Harper's New Monthly Magazine, No. XXIV, May 1852, Vol. IV

The story has nothing to do with a picture; the housekeeper can guarantee that. Mr. Guppy is obliged to her for the information; and is moreover, generally obliged. He retires with his friend, guided down another staircase by the young gardener; and presently is heard to drive away. It is now dusk. Mrs. Rouncewell can trust to the discretion of her two young hearers, and may tell them how the terrace came to have that ghostly name. She seats herself in a large chair by the fast-darkening window, and tells them:

"In the wicked days, my dears, of King Charles the First – I mean, of course, in the wicked days of the rebels who leagued themselves against that excellent King – Sir Morbury Dedlock was the owner of Chesney Wold. Whether there was any account of a ghost in the family before those days, I can't say. I should think it very likely indeed."

Mrs. Rouncewell holds this opinion, because she considers that a family of such antiquity and importance has a right to a ghost. She regards a ghost as one of the privileges of the upper classes; a genteel distinction to which the common people have no claim.

"Sir Morbury Dedlock," says Mrs. Rouncewell, "was, I have no occasion to say, on the side of the blessed martyr. But it is supposed that his lady, who had none of the family blood in her veins, favored the bad cause. It is said that she had relations among King Charles's enemies; that she was in correspondence with them; and that she gave them information. When any of the country gentlemen who followed His Majesty's cause met here, it is said that my lady was always nearer to the door of their council-room than they supposed. Do you hear a sound like a footstep passing along the terrace, Watt?"

Rosa draws nearer to the housekeeper.

"I hear the rain-drip on the stones," replies the young man, "and I hear a curious echo – I suppose an echo – which is very like a halting step."

The housekeeper gravely nods and continues.

"Partly on account of this division between them, and partly on other accounts, Sir Morbury and his lady led a troubled life. She was a lady of a haughty temper. They were not well suited to each other in age or character, and they had no children to moderate between them. After her favorite brother, a young gentleman, was killed in the civil wars (by Sir Morbury's near kinsman), her feeling was so violent that she hated the race into which she had married. When the Dedlocks were about to ride out from Chesney Wold in the King's cause, she is supposed to have more than once stolen down into the stables in the dead of night, and lamed their horses; and the story is, that once, at such an hour, her husband saw her gliding down the stairs, and followed her into the stall where his own favorite horse stood. There he seized her by the wrist; and in a struggle or in a fall, or through the horse being frightened and lashing out, she was lamed in the hip, and from that hour began to pine away."

The housekeeper has dropped her voice to little more than a whisper.

"She had been a lady of a handsome figure and a noble carriage. She never complained of the change; she never spoke to any one of being crippled, or of being in pain; but, day by day, she tried to walk upon the terrace; and, with the help of a stick, and with the help of the stone balustrade, went up and down, up and down, up and down, in sun and shadow, with greater difficulty every day. At last, one afternoon, her husband (to whom she had never, on any persuasion, opened her lips since that night), standing at the great south window, saw her drop upon the pavement. He hastened down to raise her, but she repulsed him as he bent over her, and looking at him fixedly and coldly, said, 'I will die here, where I have walked. And I will walk here, though I am in my grave. I will walk here until the pride of this house is humbled. And when calamity, or when disgrace is coming to it, let the Dedlocks listen for my step!'"

Watt looks at Rosa. Rosa, in the deepening gloom, looks down upon the ground, half frightened, and half shy.

"There and then she died. And from those days," says Mrs. Rouncewell, "the name has come down – The Ghost's Walk. If the tread is an echo, it is an echo that is only heard after dark, and is often unheard for a long while together. But it comes back, from time to time; and so sure as there is sickness or death in the family, it will be heard then."

" – And disgrace, grandmother – " says Watt.

"Disgrace never comes to Chesney Wold," returns the housekeeper.

Her grandson apologizes, with "True. True."

"That is the story. Whatever the sound is, it is a worrying sound," says Mrs. Rouncewell, getting up from her chair, "and what is to be noticed in it is, that it must be heard. My lady, who is afraid of nothing, admits that when it is there, it must be heard. You can not shut it out. Watt, there is a tall French clock behind you (placed there, a' purpose) that has a loud beat when it is in motion, and can play music. You understand how those things are managed?"

"Pretty well, grandmother, I think."

"Set it a-going."

Watt sets it a-going – music and all.

"Now, come hither," says the housekeeper. "Hither, child, toward my lady's pillow. I am not sure that it is dark enough yet, but listen! Can you hear the sound upon the terrace, through the music, and the beat, and every thing?"

"I certainly can!"

"So my lady says."

(TO BE CONTINUED.)

THE RUSSIAN CZAR AT A PUBLIC BALL

To provide resources for the invalids of the Russian army, great care is taken; and in addition to more fixed estimates, the emperor makes extraordinary exertions, by balls, and lotteries, and masquerades, of a charitable nature, to augment the ways and means of the veterans who have been disabled in his service. Sometimes the ball, the lottery, and the masquerade are all combined in one festive display. Of course, such displays take place in winter, which is the St. Petersburg season. It is not two years since I was present on one of these occasions, round which the emperor threw all the attractions of his gorgeous court. And, as the festivities were for the especial benefit of the military invalids, I may be excused for lingering for awhile on the details which I witnessed. Besides, often as the emperor, who is the real commander-in-chief of all the Russian forces, has been described, the subject is far from being picked to the bone; and what I saw of him it will gratify the curiosity of the reader to learn.

It is the military frequenters, with their prodigious variety of costumes, who give so much splendor to the celebrated masquerades of St. Petersburg. These are conducted on the model of the still more celebrated masquerades of old, in Venice. The approximation is the less complete, of course, because the climate is so different. Open-air assemblies, for pleasure's sake, are out of the question, in a northern winter. The merry-makers would have little else to do but rub each other's noses with snow, to prevent their falling off gradually after they had been bleached by the leprous-looking frost-bite. There are nights when it is hardly an exaggeration to say that, if a person spits out, it is a pellet of ice which rattles against the ground. The sudden transition from such a winter to the intense heat of the Petersburg summer is one among several conditions which render a residence in that capital so unfriendly to the health of foreigners, unless they come in the plastic time of childhood, and grow, with many precautions, acclimatized.

The place of assembly for these great festive or charitable demonstrations (the only kind of "demonstration," except such as are military, which can be seen in Russia) is not unworthy of its purposes. It is probably the finest of its kind in Europe or in the world, and is called the "Hall of Nobility" —Salle de Noblesse– a vast edifice, capable of receiving seven thousand guests, supported inside by splendid scagliola columns, richly decorated, skillfully laid out, distributed into a vast pit for dancing, with circumambient galleries and balconies, with retiring or withdrawing apartments for the emperor and his court, and with general refreshment-rooms in the outer circuit. This scene is lit up by clusters of wax-lights the beams of which are multiplied by crystal pendants; while the wax-lights themselves are many thousands in number, more numerous, in fact, than the stars visible to the naked eye on a bright frosty night.

A great masquerade ball for the benefit of the invalids, in such a place, with the additional attraction of the promised presence of the Emperor Nicholas, was irresistible. I determined to go, and my determination was the more natural inasmuch as I happened to possess a free ticket. On entering, I was struck by the novel and somewhat grotesque feature imparted to the scene by the lottery prizes, which had lain there "on view" for some days previously. I found a crowd which was afterward estimated at seven thousand; but, I dare say, it numbered five or six only.

Perfectly lost in the vastness of the place, the multitude assembled, and the grotesque horror of beautiful forms without human faces, I sat down for awhile, near the orchestra. The benches, on one of which I was, rose here in successive tiers, from the vast, pit-like saloon to the surrounding gallery, which was overhung by another gallery, and abutted upon several splendid refreshment-rooms. Before and below, the crowd was particularly dense around a little rostrum, on which a glass wheel and several officials who plied it, stood together. The press, the throng, the hustling, the jostling, the redness of faces where they could be seen, and the activity of elbows where they could be insidiously inserted, were raging around. A similar apparatus, besieged by similar votaries, stood at the other three corners of the saloon. In the ancillary apartments there were more of these shrines of gambling; a gambling in which only one class was sure to win, a class unvexed by the excitement of the game, the invalided veterans, the brave old disabled soldiers of the empire. For their sakes was all this gorgeous commotion; for their sakes this splendid mob bustled about the "Ailetpii Allegri;" that is, the wheels of fortune, the lottery stands, the stalls of fate. All round these, and between them, circulated the pervading immensity of the masquerade.

Tired of this part of the scene, I asked the person next me, in what part of the room the emperor was. I had already seen Alexander, the crown prince, or, as he is called, the Grand Duc Héritier, walking about with a lady on his arm, his handsome open countenance radiant with the smiles that are so easily lit there.

"The emperor," said the person whom I had asked, "passed this way about a quarter of an hour since, and must be somewhere yonder," and he pointed to the end of the saloon, opposite the orchestra.

I arose, ascended the flights of stairs that conducted to the Boulevard-like gallery, and I began to thread my way behind the scagliola columns. Beyond these, across the width of the corridor, arose the wall which was the running boundary of the corridor on the other side; and into this wall were let tall mirrors, which multiplied every particular of the confused and shifting splendor of the rooms.

When I reached the further end of the gallery, a spectacle was offered to me, which arrested all my attention. I must premise, that when the emperor attends these festivities, or others of a like nature, he evinces certain likings, feelings, tastes. He is not entirely indifferent as to what his subjects may do. If there be one thing more than another which he abhors, it is that in these scenes of familiar relaxation, in which he mingles to unbend his own mind, while contributing indirectly a new interest to the revels of others, he should be saluted as emperor, or beset by the unmannerly siege of a universal stare. It is strictly understood, or, as the fashionable jargon is, de rigueur, that he is present as any other stranger, not to be noted, not to be quoted, quite incognitus. Here he comes, like any one else, to amuse himself, to forget imperial cares for a brief moment. Nothing pleases him more than to let him pass. Can he not be as any other of the countless visitors, who engage in the intricate tactics of these grave and sober saturnalia – this game of small mystery – this strategic maze of hushed frolic – these profound combinations of grown-up gentlemen and ladies at hide-and-seek?

I had easily figured to myself, that it was easier for the emperor to let people know that such was his wish, than for others to affect an unconsciousness which they did not feel, or an indifference which they felt still less. I had guessed that, in such scenes, his desire to be allowed to move about unnoticed, was difficult to be reduced to perfect practice. But I was far indeed from being prepared for what I beheld.

Sauntering idly along, I became conscious, not of a start among the throng – not of any exclamation – not even of any particular hush, but of an indefinable sensation around me. Crowds have their general physiognomies like individuals. This sensation was as perceptible as a change of countenance, and as silent. I looked up, and in the midst of a vacant place, from which every one had shrunk back, as from a plague-stricken spot, or a haunted floor, or a "fairy-ring," about ten yards onward and facing me, I saw the emperor (his head bare), standing alone, with his back against the opposite wall. I had often seen him before in the streets, but never with so good an opportunity of noting his physiognomy, deportment, figure, and whole appearance.

"Now," said I to myself, "let me realize this with accuracy. It is not so much the Sovereign of Russia whom you see there, as it is Russia itself – a power – a sway, in a single person. He is the only surviving instance or ensample of types, such as loomed before the minds of the prophets of God aforetime, and have been thought worthy to be the themes of their awful predictions. This is Cyrus, or the second Cæsar; this a mystic statue – not that of which the head was of fine gold, but the breast and the arms of silver, and the belly and the thighs of brass, and the legs of iron; the feet part of iron, and part of clay."

Not such; yet assuredly such like.

I forgot every thing around me, except that great mighty figure towering aloft. It were useless to describe very particularly the present Emperor "of all the Russias." People in England still remember him, as he was when he visited us in his magnificent youth. Years have indeed made some change. His hair is thin, which was then so abundant. Public care has written some lines on a face, far more commanding, though perhaps less haughty, and certainly less blooming than in those days. But he has still the same marvelous width of chest and shoulder, the same royal-looking height, the same large open blue eye, full of authority and instinct with mind; a forehead which is even broader and loftier than of old, and which never yet belonged to one whose mental powers were not extraordinary; and that statuesque set of the head, which, if it wore no crown, would yet make you know it for the head of some mighty king.

"They would have proclaimed him," said I to myself, "on their shields, in the days of Attila, or of Clovis."

On the present occasion, the emperor was standing alone, as I have said; his back resting against the wall, and a crowd of the most persistent gazers around. He looked vexed – even melancholy. They would not grant him this casual moment of amusement untormented. He had the air of one at bay. He faced the crowd full, and wherever his glance fell, I could see all eyes sink before it immediately. It rested a moment on myself. I had often heard, and often read, that it was difficult to return his look; and why I know not. It is but an eye; yet, whether it was the involuntary sympathy I felt for a king thus bayed in his moments of relaxation, or whether it was that in his piercing glance, there is an expression as if he were about to address you, and thus to make you the object of universal notice, or whatever else it may be, I too dropped my looks to the ground.

A couple of masks approached him as if to speak; he turned full upon them, to give the opportunity; their hearts failed them at once, and with a low courtesy, they shrank back again.

I saw him again several times during the evening, once walking with a lady (deeply masked, if I remember). His dress was that of a general officer, and he wore a lofty hussar's cap, with a single tall feather at its side. It made his stature seem still more colossal.

As I was defiling through the crowd, I felt shortly afterward a sharp blow on my elbow. Turning, I saw a mask, who, looking at me for a moment, retreated. I followed till my guide had sat down in a place where there was room for two, making me to understand that I was to occupy the vacant spot. I considered her figure for a moment, and then feeling perfectly sure that it was not that of an acquaintance, I declined. Without any answer, I strolled my way. Having seen what a masquerade was at the "Nobles' Hall," I soon afterward left the rooms altogether, hoping sincerely that the proceeds might be ample, for the sake of the veteran invalids; and meditating much on the Czar, whom I had had so good an opportunity of seeing, and whom these veterans regarded as by right divine their perpetual "Generalissimo."

A SLEEP TO STARTLE US

BY CHARLES DICKENS

At the top of Farringdon-street in the city of London, once adorned by the Fleet Prison, and by a diabolical jumble of nuisances in the middle of the road called Fleet Market, is a broad new thoroughfare in a state of transition. A few years hence, and we of the present generation will find it not an easy task to recall, in the thriving street which will arise upon this spot, the wooden barriers and hoardings – the passages that lead to nothing – the glimpses of obscene Field-lane and Saffron-hill – the mounds of earth, old bricks, and oyster-shells – the arched foundations of unbuilt houses – the backs of miserable tenements with patched windows – the odds and ends of fever-stricken courts and alleys – which are the present features of the place. Not less perplexing do I find it now, to reckon how many years have passed since I traversed these by-ways one night before they were laid bare, to find out the first Ragged School.

If I say it is ten years ago, I leave a handsome margin. The discovery was then newly made, that to talk soundingly in parliament, and cheer for Church and State, or to consecrate and confirm without end, or to perorate to any extent in a thousand market-places about all the ordinary topics of patriotic songs and sentiments, was merely to embellish England on a great scale with whited sepulchres, while there was, in every corner of the land where its people were closely accumulated, profound ignorance and perfect barbarism. It was also newly discovered, that out of these noxious sinks where they were born to perish, and where the general ruin was hatching day and night, the people would not come to be improved. The gulf between them and all wholesome humanity had swollen to such a depth and breadth, that they were separated from it as by impassable seas or deserts; and so they lived, and so they died: an always-increasing band of outlaws in body and soul, against whom it were to suppose the reversal of all laws, human and divine, to believe that society could at last prevail.

In this condition of things, a few unaccredited messengers of Christianity, whom no bishop had ever heard of, and no government-office porter had ever seen, resolved to go to the miserable wretches who had lost the way to them; and to set up places of instruction in their own degraded haunts. I found my first Ragged School, in an obscure place called West-street, Saffron-hill, pitifully struggling for life, under every disadvantage. It had no means, it had no suitable rooms, it derived no power or protection from being recognized by any authority, it attracted within its wretched walls a fluctuating swarm of faces – young in years but youthful in nothing else – that scowled Hope out of countenance. It was held in a low-roofed den, in a sickening atmosphere, in the midst of taint, and dirt, and pestilence: with all the deadly sins let loose, howling and shrieking at the doors. Zeal did not supply the place of method and training; the teachers knew little of their office; the pupils, with an evil sharpness, found them out, got the better of them, derided them, made blasphemous answers to scriptural questions, sang, fought, danced, robbed each other; seemed possessed by legions of devils. The place was stormed and carried, over and over again; the lights were blown out, the books strewn in the gutters, and the female scholars carried off triumphantly to their old wickedness. With no strength in it but its purpose, the school stood it all out and made its way. Some two years since, I found it, one of many such, in a large, convenient loft in this transition part of Farringdon-street – quiet and orderly, full, lighted with gas, well white-washed, numerously attended, and thoroughly established.

The number of houseless creatures who resorted to it, and who were necessarily turned out when it closed, to hide where they could in heaps of moral and physical pollution, filled the managers with pity. To relieve some of the more constant and deserving scholars, they rented a wretched house, where a few common beds – a dozen or a dozen-and-a-half perhaps – were made upon the floors. This was the Ragged School Dormitory; and when I found the school in Farringdon-street, I found the dormitory in a court hard by, which in the time of the cholera had acquired a dismal fame. The dormitory was, in all respects, save as a small beginning, a very discouraging institution. The air was bad; the dark and ruinous building, with its small close rooms, was quite unsuited to the purpose; and a general supervision of the scattered sleepers was impossible. I had great doubts at the time whether, excepting that they found a crazy shelter for their heads, they were better than in the streets.

Having heard, in the course of last month, that this dormitory (there are others elsewhere) had grown as the school had grown, I went the other night to make another visit to it. I found the school in the same place, still advancing. It was now an Industrial School too; and besides the men and boys who were learning – some, aptly enough; some, with painful difficulty; some, sluggishly and wearily; some, not at all – to read, and write, and cipher; there were two groups, one of shoemakers, and one (in a gallery) of tailors, working with great industry and satisfaction, Each was taught and superintended by a regular workman engaged for the purpose, who delivered out the necessary means and implements. All were employed in mending, either their own dilapidated clothes or shoes, or the dilapidated clothes or shoes of some of the other pupils. They were of all ages, from young boys to old men. They were quiet, and intent upon their work. Some of them were almost as unused to it as I should have shown myself to be if I had tried my hand, but all were deeply interested and profoundly anxious to do it somehow or other. They presented a very remarkable instance of the general desire there is, after all, even in the vagabond breast, to know something useful. One shock-headed man, when he had mended his own scrap of a coat, drew it on with such an air of satisfaction, and put himself to so much inconvenience to look at the elbow he had darned, that I thought a new coat (and the mind could not imagine a period when that coat of his was new!) would not have pleased him better. In the other part of the school, where each class was partitioned off by screens adjusted like the boxes in a coffee-room, was some very good writing, and some singing of the multiplication-table – the latter, on a principle much too juvenile and innocent for some of the singers. There was also a ciphering-class, where a young pupil teacher out of the streets, who refreshed himself by spitting every half-minute, had written a legible sum in compound addition, on a broken slate, and was walking backward and forward before it, as he worked it, for the instruction of his class, in this way: