Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 707, July 14, 1877

'Yes?' says Cissy. She rather shrinks from mention of Halkett's name, and remembers with a slight pang how friendly have seemed his relations with Mrs Leyton since her arrival. 'Have you known Captain Halkett long?' she cannot help asking.

'All my life. His father and mine were fast friends; our childhood was spent together. Then we separated' – with a sigh, that sounds ominous to Cissy, but in reality is only born of past sorrow, utterly unconnected with him in any way – 'to meet again after many years in India, and now – here. One way or another, all through, Frank's life has been mixed up with mine.'

Cissy bites her lip, and asks no more questions; but Mrs Leyton notices the action of the white teeth, and ponders.

'There is a great charm in Frank's manner, I think?' she says interrogatively.

'Is there? Most men nowadays are charming, as acquaintances,' replies Cissy carelessly. 'And Captain Halkett is too universal a favourite to be altogether charming to one.'

'Poor Frank!' laughs the widow lightly. 'He is unfortunate; or at least has found some one who cannot appreciate him. Then you mean to say you would find it impossible to care for any man who liked some other woman besides yourself?'

'Well, as you ask me the question, I confess I would,' says Cissy, who is feeling irritated, she scarcely knows why. 'I would divide honours with no one, and I would be winner – or nothing.'

'Then the man you love must be civil to no one else?' – with arched eyebrows indicative of surprise.

'Oh, "civil." Let him be as civil as he pleases. If you were talking merely of civility, I altogether misunderstood you. I only meant if I had a lover – which at the present moment I certainly have not – I would wish to be first in his eyes. Let him be civil to all the world, but let him love me.'

'Quite so; that is only fair, I think,' says the widow, but she looks immensely amused; and Cissy seeing her expression, feels her wrath rising. 'I quite thought – judging from appearances – that you and Captain Halkett were very good friends,' goes on Mrs Leyton unwisely, and regrets her speech a moment later.

'I beg you will not judge me from appearances,' says Miss Mordaunt haughtily. 'A woman of the world as you are, Mrs Leyton, ought surely to know that people for the most part do not always feel everything they may look. And besides, you must forgive me; but if there is one thing I have a particular objection to, it is being watched and commented upon.'

'You are right,' returns Mrs Leyton with suspicious sweetness; 'I fear I have been very indiscreet; for the future I will not watch you and Captain Halkett.'

There is a covert meaning in this speech that is absolutely maddening; but the entrance of the gentlemen puts a stop to Miss Mordaunt's reply. She withdraws slowly, and seats herself upon a distant lounge, where she is immediately joined by Major Blake.

'I hope you have missed me,' he says with a tender glance, pushing aside her trailing skirts that he may gain room for his huge person. 'I assure you the time those men spent over their wine was actionable; while I was tantalised by dreams of fair women the entire two hours.'

'Two hours! What an exaggeration. Why, by Aunt Isabel's watch, that was never known to lose a minute, it was only half an hour.'

'What to me was two hours, to you was but a fourth of the time. How cruel an interpretation may be put upon your words! And I have been buoying myself up with the hope while absent from you, that when we did meet again, I should hear something kind from your lips.'

'And so you shall,' says Miss Mordaunt, bestowing upon him a radiant smile, just to let 'that woman' see she is not pining for the recreant Frank. But unfortunately for the success of the thing, Mrs Leyton is looking the other way, and does not see it at all, while Frank Halkett does.

'Must I confess to you? Well, then, my accurate knowledge of the hour arose from my incessant glances at the watch, to see if your delay in coming was really as long as it appeared – to me.'

'If I thought you meant that' – begins Blake hesitatingly, with a sudden gleam in his eyes (what man but feels more valiant after dinner than before?) – 'if I really thought you meant it' —

'Well – "if you really thought I meant it" – what would you do then? But no!' she cries hastily, seeing she has gone rather far, and unwilling to bring matters to a climax – 'do not tell me; I do not wish to know. My ignorance in this case no doubt is blissful; I prefer to remain in it. – And now to change the subject. Who is Mrs Leyton? and what do you know about her? I am all curiosity where she is concerned.'

'Do you like her?' asks Blake, merely as a precautionary measure.

'I can't say I do – exactly,' replies the Irish girl candidly. 'Now tell me where you first met her.'

'In India. Her husband was alive when I first became acquainted with her. He lived tremendously hard; but he was devoted to her, without doubt, and she to him; and she took his death awfully badly. Never saw a woman so cut up by anything before; they generally take it pretty sensibly after the first shock, but she didn't; and went to a skeleton in less than three months.'

'She is not very thin now.'

'No. I suppose one can't keep on pining for ever, and in course of time good food will cover one's bones. But she felt it no end for months, and was altogether down in her luck. You see he got rather a horrible death, as his horse first threw him, and then almost trampled him beyond recognition.'

'How dreadful!' murmurs Miss Mordaunt, with a little shiver; and wonders how Mrs Leyton could ever have smiled afterwards.

'Yes; wasn't it? She took it so much to heart, that for years after she could not bear the sight of a horse, though she had the best seat in the regiment – amongst the women, I mean – and could not be induced to take a ride. Before leaving India, she sold, or gave away, every one of her horses.'

Here Cissy becomes intensely interested. 'To whom did she give them?' she asks indifferently.

'I hardly know; I was up-country at the time, but her most intimate friends, I suppose. – By-the-bye, Halkett was an immense crony of hers.'

'Indeed?'

'Never out of the house,' says the major, thinking it a good opportunity to improve his own chances, though really only giving voice to what had been the common report in that part of India where the catastrophe had occurred. 'After Tom Leyton's death, he would have married her like a shot; but she would not hear of it. She is a very handsome woman, you know, and tremendously admired by some fellows, though for my part I don't altogether see it.'

'Don't you? I think her wonderfully pretty. Perhaps she will relent, and marry him now; who knows? Certainly his constancy deserves some reward. Was it Mrs Leyton gave him the mare?' 'Don't know, I'm sure. But think it very likely, now you mention it, as he sets such uncommon store by her. – How very well Mrs Leyton is looking just now,' says the major, adjusting his eyeglass with much care, and glancing significantly at the other end of the room, where sits the widow in earnest conversation with Frank Halkett. Cissy follows the direction of his gaze, but, conscious of his scrutiny, takes care that not one muscle of her face betrays what she is really feeling.

Yes, very well, very handsome looks Mrs Leyton, as leaning gracefully back in her chair, with one hand toying idly with the rings that cover her fingers, she listens to Captain Halkett's conversation. Now and then she raises large dreamy eyes – half mirthful, half sympathetic – to his face, but scarcely interrupts him. He is talking with much earnestness – is apparently entirely engrossed by his subject – and takes no heed of what is going on around him. Presently he ceases, and evidently seeks an answer from his beautiful companion. She gives him one of her upward glances – all sympathy this time – and says a few words; but they are without doubt the right ones, as Halkett's face brightens, and a smile overspreads it that makes it positively handsome. At the moment he raises her hand, and bending over it, seems to examine her rings curiously. To Cissy the action almost bespeaks a betrothal, and renders her half indignant, wholly miserable. Nevertheless, turning to Major Blake, she says with a bright brave smile: 'I think my idea was right, and even now he has received his reward.'

'Looks uncommon like it,' says the major with a sigh of relief.

NOTES FROM CHINA

A medical gentleman at one time resident in China furnishes the following notes of interesting incidents within his knowledge. Though roughly put together, they may amuse our readers and be relied on as true.

In the month of January 1869, at about half-past seven P.M., I was sitting at dinner in my house in Swatow, when a sailor from the small gun-boat at that time in Swatow Harbour came running breathless and hatless, asking me to come down without any delay to the hospital, which I had built in the Chinese town on the side of the river opposite my own house. This man said there were thirteen sailors and the captain of the gun-boat badly wounded by an unprovoked attack of the Chinese. This looked serious indeed; so putting up instruments, lint, &c. I hastened down with the sailor. On reaching the hospital, the unwounded men of the gun-boat were still carrying into the hospital their injured comrades. I never saw a set of men so severely wounded without any being fatally so. I set to work, and extracted fifteen bullets from the men; but some were too deeply imbedded to get at that night. One man had one ear shot off, a second two fingers, a third was hit in the eye, a fourth shot in the breast, and I afterwards extracted the bullet at his back. The captain of the gun-boat had on a very thick shaggy pilot-coat, double on the breast; a bullet had cut right across his chest; and on examination I found the skin just raised where it had passed. A very singular wound was that of a young officer, whose two front teeth were knocked in by a bullet, that then disappeared somewhere in his palate. I never could find this bullet whilst he was under my care; but it seemed not to have done him much harm. He left Swatow; and I saw him three or four years later, and he said the lead had never appeared, and he had suffered no inconvenience from it. I believe it must have worked itself somewhere into the muscles at the back of his neck.

The cause of this raid of the Chinese was this: the captain of the gun-boat had merely taken out twenty-five men to exercise by rowing one of his boats up the river Han, on which Swatow is situated. This river is very wide at the mouth, and abounds in large creeks; on the banks of one of the largest of these, next to Swatow, are built three fortified walled-in villages, or what we should call towns, from their large population. The inhabitants of these towns were well known as being particularly lawless, not having paid taxes for many years, and setting the mandarins at defiance. Seeing the foreigners (whom they detest) rowing up the creek, 'the Braves' (as they call themselves) rushed out in hundreds and fired into the gun-boat from each side of the river; and were it not for the nature of their guns, or as the Chinese call them 'gingals,' which are old-fashioned and of short range, none of the boat's crew would have returned alive; as it was, fourteen men were well riddled; and the boat, which I saw afterwards, had as many holes in it as a colander. The sailors rowed away for their lives, and escaped.

Our settlement, on hearing this story, was in great and just alarm. These people detest the foreigners; and having put to flight their supposed enemies in a crippled state, it was very likely they might follow this up by an attack on the settlers; and had they only sufficient courage, their numbers were so great, that our fate would have soon been decided by pillage and murder. The British consul, Mr Alabaster Challoner, saw the danger; and being a man of decided character and great energy, without any delay sent a merchant-ship that was in the harbour under high steam-pressure to Hong-kong to inform the Admiral of what had happened. The reply was prompt and satisfactory; for a few hours brought Admiral Keppel, Lord Charles M. Scott (son of the Duke of Buccleuch), two frigates, and seven gun-boats into Swatow Harbour, to the great satisfaction of the foreign settlers and of Mr Challoner. This gentleman was a small delicate-looking man, whose neck being a little crooked, made him hold his head on one side; but such was his courage, determination, and inflexible sense of justice, that the stoutest Chinese officials trembled at his look; and they all declared they would rather face a tiger than meet the glare of 'His Excellency the Devil's' eyes when displeased. The Admiral immediately told off five hundred marines and blue-jackets, fully armed and supplied with two small cannon, to punish the offenders. The friendly natives of Swatow averred loudly that these men were going to certain destruction; that not one would return, as the tribe in question was invincible; and most of the foreign merchants were sufficiently alarmed by these assertions to send all their most valuable possessions on board the vessels in the harbour. Fortunately the result was not what they dreaded. On approaching the first town, the troops saw 'the Braves' in vast numbers on the walls, shouting, waving flags, jumping up and down, and calling on them to come on and be killed. The tars replied by blowing open the gates with gunpowder, and falling on the heroes, who instantly gave way and fled precipitately. They then set fire to the place, sparing all who did not resist. They treated the other towns similarly, and returned victorious. The excellent effect of this prompt action was to produce a complete tranquillity in the neighbourhood of Swatow, which has remained undisturbed ever since (eight years), and a feeling of security which never before existed; yet the Admiral was reproved by the British government at that time for having acted without 'home orders!'

In the winter of 1873 a very unseaworthy merchant sailing-vessel (a Siamese), the Tye Wat, set out from the north of China to Siam with a cargo of beancake, &c. The weather became excessively stormy, and at last the old vessel actually went to pieces many miles from land in the Gulf of Pe-che-le. The crew consisted of eight Malays, who worked the ship; the captain, an Englishman; and in addition was one Chinese woman. They had no boats on board, no time to make a raft or means of doing so; and as the vessel was rapidly sinking, the wretched people looked round in despair; when a hope of escape struck one of them as his eye lighted on a very large wooden water-tank which was on deck. This tank was strongly made, about six feet long, five feet across, and five feet high, with a large hole at the top into which a man could squeeze, and a tight-fitting cover. There was not a moment to lose: a hole was bored in the bottom, to let out what water it contained, then quickly plugged; and all ten squeezed themselves in hurriedly, put on the lid, and awaited their fate. In a quarter of an hour after they were thus packed, the ship sunk under them. They first whirled round, and then floated off freely, and felt themselves rolling and tossing about frightfully on a stormy sea. The weather was intensely cold, so much so that icicles had hung from the rigging of the sunken ship the day before; and being so tightly packed, perhaps it was fortunate the weather was so cold. In their haste to save life, they had brought only part of a ham which the captain had snatched up, and a bottle of brandy; and thus these poor creatures were tossed about from day to day, hungry and thirsty, jostled like potatoes shaken in a barrel; now and then, when they dared, letting in a little air by raising the lid. Their situation strongly reminds one of Gulliver in his box when the eagle carried him out to sea from the land of the Brobdingnags. On the fifth day the Malays said they must kill and eat the English captain; but the poor Chinese woman (to the credit of her sex) vehemently opposed them, and succeeded in saving him for that day. On the sixth day the Malays said they must eat her; but the captain in turn saved her for that day. It is difficult to imagine a more horrible situation than that of this poor Englishman surrounded by eight starving men determined to eat him, which they certainly would have done had not an English vessel rescued them on the seventh day. It happened thus: the captain of that vessel sighted a large box tossing on the waters, and at first never thought of minding it, only supposing it part of some wreck, as the weather was so bad; but as he looked, to his utter surprise a head popped up through the hole in the centre, and then vanished, to be followed by another figure, making frantic gesticulations. With much difficulty this strange box was got alongside, hauled up, and its poor inmates dragged out to light barely alive, and emaciated fearfully, finding the man-hole easier to pass out of than to get into; which was reversing the fable of the weasel who got into the barn. The captain of the rescuing vessel was a kind Englishman, and did all in his power to restore his guests. They were still in the Gulf of Pe-che-le; and did not reach the port of Swatow sooner than six days, where a doctor was called in to visit these liberated 'Jacks-in-a-box.' He said they were a singular proof of how much human beings can endure. All lived, and recovered perfectly. Certainly they were all young people. The Malays went home. The English captain went to Singapore, and shewed himself really grateful to the poor Chinese woman who had saved him from the jaws of the Malays.

UNSUSPECTED WAYS OF EARNING A LIVELIHOOD

'Why, sir, we never should wake of our own accord, specially these dark mornings, if we hadn't somebody to knock us up.'

The speaker was a worthy artisan whom I often used to meet at a certain steam-boat pier on the Thames; his after-breakfast labours appearing to begin about the time I usually was in waiting for the boat.

'You see, sir,' he continued in answer to a question I had put to him – 'you see, sir, there's about sixty of us hereabouts down by the water-side; and there's so much that depends upon the tide, that we have to be called at all hours – sometimes two o'clock in the morning, or three or four, just as the case may be.'

'But who is it calls you?' I asked. 'A policeman, I suppose?'

'No; not a policeman,' my companion answered; 'it would take up a deal too much of his time; besides, fresh policemen are always coming on to the beat, and we could not be bothered with constantly having to shew and tell a new man the way.'

'Well, it must be rather an awkward matter,' I observed.

'No; it isn't. We each pay fourpence a week to Phil Larkins; and he wakes us as regular as clockwork.'

'But if sixty people want to be called at all sorts of irregular hours, how does the awakener manage to know his duties?' I asked.

'Oh, we chalk on our doors or shutters the time, and that way he knows. Phil is to be depended upon always. But he very nearly lost the work a year ago, and it was a shame. Some fellow wanted to step into his shoes, and morning after morning went and altered the chalkings, so that we were either called two hours before our time, or over-slept ourselves, and so got into trouble. There was no end of quarrels and misunderstandings till the trick was found out. And I think the rascal who did it deserved a ducking – only, you see Phil is such a little fellow he couldn't give it him.'