such continuance of music in modes old and new-well, I hope I am no more surprised at the achievement than is consistent with my always having held to the belief that whenever "Waring" reappeared, some such effect would follow the phenomenon. . . . In fine, the Poem is worth the thirty years' work and experience and even absence from home, and whether people accept it now, or let it alone for a while, in the end appreciated it is certain to be. I shall wait a little and read it againin no fear but that what I believe now will be confirmed hereafter: meantime my hearty congratulations.

The Contemporary Review,

This cordial letter is dated October 18th, 1872, and in Domett's Diary is the following entry for October 24th, but six days later: "To Browning's, He was out. Had a long chat with Miss Browning. When I alluded to the good-natured partiality with which he had written about my book, Sarianna said she knew he gave his sincere opinion of it, because she had heard him say precisely the same things about it to a friend of theirs-I think a sister of Leighton the R.A."

W. Hall Griffin.

A boat was rowing quietly along the shore of the Sogne Fjord, near its mouth and looking toward the sea. In its stern sat the owner, holding the tiller, whilst a boy and a girl, his son and daughter, pulled at the oars. It was evening, and the mountains on either side of the Fjord were reflected for miles into the distance. Far away could be seen the edge of the open sea, with its strips of low-lying land and islands. Over these hung a golden haze, the day's last gift. The man in the stern was a robust and happylooking bearded man. His daughter was a typical Norwegian girl, strong, broad-chested and broad-waisted, with a healthy, beautiful complexion. son looked like an English boy. the stern of the boat, just behind where the owner sat, were painted the words -"J. Holloway-Sandener." The boat quitted the shore, and made across for the other side, where Sandener could be seen. It was a little wooden village, close beside a rushing river; it possessed a wooden hotel, and a wooden church and tower. Above it rose the mountains, with waterfalls

His On

streaming down their shadowy sides. J. Holloway was an important man in his town, and had a flagstaff in his garden. He could see his little house and flagstaff, somewhat separate from the rest, beyond the church tower. His eye wandered from this to the open sea and the golden light beyond. In that direction lay England and Hull. He became meditative. The still waters, the mountains, the sound of the oars, the evening light, and the oc casional talk of the rowers-these things faded from his mind, and he journeyed back into the past, across the sea to Hull. This was what he remembered.

James Holloway had been out of work for ten weeks. During this period he had "eaten nothing," as we say of invalids or persons of abstemious temperament. He had not drunk as much as usual either; but he had drunk more than he had eaten. He had a theory that beer was as nourishing as bread to a man of his constitution. It was all a matter of

constitution. Some men grew fat on the drink, others grew thin; this was proved in every walk of life. He was one of those whom it nourished; and he was grateful to Nature for this mark of her favor. As he stood this morning in the road outside the docks at Hull, in the company of several hundred others of his kind, this peculiar constitution of his did not mark him out as being above the general average. The average was not a high one. The men were waiting to be hired, standing together in groups. It was 6 o'clock in the morning, and drizzling. The circumstances were depressing, yet there was an air of composure about the crowd. They sucked their pipes of foul tobacco, with an early morning relish; most of them had had some breakfast. They spat on the ground with decision, and when they did speak-for the most part they were silent-they spoke out loud and bold, or short and sharp, with a jest and an oath. The chins were bristly throughout. They all shaved once a week. There was not a collar amongst them, but a great variety of knotted neckcloths; and there were great-coats of some kind or another, procured somehow or other, on the backs of all. There had been a long period of slackness in the Docks, and a slump in trade all through the town. The greater part of the men had earned next to nothing for two or three months past. Most of them had wives and families at home. A specialist in sociology could have passed an interesting morning, enquiring how these men and their families had lived during this period. But the results would not have worked out on paper. For none of these men knew how he had lived; and even their wives could not have explained the secret. According to all reasonable statistics, they ought not to have lived at all. It was a most peculiar state of affairs. James Holloway was a bachelor; but

He

he did not thank his stars for it. was not of a grateful mind, and he was too full of theories. If he had had a wife, he theorized, she might have picked up a six-pence or two, now and then, and the children might have got something out of the church and after school hours; together, he thought, they might have got along better than he was doing singly. There were men who had found it so. He had a theory, too, that money was always money, however many there were to spend it, and that one and six-pence was always better than a shilling, whatever the company. This had been proved again and again to his satisfaction when clubbing together with his pals.

He waited and waited, with his hands in his great-coat pockets, now and then jogging his elbows against his sides. He had lived all his life, 25 years, in Hull, alternately working and loafing, either by inclination or compulsion. But he had a theory that his life had not yet really begun. Some day he was going to do better than he had done so far. That was quite certain. He never allowed himself for an instant to believe that the distressed and irregular condition was a permanent thing. It was merely temporary, and therefore supportable. He talked and laughed with two or three others, as they waited for work. There was a faint blueness and bitterness, a touch of solemnity, lingering round the corners of his mouth and eyes, but scarcely noticeable, owing to the strong look of life and sense which animated his countenance, and those of his friends, as they talked and laughed in their abrupt, rapid, jerky manner. Discontent appeared chiefly in the filthy adjectives with which every substantive was heralded.

After several hours of the morning had thus passed, it became apparent that no more work was to be had that day. He went off into the town, walking

up the street courageously as if he were in regular employment, and going home to dinner. He spent the middle of the day as usual; that is to say, he did not know how he spent it; it spent itself. As usual, he was busy with his thoughts and theories, thinking over his prospects. He must do something-that was certain. It would not do to go on living in this way any longer. This sort of thing must come to an end. In was time he made a new start, struck out a new line. He had said the same for years past; he had said it oftener and oftener, and now he said it once every ten minutes. When he was not talking to himself in this way, he was talking to his pals. They talked of every imaginable subject under the sun, but they arrived at no fixed opinions on any. At least the opinions were all fixed, but they were all conflicting. For instance, all were agreed that the life they were leading was a dog's life, not fit for a Christian man, and that something must be done to better themselves. This was one fixed conviction, and its friend and companion was that a man could not better himself, that there was nothing to do, and nowhere else to go. Both these opinions were clear and certain. Again, when politics came up for discussion, Jim Holloway was convinced that the Government were not doing their duty to such as himself; that they were allowing the blood and muscle of the country to be drained away; that they only talked, never did anything, and had got their posts through the influence of society women, and that the condition of the people in his town was a scandal to the country. Simultaneously, if properly aroused, he was always ready to swear by the good old British Constitution, the Flag, the Throne, the Army, Navy and the sporting Aristocracy. So, too, with religion, which was frequently discussed in the lodging houses of an evening. He was

perfectly convinced that it was all a humbug, a got-up affair-Noah's Ark and the Flood and all. The clergy and the bishops did it all for money. "Religion was civilization." This was the idea of one of the talkers in the lodg ing house; and he had succeeded in making his meaning clear to all. God could not be good, if He sent evil and suffering. The whole thing was a lie; but civilization needed it. This was perfectly clear to the unsophisticated reasoning of all. Truth had only to be stated to be understood and believed. This was one opinion. The other was that something good, some fatherly power or destiny, which understood things, lay at the back of his life. This was also quite certain. Apart from the direct knowledge of the fact, it had been proved again and again. For he would certainly have died for various reasons, chiefly for lack of nourishment, long before, if life had not been constantly supplied to him-and so would they all have done. All the middle of the day he spent outside a public-house, cogitating these contradic tory opinions, but especially about what he was going to do. For some reason he asked himself this question to-day with greater frequency and with more vital emphasis than before. "Must do something-this can't go on," he reiterated. He ran through all his old rejected schemes again for the thousandth time-emigration, enlisting, tramping into the country, going round the town once more.

In the midst of these thoughts, impelled by the certain conviction that something must be done, he found him. self wandering down the street again. It was afternoon, and during all the period of the last ten weeks he had never before felt so empty and cavernous within. A crowd of people were going into a public hall, off one of the principal streets. Admission appeared to be free, and Jim drifted in with

them, pondering on what he was going to do on what he had got to dorather than on what he was doing. He found himself at a political meeting. The chairman, a small, fat, smiling gentleman, in a fur coat, was introducing the speaker. The chairman spoke with daintiness and grace, looking round on his audience and smiling, and clasping his two little hands together. He was enjoying himself. Then the speaker began, a gloomy man. James Holloway followed all that was said. He seemed to have two minds this afternoon. With one mind he followed the speaker, and understood all that he said; with the other mind he was still determining that something must be done, that he must enlist, emigrate, cut his throat, or do something. The gloomy speaker was getting a little warmer. He had reached the glories of the Empire, the necessity for building it up, and doing all in our power to preserve it, and hand it on to our children. We must even be prepared to make sacrifices for it. Though in his own private opinion no sacrifice would be necessary, still we must be prepared to make sacrifices. James Holloway, along with the rest of the audience, loudly indicated his readiness to make a sacrifice. As he cheered, his mind Number Two was saying that something must be done, that it could not go on, and that he must go up again to the paper mills to see if a job was to be had there.

The speaker was now threatening his audience. "Was England to become a second-class Power?" he asked them. Before asking this question he had paused; and he asked it, not triumphantly, but with a deadly significance. His voice lowered itself. "Was It possible that England might ever become a second-class Power?" He spoke as if alluding to one of those darker subjects which are not men

tioned in polite society. A third time he repeated the question, in a grave and awful whisper. "Was there any one in that room who had ever faced the possibility of England's becoming a secondclass Power-a Denmark, a Sweden, or a Norway?" James Holloway felt faint. Then the speaker recovered himself, and brought out his emphatic No's. He passed on once more to Empire, to Royalty, the Flag, and the Army and Navy, in a grand peroration. Holloway, who sat at the back of the room, rose to his feet with many of the audience, and shouted. As he rose, it seemed to him that he was indeed rising and rising. For a moment he thought that his spirit had left the body. Then he realized that he must be ill; and immediately fright seized him, and he turned sick and faint. He made for the door, and hurried out.

James Holloway had a theory that when a man was feeling ill and doneup, the best thing he could do was to go and work. This he had often proved in practice. He made up his mind on the spot, that he would go and work. Cost what it might, he would work before nightfall. He went down to the docks, and slunk along the wharves unobserved. Come what might, he would work somewhere, at something. It was the only way to cure himself. Heaven was propitious. In a quiet corner, against a lonely wharf, he observed a Norwegian schooner, unloading small baulks of timber. The baulks of timber were being thrown out by hand from the hold of the vessel. Two seamen stood on deck, catching them as they popped out of the hold, and throwing them with a clatter on to a huge pile that had formed itself on the wharf. Two other seamen stood on this pile, throwing the wood slowly about, so as to build and shape the structure, and allow room for more. James Hollo

way slunk alongside this pile of wood. For some time he watched the men at work. He caught the eye of one of the seamen, and winked. The big Norwegian stopped work, and straightened himself with a slow, pleasant gasp. Jim scrambled on to the pile, and began to throw the timber towards its further end, so as to make room for more in the centre. The Norwegian smiled, and went on with his own work. Jim worked away with a will. It was a luxury to put out his strength again; and he felt better and better. Every moment he expected the mate to come and warn him off. The mate came to the edge of the vessel, and leaned his arm on the bulwarks, smiling ironically at Holloway. "You laike vurk?" he said. Holloway worked away in silence. The mate smiled a deeper smile. He remained lazily leaning on the bulwarks for a minute, and then returned to his post above the hold, catching the timber as it popped out. The vessel was being unloaded by the crew, without any outside assistance but this voluntary aid proffered by our friend. They worked on till late. Holloway ventured no questions; but they were evidently working overtime. Only one thought now occupied his mind. Would his services be recognized in any form? His unchartered work was against the rules of the docks; and they had not even asked for it. Yet he augured well from the mate's impassive look; they were evidently in a hurry, as they were working late, and his work was a gain to them.

Presently the mate made a peculiar sound in his throat; and they all stopped work. The mate leaned again on the bulwarks. The big seaman on the pile straightened himself once more with the same pleasant gasp. Slowly they all disappeared into the little fo'c'sle. Holloway stood on the pile in the gathering dusk, dismally

watching them depart. The mate had now disappeared in the forward part of the vessel; and his last hope was gone. Suddenly the mate's figure reappeared on deck. He looked at Holloway, and nodded his head casually towards the fo'c'sle.

Jim Holloway scrambled on board and, lowering his head, joined the other seamen in the fo'c'sle, which was about 6 feet by 8 feet. A beautiful smell greeted his nostrils, of frizzled onions and potatoes, along with tobacco and oil and tar, One of the men was frying a mess over a little stove. A table in the centre was prepared for the meal. Holloway jammed himself down by the table on a chest, trying to take up as little room as possible. The three other seamen lay in their bunks, enjoying the luxury of relief from toil. They grunted to one another in Norwegian, paying no attention to Jim. The cook glanced at him and laughed, as he stirred his pan. The cook could speak English. "No work in Hull," he said, "very slack, all out of work." He smiled affectionately at his onions. Presently the fry was served up on the table. The seamen came out of their bunks, and all fell to. Jim Holloway never enjoyed a meal so much. Two of the hands were scarcely more than boys. They had fair hair and blue eyes, and looked fresh and blooming, with enormous shoulders encased in blue jerseys. On Holloway's right sat an older man, in a pair of boots reaching above his knees, which he had not troubled to pull off. Opposite to him sat the cook. All five of them ate away with a relish; a small lamp burned against the wall, and the smoke of the food went up from the table. The Norwegians became more talkative as they ate. Holloway thought that never had he seen four such pleasant looking fellows. It was a luxury to him to rest

his eyes on their contented faces.