to show how the Normans had vaulted their apses. Yet, to make things "more comfortable" for modern dean and canon, the apse and the adjacent walls for about half the length of the room were pulled down, and the mutilated remainder was inclosed and floored and plastered so that not a sign of its splendid stones remained. A few years ago, however, these stones were again exposed to view, and the ground outside, once covered by the apse, was carefully examined. Several very ancient tombs were then identified, and in the library may now be seen three episcopal rings which were found within them one, set with a great sapphire, having been Ralph Flambard's. Our plan will show how the chapter-house opens upon one side of the cloisters and how its other sides are built against the church it self, the dormitory, and the refectory. From the earliest ages the arrangement was the same; but almost all parts of the buildings were more than once renewed. The cloister walks, now greatly modernized, date from the Perpendicular period, and so also do the dormitory and the refectory, though each of them is raised upon a much older vaulted basement. The dormitory formed for many years part of a canon's house, but has now been brought back as nearly as possible to its old estate. The wooden partitions which divided it into separate sleeping-cells have disappeared, of course; but one hardly regrets their absence, since it leaves free to the eye the whole vast interior — 194 feet in length lighted by ranges of noble traceried windows and covered by an oaken ceiling, rude yet massive and grand in effect, the great tree-trunks which form its beams having scarcely been squared by the axe. The room is now used to hold a portion of the large and valuable chapterlibrary and sundry other interesting collections, -of brilliant episcopal vestments, of coins and seals, and of Roman, Celtic, old-English, and Norman antiquities of Northumbrian origin.

The main portion of the library, including a collection of illuminated MSS. which has scarcely a superior in England outside of the British Museum, is housed in the old refectory. Here too are kept the relics which were found in St. Cuthbert's grave and the fragments of his earlier coffins. He who would understand the far-off roots and the first crude growths of medieval art in the north of England finds his best place of study in these richly filled and wisely administered libraries at Durham.*

* I should be very ungrateful did I forget to note that in one important respect Durham stands at the head of the English cathedrals. Here of all places the tourist feels himself a welcome guest and one for whose pleasure and instruction infinite pains are will ingly taken by all dignitaries and officials, from the highest to the humblest. The local hand-book, written by Canon Greenwell, is a pearl of its kind. And I find I

Many minor rooms and buildings lie around or near these cloisters, chief among them in interest the old priors' kitchen. I think there is but one other kitchen of the sort still intact in England, and that one- at Glastonbury — now stands isolated in a field and never knows the warmth of useful fires, while this one still serves the household of the dean. It is a great octagonal structure with a steep roof which covers a remarkable vaulted ceiling-so stately a structure that a passer-by used to modern ways of living and modern architectural devices would (but for its chimneys) surely say, A baptistery or a chapel - never, A kitchen. The old priors' house also remains as the dwelling of the modern deans — altered, of course, and in the usual practical, irreverent way, the private chapel forming now three chambers.

Beyond all these lies the dean's lovely gar den, the quiet circle of the canons' houses and the quiet sweep of their own outer gardens looking down upon the Wear. So much remains at Durham, in short, that it is hard to remember that certain things have perished even here for example, the great hall of the monastery and its church-like hospital.

The picture is not quite so exquisite as that which greater ruin has wrought at Canterbury. But it is as beautiful in a soberer fashion, and it has the added charm of a lifted outlook over a splendid landscape. Surely there can be nothing like it in all the world—nothing at once so homogeneous and so infinitely varied, so old in body yet so alive and fresh in mood. There is no class or kind of building which is not represented between the castle on the northern and the garden walls upon the southern verge of this rich promontory. There is scarcely a year of the last eight hundred which has not somewhere left some traces on it. And there is no sort of life which it has not seen, and the sort which rules to-day is as wholly different from the ancient sorts as fancy could conceive. Yet nowhere can we choose a date and say, Here the old life ceased and the new began. Nowhere can we put finger on stone and say, This was to serve religion only, or material existence only, or only war or ostentation; or, This was for use alone, and this alone for beauty. All times are here and all things are here, and all aims and motives have here found expression; but all things are intertwined in one great entity, and all times join in one vast historic panorama.

am but one of many who remember the head-verger, Mr. Wetherell, as a pearl of his kind. More than one widely traveled architect has cited him in my hearing as the best guide he had met in Europe - fully and correctly informed, patient and clear in exposition, interesting to the ignorant. yet instructive even to the professional sight-seer, and filled with an enthusiasm as wise and discriminating as it is warm and contagious.

This means that this is England. Not in some new Birmingham hot with money-making fires, black with art-destroying cinders, and deaf to the voice of long-dead years; not in some old deserted Kenilworth or Fountains, beautiful only, useful no longer, a monument of death and destruction, a milestone to show how wide a space may lie between the currents of medieval and of modern life—not there do we find the real England really pictured; but here in this Durham which was once military and monastic and feudal, and is now commercial, collegiate, domestic, and in politics boldly liberal, yet where there has been neither sudden change nor any forgetting and very little abandonment or loss-only slow, natural growth and development and the wear and tear and partial retrogressions which all growth, all development must involve. Modern life standing upon ancient life as on a worn but puissant and respected pedestal; learning alive despite the hurry of trade; religion alive despite the widening of the moral horizon; Protestantism grown from Catholicism yet not harshly dissevered from its rituals or traditions, nor scornful of its artistic legacy; things monastic supplanted by things domestic within the Church yet the Church still served with reverence and dignity and grace; the aristocrat, the soldier, and the prelate still keeping some shreds of civil power notwithstanding the upgrowth of the plebeian layman's power - this is what England means to those who see her land and her living as a whole. This and all of this is what Durham means to those who study its stones and its records together. All this is typified in that splendid throne of its bishop-princes in which a bishop still sits but a prince no longer. As this throne still stands in use and honor, so the old order of things is still revered in the land, while the loss of the

color and gold which once adorned it may seem to tell of the gradual perishing away of England's old artistic gift, and the mutilation of the effigy it covers, of the shorn authority of that class which once had no rivals in its ruling.

XII.

It is needless to try to tell which are the best points for seeing Durham from a distance they are so many and each in turn seems so supremely good. Some of the very best, moreover, we are very sure to get from the railroad station which lies a little out of the town to the north-west and from the road which thence brings us into it over a great bridge near the castle.

It would be hopeless to try to describe the outward view which may be had from the cathedral's central tower. It is not a very pleasant task to climb to the top of any such old construction. Medieval builders had little care for the life or limbs of sight-seers; or perhaps medieval sight-seers did not seek for "views" as do we to-day. It is like a bad dream to clamber up this tower - up a narrow winding staircase to the church's roof and then up a still narrower and steeper and darker staircase to the roof of the tower, turning about on exiguous steps uneven from the tread of centuries, and feeling our way by the rough convex stones. But it is like another sort of dream to come out at last, after more than three hundred painful mountings, upon the broad parapeted platform and see the magnificent wide panorama undulating away into the hilly distance and enlivened beneath the church's feet by the silver twistings of the rock-bound Wear. Hence, only a mile away, we can see where the battle of Neville's Cross was fought; and here the monks crowded to see it, in terror, doubtless, lest defeat might mean an instant siege within their home. M. G. van Rensselaer.

Rose Hawthorne Lathrop.

PART I.

HEN the little party, consisting of Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine, Mr. Enderton, my newly made wife, and myself, with the redbearded coxswain and the two sailor men, bade farewell to that little island in the Pacific where so many happy hours had been passed, where such pleasant friendships had been formed, and where I had met my Ruth and had made her my wife, we rowed away with a bright sky over our heads, a pleasant wind behind us, and a smooth sea beneath us. The long-boat was comfortable and well-appointed, and there was even room enough in it for Mr. Enderton to stretch himself out and take a noonday nap. We gave him every advantage of this kind, for we had found by experience that our party was happiest when my father-in-law was best contented. Early in the forenoon the coxswain rigged a small sail in the bow of the boat, and with this aid to our steady and systematic work at the oars we reached, just before nightfall, the large island whither we were bound, and to which, by means of the coxswain's pocket compass, we had steered a direct course. Our arrival on this island, which was inhabited by some white traders and a moderate population of natives, occasioned great surprise, for when the boats containing the crew and passengers of our unfortunate steamer had reached the island, it was found that Mrs. Lecks, Mrs. Aleshine, and myself were missing. There were many suppositions as to our fate. Some persons thought we had been afraid to leave the steamer, and, having secreted ourselves on board, had gone down with her. Others conjectured that in the darkness we had fallen overboard, either from the steamer or from one of the boats; and there was even a surmise that we might have embarked in the leaky small boat-in which we really did leave the steamer and so had been lost. At any rate, we had disappeared, and our loss was a good deal talked about, and, in a manner, mourned.

In less than a week after their arrival the people from the steamer had been taken on board a sailing vessel and carried westward to their destination.

We, however, were not so fortunate, for we remained on this island for more than a month. During this time but one ship touched there, and she was western bound and of no use to us, for we had determined to return to America. Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine had given up their journey to Japan, and were anxious to reach once more their country homes, while my dear Ruth and I were filled with a desire to found a home on some pleasant portion of the Atlantic seaboard. What Mr. Enderton intended to do we did not know. He was on his way to the United States when he left the leaking ship on which he and his daughter were passengers, and his intentions regarding his journey did not appear to have been altered by his mishaps.

By the western bound vessel, however, Mrs. Aleshine sent a letter to her son.

Our life on this island was monotonous, and to the majority of the party uninteresting; but as it was the scene of our honeymoon, Mrs. Craig and I will always look back to it with the most pleasurable recollections. We were comfortably lodged in a house belonging to one of the traders, and although Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine had no household duties to occupy their time, they managed to supply themselves with knitting materials from the stores on the island, and filled up their hours of waiting with chatty industry. The pipes of our sailor friends were always well filled, while the sands of the island were warm and pleasant for their backs, and it was only Mr. Enderton who showed any signs of impatient repining at our enforced stay. He growled, he grumbled, and he inveighed against the criminal neglect of steamship companies and the owners of sailing craft in not making it compulsory in every one of their vessels to stop on every voyage at this island, where, at any time, intelligent and important personages might be stranded.

At last, however, we were taken off by a three-masted schooner bound for San Fran

cisco, at which city we arrived in due time and in good health and condition.

We did not remain long in this city, but soon started on our way across the continent, leaving behind us our three sailor companions, who intended to ship from this port as soon as an advantageous opportunity offered itself. These men heard no news of their vessel, although they felt quite sure that she had reached Honolulu, where she had probably been condemned and the crew scattered. As some baggage belonging to my wife and my fatherin-law had been left on board this vessel, I had hopes that Mr. Enderton would remain in San Francisco and order it forwarded to him there; or that he would even take a trip to Honolulu to attend to the matter personally. But in this I was disappointed. He seemed to take very little interest in his missing trunks, and wished only to press on to the East. I wrote to Honolulu, desiring the necessary steps to be taken to forward the baggage in case it had arrived there; and soon afterwards our party of five started eastward.

It was now autumn, but, although we desired to reach the end of our journey before winter set in, we felt that we had time enough to visit some of the natural wonders of the California country before taking up our direct course to the East. Therefore, in spite of some petulant remonstrances on the part of Mr. Enderton, we made several trips to points of interest.

From the last of these excursions we set out in a stage-coach, of which we were the only occupants, towards a point on the railroad where we expected to take a train. On the way we stopped to change horses at a small stage station at the foot of a range of mountains; and when I descended from the coach I found the driver and some of the men at the station discussing the subject of our route. It appeared that there were two roads, one of which gradually ascended the mountain for several miles, and then descended to the level of the railroad, by the side of which it ran until it reached the station where we wished to take the train. The other road pursued its way along a valley or notch in the mountain for a considerable distance, and then, by a short but somewhat steep ascending grade, joined the upper road.

It was growing quite cold, and the sky and the wind indicated that bad weather might be expected; and as the upper road was considered the better one at such a time, our driver concluded to take it. Six horses, instead of four, were now attached to our stage, and as two of these animals were young and unruly and promised to be unusually difficult to drive in the ordinary way, our driver concluded to ride one of the wheel horses, postilion fashion,

and to put a boy on one of the leaders. Mr. Enderton was very much afraid of horses, and objected strongly to the young animals in our new team. But there were no others to take their places, and his protests were disregarded. My wife and I occupied a back seat, having been ordered to take this comfortable position by Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine, who had constituted themselves a board of instruction and admonition to Mrs. Craig, and, incidentally, to myself. They fancied that my wife's health was not vigorous and that she needed coddling; and if she had had two mothers she could not have been more tenderly cared for than by these good women. They sat upon the middle seat with their faces towards the horses, while Mr. Enderton had the front seat all to himself. He was, however, so nervous and fidgety, continually twisting himself about, endeavoring to get a view of the horses or of the bad places on the road, that Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine found that a position facing him and in close juxtaposition was entirely too uncomfortable; and consequently, the back of their seat being adjustable, they turned themselves about and faced us.

The ascent of the mountain was slow and tedious, and it was late in the afternoon when we reached the highest point in our route, from which the road descended for some eight miles to the level of the railroad. Now our pace became rapid, and Mr. Enderton grew wildly excited. He threw open the window and shouted to the driver to go more slowly, but Mrs. Lecks seized him by the coat and jerked him back on his seat before he could get any answer to his appeals.

"If you want your daughter to ketch her death o' cold you'll keep that window open!" As she said this, she leaned forward and pulled the window down with her own strong right arm. "I guess the driver knows what he is about," she continued, "this not bein' the first time he 's gone over the road."

"Am I to understand, madam," said Mr. Enderton, "that I am not to speak to my driver when I wish him to know my will?"

To this question Mrs. Lecks made no answer, but sat up very straight and stiff, with her back square upon the speaker. For some time she and Mr. Enderton had been "out," and she made no effort to conceal the fact.

Mr. Enderton's condition now became pitiable, for our rapid speed and the bumping over rough places in the road seemed almost to deprive him of his wits, notwithstanding my assurance that stage-coaches were generally driven at a rapid rate down long inclines. In a short time, however, we reached a level spot in the road, and the team was drawn up and