The record-union., 1898-04-12
An IMPULSE OF SPRING.

How exalting it is. now. to choose. a goal,
And drive straight for it. like flint and
steel
To break off all round one. on every side;
The bonds that bind one TO home ana
friends, Peel Gynt-
it had been q quarter Of an hour
out OF hell, but, now that it was over
the feeling uppermost in James HON.
ershams mind was that OF relief. Ac-
cording to his wont he had announced
by telegram to his sister, Mrs. Earle,
his intention Of h0noring her with
visit. and had driven down to Bixton
in his private hanson in a more ami
able frame of mind than that in which
the prospect OF such a visit usually
found him
1t was late in August, and no one
was in town Adelaide, his wife, had
gone 20 stay with her own distinguished
relatives in the north, the club was a
wilderness. and the solitude of the
house in Dover street got upon his
nerves. During his drive he came to
q determination which set him aglow
by the beneficence Of its character. He
would have his sister to dinner with
him that evening, and they would go
afterward together to the theater Poor
years since she had tasted pleasure
of the kind. he would try again to
bring back their old-time relation
when she was pretty and gay, and he
was proud of her and disconnect, if
possible, the thought of her from the
unsatisfactory husband and unWieldly
family. whose shabby existence dis
turbed his growing sense of fashionable
x,Ff =
ten intruded their shabbiness on the
elegance Of his household. Emily. his
sister, understood him, and saw to that.
But the nature of things necessitated
an occasional exchange of visits, dur
ing which it was doubtful whether
giver or receiver was the more i'll at
ease. Altogether. besides financial
one, there were ways in which the re-
lation was distinctly oppressive. But
to-day he was conscious of a different
attitude toward the visit which differ
ence might be traceable to the abb
sence of Adelaide, before whose cold
eyes ne hated the exposure OF a way of
living wholly foreign to her own gen.
teel experience.
On the threshold of his sisters house
his agreeable new sensations received
a check. She opened the door to him
herself with a face full of trouble. The
unsatisfactory husband had not gone to
work that morning, and was in the
parlor nursing a cold. So she showed
him into an ugly little drawing-room,
furnished in a taste that had been
common TO them in youth. but which
he, with his larger artistic opportuni-
ties. had long OutgrOwn; and there she
unfOlded her tale of woe. Usually at
their meetings she presented neat
and creditable appearance, but to-day,
with no fear of Adelaide in the back,
ground. she had omitted to make any
toilet preparatory for her brother S
visit and looked untidy as we'll as
shabby.
Before the drawing-rOom door had
been shut on them he had decided to
withhold his proposal for the evening.
1t was the old story, and more also.
The landlord refused to wait any longer
for his rent the doctor had said that
a visit to the seaside was imperative
for the little girls; and-and she was
afraid there was a baby coming in the
spring.
This last item completed the revul-
sion Of feeling that had already set in.
His irritation was not to be suppressed,
and, as he wrote her out a check he
let loose on her some of his ideas on the
subject of the responsibilities of parent
hood. He had not calculated the effect
of his words. He had long ceased to
associate with his sister those wild out
breaks of temper which hung about
the memory of her in the dark ages of
their joint history. In fact, her latter
day weakness had been almost a source
of irritation. To-day he learned that
the volcano had not been extinct. but
sleeping. She tore the check he hand
ed her to shreds before his eyes and
filled his astonished ears with the gar
nered bitterness of grievances borne
long years in silence. She contrasted
their positions-her own increasing
poverty and his growing wealth-and
declared the difference accountable
for the rarity of their intercourse. She
inveighed against his ill-concealed con-
tempt for her husband, his wife's open
sighting of herself. the omission of
her husband and herself from any but
the most informal and ut-of-season
dinner parties. He, who in view of
periodical checks had looked upon him
self as the aggrieved party listened open