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“The Woman Thou Gavest Me” Faces Her Great Crisis
Hall Caine’s Serial Masterpiece in the July Issue of
HEARST’S MAGAZINE Fells Vividly How “Mary
O’Neill,” Friendless and Half-Ignorant of Life’s Greatest
SYNOPSIS Daniel O'Neill. a powerful, self
made man. forces his only daughter. Mary,
into a loveless marriage with the impe
cunious and profligate Lord Raa. so that ills
ammnon to have his descendants the rightful
heirs of the one earldom In Elian may be real
ised. Mary, a convent-raised young woman,
shocked to And her husband a man of sordid,
sensual passions, refuses utterly to have any
thing to do with him until such time as he can
prove himself worthy of her love During the
honeymoon abroad Alma Ller. a divorce*- who
had been expelled from the convent Mary at
tended In Rome, attaches herself to the party,
and makes the ■honeymoon trip" a long series
of slights and insults for Lady Raa
At last Lady Raa becomes certain of the In
fidelity of her husband and of his misconduct
with Alma Ller. On her return to London
Mary encounters her old playfellow. Martin
Conrad, who has returned from his triumphant
expedition to the Antarctic. Drawn Into ever
closer relations with the onl) man for whose
friendship she had ever cared. Mary finally
awakes to the fact that she is hopelessly in
love with Martin. Terrified by this knowledge
and finding herself more and more in love with
Martin, she determines to run away from the
cause of her distress, and go home
Mary's homecoming to Castle Raa is a sad
affair Her husband Ails the tumbledown old
mansion with his fast friends from London. In
cluding Alma Ller. who assumes control of the
household. Ultimately the illness of her father
offers Mary excuse for escape from the In
tolerable environment. But before visiting her
old home Mary appeals In turn to her bishop
Published by Permission of and Copyright,
1913, by HEARST'S MAGAZINE.
FINDING it necessary to account for my
self, just as at the boarding house, I had
adhered to my former name, but said I
was the widow of a commander lately lost at
sea. which was as near to the truth as I dare
venture.
I had also made no disguise of the fact that
I was expecting a child, a circumstance which
secured me much sympathy from the womanly
women who were now my neighbors.
During the long hours of every day in which
I was alone I occupied myself in the making of
clothes for my baby—buying linen and flannel
and worsted, and borrowing patterns from my
Welsh landlady
This stimulated my tenderness toward the
child that was to come, for the heart of a young
mother is almost infantile, and 1 hardly know
whether to laugh or cry when I think of the
childish things I did and thought said to
myself in those first days when 1 was alone in
my room in that back street in Bayswater.
Thus long before the baby was liorn I
christened her. At first 1 to call her
Mary, not because I cared for that name my
self. but because Martin had said it was the
most beautiful In the world. In the end. how
ever. I called her Isabel Mary, (because Isabel
was my mother's name, and she had been a far
better woman than I was), and as I finished
my baby's garments one by one I used to put
them away in their drawer, saying to myself:
"That's Isabel Mary’s binder," or "Isabel Mary’s
christening robe," as the case might be.
1 dare say it was al! very foolish. There are
tears in my eyes when I think of it now, but
there were none then, for though there were
moments when, thinking of Martin, I felt as if
life were for ever blank and bare, I was al
most happy In my poor surroundings, and if it
were a cage I had fixed myeelf in there was al
ways a bird singing inside of it —the bird that
sang in my own bosom
“When Isabel Mary comes everything will be
all right,” I used to think.
But what about the child itself?
A being born out of the pale of the law. as
my husband would say it must be. an outcast,
a thing of shame, without a father to recognize
it, and with its mother's sin to lash its back
for ever!
When 1 thought of that, much as I had longed
for the child that was to be a living link be
tween Martin and me. I asked myself if I had
any right to wish for it.
I felt I had no right, and that considering my
kelpless position, the only true motherly love
was to pray that my baby might be still-born.
But that was too hard. It was too terrible.
It was like a second bereavement. 1 could not
and would not do it.
"Never never, never!” I told myself.
Thinking matters out. I concuded that pov
erty was at the root of nearly everything If
I could stave off poverty no real harm could
come to my child.
I determined to do so. But there was only
Madrid, June 28.
EVERY native American, every citizen of the United
States, will be interested in evidences which have
lately come to light concerning the birthplace of
Christopher Columbus. It has been generally assumed
that the discoverer of the New World was a native of
Italy, a Genoese. There is now reason to believe that
Columbus was a Spaniard and of the Jewish race.
A brochure setting forth evidence to this effect is
shortly to be published by Enrique Maria de .Arribas
y Turul, the well-known historian and investigator of
ancient MSS. In the following article Senor de Arribas
sets forth briefly the main facts of this interesting dis
covery.
By Enrique Maria de Arribas y Turul.
The Celebrated Spanish Historian.
CHRISTOBAL is Spanish for Christopher, which
means "Christ Bearer " Colon, with the accent
on the last syllable, is Spanish for Columbus.
There being positive evidence that the great discoverer
was born, not in Italy, but in Spain. Christobal Colon
is the correct form of his name.
Genoa has no more right to call him her “distinguished
son” than the eighteen other Italian towns and villages
claiming that distinction, backing up their falsehood by
exhibiting the very house of his birth, as is done at
Calvi, Saona and Cogoleto.
With regard to these Italian claims, the question may
properly be asked: "If the Admiral was an Italian, why
did he use the Spanish form of his name exclusively?
Was Christopher Columbus a Spanish Hebrew?
and to her father s lawyer, only to be told that
neither Churi-h nor State .-an offer any relief
from her false position. She returns next day
to Castle ft *■• to rind that Martin is arriving
for a farewell visit and that by Alma Ller’s
deceitful si hemlng the whole houee party has
gone off for a few davs’ cruise.
Durb -• her three days alone with her lover
Mary fights a grim battle with temptation, only
to find on the last night that her faith in re
nunciation and th*- laws of the Church Is a
fragile thing compared with her overwhelming
love for this puro-b* irted man. With Martin's
passionate words. "You are my real wife. I am
your real husband," ringing in her brain she
forgets everything * If*-. and with strong steps
w-aiks across the corridor to Martin's bedroom.
This is the action w-hlch Martin has advised as
being the only course open to them which Is
sure to bring th*- one result they are determined
to attain Mari’s divorce from Ixird Raa.
Mary determines, after the departure of Mar
tin Conrad to hid*- herself in London. She Is
driven by fear of Lord Raa's discovery of her
unfaithful!)* ss to him, she Is equally afraid of
the venomous tongue of Alma Lier. She Is no
sooner settled In a cheap little boarding house
In London than a great hue and cry Is raised
by her father. Os all persons. It is Mildred,
that one truest friend of her convent days, who
ferrets her out but for Mary’s sake she breaks
a vow and refuses to give her up. Then comes
the report of the, loss of Martin’s ship In the
Antarctic Desperate with grief and fearful
forth.- unborn child which she hopes shall re
concile her to her empty life and typify her
great love for Martin, she flees from Mildred to
a still more obscure corner of London
one way open to mg at present—and that was
to retrench my expenses.
I did retrench them. Persuading myself that
I had no real need of this and that; I reduced
my weekly outlay.
This gave me immense pleasure, and even
when I saw, after a while, that I was grow
ing thin and pale, I felt no self-pity of any
sort, remembering that I had nobody to look
well for now and only the sweet and glorious
duty before me of providing for my child.
I convinced myself, too, that my altered ap
pearance was natural to my condition, and
that all I needed was fresh air and exercisA.
Therefore I determined to walk every day in
the Park.
1 did so once only.
It was one of those lovely mornings in early
Spring, when the air and the sky of London,
after the long fog and grime of Winter, seem
to be washed by showers of sunshine.
I had entered by one of the broad avenues
and was resting (for I was rather tired) on a
seat, under a chestnut tree whose glistening
sheaths were swelling and breaking into flower,
when 1 saw a number of ladies and gentlemen
on horseback coming in my direction.
1 recognized one of them instantly. It was
Mr. Vivian, and a beautiful girl was riding be
side him My heart stood still, for I thought
he would see me. But he was too much occu
pied with his companion to do so.
After that I took my walks tn the poorer
streets behind Baychester.
Later 1 was forced to discontinue tny walks
altogether.
Then my room became my world
I do not think I ever saw a newspaper.
And knowing nothing of what was going on. be
yond the surge and swell of the life of London
as it came to me when I opened my window,
1 had now. more than ever, the sense of living
In a dungeon on a rock in the middle of the
sea
Having no exercise. I ate less and less. But
I found a certain joy in that, for I was becom
ing a miser for my child’s sake, and the only
pain 1 suffered was when I went to my drawer,
as 1 did every day. and looked at my rapidly
diminishing store
I knew that my Welsh landlady was begin
ning to call me close, meaning mean, but that
did not trouble me in the least, because I told
myself that every penny I saved out of my own
expenses was for my child, to keep her from
poverty and all the evils and Injustices that
followed in its train.
But I made no arrangements for myself un
til my Welsh landlady came up to my room
one day and asked if I had settled with a doc
tor. When 1 answered no, she held up her
hands and cried. “Good gracious! Just as I
thought Thee’st got to lose no time, though.”
Happily there was a doctor in our street
nearly every day. and if 1 wished it she would
call him up to me. I agreed and the doctor
came next morning.
He was a tall, elderly man w r ith cold eyes,
compressed lips and a sour expression .and
neither his manner nor his speech gave any
All his known documents are signed "Cristobal Colon"
by his own hand. His crest bore the device “A Castilla
y a Leon Nuevo Mundi dio Colon" (For Castilia and
Leon discovered the New World). And to this day his
descendants bear the title. “Marquese Colon, Duke of
Veragua."
Accordingly, the Admiral's biography by his natural
son Fernando, published in Madrid in 1530, is styled
"Historia del Almirante Cristobal Colon."
If his real name was Columbo (Italian for the Latin
ized Columbus), why its suppression by the owner of
the name himself, by his family, coat of arms and all
public ocuments referring to him and used during his
lifetime?
The proofs exist, and will be given in my forth
coming brochure in the form of documents showing that
Colon was born in the Spanish town of Pontevedra,
where his people were so well known that the family
name occurs no less than eighteen times between 1413
and 1528 in documents relating to taxes, commercial en
terprises. public services, etc.
The birth of the discoverer is variously stated as hav
ing taken place anywhere between 1435 and 1446 or 1447.
I have unearthed a document in the Pontevedra town
archives showing a co-partnership between the families
of Colon and Fonterosa. purveyors to the Archbishop of
Santiago, whose court they supplied with fish. The
commercial union took place in 1437. What could be
more natural than a subsequent nuptial partnership,
especially since the Jews of those days made it a point
to cement their industrial partnerships by inter-
Mystery, Went
Through the
Ordeal of
Motherhood.
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“I felt as light as air itself. A woman carrying a child was
like a queen—everybody made way for her, and it seemed
to me as if the wealth of the world were in my arms.”
hint of a consciousness (which I am sure every
• I h tor must have) that in coming to a
woman In my condition he was entering one
of the sacred chambers of human life.
He asked me a few abrupt questions, told
me when he would come again, and then spoke
about his fee.
"My fee is a guinea, and I usually get it in
advance,” he said, whereupon I went to my
drawer, and took out a sovereign and shilling,
not without a certain pang at seeing so much
go in a moment after I had been saving so long.
The doctor had dropped the money into his
waistcoat pocket with oh, such a casual air,
and was turning to go, when my Welsh land
lady said. “Her’s not doing herself justice In
the matter of food, doctor.”
"Why, what do you eat?” asked the doctor,
and as well as I could out of my dry and
parched throat, I told him.
"Tut! tut! This will never do.” he said.
"It’s your duty to your child to have better
food than that. Something light and nourish
ing every day, such as poultry, fish, chicken
broth, beef-tea, and farinaceous foods gen
erally.”
I gasped. What was the doctor thinking
about?
kJ" I'’ 1 '’
Christopher Columbus, from the Famous Painting of
Columbus at the Council at Salamanca.
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me. She was what the doctors call a croaker,
began on a long series of stories of ladles who,
having "let themselves down’ had died, either
at childbirth or soon afterward.
“It’s after a lady feels it if she has to nurse
her baby," said the nurse, * and I couldn t be
responsible neither for you nor the child If you
don’t do yourself justice.”
This was a still more terrible possibility—
the possibility that I might die and leave my
child behind me.
The thought of leaving my baby behind now
terrified and appalled me. It brought me no
comfort to think that though I was poor my
father was rich, for I knew that If he ever
came to know of my child’s existence he would
hate it and cast it off, as the central cause of
the downfall of his plans.
Yet Martin's child alone, and at the mercy
of the world! It could not and must not be!
I thought of how Martin had been taken
from me, as fate (perhaps for some good pur
pose still unrevealed) had led me to believe.
I thought of how I had comforted myself
with the hope of the child that was coming to
be a link between us.
I thought of how this had taken the sting
out of death and victory out of the grave.
I asked the old driver how long it would take me to get to Ilford. He looked at me again and said,
“ ’Bout ’our and a ’alf I should say by the looks of you—and you a-carryin’ the biby.”
“R em e m her,” he
said, with his finger
tip, “the health of the
child Is intimately de
pendent on the health
of the mother. When
the mother is in a
morbid state it affects
the composition of the
blood, and does great
harm to the health <»f
the offspring, both im
mediately and in after
life. Don’t forget now.
Good-day!”
That was a terrible
shock to me. In my
great ignorance and
treat love I had been
depriving myself fo<r
the sake of my child,
and now I learned
that I had all the time
been doing it a grave
and perhaps lifelong
injury!
Trying to make
amends. I sent out for
some of the expensive
foods the doctor had
ordered me, but when
they were cooked I
found to my dismay
that I had lost the
power of digesting
them.
My pain at this dis
covery was not les
sened next day when
my Welsh landlady
brought up a nurse
whom I had asked
her to engage for
marriage?
If the marriage was solemnized shortly after the co
partnership was entered into, the contention of nearly
all American-English authorities that the discoverer was
born about 1437 w’ould be borne out. Moreover,’there
has never been any dispute about the family name of
Colon’s mother, which, aside from differences in the
spelling owing to Spanish, Italian or Latin affiliations,
is everywhere given as Fonterosa.
But why does the discoverer himself claim Genoa as
his birthplace? First, because then, as now, the prophet
had little credit in his own country, and again because
Colon was of Jewish descent, both on his father’s and
his mother's side. Documents exist showing that as
late as 1489 Andreas, Colon, his wife and mother-in-law
were sentenced to the stake and executed at Tarragona
because they were suspected of Jewish sympathies.
The Colon family had evidently embraced the Christian
faith some time before—perhaps a long time before—
hence it was considered an especially heinous act to be
in sympathy with the proscribed race.
In the case of Colon such a suspicion was the more
dangerous, as his mothers conversion to Christianity
probably was of later date than that of the Colons, for
the Pontevedra documents mentioned give the names of
her relatives as Abraham. Alcazar, Jacob, Benjamin, etc.,
while the mother’s own name. Suzanna, was regarded as
exclusively and compromisingly Jewish.
Colon, the petitioner for crown funds to hunt for new
roads to fabulous China and Japan: Colon, “attendant in
waiting to the King"—such was the intending discov-
And after that I told myself that, however
sweet and beautiful, all this had been selfish
ness, and I must put it away.
Then I thought of the child itself, who—
conceived in sin as my Church would say, dis
inherited by the law, outlawed by society, in
heriting my physical weaknesses, having lost
one of its parents and being liable to lose the
other—was now in danger of being left to the
mercies of the world, banned from its birth,
penniless and without protector, to become a
drudge and an outcast or even a thief, a
gambler, or a harlot.
This was what I thought and felt.
And when at last I knew that I had come to
the end of my appointed time I knelt down in
my sad room, and if ever I prayed a fervent
prayer, if ever my soul went up to God tn pas
sionate supplications It was that the child I
had longed for and looked forward to as a liv
ink link with my lost one might be born dead.
It was Saturday, the twenty-first of June.
The Summer had been a cold one thus far; the
night was chill and heavy, rain was beating
against the window pane.
There was a warm fire in my room for the
first time for several months; the single gas
jet on the window side of the mantelpiece had
been turned low, and the nurse in light slippers,
was taking my little flannel and linen garments
out of the chest of drawers and laying them
on the flat steel fender.
I think I must have had intervals of insen
sibility, for the moments of consciousness
came and went with me, like the diving and
rising of a seabird in the midst of swelling
waves.
At one such moment I became aware that
the doctor and my Welsh landlady, as well as
my nurse, were in the room, and that they
were waiting for the crisis and fearing for my
life.
I heard them talking in low voices which
made a drumming noise in my ears, like that
which the sea makes when it is rolling into a
cave.
“She’s let herself down so low, pore thing,
that I don’t know in the world what’s to happen
to her.”
“As God is my witness, logk you, I never saw
anybody live on so little.”
"I’m not afraid of the mother. I’m more
afraid of the child, if you ask me.”
Then the drumming noise would die out, and
I would only hear something within myself
saying:
"Oh, God, oh, God, that my child may be
born dead.”
At another moment I heard, above the rattle
of the rain, the creaking of the mangle in the
cellar kitchen on the other side of the street.
At still another moment I heard the sound
of quarrelling in the house opposite. A woman
was screaming, children were shrieking, and a
man was swearing in a thick, hoarse voice.
I knew what had happened—it was midnight,
the "public houses had turned out,” and Mr.
Wagstaffe had come home drunk.
The night passed heavily. I heard myself
(as I had done before) calling on Martin in
a voice of wild entreaty: "Martin! Martin!”
Then remembering that he was gone I began
again to pray. I heard myself praying to the
Blessed Vrgin: "Oh, Mother of my God, let my
child”
But a voice which seemed to come from far
away interrupted me.
"Hush, bach, hush! It will- make it harder
for thee.”
At length peace came. It seemed to me that
I was running out of a tempestuous sea, with
its limitless loneliness and cruel depth, into a
quiet harbor.
There was a heavenly calm, in which I could
hear the doctor and the nurse and my Welsh
landlady talking together in cheerful whispers.
I knew that everything was over, and with
the memory of the storm I had passed through
still in my heart and brain, I said: "Is it dead?”
"Dead?” cried the nurse in a voice several
octaves higher than usual. "Dear heart no, but
alive and well. A beautiful little daughter!"
“Yes, your baby is all right, ma’am," said the
doctor, and then my Welsh landlady cried:
"Why did’st think it would be dead, bach? As
I am a Christian woman thee’st got the beauti
fullest baby that ever breathed.”
I could bear no more.
The dark thoughts of the days before were
over me still, and with a groan I turned to the
wall.
Then everything was wiped out as by an
angel’s wing, and I fell into a deep sleep.
When I awoke my dark thoughts were
vanishing away like a bad dream in the morn
ing. The rain had ceased, the gas had been
put out, and I could see by the glow on the
peonies of the wall paper that the sun was
shining with a soft red light through the Hol
land blinds of my windows.
I heard the sparrows chirping on the sills
outside; I heard the milkman rattling his cans;
I heard the bells of a neighboring church ring
ing for early communion.
I closed my eyes and held my breath and
listened to the sounds in my own room. I
heard the kettle singing over the fire; I heard
somebody humming softly, and beating a foot
on the floor in time to the tune; and then I
heard a low voice (it was Emmerjane’s saying
from somewhere near my bed: “I dunno but
what she’s awake. Her breathing ain’t agoin’
now.”
Then I turned and saw the nurse sitting be
fore the fire with something on her lap. I
knew what it was. It was my child, and it was
asleep. In spite of my dark thoughts my heart
began to yearn for it.
And then came the great miracle.
My child awoke and began to cry. It was a
faint cry, oh, so thin and weak, but it went
thundering and thundering through me.
There was a moment of awful struggle, and
then a mighty torrent of love swept over me.
It was Motherhood.
My child! Mine! Flesh of my flesh!
All my desire for my baby’s death to save it
from the pains of life was gone, and my heart,
starved so long, throbbed with tenderness.
My baby was at my breast and my sufferings
were at an end.
(The Full Instalment of This Remarkable
Novel Will Be Found in the July Issue of
HEARST’S MAGAZINE.)
erer’s title in the late eighties—had most potent reasons
then for preserving his incognito, especially while the
Council of Salamanca was considering his petition for
then and ships. The mere suspicion of his being related
to the apostates of Tarragona, or, indeed, to the Spanish
Colons, would have been fatal to his projects.
Just the same, Colon’s letters prove that he had
strong private leanings toward his former co-religionists.
Among his correspondents were the philanthropist, Luis
de Santangel; Bocher. the merchant prince, and Levy,
the physician, all three Jews, but so eminent and so
highly esteemed that the inquisition dared not touch
them.
However, if the Church, which opposed his projects on
Biblical and other grounds, had had reason to believe
that the relations between the petitioner Colon and the
Jews were other than those dictated by friendship, the
New- World would never have been discovered by Colon.
Their Catholic Majesties would never have been allowed
to fit out a Jew to prove that Bible geography was rad
ically wrong. It is far more likely that Cristobal Colon
would have perished at the stake, like his cousin, Andrew
Colon —for they were cousins.
Colon’s tendencies to express himself in the style of
the Old Testament are familiar to scholars. He loved
Biblical quotations, and his writings were models of
Hebrew literature.
Colon’s log of October 11 has this entry: “The Nina
discovered a stake covered with dog-roses, and with the ■«
signs all of them breathed and were glad.” The next day
at 2 a. m. the island afterward named San Salvador was
sighted. He took possession at once, “giving thanks to
God by kneeling upon the shore and kissing the ground
with tears of joy for the great mercy.”
That was on Friday. If it had been Saturday instead,
would Colon, with his inbred respect for the
have lauded at once?