those who were but privates in the ranks of literature, in which he was a renowned chief, was a form of brotherly kindness of which few of us have had much experience. He would go out of his way to introduce in an article, or even in a note at a page-foot, a commendatory notice of a work in which he took an interest, especially if the author were young, or appeared specially in need of it. And he liked one to be aware that he took pains to do this. "I do not know whether you detected the track of a friend in two recent Scottish biographies in the Times," he wrote, after one of these kindly feats.

In inviting M. Renan to deliver a course of lectures in Westminster Abbey, Dean Stanley seemed to many to be taking a step in the sand all too near the sea; but already it is seen to have been a firm step on the beautiful land of the future a land of light and charity, firmly compassed by infinite depths of heaven.

Stanley was a loyal son of the Church of England, but to him her reformation was as dear as her catholicity; nor did he regard her catholic character as determined by her form of govern

ment.

A bishop was, in his eyes, a useful church functionary, and nothing more. He used to congratulate himself that, as the successor of the abbots of Westminster, he was independent of the whole bench of bishops. It was, perhaps, this personal independence, as well as his love of liberty, of free discussion, and of popular rather than priestly government in the Church, that led him to cultivate such close relations to the Church of Scotland, and especially to those of its clergy who might be called Broad Churchmen. His sympathy with that party combined with his wish to do justice to the principles which he believed the Presbyterian Church had represented in the past, and he desired to bear his testimony, at a critical time, to the worth of the national establishment, in prompting the delivery of his lectures on the Church of Scotland, in Edinburgh, in 1872. The lectures are not without faults; but no more impartial and comprehensive sketch of Scotch Church history was ever limned, and the necessity and success of his vindication of unpopular "Moderatism" was attested by the noisy violence of the resentment which greeted it.

"I hope to publish the letters immediately," he wrote, "that is to say, as soon as the printers can get through the mass of illegible MS. that I have

sent." The sentence recalls one of his characteristics- -a most deplorable handwriting. Worse penmanship — more scraggy and inscrutable could not be imagined. He used to admit, pathetically, his failures in this department, although never willing to acknowledge blame if it could be laid on some one else. I once received a letter from him a week old, and that had traveled far and wide ere reaching me, at 69 Inverness Terrace, W., to which he had addressed it. "Try Holloway Road" had been added by some ingenious official. I sent the dean the envelope as a curiosity, and he wrote back,-quite ignoring the illegibility of his "Inverness Terrace,"-"I see that my address was right, as far as it went; Holloway Road' was added by the postmasters." I remember his telling us, at the Sons of the Clergy dinner, in Glasgow, how the "Halo of the Burning Bush" had come back from the printers transmuted into the "Horn of the Burning Beast."

How full and varied was his fund of anecdote, narrative, reminiscence! One recalls the vivacious, rapid utterance—the eye now beaming with sympathy, now twinkling with humor-the mobile mouth, with its patrician curves—the delicately sensitive and eager face, that in graver hours or in earnest talk grew so solemn-so impressive, with the dignity of lofty thought and feeling. Some men, in anecdote and narrative, always suggest "quorum pars magna fui," and obtrude their own personality. The dean knew better; and especially in relating incidents of his unique experience, of which few, if any except himself, had had cognizance, he showed a "curiosa felicitas" in imparting what was of interest without involving names or secrets. His reticence was as remarkable as his memory.

As one looks back on him, the "study of imagination" gets thronged with pictures, that pass gently before "the eye and prospects of the soul," recalling that slender figure, "that good gray head," that beautiful countenance, amid the old familiar scenes that shall know him no more forever; in the pulpit of the choir, or at the reading-desk in the nave, as in the summer twilight he pronounced, in his tone of trembling earnestness, his benediction of that "peace of God which passeth all understanding;" among the chapels and the monuments, the tiny centre of a listening ring of visitors-often of working

men-to whom he is imparting the lore of the mighty abbey; in the deanery, in quiet talk in his study, or in rich and versatile colloquy at his table, in those bright days when the gracious presence, that he was so proud of, shed its charm on all; at St. Andrew's, in the old library, on the evening of his installation, searching out each of the students for a word of talk, and at last resting by the table, in the centre of the room, and saying, with an air of satisfaction and relief, "Now, I think I have spoken to every one;" all now but a vision and a memory.

acter.

"In horâ mortis, et in die judicii, sit anima mea cum illis."

The end of the noble life came sooner than we had hoped; but the frame wanted vital force to repel the sharp attack of disease, and when Bishop Fraser made that pathetic appeal to the congregation in the abbey-"Pray for him, good people, while prayers may yet avail"-he was already passing gently under the shadows of death. "The doctors had desired him not to speak, and, with his usual wonderful patience, he obeyed them," we are told; so there were but few last words. Among the broken sentences that the watchers by his side caught up were these: "As far as I understood what the duties of my office were supposed to be, in spite of every incompetence, I am yet humbly trustful that I have sustained before the mind of the nation the extraordinary value of the Abbey as a religious, national, and liberal institution." "The end has come in a way I most desired it should come. I am perfectly satisfied-perfectly happy-I have not the slightest misgiving." "I always wished to die at Westminster."

The friends beside him desired to join in the Holy Communion with him ere he went, and Canon Farrar administered it. When he was about to give the blessing, the dean took hold of his hand, and signified that he should wait; then, slowly, but quite distinctly, he himself pronounced the Benediction. Before midnight of the same day-Monday, 18th July-he had passed away.

On the following Monday, in the afternoon, he was carried to his grave in Henry the Seventh's chapel. The Queen, to whom, and to whose family, he had long been a faithful friend and

wreaths of immortelles,' and white flowers from the Westminster schoolboys, and a handful of lilies from the Queen herself. The venerable Archbishop of Canterbury was in the line, and Cardinal Manning, and Lord Houghton, and Tyndall, and Browning, and the Bishop of Peterborough. The coffin was borne by the same hands that had carried the dean's beloved wife, Lady Augusta, to her burial. It was set down before the pulpit in which the dean had stood a few days before.

"By the foot of the coffin the most conspicuous figure was William E. Gladstone. He was called away before the service was over, and hastened to the House of Commons. (The pilot cannot leave the helm while the ship of State is off that Irish lee shore.) The funeral music to-day was solemn and sublime. Its rich strains swelled and rolled among the lofty arches with prodigious grandeur. Then the deep tones of the Dead March were heard, and the procession formed again. The body of Arthur Stanley was taken up and tenderly carried over those historic stones which he himself had trodden so often and so long. He was to be laid among the great in his death.

"With slow and measured tread they bore him past the tomb of Dryden. Old Spenser and Ben Johnson, and the author of the 'Elegy in a Country Church-yard,' were sleeping close by. A little further on, they passed the tomb of Edward the Confessor. The heir to the Confessor's throne was in the procession, and the descendants, too, of many a great warrior who lay in silent stone effigy on those monuments. Gradually the line passed on and on among the columns, until it entered the door of Henry the Seventh's chapel and disappeared from my view."

CHAPTER IV.-MORE LINKS. THOUGH I had no doubt but that Stockdale had intercepted my letter, yet I was determined, if possible, to place the matter beyond question. At first I thought of making inquiries at the postoffice as to who had received the letters from the office, for in those days, in Rathminster at least, letters were not delivered at the houses, but lay in the post-office till called for. On consideration I abandoned this idea, because I thought it unlikely that the postmaster could recollect what happened two years before sufficiently well to enable him to give me any information on such a point; and I was unwilling, moreover, to give occasion for any gossip on the subject. And it would be best, on the whole, to find out what I could, in the first place, from Fairy. I should have to see my cousin, at any rate, for I could not leave Rathminster without knowing, if possible, why Mrs. Pearson had exacted that promise from But Stockdale's coldness toward me-while it confirmed my suspicion that he had seen my letter and so regarded me in the light of a lover of Fairy's made it difficult for me to have an opportunity of speaking to her. Some days had already passed since the funeral, and I had heard nothing from the Stockdales, nor had I seen them or been invited to visit them. I did not wish to write to Fairy, and I could not well ask to have a private interview with her; and in paying a formal visit it was not likely that I should have an opportunity of making such inquiries as I wished; indeed, it was evidently Stockdale's intention to keep me at a distance.

me.

At length, as no other course seemed open to me, I determined to walk out to the Cottage, in hopes that accident might perhaps afford me the opportunity I desired. That afternoon, therefore, I did so, and on reaching the church-yard I passed through it and followed the pathway across the fields. I had not gone more than a hundred yards along it, when I saw my cousin a little in advance of me, walking slowly homeward. A few rapid steps brought me to her side.

"Oh, Fairy," I said, as we shook hands, "I am glad I happened to find you. I was just on my

way to the Cottage. Where have you been? To Rathminster ?"

"No, Tom," she said, "I have been to the church-yard to see my mother's grave;" and she burst into tears. We walked on in silence for some time until she had recovered her composure, and then, looking up into my face, she said, “Oh Tom, I am very glad we happened to meet, for there is one thing I wish to say to you. I don't like to speak to Robert about it; but I should like to be buried, Tom, when I die, beside mother."

She spoke quite calmly, but her extreme paleness and a strange expression which I had never seen in her face before alarmed me, and I exclaimed:

'Why, Fairy, tell me, are you ill? Is there anything the matter with you?"

"Oh, no," she replied; "nothing. But I know that I shan't live long, and I could not speak to Robert about it—it would vex him so. Another thing," she continued, "that I wished to say to you is, that you must not think me changed toward you, or that I am forgetting my dear old friend. Oh, Tom, don't think hardly of me, or forget me, whatever happens. Pray don't, for you are now my dearest, my only friend. But what I mean to say is—" Here she hesitated a little. Then she continued, "The fact is, Tom, that Robert, somehow, does not like you as he should. But he does not know you as I do. And you must not be hard upon him. It is some unaccountable prejudice of his; but I thought it best to tell you, as I feared you might wonder at his manner toward you, and at my not writing or asking you

"Well," I replied, "I am sorry he has taken a dislike to me. I am sure I have never given him any ground for it. At any rate, it will have no effect upon my feelings for you. But tell me, Fairy, is he very kind to you?"

I was angry with myself the moment I had asked this question, for the blood rushed into my cousin's cheeks, and I observed that her lips quivered.

"Tom," she said, "you have no right to Then she stopped abruptly and covered her face

with her hands, and I could see that she was weeping.

"Fairy," I cried, "forgive me, and don't be vexed. You must think of me as your brother I feel as if you were my sister, and you cannot wonder that I am anxious to hear that you are happy."

She then said, as she grew quite calm again, "Oh, I am not angry, Tom; and I forget. After the promise you made my mother, you have a right to take care of me. But don't think, pray, don't think for a moment that Robert does not love me. Indeed he does. He's very fond of me. And you know," she added, as she gave a little laugh,—very sad, it sounded to me,-" one must give up some of one's own way when one marries. I have promised, you must know, Mr. Rivers, to obey."

"what will become of my darling Fairy, linked to one who can treat her harshly ?"

I felt, however, that there was still another matter on which I was anxious to be informed, so I spoke to Fairy of myself and what had happened to me since we met, of the letters I had received from home, and those I had written. And then I took occasion to ask her how she got my letters, whether she went to the post-office herself, or who brought them. And then she told me, with a shy little smile, that ever since that morning on which I had left Rathminster, Robert Stockdale used to call, when at home, at the office, and bring her any letters that might be for her. "Though they were few enough, and hardly ever one from you, Tom," she added. She was glad, I thought, to have this little instance of her husband's attentiveness to tell me. Poor Fairy! But I remembered

"Yes, Tom; I shan't be so foolish again.”

"Can you tell me, then," I said, "what made your mother so anxious that I should make that promise ?"

"Oh, I don't know," she replied. "At least I fancy it may be that she thought me sometimes unhappy. You see I used always to be so merry and childish; but that goes off, you know, when one grows older and is married. And Robert is sometimes low-spirited and things put him out, and I suppose I can't help being vexed when matters go wrong with him. If you ever marry, Tom, and so justify the report we heard, you will find that you will have then more than your own troubles to bear. And I, you know, had never anything to grieve me all my life. I do think my only trials were parting from you when you went to sea, and so, except on that account or for some childish annoyance, mamma never saw me grieved in any way; and I suppose she thought me changed, as perhaps I am a little. That must have been her reason. But remember," she persisted, looking up into my face as she laid her hand upon my arm, "remember always, Robert is very fond of me!"

We spoke no more on this subject; Fairy seemed to wish to avoid it. And I had heard enough. I knew now that my cousin's married life was not, and would not be a happy life. She had not said that her husband was kind to her; she had been unable to say that. "Alas, alas!" I thought,

and that my initials stood out clearly on the seal. And I now knew for certain what had become of my lost letter.

"And perhaps you have forgotten a letter which had a primrose inside it. Did he bring you that one?" I inquired.

"Oh, yes, Tom," she said; "it was the first one he brought me. I remember it very well, and your dreadful leap. As you did not name your reward, I thought a lock of my hair would be quite recompense enough for so rash an act.”

"Why, Fairy, did I ask for nothing? Was there nothing in the letter but the primrose?"

"Nothing," she answered. "I remember quite well. You merely said in a postscript that you inclosed the flower."

"And from whom did you hear that I was going to be married?" I asked.

"Oh, Robert heard it ever so long ago in Liverpool, and we wondered that you never mentioned it to us. But tell me, was it not true?"

But

"No, Fairy," I exclaimed, "it was a lie. never mind; it makes no difference now. I understand how the report arose."

It was clear as daylight now what had happened. Stockdale had withheld my private letter to Fairy. The flower he had not removed, because it was only mentioned in the postscript, and he did not understand its import; and I had been totally misled by poor Fairy's gift. I could not tell Fairy the baseness of her husband, and it required all my power of self-restraint to conceal my emo

tion. I changed the subject; and we walked on slowly, saying little until we reached a little wood through which the pathway led. We were now close to the Cottage, and I, having no inclination to meet Stockdale, determined to bid Fairy goodbye and return to the town.

"Promise me," I said, "that you will certainly write if ever you should require my help."

He was the first to speak. "Rivers," he said, "you have heard what I have said to my wife. Perhaps you think me wrong-perhaps you think me unjust. I don't mean to discuss the matter with you. But one thing you must understand is, that I won't endure-no, not for a moment-any interference of yours in my conerns. and it's as well that I should have this opportunity of asking

I was not satisfied. I had taken her hand to bid her farewell, and still held it in mine. I feared that she might need my assistance and yet not ask for it.

"Promise," I said, "that you will write at any time that you feel in your heart your dear mother would have wished that you should. Promise that, Fairy, and I shall be content."

What her answer might have been I do not know, for at that moment Stockdale dashed out from among the trees close to us, his face distorted with rage.

"So," he cried, addressing his wife, and almost unable to speak with excitement, "this is the way you go to see your mother's grave! Oh, I understood your deceit from the first! Did not I tell you you were to have nothing more to do with this person? And yet you at once make an appointment with him. Over him I have no authority; he may do as he pleases, so as he does not interfere with me and mine. But once for all, my wife shall obey me, or it will be worse for her!"

Fairy remained wonderfully calm through this outburst on the part of her husband. I could see she was vexed that I was witness of it; but she bore it so patiently herself, that I felt sure it was of no uncommon occurrence.

When Stockdale had finished speaking, she said, very quietly, "You are quite mistaken, Robert. You know I wanted you to come with me, and you would not. And Tom overtook me quite accidentally as I was returning." Then fearing, I think, that, if she remained, her husband might | display yet further his harshness toward herself and the cruel jealousy of his temper, she turned to me and said, "Good-bye, Tom." One touch of her gentle hand, one kind look from those dark-gray eyes, the last,—and my darling cousin had gone. And Stockdale and I remained upon the path.

I found some difficulty in replying to him. had scarcely understood his question, filled as my mind was with the thought of his treachery toward myself, and his cruelty to one whom I loved better than my life, and who, but for his baseness, it might have been my happiness to cherish and protect. As I hesitated, he continued, in his rough, overbearing manner, "Come, it is better that we should understand one another. What did you mean by that promise?"

"Well," I replied, "I have no objection to answer you. What I meant by that promise was this: that I should consider Annie as my sister, and that I should act a brother's part by her whenever she should stand in need of it."

"Brother! sister!" exclaimed Stockdale, with a sneer. "It's but lately you thought of such a relationship. I know more about the matter than you imagine."

"Stockdale," I replied, "in one thing you are right, and it's better, as you said, that we should clearly understand one another. I understand you, what you mean, and what you are. And now you shall understand me. You think I have for my cousin a love greater than a brother's for his sister. Perhaps that is true. When we were children together, and I was her constant companion, and when to please her used to be my chief delight, I loved her with more than a brother's love, and every year that has passed over our heads since has added to the strength of my affection. In childhood, in boyhood, I loved her as only one who had known her so long and so well could. And when I became a man, then it was the dearest hope of my life that one day I might be able to ask her to become my wife. It was this hope that made separation from her tolerable; it was this hope that nerved me to work as few have done; it was this hope that enabled me to win the position which I now hold; and then, after years of patience and of toil, when the time came that I had a right