VOL. XLI.

996

"Why did your father do that, Paul?" he said. "Spoilt the place, spoilt the common, and all for nothing. They never come here, and perhaps it is as well they shouldn't. But it brings interlopersartists, and all kinds of rubbish. We have had horrid people there this summervulgar, unpleasant people. Yes, Mrs. Percival liked it at first, but she is tired of it now."

"They are coming next month," said Paul.

"No! Are they?" exclaimed the Colonel, in a voice of the greatest delight.

"As soon as his residence is over. What's-his-name is going back to India." "That's a good thing," said Colonel Ward. "You don't like him, Paul, do you?"

"We don't get on much," said Paul.

"I bet you don't. The most conceited puppy I ever met-correcting me about things I knew before he was born. People tell me all young fellows are like that, but I don't believe them. Can't imagine how the Canon can stand such an ass in the house; but he never had much sense."

Paul laughed. "But you're singular, you know," he said. "Most people like Vincent about there. He's a great swell in the Close."

"Ah! the Close!" said Colonel Ward wickedly. "Yes, I daresay he suits them well; they make a fine hero of him."

"Well, they are all very jolly," said Paul in his lazy way.

They were now walking side by side along the road that led to their two houses, past the shady garden of the post-office, and one or two other cottages. The Colonel's eyes were everywhere; Paul looked absently straight before him.

"Don't go in too much for these clerical people," said the Colonel. "Your father was the finest man that ever lived, and my greatest friend, but I never could understand his friendship for old Percival. And not giving him up, too, when he married the woman we were all in love with. However, your father was not so far gone as I was, Paul-of course not-your dear mother soon consoled him. For my part, I never could forgive Percival."

"You don't seem revengeful," said Paul. It seemed necessary to say something, though he knew all this by heart, having heard the whole story from Colonel Ward a hundred times before.

"Well, my father and the Canon were friends at school."

"Ah, well, your father was right, of course. But Percival was never good enough for him. A hollow sort of chap; and those men do more harm than good, especially when they go into the Church, which ought to keep up its character. No; I never cared for your seeing so much of Percival."

"I couldn't help it, as he was my guardian," said Paul, "and they have always been awfully good to me."

"What a strange thing that was, now!" said Colonel Ward. "As if one guardian was not enough for a fellow. I could have managed you and your affairs well enough by myself, and I should have arranged things rather differently. You are a fine fellow, no doubt, with your degree, and so on; but in my opinion you have studied too much. A man with property, like you, has something to think of besides the classics. Everything here might have gone to the dogs, in the two years since you were of age, while you were reading as if your life depended on it. All Percival's doing: your father would not have cared for all that."

"But things have not gone to the dogs, thanks to you."

"No thanks at all. I happened to be living here; I kept my eyes open, and saw that people did their duty. By-the-by, you ought not to keep that old fellow at the post-office. He is a lazy old scoundrel. His wife does all the work, and she is a tremendous gossip. I don't approve of them."

"They have been here such a long time," said Paul.

Colonel Ward came to a stand at his own gate, and the dogs thronged round him; they were all his dogs, a family of Clumber spaniels, except Paul's little rough terrier, who jumped up at his master's hand, proud of belonging to him.

A low dark arch over the gate led into Colonel Ward's garden; the windows of his house peeped out with difficulty under masses of ivy and Virginia creeper, which hung over the porch, so that a tall man had to stoop to go in. The smooth turf of the garden was all bordered with brilliant

flowers; it was a charming little place in summer-all the year round, its master thought.

He stood among his dogs and looked at Paul with bright impatient eyes. He loved Paul; but how his friend, Sir Paul Romaine, K.C.B., the distinguished, dashing cavalry soldier, who, next to Mrs. Percival, had usurped the enthusiasm of his life, came to have a son like this, must always be a mystery. He was haunted by a fear that Paul might choose to be a clergyman, or might go in for science of some kind, or take to composing music, or writing books; he believed him to be capable of anything of this kind. Not that he did not respect these occupations, especially the first of them, for he was a good and a clever man in his way; but as Paul could not, or would not, be a soldier, he thought that Providence must mean him to be a landlord and a politician. He was terribly afraid that Paul would turn into an oddity, an old bachelor like him self; and in objecting to Paul's intimacy with the Percivals, he forgot that they in their commonplace world of gossip, and fashion, and tennis, were a strong influence the other way.

"How are you going to learn to manage your tenants, I wonder !" he said, and he looked hard at the young Squire standing in the middle of the road. "We shall soon have all the bad characters in the country settled on Holm Common."

"There wouldn't be room for them, unless I built more cottages," said Paul.

The Colonel swung his stick and laughed. "There's only one hope for you, Paul," he said. "You're young, to be sure, to talk about it but you must marry a sensible woman.'

Paul made no direct answer to this. He had turned half away, playing with Scamp, who was impatient to be moving off again; and Colonel Ward did not see his smile or the light that suddenly woke in his eyes. Perhaps he was not so young as his old friend thought, after all.

"I say, Colonel, will you come and dine with me to-night?"

"All right. Nobody else?"

"No, nobody else," said Paul; and then the Colonel with his dogs dived into his little dark den, and Paul and Scamp went off at a great pace to their abode in the woods.

When the two friends met again, three hours later, Colonel Ward looked the picture of cheerful smartness, while Paul

was flushed and tired. He had been to church, and, finding that the organist was away on his holiday, he had put on a surplice and played the organ, as he used to do in more boyish days. After service, he went on playing for twenty minutes or more; a few people lingered in and near the church to listen, for the grand strains of a wedding or triumphal march-which yet could be traced to no known composer

echoed in the high roof and rolled out through open doors and windows into the quiet churchyard, with its yew trees, down to the valley where other people were slowly walking home.

The Vicar, a shy young man, who always found Paul hard to get on with, came up to him afterwards at the church door, in the twilight, and asked him if that music came from the mountains; for Paul had been in Switzerland nearly all the summer, almost ever since he left Oxford.

"No," said Paul; "it came from Wooleborough."

"Ah! from the Cathedral!" said the Vicar, thinking he had made a mistake; and Paul did not correct him further.

The establishment at Red Towers was small and military. Indoors, Sabin ruled. He, in former years, had been Sir Paul's soldier-servant. Ford, the groom, a very solemn fellow, had belonged to the same regiment. Mrs. Sabin was housekeeper and cook, with two maids under her. Out of doors there were two or three gardeners, one of whom had been a soldier. The house had never been let since Sir Paul's death, seven years ago, but had been kept in splendid order by these servants, under Colonel Ward's vigilant eye. Mr. Bailey, the agent, sometimes came down from London; and Canon and Mr. Percival walked about agreeably, and enjoyed the garden and the woods when they were at their little house hard by. The young master was there sometimes, too. was always a solitary boy, with a taste for moping about at home, which his guardian's wife struggled against as much as she could. And she succeeded in getting him away a great deal, for Paul, like most other people, was very fond of her.

He

The rooms at Red Towers were large and rather gloomy, being furnished heavily and in dark colours. The whole effect was dark, beginning with the black oak window frames; and there was nothing modern in the house at all. The Romaines had never lived there much; they were nearly always

soldiers, and their wives generally did not like the place. The present house had been built by one of them about the time of James the Second. It was the sort of place that wanted large families, dogs, games, cheerfulness. The rustling of the woods and their weird cries and noises had always been rather terrible to anxious women waiting for news from battle-fields.

The rooms at Red Towers opened chiefly into each other, and Mrs. Sabin very often kept the shutters closed for weeks together; she thought light was not good for the fine old pictures and the beautiful china. Now and then she condescended to show these treasures to some intelligent and fascinating tourist; but very seldom. Colonel Ward never failed to hear of these exhibitions, and they made him angry.

When the Squire was at home, all the rooms were open, and carefully arranged. He could spend as much time as he liked among his forefathers and their possessions; and sometimes, in fact, he would stroll through the room with his hands in his pockets, looking up at the pictures as if he wished they could talk to him.

But he lived chiefly in a small room near the entrance, close to the square tower which contained the hall and staircase. This room had two windows, one in the angle by the tower, looking out on a corner of red wall and the woods beyond it, the other looking on a wide sheltered lawn with rose-beds and cedar-trees. The windows were near the ground, and Paul, with his long legs, could jump out easily. The walls of his room were covered with heavy bookcases, now full of modern books, which had arrived that summer in large cases from Oxford. Colonel Ward had unpacked and settled them with his own hands while Paul was abroad, sending away the old ones into the much less literary room, which was called the library. There was a piano in a corner, and over the chimneypiece were two small portraits of Paul's father and mother when they were young. In a velvet frame underneath hung a few miniatures, and Sir Paul's medals; Mrs. Percival had arranged that frame for the young man at Oxford. Above the portraits, hung Sir Paul's sword; and on the black carved mantel-piece were his travelling clock and a few other things which had belonged to him. Paul's peaceful propensities did not mean any want of pride in his father.

Sabin would have thought it much more correct that his master and Colonel Ward

should dine in the large dining-room. Bat Paul said, "No, in the study"; so into the study Sabin brought his fine old plate, his Worcester china, his best wine, and waited on the two friends with a beaming benevolence which made the nervous Colonel glance at him severely.

After dinner, when Sabin was gone, Paul became very silent and dreamy; even Scamp could hardly catch his attention. At last the Colonel, who was smoking and talking serenely, noticed his host's absence of mind, and fixed his eyes upon him in a momentary anxiety. Paul always looked young, for he wore no hair on his face; but that evening he looked like a boy of eighteen. He looked very handsome, too; eyelids drooping a little over dark eyes like his mother's, and faintly smiling, some new life lighting up the dreams which had taken hold of him. Suddenly, as the Colonel stared at him curiously-but quite unaware of that—he looked up and said: "Colonel, you were saying something this afternoon about marrying

,,

Colonel Ward stared still more, in consternation now.

"What! My dear chap, take care what you are doing. Don't be in a hurry, whatever you do!"

"No," said Paul, "I have not been in a hurry. Do you mind our going outside, and talking about it? This room is sɔ fearfully hot."

ALL THE YEAR ROUND.

NEW YEAR'S DAY.

THE name January was given by the Romans to this month in honour of their god Janus, the deity who was supposed to govern the gates and avenues. In this character he was depicted holding a key in his right hand and a rod in his left, to symbolise his opening and ruling the year. Sometimes he was also shown bearing the number three hundred in one hand and sixty-five in the other; while at other times he was represented with four heads, emblematical of looking at the four seasons of the year; and again with two heads, as being acquainted with past and future events. The Saxons called the month Wolf Monath, because wolves, driven by hunger, were wont to prowl about and attack even men in their desire for food. They also gave it the name of Efter Yula, or after Christmas, and depicted it by a

January is more marked than any other month in the year for a variety of days connected with old superstitions, traditions, or curious observances. It was also a particularly unlucky month, its very first day being a "dies mala." In a manuscript calendar of the time of Henry the Sixth, the following days are set down as extremely dangerous: first, second, fourth, fifth, seventh, tenth, fifteenth; and in another calendar, the seventeenth and nineteenth are added. We are told by an old poet that

By her who in this month is born,
No gem save garnets should be worn;
They will ensure her constancy,
True friendship, and fidelity.

The precious stone set down to be worn in this month, by all who can afford to indulge themselves in such luxuries, is the hyacinth, which had the power of warding off the attacks of evil spirits.

Though the shortest day has passed before January makes its appearance, we have abundant evidence of the truth of the old couplet, that

Freeze the pot upon the fier.

Amongst other meteorological proverbs associated with the premier month are:

If the grass grow in Janiveer,

It grows the waur for't all the year.

A January spring
Is worth naething.

Under water dearth,
Under snow bread.

March in Janiveer,

Janiveer in March I fear.

If January calends be summerly gay,

'Twill be winterly weather till the calends of May.

And last of all a Scotch proverb tells us that: "Winter comes not till after New Year, nor spring till after Saint Patrick s Day."

New Year's Day in the long distant past was spent amongst the men in jollity and frolic, and by the women in carrying from door to door a bowl of spiced ale, called Wassail, which they offered to the residents of every house they stopped at. In return they received some trifling present.

In Scotland, the eve of the new year is known as Hogmanay and Singen E'en, and on this night friend visits friend, and generally "spend a night of it" together. The visitors and company make a point of not rising to separate until after the clock strikes twelve, when they immediately rise, clink glasses, drink healths, and with hearty hand-shakings, wish each other a mutual and happy new year. To the superstitious in the Highlands, it is of great moment which way the wind blows on Hogmanay:

If New Year's Eve night wind blow south,
It betokeneth warmth and growth;
If west, much milk, and fishes in the sea;
If north, much cold and storms there will be
If east, the trees will bear much fruit;
If north-east, flee it man and brute.

Opening the Bible on New Year's Day is another practice still common in some parts of Scotland, and much credit is attached thereto. It is generally set about on the morning before breakfast, as the ceremony must be performed fasting. The Bible is laid on the table unopened, and the parties who wish to consult it are then to open it in succession. They are not at liberty to choose any particular part of the book, but must open it at random. Whenever this is done, and wherever it may happen to be, the inquirer has to place his finger on any one of the chapters contained in the two open pages, but without any previous perusal. The chapter is then read aloud, and commented upon by the people assembled. It is believed that the good or ill-fortune, the happiness or misery of the consulting party during the coming year will be in some way or other described and foreshown by the contents of the chapter.

In small towns the children, dressed in