upwards of two years in England, taking part as an Independent in the hot controversy between the Independents and Presbyterians, denouncing the persecution of which the Baptists and others were the victims in America, and saying, in illustration of the greater toleration manifested in the motherland, "New England is becoming old, while Old England is becoming new." He associated with Milton, reading Dutch to him, and hearing him read in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and French. He notes that "grammar rules begin to be esteemed a tyranny;" and he says that he taught the two sons of a Parliament man a foreign tongue in the same way English is taught to children, "by words, phrases, and constant talk." He returned to Rhode Island in the summer of 1654, leaving behind him his coadjutor Mr. Clarke, who ten years afterwards obtained from Charles II. the charter of Rhode Island under which that State flourished for one hundred and eighty years. In their petition to the King, the colonists said, "It is much in our hearts to hold forth a lively experiment, that a most flourishing civil state may stand, and best be maintained, with a full liberty of religious concernments.' The charter amply met their wishes. Charles II. thought that the foundation of the charter which his father had granted to the Company of Massachusetts Bay, was "freedom of confreedom of conscience." The acts of the Massachusetts Puritans having shown that they placed a different interpretation on the charter, it was determined that no mistake should be made as to the intention of the Rhode Island charter, this being shown in the following clause: "No person within the said Colony, at any time hereafter, shall be any wise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question, for any difference in opinion in matters of religion; every person may at all times fully and freely enjoy his own judgment and conscience in matters of religious concernments." Williams was always ready to serve his fellow-men. When the general rising of the Indians under King Philip began in 1675, he accepted a commission as Captain of the Militia, and, though he was then seventy-six, he diligently laboured to drill and discipline the troops for service in the field. When Providence was threatened with attack, he went forth and tried to persuade the Indians to spare it. The older chiefs were disposed to grant his request, but the fury of the younger men could not be restrained, so that he had the mortification of witnessing the destruction by fire of the greater part of the town, including the hall in which the records were kept. He died early in 1683, being then upwards of eighty years of age. Roger Williams had many peculiarities, the chief of which was an indisposition to accept a final decision concerning religious questions. His ideal of a true Church was so high as 'to be unattainable. For a time he accepted the doctrines of the Baptists; but, during the greater part of his later years, he was a "Seeker," that is, he was in quest of a form of religious worship which should fulfil every possible condition as to divine origin and divine sanction. His eccentricities detract nothing from his services. It is unnecessary to say more in praise of Roger Williams, whom Milton styles "the noble confessor of religious liberty," than to add the words which Milton wrote to an Italian friend: "We rejoiced in the zeal of that extraordinary man and most enlightened legislator, who, after suffering persecution from his brethren, persevered, amidst incredible hardships and difficulties, in seeking a place of refuge in the sacred ark of conscience." The Puritans of Massachusetts were never more impolitic than when they sent Roger Williams into banishment, and punished his adherents by cutting them off from commercial and neighbourly intercourse. Had the enlightened views of Williams and his fellows in Rhode Island pervaded Massachusetts at an earlier day, the records of that colony might have been unstained with entries about the execution of Quakers and witches. It is contended that Williams was not persecuted because he advocated the supremacy of conscience, but that he was legally and properly punished for seditious conduct. The legality of the sentence passed and carried into effect is unquestionable. It would be as foolish to assert the contrary as to deny that Laud had the law upon his side when he dealt with English Puritans, and that Alva was acting legally when Dutch Protestants groaned under his tender mercies. What we lack is an account of the whole matter from the point of view of Williams. His adverse critics derive their inspiration from the statements of his opponents. Both those persons who laud him too unreservedly, and those by whom he is treated with scant consideration, concur in admitting that his principles are now the pride and glory of Massachusetts. More than any one man, Roger Williams is the founder of that modern New England which is the model of a free and well-governed State, and which is regarded by the civilised world with unqualified approbation. CHRISTOWELL. A Dartmoor Tale. By R. D. BLACKMORE, AUTHOR OF "LORNA Doone," etc. CHAPTER XLVIII.-A STROKE OF BUSINESS. IT T is all very well for strong-willed people, to stand up for their rights, and to kick against their wrongs, and to shove the world out of its way, to get their own. But how much more worthy of consideration (and therefore how much less likely to get it) are they, who being of a weak-willed sort, rejoice in the joys of the good folk around them, and soothe their own woes, with the woes of others! Dicky Touchwood was under urgent orders, to render himself up, on Monday morning, without more clothes than he could put upon his back, to the driest of all the dry-salters of Plymouth, Mr. Growgray of Stonehouse Wall. Dicky had neither strong mind, nor strong will, nor anything else very strong about him; except the desire to be pleased, and as an echo (weaker, but generally on the premises, when the weather permitted it) a desire to please all who pleased him; and the echo's main refrain was Beer-Beer, after the rain, and Beer again-let nobody ask for beer, in vain." This form of sympathy is perhaps of all sympathies the noblest. It touches a keythe tap-key perhaps—of the human system, which frees the best fluid, and speeds the quickest thrill, through the human barrel, up to its oral vent-peg. When it was reported, at Touchwood Park, before servicetime on Sunday, that Squire Dicky was to be turned out, and sent into a bacon-shop-for that was what it came to-there was not a man, and much more a woman, in, or around the Park, and belonging to it, who did not cry scandal, and get up in haste to see it. Dicky was the hero of the day, and felt it. Instead of withdrawing from the public gaze, he put on his brightest apparel, and went to church, with some fine independent farmers, who cared not a snap for Sir Joseph. "We'll see you through it, sir; you keep your back up," was the comfort, and counsel, he received on every side; and several young ladies, who had thought him "rather fast," longed to kiss him, in the absence of witnesses. "Am I to be debarred from my own son?" Lady Touchwood asked, with the concentrated essence of pathos, in her voice and eyes. "Shall he be torn from my arms, XXII-56 before I have fitted up his dressing-case? Oh, Sir Joseph, you are a wilful man, and you always have your own sad way! But reflect, I implore you; ponder, I implore you, the results of this sudden, and cutrageous whim." It is not sudden; and it is no whim. I have had it in my mind, for months. You The know nothing of the circumstances. boy wants pulling down; we all want pulling down; and now we shall have it, with a vengeance. To-morrow, I shall see the auctioneer, about selling this place, this gilded millstone round my neck, which has been the ruin of me; and off we go into lodgings at Plymouth." "After all we have done, to be a credit to you!" Her ladyship burst into a wild flood of tears. Through all the hot weather, she had kept her temper, in her daughter's absence, so that she scarcely knew herself; and this was all the reward she got! But Sir Joseph had nothing more to say. He had put on the shabbiest clothes, he could find-and he had some of most friendly shabbiness-although it was Sunday, and he ought to go to church, at least once, for the sake of example. He treated his partner in life to a sniff, which meant, cry away, as long as it amuses you;" and then he walked off to his own little room, and locked himself up, with some cash-books he had brought. "You may "He may starve, if he likes; but you don't catch me at it," Squire Dicky exclaimed, when his sister brought him word, that the table was not to be laid for dinner; "I suppose he's broke at last. I have always been expecting it; and that has made me so thrifty. I heard an old chap at Cambridge say-chousing, and carousing, leads to outhousing;' and we shall all have to turn out to-morrow. Not that we have had much carousing, however. What blunt have you got, to begin the world with, Judy ?” "I am not going to tell you," his sister answered; "you'd get it all out of me, and spend it, before the shops were open." Well, I'll tell you what to do. Marry old Short, and make a crib for us. I don't approve of the 'wide, wide world.' And a dry-salter I never will be; I never will be a dry-salter; sooner would I lose my liberty, by putting my neck into a halter. There, I made that in church to-day, with the ladies admiring my waistcoat. Not so dusty, for your most obedient." Adversity will indeed have sweet uses, if it fetches your slang out of you. But in reward for your brilliant stanza, I will invite you to dinner to-day. In my room at six o'clock. Mother will be there. She has been crying so, and she looks so poorly, that I cannot ask your friend. He must think he has fallen among strange people, to get no dinner for two days." circles, the master of the house is the master of the dining-room. But feminine,—or perhaps rather I should say, according to the way in which you look at it-masculine licence stops there, my dear. Good society has always maintained, as one of its first rules of existence, that the drawing-room is the ladies' realm. In my room at six the ladies' realm. There they may do anything they like, among themselves, without being interfered with. They may lock the doors, they may play pianoforte, they may order up anything from the cellar, thatthat they can get the keys to. When your father built this house-and I am sure, I wish that he had never done it, to be a 'millstone round his neck,' and to turn us, neck and crop, out of it-I took the trouble to buy a book, laying down the laws about great people, their rooms, and their dress, and their habits of feeding, and the way they behave to one another, and to the people they have nothing to do with. I knew it all, well enough, being of a highly respectable family myself, my dear; as you may find yet, if your poor father goes to prison; but it is a great point to have anything printed, because it must be impartial. Therefore, I shall order you some dinner in the drawing-room, and come myself to see you eat it ; and you will be welcome to bring in that large young man from Trinity-this trouble has driven his name out of my head-I mean, of course, the one whose bottles your dear papa kicked over." "Not he! He is a gentleman, and regards it as one of the ups and downs of trade. He knows that we are only tradespeople, and must dine upon the counter, when the business is pressing. I have told him that we always do it, when the ships are sailing, for fear of his being uncomfortable. He says that he enjoys it; but he must be off this evening, by the mail from Ashburton." "If there is anything I detest," Miss Touchwood answered, with calm pride, "it is to hear of trade continually. Trade is such a low thing; commerce is the proper word; and even that has nothing lofty in it. Make your friend understand, before he goes (if so stupid a gentleman can understand) that my father has nothing to do with either trade, or commerce, but is simply and solely, a Government contractor, moving in a very wide circle, discharging duties of the first magnitude, and commanding European confidence." "I had better put it down, to have it right this time. I'll tell him all that, on the way to the coach; and then at the tail of it, I shall stick in, but the Governor's busted up now, and must go back to the apron he began with, in the shop at Plymouth.'" "There will not be any dinner in my room to-day." Miss Touchwood spoke with dignity; and departed, to preserve it. That stern announcement compelled the young squire, to hasten to his mother's room; which he had shunned, all day, through terror of maternal outburst. But now he must try hard to get dinner, both for himself, and for his guest, who was being dismissed so curtly. And in that just enterprise he succeeded, to and beyond his warmest hopes; for her ladyship, having allowed herself to be trampled on so shamefully, was now in the growing tumult of recovery, and reaction. "Sir Joseph is master of the dining-room," she said, after bedewing her son, with one of the last tears left in her system; "in all high This was managed well; and Julia, proud but not relentless, came; and the large young man from Trinity, sighed, according to his magnitude, whenever he could sigh aside. For not only was he large, but tender; and the pricks of the barb that were meant to sting him, had acted as with a good rumpsteak-they had only made him sweeter. But feeling that he had no money, he sighed behind his handkerchief. Julia gave him several glances, in her well experienced style, soft, and rich, and to be cherished; so that his heart might ache quite nicely, when he was a hundred miles away. Lady Touchwood saw all this, and thought that her daughter should not be so cruel, even on a Sunday; the best day of the seven by rights; but the worst in fact of cruelty. For then, do schoolboys bully most; then do men most beat their wives; and then are all the great battles fought. And then Sir Joseph Touchwood raged, because he had little else to do. When Dicky came home, in a gloomy mood, after seeing the last of his friend and 3 hero, his mother watched for him, and found Smelling a rat, as he coarsely put it to himself, the young man obeyed, and on the Monday morning knocked at the Vicarage door, with his knapsack on, when the parson was sitting down to breakfast. "Well done! We shall have a sensation now;" said Mr. Short, as Dick marched in, with some contempt for people who were just come down to breakfast; "in the name of wonder, what has made a lark, of such a lie-a-bed ?" Then Dicky sat down, and told his tale, and produced his mother's letter. In an hour's time, before Sir Joseph had his sulky meal upstairs, Parson Short was holding counsel with the lady of the house. "I have no real friend, but you; and you always know what to do ;" she added, after full detail of woes. The Vicar knew little of commercial matters, and even less of heavy contracts, handled like a balanced pole, which may crack the operator's skull. But having shrewd sense, and more doubt of Sir Joseph's truth, than of his skill, he thought it most unlikely that the great contractor had lost his balance, beyond all recovery. "It is but a trick of his," he thought, "to get out of some bad job." But he could not say that, to Sir Joseph's wife. "It will all come right; depend upon it, with patience, it will all come right." He smiled as he spoke, for Lady Touchwood's faith in his wisdom was amusing. "But what can I do, without the risk of fatal offence to Sir Joseph? He is not the man to put up with any meddling, by-by a stranger almost to him, although an old friend of yours, and eager to be of any use to him. "No," said the lady; "I quite see that. Nobody would think of meddling with him. But it might be possible perhaps to ascertain what the public opinion is about it." Public opinion had not yet arrived at its present condition of debility, when it gees with the pull of some sledge-dog journals, or the push of the man who can swear the hardest. Therefore Mr. Short did not disdain it; but asked—“ where is it to be got?" "Only in Plymouth;" said Lady Touchwood, "and I can't bear to think of such a thing." "Of such a thing as my going to Plymouth? Why what is that for Trumpeter? About twoand-twenty miles, by the Post-bridge road; and he can have three hours' rest, while I lounge about, and call upon some friends. I know a man, who knows everything, about the business-people-I mean the highest mercantile circles-and without an inkling of my object, I can learn-you will understand." "Whether my husband is bankrupt, and the roof over our heads our own, or not. Oh, Mr. Short, what a blessed, happy, thing it is, to be in the Church of England! There you can do what you like; you have your own parsonage, and your own opinions, and your own time to do nothing. Everybody looks up to you; and you go out in the morning, to see what the people are about; or not to see it, if you don't like. You order your dinner, and they send you presents; and you think how much work you have done! No wonder you are wise; no wonder you can advise poor women well.” The parson laughed; though he could not think that this description of his duty did fair justice to his trials, and earnest labours to be master of the parish. But he knew that nothing can change a lady's opinion upon great subjects (any more than it can upon little ones) and so he slacked Trumpeter's curb three links, for a long day's work, and mounted. "This is a new turn of things, and a very nasty one to my mind," he thought, as he struck from a bridle-lane, up a combe, into the old Roman road; "who can make either head, or tail, of the things that may come out of it? That I should be put to discover the state of Sir Joseph's affairs, for his wife's satisfaction! I should have declined such a ticklish errand. It will require the greatest tact, and what I detest-some subterfuge. But he must be almost a brute, to keep his own wife, and children, in the dark. He is playing some deep game, and recks not a rap, how wretched he makes them, to suit his own ends. Perhaps my first impulse was right; but now, right or wrong, I must go through with it. Go along, Trumpeter; we are on a smooth road now.' "" The worthy horse put his best foot foremost, for his spirit was willing, and his flesh not weak; so that they were both in Devonport, ere the Dockyard-men streamed forth. to dinner; which is a date of the day to be trusted for rapid punctuality. Then the parson, having seen his horse in comfort, and kindly receiving nourishment, called upon a quiet man, a Christowellian, own cousin to Mrs. Aggett's relicks-as she called her dear dead husband-and now rising steadily into social excellence, as a widely esteemed ship's chandler. His name was Codd, and he was mounting into such a sphere of wholesale merit, that he was beginning to nod to Sir Joseph, instead of touching his hat to him, and had even shaken hands with him, at Christmas times. But he did not pretend to be on a par with the Vicar of the parish he was born in. Servant, sir," he said to Mr. Short, touching his forelock, like a Sunday-school boy; glad to see 'e, once again, sir. And how are all the good folk up to home, like ?" "Pretty well, considering the long dry weather. I never saw the moor so parched before. Our people say that Colonel Westcombe's grouse have done it. But I want a little talk with you, Master Codd.” Codd was a simple, straight-forward fellow, getting on slowly, by dint of downright honesty, attention to business, and heed of ancient maxims. Mrs. Codd (who had been a housemaid at Lustleigh, wooed by Codd with his apron on) happened to be upstairs, engaged in the periodic increase of an honest race; and so there was freedom of tongue, and of ears. I hope you may be wrong," said Mr. Short, as soon as he had heard the other's story, which came without any questions, for the subject was hot, that day, in Plymouth; "and I cannot help thinking that you must be wrong. Sir Joseph Touchwood, after all his years of dexterity, and of experience, should be about the last man in the kingdom, to break up suddenly, as you describe." "Well, sir, I only know what I hear tell; and I heartily hope it may be wrong. Many a poor head will ache, and many a poor belly quag, if it is so bad as they tell me. And I am sorry for the poor folk round our parish. Sir Joseph hath found work for a sight of 'em, in the winter-time; so the people tell me. He mightn't be altogether honest; but he hath been honourable. And if he hath failed, you may say for certain, he hath failed respectably." "That means, for a big lump of money. The morals of trade are wonderful. Tell me, Codd, since it is town-talk now, where I shall have the best chance of correct particulars." Mr. Codd told him; and the parson, with excitement most unusual to him (because he was full of things larger than money), hastened to the gentleman, who knew all about it, according to his own belief, and that of all the public. This gentleman was not inclined however to impart the smallest decimal of his knowledge; until Mr. Short spoke very plainly to him, and declared that he was likely to be involved in it. It then became the duty of the business-man, to come down with the truth, to the utmost of his knowledge; and the parson thanked him, and went to fetch his horse. Then his horse fetched him, at such a pace (because he was on the homeward road, and his shoes were got into wearing) that it was not dark to a clear-eyed man, when the parson of Christowell pulled the bell of the great front-door of the Touchwood house. "I want to see your master himself;" he said. "You can't see Sir Joseph, sir, I fear, just now. He is not very well to-day, and he keeps his room." him, in his room. I simply insist upon seeing him. Show me where he is, without any message." "Then let me see The man obeyed, for he held Mr. Short in some awe, for various reasons; and presently the Vicar was face to face with the great contractor, in his private room. "Mr. Short? Ah!" "Sir Joseph spoke mildly, after closing his mighty oak desk with a bang, to indicate sense of intrusion. Important business, Mr. Short ? " "That depends entirely upon how you take it. You may think me foolish, but not impertinent, when you have heard what I have to say." "Sit down, and say it, my good sir. You are the last man to be impertinent." Very well. You are a man of business, Sir Joseph; and so am I, in my little way. To-day I happened to be in Plymouth "—Mr. Short coloured, at this highly coloured version of the fact-" and there I heard things which grieved me. I heard that your firm, the first in the West of England, was in difficulties." "Oh they say that, do they? Very well; |