Part 3
If people who have these facilities for sending letters securely provided for them choose to run the risk of loss, they deserve very little sympathy if the chance goes against them. Last year an unregistered letter containing a cheque was alleged to have been stolen in the post. It was found, however, to have been duly delivered by being pushed under the front door, and afterwards to have been torn in pieces by some puppies inside the house. The fragments were in the end discovered in the straw of the dog-kennel. Now, had the sender only spent 2d. in registering this letter, a receipt would have been taken on its delivery, and all chance of its falling into the paws of the puppies would have been prevented.
But it is wonderful what people, penny-wise and pound foolish, will sometimes do to save 2d. A few years back the sealing-wax on a letter was found to contain £1 10s. in gold coins. There could hardly be a more stupid way of sending money.
If coin, or watches, or jewellery are posted in letters or packets without registration, and the fact is discovered, the Post Office people bring into force a system of registration by compulsion, and on delivery charge a fee of 8d. in addition to the ordinary postage.
When coins are sent in a letter they should on no account be put in loose, but should be packed so as to move about as little as possible. The best way is to take a card, and, cutting quite through to the other side, make a cross on it for each coin; then slip the coin into the cross, so that it is held in its place by the tongues of cardboard, two on each side.
Who owns letters whilst they are in the post? In Great Britain the ownership of a letter whilst it is in the post lies in the Queen, as represented by her Postmaster-General and her Secretary of State. "Neither the sender nor the person to whom it is sent can claim to interfere with a letter whilst it is in the Post Office. Only the warrant of a Secretary of State can stay its delivery." Once a letter is dropped into a letter-box it is like a spoken word, it cannot be recalled.
After letters come postcards, which were introduced into this country in October, 1870, and have proved a great convenience to many people, saving them both time and money. By means of reply postcards you can make sure of an answer from a correspondent without putting her to any expense or to any trouble worth mentioning.
The back of the postcard is for the message; nothing must be put on the front except the address. This limitation of space is useful for the cultivation of brevity; but those who have a great deal to say may derive consolation from the fact that on the back of a postcard you can, by writing small, easily put at least four hundred and sixty words! We do not, however, say that such a performance, good enough for amusement, would be like that of a woman of business.
All business letters ought to be preserved. They should be folded neatly longways and all of a size, and docketed, as it is called--that is to say, the date and the name of the sender and his (or her) address, and the subject, should be put on the back thus:
6th September, 1886. MARTIN ROSE AND CO., Liverpool. Remittance, £10 19s. 2d.
Do not, however, crowd these particulars together, as has been done here for convenience in printing; leave a considerable space between the first and second, and the third and fourth lines. When letters are folded and docketed they should be tied up in the order of their dates, or put away in pigeon holes under the different letters of the alphabet. One can never tell when it may be necessary to refer to old letters on matters of business, so it is prudent to keep them all. Doing so and turning them over occasionally is also useful for giving us a humble opinion of ourselves; we see by the light of additional experience how we might often have managed things much better than we did.
Besides letters and postcards, telegrams furnish another means of communication. For a telegram sent to any place in the United Kingdom, the charge is sixpence for the first twelve words, and a halfpenny for every word after the first twelve. Addresses are charged for, so a sixpennyworth of telegraphing does not represent a long message, but by ingenuity--and a business woman is nothing without ingenuity--a few words may be made to mean a great deal. The cost of a reply to a telegram may be prepaid.
About the newspaper post, the book post, and the parcel post, not much need be said. Always be careful about wrappers. A great many newspapers and books escape from their wrappers every day, and land in the returned letter office. In sending parcels the packing is often a weak point; it is not so much that people are either handless or stupid, they are just thoughtless. "It must be borne in mind," says the Postmaster-General, "although, of course, every care will be taken by the officers, that a parcel with fragile or perishable contents must be several times handled before it reaches its destination, and will probably have to be packed with many others of a different kind and shape, or more weighty and bulky. Eggs, butter, and fruit, especially delicate fruit, such as grapes and peaches, should be placed in strong boxes and so placed as not to shift. Fresh flowers should be carefully packed in strong boxes; but cardboard boxes should not be used for the purpose, as they are often reduced to pulp by the moisture which exudes from the contents. Fish or game should be carefully packed in strong boxes, or hampers, or in perforated boxes."
Remember that some things are forbidden to be sent by post--live animals, for instance. This prohibition is very little regarded by some people. Last year, in Dublin alone, two hens, eight mice, and two hedgehogs were stopped on their way through the post. One of the hens which was addressed to a veterinary surgeon in London, was in bad health, and though carefully attended to, died in the office. The rest of the animals were given up alive to the senders.
Certificates of the posting of parcels can be got at all post offices. If you have any doubt about the trustworthiness of the person entrusted with the posting of a parcel, instructions should be given to bring back a receipt. A few months ago the Post Office was charged at Liverpool with the non-delivery of a bottle of wine and a box of figs. It turned out, however, that the missing goods had never come under its charge, the person to whom the packet had been given to post having eaten the figs and drunk the wine.
Parcels can also be insured against loss and damage by the payment of a small sum. Paying a penny insures to the extent of £5 and twopence to the amount of £10.
In order to understand the outs and ins of the Post Office--and it is a subject with which every sensible person should be familiar--let a girl invest sixpence in a copy of the Post Office Guide, a publication of which an edition is issued every quarter. She will there find everything necessary to be known about the posting of letters, postcards, newspapers, book packets, and parcels to places in the United Kingdom, or abroad, the sending of telegrams, the rates for money and postal orders, and the regulations of the Savings Bank. To turn over its 300 pages or so is decidedly interesting. One sees what a complicated machinery is now employed for the convenience of the public, what wonders--to speak of letters alone--can be done for a penny, and how thousands of miles can be reduced to insignificance by the magic of twopence-halfpenny.
In the twelve months from the 31st of March, 1885, to the same day of this year, the number of letters delivered in the United Kingdom was 1,403,547,900, giving an average of 38.6 to each person in the kingdom. The total number of postcards was 171,290,000. Adding to the letters and postcards the book-packets, newspapers, and parcels which passed through the Post Office during the twelve months, we have a grand total of 2,091,183,822, which shows an average to each person of 57.5.
VARIETIES.
THE "WOMAN OF STENAY."
"And so you have not heard the story of the 'Woman of Stenay'?" said a Lorraine peasant. "It was in war-time, and she offered a barrel of wine to a detachment of Austrians, saying--
"'You are thirsty, friends. Drink. You are welcome to all my store.' And as she spoke she drank a cupful in their honour.
"The soldiers accepted with pleasure, and in a few minutes four hundred men were writhing on the ground in agony.
"Then the 'Woman of Stenay' rose, and with her dying breath shrieked out--
"'You are all poisoned! _Vive la France!_'
"She then fell back a corpse."
This is the legend of Lorraine, and the memory of its heroine is revered by the peasantry as highly as that of Charlotte Corday.
SINGING SERVANTS.
Tusser, in his "Points of Huswifry united to the Comforts of Husbandry," published in 1570, recommends the country housewife to select servants who sing at their work as being usually the most painstaking and the best. He says--
"Such servants are oftenest painful and good That sing in their labour, as birds in the wood."
A HINT FOR WORKERS.--St. Bernard has said that the more he prayed and read his Bible the better he did his ordinary work and the more clearly and regularly did he conduct his correspondence. An increase of private devotion will be found not to lessen one's power of work or one's efficiency in ordinary duties.
OUR OWN SELVES.--How can you learn self-knowledge? Never by meditation, but best by action. Try to do your duty, and you will soon find what you are worth. What is your duty? The exigency of the day.--_Goethe._
USELESS ANXIETY.--I shall add to my list as the eighth deadly sin that of anxiety of mind, and resolve not to be pining and miserable when I ought to be grateful and happy.--_Sir Thomas Barnard._
THE MOONLIGHT SONATA.--The "Moonlight Sonata" is an absurd title which has for years been attached, both in Germany and England, to one of Beethoven's sonatas. It is said to have been derived from the expression of a German critic comparing the first movement to a boat wandering by moonlight on the Lake of Lucerne.
[Illustration: THE SHEPHERD'S FAIRY]
THE SHEPHERD'S FAIRY
A PASTORALE.
BY DARLEY DALE, Author of "Fair Katherine," etc.
## CHAPTER I.
THE FAIRY'S ORIGIN.
"Die Eifersucht ist eine Leidenschaft der mit Eifer sucht muss Leiden schaffen."--_German Proverb._
Very many years ago, in a valley a few miles from the coast, there stood a French château, beautifully situated in a handsome park near the Norman village of Carolles. The rich woodland scenery, the green pastures with their large wild fences now laden with wild roses; the shady lanes, whose banks will soon be covered with the long, bright green fronds of the hartstongue, and the delicate drooping trichomanes; the fine timber, and the picturesque farmhouses with their thatched roofs nestling in the valleys--all tend to give a home-like English air to the scenery of Normandy. And the district in which the Château de Thorens stands possesses all these attractions for an English eye. Not that any English people lived in the château; the De Thorens were French, or rather Norman, to the backbone, descended from the great duke, and proud as Lucifer of their birth. Pride and poverty are generally supposed to go together; and though poor is perhaps hardly the word to apply to people who could afford to live in the ease and luxury which prevailed at Château de Thorens, yet for their rank the De Thorens were not rich, and, consequently, after the fashion of many French families, there were three generations of them now all living under the ancestral roof.
First there was the old baroness, a picturesque old lady with very white hair and piercing black eyes, with whom we have very little to do; then there was her eldest son, the present baron, for his father had been dead some years, and his beautiful young wife, whom he was so passionately fond of that he was jealous--dreadfully jealous--of her love for her baby, a little girl a few months old; and, lastly, there were the baron's three younger brothers, who with Père Yvon, the chaplain, made up the family party. The two younger brothers were mere boys, still under Père Yvon's charge, for he acted as tutor to them as well as chaplain; but Léon de Thorens was a young man of five-and-twenty, only a year or two younger than the baron. He was a fine, handsome man, tall and thin, with his mother's fine black eyes and small well-cut nose and mouth. He was of a bold, reckless nature, full of animal spirits, the very life of the house when he was at home, which was seldom, as he owned a yacht, in which he spent a great deal of his time. He was his mother's favourite son, and both he and she had often privately regretted that he was not the eldest.
The baron was smaller and fairer than Léon, and not so handsome, though there was a strong family likeness between the brothers. He was of a quieter disposition, and his restlessness took an intellectual rather than a physical form, his wanderings being confined to the shelves of the valuable library which the château boasted, instead of extending over the seas on which Léon spent so much of his time. The baron's studious nature had endeared him very much to Père Yvon, with whom he was a prime favourite, and who had never shown him any of the severity of which the other brothers often complained, but, on the contrary, had erred on the opposite side with the baron, whose wishes had never been crossed in any way, and who had grown up to think himself the one important person in the world to whom the convenience of everyone else must be sacrificed.
For the first year of their married life the pretty baroness had contributed as much as Père Yvon to spoil her husband, whose every whim she had humoured until her baby was born, and then, much to his astonishment, the baron found that his beautiful, gentle wife had a will of her own, and, what was still worse in his eyes, a large place in her heart for someone else besides himself, and although that someone else was only his infant daughter, the baron was jealous.
In vain had he urged that the baby should be sent away to some peasant to nurse until it was a year or two old, as he and all his brothers had been, after a very common custom in French families. No, the baroness would not hear of such a thing; she could not live without her baby, and every moment she could spare she spent by its cradle. Indeed, so infatuated was she with her new possession, whose every movement was a delight to her, that she did not notice the baron became daily more and more morose, and that an ominous frown had settled on his fine forehead, while his mouth was closed with a determination that boded ill for his wife and daughter. But the baroness lived so much in her child that she did not observe the change in her husband; and as he never allowed the baby to be brought into his presence, the baroness saw but little of him except at meals, when all the others were present, and Léon's wild spirits covered his brother's depression and silence.
At last, one fine June morning, matters reached a climax, when the family sat down to their one o'clock _déjeuner_. The baroness was late; the first course was finished, and still she did not appear.
"Where is Mathilde, Arnaut?" asked the old baroness.
"I don't know," said the baron, sulkily.
"I do," said Léon; "she is worshipping at the shrine of that precious baby of yours, Arnaut. Why on earth don't you send it away till it is old enough to amuse us?"
"Go and tell Madame la Baronne the soup is already finished," said the baron to a servant at his elbow; but he vouchsafed no further answer.
"I think Arnaut has suggested that the baby should be sent away, but Mathilde objects," remarked the old baroness.
"Send it away without asking her, then. Give her a pug instead; it will be much more amusing, and not half the trouble the baby is," said Léon.
Here the servant returned to say madame would take her _déjeuner_ in the nursery, as the nurse was out and she could not leave the baby.
"Really, Mathilde is too absurd, when there are at least three or four other servants in the house who could look after the baby as well as the nurse," said the old baroness, helping herself to some omelette.
"She is mad," muttered the baron, angrily.
"Quite, all women are; there can be no doubt about that. Look here, Arnaut, it is quite clear if you don't send that infant away, you might just as well live _en garçon_, like me, as I foresee you won't have much of Mathilde's society now," said Léon.
"It does not require much foresight to predict that," said the baron, bitterly.
"Well, if Mathilde won't send it away, just hand it over to me the next time I take a cruise, which will be as soon as ever there is wind enough to fill my sails, and I'll place the child somewhere where there is no fear of Mathilde getting it again till it is of a reasonable age," said Léon.
The idea of handing the baby over to the tender mercies of Léon struck them all as so comic that a general laugh, in which all but the baron joined, greeted this speech, which was forgotten as soon as it was uttered by the speaker.
A few days after Léon announced that he was going on board his yacht that evening; a south wind was blowing, and he should take a cruise up the Channel. Would the baron go with him? They were sure to have fine weather, and it would be delightful at sea in this heat. The baron declined the invitation, as he was a wretched sailor; but that evening, when he and Léon were smoking after dinner, he said, suddenly, "Where are you going, Léon?"
"I don't know; it depends on the wind. I may run over to England, or I may only go to the Channel Isles. I shall see."
"Shall you touch anywhere?"
"Oh, yes, I shall go ashore; I shan't take provisions for more than a week. Why?"
The baron looked round the verandah in which they were sitting to make sure that they were alone, and having satisfied himself of this he leant forward and said, in a half-whisper, "Tiens, Léon! Will you help me? I am determined to stand it no longer; it is wearing my life out; I have not a moment's peace. If I don't get rid of it I believe I shall go mad."
"What is it you are talking of? I'll help you if I can, but what is wearing your life out?" said Léon.
[Illustration: THE BARONESS.]
"The baby, of course," said the baron.
"The baby! Well, but what do you want me to do with that! I can't kill it, you know."
"Of course not, but you said in joke the other day you would take it with you on one of your trips, and put it out to nurse. I wish to heaven, Léon, you'd do it in reality. It is no use my sending it to anyone near here; Mathilde would go after it the next day. My only chance is to send it somewhere where it will be safe, of course, and well looked after, but where Mathilde can't go after it, and as she would go to the end of the world for it if she knew where it was, it must go where she can't find it; she must not know where it is. No one, indeed, need know but you, for as far as I am concerned the less I know about it at present the better; it has spoilt all my happiness. Mathilde is so wrapped up in that child she does not care a fig for me now; in fact, I rarely see her. If you can only put that infant safely out of our way for a year or two, I'll never forget it, Léon."
"Are you in real sober earnest, Arnaut?" asked Léon, who, in his astonishment, had risen to his feet, and was puffing away vigorously at his cigar.
"Of course I am. I am willing to pay handsomely for it, and I shall depend upon you putting it where it will be well taken care of. As for all the rest, I leave it to you to take it where you like--Australia if you wish, only don't tell me where it is, or I might cut my own throat by telling Mathilde if she makes a great scene, as she will when it is gone. Will you do it, Léon?"
"Whew!" whistled Léon. "I don't care for the work, for if anything should happen to the child Mathilde would never forgive me nor you either. However, if you insist, I think I could manage it, but as I am going to start in two or three hours, there is not much time. I must go down to the yacht and speak to my men first. If I may tell them I am taking the child by your express wish I could manage it, I think. The next difficulty is where to take it, but I have an idea about that, so I'll be off now, and see what I can arrange. I shall ride, so I shall be back in an hour."
"Tell them anything you like, except not to let anyone know where you leave the child," replied the baron, as Léon started on an errand which, in spite of his protest to the contrary, was thoroughly after his own heart; indeed, any mad freak such as this was quite in his line.
Among his crew he had an English sailor who acted as carpenter, and, as Léon often said, was worth two or three French sailors in a gale or an emergency. He knew the Channel, too, as well as a pilot, and, indeed often acted in that capacity; he was an honest, trustworthy man--at least, so Léon thought; and as he rode over the hills to Carolles, he decided to take this man into his confidence, and see if he could help him; it was possible this Englishman knew of some of his own countrywomen who would undertake the charge of the child.