"Yes, I will read it to you," said Philip, turning and leaning over the back of his chair with the letter in his hand.

There is a portrait of Mr. Philip Debarry still to be seen at Treby Manor, and a very fine bust of him at Rome, where he died fifteen years later, a convert to Catholicism. His face would have been plain but for the exquisite setting of his hazel eyes, which fascinated even the dogs of the household. The other features, though slight and irregular, were redeemed from triviality by the stamp of gravity and intellectual preoccupation in his face and bearing. As he read aloud, his voice was what his uncle's might have been if it had been modulated by delicate health and a visitation of self-doubt.

Sir,-In reply to the letter with which you have favored me this morning, I beg to state that the articles you describe were lost from the pocket of my servant, who is the bearer of this letter to you, and is the claimant of the vellum note-book and the gold chain. The large leathern pocket

"I shall send you with a letter to the preach-book is my own property, and the impression on er. You can describe your own property. And the seal, uncle-was it your coat-of-arms?"

"No, it was this head of Achilles. Here, I can take it off the ring, and you can carry it, Christian. But don't lose that, for I've had it ever since eighteen hundred. I should like to send my compliments with it," the Rector went on, looking at his brother, "and beg that since he has so much wise caution at command, he | would exercise a little in more public matters, instead of making himself a firebrand in my parish, and teaching hucksters and tape-weavers that it's their business to dictate to statesmen." "How did Dissenters, and Methodists, and Quakers, and people of that sort first come up, uncle ?" said Miss Selina, a radiant girl of twen

who had given much time to the harp. "Dear me, Selina," said her eldest sister, Harriet, whose forte was general knowledge, "don't you remember Woodstock?' They were in Cromwell's time."

"Oh! Holdenough, and those people? Yes; but they preached in the churches; they had no chapels. Tell me, Uncle Gus; I like to be wise," said Selina, looking up at the face which was smiling down on her with a sort of severe benignity. "Phil says I'm an ignorant puss." "The seeds of Nonconformity were sown at the Reformation, my dear, when some obstinate men made scruples about surplices and the place of the communion-table, and other trifles of that sort. But the Quakers came up about Cromwell's time, and the Methodists only in the last century. The first Methodists were regular clergymen, the more's the pity."

"But all those wrong things-why didn't government put them down ?"

"Ah! to be sure," fell in Sir Maximus, in a cordial tone of corroboration.

"Because error is often strong, and government is often weak, my dear. Well, Phil, have you finished your letter ?"

the wax, a helmeted head of Achilles, was made by my uncle, the Rev. Augustus Debarry, who allows me to forward his seal to you in proof that I am not making a mistaken claim.

I feel myself under deep obligation to you, sir, for the care and trouble you have taken in order to restore to its right owner a piece of property which happens to be of particular importance to me And I shall consider myself doubly fortunate if at any time you can point out to me some method by which I may procure you as lively a satisfaction as I am now feeling in that full and speedy relief from anxiety which I owe to your considerate conduct.

I remain, sir, your obliged and faithful servant,
PHILIP DEBARRY.

66

"You know best, Phil, of course," said Sir Maximus, pushing his plate from him, by way of interjection. But it seems to me you exaggerate preposterously every little service a man happens to do for you. Why should you make a general offer of that sort? How do you know what he will be asking you to do? Stuff and nonsense! Tell Willis to send him a few head of game. You should think twice before you give a blank check of that sort to one of these quibbling, meddlesome Radicals.”

"You are afraid of my committing myself to the bottomless perjury of an et cetera,'" said Philip, smiling, as he turned to fold his letter. "But I think I am not doing any mischief; at all events I could not be content to say less. And I have a notion that he would regard a present of game just now as an insult. I should, in his place."

"Yes, yes, you; but you don't make yourself a measure of Dissenting preachers, I hope," said Sir Maximus, rather wrathfully. 'What do you say, Gus?"

66

"Phil is right," said the Rector, in an absolute tone. "I would not deal with a Dissenter,

A

or put profits into the pocket of a Radical which | faltered in that intention. His power of fulfillI might put into the pocket of a good Church- ing it must depend on what he saw in this visman and a quiet subject. But if the greatestitor, of whose coming he had a horrible dread, scoundrel in the world made way for me, or picked my hat up, I would thank him. So would you, Max."

1

at the very time he was writing to demand it. In that demand he was obeying the voice of his rigid conscience, which had never left him perfectly at rest under his one act of deceptionthe concealment from Esther that he was not her natural father, the assertion of a false claim upon her. "Let my path be henceforth simple," he had said to himself in the anguish of that night; "let me seek to know what is, and if possible to declare it." If he was really going to find himself face to face with the man who had been Annette's husband, and who was Esther's father-if that wandering of his from the light had brought the punishment of a blind sacrilege as the issue of a conscious transgression-he prayed that he might be able to accept all consequences of pain to himself. But he saw other possibilities concerning the claimant of the book and chain. His ignorance and sus

"Pooh! I didn't mean that one shouldn't behave like a gentleman," said Sir Maximus, in some vexation. He had great pride in his son's superiority even to himself; but he did not enjoy having his own opinion argued down as it always was, and did not quite trust the dim vision opened by Phil's new words and new notions. He could only submit in silence while the letter was delivered to Christian, with the order to start for Malthouse Yard immediately. Meanwhile, in that somewhat dim locality the possible claimant of the note-book and the chain was thought of and expected with palpitating agitation. Mr. Lyon was seated in his study, looking haggard and already aged from a sleepless night. He was so afraid lest his emotion should deprive him of the presence of mind nec-picions as to the history and character of Anessary to the due attention to particulars in the coming interview, that he continued to occupy his sight and touch with the objects which had stirred the depths, not only of memory, but of dread. Once again he unlocked a small box which stood beside his desk, and took from it a little oval locket, and compared this with one which hung with the seals on the stray gold chain. There was the same device in enamel on the back of both: clasped hands surrounded with blue flowers. Both had round the face a name in gold italics on a blue ground: the name on the locket taken from the drawer was Maurice; the name on the locket which hung with the seals was Annette, and within the circle of this name there was a lover's knot of light brown hair, which matched a curl that lay in the box. The hair in the locket which bore the name of Maurice was of a very dark brown, and before returning it to the drawer Mr. Lyon noted the color and quality of this hair more carefully than ever. Then he recurred to the note-book: undoubtedly there had been something, probably a third name, beyond the names Maurice Christian, which had themselves been rubbed and slightly smeared as if by accident; and from the very first examination in the vestry, Mr. Lyon could not prevent himself from transferring the mental image of the third name in faint lines to the rubbed leather. The leaves of the note-book seemed to have been recently inserted; they were of fresh white paper, and only bore some abbreviations in pencil with a notation of small sums. Nothing could be gathered from the comparison of the writing in the book with that of the yellow letters which lay in the box: the smeared name had been carefully printed, and so bore no resemblance to the signature of those letters; and the pencil abbreviations and figures had been made too hurriedly to bear any decisive witness. "I will ask him to write to write a description of the locket, "I've brought you a letter from Mr. Debarhad been one of Mr. Lyon's thoughts; but he ry," said Christian, in an off-hand manner.

nette's husband made it credible that he had laid a plan for convincing her of his death as a means of freeing himself from a burdensome tie; but it seemed equally probable that he was really dead, and that these articles of property had been a bequest, or a payment, or even a sale, to their present owner. Indeed, in all these years there was no knowing into how many hands such pretty trifles might have passed. And the claimant might, after all, have no connection with the Debarrys; he might come on this day or the next. There might be more time left for reflection and prayer. Ah these possibilities, which would remove the pressing need for difficult action, Mr. Lyon represented to himself, but he had no effective belief in them; his belief went with his strongest feeling, and in these moments s strongest feeling was dread. He trembled under the weight that seemed already added to his own sin; he felt himself already confronted by Annette's husband and Esther's father. Perhaps the father was a gentleman on a visit to the Debarrys. There was no hindering the pang with which the old man said to himself,

"The child will not be sorry to leave this poor home, and I shall be guilty in her sight."

He was walking about among the rows of books when there came a loud rap at the outer door. The rap shook him so that he sank into his chair, feeling almost powerless. Lyddy presented herself.

"Here's ever such a fine man from the manor wants to see you, sir. Dear heart, dear heart! shall I tell him you're too bad to see him?"

"Show him up," said Mr. Lyon, making an effort to rally. When Christian appeared, the minister half rose, leaning on an arm of his chair, and said, "Be seated, sir," seeing nothing but that a tall man was entering.

'Oh, for more than twenty years," said Christian, carelessly. He was not altogether easy under the minister's persistence, but for that very reason he showed no more impatience. "You have been in France and in Ger

This rusty little man, in his dismal chamber, | bly," he said, in a firmer tone than before. seemed to the Ulysses of the steward's room a "How long have these articles been your proppitiable sort of human curiosity, to whom a man erty ?" of the world would speak rather loudly, in accommodation to an eccentricity which was likely to be accompanied with deafness. One can not be eminent in every thing; and if Mr. Christian had dispersed his faculties in study that would have enabled him to share uncon-many?" ventional points of view, he might have worn a mistaken kind of boot, and been less competent to win at écarté, or at betting, or in any other contest suitable to a person of figure.

"I have been in most countries on the Continent."

"Be so good as to write me your name," said Mr. Lyon, dipping a pen in the ink, and holding it out with a piece of paper.

Christian was much surprised, but not now greatly alarmed. In his rapid conjectures as to the explanation of the minister's curiosity, he had alighted on one which might carry advantage rather than inconvenience. But he was not going to commit himself.

As he seated himself, Mr. Lyon opened the letter, and held it close to his eyes, so that his face was hidden. But at the word "servant" he could not avoid starting, and looking off the letter toward the bearer. Christian, knowing what was in the letter, conjectured that the old man was amazed to learn that so distinguishedlooking a personage was a servant; he leaned "Before I oblige you there, sir," he said, layforward with his elbows on his knees, balanced ing down the pen, and looking straight at Mr. his cane on his fingers, and began a whispering Lyon, "I must know exactly the reasons you whistle. The minister checked himself, finish-have for putting these questions to me. You

ed the reading of the letter, and then slowly and nervously put on his spectacles to survey this man, between whose fate and his own there might be a terrible collision. The word "servant" had been a fresh caution to him. He must do nothing rashly. Esther's lot was deeply concerned.

are a stranger to me- an excellent person, I dare say- but I have no concern about you further than to get from you those small articles. Do you still doubt that they are mine? You wished, I think, that I should tell you what the locket is like. It has a pair of hands and blue flowers on one side, and the name Annette "Here is the seal mentioned in the letter," round the hair on the other side. That is all I said Christian. have to say.

Mr. Lyon drew the pocket-book from his desk, and, after comparing the seal with the impression, said, "It is right, sir: I deliver the pocket-book to you."

He held it out with the seal, and Christian rose to take them, saying, carelessly, "The other things the chain and the little bookmine."

"Your name, then, is "Maurice Christian."

are

A spasm shot through Mr. Lyon. It had seemed possible that he might hear another name, and be freed from the worse half of his anxiety. His next words were not wisely chosen, but escaped him impulsively.

ly.

"And you have no other name?"

If you wish for any thing more from me, you will be good enough to tell me why you wish it. Now then, sir, what is your concern with me?"

The cool stare, the hard challenging voice, with which these words were uttered, made them fall like the beating, cutting chill of heavy hail on Mr. Lyon. He sank back in his chair in utter irresolution and helplessness. How was it possible to lay bare the sad and sacred past in answer to such a call as this? The dread with which he had thought of this man's coming, the strongly-confirmed suspicion that he was really Annette's husband, intensified the antipathy created by his gestures and glances. The sensitive little minister knew instinctively that words which would cost him efforts as painful as the

"What do you mean ?” said Christian, sharp- obedient footsteps of a wounded bleeding hound

that wills a forseen throe, would fall on this man as the pressure of tender fingers falls on a brazen glove. And Esther-if this man was her father-every additional word might help to bring down irrevocable, perhaps cruel, consequences on her. A thick mist seemed to have fallen where Mr. Lyon was looking for the track of duty: the difficult question, how far he was to care for consequences in seeking and avowing the truth, seemed anew obscured. All these things, like the vision of a coming calamity, were compressed into a moment of consciousNothing could be done to-day; every thing must be deferred. He answered Christian in a low, apologetic tone.

"Be so good as to reseat yourself." Christian did not comply. "I'm rather in a hurry, sir," he said, recovering his coolness. "If it suits you to restore to me those small articles of mine, I shall be glad; but I would rather leave them behind than be detained." He had reflected that the minister was simply a punctilious old bore. The question meant nothing else. But Mr. Lyon had wrought himself up to the task of finding out, then and there, if possible, whether or not this were Annette's husband. How could he lay himself and hisness. sin before God if he willfully declined to learn the truth?

"Nay, sir, I will not detain you unreasona

"It is true, sir; you have told me all I can

demand. I have no sufficient reason for de- | after his own desires, and had let the fire die taining your property further."

out on the altar; and as the true penitent, hating his self-besotted error, asks from all coming life duty instead of joy, and service instead of ease, so Rufus was perpetually on the watch lest he should ever again postpone to some pri

He handed the note-book and chain to Christian, who had been observing him narrowly, and now said, in a tone of indifference, as he pocketed the articles, "Very good, sir. I wish you a good-morn-vate affection a great public opportunity which to him was equivalent to a command.

ing."

66

Good-morning," said Mr. Lyon, feeling, while the door closed behind his guest, that mixture of uneasiness and relief which all proerastination of difficulty produces in minds capable of strong forecast. The work was still to be done. He had still before him the task of learning every thing that could be learned about this man's relation to himself and Esther.

Now here was an opportunity brought by a combination of that unexpected, incalculable kind, which might be regarded as the Divine emphasis invoking special attention to trivial events-an opportunity of securing what Rufus Lyon had often wished for as a means of honoring truth, and exhibiting error in the character of a stammering, halting, short - breathed usurper of office and dignity. What was more exasperating to a zealous preacher, with whom copious speech was not a difficulty but a relief

Christian, as he made his way back along Malthouse Lane, was thinking, "This old fellow has got some secret in his head. It's not likely he can know any thing about me; it must-who never lacked argument, but only combe about Bycliffe. But Bycliffe was a gentleman: how should he ever have had any thing to do with such a seedy old ranter as that?"

CHAPTER XV.

And doubt shall be as lead upon the feet
Of thy most anxious will.

batants and listeners-than to reflect that there were thousands on thousands of pulpits in this kingdom, supplied with handsome soundingboards, and occupying an advantageous position in buildings far larger than the chapel in Malthouse Yard-buildings sure to be places of resort, even as the markets were, if only from habit and interest; and that these pulpits were filled, or rather made vacuous, by men whose privileged education in the ancient centres of instruction issued in twenty minutes' formal reading of tepid exhortation or probably infirm deductions from premises based on rotten scaffolding? And it is in the nature of exasperation gradually to concentrate itself. The sincere antipathy of a dog toward cats in general, necessarily takes the form of indignant barking at the neighbor's black cat which makes daily trespass; the bark at imagined cats, though a frequent exercise of the canine mind, is yet comparatively feeble. Mr. Lyon's sarcasm was not without an edge when he dilated in general on an elaborate education for teachers which issued in the minimum of teaching, but it found a whetstone in the particular example of that bad system known as the Rector of Treby Mag

MR. LYON was careful to look in at Felix as soon as possible after Christian's departure, to tell him that his trust was discharged. During the rest of the day he was somewhat relieved from agitating reflections by the necessity of attending to his ministerial duties, the rebuke of rebellious singers being one of them; and on his return from the Monday evening prayer-meeting he was so overcome with weariness that he went to bed without taking note of any objects in his study. But when he rose the next morning, his mind, once more eagerly active, was arrested by Philip Debarry's letter, which still lay open on his desk, and was arrested by precisely that portion which had been unheeded the day before: "I shall consider myself doubly fortunate if at any time you can point out to me some method by which I may procure you as lively a sat-na. There was nothing positive to be said isfaction as I am now feeling in that full and speedy relief from anxiety, which I owe to your considerate conduct."

To understand how these words could carry the suggestion they actually had for the minister in a crisis of peculiar personal anxiety and struggle, we must bear in mind that for many years he had walked through life with the sense of having for a space been unfaithful to what he esteemed the highest trust ever committed to man- - the ministerial vocation. In a mind of any nobleness, a lapse into transgression against an object still regarded as supreme, issues in a new and purer devotedness, chastised by humility and watched over by a passionate regret. So it was with that ardent spirit which animated the little body of Rufus Lyon. Once in his life he had been blinded, deafened, hurried along by rebellious impulse; he had gone astray

against the Rev. Augustus Debarry; his life could not be pronounced blameworthy except for its negatives. And the good Rufus was too pure-minded not to be glad of that. He had no delight in vice as discrediting wicked opponents; he shrank from dwelling on the images of cruelty or of grossness, and his indignation was habitually inspired only by those moral and intellectual mistakes which darken the soul, but do not injure or degrade the temple of the body. If the Rector had been a less respectable man, Rufus would have more reluctantly made him an object of antagonism; but as an incarnation of soul-destroying error, dissociated from those baser sins which have no good repute even with the worldly, it would be an argumentative luxury to get into close quarters with him, and fight with a dialectic short-sword in the eyes of the Treby world (sending also a written account

Wherefore I act on this my belief in the integrity of your written word; and I beg you to procure for me (as it is doubtless in your power) that I may be allowed a public discussion with your near relative, the Rector of this parish, the Reverend Augustus Debarry, to be held in the large room of the Free School, or in the Assembly Room of the Marquis of Granby, these being the largest cover

thereof to the chief organs of Dissenting opinion). Vice was essentially stupid-a deaf and eyeless monster, insusceptible to demonstration: the Spirit might work on it by unseen ways, and the unstudied sallies of sermons were often as the arrows which pierced and awakened the brutified conscience; but illuminated thought, finely-dividing speech, were the choicer weapons of the Divine armory, which whoso could wielded spaces at our command. For I presume he

must be careful not to leave idle.

Here, then, was the longed-for opportunity. Here was an engagement-an expression of a strong wish-on the part of Philip Debarry, if it were in his power, to procure a satisfaction to Rufus Lyon. How had that man of God and exemplary Independent minister, Mr. Ainsworth, of persecuted sanctity, conducted himself when a similar occasion had befallen him at Amsterdam? He had thought of nothing but the glory of the highest cause, and had converted the offer of recompense into a public debate with a Jew on the chief mysteries of the faith. Here was a model: the case was nothing short of a heavenly indication, and he, Rufus Lyon, would seize the occasion to demand a public debate with the Rector on the Constitution of the true Church.

What if he were inwardly torn by doubt and anxiety concerning his own private relations and the facts of his past life? That danger of absorption within the narrow bounds of self only urged him the more toward action which had a wider bearing, and might tell on the welfare of England at large. It was decided. Before the minister went down to his breakfast that morning he had written the following letter to Mr. Philip Debarry:

Sir,-Referring to your letter of yesterday, I find the following words: "I shall consider myself doubly fortunate if at any time you can point out to me some method by which I may procure you as lively a satisfaction as I am now feeling, in that full and speedy relief from anxiety which I owe to your considerate conduct."

would neither allow me to speak within his church, nor would consent himself to speak within my chapel; and the probable inclemency of the approaching season forbids an assured expectation that we could discourse in the open air. The subjects I desire to discuss are-first, the Constitution of the true Church; and, secondly, the bearing thereupon of the English Reformation. Confidently expecting that you will comply with this request, which is the sequence of your expressed desire, I remain, sir, yours, with the respect offered to a sincere withstander,

Malthouse Yard.

RUFUS LYON.

After writing this letter, the good Rufus felt that serenity and elevation of mind which is infallibly brought by a preoccupation with the wider relation of things. Already he was beginning to sketch the course his argument might most judiciously take in the coming debate; his thoughts were running into sentences, and marking off careful exceptions in parentheses; and he had come down and seated himself at the breakfast-table quite automatically, without expectation of toast or coffee, when Esther's voice and touch recalled him to an inward debate of another kind, in which he felt himself much weaker. Again there arose before him the image of that cool, hard-eyed, worldly man, who might be this dear child's father, and one against whose rights he had himself grievously offended. Always as the image recurred to him Mr. Lyon's heart sent forth a prayer for guidance, but no definite guidance had yet made itself visible for him. It could not be guidance

I am not unaware, sir, that, in the usage of the—it was a temptation—that said, "Let the world, there are words of courtesy (so called) which are understood, by those among whom they are current, to have no precise meaning, and to constitute no bond or obligation. I will not now insist that this is an abuse of language, wherein our fallible nature requires the strictest safeguards against laxity and misapplication, for I do not apprehend that in writing the words I have above quoted, you were open to the reproach of using phrases which, while seeming to carry a specific meaning, were really no more than what is called a polite from. I believe, sir, that you used these words advisedly, sincerely, and with an honorable intention of acting on them as a pledge, should such action be demanded. No other supposition on my part would correspond to the character you bear as a young man who aspires (albeit mistakenly) to ingraft the finest fruits of public virtue on a creed and institutions, whereof the sap is composed rather of human self-seeking than of everlasting truth.

matter rest; seek to know no more; know only what is thrust upon you." The remembrance that in his time of wandering he had willfully remained in ignorance of facts which he might have inquired after, deepened the impression that it was now an imperative duty to seek the fullest attainable knowledge. And the inquiry might possibly issue in a blessed repose, by putting a negative on all his suspicions. But the more vividly all the circumstances became present to him, the more unfit he felt himself to set about any investigation concerning this man who called himself Maurice Christian. He could seek no confidant or helper among "the brethren;" he was obliged to admit to himself that the members of his church, with whom he hoped to go to heaven, were not easy to converse with on earth touching the deeper secrets of his experience, and were still less able to advise him as to the wisest procedure, in a case