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THE OLD LETTER.
•roochlng oyer the fire with wan cheek and
whitened hair,
And sad sunk eyes, on the embers flxed with
a dull unseeing stare;
Crouching over the Are, the woman, worn
and old,
With the dickering flame on the letter that
trembles in her hold.
Outside, the sleet beats fast and thick on the
uncurtained pane,
The wind sobs round the lonely house, as it
sweeps the snow-clad plain;
Inside, the ghosts of Joy, and hope, aud fear
less housenold mirth
Flit and whisper round the woman who sits
beside the hearth.
Yet the magic spell of the letter has sent, her
fancies back,
Flying fast past all the graves that mark the
past’s long traok,
Flying past change and sorrow, flying past
wrong and ruth,
Till the heart beats faBt, and the pulses
thrill to the passionate glow of youth.
Ah, duller still her life will show, harder the
task-work seem,
For that weak hour by fancy snatched for
memory’s golden dieam 1
Put by the letter, let It share thy slow and
sure decay;
Patient and meek fake up again the burden
the day.
i
Eleanor.
Saturday Night.
She had been but a street singer
when Jack Desmond first had seen
and heard her, this dark eyed beauty,
who now held the world of Rome at
her feet.
The meeting between them had
taken place some four years previously,
and had been sufficiently romantic
even for an Italian story.
He was an Englishman, rich and
cultured, making a tour of Europe for
the third or fourth time, when, one
evening, sitting on the little balcony
jutting out from his room at a quiet
inn in a small Italian town, suddenly
a delicious voice had broken into de
licious music. It was a voice without
cultivation, but of rare and marvelous
quality.
He leaned forward to catch a
glimpse of the songtress. She stood
on the pavement beneath, a tail, slim
girl, whose aark eyes were upraised to
the pjace where he sat.
Music was Jack Desmond’s passion.
As yet, it had been the only abiding
love his life had ever known.
“By Jove! Such a voice and a street
singer!” he thought to himself, as
he listened. “Are the ears deaf which
hear and do not heed ?”
When the girl paused, he addressed
her in her own liquid tongue.
“Will you come up here a moment,
my child?” he said, kindly. “Your
■music pleases me. I wish to reward
yrou.”
She bowed her head In assent; and
soon a timid knock at the door an
nounced her presence. He threw it
open, and started back, amazed.
The girl was possessed of wonderful
beauty. Her face, oval in shape, was
entirely colorless save for the rich
crimson of her curved lips; her hair
swept back in low rippling waves of
raven blackness from the low brow;
her eyes were not black, as he had
fancied, but perfectly blue, large and
liquid, and full of an infinite sadness.
He took her hand and drew it across
the threshold.
“Will you answer me a few ques
tions?” he asked, “and believe them
not prompted by an idle curiosity?”
“The signor is very good,” she an
swered. “What does he wish to
know ?”
“Why with such a voice and such a
face, you sing in the public streets?”
“I have no money, signor, I sing to
live.” t
“ But your parents?”
* “Dead!”
“Your relations?”
“Dead!”
“You are alone?”
“All alone, signor.”
“How and where do you live?”
“You have seen the how! Where?
In a tiny room, in a poor place one
must know well to find.”
“It should not foe,” said the man.
“It must not be!” he added to him
self.
» But Jack Desmond was not one to
L act on impulse alone.
■ He now put his hand into his
" pocket, and drew therefrom a gold
t piece.
W “Take this," he said, thrusting it
■ into the slim, brown fingers, “and to-
W morrow night come again. I may
f have a plan to propose to you."
I The girl’s face slightly flushed.
With a gesture, almost like pride, she
offered back the gold.
"It is generous, signor, but it is
charity. My song did not deserve so
Desmond laughed as he put back
her hand.
“Why, child,the day will come,” he
said, “when men would pay a fortune
for your smile! Adieu until to-mor
row.”
She beat then, and ere he could di
vine her impulse, she snatched his
hand a moment to her lips, then
turned and fled.
The man slept little that night, but
when morning came he had deter
mined on bis purpose. He was rich.
To gratify a caprice was to give life
new zest, and this, his latest caprice,
bade fair to *,be an interesting experi
ment.
So, when the girl came, he unfolded
to her his plans. For three years she
was to study, at his expense, at the
first musical conservatory in Europe,
then under his patronage she was to
make her debut. After that, if she
felt her debt to him burdensome, she
might repay it as she would. All that
he now asked of her wa* to work hard
and realize his dreams of her success.
Would she do this?
The next month her new life had
begun. Hard and difficult work lay
before her, but she never faltered.
Her education in other matters she
strove to remedy in every spare mo
ment she snatched from her music.
But in the end she triumphed. She
spoke like a lady, was well, versed in
all the simple accomplishment, and
sang, the professor said, like an angel.
They could teach her no more. She
would have a continent to pay her
homage. And there was prophecy in
their words.
In a private box, Jack Desmond on
the night of her debut, listened with
flushed cheeks to the enthusiastic
plaudits which marked her reception,
and saw the flowers rain at her feet,
and her hour of trial was her hour of
victory.
Again and again the house recalled
her. Shouts of “Bravo!” rent the
air, but through it all the blue eyes
nevei lost their look of sadness which
so strangely marked them, save once,
and then as she raised them to that
seemingly empty box, auu sent one
glance which said more plainly than
spoken words : “It is you, not I, who
are the worthy recipient of all this. It
is you to whom I owe it.”
At that moment, Jack Desmond’s
heart beat with a new and marvelous
thrill. In that moment, Eleanor had
ceased to be merely the singer, she
was the woman.
Night after night found him in his
place, and he looked for that one
glance which showed him he was ex
pected, and absent, he would be
missed. Day after day he spent long
hours beside her.
At the end of the first month that
she sang, she handed him a paper.
It represented three-fourths of her
earnings. It would repay him for
one year of her expense.
“I owe you so much—all! all!
Think of it! Let not my debt, then
have the added weight of money.”
So, then to please her, month by
month, he let her liquidate her claim
“I will find means to make it useful
to her,” he thought, and laid the
money by in the form in which she
gave it.
At the end of six months he re
turned to England. The journals
rang with stories of her triumphs and
successes.
They could find her with only one
fault. She was cold—cold as ice. She
had been offered the coronet of a mar
quis, a prince had sued for her hand,
but all in vain.
He remembered then his idle words,
that one day men would yield a for
tune for her smile, and wondered why
it gave him pleasure to have proved
them true.
Could it be that he, Jack Desmond,
loved this woman ?
With the question, camej.be an
swer—Yes !
Yet, though dukes and princes
might lay i heir rank and title at her
feet, he hesitated. He remembered
that long ago night when she had
sang in the street«, and his pride "rose
up an insurmountable barrier between
them. Still, he hastened to Rome,
where Bhe was singing.
She welcomed him as* he knew she
welcomed no other, but of his love he
breathed no whisper. Hla proud old
name be had ever sworn should be
borne but by a woman who might
give equal heritage to its future pos
sessors.
For the first time, the sad look in
her eyee, troubled him. Why did it
ever linger there ?
Ofoe night, after the opera, he had
eqcompanied her home. They were
alone In her paftlor, filled with fragrant
flowers and innumerable offerings
laid at her shrine. She wore a thin
white dress, when, in reaching her
arm upward, the material caught in
the flame of a candle and blazed up
ward.* She uttered a slight scream,
and stood paralyzed with terrer.
He tore off his coat and threw it
about her. With but a few slight
burns, she was unharmed ; but as he
held her in his arms, close to his
wildly-beating heart, he knew that
sophistry and false reasoning lay in
the ruins of his pride at his feet—that
he was but a man, and she but a
woman, with the glorious dower of
her beauty and genius; and that, to
gain her, he would count the world
well lost.
Eleanor!” he said in a low, sup
pressed whisper; “my love! my
wife!”
But, if she had waited for these
words, she heard them not. She had
swooned upon his breast.
The next day, she would not see
even him, so carefully must she rest to
be able to undergo the evening’s per-
ormance.
Each hour now which delayed the
telling oflove dragged into an eternity.
He longed to see the marvelous eyes
f.»rget their sadnesa, and to hear the
sweet lips murmur Yes to his wooing:.
Evening came at last. As usual,
the house was crowded. More lovely
than ever she appeared at the stated
time. The exquisite voice had lost
neither strength nor sweetness.
He had come to the front of the box
to-night; he wished not to lose a sin
gle gesture. His glance devoured her.
The opera was almost finished. It
was at the close of the third act of “La
Somnamhula,” and Eleanor was sing
ing the pean of praise and thauks-
giv'ng which is so beautiful a teat of
vocal skill. Higher and higher rose
the lovely voice as she advanced to the
front of the stage, smiling at the audi
ence, when suddenly her voice broke.
A man, clad in a common seafaring
dress, had carelessly strolled into the
building, aud strangely «nough saun
tered into the aisle of the better por
tion of the house. On him her glance
rested. Her face grew deathly pale.
Her hands clashed convulsively.
Then she stretched out both arms
toward him, in sight of all that won
dering people.
“Pierre! Pierre!” she cried, and
oh, the matchless longing, the exqui
site joy of those two simple words!
Then recovering herself, she took
up the strain where she had dropped
it, and ended it in a buret of melody
which seemed scarce human.
Like one man the house rose to
their feet, but the sailor stood as if
carved in stone. Like one walking in
his sleep, Jack Desmond left the place.
What did the scene mean he just
had witnessed? From one source only
might he learn ; yet he dared not seek
the truth. Merc iful heaven! even
this torturing suspense were better
than the more torturing certainty.
But next morning came a note con
taining but three words:
“Come to me.”
She was waiting for him.
“Have I done wrong not to tell
you ?” she began. “Ah, but I though*
I never should see him more, my
Pierre ! He loved me; but he was poor
and I had no dower, so he went to
sea, and I sang, that I might save
enough to [marry on his return. He
did not come, I thought he had for
gotten me ; but last night I saw him.
I am rich now—very riali. We can
marry. Oh, tell me! are you not
glad for me?”
For a moment the man’s heart beat
to suffoeation. He who loved her so
well to give her to this man of the
people, whom she preferred to him.
Yet might it not be that she did not
know her own heart ? He forced him
self to calmness.
“Eleanor,” he said, quietly, “re
member your lover is where you left
him. You have soared far above him..
May you not regret your choice ?”
“With Pierre?” she questioned,
proudly. “Ah, night and day through
all these years I have dreamed of
him.”
“You love no other?”
“None.”
And as Bhe spoke, she raised her
eyes to his ; but the veil of sadness
had dropped—they were lustrous with
their new-born joy. They answered
him more fully than her spoken
words. But going out from her pres
ence, Jack Desmond knew that the
sunshine had gone out from his ^fe-
The shadow from her eyee had nMen
upon his. Well—he had guarded his
seorst thus long, he would guard It to
the and. Surely his experiment had
been a grand success, yet over his own
life it had write* failure.
Religious Intelligence.
Vatican Manuscript of the New Testament.
The Issue of the Revised New Testa
ment has directed fresh attention to
the history of the text of the New Tes
tament, and, particularly, to the manu
script copies of it. The two most im
portant and ancient of these in the
Greek language are the Codex Biniati-
cus and Codex Vaticanus. The Codex
Vaticanus, or Vatican MS., is in the
Vatican library at Rome, where it was
probably placed by Pope Nicholas V.,
about the time of the foundation of
the library in 1448. “ This MS.,” The
Sunday-Scho( l World says, “consists
of 759 leaves of thin vellum, of which
142 belong to the New Testament. It
has three columns on a page (except
in the poetical books of the Old Testa
ment, where it has two columns), and
forty-two lines to each column, with
no spaces between the words except
at the end of a sentence or paragraph.
Each line has from sixteen to eighteen
letters. The MS. indicates that when
the copyist began a book bis plan was
to proceed continuously to the end
without a break. At the end of each
book he usually broke eff from the
column he was writing, and began the
next book upon the next column. The
Vatican M S. omits the last twelve
verses of Mark’s gospel, and there the
the copyist leaves a part of a column
and the whole of the next column
blank, and begins Luke’s gospel upon
the second instead of upon the first
column next to where he left off copy
ing Mark’s gospel. This unusual gap
in this MS. is held to imply that the
copyist was conscious of an omission
of matter belonging to Mark. The
ornament and the ‘ kata markon ’ ‘ ac-
sording to Mark,’ at the end of the
last column, are not by the original
copyist, but were probably added by a
later hand. This makes the unusual
blank space more significant, and
i. ives a stronger indication that the
original scribe was conscious that be
had not reached the end of the book.
. . . The Vatican volumn is bound in
red morocco, is ldj inches long, 10
wide and 4J inches thick. The >rigi-
nal MS. breaks ofl' in the middle of a
word, katha— (Hebrews ix., 14); the
rest of the Epistle of the Hebrews, the
pastoral Epistles and Revelation being
added by a eomparatively recent
hand. In his recent ‘ Commentary
on St. Mark,’ Mr. Rice remarks that
this MS. ‘ has never been accessible to
scholars generally ’ ; while The New
York Independent, in a notice of the
* Commentary,’ holds that the MS.
has not been as inaccessible as that
language would imply, and adds, 1 not
only have they (scholars) been per
mitted to consult it, but now we have
the magnificent reproduction of Car
dinal Mai.’ The history of the futile
attempts to collate the Vatican MS., if
written, would prove, as Scrivener
truly says, 1 a very unprofitable his
tory.’ Birch’s imperfect collation of
the MS. was made about 1780. ‘Cer
tain it is,’ says Scrivener, ‘that since
Birch’s day no one not In the confi
dence of the Papal Court has had fair
access to this document.’ In 1843 Pro
fessor Tischeudorf, after months of
waiting, was allowetefr^^e the MS.
for six hours. In 1844 Muralt was
permitted to look at it for nine hours
In 1845 Tregelles, armed with strong
letters from Cardinal Wiseman, went
to Rome for the special purpose of ex
amining it. They would not allow
him to look at it without first search
ing his pockets to deprive him of pen,
ink and paper; if he looked too long
at a passage, the book was snatched
from his hand. In 1866 Tischeudorf
boldly asked Pope Pius IX. for per
mission to edit it as he had the Codex
Siniaticus. This was denied, but he
was allowed to consult it on points
presenting special differences. He
attempted to copy some pages, when,
after eight days, the MS. was abruptly
taken from him; but Verce^ne, of
the Papal Court, procured permission
for him to examine it for six more
days, the Italian being present all th
time watching his examination.
From this examination Tischendorf
was enabled to put forth his quarto
edition of the MS. in 1867. In regard
to 1 Cardinal Mai’B magnificent repro
duction,’ it appeared some y^rs after
Mai’s dfkath (in 1854), and of Mb merit
Scrivener, one of the foremoel textuat
critics, si%s : ‘ The plan of ne work
exhibits all the faults such aAerform-
ance well can have; nor is^he exe
cution at all less objectionable.’ Tis-
chendorfs criticism of it 1b scarcely
less severe. Professor E. C. Mitchell
(and presumably Professor Abbot, as
he carefully revised this part of Pro
fessor Mitchell’s work)
unsatisfad
was begun in 1868; but Vercellone
died in 1869, leaving the completion to
other hands, Five volumes have been
issued ; the sixth, the most important
in many respects, and which is to con
tain the notes on the alterations made
by various scribes, is soon to appear.
This edition was also severely criti
cised by Tischendorf. Scrivener
credits its general accuracy in contrast
with that ot Cardinal Mai’s, which he
unqualifiedly pronounced untrust
worthy ; but in Verceilone and Cozz’s
edition later readings are claimed to
be mixed with the original text, with
no distinguishing marks, impairing
the accuracy of the work. These facts
lead to the inference that critical
scholars still need to examine the M3,
itself on points of doubtful or disputed
reading, to insure accuracy. Writing
for Protestant readers and of Protest
ant scholars, in view of these facts, it
would seem that Mi. Rice understated
rather than overstated the inaccessi
bility of the Vatican MB. to critical
scholars.”
A New Musical Instrument.
The London 1'imea describes a re
cent trial of a new musical instrument
invented by Mr. Bailie Hamilton,
which resembles in shape and in the
means of producing sound the hai>
monium or cabinet organ. There
is, howevei, one important difference.
Mr. Hamilton employs what is tech
nically known as “free reeds,” butin-
stead of acting on them Bingly, he
divides them into groups of three con-,
nected by a bridge, which so modifie
their individual sounds as to emit
single note of great sonorous beautyl
and power. To each group of reedsj
belongs a sounding-box or cavitl
through which the air passes much
the breath in singing passes throujj
the throat, the intention being topi
duce a quality of tone resembling thj
human voic6. In this attempt Mi
Hamilton has been remarkably su<
cessful by means entirely differenl
from those employed in the “vox hu-
mana” stops of ordinary organs. The
timber of the new invention jayesj
somewhat between the voice am
softer wind instruments, suchl
French horn, clarinet, etc., partalj
of the qualities of both, the beaui
the sustained notes being, inden^re-
markable. The chief defect of tfie in
strument is its slowness of speech,
which makes the execution of rapid
passages a matter of extreme difficulty,
if not impossibility. This drawback,
however, does not appear to be struc
tural, and may no doubt be remedied
in subsequent specimens.
The Latest Fashions.
Sicilienqe is much used for spring
dresses.
Partridge feathers are used to cover
parasols.
Terra-cotta gloves are among t!
novelties.
“Patience” pokes
young ladies.
In some quarters Doll
revived.
Braidin^fiRWWEge increase in
ularity.
Red parasols are now sometinJ!
made of velvet.
White muslin dresses are embroil
ered all over.
The new bustle resembles a largJ
pin- cushion.
English costumes of cloth have^
swallow-tel coats.
A turtle of Sardonyx, set with dia
monds, makes a fashionable breast
pin.
Large Rembrant hats are covered
with ostrich feathers and shaded
roses.
Embroidery should match the dres9
goods instead of being contrasted with
it.
Marguerite dresses of white or pale
blue cashmere are in favor with youni
ladies.
A poke, fan and parasol ai^papoi
ed with country dresses of cretonne^
foulard and percale. 1
Maroon or Egyptian red in combi-
ion with porcelain blue is muoh
d in lawn tennis goods.
lawn will this,
ort prince
ad:
Drd^^f fine Fr
summ^^^jnadej
style, th
dicular s
tion, and th]
embroider
A novel dress is ma
rah, cut princesse shape,
pletely veiled, with black
diamond open- work patterns A
of the chenille, bordered with a
chenill® fringe, Is laid In ti _
e folds across the skirt in fron
, being caught up in the back wi
e Jet clasp*, falls in double
ts over the back b