the better if every woman had her mistress, and nothing else to do but to wait on her; she would then do little mischief to herself, and never hurt her neighbours."

      This social theory of Sigbrit's tended to separate Catherina from associates in her own class of life, and led her to look, as the most desirable condition that she could obtain, to be a domestic in one of the Royal or noble establishments of the capital. Pending the attaining of this advantage, and while her aunt taught her the duties of the position, she esteemed it one of her greatest privileges to come in contact with members of the class on which she aspired to attend. With right good will she surrendered herself to become the waitress on the three Englishmen, and they appropriated her whole time; indoors, and outdoors, they couldn't do without her. She became their cicerone, and guided them to all the sights in Copenhagen.

      She led them through the intricate streets of the suburbs, and to the tivolis and Alhambras, while they in return made known to her the picture galleries, and directed her mention to the most noteworthy things in that museum of which Denmark is so justly proud. The prettiest things that could be bought in the Ostergada, were made presents to her, and before a month had passed she and the gentlemen were as intimate as old friends. It was soon known to Sigbrit and Catherina that the Englishmen were sailors. They had a vessel of their own, a yacht, and it seemed to have a crew of several seamen, some of whom were always making their appearance, and wanting to speak to one or other of the gentlemen. From these men Fran Hansen learned the quality of her guests to be that of the highest order; one of them was a nobleman, the others were commoners, but of high rank; the great friends and guests of the owner of the yacht, who, for the present, desired to be addressed by no other title but that of Mr. James, and his friends were also known by appellations which, little as the Danish women knew about the language or customs of England, they were aware not the whole of their names, but merely the first part, that which they had received in baptism, so that when they addressed the companions of Mr. James respectively as "Edward" and "Tom," they knew very well that these were not the names by which they were best known in their own country. The one we have mentioned as dignified and reserved called himself Edward, the free and easy, sun-burnt, good-tempered one answered to Tom. To "James" both of these were exceedingly deferential in their treatment; he received from them a certain ceremoniousness and respect, that may have been rendered as much out of regard to his condition of sorrow as to any sense of inferiority of social degree; Catherina and her aunt saw this, and took care to observe a similar manner in their behaviour to him; moreover, they devoted themselves to divert him from his sadness, and Edward and Tom often thanked them most cordially for their kind efforts; but this was all the notice their pains seemed to attract; Mr. James seemed unconscious of their solicitude. He went on from day to day carrying out a monotonous routine of sightseeing under the direction of his friends; and but seeming to have no heart himself in the matter. "He was tired of the world," they thought, those two women who had no experience of troubles, nor any great changes in their uneventful career. They did not understand the difference between this man and Tom, and Edward, who enjoyed life, and whose way of living would, if left to themselves, have been something far different from that which they fell into in the "Prins Christian" to accommodate James. They made two excursions to Roeskild and other parts of Zealand, but he stayed at home; he liked sitting by the stove, and rending some of his numerous books better than anything that they could propose to him.

      At last, one day a very long discussion took place between the three gentlemen, and next morning, Tom and Edward packed their portmanteaus and set off for Stockholm. They started that their return might be expected early in spring, and they charged Frau Hansen and Catherina to continue their kind care and attention to James, who chose to remain their inmate for the winter. When his friends were gone, he became day by day more and more an object of solicitude to them; and the three women, Sigbrit, Catherina and "Wilhelmina, occupied themselves in nothing else but expressing their sympathy and anxiety to relieve and serve him. He accepted all their good-will most dependently, but never gratified them with the smallest effort to appear relieved; on the contrary, he was none the happier nor the livelier for all they did for him; he would never walk out of doors, but kept about the house, "ever under feet like a cat," Sigbrit used to say. As to Wilhelmina, she became unfeignedly weary of him, her frequent petition was, that he may be safely out of the way some day, or else she would unintentionally give him something to feel that would make him keep away from her side.

      "He shall feel how hot the soup is," she said, "when I am skimming it, or the iron shall fall so very near his toe that, if it don't burn him, it shall frighten him; he doesn't mind polish dropping on his toes, nor the spattering of the black and white brush when I am cleaning up the furniture; and as to floor-scrubbing he will let my brush go round his boot-sole before he will raise one foot to let me rub where he has stood."

      To the mistress of the house none of these objections were apparent, Mr. James's conduct gave her no trouble. He and his friends had hired all the accommodation that the "Prins Christian" afforded, and when Tom and Edward left, he refused to alter the arrangement by which he was sole lodger in the house. His liberality prevented this from being any disadvantage to Mrs. Hansen.

      The season passed on, and Herr James altered a little in the course of it. Under his cold, stern exterior there lay a still susceptible heart, that was now yielding to a new excitement.

      He fell in love with Catherina!

      Sigbrit saw this long before the object of the passion had any idea of its existence, although it was far from being concealed; in fact, it Was very demonstratively exhibited. Catherina did not notice that he used to follow her with his eyes, as she moved about the room, and pursue her over the house, sitting pertinaciously at her side during all her occupations; nor did she at all observe the nature of his affection, until a sudden betrayal of its warmth called for a response. She gave it in a frank, cordial acceptance of his attachment.

      In fact, the courting was a public transaction, always open and above-board; James was transformed from a dull, silent, gloomy mope, into an ardent suitor, and his success brought back joy to his heart, and health to his face.

      Mrs. Hansen declares that she matronised the affair in the most precise manner. Without being aware that she furnished a proof that the motherly proceeding of "asking a man his intentions," is a natural and not an artificial movement, she described her course of action with Mr. James to have included this step in its programme. The Danish duenna had by her own account no two words to the bargain, it was "marry, or go."

      She resolved that her niece should wear a bridal crown. All the women of her family had honestly been entitled to wear them; Catherina should not be the first to lose that honour, which is strictly forbidden in Denmark to any girl who has the slightest spot on her fair fame.

      When the alternative was offered to James, of either leaving, not only the house, but the city, or of marrying Catherina, he was incapable of choice. He married under Sigbrit's orders — "going" being quite beyond his energies. He and Catherina were made one according to the form of the Lutheran church. James did not refuse to comply with any of the ceremonial observances enforced by Frau Hansen. He exerted himself only to make a very few terms on his side of the matrimonial compact. Sigbrit had had her way, and he must have his; and his was that the whole establishment should be entirely subject to his control; he was to hire the house, and the services of its mistress; and his wife and lie were to be the temporary owners of the dwelling, Frau Hansen being their housekeeper; the arrangement was carried into effect, and things remained pretty much as they had always been, except that a law was enacted by the new master, which forbade the entrance of any human being inside the habitation beside the persons who had covenanted to form the domestic party.

      Before his marriage, Mr. James sent his yacht home to England, and seemed by this act to cut off all communication with his former connections; the seclusion of the household was extreme; Catherina was strictly guarded by her husband from all contact with society. Sigbrit only saw at church, or market, her kindred or acquaintance; the coffin-maker cousin, from Aldergade, who used to come and sit with 'Mina in her highly polished kitchen, on Sundays and holidays, was turned out without mercy; and although she grumbled, she submitted on receipt of compensation in her pocket for her privation.

      This dull routine of existence went on for a whole year; James did not increase in communicativeness; he got letters, and he replied to them, but he imparted none of their contents to his wife; he was never short of money, nor sparing with it; and when the "Barsel " came, as come it did, and brought a fine boy to the house, he disbursed his cash right royally. No one had a word to say against him as husband or father. Nothing could exceed his fondness for Catherina except his pride of "James the Second," as he called his son. About two months after its birth, he said, one day, to his wife, "Now Catherina, a message on business obliges me to go home to England, but I will come back for you, or send for you; it may be soon, it may be suddenly, so prepare, and wait."

      This was awfully abrupt; he had not been in the habit of mentioning his native land, and had never even hinted that such a thing as return to it was probable, and Catherina had never felt free enough to question him with regard to his home and family ties. There were subjects which she knew intuitively were forbidden between them, and this was one of them. Oh! how she regretted that she had not used the freedom of a wife, and that she had not insisted on gaining his inmost confidence. She confessed that she had fallen short on a point where no woman should lose her self-respect so much as to forego her natural right to be made acquainted with the whole of her husband's connections and circumstances.

      There was a distressing parting — both were deeply affected. James went away in great sorrow, Catherina remained absorbed in tribulation. Months went by, and James constantly wrote and sent plenty of money for the support of his wife and son. "James the Second" throve, "he was an amazing boy," said Sigbrit, who was as proud of him as if he had been a grandson, and she added rather spitefully, "he was not in the least like his father." Catherina resented this remark whenever she heard it, and I plead guilty to having frequently drawn her out on the subject, in order to be amused by the little bye-play by which the grotesque aunt represented to me what a dupe Catherina had been made, by her insane love with the perfidious "James."

      When these two women in thought returned to this period of their lives, it was evident that a great out-pouring of heartfelt affection had been lavished by Catherina, and that she was entirely misunderstood by her less interested relative. It was a romance in itself, the story of the period when James first went away.

      "There was nothing to live for," she said, "but my child — his child. It soothed and consoled me; I cared not for being a forsaken wife while my little one remained." Then there came a burst of tears, and a long pause during which she could not speak herself, and would not permit Sigbrit to do so.

      "No, this lady, the God-sent friend, must hear my grief from my own lips, it is a duty that no one shall spare me, I will force myself to tell my affliction — my baby took small pox and died."

      "What this crushing weight of sorrow did to poor Catherina, she never could tell: here Sigbrit took up the narrative.

      "All got dark within her," said Sigbrit, "she no longer saw even me, nothing was before her but the little coffin, which when we buried, we were obliged to replace with another, by which she sat from day to day, sleeping much, eating little, lost to us all, not reading the letters from her husband, never weeping; my heart was broken to see her, it called up all my strength; this won't do, I said to myself, James must be where the letters used to find him, before this trouble came, and to that spot I'll take his wife to seek him." At first, Catherina feebly opposed any movement whatever, and did not understand her aunt's intentions, but finally she yielded like an insensible form of plastic material, and was literally as clay in the hands of a potter, under her aunt's energetic control.

      In her deliberations on the subject of her search for James, Mrs. Hansen sought the counsel of her former mistress, the amiable Princess. This royal lady, with the condescension that characterizes the family of which she is a member, entered with true womanly sympathy into the case; she studied the route they ought to take to reach the address indicated in James's letters, advised them what conveyances and modes of travel they should adopt, and procured them the help of friends on the road. Before their arrangements for starting were complete, Catherina suddenly recovered from her apathy, and when they had entered on their journey, her brightest enthusiasm was aroused, and her zeal at its height to pursue her recusant lord. The Princess's directions were full and explicit; by following them, the travellers arrived at the stage of their journey where the writer met them.

(To be continued.)

JAMES'S DANISH BRIDE.

(Concluded.)

CHAPTER III.

WHEN I had become possessed of the details related in the foregoing chapters, I set myself immediately to establish as many of them on evidence as I could find the means of so doing; not that I had the least doubt myself of the veracity of my protégées, but that I wished to place their statement beyond question, in order that I might make my friends acquainted with the circumstances, and avail myself of every possible opportunity, to prosecute the search for "James."

      Frau Hansen's customer, Captain Hogg, was found out and communicated with. He gave the "Prins Christian" and its hostess a very high character; he said, "he would take Sigbrit or Catherina's word for anything."

      I wrote myself to the Princess ⸻, and had a most gracious answer. The royal lady expressed herself truly sorry for her humble countrywomen, and grateful for my kindness to them. She enclosed a small gold cross in token of her thanks to me, and said that it was her greatest regret that an Englishman should have disgraced his nation by such bad morals as the deception of an innocent girl. She stated that, as well as she could learn, there was informality in the marriage, but of this she could not make herself certain, the difficulty being, that there was some doubt as to the name of the person who entered into the contract with Catherina, and, in her opinion, it would be useless to pursue the case any further. She advised her poor friends to come back to Copenhagen, and return to their former honest course of life, and renew their former social ties to their home and kinsfolk. This sensible counsel they were not willing to adopt. I consulted many of my friends about the case, and every one seemed to take the Princess's view of the matter. The validity of the marriage was doubtful to every mind, and though it increased my pity for poor Catherina, it damped my ardour in pursuit of the person who had betrayed her, although I should dearly have liked to have procured him as severe a punishment as his conduct merited. My feelings were intensely interested, and I dilated frequently on the guilt of this unknown "James," and I made every effort to enlist the sympathy of gentlemen likely to trace out and identify the owner of n yacht which, on a given winter, was despatched from Copenhagen, and sold in an English port. This much concerning the fate of the vessel that brought the English gentlemen to Copenhagen was known to Catherina, but none of the names of any of the parties connected with the transaction had made any impression on her memory. "Tom," "Edward," and "James," had succeeded perfectly in cutting off all connecting links between themselves and the family into whose peaceful bosom their entrance had brought so much misery.

      There was one person who would not join me in the least effort connected with the business, and that person was my husband. He took a man's view of the affair, and "pooh, poohed" Catherina's claims on "James" altogether. He counselled me to cease all direct interference, and to let the tale drop at the point to which it had reached, stating it to be his opinion, that it would be gratuitous meddling on my part to endeavour to fix on any man such a charge us was implied in the tale these women brought forward. Indeed, he took leave to doubt a great deal of it, in the teeth of the testimony I was able to adduce, and, more than all, in full face of my personal persuasion, a want of subordination which a woman does not readily submit to on the part of her husband. This conduct of mine provided me with an additional spur to my desire to acquire at least a knowledge of the identity of "James," if not to ascertain exactly how much, and how little, was criminal in his treatment of my poor friend. Of course I had occupied myself a good deal in the womanly duty of spreading the narrative over my circle; and one of the parties to whom I had related every particular, was a person from whose influence and wide-spread acquaintanceship I expected much assistance in the discovery I was daily more bent on making. This person was Lady Bogwater, and she listened with evident interest to the affair; not a jot of my news failed to attract her attention; she had it all on her mind as clearly and as distinctly as it was on mine. I showed her the Princess's letter, and let her read Captain Hogg's flattering remarks on Sigbrit and Catherina. She entered on the subject with that sort of zeal which is merely due to the appreciation of the fact, that one esteemed worthy of a high place had been guilty of sins of the lowest nature, and had afforded to her the gratification which such knowledge generally does to inferior minds. Lady Bogwater was a woman I thoroughly disrespected, but on whom I therefore depended so much the more for the very thing I wanted to be done — the fishing of this particular sinner out of the wide sea of upper class society, in which it was evident he was swimming at his ease. My Lady had this in her power, I felt certain, if from any motive her will could be engaged in the action. But what motive could induce her to have anything to do with such a case? Her sentiments about it were of the thoroughly worldly kind; she considered it a common matter, disgraceful, it was true, when discovered, because a shock to certain feelings grounded upon a law which governed the majority of minds; but a wrong! — in that light, she declined to set down the occurrence.

      "My dear Mrs. ⸻," she would say, "if those parties could not behave well to each other, surely it is no affair of yours and mine, we can't straighten all the irregular connections which come to pass from time to time among our friends and acquaintances;" and it was quite evident, that though she would not assist to straighten the affair, she had no objection to make it a subject of conversation, and I calculated that the consequences of her so doing would indirectly lead to the furtherance of my object.

      In the many conversations that occurred between Lady Bogwater and myself in which "the Danish affair" was mentioned, there had sometimes gleamed through her Ladyship's remarks stray rays of an intelligence, extra and beyond mine in the matter. One day, it came upon me forcibly out of some of her words, obscure in themselves, but having a meaning that mysteriously hitched itself on some spot in my instinct, and made me perceive that she had some knowledge concerning the matter, which she would not impart to me. From the moment I caught up this idea, I watched every tone, look, and word of hers. I mentioned my suspicions to my husband, as usual, to have them treated as "more of my nonsense," "a development of my faculty of scenting out a plot," and of making discoveries which ended in smoke.

      "My dear," he said, "unless you bring a direct chain of facts before me, and show me that these facts affect more than the interests of a few private individuals I will not take any steps in the matter; all that suggests itself to me to do now is, to assist those foreigners to go home, and to expedite their departure from this country to that in which they have a natural asylum and friends. From all you tell me I deduce that Lady Bogwater, who is a very sensible woman, takes my view of the case; her offer is just my offer, send them away, and if there is any money wanted for the purpose I will subscribe it, Lady Bogwater's proposal seems to me to be just the same;" and in effect it truly was. She frequently urged me to get rid of the women, on the plea that I would one day find it hard to shake them off, and she somewhat jokingly represented, that they and I would become a bye-word in a short time; it was an idea of mine that she was always trying to impress me that they had an underground reason for adhering to my side, and putting themselves under my protection; "You may depend there is something beneath all this, that neither you nor I understand, Mrs. ⸻."

      There was one thing I particularly noticed, and that was, that Lady Bogwater would not assist me to lay bold of Buckley and to induce him to confess: this was a point she avoided discussing with me, as, indeed, she did every critical matter that came uppermost. Through one of my friends, a yachting man, member of an R.Y.C., I found a clue to a yacht that conducted itself very much in the manner that "James's" was likely to have done, that is to say, it had left London with three gentlemen bound for "high latitudes," had stopped short, rounded the Scaw, wintered at Copenhagen, returned to Southampton water, and changed its owner, captain, crew, and name, on a certain day, and went to a foreign station, taking an invalid gentleman to regain his health in the soft air of a southern sea.

      The history of a certain screw steam yacht, which was one winter the property of a well-known nobleman, would, I felt sure, supply the blank in the story of my Danish friends. The name of the nobleman, given me in connection with the cruise of the vessel alluded to, was that of so exalted a personage, that it was impossible to connect him in any way with the romance before my mind. He was a man of high character as well as position, of great public influence, and reputed private worth, and had no connection with Ireland that I had ever heard of. There was no possible grounds on which he could be addressed as interested in such an affair, except on the presumption of his general and well-known character for humanity. I told the whole matter to Lady Bogwater, and as I dwelt upon the necessity of communicating with him, her countenance betrayed a variety of emotions which did not escape me, and which determined me to regard her counsels less than ever.

      "You should be careful, Mrs. ⸻," said my Lady, "not to mention this matter to the Danes."

      "I have done so," I said, "as was only right. Of course I put them in immediate possession of everything that could possibly afford them the least aid in their purpose."

      "And do they mean to address Lord ⸻ on their misfortune?" she enquired, a look of dismay overspreading her features.

      "Indeed they do," I replied, "perhaps have already done so."

      "How disgraceful!" she exclaimed, "surely you will try to prevent them; horrible to hunt up a man in this way! You, as a lady, should have nothing to say to such a thing. It is a shame to draw a man back into a sin, from which he is trying to recover himself by the only means left him, by entire severance from the woman who, with her artifice, led him into mischief. Now, as a woman, intent on discountenancing vice, and having no other motive in the affair, you will surely aid in keeping this sinful couple apart. Their folly and evil is all done; let us endeavour to prevent any further consequences from it; to dissuade those silly creatures from taking any further steps, induce them to go home; at all events, use your utmost influence to make them avoid Lord ⸻. Oh! Mrs. ⸻, if you knew what mischief they may do!"

      At this point I betrayed such amazement that Lady Bogwater stopped short, overwhelmed with a sudden sense of betrayal. We looked each other full in the face, and a silence which was more portentous than words made the moment of great consequence to us both. At length I mustered courage to take what I felt was my place, and exhibit some indignation that I had all along been in some measure duped by her Ladyship. Drawing myself up, and assuming the greatest dignity of manner, I said, "I had no idea that you knew so much of this business, or had any personal interest involved in it." This conversation was occurring in Lady Bogwater's own drawing-room, and, as became the tone I assumed, I prepared to take my leave. My hostess placed herself between me and the door, and cut off my retreat. She was calm and quite able to get through the dilemma into which I forced her.

      "Yes," said she, "I have an interest in the matter, and I have no objection to tell it to you; we are old friends. Who and what are those Danes, that you should care what becomes of them, or prefer them to me and my family, whose influence and connections must be of some consequence to you and yours? I claim your help on grounds that you cannot refuse to give it; get rid of these women for me. You know the benefit it would be to you to make this tie with me."

      These words of Lady Bogwater profoundly affected me. She touched me on the vulnerable spot and she knew it. My husband had political interests which bound him to hers, and there were certain matters in which it was of vital importance that he and his noble neighbour should act together. Our families were, in fact, embarked in the same ship as regarded certain affairs, and any split in our cabinet would have been not only injurious, but fatal, to grave interests that we had much at heart. The thoughts and feelings that passed through my mind during this speech of Lady Bogwater's were of a very conflicting nature. "What were the Danes indeed to me, or all Denmark for that matter, in comparison with my husband's objects in life? But, notwithstanding the strong strain laid upon me, I yet held my tie to the injured girl, and in one minute my course of action was clear. I would be neutral, perfectly, calmly neutral; stand still and watch, maintain a position of equipoise, and study to preserve the balance of my feelings, without losing ground with my conscience, which dictated justice to Catherina and avoidance of Lady Bogwater. In this state of my sensations I could only - say, "Let us end our conversation; tell me no more, and I will take no advantage of anything you have unconsciously let slip. I have no wish to be in your confidence, and I entreat you do not draw me into anything that may tend to injure the poor women." My hand was on the door-handle — Lady Bogwater intercepted my movement.

      "Mrs. ⸻, you must hear all now. I will trust you. Lord ⸻ is about to become my son-in-law. He is engaged to Gertrude, and you know the kind of girl she is; one hint of this kind — a breath of scandal — much less such a liaison, and she would turn him off. Yes, if he were a prince; and then what a match to lose such a connection for our large unportioned family! You know how poor we are, what a shell this old concern is, how I work and manœuvre to get my family on in the world — the state world — our only world. Other people have a wide world, commerce and all that sort of thing, but nothing is left to us but Government patronage; it is neck or nothing just now, I assure you, so many to do for, and this good chance — the best we ever had — help me to secure it — you will be no loser. No, I promise that it shall cement all our ties, and form a strong reason for concluding that matter which has so long been in dispute between our husbands. Keep back those Danish women. I know Lord ⸻ well. He is a man that would sacrifice himself to a sense of duty if once it took possession of him. He has been thoroughly confidential with me with regard to his Copenhagen life, and has convinced me that there was no marriage, and, more important still, he is convinced himself, that Catherina formed a fresh connection, and can have no other object in opening any communication with him, should she succeed in doing so, except that of extorting money from him. This he would be quite willing to give her if she should be proved worthy of his assistance; and after his marriage with Gertrude, I promise you that I will enter on the subject, and take the case in my own hands, and get him to make them a handsome compensation. But until after the marriage I am determined that there shall be no intercourse, if possible, between the parties." I cannot retail my reply to all this. In fact, I was incapable of answering the outflow of her Ladyship's feelings and plans. All I could do was engage to non-intervene. I promised not to advance the Danes an inch towards Lord ⸻, but at the same time I declared positively, that I would not in the least impede any motion towards him that they were taking of their own accord. "Why should I interfere with the spontaneous efforts of justice and righteousness, Lady Bogwater?" I said. "Be assured matters will right themselves. There is a Ruler who directs the affairs of men, and he will defend the right in this as in all other cases."

      It was an exciting morning. When I reached my home, I was exceedingly disturbed to find Sigbrit and Catherina waiting for me;

      "I am ill," I said, and truly so I was, "I cannot speak: to you — Please, leave me — go, and I will try to see you to-morrow."

      They seemed greatly distressed, and to go away most reluctantly. "Every thing seems to slip from under our feet," said Catherina; "if it turned out that I have any hold to my husband by reaching Lord ⸻, shall I have to let go such a friend as you? Will you not remain steady whether we succeed in interesting him or not? Is there any reason why you and we must part?"

      "Oh, no, no," I said, "it will make no difference with me, I shall be always the same, but just at this moment I am out of sorts."

      They seemed to see through me, and to be miserable at what they saw. I was excessively sorry; it pained and grieved me so much, that I was far from well all night, and truly indisposed when they came up in the morning to say that they were starting for London, and wished to take a friendly leave of me, and asked me to continue in communication with them. They proposed to write to me a full account of all that happened to them in London. I could now read Holsteinischer Deutsch as well as ever "James" did, and her letters would be to me now more welcome than ever. It was a sad constraint not to be able to tell all I now knew to the poor girl; she had become quite endeared to me; and as for old Sigbrit, I was by this time entertaining a most cordial regard for her. Betray them! — I! — oppose their proper, honest movement, to set right a case, in which, on their side, was no sin nor wrong! I spurned the suggestion, and though I felt that my active assistance could not be given, after the confidence Lady Bogwater had forced on me, and which I certainly bad accepted from her, my hearty wishes went with them, and I believe that I never uttered a more earnest prayer than that I put up to the Almighty for his favour on their undertaking.

      I duly heard of their arrival in London, and then had no news of them for several weeks. Every Sunday Lady Bogwater and I met at church, and we greeted each other with the courtesies of polite society, but no other intercourse whatever took place between us. The Honourable Gertrude Damper, Lady Bogwater's eldest daughter, who had been a most friendly and pleasant neighbour to me — truly a noble-minded girl, one that I really loved and valued — was distant in her manner, and I felt estranged from her, because I believed her to be the willing instrument of her worldly mother's policy, in seeking a connection which travestied true love's tie, and renders the matrimonial concerns of fashionable life matters of proverbial reproach. I did not feel at ease in speaking to these ladies. I no longer expected Gerty to call and play me a new tune, nor bring me a bouquet, nor the periodicals of the month, all of which kindnesses had been almost diurnally habitual from her to me for many years. The want of cordiality which I had long felt for the mother, had never influenced my attachment to the daughter, and I had no doubt that we had a strong mutual affection. What could Lady Bogwater have told her daughter to make her cool to me? for cool she certainly was; some falsehood no doubt; the truth would have caused Gertrude to act quite differently. I dared not ask. I must not speak; my mouth was sealed.

      One Sunday, a strange, grave, middle-aged man appeared in Church with the Bogwater Castle family. Lady Bogwater waited for me in the porch. "That is he," she said, "it is all right, they will be married on Tuesday. Now, Mrs. ⸻, keep away your Danes! I beg! I implore! let them not see him; don't mar my child's happiness; tell them to stay away; when all's over I'll reward them well, they shall never want a friend."

      "Oh, Lady Bogwater," I said, "take care what you are doing. I will not, as I promised you, interfere; matters shall take their course; the women are, at present, entirely uninfluenced and unguided by me. They have been singularly and cruelly defeated in London (here her eye sparkled), and my only hope is, that the right will triumph yet; indeed I feel it will, even if a miracle have to be wrought. God surely aids the weak and innocent.

      "You will find your faith a dream, madam," said my courtly antagonist, sweeping away from me with a graceful congé.

      I scarcely slept all that night. The next day I had a long letter from Catherina. She and Sigbrit might be expected on the following night at the Bogwater Arms. "Oh, why not to-morrow morning," I cried, "that they might see and identify him?" True to my non-interfering policy I did not telegraph them, nor could any urgency of mine increase their speed; they were coming as quickly as possible, and yet I now knew that they would come too late, and had better never come at all, for the truth they must learn at all hazards — it would out inevitably! should no longer be able to contain it, nor my own indignation, for I should then reckon my bondage over and my words free.

CHAPTER IV.

IN London, Sigbrit and Catherina had met the most extraordinary series of misadventures, enough to dishearten any less ardent pursuers. On their arrival, they addressed a letter to "James," enclosed to Lord ⸻; and they waited for some days, when no answer came. Catherina wrote again. The result was the same us before; she did it again, and again, and again, repeatedly for a whole month, with unwearied perseverance. The missives were delivered at the door of Lord ⸻'s mansion, either by Sigbrit's hand or her niece's, and they were always received without remark, unless in reply to their invariable question " Is Lord ⸻ at home?" to which they received the constant answer, "Yes;" and when they asked if he had got their letters, they uniformly got the same monosyllabic response.

      One day a gentleman called at their lodgings and asked to see "Mrs. James." He was shown into their sitting-room, and Catherina's heart beat as she prepared to meet this ambassador for her lost lord; he did not announce himself as such, but she felt intuitively that he could be no other. The man had an air of command when he addressed her, and spoke as if he had detected her in some act of vice, and was about to administer justice instanter. His manner terrified her, so that in reply to each question he addressed her, she ventured only the most submissive admissions. The conversation, as I gathered it, run as follows:—

      "You call youself Mrs. James, eh?"

      "Yes, sir."

      "You wrote those letters to Lord ⸻?"

      "Yes, sir."

      "You suppose he is your husband?"

      "Yes, sir."

      "You are wrong — perhaps mad — certainly very wicked. Nothing but the extreme benevolence of Lord ⸻'s disposition previous his ordering me to have you punished according to the extremest rigour of the law. As you are a Dane, and a fool, he will let you off for this time, but don't run the risk of annoying him any more, or you will find yourself suddenly put aside in a manner that will surprise you. Lord ⸻ says you must be doing this to extort money, and if you are in want he will contribute to your relief." As the man was saying the last words, he was gradually unfolding a porte-monnaie, and seemed about to transfer some of its contents to the table; Sigbrit seized it from his hand, dashed it out of the open window into the street, and flew at him with the rage of a tigress. The astonished emissary quickly vanished from their sight, and when surprise and fright left the women, the solemn conviction remained more firmly than ever impressed on them, that Lord ⸻ was "James," and that "James" was a traitor.

      "Dear, much-suffering, ever-to-be-pitied child," said Sigbrit, "come home, this is the end of all our trouble and toil."

      "No, never! now I will not leave this country until I see James's face, and hear from his own lips that I am no longer his wife. All Copenhagen knows that I was, it shall never know that I am not. If I had not married him, and had merely done what many girls do, who live awhile with a man, and have no tie or contract with him, it would be a different thing; such people part each other without disgrace, but those who vow, cannot break the word given and taken; mine was surely pledged for life, it was a marriage till death, and I won't give up, nor be silent; aunt, let me follow the course of my spirit, which is right and pure."

      Catherina's force of character was drawn out by the opposition she was encountering, and a more obstinate, self-opiniated person than she became it would be difficult to conceive. She was firm as a rock to her purpose. Northern human nature is mnde of firmer stuff than that which is found to constitute the same feature in decreasing latitudes. Mild, calm, and benignant, as Catherina's disposition was, it had an unyielding resistance in it to other people's sentiments, and was scarcely capable of receiving an impression from without. Its love was an eternal spirit which ruled and mastered all its passions.

      Sigbrit was subdued to perfect obedience to her niece, and became, finally, a mere spectator of her proceedings. A few days after the sudden objection of Lord ⸻'s treaty of peace, Catherina found herself in the neighbourhood of his town residence, where she had often spent hours watching, in the hope that one or other of her three friends, "Tom," "Edward," or "James," would issue from the mansion. On this particular day, a young man whose face had often appeared to her over the blinds of the window of the lower floor of the house stood beside her, and accosted her with,

      "Now, miss, what can I do for you? you want something out of our house, that's clear. You are a very pretty girl, and I have taken a fancy to you; may be, if you can't get the man you want, you'll have me!"

      Catherina's blood boiled to resent this insult, but, "I'll be cunning now," thought she, "and make use of this villain." — "I want to see Lord ⸻," she said, "if you can get me into his presence I will pay you well."

      "Ha!" he muttered, "so he's like the rest of us after all; well I'll do it for five pounds, half paid in advance."

      This was cheap. Catherina immediately paid him two pounds ten, and bargained to meet him the following morning at nine o'clock, when he was to fulfil his contract.

      He was punctual, and led her into the house by a back entrance, ushering her into a large room, "the upper-servants' hall," he called it, and he there left her for some time. She was alone, and had quite time for reflection and preparation for the meeting she was courting; her mind remained serene and undaunted; she was courageous enough for anything; a placid confidence in her rights rendered her soul invincible. No doubt that if admitted to Lord ⸻'s presence she would be face to face with "James" ever crossed her thoughts, and she sat in quiet, patient attendance. After a time, her friend opened the door and called out, "Come, now, my dear." She rose to obey the summons, and followed him out into the passage, which was a long one, and terminated in a glass door. They advanced to this door, and through it she saw the grand front hall and staircase of the house. At this moment, a gentleman, in full riding costume, passed down the stairs, stood in the hall, and spoke to the porter. Catherina's friend opened the glass door, and motioned her to go forward; "that is Lord ⸻," said he.

      The gentleman was right facing Catherina, and he was not "James." She dared not advance, for such an intrusion she could offer no excuse, so she beat a retreat, rushing back discomfited and disappointed.

      She did not refuse to pay the rest of her five-pound venture, and without comment laid it in the man's hand; however unsatisfactory the business had been to her, he at least had fulfilled his part of the bargain. "'Pon my soul, I pity you," said he, "and I'll forgive you this, on condition —" "Go," she cried, and she did it so emphatically, that he took the cash and vanished, mentally concluding that she was one of the many victims to the seducer's art that he had met from time to time; "she has only just found out where she is," thought he, "she'll start on the route to hell to-morrow."

      Catherina reached her lodgings white, speechless, and fainting. She sat down, and wiped the heavy drops of cold perspiration from her brow; "Let us go back to Bally—," said she to Sigbrit, "it is all a mistake. Lord ⸻ is not 'James.'"

      A note addressed to me at this stage did not convey this impression. It would have been a comforting assurance if I could possibly have accepted it as a truth, but no such idea helped to dispel the thickening darkness which was overspreading the plot at Bogwater Castle. Gertrude Damper was to be married on Tuesday morning to Lord ⸻. Her mother had confessed to me that he was "James," the Danes denied it. Confusion worse confounded was settling on the matter.

CHAPTER V,

TUESDAY morning dawned, as bright a wedding-day as ever heaven smiled on; the wedding was to take place at eleven o'clock, A.M.; Catherina and Sigbrit could not possibly be at Bally— until ten o'clock, P.M. Suspense and anxiety were to be my portion for those intervening eleven hours; all the family began to sympathise with my feelings about the foreigners. The event of the morning, though wholly unconnected with them, had a special interest for my household. All the country was astir about this marriage, and the universal spirit of pleasure was alive in our little world. My children and maid-servants had talked of little else for a week, and I was supposed to be as anxious for news, as the tongues about me were to pour it forth. More than an hour before our family breakfast-time on the day of the marriage, all my people, from the lowest weed-picker in the garden, to the old butler that heads my ménage, was in a whirl of commotion, owing to the wonderful circumstance of an outside car, driven by a Bogwater Castle groom, being seen in our avenue. The smoking horse attested the haste of the messenger, and a note which he brought to me demanded expedition on my part in reply to it. It was from the bride elect, and it said,

      I guessed well what that point was! "What am I to do or to say?" I appealed to my husband.

      "Well, really," he replied, "I think you ought to be very glad to have an opportunity of setting their minds at rest. Now here's a nice chance for you to cement your friendship with Lady Bogwater, as I have been so long wishing you to do. At all events, I hope you won't go and increase the mischief between that mother and daughter. The happiness and welfare of that family is more value to us, and to the community, than that of those Danes, of whom we never heard until the other day, and of whom the sooner we see the last the better. Just show that letter of Catherina's to Gertrude, and it will settle the matter. You are not supposed to know anything to the contrary of its statement." In the strength of this conjugal counsel, armed with my authority, I entered Bogwater Castle, with the power of ending for ever the vexed question of Lord ⸻'s delinquency. The gracious intention of doing this lent an amiability to my greeting of Lady Bogwater, who, in her dressing-gown, met me at the door of the room where the young heroine of the day was ensconced.

      "Mrs. ⸻, I cast my last stake into your hands, for God's sake don't betray me! Get her to have him — urge her — explain to her that it was not a marriage that Danish liaison, a mere every-day matter that no one minds. Oh, pray, save us from losing this great match, and from having a disagreeable scene, and being the talk of the kingdom!"

      "Fortunately, Lady Bogwater, I can now aid you effectively. Look at this," and I showed her Catherina's letter.

      "Oh, thank you! good, kind friend, I shall never be ungrateful for for this timely relief, this rescue from ruinous calamity!" We went into the bride's chamber, and found Gertrude in a state of violent excitement:—

      "Mrs. ⸻, I would not marry even the Primate of England if another woman had a just claim on him. I have only just heard the tale of your Danish women, and I connect them with some confessions of Lord ⸻'s about a connection he formed in Copenhagen. Is there any reason to believe that any tie existed between him and your protéqée? Tell me the truth, I implore you."

      "Here it is," I said, handing her the note which I had received from Catherina. Gertrude read it, sank on a couch, and tears gently came to the relief of her overstrained nerves.

      "Now, leave me," she said, "I want to get calm."

      Lady Bogwater and I went into the next room.

      "Mrs. ⸻, I must be very candid with you," said her Ladyship, "Catherina's wrong, however the error happened — but she is no wife of Lord ⸻'s; of that he is well assured. My husband and he are prepared to defend that point. The marriage goes on with the greatest security. Gerty is all right now, thanks to your good management —"

      "Oh! don't say that — I really managed nothing. It is a series of favourable accidents, no more. Good-bye, Lady Bogwater, I am sorry I can't congratulate you, as I should wish to do, on the marriage of your dear girl. The thing is all wrong. The whole affair troubles me dreadfully."

      "Well, Mrs. ⸻, I will await your felicitations, which I know you will give me when we have steered through this crisis; — Au revoir!"

      I was shown into a room on the ground floor, to wait for the car that was to take me home; Lady Bogwater passed into the library to meet Lord ⸻; the door was open, and I could not avoid hearing a few words of then conversation.

      "Gertrude is quite composed now," said the mother, "Mrs. ⸻ has great power over her."

      "I wish I could have relieved her mind, but I bow to your decision, Lady Bogwater, and feel confident that you will not suffer your child to rest under a misapprehension."

      I was glad when the car was announced, for every moment that I remained under the roof kept me in a ferment of anxiety to relieve my mind by speaking openly to Lord ⸻, and having the whole affair explained by him to myself. My conscience was very uncomfortable about the matter. I could not agree with my husband, that it was no business of mine. I had made it my business, by every law that rules in human life. I contracted an obligation to Catherina and Sigbrit, and how had I kept it? Gertrude Damper had trusted me, how had I vindicated her confidence? Lady Bogwater had required from me guilty complicity in her plot, and had I not granted it? These were my feelings, and they were deepened by the arrival of the bride-cake, with flattering messages, wedding cards, and actually cartes-de-visite of both the high contracting parties!

      "And this is 'James!'" I exclaimed, as I laid the bridegroom's photograph before me. He was an elderly man of very remarkable appearance. His beard was large and white; his head large and bald; his face betokened strong passions for powerful self-control; he was the very hero for my romance. I carefully shut up the picture, mentally resolving to use it whenever circumstances gave me a warrant for producing a crisis.

      Catherina and Sigbrit arrived at the Bogwater Arms safely that night. They came to me very early next morning; and beside the news they brought from London, they told me that "James Buckley" had been at the Post Office and managed to get the letter addressed by Catherina to her husband. Was not this very provoking? Alas, the poor Danes were caught in the net of conspirators, who, however exalted their rank, were as vile as any connivers against the innocent! I saw that Sigbrit was beginning to perceive that they were in a snare, and that she was exercising her sagacity on me.

      "Did you, madam, see Lord ⸻?"

      "No," I replied, "at least not very distinctly, I had a glimpse of his back in church."

      "Then he did not call to ask you about Catherina?"

      "Certainly not," I said, "what put that into your head? you say he is not James."

      "She says it," emphasized the cunning woman, "she may have been shown the wrong man, I can fancy any deceit and treachery now."

      My cheeks flushed up; in went the insinuation, direct to my sense of honour.

      "Oh! madam," cried Catherina, taking my hands and warmly caressing them, "excuse her, pardon her words — they are not meant for you — you, our only friend in this strange land!"

      "Catherina," I said, "I wish you had a more powerful one. I am not my own mistress. I cannot do all I would for you; take legal advice, employ a lawyer."

      "To do what, madam? I must first find the man against whom I want to proceed, must I not?"

      "No, I think not, that will be the business of your lawyer."

      This idea seemed particularly agreeable to Sigbrit; she brightened up under its influence, and immediately proposed to return to Copenhagen and set the law in motion there; while Catherina should remain in London, and take the same course.

      With the permission of my husband, I engaged Catherina's services as an assistant in my nursery. She had many good housewifery qualities, her sewing was excellent, and she had manifested great tact in the handling of a baby, whenever she had an opportunity of taking mine into her hands. My little one, indeed, had great attractions for her, "it was new life," she said, and restored to her nearly the joy that she had in the nursing of her own.

      Lady Bogwater saw the foreign attendant with my children, and was delighted that I had not permitted the girl to get among strangers who might have incited her to troublesome movements. I found Catherina a useful inmate, and my children became very much attached to her. They taught her to speak English, and she, in return, helped to form their German accents. A year passed on, and still found us pleased with our Danish domestic. She suited us, and we suited her. We went on together as if no "James" had ever existed. No mention was made of his name between us.

      Lord ⸻ and his bride did not return to Bogwater Castle. The Bogwater family left that residence for one of their English seats, and shut up their Irish house permanently. The domain with all its advantages, deer, park, game, preserves, hunting-covers, gardens, farms, fishing-weirs, &c., were to be let. A grand advertisement, "à la Robins" brought crowds of tourists to see it, and, finally, the tenant was announced to be Sir Edward Walker. He took a cottage in the neighbourhood, and it was said that he intended to bring his family there during the sporting season. My family and I were abroad when he took possession, and Catherina was with us, continuing as peacefully as ever resigned to her lot. Sigbrit wrote from time to time, and always mentioned that Herr Professor Petersen was studying the statutes about intermarriages between Danes and foreigners, and found that the case of Catherina and "James" was very complicated, and feared that it would be long before he could give an opinion upon it.

      My husband always received this intelligence with a laugh, and said it was a dodge of Sigbrit's to keep up our interest in Catherina. We found no reason, at all events, to alter our feelings towards her; she continued to merit our good will, and was a moral, truthful, useful woman, and a most willing servant. At times I found her depressed and sorrowful, but I was careful not to allude to the probable cause, and she never intruded unasked the subject of her own grief.

      Of the Bogwater Castle family and Lord ⸻, we heard nothing, and Mr. ⸻ and I congratulated ourselves that the affair was at an end. We took great credit to ourselves in this agreeable consummation, "all's well that ends well."

      I thoroughly believed that Catherina had recovered from her delusion about the marriage obligation, and had settled down to her circumstances. She was very much at home with us, and we were happy with her and thanked the lucky chance that had brought us so agreeable an inmate to our household.

CHAPTER VI.

ON our arrival at home, after our foreign tour, the very first visitor that we had was our new neighbour, Sir Edward Walker. His object in making an early call was to include my husband in a hunting compact. It was made, and the result was a good deal of intimacy between the gentlemen. Sir Edward often dined with us. He was greatly pleased at the fluency of my children in speaking foreign tongues, talked French and German to my boys and girls, and when my baby lisped him a Danish hymn, his delight was extreme.

      "That reminds me of my visit to Copenhagen, a few years ago, with Lord ⸻. He was in bad health, and took to travelling for restoration. I went with him upon a yachting cruise up to the north, and we took with us the jolliest fellow in the world, Tom Wiltshire. But. we could not put up with L⸻'s gloomy ways, so we left him to the care of an old Danish woman, and her pretty niece, while we went to see the ice fields. It appears he recovered himself wonderfully there. Unconsciously Tom and I gave him some offence by the way we departed, and he has never made up with us since. He is a very peculiar man, a right good statesman, but on oddity in private life. By the way, did you make his acquaintance on the occasion of his wedding?"

      Instead of answering this question my husband and I stared at each other in the rudest manner. I rushed to the bell, and in reply to its summons Catherina entered the room. The meeting between her and Sir Edward was one of the most exciting scenes I have ever beheld. The stolid heavy girl awoke into the wildest exclamations, and most extravagant expressions of rapture. Her conduct was more like that of an unreasonable person; she would not, could not recover the surprise. All day and all night she wearied herself with expressions conveying her sense of gratitude to God for the fact that now, at last, a witness had appeared to clear her from all imputations that had been cast upon her honour and veracity. Sir Edward was very happy to testify to what he knew of "little Rina," as he called her, but his knowledge included no portion whatever of the matrimonial transaction; "nothing of the sort was in progress when Tom and I left," he said; "and you tell me that there was a marriage ceremony, and a baby. and all that sort of thing, and yet that Lord ⸻ ignores the business? Very puzzling, very puzzling. Wiltshire is a lawyer, and he shall set his brains to work on the case."

      The long vacation was at hand. Mr. Wiltshire obeyed a summons from his friend, and came over to shoot partridges and to talk over the gossip that had resulted from his Copenhagen visit. He was more vociferous at the sight of Catherina, and hearing her history, than Sir Edward was.

      "Well, Rina," he cried, "only to think of your selecting 'James' and overlooking me! why I was your first friend, and would have been your surest card — can't for the life of me make out how it came to pass, what sly work, and old Sigbrit too; ha! ha! old lady, so you were up to manœuvring of that kind! How did it come to pass that she let me escape?"

      Though he rattled away in this manner he also talked very seriously over the business with Mr. ⸻ and me, agreeing with us that a proper enquiry ought to be set on foot, to ascertain the exact nature of the Copenhagen marriage.

      He left us with the full assurance that he would spare no effort to see to the bottom of the entire thing. My husband and Sir Edward were neither of them as enthusiastic as Mr. Wiltshire in the matter, indeed I more than once heard them trying to induce him to desist from any exertion in the case, but he took his own course, obtained full particulars from Catherina, made copious notes from Frau Hansen's letters and left us, having excited our hopes and infused a new life into Catherina's dull existence.

      Towards the Christmas of the same year, I was planning some alterations in my household, and Catherina joined me most heartily in carrying them into effect. Notwithstanding that her mind was very much acted on by the fact that her affairs were in the lawyer's hands, she was most careful to keep steadily to her work, and seldom mentioned the matter unless when a letter came and she communicated the contents to me. One morning I found her in the nursery, sitting on a low stool, with a letter in her lap, which appeared to transfix her.

      "Well," I said, "what is the news?"

      "He has answered," she replied.

      "He? who, 'James?'" I cried.

      "Yes, madam," she answered, bursting into tears, "it is even so. Mr. Wiltshire has succeeded in reaching him."

      "And then it really is confirmed that Lord ⸻ is 'James'?"

      "As far as it possibly can be done without my seeing him. He has not been communicated with, but Mr. Wiltshire thinks that there is no longer any doubt on the subject. What have you, madam, thought all along? Have you been suspicious that Lady Bogwater was aware of the connection between him and me and permitted her daughter to become his wife?

      I did not dare to answer these questions, so I simply said, "It was the fact of the marriage that was doubted; you know Catherina that we are none of us sure about the legality of that ceremony, if we had been so you would not have wanted friends to insist on your right."

      "Then, madam, you did know that Lord ⸻ was 'James,' and you have known it for some time;" and so saying my Danish handmaiden put on an air of offended dignity that I did not think was in her nature; "I have some friends, however," she said, "who think it worth while to find out and make me certain of the formality of my marriage. My good Princess has not forgotten me. And Sigbrit has seen her, there have been letters to Mr. Tom, and there has been a letter to the P⸻ C⸻."

      I was stunned, the name she uttered so freely took away my breath. He interested in the affaire du cœur of a servant woman. It was almost incredible, but I knew the truth of my informant, and I was prepared to receive any statement that she might make me.

      I could not doubt that if Mr. Wiltshire did not believe that he had grounds for this proceeding he would have ventured to address the Danish Princess, or to have entered on the investigation under such auspices. He must have ascertained for a fact that Catherina was a wife. My husband and Sir Edward were extremely surprised when I told them where and how the business was now being done. At length they saw the complication in its full aspect, and agreed with me, that it would have been well to have insisted on an interview between Lord ⸻ and Catherina, in spite of Lady Bogwater.

      "Oh! I always knew that I was right," I cried, "but I have been coerced all through this affair — never allowed to do as my own conscience suggested, compelled to act from low motives — self-interest." And I accused myself, and, by inference, other people of participation in what really was a criminal act. We had aided and abetted Lord ⸻ in committing bigamy. There was no doubt about it. Here was a fearful mess! What was to become of Gertrude? How would Lady Bogwater face the world? What would Lord ⸻ do? The thing was exciting, we all palpitated with anxiety to understand how the delicate details of the concern were to be managed. Tom would not reply to any of our questions, and Catherina gave us to understand that the matter was referred to the arbitration of the two exalted personages with whom her advocate was in correspondence; and she was supremely contented that it should be so; "they are too great and too good to wrong me," she said, "they will adjudicate according to what is right and true — what is honest for 'James,' and good for me, and most proper for the woman who now believes herself to be his wife. I shall wait for their decision, I shall do as they say."

      Waiting, with bated breath, with a sense of hush which prevented our even discussing the extraordinary romance, in silence, we four, my husband, myself, Sir Edward, and Catherina forbore a single word or comment, or the expression of an idea on the subject; while we all throbbingly endured an amount of suspense and anxiety which could scarcely have been brought upon us by any event less extraordinary. Catherina was the calmest of us all. She was never flurried at post hour, though my nervous fingers could scarcely open the bag, and when my husband did it, he invariably accompanied the net with preparatory expressions. "Now here it is. Lord ⸻ will be here for his wife." In fact, we were all bent on no other point, and our imaginations were full of the future elation of the parties to this unique connection. My speculations went very far indeed, but I shall not name them here. I anticipated a terrible denouement on the part of Lady Bogwater. I dreaded it more than any other thing that was likely to happen, and my fears were taking a very important aspect in regard to the way in which she and I should conduct our intercourse thenceforward. I could not help feeling that she must have been pretty certain of the legality of the marriage, and that she had with her eyes wide open to the consequences, and with a strong perception of the probabilities, forced her daughter into the alliance for special reasons of her own. I also knew that she was a woman whose calculations might be relied on, and I felt thoroughly afraid of her. I expected that, notwithstanding all our powerful auxiliaries, and the strength of our position, she would yet be the conqueror to the world, at least she would carry her point. Her daughter would be Lady ⸻ to the public, whoever suffered in private. Whatever the inner life and concealed struggles of Lord ⸻ might be, there would be no outward appearance; Lady Bogwater would provide that external things, at least, should be smooth and unruffled, no deviation from the path of right would be chargeable upon her child, and the reputation of the Bogwater family would remain unblemished in haut ton; there would be no scandals, except that which ciphers, dashes, hints, and inuendoes convey, and the course of the eminent statesman would go on in unbroken serenity, the colour of his family life sheltered beneath the screen of his high reputation. I burned with indignation. Should these things be so?

      "Ah! my dear madam," Sir Edward would reply, "we, the leading classes, must maintain our dignity unruffled; these sins must not be laid to our charge; if we have been unfortunate enough to fall into them we must simply put on a cloak and cover up the stains."

      How I felt for Catherina, how I wondered at her simple, quiet ease. She lived as if no such event were hanging by a thread over her pathway, as her acknowledgment as the wife of one of the highest in the land. I was impressed with the fullest faith in her nobility. She was noble by nature, and I knew she would be noble under all circumstances. If she could rule, w bat was right and good in the case would be done, but, alas! I did not believe that this would be so; in my terror I continued to invest Lady Bogwater with invincible powers and consummate cunning. She would frustrate the Princess, and the P⸻ C⸻, bewilder Lord ⸻, confuse the whole thing, keep down her daughter's goodness and uprightness under the yoke of her worldliness and wickedness — circumvent us all, in fact, stablish the supremacy of evil over good. Yes, I believed her to be awfully wicked, and therefore awfully powerful. Meantime Catherina went on with her daily work. It was Christmas time; she sedulously helped me to prepare for our usual festivities, joined in our cookeries, and other homely doings; in particular she assisted in the making of sundry cakes and pies for which the children had special fancies; and manufactured for us a variety of what she called "consoling drinks," as specimens of Danish good cheer. Christmas morning broke. The weather was wet, and so miserable, that we made up our minds there was no possibility of going to church. It might be very religious, but it certainly would not be Christian-like to take out horses for such a purpose on such a day. I made up my mind to this, and proposed that we should hold a service in the library, in recognition of the day, and the fact to which it was devoted. We assembled, the whole household, and my husband proceeded to read for us the lessons from the church service, and just as we had all found out the portions of Scripture to which he referred, a violent ringing of the house-bell broke in on our ceremony. It was a telegram, and it was directed to me. It was from Mr. Wiltshire, and it requested me to bring Catherina to London without one moment's delay.

      "To bring," aye, that was the word, it was so unmistakeable. I was requested to "bring," that is, to go myself, and to take with me Catherina.

      "Oh, nonsense, my dear," said my husband, "it is too absurd, your leaving your home on a Christmas day; let the woman go of her own message. From beginning to end, I don't know what you have to say to the affair. It is wholly gratuitous of you to enter on the private concerns of the Bogwaters', and Lord ⸻. I tell you I won't be enmeshed in it; however the matter turns out let us keep clear. Depend upon it, it is unwise to scald our fingers with other people's broth."

      Catherina stood like a statue. Her face was set as if suddenly petrified, but her eyes were fixed on mine, and they linked her sympathies and mine together. Yes, we women would stand to each other. I made no reply to Mr. ⸻. He talked to the wind; even the children appealed in vain. How could they dine without me for the first time in their little lives on a Christmas day? There were all the little annual offices of love to be done which had never yet been omitted. Should I be the first to falter?

      "I don't like it," resumed papa. "I very much object, but I never have been master, and a wilful woman, my dear, must have her way. So the horses are going out after all; we would'nt take them, it seems, for God's service, but now how willing we are to lend them to a piece of scandal. Upon my word it is very inconsistent, so it is;" but I was getting ready during the discussion, and before it was ended had got into the vehicle which was in motion before we heard the last of it.

      Catherina's serenity was edifying. She grew beautiful as I looked at her with the beauty of a happy mind. During that journey I felt her rise from the place in which circumstances had put her. She had been my servant, she was now my friend, equal, no, not alone that, superior in nature and qualities; I looked up to her; concealed in her unobtrusive exterior there lay a being I could not emulate, and I felt she was worthy of better service than I had rendered her, and that in our connection I indeed took the lowest place.

CHAPTER VII.

WE were met at the station by Mr. Wiltshire; he drew me aside; "Mrs. ⸻," he said, "how kind of you to come. Poor Rina only finds her husband to lose him. Lord ⸻ is dying, and he wants to see her. This is awfully sudden news to you; I see you are shocked." And I truly was. I had to go into the waiting room and endeavour to recover myself before facing Catherina, who was pursuing her old occupation of gathering the parcels together and assisting to place them in a cab. I looked very hard at her as she approached me, and something in the manner of my regard attracted her attention perceptibly. A shudder passed over her frame, and, with the slightest possible hesitation in her manner, she said, "Is anything the matter? Is he ill? Pray do not keep me another moment in suspense — tell me all. Something has happened." She looked as if her endurance was at an end, and glanced with painful solicitude from Mr. Wiltshire to myself. I broke the silence which lay on us with a violent effort. It was immensely difficult for me to tell the poor creature that happiness and misery lay before her together; that they would touch her at the same moment; that extremes would meet in a manner in which they rarely come into contact.

      "Lord ⸻ is very ill, and he wants to see you."

      She received my announcement without a word. It had the old effect. Every ray of intelligence passed from her countenance; I might have addressed my intimation to marble. One of Lord ⸻'s carriages was waiting for us. Mr. Wiltshire and I stood aside. The silent impassive woman took her place. She entered her carriage, and we followed her. Not one word broke the painful pause that ensued. We drove to the grand mansion at which Catherina had so often mounted guard. We were ushered into n spacious library, and there Mr. Wiltshire left us. It was just the gloomy hour when the lamps of night begin to replace the orb of day. A man was lighting the gasalier in the centre of the room; there was a kind of artificial dawn. Before we could discern the forms of the furniture, I was conscious of my hand being seized and licked, as by a dog; and then a kind of growl emanated from a figure which locked Catherina in its embraces. It was Sigbrit.

      "When the bright flame of the gas enabled us to see each other, there was a meeting which surprised me more than I thought it possible I could have been, even under the peculiar circumstances of the case. Sir Edward Walker was also in the room. He, too, had been telegraphed for, and he had come by the same train with us, but had arrived at the house a few minutes before us, my discomposure at the terminus having delayed our proceeding. Sir Edward and Sigbrit stood face to face with scrutinising wonder for a minute; they then shook hands, and we all sat down in solemn silence. A very short time elapsed before Mr. Wiltshire returned, and addressing us all, said, "Lord ⸻ wishes the whole party to assemble round his bed."

      We passed into the grand hall, and up the wide staircase, and were ushered into a room, in which there were three persons standing together, an agitated, fearful group, and the arrival of our party evidently added to their trepidation. One of these we recognized as "James Buckley;" he moved forward as if to speak to some of us, but our leader, Mr. Wiltshire, kept him back by an imperative wave of the hand, and advancing to the door of an inner apartment, spoke to a gentleman who instantly admitted him and beckoned us to follow. We proceeded, and were immediately in the awful presence of a mightier than the mightiest. There was death in the room. It filled the chamber, and its grand visibility rendered all things else unseen: by degrees the details of the picture came out in full light. The central figure absorbed all attention. Lord ⸻ lay gasping out his life. His face had an intensly waiting expression — a waiting, not for death, but for opportunity to do a final deed, without having done which, he could not accept his dismissal from suffering. How vividly I recall that great massive body, throbbing with conscience! it heaved like the ceaseless swelling of the breast of ocean, moving with the irregular contraction of the muscles, the seat of animal life; and these again were sympathising with the subtle force derived from that Source which breathed into man's nostrils the breath of higher life, and made him a living soul; it was that life of the spirit which was agitating the fleshly tabernacle. It had a work to do before the severance of its tie to clay, — an act to perform in the time within which man alone can work ere the night cometh. The figure of the photograph was before me, magnified to its full dimensions; the large head, the white hair, the capacious development of a ponderous brain, were conspicuous; and on the man lay the shadow of a great sin — to me the dark halo of an unatoned-for evil rested like a black cloud on the brow of the departing mortal. His hands were clasped as if in prayer. A clergyman in his robes of office knelt at the side of the couch. Instinctively we all fell on our knees and joined in the solemn litany that was ascending to the throne of grace. When the prayer was ended, we stood in a wide circle round the bed, and I began to observe the final act of our drama. The first thing that struck me was the absence of Gertrude, the reputed wife of the dying man. Her mother was there, and oh, what a crest-fallen, sullen look of ill-concealed agony and shame was on her countenance. She sat in an easy chair, with her gaze rivetted on the fire, and her back turned to the bed. Her eye did not meet mine, nor was it once raised during the trying scene. The two men that we had seen in the outside room were standing near her, and "James Buckley" was not far from the group. It was easy to see that they had been associated in mischief, and were testing the strength of their union by making it visible. Lord ⸻ made a sign to Mr. Wiltshire with a paper that was between his finger and thumb. Mr. Wiltshire took this paper, and while he was unfolding it, Lord ⸻ made a second motion of his hand and looked entreatingly at Catherina. She stood next to her aunt, as immoveably firm as ever she had been under any of the attacks her nerves had been subjected to during my knowledge of her. I looked imploringly at her; Sir Edward made a sign to her to approach the bedside; Mr. Wiltshire said, "Catherina, take his Lordship's hand." The clergyman whispered, "Forgive, as you hope to be forgiven." Lord ⸻ drew a long breath and made a desperate effort to arise, saying, in thickening speech, "My wife, come."

      Calmly the quiet figure appeared at his side, her arm was soon beneath his head, and her hand was holding a cordial to his lips. This ministration immediately produced a reviving effect. Lord ⸻ turned to Mr. Wiltshire, and said, very distinctly, — "Go on."

      Sigbrit, Sir Edward Walker, and I, stood at the foot of the couch, the reverend gentleman remained beside Mr. Wiltshire, at the side of the bed which was opposite to that at which Lady Bogwater sat, with her friends at her side. The document in Mr. Wiltshire's hand contained the deliberate judgment of the august personages to whom the case of Catherina and "James" had been submitted.

      It was their verdict that a marriage had taken place at Copenhagen between the Earl of ⸻ and Catherina Neilson, and that no subsequent contract on their part could render it void. They fully rehearsed all the evidence on which they founded this opinion. I gathered from the statement they gave, that the ceremony was that of the Lutheran church, and that all the usual forms were complied with except one, which was that the parties had not signed any registry attesting the fact. It was declared that this was omitted by the officiating minister inadvertently, and owing to his having had several other similar engagements on the same day, and also to his not thoroughly understanding the proper forms connected with the affair. He had but recently entered on his duties, and there had been some difficulty connected with the objections of "James" and the peculiarities of Sigbrit, that had interfered with the ordinary proceedings of the wedding. "When the reading ended, Lord ⸻ seemed endowed with renewed life, and he suddenly sat up in the bed, and turned towards Catherina.

      "Rina," he said, "it is due to you that I should explain my desertion of you. That man" — pointing to one of those who stood near Lady Bogwater — "the man whom I trusted to carry on my correspondence with you, who was my agent while I assumed the name or 'James,' who was directed by me to receive letters so addressed to me, made me believe that you were debased and had forsaken me. He sequestered your letters, withheld them from me, invented the tale of your guilt, bore false witness to your fall, made me wretched about you by inducing me to suppose that I had led you into the highway of vice, and I dreaded to encounter you in its by-paths, to which I was told you had resorted." Here the enfeebled frame sank back breathless, and the man who had been indicated in the last address advanced a little; he seemed a good deal affected.

      "I pray you, my Lord," he said, "give me your pardon, I was urged on, and you and all men shall judge by what. This woman," and he laid his hand on Lady Bogwater as he spoke, "that I have loved with the intense adoration of my first and only passion, compelled me to work out the plot. These two men, Buckley and Gibbs, were but my tools. The first acted for me in Ireland, and Gibbs merely misled the Danish woman for me in London, at my instigation, when she tried to procure an interview with your Lordship. My whole and sole motive in preventing that was to gratify my own ambition, and to place my child — our child (touching Lady Bogwater's shoulder as he spoke) in a place to which the highest in the land might aspire." I could see that Lady Bogwater shook like a reed, as she was thus pointed out, and the speaker continued:—

      "I claim my child now. She is not Lord Bogwater's daughter. Her mother forsook me for Lord Bogwater, shortly before she was born, and when the perfidious woman left me to marry a nobleman, she carried my heart and soul with her, as well as my unborn child, on whom I beseech you now to have pity, and not to visit the sins of her parents on her."

      The maternal parent was that instant suffering for her own guilt in a manner that no one could wish to increase; she sat unmasked before her fellow beings, and evidently deeply felt her shame.

      Lord Bogwater, as was well known to us all, had always been a weak-minded man. He was advanced in life when she married him, and had now fallen into the stage of second childhood.

      This daring schemer had worked well the position to which she had been elevated as his wife, and made it subservient to her aggrandizement, and had certainly managed to maintain it with a surprising amount of tact and cleverness. Lord Bogwater's estates were heavi]y encumbered, and they had a large young family all depending upon her energy, and she bid fair to achieve an abundant success though her diplomacy and management.

      It was a relief that Lord Bogwater was not present. Aged and insensible as he may have been to many matters connected with his earthly condition, he surely would have been sensitive on the point of his honour. No doubt, to him the information that Gertrude was not his child, would convey keen and peculiar sensations, and he would have been sorely hurt at the manner in which the connection was formed with Lord ⸻. Had he thoroughly understood the case at the time of the wedding, he would have interposed his feeble authority to stay the matter and prevent the mischief that had occurred. But he was nobody then, kept in the background by his wife, acquiescent in her decisions, he, automaton and puppet, while he was capable of the least movement. Now paralysed and helpless, he was set aside by nature, and we could not but feel, that even he in his languishing state, would have to feel the pang of a trial worse than any with which he had been afflicted.

      "Sure I done nothin' but my duty, what I was hired for, and paid for, and I hope my Lord will spare me," said our Irish acquaintance, while the man called "Gibbs" stood transfixed with wonder at the whole affair, in which his part had been so small, and yet so effective.

      Meanwhile, the occupant of the bed lay struggling for breath. He had an anxious, searching, appealing look, which he could not find words to explain. He recognized Sir Edward Walker, and made an effort to respond to him when he took his hand and pressed a silent, solemn farewell. Mr. Wiltshire, with a very decided gesture, dissolved the assembly, the members of which vanished almost as mysteriously as they had appeared, and we seemed done with them at once and for ever. With a sudden impulse I rushed from the room across the gallery, and opened the door of the first room I came to. My object was to find Gertrude and another — her child; surely, they had some rights! Why were they unnamed in the general summing up? Fortunately, I hit on the very chamber of their retreat, I had got into the nursery. There was no light in the apartment I entered, beside that of the fire, which was blazing up brilliantly; the nurse was sitting before it holding a lovely boy on her knee. She rose at the sight of me, and I immediately explained that I came to inquire for Lady ⸻ and the child.

      The latter she presented to me, and he obeyed her command to "kiss the lady." In a most friendly manner I took him from her, and said, "his poor papa wants to see him." The nurse made a sign of silence and she pointed to a couch at the end of the room, and there in the gloom I discerned a recumbent form.

      "Gertrude," I said; she rose and turned round to look at me.

      "Oh! Mrs. ⸻, don't come near me, let me alone. I cannot, will not be intruded on, leave me with my child."

      "For his sake," I urged, "be wise, don't forget you have his interest to serve, bring him to his father, part friends, make friends. I know her. She will be true to your boy, if I know anything of a good woman's heart." Without letting a word slip, that would betray to the nurse the terrible nature of Gertrude's affliction, and merely seeming to discuss the duty of her paying a final visit to her husband, we carried on a long argument. I prevailed, and she took the child and accompanied me to the door of the room, wherein I had lately witnessed the sad fact of her humiliation.

      Silence reigned in the chamber lately so solemnly filled with the voice of justice, and the voice of prayer. Lord ⸻ was still breathing, but to every sense of the world's motion he seemed as dead and lost as an unconscious babe. Catherina sat at the bedside, her hand clasped in that of the dying man, and her air as satisfied and happy as if her act had been that of soothing a child to its repose. Gertrude entered and crossed the room, carrying her son as her passport and claim to a place equal, at least, to that occupied by her rival. The effect on Catherina was magical. She rose, and, with a grace and dignity of carriage, with which she seemed to be suddenly gifted, she stepped aside, and motioned Gertrude to take her place. The women looked at each other in silence, and a very brief pause ensued, in which both made up their noble minds to be sisters in sorrow; their hands met, and a warm grasp of honest good-will gave a thrill not only to them, but seemed to send life throughout the chamber.

      The shock awoke the almost dead. Lord ⸻ opened his dull, rayless eyes. They gathered sight, and slowly conveyed the scene to his failing intellect. Re put out a hand to each of the women. Catherina took the baby, and placed his little face on the pillow close to his father's. She first kissed the child, and then the man, and prest these words with her lips on her husband's brow. "Tell our child that his mother was true to his father, and will not now be false to the son that remains to bear his name."

      No sound came in reply to this holy promise, so freely received, and so beautiful and timely in its consoling assurance; but I saw a luminous emanation, like the nimbus of a sainted spirit, shine out round the head that had till now. worn the dark shadow. We all three watched the light that stole over the haggard face, and restored the manly lineaments to their proper form. The Danish woman in her own tongue uttered the happy truth, "He is in heaven," and Gertrude and myself shared her cheering belief.

      Catherina and I were led away by Mr. Wiltshire to an hotel where we found Sigbrit awaiting us. Sir Edward Walker and I returned to our homes the next day, and Mr. Wiltshire soon after announced to us that the adjustment of the case had become perfectly easy. Catherina. had declined to accept any more than a moderate sum of money, and secured to Gertrude all the dignity of her late position by entering into legal bonds engaging not to disturb her position as the widow of Lord ⸻, and to make no claim that would interfere with the legitimacy of her child.

      So Gertrude was to remain known to the world as the Countess of ⸻, and her son was to bear his father's name unblemished, and protected by the honour and high principle of "James's" Danish bride. Catherina arranged that she should bear the name of "Mrs. James," and be regarded by the son and heir of Lord ⸻, for whom she had been so self-denying, as an aunt, and under this title to have access to him whenever she came to England, which she proposed sometimes to do. I had several letters from her, filled with expressions of love and gratitude to me, and many desires either to see me at Copenhagen, or to visit me when she should have recovered from the consequences of her late sad suffering.

      We heard that the treacherous steward, Lady Bogwater's paramour, the father of Gertrude, had emigrated to Queensland, and had taken with him Buckley and Gibbs.

      Of the delicacy and forbearance of the foreign ladies, Mr. Wiltshire could not speak too highly.

      "Whatever their social place may be, at home or abroad," said he, "they are just, in every sense of the word, ladies."

      Even Sigbrit won golden opinions from us all by her kindness and amiability. She did nothing but long to comfort the unhappy Gertrude, and heartily praised Catherina's decision in declining to interfere with her in any way. They never intruded on her. Catherina. supplicated for a sight of the child before she left, but did not dream of asking an interview with the mother. It was granted, however, voluntarily, and the Danish bride and the English wife of Lord ⸻, parted with a mutual undertaking to do well by each other, and a profound reciprocal esteem.

CHAPTER VIII.

THREE years have gone by, during which Sir Edward Walker and we often remark that Mr. Wiltshire does not accept any of our invitations to visit us. We had long ago broken into the habit of calling him "Tom," and were almost as much attached to him as his older friend, now our neighbour, "Edward." We had ceased to speak of "James," and seldom named his Danish bride, though none of us had forgotten Catherina. Even against her I had some complaint. She was becoming a bad correspondent. Some of my letters to her remained unreplied to, and I had thoughts of enquiring from "Tom" whether he retained any communication with her. It was strange that she should cease to send us news of her movements, and make a breach in the friendship which was cemented by more than ordinary ties. I began to get a little anxious about her, and with this on my mind, I was particularly pleased to find a note one morning from "Tom," volunteering to pay me a visit, and more than that, proposing, at the same time, to bring his bride with him; his letter was short, and gave no details of his new connection. It merely stated that he was about to be married, and to go on a prolonged wedding tour; that on a certain day he would be in Dublin, and he begged that there he might receive permission from me to come to Bally—, and bring his wife to introduce to me; but her name, age, station, or nation, he did not reveal.

      "Just like him," said "Edward," "never explicit. I suspect that she's just some poor girl that interested him, and that he married off in some generous way, not daring to tell any of his friends, lest they might remonstrate with him for his chivalrous disregard of material advantages."

      He seemed to know his friend, and to believe him capable of the most unworldly acts. According to his view, the probabilities were that Mrs. Wiltshire was somebody of moral worth without the adjuncts of social position.

      I joined in this idea myself, for I could not otherwise account for the silence in which "Tom" passed over the antecedents of the woman he had married, and though I fully trusted him that they were such as, made her worthy of him, I thought it somewhat extraordinary that he should conceal them from us who were so little likely to undervalue her in consequence of any conventional distinctions.

      Nevertheless, I wrote him the required invitation, and appointed to meet him and his wife at the railway station, and bring them to my house. The appointed day and hour arrived, and I was at the spot when the train drew up to the platform, and I looked with eager expectation into every carriage in order to discover my friend "Tom" and his bride. No sign of them appeared, and I was turning away to drive home, in disappointment, when a closely veiled lady seized me in her arms, and vigorously kissed me. It was only when she withdrew her face far enough from me for my vision to catch its contour in a glance, that I recognized who it was.

      It was Catherina! "Tom," who had hidden in the guard's box, soon approached, and the denouement was complete.

      I have no more to tell. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Wiltshire are my guests to-day, and will leave me to-morrow morning; and one of the first stipulations of our renewed friendships was, that at this point I should end the story of "James's Danish bride."