ingly; "you're bound to be right. Still" and he hesitated. "It's a doubtful point," said his father; "and Scripture don't seem to be against it, else why should the directors take it for their motto, 'Some thirty, some sixty, some an hundredfold!" They mean well, no doubt, or they wouldn't go to the Bible." Mary felt inclined to remind him that even Satan could quote Scripture for his own ends; but she refrained. After the rest were gone to bed, Daniel Bateson sat for a long while leaning over the fire and pondering. He wanted to give his son a good start in life; he wished to see him working for himself, managing a business of his own, a rising man, a town-councillor-mayor, perhaps, of Hosewell. Why not he as well as many another? He read over again the prospectus of the "Safe and Speedy," and went to bed at last, after his wife had called to him for the third time, and dreamt about it. The next day, and for several days, he was thoughtful and absent. The "Safe and Speedy" was frequently discussed, and was frequently discussed, and formed, indeed, the principal topic of conversation. Matters were still going on thus when a low murmuring double knock was heard one evening at the door, and when Mrs. Bateson opened it, Mr. Simpson presented his card, and followed it, without waiting for an invitation, into the room. He had been advised to call, he said, by a neighbour, though contrary to his custom with strangers, the club which he represented being sufficiently well known to render any personal canvassing in its behalf unnecessary. It is needless to repeat what passed. Mr. Simpson spoke with fluency, and made out a plausible story. Daniel Bateson decided in his own mind that he would make the venture, though he did not say so at the time; he asked a great many questions about the directors, the office, and the hours of business, and was informed that he would find the former at their post about midday on the following Monday, and ready to give him further satisfaction. When Simpson was gone the vital question was again debated. John sided with his father; and in the end Mrs. Bateson came round to their views. "I dare say," she thought, "we shall not lose anything, even if we didn't gain so much as we expect; and if the worst comes to the worst, we shall still have the trade to depend on as before. Daniel ought to know what's best, and he shall have his way." Mary Dixon, too, thinking her John must be a pretty good man of business, resolved to cast in her lot with theirs and follow their example. A day or two later Mr. Badger passed, and after looking up at the house with a scrutinising air, returned and knocked at the door. Bateson was not in the house, and he sat down for a few minutes to wait for him. Mrs. Bateson, knowing that he had a reputation for long-headedness, was anxious to know his opinion of the "Safe and Speedy." know anything about it?" said she. "Not I," was the answer. "Do you "These are the directors," she continued, giving him the list. "I've seen their names before," he answered. "And the others?" "Don't know anything about them, and don't want." Mr. Badger turned away uneasily as he spoke, and looked out of the window, saying in a low tone, as if to himself: "Brightside was an honest man, but all the rest of the crew— Cock-a-doodle, cock-a-doodle, cock-a-doodle doo!" Just then old Bateson entered, and he and Badger went away together to the shop "to look at some stockings," as they said. Next morning the books were sent up to the postoffice, and the money withdrawn; and on the day named by the secretary Daniel Bateson and his son carried it by the government train to Birmingham. The chief (and only) office of the "Safe and Speedy" occupied the ground-floor of a house in Kite Street, the front of which was bright with fresh paint and gilding. A wire blind inscribed with the name of the society shut out the vulgar gaze and lent an air of privacy to the room, which had formerly been a shop. A copy of the society's constitution, neatly framed, hung in the window, with the motto above it on a scroll, "Some thirty, some sixty, some an hundredfold. See Mark iv. 8." There were also some handbills, one of which was headed, "Cent. per Cent.," and gave in large print the history of a fortunate depositor, who, by putting his money into the "Safe and Speedy' at a lucky moment, had doubled it in a few weeks; and this, it was stated in a footnote, was only one instance out of many. The office was opened every morning at nine o'clock by a man with a little round body and long legs and arms, in a black coat and white neckcloth, who, after setting the office to rights, and placing pens, ink, and paper, an interest table, and a directory upon the counter, ready for instant use, mounted a high stool in a corner, from which he could have a good view of the street over the window blind, and sat there balancing himself upon four long rickety legs, like a highly respectable spider watching for flies. The He had not been seated there very long on the day in question when a fly approached-on four wheels; it stopped before the office, and Mr. Spinney hastened to the door to open it. He was so very spider-like as he sat upon his stool, that one would have expected him to glide sideways along a line, instead of leaving half his legs behind him and moving in the ordinary way of humankind. gentleman whom he admitted was a pleasant-looking man with a bald head, and only a little white hair about his temples; his lips were parted habitually, as if ready to pronounce a friendly word to any one who should come in his way; and when he smiled, which was pretty often, it seemed like a ripple upon all his features. There was, however, no smile upon his face at this time, but rather a look of anxiety, which was the more conspicuous because evidently out of place. "Anybody come?" he asked. "No, sir," said the spider, handing him a chair. "They'll be here soon, I suppose?" "Can't say, sir." "Where's Mr. Simpson ?" "Don't know, sir.” "I must see somebody to-day. I'll call again." Spinney opened the door for him, followed him with his eyes down the street, and then resumed his usual occupation from the stool. Presently a door which connected the front office with an inner room was opened, and Mr. Simpson appeared. There were two gentlemen with him, and "Where is he?" "Call again." "He won't find me here," said Brittlebank, one of the two men who had entered with the secretary. "Better see him, I think," said Simpson; "he was very much put out the last time he called. He said he must and would see the directors; better have him in and talk to him." "Pougher can do that," said Brittlebank. 'So I will," said Pougher; "but you must stay also; it will look better, and you can put in a word now and then.” "You have realised, then? got money in hand?" "As much as we shall want at present." "I have had letters from several depositors complaining that they cannot get the money they are anxious to draw out." "All the better for them. If they were to take it out to-day, they'd repent to-morrow. They should let it remain in and roll up, as of course you know." "I fear sometimes lest it should roll away altogether. Tell me the truth: are we solvent?" "Solvent! What a question! Why, our assets are sufficient at this moment to pay every depositor a bonus-a handsome bonus. You must be aware of that yourself." "I ought to know more about these matters than I do. I have trusted to your business habits, and have suffered my name to appear as one of the directors in dependence upon you; and in the hope," he added, with a sigh, "of doing some little service to my poorer neighbours." "Of course; and now the best thing you can do is to make yourself comfortable, and believe what's told you. The Safe and Speedy' never was in a safer or more flourishing condition than it is this moment." "You will pay the claims, then, of those who have given notice to withdraw, at once ?" "Well, you know, it would be against their own interest if we were to do that." "The money is theirs, and they have a right to it." "And the markets are so low just now, that if we were to sell out we should be making fearful sacrifices. Everything is down; quite low water, in fact. It would be doing an injustice to all the members in order to satisfy the demands of two or three. But there-don't be impatient; if they want the money they must have it. I'll go up to London to-day and sell something for whatever it will fetch. It's very provoking, though; a week hence it would be all right." Mr. Brightside looked distressed and irresolute. He passed his hand nervously over his face; sat down, got up again, and at length spoke. "Mr. Pougher, Mr. Brittlebank; I am quite sure you will not deceive me. Are you certain, can you assure me, both of you, upon your honour, that you know for certain that all is right? Is this want of cash only a temporary inconvenience? Do these securities which you hold really represent the value marked upon them? Will they certainly bring in, sooner or later, the amount at which you estimate them?" "On my word of honour, as a gentleman, I believe and am sure they will," said Mr. Pougher. "On my word of honour, I believe they will do it twice over," said Mr. Brittlebank. Mr. Pougher frowned at him, as if he had overdone it; but Mr. Brightside only gave a sigh of relief. "Well, then," he said, presently, "I can lay my hand upon a few hundreds just now, and will advance the cash required. I would rather risk my own money than the money of these poor people who have trusted us. You shall have funds to meet the present calls without making any sacrifices. I will go and see about it, and arrange for you to have it by to-morrow." "What do you think of that?" said Pougher, when Mr. Brightside was gone. "The best thing I ever heard in my life," answered Brittlebank. "Ha! ha! ha!-ha! ha!" The laugh was a whispered laugh, an inaudible chuckle: it was echoed, or rather reflected, from the open throat-we had almost written open sepulchreof Mr. Pougher; and the two directors leaned back in their chairs and looked at one another with their mouths wide open, and enjoyed the joke until they were purple in the face. They were recalled to propriety by a knock at the door. Spinney put his head in, and whispered, "Business!" Instantly they seized their pens and became absorbed in the most abstruse calculations. Mr. Simpson received the expected customer in the outer office. He was a fresh-looking man in the garb of a farmer. "Ma name's Gudgeon," he said: "a'm coom to ask about this coompany.' A want to know how a'm to git cent. per cent. for ma moonny; and how mooch that'll coom tew." "Walk in and speak to the directors," said Simpson; "they'll be most happy." "Adare say they will," said Gudgeon, "but a don't want to be tewk in. A want to know-" and he repeated the question in the same words. In spite of his reluctance, Mr. Gudgeon found himself very soon in the inner office; and when he came out again, half an hour later, he was carefully folding up a piece of paper duly stamped, sealed, signed and countersigned, being a receipt for £18, all the money he had with him, and feeling himself already a far richer and more important person than when he entered. not quite gone. He walked with a lighter step, and his face beamed with its accustomed cheerfulness; but now and then a cloud passed over it. He would not yield, however, to what he deemed an unjust, unkind suspicion, and he resolved to believe and hope the best. Soon afterwards the directors were again inter- | oppressed him like a nightmare was relieved, but rupted, and this time it was Daniel Bateson and his son who were introduced. The few inquiries they made were quickly answered, and they produced their money, a larger sum than had been brought into the office for many a day. The usual receipt was given, and the directors and secretary shook hands cordially with their good customers, who departed well pleased with their day's work. The receipts looked business-like; there were several official names upon them, Joseph Brightside's among the number, which was a host in itself, as the secretary had remarked; and Daniel carried them home and locked them up in his desk with great contentment. Scarcely were they out of sight when Spinney again opened the door, and this time the word was " Dun!" "Who is it?" cried Brittlebank. "Green." "The man who wants his money out?" "Him." "We're out ourselves," said Pougher, and suiting the action to the word, directors and secretary retired promptly through the back door by which they had entered, and closed it silently behind them. Meanwhile poor simple-minded Joseph Brightside went his way to make arrangements with his bankers for a supply of the needful. The fear which had Mr. Brightside, it will easily be seen, was not a man of business. He had begun life as a working man, and had inherited a moderate fortune from a distant relative. He had been induced by the representations of Pougher, Brittlebank, and others, to join them as director of the "Safe and Speedy," believing it to be a sound and useful club, capable of conferring great benefits upon its members. Knowing little or nothing of such matters, he was entirely at the mercy of his co-directors, who made use of his honest name as a cloak of respectability for their own dishonest ends. A kind-hearted, generous, benevolent man was Joseph Brightside; yet how great a wrong was he committing, how vast a load of misery was he preparing for hundreds, or it might be thousands, who, in dependence on his word, were trusting the hard-earned savings of their lives to a "club,” the real character of which was utterly unknown both to himself and them! "Can the blind lead the blind? Shall they not both fall into the ditch?" THEY MATTHEW MORRISON: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY CHAPTER XXIV.-FAREWELL. HEY were married quietly one forenoon. Alison | was bridesmaid, and I acted as best man. My mother, Miss Kemp, and a male friend of the bridegroom's, were all the company. Jeanie, in her dark silk dress and white shawl, the latter being my bridal gift to her, looked ladylike and pretty. They were a comely pair-she so genty and modest, and he such a handsome, hearty young man. I witnessed the ceremony with more composure than I anticipated, and I was able to wish them joy with singleness of heart at its close. They started immediately on their journey, and we got poor Mrs. Carruthers moved quietly here to my mother's house in the afternoon, being the first time she had been out of her own dwelling for years. Then, with the help of Nelly, Alison and I arranged everything for the sale next day; after which the door was locked for the night. Alison, poor thing! was much exhausted by the trying scenes of the day, and my mother herself put her to bed and tended her as if she had been her own daughter. The old furniture, which had seemed decent and respectable when properly arranged, made but a shabby appearance at the sale. There was a tolerably sharp competition among the Cowgate wives for it, however, and by the afternoon it was all cleared off, and the house was empty; I was the last person to leave it, having seen the auctioneer away. The parlour in which I had spent so many happy hours looked very desolate stripped of its furniture, and with the dirt and disorder of the recent sale on its walls and floor. I groaned in spirit as I gazed around me. Who could have foretold this change a few weeks back? There was the spot where Jeanie used to sit at work, here stood my own chair. These days would never return; that pleasant social intercourse was gone for ever. I was such a creature of habit that, though I had felt nothing warmer than friendship for Jeanie, I should still have suffered by this breaking up of my daily life. As it was, I cannot describe the bitterness. I wandered up and down the parlour, indulging in melancholy thoughts. My footsteps echoed dismally through the empty house. One heavy affliction had followed another, and, like the wise king of Israel, I was ready to say of life and its changes, "all is vanity and vexation of spirit." A deep depression began to settle down upon me, and at last I was fain to leave the house and go out to breathe the fresh air of the Meadows before presenting myself at home. There was little to do during the few days that intervened between the roup and the return of the newly-married pair. It would have been better for me if more had been left to the last, for my spirits flagged extremely as the time for sailing drew near. Jeanie and her husband returned two days before it; they went into lodgings, but most of their time was spent with us. We were all sorrowful, but quiet, and by common consent avoided talking of our approaching separation. I went down to the vessel with James Bethune the day before it, and we got the luggage on board. At last the hour arrived-wind and tide were favourable for sailing. The helpless mother, less nervous than we feared, had been got safely on board, her son-in-law taking charge of her. We were gathered round her chair-the one relic of their old home that accompanied them. My mother and Miss Kemp were both there. All the females were weeping; but strangers were moving around us, and little was said. We were soon warned to leave. I bade farewell to the aged woman. "Farewell, Mr. Matthew, and God bless you," sobbed Jeanie and Alison, as I embraced them for the first and last time. Then I grasped James Bethune's hand, and in another minute was standing beside my mother and Miss Kemp on the pier. Leith Pier was a fatal spot to me. It was there I said farewell to Archie, and now from it I looked my last on the Carrutherses, as leaving their mother in the care of James Bethune, they ascended to the deck to wave another weeping adieu to us while the ship loosed from the pier and glided out into the Firth. I seem to see them still as I saw them then leaning over the side, now letting their white handkerchiefs stream out on the breeze, and now bending their weeping faces into them. We stood gazing on them till their features and even their figures were lost in the distance, and all we could discern were two shadowy specks clinging closely to each other and looking steadfastly towards the shore; and so I have seen them often in my dreams. Faint cheers from the receding vessel swept over the waters, and were responded to from the shore, but my heart lay like lead in my bosom. CHAPTER XXV.-CONCLUSION. SUCH are some of the vicissitudes of an uneventful and retired life; all over, however, long ago. It has been a singular pleasure, though certainly not unmixed with pain, to retrace this my simple history. I might have entered into fuller details, but I have thought it prudent to err rather as to brevity. There are some experiences in the lives of men too sacred to be laid bare to any eye save the All-seeing one, and these I have left untold. alone too. We were like aunt and nephew, and when she died I was chief mourner at her funeral, and laid her head in the grave at her request, though not her heir. Many must still remember the little, kindly, eccentric old lady, whose benefactions, far and near, could not be fully hidden: every tale of distress and poverty met a ready response from her, I often visit the brother's and sister's graves in the Calton buryingground, where my mother also lies. There they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them." Mr. Meggat died in Liverpool years ago, an old man and full of days. 66 Cousin Braidfute, poor man, was gathered to his fathers before my mother's death, and his widow and her two bairns got all. Poor Sarah Braidfute! at the age of eighteen she made a stolen marriage with a private soldier from the castle, and had her father's door shut upon her from that time. It was said-I hope without truth-that the stepmother herself had secretly connived at the intimacy with a view to this result. I met Sarah in the street some years ago, and would have passed her by as a stranger, she was so altered; but she recognised and stopped me. She was a faded, shabbily-dressed, careworn woman, and the sight of me, and the thought of old times, made her cry piteously. Her husband's regiment had just come to Edinburgh, and she had presented herself at her former home, hoping that her stepmother might give her some little help, but had got a rough denial. Poor thing! I took her home to Nelly, and we did what we could for her and her bairns. She is now abroad, but I hear from her statedly. I have been looking over what I have written, and I fear that the latter part of it may create an impression on the reader's mind that I am an unhappy, hermit kind of man; and I confess this troubles me. I live, indeed, apart from the worldI am alone now; indeed, it is many years since my usual walks are in its bypaths and solitary my mother was taken home. We were never sepa-places-yet have I my own simple pleasures and rate after I left Inveruven, except for the few weeks every summer which I spent with Adam Bowman. I never again had the offer of a kirk, though I stood candidate for more than one; but I found I could be useful in the Lord's vineyard without being an ordained labourer, and He opened ways for me. We had sufficient worldly means, and I was content. My mother faded gradually. Her setting was calm and tranquil as her long life had been; she was even lifted above trouble on my account. "Farewell, Matthew; we shall meet again," were the last words she addressed to me. Amen! mother, in that land where there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, for the former things shall have passed away." Thank God for death! I would not live alway." But oh, thank God for life-for Him who is the "resurrection and the life," who died that we might live! I was very lonely for a long time after my mother's death; I missed her cheerful, loving companionship. For though latterly so feeble as to be able only to move between her bed and the easy-chair in the parlour with my assistance and Nelly's, she was ever youthful in spirit, thankful for every mercy, and full of sympathy for others. The Kemps were truly kind to me when she was gone, but no one could fill her place. And ere long Mr. Kemp went to his rest also, like a full sheaf of corn, rich in faith and good works; and his worthy little sister, now far up in years, was little circle of friends. With them I keep up an interchange of humble hospitalities suited to our means. And though I possess no ties of blood except so remote as scarcely to be countable, Adam Bowman is my brother in spirit, his wife is my sister, and their children are my children. I am interested in all their joys and sorrows; and "Uncle Matthew," as they call me, is as free of the parlour fireside at the Culdees as the old house-dog himself. And is not my own nameson, dedicated like me in his youth to the holy ministry, (may his career be a higher and more useful one than mine!) an inmate of my house, my winter companion, while he walks the same course of study that I formerly did? No, I am not an unhappy man. I have had my trials, but I have had my blessings also. "Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?" I have seen the grave close over all my nearest and dearest; but what shall separate me from the love of Christ? No, not even death itself. There is a peace which the world cannot give, and, thank God, which the world cannot take away; and He has given it to me. And I have my sphere of labour. I may call myself a city missionary, deputed by no sect or congregation of men, however, but by my Master Himself, who commanded me in these words, addressed to His disciples through all the ages, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to all creatures." And with these credentials I go forth, and in my feeble way try to do a little for Him among my poorer and more ignorant fellow-men. I am getting on in my pilgrimage, being this day sixty years old. Nelly and I have daikered on together since my mother's death, and will till death takes one or other of us. May I be the one! My house is set in order; Nelly is comfortably provided for her life; and poor Sarah Braidfute and Adam Bowman's family are my heirs. I generally am to be met daily in the streets and wynds of the old town; but occasionally I wander far out into the country to enjoy God's pure air and blessed sunshine among the quiet fields and hills. To-morrow we propose to lock the door and take our summer journey-Nelly to visit her friends near "lone St. Mary's loch," and I to occupy the little green-stained room which is called mine at the Culdees farm. So farewell, reader, whoever thou art, says thy friend, MATTHEW MORRISON. THE NEW WORLD AND THE OLD. AMERICAN ILLUSTRATIONS OF EUROPEAN ANTIQUITIES. BY PRINCIPAL DAWSON, LL.D., MONTREAL. V.-HOCHELAGA. HE highest skill of the Hochelaga potters was bestowed on their tobacco-pipes. They possessed stone pipes of steatite or soapstone, but none of these of elaborate form have been found. The great number of fragments of clay pipes, however, and the manner in which some of them are blackened, testifies to the prevalence of the habit of smoking. In one Hochelagan pipe the remains of the tobaccoleaves were recognised when it was disinterred. It had been filled, perhaps, on the eve of the final assault of the town, and the smoker had thrown it down unused to rush to the last battle of his tribe. This strange habit was found in full force by Cartier. Tobacco was probably cultivated both at Stadacona and Hochelaga, as it still is by the Canadian habitants. I have, indeed, seen a well-grown patch of tobacco growing beside a noble crop of wheat on the Laurentian hills behind Murray Bay, on the Lower St. Lawrence, in latitude 47° 40", and at a height of 1,000 feet above the sea level, though physical geographers place the northern limit of wheat at the sea level far to the south of this. The Indians could, therefore, easily cultivate this plant on the warm ground in southern exposures along the St. Lawrence; but they also used wild plants designated as Petun and Kinnikinick. The habit was new to the French. Cartier says: "They have an herb, of which they store up a large quantity for winter, which they esteem very much, and the use of which is confined to the men. They use it in the following way. The plant having been dried in the sun, they carry suspended to the neck a little bag of skin containing the dried leaves, along with a little pipe (cornet, perhaps alluding to the trumpetlike shape usual at Hochelaga) of stone or wood. Thus prepared, they place a little of the powder of the herb in one end of the pipe, and placing a live coal on it, draw their breath through the other end until they fill themselves with smoke, so that it issues from their mouth and nostrils as from a chimney. They say that it keeps them healthy and warm, and never go without it." Cartier's men tried the weed, but found it too hot and peppery for their taste. This practice of smoking tobacco, as well as lobelia and other narcotic weeds, was universal in America, and is one of the few habits which men calling themselves civilised have thought fit to borrow from these barbarous tribes. It may have originated in the attempt to repel mosquitoes and other noxious insects, or to allay the pangs of hunger; or perhaps, as Wilson thinks, its narcotic fumes were supposed to aid in divination, and in communion with those spiritual beings whom the American firmly believed in as holding intercourse with man. Thus it may have become an appropriate sacrifice and means of invocation, even with reference to the Great Spirit. In any case, its use was interwoven with all the religious usages of the people, and as the "calumet of peace " with their most solemn social and political engagements. From this high place it has descended among the civilised imitators of the red man to be merely the solace of their idle hours. That the usage of smoking should have prevailed throughout America and should have been connected with the religious and social institutions of all its tribes, and that it should not have existed in the old world till introduced from America, seems singular, yet the belief at one time entertained that the "elfin pipes" found in Britain indicate ancient usages of this kind, and that smoking is an old institution in Tartary and China, where one species of tobacco is native, seems now generally discredited. Still it is not impossible that there may be some foundation in fact for the conclusion of Pallas, who argues from the general use of tobacco by the Mongol tribes, the primitive and original forms of their pipes, and the similarity of their modes of using the plant to those of the Americans, that the custom must be indigenous among them. If so, it would not be surprising that even the Palæolithic man of Europe, in his dark cavern abodes, enjoyed the solace of the fragrant weed, smoked the calumet of peace with his former foes, and, like his American brethren, fancied that he saw spiritual beings "In the smoke that rolled around him, Archeologists should keep this in view in searching for the relics of the Stone period. The pipes of old Hochelaga were mostly of clay, and of many and sometimes elegant patterns. Some were very plain and small, others of elegant trumpet or cornucopia form, and some ornamented with rude attempts to imitate the human face. While the men were the smokers, the women seem to have exhausted their plastic skill in furnishing their lords with the means of indulging their taste for the narcotic. Schoolcraft has figured pipes used by the Iroquois and Eries precisely similar to those of the Hochelagans. Those of the mound-builders were peculiar (see fig. 10, p. 184); but it is curious, and probably an evidence of ancient intercourse, that stone pipes of the mound-builders' type are occasionally though rarely found in Canada. I have seen a broken specimen from Hopkins Island, near St. Regis, where many Indian remains are found. In addition to jars and pipes, the only frequent objects of earthenware are small discs perforated in the centre and crenated at the edge. They may have served as an inferior kind of wampum, or beads, or perhaps for • The fumes or rising smoke. |