All right,' said Jack; and he kept his large right hand just behind Mr Paul Jones' neck, so that he might compress his windpipe on the instant, should his selection of subject for narration be unfit for lady's ear.

'I'll bet you a pair of gloves, Helen,' said Arthur, in lover's tones, and while the little man arranged his ideas, that it will be about his cousin the Attorney-general of Sierra Leone-a connection of which he is unreasonably proud.'

'I am not so fond of betting as some people,' was Helen's cold reply.

Tyndall bit his lip; and Allardyce, whose eye saw there was something amiss between them, though his ear did not catch her words, laughed grimly in his sleeve.

'It's a most capital story that I am going to tell you,' commenced Mr Paul Jones confidently, and one of the best you ever heard. It happened to my cousin Herbert, who was Attorney-general for Sierra Leone in 1844. Sierra Leone is in Africa. My cousin went out there with the highest recommendations, as a very young man. I suppose nobody had ever been out with higher recommendations. Sir Charles Goadby was governor, and took him by the hand. He had immense talents as a pleader. My uncle George used to predict of him-and my uncle was an uncommonly shrewd fellow, living in the neighbourhood of Kingston-onThames'

'We can't stand your uncle George,' observed Allardyce tartly; cut him out of the story.'

Everybody gave a little sigh of relief, and felt grateful to Allardyce; a sort of deadly calm had taken possession of Mr Jones' audience, which he attributed to enthralling interest; and he was irritated, therefore, at the interruption, not only on his own account, but upon theirs.

'You must let me tell the story my own way, or not at all,' said he peevishly.

'Not at all, then, by all means,' observed Allardyce coolly; but the ladies (always pitiful, and often mistaken in their pity) murmured: 'Oh, pray go on, Mr Jones;' and he went on.

When, in consequence of his excellent introductions, and the help of Governor Sir Charles Goadby, my cousin had been made Her Majesty's Attorneygeneral for Sierra Leone, he decided upon giving a little dinner.'

'Ridiculus mus,' muttered Allardyce. 'I see nothing ridiculous in my cousin's giving a dinner-party,' remonstrated Jones.

"A"party!" no, my dear fellow; but you said "a little dinner." Considering his introductions, and all the rest of it, it ought to have been a banquet.'

It was a banquet, sir,' urged Jones, asserting himself. All the beauty and fashion of all the beauty and fashion of" (Ally, Ally!' whispered the narrator earnestly, 'I've forgotten the name of the cursed place; it was your fault for interrupting me; do tell me ')'all the beauty and fashion of Sierra Leone were there. The room was decorated with all the luxurious vegetation that belongs to that tropical region. Fire-flies danced about. The moon, never so glorious as in that particular part of the world' Mr Jones was growing ghastly pale, large drops were standing on his forehead, his very hair began to bristle.

'I knew that man would be ill,' murmured Mrs Somers, regarding him with horror.

'Where was I?' inquired Mr Jones wildly. 'At the moon,' replied the inexorable Allardyce. ""The moon, in that particular part of the world," were your last words.'

Mr Jones gasped and nodded; you would have thought they had literally been his last words.

'If you are going to be ill, Jones, you'd better go out of the cabin,' whispered Allardyce. 'Don't, don't!' returned the other plaintively. "O dear, I've forgotten something.

'Your pocket-handkerchief? Here, by Jove! take mine, man,' cried Adair with good-natured promptitude.

'No, no; it's not that,' returned Mr Jones, rejecting the proffered loan with irascibility. 'Stop a bit. The moon was at the full. Through the open windows could be seen the heaving deep. The natives, in considerable numbers, were assembled beneath the balcony, beating tom-toms-beating tom-toms,' repeated the narrator with gentle pathos.

A simultaneous roar of laughter burst from the whole company, shaking the cabin and rocking the barge. Mr Paul Jones regarded this outbreak with a feeble smile; it is better to know that one has failed, than to be always on the brink of failure, with the certainty of falling over sooner or later.

'I have forgotten the point of the story, ladies and gentlemen,' said he, with a deprecating air; 'it's really the very best story you ever heard; please to give me one more chance.'

For the last quarter of an hour or so, the unhappy wretch had been talking against time.

CHAPTER V.-THE BARGEES.

Mr Jones' pathetic appeal was not acceded to, though a single effort was made in one quarter to give him 'one more chance.'

'I'll bet any man an even fiver,' said Arthur, 'that Jones don't recollect his "point" within ten minutes.'

The next moment he regretted his indiscretion; Helen, like the rest, had been convulsed with mirth at Mr Jones' discomfiture, but her lover's speech sobered her at once. Arthur Tyndall's love of gambling had been the one objection which her mother had entertained against him as a son-inlaw; she had spoken of it to her daughter very seriously, and Helen had repeated her words to Arthur. He had promised her to reform in this respect; and yet, within one half-hour, or so, and in her mother's presence, he had made, or attempted to make, two wagers; and one of them, as it seemed to her, of a very considerable amount: he had also lost it, which, in a woman's eyes, greatly heightens the immorality of misdemeanours of that description. It was, to say the least of it, very thoughtless conduct on her Arthur's part; if he were restrained by no other motive, he might have refrained from such conduct for her sake.

'Mamma and I are not accustomed,' said she, 'to hear gentlemen betting fivers; it makes me nervous.'

'Nervous! It puts me all of a twitter!' ejaculated Mrs Somers. 'I really wish you wouldn't, Harthur.'

The aspirate was very marked.

Tyndall's sun-tanned face turned a whole shade darker. It was an indiscreet speech for Helen to make, especially aloud. It seemed to him that the woman to whose money he was about to be

indebted for restoration to his old position in society was already presuming upon that circumstance; if she lectured him now (before his friends too!), what would she not do when she became his lawful wife! He would not have cared so much about what her mother had said, if she had not put in that H. He had always thought to himself: 'She is a good-natured old lady, after all.'-But What a vulgar old woman this is!' was the idea, plain and bare, that now occurred to him. His nature was passionate, his feelings unaccustomed to the control even of himself, much more to the interference of others. He rose from the table, and walked out of the cabin. A dead silence fell upon all.

'You must not be angry with him, Miss Somers,' said Allardyce in a voice, sympathising, if not absolutely tender. He meant no harm; it is so difficult to get out of what has become an ingrained habit.'

Adair, who overheard this speech, as indeed did everybody but Arthur, regarded Allardyce with fiery scorn; and perhaps Helen herself resented it in her heart. If it had been Mr Paul Jones who had spoken it, she would have told him to mind his own business; but the incense of the herb valerian was grateful to her nostrils. She could not snap that up, or tread it under foot like a common weed. She kept silence, looking angrily out at Arthur standing in the bows with his back to them all; but her mother answered for her.

"Yes, indeed, dear Mr Allardyce, Arthur is much too fond of betting; that is the only fault he has. I do wish-as a friend whose advice I am sure he would value highly-you would persuade him to give it up.'

If Mrs Somers' vision could have penetrated through a ten-inch mahogany table, she would have here perceived Mr Paul Jones' finger and thumb meet facetiously in a fleshy part of the Hon. Wynn Allardyce's leg. But as it was, she only saw the latter gentleman shrug his shoulders and shake his head.

'I'm afraid he will find it as difficult to get rid of his taste for laying fivers, my dear madam, as Mr Jervoise, of Green Place yonder, found it to get

rid of his wife.'

'Where is Green Place? Oh, that house on the hill, is it?'

Yes; and a very strange story there is attached to it, if you'd care to hear it.'

Mrs Somers did not in the least care to hear it; but anything was better than the icy silence in which the company was plunged. It was only too obvious that her future son-in-law was offended: he was pulling at a great cigar so savagely that, at a little distance, you might have taken the barge for a steam-yacht; and she was very anxious to conciliate him.

'Come, Arthur,' said she cheerfully, and listen to Mr Allardyce's story. He says it is a very strange and interesting one.'

'Jones promised the same for his, madam,' answered Arthur, with a short laugh. I'll finish my weed first, and then join you, so as to be just in time for the point, if there is one.'

Considering that Tyndall was their host, this refusal was a rudeness to the whole company, of which nobody was more conscious than himself. He not only knew he was doing wrong, but had already repented of it, and was cursing his own hot-headedness in several tropical languages. If

Helen had even looked towards him forgivinglybut her eyes, directly he turned round, had riveted themselves on the table; and if he had sold himself,' thought he, he had not sold himself as a slave; no, by Jove! he hadn't'-and so he stood unmoved-a marble statue with a yearning heart! 'I don't think you ought to tell that story, Allardyce-I mean about Jervoise,' remonstrated Adair in a smothered tone, and speaking behind Jones, who sat between them.

'And why not?' replied Allardyce, raising his eyebrows, and speaking in a very contemptuous tone.

'Well, it is not a pleasant story to tell, under the circumstances. You will do as you please, of course; but'

"Thanks,' interrupted the other insolentlythanks, I am sure. Having obtained your gracious permission, I will tell it;' and he began accordingly: Jervoise, of Green Place yonder, was a very good fellow, as I remember him, years ago. He had a little weakness for play, staked high-sometimes higher than he could afford-but mightn't have hurt himself much, had he only stuck to cards.'

Ah! that's where it is: you get led on,' sighed Mrs Somers, as though quoting from the depth of some terrific gambling experience of her own.

'Just so, madam, continued Allardyce: 'he took to the turf and the bones.'

'You don't mean to say he murdered anybody?' gasped the old lady, a ghastly vision of clandestine burial, no doubt, suggesting itself to her mind.

'No, no; I mean the race-course and the dicebox; and these two treated him so ill that they would have cost him his whole estate, but for a fortunate marriage.'

Allardyce paused here, perhaps by accident, but, it almost seemed, significantly. Mrs Somers was now as silent as the rest; and Helen's gaze fixed itself on the table more intently than before.

'His bride was a charming girl-one of the Ashleys of Devonshire-but I am afraid Jervoise did not much care for her; still, she was fond of him, and would have put up with a good deal; with anything there was to put up with, perhaps, short of a rival. Unhappily, there was a rival.'

'How shocking!' ejaculated Mrs Somers, and yet her voice had a tone of relief in it strangely inconsistent with the words. There was no longer any parallel between this Jervoise case and that of Arthur.

'Yes, and what was worse, it was so soon after their wedding. Mrs Jervoise had cause for jealousy, no doubt, as indeed was proved; but the misfortune was that this unpleasant affair occurred while the Jervoises were in Scotland, and in a moment of very natural indignation, she sued for a divorce in the Scotch courts, and obtained it. Our own Sir Creswell Creswell would not have granted it so easily, which perhaps would have been better for all parties. At all events, Mrs Jervoise soon repented of her precipitancy, and, it is said, made overtures of reconciliation to her late husband.'

'She must have been a very poor-spirited woman," observed Helen.

Allardyce gave his favourite shrug of the shoulders. I don't know, I'm sure. Ladies always seem to me to be much more tender and forgiving than their lords. Jervoise was not forgiving, at

anyrate, though he was tender to another woman; for within six months-during which he had some money left him unexpectedly-he had married somebody else.'

What an abandoned wretch! quite a Bluebeard!' exclaimed Mrs Somers.

'Doubtless; though, I daresay, the "somebody else" did not think so. She was a parson's daughter, and lived not a dozen miles from where we are sitting; and a very pretty girl. Of course, Mrs Jervoise Number One was frantic ; and she took her revenge. When Jervoise returned from his marriage-tour-the second honeymoon the monster had had that year, by-the-bye-he gave, like Jones' cousin, "a little dinner," to celebrate his return. The guests were all out upon the lawn enjoying the summer evening, and perhaps Jones' moon-when who should come sailing in among them, with a London lawyer in tow, but the late Mrs Jervoise! "This is my husband," cried she, "and that young person has no sort of business here." And she was right too, or, at all events, partly right. Though the divorce was good in Scotland, it was not so here, since the grounds for separation were not held sufficient by the English law. The matter was never disputed in the Arches Court, because the Jervoises removed to Scotland, where they were man and wife; but he was always called the Man with two Wives. Anybody about here will tell you the same story: it's as well known as the Swan with two Necks there, where our men are gone to lunch.'

'And do you mean to say,' inquired Mrs Somers, 'that this wretch was never punished?'

'Yes, indeed; did I not tell you that he was compelled to live in Scotland? Whenever he crosses the Border, wife Number One swoops down upon him, and makes his life a burden. That's why Green Place yonder is always Let. Now, if I had been the first Mrs Jervoise '

The barge, Tyndall-the barge!' cried Jack Adair at the top of his voice.

All rose to their feet, and not a moment too soon. A heavily laden coal-barge with three horses, and several men walking beside them, had just turned the corner of the river, and was bearing down upon them very fast. One could see the huge rope quiver in the blue air, and hear it brush the weeds, or tear the turf where the bank was high. The mast of the gay Lotus, its gilded cabin, and its painted flagstaff, were all menaced with instant ruin. Tyndall, deep in his own thoughts, and still savagely smoking his cigar, had his back to this terrible vessel, whose approach he had, therefore, not perceived. But he was on his feet in an instant with a Stop, you fellows! Stop those horses, or you 'll send us all to the bottom!

"They won't stop,' answered Adair grimly; 'I know them so well." There is only one way to take, and that's to lick them.' He rushed from the cabin, and had already placed one foot on the shore, while Tyndall sprang to his side, when a sweet clear voice sang out: Pray, don't, gentlemen.-Arthur, for my sake, I implore you.'

Adair looked to his friend, as if for guidance. The position was indeed critical enough. The horses were already treading on the tow-path close above them; the men, three in number, and very powerful specimens of their class, were tramping by, with a malicious sneer upon their dirt-grimed

faces.

'You'll have your figure-head spoiled, if you don't get under cover, young 'oman,' said one, a milder specimen of the river desperado than the rest. His words were addressed to Helen, who was standing by Tyndall's side with her hand laid lightly on his arm. In her hasty exit from the cabin, her hair had escaped from its bands, and was streaming in the wind like a cloud of gold. She might have sat (or stood) for her lover's Guardian Angel.

For my sake, don't fight those men. It will kill my mother.'

Poor Mrs Somers, speechless from sheer terror, was seconding her prayer from the cabin with outstretched hands; Mr Paul Jones had opened the little door that communicated with the steerage, and curled himself there, where he justly calculated no rope could touch him; and the Honourable Wynn Allardyce had thrust his head out of one of the side-windows, in hopes to see a fight.

Arthur looked doubtfully from the bargees to Helen, from Helen to the bargees. He was exceedingly angry with the latter, and longed to chastise them for their brutality; his dissatisfaction with himself increased his fury against them; and, besides, unless some very strong measure should at once be taken, their pleasure-boat would be knocked to pieces, not to mention the possible danger to life and limb. On the other hand, there was Helen's imploring voice-no longer rebukeful, but sweet and suppliant. What was to be done? Suddenly, an alternative presented itself: he sprang to the luncheon-table, and seized a carving-knife. "There will be bloodshed,' screamed Mrs Somers, ́ 'gore !-oh, dreadful!'

The next minute, he was holding by the mast with one hand, while the other grasped what seemed to be a flaming sword. A roar of voices from the approaching vessel perforce drew the attention of the three bargees on shore, who were plodding on remorselessly. The leader instantly stopped his horse.

I say, what are you arter, young fellow?' 'I am about to cut your rope, my man,' answered Tyndall coolly; that is, if it comes near enough. Pray, go on, if it so pleases you.'

He really looked a handsome fellow, standing up in the sunlight, with his calm bronzed face set so resolutely to keep his word, and his gaze fixed on the now slackening rope. Full of admiration and love, Helen's eyes devoured him. In the height of his passionate fury, her voice had calmed him, and he had obeyed it; and now had not his quick wits devised a plan which bade fair to release them from their perils? She did not know it was a common plan, that is often found to be efficacious with bargees, who will never stop for love, and sometimes not even for money. She thought him as wise as he was brave and handsome. For the moment, the Lotus was a floating shrine, and Arthur Tyndall the object not only of her love, but of her adoration.

Up crept the grimy barge-no longer terrible, its slackened rope passing from hand to hand over mast and flagstaff-and slid along the gilded galley so closely that the inmates of each could have shaken hands. This was far from their intention, however. Nothing but the resolute attitude of Adair and Tyndall restrained the horny-handed sons of Toil from expressing their opinion of the sons (and daughters) of Pleasure in the strongest

language: their brethren in charge of the horses were already doing so, but fortunately the wind was contrary, and the ladies' ears were spared. Even as it was, though the Bella of London passed the Lotus without speaking her, the temptation which the gay attire of Mr Paul Jones, still crouching in the stern, offered to the steersman of the former craft, proved too great for his discretion, and he emptied a small sack of coal-dust exactly over him. As the victim had done nothing for the common weal during the late commotion, this outrage was not made a casus belli; and in the stern, Mr Paul Jones remained for hours, washing himself, and vainly striving to renovate his apparel. His absence-or rather separation by panel-from the rest of the company did not affect its cheer fulness, which recent events had completely restored. Even Mrs Somers, paralysed as she had been by terror, rallied at the sight of the reconciliation between 'her two young people;' and with the assistance of a glass of green Curaçoa, recommended by Mr Allardyce as a specific for nervous disorders, became herself. Once only did she break down again, when, having the bargees and their threats of vengeance, which had vaguely reached her, still upon her mind, she suddenly exclaimed: Great Heavens! there's a man in a black mask levelling a gun at us!'

At these words, Mr Paul Jones came through his panel with the agility of a harlequin at Christmas; and even Mr Allardyce turned his head to look out at window for the assassin. But after all, it was only a photographic artist, who (attracted by their picturesque appearance) had set up his machine upon the bank, and was focusing the Lotus. Then the crew came back from the Swan with two Necks in a fine state of exhilaration, and off started the faithful steed, this time with the rope attached to him; and away they went, with a surge at the bow and a ripple at the stern, on their river-voyage again.

CHRONOGRAMS AND CHRONOPHONS.` THESE two words, identical or nearly identical in meaning, relate to a matter which at one time occupied a good deal of puzzle-making ingenuity, and may perchance again do so, if an imitative freak should seize upon us. When men made no steam-engines, and did not spin cotton at the rate of a thousand miles or so per hour; when they neither travelled by railway over the land, nor by screw and paddle over the sea; when there were no penny posts, electric telegraphs, penny papers, or gas-lights; when men did not give three thousand guineas for a picture about Roast Pig,' or three hundred for an old fiddle then it was that verbal crotchets were in fashion to an extent that we can hardly understand now. In France, especially, during the dissipated reigns of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. the gilded youth' of the gay capital, and aristocrats old enough to have known better, whiled away their hours in such fashion to an almost incredible degree, incited partly thereto by the epigrammatic qualities of the French language. The chronogram, or description by means of numbers,' is rather antiquarian and ecclesiastical than gay in its origin. Perhaps it may be more correctly defined as date-writing-the incorporating a date as part of a written word or sentence. It depends on the main characteristics of the Roman

numerals. We are all told at school that our usual numerals, such as 1, 2, 3, 4, are of Arabic origin; but that the Romans employed some of the capital letters of their alphabet as numbers. There are seven in familiar use-namely, I, V, X, L, C, D, M, standing respectively for 1, 5, 10, 50, 100, 500, 1000; but there are others, found in old documents, which are now seldom used-especially a capital C turned upside down (3), and a sort of figure of 8 laid on its side (∞). One extraordinary combination, to denote a million, stands thusCCCC; and another, only a little less complex, for a hundred thousand-CCCI. In order to denote four, the Romans occasionally used I four times repeated-IIII; but a briefer form was IV, which stands for one less than five;' in like manner XL and CD were devised instead of XXXX and CCCC, for forty and four hundred. Sixteen years hence, in 1888, the A.D. when expressed in Roman numerals of the usual kind, will be more lengthy than it has ever before been, or than it will again be for a long time to come-namely, MDCCCLXXXVIII-thirteen symbols instead of the convenient four which suffice when Arabic numerals are used.

In some languages, a sentence will express a date or number whether the writer intends it or not. Thus, learned men tell us that, in Persian, the letters forming the words 'Hooshung Shah is no more,' also denote the number 837; and a chronogram was at once thus constructed, seeing that Shah Hooshung died in the 837th year of the Hegira. In like manner, many of the controversies and speculations concerning the mysterious 66 and 666 of the Book of Revelation have arisen out of the Hebrew alphabetical characters being alike letters and numerals.

The Romans are believed to have begun the style of chronogram which has more or less been in favour ever since. It was an amusement, a play upon words something like our rebus. We all remember such effusions as XL, which will serve either for 40 or for 'excel' in a puzzle; and MIX, which will do alike for 1009 and for 'mix-and doubtless we deemed ourselves very clever in composing them.

Chronograms are rather numerous in and about churches and other religious structures, comprising pious sentences, often passages from the Bible. Tourists have detected many of them in the Rhenish provinces, in some instances placed in odd corners and nooks not very visible, and often partly obliterated by time and weather. Some are incised or cut in the stone-work, others painted or gilt on wood. Instances have been met with on a beam in a chapel on the south side of the choir of Cologne Cathedral; on the base of a crucifix outside the minster at Bonn, and another within the minster; in Poppelsdorf church, near the same city; on the baptistery at Aix-la-Chapelle; on the front of the west gallery at St Michael's Church, in the same city; round the arch of the west door of St Castor's, Coblenz ; on the base of a crucifix, and over the principal door of a church, at Königswinter; and in many other places. There is one on the floor of the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli at Rome, comprising a date relating to the English Jacobite princes in 1721; and on a fountain near the church of San Paolo, at Parma, is one to the honour of one of the vice-regents of that state. Our own country is not wanting in