World's saints, and no doubt will some day-I don't believe he was influenced a feather's weight by learned disquisition or deduction. What stirred his nature was the great unknown,-the watery pathway that led none knew whither or to what. That is the true inspiration of the discoverer, it matters not in what domain,-the irrepressible desire to go where others have never been, to find the unknown, to walk in a path unpressed by others' feet, and then-to mock at the laggards!"

How the man's eyes burned! They were like two flashing spheres of tawny topaz set in the waxy pallor of his face, with the silver fringe of his white brows falling over their dark rims.

He paused a moment, evidently repressing himself with an effort. I could see that he was systematically treasuring his vital power.

"Pardon me," he resumed, after a moment, with a smile, " my hobby has led me away from my thought; not an unusual thing with men who have hobbies. I was saying that there are natures whom one cannot influence,-natures which seem to be shaped by surroundings rather than moved by internal forces, just as molten metal runs into the shapes made in the sand and becomes fixed and hard and inflexible. They may not be weak natures, but they represent vis inertia rather than inherent force. If a cannon-ball is merely rolled down an inclined plane, it will dash through a hillock of sand which would drive it out of its path if moving a thousand feet in a second. Such natures are unimpressible, at least by any force I can command. I can-or could, rather-impress, touch, make myself appreciable to the consciousness of Mr. Swallow at any distance and at almost any time. I do not know how I did it,-just by willing, wishing, determining that he should think of a particular subject. I could not always shape his thought, but could prescribe its direction. Mr. Gauge, now, is impervious to such influence. I am as familiar a presence to him as to Mr. Swallow, though he has only lately found it out. It is the same with you. I tried to get hold of you without letting Swallow know, but I might as well have tried to move a quicksand. I wanted you, and, as I was afraid I would not live until we could send forty miles and have you summoned by telegraph, I concluded to try my old power. I knew when the steamer sailed, and that it was the only chance to get you here in time. It was a foolish experiment. I succeeded, it is true, but it is strange it did not kill me. One wastes a lot of vital power every time he goes across the world, taps another on the shoulder, and compels him to think of him,-about the matter of which he is thinking, I mean. I don't intend to try it again, ever; while I live on earth, that is."

"You expect to use the faculty afterwards?" I asked, with an uneasy feeling.

"Most unquestionably," was the reply. "That is one reason I selected Mr. Swallow as my representative. I am telling you a good deal about myself, Mr. Fountain,-things, too, which I have never told any one else,-because I want to convince you that I have no ulterior motive that I am entirely sincere-in the proposition I am about to make to you. I ought not, perhaps, to have alluded to your love for my wife"

"Your wife!" I exclaimed.

"Certainly. Did you not know that Mrs. Murray is my wife?" "I knew that is-I supposed-" I stammered.

"I understand," he said. "You supposed there might have been a common-law marriage,—a marriage by acknowledgment, that is. Perhaps there was; perhaps not. It might have been a curious question if it had come to trial. No doubt it will be charged against me as one of my many sins, some day, that for years I maintained an illegal relation with the occupant of that pretty little home on the Bergen Heights. Yet the illegality was apparent only. She might have been my daughter, so far as any personal intimacy was concerned. I do not know why it was. I have no doubt she would have yielded to my wishes at any time. She regarded that as the tenor of the compact between us; and such was the inflexible candor of her nature that she would not have shrunk from the performance of her part of the bargain. But I wanted her to trust me, to honor me,-to love me, in short. I wanted rest, rather than excitement, the rest which only a loving, sympathetic nature can give. I was willing to wait. For years I went now and then for a few days' or a few hours' rest, as occasion served, to the cosey little nest over which she presided with such scrupulous care. I guarded her honor, and she respected my secret. Not once did she betray any dissatisfaction or ask to know more than I volunteered to tell her.

"At length my long forbearance bore its natural fruit: she loved the man who had respected her helplessness. Even then, though, it was more the love of the daughter than of the wife. She would have given her life for me because I had been so kind and good to her. She had sold herself voluntarily and coolly to save her mother from suffering and want, but she would have consummated the sacrifice willingly because I had forborne to use my power. It was just at this moment that you formed her acquaintance; and I saw that your society was not only agreeable to her, but that she began to long for that sense of approval among her associates which is an inherent necessity to the female mind. A man may be a social hermit, he may care very little how he is regarded by others,-but a woman must be respectable, or she is unhappy. Even in her lowest estate she must have some one to look upon her as an equal or a superior, or she cannot live. That is one of the moral differences of sex.

"It was in consequence of this that I arranged for her fictitious widowhood. It was not a difficult thing to do, and Fortune favored me, as she usually does one who is determined to do without her help. I fully intended to leave her free-I mean in her own estimationto marry you or any one else she might prefer. I am free to say that I had studied you up, and thought you would make her a good, faithful husband, who would devote himself to her happiness, be a competent guardian of the little estate I had provided should fall into her hands, and that with you she would lead a happy, peaceful, contented life, in which I would always be pleasantly and kindly remembered.

"Don't thank me," he continued, irritably, with an impatient gesture of his puffy white hand. "I did not intend to do it for your

sake, and had not a particle of good feeling for you while I was thus planning your happiness. It was her comfort, her happiness, her peace, I wished to secure. If I could have made her happy and you miserable at the same time, it would have pleased me still better. It is all the same, however. That has usually been the fate of my endeavors to sacrifice myself: it has become more convenient not to do it. About the time I had arranged everything so that you could marry the woman I loved, I found I could marry her myself, and concluded to do so. I do not know whether she would have married you if I had not been in existence, but I judge, from the reticence she has shown in speaking of you, that she had a more than usually kind feeling for you; and I will do you the justice to say, though I never liked you and never could like you, that I think you would have deserved her confidence and have done honor to her love. However, I determined to test her love, and, if she endured the test, to make her my wife. I professed to have suffered great losses, that I was going abroad broken in health, and asked her to go with me. The latter was true enough. For the past three years I have been paying the penalty for having strewed the path of life with those ashes of the brain' which are the sure precursors of decay. I could not avoid the revenge which nature takes upon the overworked American. I have fought with death ever since. I can see that you recognize the scars. I said nothing about the relation we were to sustain to each other, and she asked me no questions. I merely told her our absence would be an indefinite one. She came, as you know, prepared never to return. I saw you upon the dock after I had been carried aboard. I expected to find you there, and was glad I did. It spoke well for you as a man.

"Well, we were married as soon as we reached England. Is there any question as to its validity? I think not; though it will probably be contested as soon as I am dead. You know the reason? Yes, I was a bigamist,-not exactly intentionally, but at least recklessly. My first wife was a good enough woman,-much better than I deserved,but nervous, ambitious, anxious to get on, to be as good if not a little better than our neighbors. I was careless of little things, defiant of opposition, and possessed with the idea that I could make a machine that would sew better than a tailor-I was a tailor myself by trade-and as fast as a hundred tailors. She believed in my idea until the flour grew low in the barrel, the wood-shed empty, the little one ragged, and she realized that we were becoming the laughing-stock of the community. Then she insisted that I should stop inventing, for a while at least, and go to work. Her remonstrance angered me even more than the ridicule of my neighbors, and I finally sold the little property I had, gave her the proceeds, and, with my model under my arm, bade good-by to the little Western town and started on foot for that Mecca of the inventor, the rich and prosperous East.

"Our parting was not especially tender. Stung by want and humiliation, she did not hesitate to use sharp words, to taunt me with faults of which I had never intended to be guilty, and to express the hope that I would never return,—a wish which I promptly assured her should be fulfilled. Filled with anger, I changed my name as soon as

I got beyond the range of my acquaintance, using my middle name as a surname. This name long afterwards I had legitimatized,-in fact, just before leaving the country. In the mean time, I have used several others, though never again dropping entirely my identity,—only duplicating it. I soon met with success, and almost the first use I made of it was to send money to my wife. I was very careful never to send it twice through the same channel, and never in such a way that it could be traced back to me. Finally the amount sent was refused. She had, of course, divined its origin and refused to take support as an abandoned wife. I saw an account in the local paper of her ill treatment, also of her resolution to accept no further gratuity at my hands. Awhile afterwards she disappeared, and I was informed, when I had inquiries instituted, that both she and her child were dead.

"I confess I did not feel much sorrow. I had come to have a decided antipathy for her because she did not believe in my hobby. She thought I hated the child. The fact was, it only troubled me. I had no room in my mind then for anything but my idea. When this had become a success I would have taken care of them,-perhaps in time have become reconciled to my family; but I was not at all sorry when I found that I had none. After a time I married again, and was well paid for my conduct to my former wife. I was not suspicious. It never occurred to me that a woman having everything that wealth could buy could be unfaithful. I was absorbed in business, -how absorbed, only the American who is the architect of a great fortune can ever imagine. Almost at the same moment the fact of my second wife's perfidy and my first wife's existence became known to me. It was a perilous situation, but its very danger gave it a charm to my mind. I determined to make some atonement to my wife and her child, and to protect the woman known as my wife and her children from disgrace. It was a hard battle. I had to separate myself entirely from the latter, and yet do it in a way not to excite general comment. This fight had just ended when I sailed for Europe.

"My first wife finally died; the other had long been dead to me, and the overwhelming proof of her continued guilt had been put in form to be perpetuated for future use. This was the story, much extended, which I told 'Mrs. Murray' as we crossed the Atlantic, and I asked her to become my wife and help me make the best of what was left of a bad life. She consented, not, I think, without qualms, but because she is of that practical nature, so rare in woman, which seeks for the best thing that is really attainable, whether it be the ideal good or not. She has helped me very greatly by keeping always in my mind the pledge I made to her then. Thus far I have managed to avoid scandal,-I hardly know how. Of course society thinks my wife is my mistress, and that a woman who has never been my wife has a legal right to the name. In order to prevent a scandal which would blight the happiness of the woman I love, I must prevent the possibility of personal attack upon her after my death. I have taken certain steps, of which you know something, to secure that end; but they alone will not at least I am apprehensive that they will not be sufficient to save her from unpleasant attack. I can think of but one way to accom

plish that end; and that is, to ask you if you love her well enough to sacrifice yourself-your career, I mean, for you will not need to forego any comforts for her sake."

"I-I-do not understand you," I gasped, in amazement.

"Probably not," he responded, coolly; "and I have no notion of explaining myself. I simply ask you if you love my wife well enough to sacrifice something of your independence, possibly your dreams of domestic felicity, and certainly your professional prospects, to save her from sorrow, disgrace, and persecution."

"If I could be assured" I began.

"There are not many men who would question the assurance of Andrew M. Hazzard that one of his plans would not miscarry." "Does your wife know of your intentions?" "Not a word, and will not until my death." "She, of course, knows that you have summoned me ?" "She has no idea that I ever thought about you."

"Will I be permitted to see her during my stay?"

"You will make no stay. Whether you accede to my proposal or not, you will leave here to-night, and will neither see nor communicate with her until you learn of my death."

I rose and walked back and forth across the room once or twice. "And you believe my assent to your conditions will enhance her happiness?" I asked, at length.

"That is my conviction, and is the sole reason of my making this proposal."

"I will do what you wish," I said, going towards him and extending my hand.

"There is no need of that," he said, impatiently, waving my hand aside. "I know I am securing your comfort, ease, and happiness, but I do not like you any better for that. What I am doing is for her sake alone: you are a mere incident of her happiness. I hate you because I think you are an essential incident of it, and take this course only because I do not see any other way by which the end may be attained. I don't want to shake hands with you, but you know you can rely on my word."

"I will do what you wish," I said, coolly, as I walked back to my seat. "What are your instructions ?"

"You will return at once to London and take lodgings suitable to a gentleman of wealth and leisure. Go into society as little as you can, but make yourself familiar with the city and the surrounding country. Do not mind expense. You will find in this”—handing me an envelope as he spoke-" enough to serve your reasonable needs until my death. If you require more, let me know. You can engage in any study you choose, but no business. I would recommend that you study all European tongues. You may have need for them. Notify Gauge & Swallow that you have left their employ, and break off all communication with the New World except what is absolutely essential. You can go anywhere in Europe that you choose, taking care never to be more than twenty-four hours from Paris, and reporting to me every change of address before it is made. Be sure that the telegraph com