Blade-O'-Grass. Golden Grain. and Bread and Cheese and Kisses.

Wiser, stronger, than she, he said,

'Do not let this trivial matter come between us, my dear;' and would have taken her to his heart again, but she did not meet him as before. 'This trivial matter!' Was he so lost to honour and to love for her? Something of her mind he saw in her face, and it made his blood hot. 'Good God,' he thought, 'is it possible she suspects me?' Then he strove to soothe her, but she would not be soothed. She said but little now; but her face was white with misery; doubt tore at the wound in her heart. She knew the pain she was inflicting upon him by the pain she felt herself. But she could not yield; she could not say, 'I know you are true to me. I will be satisfied, and will wait.' So his efforts were vain, and two o'clock struck, and their agony was not over. The tolling of the bell, however, brought to him the picture of his father and mother waiting up at home for him. 'I must go,' he said hurriedly. 'Good-bye, dear Bessie, and God bless you! Trust to me, and believe that no girl ever had more faithful lover.'

In spite of her coldness, he pressed her close to his breast, and whispered assurances of his love and faithfulness. Then tore himself away, and left her almost fainting in the shop, love and doubt fighting a sickening battle in her heart.

YOU ALONE, AND MY MOTHER, ARE TRUE; ALL THE REST OF THE WORLD IS FALSE

The night was very cold, and George felt the keen wind a relief. He took off his hat, and looked around. The street was still and quiet; the last strains of 'Home, sweet home,' had been played, and the players had departed. All but one, and he waited at the end of the street for George to come up to him.

'What, Saul!'

'George!'

They clasped hands.

'I am glad you are here, Saul. I should not have liked to go without wishing you good-bye.'

'I waited for you, George. I knew you were in there. Mother and father sitting up for you, I suppose?'

'Yes. In a few hours I shall go from here; then I shall be alone!'

'As I am, George.'

'Nay, Saul, you have Jane.'

'She has left me, dear woman. I may never see her face again. It is for my good, George, that she has done this. You do not know how low we have sunk. George,' and here his voice fell to a whisper, 'at times we have been almost starving! It could not go on like this, and she has left me, and taken service somewhere in the country. She has done right. As I suffer, as I stretch out my arms in vain for her, as I look round the walls of my garret and am desolate in the light of my misery, I feel and confess she has done right. Here is her letter. Come to the lamp; there is light enough to read it by.'

George read the letter, and returned it to Saul, saying, 'Yes, she is right. What do you intend to do?'

'God knows. To try if I can see any way. But all is dark before me now, George.'

'I wish I could help you, Saul.'

'I know, I know. You are my only friend. If it ever be in my power to repay you for what you have done-' He dashed the tears from his eyes, and stood silent for a few moments, holding George's hand in his. 'George,' he said, in unsteady tones, 'in times gone by you and I have had many good conversations; we passed happy hours together. Words that have passed between us are in my mind now.'

'In mine too, Saul.'

'We had once,' continued Saul in the same strange unsteady tones, 'a conversation on friendship. I remember it well, and the night on which it took place. We walked up and down Westminster-bridge, and stopped now and then, gazing at the lights on the water. There is something grand and solemn in that sight, George; I do not know why, but it always brings to my mind a dim idea of death and immortality. The lights stretch out and out, smaller and smaller, until not a glimmer can be seen; darkness succeeds them as death does life. But the lights are there, George, although our vision is too limited to see them. You remember that conversation, George?'

'As if it had taken place this night, Saul. I can see the lights, and the darkness that follows them.'

'We agreed then upon the quality of friendship, but gave utterance to many generalities.' Saul paused awhile, and then said slowly, 'I am considering, George, whether I rightly understand the duties that lie in friendship.'

'Faithfulness, trustfulness.'

'Yes, those; and other things as well. Say that you had a friend, and had learnt something, had seen something, of which he is ignorant, and which he should know; say it is something that you would keep from your friend if you were false instead of true to him-'

'I should be a traitor to friendship,' interrupted George warmly, 'if I kept it from him. If I were truly his friend, I should seek him out and say what I had learnt, what I had seen.'

'Even if it contained pain, George; even if it would hurt him to know?'

'Even if it contained pain; even if it would hurt him to know. There is often pain in friendship; there is often pain in love. You have felt this, Saul, yourself. I have too, dear friend! Often into life's sweetness and tenderness pain creeps, and we do not know how it got there.'

George uttered this in a gentle tone; he was thinking of Bessie. 'Come, friend,' he said, seeing that Saul hesitated to speak, 'you have something to tell your friend. If you are true to him, tell it.'

Thus urged, Saul said: 'First answer me this. When did you first think of emigrating?'

'I did not think of it at all, before it was put in my head.'

'By whom?'

'By young Mr. Million. One night, not very long ago now, he met me, and got into conversation with me. Trade had been a little slack, and I had had a few idle days. This made me fret, for I saw that if things went on in the same way it might be years before I could save enough to buy furniture to make a home for Bessie. I let this out in conversation with young Mr. Million, and he sympathised with me, and said it was a shame, but that if he were in my place he would put himself in a position to marry his sweetheart in less than a year. How? I asked. By emigrating, he said. It staggered me, as you may guess, Saul. The idea of going away had never entered my head. He went on to say that his father took a great interest in working men, and was very interested also in emigration; that only that morning his father had mentioned my name and had said that he had a passage ticket for the very ship that is going out of the Mersey to-morrow, Saul-and that if I had a mind to better myself, he would give the ticket to me. I thanked him, and told him I would think of it. Well, I did think of it, and I read about wages over the water, and saw that I could do what he said. He gave me the ticket, and that's how it came about.'

'George,' said Saul pityingly, for things that were at present dark to George seemed clear to him, 'Mr. Million never heard your name until this morning.'

'Stop!' exclaimed George, passing his hand over his eyes with a bewildered air. 'Speak slowly. I don't know that I understand you. Say that again.'

Saul repeated: 'Mr. Million never heard your name until this morning. I went to his house, thinking that as he had helped you, he might help me; and he scoffed at me, and taunted me bitterly. He had no more to do with getting your ticket than I had. Every word young Mr. Million told you about the passage and about his father was false.'

'Good God!' cried George. 'What could be his motive, then, in telling me these things, and in obtaining this passage ticket for me?'

'Think, George,' said Saul; 'there is such a thing as false kindness. He may have a motive in wishing you away. I could say more, but I cannot bring my tongue to utter it.'

'You must, Saul, you must!' cried George, in a voice that rang through the street. They had walked as they conversed, and they were now standing outside his mother's house. 'You must! By the friendship I have borne for you! By the memory of what I have done for you!' The door of his house was opened as he spoke. His mother had heard his voice, and the agony in it, and came to the door. George saw her standing there, looking anxiously towards him, and he said in a voice thick with pain, 'Stay here until I come out. By the love you bear to Jane, stop until I come. My mother will know-she is far-seeing, and I may have been blind.'

He hurried to his mother, and went into the house with her. For full half an hour Saul waited in suspense, and at the end of that time George came out of the house, staggering like a drunken man. Saul caught him, and held him up. His face was as the face of death; a strong agony dwelt in it.

'I have heard something,' he said, in a tone that trembled with passion and pain and weakness. 'My mother has doubted for a long time past. She took a letter from him secretly to-night! Those earrings she wore he gave her. O, my God! Tell me, you, what more you know! By the memory of all you hold dear, tell me!'

'George, my dear,' said Saul, in a broken voice, 'a few moments after I quitted Mr. Million's house, I saw her enter it.'

A long, long silence followed. The stars and the moon shone brightly, but there was no light in the heavens for George. A sob broke from him, and another, and another.

'For God's sake,' exclaimed Saul, 'for your mother's sake, who suffers now a grief as keen as yours, bear up! Dear friend, if I could lay down my life for you, I would!'

'I know it. You alone, and my mother, are true; all the rest of the world is false! He wished to get rid of me, did he, and this was a trap! The false lying dog! But when I meet him! – See here! Here is the ticket he gave me. If I had him before me now, I would do to him as I do to this-'

He crumpled the paper in his hand, and tore it fiercely in twain. Saul caught his arm, and stayed its destruction.

'No, no, George!' he cried, but his cry was like a whisper. 'Don't destroy it! Give it, O, give it to me! Remember the letter that Jane wrote to me. Think of the future that is open to me, to her, unless I can see a way. The way is here! Here is my salvation! Let me go instead of you!' He fell upon his knee's and raised his hands tremblingly, as if the Death-Angel were before him, and he was not prepared. 'If I live, I will repay you, so help me, the Great God!'

George muttered, 'Take it. For me it is useless. May it bring you the happiness that I have lost!'

Saul kissed his friend's hand, which fell from his grasp. When he looked up, his friend was gone. And the light in the heavens that George could not see, shone on the face of the kneeling man.

PART II

THEY SAW, UPON ONE OF THE NEAREST PEAKS, A MAN STANDING, WITH SUNSET COLOURS ALL AROUND HIM