contracting circles, about the forbidden tree, till she has brought him to take the unwholesome morsel. The male bird blazes in gorgeous plumage and swims alone on the glassy pool, but the sky is speckled with sombre feathered females who disturb his repose, drive him into a corner and force him to divide his worms, and drudge for them in collecting twigs and dabbing mud about their nest. The male glow-worm browses on the dewy blades by his moony lamp; it is the lack-light female that buzzes about him, coming out of obscurity, obscure herself, flattering and fettering him and extinguishing his lamp.
Where culture prevails, the sexes change their habits with ostentation, but remain the same in proclivities behind disguise. The male is supposed to pursue the female he seeks as his mate, to hover round her; and she is supposed to coyly retire, and start from his advances. But her modesty is as unreal as the nolo episcopari of a simoniacal bishop-elect. Bashfulness is a product of education, a mask made by art. The cultured damsel hunts not openly, but like a poacher, in the dark. Eve put off modesty when she put on fig-leaves; in the simplicity of the country, her daughters walk without either. The female gives chase to the male as a matter of course, as systematically and unblushingly in rustic life, as in the other grades of brute existence. The mother adorns her daughter for the war-path with paint and feathers, and sends her forth with a blessing and a smile to fulfil the first duty of woman, and the meed of praise is hers when she returns with a masculine heart, yet hot and mangled, at her belt.
The Early Church set apart one day in seven for rest; the Christian pagans set it apart for the exercise of the man hunt. The Stuart bishops published a book on Sunday amusements, and allowed of Sabbath hunting. They followed, and did not lead opinion. It is the coursing day of days when marriage-wanting maids are in full cry and scent of all marriageable men.
A village girl who does not walk about her boy is an outlaw to the commonwealth, a renegade to her sex. A lover is held to be of as much necessity as an umbrella, a maiden must not go out without either. If she cannot attract one by her charms, she must retain him with a fee. Rural morality moreover allows her to change the beau on her arm as often as the riband in her cap, but not to be seen about, at least on Sunday, devoid of either.
Phoebe Musset intended some day to marry, but had not made up her mind whom to choose, and when to alter her condition. She would have liked a well-to-do young farmer, but there happened to be no man of this kind available. There were, indeed, at Peldon four bachelor brothers of the name of Marriage, but they were grown grey in celibacy and not disposed to change their lot. One of the principal Mersea farmers was named Wise, and had a son of age, but he was an idiot. The rest were afflicted with only daughters—afflicted from Phoebe's point of view, blessed from their own. There was a widower, but to take a widower was like buying a broken-kneed horse.
George was comfortably off. He owned some oyster pans and gardens, and had a fishing smack.
But he was not a catch. There were, however, no catches to be angled, trawled or dredged for. Phoebe did not trouble herself greatly about the future. Her father and mother would, perhaps, not be best pleased were she to marry off the land, but the wishes of her parents were of no weight with Phoebe, who was determined to suit her own fancy.
As she approached the 'City,' she saw Glory surrounded by young boatmen, eager to get a word from her lips or a glance from her eyes. Phoebe's heart contracted with spite, but next moment swelled with triumph at the thought that it lay in her power to wound her rival and exhibit her own superiority, before the eyes of all assembled on the beach.
'There is the boy from the Leather Bottle, George,' said she, 'he shall take the horse.'
De Witt descended and helped her to alight, then directly, to her great indignation, made his way to Mehalah. Glory put out both hands to him and smiled. Her smile, which was rare, was sweet; it lighted up and transformed a face somewhat stern and dark.
'Where have you been, George?'
'I have been driving that girl yonder, what's-her-name, to Waldegraves.'
'What, Phoebe Musset? I did not know you could drive.'
'I can do more than row a boat and catch crabs, Glory.'
'What induced you to drive her?'
'I could not help myself, I was driven into doing so. You see, Glory, a fellow is not always his own master. Circumstances are sometimes stronger than his best purposes, and like a mass of seaweed arrest his oar and perhaps upset his boat.'
'Why, bless the boy!' exclaimed Mehalah. 'What are all these excuses for? I am not jealous.'
'But I am,' said Phoebe who had come up. 'George, you are very ungallant to desert me. You have forgotten your promise, moreover.'
'What promise?'
'There! what promise you say, as if your head were a riddle and everything put in except clots of clay and pebbles fell through. Mehalah has stuck in the wires, and poor little I have been sifted out.'
'But what did I promise?'
'To show me the hull in which you and your mother live, the "Pandora" I think you call her.'
'Did I promise?'
'Yes, you did, when we were together at the Decoy under the willows. I told you I wished greatly to be introduced to the interior and see how you lived.' Turning to Mehalah, 'George and I have been to the Decoy. He was most good-natured, and explained the whole contrivance to me, and—and illustrated it. We had a very pleasant little trot together, had we not, George?'
'Oh! this is what's-her-name, is it?' said Mehalah in a low tone with an amused look. She was neither angry nor jealous, she despised Phoebe too heartily to be either, though with feminine instinct she perceived what the girl was about, and saw through all her affectation.
'If I made the promise, I must of course keep it,' said George, 'but it is strange I should not remember having made it.'
'I dare say you forget a great many things that were said and done at the Decoy, but,' with a little affected sigh, 'I do not, I never shall, I fear.'
George De Witt looked uncomfortable and awkward. 'Will not another day do as well?'
'No, it will not, George,' said Phoebe petulantly. 'I know you have no engagement, you said so when you volunteered to drive me to Waldegraves.'
De Witt turned to Mehalah, and said, 'Come along with us, Glory! my mother will be glad to see you.'
'Oh! don't trouble yourself, Miss Sharland—or Master Sharland, which is it?'—staring first at the short petticoats, and then at the cap and jersey.
'Come, Glory,' repeated De Witt, and looked so uncomfortable that Mehalah readily complied with his request.
'I can give you oysters and ale, natives, you have never tasted better.'
'No ale for me, George,' said Phoebe. 'It is getting on for five o'clock when I take a dish of tea.'
'Tea!' echoed De Witt, 'I have no such dainty on board. But I can give you rum or brandy, if you prefer either to ale. Mother always has a glass of grog about this time; the cockles of her heart require it, she says.'
'You must give me your arm, George, you know I have sprained my ankle. I really cannot walk unsupported.'
De Witt looked at Mehalah and then at Phoebe, who gave him such a tender, entreating glance that he was unable to refuse his arm. She
