A Terrible Adventure

Theophilus Lane and Francia Abbot were old colloge couipanions and tast fi-iends; but though still young, their paths in life had diverged. Lane had become au ecclesiastic. He was uot so broad perhaps in his religious views as his enunoiation of theni from the pulpit was long, but novertheless he was an excellent l'ellow. Abbot was a barrister, eimnently respectable in his conduct and behavior, and a regular attendant at his parish church, but not a glutton for sermons. Ho had a logical mind. But the two men had still one ta6te left in comraon- that of mountaineering. They both dclighted in the strength of their legs. They did not talk much together - uo great pedestrians talk. A few words inay be interchanged during the first six miles, but a soleiuu silence soon intervenes; the distante bet ween thero, as they plod on side by side, imperceptibly widens ; they are hot, they are thirsty, they are each a little bit cross because tho other shows no external symptoras of weariness ; not until kindly nature drops the veil of evening on the scène does either propose to halt Then they eat enormously, and fall asleep iinraediately af terwards like anacondas. In that part of the Tyrol into which the unreflecting legs of these two men had carried them in August last, there happened to be nothing to eat. There was no meat, no wine, no beer - nothing but a sort of thin meal uiade of the same bran which piu-cushious are stuffed at home, stirred up in uiilk, and which they described eulogistically as " very füling." Tho effect, indeed, was to give thern both the appearance of pin-uushions. The Divine, being used to fasting, suffered no pai'ticular iucouvenience from this scanty tare, but the Lawyer did. His spirits were greatly subdued - a circumstance which must be the apology for his apparent pusillanimity in the crisis to be presently described. Hunger will tame a [ion; and it is probable that a continuous diet of bran and milk woulJ inuch diminish the spirit of the king of beasts, even if it did not induce him to lie down with the lamb: This was Abbot's case. - What he would have given for a lauib, on the sixth day of that involuntary abstinence, would make the high meat prices of our own metropolis seeni cheapness. The seventh day (even in the Tyrol) was Sunday, and after their bran breakfast, instead of setting out to walk as usual, the Rev. Lane thus addressed his friend. His voice, (as the matter was subsequently described to me by an unseen spectator of these proceedings, one whose beard ind green spectacles coucealed his nationility, and who kept his mouth shut lest ie also should fall a victim to the oppressor) - Lane's voice, I say, had anunctuous persuasiveness about it which it did not exhibit upon a week day ; aud while he spoke ho held his doomed companion by lis glittering eye, like the Ancient Mariner in the bailad. " Don't you think, Abbot, it would be very nice if we had a church service this norning 'f' " It would be charming," answered the other, confidently ; " only unfortunately ;here is nobody to attend it ! There is not a Christian, or at least a fellow-counryiuau - for I ain sure that hairy man with spectacles Cannot be one - within a aundred miles of us, so I don't see where you are to get jour congregation." " My dear fellow," auswered the Divine, softly, laying his hand in an episcojal manner upon the other'sknees, "there s you, and there is I." The earnest gravity of this remark, oined with the contemplation of what it was evidently leadiug up to, was such as .o paralvze poor Abbot's already enfeebed powers ; and his grammatical sense, which at home would have begn outraged 3 y the expression " There is I," was now only faintly irritated. " There is I," he repeated mechanically. " Just so," continued tho Divine, with cheerful acquiescence. " I will read the service to you !" " But there is no room where we can be done, my good soul, " pleaded Abbot. In one part of the rude apartment in which they sat was a party of natives among whom they included the bearded stranger) carousing over bran and milk, and in another the goat which supplied the milk was being taught a varie'ty of accomplishments by the junior members of their host's fainily - especially to stand with all tour legs upon a penny Tjiece, generously supplied for that purpose by one of the two visitors. " Nay, my friend, there is our bedroom." The romark was undeniable ; thero was their bed-room - accessible, though with difficulty, by a ladder that led out of the common room through a hole in the ceiling. In the early days of Christian persecution, orin Coveninting times in Scotland, such an apartment would, without doubt, havfi had its advantages as a place of public worship, since nobody would havs ever suspected its being used for that purpose even by the most fanatical ; but in that year of grace, 1873, it did seem a little - well, incongruous. That two people, and one of them the olergyman, should unite in supplications in a rickety chainber, with a roof so Bloping that the congregation couldn't stand up even when so commanded by the Kubric, and with a running accompaniment of Tyrolese jargon coming through the open space where the ladder was, rovived in Abbot a transient sense of the ridiculous; but he was gone too far (through bran and milk) to discuss the matter. They .accordingly climbed up the ladder into this wretched apartment, and from the breast-pocket of his coat tho liov, Theophilus Laño produced a pair of snowwhite bands, and tied them iound his neck. His design, it was therefore evident, had been premeditated, and in his countenance was an expression not only of fixed resolve, but of placid triumph. " Has he brought a surplice with him," thougbt the nnhappy congregation, " or will ho put on the counterpane ?" He did not, however, proceed to that extremity, but sat down, with the washing-stand - the only article of furnituro in tho room - between him and hia victiin. A spectator who had not overheard thpir previous convorsation would have imagined that thej' were about to baptizn an infant. The vietim had never beon so near an cfficiating clergyman bofore, and the Divine apparently fascinated him. He could not keep bis eyea off thoso band?, one of whieh he porceived liad a spot of iron-inould upon it ; would it annoy him (the eongrogation seemed to be thinking) if he should mention the fact? Not of course now - that was not to be thought of; but when the service was over - if it ever should be over. He was spared nothiug, absolutely nothing, except the Prayer for ruin. If a collection shouH presently be made i'rom the congregation, would he have to drop sornothing into the soap-dish, he wondered, and found himsolf reading the dire'ctions in the Prayer Book, iustead of follnwing his pastoi-. They were so close togothor that it was iinpossible to follow him. " In choirs and places where they sing, liere followeth the antheru." Will he propose an anthem V The congregation could not sing. It would do anything to oblige; it had no forco of will to resist its minister; bran and inilk had sapped its vitáis; but it could not sing. The roader was, for the most part, monotonous, but at times his voice gathered strength and volume- it seemed to the unscen spectator (who was looking through the hola in tho floor) at the wrong times. When he was talking about " the sinner," for example, he could not help casting a glance in the d,irection of his congregation, as much as to say, " You hear ilutl '.'" Abbot's lips were moving all this tinae- but, as ray informant imagined, by nojneans in davotional exercises. " This is hard," he seemed to be muttering to himself - " this is really very hard ; ho shall never havo this chance agaiu, by jingo- never, never. I will take care' not to travel with him in future, except on week days ; or if 1 do, I will take a Dissenter with us - somebody that will protect one from him ; who will have something to say on tho other side of the question. IIow monotonous he is getting." Here the vietim (as my informant supposes) must havo dropped asleep, for the tones of the Divine had a sharpness in fchem whieh savored of reproof. But flesh and blood - or at least flesh and bran and milk - could not iudefinitely endure such an infliction. The service had lasted three-quarters of an hour, though the congregation had not dared to look at its watch. However, it was over now. The Eev. Lane was about to dismiss his hearer, " Now shall the priest let them depart," says the Rubric. A quaint but adnirable sentence. What was he about 'i ' This is terrible ! this is shameful !" tho't ;he spectator, (and so do I). He produces a sort of blank copy-book from the pocket whence ho took the bands. He is about to preuch a sermón - a sermón, too, of his own eomposition. ' Tho victim's emotions became obviousy almost too much for him. His countenance revealed him to be indignant, irritated, and even revengeful, but he was not strong. The very worm it is said, will turn, but not when it has been fed for six days on nothing but bran and milk - besides there was no room to turn. He was obliged to sit and listen. When heheard limself addressed as " my beloved brethren," and even as " my dear brothers and sisters," he did not reuionstrate. ín spite of those plural expiessions, it is my inormant's conviction that the discourse íad not been delivered before. There were descriptions of Tyrolean scenery in it, allusions to a diet of locusts and honey, and other local coloring that proclaimed it to be a recent effort of its author, j'et it was obviously frained for a larger audience. Poor Abbot was the houseíeeper to whom this clerical Moliere reíearsed his composition before trying it on liis congregation at home. lts recep;ion was insured, even it should not prove ;o be an oratorical success. Tied and jound by a delicato sense of the becomng, the unfortunate congregation had to it it through. If every point did not ' teil," at all events it could not be escaped, the missile being cast as it were at uch a very short range. When the Diine rose upon the wind of eloquence, my nformant describedhis own sensatious as hose of one who is blown froin a gun. - ft'hat then must the se-nsationsof the vic;ira have beeu, who was still nearer to he iinpassioned preacher? The victim never revealed his sufferngs, (thougb it ishighly improbable that .e ever forgot them,) but my informant adjures me to make them public. " Not," says he, " that it is possible that uch a catastrophe oan oceur in my own case ; I will take good caro of that. But . hope (in spite of what Laño said in his erinon) that I sometimes think of others ; and I adjure you to put the human race upon their guard. Let no one travel alone with an eHthusiastic Divine in a district unfrequented by his fellow coun;rymen, and towards the lattorend of the week, lest a worse thing betide him than ever happened to that unhappy and deressed young man." " Well, upon my Ufé," said I, " I don't ee how tho adventure could have been more terrible." " Yes, it inight," retnrned ho in a hush ed voice. " I have had dreams - nightmare dreama - since I was witness to that occurrence, wherein the infliction took a 'orm even yet more aggravated. Supose that this Divine, so young and enhusiastic, and with such excellent lungs, ïad had the gift of preaching extempore ? What would have stopped him 'i Certainly not a congregation enfeebled by bran and ruilk. He might have gone on forever !" And there is no doubt he might.