fracture of the skull, and die in a commonplace fashion, which is of no interest to the books or the profession.

66

""T war n't 'Vander's deed! It could n't be!" she declared passionately.

For the first time he faltered. There was a pause. He could not speak.

"I done it!” cried the idiot, in shrill glee.

Then Evander regained his voice. ""T war me ez done it," he said huskily, turning away to the anvil with a gesture of dull despair. "I done it!"

Fainting is not a common demonstration in the mountains. It seemed to the bewildered group as if the girl had suddenly dropped dead. She revived under the water and cinders dashed into her face from the barrel where the steel was tempered. But life returned enfeebled and vapid. That vivid consciousness and intensity of emotion had reached a climax of sensibility, and now she experienced the reaction. It was in a sort of lethargy that she watched their preparations to depart, while she sat upon a rock at the verge of the clearing. As the wagon trundled away down the road, laden with the stolen goods, one of the posse looked back at her with some compassion, and observed to a companion that she seemed to take it considerably to heart, and sagely opined that she and 'Vander must "hev been a-keepin' company tergether some. But then," he argued, "she's a downright good-lookin' gal, ef she do be so redheaded. An' thar air plenty likely boys left in the mountings yit; an' ef thar ain't, she kin jes' send down the valley a piece fur me!" and he laughed, and went away quite cheerful, despite his compassion. The horsemen were in frantic impatience to be off, and presently they were speeding in single file along the sandy mountain road.

Cynthia sat there until late in the day, wistfully gazing down the long green vista where they had disappeared. She could not believe that Evander had

really gone. Something, she felt sure, would happen to bring them back. Once and again she thought, she heard the beat of hoofs, - of distant hoofs. It was only the melancholy wind in the melancholy pines.

They were laden with snow before she heard aught of him. Beneath them, instead of the dusky vistas the summer had explored, were long reaches of ghastly white undulations, whence the boles rose dark and drear. The Cumberland range, bleak and bare, with its leafless trees and frowning cliffs, stretched out long, parallel spurs, one above another, one beyond another, tier upon tier, till they appeared to meet in one distant level line somewhat grayer than the gray sky, somewhat more desolate of aspect than all the rest of the desolate world. When the wind rose, Pine Mountain mourned with a mighty voice. Cynthia had known that voice since her birth. But what new meaning in its threnody! Sometimes the forest was dumb; the sun glittered frigidly, and the pines, every tiny needle encased in ice, shone like a wilderness of gleaming rays. The crags were begirt with gigantic icicles; the air was crystalline and cold, and the only sound was the clinking of the hand-hammer and the clanking of the sledge from the forge on the mountain's brink. For there was a new striker there, of whom Pete Blenkins did not stand in awe. He felt peculiarly able to cope with the world in general since his experience had been enriched by a recent trip to Sparta. He had been subpoenaed by the prosecution; in the case of the State of Tennessee versus Evander Price, to tell the jury all he knew of the violent temper of his quondam striker, which he did with much gusto and self-importance, and pocketed his fee with circumspect dignity.

"Vander looks toler'ble skimpy an' jail-bleached, so Pete Blenkins say," remarked Mrs. Ware, as she sat smok

ing her pipe in the chimney corner, while Cynthia stood before the warping bars, winding the party-colored yarn upon the equidistant pegs of the great frame."Pete 'lowed ter me ez he hed tole you-uns ez 'Vander say he air powerful sorry he would never l'arn ter write, when he went ter the school at the Notch. 'Vander say he never knowed ez he would hev a use fur sech. But law! the critter hed better be studyin' 'bout the opportunities he hev wasted fur grace; fur they say now ez Jube Tynes air bound ter die. An' he will fur true, ef old Dr. Patton air the man I take him fur."

""T war n't 'Vander's deed," said Cynthia, her practiced hands still busily investing the warping-bars with a homely rainbow of scarlet and blue and saffron yarn. It added an embellishment to the little room, which was already bright with the firelight and the sunset streaming in at the windows, and the festoons of red pepper and popcorn and peltry swinging from the rafters.

"Waal, waal, hev it so," said her mother, in acquiescent dissent, "hev it so! But 't war his deed receivin' of the stolen goods; leastwise, the jury b'lieved so. Pete say, though, ez they would n't hev been so sure, ef it war n't fur 'Vander's resistin' arrest an' in an' about haffen killin' Jubal Tynes. Pete say ez 'Vander's name fur fightin' an' sech seemed ter hev sot the jury powerful agin him."

"An' thar war nobody thar ez would gin a good word fur him!" cried the girl, dropping her hands with a gesture of poignant despair.

""T war n't in reason ez thar could be," said Mrs. Ware. "Vander's lawyer never summonsed but a few of the slack-jawed boys from the Settlemint ter prove his good character, an' Pete said they 'peared awk'ard in thar minds an' flustrated, an' spoke more agin 'Vander 'n fur him. Pete 'lows ez they hed ter be paid thar witness-fee by the State, too,

on account of 'Vander hevin' no money ter fetch witnesses an' sech ter Sparty. His dad an' mam air mighty shiftless

always war, an' they hev got that hulking idjit ter eat 'em out 'n house an' home. They hev been mightily put ter it this winter ter live along, 'thout 'Vander ter holp 'em, like he uster. But they war no ways anxious 'bout his trial, 'kase Squair Bates tole 'em ez the jedge would app'int a lawyer ter defend 'Vander, ez he hed no money ter hire a lawyer fur hisself. An' the jedge app'inted a young lawyer thar; an' Pete 'lowed ez that young lawyer made the trial the same ez a gander-pullin' fur the 'torney-gineral. Pete say ez that young lawyer's ways tickled the 'torneygineral haffen ter death. Pete say the 'torney-gineral jes' sot out ter devil that young lawyer, an' he done it. Pete say the young lawyer hed never hed more 'n one or two cases afore, an' he acted so foolish that the 'torney-gineral kep' all the folks laffin' at him. The jury laffed, an' so did the jedge. I reckon 'Vander thought 't war mighty pore fun. Pete say ez 'Vander's lawyer furgot a heap ez he oughter hev remembered, an' fairly ruined 'Vander's chances. Arter the trial the 'torney-gineral 'lowed ter Pete ez the State hed hed a mighty shaky case agin 'Vander. But I reckon he jes' said that ter make his own smartness in winning it seem more s'prisin'. 'Vander war powerful interrupted by thar laffin' an' the game they made o' his lawyer, an' said he did n't want no appeal. He 'lowed he hed seen enough o' jestice. He 'lowed ez he 'd take the seven years in the pen'tiary that the jury gin him, fur fear at the nex' trial they'd gin him twenty-seven; though the 'torney-gineral say ef Jube dies they will fetch him out agin, an' try him fur that. The 'torney-gineral 'lowed ter Pete ez 'Vander war a fool not ter move fur a new trial an' appeal, an' sech. He 'lowed ez 'Vander war a derned ignorant man.' An' all the folks round the

How Cynthia lived through that winter of despair was a mystery to her afterward. Often, as she sat brooding over the midnight embers, she sought to picture to herself some detail of the life that Evander was leading so far away. The storm would beat heavily on the roof of the log cabin, the mountain wind sob through the sighing pines; ever and anon a wolf might howl, in the sombre depths of Lost Creek Valley. But Evander had become a stranger to her imagination. She could not construct even a vague status that would answer for the problematic mode of life of the 66 valley folks" who dwelt in Nashville, or in the penitentiary hard by. She began to appreciate that it was a narrow existence within the limits of Lost Creek Valley, and that to its simple denizens the world beyond was a foreign world, full of strange habitudes and alien complications. Thus it came to pass that he was no longer even a vision. Because of this subtle bereavement she would fall to sobbing drearily beside the dreary, dying fire, only because of this, for she never wondered if her image to him had also grown remote. How she pitied him, so lonely, so strange, so forlorn, as he must be! Did he yearn for the mountains? Could he see them in the spirit? Surely in his dreams, surely in some kindly illusion, he might still behold that fair land which touched the sky the golden splendors of the sunshine sifting through the pines; fly ing shadows of clouds as fleet racing above the distant ranges; untrodden woodland nooks beside singing cascades; or some lonely pool, whence the gray

deer bounded away through the red sumach leaves.

Sombre though the present was, the future seemed darker still, clouded by the long and terrible suspense concerning the wounded officer's fate and the crime that Evander had acknowledged. "He could n't hev done it," she argued futilely. ""T war n't his deed."

She grew pale and thin, and her strength failed with her failing spirit, and her mother querulously commented on the change.

"An' sech a hard winter ez we-uns air a-tusslin' with; an' that thar ewe a-dyin' ez M'ria traded fur my little calf, ez war wuth forty sech dead critters; an' hyar be Cynthy lookin' like she hed fairly pegged out forty year ago, an' been raised from the grave, - an' all jes' 'kase 'Vander Price hev got ter be a evil man, an' air locked up in the pen'tiary. It beats my time! He never said nothin' 'bout marryin', nohow, ez I knows on. I never would hev b'lieved ez you-un would hev turned off Jeemes Blake, ez hev got a good grist-mill o' his own an' a mighty desirable widder-woman fur a mother, jes' account of 'Vander Price. An' 'Vander will never kem back ter Pine Mounting no more 'n Lost Creek will."

Cynthia's color flared up for a moment. Then she sedately replied, "I hev tole Jeemes Blake, and I hev tole you-uns, ez I count on livin' single."

"I'll be bound ye never told 'Vander that word!" cried the astute old woman. "Waal, waal, waal!" she continued, in exclamatory disapproval, as she leaned to the fire and scooped up a live coal into the bowl of her pipe, "a gal is a aggervatin' contrivance, ennyhow, in the world! But I jes' up an' tole Jeemes ez ye hed got ter lookin' so peaked an' mournful, like some critter ez war shot an' creepin' away ter die somewhar, an' he hed n't los' much, arter all." She puffed vigorously at her pipe; then, with a change of tone,

"An' Jeemes air mighty slack-jawed ter his elders, too! He tuk me up ez sharp. He 'lowed ez he hed no fault ter find with yer looks. He said ye war pritty enough fur him. Then my dander riz, an' I spoke up, an' says, 'Mebbe so, Jeemes, mebbe so, fur ye air in no wise pritty yerself.' An' then he gin me no more of his jaw, but arter he hed sot a while longer he said, 'Far'well,' toler❜ble perlite, an' put out."

After a long time the snow slipped gradually from the mountain top, and the drifts in the deep abysses melted, and heavy rains came on. The mists clung, shroud-like, to Pine Mountain. The distant ranges seemed to withdraw themselves into indefinite space, and for weeks Cynthia was bereft of their familiar presence. Myriads of streamlets, channeling the gullies and swirling

among the bowlders, were flowing down. the steeps to join Lost Creek, on its way to its mysterious sepulchre beneath the mountains.

And at last the spring opened. A vivid green tipped the sombre plumes of the pines. The dull gray mists etherealized to a silver gauze, and glistened above the mellowing landscape. The wild cherry was blooming far and near. From the summit of the mountain could be seen for many a mile the dirt-road in the valley, a tawny streak of color on every hill-top, or winding by every fallow field and rocky slope. A wild, new hope was suddenly astir in Cynthia's heart; a new energy fired her blood. It may have been only the recuperative power of youth asserting itself. To her it was as if she had heard the voice of the Lord; and she arose and followed it. Charles Egbert Craddock.

IN one of the public squares of the city of Messina there stands a colossal bronze statue, by Andrea Calamach, which was erected in the year 1572, in honor of the great naval battle of Lepanto. The exposure of three centuries has left no trace of the gilding which originally adorned this noble statue, but the event and the man that it commemorates have not ceased to shine in the pages of history. For the figure, which is sheathed in rich armor and grasps the triple truncheon of the Holy League, is that of Don John of Austria, who followed up his successes over the Moors by saving Christendom from the supremacy of the Turks. He was only twenty-four years of age when he won Lepanto, and his previous experience was so romantic that nothing seemed impossible in a career which had thus far set probabilities at defiance. The daz

zling splendors of his early triumphs deepened the gloom which shadowed his later years, and his death, at the age of thirty-one, added the final touch of pathos to a life for which it appeared as if fortune must have some compensating favors in reserve.

The career of Don John of Austria, however, has an interest beyond that of personal successes and disappointments, for it illustrates a mighty conflict of principles and institutions. In that great sixteenth century in which he lived, he played the double part of the champion of civilization against the infidel and of the supporter of Spanish despotism against the growing power of civil and religious liberty as represented in the revolt of the Netherlands. The qualities which he displayed in upholding a cause which is repugnant to modern ideas of justice and humanity help us

to understand the reactionary ideas and institutions of his age, and to appreciate the character of their supporters. To account for the influence exercised by the Inquisition, we must recognize its hold not only upon Torquemada and Alva, but upon Isabella of Castile and Don John of Austria. Nothing is more misleading in history than the tendency to judge men and events by present standards of moral and intellectual progress, and to condemn individuals and peoples for not reaching a plane of enlightenment which is the result of a more advanced civilization. So far is the complexion of human actions dependent upon education and environment that a man who burned heretics in the sixteenth century might be an opponent of the vivisection of animals if he lived in the nineteenth, and a member of the Council of Blood be an officer of the Humane Society.

Fresh interest has been given to the career of Don John of Austria by the publication of the late Sir William Stir ling-Maxwell's elaborate biography; and M. Forneron, in his recent Histoire de Philippe II., has added to the stock of information concerning the hero of Lepanto which has been furnished by such modern historians as Ranke and Prescott and Motley.

The romance which colors the career of Don John of Austria began with his birth. The reputed son of the Emperor Charles V. by Barbara Blomberg, an humble resident of Ratisbon, he was kept in ignorance of his imperial origin till he had reached the age of twelve. Yet he had been removed from his mother's care soon after his birth, which according to the best authorities, took place on the 24th of February, 1547. From what is known of Barbara Blomberg's disposition, which twenty years later tried the patience of the Duke of Alva, who had been deputed by Philip II. to look after her, her illegitimate son may be thought to have had a lucky

escape from her influence. Her singing is said to have allayed the melancholy of Charles V.; and although her voice sounded harsh to Alva, it should be remembered that he was hardly the person to evoke harmony, especially from a woman who had lost a husband since her liaison with the emperor, and who was naturally irritated by the grim duke's efforts to restrain her extravagance, to prevent her from marrying again, and even to immure her in a Spanish nunnery.

When, in after years, Don John himself, who had not seen his mother since he was a baby, came to the Netherlands as a royal governor, he induced her to yield to the king's desire, and make her home in Spain. She is said to have repaid his efforts, which had been preceded by a liberal allowance in addition to the royal pension, by denying that he was the emperor's son. This unmotherly gibe was naturally turned to account by Don John's enemies, but it is of little value as evidence. The position of Commissary of Brussels which Charles V. bestowed upon Barbara Blomberg's husband, who rejoiced in the name of Jerome Pyramus Kegel; the pension which he settled upon her on his death-bed; and the efforts of Philip II. to comfort her impoverished widowhood and prevent her from disgracing his father's memory and from clouding his brother's prospects, confirm the contemporary belief in Don John's imperial parentage.

It was no doubt the lowly position of the boy's mother that deterred Charles V. from publicly acknowledging him as a son, and giving to him something of the consideration which was so early shown to the emperor's natural daughter, Margaret of Parma, whose mother was of a high-born Netherland family. Though imperial favor could dignify its recipient, of whatever social rank, the irresponsible victim of illicit love was at the mercy of paternal caprice in after