ZZZ - The podcast that helps you sleep

 Welcome to today's triple Z..... The triple Z podcast is a daily recording that you can use to help you fall asleep each night. Just turn down the volume, lay back and enjoy as you fall asleep.

This episode we are reading two short stories form Author James Grant published in 1874 in the book The Queen's cadet and other tales. We will be reading The Queens cadet, and The Bombardier's Story.

James Grant was born in 1822 was a Scottish novelist and miscellaneous writer.

Grant was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, and was a distant relation of Sir Walter Scott. He was a prolific author, writing some 90 books, including many yellow-backs. Titles included Adventures of an Aide-de-camp, One of "The six hundred", The Scottish musketeers and The Scottish cavalier.

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The Queens Cadet.

"I have been forced to believe in the existence and influence of an unseen world, of something which is described in that line of Dryden's,

"'With silent steps I follow you all day.'

"I have felt the influence of the spiritual and invisible on the senses, though I know nothing of the complications, the deceptions and alleged perils, forming a portion of that which is now termed spiritualism; and which affirms that the unseen world cannot become manifest, save in obedience to certain occult laws which regulate the phenomena of nature."

What rigmarole was this?

Could the speaker—this man with the melancholy tone and saddened eye—actually be the same handsome Jack Arkley, my old college chum at Sandhurst, who was always rather sceptical even in religious matters, who was one of the merriest fellows there, who had been once nearly rusticated for breaking the lamps and dismounting the guns to spite the adjutant, but who, as a Queen's cadet, had more marks of excellence than any of us; who was afterwards the beau-ideal of a fine young English officer—a prime bat and bowler, who pulled a good stroke oar, had such a firm seat in his saddle, and who was the best hand for organizing a picnic, a ball, or a scratch company, for amateur theatricals; and who in the late expedition against the Looshais, had won the reputation of being a regular fire-eater—a fellow who would face the devil in his shirt sleeves!

Could the champagne of "the Rag" have affected him, thought I, as he continued earnestly and sadly, and while manipulating a cigar selected from the silver stand on the table:

"I have somewhere read that very few persons in this world have been unfortunate enough to have seen those things that are invisible to others."

"By Jove! Do you mean a—ghost?"

"Not exactly the vulgar ghost of the nursery," said he, his pale face colouring slightly.

"But we have all met with those who knew some one else who had seen something weird, unearthly, unexplainable."

"Precisely; but I shall speak from personal experience—so now for a little narrative of my own."

We had dined that evening at the club, where D—— of the Greys had given a few fellows a dinner, in honour of being gazetted to his troop, and to "wet" the new commission; and though it seemed to me that, like the rest of us, Jack Arkley had done justice to all the good things set before him, from the soup to the coffee and curaçao, he had been, during dinner, remarkably triste or abstracted, and took but little interest in the subjects discussed by the guests, who were mostly all upon short leave from Aldershot, and, the Spring drills being over, were thankful to exchange the white dust of the Long Valley, for the Row or Regent Street.

We were alone now, and lingering over some iced brandy-pawnee (as we called it in India) in the cool bay-window of his room in Piccadilly, where it overlooked the pleasant Green Park and where the clock of Westminster was shining above the trees, like a red harvest moon. So I prepared to listen to him with more curiosity than belief, while he related the following singular story, which he would never have ventured to relate to the circle of heedless fellows whom we had just left.

"My parents died when I was little more than an infant, leaving me to the care of two uncles, a maternal one, named Beverley, a man of considerable wealth, who in consequence of a quarrel with my father, whose marriage with his sister he resented, totally ignored my existence, and was ever a kind of myth to me; the other a paternal one, a bachelor curate in North Wales, poor old Morgan Apreece Arkley, than whom there was no better or more kind-hearted man in all the principality.

"His means were most limited; but to share the little he possessed he made me freely and tenderly welcome, all the more so that to two appeals he had made to the generosity of my Uncle Beverley, no response was ever returned—a cutting coldness and rudeness, bitterly resented by my hot-tempered but warm-hearted old Welsh kinsman.

"A career was necessarily chosen for me.

"The death of my father on duty at Benares, enabled me to be borne on the strength of the Military College at Sandhurst as one of the twenty Queen's cadets; and to that seminary I repaired, a few months after you did, when in my sixteenth year, leaving with sincere sorrow the lonely white-haired man who had been as a parent to me, and whose secluded parsonage by the margin of Llyn Ogwen, and under the shadow of Carneydd Davydd, had been the only home I could remember. There for years he had been my earnest and anxious tutor, mingling with the classics a store of quaint old Welsh legends and ancient songs, for he was an excellent and enthusiastic harper, and had come of a long line of harpers.

"Prior to this change in my life, I encountered an adventure which has had considerable influence in my after career.

"From childhood I had been familiar with the mountains that overhang Llyn Ogwen. I knew every track and rock and fissure of Carneydd Davydd, of 'the Black Ladders' of Carneydd Llewellyn, and the brows of the greater giant of the three, cloud-capped Snowdon. For miles upon miles among them I had been wont to wander with my gun, and at times to aid the shepherds in tracking out lost sheep or goats, by places where we looked down upon the gray mist and vapour that floated below us, and where the mountain peaks seemed to start out of it like isles amid a sea. In the heart of such solitudes as these I found food for much reflective thought, and was wont to give full swing to my boyish fancies.

"Under every variety of season and weather I was wont to wander among these mountains; sometimes when their sides seemed to vibrate under the hot rays of a cloudless summer sun; at others when the glistening snow lay deep in the passes and valleys, or when height and hollow were alike shrouded in thick and impenetrable mist; but my favourite spot was ever Llyn Idwal, the wildest and most savage of all our Welsh lakes. It fills the crater of an ancient volcano, and is the traditional scene of the murder of Idwal, a prince of Wales, who was flung over its precipice—a place which for gloomy grandeur has no equal, as the bare rocks that start out of it, sheer as a wall, darken by their shadows its depth to the most intense blackness; and the peasants aver that no fish can swim in it, and no bird fly over it and liv.

"Lying upon the mountain tops, amid the purple heather or the scented thyme-grass, I was wont to watch the distant waters of the Channel, stretching far away beyond the Puffin Isle and Great Orme's Head, ever changing in hue as the masses of cloud skimmed over them; and from thence I followed, with eager eyes, the white sails of the ships, or the long smoky pennants of the steamers that were bound for—ah! where were they bound for?—and so, far from the solitary parsonage of the good old man who loved me so well, I was ungrateful enough to follow to distant isles and shores these vanishing specks, in the spirit.

"I see that you are impatient to know what all this preamble has to do with Sandhurst and the melancholy which now oppresses me; but nevertheless, I am fast coming to the matter—to 'that keystone of the soul which must exist in every nature.'

"One day I was up a wild part of the mountains, far above Llyn Ogwen, a long and narrow sheet of water which occupies the whole pass between Braich-ddu and the shoulder of Carneydd Davydd. My sole companion was my dog Cidwm—in English, 'Wolf'—which lay beside me on the sunny grass, when from one of my day-dreams I was suddenly roused by voices, and found three persons close beside me.

"Mounted on sturdy Welsh ponies, two of these were a gentleman in the prime of life, and a very young lady, apparently his daughter, attended by David Lloyd, one of the guides for the district, who knew me well. He led the bridle of the girl's pony with one hand, and grasped his alpenstock with the other. This group paused near me, and some conversation ensued. Lloyd had evidently mistaken the path, and was loath to admit the fact, or to suggest that they should retrace their steps, and yet he knew enough of the mountains to be well aware that to advance would be to court danger. During the colloquy that ensued between him and his employer, a haughty and imperious-looking man, I was earnestly gazing in the half-averted face of the girl, who was watching an eagle in full flight.

"She was marvellously beautiful. Her features—save in profile—were perhaps far from correct, yet there was a divine delicacy, a charming purity of complexion, and brightness of expression over them all; and her minute face seemed to nestle amid the masses of her fair rippling hair. She turned towards me, and her eyes met mine. They were dark violet blue, and shaded by brown lashes, so long that they imparted much of softness to their dove-like expression, and she smiled, for no doubt the little maid saw that there was something of unequivocal admiration to be read in my ardent gaze; and so absorbed was I, that, for a few seconds, I was not aware that the guide was addressing me, and inquiring how far the path was traversable in this particular direction. Ere I could reply,

"'How should this mere lad know, if you don't?' asked the male tourist, haughtily and sharply.

"'Few here can know better, sir,' replied Lloyd. 'I have seen him climb where the eagles alone can go.'

"'Shall we proceed, then?' he asked me, sharply.

"'I think not, sir,' said I; 'Moel Hebog was covered with mist this morning, and——'

"'But Moel Hebog is clear enough now,' said David Lloyd, with irritation—the mountain so named being deemed an unerring barometer, as regards the chances of mist upon its greater brethren—'so I think we may proceed,' he added, touching his hat to his employer. 'I don't require, sir, to be taught my trade by a mere lad, a gentleman tho you be, Master Arkley.'

"'Arkley!' repeated the stranger, starting and eyeing me keenly, and yet with a lowering expression of face.

"I warned them of the danger of farther progression, but the avaricious guide derided me; and I heard his employer, as they passed on, asking him some questions, amid which—but it might be fancy—I thought my own name occurred. I gazed after them with interest, and with much of anxiety, for their path was perilous, and the sweet soft beauty of the girl had impressed me deeply; and, as she disappeared, with all her wealth of golden hair, the brightness seemed to have departed from the mountain side.

"What was the magic this creature, whom I had only seen for a few minutes, possessed for me? She was scarcely a woman, yet past childhood; and her features remained as distinctly impressed upon my memory as if they were before me still. Do not infer from this strange interest that 'love at first sight,' as the novels used to have it, was an ingredient of this emotion. No; it was something deeper—a subtle magnetism—something that I know not how to define or to express; and with a repining sigh, I thought of my lonely life, and longed to go forth on the career that awaited me beyond those green mountains that were bounded by the sea.

"Had I ever seen that fair little face before, or dreamed of it by night or by day, that already it seemed to haunt me so?

"The little group had not disappeared above five minutes, when a sound like a cry was borne past me on the mountain breeze. I started up, my heart beating wildly; and with undefined apprehension, hastened in the direction of the sound, while Wolf careered in front of me. There now came the sound of hoofs, and with bridle trailing, saddle reversed, and nostrils distended, the pony on which I had so recently seen the young girl, came tearing over the crest of the hill, and galloped madly past me towards Llyn Idwal.

"Quicker beat my heart, and my breath came thick and fast. Something dreadful had taken place! True to his instincts as ever was the faithful Gelert of the Welsh tradition, Wolf sped in haste to the edge of what I knew to be a frightful ravine. There the hoof marks were fresh in the turf, the edge of which was broken; the grass too, was crushed and torn, as if something had fallen over it. The dog now paused, lifted up his nose, and howled ominously. I peered over; and far down below, on a ledge of green turf, but perilously overhanging a chasm in the mountain side, lay that which appeared at first to be a mere bundle of clothes, but which I knew to be the little maiden dead— doubtlessly dead—and a wail of sorrow escaped me.

"Her father and the guide had disappeared.

"Partly sliding, partly descending as if by a natural ladder, finding footing and grasp where many might have found neither, mechanically, and as one in a dream, I reached her in about ten minutes; and, as I had a naturally boyish dread of facing death, with joy I saw her move, and then took her in my arms tenderly and caressingly; while she opened her eyes and sighed deeply, for the fall had stunned and shaken her severely. Otherwise she was, happily, uninjured; but I had reached her just in time, for, if left to herself, she must have tottered and fallen into the terrible profundity below.

"'Papa! oh, where is my papa? I was thrown suddenly from my pony—a bird scared it—and remember no more;' then a passion of tears and terror came over her, with the consciousness of the peril she had escaped and that which still menaced her, for to ascend was quite impracticable, and to descend seemed nearly equally so. Above us the mountain side seemed to rise like a wall of rock; on the other hand, at the bottom of the ravine, where the shadows of evening were dark and blue, though sunset still tipped Snowdon's peaks with fire, and clouds of crimson and gold were floating above us, I could see a rivulet, a tributary of the Ogwen, glittering like a silver thread far down, perhaps a thousand feet below.

"'Courage,' said I, while for a time my heart died within me; 'I shall soon conduct you to a place of safety.'

"'But papa, he will die of fright. Where is my papa?' she exclaimed, piteously.

"'Gone round some other way,' I suggested. And subsequently this proved to be the case. Placing an arm round her for aid, we now began to descend, but slowly, the face of the hill, which was there so steep and shelved so abruptly, that to lose one step might have precipitated us to the bottom with a speed that would have insured destruction. From rock to rock, from bush to bush, and from cleft to cleft, I guided and often lifted her, sometimes with her eyes closed; and gazed the while with boyish rapture on the beautiful girl, as her head drooped upon my shoulder. She had lost her hat, and the unbound masses of her golden hair, blown by the wind, came in silken ripples across my face; and delight, mingled with alarm, bewildered me.

"Till that hour no sorrow could have affected a spirit so pure as hers; and certainly love could not have agitated it—she was so young. But when we drew nearer the base of the hill, and reached a place of perfect safety, the soft colour came back to her face, and the enchantment of her smile was as indescribable as the clear violet blue of her eye, which filled with wonder and terror as she gazed upward to the giddy verge from which she had partly fallen; and then a little shudder came over her.

"With a boy's ready ardour, I was already beginning to dream of being beloved by her, when excited voices came on the wind; and round an angle of the ravine into which we had descended came Lloyd, the guide, several peasants, and her father, who had partially witnessed our progress, and whose joy in finding her alive and well, when he might have found her dashed perhaps out of the very semblance of humanity, was too great for words. The poor man wept like a very woman, as he embraced her again and again, and muttered in broken accents his gratitude to me, and praise of my courage. Suddenly he exclaimed to the guide,

"'You said his name was—Arkley, I think?'

"'Yes, sir,' replied Lloyd.

"'John Beverley Arkley, nephew of the curate at the foot of the mountain yonder?' he added, turning to me.

"'The same, sir.'

"'Good heavens! I am your Uncle Beverley!' said he, colouring deeply, and taking my hand again in his. 'The girl you have saved is your own cousin—my darling Eve. I owe you some reparation for past neglect, so come with me to the parsonage at once.'

"Here was a discovery that quite took away my breath. So this dazzling little Hebe was my cousin! How fondly I cherished and thought over this mysterious tie of blood—near almost as a sister, and yet no sister. It was very sweet to ponder over and to nurse the thoughts of affection, and all that yet might be.

"What a happy, happy night was that in the ancient parsonage! The good old curate forgave Uncle Beverley all the short-comings in the years that were past, and seemed never to weary of caressing the wonderful hair and the tiny hands of Evelyn Beverley, for such was her name, though familiarly known as Eve.

"'It is quite a romance, this,' said kind Uncle Arkley to his brother-in-law; 'the young folks will be falling in love!'

"Eve grew quite pale, and cast down her eyes; while I blushed furiously.

"'Stuff!' said Uncle Beverley, somewhat sharply. 'She has barely cut her primers and pinafores, and Jack has Sandhurst before him yet.'

"He presented me with his gold repeater, and departed by the first convenient train, taking my newly-discovered relation with him. I had a warm invitation to visit them for a few weeks before entering at Sandhurst; and, to add to my joy and impatience, I found that Beverley Lodge was in Berkshire, and within a mile of the College: and so, but for the presence of the golden gift, and the memory of a kind and grateful kiss from a beautiful lip—a kiss that made every nerve thrill—I might have imagined that the whole adventure on the slopes of Carneydd Davydd was but a dream.

"Naturally avaricious, cold, and hard in heart, Mr. Beverley had warmed to me for a time, but a time only; yet I revered and almost loved him. He was the only brother of my dead mother, whom I had never known. She—this golden-haired girl—was of her blood, and had her name; so my whole soul clung to her with an amount of youthful ardour, such as I cannot portray to you—for I was always much of an enthusiast—and I was again alone, to indulge in the old tenor of my ways amid the voiceless mountain solitudes.

"Again and again in my lonely wanderings had my mind been full of vague longings and boyish aspirations after glory, pleasure, and love: and now the memory of Eve's minute and perfect face—so pure and English in its beauty—by its reality filled up all that had been a blank before; and I was ever in fancied communion with her, while lying on the hill-slopes and looking to the sea that sparkled at the far horizon, into the black ravines through which the mountain brooks went foaming to the rocky shore, or where our deep Welsh llyns were gleaming in the sunshine like gold and turquoise blue—amid the monotony of the silent woods; and so the time passed on, and the day came when I was to start for Beverley Lodge, and thence to Sandhurst; while love and ambition rendered me selfishly oblivious of poor old Uncle Morgan, and the fervent wishes and blessings with which he followed my departing steps.

"A month's visit to Beverley Lodge, amid the fertility of Berkshire, many a ride and ramble in the Vale of the White Horse, many an hour spent by us together in the shady woods, the luxurious garden, in the beautiful conservatory, and in the deep leafy lanes where we wandered at will, confirmed the love my cousin and I bore each other. A boy and a girl, it came easily about; while many were our regrets and much was our marvelling that we had not known each other earlier.

"No two men make a declaration of love, perhaps, in precisely the same way, though it all comes to the same thing in the end; but it might be interesting to know in what precise terms, and having so little choice, Father Adam declared his passion for Mother Eve, and in what fashion she responded.

"I know not now how my love for my little Eve was expressed; but told it was, and I departed for college the happiest student there, every hour I could spare from study and drill being spent in or about Beverley Lodge.

"With an income of forty pounds per annum till gazetted, I almost thought myself rich; and I had three years before me—it seemed an eternity of joy—to look forward to. At Sandhurst I was, as you know, entered as a Queen's cadet free, and a candidate for the infantry. I had thus to master algebra, the three first books of Euclid, French, German, and 'Higher Fortification;' but in the pages of Straith, amid the ravelins of Vauban and the casemates of Coehorn, I seemed to see only the name and the tender eyes of Eve. The daily drills, in which I was at first an enthusiast, became dull and prosaic, and hourly I made terrible mistakes, for Eve's voice was ever in my ear, and her delicate beauty haunted me; for wondrously delicate it became, as consumption—which she fatally inherited from her mother—shed over it a medium that was alike soft and alluring.

"Since then I have met girls of all kinds everywhere. Though only a sub, I have been dressed for, played for, sung for; but never have I had the delight of those remembered days that were passed with Eve Beverley in our dream of cousinly love; however, a rude waking was at hand!

"When she was eighteen, and I a year older, she told me one day that her father had been insisting upon her marrying an old friend of his, a retired Sudder judge, who had proposed in form; but she had laughed at the idea.

"'Absurd! It is so funny of papa to have a husband ready cut and dry for me; is it not, Jack?' said she.

"I did not think so; but my heart beat painfully as I leaned caressingly over her, and played with her beautiful hair.

"'I don't thank him for selecting a husband for me, Jack, dear,' she continued, pouting; 'do you?'"

"'Certainly not, Eve.'

"'But I must prepare my mind for the awful event,' said she, looking up at me with a bright, waggish smile.

"The time was fast approaching, however, when neither of us could see anything 'funny' in the prospect; for 'the awful event' became alarmingly palpable, when one day she met me with tears, and threw herself on my breast, saying:

"'Save me, dearest Jack—save me!'

"'From whom?"

"'Papa and his odious old Sudder judge, Jack, love. You know that I must marry you, and you only!'

"'The devil he does!' said a voice, sharply; and there, grim as Ajax, stood Uncle Beverley, with hands clenched and brows knit. 'My sister married his father, a beggar, with only his pay; and now, minx, you dare to love their son, by heavens, with no pay at all! Leave this house, sir—begone instantly!' he added, furiously, to me. 'I would rather that she had broken her neck on the mountains than treated me to a scene like this.'

"The gates of Beverley Lodge closed behind me, and our dream was over.

"Half my life seemed to have left me. After three years of such delightful intercourse I could not adopt the conviction that I should never see her again; and in a very unenviable state of mind I entered the college, where you may remember meeting me under the Doric portico, and saying:

"'What's up, Jack? But let me congratulate you.'

"'On what?' I asked sulkily.

"'Your appointment to the Buffs. The Gazette has just come from town. They are stationed at Jubbulpore.'

"And so it proved that the very day I lost her saw me in the service, with India, and a far and final separation before us. Necessity compelled us to prepare for an almost instant departure; short leave was given me by the adjutant-general; and I had to join the Candahar transport going with drafts from Chatham for the East, on a certain day.

"Rumours reached me of Eve being seriously ill. She was secluded from me, and there was every chance that I should see her no more. A letter came from her imploring me to meet her for the last time at a spot known to us both—a green lane that led to a churchyard stile—the scene of many a tender tryst and blissful hour, as it was a place where overhanging trees, with the golden apple, the purple damson, and the plum, formed a very bower, and where few or none ever came, save on Sunday; and there we met for the last time!

"There once again her head lay on my shoulder, my circling arm was round her, and her hot, tremulous hand was clasped in mine. I was shocked by the change I perceived in her. Painful was her pallor to look upon; there were circles dark as her lashes under her sad, melancholy eyes; her nostrils and lips were unnaturally pink; she had a short, dry cough; and blood appeared more than once upon her handkerchief.

"Consumption on one hand, and parental tyranny on the other, were fast doing their fatal work.

"Her father was pitiless and inexorable—wonderfully, infamously so, as he was so rich that mere money was no object, and as she was his only child, and one so tender, and so fragile. His studied system of deliberate 'worry' had wrung a consent from her; she was to marry the old judge; and in more ways than one I felt that too surely I was losing her for ever. She could not go out with me. I felt desperate, and in silence folded her again and again to my breast. At last the ting-tong of the old church clock announced the hour when we must part, never to meet again, and the fatal sound struck us like a shock of electricity.

"'Jack, my dearest—my dearest,' she whispered wildly; 'I don't think I shall live very long now. I may—nay, I must, die very soon; but the spirit is imperishable, and I shall always be with you, wherever you may be, wherever you may go, hovering near you, I hope, like a guardian angel!'

"Her words struck me as strange and wild; I did not attach much importance to them then, but they have had a strange and terrible significance since.

"'Would you welcome me?' she asked, with a mournful smile.

"'Dead or living shall I welcome you!' I replied, with mournful ardour.

"'Then kiss me once again, dear Jack; and now we part—in this world, at least!'

"Another wild, passionate embrace, and all was over. In a minute later I was galloping far from the villa to reach the railway. I saw her beloved face no more; but voice and face, eye and kiss, were all with me still. Would a time ever come when I might forgot them?

"Adverse winds detained us long in the Channel, but we cleared it at last; and the last Times that came on board announced the marriage of this unhappy girl.

"Six months subsequent found me in cantonments at Neemuch, with a small detachment of ours, and in hourly expectation of the mutiny which had broken out at Meerut and Delhi, with such horrors, being imitated there, though we had sworn the sepoys to be 'true to their salt,' the Mahometans on the Koran, the Hindoos on the waters of the Ganges, and the other darkies on whatever was most sacred to them; and if they revolted, all Europeans were to seek instant shelter in the fort.

"It was the night of the 3rd June—one of the loveliest I ever saw in India—the moonlight was radiant as midday, and not a cloud was visible throughout the blue expanse of heaven. I was lying in my bungalow, with sword and revolver beside me, as we could not count upon the events of an hour, for all Hindostan seemed to be going to chaos in blood and outrage.

"The cantonment ghurries had clanged midnight; my eyes were closing heavily; and when just about to sleep I thought that my name was uttered by some one near me, very softly, very tenderly, and with an accent that thrilled my heart's core. Starting, I looked up, and there—oh, my God!—there, in the slanting light of the moon, like a glorified spirit, with a brightness all about her, was the figure of Eve Beverley bending over me, with all her golden hair unbound, and a garment like a shroud or robe about her.

"Entranced, enchained by love as much as by mortal terror, I could not move or speak, while nearer she bent to kiss my brow; but I felt not the pressure of her lips, though reading in her starry, violet eyes a divine intensity of expression—a mournful, unspeakable tenderness, when, pointing in the direction of the fort, she disappeared.

"'It is a dread—a dreadful dream!' said I, starting to my feet preternaturally awake, to hear the sound of artillery, the rattle of musketry, the yells of 'Deen! deen!' and the shrieks of those who were perishing; for the mutineers had risen, and the 1st Cavalry, the 72nd N. I., and Walker's artillery, had commenced the work of massacre. I rushed forth, and at the moment I left my bungalow on one side it was set in flames and fired through from the other. I fled to the fort, which, thanks to my dream—for such I supposed it to be—I reached in safety, while many perished, for all the station was sheeted now with flame.

"Once again I had that dream, so wild and strange, when a deadly peril threatened me. I was hiding in the jungle, alone and in great misery, near Jehaz-ghur, a fugitive. The time was noon, and I had dropped asleep under the deep, cool shadow of a thicket, when that weird vision of Eve came before me, soft and sad, tender and intense, with her loving eyes and flowing hair, as, with hands outstretched, she beckoned me to follow her. A cry escaped me, and I awoke.

"'Was my Eve indeed dead?' I asked of myself; 'and was it her intellectual spirit, her pure essence, that imperishable something engendered in us all from a higher source, that followed me as a guardian angel?' I remembered her parting words. The idea suggested was sadly sweet and terrible; and so, as a sense of her perpetual presence as a spirit-wife hovered at all times about me, controlling all my actions, rendered me unfit for society, till at Calcutta, a crisis was put to all this.

"With some of the 72nd, and other Europeans who had escaped from Neemuch, or had 'distinguished themselves,' as the 'Hurkaru' had it, I once went to be photographed at the famous studio near the corner of the Strand. I sat, in succession, alone and in a group, after being posed in the usual fashion, with an iron hoop at the nape of my neck. On examining the first negative, an expression of perplexity and astonishment came over the face of the artist.

"'Strange, sir,' said he; 'most unaccountable!'

"'What is strange; what is unaccountable?' asked several.

"'Another figure that is not in the room appears at Captain Arkley's back—a woman, by Jove!' he replied, placing the glass over a piece of black velvet; and there—there—oh, there could be no doubt of it—was faintly indicated the outline of one whose face and form had been but too vividly impressed on my heart and brain, bending sorrowfully over me, with her soft, bright eyes and wealth of long bright hair.

"From my hand the glass fell on the floor, and was shivered to atoms. A similar figure hovering near me, was visible among the pictured group of officers, but faded out. I refused to sit again, and quitted the studio in utter confusion, and with nerves dreadfully shaken, though my comrades averred that a trick had been played upon me. If so, how was the figure that of my dream—that of my lost love—who, a letter soon after informed me, had burst a blood-vessel, and expired on the night of the 3rd June, with my name on her lips?"

Such was the story of Jack Arkley. Whether it was false or true, in this age of spiritualism and many other isms of mediums with the world unseen, and in which Enemoser has ventilated his theory of polarity, I pretend not to say, and leave others to determine. He became a moody monomaniac. I rejoined my regiment, and from that time never saw my old chum again. The last that I heard of him was, that he had quitted the service, and died a Passionist Father, in one of the many new monastic institutions that exist in the great metropolis.

THE BOMBARDIER'S STORY.

"Some feel by instinct swift as light

The presence of the foe,

Whom God ordains in future time

To strike the fatal blow." AYTOUN.

Very few persons in this world are unlucky enough to see, or to have seen, a ghost; but we nearly have all met with some one else who had seen something weird or unearthly. And now for a little story of my own, by which you will find that, in my time, I have more than once encountered a ghost, or that which, perhaps, was worse than any ghost could be.

In the Christmas before the battle of the Alma, I, Bob Twyford, was a young bombardier of the Royal Artillery, a "G.C.R." (good conduct ring) man, mighty proud of that, and of my uniform, with its yellow lace and rows of brass buttons, with the motto "Ubique quo fas et gloria ducunt," and so forth, when I went home on a month's furlough, to see old mother and all my friends at our little village in the Weald of Kent.

I was proud too, to show them that, by the single chevron of bombardier, my foot was firmly planted on the first step of the long ladder of promotion; happy, too, that there was one in particular to show it to—my cousin, little Bessie Leybourne—though she was a big Bessie now—my sweetheart, and my wife that was to be, if good promotion came, or if I bought my discharge, and took to business with some money we expected—money that was long, long in coming.

More than once, in the beautiful season of autumn, had Bessie Leybourne been the queen of the hop-pickers, and then I thought that she looked bright and beautiful as a fairy, when the crown of flowers was placed on her sunny brown hair, and her deep blue eyes were beaming with pleasure and gratified vanity.

I had a dream about Bessie on the night before—a dream that made me uncomfortable and gave me much cause for thought; and so a vague presentiment of coming evil clouded the joy of my returning home.

I had seen Bessy in her beauty and her bravery as the hop queen; but she was calling on me to protect her—for she was struggling to free herself from the embraces and the blandishments of a handsome and blasé-looking man, whose costume and bearing were alike fashionable and distinguished. Close by them, looking on evidently with amusement, was his friend, a hook-nosed, grim, and sombre-looking fellow, with a black moustache, and malevolent eyes, who held me back as with a grasp of iron, while uttering a strange, chuckling laugh, the sound of which awoke me. But the faces of those men made a vivid and painful impression upon me; for the whole vision seemed so distinct and real, that I believed I should recognize them anywhere.

I spoke to Tom Inches, our Scotch pay-sergeant, about it, and he, being a great believer in dreams, assured me that it was ominous of some evil that would certainly happen to Bessie or to me, or to us both.

"For you must know, Bob," he continued, "that in sleep the soul seems to issue from the body, and to attain the power of looking into the future; for time or place, distance or space, form no obstruction then; so the untrammelled spirit of the dreamer may see the future as well as the past, and know that which is to happen as well as that which has happened."

The Scotchman's words had a solemnity about them that rendered me still more uneasy; but I strove to shake off care, and already saw in anticipation my mother's cottage among the woodlands of the Weald.

Every pace drew me nearer home, and I trod gaily on, with my knapsack on my back, and only a crown piece in my pocket. My purse was light; but, save for that ugly dream, my heart was lighter still, as I thought of Bessie Leybourne.

I had left the railway station some miles behind. It was Christmas Eve. The Weald of Kent spread before me; not as I had seen it last in its summer greenness, but covered deep with snow, over which the sun, as he set, shed a purple flush, that deepened in the shade to blue, and made the icicles on every hedge and tree glitter with a thousand prismatic colours.

Red lights were beginning to twinkle through the leafless copses from cottage windows, and heavily the dun winter smoke was curling in the clear mid air, from many a house and homestead, and from the clustered chimney stalks of the quaint and stately old rectory.

An emotion of bitterness came over me, on passing this edifice, with all its gables and lighted oriel windows.

I had no great love for the rector. When a boy I had found in our garden a pheasant, which he, the Rev. Dr. Raikes, had wounded by a shot. Pleased with the beauty of the bird, I made a household pet of it, till his keeper, hearing of the circumstance, had me arrested and stigmatized as a little poacher, the rector, as a magistrate, being the exponent of the law in the matter. So I quitted the parish and its petty tyrant, to become a gunner and driver in the artillery, where my good education soon proved of service to me.

For the sake of a miserable bird, the sporting rector had driven into the world a widow's only son. But how fared he in his own household?

Valentine Raikes, his only son, was breaking his proud and pampered heart by mad dissipation, by gambling, and every species of debauchery; by horse-racing, and by debts of honour, which had been paid thrice over, to save his commission in the hussars.

At last I stood by mother's cottage door.

The little dwelling was smothered among hops and ivy, and with these were blended roses and honeysuckle in summer. Now the icicles hung in rows under the thatched eaves, but a red and cheerful glow came through the lozenged panes of the deep-set little windows on the waste of snow without.

A moment I lingered by the gate, and in the garden plot, for my heart was very full, and it well-nigh failed me; but there was a listener within who heard my step and knew it. And the next moment saw me in my mother's arms, and I felt like a boy again, as my happy tears mingled with hers, and it seemed as if this Christmas Eve was to be the Christmas Eve of past and jollier times.

"A merry Christmas, Bob, and a happy new year!"

The dear old woman's face was bright with joy; yet I could detect many a wrinkle now where dimples once had been, and see that her hair was thinner and whiter, perhaps, as she passed her tremulous hand caressingly over my bronzed face as if to assure herself of my identity, and that I was really her "own boy Bob." Then she helped me off with my knapsack, and sat me in father's old leathern chair, by the side of the glowing hearth, and pottered about, getting me a hot cake, and a mug of spiced ale, muttering and laughing, and hovering about me the while.

"But, mother, dear," said I, looking round, "where is Bessie all this time? She got my letter, of course?"

"Bessie is across the meadows at the church, Bob?"

"On this cold night, mother!"

"Yes; helping Miss Raikes to decorate it for the service to-morrow."

"Miss Raikes!" said I, and a cloud came over me.

I had left head-quarters with only four crowns in my pocket. We soldiers are seldom over-burdened with cash—for though England expects every man to do his duty, England likes it done cheap—and I had well-nigh starved myself on the road home that I might bring something with me for those I loved—some gay ribbons for Bessie, and a lace cap for my mother, who was so proud of her "Bombardier Bob," for so she always called me, heaven bless her!

"I hope she won't be long away, mother, for I've had such a dream——"

"Lor' bless me, Bob," said she, pausing as she bustled about preparing supper, "a dream, have you—about what, or whom?"

"Bessie," said I, with a sigh, as I took the ribbons from my knapsack.

"Was it good or evil, Bob?"

"I can't say, mother," said I, with a sickly smile, as the solemn words of the Scotch pay-sergeant came back to my memory; "for an evil dream, say we, portends good, and a pleasant dream portends evil; they seem to go by contraries. Yet somehow, by the impression this dream made upon me, it seems almost prophetic."

"Don't 'ee say so, Bob, for though in the Old Testament we find many instances of prophetic dreaming, I don't believe in such things nowadays."

The darkness had set completely in now, and I saw that, although mother affected to make light of Bessie's protracted absence, she glanced uneasily, from time to time, through the window, and at the old Dutch clock that ticked in its corner, just as it used to tick when I was a boy, and rode on father's knee; for nothing here seemed changed, save that mother was older, and stooped a trifle more.

"Mother, dear," said I, starting up at last, "I can't stand this delay, and Bessie must not come through the lanes alone; so I shall just step down to the church and escort her home."

In another moment I was out in the snow. A few thick flakes were falling athwart the gloom. The decoration of the rectory church for the solemn services of the morrow was, I knew of old, always considered an important matter in our village, yet I could not help thinking that, as I had written to announce the very time of my return, Bessie might have been at home to welcome me. Instead of that, I had now to go in search of her; and this was the Christmas meeting—the home-coming of which I had drawn so many happy and joyous pictures when alone, and in the silence of the night when far away, a sentinel on a lonely post, or when tossing sleeplessly on the hard wooden guard-bed.

Mother was kind, loving, affectionate as ever, but Bessie, my betrothed, why was she absent at such a time?

The sad presentiment of coming evil grew strong within me, and I thought, with bitterness, of how far I had marched afoot for days, and starved myself to buy her gewgaws, for I knew that pretty Bessie was not without vanity.

"Pshaw!" said I. "Be a man, Bob Twyford—be a man!" and, leaping the churchyard stile, I slowly crossed the burial ground.

There were lights in the church; and I heard the sound of merry voices, and even of laughter, ringing in its hollow, stony space.

Snow covered all the graves, and the headstones, which stood in close rows; a heavy mantle of snow loaded the roof of the church, and, tipping the carvings of its buttresses, brought them out from the mass of the building in strong white relief. Great icicles depended from the gurgoyles of its tower and battlements, and the wind whistled drearily past, rustling the masses of ivy that grew over the old Saxon apse. The tracery of the windows, the sturdy old mullions and some heraldic blazons, with quaint and ghastly spiritual subjects in stained glass, could be discerned by the lights that were within.

I lifted my forage-cap in mute reverence as I passed one grave, for I knew my father lay there under a winding-sheet of snow, and a pace or two more brought me to the quaint little porch of the church, where I remained for a time looking in, and irresolute whether to advance or retire.

When my eyes became accustomed to the partial gloom within, I could see that the zigzag Saxon mouldings and ornaments of the little chancel arch, the capitals of the shafts, the stairs of the pulpit, and the oaken canopy thereof, were all decorated with ivy sprigs and holly leaves, combined with artificial flowers, all with some meaning and taste, so as to bring out the architectural features of the quaint old edifice.

A portable flight of steps stood in the centre of the aisle, just under the chancel arch, which was low, broad, massive, of no great height, and formed a species of frame for a picture that sorely disconcerted me.

On the summit of that flight stood a lovely, laughing young lady, whose delicate white hands, a little reddened by the winter's frost, were wreathing scarlet holy-berries among the green leaves.

A little lower down was seated Bessie—my own Bessie—her blue eyes radiant with pleasure, her thick hair—half flaxen, half auburn—shining like golden threads in the light of the altar lamps, that fell on her beaming English face, so fresh, so fair, so charming. Her lap was full of ivy and holly twigs, which a gentleman who hovered near, cigar in mouth, was cutting and tossing into that receptacle, amid much banter and badinage, that savoured strongly of familiarity, if not of flirtation.

Near them in the background loitered another, who was simply leaning against the pillar of the chancel arch, looking on with a strange smile, and sucking the ivory handle of his cane.

He laughed as he regarded them.

That laugh—where had I heard it before?

In my dream. And now the antitypes—the men of my dream—stood before me!

As yet unnoticed, I remained apart, and observed them; but not unseen, for the eyes of the dark man were instantly upon me, and the peculiarity of their expression rendered me uneasy.

He who hovered about Bessie was a fair-faced, blasé-looking young man, with sleepy blue eyes, a large jaw, a receding chin, and thick, red, sensual lips. He had long, thin, flyaway whiskers, and a slight moustache, with an unmistakably good air about him.

His companion had that peculiar cast of features which we sometimes see in the Polish Jew—keen and hawk-like, with sharp, glittering black eyes, hair of a raven hue, and a general pallor of complexion that seemed bilious, sickly, and unhealthy.

I felt instinctively that I hated one and solemnly feared the other. Why was this?

Was it the result of my dream?—of that "instinct which, like imagination, is a word everybody uses, and nobody understands?"

Perhaps we shall see.

Suddenly the eye of the fair-haired stranger fell on me. He adjusted his glass, surveyed me leisurely, and, pausing in the act of playfully holding a sprig of mistletoe over Bessie's head, said, in the lisping drawl peculiar to men of his style—

"A soldier, by Jove! Now, my good man—ah, ah!—what do you want here at this time of night?"

"I came to escort my cousin home, sir."

"Your cousin, eh—haw?"

"Bessie Leybourne, sir; but," I added, reddening with vexation and annoyance, "I see she is still busy."

"Cousin, eh? What do you say to this, Bessie?"

Bessie, who started from the steps on which she had been seated, came towards me, also blushing, confused, and letting fall all the contents of her lap as she held out her hands to me, and said—

"Welcome home, dear Bob. A merry Christmas and a happy new year! Captain Raikes, this is my Cousin Bob, who is a soldier like yourself—an artilleryman," she added, with increasing confusion, as if she felt ashamed of my blue jacket among those fine folks; while the captain, after glancing at me coolly again, merely said, "Oh—ah—haw—indeed!" and proceeded to assist his sister in descending the steps, as their labours were done, and the decorations of the church complete; but a heavier cloud came over me now.

Captain Raikes was the son of the rector, and squire of the parish, in right of his mother, who was an heiress; and he, perhaps the wildest and most systematic profligate in all England, had made the acquaintance of Bessie Leybourne!

A little time they lingered ere Bessie curtseyed, and bade the young lady good-night. Captain Raikes whispered something which made Bessie blush, and glance nervously at me, while his friend with the hook nose gave a mocking cough, and then we separated. They took the path to the gaily-lighted rectory, while Bessie and I trod silently back through the snow to my mother's little cottage.

I pressed Bessie's hand and arm from time to time, and though the pressure was returned, I never ventured to touch her cheek, or even to speak to her, for I felt somehow, intuitively, that all was over between us; and we walked in silence through the lanes where we had been wont to ramble when children.

It seemed to be always summer in the green lanes then; but it was biting winter now. I asked for no explanation, and none was offered me; but I felt that Bessie, once so loving and playful, was now cold, reserved, and shy.

Next day was Christmas. Our fireplace was decked with green boughs, and holly-leaves, and huge sprigs of mistletoe. I heard the chimes ringing merrily in the old tower of the rectory church.

It was a clear, cold, snowy, and frosty, but hearty old English Christmas; and faces shone bright, hands were shaken, and warm wishes expressed among friends and neighbours, as we trod through the holly lanes, and over the crisp, frosty grass, to church—mother, Bessie, and I; and again, as in boyhood, I heard our rubicund rector preach against worldly pride and luxury, both of which, throughout a long life, he had enjoyed to the full.

The dark stranger—the squire's constant companion, chum, and Mentor, whose strange bearing and wicked ways gained him the sobriquets of Pluto and Hooknose in the village—was not with the rector's family on this day; and I learned that he resided at the village inn. It was evident, though we read off the same book, that Bessie's thoughts were neither with heaven nor me, for I caught many a glance that was exchanged between Captain Raikes and her, and these showed a secret intelligence.

I sat out the rector's sermon in silent misery, and in misery returned home—a moody and discontented fellow, wishing myself back at head-quarters, or anywhere but in the Weald of Kent.

Bessie didn't seem to care much about my ribbons. Why should she? I was only a poor devil of a bombardier, and couldn't give her such rich presents as those pearl drops which I now discovered in her ears.

"A present from Captain Raikes, Bob," said mother, good, simple soul; "but I don't think she should ha' shown 'em till her wedding-day."

I had a mouthful of mother's Christmas dumpling in my throat at that moment, and it well-nigh choked me.

The mistletoe hung over our heads; but I never claimed the playful privilege it accorded. Was there not some terrible change, when I dared not—or scorned—to kiss Bessie, even in jest? Others' kisses had been upon her lips, and so they had no longer a charm for me!

Day and night dread and doubt haunted me, while hope, with her hundred shapes and many hues, returned no more. Brooding, silent, and melancholy thoughts seemed to consume me; yet the time passed slowly and heavily, for Bessie's falsehood and fickleness formed the first recollection in the morning, the last at night, and the source of many a tantalizing dream between. All the ebbs and flows of feeling or emotion which torment the lover I endured. My sufferings were very great; and from being as jolly, hardy, and expert a gunner as ever levelled a Lancaster or an Armstrong, I was becoming a very noodle—a moonstruck creature—"a thoroughbred donkey," as Tom Inches would have called me—and all for the love of Bessie Leybourne.

Short though my time at home would be, Bessie could give me but little of her society. My jealousy would no longer be concealed, and that she had secret meetings with our squire I could no more doubt. Then came tears, upbraidings, and bitterness, with promises that she would meet him no more; and in the strongest language I could command, I told her of the perils she ran, of the desperate character of Valentine Raikes, of his mad orgies and debaucheries, of the gambling, drinking, singing, swearing, and whooping that accompanied the suppers he and Hooknose had almost every night in a lonely lodge of the rectory grounds.

"Oh, Bob, don't bother," she would say, imploringly, through her smiles and tears. "It is terrible to be told constantly that one must marry one particular young man."

"Meaning, Bessie, that mother reminds you of being engaged to me?"

"Well, yes."

"You are fickle, Bessie."

"My poor Bob, you are not rich, neither am I."

"Hence your fickleness; but, oh, Bessie, don't think I want to make a soldier's wife of you. I hope for better days, and to settle down at home. Oh, Bessie, my own Bessie, listen to me, and hear me."

And so she would listen to me, and hear me, and then slip away to keep a tryst with my rival.

Once or twice Bessie became angry with me, and ventured to defend the squire, laying the blame of all his evil actions on his friend, or Mentor—the dark Mephistopheles, who was always by his side. Her defence of him maddened me. From tears she took to taunts, and I replied by scorn.

We separated in hot anger, and with my mind a perfect chaos—a whirl—and already repenting my violence, or precipitation, I strode moodily through the holly lanes, till a sudden turn brought me face to face with Captain Raikes and his dark friend, in close and earnest conversation.

The idea of honest and manly remonstrance seized me; and touching my cap respectfully, as became me to an officer, I said—

"Captain Raikes, may I crave a word with you?"

"Certainly—haw!" he drawled, while his friend drew back, surveying me with his strange, malevolent, but terrible smile. "In what can I—haw—serve you?"

"In a matter, sir, that lies very near my heart."

He surveyed me with a quiet but puzzled air, through his glass, and replied—

"Haw—have seen you before. How is your pretty cousin, Bessie Leybourne, this morning—well, I hope?"

"It is about Bessie I wish to speak, sir," said I, with a gravity that made him start and colour a little—but only a little, as he was one of those solemn, self-conceited, unimpressionable "snobs," who disdain to exhibit the slightest emotion. He did, however, become uneasy ultimately, and pulled his long whiskers when I said—

"Captain Raikes, my cousin Bessie is my betrothed wife; and, though I am but a poor private soldier (or little more), I must urge, sir—ay, request—that you cease to follow, molest, or meet her, as I have good reason to know you do; for though Bessie is a true-hearted girl, no good can come of it. So I put it to you, sir, as a gentleman—as my comrade, though our ranks are far apart—whether your intentions can be honourable in the matter?"

"By Jove! the idea! I'll tell you what it is, my good fellah," said he, twirling his riding whip; "I have listened to your impertinent advice—your demmed interference with my movements—so far without laying this across your shoulders; but beware—haw—how you address me on this subject again."

Passion and jealousy blinded me, and shaking my hand in his face, I said—

"Captain Raikes, on your life I charge you not to trifle with her or with me!"

He never lost his self-possession, but said, with a smile—

"Very good; but rather daring in a private soldier—a poacher—a vagabond!"

I heard the strange laugh of Hooknose at these words, and, while it was ringing in my ears, I struck the squire to the earth, and he lay as still as if a twelve-pound shot had finished him. Then I walked deliberately away.

I had vague alarms now. He might have me arrested on a charge of assault or might report me to head-quarters for the blow, although he was not in uniform; but he did neither, as he left the Weald that night for London; and mother and I sat gazing at each other in alarm and grief—our Bessie had disappeared!

By some of our neighbours she had been seen near the branch station of the South-Eastern line, with Valentine Raikes and his mysterious friend, the Hooknose: and from that hour all trace of her was—lost!

* * * * *

She had left me coldly and heartlessly, and old mother, too, who had always been more than a mother to her.

So passed the last Christmas I was to spend in old England.

I got over it in time. I was not without hope that I might discover Bessie, and befriend her yet—ay, even yet. But I couldn't do much, being only a poor fellow with two shillings per diem, and an extra penny for beer and pipeclay. But even that hope was crushed when, in the following August, I was ordered with the siege train to Sebastopol, and sailed from Southampton aboard the "Balmoral," of Hull, a transport ship, which had on board a whole battery of artillery, with one hundred and ten fine horses.

Captain Raikes was, I knew, with the Light Cavalry Brigade, under Lord Cardigan; and I only prayed that heaven and the chances of war would keep us apart, and not put the terrible temptation before me of seeing him under fire.

Our voyage was prosperous till we entered the Black Sea, when we experienced heavy gales of wind, and lost our topmasts; and as the gales increased in fury and steadiness, they were blowing a perfect hurricane on the night when, in this crippled condition, we hauled up for the harbour of Balaclava.

Were I to live a thousand years, I should never forget the horrors and certain events of that night; and though the perils that our transport encountered were ably described by more than one newspaper correspondent, I shall venture to recall them here.

Wearied with hard stable duty, I had fallen asleep in my birth, when I was suddenly roused by a voice—the voice of Bessie,

"Bob, Bob, dearest Bob—save me! save me! I am drowning!"

It rang distinctly in my ears, and then I seemed to hear the gurgling of water, as I sprang from bed in terror and bewilderment, and from no dream that I was at all conscious of; but I had little time to think of the matter, for now the bugle sounded down the hatchway to change the watch on deck.

The night was pitchy dark; all our compasses had suddenly become useless—no two needles pointed the same way—and the rudder bands were rent by the force of the sea, which tore in vast volume over the deck, sweeping everything that was loose away. The watch were all lashed to belaying pins, or the lower rattlins; but three of ours and two seamen were swept overboard and drowned.

To add to our dangers, as we lifted towards the harbour mouth, the "Balmoral" heeled over so much that the ballast broke loose in the hold, and uprooted the stable deck. The centre of gravity was thus lost, and the transport lay almost over on her beam-ends, with the wild sea breaking over her, as she went, like a helpless log, on some rocks within the harbour entrance.

The captain commanding the artillery ordered Tom Inches and a party, of whom I was one, into the hold or stables, to see how the horses fared; and I shall never forget that terrific scene, for it nearly rendered me oblivious of the cry that yet lingered in my ears.

The time was exactly midnight, and I almost fear to be considered a visionary by relating all that followed. The vessel lay nearly on her beam-ends to starboard; the whole of the stalls on the port side had given way, and the horses were lying over each other in piles, many of them half or wholly strangled in their halters; and there, in the dark, they were biting and tearing each other with their teeth, neighing, snorting, and even screaming (a dreadful sound is a horse's scream), and kicking each other to death.

The atmosphere was stifling. The wounds they gave each other were bloody and frightful. Many had their legs and ribs broken, and others their eyes dashed out by ironed hoofs. Above were the bellowing of the wind, and the roaring of the Black Sea on the rocks of Balaclava. There were even thunder-peals at times, to add to the terrors of the occasion, and the rain was falling on the deck like a vast sheet of water.

Many of our men were severely wounded by kicks; for the horses that survived were wild with fear—maddened, in fact—and, in their present condition, proved quite unmanageable.

Carrying a lantern, I was making my way into the hold, and through this frightful scene, when suddenly, amid it all, and through the gloom, I saw a face that terrified—that fascinated—me, but which none of my comrades could see.

Was I mad, or about to become so?

Within six inches of my own face was the keen, dark, and swarthy—the almost black—visage of Hooknose glaring at me, mocking and jibbering; his eyes shining like two carbuncles, his sharp teeth glistening with his old malevolent smile; and, as I shrank back, I heard his mocking laugh—the same laugh that had tingled in my ears on that fatal Christmas time at home.

I fell over a horse, the hoof of another struck me on the chest. I became insensible, and, on recovering, found myself on deck, in the hands of Tom Inches and the surgeon.

I was soon fit for duty, luckily, as that ship was no place for a sick man. With sunrise the storm abated; with slings the horses were hoisted out as fast as we could bring them; and of the hundred and ten we had on board, we found that ninety-five had been kicked to death, smothered, or so bruised that we were compelled to shoot them with our carbines.

Their carcasses lay long in Balaclava harbour, where they were used as stepping stones by the sailors and boatmen, till their corruption filled the air, adding to the cholera and fever in the town and camp.

All that haunted me must have been fancy, thought I, for my thoughts were always running on Bessie—lost to me and to the world—fevered fancy, especially the cry, and the horrid gurgling as of a drowning person that followed it. The sound of the sea must have produced or suggested the cry in my sleeping ear, and the subsequent vision in the hold—those gleaming eyes and that fierce hooked nose; and yet, as an author has remarked, the whole world of nature is but one vast book of symbols, which we cannot decipher because we have lost the key.

It was ungrateful of me to be always thinking of Bessie, who had scorned, flouted, and deserted me—thinking more of her than of poor old mother in the Weald of Kent, who loved me with all her soul, as only a mother could love a son who was amid the trenches of Sebastopol; but I couldn't help it, for the terrible mystery that involved the fate of Bessie made me brood over it at all times.

As for the trifle of money I had expected, it never came, and now I didn't want it.

It was Christmas Eve before Sebastopol, as it was all over God's Christian world; but I hope never again to see such a ghastly festival. I was not at the breaching batteries that night, having been sent with two horses and four men to bring in a twelve pound gun, which had been left by the Russians in the valley of Inkermann, after the battle of the 5th of November. Tom Inches and many a brave fellow of ours had gone to their long home in that valley of death, and I was a battery-sergeant now.

The cold was awful, and we were rendered very feeble by hunger, toil, and half-healed wounds; so, like men in a dream, we traced the horses to the gun, and limbered up the tumbril, both of which lay among some ruins in rear of the British right attack, and not far from the frozen Tchernay.

Three miles distant rose Sebastopol, and the sky seemed all on fire in and around it, for they were keeping Christmas night, amid shot from our Lancaster guns, and whistling Dicks of all sorts and sizes, from hand-grenades to eighteen-inch bombs, chokeful of nails, broken bottles, and grapeshot.

Yet I couldn't help thinking of home, and how merrily the village chimes would be ringing in the old tower of the rectory church, amid the hop-gardens and the cherry-groves of Kent. And then I saw in fancy the old fireside, where father's leathern chair was empty now, and where one at least would say her prayers that night for me—that happy night at home, when every church and hearth would be gay with ivy leaves and holly-berries, and the lads and the lasses would be dancing under the mistletoe; and with all these came thoughts of Christmas geese and plum-puddings, and I drew my sword-belt in a hole or two, for I was starving—light-headed and giddy with want; and as we rode silently on, the swinging chains of the gun seemed to me like the jangle of our village chimes! but they rung over the snowy waste that lay between Khutor Mackenzie and the Highland camp—a white waste, dotted by many a dead man and horse.

As we rode silently on, man after man of our little party of four gave in, dropped from the gun, to which I had no means of securing them, overcome by cold, fatigue, and death. At last I was riding alone in the saddle, with the gun rattling behind me.

Ghastly sights were around me on that Christmas night, and the glinting of the moon at times made them more ghastly still.

On French mule litters, and on horses, many wounded and dying men were being borne from the redoubts down to Balaclava; and as my progress was very slow, with two worn-out, half-starved nags, a terrible procession passed before me. Many of the poor fellows were nearly over their troubles and sorrows. With closed eyes, relaxed jaws, and hollow visages, they were carried down the snowy path by the Ambulance Corps, and the pale steam that curled in the frosty air from the lips of each alone indicated that they breathed.

Two dismounted hussars—for amid their rags, I discovered them to be such—were carrying one who seemed like a veritable corpse, strapped upright on a seat; the legs dangled, the eyes were staring open and glassy, and the head nodded to and fro.

"Comrades," said I, "that poor fellow is surely out of pain now?"

"Not yet," said one. "He is an officer of ours, badly wounded and frost-bitten."

"An officer!"

"Captain Raikes. He won't last till morning, I fear."

"Raikes," said I through my clenched teeth; "Valentine Raikes—and here!"

"Ay, here, sure enough," said the hussar.

My heart bounded, and then stood still for a moment. At last I said—

"Place him on the gun, comrades, and I will take him on to Balaclava; but first, here I've some raki in my canteen. Give him a mouthful, if he can swallow."

Raikes was placed on the seat of the gun-carriage, buckled thereto with straps, and muffled up as well as we could devise, to protect him from the cold. The two hussars left me, and then we were alone, he and I—Valentine Raikes and Bob Twyford—in the solitary valley, through which the road wound that led to Balaclava.

Though coarse and fiery, the raki partially revived the sinking man, and, leaving my saddle, I asked him, in a voice husky with cold and emotion, if he knew me.

But he shook his head sadly and listlessly. And bearded as I was then, it was no wonder that his dimmed vision failed to recognize me.

"I am Robert Twyford, the bombardier, whose plighted wife you stole, Valentine Raikes! God judge between you and me; but I feel that I must forgive you now."

"My winding sheet is woven in the loom of hell!" he moaned, in a low and almost inarticulate voice. "Oh! Twyford, I have wronged you—and her—and—many, many more."

"But Bessie!" said I, drawing near, and propping him in my arms; "what came of Bessie Leybourne? Speak—tell me for mercy's sake, while you have the power!"

"Ask the waters—the waters——"

"Where—where?"

"Under Blackfriars-bridge. She perished there on the 27th of last September."

The 27th was the night of the storm—the night of the mysterious drowning cry, which startled me from sleep!

"I am sinking fast, Twyford!" he resumed, in a hollow and broken voice. "Pray for me—pray for me. There is but one way to heaven——"

"But many to perdition!" added a strange, deep voice.

And a dark, indistinct, and muffled figure, having two gleaming eyes, stood by the wheel of the gun-carriage, just as a cloud overspread the moon.

"Here—he here! Do not let him touch me—do not let him—touch me!" cried Raikes, in a voice that rose into a scream of despair, as he threw up his arms and fell back.

There was a gurgle in his throat, and all was over!

A fiendish, chuckling laugh seemed to pass me on the skirt of the frosty wind; but I saw no one; nor had I time to observe, or to remember, much more, for now a madness seemed to seize the horses.

They dashed away with frightful speed, the field-piece swinging like a toy at their hoofs. It swept over me breaking one of my legs, and inflicting also a terrible wound on the head, I sank among the snow, and remember no more of that night, for, after weeks of delirium and fever, I found myself a poor, weak, and emaciated inmate of the hospital at Scutari, and so far on my way home to dear old England.

But such was the Christmas night I spent before Sebastopol, and such were those mysteries in the "Book of Nature," to which I can find as yet no key.