after receiving your letter, but to set off for Liverpool straight, and join you. And after that decision was made, my spirits rose, for the old talks about Canada and Australia came to my mind, and this seemed like a realization of them. Besides, Maggie, I suspected–I even suspect now–that my father had something to do with your going with Edward?”
“Indeed, Frank!” said she, earnestly, “you are mistaken; I cannot tell you all now; but he was so good and kind at last. He never urged me to go; though, I believe, he did tell me it would be the saving of Edward.”
“Don’t agitate yourself, love. I trust there will be time enough, some happy day at home, to tell me all. And till then, I will believe that my father did not in any way suggest this voyage. But you’ll allow that, after all that has passed, it was not unnatural in me to suppose so. I only told Middleton I was obliged to leave him by the next train. It was not till I was fairly off, that I began to reckon up what money I had with me. I doubt even if I was sorry to find it was so little. I should have to put forth my energies and fight my way, as I had often wanted to do. I remember, I thought how happy you and I would be, striving together as poor people ‘in that new world which is the old.’ Then you had told me you were going in the steerage; and that was all suitable to my desires for myself.”
“It was Erminia’s kindness that prevented our going there. She asked your father to take us cabin places unknown to me.”
“Did she? dear Erminia! it is just like her. I could almost laugh to remember the eagerness with which I doffed my signs of wealth, and put on those of poverty. I sold my watch when I got into Liverpool–yesterday, I believe–but it seems like months ago. And I rigged myself out at a slop-shop with suitable clothes for a steerage passenger. Maggie! you never told me the name of the vessel you were going to sail in!”
“I did not know it till I got to Liverpool. All Mr. Buxton said was, that some ship sailed on the 15th.”
“I concluded it must be the Anna-Maria, (poor Anna-Maria!) and I had no time to lose. She had just heaved her anchor when I came on board. Don’t you recollect a boat hailing her at the last moment? There were three of us in her.”
“No! I was below in my cabin–trying not to think,” said she, coloring a little.
“Well! as soon as I got on board it began to grow dark, or, perhaps, it was the fog on the river; at any rate, instead of being able to single out your figure at once, Maggie–it is one among a thousand–I had to go peering into every woman’s face; and many were below. I went between decks, and by-and-by I was afraid I had mistaken the vessel; I sat down–I had no spirit to stand; and every time the door opened I roused up and looked–but you never came. I was thinking what to do; whether to be put on shore in Ireland, or to go on to New York, and wait for you there;–if was the worst time of all, for I had nothing to do; and the suspense was horrible. I might have known,” said he, smiling, “my little Emperor of Russia was not one to be a steerage passenger.”
But Maggie was too much shaken to smile; and the thought of Edward lay heavy upon her mind.
“Then the fire broke out; how, or why, I suppose will never be ascertained. It was at our end of the vessel. I thanked God, then, that you were not there. The second mate wanted some one to go down with him to bring up the gunpowder, and throw it overboard. I had nothing to do, and I went. We wrapped it up in wet sails, but it was a ticklish piece of work, and took time. When we had got it overboard, the flames were gathering far and wide. I don’t remember what I did until I heard Edward’s voice speaking your name.”
It was decided that the next morning they should set off homeward, striving on their way to obtain tidings of Edward. Frank would have given his only valuable, (his mother’s diamond-guard, which he wore constantly,)as a pledge for some advance of money; but the kind Welsh people would not have it. They had not much spare cash, but what they had they readily lent to the survivors of the Anna-Maria. Dressed in the homely country garb of the people, Frank and Maggie set off in their car. If was a clear, frosty morning; the first that winter. The road soon lay high up on the cliffs along the coast. They looked down on the sea rocking below. At every village they stopped, and Frank inquired, and made the driver inquire in Welsh; but no tidings gained they of Edward; though here and there Maggie watched Frank into some cottage or other, going to see a dead body, beloved by some one: and when he came out, solemn and grave, their sad eyes met, and she knew it was not he they sought, without needing words.
At Abergele they stopped to rest; and because, being a larger place, it would need a longer search, Maggie lay down on the sofa, for she was very weak, and shut her eyes, and tried not to see forever and ever that mad struggling crowd lighted by the red flames.
Frank came back in an hour or so; and soft behind him–laboriously treading on tiptoe–Mr. Buxton followed. He was evidently choking down his sobs; but when he saw the white wan figure of Maggie, he held out his arms.
“My dear! my daughter!” he said, “God bless you!” He could not speak more–he was fairly crying; but he put her hand in Frank’s and kept holding them both.
“My father,” said Frank, speaking in a husky voice, while his eyes filled with tears, “had heard of it before he received my letter. I might have known that the lighthouse signals would take it fast to Liverpool. I had written a few lines to him saying I was going to you; happily they never reached–that was spared to my dear father.”
Maggie saw the look of restored confidence that passed between father and son.
“My mother?” said she at last.
“She is here,” said they both at once, with sad solemnity.
“Oh, where? Why did not you tell me?” exclaimed she, starting up. But their faces told her why.
“Edward is drowned–is dead,” said she, reading their looks.
There was no answer.
“Let me go to my mother.”
“Maggie, she is with him. His body was washed ashore last night. My father and she heard of it as they came along. Can you bear to see her? She will not leave him.”
“Take me to her,” Maggie answered.
They led her into a bed-room. Stretched on the bed lay Edward, but now so full of hope and worldly plans.
Mrs. Browne looked round, and saw Maggie. She did not get up from her place by his head; nor did she long avert her gaze from his poor face. But she held Maggie’s hand, as the girl knelt by her, and spoke to her in a hushed voice, undisturbed by tears. Her miserable heart could not find that relief.
“He is dead!–he is gone!–he will never come back again! If he had gone to America–it might have been years first–but he would have come back to me. But now he will never come back again;–never–never!”
Her voice died away, as the wailings of the night-wind die in the distance; and there was silence–silence more sad and hopeless than any passionate words of grief.
And to this day it is the same. She prizes her dead son more than a thousand living daughters, happy and prosperous as is Maggie now–rich in the love of many. If Maggie did not show such reverence to her mother’s faithful sorrows, others might wonder at her refusal to be comforted by that sweet daughter. But Maggie treats her with such tender sympathy, never thinking of herself or her own claims, that Frank, Erminia, Mr. Buxton, Nancy, and all, are reverent and sympathizing too.
Over both old and young the memory of one who is dead broods like a dove–of one who could do but little during her lifetime–who was doomed only to “stand and wait”–who was meekly content to _be_ gentle, holy, patient, and undefiled–the memory of the invalid Mrs. Buxton.
“THERE’S ROSEMARY FOR REMEMBRANCE.”
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%Mary Queen of Scots.%
This history is given here minute in every point of real interest, and without the encumbrance of useless opinions. There is no sentence thrown away–no time lost in mere ornament. Perhaps no book extant containing so few pages, can said to convey so many genuine historical facts. There is here no attempt to glaze over recorded truth, or win the reader by sophistry to opinions merely those of the author. The pure, simple history of Queen Mary is placed before the reader, and each one is left to form an unbiased opinion from events impartially recorded there. One great and most valuable feature in this little work is a map of Scotland, with many engravings of the royal castles and wild scenes connected with Mary’s history. There is also a beautiful portrait of the Queen, and a richly illuminated title-page such as only the Harpers can get up–_National Magazine._
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%Queen Elizabeth.%
Full of instructive and heart-stirring incident, displayed by the hand of a master. We doubt whether old Queen Bess ever before had so much justice done to her within the same compass. Such a pen as Jacob Abbott wields, especially in this department of literature, has no right to lie still–_Albany Express_.
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%Charles the First.%
We incline to think that there never was before so much said about this unfortunate monarch in so short a space; so much to the purpose; with so much impartiality; and in such a style as just suits those for whom it is designed–the “two millions” of young persons in the United States, who ought to be supplied with such works as these. The engravings represent the prominent persons and places of the history, and are well executed. The portrait of John Hampden is charming. The antique title-page is rich.–_Southern Christian Advocate._
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%Hannibal the Carthaginian.%
A new volume of the series projected by the skillful book-manufacturer, Mr. Abbott, who displays no little tact in engaging the attention of that marvellous body “the reading public” in old scholastic topics hitherto almost exclusively the property of the learned. The latter, with their ingenious implements of lexicons and scholia, will be in no danger of being superseded, however, while the least-furnished reader may gain something from the attractively-printed and easily-perused volumes of Mr. Abbott. The story of Hannibal is well adapted for popular treatment, and loses nothing for this purpose in the present explanatory and pictorial version.–_Literary World._
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%Maria Antoinette.%
In a style copious and yet forcible, with an expression singularly clear and happy, and in language exceedingly chaste and at times very beautiful, he has given us a plain, unvarnished narrative of facts, as he himself says, unclogged by individual reflections which would “only encumber rather than enforce.” The present work wants none of the interest inseparably connecting itself with the preceding numbers of the same series, but is characterized throughout by the same peculiar beauties, riveting the attention and deeply engraving on the mind the information with which they every where teem.–_Evening Mirror._