The Savannah morning news., 1903-08-02

ne presented IN hlmSelf an example
exhibiting something of the cost of
was more or less incoherent, but the
effect of it was complete.
CHAPTER II.
SURVIVING EVILS OF THE REIGN
OF TERROR.
Does there exist an incredulous, or
Jealous. denizen of another portion of
our country who, knowing that the
room in the wooden cupalo over Mr..
Carewe's library commonly alluded to
by Rouen as the Tower Chamber
will prove himself so sectionally pre-
JUDGED as to deny that the town was
a veritable hotbed of literary interest,
or that Sir Walter Scott was ill-appre-
ciated there? Some of the men looked
sly, and others grinned, at mention of
this apartment; but the romantic were
not lacking who spoke of it in whis-
perS; how the lights sometimes shone
there, all night long, and the gentlemen
Grove away, white-faced, in the dawn.
The cupola, rising above the library,
overlooked the garden; and the house,
save for that, was of a single story,
with low veranda running the length
/ of its front The windows of the liz
| brary and of a row of bedrooms-one
of which was Miss Betty's-lined the
veranda, Steamboat fashion," the in
ner doors of these rooms all opening
upon a long hall which bisected the
| house. The stairway leading to the
| room in the cupola rose in the library
| Itself while the bisectng hall afforded
| the only access to the library; hence
| the gossips, well acquainted with the
geography of the place conferred seri-
| ously together upon what effect Miss
Betty's home coming would have in
| 70
the stairway must needs pass her door
and what was more to the point a
party of gentlemen descending late
from the mysterious turret might be
not so quiet as they intended, and the
young lady sufficiently disturbed to in
quire of her father what entertainment
he provided that should keep his guests
until in the morning.
But at present it was with the
| opposite end of the house that the
town was occupied, for there, work
men were hammering and saving and
painting all day long, finishing the
addition Mr. Carewe was building for
his daughters debut. This hammering
disturbed Miss Betty, who had become
almost as busy with the French
| Revolution as with her mantua-maker
For she had found in her fathers
library many books not for convent
shelves; and she had become a Giron-
din.
She found memoirs, histories and
tales of that delectable period, then not
so dim with time but that the figures
of 1t were more than tragic shadows
and for week there was no meal in
that house to which she sat down
earlier than half an hour late. She
had rightful property interest in the
Revolution, her own great-uncle having
been one of those who suffered" not,
however, under the guillotine; for to
| Georges Meilhac appertained the rare
distinction of death by accident on the
day when the business-like young
Bonaparte played upon the mob with
| his cannon.
There were some yellow letters of
this great-uncle's in a box which had
| belonged to her grandmother, a rich
discovery for Miss Betty, who read and
re-read them with eager and excited
eyes, living more in Paris with Georges
and his friends than in Rouen, with
her father. Indeed, she had little else
to do Mr.. Carewe was no comrade for
her, by far the reverse. She seldom
saw him, except at the table, when he
sat with averted eyes, and talked to
her very little; and while making elab-
crate preparation for her introduction
to his friends (such was his phrase) he
| treated her with a perfunctory ciVility
which made her wonder if her advent
was altogether welcome to him. but
when she noticed that his hair looked
darker than usual about every fourth
| day, she began to understand why he
appeared ungrateful to her for growing
up. He went out great DEAL though
no visitors came to the house; for it
was known that Mr. Carewe desired
to present his daughter to no one until
he presented her to all. Fanchon
Bareaud, indeed, made one hurried and
embarrassed call, evading Miss Betty's
reference to the chevalier of the kitten
with deXterity too nimble to be
thought unintentional. Miss Carewe
was forbidden to return her friends
visit until after her debut: and Mr.
| Carewe explained that there was al
ways some worthless young men hang
ing about the Bareaud's, where (he
did not add they interfered with a
worthy old one who desired to honor
Fanchon's older sister, Virginia, with
his attentions.
This was no great hardship for Miss
Betty. as since plunging into the
| revolution with her great-uncle, she
had lost some curiosity concerning the
men of to-day, doubling that they
would show forth as heroic, as debon-
ndir, gay and tragic as he. He was
the legendary hero of her childhood;
she Remembered her mothers stories of
him perhaps more clearly than she
| remembered her mother; and one of
the older Sisters had known him in
Paris and had talked to him at length,
! giving the flavor of his dandyism and
his beauty at first hand to his young
relative. He had been one of those
hardy young men wearing unbelievable
| garments, who began to appear in the
garden of the TlIilleries with knives in
their sleeves and cudgels in their
hands, about April, 1894, and whose
dash and recklessness In many matters
were the first limitations that the
| Citizen Tallien was about to cause the
Citizen Robespierre to shoot himself
through the Jaw.
In the library hung a small. full
length drawing Of Georges. done In
color by Miss Bettys grandmother:
and this she carried to her own room