The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1893-07-06
SISTER URsuLAs CLIMB.
BY RUYDARD K1PLING.


in the footsteps of Laurence Sterne.
In a nameless city OF a land that
shall be nameless, rich man lived
alone. HIS wealth had bought him a
luxurious fiat on the fifth A lor of |
red brick mansion, whose grilles were
of hammered iron, and whose halls
were of inlaid marble. When he
needed attendance, Goals, his letters,
meal, a messenger or Carriage, he |
pressed an electric button and his |
wants were satisfied almost as swift. |
ly as even petulant wealth could |
expect. An exceedingly swift lift bore
hi II to and from his rooms, and in his
rooms he had gathered about him all
that his eye desired books in rich
cases with felted hinges, worries from
all the world, rugs, lamps, cushions,
couches, engraving, and rings with en-
cravings upon them, miniatures e
pretty women, scientific t US and china
from Persia. He had friends and &C
qlaintanCes as many as he could be-
friend or know; and some said that
more than one woman had given him
her whole love. Therefore he could
have lacked nothing whatever
One day hot sickness touched him
with its finger, and he became no more
than a sick man alone among his pos
sessions, the sport of dreams and
devils and shadows, sometimes a log
and sometimes lunatc crying in de-
lrium. Before his friends forsook him
altogether, as healthy brutes will for
sake the wounded, they saw that he
was efficiently doctored, and the ex,
pensive physician who called upon him
at frs: three times a day, and later
only once, caused him to be nursed by
a nun. Science is good" said the
physician, "but for steady, continuous
nursing, with no science in it, religion
is better--and l know Sister Ursula s"
So this sick man was nursed by a
nun, young and fairly pretty, but, above
all, skilful. When he got better, he
would give the convent, and not Sister
Ursula, thank offering which would
be spent among the poor whom Sister
Ursula chiefly attended. AT first the
man knew nothing of the nuns exist
ence-he was in the country beyond
all creeds-but later a white colfed
face came and went across his visions,
and at last, spent and broken, he woke
to see a very quiet young woman in
black moving about his room. He was
too weak to speak; TOO weak almost to
cling to life any more. In his despair
he thought that it was not worth cling
ing to; but the woman was at least a
woman, and alive. The touch of her
fingers in his as she gave him the
medicine was warm. She testified to
the existence of world full of women
also alive-the world he was beginning
TO dlsbelieve in. He watched her sit
ting in the sunshine by the window,
and counted the light creeping down
from bead to bead Of the rosary at her
waist. They then moved his bed to
the window that he might look down
upon the stately avenue that ran by
the fiat house, and watch the people
going to and fro about their business.
But the change, instead of cheering
cast him into deeper melancholy. 1t
was nearly 100 feet, sheer drop, to
those healthy people walking SO fast
and the mere distance depressed him
unutterably He played with the
scores Of visiting cards that his friend.
had left, and he tried to play with the
knobs of the desk close to the head o.
his bed, and he was very, very wretched
One morning he turned his face away
from the sunlight and took no interes
in anything, while the hand turned
back upon the dial SO swiftly that i
almost alarmed the doctor. He sale
to himself "Bored, chi Yes. Your,
just the kind of over -educated, over
refined man that would drop his hol(
on life through sheer boredom. You'v
been most interesting case so far, ant
l won't lose you" He said to Siste
Ursula that he would send an entire
fresh prescription, and that Siste
Ursula must give it to the invalid ever
twenty minutes without fail. Also,
the man responded, it might be well t
talk to him little. "He needs cheer
ing up. There is nothing the matte
with him now but he won't pick up.
There can be few points of sympath
between a man born, bred, trained an
sold for and to the world and goo
nun made for the service of othe
things. Sister ,Ursula's voice was yer
sweet, but the matter of her speech di
not interest. The invalid lay still
looking out Of the window upon tn
street all dressed in its Sunday ate
noon emptiness. Then he shut h
eyes, the doctors boy rang at tn
door Sister Ursula stepped out int
the hall, not to disturb the sleeper, an
took the medicine from the boys han'
Then the lift shot down, and even ;
she turned, the wind of its descel
pulled up and blew shut the spring-loc
door of the rooms with click only
little more loud than the leap of h
terrified heart.
Sister Ursula tried the door softl
but rich men with many hundrt
pounds worth of bric-a braC buy then
selves very well-made doors that taste
with singularly cunning Locks. The
the lift returned with the boy in charg