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Ron Athey Literally Bleeds for His Art
We spoke to the controversial performance artist about self-mutilation, audience members who faint on him, and surviving the AIDS epidemic as an HIV-positive man.
by Amelia Abraham
Sep 24 2014, 3:35pm
Solar Anus (2006) at the Hayward Gallery, in London. Photo by Regis Hertrich
It's not easy to comprehend why someone would want to penetrate his scalp with a metal hook, infuse his scrotum with saline solution, and invite a live audience to watch. But Ron Athey's not a simple guy.
Over the last 20 years the experimental body artist has been dubbed a masochist and a sensationalist for his extreme practice-a kind of queer performance art that deals with themes of trauma, ritual, and resistance through the mutilation of the body. Always challenging, always underground, his work has been heavily influenced by his upbringing in a Pentecostal household and by living the past 28 years of his life as HIV-positive.
Pleading in the Blood, a new book on Ron's life and work, features contributions from the likes of Anthony Hegarty, Bruce LaBruce, and Lydia Lunch. When he invited me to his North London studio to chat about it, I wondered if I was about to walk into a torture chamber. Instead, I found a neat apartment with an enviable bookshelf of queer literature and a guy whose field of knowledge seemed to match.
Talking to Ron assured me that he doesn't create work for his audience, and that he certainly doesn't torture himself for the press. He's working through his own experience-the experience of outliving your friends in an epidemic, and not quite understanding why you're alive.
Martyrs & Saints (photo by Elyse Regehr) and Premature Ejaculation, 1981, with Rozz Williams (photo courtesy of the artist)
VICE: Your work often involves some kind of self-mutilation. Can you explain the kind of stuff you do?
Ron Athey: Well, there was an earlier work called St. Sebastian, which I still redo, where I make arrows out of very long medical needles and insert the metal into the head, which causes a lot of bleeding. So really it's a sort of bloodletting performance. Some longer performances from the 90s, like the Torture Trilogy, included scarification, flesh hooks, branding, anal penetration, surgical staplers-an entire palette of things, some of which I still use. I guess I always play either with flesh or with fluid or blood in my work.
I'm very squeamish and would probably faint if I saw that in the flesh. Do you find your audience transfixed or horrified?
I think it's harder to watch a video because you lose the context and the rhythm of the piece. It's not relentless blood and gore, but people have really different boundaries around the body, yes, so I've had a number of fainters at shows-people who didn't think they were particularly squeamish. There are things that some people maybe didn't bargain for in close proximity if it's an intimate performance [laughs].
Do you enjoy those reactions?
I don't really notice them. I think it surprises me, because I'm not one of those people. I'd like to be an emergency room doctor.
St. Sebastian,1999. Video still via YouTube
You've been described as a "masochist" by the media. How do you feel about that?
I worked for LA Weekly and Village Voice for a long time, so I'm not un-savvy-I do understand how the long table works: exploitative headlines, or being assigned to write a headline that's an attention-grabber, even though sometimes it makes you cringe or you wouldn't have used it. So even serious journalists-you know, people I respect-they'll talk about the physical action [in the work], but I think over time you can begin to see the other layers.
But are you trying to play with the boundaries of shock or horror a little bit? It feels like your work might be to do with looking-like you're challenging people not to look away.
For me it was activism to be who I am, and to represent it in a performance it has to be upped to a hyperreality. So in a way it's really honest, and in another way, it's really manipulative. In the beginning, a lot of the symbols were didactic around HIV iconography; later, they sometimes don't mean anything, or a successful performance is just one where I have some kind of transformation. For example, in the Self Obliteration series with the blond wig and the glass, they don't mean anything, and the needles hidden underneath the wig are a kind of masquerade to do with my turning fifty.
Self Obliteration I & II in Ljubljana, Slovenia, 2011. Photo by Miha Fras
Your parents were quite devout Pentecostals-how did you move away from that into what was essentially a queer performance environment? Did you speak to them again after you left home?
Not those ones, no. I just waited for them to die, one at a time. My first boyfriend, Ros, had a rock band called Christian Death. That was kind of my entry into that scene-taking acid, reading Patti Smith... Imagine being a teenager in a pre-internet era, locked in a house in suburbia; you have a very small idea of the history of the world. I needed to read backwards through Jean Genet and Charles Baudelaire, and Patti Smith points the way over and over again in different songs.
How did the AIDS epidemic shape your work back in the 1980s?
I always refer back to AIDS because I had a cloud of death over me from 1985, until I trusted that the drug cocktail was working. I'm an outwardly very expressive person, and with the intense conditions of the time-real scenes, real activism, real death, real loss-I effortlessly made all of that into work because of the way the pressure was. I wasn't performing therapy or catharsis with my work, but I was just completely observing and trying things out while I had a fire under my ass because there was this black cloud over my head.
My work always has a philosophical question, a thesis. I think that came about after surviving an apocalypse with everyone dying rapidly and everyone being sick and choosing whom you need to visit at the hospital as priority. This was a time to live through. We're definitely in a different era now. You have to adapt somehow to that change, stop having a tantrum that everyone died and it was so bleak. It was really bleak for a time, but a whole other generation has come through.
In 1994 a newspaper claimed that audience members had been put at risk of contact with HIV-infected blood at one of your performances, and although it wasn't your blood, there was a media outcry. What happened?
It was a really enthusiastic audience somewhere small, so the performance sold out a month ahead of time and everyone had waited for it and everything went fine. And then it was this front-page story that blood was spilling and people were running around knocking over chairs. It was very carefully written, attributing everything to a quote from a different audience person so it wasn't actually libelous. It was a front-page news story and went on the wire to, like, 200 newspapers, the Weekly World News, and even chat shows. I have to admit it was something bigger than me, bigger than my performance art.
I was essentially blacklisted in the US, and nobody had the money or a way of showing my work without the specter of a scandal over his or her head. I didn't do anything but works in progress in LA, because I lived there, or at European festivals, and tried to ignore the political bullshit. Now, so much time has gone that I can see that it's something that probably bent me in a different direction. It was almost like a world event happened to me [laughs].
What direction did it bend you in?
That was a particularly prolific period for me. I just started taking myself a bit more seriously. I could handle the word "artist" after my name without cringing. I didn't really relate to anyone else's work so much, except for writers, and kind of scolded myself. I'm not naive, but I don't come from the academy either, and I do a lot of innocent visiting lectureship stuff, but I don't teach anywhere. I couldn't imagine going to a staff meeting.
Incorruptible Flesh: Messianic Remains. Photo by Maneul Vason.
Is it tough to make a living as a performance artist? You don't really produce any tangible work as such.
There's a structural problem with performance art, not having anything for sale. OK, so there's ephemera, but that's not considered high art-you'll never sell ephemera for anything significant. Although, you can go to the other extreme, like Marina Abramović, where you make amazing work to then go the lowbrow celebrity route. But you have to get paid from somewhere. It's like there's Marina and Tin Sehgal, and then there's no more money left.
It must be nice to archive everything in Pleading in the Blood then. Are most of the contributors friends?
They were all people I asked. Friends on different levels, yeah. Lydia Lunch has been one of my mentors since the late 80s. It's always been part of her practice to kick everyone's ass to make them work. She's like the motivator saying, "Start a fucking band or do spoken word instead of daydreaming about it." She knew I'd done performance and worked with bands in the early 80s, and when I was waffling about kicking it back up she was instrumental.
It was an honor to get quotes from Genesis P-Orridge, because their work's been so important to me; Throbbing Gristle, COUM Transmissions, etc. It was a smaller scene and a different time then, so it was easier to infiltrate everyone. There was a small 400-person punk club called Club Lingerie in LA. It was where Diamanda Galás performed on her first tour. It was like everyone wanted to see who this bitch was with the screaming voice [laughs]. She topped the room in a sequin opera gown.
What are you working on at the moment? What's your most recent work?
Further ahead projects work more with ecstatic voice, glossolalia, and operatic theater. I'm kind of leaning back in a theatrical direction. So Messianic Remains-which is what I just showed in Hackney Wick-has some nods to Kenneth Anger's Lucifer Rising and addresses the ritual circle as performance space. It starts out interactive, so people touch me as I'm suspended in a state of trauma, and then the second part is a text from Jean Genet's Our Lady of the Flowers and it's about Divine's funeral-a drag queen's funeral. I have a phobia of being the last suburban goth chick [laughs]. I'm always wrestling with that.
Ron Athey will be presenting his new performance Incorruptible Flesh: Messianic Remains in the UK this autumn. The first-ever monograph on Athey's work, Pleading in the Blood: The Art and Performances of Ron Athey, edited by Dominic Johnson, is published for Intellect Live by Intellect and Live Art Development Agency. It's available here.
Follow Amelia Abraham on Twitter.
Ron Athey
mutilation
live art
Anthony Hegarty
Messianic Remains
Pleading in the Blood
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'Fortnite' Champions Say They 'Don't Really Like the Game' in Victory Speech
At the Fortnite Collegiate Starleague finals, two University of Georgia players called out developer Epic Games for its unpopular balance changes.
by Nicole Carpenter
The University of Georgia’s Fortnite team won its first—and, apparently, last—championship title during the Collegiate Starleague (CSL) finals in Atlantic City over the weekend.
After going undefeated in the event (and throughout the whole season), newly-minted champions Jack Stuttard and Ibrahim Diaz took the stage to accept their prize. The duo used their time in the spotlight to call out Fortnite’s developer Epic Games for the way it’s handling the game’s balance.
“We don’t really like the game that much anymore,” Stuttard said on stage. “We’ll see what happens. Epic is kind of messing around a little bit with the way they are balancing everything.” When pressed for a “better” answer by the host, Diaz added: “We’ve decided we don’t want to play competitive Fortnite anymore.”
The UGA Fortnite players won $6,000 at the finals event after beating teams from the University of British Columbia in the semifinals and finals. But the money earned from playing Fortnite competitively isn’t enough to keep them playing the game. “Definitely quitting playing competitively,” Stuttard told Motherboard over Discord. “It just makes me sad seeing the game I love fall from grace so much. I hope they can turn it around.”
Epic has been criticized a lot by competitive players for the decision-making around balance. Earlier on, players were upset that Epic made large-scale adjustments to the game—specifically, the overpowered Infinity Blade patched in before a $1 million tournament. But now players are confused with some other balance adjustments, like the addition of a hamster ball–like vehicle called The Baller and the removal of “siphoning,” which gives players shields and health for kills and encourages an aggressive style of play. Epic addressed the criticism in a blog post on April 26, citing feedback that Fortnite was “too intense to be enjoyable,” and that it won’t be returning to the game’s regular modes. It's also important to note that the constant balancing and iterating Fortnite is known for comes at a personal cost to the developers working on the game. Last week, Polygon reported that the game's success led to months of intense "crunch" at Epic games.
Stuttard and Diaz wanted to use their platform to “attempt to improve a game [they] loved,” Stuttard told Motherboard. But he wanted to make it clear that he wasn’t criticizing CSL—”I am extremely grateful to CSL,” Stuttard said. “They have been so great to us all season so I was not intending to be ungrateful or distasteful at all. I was just being honest when asked how I felt about the game.”
CSL and Epic did not immediately respond to Motherboard’s request for comment.
Though Fortnite may not be what’s next for the UGA players, Stuttard said he’ll go back to League of Legends until a new game that he likes to play is released. But he doesn’t expect to play competitively, regardless. “I’m definitely more of a casual player and am not very good at any other game I play, but for some reason I’m really good at Fortnite,” he said.
Despite having some balancing issues, it appears that Fortnite players at the professional level are not frustrated with each other.
"Shout-out to the kids from UBA we beat in the semis and finals," Stuttard said. "We hung out with them Saturday night and they were really cool guys. But I'm happy we beat them. We all got philly cheesesteaks at this place on the boardwalk."
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Prune Belly
Prune belly syndrome is a rare disorder characterized by partial or complete absence of the stomach muscles, failure of both testes to descend into the scrotum and/or urinary tract malformations.
Prune belly syndrome (PBS), also known as Eagle-Barrett syndrome, is a rare disorder characterized by partial or complete absence of the stomach (abdominal) muscles, failure of both testes to descend into the scrotum, and/or urinary tract malformations.
PBS is a rare, genetic birth defect affecting about 1 in 40,000 births. About 97 percent of those affected are male. PBS can present with a spectrum of abnormalities ranging from the stillborn infant with severe urogenital and pulmonary problems to the child with little, if any, urologic abnormalities requiring no therapy other than surgery to move an undescended testicle into the scrotum and permanently fix it there.H2: What Causes It?
Hypospadias results from incomplete development of the urethra. It is sometimes inherited – in about 7 out of 100 boys with hypospadias, the father also had it. In all other cases, the cause is usually not known.
Prune Belly Syndrome Symptoms
PBS symptoms vary in severity and can include a wrinkled abdomen, constipation, delay in sitting and walking, difficulties coughing and difficulty urinating. The condition can be categorized on a scale from I-III.
Category I patients are the most severe and have poor lung and kidney development. These children usually do not survive more than a few days after birth.
Category II patients do not have lung problems but have significant problems with the urinary tract. They may develop kidney failure over time.
Category III patients do not have lung problems and their kidney function is not severely impaired.
PBS may be suspected due to the appearance of a dilated urinary tract on prenatal ultrasound. Once the child is born the combination of physical exam (wrinkled appearance of the belly wall and the presence of undescended testicles) and radiographic studies to identify the dilated urinary tract make the diagnosis.
The initial evaluation of the newborn with PBS requires a team consisting of a neonatologist, nephrologist, urologist and in some cases, other specialists as well.
Prune Belly Syndrome Treatment
The goal for management of prune belly syndrome is to preserve kidney function and prevent urinary tract infection. The prognosis varies depending on several factors including the severity of the underlying tract anomaly, how well the kidneys are developed, and the likelihood of renal failure.
Studies have found that 30 percent of individuals with prune belly syndrome require kidney transplantation in their lifetime.
Sometimes surgical intervention for reconstruction of the urinary tract and the abdominal wall is required. Children may be placed on prophylactic antibiotics to help prevent urinary tract infection. Male children with PBS will also require surgery to place the testicles down in the scrotum. All patients require lifelong surveillance because they are at risk for urinary tract infection and decline in kidney function over time.
Despite these concerns, many individuals with PBS report having good physical and mental health as well as a good overall quality of life.
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Pawtuxet's Historic Fair House... State Fair Exhibit Hall, to a School, to a House for the Homeless.
The Fair House is a 2 1/2 story historic "Greek Revival Building" located at 69 Fair Street in Pawtuxet Village. It was originally built in 1820 by the Budlong family who were members of the Rhode Island Society for the Encouragement of Domestic Industry.
The Society brought the State Fair to Pawtuxet and would use the Fair House to display the exhibits of those who were participating in the fair. The Fair grounds were used for different activities to attract people of all ages, prizes were given out, and prominent speakers would also come to the grounds to give the Society's message.
After the State Fair continued to grow in size, it eventually moved to Narragansett park. Former Governor and Senator, John Brown Francis -who served as Treasurer for the Society- championed that a portion of the Fair Grounds be used for educational purposes and eventually, a portion of the fair grounds became a public meeting place and a school.
The Fair House eventually went on to serve a few other organizations before it ultimately became vacant.
The Fair House --4100 sf sitting on a 35,660 sf lot--was purchased by the House of Hope back in 2012 for $125,000.
Former HOH Director, Jean Johnson (got a $240K back tax write-off break from her friend the Mayor), went before the City Planning Dept. for a zoning change to have the property developed into 10 affordable housing units.. 5 at the existing historic house and another 5 units built as an addition.
The property just next door at 57 Fair Street is also owned by HOH and offers affordable and supportive housing as well.
It would be interesting to know how many families in the surrounding historic Pawtuxet area knew about the ONE public outreach meeting and that these affordable housing changes to the residential area would be coming. Only three members of the public showed up to the one public outreach meeting.
After the zoning change, construction began in 2015 and the Fair House was renovated to accommodate 10 affordable housing units costing approximately $1.6 million including: $231K in historic tax credits, $350K in RI Housing funding, Federal Home Loan Funds and CDBG funding.
Is this the only way to get our beautiful historic properties restored in Warwick? What was once a thriving society that encouraged domestic industry has now become housing for the homeless.
What do the people of historic Pawtuxet Village think?
Will more families come.. or go?
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Check Out Lastminute
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The Local Time is Tuesday, 16-Jul-2019 23:19:14 CEST
Visitor Attractions in the Brecon Beacons
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The vast majority of visitors to the Brecon Beacons National Park, arrive by private vehicle, with 'scenery and landscape' being the most often quoted reason for visiting. Not surprisingly, 'sightseeing by car' is the most popular activity for visitors and of the more active pursuits, walking is the most popular, but cycling, caving, water-sports, trekking and fishing are also widely enjoyed.
In recent years, hang-gliding, parascending and mountain biking have increased in popularity. The rich natural and built heritage of the National Park is also a source of pleasure for the many visitors who enjoy bird-watching, painting, photography, visiting archaeological and historical sites and shopping.
Some of the most popular visitor attractions in the National Park are shown below:
National Park Visitor Centre : Libanus - 170,000 visitors pa.
7 km south-west of Brecon, off the A470 Merthyr Tydfil to Brecon road. Information, displays and publications about the National Park, with an award winning restaurant and spectacular views of the Central Beacons.
Pen y Fan : Owned and managed by the National Trust - 120,000 visitors pa.
8 km south of Brecon, at 886 metres, the highest peak in the National Park.
The popular walk up from Pont ar Daf on the A 470 involves an ascent of 450 metres (almost 1500 feet) The weather can change very quickly, so be prepared!
Carreg Cennen Castle : Maintained by Cadw - 100,000 visitors pa.
20 km south-west of Llandovery, 5 km south-east of Llandeilo off the a 40 or A 483.
Perched on a 100 metre cliff with stunning views, the current ruin dates from the late 13th century, although Prehistoric and Roman remains have been found on the site.
Dan-yr-Ogof Showcaves : The National Showcaves Centre for Wales - 90,000 visitors pa.
On the A 4067 Sennybridge to Swansea road, 30 km north-east of Swansea.
First discovered in 1912, and opened to the public in 1939, there are now 3 Show Caves, a Dinosaur Park, replica Iron-Age Village, Shire Horse centre and Stone Circles to explore. www.showcaves.co.uk
Llangorse Lake and Common - 75,000 visitors pa.
10 km east of Brecon off the A 40 Abergavenny to Brecon road.
The largest natural lake in South Wales, well-known for fishing, sailing, windsurfing and a haven for wildlife, particularly birds. There is also an iron-Age inspired Visitor Centre.
Craig-y-nos Country Park and Visitor Centre - 73,000 visitors pa.
On the A 4067 Swansea to Sennybridge road, 18 km south-west of Sennybridge.
Information and displays about the industrial and social history of the area, and the important geology of the nearby Cribarth mountain. Easy walking around the extensive grounds.
Garwnant Visitor Centre Owned and managed by Forestry Commission Wales - 60,000 visitors pa. 8 km north-west of Merthyr Tydfil off the A 470 Merthyr to Brecon road.
The centre for the Coed Taf Fawrwoodlands; it has a gift shop and tea rooms, a low level rope assault course,toddlers play area, woodland walking trails and family cycle route.
Mid Wales and the Brecon Beacons
Brecon - a historical cathedral town that lies in the shadow of the Brecon Beacons and on the banks of the River Usk. A hub before you head up into the Brecon Beacons - which are located just 300 metres from the town centre.
Builth Wells - an agricultural town on the banks of the River Wye and home to Britain's biggest agricultural show, The Royal Welsh Agricultural Show. Builth is a real, live market town with fine buildings and fanciful architecture inherited from the late 19th Century.
Llandrindod Wells - a Victorian spa town with grandiose public buildings and an air of gentility. The town is the largest and most famous of the mid Wales spa towns.
Llanfyllin/Lake Vyrnwy - An ancient town of Llanfyllin located in the foothills of the Berwyn Mountains, an ideal base for exploring the Mid Wales countryside. Lake Vyrnwy offers stunning scenery and a wealth of wildlife. The perfect setting for walking and cycling, with a 13 mile circular route around the lake.
Llanwrtyd Wells - The smallest town in Britain. Llanwrtyd Wells is very popular with mountain bikers, walkers and bird watchers. Llanwrtyd Wells is home to some of the many weird and wacky events from the Bog Snorkelling Championship to the Man versus Horse marathon.
Machynlleth - the ancient capital of Wales. ‘Mach’ is a small market town with a population of around 2000. It sits in the lower Dyfi Valley, about 10 miles in from the coast. The town is a seat of Welsh culture and politics - this was the site of Owain Glyndŵr's Welsh Parliament in 1404. Today, the most recognised feature in town is the central Clocktower, which stands at nearly 80 feet tall and was built in the latter part of the 19th Century.
Newtown - An ancient market town nestled on the banks of the River Severn. Newtown is steeped in history, founded in the 10th century. Newtown is home to the famous world record breaking Santa run in December.
Rhayader - A small historic market town on the banks of the River Wye. Rhayader is the oldest town in Mid Wales, dating back to the 5th century. Rhayader provides an excellent base for exploring the nearby Elan Valley and the Cambrian Mountains. The town and its surrounding area is a perfect destination for anyone seeking all year round activities, whether it's a gentle walk along the River Wye or an energizing mountain biking across the rugged hills.
Welshpool - a bustling market town nestled in the upper reaches of the Severn Valley. Traditionally an agricultural service centre it is home to the largest sheep market in Europe. Welshpool provides an ideal central base for exploring the surrounding countryside and some of the area's many attractions.
This page last modified Friday, 12-Jul-2019 12:32:16 CEST
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Published on The Voice Online (https://www.voice-online.co.uk)
Home > Sport > Meet the NHS nurse who was once the fastest woman in Africa
Meet the NHS nurse who was once the fastest woman in Africa
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Rose Amankwaah's early successes included 200m gold in Latin American Games, and a silver and gold in the 100m and 4x100 relay in the All Africa Games
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NURSES HAVE to think on their feet but Rose Amankwaah is fast on them too.
She was once feted as the ‘fastest woman in Africa’ and enjoyed a successful career as a sprinter before swapping her spikes for scrubs.
Amankwaah, who lives in Kenton, began working as a trainee nurse at the Central Middlesex Hospital in 1975 - the same year the Vietnam War ended and Margaret Thatcher came to power.
“I was exempt from weekend shifts so I could continue competing domestically,” said Amankwaah who represented Ghana at the All Africa Games in Nigeria 1974, Latin American and Commonwealth Games and trained alongside a promising young teenager called Linford Christie.
She was denied a place at the 1976 Montreal Olympics after African nations boycotted the event. It was a blow to the young woman whose earlier successes included 200m gold in Latin American Games, a silver and gold in the 100m and 4x100 relay in the All Africa Games and bronze in the 4x100m relay at the Commonwealth Games.
“It still seems like yesterday when I think about it,” she said as she notes both God and her hard work as the secret to her success. “There is always going to be someone who is better than you but that shouldn’t stop you trying your best. You have to be your own champion and give 100%.”
Amankwaah, who says she has worked so long at the hospital that she ‘feels like part of the furniture,’ has assisted in thousands of surgical procedures including a dramatic intervention when a stab victim was treated in the car park.
“It’s not the easiest job in the world but I love it,” added the self-confessed sports fan who has met both Prince Charles and Tony Blair during their visit to Central Middlesex hospital visits.
Nowadays, she keeps limber by attending community yoga classes before work each morning.
It promises to be a busy summer for the sports fan, who, aside from looking after her nine grandchildren, will be settling down to the World Cup. "Oh my god, you don’t want to see me at a football match. My son is a semi-professional player and I shout myself hoarse every time I see him play.
“I love sport. It only seems like yesterday that I was out on the track and I’m running every step when I see athletes like Usain Bolt, Mo Farah and Jessica Ennis-Hill on TV.”
World Cup: Fears over potential of racism in Russia [5]
Source URL: https://www.voice-online.co.uk/article/meet-nhs-nurse-who-was-once-fastest-woman-africa
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School with a locked library
Father's work
Aaron Klug Scientist
1. Father's work 1 1355 01:55
2. School with a locked library 385 06:03
3. Reading and the book that got me into science 388 03:17
4. Studying at the University of Witwatersrand 252 06:12
5. An MSc and PhD at Cape Town University 210 08:06
6. Reginald W James 185 01:00
7. Meeting my wife and moving to Cambridge 287 02:02
8. Finding work at Cambridge 209 04:37
9. My work on steel helped with accelerating the growth of TMV 147 03:14
10. Politics and working on haemoglobin 180 03:56
vaneyck
Friday, 09 September 2011 11:48 PM
Aaron Klug is a scientist of great ability who tells his stories extremely well, though he assumes...
Aaron Klug is a scientist of great ability who tells his stories extremely well, though he assumes knowledge on the part of his listeners that most of us,(I included), do not have. But this is not a flaw, in my eyes - I feel I have been given a whole new range of information to look into. I came to Web of Stories looking for the interviews with Sydney Brenner, just having re-read H.F. Judson's The Eighth Day of Creation. After listening to Brenner - I was not disappointed -I went to the Klug interviews, as he is also mentioned favorably in the book. I was even better pleased with Klug's stories, and am starting to listen to them a second time through. I highly recommend them to anyone who has even a passing interest in the progress of biological knowledge in the second half of the 20th century. You will meet a brilliant man who has had a very interesting career and who describes it very well.
I was born in Lithuania, one of the Baltic States, but my parents emigrated to South Africa when I was a... when I was... my father went ahead as was the custom in those days and the family followed; and, I was two years old so I remember nothing of this. I had an elder brother who was a couple of years older than me and he doesn't remember much either. But, we came to Durban where members of my mother's family had settled actually around about 1900, after the Boer War. And, so, my mother... belonged to a family called the Gevissers who are quite well known in Durban, and so that's why we chose Durban. My father was trained as a saddler, he... he was actually apprenticed in those days so he knew a great deal about leather. And, he... his father had a farm... a farm is not the right word, they didn't farm but they... they fattened cattle – he was a cattle dealer. And, of course, they had horses and things and my father used to take the cattle long distances to market in the big cities. They would gather them from the small farmers and the small cattle holders. So... so when he came to Durban he worked for the family firm of Gevissers, because of his experience with leather he was involved in hides. They were involved in what were called primary products in those days; they owned wattle farms, which were used as mine props, making... making boxes. They also had leather and hides and so on; my father, because he knew about hides and skins was involved, he was really a hide merchant, that's what it came down to.
Born in Lithuania, Aaron Klug (1926-2018) was a British chemist and biophysicist. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1982 for developments in electron microscopy and his work on complexes of nucleic acids and proteins. He studied crystallography at the University of Cape Town before moving to England, completing his doctorate in 1953 at Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1981, he was awarded the Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize from Columbia University. His long and influential career led to a knighthood in 1988. He was also elected President of the Royal Society, and served there from 1995-2000.
Title: Father's work
Listeners: John Finch Ken Holmes
John Finch is a retired member of staff of the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK. He began research as a PhD student of Rosalind Franklin's at Birkbeck College, London in 1955 studying the structure of small viruses by x-ray diffraction. He came to Cambridge as part of Aaron Klug's team in 1962 and has continued with the structural study of viruses and other nucleoproteins such as chromatin, using both x-rays and electron microscopy.
Kenneth Holmes was born in London in 1934 and attended schools in Chiswick. He obtained his BA at St Johns College, Cambridge. He obtained his PhD at Birkbeck College, London working on the structure of tobacco mosaic virus with Rosalind Franklin and Aaron Klug. After a post-doc at Childrens' Hospital, Boston, where he started to work on muscle structure, he joined to the newly opened Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge where he stayed for six years. He worked with Aaron Klug on virus structure and with Hugh Huxley on muscle. He then moved to Heidelberg to open the Department of Biophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research where he remained as director until his retirement. During this time he completed the structure of tobacco mosaic virus and solved the structures of a number of protein molecules including the structure of the muscle protein actin and the actin filament. Recently he has worked on the molecular mechanism of muscle contraction. He also initiated the use of synchrotron radiation as a source for X-ray diffraction and founded the EMBL outstation at DESY Hamburg. He was elected to the Royal Society in 1981 and is a member of a number of scientific academies.
Tags: Lithuania, Baltic States, South Africa, Durban, Boer War
Duration: 1 minute, 55 seconds
Date story recorded: July 2005
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Media, Entertainment and Information
France v Croatia: How the World Cup finalists stack up off the pitch
Croatia takes on France in the final of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
Image: REUTERS/Darren Staples
Sean Fleming Senior Writer, Formative Content
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It’s a clash of the titans. The match millions have been waiting for. On Sunday, 15 July at Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium at 18:00 local time, Croatia takes on France in the final of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
On the pitch, both teams look to be in great form, with France beating Belgium to reach their third final in 20 years, and Croatia knocking out England in extra time. Unlike their opponents, this will be the Croatian team’s first final, although they managed a respectable third place at the 1998 World Cup, the country’s debut at the tournament.
With just three days to go until someone lifts the iconic Jules Rimet Cup, this is how the nations stack up off the pitch.
As tension mounts, who will come out on top?
Economic might
It may now be a big fish in the footballing world, but Croatia is an economic minnow by comparison with its opponent. With a GDP of $2.93 trillion, France is the 6th largest economy in the world, whereas Croatia ranks just 78th, with a GDP of $61.06 billion.
The French economy grew 1.8% in 2017 and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicts it will continue to grow, by 2.1% in 2018 and 2% in 2019. The Croatian economy has endured several periods of turbulence since the country’s inception in 1990, but has seen consistent growth in recent years — up 2.8% last year. The IMF predicts it will maintain that level of growth in 2018, before falling slightly to 2.6% for 2019.
Despite ranking in the global top 10 for GDP, France is only 22nd in the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Index, whereas Croatia is 74th out of 137 countries measured.
France’s relative competitive weaknesses are connected to many of its rigid labour market regulations and a perceived lack of ability to attract talent. Clearly, that’s something that hasn’t been apparent on the pitch so far during the World Cup this year. As both a much younger democracy and economy, Croatia has — like many former Soviet countries — had to dismantle many of its former institutions and adapt to a more market-oriented model. Consequently, in fields such as innovation and the maturity of its financial markets there is still work to be done.
Croatia’s global competitiveness performance
France is the clear winner here, according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report. Ranked 11th out of 144 countries on their progress toward parity, France scores highly for educational attainment and political empowerment, making the most progress towards gender parity of any of the G20 group of countries.
Croatia ranks 54th out of 144. While it is broadly aligned with average performances for balanced access to healthcare, educational attainment, and economic opportunities, Croatia scores less well when it comes to women’s involvement in political life.
Iceland tops the Gender Gap Report rankings for the ninth year in a row, but failed to make it out of the Group Stages of the World Cup, finishing bottom of Group D. The nation’s gender gap has narrowed rapidly since 2006, according to the Forum report, and the country is the top performer when it comes to political empowerment.
France v Croatia
France beats Croatia yet again when it comes to sustainable, affordable and secure energy systems, according to the Forum's Global Energy Architecture Performance Index (EAPI). Ranked 5th out of 127 countries, the widespread use of nuclear power in France (it makes up 75% of the country’s electricity supply) goes a long way to explaining this strong performance.
Furthermore, because the cost of generating electricity is low, France is the world’s largest net exporter of electricity, which contributes over 3 billion euros annually to the economy. The nation aims to diversify away from nuclear, and is aiming to expand renewable energy sources to account for 32% of consumption by 2030, according to the Forum report.
Croatia ranks 18th overall, ahead of Germany at 19th, and showing strong performance over the period 2009-2017 — rising 12 places. Switzerland wears the crown in energy architecture performance terms, followed by the Scandinavian nations, Norway, Sweden, Denmark.
Image: EAPI 2017 summary data
Does hosting a World Cup make economic sense?
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Here are 4 of the most politically charged World Cup games ever played
Sean Fleming, Senior Writer, Formative Content
The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.
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Detroit Grand Prix
Quick links... Lions Tigers Red Wings Pistons College Sports High School Sports Golf Detroit Grand Prix
Alabama pulls out dramatic win in overtime for 17th national title
Posted: 12:11 AM, Jan 09, 2018
By: Justin Boggs
Streeter Lecka
<p>ATLANTA, GA - JANUARY 08: Jake Fromm #11 of the Georgia Bulldogs throws a pass during the third quarter against the Alabama Crimson Tide in the CFP National Championship presented by AT&T at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on January 8, 2018 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)</p>
Despite being the last team in the College Football Playoff and trailing 13-0 at halftime, Alabama rallied to defeat Georgia in Monday's College Football Playoff National Championship by a 26-23 margin in overtime.
Alabama's victory marked its second title in the four-year College Football Playoff era. The Tide also claimed their fifth national championship in the last decade, and 17th overall.
Freshman quarterback Tua Tagovailoa found fellow freshman DeVonta Smith wide open in the end zone after Tagovailoa took a devastating 16-yard sack to start overtime. The ending was a shocking conclusion to one of the best national title games in recent memory.
The touchdown came just moments after Georgia took a 23-20 lead to start overtime with a 51-yard field goal.
The Crimson Tide had a chance to win the game in regulation, but senior Andy Pappanastos sailed a 36-year field goal wide left of the uprights.
Alabama rallied from a halftime deficit of 13-0, and a second-half shortfall of 20-7. Tagovailoa led the comeback for the Crimson Tide in the second half with a pair of touchdown passes, including a game-tying 7-yard strike to Calvin Ridley with 3:49 left in regulation.
"It was a team effort, couldn't have happened without the defense getting the ball back," Tagovailoa said.
Despite Bama quarterback Jalen Hurts getting the start, Alabama coach Nick Saban went to Tagovailoa in relief.
Alabama snuck into the College Football Playoff despite not making the SEC title game. Alabama earned the fourth and final spot over Ohio State, who despite winning the Big Ten, had an embarrassing loss at Iowa .
Alabama made the most of the opportunity. In earning a spot to the National Championship, Alabama defeated Clemson 24-6 in last week's Sugar Bowl.
Georgia earned its spot by defeating Oklahoma in double overtime in last week's Rose Bowl.
Alabama is the second No. 4 seed in four years to win the College Football Playoff. In 2014, Ohio State defeated Alabama and Oregon en route to the title.
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Dispirited Kurds shy away from Iraqi elections in Kirkuk
Ali Choukeir
AFP• May 4, 2018
A picture taken on April 30, 2018, shows an electoral banner for the Iraqi Turkmen Front hanging beneath the flags of Iraq (L) and the Iraqi Turkmen (C) above a pedestrian crossing in the oil-rich and multi-ethnic northern city of Kirkuk
A picture taken on April 30, 2018, shows an electoral banner for the Iraqi Turkmen Front hanging beneath the flags of Iraq (L) and the Iraqi Turkmen (C) above a pedestrian crossing in the oil-rich and multi-ethnic northern city of Kirkuk (AFP Photo/SABAH ARAR)
Kirkuk (Iraq) (AFP) - In the multi-ethnic city of Kirkuk it is hard to find posters of Kurdish candidates for Iraq's upcoming elections, but the campaigns of other hopefuls are in full swing.
The past seven months have seen a dramatic turn of events in Kirkuk, the "Jerusalem of Kurdistan" where hopes of independence for Iraqi Kurdistan were dashed after Baghdad retaliated against a referendum held in September.
The May 12 national elections have been welcomed by the city's Arab and Turkmen politicians, who are busy organising campaign meetings and whose election posters hang proudly in place.
In the Kurdish neighbourhood of Rahim Awa, home to the polling station that received the largest number of votes in the referendum, passers-by prefer not to discuss the return to the polls.
Only Freidoun Rahim, a 41-year-old Kurdish labourer, was willing to express his view.
"I voted yes in the referendum but today we have to live together -- Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen -- and so I will vote on May 12," he told AFP, without indicating which list he supported.
Rahim is one of around 940,000 registered voters in the oil-rich province of Kirkuk, who will decide between 291 candidates -- 80 percent of which are new faces -- divided into 31 lists.
The hopefuls are vying for just 13 seats, one of which is already reserved for a Christian politician.
In the 2014 elections Kurds took eight of the available seats, with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) winning six seats and their rivals the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) securing the other two. Kirkuk's Arab and Turkmen communities each saw two lawmakers voted into parliament.
- 'Dreaming' of the past -
The outcome of this month's vote remains uncertain, with the KDP -- which initiated the referendum -- calling for a boycott and declaring the province an "occupied territory".
Other Kurdish groups have refused to present a unified list of candidates, while the PUK is urging its supporters to go to the polls.
But the party is facing allegations of betrayal after it facilitated the federal army's takeover of the province six months ago.
Federal troops pushed Kurdish forces out of Kirkuk and its oilfields in October, part of Baghdad's response to the "illegal" referendum that also saw the central government impose economic sanctions.
"My presence in Kirkuk during these difficult times is proof of my loyalty to the city," declares a slogan on the election poster of lawmaker Rebwar Taha Mustafa, head of the PUK list.
Speaking to AFP in his office, Mustafa alluded to the Arab and Turkmen groups: "Today we are witnessing the revenge of certain people."
He said the PUK had no choice but to allow federal troops into Kirkuk in October.
"The referendum changed the equation, but it's very temporary," the 40-year-old politician said, while admitting it is unlikely the PUK will do as well in this year's election.
"Kirkuk is Iraqi, yes, but with a Kurdish identity. The Kurds will still win but not with eight seats as in the last poll."
When Kirkuk residents went out to vote in September, they were met with the green, white and red Kurdish flag, a sun in the centre, flying in the streets.
It has since been replaced by the blue Turkmen flag, adorned with a crescent moon and one star, along with slogans for Arab candidates declaring "Kirkuk belongs to its residents".
"The next elections will show the real weight of different communities," said Turkmen politician Hassan Tauran.
"We warned the Kurds that the cost of the referendum would be very high and those that imagine a return (to the situation before) are dreaming," he told AFP.
His view was echoed by Amer al-Juburi, a candidate from Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's list, who said: "Kirkuk is Iraqi, those who don't like the new situation can go elsewhere."
The political change can be seen in the office of governor Rakan al-Juburi, the Arab replacement of a pro-independence Kurd, who removed a photo of PUK founder Jalal Talabani from the wall.
The image has been replaced by one of Fuad Masum, a Kurd who is also Iraq's sitting president.
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Return to yelp.co.uk
Posting Reviews
How do I write a review?
To write a review you'll need to create a Yelp user account if you don't already have one.
Once you're logged in, you can locate the business you're trying to review by using the search bar located at the top of any page on the website or from the search button on the app. Enter what you're looking for in the first window (either a specific business or a category), and the location in the second. There are also search filters you can use to narrow your results.
Once you've located the business page, it's simple: click or tap Write a Review and you'll be led through the remaining steps to finish.
Please note that if you're unable to locate the business, you may need to add it to Yelp.
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Management & Governance
freedom-of-information-foi
who-we-are-what-we-do
about us Management & Governance University Policies and Regulations Freedom of Information Policy
Aston University has its origins in the Birmingham Municipal Technical School established in 1895. In 1956 it became the first designated College of Advanced Technology. In 1966 it received its Charter as a university. In conjunction with the City of Birmingham and Lloyds Bank plc, the University established the Aston Science Park in 1982.
Aston is an international centre of excellence in teaching, research and consultancy, focused on subjects of professional and vocational relevance in the sciences, engineering, business and the humanities. It attracts eminent scholars and outstanding students from a global recruitment market.
Information is published on the website about the University's legal and regulatory framework and its management structure and organisation. Academic Schools and most administrative departments publish information regularly via School and Departmental webpages which can be accessed via the A-Z index.
The contact details of most University employees are publicly available from several places on the University's website. The simplest way to find information about individual members of staff is via the list of Schools and Departments or by using the website's search function.
Information about the University's location, campus and physical layout is published electronically.
The University has many links with public and private organisations including government and regulatory bodies, sponsors, professional groups, and local, national and international businesses. These links change as partnerships and associations are renewed or discontinued. To find information about a particular partner or sponsor use the search facility on the University's home page.
We maintain a list of companies owned by the University which is available on request.
The names of company officers, information describing the company's principal activities and the most recent company accounts sent to Companies House are available in paper format on application.
Information about Aston University student activities is published by the Students' Union and can be accessed from the Union's website.
freedom of information foi
faqs public
faqs staff
lists registers
policies procedures
what we spend how
who we are what we do
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Corporate News Weekly Round-Up 1/25/16: SEC Adopts FAST Act Rules and Makes Whistleblower Award, EU Proposes European Deposit Insurance Scheme
In this week's roundup, we provide information on the SEC's new FAST Act rules for emerging growth companies and smaller reporting companies and its recent whistleblower award, and on the European Union's proposed new EDIS rules. SEC ADOPTS FAST ACT RULES SIMPLIFYING DISCLOSURE REQUIREMENTS FOR EMERGING GROWTH COMPANIES AND SMALLER REPORTING COMPANIES On January 13, 2016, the SEC adopted interim final rules under the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act that modify Forms S-1 and F-1. The new rules permit emerging growth companies to omit certain historical financial information prior to an initial public offering and permit forward incorporation by reference for smaller reporting companies (excluding blank check companies and most shell companies), similar to Form S-3. The rules become effective on Federal Register publication, and are subject to a 30-day comment period. For more information, see www.sec.gov/rules/interim/2016/33-10003.pdf ** EUROPEAN COMMISSION PROPOSES “EUROPEAN DEPOSIT INSURANCE SCHEME” TO STRENGTHEN BANKING UNION The EU recently proposed a European Deposit Insurance Scheme (EDIS) to help weaken the link between banks and their national sovereigns and promote trust in the safety of retail bank deposits, regardless of a bank's location in the EU, as a step toward creating a fully-fledged European banking union. Under the proposal, the EDIS would be adopted incrementally in three phases: a re-insurance stage, a co-insurance stage and then a full European system of deposit guarantees (envisioned for 2024). For more information, see europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-15-6153_en.htm (fact sheet) and ec.europa.eu/finance/general-policy/docs/banking-union/european-deposit-insurance-scheme/151124-factsheets_en.pdf (slides). SEC MAKES BOUNTY PAYMENT TO CORPORATE WHISTLEBLOWER On January 15, 2016, the SEC announced a $700,000 whistleblower award to a company outsider who provided a detailed analysis that resulted in a successful SEC enforcement action. Since the 2011 inception of its whistleblower program, the SEC has paid over $55 million to 23 whistleblowers, with awards ranging from 10% to 30% of money collected when sanctions exceed $1 million. For more information, see www.sec.gov/whistleblower.
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GARRETT AMMON
Artistic Director, Choreographer
Garrett Ammon began his tenure as Artistic Director of Wonderbound in 2007. Under his direction, the organization has been transformed into an open laboratory for cross disciplinary exploration and creation. He has been recognized for his work as both an artist and leader through a Denver Mayor’s Award for Excellence in Arts & Culture and a Bonfils-Stanton Foundation Livingston Fellowship.
Having choreographed nearly 60 works over the past sixteen years, Ammon has developed a trademark aesthetic that seamlessly blends tradition with adventurous new ideas. He keeps Wonderbound continually engaged in collaborative endeavors with the region’s finest arts organizations including Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado, Central City Opera, the Colorado Symphony, Curious Theatre Company, Lighthouse Writers Workshop, Mizel Arts & Culture Center, and Newman Center Presents among many others.
In addition, Ammon’s deep belief in the value of live music as an integral part of the dance experience keeps Wonderbound actively creating with a wide range of independent musicians and composers like Hal Aqua and The Lost Tribe, Ofer Ben-Amots, Chimney Choir, Confluence String Quartet, Ian Cooke Band, Tom Hagerman, Jesse Manley and His Band, and Paper Bird.
Always pushing the boundaries of dance and the performance experience, Ammon brings an eclectic range of other collaborators into Wonderbound projects as well. These individuals include visual artists Eric Dallimore, Mark Allen Henderson, Andrea Pliner and Tom Varani as well as poet Michael J. Henry, digital artist Kristopher Collins, photographer Amanda Tipton, illusionist and mentalist Professor Phelyx, and perfumist Michelle Roark.
In recent seasons, Ammon has also had the pleasure of bringing Wonderbound’s artists together with the dancers of Israel’s Liat Dror Nir Ben Gal Dance Company as well as Brazil’s Companhia Urbana de Dança to share the studio and stage.
As a dancer, Ammon was a member of Houston Ballet, Oregon Ballet Theatre, Ballet Memphis and Trey McIntyre Project where he toured to Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Vail International Dance Festival, HIDC’s Dance Salad and Wolf Trap.
Ammon lives in Denver, Colorado with his wife and muse, Dawn Fay. They have worked alongside each other continuously since they first met in 1999.
Explore Garrett's choreography for Wonderbound. →
DAWN FAY
Dawn Fay was named Producing Director of Wonderbound in 2007, and her professional career spanned more than twenty years, including being named one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch.” Dawn is a native of Memphis, Tennessee and received her professional training at North Carolina School of the Arts. She began her career at Ballet Oklahoma and went on to dance with Miami City Ballet, Royal Ballet of Flanders and Ballet Memphis. Dawn has performed classical works including Rudolf Nureyev’s Don Quixote, Fleming Flindt’s La Sylphide, as well as Giselle, Cinderella and Coppelia. She has danced contemporary works by Garrett Ammon, Trey McIntyre, Jiri Kylian, Choo San Goh, and Lila York among others.
In 2005, Dawn became a founding member of Trey McIntyre Project, dancing at festivals around the country including The Vail International Dance Festival and Jacob’s Pillow. Dawn has also staged Mr. McIntyre’s work for Trey McIntyre Project, The Washington Ballet, Kansas City Ballet, Ballet Augsburg and Smuin Ballet.
As Producing Director at Wonderbound, Dawn works closely with Artistic Director Garrett Ammon on the development and creation of his new works and facilitates the collaborations with Wonderbound’s plethora of multi-genre artists. Dawn plays a key role in all of Wonderbound’s fundraising efforts, and she is also deeply involved in all of Wonderbound’s community programs.
Dawn is married to Artistic Director Garrett Ammon.
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UK Policies
UK Leadership
Energy, Industry and Resources
Planning and Advisory
We develop creative, comprehensive and sustainable engineering solutions for a future where society can thrive. Equipped with local knowledge, world-class talent and proactive leadership, we plan, design, manage and engineer long lasting and impactful solutions to uniquely complex problems.
WSP offers fully integrated services to meet financial, social, environmental and aesthetic needs, based on our experience of designing, building, maintaining and managing thousands of bridge projects.
We help clients across all sectors unlock opportunities to meet the rising demand for power, maintain secure and reliable energy supplies, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and deliver future energy schemes to help create a sustainable world.
WSP’s maritime specialists are dedicated to the planning, design and construction of port facilities, marine infrastructure and coastal facilities, using the latest technology to deliver future ready solutions.
Rail and Transport
More than 125 years’ experience of delivering rail and transport schemes across the world tells us that what we do is about more than improving the movement of people and goods. High quality transport, from metro and rapid transit to light and heavy rail, has the potential to revitalise communities by encouraging investment.
WSP has one of the longest standing and extensive tunnelling practices globally. In both rock and soft ground, we build transportation, water, and utility tunnels, and underground spaces.
Airport Cities and Aerotropolis
Airports are no longer just locations where aircraft land and depart. They are now destinations where businesses grow, people live and development flourishes.
We have delivered tens of millions of square meters of office space for investors, developers and occupiers around the world. Our work is focused on office and mixed-use buildings and includes new build and refurbishment projects, high-rise developments and business parks.
Organizations in the arts and heritage sectors are often intimately associated with the spaces they occupy – a great building reinforces a brand, puts an organization on the map, welcomes a broader audience and keeps them coming back time and again. Creating places that will inspire, educate and entertain increasingly sophisticated generations of visitors is no mean feat, especially with ever-greater competition for their attention and leisure time.
For more than a century WSP has been helping to shape the skyline of cities throughout the world. We are leaders in the design of tall buildings, pioneering the trend to build higher and slimmer to optimize valuable real estate in our dense urban environments.
Our team of experts possesses a rich understanding of industrial and energy processes, a unique combination of specialist skills and multidisciplinary expertise required to plan, design, build and operate a new plant, or to automate equipment in an existing industrial facility, for numerous industry and manufacturing sectors in developed and emerging markets.
We understand the challenges that our clients are facing in the fast-paced telecommunications industry and provide tailored engineering solutions that meet even the most demanding clients’ needs.
Asbestos, legionella and hazardous materials management
Building Information Modelling- BIM
Public Private Partnerships and Capital Investment Services
Rail Planning
Environmental Due Diligence
Facade Engineering
Kidbrooke Village
WSP has been working for Berkeley Homes on the Kidbrooke Village development, which is transforming one of the former most deprived places in London. The site consists of approximately 109 hectares of land with 38 hectares of developable area. This is one of the largest regeneration schemes of its type in Europe that will create around 4,800 new homes.
East West Interconnector
Voted as Engineers Ireland’s Project of the Year 2013, the East West Interconnector is a key enabler in meeting the Irish government’s target to generate 40 percent of electricity from renewable sources by 2020.
Crossrail South East Section
Network Rail’s $218 million South-East Section Project is part of Crossrail, Europe’s biggest construction project.
Devon - UK
The Exe Estuary Trail Cycle and Walking Route
WSP was appointed in 2004 by Devon County Council to help project manage the delivery of the award-winning Exe Estuary Trail, a 16 mile cycle and walking route located on Devon’s south coast.
22-bishopsgate
WSP is providing multi-disciplinary services to what will be the second tallest building in London.
North of England, UK
A19/A1058 Coast Road
We delivered major improvements to the A19/A1058 Coast Road to relieve congestion and deliver a cost effective solution.
Slavery and Human Trafficking Policy
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Property & Buildings
WSP in Africa
storaselva-power-plant
Storåselva Power Plant
WSP supported the Norwegian power company NTE Energi AS and contractor Skanska Norge AS in building the Storåselva power plant, which utilized the 124-metre-high waterfall in the Storåselva river.
Snåsa, Trøndelag, Norway
Project and Programme Management
NTE Energi AS
Contact us to know more about Storåselva Power Plant.
Francois van Rensburg
Director Customer Experience & Strategic Growth
Martin Mkhabela
Director, Customer Experience & Strategic Growth (Alt)
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Project Featured in 2018 Sustainability Report
This is the first project in Norway for which a CEEQUAL certification was initiated and completed. The evidence-based sustainability assessment encourages and promotes the attainment of high economic, environmental and social performance in all forms of civil engineering through identifying and applying best practice.
Sustainability therefore became a crucial thread across all aspects of the project. All CEEQUAL requirements were converted into practical measures and implemented in all relevant documents. In addition to other considerations, the team considered the historic environment, endangered species, important landscape features, effluents in the water environment, involvement of the local community and interested parties. Hedges were even established to protect Norway’s national bird, the white-throated dipper (also known as the European dipper).
CEEQUAL-certified project in Norway
Clean and renewable energy production per year
75 GWh
Estimated Number of households supplied, per year
The project consists of a concrete dam, 4 km of tunnels, a powerhouse with 3 turbines, access roads and 18 km of 66kV powerlines. The power plant will, after start-up, deliver an annual energy production of 75 GWh of clean and renewable energy per year, which roughly corresponds to the annual consumption of electricity in 4,000 households. As a region with a significant power deficit, Storåselva will benefit greatly from this new renewable power plant. We are honoured to have supported this effort toward ensuring access to sustainable energy for all.
The United Nations adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015 as part of a new sustainable development agenda. We believe that WSP has an important role to play in contributing to achieving these goals. Here are the SDGs associated with this project:
OTHER CHALLENGES THAT WE HAVE OVERCOME
Designing an Energy and Environmental Centre in Borås, Sweden
A new biofuel combined heat and power plant will support the city of Borås’ goal of becoming a non-fossil dependent city by 2030.
Optimizing Space for Marlow Foods’ Manufacturing Processes
We have switched the process of manufacturing Quorn from the horizontal to the vertical to future proof Marlow Foods’ new Belasis site in County Durham.
Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension
The first subway extension in Toronto in over 15 years, the Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension (TYSSE) was a decade long project. The $3.2 billion Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension (TYSSE) is expected to carry some 24 million passengers a year by 2020.
Billingham, Durham, England, UK
Premier Foods Plant
WSP delivered a upgrade to Premier Foods’ Billingham facility to increase the capacity of a plant manufacturing the meat-free protein Quorn.
Solid Dosage Forms Pharmaceutical Production Facility
WSP assists a pharma company expand its range of products, providing all the engineering services needed to support the launch of its new solid dosage form for North American and European markets.
Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi Emirate, UAE
Yas South Integrated Destination Resort
The Yas South Integrated Destination Resort in Abu Dhabi is a visionary entertainment resort district located on the southern tip of Yas Island which includes two hotels, 35,000 m2 of waterfront retail and restaurants situated along a boardwalk promenade, a state-of-the-art multi-purpose arena, gardens and plazas.. The scheme forms part of a much wider masterplan to transform Yas Island in to a one-stop destination for tourism and business.
Saint-André-d’Argenteuil, Quebec, Canada
Carillon Generating Station Rehabilitation and Retrofit
The Carillon generating station, built in 1962, produces some 753 MW of energy. Many of the original pieces of equipment were at the end of their useful life and needed be completely rehabilitated and retrofitted.
Ras Laffan C IWPP
Water and power plants are crucial to serving the growing populations of the Middle East. WSP’s environmental and energy experts are leading the way in achieving regulatory compliance for this important sector.
Sand Hill Energy Center Expansion
WSP provided detailed design in joint venture and full engineer-procure-construct services for the expansion of the Sand Hill Energy Center in Austin, Texas.
Mombasa, Mombasa County, Kenya
Kwale Minerals Sands
Acting as EPCM Consultant for the Construction of a New Port Infrastructure Designed for Mineral Sands Export.
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DEPARTMENT HOME
DEGREE CHECKLISTS
2-YEAR COURSE ROTATION
Theatre Accreditation
- Art Programs
- Studio Art
Art Program Alumni
Andrew Lewis, M.F.A.
Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre - Musical Theatre, Acting
Office: Sybil B. Harrington Fine Arts Complex, Room 118
Email: alewis@wtamu.edu
Andrew joined the Department of Art, Theatre, & Dance in 2014 as an Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre. He holds a B.A. in Musical Theatre from Weber State University and a M.F.A. in Musical Theatre from The University of Central Florida.
Before coming to WT, Andrew served as Director of Musical Theatre and Assistant Professor of Theatre at Northwestern State University of Louisiana.
Andrew specializes in Musical Theatre Voice, Acting, and History. He teaches Musical Theatre, Acting, Script Analysis and Introduction to Theatre at WT.
A member of the Region VI Committee for the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (www.kcactf6.org), Andrew serves as the Musical Theatre Initiative Coordinator.
Research and Creative Activity
Andrew is a Director and Musical Director. His credits include: You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown, Once on this Island, Hairspray, West Side Story, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Taffetas, 100 Years of Broadway, Only in America, Nunsense, Noises Off, Little Women, The Witches and Cinderella.
Professionally, Andrew has: Sung with The Orlando Philharmonic and Mad Cow Theatre in their joint production of Carmen, Toured with Omega Productions' 35th Anniversary Celebration of Saturday's Warrior & The White Star, and performed two summers at Utah's Amusement Park, Lagoon
Personal Sketch
When not directing or teaching, Andrew loves spending time with his wife, son, and dog.
He is originally from Utah and frequently enjoys trips home to visit extended family, keep up with friends, and play in the snow.
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Son donates portion of liver to dad in need
By: Syma Chowdhry
Usually parents are the ones that help their children live well. In this case, a son is giving his father the gift of life. That's because he donated a portion of his liver to his dad.
When a John Barnes went into liver failure, his youngest son Brian, who just finished college, decided to step in and put his life on hold to help his dad.
John said, "Things he had to give up for me... It's hard to put into words. There are no words."
He fights back tears when he thinks about the sacrifice he son made to help him stay alive.
John was suffering from liver failure and was put on a transplant list in December, but his health was quickly deteriorating.
He told his four kids not to worry and that he will wait for a transplant, but Brian, the youngest of four children, didn't listen.
He checked to see if he was a match to be a living donor for his father, against his wishes.
"It felt like there was nothing more important that I can do at that point than get tested and try to become a donor," Brian said.
He was a match.
After months of tests, both father and son came to Henry Ford Hospital for the successful surgery in July.
Brian donated the 60% of his liver to his father.
Dr. Marwan Abouljoud performed transplant surgery.
"And the remaining part of the liver is healthy and the person is healthy the liver grows back," he said.
It was a 12-hour surgery with a three month recovery.
Both father and son seem to be doing just fine.
Brian said, "The day after surgery. I was laying in bed and he was running circles around me."
Now John will always have a piece on Brian with him and the scars are a happy reminder.
"An important part of my son, right next to my heart," John said.
He will be forever grateful to his son who gave him the gift of life.
He added, "A mix of Euphoria, because I was so sick and what he would have to give up to help me.... All the time..."
The family says they are sharing their touching story to serve as a reminder that organ donation is important.
The doctor says 20% of those on liver transplant list won't survive the wait because there are not enough organs being donated.
If you would like to learn how you can be an organ donor - go to: giftoflifemichigan.org or henryford.com .
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Shoaib Akhtar blames PCB for Pakistan’s World Cup debacle, urges Imran Khan to act
Shoaib Akhtar said that “in order to get match winners back in the team, you got to bring a match winning management”.
Shobhit Sujay
SC to decide fate of rebel Karnataka MLAs on Wednesday, BJP keeps fingers crossed
Former Pakistani pacer Shoaib Akhtar has blamed the country’s cricket administration for the poor show by men in green in ICC World Cup 2019. Lashing out at the Pakistan Cricket Board, the legendary cricketer said that people who understand modern-day cricket need to brought in.
In the latest video on his YouTube channel, Akhtar said that “in order to get match winners back in the team, you got to bring a match winning management”. He said that Pakistan cricket “need to really reconsider its working”.
Pointing that the team has shown an abysmal performance in the world cup, the ‘Rawalpindi Express’ urged Pakistan Prime Minister and former skipper Imran Khan to take necessary hopes in this regard.
“Our prime minister is a former cricketer and we have heard that is going to revamp the whole structure. That is what I am hoping for,” said Akhtar.
“If you want to change, you need to bring proper people who understand the game of cricket, who have played modern cricket, who have actually accomplished and not working just for money,” he added.
According to Akhtar, the Pakistani cricket team went into the world cup with a “scared mindset” and that reflected in their performance. “We cannot play with this mindset and this scared team. You need daring players who can play upfront - what used to be the character of the Pakistani team.”
Akhtar said that Pakistan now needed to play well against Bangladesh to avoid further humiliation, adding that the mess was the team’s own doing.
“This is the end of journey for Pakistan and that is because of our own faults. However, all is not lost. We need to play for our pride. Pakistan need to play well now to avoid humiliation. They need to play good game of cricket against Bangladesh,” he said, adding that “Bangladesh is going to come back hard on you”.
The former pacer also expressed disappointment at the quality of cricket in the current edition of the world cup. Akhtar said that the players today were not playing good cricket and that was evident. He further said that had there been batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara and Ricky Ponting, they would have scored somewhere near 550 runs in each match.
PakistanShoaib AkhtarPakistan Cricket BoardICC World Cup 2019
Score 300, bowl out Bangladesh for 0: What Pakistan need to do to reach World Cup semi-finals
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general elections 2019
Election Commission issues notification for phase 1 of Lok Sabha election
The last date for filing nominations for the first phase is March 25. The scrutiny takes place the next day, while March 28 is the last date for withdrawal of nominations. The polling day is April 11.
Kolkata/New Delhi: The polling process to elect the next government of the world`s largest democracy begins on Monday with the Election Commission issuing the notification for the first of the seven-phase Lok Sabha polls involving 91 seats spread over 20 states and union territories.
The notification heralds filing of nominations by the candidates for these parliamentary constituencies, before plunging into the heat and dust for a gruelling campaign for the elections to the 17th Lok Sabha.
The first phase involves all the 25 Lok Sabha constituencies of Andhra Pradesh and 17 from Telangana.
The others states and union territories going to the polls in this round are: Arunachal Pradesh (2), Assam (5), Bihar (4), Chattishgarh (1), Jammu and Kashmir (2), Maharashtra (7), Manipur (1), Meghalaya (2), Mizoram (1), Nagaland (1), Odisha (4), Sikkim (1), Tripura (1), Uttar Pradesh (8), Uttarakhand (5), West Bengal (2), Andaman and Nicobar (1) and Lakshadweep (1).
The five-year term of the 16th Lok Sabha is due to expire on June 3.
Simultaneously, notification would be issued for Assembly elections for four states - Andhra Pradesh (all 175 constituencies), Odisha (28 of total 147 constituencies), Sikkim (all 32 constituencies) and Arunachal Pradesh (all 60 constituencies).
The votes would be counted on May 23. The subsequent polling dates are April 18 (97 Lok Sabha constituencies), April 23 (115), April 29 (71), May 6 (51), May 12 (59) and May 19 (59).
Lok Sabha election 2019general election 2019India election 2019
Late Congress leader MH Ambareesh's wife Sumalatha to contest Lok Sabha election from Mandya against Nikhil Kumaraswamy
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Williams Hart > Practice Areas > Directors and Officers Liability
Houston Directors and Officers Liability Lawyers
Serving on a board of directors or as an officer in your company can be a rewarding experience, but it also comes with risks. Directors and officers are big targets, and they often face accusations of misconduct, which sometimes results in civil litigation or government investigations.
Whether you are facing legal action from a government agency, such as the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), or from a group of disgruntled employees, dealing with directors and officers liability issues is a difficult process than can distract you from your duties as a leader in your company. Whatever you are being accused of, Williams Hart can help build your case and increase your chances of success.
Accusations Directors and Officers Face
Accusations against directors and officers can take many forms, but most involve allegations of misusing the power that comes with the position. In many cases, this conduct can be difficult to prove, but successful legal action can result in costly civil and criminal penalties, so it is important to take these allegations seriously from the moment they arise. Here are the types of accusations against directors and officers we have found to be the most common:
Both of these offenses, if proven, can have serious consequences that can disrupt your life and your finances. If you are facing either of these accusations, seeking legal assistance quickly can decrease your chances of paying these penalties. The sooner you begin to build your case, the more likely it is you will be able to disprove the allegations or even settle the matter before it goes to court. In cases of government investigation, such as an insider trading investigation by the SEC, you may even be able to disprove the accusations before criminal charges are filed.
Fighting these claims can be a difficult process. On top of your professional obligations, you now have to deal with serious accusations of misconduct that could force you to pay hefty penalties. It is important to seek legal assistance as soon as possible and to have a lawyer on your side who knows how to properly defend against these allegations. The Houston business lawyers at Williams Hart have experience representing directors and officers in civil and criminal cases. We will work to build your case as quickly as possible and increase your chances of success in and out of court. If you have been accused of misconduct as a director or officer in your company, contact the Houston directors and officers liability lawyers at Williams Hart today by calling (713) 230-2200.
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‘Madame Butterfly’ in Kyleakin hall
The cast during rehearsals
Opera Bohemia, Scotland’s dynamic young professional company, is delighted to announce their first visit to the Skye. They will perform Puccini’s masterpiece, ‘Madame Butterfly’, at Kyleakin hall on Friday 22nd May at 7.30pm.
The company was founded by Alistair Digges and Douglas Nairne, both young Scottish professional opera singers, who were keen to produce more operatic performances across Scotland and create more opportunities for professional artists in all areas of opera. They also wanted to introduce opera to first time opera goers and a younger generation, in a fresh dynamic way. Now in its fifth year, the company continues to add new works to its repertoire and expand its reach throughout the country. They now perform at over twenty venues across Scotland and are really excited to be visiting Skye for the first time.
John Wilkie’s production of Madame Butterfly is set in modern-day Japan and has already received a great reception from packed audience across Scotland. The company was also invited to give a special performance of the opera at Middle Temple in London as part of a charity event for the Muir Maxwell Trust.
Rising Scottish star Catriona Clark sings the role of the naïve Cio-Cio San, which includes the famous aria, ‘Un bel di (One Fine Day)’. Clark enjoys an international operatic career but said: “I always love performing at home in Scotland, audiences are always so warm and touring with Opera Bohemia is great fun.”
She leads a cast of up and coming professional opera singers in Scotland including Plockton’s very own mezzo-soprano, Fiona MacKenzie, a graduate of the Royal College of Music in London.
Opera Bohemia performs the opera in a special arrangement for piano and solo violin. The latter is played by Feargus Hetherington. He is enjoying a fantastic and varied career as a solo recitalist, orchestral and chamber musician, most recently appearing on BBC Radio Scotland’s Classics Unwrapped.
This tale of love, sacrifice and heartbreak promises to be a memorable night for opera lovers and newcomers alike. The production is supported by Creative Scotland.
Tickets are available at Kyle of Lochalsh Pharmacy, www.wegottickets.com, or from 01592 596904. For more information see www.operabohemia.com.
Posted inNews Slider
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Resources About
Contact :: (806) 356-6100
Johnson Ranch
Armstrong County, Texas
LOCATION: 9047 Oscar Road, Claude, TX — The Johnson Ranch is located southeast of Amarillo, Texas in Armstrong County. Access is provided by FM 1258, then one mile south on County Road 9. This is approximately a thirty-minute drive from Amarillo. Access to air service is excellent, as the north end of FM 1258 is at the Rick Husband International Airport in Amarillo. Although there is no runway on the ranch, there would appear to be a suitable location for one extending south from the headquarters.
ACREAGE: 5,412.64 +/- This ranch consists of approximately 210 acres of flat, fertile farmland (Olton Clay Loam), and 5,202 acres of grassland.
RANCH HISTORY: Most of Armstrong County was at one time part of the historic JA Ranch, which in its prime encompassed some 1,300,000 acres. Over time, parts of the ranch were sold off, including the bulk of the Johnson Ranch.
The ranch has been basically used as a cow-calf operation. A carrying capacity of approximately 140 cows would be considered a typical stocking rate for the ranch. Ownership rests with Montford T. Johnson III.
WILDLIFE: This ranch features a thriving population of aoudad sheep, as well as mule deer, and an increasing population of white-tail deer. Quail, both bob-white and blue, and dove are prevalent. Visitors to the ranch may also see turkey, ducks, coyotes, bobcats, and wild pigs. Nature provides an excellent habitat for wildlife on this ranch. The owner has chosen not to lease it out for hunting.
PALO DURO CANYON: Armstrong County covers 583,040 ares, or 911 square miles. Average rainfall is 20+ inches, and the average growing season is 197 days. There are two major physiographic areas, the High Plains and the Rolling Plains. The High Plains area covers the northwestern part of the county and a small area south of Palo Duro Canyon. Geologic erosion of the land that once was part of the High Plains has produced the area known as the Rolling Plains. These plains are the watershed for the Prairie Dog Town Fork of the Red River. Stream erosion, and perhaps some wind erosion, has formed the Palo Duro Canyon. Along the canyon rim, or caprock, elevations change in a short distance, resulting in some very rough country. These areas are ideal for and home to aoudad sheep, deer, and other wildlife.
Palo Duro Canyon is promoted as being the United States’ second largest canyon. Apache and Comanche Indians, buffalo hunters, and early Spanish explorers once roamed the canyon. Today it features attractions such as the Palo Duro Canyon State Park and the musical drama “Texas”.
TOPOGRAPHY: Flat, open land on top to dramatic canyon land with Salt Fork draw and several other canyon tributaries. There is roughly 800 feet change in elevation on this property.
IMPROVEMENTS: A recently remodeled 2 story ranch home with 4 bedrooms and 2 1/2 bathrooms. The oversized 2 car garage has a finished 2nd story loft. 40×80 metal shop building with attached 30×80 shed roof, catch pens in canyon.
WATER: There are six wells on the property. At the headquarters, there is one windmill and one submersible. There are two other windmills and one electric submersible on the top part of the ranch. Off the caprock, there is a solar powered submersible and several dirt tanks.
TAXES: $7,011.01 for 2018 w/ag exemptions
SCHOOL DISTRICT: Claude ISD
MINERALS: Subject to previous reservations of record, Seller will reserve none.
POSSESSION: Property is owner operated, possession is negotiable.
PRICE: $1,150 / acre ($6,224,536) Seller will consider owner financing for 20 years at 5% interest with approved credit and $1,000,000 down payment.
OTHER DATA: This ranch is a great combination of productivity and recreation, with flat farmland, open grassland, amazing canyon views, and accessible canyon land. This is a unique opportunity to purchase a ranch of this size, quality, and location. Deer, sheep, quail, coyotes, bobcats and hogs are common with a record Auodad taken on this ranch. The grass has been rested for several years and is in very good shape.
With Amarillo in easy driving distance from the properties along the north rim of the Palo Duro Canyon, the demand in this area has soared. Much of the canyon land is held by large ranches and is very seldom available for purchase. The Johnson Ranch provides both a working ranch and unlimited recreational possibilities. The hunting and scenic landscape afforded by Palo Duro Canyon is unequalled in this region.
The neighboring ranch land along most of the west side, the south side, and some of the east side is in a conservation easement. This should limit the potential for development of that property and ensure unimpeded views from the Johnson Ranch of the natural beauty of the canyon for many years to come.
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The information provided is for consumers' personal, non commercial use and may not be used for any purpose other than to identify prospective properties consumers may be interested in purchasing. All properties are subject to prior sale or withdrawal. All information provided is deemed reliable but is not guaranteed accurate, and should be independently verified.
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63% of motorists 'feel awkward about asking passengers for petrol money'
Over a quarter of drivers (27%) said they had fallen out with somebody who did not pay
Iain Lynn
Nearly two-thirds of motorists feel awkward about asking passengers for petrol money in return for a lift, a survey has found.
Some 63% of people feel this way - with men more likely than women to ask their passengers to stump up some cash - insurer Admiral found.
Nearly a third (31%) of male drivers said they do ask for contributions towards their costs, compared with just over one in five (21%) women.
Siblings, parents of children's friends, colleagues, friends and neighbours are the least likely to offer money for a lift, drivers said.
Some 72% of drivers giving lifts claimed that even their closest friends do not offer any petrol money in return.
Over a quarter of drivers (27%) said they had fallen out with somebody who did not pay their way, the survey of more than 2,000 people across the UK found.
Sabine Williams, head of motor at Admiral, said: "Most of us have given or received a lift from someone else in our lifetime and many of us do so on a regular basis, so it's interesting to see that we don't seem to have an established set of social rules when it comes to offering or accepting petrol money - And that it's actually causing some people to quarrel."
Wigan motorists grow weary of roadworks chaos
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+ Donors
Captain Norman L. Barr, Jr.
The Marines Invade Goleta
Home > Press > History > @article.title
written by: Tom Modugno Goleta History
World War II brought a lot of changes to our world, and Goleta was no exception. Our little airport served as the backdrop for a Marine air station that served as a training base for multiple squadrons that went on to support combat operations in the Pacific Theater. This sleepy little agriculture village was abruptly invaded by the United States Marines in 1942, and the work they did in a few short years changed Goleta forever.
This is how things look today. The ever expanding UCSB at the top and the Santa Barbara Airport at the bottom. The size of the airport and the location of the university are both direct results of the U.S. Marine base.
This photo from 1938 shows how things looked a few years before before the war. The red arrow points to downtown Goleta. The white arrow shows the single runway of the earliest stages of the airport. The green arrow points to a complete Mescaltitlan Island. The slough was still a large lagoon of sorts, and the mesa that holds UCSB was farmland.
As tensions in the world increased, the United States Government established a program to construct airports across the country on a cost-sharing basis with local governments. Since Goleta already had a little airfield with a lot of empty land around it, it seemed a natural for expansion. Thomas M. Storke, editor and publisher of the News Press, used his influence to secure Santa Barbara’s enrollment in the government program.
In 1941, construction began on the new Santa Barbara Municipal Airport. A portion of Mescaltitlan Island was used as fill dirt to turn the marshlands of the slough into runways and a beautiful Spanish style terminal was built to service commercial air customers.
After we entered the war, the United States Army began building concrete revetments, seen on the lower left, and they stationed fighter planes at the airport. The Navy sent the first Marines to Goleta in 1942 and they petitioned the government to make it a Marine base. They chose Goleta because the climate allowed year round training and because an airfield was already in place.
Tents were set up as temporary barracks on the dry, high ground at the northeast end of the airport. Drinking water had to be trucked in from town.
The two old General Western hangars were used for additional barracks and a mess hall. A temporary station headquarters was set up in the old terminal building and for squadron areas they used the former Army revetments.
The old terminal in the middle has been demolished, but the two original hangars still stand today near the corner of Hollister and Fairview, patiently awaiting restoration.
Things were pretty rough for the first Marines. High tides and heavy rains flooded the landing field with mud, so four-wheel drive Jeeps were required to get around the base. Mosquitoes were abundant and a constant nuisance. The Marines nicknamed the station “The Swamp” and a standing joke among the pilots was to request permission to land on Santa Barbara Lake.
A problem the airport built on a slough still has to this day….
Another thing that made life difficult for the first Marines was the stench and flies coming from a thriving hog farm and slaughterhouse on Fairview Avenue. The prevailing winds blew the not so fresh aroma straight at their temporary living quarters. The white arrow shows the hog farm and the red arrow shows the two old hangars in this photo from the 1930’s. The hog farm suffered a mysterious fire, and was soon after removed to make more room for the base.
The station was initially equipped with only a few aircraft and at least half were bi-planes. Older planes like this PT-17 Stearman were used for local patrols and some of the old aircraft were fitted with depth charges to defend against another submarine attack. The Japanese sub attack on the oil fields at Ellwood in February of 1942 kept the base on a very high alert. A complete blackout was maintained at night and lookouts were on duty 24/7. The primitive base had many foxholes, gun emplacements, and barbed wire barriers in case of a Japanese land assault.
In August of 1942 the Marine HQ moved out of the old terminal and into the beautiful new United Airlines terminal. Goleta was unique in that the military shared airfields and the terminal with the commercial airport.
This headline announced the decision in May, 1942 and the airfield was officially commissioned by the Marines on December 4, 1942 as the Marine Corps Air Station Santa Barbara. A lease agreement of $2,600 a year was made with the city of Santa Barbara for the airport property, but the fee was never paid.
Another unique thing about the Marine base at Goleta was the control tower was shared with the commercial airport. In fact, civilians remained the air traffic controllers for both commercial and Marine flight operations for the duration of the base.
This map shows just a portion of the huge expanse of land that was confiscated to make the existing airport an operational Marine base. The government used eminent domain to confiscate over 70 properties in one swipe and they paid only $80,000 for all of it!
Here is the 1942 land transfer record found by historian Adam Lewis in the County records office. It names all the parties that were forced to sacrifice their land for the cause.
In times of war, things like historic sites and the environment are of little concern. Defending our nation is the top priority and the ends justify the means. The existing runways needed to be expanded for the military aircraft, so more of the slough was filled in with dirt from Mescaltitlan Island (circled) and from the bluffs of Isla Vista.
Mescaltitlan Island fill dirt was harvested without any second thoughts about all the prehistoric artifacts the heavy machinery was cutting through. When they were done, about half the island was gone.
This 1942 site plan shows some extent of the development done by the Marines during their short stay in Goleta. The Navy hired a civilian contractor from Los Angeles to do most of the construction. The government provided unlimited money and materials to complete the project ASAP.
A railroad spur was built to ease the delivery of the massive amounts of materials and machinery needed to build the base as quickly as possible. Time was of the essence.
A platform was built on the spur and tons of supplies were delivered to facilitate the round-the-clock construction of the base. The platform remained and was used for supply deliveries throughout the war.
This railroad spur still exists and is being used to this day by Hayward Lumber.
Most folks that visit Hayward Lumber have no idea this old track was built for the Marine base.
Life got a little easier for the Marines with the construction of new living quarters. Due to the marshy slough surrounding the air base, the operations and the housing had to be widely separated.
The barracks, mess halls, chapels, theaters, laundry, administration buildings and other facilities were built on the mesa above the slough. Over 100 wooden buildings were built by mid 1943. Some taxpayers moaned about the frills being built, like the Olympic sized swimming pool and the fancy Officers Club, but the Navy ignored the critics.
These buildings would later lay the groundwork for the University, as many were easily converted into classrooms.
© 2019 Wings Of Honor Santa Barbara | Website by Ameravant
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:: Anarcho-Capitalist Non-Miscellaneous :: AnCaps With FreeStyle Miscellaneous
Dave Rubin on why he left the left
Subject: Dave Rubin on why he left the left Sun May 12, 2019 9:58 pm
On Friday, May 10, popular YouTube personality and host of “The Rubin Report” podcast, Dave Rubin, visited campus to discuss how his political viewpoint evolved from modern liberalism or progressivism to classical liberalism.
Rubin began his talk by discussing the presence of discrimination against conservatives and libertarians on tech and media platforms.
“There’s a really fascinating debate and a truly deep, psychological political debate happening right now on what the government should do. Right?” Rubin said. “So what I’m seeing right now is that it seems to me that a lot of the Trump right — so let’s say the ‘conservative right’ at the moment — is doing something a little odd right now. They’re sort of pushing for government involvement in the tech companies.”
Rubin went on to illustrate his point by making an example of Carl Benjamin — a political commentator and owner of a channel on YouTube called “Sargon of Akkad.” Benjamin is currently running for a seat in Parliament in the United Kingdom.
“He was booted off Patreon, and Jordan [Peterson], Sam Harris and I think a few other people decided to leave the platform because we thought this guy, Carl Benjamin, who’s basically a classical liberal, I’d say he’s pretty much a centrist — he’s got some Libertarian leanings,” Rubin said. “If this guy is not allowed on these platforms, then I guarantee you, everyone in this room is about this far away from being booted off these platforms too.”
Rubin said that the world continues to move journalism toward alternative forms of media, including YouTube and podcasts. He argues it will be up to college-age individuals to ensure that those who do not fall into “liberal” political beliefs continue to remain on tech platforms.
“It’s not just conservatives,” Rubin said. “It’s pretty much anyone that doesn’t sort of fall into the postmodern-left-progressive box. We’ve got a target on us at the moment and for you guys that grew up getting your news on YouTube and through podcasts and all these things, this is gonna be your challenge basically to fix this thing.”
Rubin additionally addressed how he tries to “get through” to liberals and posed a question that he poses at each college visit.
“Is there anyone in this room that has it worse than their grandparents?” Rubin asked. “I mean really think about your grandparents for just a sec, whether they were born in this country, whether they’re third-generation in this country, whether you are first generation yourself, your parents came from somewhere else. Your grandparents came from somewhere else.
No one in the audience raised their hand to answer this question.
In this day and age, Rubin sees a change in the right-wing, specifically in its progress and discussion toward a more Libertarian point of view.
“So what’s happening right now on the center-right is you’ve got some Trump people, you’ve got some never-Trump people,” Rubin said. “There’s not many neocons left, but you’ve got neocons, you’ve got classical liberals, you got ex-lefties, that are sort of waking up to what the left has become, and I see something very very rich developing here. The other thing that I really like, which sort of brings it around to where I started is that what I see, as a really sort of healthy bright or healthy conservative group, is one that embraces a little more Libertarians.”
http://udreview.com/dave-rubin-on-why-he-left-the-left/
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The Bahá'í Chair for World Peace Fall Lecture
China's Religious Landscape: Models of Religious Pluralism
Dr. David A. Palmer, Associate Professor
University of Hong Kong
Dr. David A. Palmer is an Associate Professor in the department of Sociology at the University of Hong Kong, and Honourary Associate Professor at the Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences. Trained at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in Paris, he was formerly the Eileen Barker Fellow in Religion and Contemporary Society at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and, from 2004 to 2008, director of the Hong Kong Centre of the Ecole Française d'Extrême-Orient (French School of Asian Studies), located at the Institute for Chinese Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is the author of the award-winning Qigong Fever: Body, Science and Utopia in China (Columbia University Press, 2007), co-author of The Religious Question in Modern China (University of Chicago Press, 2011; awarded the Levenson Book Prize of the Association for Asian Studies), and co-editor of Chinese Religious Life (Oxford University Press, 2011). He has published several articles, journal issues and edited volumes on Chinese religion, modern Daoism, the Baha’i Faith, and modern religious movements. His current research projects focus on local ritual traditions, transnational religious movements, and on faith-based volunteering and NGOs in the Chinese world and Southeast Asia.
Lecture Video
Download flier (pdf)
McKeldin Library
Special Events Room # 6137
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Book Review-Kiss Of The Highlander
Kiss of the Highlander by Karen Marie Moning
Also in this series: Spell of the Highlander, Beyond the Highland Mist, The Dark Highlander, Surrender to the Highlander
Published by Random House Publishing Group on May 20th 2008
Genres: Historical Romance, European Renaissance Era, Time Travel Romance, Fantasy Romance
Source: Library
A laird trapped between centuries...Enchanted by a powerful spell, Highland laird Drustan MacKeltar slumbered for nearly five centuries hidden deep in a cave, until an unlikely savior awakened him. The enticing lass who dressed and spoke like no woman he’d ever known was from his distant future, where crumbled ruins were all that remained of his vanished world. Drustan knew he had to return to his own century if he was to save his people from a terrible fate. And he needed the bewitching woman by his side....A woman changed forever in his arms...Gwen Cassidy had come to Scotland to shake up her humdrum life and, just maybe, meet a man. How could she have known that a tumble down a Highland ravine would send her plunging into an underground cavern — to land atop the most devastatingly seductive man she’d ever seen? Or that once he’d kissed her, he wouldn’t let her go? Bound to Drustan by a passion stronger than time, Gwen is swept back to sixteenth-century Scotland, where a treacherous enemy plots against them ... and where a warrior with the power to change history will defy time itself for the woman he loves....From the Paperback edition.
Gwen Cassidy comes to Scotland with her friend and her husband on a much needed vacation. Although at a reasonable price, she is surround by elderly folk that tend to gossip and no hope of finding the right man. Gwen is lonely and tired of being in that state. When she falls down a ravine, on a hike, she lands on top of a man, the most sensual man she has ever seen. They share a passionate embrace, and stirs up her inner desires that she has never felt before, but so different from any other man she has ever met. Now Dustran realizes that he is no longer in the 16th century Scotland, but has somehow traveled forward in time to the 21st century, with no memory of it, and starts feeling out of control and more lost than ever, until the love of a good woman changed him forever.
Drustan MacKeltar doesn’t remember how he found himself aroused with a beautiful woman on top of him. And she is different than any other woman he has ever know, for she is a modern woman. She dresses differently, and talks in a strange manner he is unfamiliar with, but his body wants her in a way he can hardly think straight. Drustan is a druid, with unnatural abilities, reluctant to use them and show them to Gwen, after losing 3 fiancees due to who he was. From the 16th century, Laird of his clan, recently having losing his twin brother Daegus. Drustan is a strong leader, passionate nature, definitely the imbediment of a alpha male.
The Heroine
Gwen Cassidy losing both of her parents, being killed in a plane crash, is still a virgin. So having recently quitting smoking, is looking for a man to be her as she names it “Cherry Picker”. Having followed in her mother’s footsteps to be a physicist. Gwen fears that wanting to have a “grand passion” is just a dream and fantasy and will never come true for her, or that maybe there is something wrong with her. Gwen is a woman that wants to believe in love but has yet to find it for herself. She is intelligent and loves the world around her, she dreams of having children, and even more of a love of a man and a intense passion.
Kiss of the Highlander is the fourth in the Highlander series written by Karen Marie Moning. And as far as this series goes, this was definitely one hell of a ride, and at the top of my personal favorites list. This love story was filled with so many surprises that I could hardly keep up with the story( but in a really great way…of course) The plot was very intense and dramatic, filled with passion and adventure….from beginning to end a remarkable love story, that truly had me from the first page. The characters were riveting and real for the reader, and a roller coaster of emotional results, a perfect mix of a wonderfully written romance! Definitely one of my favorites to read, and I couldn’t put this down…..
“Och lass, doona you know? Your heart is my home..”
Karen Marie Moning is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the sizzling Urban Fantasy FEVER Novels set in Dublin, featuring MacKayla Lane and Jericho Barrons, and the paranormal romance HIGHLANDER Series, with fifteen books in print in thirty-six countries.
She is a winner of the prestigious Romance Writers of America RITA award, and multiple RITA nominee. She graduated from Purdue University with a degree in Society & Law.
Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads
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Mass and lunch: Pope to lead celebration of World Day of the Poor
A woman in Delhi, India, reacts amid the rubble of her home destroyed by local authorities in a bid to relocate the residents in this Nov. 2 photo. Pope Francis will celebrate the Catholic Church’s first World Day of the Poor Nov. 19. (CNS photo/Cathal McNaughton, Reuters)
By Catholic News Service • Posted November 10, 2017
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis will celebrate the Catholic Church’s first World Day of the Poor Nov. 19 by celebrating a morning Mass with people in need and those who assist them. After Mass, he will offer lunch to 500 people in the Vatican audience hall.
As the Year of Mercy was ending in November 2016, Pope Francis told people he wanted to set one day aside each year to underline everyone’s responsibility “to care for the true riches, which are the poor.”
The result was the World Day of the Poor, which is to be marked annually on the 33rd Sunday of ordinary time on the church’s liturgical calendar.
An admonition from St. John Chrysostom “remains ever timely,” Pope Francis said in a message for the 2017 celebration. He quoted the fifth-century theologian: “If you want to honor the body of Christ, do not scorn it when it is naked; do not honor the eucharistic Christ with silk vestments and then, leaving the church, neglect the other Christ suffering from cold and nakedness.”
The pope chose “Love not in word, but in deed” as the theme for 2017.
The Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization is coordinating the celebration and issued a resource book — available online at www.pcpne.va — that includes Scripture meditations, sample prayer services and suggestions for parishes and dioceses.
An obvious starting place, the council said, is to reach out “to places such as soup kitchens, shelters, prisons, hospitals, nursing homes, treatment centers, etc., so that the words of the pope could arrive to everyone at the same time on this day.”
Every parish and Catholic group, it said, should organize at least one practical initiative, such as “taking groceries to a needy family, offering a meal for the poor, purchasing equipment for elderly persons who are not self-sufficient, donating a vehicle to a family, or making a contribution to the Caritas fund for families.”
One of the primary goals of the day, the council said, is to help Catholics answer the question, “Who are ‘the poor’ today, and where are they around me, in the area in which I live?” and then to find ways to share and create relationships with them.
The resource book also offered 18 “saints and blesseds of charity of the 20th and 21st centuries” as examples. The list is led by St. Teresa of Kolkata, but also includes Blessed Oscar Romero of San Salvador and U.S. St. Katharine Drexel and Blessed Stanley Rother.
PREVIOUS: Peace, dialogue held hostage by nuclear weapons threat, pope says
NEXT: Forgotten Catholics: French author speaks on single people, celibacy
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Home / Channels / Boxing / The Talk Ends This Saturday
The Talk Ends This Saturday
By Francis Walker
The rematch should be fun...
NEW YORK, NY (BASN)—The long-awaited rematch between boxing’s oldest champion in history, WBC light-heavyweight kingpin Bernard Hopkins (52-5-2, 32 KOs) and Chad Dawson (30-1, 17 KOs), once labeled as the future at 175 pounds, will occur on Saturday, April 28, from Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, NJ.
HBO will televise along with an intriguing co-featured attraction between American heavyweights Seth Mitchell and Chazz Witherspoon.
The first fight ended in controversy when Chad Dawson inadvertently hoisted Hopkins off his feet and sent him sprawling onto the canvas.
Hopkins landed on his left shoulder and couldn’t continue. The result was officially announced as a TKO, but later changed to a no-contest.
Just when it appeared as though Hopkins and Dawson would go along their own separate ways, the WBC mandated an immediate rematch.
So here we are folks. It’s fight week. The barricade of words between Hopkins and Golden Boy Promotions Richard Shafer, Dawson and Gary Shaw will soon end. Shaw made reference to the end of Bernard Hopkins.
Dawson believes he will be crowned as the best light-heavyweight in the world after Saturday. Shafer and Shaw both have disagreed on the events of the first fight and why the rematch is even happening.
Bernard is fed up with all the talking. After years of being questioned about his age, his endurance, how long, and how much longer he plans on fighting. It gets to be a bit much after a while.
“I know what I know and I start getting kind of old in boxing because to be honest with you, I don’t really have too much to say any more,” Hopkins said during a recent conference call. “The last two or three years even though I try to push myself to give people something because it’s part of the game in boxing. You do a lot of talking. Then you do a lot of backing up. Some do and some don’t, but I think I am getting kind of old in my age where right now I get agitated even doing these interviews because it seems to be the same questions and nobody else has anything different to ask me.”
Dawson, the much younger man at age 29, was recently compared to other young fighters Hopkins, 47, fought earlier in his career.
Dawson believes he’s much too different than anyone Hopkins has ever been in the ring with.
“I don’t know because I can’t compare myself to other young guys,” Dawson stated. “I think I’m fully different from all the other young guys he’s beaten. I have more will. I’m definitely smarter. I know Bernard’s been around the game for a long time. I know he knows all the tricks and all of the tactics and everything, but I’m not worried about that.”
Look at Hopkins’ losses. Minus losing his professional debut, Hopkins’ four losses against Roy Jones, Jr., Jermain Taylor, and Joe Calzaghe occurred against fighters with greater hand and foot speed. Calzaghe, like Dawson was a southpaw before retiring as an undefeated fighter having bested both Jones and Hopkins in 2008.
However, Dawson differs from Calzaghe.
“I mean Joe Calzaghe was a great fighter,” Dawson said, “but me and Joe Calzaghe are two different fighters. We’re both southpaws, but Calzaghe uses his hand speed. I use my hand speed too, but my punches mean something. My punches count. My punches hurt. Joe Calzaghe was more of slapper with his punches. There wasn’t that much power on his punches but he threw a lot of punches.”
That could be the difference between a widespread decision victory, or a marginal defeat. If Dawson can keep his hands busy, use his speed, and outwork Hopkins, he has a good chance to win.
Dawson cannot allow Hopkins to bully him.
Hopkins has made a career out of pulling a rabbit out a hat. Let’s not forget his performances against Jean Pascal and Kelly Pavlik in recent fights.
Also, when Hopkins lost to Calzaghe, it was a split-decision.
Hopkins also knocked Calzaghe down early in the fight. Beating Dawson, however, is an uphill task.
Dawson fights tall at 6′ 3,” he’ll have the youth on his side as well.
“I mean I have every advantage” Dawson said. “I got the fire in my eyes and people saw that at the last fight. I really wanted to go out and I really wanted to beat Bernard Hopkins. Bernard had other plans. I’m going to keep saying this; Bernard did not want to be in the ring with me that night. Maybe he under trained and he didn’t expect to see what he saw that night. Maybe he needed more time to get in better shape. I don’t know, but I’m here and I’m for real and I’m coming to fight.”
Although the first fight lasted only two rounds, the fight was according to plan.
Hopkins did the same thing Dawson anticipated during his preparations for the first encounter.
“I think he did everything we thought he was going to,” Dawson said. “He started head butting early. He started all of his dirty tactics. He kept jumping on my back. Everything he did that night we expected. Even when he hit the canvas we knew he wasn’t getting back up. We knew he was going to fake it until he made it, and that’s what happened.”
Hopkins isn’t buying into Dawson’s claim. In fact, Hopkins simply isn’t buying anything no one says.
Hopkins is focused on the physical aspect of what awaits on Saturday.
“Listen, I like this,” Hopkins said. “This is all a game. It’s all a game. It’s a game of chess not checkers. It’s a game in the ring. There’s a game out of the ring. I hear the whispers. I hear the whispers. It’s all a game. And you know what? Right now I’m winning the game. I’m winning the game and April 28th that the physical part of the game, but the other game is vicious because you don’t see the part that’s coming.”
You can feel the excitement in the air. Can Chad Dawson end the legacy of Bernard Hopkins? Can he do what so many fighters have tried and repeatedly failed to do through the years?
The world light-heavyweight champion is closer to 50 than 40 folks. Bernard can’t fight forever. It has to end eventually, but will it end on Saturday? Does Dawson have the tools to shock Bernard?
Dawson, although he owns a pair of wins against both Antonio Tarver and Glen Johnson, in addition to Tomasz Adamek, who foufght for a heavyweight title last September, hasn’t looked spectacular since he beat Tarver the first time. After three-four-five punch combinations thrown, Tarver didn’t even belong in the ring with Dawson that night. The rematch was all Dawson.
Will Saturday’s rematch with Hopkins be all Dawson’s again?
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John Mayer: Career Partners Locations 2003-08 2009-15 2016-18
Photo: Ed Chan
Home Town Culver City, CA
Resides Los Angeles, CA
College Pierce Junior College/Pepperdine
United States 1st (4 times) $340,933
AVP 1st (4 times) $294,120
NVL 3rd (2 times) $3,125
P&R 9th $0
Pro Beach 2nd (3 times) $31,750
Wide Open 2nd (2 times) $9,438
Bonus Money $2,500
International 1st (2 times) $56,950
FIVB 1st (2 times) $56,950
NORCECA 2nd (2 times) $2,400
Overall 1st (6 times) $400,283
Beach Bits:
� Mayer improved his AVP player ranking each season since he began in 2003 through 2009.
� In reaching the semifinals in Hermosa Beach in 2006, Mayer and Keenan became the lowest seeded team (27th) to reach the Final Four since a team seeded 30th accomplished it in 1997.
� In his career, Mayer has partnered with three college National Players of the Year (Jeff Nygaard, 1994, 1995; Brad Keenan, 2002; Sean Rooney, 2005).
2015: Mayer formed a partnership with Ryan Doherty, and the duo's six semifinals in the seven AVP events was the most on the Tour. They won in Seattle after knocking off the top three seeds while finishing second three times. They ended the year as the Tour's top-ranked pair, while Mayer was ninth in digs per set (4.72). Mayer and Doherty played in six FIVB events, advancing from the qualifier four times, with a best of fifth in Long Beach.
2014: Mayer and Keenan won the AVP season opener, giving Mayer his first win in over five years. The duo's other semifinal came in Manhattan Beach, finishing third. Mayer was seventh in digs per set (4.88). Internationally Mayer and Keenan played one FIVB event, advancing from the qualifier to place ninth. At the end of the year Mayer teamed with Theo Brunner for two FIVB tournaments, with a best of fourth.
2013: Mayer and Keenan played in two FIVB events together, advancing to one main draw and finishing 17th. On the AVP Tour, Mayer and Keenan played in all seven tournaments, with their best finish of third coming in the season finale.
2012: Mayer began a partnership with Brad Keenan, playing in six FIVB events together. The duo advanced to three main draws, with a best of 17th.
2011: Mayer played on three domestic tours with Prosser, finishing with two seconds and three thirds in their eight events together.
2010: Mayer began the AVP season with three events playing alongside Nygaard. In the next four tournaments Mayer partnered with Prosser, with a best of second place.
2009: Won his first career title in San Diego in May with Nygaard. As the seventh seeds, they became the lowest seeded duo to win an AVP event since Boulder in 2005. The pair also advanced to four other semifinals during the year, and ended as the fourth-ranked team on tour. In the season-ending individual event, Mayer finished fifth. Mayer played one FIVB tournament with Matt Fuerbringer, placing 17th.
2008: In the season opener Mayer placed seventh in his first event with Jeff Carlucci, and after three tournaments played once with Will Strickland. He then formed a partnership with Jeff Nygaard, placing fifth in their first outing. In Hermosa Beach the pair advanced to the semifinals, and also added three more fifth-place finishes. Mayer earned his first top 20 ranking, at 18th. He was seventh in digs per game (5.06).
2007: Played in 16 events with six different partners, including brothers Scott and Kevin Wong. He reunited with Prosser and had a season-best seventh place finish. Mayer was eighth in digs per game (4.56).
2006: Began a partnership with Brad Keenan, a former collegiate teammate at Pepperdine, playing in the qualifiers in their first five tournaments. After failing to make the main draw in the first two outings, the duo placed 25th and then 17th before a record-tying performance in Hermosa Beach. The pair won three qualifier matches then proceeded to finish third, tying for the highest AVP finish by a qualifier. The high finish secured an automatic main draw berth for Mayer the rest of the season. Immediately after the Hermosa Beach event, he and Prosser competed in the World University Games in Cyprus, claiming a Bronze medal.
2005: Started the year with four tournaments alongside Rooney, with a best of 13th. His final three events came with two different partners, including twice with Matt Prosser.
2004: Mayer played three events with Mintz, collecting his first paycheck in Huntington Beach. His final tournament of the year came with Sean Rooney, a college teammate from his 2005 National Championship team.
2003: Mayer made his pro beach volleyball debut in a qualifier in Hermosa Beach with Yariv Lerner. He played three times with Lerner during the year, with a best of 33rd.
College: Mayer started out at Los Angeles Pierce Community College, where he led the team to the 2002 California state championship while earning MVP honors in the tournament as well as in the conference. He transferred to Pepperdine and immediately became the starting setter, guiding the team to the National Championship match. After two years as the starting setter, he switched positions, briefly becoming a libero before settling in at opposite hitter, starting on the 2005 National Championship team. He left the school fourth in career assists and seventh in career digs.
Personal: Mayer was the head men's volleyball coach at Santa Monica College, and was assisted by fellow AVP players Yariv Lerner and Billy Allen. Mayer was named co-Western State Conference Coach of the Year in guiding the team to the 2008 conference championship. He also spent four seasons as an assistant coach for Loyola Marymount's sand volleyball program. In the summer of 2015 he was named as the head coach of LMU's beach volleyball team.
AVP Best Defensive Player 2015
AVP Most Improved Player 2009
AVP Most Valuable Player 2015
Season Assoc Played 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 7th 9th Money Points Rank 13th 17th 25th 29th 33rd 41st 57th CQ
2003 AVP 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $0.00 24.0 142nd 0 0 0 0 1 2 0 0
2004 AVP 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $50.00 39.0 118th 0 0 1 0 1 0 2 0
2005 AVP 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $2,362.50 287.0 53rd 1 3 2 0 0 0 1 0
2006 AVP 13 0 0 1 0 0 0 2 $12,250.00 743.0 33rd 4 3 1 1 1 0 0 0
2007 AVP 16 0 0 0 0 0 1 3 $15,450.00 972.0 31st 7 3 2 0 0 0 0 0
2008 AVP 17 0 0 1 0 4 2 6 $38,687.50 1,581.0 18th 1 3 0 0 0 0 0 0
2009 AVP 15 1 0 4 0 7 1 1 $67,445.00 3,260.0 9th 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2010 AVP 7 0 1 0 0 0 1 2 $14,050.00 1,115.0 22nd 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0
2010 P&R 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 $0.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2011 Pro Beach 3 0 0 2 0 1 0 0 $10,500.00 792.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2011 NVL 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 $1,750.00 540.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2011 Wide Open 4 0 2 0 0 0 1 1 $9,437.50 0.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2012 AVP 2 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 $15,000.00 2,160.0 5th 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2012 Pro Beach 7 0 3 2 0 2 0 0 $21,250.00 1,190.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2013 AVP 7 0 0 1 0 2 1 3 $15,500.00 1,130.0 13th 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2015 AVP 7 1 3 2 0 1 0 0 $34,350.00 2,100.0 1st 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(55th) 4
(71st) 10 23 0 26 11 24 $340,932.50
(43rd) 23,018.0 16 14 6 1 3 2 3 0
2009 FIVB 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $1,400.00 60.0 159th 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
2012 FIVB 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $5,300.00 182.0 100th 0 1 2 0 1 1 0 1
2013 FIVB 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $1,850.00 240.0 151st 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0
2015 FIVB 6 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 $24,900.00 920.0 65th 0 3 1 0 0 0 0 0
2017 FIVB 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 $1,000.00 60.0 172nd 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
(425th) 2
(89th) 0 0 2 1 0 3 $56,950.00
(263rd) 3,212.0 0 9 3 0 9 1 0 1
NORCECA
2013 NORCECA 3 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 $1,375.00 160.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2016 NORCECA 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 $525.00 0.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
2017 NORCECA 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 $500.00 80.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(Rank) 5
(141st) 0 2 1 1 0 1 0 $2,400.00
(59th) 240.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(118th) 12 24 3 27 12 27 $400,282.50
(95th) 26,470.0 16 23 9 1 12 3 3 1
Victory List
Victory Date Assoc Location Partner Seed Winnings
1 5/3/2009 AVP San Diego Jeff Nygaard 7 $12,000
2 6/1/2014 AVP St. Petersburg Brad Keenan 6 $7,500
3 8/9/2015 AVP Seattle Ryan Doherty 4 $7,500
4 4/17/2016 AVP New Orleans Ryan Doherty 1 $7,500
5 5/13/2018 FIVB Lucerne Trevor Crabb 29 $5,000
6 6/3/2018 FIVB Jinjiang Trevor Crabb 2 $2,000
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Political FARA Violations:
FARA Statute: The term “agent of a foreign principal” refers to any person who acts as an agent, representative, employee, or servant, or any person who acts in any other capacity at the order, request, or under the direction or control, of a foreign principal or of a person any of whose activities are directly or indirectly supervised, directed, controlled, financed, or subsidized in whole or in major part by a foreign principal. And who directly or through any other person:
represents the interests of such foreign principal before any agency or official of the Government of the United States
engages within the United States in political activities for or in the interests of such foreign principal
acts within the United States as a public relations counsel, publicity agent, information-service employee or political consultant for or in the interests of such foreign principal
Meetings and Coordination: CAIR has acted as a foreign agent of the Jeddah, Saudi Arabia-based Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), an association of 57 Islamic states promoting Muslim solidarity in economic, social, and political affairs. CAIR has also acted as a foreign agent for member states of the OIC, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran and the UAE. The above link contains a selection of cases in which CAIR has coordinated with such foreign principals and failed to report these interactions as a registered foreign agent to the Department of Justice in contravention of the requirements of FARA.
NOTE: Private documents exist indicating hundreds of contacts between CAIR and foreign principals including representatives of foreign governments, businesses, NGO’s and individuals, all of which potentially come under FARA. Due to ongoing litigation we cannot reproduce those documents here at this time.
Influence Operations: CAIR has consistently acted in its role as a foreign agent to influence agencies and officials of the United States government. They have had extensive relationships with law enforcement including numerous education and “sensitivity training” programs on dealing with the Muslim community. CAIR has also publicly censured and criticized government representatives and officials who have expressed opposition to their OIC-inspired activities in the United States. CAIR has intimidated corporations who violate OIC-approved conduct regarding Muslim employees and customers. By means of lawsuits and threats of lawsuits, boycotts and threats of boycotts, letter-writing campaigns, and other tactics they have chilled open debate about Sharia-compliance. CAIR has also participated in various media campaigns to influence US public opinion on behalf of foreign principals.
NOTE: This is an interim report and the political influence operations cited here are meant to be exemplary, not exhaustive. We will continue to add influence operations to the list, and we encourage readers to send us open-source documentation of activities similar to those presented here so we may deepen the evidence in our case.
Action Alerts: The CAIR Observatory maintains an archive of 2,284 CAIR Action Alerts dated from September 6, 2001 to February 13, 2007. Action Alerts are news items, press releases and calls to activism that were sent out via email to the CAIR listserv. Our archive preserves statements by CAIR personnel that they may have removed from their website. By browsing the Action Alerts you can retrace CAIR’s priorities in real-time, including how they framed the news issues of the day.
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Exclusive: Matt Reeves Talks LET ME IN, CLOVERFIELD, THE PASSAGE, THIS DARK ENDEAVOR, More at the Saturn Awards
by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub June 27, 2011
While on the red carpet for the 37th annual Saturn Awards, we got the chance to speak with Cloverfield and Let Me In director Matt Reeves. He gave a wide-ranging interview, talking at length about Let Me In (including his comments on the ending of the film), giving updates on his upcoming projects The Passage, This Dark Endeavor and a new script he’s currently writing, discussing the similarities between the creatures in Cloverfield and J.J. Abrams’ Super 8, and much, much more.
Hit the jump to watch the interview. If you missed our other coverage from the Saturn Awards, be sure to check out our conversations with makeup artists Rick Baker and Dave Elsey, Brandon Routh, Fringe’s Lance Reddick, producer Dean Devlin, Frank Darabont and Gale Anne Hurd for The Walking Dead, and Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan.
Here’s a few of the choice quotes from the interview. The full video interview is below.
2:27 – Transitioning to Horror/Science Fiction Filmmaker
“You know I never would have guessed I would be making science fiction and horror films. That kind of stuff. They were the kind of movies that frankly as a kid scared the hell out of me and so I really had a hard time watching them… I never thought I would be making them and then after Cloverfield happened it obviously created a lot of opportunity for me to do those kind of films. I discovered the fun of genre is…you get to explore your fears and you get to use the metaphor of the genre – whether it’s a giant monster or a… 12-year-old vampire. Whatever it is you can sink something underneath the surface and make a personal film under the guise of great fun romp.”
3:34 – What’s Next
There’s a few things I’m doing – there’s a project called The Passage, which is a novel by Justin Cronin and I’m developing that and that’s one I might direct. There’s one called This Dark Endeavor, which is a young Victor Frankenstein – kind of a creation myth. It’s a book that’s coming out this summer by Kenneth Oppel. It’s a terrific book and Jacob Estes is writing that. Jason Keller is writing The Passage and I myself am doing a script I hope to direct as well for Universal, which is based on a short story by Ray Nelson called Eight O’Clock In The Morning, which was actually the source material for John Carpenter’s They Live but it won’t have anything to do with the original They Live.
6:13 – On Super 8 and similarities to Cloverfield
“We (J.J. Abrams and Reeves) met in an 8mm film festival when we were thirteen years old and the movie the way it affects me most profoundly is not – I know people when Super 8 was first announced [thought] is this the Cloverfield sequel? – but really I know it’s about his (Abrams) childhood and I shared so much of that time with him. When I saw that movie, in addition to loving the movie, when it got to the end titles and it had that film the kids had made [it was] just so evocative of the films J.J. and I made when we were kids that it blew me away.”
9:41 – On thematic similarities between Let Me In and the Columbine tragedy
“What it made me think of was this idea of alienation and being on the outside and these feeling you can’t express being bottled up. [It] definitely made me think of Columbine. So without being too direct about it – that was the first thing that came to mind: the idea of what should be an ideal American suburb in Colorado and nature and should be a place of what you would imagine [of] classic Americana but under the surface was isolation and loneliness. That was really the inspiration of why it was in Colorado in the script.”
:10 Talks about the ending of Let Me In
:48 His process of adapting material that already existed.
1:37 Talks about going from directing a dark comedy like The Pallbearer to now doing more science-fiction material.
2:44 His future projects. Talks The Passage, This Dark Endeavor, and a script he’s writing based on the short story 8 O’Clock in the Morning off of which They Live was based.
3:33 Talks about what appealed to him about The Passage
4:13 Elaborates on This Dark Endeavor and what drew him to the Frankenstein story.
5:18 Discusses the similarities between the monsters in Cloverfield and Super 8.
6:19 His answer as to whether or not the Super 8 creature is the same creature that lands in Cloverfield.
6:42 Talks about the similarities between the child stories in Let Me In and Super 8 and his connection with them.
7:40 His history with the Frankenstein story.
8:18 Tells a story about how they changed the location of Let Me In from Colorado to Los Alamos.
8:57 Talks about the youth-violence aspects of Let Me In and the parallel to the Columbine incident, and funneling that through a genre film.
10:35 Talks about his penchant for long-takes and why he likes to use them.
11:37 The Saturn Awards. Talks about what it means to be recognized by the genre community.
'Years and Years' Star Russell Tovey on That Episode 4 Twist
'For All Mankind' Showrunner Ronald D. Moore on His Alt History Space Race Apple+ Series
Olivia Munn on Her Two Rules for Taking on Any Role and Why She Joined 'The Rook'
'Crawl' Director Alexandre Aja on Making a Home-Invasion Horror with Alligators
Ella Purnell Talks ‘Sweetbitter’ Season 2 and Zack Snyder’s ‘Army of the Dead’
Casting Call: Nicole Kidman in Talks for THE PAPERBOY as Tobey Maguire…
Final Trailer and Posters for TRANSFORMERS: DARK OF THE MOON
• 8 O'Clock in the Morning • Cloverfield • Entertainment • Matt Reeves • Movie • Super 8 • The Passage • This Dark Endeavor • Video Interview • Video Interviews
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Category: John Malkovich
Nespresso Falling Piano Heaven
Nespresso is the brand name of Nestlé Nespresso S.A., an operating unit of the Nestlé Group, based in Lausanne, Switzerland.
George Timothy Clooney (born May 6, 1961) is an American actor, director, producer, screenwriter, activist, businessman, and philanthropist. Clooney has appeared in commercials outside the U.S. for Fiat, Nespresso, Martini vermouth, and Omega.
Pearly gates is an informal name for the gateway to Heaven according to some Christian denominations. The image of the gates in popular culture is a set of large, white or wrought-iron gates in the clouds, guarded by Saint Peter (the keeper of the “keys to the kingdom”). Those not fit to enter heaven are denied entrance at the gates, and descend into Hell.
John Gavin Malkovich (born December 9, 1953) is an American actor, director, and producer. He has appeared in more than 70 films. In November 2009, Malkovich appeared in an advertisement for Nespresso with fellow actor George Clooney.
The requirement of structural strength, fulfilled by stout hardwood and thick metal, makes a piano heavy. Even a small upright can weigh 136 kg (300 lb), and the Steinway concert grand (Model D) weighs 480 kg (1,060 lb).
Robert Anthony Rodriguez (born June 20, 1968) is an American filmmaker. Rodriguez directed the 1992 action film El Mariachi, which was a commercial success after grossing $2 million against a budget of $7,000.
Author adminPosted on January 9, 2018 January 12, 2018 Categories 2000s, Celebrities, Coffee, Commercials, Drinks, France, George Clooney, Germany, Heaven, Italy, John Malkovich, Switzerland, Violent
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Snoop Dogg – Evolution of a Hip Hop Icon
Evolution of a Hip-Hop Icon
For many people who came of age during the soul era, who loved the tight rhythms, gospel and blues influences of R&B, the emergence of hip-hop was like hearing noise from an unpleasant outer planet. And many hip-hop fans have responded with mutual disdain for the music that lit their parents’ lives and changed society.
As a lot of musicians know, there’s a steady continuum between the seemingly disparate genres. More than any of the standard bearers for hip-hop, Snoop Dogg pays homage to their forerunners, with much love and respect for soul music. He grew up with it. His mother and friends of that generation had it playing on the boom box at home, it was all over the radio, in the clubs and on the streets.
It was from those same streets that the voices of a new generation told the raw story of life as they saw and felt it. Snoop Dogg and his cohorts were at the leading edge of in-your-face gansta rap, igniting the devotion and capturing the hearts of young, angry, querulous generations, while inciting fear, shock and controversy in hidebound polite society everywhere.
Twenty some years later, Snoop is now a leading international media figure, the star who sparks honest communication and good-will across the same divergent cultures and generations that were once so at odds.
Married to his high-school sweetheart, Shante Broadus, for 21 years, they have raised three children and as he has said, “I’m 41 years old and a father, who I am is not who I was.”
Who he is now is the same fun-loving, laid-back, creative, disciplined and totally honest person he’s always been. He radiates an open-heart and open-mind to all who encounter him, devoting his time and energy to worthwhile and ground-breaking endeavors.
Among them is the fact that Snoop is a certified football coach and has been the head coach of his son Cordell’s youth football teams and the John A. Rowland High School trophy-winning team. You can see a fascinating Netflix original series about it, “Coach Snoop” here.
Snoop is an active entrepreneur and investor. In 2009, he was appointed creative chairman of Priority Records. He has become the first major celebrity to brand and market a line of legal marijuana products, he purchased the famed soul food restaurant chain Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles out of bankruptcy and supports numerous charities and worthy causes.
He’s also changed the face and presumptions for prime-time cooking/variety show tv by co-hosting, with his friend, living-well maven, Martha Stewart, VH1’s Martha & Snoop’s Potluck Dinner Party.
As a bridge between R&B and hip hop, Snoop Dogg is a worthy ambassador to both musical worlds as you can see and hear in his collaboration with the great soul vocalist, William Bell on “I Forgot To Be Your Lover.” Link to the Citizen Planet feature, “Partners in Song Across the Generations” here. You can watch a clip of Snoop talking about the link between soul and hip hop and experience an artistically thrilling collaboration between two masters of their genre who pull it all together.
Snoop’s flow is front and center in everything he does. From his earliest mega-hits Doggystyle and The Doggfather, through decades of evolving messages and music, to today’s spiritual expression, Snoop Dogg’s personal and professional evolution is reflected in his willingness to share every part of his journey with courage and depth. We’re all the richer for this man’s evolution.
See how he applies it in Snoop Dog Presents: Bible of Love, the new faith-based set that debuted at No. 1 on Billboard‘s Top Gospel Albums chart. Watch the vid below “Words Are Few” from Bible of Love to experience it for yourself.
Professor Michelle Simmons – Australian Quantum Physicist
Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom
Cannabis “The New Normal” in Spike Jonze’s Video
Havana Film Festival – New York
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Civil War Librarian
Covers new and classic American Civil War books and media.
CWL---Saving the Gettysburg Cyclorama
Saving the Gettysburg Cyclorama, Gettysburg Foundation, DVD, 60 minutes, 2009. $21.95.
You may have seen it before, but never like it is today. In its nearly 125-year history, the 16,000-square-foot, four ton, 125 year old Gettysburg cyclorama- panorama painting has lost about 40% of its canvas. It's moved around the country half a dozen times. It has been burned. It has been cut up. It has painted over. It has been stored under roofs with only three walls.
The Gettysburg Cyclorama has been restored to its original 377 feet long and 43 high is being hyperbolic shape and is now on display at the Gettysburg Military Park's $125 million visitor center, theatre and museum building.
If you saw it in the old visitors center, you saw a flat canvas in a circle. Now, two years and over $11 millions later, the cyclorama painting has two surface cleaning, the wax and glue backing removed, the old patches over tears removed, and the cracks in the paint restored. It now hangs with a slight bow in the canvas, a convex curve that brings center line of sight almost 18 inches closer to the viewer, who does not now stand at the bottom of the painting and looks up but stands on and elevated platform and looks directly at the center of the painting.
This dvd not only pays attention to the preservation procedures but also to the painting's history and the history of panoramic art that was so popular in the mid-19th century. From Pilippoteaux's first visit to the battlefield, his commissioning of photographs to be taken from a tower erected at the Angle, and finally to his team of painters execution of the work, the dvd is a brief but thorough presentation of art, popular culture and preservation science.
Top Image: Newsday
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 7:06 PM No comments:
Labels: Gettysburg Cyclorama, Gettysburg Visitors Center
CWL--- One Northern County's Civil War: Tremendous Resource, Tremendous Story
Our Honored Dead: Allegheny County, Pennsylvania in the American Civil War, Arthur B. Fox, Mechling Bookbindery, photographs, maps, notes, index, bibliography, 486 pages,2008, $39.95.
In Pennsylvania, the cities of Pittsburgh, and Allegheny City and the rest of Allegheny County raised over 200 companies of infantry, cavalry and artillery during the Civil War. Arthur Fox has set forth a clear, complete and very well referenced description Allegheny County's soldiers. With tables of the 1860 and 1870 census, a composite of troop calls, quotas and numbers of Allegheny County and Pennsylvania troops, Fox has find the important numbers for local regional and state researchers as well as social historians. By providing 27 maps that show the cities, boroughs and townships and the major battles at which Allegheny County troops fought, Fox has provided a much needed resource for those not immersed in the military history of the Civil War. Indeed the 71 photographic portraits and drawings embedded in the text insure that the non-Civil War expert will be comfortable with Fox's book.
Readers coming for the first time to mid-19th century history will be pleased to find an entertaining and informative discussion of the county's canals, railroads, newspapers, politics, fire fighting and law enforcement efforts, taverns, horse racing, industries (including the ironworks and the arsenal) and many other things, that form the socio-political environment of the county's' soldiers. Even artists and the 1864 Sanitary Fair are covered in Fox's description of the county.
Fox's treatment of the military companies consists of: dates of enlistment, a biographical description of field officers, the county organization of the regiment, the Allegheny county companies and their captains, the organization of the regiment and its military service, its losses, and its published regimental histories. The book is extensively (35 pages) indexed by subject, personal names, and geographic locations. The bibliography is over 20 pages. Each chapter has its own notes which number 30 to 50. There are 10 appendices regarding; statistics, medal of honor winners, African-American soldiers, generals, Roman Catholic nuns, the payroll of the Allegheny Arsenal which exploded on September 17, 1862, steamships built on the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio River docks in Allegheny, Civil War monuments, and a case study of the veterans of one company, and a list of repositories of Civil War documents.
Because of the wealth of information on Allegheny County, on Pennsylvania, and as a fine model of historic research and writing Our Honored Dead: Allegheny County, Pennsylvania in the American Civil War should be added to the collections all Pennsylvania public, academic, and historical society libraries.
Arthur B. Fox is professor of geography and also teaches courses in regional history and popular culture. His 2002 book, Pittsburgh During the American Civil War, 1860-1865 is a standard among Civil War era Northern urban studies. He was a contributing editor to the African-American Historic Sites Survey of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 10:47 PM No comments:
Labels: Allegheny County Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, Social History, Union Regiments
New On The CWL Bookshelf---The Biography of A Writer: Lincoln
Lincoln: A Biography Of A Writer, Fred Kaplan, Harper Publishing, 406pp., annotated bibliography, notes, index, $27.95.
CWL thoroughly enjoys biographies of writers when the biography is written by an historian. Stephen Oates on William Faulkner! David Reynolds on Walt Whitman! William Manchester on H. L. Mencken! And now Fred Kaplan on Lincoln! Though a professor of English, Kaplan has written on Mark Twain, Gore Vidal, Charles Dickens, Henry James and Thomas Carlyle and has treated sources even-handedly, paid attention to the main currents of the writers' eras and has no allegiance to a particular theoretical, psychological or social school of criticism.
What were the elements that shaped Lincoln's imaginative and mental disciplines? How did Lincoln develop his literary style? Lincoln's childhood contained a search for all the books he could lay his hands on. The King James Bible, Shakespeare, Bunyan, Burns, and Byron were among the classics he read as well as a fair sample of popular sentimental and political literature of the times.
Recently much has been made of Obama's study and use of Lincoln's life and works. In both Obama's autobiographies and in the Time magazine interview of 2003, he treats Lincoln was an icon, model, and teacher. From the photograph to the left, it appears that Obama's next excursion into his Lincoln studies will be Fred Kaplan's Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer. CWL is starting on his copy of the biography, which arrived on December 25th.
Top Image Source: Very Well Said
Bottom Image Source: Daylife, Photo Segment from a larger AP Photo by Charles Dharapak. Caption: President-elect Barack Obama, carrying the book "Lincoln: The Biography of a Writer" by Fred Kaplan, leaves the home of friend Penny Pritzker after having dinner in Chicago, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2008.
Labels: Abraham Lincoln
Off Topic Novel---A Novel of Detection Set at West Point, 1830
The Pale Blue Eye, Louis Bayard, $24.95 hardcover, $14.95 softcover, 432pp., Harper Collins, 2006.
At West Point Academy in the autumn 1830 a cadet commits suicide by hanging. While being stored in an icehouse the dead man's heart is removed. West Point neighbor and retired NYC policeman, Augustus Landor is asked by academy adminstrators to discreetly investigate. At risk is the academy's fledgling reputation. Landor enlists the aid of cadet E. A. Poe. Yes, that E. A. Poe who was indeed a West Point cadet at that time. The New Yorker and the Virginia are certainly a different Holmes-Watson pair of investigators.
Landor has his sorrows; both his wife and his daughter died soon after relocating from New York City to the Hudson River Valley. Superintendent Thayer has his priorities. Poe has his metaphors and insider inforamtion on the student body. The trio find themselves confronting a second murder and mutiliation. Clues, codes, and cults are examined and psychological suspense ensues. This reader suspended his disbelief in due time but also found a few outlandish developments that made him wince. But, Bayard's delightfully executed period prose and details were thoroughly enjoyable and returned this reader to his required disbelief. The meticulously described historical setting, the young Poe's literary inspirations, and Lander's veiled confessions provided incentive to bear with the slightly preposterous intrustions from the 1980s, such as the possiblity of a Satanic cult. These intrusions are rare and the plot does not hinge upon them.
Overall, The Pale Blue Eye is enjoyable because the plot hangs together, and the characters of Landor, Poe and Thayer are well described and compelling. The details of Benny Haven's Tavern and West Point's dining and residence halls appear accurate. The main detraction is a cinematically overwrought climax which fortunately is not the conclusion of the novel. Poe is not only a poet but a detective and uncovers the policeman's secrets at the very end.
Labels: Off Topic Novel
News---Antietam's Cornfield Yields Grave of New York Soldier
Union Soldier's Remains Found at Antietam, Linda Wheeler, Washington Post, December 28, 2008.
The soldier was just a teenager. Somewhere in New York state, he had signed up to fight for the Union. The band was playing on the day he marched away from home, headed South to to kill those rebels. Everyone said it would be a short war. He'd be home in no time. All of that ended on Sept. 17, 1862 at Antietam when he and his comrades were crossing a farmer's field. A bullet or piece of shrapnel found him. He sagged to the ground and was dead. His buddies moved on; they had to. The fighting was intense. By the end of the day, the battle considered the bloodiest of the war would end with 23,000 casualties.
The next day, under a flag of truce, a Union burial detail began its grim work. Sometime in the next week, the New Yorker was put in a shallow grave near where he fell, but away from the the farmer's plow. He was buried near a limestone outcropping that rippled just above the surface. This was temporary. Either his family or the government would move him to a cemetery and give him a proper burial. No one ever came for him. His grave was overlooked when the Union dead were gathered and moved to the new Antietam National Cemetery, dedicated exactly five years after the battle.
For 146 seasons, crops were planted all around him and even over him if a farmer could make the tight turn at the rocky place, but nothing disturbed his sleep. He could have been there forever, never found and never known except for a ground hog who happened to build a tunnel at that spot. The tunnel was deep, angling down under the limestone. At some point, the tunnel became clogged with debris and the ground hog vigorously kicked it out of the way, flinging it all the way to the surface. It included pieces of tea-colored bone. A visitor who was walking the battlefield in mid-October,strayed off the Corn Field Trail and saw some bones on the ground that he later left at the visitors' center. He didn't give his name, saying only he had found something in a field off the trail, next to an animal hole.
"It was a jaw bone with four teeth attached and one loose plus some other fragments," said Ed Wenschhof Jr., Antietam's chief of Natural Resources Management and Resources Protection. "We get a lot of these bones brought in here, almost all of them are animal." He needed to check it out. Several photographs were emailed to the National Park Service's regional archaeologist, Stephen Potter, in Washington. Potter said he knew right away the jaw, and what turned out to be skull fragments, belonged to a human. And he knew they were very old bones.
"When I realized what I had -- an unmarked, unknown burial of a Civil War soldier, not a victim of modern mayhem -- it grabbed me in the gut," he said. "I was totally focused. I forgot everything else. I immediately started planning what we would do next." He said he estimated the soldier's age at 19 to 21, based on an impacted wisdom tooth in the jaw bone, the lack of wear on the teeth and an open suture in the cranium. That suture closes only when an individual ceases to grow. He called Wenschhof. Potter wanted to see the the bones but his first impulse was to collect whatever else was out there in the field. It was going to be difficult to find the spot. The field covered acres of land, but they had to move quickly because relic hunters might hear about the discovery and disturb the grave.
Wenschhof and a team of park rangers crisscrossed the field that was adjacent to the infamous Corn Field, where brutal hand-to-hand fighting had taken place during the battle. There were burrows everywhere, and they had to be careful not to step in to them. Finally, one of the team found bone fragments and several pieces of leather outside a ground hog hole. It had to be the right place. The soldier had been found. Potter had sent the photographs to Douglas Owsley, a well-known forensic anthropologist with the Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution. He agreed with Potter's assessment but felt the soldier was somewhere between 18 and 21 and most likely was a teenager.
"He said the kid never saw his 20th birthday," Potter recalled. Within a few weeks, Potter and a crew were at Antietam, also known as Sharpsburg, scraping away the top layer of brown earth and then delving into the reddish layer of clay. They were working under a blue and white tent erected to shield themselves from the rain and wind and to protect whatever they found. Two animal holes were within the the rectangle sketched on the earth, probably boundaries of the grave. The resident of the burrow had been captured a few days earlier and delivered to a new neighborhood beyond the field.
The excavation work was slow. There weren't any large bones in the grave shaft. "Ground hogs can do a lot of damage," Potter said. "Context means everything. if the bones are moved or damaged or if the ground hog gnawed on them, and ground hogs do gnaw on bones -- they need their daily calcium supplement -- things can be hard to figure out." In this case, the ground hog had destroyed most of the soldier's bones.
What they did find was a number of jacket or coat buttons that connected the soldier to a New York regiment. The ones from the cuffs had the state emblem and some of the larger ones from the front had the emblem and the Latin word, "Excelsior," meaning upward. The other buttons found were general government issue, indicating the soldier was not a green recruit but a veteran who had been around long enough to have replaced lost buttons. They also found a belt buckle with "U.S." engraved on it, and some bits of leather later identified as coming from boots or shoes.
Potter told the crew, "We now know three things: our soldier was a young guy, probably a teenager, but he was a veteran and not a new recruit and he was part of a New York regiment." The crew, having plotted the exact position on paper of every bit of metal and bone and leather taken from the grave site, filled the 18-inch-deep excavation and tried to make it look like just another part of the farmer's field. The next step is for Owsley to examine all the bones and items found in the grave to see if he can tease any more information from them. He won't be able to do that for several months.
John Howard, Antietam battlefield superintendent, had been following the progress of the search closely. He had come out to watch the crews excavating the grave. Later he said it was unlikely the solider would ever be identified because so little was known about him and, on the day of the battle, there were many New York regiments involved. One of the rangers who works for Howard, Brian S. Baracz, has studied the battle for 10 years. He said there had been 68 infantry regiments, 12 artillery and seven cavalry units from New York at Antietam. Close to the area where the soldier was found, two dozen New York infantry regiments had crossed through. Using just those 24 units and narrowing the list of possible soldiers to those of the right age who were listed as "missing," he said the number would range between 25 and 50.
Howard said if they ever got "really lucky and identified the soldier, we'd make a real effort to track down the next of kin. We'd ask them what they wanted us to do. We could ship the remains or give him a proper burial here at Antietam." If there is no identification, he expects the soldier will be buried in the New York section of the national cemetery, which is near his office. "Just like any other American soldier, we will give him a proper burial," he said. "This is where he fought. This is where he died. This is now his home."
Text, Top and Middle Images Source: Washington Post, December 26, 2008
Bottom Image Source: Through the Cornfield, Keith Rocco. Keith Rocco is among the very best artists working in the field of American Civil War and Napoleonic Era painting. He as two published collections of his work, On Campaign: The Civil War Art of Keith Rocco, and The Soldier's View: The Civil War Art of Keith Rocco
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 1:35 PM 1 comment:
Labels: Antietam, Archaeology, Battle of Antietam
Off Topic---News: Bowels of the Ship and Bowels of the Sailors
Mystery Naval Explosion May Have Stinky Solution, The Telegraph, Sarah Knapton, December 26, 2008.
The mysterious explosion which sank a 17th century Royal warship may have been caused by the lavatory habits of its crew, a historian believes. HMS London sank in 1685 after exploding without warning in the Thames Estuary near Chatham Docks in a blast which killed 300 people and was recorded by diarist Samuel Pepys. Naval historians have long argued about the cause, suggesting a build-up of chemicals could have ignited the ship's supply of gunpowder. But now one researcher believes the blast may have been triggered by the noxious accumulation of methane from the scores of sailors who relieved themselves in the bowels of the ship.
The theory suggests that rotting faeces in the bilges led to a build up of gas which was ignited by a candle below deck. Richard Ender, an engineer and naval historian, came across the solution while researching an incident on the 17th century warship Lennox. Records show that a lieutenant accidentally fell into the bottom of the hold and when crew members climbed down to rescue him "they were rendered in a manner dead by the stench". Mr Ender said: "They were unconscious. Of course, it is not the smell that makes you unconscious, it's the methane.
"When you have that concentration of methane, all it would take is someone being send down here with a lantern to set it off. The powder room is in the hold as well." But Charles Trollope, an authority on naval ordnance from the period, believes the explosion was caused by the sloppy practice of reusing old materials for storing gunpowder.
Text Source: Telegraph.UK
Image Source: Brian Levy
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 10:18 AM No comments:
Labels: Off Topic: Archaeology
Off Topic---World War II Espionage
Agent Zigzag: A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal, Ben McIntyre, Harmony Books, 365pp, 23 b/w photographs, appendices, notes, index, bibliography, $25.95 hardcover, $14.95 softcover, 2007.
Published in Britain as Agent Zigzag: The True Wartime Story of Eddie Chapman, Lover, Betrayer, Hero, Spy, Ben McIntyre's story of a nearly-always-successful safe cracking burglar conning the Nazi's to sending him to England, returning to the Nazis and then the Nazi's returning him to England is remarkable on several levels. McIntyre captures the personalities of Chapman, his accomplices, his Nazi handlers, his British handlers and his lovers. There are neither stereotypes of Nazi or English bureaucrats nor females who fall in love with Chapman in the story. What could be a convoluted story of treason and double cross is well ordered and well explained.
Captured by the English police on the Island of Jersey, Eddie Chapman is in jail when the Nazi's capture the island. Offering himself as a recruit, Chapman leaves a friend in the jail as a hostage. Receiving training in wireless communication, explosives and weapons, Chapman at times teaches his instructors a few clever tricks of the trade. By 1941, he parachuted into England with a wireless radio, a pistol, a suicide pill, and cash with an assignment to blow up a aircraft factory. Within twenty four hours he as found the police and turns himself in with the offer to work for the British against the Nazis.
Chapman and a British officer communicate regularly with the Nazis. The destruction of the airplane factory occurs with the help of a magician and his crew. By way of Portugal, Chapman returns to occupied France with information cooked especially for the Nazis. While receiving training in Norway and having enough money to by a yacht,
Chapman falls in love for third time, and takes pictures of suitable targets for Britain. He returns to Britain again with a wireless radio and cash; this time the mission is to discover the gadget that the British have invented which allows them to sink Nazi subs that are hiding in deep waters. Chapman is supplied more cooked intelligence for the Nazis and even outwits them into revealing what they know about British wireless communication.
Amazingly, Chapman surived the war, finds the girl he left on Jersey, and supports his first wife and daughter; he eludes the Norway girl who was the only person in Europe to whom he revealed his double cross. Living the life of a Nazi collaborator, she was actually a member of the Norwegian resistance movement. With money in the bank he returns to burglary, this time aboard and not in England.
McIntyre's story reveals the workings of the Abwehr and MI5, the difficulty of hiding from the Germans the truth of Ultra device, the devastation of London's suburbs by the V-1 and V-2 rockets. These rockets missed their targets in central London in part because of Chapman's misinformation about the rockets that fell short and fell long.
Labels: Off-Topic War, World War Two
News---Gettysburg: July 1st Assault Path of Heth's and Pender's Divisions For Sale
Gettysburg Country Club To Be Sold At Sheriff’s Sale, Dick Watson, Gettysburg Times, December 24, 2008.
After nearly 50 years of operation, the Gettysburg Country Club will be sold at a sheriff’s sale on Friday, January 9 at 10 a.m. Located along Country Club Lane, between Route 30 and Old Mill Road, the 120-acre, nine-hole golf course with pro shop, locker rooms, pool and tennis courts has been fighting declining membership since the mid-1990s. Convinced that the decline was due to its aging facilities, the club’s board of directors decided in 2005 that new facilities would attract new members.
Approved by a majority, many of its predominantly older and retired members indicated they would not support a multi-million dollar upgrade. Nevertheless, the board proceeded with its plans, and a significant number of members resigned. Over a two-year period, a new clubhouse with bar, restaurant and commercial kitchen was built, as were new tennis courts. Renovations were also made to its locker rooms.
Beginning in early 2007, as the new facilities were coming online, the club appointed a new golf pro and a new general manager and an executive chef. New incentives, including reduced initiation fees and monthly dues, were also initiated. Not achieving the results they anticipated, the board in October 2007 hired the team of Gilbert Andrews Law of York and Executive Insights of Camp Hill to “restructure” its operations.
During its best days, the country club maintained a membership of about 270. That dropped to below 240 after the exodus of many of its members, according to attorney Thomas Campbell, a member, in May. Unfortunately, the new facilities failed to attract the anticipated number of new members, and the club’s debt increased. After it officially closed on May 30 this year, club members were allowed to continue playing golf.
Members also put up their own funds to keep the pool open during the summer. According to a member of the sheriff’s office, the bank (Susquehanna) is seeking $2.9million for the country club. “In addition, there are also seven or eight liens against the property that probably amount to another several thousand dollars,” he said.
Caption: Patio furniture is neatly stacked next to the covered swimming pool in front of the Gettysburg Country Club's new clubhouse in late May.
Text and Image Source: Gettysburg Times, December 24, 2008
CWL: The property is on the south side of the Chambersburg Pike. It's eastern boundary is Willoughby Run. Archer's brigade launched its attack on Herbst's Woods from this property, as did the brigades of Fry, Pettigrew and Brockenbrough. Pender's division lauched its attack on Seminary Ridge from this property.
Map Source: Gettysburg National Military Park's Virtual Tour
Labels: Gettysburg NMP, July 1st
HOLIDAY GREETINGS TO ALL THE READERS OF CIVIL WAR LIBRARIAN!!!
PEACE! OUT!
CWL/RAR
IMAGE SOURCE: YAHOO.SPORTS.COM
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 11:03 AM 2 comments:
Labels: REF STOPS RUNNING BACK
Key Moments & Commanders at Gettyburg, January-March 2009
Key Moments and Commanders of the Gettysburg Campaign, Gettysburg National Military Park, Museum and Visitor Center, Saturdays and Sundays, 1:30p, January thourgh mid-March, 2009
Key Moments: Longstreet Tries to Flank the Round Tops on July 3 – Troy Harman
Commanders: General Alexander Hays and the Repulse of Longstreet's Assault - Karlton Smith
Commanders: Alexander Webb, Norman Hall, & Alonzo Cushing: Profiles of Successful Leaders – D. Scott Hartwig
Commanders: Daniel Sickles: The Colorful and Controversial Commander of Gettysburg -- Matt Atkinson
Key Moments: "A Final Resting Place:” The Establishment of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery -- Eric A. Campbell
Commanders: Strong Vincent and the Battle for Little Round Top – Tom Holbrook
Key Moments: Crisis at the Union Center – The Second Corps Front on July 2 - John Heiser
Key Moments: "We drop a comrade’s tears" The 2nd New Hampshire at the Peach Orchard – Karlton Smith
Commanders: Opportunity, Possibility, and Liability: Lee, E. P. Alexander, William Pendleton and the Great Cannonade of July 3 – Bert Barnett
Commanders: “Day was now breaking and it was too late for any change of place;” Richard Ewell, Cemetery Hill & Memory - Angie Atkinson
Key Moments: “Take that hill if practicable” – Cemetery Hill and the End of the First Day’s Battle -- Tom Holbrook
Commanders: July 1, 1863 – Surprise or Surmise – Bill Hewitt
Key Moments: The 1st Minnesota Infantry on July 2 – Matt Atkinson
Commanders: From “Forever Free” to “A New Birth of Freedom:” Abraham Lincoln in 1863" – Eric A. Campbell
Key Moments: “I Have Never Seen the Like Before” - The July 1 Battle for Herbst Woods - D. Scott Hartwig
Commanders: "Much oppressed with a sense of responsibility:" George G. Meade Takes Command of the Army of the Potomac – Charles Teague
Commanders: Did Meade Begin a Counteroffensive after Pickett's Charge? - Troy Harman
Key Moments: Hancock Takes Command – July 1 – Angie Atkinson
Image Source: Gettysburg365 is among the very best photographers of the battlefield
Labels: Battle of Gettysburg, Gettysburg NMP
Forthcoming- Deserter Country: Civil War Opposition in the Pennsylvania Appalachians
Deserter Country: civil War Opposition in the Pennsylvnaia Appalachians, Robert M. Sandow, Fordham Unversity Press, 24 black/white photographs and illustrations, 6 color photographs, notes, bibliogrpahy, index, 288 pp., April 2009.
During the Civil War, there were throughout the Union explosions of resistance to the war—from the deadly Draft Riots in New York City to other, less well-known outbreaks. In Deserter Country, Robert Sandow explores one of these least known “inner civil wars,” the widespread, sometimes violent opposition in the Appalachian lumber country of Pennsylvania. Sparsely settled, these mountains were home to divided communities that provided safe haven for opponents of the war. The dissent of mountain folk reflected their own marginality in the face of rapidly increasing exploitation of timber resources by big firms, as well as partisan debates over loyalty.
One of the few studies of the northern Appalachians, this book draws revealing parallels to the war in the southern mountains, exploring the roots of rural protest in frontier development, the market economy, military policy, partisan debate, and everyday resistance. Sandow also sheds new light on the party politics of rural resistance, rejecting easy depictions of war opponents as traitors and malcontents for a more nuanced and complicated study of class, economic upheaval, and localism.
Text and Image Source: Fordham University Press
Labels: 149th Pennsylvania, Deserters, Dissent
CWL---Controlling the Violence of the 54th Massachusetts
Managing The Violence In The Fifty Fourth Massachusetts, in Battle Exhortation: The Rhetoric of Combat Leadership, Keith Yellin, University of South Carolina Press, 2008, pp. 94-101.
A controlled explosion. "All the discipline of drill, uniforms, codes of conduct are meant to ignite and yet contain the forces that can keep up this . . . wrath' of Civil War combat (p. 94). Can violent ardor be managed? Most readers of CWL are familiar with the film Glory. Fredrick Douglass and Governor John Andrew review the enthusiastic troops as they march through Boston and Colonel Shaw nods to his proud parents. During the war, there was the issue of arming the Negroes. Slaveholders worried about nighttime slave uprisings; slavery itself was viewed as a restraint upon savages. Northerners understood that it may be perfectly naturally for former slaves in blue uniforms may slip the shackles of military discipline. Had slavery crippled blacks? Would they be soldiers and not give in to docility or vengeance when faced with armed Southern soldiers?
Colonel Shaw reports in his letters and diary that General Montgomery let loose his black troops, former slaves, to loot and burn small towns in South Carolina. At dusk on July 18, 1863 the 54th Massachusetts was ordered into line of battle. In the film, special attention to devoted to the flags. Exactly two months, before the assault on Fort Wagner, Governor Andrew as he presented four flags to the regiment asked for manly character and manly zeal. Discretion and aggression required by the troops. On the banners were the words: liberty, loyalty, unity and the Latin phrase In hoc signo vinces (In this sign you will conquer). Andrew asked the troops to fight, win and return with dignity.
An eyewitness recalled Shaw's words to the troops before the assault began. 'Now I want you to prove yourselves men' and and reminded them that the eyes of thousands would look upon the night's work (p. 100).Of the failed assault by the 54th Massachusetts, The Atlantic Magazine that "the manhood of the colored races shines before many eyes that would not see." The Federal flag was set upon the ramparts and then carried back to the Union lines; the Massachusetts flag was sent upon the ramparts and was ripped from the staff by the Confederates. The staff was carried back to the Union lines were lost at Fort Wagner.
Image Source: Keith Rocco is among the best contemporary Civil War and Napoleonic War artists.
Labels: 54th Massachusetts
CWL---Gettysburg Battlewalks: The 13th Vermont on July 3rd at Gettysburg
The 13th Vermont Infantry: Gettysburg Battlewalks, Scott Hartwig and the Mifflin Gaurd, Pennsylvania Cable Network, dvd, 70 minutes, 2004.
Gettysburg National Park Ranger Scott Hartwig conducts the movements of the Mifflin Guard, a Civil War reenactment unit, in the footsteps of the 13th Vermont Infantry. On July 3rd,the 13th and 16th Vermont Infantry units flanked Kemper's Brigade as to marched from the Spangler Farm, through the Cordori Farm and to the Copse of Trees at the Angle. The ranger, about 200 members of the reenactment unit and about 200 park visitors, proceed from the Vermont Brigade monument and march toward the Cordori Farm buildings and then wheel right by companies and march toward the Copse of trees.
Hartwig begins his presentation with the 4:30a Union artillery assault on the Confederates ensconced on lower Culp's Hill and the ensuing battle until 11:00a. Longstreet's troops depositions during the dawn hours are presented in light of Lee's visit to Longstreet and his dismissal of Longstreet's suggestion to move the Confederate First Corps further to the right. The Grand Assault is briefly presented by Hartwig with special attention to Kemper's Brigade.
He describes the Vermont Brigade and in particular the 13th Vermont, nine month volunteers whose only battle was Gettysburg. Hartwig relies on the words of the men of the 13th Vermont as found in letters and post-war memoirs. He imparts a sense of immediacy during the tour as the words of the soldiers are presented in the footsteps of the soldiers. The 13th Vermont was much larger than most Union Regiments on the field; the regiments 650 soldiers made it twice the size of the majority of the Federal fighting units.
This particular Battlewalk relies heavily on the the tactical movements and manual of arms that are reenacted by the Mifflin Gaurd. For those viewers who are familar with the fields covered by the Vermont Brigade, the reenactment unit's size with the addition of the park visitors, accurately show movements of a regiment. Hartwig has both the reenactors and the park visitors lie down behind the breastwork that was built by the 13th Vermont on the Cordori Knoll, then rise up, march forward and deliver several volleys toward the Cordori Farm. Overall, this Gettysburg Battlewalk is consistently interesting for the information it gives, the tactical movements that are shown, and the visuals of having a nearly accurately-sized Federal regiment in the right spot at the right time to repel The Grand Assault.
Labels: Battle of Gettysburg, PCN Tours of Gettysburg Battlefield
News---Will Obama's Inaugural Procession Start in Gettysburg?
Obama Inaugural Procession To Start In Gettysburg?, Erin James, Evening Sun, December 5, 2008.
An established heritage organization wants Obama to begin his Jan. 20 inaugural procession to Washington, D.C., in Gettysburg - the northernmost point of Journey Through Hallowed Ground's 175-mile corridor through Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. Journey Through Hallowed Ground President Cate Magennis Wyatt said the procession would give more people the opportunity to participate in the historic event and would fit into Obama's inauguration theme of "A New Birth of Freedom," which is derived from President Abraham Lincoln's famous Gettysburg Address. The organization sent its proposal in a letter to Obama's Presidential Inaugural Committee and has enlisted the help of state and local officials to lend the idea support. "We don't know if they're going to take us up on this, but we thought we would ask," Wyatt said.
Presidential Inaugural Committee spokeswoman Chris Mather said she did not know Thursday whether the proposal was being considered, however, and could not provide further information. The letter was signed by officials in the municipalities Obama would pass through, including Gettysburg Borough Council President Dick Peterson and Cumberland Township Manager Flo Ford. Peterson said the letter was signed about a month ago, and officials are now waiting for a response. He said a visit from Obama in Gettysburg "would be wonderful." "Whether it's coming to fruition is another thing," he said.
Ford said the municipal advisory committee, of which she and Peterson are members, was asked to support the idea by Journey Through Hallowed Ground staff. "I wouldn't have signed the letter if I didn't think it was a good idea," she said. Wyatt said the Journey Through Hallowed Ground has also reached out to Gettysburg Foundation President Robert Wilburn for help soliciting support from Gov. Ed Rendell. Foundation spokeswoman Dru Neil confirmed that a discussion between Wilburn and Journey staff had taken place but said no further action has yet been taken. The procession idea was partly inspired by Obama's reference to the Founding Fathers in his victory speech, Wyatt said. A history-themed inaugural procession seems to fit the president-elect, she said.
"That was basically in response to the fact that clearly the president-elect has a very keen and sobering appreciation for our history and our heritage," Wyatt said. If Obama and the inaugural committee accept the proposal, the president-elect would begin his procession in Gettysburg and travel the Hallowed Ground corridor on Route 15 through Maryland. The route would take him to the Dulles Toll Road and directly to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., Wyatt said. Millions of people are planning to attend the inauguration ceremony on Jan. 20, but most of them won't be anywhere near the event. A procession would allow more to participate, Wyatt said.
An Obama inaugural procession would not be the first in history. In 1993, President Clinton began a 120-mile procession to Washington from Monticello, Va., at the home of Thomas Jefferson. It never happened, but an Obama visit to Gettysburg had been a rumored possibility since the Illinois senator with similarities to President Lincoln decided to run for office nearly two years ago. But an inaugural procession to Washington would be significant not only to Gettysburg, Wyatt said. "It would be a big deal for everybody," she said.
Text Source: Evening Sun, December 5, 2008.
Image Source: New York Times
Labels: Barack Obama, Gettysburg NMP
CWL Takes Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guide Exam
CWL arrived in Gettysburg Thursday 12.04.08 in the late afternoon for the Saturday test. Bivouacking in the Travelodge on Steinwehr, CWL took meals at The Avenue Diner. Twelve hundred flashcards, a three hour hike, one Guinness draft and 42 hours later, the test was wrapped up. In 2006, the test took CWL the full three hours; in 2008 2.5 hours. Maybe I know more than I did the first time through in 2006but maybe not enough in 2008 to get that 92% which would probably advance me to the oral exam. The 2006 score was 82%. This year I am hoping to get close to within a couple of points 90%.
In 2006, CWL probably identified two of the 21 monument pictures; this year 12 to 14 are probably right. It's tough; they are black and white photographs, with most of the text digitally chiseled off the monument, then photocopied. Pick from a list of possible answers; the list contains 4 more answers than monuments. So was it the 2nd or the 6th New Jersey monument? The 9th or the 11th Pennsylvania Reserves monument. (It was the 9th's monument; I am a reenactor in Co. A, 9th Pennsylvania Reserves.) In 2006, CWL aced the map and the portraits; ditto in 2008. Did well on the true and false, multiple choice and okay on the completion without a work bank.
About 250 people asked the Gettysburg NPS for materials to be mailed to them. Of those Close to 145 sent in the $50 registration fee and 135 showed up today to take the test. Less than 20 of the top scorers will be asked to attend a two and a half day seminar regarding the contents and style of tour giving. These then will be listed for the 2 hour oral exam in which they present their tour of the battlefield. In 2006, 21 people were eligible to take the oral exam, and only 10 of those passed the exam . Therefore, of the 250 people who requested information to take the test this year, possibly 10 will become Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guides before the December, 2010 examination.
In the top picture, NPS test creator and administrator Clyde Bell displays the 25+/- page test. In the middle picture (left) CWL is sitting in the aisle seat of the fourth table on the left, a furrowed brow resting on his left hand. In the bottom picture CWL is at the fourth table, in the black long sleeve tee shirt. To CWL's right and in the blue sweatshirt is police officer and firearms instructor Thaddeus Comer, whom used CWL's flashcards which were shared on the internet.
Image and Numbers Source: Gettysburg Daily.com, December 6th, 2008.
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 7:38 PM 3 comments:
Labels: Gettysburg Exam., Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guides
News: Central Virginia Civil War Park Open By Advance Reservation Only Beginning January 2
Historical Park Soon to Close Doors to Public, VillageNewsOnline.com
Effective January 2, 2009, Pamplin Historical Park and the National Museum of the Civil War Soldier in Dinwiddie County will be open by reservation only. Guests wishing to visit the Park may do so by making a reservation forty-eight hours in advance. Admission fees for non-members will be $100 for a group of up to ten people, and $10 per adult for groups of more than ten. Park members may make reservations twenty-four hours in advance with no minimum numbers and no admission fee.
The Park will continue to offer all reservation-based programming as usual, including its popular school field trips, battlefield tours, Annual Symposium, Civil War Adventure Camps, Summer Teacher Institutes, and History Day Camps. The severe economic downturn has undercut the ability of the Pamplin Foundation to support the Park at current levels, says Pamplin Historical Park President, A. Wilson Greene. We deeply regret the necessity to curtail normal daily operations to meet this new fiscal reality.
None of the Parks four museums will be altered and the Park will continue to maintain its four historic structures, ten reconstructed buildings, and three miles of interpretive trails. There will be no changes to the Park's extensive artifact collection. Should economic conditions improve, we hope to restore some regular public operating hours next spring, adds Greene.
The Park will continue to accelerate its use of the internet to fulfill its educational mission through on-line programming. Pamplin Historical Park and the National Museum of the Civil War Soldier preserves 422 acres near Petersburg, Virginia, including the Breakthrough Battlefield, a National Historic Landmark. It is owned and operated by the Pamplin Foundation of Portland, Oregon. The Park opened in 1994 as Pamplin Park Civil War Site and debuted the National Museum of the Civil War Soldier in 1999, when it adopted its current name.
Text Source: VillageNewsOnline.com
Image: portion of Pamplin Park Mural created by Keith Rocco
Posted by Rea Andrew Redd at 10:27 AM 1 comment:
Labels: living history, Pamplin Park, Virginia
CWL---Among The Top Ten of 2008: Learning the Battle of Gettysburg.
Learning the Battle of Gettysburg: A Guide to the Official Records, Benjamin Y. Dixon, Ph.D.,144 pp., 11 Illus., Thomas Publications, 2008. $9.95.
This book is the most complete and annotated guide to the official battle reports submitted by officers from both armies at Gettysburg. Readers will learn which Gettysburg reports and parts of reports pertain to nearly every significant battle event from the opening of the fight to its aftermath. Annotations are included to highlight important facts, explanations, and fascinating battle descriptions and stories as reported by Gettysburg officers.
This book's focus is a detailed, concise history of the battle featuring the best quotes from the more than 500 Gettysburg officer reports. Important heroes, units, plans, and maneuvers are presented to explain the fighting in efficient detail at such places as Little Round Top, Devil’s Den, the Wheatfield, and 25 other key locations. For each of these battle sites, readers learn precisely what units reported action, where to find those reports, and the quality of those reports. Best of all, this guide is organized geographically and chronologically for easy use in the field as well as at home or in the library.
In addition, separate chapters are devoted to the aftermath of the battle, interesting quotes from the soldiers, and miscellaneous incidents and events. CWL thoroughly enjoyed the officer reports that discussed incidents of cowardice, death by friendly fire, the dangers of retrieving the wounded, disputes between officers and units, and much, much more. An “Order of Battle” is appended showing which units at Gettysburg submitted reports for the Official Records, and which did not.
Ben Dixon has cross-referenced the Official Records so thoroughly that he has made it an easy task for readers and researchers to find what they need in the nearly 2100pages of battle reports relating to the Battle of Gettysburg. This book is an excellent training and reference manual about the Battle of Gettysburg for any guide, buff, or even casual learner.
As a Gettysburg native and as a academic with a Ph.D in geography, Ben Dixon brings a unique perspective to Gettysburg studies. His all day seminar and tour of Gettysburg, sponsored by the Gettysburg Foundation and Friends in July, was a remarkable presentation of preservation efforts and the varieties of interpretations of the battlefield. With inexhaustable enthusiasm, Dixon combined an overview of these trends with a remarkable collection of signicant details and anecdotes. This time next year, CWL will be compiling the best of 2009 and Dixon's history of the park, to be released late in 2009 by Johns Hopkins University Press, is most likely to be on the list.
Labels: Ben Dixon, Gettysburg Foundation, Learning The Battle of Gettysburg: A Guide to the Official Records
Captain Rea Andrew Redd,
Medical Service, Ninth Pennsylvania Reserves
CWL--- One Northern County's Civil War: Tremendous...
New On The CWL Bookshelf---The Biography of A Writ...
Off Topic Novel---A Novel of Detection Set at West...
News---Antietam's Cornfield Yields Grave of New Yo...
Off Topic---News: Bowels of the Ship and Bowels of...
News---Gettysburg: July 1st Assault Path of Heth's...
HOLIDAY GREETINGS TO ALL THE READERS OF CIVIL WAR ...
Key Moments & Commanders at Gettyburg, January-Ma...
Forthcoming- Deserter Country: Civil War Oppositio...
CWL---Controlling the Violence of the 54th Massach...
CWL---Gettysburg Battlewalks: The 13th Vermont on ...
News---Will Obama's Inaugural Procession Start in ...
CWL Takes Gettysburg Licensed Battlefield Guide Ex...
News: Central Virginia Civil War Park Open By Adva...
CWL---Among The Top Ten of 2008: Learning the Batt...
Inside Book Marketing and Workiing With Authors
This Might Scourge of War
Inside Book Marketing (Sarah Keeney)
Inside Book Publishing (Ted Savas)
Civil War Bookshelf (Dimitri Rotov)
Antietam on the Web (Brian Downey)
Civil War Memory (Kevin Levin)
Battlefield Wanderings (Nick Kurtz)
Lincoln Studies (Samuel P. Wheeler)
Civil War Literature (Fiction), Craig Warren
Guide to Civil War Fiction, Tim Morris
Of Bibliophiles and Battlefields (David Woodbury)
9th Pennsylvania Reserves
One Hundred Fortieth Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry
18th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (Tom Churchill)
Amazon.Com and Amazon Zshops, home of the best prices for books old and new
Zooba, Home of the $9.95 new book
Rea Andrew Redd
Washington, Pennsylvania, United States
Professor, Waynesburg University, Director of Eberly Library, Adjunct instructor in U.S. history. Member: Ninth Pennsylvania Reserves, Pennsylvania Reserves Division; Chesapeake Volunteer Guard. Areas of study: Civil War medicine, Abraham Lincoln, U.S. Army Signal Corps, antebellum politics.
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Articles Tagged "A Graph to Debunk AGW"
A Graph to Debunk AGW: Solar Geomagnetic Activity is highly correlated to Global Temperature changes between 1856-2000
Wednesday, April 10th 2013, 4:15 PM EDT
A paper published in the journal of the Italian Astronomical Society finds that solar geomagnetic activity was highly correlated to global temperature changes over the period from 1856-2000. The authors “show that the index commonly used for quantifying long-term changes in solar activity, the sunspot number, accounts for only one part of solar activity and using this index leads to the underestimation of the role of solar activity in the global warming in the recent decades. A more suitable index is the geomagnetic activity which reflects all solar activity, and it is highly correlated to global temperature variations in the whole period for which we have data.”
Source Link: hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.uk
WORLD TEMPERATURES A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
Global Warming’s ‘fatal conceit’ (It’s hard for believers to admit they’re wrong), by Richard Rahn, The Washington Times
Tuesday, April 2nd 2013, 2:34 PM EDT
Image link - washingtontimes.com
Much of Northern Europe, including Britain, is suffering under the coldest winter and spring of the last 30 to 100 years. The Northeastern part of the United States has had a record cold March. The record cold in Europe has killed thousands and cost billions. It was not supposed to be this way.
Back in 1998, scientist Michael Mann published a paper with the famous “hockey stick” showing a sharp rise in global temperatures. Mr. Mann and others argued that if global action was not taken immediately, then the temperature rise would be rapid and uncontrollable. Much of Mr. Mann’s work was the basis for Al Gore’s famous film “An Inconvenient Truth.” What has turned out to be an inconvenient truth is that Mr. Mann and his allies were sloppy in their research and engaged in a campaign to disparage their critics.
The United Kingdom's Met Office has been a major source of global temperature data in recent decades, and has been heavily relied upon by global-warming proponents. On March 12, a report written by David Whitehouse and published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation concluded that “there has been no statistically significant increase in annual global temperatures since 1997.” In the accompanying chart, using the same official data from the Met Office that the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change uses, it can be easily seen that global temperatures have not been rising as predicted by the best-known climate models.
Source Link: WashingtonTimes.com
THIS ARTICLE CONTINUES
DAVID ROSE DAVID WHITEHOUSE REPLY TO ARTICLE A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW HEADLINE STORY
David Rose: Government's climate watchdog launches astonishing attack on the Mail on Sunday... for revealing global warming science is wrong
Sunday, March 31st 2013, 8:09 AM EDT
The official watchdog that advises the Government on greenhouse gas emissions targets has launched an astonishing attack on The Mail on Sunday – for accurately reporting that alarming predictions of global warming are wrong.
We disclosed that although highly influential computer models are still estimating huge rises in world temperatures, there has been no statistically significant increase for more than 16 years.
Despite our revelation earlier this month, backed up by a scientifically researched graph, the Committee on Climate Change still clings to flawed predictions.
Source Link: dailymail.co.uk
DAVID WHITEHOUSE DAVID ROSE HEADLINE STORY A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
David Whitehouse: COMMITTEE ON CLIMATE CHANGE VS MAIL ON SUNDAY
Wednesday, March 27th 2013, 3:55 PM EDT
The Committee on Climate Change has given its view on the much-discussed recent article on global warming predictions in the Mail on Sunday, written by David Rose. The article points out the disparity between model simulations of global warming and real data, suggesting that using models to formulate policy in such a situation might be unwise.
The Committee on Climate Change is an independent, statutory body established under the Climate Change Act 2008. Its role is to advise the UK Government and Devolved Administrations on emissions targets, and report to Parliament on progress made in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and preparing for climate change. It says it conducts independent analysis into climate change science, economics and policy.
Source Link: thegwpf.org
ROGER HELMER A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
Roger Helmer: See how the predictions of global warming were just plain wrong
Tuesday, March 26th 2013, 4:48 PM EDT
Click source for bigger image
Source Link: twitter.com/RogerHelmerMEP
SOLAR CYCLE 24 COMMENT UPDATED SOLAR CYCLE 25 A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
IPCC & Met Office forecast 2050 as HOT... how COLD will it be?: Updated
Tuesday, March 19th 2013, 10:27 AM EDT
In October last year I had a play about with a Solar Cycle graph from informthepundits.wordpress.com, and added an overlay to show three solar cycle periods (SC12, 13 & 14), that as far as I know are not given any "minimum" status as the period was not identified as being "COLD". No, I'm not looking for any recognition about this period, and as far as I know neither is Piers Corbyn....but hey don't let that stop anyone from calling it "The Gabriel Near Minimum":)
I have now added another overlay to the original chart and also extended it with three fictitious shaped solar cycles (SC24, 25 & 26). All of these cycles are forecast to be lower then SC 23, and SC 24 is expected to be the highest of the three, be it the lowest one for 100 years! SC 25 WILL be lower then SC 24 as per latest estimate from NASA. SC 26 Is entered as similar level to SC 25 (my guess). This should bring the period up to around 2050, as you can see from above, this WILL BE A COOL/COLD period and NOT HOT as per the Met Office and the IPCC.
See below a rare photo from the winter of 1911, near the end of solar cycle 14, it makes a very good point about the "Gabriel Near Minimum".
DAVID BELLAMY A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
I said the end wasn't nigh... and it cost me my BBC career says TV's first environmentalist, David Bellamy
Sunday, March 17th 2013, 1:06 PM EDT
This graph shows the end of the world isn’t nigh. But for anyone – like myself – who has been vilified for holding such an unfashionable view, possibly the most important thing about it is its source: the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Since its creation in 1988, the IPCC has been sounding the alarm about man-made global warming. Yet here, in a draft of its latest report, is a diagram overlaying the observed temperature of the earth on its predictions.
The graph shows a world stubbornly refusing to warm. Indeed, it shows the world is soon set to be cooler.
The awkward fact is that the earth has warmed just 0.5 degrees over the past 50 years. And Met Office records show that for the past 16 years temperatures have plateaued and, if anything, are going down.
DAVID ROSE HEADLINE STORY A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
David Rose: The hard proof that finally shows global warming forecasts that are costing you billions were WRONG all along
Sunday, March 17th 2013, 5:01 AM EDT
No, the world ISN'T getting warmer (as you may have noticed). Now we reveal the official data that's making scientists suddenly change their minds about climate doom. So will eco-funded MPs stop waging a green crusade with your money? Well... what do YOU think?
The Mail on Sunday today presents irrefutable evidence that official predictions of global climate warming have been catastrophically flawed.
The graph on this page blows apart the ‘scientific basis’ for Britain reshaping its entire economy and spending billions in taxes and subsidies in order to cut emissions of greenhouse gases. These moves have already added £100 a year to household energy bills.
Steadily climbing orange and red bands on the graph show the computer predictions of world temperatures used by the official United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Source Link: dailymail.co.uk/
STEVEN GODDARD ICE CHART WORLD TEMPERATURES A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW
Steve Goddard: Arctic Blows Away The Old Record For Winter Ice Growth
Thursday, March 14th 2013, 12:44 PM EDT
arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/timeseries.anom.1979-2008
Arctic ice area is at a ten year high for the date, and has blown away the previous record for ice growth by more than half a million km^2.
Source Link: stevengoddard.wordpress.com
A GRAPH TO DEBUNK AGW WORLD TEMPERATURES MARC MORANO STEVEN MILLOY
A Graph to Debunk AGW: After 4000 Years .....You Are Here!
Saturday, March 9th 2013, 9:12 AM EST
New 4,000-year temperature reconstruction debunked -- 'Check out the Greenland ice core for the relevant period of time' - junkscience.com -- 'As can be plainly seen, modern warming isn't even close to the 'highest' in past 4,000 years'
Also: See below report from Marc Morano at ClimateDepot.com
Source Link: junkscience.com
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Exeter for Foodies and History Buffs
devon city devon history exeter exeter cathedral exeter history south devon things to do in exeter visit exeter waht to do in exeter what to see in exeter by Curious to Visit | on February 22, 2019 | in Outside London | Like it
Arriving in Exeter, a southern England city, counting almost 2000 years of history, the first thing a curious visitor needs to do on a crisp winter’s morning is find a coffee shop and defrost those fingertips…
And she is in luck.
It turns out Exeter has a bustling cafe scene, whether you prefer coffee made by one of the numerous franchise cafes or want to explore what the independents have to offer.
This curious visitor finds that it’s too cold to be wandering around in an unknown city, looking for a proper coffee, so she dashes into the very first place on her way…
It turns out she ends up in a small independent place March Coffee brewing excellent coffee and serving some wickedly delicious doughnuts…
…the frozen visitor ends up having a doughnut (!) after many years of not even looking the direction of this type of food…
With doughnut filling varieties that change every week, plus some healthy cake and savoury dish choices on the menu, March Coffee seems to attract a motley crowd of coffee+cake types as well as healthy food enthusiasts.
Another independent coffee house you might find yourself going back to is a tiny little place called ‘Devon Coffee‘, squeezed between a jeweller’s and a tailor’s.
Like their colleagues in March Coffee, this crowd serves delicious, well-prepared coffee and some cakes to die for…
…their banana and peanut butter bread will keep calling your name for a long time after the first taste…
Warmed up and fingers defrosted, the next stop on the agenda is Exeter’s main attraction, the jewel in the city’s crown – Exeter Cathedral.
Exeter Cathedral
It certainly is a must-see place, not only because of its architectural significance but also because the origins of Exeter city truly lie in this area.
While Exeter cathedral counts almost 900 years of history, the city itself dates back to pre-Roman times with the cathedral area being the centre of it all.
Built and rebuilt a number of times, Exeter Cathedral has features dating back to the 11th century while the facade and the interior are some of the finest examples of the Decorated Gothic style in the country.
Did you know that the cathedral vault (or ceiling) is approx 96 metres long, which makes it the longest continuous Medieval stone vault in the world?
Fun fact.
Exeter Cathedral had its own cat whose job was to prevent mice from eating through bell ropes. Here’s an ancient door with a cat hole. The cat was paid for the job he did.
While from the outside Exeter Cathedral looks beautiful with numerous ornaments carved out from sandy coloured stone, it turns out this is not how it used to look.
Much like in the ancient Greece or Rome, the sculptures adorning the facade of Exeter cathedral were painted in various colours, so the effect must have been even more spectacular for those who came to visit Exeter’s holy place.
If you have time, don’t miss the guided tour of Exeter Cathedral. The tour is free to attend, although the entrance to the cathedral is paid, whether you take the tour or not.
The Cathedral and the surrounding area are the true historic heart of the city – there used to be a place of worship in this location even in Roman times.
FREE Red Coat Guided Tours
If you are one of those people who love exploring places they visit thoroughly – history, architecture, and all, then before you plan your trip to Exeter, check out City Council website HERE
You’ll find that there are FREE daily tours of the city run by Red Coat Volunteers focusing on different aspects of Exeter’s history and life.
All tours start at the front door of Exeter’s cathedral and are a truly great way to get acquainted with this fascinating Devon city.
For example, on one of the tours, this curious visitor found out that Exeter used to be a hugely important centre for wool making industry for a long long time. And the majority of city dwellers were employed in the industry.
Did you know that visitors in those days could smell the city before they saw it?
The red coat guide told us, the strongest impression a visitor used to come away with was the smell of…
…urine!?
Apparently, urine was used in wool production process and the industry needed huge quantities of this bodily fluid every day.
Hence the smell in the city.
But where did they get it from?
It turns out Exeter wool merchants ran a morning service of urine collection, where a cart (known as ‘piss cart’) used to go around to people’s houses collecting their urine for a small weekly fee. For some of the poorest of Exeter citizens, this money was the only regular source of income, and that’s where the phrase ‘piss poor’ comes from.
This and other interesting facts about the city life and its wool industry can be discovered in Tucker’s Hall , the historic guild of Exeter’s cloth trade.
Exeter Quayside
Another location connected to the city’s historic cloth trade, and a beautiful place to visit on a sunny afternoon, is Exeter’s Quayside.
Exeter sits on the bank of the river Exe which had much to do with the city’s historic significance and its wealth.
If you visit the quayside, you’ll see the remnants of the fulling mills and warehouses as well as old pubs continuing to tell the story of the city’s golden cloth trading age and the life of its citizens.
But more importantly for the 21st-century visitor, Exeter’s Quayside is also a location to have lots of fun.
There are numerous independent shops and workshops along the quay, plus cafes, pubs and restaurants.
On a warm and sunny day, the quayside seems to be the main attraction for the locals and visitors alike.
So whether you are a fan of history, shopping or dining and wining, the quayside is your place in Exeter.
The House that Moved.
When on your way to or from the quayside, don’t miss another of Exeter’s attractions – the House That Moved.
This 15th century building, one of the oldest buildings in Exeter, is called this way because it was actually moved from its original location about 70m away when the new road was being built in the 1960s.
The house was marked for demolition to make way for the new road, but luckily Exeter’s archaeologists managed to put enough pressure on the authorities just in time to prevent the loss of yet another historic building.
The House That Moved is part of a very interesting historic corner in Exeter with Stepcote Hill, the main route into Exeter since Roman Times, and a couple of other buildings dating back to the 16th century…
…which obviously means that your social media followers will be impressed with the pictures!
Did you know that today The House That Moved is also a bridal shop?
So visit not only for history, visit for shopping too!
Narrowest Street in the World.
Did you know that Exeter claims to have the narrowest street in the world?
But why is this dark, narrow alley is even considered to be a street?
Apparently, for it to be registered as a ‘street’, it has to have doors coming out onto it and a street light. This one has both.
So here it is, it’s very narrow, very dark, but still considered a street, Parliament street 🙂
The first impression that a visitor to this small but lively city comes away with is a brilliant combination between old and new, where every corner seems to be marked by hundreds of years of history and yet is adapted to the needs and pace of a 21st-century city.
Visit Exeter, enjoy your life!
Want to Explore Devon and its towns? Take this 5-day Tour from London. Check it out HERE
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Vice provost Kathryn Atchison returns to faculty after five years
By April Hoang
Campus, News, Science & Health
A UCLA vice provost stepped down Monday after serving for about five years.
Kathryn Atchison, vice provost of new collaborative initiatives, plans to return to the faculty and focus on health education, according to an announcement from Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Scott Waugh last week.
As vice provost, Atchison helped implement new research and academic programs for students, Waugh said. She helped create the Congo Basin Institute, the first foreign affiliate at UCLA, and was Chancellor Gene Block’s representative in the UCLA Russian Flagship, a program designed to help students learn Russian.
Prior to her position as vice provost of new collaborative initiatives, Atchison served as UCLA’s vice provost for intellectual property and industry relations for about six years, Waugh added.
Atchison has been at UCLA since 1987, according to her faculty page. She is a professor at the School of Dentistry, where she served as associate dean for research and knowledge management. She also won the International Association for Dental Research Distinguished Scientist Award for Behavioral, Epidemiologic and Health Services Research in 2008.
She currently conducts oral health and health literacy research, and is funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research.
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Campus Politics editor
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By Joel R. Brandes, Bari Brandes Corbin and Evan B. Brandes
Domestic Relations Law §170 was amended to add “irretrievable breakdown” in subdivision 7 as a ”no-fault ground” for divorce. It provides that a husband or wife may be granted a judgment or divorce on the ground that: “(7) The relationship between husband and wife has broken down irretrievably for a period of at least six months, provided that one party has so stated under oath. No judgment of divorce shall be granted under this subdivision unless and until the economic issues of equitable distribution of marital property, the payment or waiver of spousal support, the payment of child support, the payment of counsel and experts' fees and expenses as well as the custody and visitation with the infant children of the marriage have been resolved by the parties, or determined by the court and incorporated into the judgment of divorce.”
In order to establish a cause of action and obtain a divorce under Domestic Relations Law §170 (7) the plaintiff must satisfy the residence requirements of Domestic Relations Law § 230, and, in addition, establish that: (1) the relationship between husband and wife is irretrievably broken; (2) for a period of at least six months; and (3) the plaintiff or defendant must state under oath that the relationship between husband and wife is irretrievably broken.
However, no judgment of divorce may be granted upon such a finding unless and until the economic issues of equitable distribution of marital property, the payment or waiver of spousal support, the payment of child support, the payment of counsel and experts' fees and expenses as well as the custody and visitation with the infant children of the marriage have been resolved by the parties, or determined by the court and incorporated into the judgment of divorce.
Where the parties to a contested action for a divorce have agreed that the divorce will be uncontested it has been the practice of New York courts to permit them to submit the matter to the court for determination upon affidavits and the required papers, or to hold an inquest on a fault ground. Where the papers were submitted, the court would reserve decision until the resolution of the ancillary issues. Where the court held an inquest, the court would grant a judgment of divorce, but hold the entry of the judgment in abeyance pending the resolution of the ancillary issues. The practice of granting the judgment and holding its entry into abeyance pending the resolution of the ancillary issues is not permitted under subdivision 7 which prohibits the granting of a judgment of divorce until all of the ancillary issues are resolved by the parties, or determined by the court and incorporated into the judgment of divorce. However, the court can still hear the testimony and reserve decision.
Irretrievable Breakdown Defined
The term “irretrievably broken” is not defined in the statute. Black's Law Dictionary states that “irretrievable breakdown of the marriage” is a ground for divorce that is based on incompatibility between marriage partners and that is used in many states as the sole ground of no-fault divorce. — Also termed irretrievable breakdown; irremediable breakdown of the marriage; irremediable breakdown. Cf. irreconcilable differences; incompatibility. However, it does not define the term which is different from “irreconcilable differences” which Black's Law Dictionary defines as “persistent and unresolvable disagreements between spouses, leading to the breakdown of the marriage. • These differences may be cited — without specifics — as grounds for no-fault divorce. At least 33 states have provided that irreconcilable differences are a basis for divorce. Cf. irretrievable breakdown of the marriage; incompatibility.”
An examination of the case law in other states which have adopted the “irretrievable breakdown” ground for divorce appear to indicate that a marriage has irretrievably broken down when the relationship is for all intents and
purposes ended. Where no guidelines are established as to what constitutes an irretrievable breakdown, courts consider each case individually, and the determination whether the marriage is broken must be based on an inquiry into all the surrounding facts and circumstances. In general, a marriage is irretrievably broken when, for whatever reason or cause and no matter whose fault, the marriage relationship is for all intents and purposes ended, when it is no longer viable, when the parties are unable, or refuse, to cohabit, or when it is beyond hope of reconciliation or repair. The principal question to be determined is whether the marriage is at an end and beyond reconciliation.
In some states irretrievable breakdown of a marriage may be sufficiently shown by both parties alleging the breakdown, or by one party seeking a divorce or dissolution on the ground of irretrievable breakdown, and the other seeking divorce or dissolution on a ground involving misconduct. In some states the decision that a marriage is irretrievably broken need not be based on any identifiable objective fact. It is sufficient that one or both parties subjectively decide that their marriage is over and there is no hope of reconciliation. Under one statute, where both parties by petition or otherwise have stated under oath or affirmation that the marriage is irretrievably broken, or one of the parties has so stated and the other has not denied it, the court, after considering the statement and holding a hearing on the matter must make a finding whether or not the marriage is irretrievably broken and enter an order of dissolution or dismissal accordingly.
The consensus appears to be that the term “irretrievable breakdown” means a breakdown of the marriage to the point that reconciliation is not possible or probable. For example, Alabama ‘s statute requires a finding that “further attempts at reconciliation are impractical or futile and not in the best interests of the parties or family. The Delaware statute requires a finding that reconciliation is improbable as proof that the marriage has irretrievably broken down. The Connecticut statute requires a period of separation “by reason of incompatibility” for a continuous period prior to the service of the complaint and that there is no reasonable prospect that they will be reconciled.” The Illinois statute requires a period of separation and a finding that efforts at reconciliation have failed or that future attempts at reconciliation would be impracticable and not in the best interests of the family. Kentucky laws provide that if one of the parties disputes that the marriage is irretrievably broken, the court must consider all relevant factors, including the prospect of reconciliation, and make a finding whether the marriage is irretrievably broken. The Wisconsin statute requires that the court find an irretrievable breakdown of the marriage with no possible chance at reconciliation.
The Uniform Marriage and Divorce Act § 305 (c) defines a finding of irretrievable breakdown as “a determination that there is no reasonable prospect of reconciliation.”
Some states couple the irretrievable ground with a period of separation of anywhere from sixty days to two years. For example Missouri law provides that if the defendant denies that the marriage is irretrievably broken, the plaintiff must prove one or more of what appear to be fault grounds, or that the parties have lived apart for 24 months. The Connecticut statute requires the parties to have lived apart by reason of incompatibility for a continuous period of at least the eighteen months.
Irretrievable breakdown has been adopted as a ground for divorce in the following 17 states: Alabama, Arizona , Colorado , Connecticut , Delaware , Florida , Georgia , Hawaii , Illinois , Indiana , Kentucky , Massachusetts , Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. However, none of the state laws define the term irretrievable breakdown.
Sufficiency of Proof and Defenses
It is clear from the statute that the court must find that the marriage is irretrievably broken as a predicate to the granting of a divorce. On its face Domestic Relations Law § 170(7) appears to allow the court to grant a judgment of divorce where one spouse states under oath that the relationship between husband and wife is irretrievably broken. This construction would eliminate any defenses to this ground. However, the authority in other jurisdictions which have adopted this ground for a divorce supports the conclusion that the defendant can raise the defense that the marriage is not irretrievably broken. Moreover, this construction does not eliminate the five year statute of limitations applicable to actions for a divorce. The Domestic Relations Law provides that no action for divorce may be maintained on a ground which arose more than five years before the date of the commencement of the action except where abandonment or separation pursuant to agreement or decree is the ground.
However, in those states where irretrievable breakdown is a ground for divorce it has been held that the court presiding over an action for divorce on the ground of irretrievable breakdown has a duty to determine whether the marriage is, in fact, irretrievably broken.
Posted by Joel R. Brandes at 11:36 AM
Labels: The Irretrievable Breakdown Ground for Divorce
Nice post, kind of drawn out though. Really good subject matter though.
The implication is that the statute of limitations of 5 years could be an affirmative defense to the grounds of irretrievable breakdown. Incredible!
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HomeBadge Categories Cap Badges Infantry
Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers WW2 Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers Irish Regiment Cap Badge (Flag Right)
28711-VX07 : £29.99
Guaranteed original. Complete & intact. This is an original WW2 Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers Regiment Cap Badge for sale. In good condition. Please see our other items for more original WW1, WW2 & post war British military cap badges for sale including other Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers cap badges.
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The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers was an Irish infantry regiment of the British Army formed in 1881 by the amalgamation of the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot and the 108th Regiment of Foot. The regimental district comprised the City of Londonderry and the counties of Donegal, Londonderry, Tyrone and Fermanagh in Ireland, with its garrison depot located at Omagh. The local militia regiments also became part of the new regiment, becoming the 3rd to 5th (Militia) Battalions. Militarily, the whole of Ireland was administered as a separate command within the United Kingdom with Command Headquarters at Parkgate (Phoenix Park) Dublin, directly under the War Office in London. In 1914 the Great War broke out and the 2nd Battalion was first to see action in the Battle of Le Cateau. The 1st Battalion participated in the Landing at Cape Helles on the Gallipoli peninsula in April 1915 with the 29th Division. There were also nine New Army battalions raised seeing service with the 36th (Ulster) Division and the 16th (Irish) Division on the Western Front and at Gallipoli, the Macedonian Campaign and Palestine. The 12th battalion fought against Irish rebels who were fighting to end British rule in Ireland and to establish the Irish Republic during the Easter Rising of 1916 in Dublin. Two of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers were killed and seven more wounded.
The 2nd Battalion, as part of the BEF, was among those that were evacuated from Dunkirk after desperate fighting as the rearguard to the retreating BEF. In 1942 the 1st Battalion was flown to Burma to help stem the Japanese advance and in 1943 took part in the operations in the Arakan peninsula. After re-fitting, the 2nd Battalion, as part of Fifth Division, left England in 1942 for the East Indies. Their journey was to take them to Madagascar, where they fought the Vichy French in a brief campaign to ensure that the Japanese did not occupy the island to interdict Allied shipping, India, Persia and Syria before they deployed for Operation HUSKY, the invasion of Sicily followed by that of Italy. During the Italian Campaign, the 6th Battalion would serve in the same theatre as the 2nd but with 38th (Irish) Infantry Brigade. The 6th Battalion fought in the Tunisian Campaign in North Africa and the 2nd Battalion took part in the landings on Sicily and then Italy. The 6th Battalion also fought in Sicily and Italy, most notably at Centuripe in Sicily where its unexpected assault on the hilltop town took the Germans by surprise. In Italy the battalion fought at Cassino and in the pursuit north of Rome but was disbanded after the battles at Lake Trasimene in June 1944; its place in the Irish Brigade was taken by the 2nd Battalion which absorbed many of the personnel of 6th Inniskillings.
Please see our other items for more original WW1, WW2 & post war British military cap badges for sale including other Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers cap badges.
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WW2 Royal Artillery Regiment Cloth Arm of Service Strips Stripes
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The 1888 Armeny Building -- No. 90 Nassau Street
Frank Raub was proficient at two things in 1888—real estate development and the saloon business. For several years he managed the successful saloon known as “Hillen’s” near the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge and had dabbled in real estate. With the population of Manhattan exploding and the financial potential of the downtown area ripe, he combined his two talents into one project.
Purchasing the small buildings at the corner of Fulton and Nassau Streets, he hired architects De Lemos & Cordes to design an office building with restaurant space on the first floor. Theodore W. E. De Lemos and August W. Cordes had been in partnership only four years and their robust design would foreshadows the grand office buildings and department stores to come; among them the New York County National Bank and the department stores of Siegel-Cooper, Adams and Macy’s on Herald Square.
Early in 1889 the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide remarked on the new structures appearing along Nassau Street. “Another Nassau street building, on the southeast corner of Fulton street, is being put up for Frank Raub, who will have a café and restaurant on the first floor and rent out the offices above. It is up to the roof and will be completed, so the architects, De Lemos & Cordes, say, about November.”
Using buff-colored brick with limestone and terra cotta trim, the architects created a refined 6-story structure in five sections, ending with a complex cornice. Cast iron enframements enabled spacious window openings that allowed exceptional sunlight into the office spaces.
No. 90 Nassau Street shortly after completion -- American Architect & Building News, October 6, 1889 (copyright expired)
The neighborhood was the center of the jewelry trade at the time and Raub’s completed building filled with related businesses. Among the first was Armeny & Marion, makers of high-end gold pens.
Gyulo Armeny had arrived alone in New York from Austria-Hungary at the age of 19. After learning the jewelry trade in the Bronx, he started his own business at No. 75 Nassau Street. When he met pen-maker William Clayborn Marion his life would change.
Gyulo Armeny -- The Jewelers' Circular April 14, 1920 (copyright expired)
Unlike the immigrant Armeny, Marion was born to a prestigious family with French roots who settled in Kentucky in the 18th century. In 1900 biographer Cornelius Burnham Harvey would say of him “Breathing in his father’s house a wholesome mechanical atmosphere, and having received at the district schools a good rudimentary education, he left home at the age of fourteen and apprenticed himself to Andrew J. Berrian, a maker of gold pens at 75 Nassau Street, New York.” In 1884 the two men, now both masters at their craft, formed Armeny & Marion.
Marion's biographer, in 1900, called him "without doubt or question the oldest living working gold pen maker in the world --"Genealogical History of Hudson and Bergen Counties, New Jersey" (copyright expired)
The Jewelers’ Circular noted that “This business grew to such proportions that in 1890 it was moved to 90 Nassau Street.”
Advertisement in The American Stationery (copyright expired)
In the building with Armeny & Marion was the prosperous watch dealer Charles D. P. Gibson. The interesting Gibson had served in the Civil War and for about 25 years was connected with the United States Secret Service. But Gibson’s viewpoints on religion were extreme.
The New York Times noted on June 28, 1894 that “On ordinary questions he seems to think pretty much as other people, but in regard to his Roman Catholic fellow-citizens he entertains sentiments that would have seemed impossible even in the dark ages.”
Mercury, the Roman patron of commerce, peers out from above the fourth floor -- photo by Alice Lum
Gibson was an officer in the American Protective Association, a society “organized to hunt down Catholics.” In words that presaged those of a future German dictator, he announced “There is no room in this country for Roman Catholics and the American Protective Association will soon demonstrate this. They will have to go elsewhere. They can’t exist much longer here, for they will starve.”
When a reporter for The Times asked the jeweler “What would you do with these millions of people whom you condemn simply on religious grounds,” he answered “I wouldn’t do anything with the ___. I’d simply drive them out and make it impossible for them to live here, where they are a curse to good people who love the American institutions.”
Happily the rest of the tenants in the building drew less negative press. Jacob Horowitz quietly dealt in diamonds and Rudolph F. Albrecht sold rare stamps.
In 1893, with the building fully-leased, Raub commissioned architect A. L. C. Marsh to enlarge it. The handsome cornice was removed and two stories were added. Although Marsh attempted to meld the architecture with banded piers and terra cotta trim, the proportions were somewhat skewed.
The 1893 upward addition upset the attractive proportions -- photo by Alice Lum
Meanwhile the business of Armeny & Marion continued to flourish. In 1893 Gyulo Armeny purchased the building from Raub, renaming it the Armeny Building. Frank Raub continued running Raub’s Saloon at street level.
In 1900 the National Loan Association took space in the building, about the same time that Raub hired a new cashier, the 21-year old Martin J. Tighe. Tighe, whom The New York Times described as “an inveterate cigarette smoker,” was abusive to his young wife. In the Fall of 1900 he threatened to kill his 17-year old wife and her father, but when police disarmed him he “promised then to do better and was not arrested,” said the newspaper.
In April 1901 the couple had a baby boy and when the abuse continued, the young mother left Tighe to move back into her father’s home. Tighe stalked the building and on June 11, finding the door unlocked, he went up to the apartment. When his wife opened the door he grabbed her by the hair, dragged her into the hall and beat her with his fist. The enraged man bit his wife’s wrist until blood ran.
Although he was arrested, his father signed his bond and he was released. It was a move that would end the 18-year old mother’s life.
The girl returned to her father’s apartment and so too did her husband, who loitered around throughout the afternoon. Around 9:00 that evening with the protection of her aunt, Margaret Schaffney, Mrs. Tighe went back to the former apartment she had shared with her husband. She hoped to get clothes for the baby. After only a few minutes of their being in the apartment, Tighe burst in and threw Schaffrey out, locking the door.
When the aunt failed to find a policeman, she rushed back to the apartment and broke the door down with her shoulder. Tighe flew past her and into the street. The young wife was on the kitchen floor slashed in several places by a razor.
As the 18-year old mother slowly died, Tighe slit his own throat then, bleeding, sat smoking cigarettes and playing the piano in his father’s saloon awaiting police. Tighe’s father blamed the tragedy on the girl’s family interfering “with the household affairs of the young couple.”
Within the next few years jewelry firms were slowly replaced by law offices. In 1902 Ralph Gillett opened his practice here and two years later the law firm of J. & W. Shrady was here. Scandal visited the building in 1913 when former policeman Robert E. Ullner had his law offices in the building. That year an indictment was filed again him and his wife, Annie Grey, who, according to The New York Times “amassed a fortune as a keeper of disorderly resorts.” It was a polite term for brothels.
By 1917 Raub’s Saloon was gone and in its place was the liquor store owned by Joseph Varon. Varon would remain here for at least two decades.
On March 9, 1920 Gyulo Armeny was at his home in West Bronx, New York, suffering from gangrene poisoning as workers prepared an improvement to the building on Nassau Street. At 5:00 in the afternoon—the peak of rush hour—construction workers maneuvered an 800-pound cast iron flagpole base into position high over the sidewalk. Hundreds of businessmen and secretaries rushed along the sidewalk below.
Suddenly the rigging broke. The giant iron base held for a second by a portion of the rigging, long enough for workers to shout a warning. The crowd below scattered in all directions not knowing exactly what the danger was. The Times reported that “In a second or two the 800-pound weight snapped the remaining ropes and shot downward…The cast-iron base broke, and the street was filled with huge fragments of iron and broken lumber.” Only three persons were injured.
A month after the accident, Armeny succumbed to his 11-week illness. The sons of William Marion continued the pen manufacturing firm.
Within a year The United Happiness Candy Store was here. The store had several branches, along with a club. “The purpose of the United Happiness Candy Club is to introduce our various kinds of Candy, and have the story of their goodness spread by all the members. Everybody who buys automatically becomes a member," promised an advertisement.
Not all the jewelry firms left No. 90 Nassau Street and they proved to be a temptation for thieves. Charles Kresney ran his jewelry manufacturing shop here in 1924. On April 28 the cleaning woman walked in on a robbery by four gunmen and was immediately taken captive. The four bandits made off with $125,000 worth of jewelry. Kresney and the scrubwoman were found bound and gagged later.
A year later, two days before Christmas in 1925 the jewelry manufacturer Folmer Pripp was robbed by stepbrothers Jacob and Leon Kraemer, along with gunman Milton (Shuffles) Goldberg.
The boys were members of the notorious Whittemore gang, led by Richard Reese Whittemore. Goldberg was, according to newspapers, "the closest lieutenant" of Whittemore. A year later the robbers were sentenced; Goldberg getting 20 to 40 years in Sing Sing prison. His attorneys pled for a reduced sentence because he had an advanced case of tuberculosis.
Judge Koenig, however, was unmoved. The New York Times reported that he "rebuffs plea of mercy based on his weakened physique."
Dripping garlands, radiant discs and lions' heads are among the lavish ornaments -- photo by Alice Lum
In 1955 jeweler Charles Krensky operated his business in the building. That year three hold-up men barged into the shop. Before they fled Krensky lay dead.
By 1975 the street level housed a restaurant and bar, but the upper floors had been vacant for over a decade. Then in 1999 the building was renovated, creating residential space on the floors above the restaurant.
Other than the zig-zagging fire escape, No. 90 Nassau Street looks much as it did after the 1893 alterations when the vibrant neighborhood was filled with jewelry merchants.
Labels: DeLemos and Cordes, financial district
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The New York Curb Market Building -- 113-123 Greenwich Street
Stockbrokers can trace their history in New York back to 1788 when the purchase and sale of an $80 million bond issue was authorized by the First Congress of the United States. Four years later in March the leading brokers established the Stock Exchange which met in the open air under a buttonwood tree which, reportedly, stood between Nos. 68 and 70 Wall Street.
By 1869 when the New York Stock and Exchange Board was born the stock trading business was highly organized and regulated by internal rules. Neither the New York Stock Exchange nor the later Consolidated Stock Exchange would trade unlisted securities. This led to a rather disorganized group of brokers who met on the curb outside the New Street entrance of the New York Stock Exchange.
This noisy tangle of men became known as “the curbstone brokers” and their market The New York Curb Market. The disjointed, unregulated market was rife with unscrupulous swindlers and questionable trades. Worthless stocks were sold and unwary buyers bilked. In 1873 E. E. Mendels attempted to rein in the process. Called the “Father of the Curb,” he drew up an informal agreement which eventualy became the Curb Market Association.
The New York Curb Market moved its operation to Broad Street and tourists would flock here to witness what appeared to be an undisciplined mob of brokers shouting and waving signals to clerks hanging from the windows of surrounding buildings. Through sunshine and rain, sleet and snow, the brokers dealt in the open air for decades.
A vintage postcard captured the mob of brokers on Broad Street.
But the Curb Market brokers were often viewed with disdain by the Stock Exchange traders. Others criticized them as unregulated and unscrupulous. On January 6, 1920 Assistant District Attorney Edwin P. Kilroe urged “Licensing of stock exchange, which should be put under government control; licensing of brokers and dealers in stocks, bonds and investment securities, and drive the New York curb market from the streets as a public nuisance.”
Some members of the Curb Market recognized that a move into permanent, indoor headquarters would result in respectability. But they were in the minority. The greater number of curb brokers were only marginally successful and respectability was not their priority. Besides that, the curb was a cherished tradition. Moving indoors was not an option for these members.
In 1908 Frank Leslie's "Leslie's Weekly" illustrated the foul conditions brokers often faced (copyright expired)
But at the same time high-powered New York Stock Exchange members like J. P. Morgan were eying the Mills and Broad Exchange buildings where Curb Market clerks kept tabs on the action below. They wanted the Curb Market gone. Pressure was put on the leaders to move and the threat of the area simply being taking over, thus dooming the Curb, was evident.
Despite being in a minority the brokers who wanted to move indoors were the most powerful. Edward McCormick, Alfred Sturges and Franklin Leonard were the leaders of the movement and they forged ahead with their plans. The great majority of the Curb brokers had no choice but to follow along. If they remained on the street they would simply see their business wane and eventually die.
The New York Times remarked “While this change will rob the city of one of its picturesque features, there is no doubt of its desirability.”
Ground was broken in November 1920 on Trinity Place, somewhat surprisingly distant from Wall Street. The expansive $1 million plot faced the graveyard of Trinity Church and ran through the block to Greenwich Street. Architects Starrett & Van Vleck were given the commission to design the new structure. If the architects were given latitude in the exterior design, they were given specific instructions regarding the interior.
The New York Curb Market had a tradition of street trading. Its brokers had unwritten territorial rights to lampposts and other easily-recognized street structures where they could be easily picked out by their clerks. Except for the coffered roof above the brokers’ heads, Starrett & Van Vleck were to recreate the outside Curb Market.
The $1.2 million building rose rapidly and on Saturday, June 25, 1921 the Curbstone brokers held their last outdoor sesssion. The following Monday an impressive ceremony opened the new New York Curbstone Market. Around 8:00 in the morning the Curbstone brokers assembled on Broad Street as they always had, along with their clerks. Each broker was assigned his position in the new building. Despite the $1,500 membership fee in the indoor market and the $500 initiation fee, moods were high. Some of the brokers risked their last dollar to stay in business, but there was no other option.
The Trinity Place entrance faced the elevated train tracks and the graveyard of Trinity Church (foreground) -- photo NYPL Collection
Thirty minutes before the market was to open, at 9:00 a.m., Edward McCormick began the procession to to Trinity Place. The large group arrived at the new building and McCormick gave a succinct speech that began, “The die is cast. The old order is gone forever.” The brokers then sang “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the doors were opened and the men pushed in.
Here they found a virtual street scene. Tall posts resembled the street lamps of Broad Street. Stepped “terraces” against the walls provided clerks elevated positions from which to catch hand signals from their brokers as they had from windows. The roof above would keep out the rain and snow, but the walls would keep out—at least in McCormick’s and his partners’ hopes—cheats and crooks.
The cavernous trading floor featured large lamp posts and raised "terraces" -- sketch The New York Times December 5, 1920 (copyright expired)
The New York Tribune’s headline announced “The Curb Is Dead! Long Live The Curb!”
Starrett & Van Vleck’s structure, constructed by the Thompson-Starrett Company, was simple and reserved. Constructed of light gray brick and limestone, the flat facade was broken by a series of expansive arched windows that flooded light onto the 65-foot high trading floor.
The Evening World described the architecture as “a combination of Greek and Moorish art.” The Greenwich Street façade was a carbon-copy of the Trinity Place elevation. Inside, the trading floor was lined with 16-foot high wainscot of Bottochino marble and a large visitors’ gallery at the north end afforded an uninterrupted view over the floor. Below ground were a large restaurant and cafeteria and the coatrooms for the members and employees. The third floor housed executive offices for the Curb Market Association.
There were still a few hold-outs who traded on the street. One curb broker told The New York Tribune “That’s all nonsense about the city clearing the street and forcing us off. We’re citizens and we have a permit from the city to trade here...We’re not obstructing the traffic and we’re minding our own business, and open air trading is going to continue.”
And it did. For a while. In 1922 in his “The Stock Market,” S. S. Huebner noted that “According to recent press accounts a certain limited element, formerly connected with the curb market, continues to operate on the street as formerly.”
A handsome panel displays a shield with the monogram of the Curb Market -- photo by Alice Lum
In 1931, now known as the New York Curb Exchange, the group remodeled the main façade at No. 86 Trinity Place, giving it an up-to-date modernistic face. Perhaps to save money, however, the Greenwich Street façade was left as-is. Change came again to the Curb when in 1953 the name was changed to the American Stock Exchange. Massive lettering was affixed to the Trinity Place front announcing the new name. But on Greenwich Street “NEW YORK CURB MARKET” still remained carved into the stone.
In 2008 the exchange was absorbed by NYSE Amex Equities and it abandoned its old headquarters for Wall Street. The massive building sits unused and largely ignored, the last remnant of an uncanny and quirky time in New York stock trading.
Mere blocks from Ground Zero, an NYPD surveillance station sits in front of the building. Still vacant, a poster offers retail space in the immense trading place. -- photo by Alice Lum
Labels: financial district, starrett and van vleck
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History, Race
No Infamy for Black Tragedies
December 8, 2016 MuniCourts
December 7, 2016, marked the 75th anniversary of Pearl Harbor. News outlets all over the country showed footage from December 7, 1941, "A date which will live in infamy". People were interviewed, stories were told about that tragic day when more than 2,400 people were killed, the day was memorialized and ceremonies were held.
Tragedies involving Black people, don't usually get memorialize or "live in infamy" and instead are mostly forgotten. Dorris "Dorie" Miller, a Black Pearl Harbor hero, was mostly ignored by the white press; a tradition that continues even to this day, remember Shoshana Johnson? Dorie Miller took part in the Battle of Makin Island and was killed when a torpedo hit his ship within two years of his Pearl Harbor heroics.
My grandmother, on my father's side, had six sons serving overseas in the military during World War II, but when it came time to recognize the mother from St. Louis with the most number of sons serving in the military, a white woman with five sons was chosen.
My grandmother, according to my father, rarely went downtown, so he was excited one day when they caught the bus downtown. By the time they arrived downtown, my grandmother needed to use the restroom. While her six sons were risking their lives for this country, my grandmother was denied the simple dignity of using the restroom. My father mentioned how humilated his mother felt after being rudely told she could not use the restroom at several locations, forcing them to catch the bus home so she could use the restroom. My grandmother almost never left home after that incident according to my father. Discussing it almost brought tears to my father's eyes.
Slavery, Jim Crow, convict leasing, peonage, race riots, lynchings, medical experimentation, mass incarceration, and other racial atrocities commited against black people is not treated as a tragedy in the same way the Holocaust is treated even though Africans experience their own Holocaust in addition to slavery.
The negative affects of slavery includes all the horrible combined legacy, both physical and mental, of actual bondage and the institutional forms of racism, and oppression that followed and still continues to this day. Black Americans have never fully been allowed to recover or progress.
Malcolm X stated it best when he said, “If you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, that’s not progress. If you pull it all the way out, that’s not progress. The progress comes from healing the wound that the blow made. They haven’t even begun to pull the knife out. They won’t even admit the knife is there.”
In addition to bondage, slaves were prohibited from reading and so-called "free Blacks" were restricted by law, through the "Black Codes," from entering certain professions, assembling, establishing businesses, bearing arms, serving in the militias, and some states even barred free blacks from entering.
Dispite the fact that African-Americans were treated as second class citizens and endured numerous indignities, they strongly supported, and desired to be part of, the war effor. After Japan's defeat, the United States treated their former enemy better than they did black men and women who served and risked their lives. During the occupation and reconstruction period, Billions of U.S. aid and assistance were spent rebuilding Japan.
The U.S. purchased approximately 5,800,000 acres of land, (approximately 38% of Japan's cultivated land), from wealthy landowners, under the government's reform program and resold the land to Japan's tenant farmers at extremely low prices. By 1950, three million peasants had acquired land, dismantling a power structure that the former landlords had long dominated.
The United States provided for Japan's poor farmers better than it did it's own former slaves. While the U.S. was helping the poor citizens of it's enemy secure land, Black soldiers who helped win the war were denied access to the G.I. Bill which allowed returning white soldiers to enroll in college and purchase homes. Japan is now a world economic power, while Blacks in America are still subjected to discrimination, police brutality, predatory courts, and an enormous wealth gap.
Japan is currently a world power because it received crucial aid and assistance rebuilding it's devasted cities and economy. Had the Black community received a fraction of the assistance provided to former enemies, our communities would be flourishing too. Instead of aid, the Black community was sabotaged by laws that placed artificial restrictions and provided substandard education. The government even participated in an illegal program that dumped drugs into black nieghborhoods. When Black folks became addicted to those drugs, they were treated like criminals, sentenced to harsh jail sentences and prevented from participating in society's safety nets such as student aid, food stamps and public housing.
Even as American was reflecting this Pearl Harbor day, there were those who will tell Black folks to stop whining and re-visiting the past, get over it and forget about slavery and the residual suffering because it was so long ago. We can't get over it, because it's not over. Every economic downturn or crisis effects the Black community disproportunately because of systemic exclusion of resources and opportunity.
"It's foolish to let your oppressor tell you that you should forget about the oppression that they inflicted upon you."
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DEATH TO FALSE MODESTY!!!
Portland has a rich tradition of throwing uncomfortable "surprise" birthday parties for me, primarily so "friends" can use very unflattering photos on the flyers. Why should this year be any different? The Old Ones at The Lovecraft are responsible for this year's atrocity. Feel free to come down and toast a senile geezer on his special day. In lieu of gifts, please consider making a charitable donation of your rarest records to my collection...
R.I.P. Patrick Woodroffe
To be perfectly honest, writing eulogies for artists and friends I've adored is getting downright exhausting at this point. Not to mention depressing. So instead of mourning the loss of Patrick Woodroffe this week - the artist who gave us Judas Priest's Sad Wings of Destiny and Budgie's Bandolier to name only his most well known album covers - allow me to suggest you find a copy of his 1976 book 'Mythopoeikon' and curl up while enjoying this short set of music I assembled back in 2010 for a UK website that asked me to blab about 10 songs suitable for long sits at the drawing table. If you strictly limit yourself to music of a particular genre, you will inevitably be disappointed by the songs I've selected (and what a sad little life you must truly live). However, if you're receptive to great music that doesn't necessarily have pictures of goatmen fucking jesus on the cover, you just might enjoy the trip.
H.R. GIGER R.I.P.
I first became aware of H.R. Giger as a very impressionable young child while flipping through my oldest brother's records during the late 70s. I came across Emerson Lake and Palmer's Brain Salad Surgery LP with the brilliant gatefold split, an iconic melding of Eros and Thanatos. That painting left a huge impression on me, especially the subtle impact of Giger's monochromatic technique. The intimate gray tones immediately struck me and the design made the sleeve an engaging tactile experience. Who knew the whole thing was a cheap euphemism for blow jobs? Some years later as a teen I came across To Mega Therion and those two album covers remain among my childhood favorites. Around that same time in the mid 80s I stumbled into a hippy poster shop on West 8th Street in New York City called Psychedelic Solution and learned more about the man behind those album covers. The hippy behind the counter was selling postcards of Giger's 'Illuminatus I' that really blew my mind and if I had to pinpoint a seminal moment in the evolution of my own heavily shaded style it was that afternoon at Psychedelic Solution. Then I saw Alien (it was released in 1979, but I didn't get around to seeing it until much later in 1986). It suddenly occurred to me that the man was everywhere, and as an early stimulating force in my creative development his influence permeated my brain at an almost subconscious level. That's where his best ideas will burrow and breed, if you let them in. Entire library shelves could be devoted to the theory and technique of his vast legacy, so there's no need for lengthy pontification here. I only wish more contemporary artists were liberated by his style instead of simply aping his biomechanical inventions - after all, this was an important but relatively small aspect of his overarching oeuvre. There is so much more to his body of work to explore (pun intended), such as the perverse surrealist drawings he created during the 60s that look like Hans Bellmer and Francis Bacon on dubious speed and viagra. Incidentally, some of those were hastily scrawled in ballpoint pen! Giger is an artist who has cast such a monolithic shadow over popular culture and the "dark arts" that at this point it's almost easy to take his immense vision for granted. Of course that would be a grave mistake.
LONG LIVE BLACK DEATH!
THE SIKI SPACEK EXPERIENCE
The cat's out of the bag. Legendary headbanger Siki Spacek is bringing his latest incarnation of Black Death to Portland, Oregon on July 4th, 2014. Don't worry if you can't sing a single Black Death song. Even the most devout metallurgists are relatively hazy when it comes to this Cleveland, Ohio oddity (plus you've still got almost two months to learn). During their decade long run from 1978-1988 they only released one LP and one 7", which were intended to be sold together, plus two songs on Clubside Records' Cleveland Metal compilation and they never performed outside of their hometown. Yet their influence, charm and notoriety have assumed nearly mythic proportions over the years, not to mention staggering collector prices for a vinyl pressing that still nobody has definitively numbered. The mastermind behind this musical fist in the face of bullshit is Mr. Reginald Gamble, a proud leather clad Sagittarius born on December 10, 1958, better known to the initiated by his colorful stage name. The secret to Siki's enduring power is his soulful high pitched delivery and his ability to craft catchy as hell songs that hold their own alongside the best NWOBHM. Message board champions love to flex their virtual muscle by trotting out obscure bands, but the fact is, most unknown bands remain that way for a reason. Siki's songs for Black Death are loaded with sweaty sexual aggression, shredding guitar acrobatics and outrageous lyrical wit. Think Blackie Lawless if he was raised on Motown 45s in a Midwest ghetto. It's metal to the bone, but possessed with the unbridled don't-give-a-fuck-ery of the most incendiary punk rock. It's music that makes you feel, if only for those fleeting 40 minutes, that even you could start a band and maybe someday make a record that fans will still be blasting three decades later. As his debut album approaches its 30th anniversary, I decided to give the Iron Messiah a call to find out more about his upcoming Portland appearance. Turns out he's even cooler than I had imagined. And that's pretty damn cool. So lock the door and keep your parents out and turn your music up LOOOOOUD!!!! Here comes the Wrecking Crew...
Dennis Dread: Ok, so the big question everyone is gonna want to know is what lineup will you be bringing to Portland for the East End Block Party in July?
Siki Spacek: Well, Philip [Bullard] from my first lineup that’s on the album, he passed away. And the other guitar player was trying to go around with a fake Black Death band and was misleading people into thinking I was in the band just to get people to come out and hear them play. They was playing all my songs and music. The lineup I’m bringing with me is my current lineup. It’s the guys from one of my side bands Siki Spacek and The Resurrection. I have my rhythm section from that band and the bass player originally should’ve been on the first album with Black Death but he was on tour with some other group. He was doing some rock/jazz fusion thing. I also have one of the original guitar players who was in the band from 1986 to 1988, Vincent Lindsay, and we recorded the second unreleased Black Death album that was called The Trainshop Maneuvers. That was when the speed metal thing was going on. It’s a different take on Black Death, but we’re gonna be doing some of those songs in the future hopefully. I’m bringing my best talent with me. I’ve got a better guitar player [now] ‘cause the other guitar player was really more a prop than anything else…
Are you talking about Greg Hicks?
Yeah, Greg Hicks. And on that album it’s only two solos of his that’s actually recorded on there. They had me overdub my solos, but they didn’t let me know I was doing his parts.
You’re credited on the LP for writing all the songs and all the lyrics.
I write the music in every band I play in. That way I know it’s gonna sound right, it’s gonna sound heavy! I’ve been blessed to have a little talent with catchy melody lines… [breaks into the opening line of ‘Street Walker’, sing-along ensues…] Haha! Yeah, we gonna have t-shirts and shit too and DVDs recorded from when we performed in Chicago at this metal festival with Grim Reaper.
Is it true that Greg Hicks copyrighted the logo and the band name?
All he’s got is that stupid ass logo that’s on the album cover that I could not stand. He just trademarked the fuckin’ logo on that first Black Death album. That stupid ass logo! He can keep that shit, I could give a shit less! But he doesn’t own my songs, I own all my music, that’s why they’re not playing out no more. He had some nazi guy playing drums, some guy name Dennis actually, who had nazi flags all up in the fuckin’ practice room!
It seems like an odd band for a nazi to play drums with…
Exactly! Exactly, man. And that Wikipedia bullshit that he put up about the so-called “legacy of Black Death”? He’s full of shit. And then in this fake Black Death band that he had, he’s supposed to be the guitar player, but this motherfucker was playing bass. Playing bass! What kind of shit is that?
Tell me about the early 80s Cleveland metal scene. What bands were you playing with back then?
It was a lot of guys out here with bands, but they didn’t get a chance to play in a lot of the clubs until after they let us play. At first they thought we were like a novelty act, you know what I mean, some dark guys playing heavy metal, right? But heavy metal is a lifestyle, it’s a culture, it’s like religion. Either you get it or you don’t, y’know? Not everybody is called to wear the denim and leather. And those that ain’t called upon it, they look at us like, “Look at those motherfuckers…” Just cue in the Twisted Sister video! Haha! “Yooou, mister!” We played with Destructor, Shok Paris, Breaker…
Did you ever play with Jagged Edge?
Oh, Jagged Edge! Hell yeah! Jagged Edge, Sorceress, Cerebus...There were very few [bands] that we didn’t play with. But the thing was, a lot of these guys headlining the shows, like Breaker or Shok Paris, were pretty boy metal bands like Mötley Crüe. When they first came out of high school they could pass for transvestites, but now they look like ugly potbellied guys. Haha! But I mean everybody had the big hair, that was the thing back then. Hell, I even had a hair weave! I had big hair back when we first started Black Death in ’78.
Jamie [Midnight] told me he jammed with you for a little bit.
Yeah, Mr. Sagittarius, like myself, hell yeah! I jammed with him down in Kent at one of the shows we did ‘cause he covered one of my songs when he was playing with Boulder. On the first album he recorded ‘Scream of the Iron Messiah’, which we’ll be playing when we come out there.
And listen, thank you for bringing us all the fuckin’ way out there, dude. Can we play for an hour, man?
We can play for an hour?
Aw sweet, damn, thank you! Thank you! Cause dude, we’ve got so many goddamn songs! We already have three albums worth of songs, not to mention the Trainshop shit!
I understand you’ve never actually flown on an airplane before…
No, I’ve not. Ok, here’s a light comin’ from the cloud from heaven and the angels are singing, “Yo, Dennis! Thou hast been chosen! Siki Spacek’s first flight will be due to you!” ‘Cause I said the only way you can ever get me on a flight is if we have to go across to Europe…
So is the band planning on knocking you out like B.A. Baracus from the A-Team?
Haha! Right on, ‘cause I’ve got a fear of heights I’ve been dealing with...
You’ll be ok, man.
Hell yeah, ‘cause I’m gonna get stoned!
Don’t bring weed to the airport…
No! I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize us coming out there, man. Y’know, this is a long time coming, man. Let me tell you, if nobody liked the music I play I would still play it just for myself, but when people like what you’re doing, that’s something special. And for it to go worldwide like it is and for you to get us to come out there and share us coming out there with the rest of the Portland, Oregon metal fans…
I gotta tell you, for me, it’s an honor to have you coming out.
No, no. The honor is all ours, please. Especially mine. ‘Cause I walked away from this shit in ’88. It was [hard] trying to find the right musicians and then everybody kept trying to pigeonhole it, “Play with all black guys! Play with all black guys!” When with me it was never a contrived thing, it just happened to turn out that way. ‘Cause the guys that I cut the album with, they didn’t even listen to heavy metal, they was playin’, “I shot the sheriff but I did not shoot the deputy!” Haha! They was playin’ shit like that! As far as metal went, Black Sabbath was ok. Cool. But then I took them to see Judas Priest the second time they came to Cleveland, the Hellbent For Leather album had just came out. I kept trying to explain to them what heavy metal was, “This band you’ve got to see!” And when they saw it, then they got it. ‘Cause I used to be the only one dressing in leather and studs and all that shit.
You can hear the Priest influence on the record for sure.
You heard the song ‘Dreamer Deceiver’ by Priest?
I love that song! [another sing-along ensues…]
Well, I wrote a song called ‘Have You Seen Her’ with a similar chord progression and you know I had always kinda’ sung with that high pitched voice, ‘cause I couldn’t sing low. And I thought that was gonna sound weird. I said, “Damn, they gonna think I sound like The Temptations!” Y’know, Eddie Kendricks, “Oh, I see her face everywhere I go!” Haha! Then my friend Squeaky said, “Hey man, this group ripped off your song,” and then he turned me on to Priest and I heard that and I said, “Aha!” Their version was better than mine, how they had it structured and everything.
In the song ‘Black Death’ you have some vocal patterns that are very similar to Rob Halford’s on Hellbent.
Yeah, we’re kindred spirits. He gave me a direction to go. ‘Cause I’ve been hearing heavy metal in my head since I was a kid, before I even learned how to play. As a matter of fact, ‘Street Walker’ was in my head back when I was in junior high. Actually before junior high, because I didn’t learn how to play guitar until my sophomore year in high school. That’s when I learned how to play guitar and the first song I learned to play was Jimi Hendrix ‘Hey Joe’. One day I’d like to do my little Hendrix tribute thing. Y’know, it takes a Sagittarian to do a Sagittarian…
Did Black Death ever play outside of Cleveland?
We played in Pittsburg and that place was sold out. That was when we were Siki Spacek and The Resurrection.
But back in the day as Black Death?
No, we never left Cleveland. I never played outside of Cleveland until it was the Siki Spacek and The Resurrection thing. And it didn’t matter what I called it, ‘cause after that it was Iron Messiah, they always called it Black Death. I’d tell the guys that was announcing us before we go on stage, “Ok, the name of the band is Iron Messiah.” They’d get up to the mic, “And now from Cleveland…BLACK DEATH!!!” I’d say, “What the fuck??” So anyway, this will be the furthest we’ve ever travelled to. Prior to Portland, New York was the farthest and that was in a van with a bunch of equipment. I’ll never do that again!
This is a very special event!
I’ve always wondered why Cyndi Lauper is thanked on the LP.
Oh yeah! I squeezed Cyndi Lauper’s tit. I don’t know if you know the Cleveland radio station WMMS, The Buzzard, 100.7? WMMS is pretty much the big rock radio station here in Cleveland and they had this Coffee Break Concert thing where you could get in free, like during the daytime, people working downtown could go there on their lunch break at 12 o’clock and see some bands. I saw Yngwie Malmsteen there with Alcatraz before he went out on his own and Priest played there the first time they came to Cleveland.
What year was that?
That was ’78. They had just released Sin After Sin. Then they came back in ’79 when Hellbent For Leather came out.
Damn! So what the hell happened with Cyndi Lauper?
Oh right! So the day she was in Cleveland she performed at this Coffee Break Concert thing, we were down there to record some [promotional bits] like, “Hi! I’m Siki Spacek and when I’m in Cleveland I listen to 100.7, The Buzzard!” So she was down there to cut some shit too and her road manager came in and that’s when she found out her album went platinum with that, “Oh, girls just wanna have fun!” shit. But she don’t talk like that in real life, she just talk like some chick from the ‘hood or somethin’. But anyway, we took pictures with her and she put her tit in my hands. Her left tit. I ain’t never gonna forget that…
And she got a thank you on the record for that?
Yeah! Why do you think she looks so wild and extreme now?
She’s been touched by Siki!
Now imagine if I had put the tongue to her…
Maybe she would’ve had another platinum record!
Yeah! Right! And it’d been Black Death! Or Siki and Cyndi! Or Cyndi and Siki, I don’t care whose name is first…
Why did the record come out with a 7” instead of two separate releases?
Some of them had that little 7” EP and some of them didn’t. The only reason it came out like that was because the group that I originally cut the album with, again, like I mentioned earlier, they weren’t really heavy metal and you have to teach people some things…We play those same songs [now] and they’re nowhere near as long as they were when I played with the first line up, the ‘classic lineup’ we’ll say. Jamie [Walters] and Jeremy [Kursik] played me some bootleg recordings from the Pop Shop and some shows we did around the area and I was listening to these songs and I’m like, “Damn this motherfucker’s 15 minutes long, 12 minutes long! What the fuck?!” Black Death shows are legendary. We played like The Song Remains the Same, damn near two hours of shit and that’s only because the fuckin’ songs were 15 to 20 minutes long a piece! And there were some songs that didn’t make it on the album and in my opinion a couple of them are heavier than some of the songs that did. You’ll hear this on the [new] EP and then on the next album. This EP we’re calling The Return of the Iron Messiah, speaking about moi, ‘cause that was a nickname they gave me. “Iron Messiah!!!!!” Just ‘cause I wrote that song…
So those songs were released on the 7” because they didn’t fit on the LP?
Because they were so long, and Billy [Peters, founder of Auburn Records] thought all of ‘em were good songs and he wanted, “Here comes the Wrecking Crew!” and…what was on the other side of that?
'Retribution'.
Yeah, ‘Retribution’!
Are you playing ‘Retribution’ in Portland?
Oh, hell yeah! We’ll be doing ‘Black Death’, ‘Street Walker’, ‘Last Prophet’- that was another song that didn’t make it on there- and ‘The Rise of the Beast’…Y’know, it’s funny you should mention Halford and Priest because everybody usually says I sound more like King Diamond [starts singing ‘Evil’ and trails off]…
Do you know how many copies of the LP were pressed and how many came with the 7”?
I think he definitely pressed more than 1000 ‘cause this shit has been international, man. I got fan mail from England, Germany, Chile, Peru and even more from Poland! From motherfuckin’ Poland, dude! And this is before Reagan tore the wall down...
So you don’t know the exact number of records Auburn pressed?
No, I don’t. But it had to be more than 1000. Just the geography tends to lend itself to that, ‘cause [fan mail] came from such a wide dispersed area. But he wants to re-release it…
I hope you see some money from that…
Oh, I will on this. That’s the only reason he hasn’t tried to put it out again yet, because the contract was a one shot deal. So this time shit will have to be negotiated and I’m about to put my songs with a publishing company. I didn’t know nothin’ about that [back then], otherwise I would’ve been receiving little stipends all these years.
Did you get paid when the record came out in ‘84?
He offered me money in ’85-’86, and I turned it down. The album was released across seas on Halloween ’84, [but] it wasn’t released in America until ‘85. Well, if he only pressed 1000 copies to send overseas, how many do you think he pressed for here in the States? But that’s ok, I don’t stress too much about that. He was a fan…Anyway, the band I have now is a hell of a lot more professional, the songs are tighter, more concise and I have a guitar player with me who can play guitar. He has a Glenn Tipton style to his playing. There’s the Judas Priest reference again!
What are you most looking forward to seeing when you get to Portland?
The fans. The club. And to play. And just to see everybody out there. If it’s anything like Chicago, it’ll be crazy. We rocked! We played with Grim Reaper. I always thought Grim Reaper was a local band…
They’re from England.
Yeah! And I didn’t know they were fans of Black Death, but I was talking to this guy backstage and I thought he was a fan and, surprise on me, he got up on stage and was playing guitar left handed and shit!
Hendrix style!
Yeah man, Jimi Reaper! Haha! Y’know, back in the old Cleveland days the only band we hung out with that was cool with us was Destructor. A lot of the other groups got kind of intimidated ‘cause I mean, hell, these big dark guys and shit…but see, my leather is black, my skin is brown. I’m not a black guy, ok? I’m a brown guy! Haha! And I smoke green! Haha! I got a rainbow, but it ain’t gay! It’s brown, green…
With red underwear!
Yeah! And red underwear! Now, the only reason I had on that underwear was we were at the old Cleveland Agora [Theater], it had caught fire down in the club part but upstairs it was like a recording studio. So we went upstairs for the photo shoot for the album cover and I had my Fredericks of Hollywood spandex on, y’know, this real sheer shit, I didn’t know that they had this thicker shit for guys. So anyways, I’m doing my poses, y’know, you’re crotch squats with one leg stuck out, the classic Yngwie pose. And I think I Yngwie’d a little too much, cause my shit ripped! And I didn’t have on no underwear and everything was hanging out! Luckily my girlfriend was there so she gave me her underwear…
Haha! And what’s up with that giant safety pin?
Oh, yeah…I just had that…I was holding something together with that…And I had that long leather coat…I looked cool! Sweaty like a motherfucker, but I was cool!
Damn right you were! ●
Posted by Dennis Dread at 11:36 PM 0 comments
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Suzi Awards to be held Monday
Monday, November 4th, 2013, 12:37pm
DECATUR, Ga. -- The 2013 Suzi Bass Awards ceremony will be held Monday, Nov. 4 at 7:30 p.m. at the Porter Sanford Performing Arts Center in DeKalb County.
WHO'S NOMINATED? | Meet this year's Suzi Awards nominees
This year's Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented to Del Hamilton and Faye Allen, founders of 7 Stages Theatre. The duo started the Little Five Point theater company in 1979. Today, it's one of metro Atlanta's most popular and respected theaters.
RELATED | 7 Stages announces 2013-14 season
The winner of this year's Gene-Gabriel Moore Playwriting Award for an outstanding play penned by a local writer will also be revealed at Monday's ceremony.
Reframing 'Black is Beautiful' lecture at Spelman College
Submitted by SpelmanCollege on Tuesday, October 15th, 8:15 am
ATLANTA -- The Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, in partnership with the Spelman College Ida B. Wells-Barnett Distinguished Lecture Series and Atlanta Celebrates Photography, presents the lecture Reframing "Black is Beautiful," with Deborah Willis, Ph.D., chair and professor of Photography and Imaging at Tisch School of the Arts, New York University.
The lecture will take place at 7 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 17 at Spelman College Cosby Academic Center Auditorium, 350 Spelman Lane SW, Atlanta.
Elevate Week begins Oct. 18
Tuesday, October 8th, 2013, 10:26am
ATLANTA -- Elevate Week, the Office of Cultural Affairs' large scale public art project, will begin Friday, Oct. 18 at locations throughout the city.
Muralists and performance groups will create art with the theme "Transit: Time, People and Places" through Saturday, Oct. 26.
"I am excited by this year's program because it is a testament to the evolving role of public art in the cultural and economic development of Atlanta," Eddie Granderson, public art program manager for the Office of Cultural Affairs, said in a statement. "We are growing Atlanta's reputation as a cultural destination through public art."
MARTA has partnered with the program to design a special Elevate bus. Route 49 will drive past much of the Elevate artwork, giving riders the opportunity to see it.
BRO5 set to release debut single 'Bruises' for Domestic Violence Awareness Month
Submitted by ReinChild, By ReinChild, Where U Live Blogger
Monday, October 7th, 2013, 6:55am
ATLANTA-- A pop boy band of five brothers, BRO5, is formally introducing themselves to the mainstream national market with the release of their debut single "Bruises."
Levi, Madison, JD, Skyler and Casey Jones are five distinct voices that combine into one talented harmonious sound. These blood brothers are creating a big buzz with their East Coast high school and college tour, which will kick off an anti-bullying campaign.
A day hours after filming their video in Atlanta, the band was back on the road to promote the new single, a heart-wrenching hit that addresses domestic violence and the insecurities associated with being hurt by a loved one. As vividly depicted in the video, the song also deals broadly with the various issues that "bruise" America and the world today.
2 Christmas favorites return to Horizon Theatre
Thursday, October 3rd, 2013, 10:48am
Greg Mooney
2013 Suzi Awards nominees revealed
Thursday, September 12th, 2013, 10:58am
ATLANTA -- The nominees for the 2012-13 Suzi Bass Awards were announced Monday.
This year's Suzi Nomination Party was held at 7 Stages Theatre in Little Five Points and was hosted by past Suzi winners Ingrid Cole and Glenn Rainey.
RELATED | See last year's Suzi nominees
RELATED | See last year's Suzi winners
The Suzi Awards are named for Suzi Bass, a well-loved Atlanta actress who died of cancer in 2002. Every year, they honor some of the best theater productions in metro Atlanta.
Seminal Photography Exhibition ‘Posing Beauty’ Makes Southeast Debut at Spelman College
Submitted by SpelmanCollege on Monday, September 9th, 5:15 pm
The Spelman College Museum of Fine Art is the first institution in the Southeast to present the nationally touring exhibition, “Posing Beauty in African American Culture.” Featuring more than 75 photographs by leading, emerging, and amateur photographers, “Posing Beauty” explores ways contemporary understanding of beauty has been informed by the works of photographers and artists dating from 1890 to the present. The exhibition will be on view Sept. 5 through Dec. 7, 2013. The exhibition is curated by Deborah Willis, Ph.D., one of the nation's leading historians of African-American photography.
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Rallylegend 2013 Eberhard & Co. Takes To The Track With The World's Greatest Champions
Another date has been added to the packed schedule of historic car events for Eberhard & Co., which after achieving extraordinary results at the most recent edition of the Nuvolari Grand Prix – the race with the richest history of the many competitions dedicated to the cars of yesterday supported by the brand – will be making its debut next weekend for the first time as sponsor and official timekeeper for Rallylegend, the adrenaline-steeped automotive event par excellence featuring historic rally cars.
Legendary cars and celebrated drivers will be returning to the track from 10 to 13 October in San Marino for the most eagerly awaited rally event of the year, featuring a stellar cast in a show not to be missed. Of the 150 crews participating, as many as 120 will be taking part in the competitions, including the Historic, Myth and WRC competitions (only the Stars will not require time measurements). Over 50 crews will be arriving from beyond the borders of San Marino and Italy, with approximately 20 nations represented, for three days of toptier rally racing involving the vehicles that have shaped the sport's history and countless enthusiasts who will breathe life into the highly anticipated event to be held in San Marino.
The Swiss watchmaker has strong, longstanding ties to the thrilling world of speed and challenges with a retro flavour that date back to 1991, when Eberhard & Co. dedicated a special collection of chronographs to one of the greatest drivers of all time, Tazio Nuvolari, and became a sponsor of the event dedicated to him. Since then the brand has taken part in many of the most important events in the historic car racing scene at a national and international level that fully reflect the brand's style, elegance, refinement and attention to detail.
“Our relationship with the historic car world continues and grows stronger thanks to this new event, which has by now become an essential attraction for enthusiasts,” explained Mario Peserico, CEO of Eberhard Italia. “We are honoured to be able to mark time and reward some of the most illustrious representatives of this world with our watches.”
Indeed, the greatest champions in the world will be coming together at this eleventh edition, starting with Miki Biasion, the Italian driver and two-time rally world champion who will be racing in a Delta Integrale, the vehicle with which he won his past two titles. The race will also involve the participation of high-profile Italian champions, with the aim of highlighting the achievements of Italy's star drivers and bearing witness to a desire to set mighty Italy back on track at a time when it is absent from the top spots in the World Rally Championship rankings. In addition to Biasion, other natural-born champions will be participating, including Sandro Munari (Lancia Stratos), Gianfranco Cunico (Ford Escort WRC), “Lucky” Battistolli (Ferrari 308 Gtb) and Gigi Galli, the last Italian driver to participate in the Rally World Championships (he will be among the Stars, driving a Ford Focus WRC) – not to forget “Pedro” and Enrico Brazzoli, two of the fastest drivers in the European and Italian Historic Car Championships. In addition, two consistently spectacular drivers, Gabriele Noberasco and Federico Ormezzano, will also be returning to Rallylegend.
For Rallylegend, Eberhard & Co. will customize the Lancia Delta driven during the race by Gabriele Noberasco, a great rally racer and friend of the brand. On race days, the driver and vehicle will display a highperformance model from the Chrono 4 Géant collection, the Chrono 4 Géant Full Injection, an iconic watch featuring a perfect blend of strong, appealing aesthetic touches and cutting-edge technical processes.
The top Italian ace drivers will be accompanied by already well-established super-champions Carlos Sainz, eagerly awaited safety-car driver Didier Auriol, Gustavo Trelles and Jimmy Mc Rae, as well as the Finnish Markku Alen with Ilkka Kivimaki, Harri Toivonen, the German Harald Demuth and Fabrizia Pons, for an all-around stellar cast. Foremost among the participating vehicles is the timeless Lancia Delta, with over 25 models taking part, including some outstanding specimens, as well as an impressive ten Lancia 037s, six Audio Quattros in various versions and iterations, some of which will be coming from the German group's museum, and several VW Golfs. Other vehicles will include a Fiat 131 Abarth, various models of Porsches and a Ford Escort, along with Opels, BMWs, Toyotas and Subarus. Also in attendance will be a Lancia Stratos, three Delta S4s and the ever-captivating Ferrari 308 Gtb. Worthy of mention is the presence of the full complement of “B Group” cars responsible for shaping rally history.
Eberhard & Co. will reward the pair who places first in the rankings with two timepieces from the Champion collection and will bestow two models from the Traversetolo collection as a special prize on two of the discipline's great champions.
Our engines are already running as we await the chequered flag!
Eberhard & Co., a watchmaker specialized in manufacturing high-tech watches, was founded in 1887 in Chaux-de- Fonds, in the Swiss Canton of Jura. In 2012 Eberhard & Co. celebrated 125 years of history, confirming its natural inclination towards evolution and growth, while also maintaining its personality and strong independent spirit, without abandoning its strong ties to its roots and tradition. Eberhard & Co. manufactures approximately 15,000 pieces per year, with the aim of achieving balanced, yet constant growth, and is present in approximately 25 countries, from Europe to the United States, the Far East and the Middle East. Eberhard & Co.'s history is a series of unforgettable creations, from the Chrono 4 to the 8 JOURS, Tazio Nuvolari collection, Extra-fort model – produced as a special, limited edition, commemorating the watchmaker's 125 years of history – and the latest entries: the Chrono 4 Géant Full Injection and Chrono 4 Colors.
PR Category : Lifestyle
Posted on : Saturday, October 19, 2013 4:22:00 PM UAE local time (GMT+4)
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Echo Base News Interviews Gerald Home
I have recently done an interview with Gerald Home, who played Tessek and a Mon Calamari Officer on Home One. Read on about the actor's Star Wars experience after the jump!
Echo Base News: What was being in the Mon Cal/Tessek suits like and did you have any difficulty moving around in them?
Gerald Home: Both costumes were very comfortable to wear and move around in until the masks were put on. The real difficulty arose when we were wearing the masks, because it was very difficult to see out of both of them. Sometimes I'd count the steps I had to take, like a blind person would: "2 steps to the eft, then 3 steps straight ahead" etc - that type of thing. It was also extremely hot inside the masks, though we had helpers who used hair dryers to cool us down between shots.
EBN: What is your fondest memory from being on set?
GH: The biggest thrill about being on set in 1982 was that we all knew we were part of Star Wars and cinema history: the first 2 Star Wars films had been huge international successes, and we were sure REVENGE of the Jedi would be a big hit too. It was fantastic to be on set with all these iconic characters we had seen on screen in the first 2 films - and now we were part of it all!
EBN: Did you keep anything from the film once it wrapped?
GH: The only things I was able to keep were my call sheets and the 2 pages of additional scenes I had as the Mon Calamari Officer, in which I had some experimental dialogue as an "Aid" to Ackbar.
EBN: Do have a Star Wars collection and if so what's your favorite item in it?
GH: I'm not a collector myself, but of course I have my 3 action figures, as you see here!
I also have a small collection of things that have been given to me by Star Wars fans, including certificates from various fan groups and drawings they have made for me. I treasure things that fans make for me, such as these 2 fantastic Mon Calamari drawings. The black and white one was drawn by Pablo Bellver Martin in Spain and the colour one by Jacinthe Massey in Canada.
And I mustn't forget my Imperial character (sorry Rebels!) so here's a photo of me with the superb Tessek-Squid Head mask which was made for me and given to me by Carsten Sacher in Germany last year.
My other Tessek treasure is the statue given to me by Cezary on behalf of Star Wars fans in Poland.
EBN: What was it like behind the scenes?
GH: Sometimes there were at least 150 people on set. Add to that the heat from the lights and smoke from the smoke guns, and you can imagine how hot and airless it was. That's my main memory of the atmosphere on set: it was extremely hot and sticky. Other than that, everything was very well organised and we performers were very well taken care of. As this was the third Star Wars film, the production team were prepared for anything, and so everything ran very smoothly.
EBN: Was filming hard with a blue screen?
GH: I've heard some actors complain about working with blue screen, but I never had any problem with it. An actor's job is to use his imagination, and if there's nothing to see or to react to in the blue screens, then the actor has to imagine what's there. For example, during the Battle of Endor, we had to imagine spacecraft and explosions in the blue screens. It's very easy to imagine such things - that's what we actors are paid for!By the way, well done saying "blue" screen, because it was blue screen in 1982, whereas today green screen is used.
EBN: Are you going to be at Star Wars Celebration VI?
GH: Celebration VI is still a year away from now, so I've no idea whether I'll be there or not. I'll be there if I'm invited and if I'm available. I'm still a busy working actor so I have to turn down a lot of invitations, but I'd love to go to CVI. I've been to several events in the US, including CIII and CIV, but I know there are still many American fans I haven't met yet. I hope the day comes when as many fans in America know me as here in Europe. By the way, regarding work: I had an audition a couple of days ago for a small part in Sherlock Holmes: a Game of Shadows. The film has wrapped but they want to add some new scenes. I was told the scene I auditioned for hasn't been written yet, so I'll be very surprised if I get a part, but fingers crossed!
EBN: What do you think of the action figures of your characters?
GH: I love my action figures, as you see in the photo above. I think all 3 of them are brilliant. I just wish there were more versions of my characters, such as 12" figures, or Galactic Heroes, for example. We performers from Jabba's Palace and Home One can't understand why our characters are so neglected! Other characters get used in all kinds of merchandise, so why not us?! I talked about this at an event in Chicago last year, as you can see in this wide-ranging interview on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q99Xe-Mavjk
EBN: I read your rebelscum.com thread on autograph collecting and I never knew people falsified autographs by signing pictures they're not in. What was it that originally motivated you to speak out on that?
GH: I spoke out about this very unpleasant subject because several Star Wars fans asked me to. Since I started meeting Star Wars fans about 7 years ago, I have often been asked which performers were in the creature costumes in Return of the Jedi. My replies sometimes shocked fans because other people had signed their photos of those characters - not the actual people who were really inside the costumes. Such behaviour makes my blood boil. First of all, it's unfair and disrespectful to the performer who really is inside the costume, and, equally importantly, it's unfair to the Star Wars fans who pay to have their photos signed by the people who they believe are in the costumes. It just isn't right that this situation should be allowed to continue. Star Wars fans who know me know that I'm passionate about truth and historical accuracy in the Star Wars universe, and they also know that I'll watch out for them and their interests as best I can. When I was asked to write about my information online, I decided I should, even though it was a very difficult and awkward thing for me to do: as I've said before, I'm not Lucasfilm's or OPX's policeman, but I do think it's time to put an end to people signing photographs they're not in, and I'll be very happy if I can help stop that happening. I didn't actually name anyone who does this sort of thing, it would be wrong of me to name names - but by identifying the people who really are in the photos, Star Wars fans can work out the rest for themselves!
For those of you who haven't seen the article on Rebelscum, here's the link:
http://threads.rebelscum.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=4615260&page=4&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=93&fpart=1#4615260llapsed&sb=5&o=93&fpart=1#4615260
EBN: Out of the six Star Wars films which is your favorite and why?
GH: I guess I should say Return of the Jedi is my favourite Star Wars film as that's the one I worked on! But in fact my favourite is still the first one, the original Star Wars (A New Hope). Why? Because when it came out in 1977, there had never been another film like it. Many younger readers have seen many sci-fi films and TV programmes, but in 1977, they were still quite rare. Yes of course, there had been other sci-fi films before Star Wars, but Star Wars wasn't really like a sci-fi film at all! It was more like a Cowboy and Indian film, which happened to be set in space! Something else that younger people who haven't seen the original Star Wars in a cinema don't realise is what it was like to be sitting in a cinema in 1977, not knowing what to expect from the film: there we were, looking at the screen in front of us, the film had just begun and this incredible noise started coming from behind us. Everyone in the cinema turned around and looked behind them, then above them, as a deep, rumbling sound passed over our heads. It got louder and went on for a long time - but of course "the noise" was the huge space ship on screen. The excellent sound system made it feel like that space ship really did pass over our heads. It was a wonderful moment and I still remember that magical feeling today. From then on, the world was hooked on Star Wars!
EBN: Do you watch the Clone Wars tv series?
GH: No, I don't watch the TV series, though I did see the first 2 episodes when they were shown in the cinema as a film. I thought it was excellent. I'm amazed at the number of really young children I meet these days who have discovered Star Wars via the Clone Wars TV series.
EBN: Have you kept in touch with the cast and crew from the film?
GH: I knew some of the cast before filming started, and I saw them afterwards, and there were others I worked with in 1986 on Little Shop of Horrors. Of course I meet many of them these days at conventions and events all over the world.Dave Prowse lives near me so I've visited him a couple of times this year. I saw him last week and I'm happy to tell you he's much improved after his latest operation, and is on his feet again. He hopes to travel to events abroad again next year. You can see how well he looks in this photo of us taken a few days ago.
EBN: What do you think of Star Wars in concert?
GH: I've met a lot of Star Wars fans around the word who have seen Star Wars in Concert and they all loved it. I've never seen it because I wasn't invited to it when it was here in London. I think only 2 or 3 actors were invited, but there are many of us Star Wars actors who live in London and we couldn't understand why we weren't invited! Only the organisers know the answer to that.
GH: I have actually narrated a concert of Star Wars music myself - in Valencia, Spain, in 2007, for the 30th anniversary. It was a charity concert, organised by the Rebel Legion Spanish Base, with the participation of the Spanish Garrison, and I narrated in Spanish. In fact, I'm the only Star Wars actor besides Anthony Daniels to narrate a concert of Star Wars music, and I'm the only one to have done so in Spanish! It was a fantastic occasion and raised a lot of money for Spanish charities. (My ambition is to do the same in French and German.)
EBN: How is The CalamariMen Club doing and what can you tell us about it?
GH: What a great question! Thanks for asking it.
The CalamariMen Club was formed at the suggestion of a member of Holored Estelar in Seville, Spain. He said there should be a club to celebrate Tessek-Squid Head and the Mon Calamari Officer, who both come from Mon Calamari and are therefore CalamariMen! That's why I started the club. There is only one rule for members: Don't eat Calamari! Here's the membership card.
There are about 30 members, and lots more people wanted to join,but it was becoming too much to handle, so I kept it to just this group in Spain, and invited other people to join SWORA - the Star Wars Outer Rim Alliance. This was an alliance of Star Wars fan groups from all around the world that I helped set up in 2008. It was a huge success and many other groups wanted to join. Unfortunately, it folded after about a year. A lot of good things happenedbecause of SWORA and I'm still totally committed to it, and to the Star Wars fans I met through it. You never know, it might start up again one day.
Finally, I've tried to say new things in this interview, but I have given a lot of other information in other interviews, which you might like to see. As well as the 3-part interview on my website, you'll find links to 3 excellent interviews at the bottom of my Wikipedia page. In fact, here they are. You'll find info and pictures in these interviews not seen anywhere else, including more of my "collection":
http://yildizsavaslari.com/inceleme/geraldhome/index-eng.html
http://www.starwarsy.pl/opowiadania/wywiad_home_eng.htm
http://maartenbouw.blogspot.com/2010/06/interview-with-gerald-home.html
Thanks to Echo Base News and Jim Slowes for asking the questions. Long live the Rebels - and May the Force be with you all!
Update: In the Blu-Ray set Gerald Home appears in a deleted scene in which General Madine takes Admiral Ackbar's place on Home One and no Mon Cals are in the background. He is seated behind General Madine's left shoulder.
Posted by Jim Slowes at 1:10 PM
Labels: interviews, Return of the Jedi
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Municipal Campus – Village Hall & Fire Department Headquarters
EEA worked with the Village of Arlington Heights to develop a new, comprehensive fire station headquarters and village hall building. Work on the project included demolition of the existing fire station and Village Hall while preserving the existing parking garage structure and police building. Throughout the project, the Village wanted the police station and utilities to remain operational, requiring careful phasing of the various aspects of the project.
With the new design, the fire station became a stand-along building with four drive-thru bays. Special considerations were made to the structural elements of the site due to poor soils. Design elements for the new Village Hall accommodated two public plazas, numerous traffic considerations, and turning movements of large delivery vehicles and the fire trucks housed on the campus. EEA consultants coordinated permitting approvals through the Illinois Department of Transportation, Union Pacific Railroad and the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago (MWRDGC).
of work Demolition, New Buildings, Traffic & Parking Design, Permitting & Approvals
Owner Village of Arlington Heights
Architect FGM Architects
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In this section we collect articles and other contributions in English that we have found around the world and we like – or simply think they might be of interest.
Venezuela: When diplomacy is not enough
Organization of American States
Last June 23, Venezuela lost for the first time in years, the vote at the Organization of American States (OAS) regarding an eventual application of the Democratic Chart.
The OAS General Secretary, Mr. Luis Almagro, holds that in Venezuela there is "an alteration to the constitutional order which is seriously affecting the democratic order". On the other hand, the government of Nicolas Maduro finds that such assertion is a clear and simple intereference to the national sovereign affairs: it is a "coup-de-etat".
The debate on the Democratic Chart was adjourned without a new date for resuming discussions on the agenda. Argentina has proposed the creation of the "OAS Group of Friends", supported by Almagro as a way for furthering dialogue in Venezuela. Such space is being spearheaded by three former presidents, sponsored by the Union of South American Nations (Unasur).
The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves. (Niccolo Machiavelli 1469 – 1527)
Machiavelli asserted that politics has no relation to morals. Undoubtedly the people of Venezuela think differently and the International Community is exerting pressure. Will Maduro have much time left in power?
Illegitimate deprivation of liberty for civilians and political leaders who are not akin to the government, speech monopoly imposed upon the media, fall of the oil price, scarcity of basic products and a deep economic crisis, are only some of the triggers that have generated a crack in trust levels which are necessary to govern a nation.
In Brazil the scandals of corruption and the deep deterioration of the economy have ousted a president who had been democratically elected. Venezuela is currently undergoing one of its worst moments in history. It is not about a mere popular discontent anymore. The Democratic order itself is at stake.
The Inter-American Democratic Chart dated September 11th, 2001 acknowledges representative democracy as an indispensable element for the stability, peace and development of the region. Therefore, the purposes of the Organization of American States (OAS), includes the principle of non-intervention. Nonetheless, the chart also provides that any alteration or unconstitutional interruption of the democratic order in a state of the hemisphere will constitute an unsurpassable obstacle for the participation of the government of such State in the Organization. Therefore, pursuant to article 3, the following are essential elements of representative democracy: the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; access to power and its exercise subject to the state of law; the performance of free, periodic and fair elections, based on universal and secret voting as expression of the people’s sovereignty; the plural regime of political parties and political organizations; and the separation and independence of public powers.
Democracy requires transparency in the government activities, respect for social rights and freedom of expression and press.
Argentina was the protagonist of constant confusion in a river of muddy waters. Some days earlier, president Macri was desperately making a “call to action” while Foreign Relations Minister Malcorra begged to differ by making use of the art of diplomacy: “the problem with Venezuela must be solved by the people of Venezuela themselves, by finding a dialogue mechanism which may allow them to decide how to solve the crisis”. It looked like making use of the Chart was not the solution. Despite of it all, we cannot ignore our condition as a country. We are now presiding the Permanent Council of OAS.
The serious lawsuit filed by the International Community together with the request by General Secretary, Luis Almagro, and the rain of criticism that Argentina had to endure regarding political inactivity, finally led our country to summon an extraordinary meeting. On June 23rd this year, OAS will vote to decide on whether to apply the Democratic Chart to the oil exporting country or otherwise. The applicability of Article 20 is expected which sets forth the following: “In the event of an unconstitutional alteration of the constitutional regime that seriously impairs the democratic order in a member state, any member state or the Secretary General may request the immediate convocation of the Permanent Council to undertake a collective assessment of the situation and to take such decisions as it deems appropriate. The Permanent Council, depending on the situation, may undertake the necessary diplomatic initiatives, including good offices, to foster the restoration of democracy.”
If the Diplomatic means fail and after verifying the interruption of the democratic order, the General Assembly is empowered to suspend Venezuela from exercising its right to participate in OAS. For such purpose, the affirmative vote of two-thirds of the member states is required. The suspension will become effective immediately (Article 21).
It is not just about a simple suspension. A country is taught a lesson and internationally warned by establishing a clear limit to the impunity of the leaders who expect to remain in power under a dictatorial frame by humiliating the unassailable rights of every citizen. Democracy guarantees a socially and politically ordered coexistence, respect for human dignity, freedom, the rights of all and each of its members. Free participation of the inhabitants must be reinforced and deepened.
Freedom dignifies the essence of every man and democracy is the frame for its development. Without democracy, the rights and individual liberties are not exercised, basic human rights are not protected, such as the freedom of speech and the right to protection from the law in a plane of equality, the opportunity to organize and participate fully in the political, economic and cultural life of a society.
Ignoring what is happening in Venezuela and alleging that it is all about a national and sovereign problem would simply mean a validation of what is happening within such country. This is not just about a particular situation. Human lives are at stake and a democratic system is cracking the spirit of OAS.
Not always is diplomacy the right path. Until when will it be used as a “light excuse” to refrain from intervening? The community of values may provoke a change in world views. We have a historic opportunity as a region to make a difference before the ruling indifference.
Author: Gretel LedoWebsite: http://www.gretel-ledo.com
Analista di politica internazionale, consulente di giornali e tv nazionali e internazionali. Consulente Parlamentare della Commissione Relazioni Estere e al Parlamento del Mercosur. Magister in Relazioni Internazionali Europa – America Latina (Università di Bologna). Avvocatessa, specializzata in Diritto amministrativo (UBA). Politologa, specializzata in Stato, amministrazione e politiche pubbliche (UBA). Sociologa, Laura con lode (UBA). Direttrice di Conexión 13 (www.conexion13.com). Conduttrice di trasmissioni radiofoniche e televisive. Prima candidata donna nella Legislatura 2005.
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Home >> China
UPDATED: 09:22, December 09, 2006
Yearender: China-Japan relations stand on new starting point
With Japanese new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to China, the year of 2006 witnessed a new starting point for the development of China-Japan relations.
Abe paid an official visit to China from Oct. 8 to 9, based on a consensus reached between China and Japan on overcoming the political obstacle to the bilateral relationship and promoting the sound development of bilateral friendly and cooperative relationship.
Experts described Abe's visit as the thaw of the deadlocked
China-Japan political relationship and thought it opened the window of hope for improving relations between the two neighbors.
During his first foreign trip since assuming the premiership and also the first visit to China by a Japanese prime minister in the past five years, Abe met with Chinese leaders Hu Jintao, Wen Jiabao and Wu Bangguo separately.
The two sides agreed to build mutually beneficial bilateral relations and to realize the lofty goals of peaceful co-existence, friendship from generation to generation, reciprocal cooperation and common development.
The two countries' leaders also reached consensus on enhancing the exchange of high-level visits and dialogues, paving the way for China and Japan to expand their exchanges and deepen their cooperation in various fields.
After Abe's China tour, President Hu and Abe met again during the 14th Economic Leaders' Meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum last month in Hanoi, capital of Vietnam.
China and Japan now are preparing for meetings between Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Abe in Philippines when they attend a series of meetings held in Cebu City from Dec. 11 to 14.
"The two countries have already broken the five-year-long political stalemate and brought bilateral ties to the normal track of development," Chinese state councilor Tang Jiaxuan said earlier this month, noting that China and Japan are standing at a "new starting point" of bilateral ties.
Sino-Japanese relations were soured by former Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's repeated visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, where Japan's war dead, including 14 class-A war criminals in WWII, are honored.
The leaders of the two countries had not met since Koizumi began visits to the war shrine in 2001.
Now with Abe's visit to China and the other high level exchanges, the political stalemate between China and Japan has been broken.
Gao Hong, a research fellow of Japanese studies with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the meetings between Chinese and Japanese leaders indicates that bilateral relations have enjoyed sound momentum of development.
"The resumption of China-Japan high level exchanges helped remove the political obstacles existing in Koizumi's regime, and was conducive to promoting bilateral cooperation in various fields," Gao said.
The improvement of political environment will provide powerful support to economic exchanges and cooperation between China and Japan, experts said.
When China and Japan established relations in 1972, their bilateral trade was only 1.1 billion U.S. dollars, but last year the figure had climbed to 184.4 billion dollars. Statistics showed that this year's bilateral trade volume is expected to reach 200 billion dollars.
Abe also attached importance to the economic cooperation between the two nations. He told Xinhua in an exclusive interview that the two economies were closely related.
"Japan gained great interests through investment in and exports to China, and China received 10 million more jobs through investment from Japan. China imports semi-manufactured goods from Japan and then exports them to other countries after processing," Abe said.
"It is necessary to forcefully push both the political and the economic wheels forward to promote Sino-Japanese relations," he said.
He also expressed the hope that bilateral cooperation on environment, energy, finance, IT and intellectual property rights could be further boosted.
Experts believe that with the warming of bilateral political relations and with the importance attached by leaders from both nations, economic cooperation will progress even further in the future.
Meanwhile, experts are still "prudently optimistic" about the prospects of China-Japan relations. Xu Dunxin, who was Chinese ambassador to Japan from 1993 to 1998, said Abe's visit and the improvement of the political situation could not resolve all the problems in bilateral ties as they are complicated and protracted.
Since taking office, Abe has on various occasions made positive gestures on outstanding and sensitive historical issues. He admitted that Japan's colonial rule and aggression in the Second World War inflicted great pain and suffering on many countries, particularly Japan's Asian neighbors. He also said that Japan accepted and would not dispute the verdicts delivered by the Fareastern International Military Court of Justice.
According to a joint press communique issued by China and Japan on Oct. 8, scholars from the two countries will start joint research on the history of the two countries this year.
Abe told China that Japan would continue to deal with the Taiwan issue in accordance with the Sino-Japanese Joint Communique and this position would not change. He added that Japan is committed to the one-China policy and did not support "Taiwan independence."
Experts called for both sides to take practical action to implement their leaders' consensus on developing bilateral relations.
Xu Dunxin said as long as the two sides "take history as a mirror and look into the future," abide by the principles of the three political documents, and meet words with actions, China-Japan relations will develop deeply and widely.
Source: Xinhua
- Chinese state councilor calls for fortified momentum for China-Japan ties
- China, Japan vow to keep ties progressing
- Improvement of Japan-China ties needs concrete actions
- China, Japan should properly handle sensitive issues: Chinese FM
- China pledges to safeguard political foundation for relations with Japan
- China commemorates two Japanese promoters of Sino-Japan friendship
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Imam Muhammad b. 'Ali al-Jawad (a)
Muhammad b. 'Alī
9th Imam of the Shia
Al-Jawad
Holy Shrine of Kazimayn (a), Kadhimiya, Iraq
Teknonym
Abu Ja'far, Abu 'Ali
Rajab 10, 195/April 8, 811
Medina, Arabia
From Safar 30, 203/September 6, 818(for 17 years)
Contemporary Rulers
Al-Ma'mun, al-Mu'tasim
Dhu l-Qa'da 30, 220/November 25, 835 in Kadhimiya, Iraq
Kadhimiyaa, Iraq,
33°22′48″N 44°20′17.3″E / 33.38000°N 44.338139°E / 33.38000; 44.338139
'Ali b. Musa al-Rida (a)
'Ali b. Muhammad al-Hadi (a)
Samana, Umm al-Fadl
Son(s)
'Ali, Musa
Daughter(s)
Fatima, Amama
Abu Ja'far al-Thani, al-Jawad (the generous), al-Taqi (the pious), Ibn al-Rida (Son of al-Rida)
The Twelve Imams
'Ali, al-Hasan, al-Husayn, al-Sajjad, al-Baqir, al-Sadiq, al-Kazim, al-Rida, al-Jawad, al-Hadi, al-'Askari, al-Mahdi
Muḥammad b. ʿAlī b. Mūsā (Arabic: محمد بن علي بن موسی) known as Imām al-Jawād (a) (Arabic: امام الجواد) was the ninth Imam of Twelver Shia, his kunya was Abu Ja'far and he is mentioned in haidth sources as Abu Ja'far al-Thani (the second Abu Ja'far). He (a) was born on Rajab 10, 195/April 8, 811 in Medina and was Imam for 17 years. He was martyred when he (a) was 25 years old and was buried in Kadhimiya beside the grave of his grandfather Musa b. Ja'far (a). He was the youngest Imam when he was martyred.
Because Imam al-Jawad was an 8 year old child, some Shi'a followed 'Abd Allah b. Musa and some others followed Waqifids. But most Shi'a accepted the imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a) due to his scientific superiority in spite of his age. At that time, due to restrictions made for Imam (a), his connections with Shi'a were mostly made through agents.
Scientific debates of Imam al-Jawad (a) in his childhood age with religious scholars of different Islamic sects in theological issues such as the position of caliphs and in jurisprudential issues such as hajj rituals are among well-known debates of Imams (a).
1 Lineage, Kunya, and Titles
2 Birth
2.1 Blessed Child
3 Wives
5 Imamate
5.1 Proofs
5.2 Imamate in Childhood
5.2.1 Testing for Certainty
6 Activities of Other Sects
7 Conduct
8 Hadiths and Debates
8.1 Debate in the Meeting of al-Ma'mun
8.2 Debate about the Two Caliphs
8.3 Cutting the Hand of a Thief
9 Companions
10 Connection with Shi'as
11 Virtues and Merits
11.1 Healing Blindness
11.2 Acceptance of Prayer
11.3 Fertility of Trees
12 Martyrdom
13 Words of Sunni Figures
14 Tawassul (Entreaty) to Imam al-Jawad (a)
Lineage, Kunya, and Titles
Muhammad b. 'Ali b. Musa b. Ja'far b. Muhammad is the ninth Imam of Twelver Shi'a who is known as al-Jawad and Jawad al-'A'imma. His father Imam al-Rida (a) was the eighth Imam of Twelver Shia.[1] His mother was Sabika from the family of Mariya al-Qibtiyya, the wife of the Holy Prophet (s). In some sources, the name of his mother is mentioned as Khayzuran, Nawbiyya and Rayhana.[2]
His kunya was Abu Ja'far[3] and it is mentioned in historical narrations as Abu Ja'far al-Thani so that he (a) is not mistaken with Abu Ja'far al-Awwal who is Imam al-Baqir (a).
His most famous title was al-Jawad and they have mentioned other titles for him such as al-Taqi, al-Murtada, al-Qani', al-Radi, al-Mukhtar, al-Mutawakkil, and al-Muntajab.[4]
Family tree of Ahl al-Bayt (a)
Al-Qasim
'Abd Allah
Lady Fatima
Imam al-Husayn
Imam al-Hasan
Lady Zaynab
Muhsin
Al-'Abbas
Abd Allah
Uthman
Ja'far
'Awn
Al-Hasan
Zayd
Imam al-Sajjad
'Ali al-Akbar
'Ali al-Asghar
Imam al-Baqir
Imam al-Sadiq
'Ubayd Allah
'Ali
Imam al-Kazim
Ishaq
Isma'il
Imam al-Rida
Ma'suama
Imam al-Jawad
Imam al-Hadi
Amama
Imam al-'Askari
According to the report of historians, Imam al-Jawad (a) was born in 195/811 in Medina. However, there is a disagreement about the day and month of his birth. Some have regarded Imam's (a) birthday as Ramadan 15/June 11.[5] The famous and unique report is Rajab 10/April 8 which has been mentioned by al-Shaykh al-Tusi in Misbah al-mutahajjid.[6]
Blessed Child
Imam al-Jawad (a) was born in last years of Imam al-Rida's (a) life. They have said that before his birth, Imam al-Rida (a) had no children and some enemies spread this rumor that Imam al-Rida (a) is not going to leave any lineage after himself and the chain of imamate will be broken. According to narrative sources, when Imam al-Jawad (a) was born and they brought him to his father; Imam al-Rida (a) said, "This is a child, more blessed than him is not born for our followers." Also, a report narrated by Ibn Asbat and 'Ubbad b. Isma'il said, "We were at the presence of Imam al-Rida (a) that they brought Abu Ja'far (Imam al-Jawad (a)). We asked, 'Is this that blessed child?' Imam al-Rida (a) said, 'This is the child, no more blessed than him is ever born."[7]
Al-Ma'mun al-Abbasi married her daughter, called Umm al-Fadl, to Imam al-Jawad (a) in 202/817-18[8] or 215/830-1.[9] This marriage took place following the request of al-Ma'mun and Imam (a) expressed his consent with this marriage after specifying the dowry similar to that of Fatima al-Zahra (a) (which was 500 Dirhams).[10] Some sources have said that during Imam al-Rida's (a) stay in Khorasan, Imam al-Jawad (a) went to see him once[11] and that was when al-Ma'mun asked him to marry his daughter. According to Ibn Kathir, the marriage contract of Imam al-Jawad (a) and al-Ma'mun's daughter was made at the time of Imam al-Rida (a) but the marriage ceremony was held in 215/830 in Tikrit, Iraq.[12] The marriage of Imam al-Jawad (a) with Umm al-Fadl was made by the request of al-Ma'mun.[citation needed] Al-Ma'amun said that he sought to be the grandfather of a child who was a progeny of the Prophet (a) and Imam Ali (a). Al-Shaykh al-Mufid considered that marriage because of al-Ma'mun's love for Imam al-Jawad (a). Some researchers believe that this marriage had political motives, including that al-Ma'mun wanted to control Imam al-Jawad (a) and his relations with Shi'a through that marriage;[13] or to show himself interested in Alawis and prevent them from making uprising.[14] This marriage caused the opposition of some of al-Ma'mun's agents, because they were afraid of transferring caliphate from 'Abbasids to 'Alawis.[15]
Other wife of Imam al-Jawad (a) was Samana al-Maghribiyya, who was a concubine.[16] Imam (a) did not have any children from Umm al-Fadl[17] and all his children are from Samana.[18]
According to al-Shaykh al-Mufid, Imam al-Jawad (a) had four children with the names, 'Ali (Imam al-Hadi (a)), Musa, Fatima and Amama.[19] However some sources regarded three daughters for Imam (a) with the names of Hakima, Khadija, and Umm Kulthum.[20]
Contemporary Rulers with Imam al-Jawad (a)
al-Mu'tasim al-'Abbasi 218-227
Ma'mun 198-218
Imam al-Jawad's (a) Imamate 203-220
Imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a) was contemporary with two Abbasid caliphs: the first was al-Ma'mun (r. 193/808-9 to 218/833) and Imam (a) spent 23 years of his life at the time of his caliphate. The second was al-Mu'tasim al-Abbasi (r. 218/833 to 227/841-42) two years of his caliphate were contemporary with imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a). Imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a) lasted 17 years from 203/818 until 220/835. After the martyrdom of Imam al-Jawad (a), his son, Imam 'Ali b. Muhammad al-Hadi (a) , took responsibility of imamate.
In the views of Shi'a, Imam will only be appointed through a prior Imam; i.e. every Imam needs to introduce, in clear words, the Imam after himself. In several cases, Imam al-Rida (a) declared the imamate of Muhammad b. Ali (a) for his companions. In all the books of al-Kafi[21], al-Irshad[22], I'lam al-wara[23], and Bihar al-anwar[24], there is a chapter about the proofs for the imamate of Muhammad b. Ali (a) which have mentioned 14, 11, 9, and 26 hadiths respectively.
There are many reports and proofs for Imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a) including the report that one of the companions of Imam al-Rida (a) asked about his successor, and Imam al-Rida (a) pointed with his hand towards his son Abu Ja'far (Imam al-Jawad (a)) who was standing in front of him.[25]
In another narration, Imam al-Rida (a) said, "This is Abu Ja'far I have seated in my place and I have left my position to him. We are the family, the children of whom inherit like their old ones." (which means that the same way our old ones inherit and receive knowledge, our children inherit knowledge from the old ones.)[26]
In another report, Imam al-Rida (a) said, 'Abu Ja'far is my successor among my people.'"[27]
Imamate in Childhood
Imam al-Rida (a) was martyred in 203/818 when his son, Imam al-Jawad (a) was only 8 years old and became Imam and this caused disagreement among Shi'a so that some of them followed 'Abd Allah b. Musa b. Ja'far, brother of Imam al-Rida (a); but since they did not want to accept imamate of a person without any reason, some of them asked 'Abd Allah some questions and after they found him unable to answer, they abandoned him.[28] Some other Shi'a joined Waqifids.[29] Nevertheless most of the companions of Imam al-Rida (a) believed in the imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a). According to al-Nawbakhti, the reason of such a division was that they considered the age of puberty as one of the requirements of imamate.[30]
The issue of imamate in childhood was risen by some people at the time of Imam al-Rida (a), and he mentioned the prophet 'Isa (a) [Jesus] and said, "when 'Isa (a) was given prophethood his age was lower than my son".[31] The issue was risen more seriously in after the martyrdom of Imam al-Rida (a) and even some of the close companions of Imam al-Rida (a), like Yunus b. 'Abd al-Rahman, doubted about the imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a).[32] Later the same issue was risen about the imamate of Imam al-Hadi (a) and Imam al-Mahdi (a).[33] The answer was from the Qur'an about the prophethood of Prophet Yahya (a) (John), where the Qur'an says: "And We gave him judgment while still a child",[34] and speaking of the Prophet 'Isa (a) (Jesus) in the first days after birth[35] Imam al-Jawad (a) answered to the issue by mentioning the successorship of Prophet Sulayman (a) (Solomon) after Prophet Dawud (a) (David) and said, "When Prophet Solomon (a) was still a little child and took the sheep out for grazing, Prophet David (a) made him his successor."[36]
Testing for Certainty
Although in several cases Imam al-Rida (a) had declared the imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a),[37] but some Shi'a tested Imam al-Jawad (a) with some questions to become more certain.[38] This testing was made about other Imams (a) as well,[39] but due to the low age of Imam al-Jawad (a), Shi'as felt it was more necessary about him.[40]
There are several reports about Shi'a's questions and answers of Imam al-Jawad (a) in hadith sources. Imam's (a) answers promoted his position in the eyes of Shi'a and their acceptance of his imamate. However, Shi'a did not only tested Imam al-Jawad (a) by their questions, but they tested others, who claimed to be imam, the same way.[41] Some people from Baghdad and other cities went to Medina during hajj. In a meeting they had with 'Abd Allah b. Musa, Imam al-Jawad's (a) uncle,-who was thought to be the Imam after Imam al-Rida (a)- they asked him some questions, but his answers was not right and they became disappointed and sad. Then they went to Imam al-Jawad (a) and asked him the same questions and he (a) gave them the right answers which made them happy, praised Imam (a) and prayed for him.[42]
Activities of Other Sects
From the questions of Shi'as and the answers of Imam al-Jawad (a) mentioned in Shi'a sources, it can be learned that during the imamate of Imam al-Jawad (a), People of Hadith, Waqifids, Zaydis and Ghulat were also active that time. People of Hadith believed in the embodiment of God and Imam al-Jawad (a) prohibited Shi'a of following them in congregational prayers and paying zakat to them.[43]
In answering Abu Hashim al-Ja'fari who asked about the meaning of the verse "The sights do not apprehend Him, yet He apprehends the sights" (Qur'an 6:103), Imam al-Jawad (a) rejected the possibility of seeing God by eyes (the belief in the embodiment) and said, "fantasies of the heart are more delicate than the eyesight. Human being can fantasize things he has not seen. When fantasies of the hearts cannot perceive God, how may the eyes see Him?"[44]
There are hadiths narrated from Imam al-Jawad (a) in which he (a) considered Zaydiyya and Waqifiyya similar to Nasibis.[45] He (a) said that the verses "Some faces on that day will be humbled, (2) wrought-up and weary" (Qur'an 88:2-3) were revealed about them.[46] Also, Imam al-Jawad (a) prohibited his companions from following Waqifiyya in congregational prayers.[47]
Imam al-Jawad (a) also cursed Ghulat [exaggerators] such as Abu l-Khattab and his followers. He (a) also cursed those who doubted or were silent about cursing Abu l-Khattab.[48] He (a) introduced people such as Abu l-Ghamr, Ja'far b. Waqid, and Hashim b. Abi Hashim, as followers of Abu l-Khattab and said that they abuse people in our names.[49] Also in a hadith, he (a) permitted the killing of two of Ghulat who were Abu l-Mahri and Ibn Abi Razqa' because of their role in deviation of Shi'a.[50] It is said that in letters Imam (a) sent to his deputies, prohibited Shi'a of associating with Ghulat.[citation needed]
Also, Imam al-Jawad (a) addressed Muhammad b. Sinan and rejected the claim of Mufawwida about leaving the creation and management of the world to the Prophet (a).[51]
Some sources considered the title of "al-Jawad" (the generous) given to Imam (a) because to his great generosity and giving to people.[52] According to a letter Imam al-Rida (a) sent to his son from Khorasan, Imam al-Jawad (a) was known for his generosity since the first years of his life. When his father was in Khorasan, his companions sent out Jawad (a) from a side door of the house to meet less people who would gather at his door to receive charity. According to this report, Imam al-Rida (a) sent a letter to his son and advised him not to follow those who told him not to use the main door. In that letter, Imam al-Rida (a) advised his son, "whenever you want to go out of home, take some gold and silver with you. No one should ask you but you give them something." He (a) had also made special advice about his close relatives such as his uncles and aunts.[53]
Al-Qarashi introduced Imam al-Jawad (a) the most ascetic and purest of the people of his time. He also spoke about the many nafila prayers Imam al-Jawad (a) performed. According to al-Qurashi, Imam al-Jawad (a) made a nafila prayer in every rak'a of which, he (a) recited each of the suras al-Fatiha and al-Tawhid 70 times.[54] Also, according to a hadith transmitted by al-Sayyid b. Tawus, upon the coming of every new moon, Imam al-Jawad (a) performed two rak'as of prayer, in the first rak'a of which recited Sura al-Tawhid 30 times and in the second rak'a, he (a) recited Sura al-Qadr 30 times and after the prayer, he (a) give charity.[55]
Hadiths and Debates
About 250 hadiths are transmitted from Imam al-Jawad (a).[56] These hadiths are about topics in fiqh, tafsir, supplication, and theology. The low number of hadiths transmitted from Imam al-Jawad (a) in comparison to hadiths of other Imams (a) is because of the surveillance over Imam al-Jawad (a) and also his young age at the time of martyrdom.[citation needed]
Imam al-Jawad (a) had several debates with fiqh scholars of the court of 'Abbasids. Historical reports suggest that some of these debates were made following the requests of the courtiers of al-Ma'mun and al-Mu'tasim who wanted to test Imam al-Jawad (a) and the result astonished those who were present in those sessions. 9 debates are reported, four of which were with Yahya b. Aktham and one of them was with Ahmad b. Abi Dawud, the judge of all judges of Baghdad. Also, some of his conversations with 'Abd Allah b. Musa, Abu Hashim al-Ja'fari, 'Abd al-'Azim al-Hasani and al-Mu'tasim are reported. The topics of these conversation were issues in fiqh, about hajj, divorce, punishment for robbery and also theological issues such as the attributes of the companions of Imam al-Mahdi (a), merits of the two Caliphs and also the attributes of God.[citation needed]
Debate in the Meeting of al-Ma'mun
Imam al-Jawad's (a) debate with Yahya b. Aktham was among the important debates of Imam (a) which took place at the time of al-Ma'mun al-'Abbasi in Baghdad. According to some Shi'a sources, the cause for happening this debate was al-Ma'mun's proposal for the marriage of Imam (a) with Umm al-Fadl. After Abbasid noblemen were informed of that, they objected to al-Ma'mun. To justify his decision, al-Ma'mun suggested to them to test Imam al-Jawad (a) and they accepted and arranged a debate to test Imam (a).
In the debate, first Yahya mentioned a question about a muhrim (one who perform rituals of hajj) who hunts an animal. Then, Imam (a) explained different aspects of the issue and asked Yahya to define which aspect he meant. Yahya could not answer and the people there were surprised. Then, Imam (a) himself answered the question regarding different aspects. After hearing Imam's (a) complete answer, Abbasid scholars and courtiers admitted to his competence in fiqh. It is said that upon seeing this, al-Ma'mun said, "Praise to God that what I had thought happened."[57]
Debate about the Two Caliphs
According to Shi'a hadith sources, in a session where al-Ma'mun and many jurists and courtiers were present, Imam al-Jawad (a) had a debate with Yahya b. Aktham about the merits of caliphs (Abu Bakr and 'Umar). Yahya turned to Imam (a) and said, Gabriel conveyed the message of God to the Prophet (s): "Ask Abu Bakr if he is pleased with me? I am pleased with him." Imam (a) answered, I do not reject merits of Abu bakr but anyone who has narrated this hadith needs to pay attention to other hadiths of the Prophet (s) and that he (s) said, "when you receive a hadith from me, present it to the Book of God and my sunna; if it is in agreement with them, accept it and if it is not, do not accept it because liars and forgers of hadiths will increase." Then, Imam (a) continued that this hadith is not in agreement with the Qur'an because the Qur'an says, 'We are nearer to him than his jugular vein.' (50:16) Then, was not God aware of Abu bakr's satisfaction that had to ask him?"[58]
Then, Yahya asked about this hadith which said, "Abu bakr and 'Umar on the earth are like Gabriel and Michael in the skies." Imam (a) answered, "this hadith is not true because Gabriel and Michael have always served God and have not committed a sin while Abu bakr and 'Umar have long been polytheist before they become Muslims."[59]
Cutting the Hand of a Thief
When Imam (a) was living in Baghdad, events happened which promoted the position of Imam (a) among people such as his ruling about thieves. Once there was a disagreement over the question that from where the hand of a thief has to be cut; some said that it needs to be cut from wrist and some said that it needs to be cut from elbow. Al-Mu'tasim, the Abbasid caliph asked Imam al-Jawad (a) to give his opinion in this regard. After caliph insisted, Imam (a) said, "Only the four fingers of a thief have to be cut and the rest of his hand needs to remain. He referred to the following verse of the Qur'an as his reason, "The places of sajda belong to Allah, so do not invoke anyone along with Allah." (72:18) Al-Mu'tasim liked Imam's (a) answer and ordered to follow his ruling.[60]
See also: List of Companions of Imam al-Jawad (a)
Many of his companions who were also among the companions of his father and his son (Imam al-Hadi (a)) had written works in fiqh and theology and were known as influential people in their own communities. Companions of Imam al-Jawad (a) and narrators of his hadiths were about 120 people who have narrated about 250 hadiths from him. These hadiths are about different subjects in fiqh, exegesis and theology. The small number of hadiths narrated from Imam al-Jawad (a) is due to his surveillance and his young age at the time of martyrdom. Among his famous companions are 'Abd al-'Azim al-Hasani, Ibrahim b. Hashim al-Qummi, 'Ali b. Mahziyar, Ahmad b. Abi Nasr al-Bazanti, Zakariyya b. Adam, Muhammad b. Isma'il b. Bazi', al-Hasan b. Sa'id al-Ahwazi and Ahmad b. Muhammad al-Barqi. His companions and narrators of his hadiths were not exclusive to Shi'a and there were people from other sects including Sunni sects among them as well.[61]
Connection with Shi'as
The Darih of two Imams (a), Imam al-Kazim (a) and Imam al-Jawad (a)
Through appointing agents in different parts of the Islamic world, Imam al-Jawad (a) was connected with Shi'as. Imam al-Jawad (a) had agents in in Islamic lands including Baghdad, Kufa, Ahvaz, Basra, Hamadan, Qom, Rey, Sistan, and Bost.[62] The number of the deputies of Imam al-Jawad (a) is mentioned as 13.[63] They took religious taxes of Shi'a and delivered them to Imam al-Jawad (a). Ibrahim b. Muhammad al-Hamadani in Hamadan[64] and Abu 'Amr al-Hadhdha' in Basra[65] were deputies of Imam (a). Salih b. Muhammad b. Sahl managed donated properties in Qom[66]. Also, Zakariyya b. Adam al-Qummi[67], 'Abd al-'Aziz b. Muhtadi al-Ash'ari al-Qummi[68], Safwan b. Yahya[69], Ali b. Mahziyar[70] and Yahya b. Abi 'Imran[71] were among the deputies of Imam al-Jawad (a). Some authors referred to some evidences and mentioned Muhammad b. Faraj al-Rukhkhaji and Abu Hashim al-Ja'fari among his deputies as well.[72] Also, Ahmad b. Muhammad al-Sayyari claimed deputyship of Imam al-Jawad (a), but Imam (a) rejected his claim and asked Shi'a not to give him religious taxes.[73]
That he (a) was not connected with Shi'a directly and benefited from agents had some reasons, one was that Imam (a) was under serious surveillance and control of ruling government and another was that he (a) wanted to make preparations for the Occultation of Imam al-Mahdi (a).[74]
Imam al-Jawad (a) met Shi'a and spoke with them during hajj. Some researchers believe that the journey of Imam al-Rida (a) to Khurasan made the relations of Shi'a with their Imams (a) develop.[75] Thus, Shi'a from Khurasan, Rey, Bast and Sajistan went to visit Imam al-Jawad (a).[citation needed]
Also, the connection of Shi'a with Imam (a) was through sending letters (See: tawqi'). Much of the teachings remained from Imam al-Jawad (a) are mentioned in his letters to Shi'as.[76] In their letters, Shi'as mentioned their questions which were mostly jurisprudential issues and Imam (a) answered them. In most cases, the name of the one who has written letter to Imam (a) is mentioned[77] and few cases, the name of the author is not mentioned.
In Mawsu'at al-Imam al-Jawad (a),[78] except the names the father and son of Imam al-Jawad (a), the names of 63 people with whom Imam (a) had correspondences are collected from hadith and rijal sources; however, some letters have been written to a group of Shi'as.[79]
Imam al-Jawad (a) also wrote some letters to his agents in different cities such as Hamadan and Bost and also some Shi'as of Iran went to visit him in Medina. These visits are in addition to visits which took place during the days of hajj between Imam (a) and Shi'as.[citation needed]
Virtues and Merits
Many merits and virtues are reported for Imam al-Jawad (a). His superiority in debates and scholarly discussions with scholars in his childhood is among these mentioned virtues. Some of the wonders narrated for him are as follows:
Healing Blindness
Qutb al-Din al-Rawandi narrated from Muhammad b. Maymun, "when Imam al-Jawad (a) was a child and Imam al-Rida (a) had not yet gone to Khorasan, he (a) had a journey to Mecca and I was with him. Upon his return, I told him, 'I want to go to Medina. Please write a letter to Abu Ja'far Muhammad al-Jawad (a) I take to him.' Imam (a) smiled and wrote a letter. I took the letter to Medina. That time I had become blind. Muwaffaq, the servant of Imam, brought Muhammad al-Jawad (a) while he (a) was in his cradle and I gave him the letter. Imam (a) asked Muwaffaq to unseal the letter and open it. Then he (a) asked, 'O Muhammad! How are your eyes?' I said, 'O son of the Prophet (a), my eyes have a disease and my eyesight is lost.' He (a) then touched my eyes and by the blessings of his hand, my eyes were healed. Then, I kissed his hands and feet and went out while I was not blind anymore."[80]
Acceptance of Prayer
Dawud b. al-Qasim said, "One day, I went with Imam al-Jawad (a) to a garden. I told him, 'May I be sacrificed for you! I am greedy to eat mud. Please make a du'a for me!' (so that I give up this habit). Imam (a) did not answer and some days later, he (a) told me, 'O Abu Hashim! God removed [the habit of] eating mud from you.'" Abu Hashim says that, "Since then, there was nothing I hated more than mud."[citation needed]
Fertility of Trees
Upon the return of Imam al-Jawad (a) from Baghdad to Medina, a group of people accompanied Imam (a) out of Medina to see him off. By the time of maghrib prayer, they arrived in a place where an old mosque was located. Imam (a) went to that mosque to say his prayer. There was a cedar tree in the yard of that mosque which had not yielded any fruits until that time. Imam (a) asked for some water and made wudu beside that tree and then led a congregational prayer there and after the prayer made a sajda of gratitude. He (a) then said goodbye to people and went away. The next day, the tree yielded so much fruit and people became so surprised of that. It is narrated from al-Shaykh al-Mufid that he has seen this tree many years later and has eaten from its fruits.[81]
An old photo of the Holy Shrine of al-Kazimayn (a). Photo is taken by British Air Force in 1335/1917 during World War I.
Imam al-Jawad (a) went to Baghdad twice following the request of his two contemporary caliphs. The first trip at the time of al-Ma'mun was not long.[82] Al-Mu'tasim, the Abbasid caliph summoned Imam al-Jawad (a) from Medina to Baghdad. On Muharram 28, 220/February 1, 835, Imam (a) entered Baghdad and passed away in Dhu l-Qa'da/November of the same year[83] at the age of 25 and was buried beside his grandfather Imam al-Kazim (a) in Kadhimiya.[84]
The day and month of his martyrdom have been mentioned in some sources as Dhu l-Hijja 5 or 6 (December 4 or 5)[85] and in some other sources as the end of Dhu l-Qa'da/November 29.[86]
About the cause of his martyrdom, it is said that Ibn Abi Duwad, the judge of Baghdad slandered against Imam (a) after Imam's (a) opinion about cutting the hand of a thief was accepted and Ibn Abi Duwad and many other jurists and courtiers were discredited. After caliph was influenced by the words of the judge, he decided to kill Imam (a). Al-Mu'tasim used one of his ministers and poisoned Imam (a) and martyred him.[87] However, some believe that Imam (a) was poisoned by Umm al-Fadl, daughter of al-Mu'mun.
Based on another hadith, when people were giving allegiance to al-Mu'tasim, he wrote a letter to 'Abd al-Malik al-Ziyyat, governor of Medina to send Imam al-Jawad (a) with Umm al-Fadl to Baghdad. When Imam (a) arrived in Baghdad, al-Mu'tasim showed a façade of respect toward him and sent some gifts for him and Umm al-Fadl. Based on this hadith, al-Mu'tasim sent an orange juice to Imam (a) by his servant (called Ashnas). Ashnas told Imam (a), "The caliph has given this orange juice to some noble people including Ahmad b. Abi Dawud and Sa'id b. Khadib before you and now has ordered that you too drink of it." Imam (a) said, "I will drink it at night." But, Ashnas insisted that he (a) should drink it as long it is cold and that its ice would melt. So, Imam (a) drink that and was martyred by it.[88]
Al-Shaykh al-Mufid (d. 413/1022) said, "Even though some have said that Imam (a) was martyred by poison; however, this has not been proved to me so that I can swear about it."[89] But al-Mas'udi (d. 346/957) said, "al-Mu'tasim and Ja'far b. al-Ma'mun (brother of Umm al-Fadl, wife of Imam al-Jawad (a)) were always thinking about killing Imam (a). Since Imam (a) did not have any child from Umm al-Fadl and his son 'Ali (a) was from his other wife, Ja'far induced his sister to poison Imam (a). This way, they poisoned grapes and Imam (a) ate from them." Al-Mas'udi continues that afterwards, Umm al-Fadl became so regretful of her work and cried so much and Imam (a) cursed her and she was afflicted with a severe illness."[90]
Words of Sunni Figures
Imam al-Jawad's (a) scientific dialogues and debates at the time of the government of al-Ma'mun and al-Mu'tasim which solved many scientific problems and issues in fiqh made Islamic scholars and researchers including Shi'a and Sunni ones surprised so that many of them considered Imam (a) an outstanding figure and praised him. They mentioned his knowledge, piety, and generosity.[91] some of them believe that al-Ma'mun chose him to become his son-in-law because even with being young, he was superior to all scholars in knowledge and forbearance.[92] Jahiz 'Uthman, the mu'tazili scholar, has mentioned him as knowledgeable, pious, worshiping, brave, generous, pure, with pure origin."[93]
Tawassul (Entreaty) to Imam al-Jawad (a)
For his ziyarah text see ziyarah text of Imam al-Jawad (a).
According to consults of some Shi'a scholars, some Shi'as make tawassul to Imam al-Jawad (a) for increase in their daily sustenance and solution of their material problems and call him Bab al-Hawa'ij [Gate of Requests]. An example of such consults is quoted by the Second Majlisi from Abu l-Wafa' Shirazi who claimed that the Prophet (s) advised him in his dream to make Tawassul to Imam al-Jawad (a) in material issues.[94][95]
According to a hadith Dawud al-Sayrafi transmitted from Imam al-Hadi (a), visiting the shrine of Imam al-Jawad (a) has great rewards.[96] Also in a letter to Imam al-Hadi (a), Ibrahim b. 'Uqba asked about visiting the shrines of Imam al-Husayn (a), Imam al-Kazim (a) and Imam al-Jawad (a), and Imam al-Hadi (a) mentioned visiting the shrine of Imam al-Husayn (a) more important and said that visiting all the three is perfect and has many rewards.[97] The shrine of Imam al-Jawad (a) and Imam al-Kazim (a) is in Baghdad, where Muslims and especially Shi'a visit. They visit his shrine in Kadhimiya and make entreaty to him. In the martyrdom anniversary of Imam al-Jawad (a), Shi'a hold mourning ceremonies, recite elegies and beat their chests.[citation needed]
Al-Qurashi, Baqir Sharif, The Life of Imam Muhammad Al-Jawad
↑ Ṭabarī, Dalāʾil al-imāma, p. 396
↑ Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 315, 492; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 1; Ibn Shahrāshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 379.
↑ Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 315, 492; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 1.
↑ Ibn Shahrāshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 379; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 12, 13.
↑ Ashʿarī, Kitāb al-maqālāt wa al-firaq, p. 99; Ṭabarī, Dalāʾil al-imāma, p. 201.
↑ Ṭūsī, Misbāḥ al-mutahajjid, p. 805
↑ Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 20, 23, 35.
↑ Ṭabarī, Tārīkh al-Ṭabarī, vol. 7, p. 149.
↑ Masʿūdī, Ithbāt al-waṣīyya, p. 223.
↑ Ibn Shahrāshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 382.
↑ Bayhaqī, Tārīkh-i Bayhaq, p. 46.
↑ Ibn Kathīr, al-Bidāya wa l-nihāya, vol. 10, p. 295.
↑ Jaʿfarīyān, Ḥayāt-i fikrī wa sīyāsī-yi Imāmān-i Shīʿa, p. 478.
↑ Pīshwāyī, Sīrah-yi pīshwāyān, p. 558.
↑ Ibn Shahr Āshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 380-381.
↑ Qummī, Muntahā l-āmāl, vol. 2, p. 497.
↑ Mufīd, al-Irshād, vol. 2, p. 284.
↑ Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 320-323.
↑ Mufīd, al-Irshād, vol. 2, p. 274-280.
↑ Ṭabrisī, Iʿlām al-warā, vol. 2, p. 92-96.
↑ Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 18-37.
↑ Ṣadūq, ʿUyūn akhbār al-Riḍā, vol. 2, p. 586.
↑ Nawbakhtī, Firaq, al-Shīʿa, p. 77-78.
↑ Nawbakhtī, Firaq, al-Shīʿa, p. 88.
↑ Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 322.
↑ Masʿūdī, Ithbāt al-waṣīyya, p. 220
↑ Jaʿfarīyān, Ḥayāt-i fikrī sīyāsī-yi Imāmān-i Shīʿa, p. 472.
↑ Qurān, 19:12.
↑ Qurān, 19:30-32.
↑ See: Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 383.
↑ See: Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 320-323.
↑ See: Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 282-283.
↑ Ibn Shahr Āshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 383.
↑ Ṭabarī, Dalāʾil al-imāma, p. 205-206; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 99-100.
↑ Ṣadūq, al-Tawḥīd, p. 101; Ṭūsī, al-Tahdhīb, vol. 3, p. 283 quoted from Jaʿfarīyān, Ḥayāt-i fikrī sīyāsī-yi Imāmān-i Shīʿa, p. 603.
↑ Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 99.
↑ Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 460.
↑ Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 229, 460.
↑ Ṭūsī, Man lā yaḥḍuruh al-faqīh, quoted from Jaʿfarīyān, Ḥayāt-i fikrī wa sīyāsī-yi Imāmān-i Shīʿa, p. 603.
↑ Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 528-529.
↑ Qarashī, Ḥayāt al-Imām Muḥammad al-Jawād, p. 70-71.
↑ Sayyid b. Ṭāwūs, al-Durūʿ al-wāqīya, p. 44.
↑ ʿAṭārudī, Musnad al-Imām al-Jawād, p. 249.
↑ Ṭabrisī, al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 2, p. 444; Nawbakhtī, Firaq, al-Shīʿa, p. 88.
↑ Ṭabrisī, al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 2, p. 446-447.
↑ Ṭabrisī, al-Iḥtijāj, p. vol. 2, p. 447.
↑ ʿAyyāshī, Kitāb al-tafsīr, vol. 1, p. 319-320; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 5-6.
↑ ʿAṭārudī, Musnad al-Imām al-Jawād, p. 314, 315, 262, 283, 319, 271.
↑ Jāsim, Tārīkh-i sīyāsī-yi ghaybat-i Imām Dawāzdahum, p. 79.
↑ Jabbārī, Sāzmān-i wikālat, vol. 2, p. 427.
↑ Ṭūsī, al-Ghayba, p. 351.
↑ Najāshī, Rijāl al-Najāshī, p. 197.
↑ Rāwandī, al-Kharāʾij wa l-jarāʾiḥ, vol. 2, p. 717.
↑ Dashtī, Naqsh-i sīyāsī-yi sāzmān-i wikālat dar ʿaṣr-i ḥuḍūr-i Iʾmma, p. 103.
↑ See: Jaʿfarīyān, Ḥayāt-i fikrī wa sīyāsī-yi Imāmān-i Shīʿa, p. 603.
↑ For example refer to Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 3, p. 399; vol. 4, p. 275, 534; vol. 5, p. 347; Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 783, 869.
↑ Mawsūʾat al-Imām al-Jawād (a), vol. 2, p. 416, 508.
↑ Cf. Kulaynī, al-Kāfī, vol. 3, p. 331, 398; vol. 5, p. 394; vol, p. 163; Kashshī, Ikhtīyār maʿrifat al-rijāl, p. 783, 869.
↑ Qummī, Muntahī l-āmāl, vol. 2, p. 469-470.
↑ Ibn Shahrāshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 390; Mufīd, al-Irshād, vol. 2, p. 278.
↑ See: Ibn Shahrāshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 380.
↑ Ibn Abī l-Thalj, Tārīkh al-Aʾimma, p. 13.
↑ Ashʿarī, Kitāb al-maqālāt wa al-firaq, p. 99; Ṭabrisī, Iʿlām al-warā, vol. 2, p. 106.
↑ ʿAyyāshī, Kitāb al-tafsīr, vol. 1, p. 320.
↑ Ibn Shahr Āshūb, Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, vol. 4, p. 384; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 50, p. 8.
↑ Sibṭ b. al-Jawzī, Tadhkirat al-khawāṣ, p. 321.
↑ Haythamī, al-Ṣawāʿiq al-muḥriqa, p. 288.
↑ ʿĀmilī, al-Ḥayāt al-sīyāsīyya li-l-Imām al-Jawād, p. 137.
↑ Rāwandī, Daʿwāt al-Rāwandī, p. 191; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 91; 35.
↑ Al-'Allama al-Majlisi narrated from Abu l-Wafa', "I was once arrested by son of Ilyas, governor of Kerman and was imprisoned for a while. After a while, I recognized that they are plotting for killing me. I was worried and did not know what to do to free from such a plot. One night I made entreaty to Imam al-Sajjad (a) while I was praying before God and I asked God for freedom. Instantly I fall asleep and I dreamed the Prophet (s) who said, 'Do not make entreaty to me, my daughter, al-Hasan, al-Husayn or others; but for the increase of daily sustenance and solving problems make entreaty to my son al-Jawad (a), through whom God will answer your request. Rāwandī, Daʿwāt al-Rāwandī, p. 191; Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, vol. 91; 35.'"
↑ Mufīd, al-Mazār, p. 207.
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Sayyid b. Ṭāwūs, ʿAlī b. Mūsā al-. Al-Durūʿ al-wāqīya. Beirut: Muʾassisat Āl al-Bayt, 1415 AH.
Sibṭ b. al-Jawzī, Yūsuf b. Qazāwughlī. Tadhkirat al-khawāṣ. Qom: al-Sharīf al-Raḍī, 1418 AH.
Ṭabarī, Muḥammad b. Jarīr al-. Dalāʾil al-imāma. Qom: Dār al-Dhakhāʾir, 1383 AH.
Ṭabarī, Muḥammad b. Jarīr al-. Tārīkh al-Ṭabarī. Fourth edition. Beirut: Muʾassisat al-Aʿlamī li-l-Maṭbūʿāt, 1403 AH.
Ṭabrisī, Aḥmad b. ʿAlī al-. Al-Iḥtijāj. Mashhad: Nashr al-Murtaḍā, 1403 AH.
Ṭabrisī, Faḍl b. al-Ḥasan al-. Iʿlām al-warā bi-aʿlām al-hudā. Qom: Muʾassisat Āl al-Bayt li-Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth, 1417 AH.
Ṭūsī, Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan al-. Al-Ghayba. Edited by ʿIbād Allāh Tihrānī & ʿAlī Aḥmad Nāṣiḥ. Qom: Muʾassisat al-Maʿārif al-Islāmīyya, 1425 AH.
Ṭūsī, Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan. Misbāḥ al-mutahajjid. Qom: Maktaba al-Islamīyya.
Imam al-Rida (a) • Sabika
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Kadhimiya • Holy Shrine of Kadhimiyya • Radawi Sayyids • Imam al-Jawad's (a) debates • List of Figures Buried in Kadhimiyya • Yahya b. Aktham • Ibn al-Rida • Al-Mu'tasim Burqa'i Sayyids
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Portugal - 2 euros 2016 (Inauguration of 25th of April Bridge)
Portugal - 2 euros 2018 ( Imprensa Nacional Casa da Moeda)
Malta - 2 euros 2017 (Temples of Hagar Qim)
Greek eurosMintmarks FES
Greek currencyOfficial BU sets
Greek mint sets (BU sets)
The poorest member of the EU, Greece saw EMU as an essential step towards achieving its strategic and economic ambitions. In spite of the euro's weakness when Greece entered the euro-zone on January 1 2001, opinion polls showed that some 70 per cent of Greeks were in favour of membership. There was little attachment to the drachma, as europe's second-oldest currency was linked in Greek minds with economic and political backwardness. Greece leveraged the euro to encourage foreign direct investment with a view to the country becoming a business and transport hub, linking south-east Europe with EU markets.
The following Official Blisters were issued in Greece since the introduction of the Common European Currency on January 1, 2002:
12View All
Official Blister 2018
The official 2018 blister of the Hellenic Republic is dedicated to “Rhodos” and includes all 8 euro coins (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cents and 1, 2 euros). Rhodes is the largest of the Dodecanese islands of Greece in terms of land area and also the island group's historical capital. Rhodes' nickname is The island of the Knights, named after the Knights ...
Year Mintage Price Shop
2018 15,000 pieces € 20.95 Buy
The official 2017 blister of the Hellenic Republic is dedicated to “Crete” and includes all 8 euro coins (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cents and 1, 2 euros). Crete is the largest island of Greece and the cradle of Minoan civilisation. According to mythology, the is also the birthplace of Zeus. Crete is strategically situated at the juncture of three continents ...
2017 15,000 pieces - View
The official 2016 blister of the Hellenic Republic is dedicated to “Peloponnese” and includes all 8 euro coins (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cents and 1, 2 euros). The Peloponnese or Peloponnesus is a peninsula and geographic region in southern Greece. It is separated from the central part of the country by the Gulf of Corinth. It was here that the Greek War ...
The official 2015 blister of the Hellenic Republic is dedicated to “Epirus” and includes all 8 euro coins (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cents and 1, 2 euros). Epirus is a geographical and historical region in southeastern Europe, now shared between Greece and Albania. It lies between the Pindus Mountains and the Ionian Sea, stretching from the Bay of Vlorë and ...
The official 2014 blister of the Hellenic Republic is dedicated to “Thrace”, a north-east region of the country. It includes all 8 euro coins (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cents and 1, 2 euros). Modern-day Thrace consists of the southeastern regions of Bulgaria, northwestern Greece, and the parts of Turkey that separate the Black Sea from the Sea of Marmara. ...
Mykonos - Delos 2013
One of the first Greek islands to embrace tourism, Mykonos was a choice destination for visitors in ever - increasing numbers as early as the 1960s. Today, Mykonos is Greece's most cosmopolitan island and received visitors year - round. A few miles from Mykonos lies the tiny island of Delos, sacred in antiquity for being the birthplace of Apollo and ...
Following the Press Release (12.03.2012) of the Deputy Minister of Finance regarding the Hellenic Numismatic Program 2012, the General Accounting Office (G.A.O.) authorised the Bank of Greece to dispense to the public Blister Sets containing all eight denominations of Brilliant Uncirculated (BU) Greek Euro Coins. The blister is dedicated to the “The ...
This Special Olympics Blister 2011 commemorates the XIII Special Olympics World Summer Games and contains the following coins: 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 cent coins and 1, 2 euros. Greek euro coins feature a unique design for every one of the eight coins and they were all designed by Georgios Stamatopoulos. The minor coins depict Greek ships (Athenian triere ...
The Official Blister 2010 is dedicated to the "Athenian Triere" (or trireme), the largest battle ship for 200 years dating from the time of the Athenian democracy and Kimon (5th century b.C.- Marine Museum). Triremes were the dominant warship in the Mediterranean from around 700 to 300 BC, when naval combat took place mainly by ramming enemy vessels ...
2010 7,500 pieces € 39.60 Buy
The Official Blister 2009 is dedicated to the "Theran Ship", a typical Cycladic ship from the 17th century BC. The construction model was based on the Miniature Ships Fresco, depicting a fleet in procession, discovered in the West House of the prehistoric settlement of Akritiri, on the island of Thera The "Theran Ship" blister was issued on 7 December ...
Greek currency
Commemorative sets - A complete list of Greek commemorative BU sets
Olympic sets - Official Athens 2004 Olympic Games sets
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Pixel Scroll 1/20/19 Pix-El: The Man of Scroll
Posted on January 20, 2019 by Mike Glyer
(1) TOLKIEN RESEARCH SURVEY. Robin Anne Reid of the Department of Literature and Languages at Texas A&M University-Commerce is continuing to collect surveys for the project mentioned in the January 11 Scroll (item 2) – “I have 42 but more would be nice.”
The link leads to Reid’s academic Dreamwidth page for the informed consent information. The link from there goes to SurveyMonkey. Reid’s cover letter says:
Hello: I am a professor of Literature and Languages at Texas A&M University-Commerce (TAMUC) who is doing a research project. The project asks how readers of J. R. R. Tolkien’s Legendarium who are at least eighteen years old and who are atheists, agnostics, animists, or part of New Age movements interpret his work in the context of the common assumption that Tolkien’s Catholic beliefs must play a part in what readers see as the meaning of his fiction.
I have created a short survey which consists of ten open-ended questions about your religious and/or spiritual background, your experiences of Tolkien’s work, and your ideas about the relationship between religious beliefs and interpreting his work. It would take anywhere from thirty minutes to several hours to complete the survey, depending on how much you write in response to the questions. The survey is uploaded to my personal account at Survey Monkey: only I will have access to the responses. My research proposal has been reviewed by the TAMUC Institutional Review Board.
If you are eighteen years or older, and are an atheist, agnostic, animist, or part of a New Age movement that emphasizes spirituality but not a creator figure, you are invited to go to my academic blog to see more information about the survey. The survey will be open from December 1, 2018-January 31, 2019, closing at 11:30 PM GMT-0500 Central Daylight Time.
Complete information about the project and how your anonymity and privacy will be protected can be found at by clicking on the link:
https://robin-anne-reid.dreamwidth.org/50424.html
(2) RETRO READING. The Hugo Award Book Club‘s Olav Rokne recalls: “The Retro-Hugo for Best Graphic Story was overlooked by enough nominators that it failed to be awarded last year. That’s a real shame, because I can tell you that there was a lot of work that’s worth celebrating. It’s actually quite sad that it was forgotten last year, and I’m sincerely hoping that people don’t neglect the category this year.” That’s the reason for his recommended reading post “Retro Hugo – Best Graphic Story 1944”.
(3) A FEMINIST SFF ROUNDUP. Cheryl Morgan gives an overview of 2018 in “A Year In Feminist Speculative Fiction” at the British Science Fiction Association’s Vector blog. Morgan’s first recommendation —
Top of the list for anyone’s feminist reading from 2018 must be Maria Dahvana Headley’s amazing re-telling of Beowulf, The Mere Wife. Set in contemporary America, with a gated community taking the place of Heorot Hall, and a policeman called Ben Wolfe in the title role, it uses the poem’s story to tackle a variety of issues. Chief among them is one of translation. Why is it that Beowulf is always described as a hero, whereas Grendel’s Mother is a hag or a wretch? In the original Anglo-Saxon, the same word is used to describe both of them. And why do white women vote for Trump? The book tackles both of those questions, and more. I expect to see it scooping awards.
(4) HONEY, YOU GOT TO GET THE SCIENCE RIGHT. Where have I heard that before? Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is netting all kinds of awards, but writing for CNN, physicist Don Lincoln opines that, “‘Spider-verse’ gets the science right — and wrong.” Of course, this is an animated movie and maybe Don is a bit of a grump.
CNN—(Warning: Contains mild spoilers)
As a scientist who has written about colliding black holes and alien space probes, I was already convinced I was pretty cool. But it wasn’t until I sat down to watch “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” that I understood the extent of my own coolness. There on the screen was fictional scientific equipment that was clearly inspired by the actual apparatus that my colleagues and I use to try to unlock the mysteries of the universe.
Amid the action, the coming-of-age story, a little romance and a few twists and turns, the movie shows a fictional gadget located in New York City called a collider, which connects parallel universes and brings many different versions of Spider-Man into a single universe.
(5) SFF TV EDITOR. CreativeCOW.net features a rising star in “Editing SYFY”.
When talking about her career path, you get the immediate sense that rejection isn’t a “no” for Shiran Amir. There’s never been an obstacle that’s kept her from living her dream. Shattering ceiling after glass ceiling, she makes her rise up through the ranks look like a piece of cake. However, her story is equal parts strategy and risk – and none of it was easy.
After taking countless chances in her career, of which some aspiring editors don’t see the other side, she has continually pushed herself to move onward and upward. She’s been an assistant editor on Fear the Walking Dead, The OA, and Outcast to name a few, before becoming a full-fledged editor of Z Nation for SyFy, editing the 4th and 9th episodes of the zombie apocalypse show’s final season, with its final episode airing December 28, 2018. She’s currently on the Editors Guild Board of Directors and is involved in the post-production community in Los Angeles.
And she’s only 30 years old.
(6) ARISIA. Bjo Trimble poses with fans in Star Trek uniforms.
Got a pic with @BjoTrimble in our costumes. Epic @arisia win. Such an awesome weekend @SFI_Region15 @15thSFMC pic.twitter.com/llrDaUs6xA
— USS Ares NCC-63591 (@USSAres) January 20, 2019
The con also overcame horrible weather and other challenges:
Logistics would like to thank everyone who helped us with what was probably our most difficult move-in ever. We tilted at elevators, bucket-brigaded thousands of pounds of stuff down 3 (actually 5) flights of stairs, dealt with dead trucks, and survived the cold. (Cont.)
— Arisia Logistics (@ArisiaLogistics) January 20, 2019
And here’s a further example of the Arisia’s antiharassment measures:
#Arisia2019 put these in the bathroom stalls. Yay for helping people reach out if they need it to #irt pic.twitter.com/lFlOopiye4
— Michelle W (@PygmentBlue) January 20, 2019
(7) EXTRA CREDITS. The Extra Credits Sci Fi series on YouTube began Season 3 with “Tolkien and Herbert – The World Builder”
Mythic worldbuilding and intentionality just weren’t staples of science fiction until the works of J. R. R. Tolkien and Frank Herbert were published. We’ll be doing an analysis of The Lord of the Rings and Dune, respectively–works that still stand out today because they are meticulously crafted.
Here are links to playlists for the first two seasons:
The first season covered the origins of SF up to John Campbell.
The second season covered the Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke era up to the start of the New Wave.
(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born January 20, 1884 – A. Merritt. Early pulp writer whose career consisted of eight complete novels and a number of short stories. Gutenberg has all of all his novels and most of his stories available online. H. P. Lovecraft notes in a letter that he was a major influence upon his writings, and a number of authors including Michael Moorcock and Robert Bloch list him as being among their favorite authors.
Born January 20, 1920 – DeForest Kelley. Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy on the original Trek and a number of films that followed plus the animated series. Other genre appearances include voicing voicing Viking 1 in The Brave Little Toaster Goes to Mars (his last acting work) and a 1955 episode of Science Fiction Theatre entitled “Y..O..R..D..” being his only ones as he didn’t do SF Really preferring Westerners. (Died 1999.)
Born January 20, 1926 – Patricia Neal. Best known to genre buffs for her film role as World War II widow Helen Benson in The Day the Earth Stood Still. She also appeared in Stranger from Venus, your usual British made flying saucer film. She shows up in the Eighties in Ghost Story based off a Peter Straub novel, and she did an episode of The Ghost Story series which was later retitled Circle Of Fear in hopes of getting better ratings (it didn’t, it was cancelled). If Kung Fu counts as genre, she did an appearance there. (Died 2010)
Born January 20, 1934 – Tom Baker, 85. The Fourth Doctor and my introduction to Doctor Who. My favorite story? The Talons of Weng Chiang with of course the delicious added delight of his companion Leela played by Lousie Jameson. Even the worse of the stories, and there were truly shitty stories, were redeemed by him and his jelly babies. He did have a turn before being the Fourth Doctor as Sherlock Holmes In The Hound of the Baskervilles, and though not genre, he turns up as Rasputin early in his career in Nicholas and Alexandra! Being a working actor, he shows up in a number of low budget films early on such as The Vault of Horror, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, The Mutations, The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb and The Zany Adventures of Robin Hood. And weirdly enough, he’s Halvarth the Elf in a Czech made Dungeons & Dragons film which has a score of 10% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Born January 20, 1946 – David Lynch, 73. Director of possibly the worst SF film ever made from a really great novel in the form of Dune. Went on to make Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me which is possibly one of the weirdest films ever made. (Well with Blue Velvet being a horror film also vying for top honors as well.) Oh and I know that I didn’t mention Eraserhead. You can talk about that film.
Born January 20, 1948 – Nancy Kress, 71. Best known for her Hugo and Nebula Award winning Beggars in Spain and its sequels. Her latest novel is If Tomorrow Comes: Book 2 in the Yesterday’s Kin trilogy.
Born January 20, 1958 – Kij Johnson, 61. Writer and associate director of The Center for the Study of Science Fiction the University of Kansas English Department which is I must say a cool genre thing indeed. She’s also worked for Tor, TSR and Dark Horse. Wow. Where was I? Oh about to mention her writings… if you not read her Japanese mythology based The Fox Woman, do so now as it’s superb. The sequel, Fudoki, is just as interesting. The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe is a novella taking a classic Lovecraftian tale and giving a nice twist. Finally I’ll recommend her short story collection, At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories.
Born January 20, 1964 – Francesca Buller, 55. Performer and wife of Ben Browder, yes that’s relevant as she’s been four different characters on Farscape, to wit she played the characters of Minister Ahkna, Raxil, ro-NA and M’Lee. Minister Ahkn is likely the one you remember her as being. Farscape is her entire genre acting career.
(9) IS BRAM STOKER SPINNING? It’s all about Scott Edelman:
Congrats to all creators who made the 2018 Bram Stoker Awards preliminary ballot! I'm pleased to note that regardless of who advances to the final ballot, and who thereafter wins or loses, I will retain my title as the losingest loser — the Susan Lucci of @HorrorWriters! Yay, me! pic.twitter.com/S6GUUYmgq4
— Scott Edelman (@scottedelman) January 20, 2019
(10) MAGICON. Fanac.org has added another historic video to its YouTube channel: “MagiCon (1992) Worldcon – Rusty Hevelin interviews Frank Robinson.”
MagiCon, the 50th Worldcon, was held in Orlando, Florida in 1992. In this video, Rusty Hevelin interviews fan, editor and author Frank Robinson on his career, both fannish and professional and on the early days of science fiction. Frank talks about the war years, the fanzines he published, the Ray Palmer era in magazines, his time at Rogue Magazine and lots more. Highlights include: working with Ray Palmer, discussion on the line between fan and pro writing, the story of George Pal’s production of ‘The Power’ from Frank’s story of that name, and Frank’s views on the impact of science fiction and of fantasy. Frank Robinson was a true devotee of the field – “Science fiction can change the world.”
(11) MUONS VS. MEGS. [Item by Mike Kennedy.]Those cheering for the stupid-large shark in last year’s The Meg, may now know what to blame for the lack of megalodons in the current age. A story in Quanta Magazine (“How Nearby Stellar Explosions Could Have Killed Off Large Animals”) explains a preprint paper (“Hypothesis: Muon Radiation Dose and Marine Megafaunal Extinction at the End-Pliocene Supernova”). Using iron-60 as a tracer, supernovae have been tracked to a time of mass extinction at the Pliocene-Pleistocene boundary 2.6 million years ago. The paper’s authors make the leap from that to a hypothesis that a huge spike in muons that would have occurred when supernova radiation slammed into Earth’s atmosphere could have contributed to that extinction.
Even though Earth is floating in the void, it does not exist in a vacuum. The planet is constantly bombarded by stuff from space, including a daily deluge of micrometeorites and a shower of radiation from the sun and more-distant stars. Sometimes, things from space can maim or kill us, like the gargantuan asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs. More often, stellar smithereens make their way to Earth and the moon and then peacefully settle, remaining for eternity, or at least until scientists dig them up.
[…] But the search for cosmic debris on Earth has a long history. Other researchers have demonstrated that it’s possible to find fossil evidence of astrophysical particles in Earth’s crust. Some researchers are pondering how these cosmic events affect Earth — even whether they have altered the course of evolution. A new study suggests that energetic particles from an exploding star may have contributed to the extinction of a number of megafauna, including the prehistoric monster shark megalodon, which went extinct at around the same time.
“It’s an interesting coincidence,” said Adrian Melott, an astrophysicist at the University of Kansas and the author of a new paper.
(12) STEPPING UP. “Girl Scouts of America offers badge in cybersecurity” – a BBC video report.
Girl Scouts of America is now offering girls as young as five a badge in cybersecurity.
It’s part of a drive to get more girls involved in science, technology engineering and mathematics from a young age.
An event in Silicon Valley gave scouts an opportunity to earn the first patch in the activity, with the help of some eggs.
(13) A LITTLE GETAWAY. The BBC asks “Is this the least romantic weekend ever?”
The road runs straight and black into the gloom of the snowy birch forest. It is -5C (23F), the sky is slate-grey and we’re in a steamy minibus full of strangers. Not very romantic you’re thinking, and I haven’t yet told you where we’re going.
My wife, Bee, had suggested a cheeky New Year break. Just the two of us, no kids. “Surprise me,” she’d said.
Then I met a bloke at a friend’s 50th. He told me how much he and his girlfriend had enjoyed a trip to Chernobyl – that’s right, the nuclear power station that blew up in the 1980s, causing the worst civilian nuclear disaster in history.
“Don’t worry,” my new friend declared, a large glass of wine in his hand. “It’s safe now.”
Well, she’d said she’d like something memorable…
(14) HARRIMAN REDUX. BBC considers the question — “Chang’e-4: Can anyone ‘own’ the Moon?”
Companies are looking at mining the surface of the Moon for precious materials. So what rules are there on humans exploiting and claiming ownership?
It’s almost 50 years since Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the Moon. “That’s one small step for a man,” the US astronaut famously said, “one giant leap for mankind.”
Shortly afterwards, his colleague Buzz Aldrin joined him in bounding across the Sea of Tranquility. After descending from the steps of the Eagle lunar module, he gazed at the empty landscape and said: “Magnificent desolation.”
Since the Apollo 11 mission of July 1969, the Moon has remained largely untouched – no human has been there since 1972. But this could change soon, with several companies expressing an interest in exploring and, possibly, mining its surface for resources including gold, platinum and the rare earth minerals widely used in electronics.
(15) UNIDENTIFIED FEDERAL OUTLAYS. [Item by Mike Kennedy.] Piggybacking on a Washington Post article (paywalled here) and a Vice article (freely available here), SYFY Wire says, “The government’s secret UFO program has just been revealed, and it’s something out of a sci-fi movie.”
We didn’t know much about the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program until now, but apparently, the Department of Defense has been focusing its efforts far beyond potential threats on Earth.
The Defense Intelligence Agency has finally let the public in on at least some of what it’s been up to by recently releasing a list of 38 research titles that range from the weird to the downright bizarre. It would have never revealed these titles—on topics like invisibility cloaking, wormholes and extradimensional manipulation—if it wasn’t for the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request put in by the director of the Federation of American Scientists’ Project on Government Society, Steven Aftergood.
(16) STANDING TALL. BBC traces “How Japan’s skyscrapers are built to survive earthquakes” in a photo gallery with some interesting tech info. “Japan is home to some of the most resilient buildings in the world – and their secret lies in their capacity to dance as the ground moves beneath them.”
The bar is set by the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. This was a large earthquake – of magnitude 7.9 – that devastated Tokyo and Yokohama, and killed more than 140,000 people.
For earthquakes of a greater magnitude than this benchmark, preserving buildings perfectly is no longer the goal. Any damage that does not cause a human casualty is acceptable.
“You design buildings to protect people’s lives,” says Ziggy Lubkowski, a seismic specialist at University College London. “That’s the minimum requirement.”
(17) ORDER IN THE TINY BRICK COURT. SYFY Wire reports “Ruth Bader Ginsburg will uphold the Constitution in Lego Movie 2: The Second Part cameo”.
If nothing else, the upcoming sequel to The Lego Movie will adhere strictly to the legal confines of the U.S. Constitution.
That’s because 85-year-old Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will have a cameo as a black-robed, law-defining minifigure in The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part, according to the film’s director, Mike Mitchell.
“These movies are so full of surprises. And we were thinking, ‘Who’s the last person you would think to see in a Lego film as a minifig?’ Ruth Bader Ginsburg!” Mitchell told USA Today. “And we’re all huge fans. It made us laugh to think of having her enter this world.”
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is stepping out in a new role — a gavel-wielding minifigure in @TheLEGOMovie 2! See the photos, exclusively revealed here: https://t.co/q7kypl4IeF
— USA TODAY Life (@usatodaylife) January 19, 2019
[Thanks to Greg Hullender, Cat Eldridge, JJ, Chip Hitchcock, Martin Morse Wooster, Mike Kennedy, John King Tarpinian, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kip Williams.]
This entry was posted in Pixel Scroll and tagged Arisia, Bjo Trimble, Bram Stoker Awards, Chang'e-4, Cheryl Morgan, dinosaurs, Frank Herbert, Frank Robinson, Hugo Award Book Club, J.R.R. Tolkien, Lego, MagiCon, Olav Rokne, Robin Anne Reid, Rusty Hevelin, Scott Edelman, Spider-Man, Star Trek by Mike Glyer. Bookmark the permalink.
74 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 1/20/19 Pix-El: The Man of Scroll”
Cat Eldridge on January 21, 2019 at 4:40 pm said:
Andrew says I think Catholics acknowledge that miracle (and several other raisings from the dead by Apostles), though I could be wrong.
No idea. He didn’t seem inclined to argue the finer points of Catholic theological underpinnings with me as he was truly offended at the idea that I believed I died. (Mind I wasn’t, and still aren’t, terribly thrilled that I did.) It appeared to be a great spiritual offence to him.
Nancy Sauer on January 21, 2019 at 4:41 pm said:
No, I didn’t think of that excellent rejoinder. Do Catholics acknowledge the story of Lazarus?
Yes. And those of us who have actually been paying attention to the scripture readings during Mass know there are two other people who weren’t Jesus who came back-from-the-dead in the New Testament: the daughter of the synagogue official, and the adult son (and only child) of a widow. The Old Testament has a young child being brought back to life by one of the prophets. (Elijah I think, but I wouldn’t bet money on it.)
JJ on January 21, 2019 at 4:48 pm said:
Mega Meredith Moment:
Diane Duane, whose Tale of the Five series is eligible for nomination for Best Series this year, is making e-copies of all three novels and the novella available at a 75% discount at E-books Direct until March 15 with the use of the discount code HUGONOM (total cost $18.96 discounted to $4.75, $1.25 for each of the novels, and $1 for the novella).
(the books are also available at Amazon and other retailers, but not at a discount)
Andrew on January 21, 2019 at 4:50 pm said:
Cat: I think I speak for many here when I say I’m glad you came back…
Andrew says to me I think I speak for many here when I say I’m glad you came back…
Thank you. File 770 and its community has been important to me over the past sixteen months. The Birthdays and your reactions to them have been most satisfying.
Lis Carey on January 21, 2019 at 7:17 pm said:
@Cat Eldridge–
That might be the way he was but it’s not true of all Catholics. I’ve run into more than a few who believe that spreading the Faith is their mission in life.
And I had one Catholic that was really upset with me when I told him I had died as he said I couldn’t have died and come back as only one person had done that.
Cat, there’s roughly a billion Catholics on the planet, and since cloning is not really a thing yet, they’re all individuals. Some of them are stuipid or fanatical individuals. But, as a general rule of thumb, people raised in a religion, Catholicism as well as most others, tend to be a lot more relaxed about “sharing” it in pushy ways.
Do Catholics acknowledge the story of Lazarus?
Indeed, it’s a favorite Bible story, along with the related story of Mary and Martha. Features in the normal rotation of Bible readings in the Mass, gets told to children…honestly, I don’t think you need to bother much about a Catholic, so-called, who is apparently unaware of it. Or perhaps he just didn’t think of it in that context at that moment, but still, that’s on him, not you.
People are individuals. People vary lots,
But, speaking in broad generalities, Tolkien’s behavior in this regard is more typical of people raised in a religion, and Lewis’s is more typical of converts. Yes, there are exceptions and aberrations in both directions. Doesn’t matter; doesn’t change the point I was making–which was not about absolute and invariable rules.
Chip Hitchcock on January 21, 2019 at 7:48 pm said:
@Andrew: I’m guessing you disagree with putting The Magician’s Nephew first (which I have seen in some cases and not in others); why do you object, given Lewis’s statement that he didn’t write to a particular plan?
@Chip: In Wardrobe, the characters and the readers are presented with a series of wonders, such as the Lantern Wastes and the wardrobe itself. Reading Nephew first gives away the origin of the wonders, giving away answers before the questions are even raised. Once you’ve read all the books in publication order (as the boy Laurence did in fact did) there’s no harm in rereading them in any order, but Nephew is a poor introduction to Narnia (compared to Wardrobe) for a newcomer.
David Goldfarb on January 21, 2019 at 10:52 pm said:
I agree with Andrew on Narnia reading order, for just the reasons he gives. In fact I’d say that this is a special case of the general rule that all series are best read in the order that they were published. (As with any general rule, it may admit of one or two exceptions – Discworld is generally agreed to have begun with two of the weaker series entries, although even there it’s not so much a matter of reordering as of judicious skipping.)
Hampus Eckerman on January 22, 2019 at 12:03 am said:
I prefer to start with The Dark Is Rising before Over Sea, Under Stone in Susan Cooper’s series, and that is the order they were published in Sweden.
Discworld, I only liked the first two books and then Mort. I skipped out on the series afer ten books as I found the rest of them kind of boring
Oneiros on January 22, 2019 at 12:35 am said:
I accidentally started with The Dark Is Rising, then I got an omnibus volume of the series and that’s when I found out it was the 2nd book. I would agree that it’s a good book to begin the series with.
Joe H. on January 22, 2019 at 4:51 am said:
I can think of a few series that I do prefer to read in internal chronological order rather than published order — C.S. Forester’s Hornblower books are a prime example, as are Leiber’s Fafhrd & Gray Mouser stories and Moorcock’s Elric. But in all three of those cases, when I first encountered the series I did so in the form of a chronologically-arranged fix-up version.
Narnia for me is a special case in the other direction because even though the events in Magician’s Nephew happen prior to Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the narration in Magician’s Nephew happens after LWW — there are multiple points where the narrator, in an aside, mentions events from earlier-published books in the series.
(And even with Leiber there’s a strong case to be made for skipping at least the first couple of stories in the (chronologically) first book — the Fafhrd & Gray Mouser solo origin stories, that is.)
Lenora Rose on January 22, 2019 at 10:47 am said:
IIRC, when Cooper wrote Over Sea Under Stone, she didn’t actually know she was going to tie it to a whole other then-nonexistent series, and the Dark Is Rising was consciously written as the first of a series of books before she realised her other book would connect after all, and brought its characters in to meet Will Stanton. So it makes a good entry because it was planned as one. And it is a splendid book.
And I am reminded of the supposed reason Steven Brust wrote Dragon the way he did: Specifically to thwart people who are too locked into wanting to read a series in its exact internal chronological order. (For those who don’t know, the story interweaves two timelines, which occur several novels apart in the general Dragaeran continuity.)
Of course, considering the second book he wrote of that series occurs chronologically before the first, so he’s been toying with the order of events for a long time… but I started with Taltos and it rocked (fourth written, first chronologically even once you account for Dragon).
Internal chronology is a tricky beast and there are many many ways to decide which way works best for you. I *accidentally* started the Mageworlds series with the book that happens first in the entire storyline, well before the (first-written) trilogy that is usually agreed upon as the best entry point, and it did me no serious harm. It was the book I could find, and the foreword gave me enough context that I figured it was a reasonable beginning point.
(Now that I think on it, I think I started with the Grey King and went back…)
On the other hand, Pamela Dean’s Secret Country Trilogy should NOT be started with the second book, which for some weird reason was all our library had of that trilogy, and after Tam Lin I really wanted more of her work.
Eli on January 22, 2019 at 10:52 am said:
@Chip: “…why do you object, given Lewis’s statement that he didn’t write to a particular plan?”
Besides what Andrew said, “the author didn’t have a specific intent” isn’t at all a counter-argument to “what the author actually did works a certain way and will work less well if you rearrange it.” Especially when you’re talking about storytelling, where there are intuitive concerns that tend to produce certain patterns even when (or especially when) you’re not conscious of what you’re doing. In this case, Lewis decided to start telling a story at a certain point, and proceeded in a way that makes the most sense if the audience did in fact come in at that point.
Cora Buhlert on January 22, 2019 at 12:24 pm said:
@Joe H.
I think most of us first encountered Fafhrd and Mouser as well as Elric that way, unless we happened to read the original stories when they appeared. As for Hornblower, I first read him as a kid in the hardcover books my parents had on their shelves and don’t really remember whether they were fix-ups or not, though they probably were.
Regarding Fafhrd and Gray Mouser’s origin stories, the Fafhrd origin novella is skippable IMO, since it’s not all that good and also makes Fafhrd look like something of a jerk. Plus, the villainous matriarchy keeping men down left a bad taste in mouth (and I just reread them last summer – reread “The Sunken Land” for the Retro Hugos and got sucked in).
Mouser’s origin story “The Unholy Grail” is very good, though it doesn’t always quite fit in with hints of Mouser’s background given in the rest of the series. I also noticed that “The Unholy Grail” was one story I remembered very clearly thirty years or so after I first read it, while many of the others blurred together.
But “Ill Met in Lankhmar” is also an excellent start to the series and a great story in general.
Joe H. on January 22, 2019 at 2:08 pm said:
@Cora — Well, for Hornblower, fix-up is probably too strong a word. But Forester wrote the three Captain books (Beat to Quarters, Ship of the Line, Flying Colours) and then went back and filled things in with Mr. Midshipman Hornblower et al.; and when I found the books in the public library, there were three omnibus volumes and obviously you’d start with him just joining the navy …
Yeah, I believe you’re right on all counts about “The Unholy Grail”.
Xtifr on January 22, 2019 at 3:39 pm said:
@Xtifr–
I’m a 3rd-gen SF fan, and I genuinely had no idea people still believed in gods (at least in the Industrial World) till I was about 8. I thought that going to church was just something people did because of bizarre social conventions, like wearing ties. Something that made no sense, but people didn’t want to rock the boat or seem weird.
Yes, it’s no favor to kids to let them grow up with zero awareness that there are normal, intelligent people who look at the world differently than their own family does.
Oh I certainly knew that! It was the late sixties, and I lived in Berkeley! Plus, I was an extremely social child. I was more than aware that all sorts of people had different opinions and world-views. We had marches in the streets to remind me of that!
And it’s not like my parents ever tried to convince me of anything–religion simply wasn’t a topic that came up. So I formed my own opinions, based on random samplings of the people we knew–which meant, basically, SF fans, radical lefties, or, frequently, both. Religion simply wasn’t a common topic of discussion in Berkeley at the time. Nor at various local SF cons. There were more important issues on people’s minds. It took a trip to the midwest, where my grandmother lived, for me to stumble across my first open believer.
And, of course, after a couple of years, as the sixties progressed and got more, um, sixtiesish, I ended up knowing a lot of religious people. It was just that they were almost all neo-pagans or Buddhists or the like. 🙂
@Xtifr–And yet, you weren’t prepared for a different worldview that is, in fact, really, really common.
That’s a huge blind spot. Which is unfortunate.
@Liz Carey: I’m not quite sure why you think this was something I had to be “prepared for”. Kids learn stuff all the time. This was something I learned–a little later than usual, but I hardly found it a world-shaking revelation. It was a curious fact. I already knew people could be silly. 😉
My mom was from the midwest. She certainly knew that there are lots of religious people in this country. I doubt she had any idea I’d formed the theories I had. And I was a smart kid who read lots and lots. I formed theories all the time, and often found that they were incorrect, so it wasn’t at all shocking to learn that one more was.
Half a century later, I still consider it no more than a curious bit of trivia. I’m not sure why you think it was a “huge blind spot.” It’s not like it’s something that’s ever particularly mattered to me. Certainly, at the time, there were far more important issues to worry about: the war, racism, and (to a lesser extent, I’m sorry to say, though my mother helped me see its importance even at the time) sexism. And at this late date, I still think at least two of those are far more important.
Heck, if anything, the main result of the revelation was that I suddenly realized that the various people I knew who went to church might be doing so out of sincere belief, rather than blindly aping the actions of their ancestors in order to avoid rocking the boat. Which improved my opinion of them. But I still don’t see it as a huge blind spot. Can you explain?
@Xtifr–It comes from too many atheist fans certain that religious people are either hypocrites or fools, often with a side dish of “but not the neo-pagans.” It’s not you I’m giving the side-eye to, but your parents, who created an environment where you could assume that all those people were mindless sheep, rather than people with different beliefs. And at an age where, yes, I was expected to remember that both atheists and people of other religions existed and were entitled to the same courtesy and respect as people who shared our beliefs. Even the Protestants. 🙂
It’s good you had that revelation, but according to the way you tell the story, your parents never thought to teach you that.
bookworm1398 on January 23, 2019 at 2:25 pm said:
@ Xtfir. My daughter recently told me that until she was eight, she thought Christmas was on Dec 31st. Since we don’t celebrate Christmas at home, she couldn’t use that to identify a specific date. She knew that kids came back from winter break with Christmas presents and there were Christmas lights and displays till the beginning of Jan. And she just thought Christmas must be close to the new year, so Dec 31 it was.
If she had mentioned it to me at the time, I could have told her, but I never knew.
@bookworm–Call me crazy, but I think that’s a little bit different than not knowing that other people actually have different beliefs and aren’t just being insincere sheep.
But I really don’t want this to go in a direction of hostility and anger. It was really just a snarky observation.
@Xtifr–It comes from too many atheist fans certain that religious people are either hypocrites or fools
So because some atheists are assholes, you assume all atheists (or agnostics) are assholes? Nice.
Anyway, it’s not hypocritical to want to fit in with the people around you. It’s perfectly natural. I didn’t have a particularly negative opinion of people who went to church even before I discovered that some of them were sincere. (And learning that they were sincere didn’t prevent me from thinking they were silly. But I knew–and know–that most people–including myself–have at least some silly beliefs, so that didn’t–and doesn’t–particularly bother me.)
It’s not you I’m giving the side-eye to, but your parents
Yes, I’m quite aware of that. And it’s on their behalf that I’ve taken offense at your comments. I am struggling to maintain a veneer of politeness here, because I am actually extremely offended!
Again, I’m not sure why you consider religious belief such a big deal. I think you’ll find that very few parents offer their children courses in comparative religion, and I’m not sure what else would satisfy what you seem to be asking for. And other than that I was certainly aware that people had different beliefs about things, even if my list of things didn’t include something you consider important, but that I still don’t.
You’ll forgive me if I’m starting to feel like the problem might be that my parents didn’t teach me to take your religion seriously–even though that’s probably true of 99+% of all parents who don’t share your religion.
In any case, my parents weren’t entirely responsible for my initial mistake. As I say, I was a very social child, and I went out and started making friends with our neighbors not long after I was able to toddle that far. And I loved to talk. About all sorts of things. The failure (if failure it was–you still haven’t convinced me of that) was shared by our whole neighborhood! And big chunks of west-coast fandom. :p
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America: Going to Hell in a Hand Basket
In case you hadn't noticed, our nation is sinking fast. I hope you have noticed because as Black Commentator says, the corporate media won't tell you.
There is a an international conversation going on that Americans are not privy to, because of the censorship practiced by our corporate media. Whether we hear it or not, the bell is tolling.
Black Commentator printed this brilliant analysis from Aijaz Ahmad, writing for India's national newspaper, the Hindu. It is called the Global Descent of America. It is a must read.
Posted by Freedom Rider at 8:32:00 AM
The Bush Family and the Nazis
As the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz is commemorated, it is worth noting the connection between the Bush family and Hitler's Germany. Prescott Bush, the President's grandfather, had business dealings with the Nazis even after the U.S. entered the war. The Guardian has the story.
Time to Get Out of Dodge
Ted Kennedy is now saying what his junior Senator should have been saying last year. The U.S. must leave Iraq.
He doesn't say anything particularly earth shaking, just common sense statements about people hating occupation. These days common sense looks like brilliance.
One Nation, Under a Cult
I have called Bush delusional and I have called him a fascist. Seymour Hersh has outdone me. He says the Bushmen are a cult. I agree with him. Hersh has ominous thoughts on the direction the country is moving toward.
"You know, if you have not sold your stocks and bought property in Italy, you better do it quick. And the third thing is Europe -- Europe is not going to tolerate us much longer. The rage there is enormous. I'm talking about our old-fashioned allies. We could see something there, collective action against us. Certainly, nobody -- it's going to be an awful lot of dancing on our graves as the dollar goes bad and everybody stops buying our bonds, our credit -- our -- we're spending $2 billion a day to float the debt, and one of these days, the Japanese and the Russians, everybody is going to start buying oil in Euros instead of dollars. We're going to see enormous panic here. But he could get through that. That will be another year, and the damage he’s going to do between then and now is enormous. We’re going to have some very bad months ahead."
You Say Personal, I Say Private
The Republicans want to eliminate social security but they don't want to say that of course. The Bushmen held their focus groups and they must have told them that "private account" was too scary. Now they are called "personal accounts."
None of that is surprising, but as usual the press are disgracing themselves by repeating conservative phraseology and not owning up to their blanket suck up to Bush. Salon has the story on the press capitulation. As of now you don't need to go to the GOP to get their talking points. Just read the paper and watch the evening news.
Conscience of a Conservative
"In the ranks of the new conservatives, however, I see and experience much hate. It comes to me in violently worded, ignorant and irrational emails from self-professed conservatives who literally worship George Bush. Even Christians have fallen into idolatry. There appears to be a large number of Americans who are prepared to kill anyone for George Bush."
These words were written by a Republican, Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, who served as Assistant Treasury Secretary under Reagan. He has also served as an associate editor for the Wall Street Journal editoral page and as contributing editor for the National Review.
In a commentary for Zmag he not only skewers the fanaticism and delusion of the right, but the failure of the supposedly liberal media to stand up to Bush. Roberts' words are a powerful indictment of a delusional, crazed nation.
Will Israel Attack Iran?
If it does, it will be with the full support of the United States. The same people who gave us the Iraq occupation are chomping at the bit to let Israel attack Iran and destroy its nuclear capability.
Israel did the same thing with Iraq, which made Condi's now infamous "mushroom cloud" remark all the more laughable. Saddam Hussein couldn't resurrect his plans for attaining nuclear capability even if he wanted to do so.
The full insanity of the Bushmen and the irrelevance of the Democrats has come to fruition. What will the Democrats do? We already know the answer to that because they don't dare criticize Israel either. They will do nothing.
The pro-Israeli lobby has silenced the nation. You can't run for dog catcher if you speak out against Israel. Once again Israel's desires will help determine foreign policy decisions that the rest of the world finds abhorrent.
The Muslim world will hate us all the more. Actually, the entire world will hate us, all of us, no longer making a distinction between the government and the people.
Bringing Liberty to the Iraqi People
Chris Hondros, Getty Images
At his coronation today the Mad King went on and on about liberty and how the United States would bring it to the rest of the world. This week an embedded journalist showed the world that Iraqis now have the freedom to be shot to death if they drive down the wrong street.
The young girl in the photo saw her parents gunned down by itchy fingered U.S. troops. You know, the ones we are supposed to support without question. This child is just one of thousands who would probably disagree if you told them they were better off without Saddam.
Chinese Terrorists
You have to give credit where it is due. Only the Bush administration could add more paranoia and fear mongering to their already frightening inaugural celebration.
Phony terror alert number 99 alleges that Iraqi and Chinese terrorists are on their way to Beantown, to throw tea in the harbor I suppose. As always, the evidence is such a sham that even public officials have to say that they doubt the official story. Boston's Mayor said there is “a lot of misinformation out there.”
In today's Black Commentator I note how Bush's pathological paranoia has made the whole country just as crazy as he is.
John Kerry, A Day Late and a Dollar Short
"Thousands of people were suppressed in their efforts to vote."
Well, well, well. It seems that John Kerry does know how to speak up. It is all a few months late of course. I don't know whether to say better late than never or to keep cursing his name. I think I will choose the latter. I guess Kerry realizes that showing clear differences with Bush was the key to victory, but I hope he doesn't think he can run again.
Kerry says he may not vote to confirm the inept and undiplomatic Condi Rice as Secretary of State. That's nice but I'll be a little more impressed if he says no to the torturer, Alberto Gonzales, who wants to head the Justice Department.
King Day
How should we remember Dr. King? As always, read Black Commentator for the answer. On Monday the media will go on and on and on about the I Have a Dream speech. They won't tell you that when he was alive they had nothing good to say about him.
"From a Viacom standpoint, the election of a Republican administration is a better deal. Because the Republican administration has stood for many things we believe in, deregulation and so on…. I vote for Viacom. Viacom is my life, and I do believe that a Republican administration is better for media companies than a Democratic one."
There you have it. In case you couldn't figure it out, you now know why CBS fell on its sword after correctly reporting that George W. Bush didn't show up for his national guard duty. Greg Palast tells all.
"White reality is privileged at every turn, so that if whites say something is a problem, it is, and if whites insist it isn't, then it isn't."
As usual, Tim Wise hits the nail on the head.
How John Kerry Can Redeem Himself
Keith Olbermann has been unique in the corporate media. He has actually covered the vote theft of 2004. Imagine that.
Today Congress will ratify the vote of the electoral college unless at least one member of the United States Senate says that they should not. In his blog Olbermann reports that as many as six Senators may do just that. John Kerry should be one of them.
Instead of thinking about running again and bringing another Republican to the White House, Kerry must stand up today and do what he should have done on November 3rd when he punked out and gave George W. Bush legitimacy.
He must say that the Republicans cheated. They cheated when they made sure that Ohio polling places had insufficient numbers of voting machines. They cheated when they tabulated votes electronically. John Kerry can only redeem himself if he stands up today for the voting rights of American citizens.
America: Going to Hell in a Hand Basket In case...
The Bush Family and the Nazis As the 60th anniv...
Time to Get Out of Dodge Ted Kennedy is now say...
One Nation, Under a Cult I have called Bush del...
You Say Personal, I Say Private The Republicans...
Conscience of a Conservative "In the ranks of t...
Will Israel Attack Iran? If it does, it will be...
Bringing Liberty to the Iraqi People Chris Ho...
Chinese Terrorists You have to give credit wher...
John Kerry, A Day Late and a Dollar Short "Thou...
King Day How should we remember Dr. King? As al...
CBS "From a Viacom standpoint, the election of ...
Privilege "White reality is privileged at every...
How John Kerry Can Redeem Himself Keith Olberma...
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GIWPS > Events > Bridging Theory and Practice: Climate Change, Conflict and Gender
Bridging Theory and Practice: Climate Change, Conflict and Gender
The Georgetown Institute for Women Peace and Security hosted a symposium at Georgetown University on the intersection of climate change, conflict and gender, co-sponsored by Trinity College in Dublin.
Former Irish President Mary Robinson joined 25 academics, practitioners and policymakers from a number of countries, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, and Costa Rica at the symposium, which was supported by Nicolaus and Christiane Weickart. See some of their key insights from the symposium below.
“I’m really worried that climate change is going to be so severe over the coming years, no matter what we do—we’re not on course for a safe world. Even if we change now, we’ve done a lot of damage. It’s disrupting livelihoods, it’s driving people out of their homes, and it’s going to exacerbate and further threaten conflict and fragile states. So it’s really important that we link these three issues and that we understand what women are doing on the ground to build resilience.” – Mary Robinson, Former President of Ireland
“Climate change is going to affect everyone, but it doesn’t affect everyone equally. Women are already being displaced and adversely affected by climate change all over the world, and also by conflict. They’re both some of the most vulnerable people, but also, they’re the decision makers often for their families. And if you make women’s lives better, you improve the lives of everyone. While my work tends to be more on climate than on women’s issues, I think it’s really important to lift up women’s voices, and I think it’s very important to have women at the table because we need all hands on deck.” – Vicki Arroyo, Executive Director, Georgetown Climate Center
“Considering conflict, climate change, and gender separately provides no solutions to what we need in the South. It is in our communities, it is in our countries, in which you see that looking at climate change only from one side, or conflict on its own track—it’s impossible. The reality brings them together. And we need integral solutions to what we’re facing.” – Lorena Aguilar, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Government of Costa Rica
“Actually the issues are very interesting, especially in Africa, in my country, where there is a lot of competition, over the land, over the natural resources. And especially because of the poverty that has affected women and children because of the armed conflict, and because, also, of the lack of empowerment of the women… These three topics fit together because gender has become a crosscutting question for all the countries, especially in Africa and in my country [Democratic Republic of the Congo]. We need to understand better how to take this question into account when drafting and implementing policies, which will continue to affect especially women and young people.” – Charles Mushizi, Node Coordinator, FANRPAN, DRC
“Today, coming here to Georgetown University, is very important for me, because it gives me a platform, to talk to the world and to give them the real issues and the case studies, which are happening on the ground. And it’s really amazing, and interesting, to see women and people working on gender from all around the world at the policy level and also at the local level. And for us to come up with some uniform voice on certain issues that we have to do at the international level, at the national level, and also on the local level.” – Nancy Omolo, Gender Inclusion and Climate Change Advisor, Government of Kenya
“I think we just need a call for political leadership on these issues. I think we, you know, we’ve talking here about the importance of policy frameworks, and integrating this into that, and putting more gender into this. But really, what I would just call for is that we already have so many policy frameworks and so many decisions around this, and really what we need is leadership on actual implementation of some of this and enforcement. And that also goes with financing, and what we’re seeing is a lot of fragmentation around financing these issues. And we really need more countries to take the mantle of, kind of, feminist approaches to climate and security, which we’re missing.” – Silja Halle, Program Officer, UN Environment
“As a graduate student and research assistant at GIWPS, I study the relationship between women and conflict. Climate change has emerged as another dimension in this relationship. Women are adversely affected by both climate change and conflict but are consistently left out of the management of natural resources and the decision-making process on climate action. It is inspiring to sit in a room of esteemed practitioners, policymakers, and researchers who bring together diverse ideas and propose solutions or new research at the nexus of this relationship.” – Devin Olmack, M.A. Candidate ’20 (pictured second from right)
Melanne Verveer, GIWPS executive director and former first U.S. ambassador for global women’s issues said the world has to “do better on intersectionality for more effective results.”
“This applies to the substance of the discussion, as well as to who is in the room,” she explained.
“Trinity College Dublin is delighted to collaborate with Georgetown University Institute for Women Peace and Security on this critically important Bridging Theory and Practice workshop to unpack the intersections between gender, climate change and conflict,” said Susan Murphy, director of Trinity College’s international development initiative. “We need more evidence to better inform climate and conflict policy and sustainable practice.”
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Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill (No 2) 2015
Mr GREG PIPER (Lake Macquarie) [6.25 p.m.]: I contribute to debate on the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill (No 2) 2015. This bill is part of a longstanding parliamentary process. It is a housekeeping bill that tidies up aspects of several Acts that have come to the attention of the Government over time. For example, page 5 of the bill deals with Act No. 38 of 1994, the Fisheries Management Act. Item [1] of schedule 1.6 of the bill states:
Schedule 4 Endangered species, populations and ecological communities
Insert an asterisk before "Posidonia australis" (appearing under the heading Marine vegetation) in Part 2.
Posidonia australis is one of the great seagrasses of Australia, which is found off coastal New South Wales. In schedule 4, part 4, of the Fisheries Management Act 1994 the bill inserts an asterisk before Vanvoorstia bennettiana, appearing under the heading "Marine vegetation". Likewise, the bill inserts an asterisk before Bidyanus bidyanus and Epinephelus daemelii. Learned members would be well aware of those species. Schedule 1.7, also on page 5, makes a change to the Health Care Complaints Act 1993. It says:
[1] Part 2, Division 5, note
Omit "unregistered". Insert instead "non-registered".
I will jump ahead, for the sake of brevity. Schedule 1.9, on page 6, proposes changes to the Mental Health Act 2007, Act No. 8 of 2007. I do not want to make light of that Act. Item [2] of schedule 1.9 states:
[2] Section 127 Certain private health facilities to be licensed
Omit "private hospital within the meaning of the Private Hospitals and Day Procedure Centres Act 1988" and "the hospital".
Insert instead "private health facility within the meaning of the Private Health Facilities Act 2007" and "the private health facility", respectively.
It goes on and on. I note that the bill contains very minor housekeeping provisions. No doubt it is important to tidy up legislation. From time to time the Government makes mistakes in the drafting of legislation that need to be tidied up. Mistakes may not be noticed in the short term. They might be noticed by legal practitioners, brought to the attention of the Government and corrected. I turn to page 8 of the bill and schedule 1.13. The heading is "Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Act 1978 No 72". I have had scant discussion with the Government about this. Members in the Legislative Council and in this House who have considered this legislation seem to have missed this part of the bill. In a bill that deals with relatively minor amendments to a raft of legislation, this schedule seems anomalous. It states:
Schedule 4 Savings, transitional and other provisions
Insert at the end of the Schedule with appropriate Part and clause numbering:
Part Leases and licences to Australian Rugby Union
Limited and University of Technology Sydney
This is a very significant departure from the tone of the rest of the legislation. The bill deals with the ability for the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Trust to provide a further lease of up to 75 years to the Australian Rugby Union to construct a building on part of the car park. I acknowledge the Minister for Sport, whom I have discussed this matter with—not the Attorney General, who has carriage of this legislation—but I believe Cabinet, including perhaps the Attorney General, should have asked some questions about the appropriateness of this particular inclusion in the bill. I thank the Minister for Sport for the information he provided to me earlier. I listened to earlier contributions by the member for Sydney, the member for Newtownand the member for Heffron, who was rightly indignant that although this land is within his electorate he had received no briefing on this proposal. However, I understand that there may have been some oversight in Opposition processes and that the matter was brought to the attention of the Opposition but, unfortunately, the member for Heffron was not a beneficiary of the information.
A short time ago the Minister showed me the mapping. The actual percentage of space lost within the precinct is relatively minor when one considers what is being provided for the Australian Rugby Union. I say straight up that I support the Australian Rugby Union and I would love to see it have a new home within that area generally. I have not had the benefit of a detailed briefing on this matter or a discussion about the merits one way or the other, but to include such a substantial matter within a bill such as this when clearly it warrants its own dedicated piece of legislation does no credit to the Government. I believe there was some discussion about whether an amendment could be made to excise this proposal from the legislation and that the member for Sydney may move such an amendment.
I am not here to attack the Government on every piece of legislation it puts through this place. I acknowledge that it is a complex business running the State of New South Wales, but I believe it is an abuse of process to insert a significant matter into a bill that deals with relatively minor issues. While the general public may ultimately be supportive of the suggestion that the car park land at the Sydney Cricket Ground be made available to the Australian Rugby Union and the University of Technology Sydney, I am sure they do not know about it. It is a real concern for a proposal like this to be bundled into such a bill that deals with relatively minor matters. On that basis, I hope that the Government will see its way to support the amendment foreshadowed by the member for Sydney. I certainly will be. I cannot say I am overly hopeful, but I hope that the Government understands this is not the appropriate legislation to deal with the use of this site.
TEMPORARY SPEAKER (Mr Lee Evans): I welcome to the public gallery members of the Panthers on the Prowl Kokoda Leadership Project: Brad Waugh, General Manager, Panthers on the Prowl and his wife, Mandy, Nikki George, Vicky Dunn, Debbie Robertson, Daniel Myer, Analiese Langer, Cassie Fitzpatrick, Aimee Carlin, Sheriden Page, Jessica Tibbett and Nicole O'Haire. I welcome you all. I am sure it was a tough time on the Kokoda Track. Congratulations.
Mr JAMIE PARKER (Balmain) [6.34 p.m.]: I make a contribution on behalf of The Greens to debate on the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill (No 2) 2015. A lot of legislation comes before the House and many small changes are made through numerous machinery bills that improve legislation—and this should be one of them. But hidden in this legislation is a lease to allow for the development of the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground. I will speak about two things: what this bill will allow to happen and why it is so disappointing that this provision has been included in the bill. I quote part of the second reading speech given in the upper House by Parliamentary Secretary the Hon. David Clarke:
The Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill (No 2) 2015 continues the statute law revision program that has been in place for more than 30 years. Bills of this kind have featured in most sessions of Parliament since 1984 and are an effective method for making minor policy changes and maintaining the quality of the New South Wales statute book. Schedule 1 to the bill contains policy changes of a minor and non-controversial nature that are too inconsequential to warrant the introduction of a separate amending bill.
These miscellaneous provisions bills deal with small things that need to be changed in legislation that do not require their own bill because they are minor, non-controversial and not an issue. This particular inclusion is not minor, it is controversial and it is an issue. The Government has included in this legislation—which usually deals with minor matters—a significant change. The Government is changing a law that would allow for the granting of a lease or a licence to the Australian Rugby Union Ltd and to the University of Technology Sydney when there has been almost no consultation with the local community. Indeed, a consultation process is currently underway.
Instead of introducing a separate bill dealing with the way that the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Trust can manage the site, the Government is sticking the amendment into a miscellaneous provisions bill. These bills have come before the Parliament since 1984 and they are all about minor, inconsequential matters. If there is a significant matter that is controversial it should be put in a separate bill and debated. Public feedback should be sought and we should have a proper argument about it. The Parliamentary Secretary in the upper House said in his second reading speech:
I am sure that honourable members will appreciate the straightforward and non-controversial nature of the provisions contained in the bill. However, if any amendment causes concern or requires clarification, it should be brought to my attention. If necessary, I will arrange for government staff to provide additional information on the matters raised. If any particular matter of concern cannot be resolved, and is likely to delay the passage of the bill, the Government is prepared to consider withdrawing the matter from the bill. Withdrawn proposals can also be dealt with in a second bill, using the procedure for splitting bills in the Legislative Council, which can be dealt with in each of the Houses in the same way as an ordinary bill.
Members of the upper House are not local members and do not understand the specific issues that are raised regarding the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Trust. People trust the Government not to put controversial issues in this bill. It looks sneaky. If the Government is serious about changing the trust's arrangements in relation to leases, it should introduce a separate bill. This does not look good; it does not reflect the spirit of miscellaneous provisions bills, which deal with non-controversial issues. I protest about this because I have trusts in my electorate. If the Government is seeking to change the way the trust is managed I would expect it to introduce a bill to amend the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Act, not to stick such an amendment at the back of a miscellaneous provisions bill, which is a machinery bill.
Matters contained in miscellaneous provisions bills rely on trust: We tell the Government that we will not slow down the miscellaneous issues and allow them to pass. But that is not the case here. The Minister for Sport said that only a little bit of a car park will be developed. Even if we put aside the principle of the matter—which I believe is sufficient to warrant a separate amendment to the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Act—over the years we have seen the constant chipping away at Moore Park, which is a part of the original Governor Macquarie bequest, and increasing development of the site. The cumulative impact is significant.
We will see yet another development on the site. Instead of a car park, a relatively low-impact activity, we will have a six-storey building, including different activities and intensifying development, on the site, against the original intent of the Governor Macquarie bequest. The Greens believe consideration of public lands should be done in an open and transparent manner, not by way of a statute law bill. If it were done through a separate bill members could vote on the bill—and we would probably vote against it. However, this does not pass the test imposed on all of us, which is the test of trust requested of us when dealing with bills of this nature.
I draw the attention of members to debate in the upper House. I know when these bills have been debated Ministers have said, "If there is a problem let us know. We will knock it out and deal with it later." However, the Minister for Sport seems besotted with getting this bill through. He knows this issue deserves its own separate bill so it is disappointing that we cannot debate a separate bill following public involvement and input. Instead, we basically have one day in which to try to resolve the issue. Time should be allowed for consultation. Delaying schedule 1.13 relating to the Sydney Cricket and Sports Ground Act 1978 No. 2 would enable community engagement, discussion and consultation to take place. It will delay the bill and allow further consultation. Therefore, I move:
That the motion be amended by leaving out the word "now" and inserting instead "on 16 February 2016."
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With up to 70 percent of pregnant American women reaching for acetaminophen to treat pain, infection, and fever, debate about the drug’s safety is ongoing. New research has brought further risks to light.
Acetaminophen is generally regarded as safe during pregnancy, but more evidence pointing to the contrary is coming to light.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) always recommend consulting a doctor prior to using any pain medication during pregnancy.
Acetaminophen — also known as paracetamol — is a widely available over-the-counter (OTC) painkiller, used by 65–70 percent of pregnant women in the United States.
But it is also a component of many other drugs, such as those used to treat symptoms of the common cold or flu, allergies, and sleep problems.
Research into the drug’s safety during pregnancy is ongoing, with little in the way of definitive conclusions. The FDA point out that “severe and persistent pain that is not effectively treated during pregnancy can result in depression, anxiety, and high blood pressure in the mother.”
“However, it is important to carefully weigh the benefits and risks of using prescription and OTC pain medicines during pregnancy,” the statement continues.
As an expectant mother myself, I’ve been keeping a close eye on any studies into the drug’s effect. Evidence of a link between attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the use of acetaminophen during pregnancy has been steadily mounting over the past few years.
In the past week, two new studies have joined the ranks, and they point to the potential effects on fertility and language development after acetaminophen use.
Here is what you need to know.
ADHD and behavioral problems
While there have been many efforts in the past to untangle a possible link between ADHD and acetaminophen use, the FDA have been critical of many of these.
According to their latest statement, from 2015, “[W]e found all of the studies we reviewed to have potential limitations in their designs; sometimes the accumulated studies on a topic contained conflicting results that prevented us from drawing reliable conclusions.”
Last November, we brought you a study from the journal Pediatrics that asked nearly 100,000 mothers about their acetaminophen use during pregnancy.
Almost half of the participants had used the drug. The researchers revealed that the risk of having a child with ADHD symptoms significantly increased when mothers took acetaminophen for more than 7 days.
Use of the drug for 29 days or longer doubled the risk of having a child with ADHD, regardless of whether the reason for taking the OTC drug was fever, infection, or pain.
These results are in line with a study we covered in 2016 that showed that acetaminophen use was linked to behavioral problems. The team — from the University of Bristol and Cardiff University, both in the United Kingdom — found that when mothers took acetaminophen at 18 weeks of pregnancy, their children were more likely to have conduct problems and symptoms of hyperactivity.
When the drug was used later on in pregnancy — at 32 weeks — these same traits were observed, but the risk of emotional symptoms and total behavioral difficulties was also higher.
New research published in the past week further incriminates acetaminophen, but this time, the effects are on fertility and language development.
Fertility affected across generations
A few years ago, we reported on a study that showed a potential link between acetaminophen use and fertility problems in male offspring in a mouse model.
The research team — from the University of Edinburgh in the U.K. — showed that three daily doses of acetaminophen over 7 days caused the levels of testosterone in male mouse babies to drop by nearly half.
Last week, a review of studies looking at the effects of acetaminophen use and fertility in female offspring concluded that the last weeks of the first trimester may be a critical time window.
Data obtained from rodent studies indicate that acetaminophen may disrupt normal development of the female reproductive organs, causing symptoms similar to premature ovarian insufficiency syndrome in humans.
Data from three independent studies, cited in the review, revealed that when rodents received acetaminophen, their offspring produced fewer eggs.
What is more, in one of the studies, this was passed on to the next generation, even if no more exposure to acetaminophen took place.
Senior paper author David Møbjerg Kristensen, Ph.D. — an assistant professor at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark — says, “[A]lthough this may not be a severe impairment to fertility, it is still of real concern since data from three different labs all independently found that paracetamol may disrupt female reproductive development in this way, which indicates further investigation is needed to establish how this affects human fertility.”
Prof. Kristensen urges that further research is needed.
“[…] by combining epidemiological data from human studies with more experimental research on models, such as rodents, it may be possible to firmly establish this link and determine how it happens, so that pregnant women in pain can be successfully treated, without risk to their unborn children.”
Prof. David Møbjerg Kristensen
Acetaminophen and language delay
A new study — published just yesterday — adds another dimension to the potential hazards that acetaminophen may cause.
Shanna Swan, Ph.D. — who is a professor of environmental and public health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, NY — and team studied early language development in children whose mothers took acetaminophen during the very early stages of pregnancy.
Writing in the journal European Psychiatry, Prof. Swan used data from the Swedish Environmental Longitudinal, Mother and Child, Asthma and Allergy study.
This included self-reported data on acetaminophen use in early pregnancy — meaning between the point of conception and enrolment in the study, which typically occurred at 8–13 weeks of pregnancy.
The data also included a measurement of acetaminophen levels in the urine of all participants at enrolment. The results found that 59 percent of the 754 women in the study took acetaminophen during early pregnancy.
Language delay in children — meaning the use of fewer than 50 words by the age of 30 months — was assessed by specialist nurses and a follow-up questionnaire. The authors also explain in the paper that it is “an early marker of impaired cognitive development.”
In all, 10 percent of the children experienced language delay. This was greater in boys than in girls.
However, when mothers took six or more tablets of acetaminophen during early pregnancy, the risk of their daughters showing signs of language delay was increased by almost six times.
Acetaminophen use was not linked to language delay in boys in this study.
Commenting on the findings, Prof. Swan states, “[G]iven the prevalence of prenatal acetaminophen use and the importance of language development, our findings, if replicated, suggest that pregnant women should limit their use of this analgesic during pregnancy.”
“It’s important for us to look at language development,” she adds, “because it has shown to be predictive of other neurodevelopmental problems in children.”
Is acetaminophen safe?
Unfortunately, there’s no simple answer. The majority of studies do not show any long-term effects if acetaminophen is taken sporadically and at low doses. However, as few as six tablets taken in early pregnancy increases the risk of language delay in daughters.
For some expectant mothers, longer use of acetaminophen is the only way to deal with severe pain or fever and infections, which can cause potential harm to their unborn baby if untreated. It can be a fine balancing act between risk and benefit.
The FDA make their views clear: work with your healthcare professional and take acetaminophen only when it is recommended.
In the meantime, expectant mothers like me will have to wait and see what research brings to light, to help inform our future choices.
Tagged Pregnancy / Obstetrics
Endometriosis after a cesarean delivery: What to know
Having a cesarean section is a risk factor for endometriosis. Endometriosis following a cesarean delivery remains relatively rare, but it is a potential complication that women should discuss with their doctors. A 2013 study found that women who had undergone cesarean delivery were more likely to receive an in-hospital endometriosis diagnosis. They also found a […]
Pregnancy / Obstetrics Women's Health / Gynecology
Vulvar varicosities: What to know about varicose veins on the vulva
A vulvar varicosity is a varicose vein in or around the vulva. This type of vein tends to occur in women during pregnancy, and many women with vulvar varicosities also have varicose veins elsewhere. In this article, we look at the causes and symptoms of vulvar varicosities, as well as treatment options if they do […]
Is hair loss a side effect of Adderall?
Adderall is a combination of the stimulant drugs amphetamine and dextroamphetamine. Doctors prescribe it for the treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and narcolepsy, and they sometimes use it off-label for other conditions. Although taking Adderall can cause hair loss in some people, this is a relatively uncommon side effect. Some people misuse Adderall […]
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Helena Geirinhas Ramos
Helena Geirinhas Ramos received the Ing., M.Sc. and PhD. Degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), Technical University of Lisbon in 1980, 1987, 1995 and 2005 respectively. She is Associate Professor in IST where she is a faculty member since 1980. She is Senior Researcher at Instituto de Telecomunicações (IT). Her research areas include non destructive testing, transducers, measurement interfaces, ADC testing and ferromagnetic materials modelling. She is author or co-author of 3 book chapters, 49 scientific papers in international journals and more than 160 conference proceeding papers. She has supervised 6 PhD thesis, more than 40 Master thesis and internship supervisions and participated in several national and international academic juries. Presently, she is Vice-president of IST Scientific Board and as the most significant management positions that she has already exercised one can refer Member of IST Board of Directors, Vice-President of the Electrical and Computer Department, Director of IT. She acts regularly as an expert evaluator for the European Commission and other international funding agencies.
Curriculum Vitae here.
Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), Technical University of Lisbon
hgramos@ist.utl.pt
I&M AdCom (2017-2020), Treasurer (2019); IEEE Joseph F. Keithley Award in Instrumentation & Measurement Committee Member (2017-2018)
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Signature Bank Reports 2015 First Quarter Results 85 KB
Signature Bank Reports 2015 First Quarter Results
Net Income for the 2015 First Quarter Reached a Record $83.4 Million, or $1.64 Diluted Earnings Per Share, An Increase of $17.4 Million, or 26.3 Percent, from $66.0 Million, or $1.37 Diluted Earnings Per Share, Reported in the 2014 First Quarter.
Total Deposits in the First Quarter Grew $1.41 Billion to $24.03 Billion, Including Core Deposit Growth of $1.11 Billion; Total Deposits Have Grown $5.72 Billion, or 31.2 Percent, Since the End of the 2014 First Quarter
Average Deposits Increased $1.24 Billion, or 5.6 Percent, in the 2015 First Quarter
For the 2015 First Quarter, Loans Increased a Record $1.44 Billion, or 8.1 Percent, to $19.30 Billion. Since the End of the 2014 First Quarter, Loans Have Increased 35.7 Percent, or $5.08 Billion
Non-Accrual Loans were $27.8 Million, or 0.14 Percent of Total Loans, at March 31, 2015, Versus $21.0 Million, or 0.12 Percent, at the End of the 2014 Fourth Quarter and $36.2 Million, or 0.25 Percent, at the End of the 2014 First Quarter
Net Interest Margin was 3.26 Percent, Compared with 3.23 Percent for the 2014 Fourth Quarter and 3.39 Percent for the 2014 First Quarter. Core Net Interest Margin Excluding Loan Prepayment Penalty Income Increased Four Basis Points to 3.17 Percent, Compared with 3.13 Percent for the 2014 Fourth Quarter. Approximately Two Basis Points of the Linked-Quarter Increases in Both Overall and Core Margins Were Partly Due to Two Less Days in the 2015 First Quarter
Tier 1 Leverage, Common Equity Tier 1 Risk-Based, Tier 1 Risk-Based, and Total Risk-Based Capital Ratios were 9.25 Percent, 12.27 Percent, 12.27 Percent, and 13.08 Percent, Respectively, at March 31, 2015. Signature Bank Remains Significantly Above FDIC "Well Capitalized" Standards. Tangible Common Equity Ratio was 9.16 Percent
Three Private Client Banking Teams Joined During the 2015 First Quarter
NEW YORK CITY--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Signature Bank (Nasdaq: SBNY), a New York-based full-service commercial bank, today announced results for its first quarter ended March 31, 2015.
Net income for the 2015 first quarter reached a record $83.4 million, or $1.64 diluted earnings per share, versus $66.0 million, or $1.37 diluted earnings per share, for the 2014 first quarter. The record net income for the 2015 first quarter, versus the comparable quarter last year, is primarily due to an increase in net interest income, fueled by strong deposit growth and record loan growth. These factors were partially offset by an increase in non-interest expense.
Net interest income for the 2015 first quarter reached $222.5 million, up $36.0 million, or 19.3 percent, when compared with the 2014 first quarter. This increase is primarily due to growth in average interest-earning assets. Total assets reached $28.59 billion at March 31, 2015, an increase of $5.48 billion, or 23.7 percent, from $23.10 billion at March 31, 2014. Average assets for the 2015 first quarter reached $27.98 billion, an increase of $5.28 billion, or 23.3 percent, compared with the 2014 first quarter.
Deposits for the 2015 first quarter rose $1.41 billion, or 6.2 percent, to $24.03 billion at March 31, 2015. When compared with deposits at March 31, 2014, overall deposit growth for the last twelve months was 31.2 percent, or $5.72 billion. Excluding short-term escrow and brokered deposits of $3.38 billion at the end of the 2015 first quarter and $3.08 billion at year-end 2014, core deposits increased $1.11 billion for the quarter. Average deposits for the 2015 first quarter reached $23.38 billion, an increase of $1.24 billion, or 5.6 percent.
"2015 is off to an outstanding start as we again set records in both earnings and loan growth while also delivering very strong deposit growth," stated Joseph J. DePaolo, President and Chief Executive Officer.
"Equally important is the continuation of our investment in the future of this institution. To date this year, we added three private client banking teams that bring significant experience to the Bank, demonstrating the vast opportunity that continues to exist in the marketplace we serve. We remain hungry for further expansion of our network through additional talent acquisition. We have consistently proven that the veteran bankers we are attracting prefer and thrive in the single-point-of-contact business model and culture found here. Now, with 95 private client banking teams serving our growing clientele base, we are excited about the contributions they will make in the coming year and look forward to identifying more opportunities to onboard other talent," DePaolo explained.
Scott A. Shay, Chairman of the Board, commented: "We are frequently asked when the law of large numbers will begin to affect Signature Bank. However, our business momentum continues to grow due to the network effect, which is the strength of our private client banking teams. The Bank is gaining further traction from our organic growth and relationship-based business model, resulting from our commitment to service and safety. Many new companies become clients because they are continually hearing about the level, quality and consistency of our service from their colleagues and friends. Once they become clients, they then wonder why they waited so long to move to Signature Bank. The word is spreading quickly that banking at Signature Bank is truly a different experience than banking elsewhere. Within the niche market to which we cater -- privately owned businesses -- we have solidified our position as the bank of choice."
The Bank's Tier 1 leverage, common equity Tier 1 risk-based, Tier 1 risk-based, and total risk-based capital ratios were approximately 9.25 percent, 12.27 percent, 12.27 percent, and 13.08 percent, respectively, as of March 31, 2015. Each of these ratios is well in excess of regulatory requirements. The Bank's strong risk-based capital ratios reflect the relatively low risk profile of the Bank's balance sheet. The Bank's tangible common equity ratio remains strong at 9.16 percent. The Bank defines tangible common equity ratio as the ratio of tangible common equity to adjusted tangible assets and calculates this ratio by dividing total consolidated common shareholders' equity by consolidated total assets.
Net interest income for the 2015 first quarter was $222.5 million, an increase of $36.0 million, or 19.3 percent, versus the same period last year, primarily due to growth in average interest-earning assets. Average interest-earning assets of $27.68 billion for the 2015 first quarter represent an increase of $5.35 billion, or 24.0 percent, from the 2014 first quarter. Yield on interest-earning assets for the 2015 first quarter decreased 20 basis points, to 3.72 percent, compared with the 2014 first quarter. This decrease was primarily attributable to prolonged low interest rates.
Average cost of deposits and average cost of funds for the first quarter of 2015 decreased by six and seven basis points, respectively, versus the 2014 first quarter to 0.43 percent and 0.50 percent. These decreases were predominantly due to prolonged low interest rates.
Net interest margin for the 2015 first quarter was 3.26 percent versus 3.39 percent reported in the same period a year ago. On a linked quarter basis, net interest margin increased three basis points. Excluding loan prepayment penalties in both quarters, linked quarter core margin increased four basis points to 3.17 percent. Approximately two basis points of the respective linked quarter increases were due to two less days in the 2015 first quarter.
The Bank's provision for loan losses for the first quarter of 2015 was $7.9 million, compared with $7.6 million for the 2014 fourth quarter and $8.2 million for the 2014 first quarter.
Net charge offs for the 2015 first quarter were $1.5 million, or 0.03 percent, of average loans on an annualized basis, versus net recoveries of $181,000, or 0.00 percent, for the 2014 fourth quarter and net recoveries of $244,000, or 0.01 percent, for the 2014 first quarter.
Non-interest income for the 2015 first quarter was $10.1 million, up $3.0 million when compared with $7.2 million reported in the 2014 first quarter. The increase was led by a $2.7 million increase in net gains on sales of loans predominantly from our SBA pool assembly business.
Non-interest expense for the first quarter of 2015 was $81.7 million, an increase of $11.7 million, or 16.7 percent, versus $70.0 million reported in the 2014 first quarter. The increase was primarily a result of the addition of new private client banking teams and our continued investment in Signature Financial, as well as an increase in costs in our risk management and compliance related activities.
The Bank's efficiency ratio improved to 35.1 percent for the 2015 first quarter versus 36.2 percent for the comparable period last year. The improvement was primarily due to growth in net interest income.
Loans, excluding loans held for sale, grew a record $1.44 billion, or 8.1 percent, during the first quarter of 2015 to $19.30 billion, compared with $17.86 billion at December 31, 2014. At March 31, 2015, loans accounted for 67.5 percent of total assets, versus 65.4 percent at the end of the 2014 fourth quarter and 61.5 percent at the end of 2014 first quarter. Average loans, excluding loans held for sale, reached $18.43 billion in the 2015 first quarter, growing $1.37 billion, or 8.1 percent, from the 2014 fourth quarter and $4.63 billion, or 33.5 percent, from the 2014 first quarter. The increase in loans for the first quarter was primarily driven by growth in commercial real estate and multi-family loans.
At March 31, 2015, non-accrual loans were $27.8 million, representing 0.14 percent of total loans and 0.10 percent of total assets, compared with non-accrual loans of $21.0 million, or 0.12 percent of total loans, at December 31, 2014 and $36.2 million, or 0.25 percent of total loans, at March 31, 2014. The ratio of allowance for loan and lease losses to total loans at March 31, 2015 was 0.88 percent, versus 0.92 percent at December 31, 2014 and 1.01 percent at March 31, 2014. Additionally, the ratio of allowance for loan and lease losses to non-accrual loans, or the coverage ratio, was 614 percent for the 2015 first quarter versus 783 percent for the fourth quarter of 2014 and 396 percent for the 2014 first quarter.
Signature Bank's management will host a conference call to review results of the 2015 first quarter on Tuesday, April 21, 2015, at 10:00 AM ET. All participants should dial 866-359-8135 at least ten minutes prior to the start of the call and reference conference ID #22573423. International callers should dial 901-300-3484.
To hear a live web simulcast or to listen to the archived web cast following completion of the call, please visit the Bank's web site at www.signatureny.com, click on "Investor Information," then under "Company News," select "Conference Calls," to access the link to the call. To listen to a telephone replay of the conference call, please dial 800-585-8367 or 404-537-3406 and enter conference ID #22573423. The replay will be available from approximately 1:00 PM ET on Tuesday, April 21, 2015 through 11:59 PM ET on Friday, April 24, 2015.
Signature Bank, member FDIC, is a New York-based full-service commercial bank with 29 private client offices throughout the New York metropolitan area, including those in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Westchester, Long Island, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island and Connecticut. The Bank's growing network of private client banking teams serves the needs of privately owned businesses, their owners and senior managers.
Signature Bank offers a wide variety of business and personal banking products and services. Its specialty finance subsidiary, Signature Financial, LLC, provides equipment finance and leasing as well as transportation and taxi medallion financing. Signature Securities Group Corporation, a wholly owned Bank subsidiary, is a licensed broker-dealer, investment adviser and member FINRA/SIPC, offering investment, brokerage, asset management and insurance products and services.
Signature Bank was named the Best Bank in America by Forbes for 2015 and the only large cap bank to appear on Forbes' list of America's 50 Most Trustworthy Financial Companies. Signature Bank also was voted Best Business Bank by the New York Law Journal in the publication's fifth annual reader survey; named the nation's fifth top-performing bank by ABA Banking Journal; and ranked seventh on Bank Director magazine's 2014 Bank Performance Scorecard for banks with assets between $5 and $50 billion.
This press release and oral statements made from time to time by our representatives contain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 that are subject to risks and uncertainties. You should not place undue reliance on those statements because they are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties relating to our operations and business environment, all of which are difficult to predict and may be beyond our control. Forward-looking statements include information concerning our future results, interest rates and the interest rate environment, loan and deposit growth, loan performance, operations, new private client teams and other hires, new office openings and business strategy. These statements often include words such as "may," "believe," "expect," "anticipate," "intend," "potential," "opportunity," "could," "project," "seek," "should," "will," would," "plan," "estimate" or other similar expressions. As you consider forward-looking statements, you should understand that these statements are not guarantees of performance or results. They involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements and can change as a result of many possible events or factors, not all of which are known to us or in our control. These factors include but are not limited to: (i) prevailing economic conditions; (ii) changes in interest rates, loan demand, real estate values and competition, any of which can materially affect origination levels and gain on sale results in our business, as well as other aspects of our financial performance, including earnings on interest-bearing assets; (iii) the level of defaults, losses and prepayments on loans made by us, whether held in portfolio or sold in the whole loan secondary markets, which can materially affect charge-off levels and required credit loss reserve levels; (iv) changes in monetary and fiscal policies of the U.S. Government, including policies of the U.S. Treasury and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System; (v) changes in the banking and other financial services regulatory environment and (vi) competition for qualified personnel and desirable office locations. Although we believe that these forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, beliefs and expectations, if a change occurs or our beliefs, assumptions and expectations were incorrect, our business, financial condition, liquidity or results of operations may vary materially from those expressed in our forward-looking statements. Additional risks are described in our quarterly and annual reports filed with the FDIC. You should keep in mind that any forward-looking statements made by Signature Bank speak only as of the date on which they were made. New risks and uncertainties come up from time to time, and we cannot predict these events or how they may affect the Bank. Signature Bank has no duty to, and does not intend to, update or revise the forward-looking statements after the date on which they are made. In light of these risks and uncertainties, you should keep in mind that any forward-looking statement made in this release or elsewhere might not reflect actual results.
FINANCIAL TABLES ATTACHED
Three months ended March 31,
Loans held for sale $ 596 943
Loans and leases, net 185,763 148,167
Securities available-for-sale 49,236 47,929
Securities held-to-maturity 17,078 17,315
Other short-term investments 1,289 1,414
Total interest income 253,962 215,768
Deposits 24,817 21,671
agreements to repurchase 3,721 4,420
Federal Home Loan Bank advances 2,927 3,209
Total interest expense 31,465 29,300
Net interest income before provision for loan and lease losses 222,497 186,468
Provision for loan and lease losses 7,887 8,188
Net interest income after provision for loan and lease losses 214,610 178,280
Commissions 2,553 2,534
Fees and service charges 5,021 4,457
Net gains on sales of securities 418 445
Net gains on sales of loans 3,467 743
Total impairment losses on securities (933 ) (1,475 )
Portion recognized in other comprehensive income (before taxes) 592 857
Net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings (341 ) (618 )
Other losses (969 ) (391 )
Total non-interest income 10,149 7,170
Salaries and benefits 55,077 46,417
Occupancy and equipment 5,926 5,239
Data processing 3,961 3,692
FDIC assessment fees 3,813 2,887
Professional fees 2,934 2,064
Other general and administrative 9,987 9,737
Total non-interest expense 81,698 70,036
Net income $ 83,390 66,007
Earnings per share - basic $ 1.66 1.39
Earnings per share - diluted $ 1.64 1.37
March 31, December 31,
Cash and due from banks $ 232,515 274,247
Total cash and cash equivalents 258,286 299,078
Securities available-for-sale 6,229,905 6,073,459
Securities held-to-maturity (fair value $2,251,879 at March 31, 2015
Loans and leases, net 19,128,824 17,693,316
Non-interest-bearing $ 7,353,419 7,064,959
Interest-bearing 16,672,155 15,555,316
Total deposits 24,025,574 22,620,275
Federal Home Loan Bank advances 1,220,163 1,335,163
Accrued expenses and other liabilities 153,512 151,964
none issued at March 31, 2015 and December 31, 2014 - -
51,738,170 shares issued and 50,669,910 shares outstanding at March 31, 2015;
51,398,685 shares issued and 50,317,609 shares outstanding at December 31, 2014 507 503
Retained earnings 1,217,340 1,133,950
Net unrealized gains on securities, net of tax 38,538 13,124
Total shareholders' equity 2,619,942 2,496,238
(in thousands, except ratios and per share amounts) March 31,
Net income - basic $ 1.66 $ 1.62 $ 1.39
Net income - diluted $ 1.64 $ 1.60 $ 1.37
Average shares outstanding - basic 50,352 50,316 47,318
Average shares outstanding - diluted 50,892 50,936 48,170
Book value $ 51.71 $ 49.61 $ 40.17
Return on average total assets 1.21% 1.20% 1.18%
Return on average shareholders' equity 13.22% 13.19% 14.42%
Efficiency ratio (1) 35.12% 34.05% 36.17%
in earnings (1) (2)
Yield on interest-earning assets 3.72% 3.71% 3.92%
Cost of deposits and borrowings 0.50% 0.53% 0.57%
Net interest margin 3.26% 3.23% 3.39%
(1) The efficiency ratio is calculated by dividing non-interest expense by the sum of net interest income before provision for loan and lease losses and non-interest income.
(2) The efficiency ratio excluding net gains on sales of securities and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings is considered to be a non-GAAP financial measure and should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for or superior to, financial measures determined in accordance with GAAP. This ratio is a metric used by management to evaluate the performance of the Bank's core business activities.
Tangible common equity (3) 9.16% 9.14% 8.28%
Tier 1 leverage 9.25% 9.25% 8.51%
Common equity Tier 1 risk-based (4) 12.27% - -
Tier 1 risk-based 12.27% 13.49% 14.05%
Total risk-based 13.08% 14.39% 15.10%
Non-accrual loans $ 27,809 $ 21,008 $ 36,209
Allowance for loan and lease losses $ 170,776 $ 164,392 $ 143,503
Allowance for loan and lease losses to non-accrual loans 614.10% 782.52% 396.32%
Allowance for loan and lease losses to total loans 0.88% 0.92% 1.01%
Non-accrual loans to total loans 0.14% 0.12% 0.25%
Quarterly net (charge-offs) recoveries to average loans,
(0.03)% 0.00% 0.01%
(3) We define tangible common equity as the ratio of tangible common equity to adjusted tangible assets (the "TCE ratio") and calculate this ratio by dividing total consolidated common shareholders' equity by consolidated total assets (we had no intangible assets at any of the dates presented above). Tangible common equity is considered to be a non-GAAP financial measure and should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for or superior to, financial measures determined in accordance with GAAP. The TCE ratio is a metric used by management to evaluate the adequacy of our capital levels. In addition to tangible common equity, management uses other metrics, such as Tier 1 capital related ratios, to evaluate capital levels.
As part of the final rules implementing Basel III regulatory capital reforms, a new common equity Tier 1 risk-based capital ratio was added to existing minimum capital requirements as of January 1, 2015.
Short-term investments $ 478,015 289 0.25% 172,502 96 0.23%
Investment securities 8,565,277 67,314 3.14% 8,010,439 66,562 3.32%
Commercial loans, mortgages and leases 18,099,019 182,631 4.09% 13,457,376 144,803 4.36%
Residential mortgages and consumer loans 334,845 3,132 3.79% 349,544 3,364 3.90%
Loans held for sale 205,406 596 1.18% 337,957 943 1.13%
Total interest-earning assets 27,682,562 253,962 3.72% 22,327,818 215,768 3.92%
NOW and interest-bearing demand $ 1,777,131 1,720 0.39% 950,106 898 0.38%
Money market 13,452,848 20,318 0.61% 10,274,993 17,600 0.69%
Time deposits 962,796 2,779 1.17% 1,217,253 3,173 1.06%
Non-interest-bearing demand deposits 7,190,660 - - 5,331,071 - -
Total deposits 23,383,435 24,817 0.43% 17,773,423 21,671 0.49%
Borrowings 1,898,829 6,648 1.42% 2,929,546 7,629 1.06%
Total deposits and borrowings 25,282,264 31,465 0.50% 20,702,969 29,300 0.57%
and shareholders' equity 2,695,593 1,993,148
Net interest income / interest rate spread 222,497 3.22% 186,468 3.35%
Net interest margin 3.26% 3.39%
to average interest-bearing liabilities 109.49% 107.85%
Management believes that the presentation of certain non-GAAP financial measures assists investors when comparing results period-to-period in a more consistent manner and provides a better measure of Signature Bank's results. These non-GAAP measures include the Bank's (i) net income and diluted earnings per share excluding the after tax effect of net gains on sales of securities and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings, (ii) tangible common equity ratio, (iii) efficiency ratio excluding net gains on sales of securities and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings, and (iv) core net interest margin excluding loan prepayment penalty income. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for GAAP-basis measures and results. We strongly encourage investors to review our consolidated financial statements in their entirety and not to rely on any single financial measure. Because non-GAAP financial measures are not standardized, it may not be possible to compare these financial measures with other companies' non-GAAP financial measures having the same or similar names.
The following table presents a reconciliation of net income and diluted earnings per share (as reported) to net income and diluted earnings per share excluding the after tax effect of gains from the sales of securities and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings:
Net income (as reported) $ 83,390 66,007
Net gains on sales of securities (418 ) (445 )
Net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings 341 618
Tax effect 32 (74 )
Net income - excluding after tax effect of net gains on sales of securities
and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings $ 83,345 66,106
Diluted earnings per share (as reported) $ 1.64 1.37
Net gains on sales of securities (0.01 ) (0.01 )
Net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings 0.01 0.01
Tax effect - -
Diluted earnings per share - excluding after tax effect of net gains on sales of securities
and net impairment losses on securities recognized in earnings $ 1.64 1.37
The following table reconciles net interest margin (as reported) to core net interest margin excluding loan prepayment penalty income:
Net interest margin (as reported) 3.26% 3.39%
Margin contribution from loan prepayment penalty income (0.09)% (0.14)%
Core net interest margin - excluding loan prepayment penalty income 3.17% 3.25%
Executive Vice President - Corporate & Business Development
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January 22, 2018 by Shreya Mukhopadhyay
India: Changing the tone on menstruation
The manifold disadvantages and discrimination continue to plague women in many parts of the world. Women are still regarded to be objects of repression in various countries especially India. Despite stringent laws for the protection of women, they continue to be the victims of violence and harassment. Be it in terms of access to education, access to equal economic opportunity or even access to basic health care services, women continue to face discrimination from laws, social norms or customs linked to stereotypes mostly in rural areas.
Image source: Medical Daily
Among these, one of the least talked about aspect remains women’s access to menstrual health care. Menarche is the beginning of a woman’s journey to motherhood. But in India, especially rural India, rather than celebrating, it is considered a taboo to even discuss it. Superstitions and cultural taboos associated with periods have persisted at the cost of women’s health and safety. Practices of not letting menstruating women enter places of worship or fetch water in rural areas as that would impure the sources are still prevalent. Most of the women in rural areas use unhygienic products such as wood shavings, sand, ash or dirty cloth. Many women stuffed their undergarments with sand, leaves or ashes during their monthly periods because there was lack awareness or sanitary napkins were unaffordable or even worse they were inaccessible. This in turn results in women suffering from numerous episodes of vaginal infections which often lead to reproductive tract infection and a host of other diseases. Lack of sanitary products also causes girls to stay home from school and keeps women out of the informal labour workforce.
Limited access and acceptance in India comes coupled with the issue of disposal. Disposal of sanitary products is another important issue, both from a waste management and a cultural perspective. Even under the current government’s procurement system of sanitary pads in national health programs, the quality requirement for tenders is outdated.
Inadequate sanitation facilities act as a hindrance to growth and impact. Women find it difficult to replace napkins or wash in privacy given the lack of proper and clean toilets. All these act as impediments. Studies have shown girls lack water, soap, privacy, and space to change adequate time to manage their menses comfortably, safely, and with dignity and hygienic sanitary products and sometimes underwear.
As per the latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4), 2015-16, rural Madhya Pradesh fares the worst in the country in menstrual health management, with only 26.4 per cent of women between the ages of 15 and 24 using hygienic methods. There is extreme reluctance among girls and their families to approach health centers for any sort of counselling or medical help.
The 12% GST on sanitary napkins have spurred heated debates and widespread anger among various sections of the society. This has led to mass participation and demonstrations against the current government’s move. But activists often miss out that is not about taxation rather about the product categorization. Sanitary pads are put under “miscellaneous items” (the same category in which pencils and crayons are also placed). An essential commodity and hygiene product like sanitary pad should ideally come under “health”.
Again, lack of good menstrual hygiene practices cannot be replaced by a non-biodegradable disposable product, that is, sanitary pads made of plastic. Tampons and menstrual cups carry with them the skepticism of inserting foreign material in the body.
Action Taken by Government and Policy Makers:
Governments have begun to address menstrual hygiene as a key issue in women’s health and education. International organizations such as the World Bank, UNESCO, UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO), and others have started including menstrual hygiene management, including the provision of sanitary products, in their research and support to governments.
The “MHM in Ten” initiative was organized by Columbia University and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in New York City in October 2014 to systematically map out a ten-year agenda for overcoming the menstrual hygiene management (MHM)-related barriers facing schoolgirls.
Governments are being encouraged to subsidize pads and even distributing them for free amongst girl children of various schools in rural areas. The Indian government in 2010 started the Menstrual Hygiene Scheme under which highly subsidized sanitary napkins are given to girls in rural areas below the poverty line. The state governments too followed similar initiatives. Scheme for promotion of menstrual hygiene has rolled out in 17 states in 1092 blocks through Central supply of ‘Freedays’ sanitary napkins.
Possible solutions/changes-
For Indian women, menstruation is much more than biological; it is a way of perpetuating gender discrimination. Many girls receive factually incorrect or no guidance prior to menarche about the normal physiological process of menstruation or its management. This in turn results in numerous misconceptions about their own fertility, creating vulnerability to adolescent pregnancy. Lack of scientific understanding about menstruation, rampant myths and misconceptions coupled with limited or no access to hygienic menstrual products result in some of the biggest problems crippling the women in rural India. Combining menstrual hygiene education and the sale of sanitary products allow addressing the cultural taboos and misconceptions, eventually leading to the breaking of gendered stereotypes.
Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) guidelines of the government concentrate on spreading awareness and removing the taboo around menstruation. The majority of existing efforts aimed at addressing MHM have emerged from the WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) community, yet the WASH sector alone cannot advance the MHM agenda in schools. Including menstrual hygiene in national sanitation and hygiene strategies and school health policies is an important step toward improving awareness of feminine hygiene products.
India has one of the lowest levels of penetration of sanitary pad usage in the world. More startups are wanted to address the issue of affordability and accessibility. A bunch of local ventures is looking to build viable feminine care businesses. Saral Design, founded by four IIT Bombay graduates, is one such company. By using the ASHA workers in rural India, Saral is establishing a door-to-door sales network. Their objective is to tap on the areas where inaccessibility is an issue. These women took on the role of ambassadors of menstrual health in their villages where they are seeking first-time converts. Soothe Healthcare is another venture to receive funding from Vini Healthcare and are reaching out to the mass market with their brand Paree.
Vatsalya Foundation developed sanitary pad manufacturing unit that were hygienic and low cost using wood pulp to absorb menstrual flow. They further involved the Sakhi Mandals (Women Self Help Groups) to increase women participation. This also allowed for viable livelihood options. Project Baala decided on manufacturing environment friendly sanitary pads to be distributed in the villages. The pad is made of three layers of cloth stitched together, is reusable and can be used for a period of 1.5 to 2 years. They conduct workshops too in order to create awareness among public, especially women.
Manufacturing of sanitary napkins in rural areas using local products widens reach and reduces cost too. Women’s involvement in this value chain at every step also ensure production and selling of pads themselves. Women’s productivity at home and work rises with their access to menstrual health care. Some models, such as Aakar Innovation, Azadi produce compostable products which disintegrate quickly. This helps in addressing the environmental issues. It is also important to ensure toilet with running water facility and proper pad disposal facilities are available to the women and girls.
It is crucial to build collaboration and strengthen research capacity across countries and regions of the world on menstrual health management and indentify or foster new menstrual hygiene experts and actors. As far as taxation is concerned, tax and health policy should be intertwined. The policies should ensure impact of tax on less affluent consumers is lower, keeping in mind social and economic objective. It is important to make sanitary napkins a health product. The proper access to menstrual health care is important to ensure high rate of girl student drop outs. The importance of proper quality check is equally essential.
Women are not always comfortable buying napkins from the pharmaceutical shops due to the prevalent taboos and cultural norms. A simple change in a lifestyle habit can often change social indicators. Providing sanitary napkin is one aspect of it, we need to look at the issue through a larger lens of access, awareness and affordability. It is important thus to go beyond the problem in providing sanitary napkin. There are communities even today who believe menstruation is a curse to girls and a health problem. Good menstrual hygiene practices needs to be talked about and discussed in the open for the sake of economic and environmental sustainability and health. It is also vital to bring global and local expertise together in order to coordinate progress and share outcomes.
Men too need to be involved in this process. Many issues like proper functioning toilets, access to safe private spaces and clean water need to be ensured, even at the household level, to allow the rural women a decent shot at having a healthy reproductive life and beyond. Menstrual health management is crucial for educational and health reasons. There is a need for greater representation of government representatives, youth voices, and sanitary napkin manufacturers to address this.
Shreya Mukhopadhyay
Intern at InPRA
Shreya is a final year undergraduate of the Political Science, International Relations department, from Jadavpur University.
She has previously interned at organizations like OneWorld Women Network, Child Rights and You, and Daricha Foundation.
Shreya takes active interest in Model United Nations simulation and has done research related to gender rights.
She is a firm believer of gender parity and passionate about working in this field.
Latest posts by Shreya Mukhopadhyay (see all)
Sex workers in India - April 9, 2018
India: Changing the tone on menstruation - January 22, 2018
More in India
India’s position in a changing Afghan landscape April 16, 2018
Sex workers in India April 9, 2018
Paving the road to Kabul January 29, 2018
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Home » General • Pictures • Women's apparel » Full House’ Reboot Is Officially Happening
Full House’ Reboot Is Officially Happening
‘Full House’ Here Are the Details As it Appears In ABC News
The original series – which aired from 1987 to 1995 on ABC – featured widower Danny Tanner (Saget)
raising his daughters with the help of brother-in-law Jesse and best friend Joey (Coulier).
Executive producers Robert L. Boyett, Thomas L. Miller and Jeff Franklin reflected on the series’
enduring popularity in the statement released by Netflix.
Prepare to catch up with D.J., Stephanie and Kimmy in 2016.
Details about the rumored “Full House” reboot were revealed in a press release by Netflix and actor John Stamos’
Monday appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”
The reboot – titled “Fuller House” – will star Candace Cameron Bure, Jodie Sweetin and Andrea Barber, with Stamos
(Uncle Jesse on the original series) set to produce and guest star. According to the statement, discussions with additional
“Full House” cast members Bob Saget, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, Dave Coulier and Lori Loughlin are ongoing.
At this point, 13 episodes of the series have been ordered.
“Fuller House” picks up with D.J. (Cameron Bure), a pregnant and recently widowed veterinarian,
living in San Francisco. But D.J. needs help taking care of her children, 12-year-old J.D. and 7-year-old Max,
along with the soon-to-arrive baby. Enter her sister – Stephanie Tanner (Sweetin), an aspiring musician –
and best friend Kimmy Gibbler (Barber), along with Kimmy’s teenage daughter Ramona, who all move in together.
“The continued support of Full House fans of all ages for the last 28 years has been astounding,
” the producers said. “It is an honor and a thrill to catch up with these beloved characters
and explore their lives today. The love you saw on the show was real. The cast has remained a
loving family off screen all these years. We are as excited as our fans to finally bring Full House back to life.”
Stamos revealed further details about the project on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”
“It stars sort of as a reunion and then spins off into this … spin-off,” Stamos said.
“It’s a labor of love, and we’ve been literally trying for years to do it right, and I think we finally got it perfect.”
Kimmel asked if Saget will be on the show.
“He better be,” Stamos said.
And the Olsen twins?
“If we can’t get the Olsen twins, we’re going to dress you up,” Stamos told Kimmel.
Credit : ABC News.go.com
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Research ArticleArticle
Reproducibility and Variability of Protein Analytes Measured Using a Multiplexed Modified Aptamer Assay
Adrienne Tin, Bing Yu, Jianzhong Ma, Kunihiro Masushita, Natalie Daya, Ron C. Hoogeveen, Christie M. Ballantyne, David Couper, Casey M. Rebholz, Morgan E. Grams, Alvaro Alonso, Thomas Mosley, Gerardo Heiss, Peter Ganz, Elizabeth Selvin, Eric Boerwinkle, Josef Coresh
DOI: 10.1373/jalm.2018.027086 Published January 2019
Adrienne Tin
Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MDWelch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore MD
For correspondence: atin1@jhu.edu
Bing Yu
Department of Epidemiology, Human Genetics and Environmental Sciences, School of Public Health, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, TX
Jianzhong Ma
Kunihiro Masushita
Natalie Daya
Ron C. Hoogeveen
Section of Cardiovascular Research, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston TX
Christie M. Ballantyne
David Couper
Department of Biostatistics, Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Casey M. Rebholz
Morgan E. Grams
Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MDDivision of Nephrology, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
Alvaro Alonso
Department of Epidemiology, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Atlanta, GA
Thomas Mosley
Department of Neurology, The University of Mississippi Medical Center, Jackson, MS
Gerardo Heiss
Department of Epidemiology, Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Peter Ganz
Division of Cardiology, San Francisco General Hospital, University of California, San Francisco, CA
Elizabeth Selvin
Eric Boerwinkle
Department of Epidemiology, Human Genetics and Environmental Sciences, School of Public Health, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, TXHuman Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX.
Josef Coresh
jalm.2018.027086
https://doi.org/10.1373/jalm.2018.027086
The Journal of Applied Laboratory Medicine
Received May 16, 2018
Accepted November 5, 2018
Published online January 22, 2019.
You are currently viewing a Latest version of this article (January 22, 2019 - 09:17).
View the most recent version of this article
Adrienne Tin1,2,*,†,
Bing Yu3,†,
Jianzhong Ma3,
Kunihiro Masushita1,2,
Natalie Daya1,2,
Ron C. Hoogeveen4,
Christie M. Ballantyne4,
David Couper5,
Casey M. Rebholz1,2,
Morgan E. Grams1,6,
Alvaro Alonso7,
Thomas Mosley8,
Gerardo Heiss9,
Peter Ganz10,
Elizabeth Selvin1,2,
Eric Boerwinkle3,11 and
Josef Coresh1,2
1Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD
2Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology and Clinical Research, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore MD
3Department of Epidemiology, Human Genetics and Environmental Sciences, School of Public Health, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, TX
4Section of Cardiovascular Research, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston TX
5Department of Biostatistics, Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
6Division of Nephrology, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
7Department of Epidemiology, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Atlanta, GA
8Department of Neurology, The University of Mississippi Medical Center, Jackson, MS
9Department of Epidemiology, Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
10Division of Cardiology, San Francisco General Hospital, University of California, San Francisco, CA
11Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX.
↵*Address correspondence to this author at: 615 N Wolfe Street, W6017, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205. Fax 410-955-0863; e-mail atin1{at}jhu.edu.
The Journal of Applied Laboratory Medicine Jan 2019, jalm.2018.027086; DOI: 10.1373/jalm.2018.027086
Comparison of Urine Antigen Assays for the Diagnosis of Histoplasma capsulatum Infection
Comparison of 3 Nucleic Acid Amplification Tests and a Rapid Antigen Test with Culture for the Detection of Group A Streptococci from Throat Swabs
Kinetic Approach Extends the Analytical Measurement Range and Corrects Antigen Excess in Homogeneous Turbidimetric Immunoassays
Show more Article
Proteomics and Protein Markers
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Here’s what classic movie you should watch, based on your zodiac sign
Posted on November 20, 2018 by admin in Zodiac Signs ‘N Secrets
Sometimes you just don’t want to watch a movie based on a comic book, reboot, or three-quel. No, sometimes you just want to go back to basics and watch a classic movie. But since there are so many classic movies out there, which one should you choose to add to your Netflix queue? Thankfully, you can turn to the stars for guidance and choose a classic movie based on your zodiac sign.
Whether you’re a big rom-com fan or prefer a feel-good drama, there are a number of must-sees out there for you. But with such a long list of titles — some of which might sound unfamiliar — it’s easy to get overwhelmed with the choices. Should you make it a Scorsese or Spielberg night? Luckily, you can let your zodiac sign do the choosing for you — at least to get you started.
Here’s the classic movie you should watch based on your zodiac sign:
Since Aries is a fire sign, you naturally like movies that let you channel your aggressive and passionate energy, which is why you’d prefer a high-energy thriller like Martin Scorcese’s Goodfellas. Nominated for a boatload of Oscars and starring Robert DeNiro, the film about the high-stakes Italian American crime syndicate, aka the Mafia, is your go-to.
Taurses love to laze around on the couch and have anything light, frothy, and super funny distract them from their own reality. You’ll love the comedy Some Like It Hot, starring Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon as two musicians posing as women to escape from the mob. Marilyn Monroe co-stars and is, of course, perfect.
Geminis love anything that keeps their minds moving, so they’ll enjoy a good mystery or thriller with a twisty plot. Cue the Alfred Hitchcock classic North By Northwest, starring Cary Grant as a man who’s mistaken for a government spy.
Cancers prefer anything that is light on the drama and heavy on the glitz, glam, and feel-good vibes. If you haven’t watched My Fair Lady starring Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Doolittle in a musical version of Pygmalion, you haven’t experienced life yet.
Leos secretly (or not) dream of being the star of their own show, which is why they’ll love to catch A Star is Born with Judy Garland, hailed by many as the greatest musical of all time. (P.S. Lady Gaga will star in the remake later this year.)
Virgos prefer to be wowed by anything science fiction or, conversely, anything rooted in reality. Although Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind isn’t exactly based on true events…we don’t know if we’re truly alone, do we?
Libras love anything light-hearted, charming, and filled with love — much like themselves. If that sounds like you, then you need to check out When Harry Met Sally… and then everyone will “want to have what you’re having” (watch the movie, you’ll get it).
The mysterious Scorpio loves anything scary — from gory thrillers to cheesy horror movies — because they actually like to be scared. Which is why if you haven’t watched the Oscar-winning Silence of the Lambs yet, then what are you waiting for?
Sagittarians love, love, and also love anything related to travel and lands far, far away. They’ll adore the fantasy love story The Princess Bride starring Cary Elwes and Robin Wright, and the romance between their respective characters, Westley and Princess Buttercup.
Capricorns are secretly animation lovers. They love the flashy characters, the music, the colors, and the witty dialogue. Watch Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, and see where the Disney magic all started.
Anything that is true to life is what an Aquarius really wants to watch. They love to think while also looking at the world in a different way. Watch Sally Field in Norma Rae, a film about a North Carolina textile factory worker who becomes involved in the labor union activities, and prepare to be inspired.
Pisces are the natural dreamers of the zodiac. They love to escape their reality but also love rainbows, happy endings, and anything that puts a pep in their step. Their go-to movie is obviously The Wizard of Oz.
Pop some popcorn tonight, and enjoy taking in these classic flicks.
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Landscape Photography Reader: Beyond Art & Environment
Fine Art Photography, Wilderness Travel and Conservation Photographers
Philip Hyde CV
PhilipHyde.com
David Leland Hyde CV
HydeFineArt.com
Posts Tagged ‘Photography and America’s National Parks’
Book Review: Picturing America’s National Parks
Book Review: Picturing America’s National Parks by George Eastman Museum Assistant Curator Jamie M. Allen
Cover of “Picturing America’s National Parks” by Jamie M. Allen (2016). (Click on Image to See Larger.)
Landscape Photography Classics and Much More
To accompany the George Eastman Museum exhibition, Photography and America’s National Parks, the Eastman Museum and Aperture Foundation teamed up to publish assistant curator Jamie M. Allen’s new comprehensive book on the history of photography in our nation’s parks called Picturing America’s National Parks.
The George Eastman show, made up of the work of more than 50 photographers from all eras in the history of photography, includes landscape photography greats such as Ansel Adams, Alvin Langdon Coburn, Imogen Cunningham, John K. Hillers, Philip Hyde, William Henry Jackson, the Kolb Brothers, Eadweard J. Muybridge, Eliot Porter, Bradford Washburn, Carleton E. Watkins, Edward Weston and Minor White, as well as a good number of other renowned photographers who also happened to make exposures in the National Parks such as George Eastman, Andreas Feininger, Lee Friedlander, Johan Hagemeyer, Martin Parr, Stephen Shore, Garry Winogrand and others. The exhibition has also turned out to be one of the most popular and prominent museum shows of the year.
You See It “Everywhere”
As such, during the run of the exhibit from June 4 – October 2, 2016, Photography and America’s National Parks has enjoyed significant publicity, while the book, Picturing America’s National Parks, already has attracted even greater press exposure. The exhibition or the book or both were introduced or reviewed in Antiques Magazine, Outdoor Photographer magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Aperture, Real Clear Life, the Rochesteriat, the Nature Conservancy magazine, the Rochester City Newspaper, Smithsonian Magazine, the Wall Street Journal, Fortune Magazine, Museum of Photographic Arts, Visit Rochester, The Atlantic, Tween Tribune, Artsy, Outside Magazine, AnOther magazine, Mother Jones magazine, USA Today, Yahoo News, Slate, Audubon magazine, Artbook, Travel & Leisure magazine, Pop Photo, and many others. The book can be found online to purchase, borrow or to read more reviews at Amazon.com, Aperture Foundation, Target.com, Bookshop.com, eBay, Google Play, Library Resource Finder, Sweet, Abelardo Morell, Schaumburg Library, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art bookshop, Worldcat, Fraser Muggeridge Studio, Loot, LibraryThing, Lenscratch, Photolucida, ALA Booklist, Beyond Words, PDN Online and many, many others too deep in Google search results to track down.
Fascinating, Well-Written and Leavened With Significant Detail
Like her pre-show introductory article in Antiques magazine, assistant Curator Jamie M. Allen’s main essay in the book is well written, smooth flowing and easy to read, yet packed with interesting history of both the national parks and early photography in them. The rest of the book displays the photographs with titles and an accompanying text for each of the featured photographers, interspersed with several paragraphs at a time on various historically relevant points such as the invention of the mass produced Kodak camera, the increase in availability of the automobile, the development of photomechanical and photolithographic postcards for sale at park concessions, 18-by-60-foot Colorama photo advertisements for the national parks, caretakers in the national parks and the National Park Service’s social media campaign #findyourpark.
Interspersed with the images from each major contributor at approximately every 16 pages, a timeline page provides the reader with significant dates in the history of photography and the history of the national parks. These timeline pages are loaded with fascinating tidbits that enrich the reading experience of the book. Despite many details included, the timelines present history in general, broad strokes. There are significant points of history, especially of the parks that are not detailed, but this would require a much larger, more difficult to read book.
A Popular Populist Approach
Ms. Jamie M. Allen approaches her subject from a populist perspective, which is somewhat unusual for a museum curator. More than one of the reviews of Picturing America’s National Parks said it was a comprehensive history of photography in the national parks. This is partly true, depending on the definitions of these terms. On a more close reading though, I would say that this volume is not necessarily the history of fine art photography or landscape photography in the national parks, but it could more accurately be described as the history of all photography in the national parks, or a history of cameras and images of any kind from any source made in the national parks.
This populist view of photography in the national parks puts significant emphasis on the various ways that photographs have helped to establish, preserve, depict and popularize the national parks. Allen observes that the history of the national parks is inextricably intertwined with the history of photography. After reading this inspiring book, I would go beyond saying that photography helped popularize the national parks to say that apparently the national parks helped popularize photography. In the development of the West, Allen points out that images produced on location at several of the most popular parks such as the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone and Yosemite became a hot commodity. A cottage industry in photograph sales developed with photographers establishing small shops where tourists could purchase various types of photographic reproductions of the scenery they had enjoyed during their visit and in some cases purchase photos of themselves in the scenery.
Intertwining Histories of National Parks and Photography
The development of postcards, the snapshot camera and many other aspects of photography that were popular rather than professional, were a large part of the story of the intertwining histories. In addition these aspects make a more interesting read than a mere compilation of the great photographers who have depicted the national parks. Because some of the professionals have been left out, the collection of photographs represented acts less as a survey of those famous for photographing the parks and more as a compilation of famous people and ordinary people who also made images in the national parks.
Both the exhibition and the book tie all of this history into current trends by bringing to light the masses of images and selfies made each day and shared hourly on social media. However, Allen and the Eastman Museum go beyond the mere mention of this phenomenon, to incorporating it as an activity at the exhibit. In the entryway to the show a photograph of the Grand Canyon containing a life-sized figure of George Eastman standing on the rim gives visitors to the show an opportunity to make a selfie with Mr. Eastman and the Grand Canyon in the background to take home, share on social media and discuss the exhibit with friends online. This feature and the encouragement of phone snapshots in the museum makes the visitor experience more fun while portraying the museum as cool and up to date in their delivery of history, not to mention making the show and the museum extremely popular, as well as the objects of considerable buzz.
Allen and her team are to be commended for their fanning of the media flames through her appearance on local TV and the comprehensive development of publicity across the country, but also in their exhaustive and colossal volume of research necessary for such a project. As excellent as done, their research was not necessarily perfect, or perhaps for sake of simplicity and accessibility they chose to leave some information out. For example: the timeline for the 1960s is missing the introduction of color to photography books. Though the timelines are a small part of the overall book presentation, this was a major breakthrough for the parks, for photography and for the fortunes of Kodak because it caused a huge spike in the popularity of color film. It also was part of what led to the popularization of the coffee table photography book, which changed the face of the photography industry and paved the way for more photographers to make a living in the medium.
In the timelines, there is also no mention of the Sierra Club Exhibit Format Series, which during the 1960s, especially in the Western U.S., but also all over the world, greatly advanced the momentum of the movement to conserve more public lands and to further popularize the national parks themselves. The timeline entry for 1963 mentioned that David Brower and Eliot Porter published several books on the parks, but the mention of popular books by Philip Hyde in the Exhibit Format Series, who is represented in the Eastman Museum collection, also is omitted. David Brower called Philip Hyde his go-to photographer because he produced the images for many books that made or protected national parks just in the 1960s alone, such as The Last Redwoods (1963), Time and the River Flowing: Grand Canyon (1964), The Wild Cascades: Forgotten Parkland (1965), Not Man Apart (1965) Navajo Wildlands (1967), The Grand Colorado (1969) and even more volumes in the 1970s.
Philip Hyde’s book, Island In Time: The Point Reyes Peninsula (1962) was the first book to ever raise funds to purchase land to make a national park service unit, Point Reyes National Seashore. It was also published the same year as Eliot Porter’s In Wildness Is the Preservation of the World, (also not mentioned in Picturing America’s National Parks) in 1962, giving both books the shared title of the first major book projects published in color.
Outstanding Image Choice and the Making of an Evergreen Title
I like Allen’s image choices for the sections on Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Minor White and many of the others because she used photographs we don’t often see from these well-known masters. Adams as usual gets a huge amount of credit for his work in the national parks, most of which is well-deserved. However, also as usual, Adams gets credit for some of the accomplishments of other photographers such as the help in conservation and formation of national parks, which Adams did do some and quite effectively, but not more than or even at the same level as photographers such as Philip Hyde and Eliot Porter, who essentially took over the Sierra Club Books from Ansel Adams after they transitioned to color. The description under Ansel Adams carried on at length about conservation and the national parks, whereas the Philip Hyde description mentioned it only briefly, especially in light of his much greater volume of work on wilderness and national park protection campaigns. When I asked Allen about the difference, she said that originally her text included much more about Philip Hyde’s work in preserving national parks, but that her editors cut some of it. Apparently editors need educating as well about the figures behind major conservation efforts.
To illustrate this point and to show an example of how the descriptions were presented, here is the entry for Ansel Adams:
Ansel Adams‘ (American, 1902-1984) lifelong passion for the national parks began in 1916 when, at the age of 14, he read James Mason Hutching’s 496-page book In the Heart of the Sierras (1886) and convinced his parents to take him on vacation to Yosemite Valley. Equipped with a No. 1 Brownie camera that his parents had given him, Adams took his first images of Yosemite that year. Soon after, he became involved with the Sierra Club, starting as the custodian for the club’s headquarters in Yosemite and later leading tours and participating in trips to the Yosemite High Country. He was eventually elected to the board of directors and lobbied for additional areas to be set aside as national parks and monuments. By the 1930s, Adams’ photographic work had become well known, and in 1941 he was invited to participate in a project to photograph all the national parks. Organized by the Secretary of Interior, the initiative was abruptly cancelled when the United States entered World War II. Adams continued the project independently, supported by a series of Guggenheim Fellowships. His images of the parks have come to represent the grandeur of the American landscape, conjuring a sense of pride for American viewers in both the land itself and the preservation of these spaces through the National Park Service. Adams’ photographs have also had broad international appeal, establishing the national parks as globally recognizable icons.
Compare that to the entry for Philip Hyde, which is also excellent, but not as thorough:
In 1946, Philip Hyde (American 1921-2006) became one of the first students to attend the newly formed photography program at the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute). Here he studied under Edward Weston, Minor White, Imogen Cunningham, Dorothea Lange, and many other influential photographers of the time. After graduating, Hyde served as the official photographer of the Sierra Club High Trip during the summer of 1950, thus beginning his long relationship with the organization. His involvement with the club blossomed into relationships with other groups, including the Wilderness Society and the National Audubon Society. Hyde’s photographic work was used to advocate for and realize the preservation of places such as the Grand Canyon. While he photographed the characteristic vantages of many national parks, his images also show atypical views, such as a sand dune at the Grand Canyon.
Regardless, even with some omissions, Picturing America’s National Parks is destined to be a staple of bookstores, libraries, schools and universities for many years to come. I like the accessibility of the approach, the innovative layout and the depth of information presented in an easy to digest format. I like the cover art, but don’t particularly like the no dust-jacket cover. However, this keeps the costs down also adding to accessibility. Besides, this type of jacketless cover will likely prove ideal when the book is used as a textbook. It certainly ought to be mandatory reading for anyone studying photography, the national parks or any related outdoor curriculum.
Tags: #findyourpark Alvin Langdon Coburn Andreas Feininger Ansel Adams Antiques magazine Aperture Artsy Atlantic Monthly Audubon magazine Black and White Photography Bradford Washburn Carleton E. Watkins Colorado River Colorama David Brower desert landscapes Eadweard Muybridge Eastman Museum Edward Weston Eliot Porter fine art photography Fortune Magazine Garry Winogrand George Eastman George Eastman House Grand Canyon Grand Canyon National Park Imogen Cunningham In Wildness Is The Preservation Of The World Island In Time Johan Hagemeyer John K. Hillers Kodak Kolb Brothers landscape photography Lee Friedlander Los Angeles Times Martin Parr Minor White Mother Jones National Park Service National Parks Nature Conservancy Navajo Wildlands Not Man Apart Outdoor Photographer PDN Philip Hyde Photography and America's National Parks Picturing America's National Parks selfie Sierra Club Sierra Club Books Exhibit Format Series Slate social media Stephen Shore The Grand Colorado The History of Photography The Last Redwoods The Smithsonian The Wild Cascades Time and the River Flowing Travel & Leisure USA Today Wall Street Journal Western United States wilderness William Henry Jackson Yellowstone National Park Yosemite National Park
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Project Gutenberg Australia
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Title: The Adventures Of Tyler Tatlock, Private Detective
Author: James Edward Muddock (writing as Dick Donovan)
* A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook *
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The Adventures Of Tyler Tatlock,
James Edward Muddock
(writing as Dick Donovan)
First published by Chatto & Windus, London, 1900
This e-book edition: Project Gutenberg Australia, 2019
"The Adventures Of Tyler Tatlock," Chatto & Windus, London, 1900
THE QUEENSFERRY MYSTERY
THE CLUE OF THE SILVER JUG
TRACING A TRAITOR
THE BIG LOAN FRAUD
THE MISSING BRIDE
LOVED AND LOST
THE FORGED CHEQUE
THE GOLD-SEEKER'S STRANGE FATE:
AN ASTOUNDING ROMANCE OF REAL LIFE
WITH A PASSING GLORY
THE MYSTERY OF THE GRAVEL PITS FARM
THE SIGN OF THE YELLOW STAR
TRACKED BY TEETH
THE BAND OF THREE
AN UNSOLVED PROBLEM
THE NEW TENANT
THE YANKEE TOURIST
CLINTON & HILLS' DEED-BOX
THE MYSTERIOUS PASSENGER
THE STOLEN PICTURE
THE PRIVATE SECRETARY
A MEMORABLE CHRISTMAS.
SOME years ago a series of remarkable house burglaries took place during the winter months in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh's most beautiful suburb, Queensferry. Several of the large houses there had been entered in a mysterious manner, and a great amount of valuable property, consisting principally of plate and jewellery, was carried off. As may be supposed, something like consternation spread through the district, and very strong complaints were made to the police, without producing material results, however. Of course, steps were at once taken to try and spot the gang, for it was believed to be a gang, who were working their 'trade' so successfully; but no arrest was made, and no explanations of the robberies were forthcoming. And more than that, notwithstanding these inquiries, watchings, and waitings, they did not even put a stop to the depredations. A Mr. M'Gowan, the occupant of 'The Rowans,' complained that his house had been entered and nearly a hundred pounds' worth of miscellaneous jewellery carried off; Mrs. Gorst, a widow lady, living at Islandview Lodge,' reported the loss of some very valuable old silver which had been in her family for generations; Mrs. Wilfred Read, of 'The Retreat,' was the poorer by a diamond necklet valued at a hundred and fifty pounds; while Mr. John Nairn, of 'The Rookery,' missed a presentation gold chronometer watch and a pearl and diamond scarfpin.
These are mere samples of the numerous reports that reached the police, and they serve to show how very serious the matter was. In some cases windows or doors were forced, but this was rather the exception than the rule, for things disappeared as if by magic, and there was often no trace of any forcible entry into the premises from whence the property had been taken.
Having regard to all the circumstances, it was perhaps in accordance with a natural police law that the culprits, it was expected, would be found among the ranks of the domestics in the various houses; but though the usual methods adopted by the police when servants are suspected were put into force, they failed to obtain even the shadow of a clue.
At last a crisis was reached when a Mrs. Bertha Wylie made a great outcry about the loss of a very valuable gold bracelet set with diamonds and rubies—present from her father on the morning of her marriage. It appeared that Mrs. Wylie had been attending an 'At Home' at the house of a neighbour, where her bracelet was the admiration of all. When she left she drove in a cab to her own residence, and immediately went upstairs to her bedroom, where she took off her bracelet and laid it on the dressing-table while she washed her hands preparatory to joining her husband at dinner. She was rather late, and he being a-hungered was not in the best of tempers at having to wait, particularly as he had brought a friend home to dine with him, so having hastily arranged her hair and performed other little toilet details dear to the heart of every woman she rushed downstairs to the dining-room, forgetting all about the bracelet. Nor did she remember it until the following morning when she rose. But a search on the toilet table, on the floor, in her jewel case, and in possible and impossible places did not bring the missing trinket to light. It had gone, disappeared, vanished completely. Full of a great grief, and with heavy heart, the lady made known her loss, and in discussing the matter with a friend she said—
'You know, dear, valuable as the bracelet is, it is not so much the mere value that affects me as the fact that dear papa gave it to me the morning I married Tom.'
Mrs. Wylie was loud in her lamentations, and through the medium of the newspapers, as well as by handbills exhibited in the shop windows, she offered a reward of twenty pounds for the recovery of the missing article.
This last robbery, so mysterious and audacious, aroused the whole community, and the male representatives met together in the house of a Mr. Scott, an Edinburgh lawyer, to discuss the situation and see if something couldn't be done to bring the guilt home to someone. The police had been baffled entirely, and the law-abiding subjects felt that the time had come when they should take the matter into their own hands. But notwithstanding that a good many of Mr. Scott's cigars were smoked and a fair quantity of his excellent whisky drunk, nothing practically was arrived at until the host himself, who had remained unusually silent during the discussion, on the principle, probably, that 'he who speaks last speaks well,' put a suggestion before the meeting.
'Some time ago,' he said, 'I had to do with a very peculiar will case, in which I was associated with the well-known London legal firm of Fleming, Steel, & Griffin, of Chancery Lane, and it became necessary for us to engage the services of Tyler Tatlock.'
'Who is Tyler Tatlock?' asked somebody.
'Well, he is a very remarkable man who carries on a private detective agency in London, and I was informed that he was considered to be without a rival.'
'Never heard of him,' remarked two or three persons together.
'Possibly not, but he has earned a reputation. At any rate, in the will case I instance he rendered invaluable service, and he made a very deep impression upon me.
'What sort of a man is he?' asked some one.
'Do you mean mentally, physically, or what?'
'Generally.'
'Well, physically he is below medium height, but lithe as a snake and tough as nails. He doesn't impress you at first sight. He has a clean-shaven face. His features are rather small, and his eyes are so small and deep-set that sometimes when he frowns you would think he had no eyes at all. But I have never met a man yet who saw so much with his eyes as Tatlock. He would discern a microbe on the end of your nose.'
'I suppose what you are driving at, Scott,' said one of his guests, 'is that we should get this marvel down here?'
'Precisely.'
'At whose cost?'
'Our own. I propose that we should make a whip round for his fee, whatever it is. Those who have lost things will surely not begrudge to give it. There is a chance of their property being restored to them.'
'Well, I shall be willing to do my bit,' said one gentleman.
'And so will I.'
'And I.'
So the proposal was agreed to, it being understood that the matter should be kept secret.
About a week later there entered Mr. Scott's office in Edinburgh a little, somewhat sallow-faced man, with small black beady eyes, somewhat scant black hair, a clean-shaven face that seemed to wear an habitual expression of good humour, and a smooth, dulcet voice that might have been taken for a woman's. He was neatly, but not ostentatiously, dressed. This person was Tyler Tatlock, who would have passed unnoticed in a crowd by the casual observer. But no man who had the power to penetrate a little beneath the surface of the human mask could have been in Tatlock's presence very long before discovering that he was dealing with no ordinary person. The mobility of the face, to begin with, was simply marvellous; and then there was a strange, absolutely inexplicable magnetic influence about him that, in spite of yourself, made you feel you could at once take the little man into your confidence and tell him the innermost secrets of your heart. He was so quiet, his voice was so soft and insinuating, his manner so pleasant that he drew you out against your will.
Tatlock had originally intended to become an analytical chemist, and spent many years studying the science, when suddenly the true bent of his mind was developed by some analytical work he was doing in connection with a case of murder by poison. He thereupon abandoned chemistry as a profession and became a detective, but not without much study and preparation. He visited every capital in Europe, made himself thoroughly conversant with the various police systems; travelled extensively through India, China, Japan, and other countries, including Brazil. During his wanderings he acquired a wonderful knowledge of poisons, and at last returned home fully equipped for the walk in life he elected to follow.
Mr. Scott, with lawyer-like precision, gave Tatlock a full account of the Queensferry robberies. Tatlock listened attentively, his small eyes seemingly hidden by a frown, the index finger of his right hand on his temple, the elbow supported by the left hand; a favourite attitude when he was absorbed.
'Of course,' said Mr. Scott, when he had finished his recital, 'no one save a few gentlemen in the Ferry knows that you are here.'
'I am glad of that. A man has a much better chance of getting at the bottom of an apparent mystery if no one suspects that he is prowling about.'
A little later Tyler Tatlock went down to Queensferry to study the lay of the land, and spent some hours in wandering about. He strolled into a spirit merchant's shop for a dram in the course of the afternoon, and had a chat with the man who served the drink, and incidentally touched on the burning question of the hour in that neighbourhood—the robberies.
'I suppose you've heard a' aboot the thefts,' remarked the publican.
'Well, I've heard something, but one never knows what to believe.'
'Well, I'm of opinion that the servants in the different hooses are at the bottom of the whole business.'
'I can't think that.'
'Weel noo' tak' the case o' Mistress Wylie, a bonnie young woman but newly marrit. She pits her bracelet on her dressing-table after making a call on some friends. She forgets a' aboot it when she gangs tae her dinner, and the next day there's nae signs o' it.'
'But was the house not broken into?'
'Na, na.'
'Well, on the face of it it does look as though the servants had had something to do with that robbery. How many does she keep?'
'Twa, I think.'
'Has she lived here long?'
'Na, aboot sax months.'
'Where does she come from?'
I've heard say she was born here in the Ferry, but went south with her parents when she was a wee lassie. Her husband's an Edinburgh man, but I understand he has been living in France or somewhere on the Continent.'
'What does he do?'
'I'm no sure that lie has any trade. Any way I've not heard that he does anything. I'm perfectly sure he doesna gang to Edinburgh every day like most of the folk hereabouts.'
At this point the loquacious publican was called off to serve and pass the time of day with some other customer. So Tatlock finished his liquor and went out, and returned to Edinburgh.
Two or three days later a curious-looking little old country woman called at Mrs. Wylie's house at Queensferry, and asked to see Mrs. Wylie herself. She was requested to state her business, but declined, simply saying she wished to see the mistress on a very important matter. Presently she was invited to enter the breakfast-room, and having been kept waiting nearly half-an-hour Mrs. Wylie put in an appearance.
A very pretty little blonde woman with golden hair, blue eyes, and a sweet, baby face, but somewhat fussy manner.
'What do you want with me, my good woman?'
I've heard tell that you're offering a reward of twenty pounds for the recovery of a bracelet that was stolen from you.
'Yes, that is right.'
'I suppose there is no fear but the money would be paid if you got information?'
'Why, of course it would be paid.'
'Is the master in?'
'Yes.'
'Could I see him?'
'No, I don't think you can. He's not up yet. He didn't go to bed till very late. But what do you want to see him for?'
'Well, mistress, you see I'm a woman, and—don't be angry with me—but I've no great faith in my own sex when it comes to a matter of business.'
'You are certainly not complimentary,' remarked Mrs. Wylie sharply.
'I hope I haven't offended you, Mistress Wylie,' said the woman apologetically.
'But you have.'
'I'm sorry for it, but I thought it would be more satisfaction to me if your husband would just give me a bit paper promising to pay the twenty pounds if the bracelet is found.'
'Oh, you can trust me,' said the lady haughtily, 'but I don't believe you know anything about the bracelet.'
'What makes you think that?'
'Two or three things. Can you describe it now?'
'The funny little old woman fumbled about her clothes, and at last produced from an inner pocket one of the hand-bills offering the reward and describing the article.
'I get my description from that,' she said.
'Oh, that's all right; but where have you seen the bracelet?'
'I didn't say I had seen it.'
'But you evidently know something about it.'
'No, I've only heard some folk talking.'
Mrs. Wylie laughed heartily as she said:
'Well, you are a comical sort of person, upon my word. What's the use of you coining here unless you can help me to recover my property?'
'You see, m'm, I'm a poor body, and twenty pounds would be a fortune to me; so I thought I would come and tell you what I've heard.'
'What have you heard?'
'I heard a neighbour of mine say she was in a pawn-shop on Saturday night getting out her man's duds for the Sabbath, when a man came in and offered a bracelet in pawn, and my neighbour vows from what she could see of it it was your bracelet.'
'And was it pawned?' asked the lady quickly.
'Oh, ay.'
'Well, you see, it could hardly be mine, because every pawnbroker in Scotland has had a description of the bracelet, so no one would be likely to lend money on it.'
The country woman looked rather chapfallen as she remarked:
'Ma certes! I didn't think of that. Ah, well, just forgive me for calling on you. I was keen to get that twenty pounds, and I thought I'd give you the information.'
The old woman took herself off, and in the course of the day Mrs. Bertha Wylie, elegantly dressed, wearing a real sealskin jacket and carrying a sealskin muff, called on a lady friend, a Mrs. Smith, who resided in the Ferry, and over the tea and cakes she told her about the old woman calling on her.
'Well, to be sure, what a stupid creature!' exclaimed Mrs. Smith. 'Whatever could have been her object!'
'I suppose she thought I should give her something; but I wasn't quite such a fool as she fancied I was.'
'I wonder,' remarked Mrs. Smith thoughtfully, 'if she is connected in any way with the mysterious thieves who have been committing all these robberies?'
'I wonder,' echoed the pretty little blonde lady, arranging the dainty mass of flimsy tulle that encircled her white throat as she stood before the mirror over the drawing-room mantelpiece.
'I shouldn't think you are ever likely to get the bracelet back,' pursued Mrs. Smith.
'No, I don't think there's the slightest chance; but there's no use crying over spilt milk. Tom must buy me another bracelet; that's all.'
'You are more philosophical than I should be,' remarked Mrs. Smith with considerable emphasis.
'It's a good thing to be philosophical, dear.'
'Perhaps it is, but I hope I shan't be called upon to exercise my philosophy for the same cause as you.'
'I hope not, but one never knows. It may be your turn next. The thieves—whoever they are—seem to be pretty impartial, and apparently all's fish that comes to their net.'
The subject having been exhausted, the ladies turned to a more agreeable one, and discussed dress. Mrs. Smith admired her friend's sealskin jacket, and, with a woman's privilege, inquired what was the cost of it.
'Oh, not very much,' answered the wearer. 'About a hundred and fifty pounds I think Tom gave for it.'
Mrs. Smith sighed as she confessed sadly that her lord and master was not likely to indulge her in such a piece of extravagance. The pleasant little interview having terminated, the ladies kissed each other lovingly and parted, as Mrs. Wylie had another social call to make previous to returning home.
About a week from that date Mr. and Mrs. Smith went up to Edinburgh to the theatre, leaving their two children, their nurse, a cook, and housemaid at home, though the cook had permission to go out for a couple of hours. Mr. Smith was a jeweller in Edinburgh, and carried on a large business. He had three shops, the principal one being in Princes Street. He and his wife gave orders to the servants to see that all the doors were locked and everything safe before they went to bed.
The cook left the house a little before eight, soon after her master and mistress had gone, and she was to be back not later than ten, the housemaid and nurse undertaking to sit up for her. During her absence the two young women, having seen all the doors secured below, went upstairs to the nursery, where a cheerful fire blazed, and it was only when they heard the bell ring, announcing the cook's return, that they descended together—brave women as they were—and let her in. The three of them partook of supper in the kitchen, and retired to bed almost on the stroke of eleven. An hour later Mr. and Mrs. Smith returned home, had a hasty supper, and retired also, the lady glancing in at the nursery to see that her pets were snug and comfortable in bed.
The following morning Mr. Smith went off, as usual, to his business at half-past eight, and later in the forenoon Mrs. Smith made the alarming discovery that nearly all her jewellery had disappeared, together with about fifty silver spoons, forks, and two small silver dishes. Without making her loss known to the household, she hastily attired herself, and rushed off to Edinburgh to inform her husband. Now, it chanced that Mr. Smith was one of the gentlemen who had on a recent occasion assembled at Mr. Scott's when it was decided to secure the services of Tyler Tatlock; but, in accordance with the arrangement then come to, he had not told his wife, nor did he do so now. He merely requested her to make out a list, and give information at the Central Police Station, and ask them to send one of their men down to investigate the matter. He said he was not able to get away himself then, as he was very busy, but he would be home as soon as possible. An hour after his wife had left him Mr. Smith made his way to Mr. Scott's office.
'I say, what's that man of yours about?' he asked in a tone that indicated he was by no means pleased.
'What man?'
'Why, the brilliant detective who was to do such wonders for us.'
'I really don't know. I haven't seen him for some days.'
'Well, shunt him.'
'Why, what's wrong?'
'Everything.'
'You don't mean to say you've been robbed?'
'I do.'
'When?'
'Last night. Mrs. Smith and I came up to the theatre, and during our absence there's been a fine haul made.' Here Mr. Smith laid a list of the missing articles before his legal friend. 'Now look at that. What do you think of it? A nice state of matters, isn't it?'
'It's most remarkable,' said the lawyer, musingly.
'Yes, but what I want to say is that that fellow Tatlock is no good.'
'I shouldn't be too hasty in condemning him. Let's put him on his defence first,' suggested Mr. Scott.
'But he condemns himself. The fellow's been here getting on for a fortnight, and has done nothing. What is more, the mysterious thief has committed a robbery under his very nose, so to speak, and yet he can't see him. Why, I'd do better myself as a detective.'
Soon after Mr. Smith had taken his departure Mr. Scott sent a note over to Philp's Cockburn Hotel, asking Tatlock to come across and see him; but word was brought back that Mr. Tatlock had been absent for two days, and when he went off did not leave word when he would be back.
The next morning Tyler Tatlock put in an appearance at Mr. Scott's office soon after that gentleman arrived.
'I'm sorry I was away yesterday when you sent your note across.'
'You've been enjoying yourself,' suggested the lawyer with a smile.
'Yes, very much. A little recreation at times does no one any harm, does it?'
'No, certainly not. But to be serious now, have you got hold of any clue?'
'I would rather not answer that question at present.'
'Good. I am a lawyer and appreciate your caution. Probably you will not have heard yet of the robbery at the private residence of Mr. Smith, the jeweller, who lives at Queensferry?'
Tatlock smiled.
'Oh, yes, I have,' he said.
Mr. Scott smiled also. It was a smile of self-satisfaction. He felt absolutely convinced now that he was not mistaken in his estimate of Tatlock.
'I don't want to force your hand,' he remarked, 'but your smile is significant. It is a smile of meaning. You are not without some clue, I fancy.'
Tatlock smiled again, and turned the conversation.
'Now for a little announcement,' said he. 'I am leaving Edinburgh to-night. How long I shall be absent I really cannot tell, but I shall return, and when I do I shall probably be able to supply you with reliable and valuable information.'
'That satisfies me,' answered the lawyer; and on this the two men parted, and in the course of the evening he saw some of his neighbours who were in the secret about Tatlock, and to them he said, in order to reassure them:
'I think Tatlock's all right. He has left Edinburgh, but will be back again before very long, I expect, and when he again appears on the scene he may have something to tell you.'
That night a tall, handsome man, wearing a costly, fur-lined coat and dainty kid gloves, entered the refreshment room at the Waverley Station, Edinburgh, in company with a lady, young and pretty. They partook of some refreshment, then went on to the platform, which was swept by a fierce snow-laden wind, for it was a bitter night, with all the sting of winter in it. The gentleman kissed the lady affectionately, and they parted. She went one way, and he hurried to the Great Northern London train, which in another few minutes would be speeding on its way to the South. At the door of a first-class compartment stood an obsequious porter. He had already deposited two hand-bags belonging to the gentleman in the rack of the compartment, and, as he of the fur-lined coat appeared, the porter touched his cap.
'I've pit a' your things in, sir, and there's a guid hot footpan for ye.'
'Thank you,' answered the gentleman curtly, as he dropped a silver coin into the eager, outstretched palm, and entered the compartment, exchanged his highly polished silk hat for a travelling cap, ensconced himself comfortably in a corner, and enveloped the lower part of his body in a handsome rug, drew off his dainty gloves, selected a cigar from his case, and lit it—it was a smoking compartment. Then the guard's shrill whistle sounded, there was a snort, puff, and jerk, and the night mail began its journey.
There was only one other passenger in the compartment, a little old man, wearing a skull cap over his snow-white hair. He was warmly clad, and had a heavy rug across his knees.
'It's a bitter night,' he remarked to his fellow passenger.
'Yes, awful. Are you travelling far?'
'To London. And you?'
'To London also.'
'We had better give the guard a wink at the next stopping-place, and ask him to keep the compartment for us, and we shall be able to stretch out; not that I think there is much fear of being overcrowded on a night like this.'
'No, I fancy not. It's a pretty empty train as it is. Do you smoke?' asked the young man.
'Allow me to offer you a cigar. I can recommend those. They're a favourite brand with the Rothschilds.'
'Thank you, they look good, and smell good. I have matches, thanks. Yes! your recommendation is justified. It's an excellent smoke. I suppose you've seen the papers?'
'Oh, yes.'
'Do you care to look at the 'Times'?'
'No, thank you. The light's not good enough.'
Thus these fellow-travellers on that winter night exchanged the commonplace civilities peculiar to the situation until the inevitable drowsiness which night travelling superinduces lulled them to silence, which lasted until Carlisle was reached.
'Well, I think we can settle down for the night now,' remarked the tall gentleman, as the train began to move out of the station on its long run to York.
The old man agreed with this, and each prepared a comfortable bed with rugs and wraps on the seats, and then stretched himself out for sleep, the shade over the lamp and the curtains at the windows having been drawn. The compartment was cosy and warm, outside snow was falling heavily. The train thundered on through the night. The travellers slept. Nearly an hour passed. The train was flying through the darkness at the rate of fifty miles an hour. Presently the little old man raised his head very cautiously, and glanced towards his fellow-passenger, who was lying on his back, his lips slightly apart, and testifying by nasal evidence that he slept. The little old man gradually and silently sat bolt upright, and drew from his pocket a tiny metal flask, with about three inches of india-rubber tubing and hollow ball attached. He advanced the flask close to the sleeper's mouth and nostrils, gently squeezed the ball, and, without the slightest hissing or noise of any kind, there issued from the tiny nozzle a thin, bluish vapour. With the first inhalation of this vapour the sleeper gave a start and a gasp, then he became perfectly still, and lay rigid like a marble statue. Having assured himself that his fellow-traveller was fully under the influence of the vapour, the old man lifted the traveller's bags from the rack, and deliberately proceeded to open them with keys he drew from his pocket. He carefully examined the contents of the bags, but took nothing out. Having satisfied his curiosity, he closed the bags again, and restored them to the rack. He next felt the pulse of the sleeper, and, being apparently satisfied that all was well, he rolled himself in his rugs again, and went to sleep.
The tall gentleman awoke just as the train reached York. He seemed all right, and exactly like a man who awakens from a sound, refreshing, and health-giving sleep. He glanced at his fellow-traveller, who was buried in his rugs and motionless. He really was asleep. The gentleman rose and stretched himself as the guard opened the door, and announced there were twenty minutes allowed at York. Snow was falling heavily. The temperature was low enough to freeze one's marrow. The gentleman, who was suffering from a vacuum, buttoned up his fur coat, hurried to the refreshment-room, and made a substantial meal of cold ham and chicken and hot coffee. He returned to his carriage refreshed and strengthened, and lit up another of his excellent cigars.
The little old man still slept.
The rest of the journey passed without incident.
London was reached in gloom, fog, and snow. Our two travellers began to gather up their traps a few minutes before the train drew up in King's Cross Station.
'May I inquire if you are going to stay at an hotel? asked the little old man in the blandest possible manner, as he exchanged his skull-cap for a silk hat, and wound a muffler about his throat.
'Yes; at the Holborn Viaduct.'
'Can you recommend it?'
'Most thoroughly. I always stay there, as I generally have business in Paris, and it's so handy for the Chatham and Dover train, you know.'
'Are you going to Paris to-night?'
No; to-morrow night.'
'I don't know that I envy you your journey this weather.'
'Oh, I'm used to it.'
'Well, we may meet again, as on your recommendation I shall put up at the Viaduct. Good-morning.'
The following day the tall, handsome gentleman who had travelled up from Edinburgh on the previous night sat at breakfast in the well-lighted, well-warmed breakfast-room of his hotel. He had the appearance of one who had no care on his mind, and was at peace with all the world. His fair moustache was daintily trimmed, his hair well brushed, his hands were white and beringed, his nails polished and faultless. He finished his breakfast, tossed aside the 'Times' with which he had beguiled himself during the meal, glanced admiringly at himself in the mirror, and went out. When he reached the lobby two men were standing there. One touched him on the shoulder, and spoke something in his ear which caused him to start and turn deadly pale. As he seemed disposed to try conclusions with the two men, the other seized him and very adroitly and dexterously clapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists.
'This outrage will cost you dear,' he said between his set, gleaming teeth.
The two men did not seem to be disturbed by the menace. One said You had better not make a scene, Mr. Jordon.'
'Remove these signs of infamy, then,' said the gentleman addressed as Jordon, and indicating the handcuffs.
'No. We can't do that. We know your desperate character.'
Mr. Jordon smiled bitterly, but made no answer. In obedience to the request of his captors he walked quietly down the stairs, a man on either side of him. A waiter was ordered to go to the gentleman's room and bring his hat for him. While that was being done a four-wheeler was summoned, and a few minutes later Mr. Jordon, white-faced and savage-looking, was being driven to Bow Street.
Three days after that peculiarly dramatic little scene at the Holborn Viaduct Hotel a scene scarcely less dramatic was being enacted in Edinburgh. A cab drew up at the door of Mr. Wylie's house at Queensferry. There were two men in the cab. One alighted, knocked at the door, and was admitted by a servant, the other man remaining in the cab. Fully three-quarters of an hour passed before the man who had entered the house reappeared. He was accompanied by pretty little Mrs. Wylie, who wore a thick veil over her face. She entered the cab, followed by the man, and the cab at once drove off to Edinburgh, where the two men—plain-clothes policemen—delivered their capture, pretty, blonde-haired, blue-eyed Mrs. Wylie, to the police authorities.
That afternoon Tyler Tatlock entered Mr. Scott's office. 'Well,' he said carelessly, as he toyed with a cigar he was smoking, 'there'll be no more robberies at the Ferry—at least, for some time.'
'Oh! What, have you made a capture?'
'Two.'
'Who are they?'
'One is Mr. Joseph Jordon, ex-convict, alias Samuel Turner, alias Richard Graham, alias Tom Wylie, and his charming little fair-haired wife.'
Mr. Scott fell back in his chair with amazement.
'What! Tom Wylie and his wife the thieves?'
'Yes; funny, isn't it?'
'How did you ferret the business out?'
'By instinct. Inquiry led me to suspect Mrs. Wylie as the jackal. I visited her to inquire about the reward she had offered for the bracelet she averred she had lost. Of course, she never lost it. She made the announcement to throw people off the scent. My interview with her convinced me she was guilty. I watched her husband. When I disappeared for a few days, to the annoyance of your friends, I had followed him to Glasgow, where he had put up at the St. Enoch's Hotel, and met a man from London, whom I happened to know was one of the cleverest forgers in London, and an expert swell-mobsman. I found out—never mind how—that is my affair—that the two were in partnership of some kind, and had an agency in Paris for the disposal of stolen property. The swell was going north on business, but, as I was not concerned with him, I gave the police a hint, returned to Edinburgh with Wylie, and a day or two later travelled with him to London, opened his bags, and found them stuffed with the proceeds of the Ferry robberies, which he was conveying to Paris. Of course, I stopped his little game.'
'Well—you—do amaze me!' exclaimed Mr. Scott. 'But how on earth were the robberies managed?'
'On a very simple plan. Mrs. Wylie, charming little woman she is, but as dangerous as they make 'em, won the confidence of her victims—studied their houses, ascertained where the valuables were kept, knew when the heads of the household were likely to be absent; and, having performed all this scouting work with skill and adroitness, carried the information to her husband. There is hardly a door or window that man cannot open without leaving any trace behind. This, of course, at once threw suspicion on servants. Artful, wasn't it?'
'But who is this Wylie?'
'Joseph Jordon, only son of the late Joseph John Jordon, colliery proprietor and iron master, of Stockton-on-Tees. He left his son, who had been highly educated, a fortune. The son made ducks and drakes of it on the Turf. Then he associated himself with swell-mobsmen and blacklegs. He was arrested in connection with a forgery, and put in five years at Dartmoor. On his release he married a Miss Jennie Gramont, who had been keeping body and soul together by teaching. Jordon is one of the most plausible and polished scoundrels in the business, and he soon educated his wife up to his own business. However, we have them by the heels. Funny little story, isn't it? Very human, though. The police-court proceedings will be interesting. Jordon, of course, will be brought north. It is to be hoped your judges won't err on the side of leniency. Well, ta-ta; look me up when you are in London. I must leave Edinburgh to-night, as I have pressing business demanding my attention.'
NOTE.—Any chemist reading the foregoing story will know the nature of the vapour used by Mr. Tatlock in the railway carriage to ensure Jordon sleeping long enough to enable the bags to be examined, This vapour produces a sort of stupor which may last from fifteen minutes to an hour. Its administration is not unattended with risk, though when the sleeper awakes he feels refreshed and lively, but some time afterwards violent headache is apt to ensue, though it speedily passes off under ordinary circumstances. It must be remembered that Mr. Tatlock was a chemist, and thoroughly understood the use and nature of drugs.
I HAD occasion one morning to call on Tatlock at his chambers on a matter of business in which we were jointly engaged. Having spent an hour with him, and discussed the subject of my visit, I was about to take my departure, when he pushed a box of cigars towards me, inviting me to help myself, and as he lit his he remarked:
'By the way, that's rather a curious case at Flaxton, isn't it?'
'What case is that?' I asked, not knowing what he referred to.
'Oh, haven't you heard of it. Here, read that,' and he tossed a copy of the 'Standard' to me, in which he had marked with a blue pencil the following paragraph:
MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF MR. GEORGE GRAVELING—SUPPOSED SUICIDE.
Early on Friday morning last a gamekeeper in the service of Sir John Sterling of Flaxton was crossing the wild moorland which stretches between that place and Hutton, on the line of railway between York and Scarborough, when he came across the dead body of a well-dressed man lying in a little hollow that was partly concealed by heather and bracken. The gamekeeper's attention was attracted by a flock of crows hovering over the spot, and evidently greatly excited about something. Thinking there might be a disabled sheep lying there, he approached the spot, and to his horror saw the body of a man lying on its back at the bottom of a basin-like depression. Having satisfied himself that the man was dead, the gamekeeper hurried back to Flaxton, a distance of four miles, and informed his master, Sir John Sterling, of what he had seen. Sir John lost no time in giving information to the police, and in company with a small body of the rural constabulary he drove over to the place where the gamekeeper had seen the body lying. They took a country cart with them, with a layer of straw at the bottom. On this the body was laid, and conveyed to Flaxton, where the identity of the deceased was at once established by means of letters and cards in his pocket. The body proved to be that of Mr. George Graveling, the well-known bookmaker, of Glasgow and London. A considerable amount of valuable property was found in the pockets, including a gold watch and chain, a massive gold pencil case, nearly fifteen pounds in gold, and about twenty pounds in Scotch bank-notes. It appears that Mr. Graveling had travelled from Glasgow to York to attend the York races two days previously to his body being discovered on the moor. He was apparently in the best of health and spirits, and he was known to have won a very large sum of money at the York meeting. He was supposed to have returned to Glasgow the same night, and how he came to his death in the lonely spot where his body was found is at present a mystery, which no doubt the coroner's inquest will be able to clear up.
'Yes,' I remarked, as I finished reading the item of news, 'yes, it's rather a curious business.'
'I am going down to the inquest,' said Tatlock, in the apparently unconcerned way in which he usually spoke. 'Sir John Sterling has wired to me asking me to attend.'
'Why?'
'Don't know,' answered Tatlock, shrugging his shoulders, and puffing out a great volume of smoke from his mouth. 'Foul play suspected, I suppose.'
'When do you go?'
'To-night. The inquest is to be held to-morrow.'
The foregoing is the prologue, so to speak, to as remarkable a crime as the annals of evil-doing can furnish us with, and the particulars of the case I now give from Tatlock's own notes and papers.
The external medical examination of the body failed to reveal any cause of death, but an autopsy made it clear that the deceased had died from poison, and that poison diluted oxalic acid, although there were traces of laudanum detected. The evidence given at the inquest brought out the following facts: Mr. Graveling was a wealthy man, and greatly respected. He was noted for his generous liberality and kindly disposition. He was in the habit of attending most of the great race meetings throughout the country. He left Glasgow on the Wednesday night preceding his death, travelled to York, and was present at the races. He dined with some friends at an hotel in York, but left them early, saying he was going to make a call in the town, and intended to get the down train to Glasgow. From that hour to the discovery of his body on the moor the following morning his movements were shrouded in mystery. The spot where he was found was about eight miles from York and two from Flaxton, a station on the direct line of railway between York and Scarborough. It was obvious, therefore, that he could not have travelled by the Scottish train. Had it not been for the mere chance of Sir John Sterling's gamekeeper crossing the moor, and having his curiosity aroused by the crows, the body might have lain undiscovered for months, possibly years.
Had his money and other property been taken from him a motive for crime would have been established, but though several of those who were at the races with him declared that he had a very large sum in his possession when he left the course, no evidence was forthcoming to show, if that was the case, what he had done with it. He did not keep a banking account in York.
There was one other item found amongst the effects in his pocket, and a very significant item it was, being nothing more nor less than a glass-stoppered two-ounce phial, which had contained oxalic acid. It was in the breast pocket of his coat.
As may be supposed, the most exhaustive inquiries were made with a view to determining the source from whence the poison had been obtained, and for this purpose the inquest was adjourned from week to week for three weeks. But the mystery could not be cleared up. In the end there seem to have been divided opinions as to how the deceased came by his death, and this verdict was returned:
That the deceased, George Graveling, met his death from a dose of oxalic acid, but there was no evidence to show whether the fatal dose was administered by his own hand, or the hand of another person.'
This, of course, was practically an open verdict, and its tendency was to make the mystery more mysterious. It should be mentioned that amongst the general public there were not many who did not favour the suicide theory. In the minority, however, were numbered a few old and staunch friends of the deceased, who, feeling convinced that George Graveling was not the man to have taken his own life, instructed Tyler Tatlock to try and solve the problem. To these friends the circumstances of the tragedy called for a deeper and more crucial examination than the coroner's inquest had afforded. Tatlock himself had declined to express any open opinion at the time; but in a private letter he wrote to me after the verdict he referred casually to it in these words:
By the way, the verdict in the Graveling case couldn't have been other than it was, though I hear that the coroner himself and some of the jury favoured suicide. But Graveling did not commit suicide. He was murdered.'
It appeared that when Tatlock arrived in Flaxton, the village where the inquest was held, he lost no time in proceeding to the spot where the body was found. It was a wild, lonely, desolate region. If Graveling wanted to kill himself why did he go to such an out-of-the-way place? It was proved by the medical evidence that he could not have taken the poison first, and have walked to the pit afterwards, inasmuch as the effects of the dose would be to almost immediately paralyse the heart and brain.
Tatlock did not find much to help him, but an examination of the dead man's clothes, which he was permitted to make, revealed the fact that the soles of the boots worn by Graveling were clean; that is, they bore no trace of the black, loamy soil of the moor. Strangely enough, neither coroner, jury, nor witnesses attached much, if any, importance to this remarkable fact; but Tatlock did. The back of the deceased's coat was much stained with the boggy earth, but the front part of the clothes were not soiled in any way. Had he drunk the poison first, and staggered to the pit, he would in all human probability have pitched on to his face or knees, but there was no sign of his having done this. Another peculiar feature was that Tatlock could discover no trace of the deceased's footprints anywhere about the pit where he was found.
Tatlock did not visit the moor again until after the coroner's verdict. His second visit was unpremeditated. He had had some drawings made of the footprints, and he wished to verify some minor point. He descended into the hollow where the body had been found, without, as he himself says, any particular reason for so doing. When about to leave the place his attention was attracted to some-thing with a metallic lustre, half hidden in a tuft of heather. He picked it up, and to his astonishment found it was a small silver cream-jug, very much tarnished and discoloured, while the inside and the spout bore signs of having been corroded by acid. Had it not been for the established fact that the deceased had died from oxalic acid poison, this corrosion of the jug might have passed almost unnoticed, but under the circumstances it was a natural conclusion to come to that the jug had contained some or all of the fiery acid which had found its way into Mr. Graveling's stomach.
Needless to say, Tatlock considered this discovery as of great importance, and as likely to afford him a clue to the unravelling of the mystery. The jug, which was 'hall-marked' as silver, weighed about four ounces, and was of a very ordinary pattern. On the bottom the initials 'S. H.' had been roughly scratched—with the point of a knife probably.
For three months, in spite of many other calls upon his time and attention, Tatlock did not relax his vigilance or cease to exercise his talents in the Graveling case. He had all the tenacity of a barnacle. He clung to what he attached himself to, and could not be easily shaken off Nor did his vigilance in this case go unrewarded, for he made an important and startling discovery.
In one of the byeways of the city of York there was situated a shop where a fairly flourishing business was carried on in second-hand goods of a miscellaneous character. The interior of the shop was stuffed full of assorted lumber in keeping with the display in the window. Over the door a signboard set forth that the proprietrix of the shop was Selina Howells. One afternoon a man entered this shop—a seedy-looking little man, with a general woebegone, down-at-the-heel, empty-pocket appearance about him. He carried a bundle with him. A woman was busy behind the counter ticketing some goods that were to go into the window.
'What can I do for you, my man?' she asked, looking up as the stranger entered.
'I've got summat to sell, missus,' he answered as he produced an accordion.
'Anything else?' A few well-worn white shirts were displayed, and some electro-plated spoons and forks the worse for wear, and lastly a metal cream jug. The woman's attention was arrested by the latter article. She took it up quickly, carried it to the window, where there was a better light, flipped it with her finger-nail, examined it carefully inside and out, and, turning at last to the man, remarked—
'This is silver.'
'Is it?' he said in astonishment.
'Yes. What did you think it was?'
'Electro.'
'Where did you get it from?' she asked, eyeing him curiously.
'Found it.'
'Where did you find it?'
'On Flaxton Moor.'
The woman walked to the end of the shop, carrying the silver jug with her, opened a half-glazed door, and disappeared into a room, where a man was sitting smoking a pipe. She was absent quite ten minutes. When she returned to the shop she told the customer she would give him two pounds for the things.
'No, mum,' he answered decisively. 'If that jug's worth two pound to you it's worth that to me, and maybe more, and so I'll keep it.'
'Well, you're a fool; that's all I've got to say,' snapped the woman angrily, as she banged the article down on the counter before him. 'Why, it's not worth five shillings. It's been burnt inside with something, for one thing.'
'Missus,' said the man, eyeing her keenly as he took the jug up, 'if I can't get more'n that for it somewhere else I'll come back to you and you shall have it,' and with a brusque 'Good day' walked out of the shop.
About a week after this little incident two men entered Mrs. Selina Howells' shop, bent on much more serious business than that of either selling or buying. They inquired if her husband was at home, and on being answered in the affirmative they expressed a desire to see him. The lady was naturally curious to know what their errand was, and on their declining to enlighten her she said that under these circumstances they could not see him. On that one of the men went to the shop door and called in a third man, who was ordered to remain in the shop while the other two searched the house. Mrs. Howells stormed and raved, and seemed very indignant, describing the conduct of the men as an outrage, and demanding to know what it meant. She was told she would know in good time, and thereupon the two men went into the back room, and thence upstairs, the hour being eleven o'clock in the morning. They found Mr. Howells in bed, and they at once declared themselves as police officers, and showed him a warrant for his arrest on suspicion of his being concerned in the death of George Graveling, and they bade him dress himself.
Richard Howells was an enormous man between thirty and forty years of age. He stood six feet three, and had the muscles and power of a Hercules. When he recognised that he was trapped he sprang out of bed, and his whole manner seemed to indicate mischief, but one of the officers whipped a revolver from his pocket and said quietly—
'You had better dress yourself quickly, Mr. Howells.'
Mr. Howells thought better of his resolve, whatever it was, and sullenly and silently donned his clothes and made his toilet. It was very embarrassing to have to do so in the presence of strangers, but under the circumstances there was no avoiding it. As soon as he had finished one of the officers very adroitly handcuffed Mr. Howells, who looked furious, but who was helpless in spite of his great strength. He was then conducted downstairs to the shop, and Mrs. Howells was arrested on a warrant and on the same charge. Two servants, a cook and maid-of-all-work, named Jane Holcraft and Mary Prendergast respectively, were told to leave the premises at once, and the third man was temporarily placed in charge. The two officers and their prisoners then got into a four-wheeled cab which had been waiting in the street, and they were driven to the jail. Needless to say, perhaps, that the arrest of these people was due to Tyler Tatlock, and the way in which he tracked them down is a story in itself.
The initial point which gave Tatlock his clue was the clean soles of the dead man's boots. It was clear—at least, to Tatlock it seemed so—that the man never walked to the spot where his dead body was found. If such was the case, it followed that he must have been carried there, and who-ever carried him there necessarily had a strong motive for concealing his death. That was, so to speak, link number one.
Now for link number two. Mr. Graveling was well known. He was a conspicuous man, horsy in appearance, and carrying about with him the unmistakable air of his calling. Now, on the evening that he left his friends at the hotel in York on the plea that he had an appointment to keep previously to starting for the North, it was evident to such a mind as Tatlock's that the man was going to meet somebody outside of his particular ring of acquaintances, and that somebody in all probability was not of the masculine gender. Acting on this idea, Tatlock did search for the woman in York, but failed to find her.
Then as to link third. There are very, very few men indeed who have not some pages in their book of life they would like to tear out and destroy for ever and ever. But though that cannot be done, every care is taken to keep these pages from the eyes of the world. Tatlock therefore turned his attention to Graveling's past history, with the result that he learnt some curious facts. Years before, in a certain public-house in Glasgow patronised and frequented by betting men, was a very showy barmaid known as Agnes Lyal. She had an almost perfect figure, a good complexion, fair hair. For the rest, she was uneducated but intelligent, consumed with vanity, conceited and cheeky. Her employer considered her a great attraction to his place, and paid her well. Her admirers were numbered by dozens, from the stupid shop-lad to the hardened old Turfite. But Miss Agnes Lyal knew her game, and played it well. Amongst the frequenters of the place was one who looked with very admiring eyes on this bar Hebe, but from all his acquaintances he concealed his admiration, and while others fawned on her and flattered her, and she fooled them to the top of their bent, he silently and insidiously worked to win her, and he succeeded. A Scotch marriage took place, but he had his own reasons for concealing it, and for some time after-wards she continued her duties as barmaid. Then at her husband's request she took up her residence in Belfast, where he paid her periodical visits. It needed no prophet to predict that such an ill-assorted marriage could have but one ending. He was a man of considerable culture and refined tastes. She was coarse, uncultured, loud in her dress, fast in her manner. Within two years they mutually agreed to separate. Nevertheless, he recognised his obligation as the woman's husband, and made her a good allowance until on the most justifiable grounds he stopped it. It might be said that from that moment she became his implacable enemy.
The name of the man who married Agnes Lyal was George Graveling. By the way, Agnes Lyal was only an assumed name. Her real name was Selina Smith. At the time of her marriage her father was a convict, working out a long term of penal servitude at Dartmoor. Subsequently she allied herself with one Richard Howells, a powerful brute who had at one time been a prize-fighter, and ultimately they set up a second-hand store within the precincts of the city of York. On that fatal day when George Graveling disappeared from the ken of his friends, to be subsequently found stark and dead on Flaxton Moor, he had received an urgent message from his former wife, asking him for some reason or other to see her, and as he was still under her spell to some extent he went to her.
Step by step, cleverly and patiently, Tyler Tatlock traced the careers of Selina Smith and George Graveling down to that point. It was in Belfast he picked up the information that Selina was residing in York as Selina Howells. On the silver cream-jug he found on Flaxton Moor the initials S. H. were scratched on the bottom of the jug. They might have stood for lots of names be-ginning with S. and H., but, having regard to all the facts he had gathered up, he thought the jug might have belonged to Selina Howells, and so he visited her shop, and amongst other things offered the jug for sale. His deep-set eyes watched her the while, and he read her face like a book, and felt perfectly sure that she knew the secret of Graveling's death. Anyway, he laid such information before the police that they were enabled to procure a warrant for the arrest of the man and woman.
Firstly, it was absolutely certain that on the night of his death Graveling was at the Howells' house.
Secondly, it was no less certain he had died from the effects of oxalic acid.
Thirdly, oxalic acid was largely used by the Howells in their business for cleaning tarnished metals and other things.
Here at once was a chain of presumptive evidence which justified the warrant. The next step was to get up evidence to secure a conviction; and the evidence as given at the magisterial inquiry can be focussed thus:
Jane Holcraft had been in the service of the Howells for a little over a year as cook. On the date mentioned she remembered a gentleman coming to her master's house about eight o'clock at night. She did not see the gentleman herself, but she was ordered to cook some fish for supper, which she served at ten o'clock. She believed a good deal of drink was consumed, including champagne. She recognised the silver jug produced. It was one of a number of silver things belonging to her mistress. She had the cleaning of the silver, and had often cleaned the jug. She knew that oxalic acid was kept in the house, but she herself never used it.
Jerry Coghlan was a groom in the service of the Howells. He had two horses to look after and two traps, a dogcart, and a small waggonette. He had been with the Howells for a little over a year. On the date in question his master drove out in the dogcart, but returned about four o'clock. It was the day of the races. It had been raining, and the roads were very muddy. He washed the trap, groomed the horses, and bedded them both down before he left for the night. He did not sleep on the premises, as there was no accommodation, but lodged in the neighbourhood. He went to a music-hall that night with his young woman. The next morning when he went to the stables he was surprised to find that one of the horses had been out in the waggonette. The trap was very dirty, and so was the horse; in fact, it was covered with mud, which had caked on it. He noticed that in the apron of the waggonette there was a large hole. It had the appearance of having been corroded or burnt with some fluid. There was a similar burn and stain on one of the cushions of the trap. As he did not want to be blamed for this damage, he at once called his master's attention to it. Mr. Howells said that he had driven a friend to the station on the previous night, but he did not know what had caused the damage.
Mr. Andrew Weardale kept the Bell Inn at Market Weighton. He attended races all over the country, and was very well acquainted with Mr. George Graveling. On the day in question he was at the York races, and had several business transactions with Graveling, the result being that he gave him a cheque for twenty-nine pounds. It was a crossed cheque, payable to the order of George Graveling, and was drawn on the York branch of a Darlington bank. That cheque had never been cashed. He recognised the cheque now produced as the one he had given to Mr. Graveling.
This last piece of evidence added a powerful link to the chain of evidence. The cheque had been found amongst Howells' papers in his writing-desk.
The foregoing evidence was more than amply sufficient to justify both prisoners being committed for trial at the Assizes, and during the time that intervened more evidence was accumulated which left little doubt that on the night of Graveling's death the two prisoners drove in the waggonette towards Flaxton. There was a man with them, but he was either dead drunk or asleep.
At the trial the prisoners were powerfully defended, but the defence could not break down the prosecution, and both of the accused were condemned to death. The man remained a hardened ruffian; the woman broke down and became repentant, and the day before her execution she made a written confession. In it she stated she had written to Graveling asking him to see her. She had always retained a considerable amount of influence over him. It was Howells who suggested that he should be drugged and robbed. They plied him first with drink. Then they gave him a large dose of laudanum, after that they became frightened, as he looked so strange, and seemed to be dying. The consequence was that Howells put the horse to the waggonette. The insensible man was placed in it. Howells also took a phial of oxalic acid which was on the dining-room mantelpiece, and just as they were going out he snatched up the silver cream-jug from the sideboard, so as to get some water when they got to the moor, which Howells knew very well. He said that by mixing the acid with water the effect would be more rapid. As they drove along Howells took the phial from his pocket to see how much it contained, and in the dark, thinking he had made a mistake and brought a phial of spirits of wine, which was also on the sideboard, he took out the stopper to spell, and in doing so he spilt some of the acid on the apron and the cushion of the vehicle. On reaching the moor, Howells carried the semi-insensible man, who was then beginning to show signs of recovery, to the spot where he was found. He got some water in the jug, put the acid into it, and poured it down Graveling's throat. The victim was too dazed then to know what it was he was drinking. To lead to the belief that the man had committed suicide, in case his body should be found, the phial that had contained the poison was placed in his pocket. It was also decided to leave the Scotch bank-notes and the watch and chain upon him. The loose gold, however, was left by an oversight. In their excitement they forgot it.
Thus ended this remarkable tragedy, and it was due entirely to the sagacity, skill, and patience of Tyler Tatlock that the cruel murder of Mr. George Graveling was avenged.
As most people are aware, every civilised country in the world expends a large sum annually on what is known as 'Secret Service,' but not many know to what extent every capital of Europe swarms with spies, who are paid out of the Secret Service funds. It is the business of each Government to find out all it possibly can as to what is being done by other Governments. It is a matter of almost absolute impossibility for any Government to preserve military or naval secrets from the prying eyes of the ubiquitous spy. This spy system is universal, and in the 'Service' are to be found men and women of exceptional cleverness, who might in any other walk in life, probably, if they so desired, become very prominent members of society. But as spies they must ever remain unknown to the outside world, and, no matter to what extent they distinguish themselves in their calling, they receive no public recognition. Secrecy is the guiding principle of the spy's existence. His life is a mystery and a puzzle; and even those who are closest and dearest to him are probably in ignorance of how he earns his bread. Spies are almost invariably educated people, excellent linguists, unemotional by nature, and gifted with the power of being able to conceal their thoughts. Moreover, they should be adepts in the art of disguise, and capable of deceiving their own parents. For obvious reasons it is important that spies should not be known even to each other, though it is not easy to guard against this. It is the duty of the spy to transmit to his Government, as secretly as possible, every scrap of information likely to be of value; and, as may be supposed, in order to get his facts the spy not infrequently has to try and corrupt somebody in a position to give the information required. Now and again the public hear of a traitor who may have been in the army, the navy, the dockyards or elsewhere; but as a rule when a traitor is detected a discreet silence is preserved. He is dismissed from the service, of course, and for ever afterwards becomes a marked man in his own country.
England, perhaps, spends less than any other European nation in Secret Service, with the result—proved over and over again—that we are often profoundly ignorant when we ought to be well informed. The South African War, however, has opened the eyes of the Government to its parsimony, and the Secret Service vote for this year of grace is double what it has been for many years.
These brief remarks are quite a propos to the remarkable story that follows, and will serve to render the incidents more intelligible.
YEARS ago, when it seemed as if this country and Russia would become embroiled in a life-and-death struggle for supremacy in the East, Tyler Tatlock was suddenly summoned to the War Office. It was during a time of public excitement, and we were within an ace of breaking off diplomatic relations with the 'Colossus of the North.' How near we were to war the public did not know. Russia, with the aggressiveness and self-assertiveness which have characterised her 'expansion policy' for centuries, disputed our claim to certain boundary lines in connection with our Indian frontier; and we were compelled to put our foot down, as the saying is, and exclaim in no ambiguous language to the Northern Bully—'Thus far and no farther.'
Some of our frontier defences, if not all, had been allowed foolishly to fall into such a state of ruin that feverish activity prevailed in order to be prepared for emergencies. It was at the most critical stage of the negotiations that the Government learnt by some means that Russia was being kept fully informed of our plans and operations by a traitor or traitors; and at the War Office a startling discovery was made. Copies of certain drawings of the utmost importance were missing from the department where much of the drawing was done, and there was every reason to suppose they had been stolen with a view to selling them to Russia.
Efforts had been made to unearth the delinquent, but so far without success, and there was a consensus of opinion amongst the officials that it was desirable that an entire stranger should be employed to ferret out this traitor, as the detectives employed by the War Office permanently were more or less well known to the clerks and others of the various departments—consequently Tatlock was selected for the work. He bore a high reputation in Government circles as a man of exceptional ability in his line, and he had previously distinguished himself in carrying out Government work.
Tatlock's interview was with General Sir George ——, who in guarded language explained the situation.
'You will understand,' he said, after much talk, 'what an uneasy feeling there is in the department alluded to, since every man connected with it feels that to a greater or less extent he is under suspicion. In a case of this kind the black sheep is at especial pains to appear white, and, the documents having disappeared, it may be very difficult to spot the thief. And yet it is of the highest importance that he should be spotted, and weeded out root and branch.'
Tatlock assented to the proposition involved in the foregoing remark, and urged that the problem submitted to him for solution was beset with so many difficulties that he was by no means hopeful of success.
'For instance,' he said, running his eye down a list of about forty names the General had placed before him, 'there are gentlemen mentioned here whom to suspect seems almost to border upon the ridiculous.'
Well—no,' replied the General. 'You see, every man in the department is, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, a gentleman. By that I mean, apart from the necessary qualifications of education, he is a man of honour; a man incapable of a base action, and nothing can be baser than crime. It is not pleasant, therefore, to have to raise one's finger and say A or B may be guilty, when investigation would reveal that C or D was the actual culprit. You follow me?'
'Perfectly well, and I appreciate your delicacy of feeling. Nevertheless, what you say only serves to make my difficulty more apparent.'
'In a sense yes; in reality perhaps no. You see, the considerations which weigh with me can hardly influence you. You can, for the purposes of your inquiry, place every one of these men on a common level, and at the initial stage you need not discriminate between Dick and Harry.'
The result of the interview was that Tatlock undertook to try to unearth the culprit, stipulating for a perfectly free hand, which the General assured him he should have.
The seriousness of the crime which Tatlock was called upon to fix on the guilty person can hardly be realised by the casual reader. But it will be best expressed by stating that owing to the abstraction of the drawings, which it was logically concluded had been stolen for the purpose of supplying Russia with information, instructions had to be telegraphed out to India to make certain modifications in the defence scheme. This meant an expenditure of several thousand pounds. When Tatlock took up the work in earnest he found that the laws of probability necessitated the focussing of the suspicion on a section comprising twelve men, and closer investigation reduced the twelve to six. It is perhaps necessary to mention that while the various officials of the department in question had been in conference with the chiefs of the War Office, no definite steps had been taken with regard to the subordinates, and the engagement of the services of Tyler Tatlock was kept a profound secret.
The task that devolved upon Tatlock was one requiring the exercise of skill, tact, and judgment. But he was equal to it, and he set about his work with the deliberate caution that characterised him. A full consideration of the duties, and the conditions under which they were performed, of the six men Tatlock had selected forced him to the conclusion that the traitor would be found amongst them, and he proceeded to make himself acquainted with the habits and non-official lives of this little group. Three were married and had families; one was married, but without family; two were bachelors.
Now, it chanced that at this period there lived in London, and moved in the best society, a lady whom we'll designate as the Countess X. She was said to be a Pole, but was an open advocate of Russia. She was handsome, brilliant, rich; and her frequent letters to the Times, in which by astute arguments she endeavoured to prove that all our suspicions of Russia were absolutely unjustifiable, had made her name known throughout the length and breadth of the land; while her splendid receptions and entertainments at her mansion in Park Lane had given her a conspicuous position in society. Nevertheless, she was regarded with suspicion by some people, as it was believed she was a spy in the pay of Russia. She was about forty-five years of age, and whether she had a husband living or not was a matter about which she did not choose to enlighten the public. She had a daughter named Olga, a singularly handsome girl of twenty or thereabouts, who was reputed to be able to speak and write six or seven languages fluently, to be highly educated, and to possess all her mother's cleverness and brilliancy. The joint attractions of mother and daughter drew to the hospitable Park Lane mansion hosts of people, a large percentage of whom were young men, who vied with each other in paying Olga flattering attention.
About a fortnight after Tyler Tatlock had seriously set to work in his investigation of the War Office mystery he entered a very foreign-looking cafe restaurant in the neighbourhood of Leicester Square. He seated himself at an unoccupied table, and, speaking in French to one of the waiters, ordered coffee a la verre and a cheroot. He had not entered the place because it had any particular attraction for him, but because he was interested in two young men who had preceded him, and were joined at a table in a corner almost immediately by a very foreign and very Jewish-looking individual, 'who might have been a Rooshian, a German, or a Prooshian, but was not an Englishman.'
The two young men whom Tatlock had under his observation were employed at the War Office. One, named Terence Trapmore, was a draughtsman's copyist; the other, Paul Redmond, was a second-class clerk. It was evident they had gone to the cafe for the purpose of meeting the foreign gentleman, and by appointment. He greeted them effusively, and for some time they engaged in earnest conversation. The foreign gentleman gesticulated much, and shrugged his shoulders with an impressiveness that conveyed a good deal of meaning. Tatlock was too far removed from the trio to catch any of their conversation, which, as a matter of fact, was carried on sotto voce, but from his little, half-closed eyes he watched them, and the gesticulations and shoulder-shrugs were signs to him of a dumb language not altogether lost upon him. At last a little incident occurred which was destined to afford him the clue for which he had been searching so diligently. Terence Trapmore, clearly in reply to something said by the foreign gentleman, pulled an envelope from his pocket, took a letter from the envelope, placed the envelope on the marble-top table, and handed the letter to the foreigner, who read it with every manifestation of deep interest, and an elevating of the eye-brows. Tatlock would have given a great deal to have been able to have glanced over that letter, but that was out of the question. He never did anything rash; he knew how to wait and watch, and he had a saying to the effect that 'the patient watcher was bound to sec many things.' Well, he saw the foreigner fold the letter up and hand it back to Trapmore, who mechanically placed it in his pocket, unmindful of the envelope on the table, and by-and-by all unknowingly he swept the envelope off the table with his elbow, and it fell to the sanded floor.
Tatlock watched and waited. And he continued to watch and wait for fully an hour, when he was comforted by seeing the three men rise and depart. When they had gone he moved quietly to where they had been sitting, rapidly picked up the envelope, which had been trampled upon and was much dirtied, and slipped it into his pocket. He went back to his own table, gave a repeat order for coffee, and in an unconcerned way, and as if prompted by the merest curiosity, he inquired of the waiter who the foreign gentleman with the black beard might be who had just gone out.
The waiter, suspecting nothing, answered that the gentleman was known as Mr. Peter Petrovitch. He was staying in the house, and had been there about five weeks. He was supposed to have some business at the Russian Consulate, but what his business was the waiter did not know.
In due time Tatlock sauntered out, and later on examined the dirty envelope. In a cramped and unmistakably foreign hand it was addressed to 'Terence Trapmore, Esq.,' at his private residence. Of course, there was not much in that, but on the flap, stamped in black and gold, was a peculiar crest. So the detective put that envelope very carefully away in his pocket-hook. Though he did not suspect it then, it was to prove the key to the somewhat complex problem he had been called upon to solve. The following day he presented himself at the Heralds' College, and showing the envelope asked whose crest it was. After some little research he was informed it was one that was used by the Countess X.
'Oh, oh,' thought Tatlock, this is getting interesting.'
The fact of an envelope bearing the crest of the Countess being addressed to Terence Trapmore proved conclusively that Mr. Trapmore was in communication with a lady who, rightly or wrongly, was supposed to be an agent in the pay of Russia. His meeting Peter Petrovitch at the Leicester Square cafe was also suspicious, and altogether it seemed as if a pretty little plot was being worked to the detriment of Great Britain.
Tatlock was now convinced he had got hold of certain threads which, if followed up, would lead to important results. It was necessary, of course, to act with caution, and apart from detecting the traitor it was of the highest importance that the stolen drawings should be recovered if possible. Any precipitancy would in all probability frustrate the object aimed at. At that stage an open accusation of Trapmore would serve no purpose; it was Tatlock's business to get behind the scenes, and find out what was going on. And he found out this much, that two nights after the cafe incident Terence Trapmore and Paul Redmond were guests at the Countess X.'s house.
A week later he received an intimation from the War Office that, in spite of the precautions taken, it was believed an unauthorised copy had been made of certain frontier out-posts in Northern India. Up to this stage of the unravelment Tatlock had kept his suspicions to himself. But he now laid such information as he had gathered before Sir George ——, and was informed in return that three days before Trapmore and Redmond had commenced their annual holiday, and would not return to their duties for a month.
Tatlock now felt that, in a sense, his two men had scored a point against him. Whoever had come into possession of the stolen drawings would personally convey them out of the country owing to the tremendous risks of sending them through the post, for, of course, the postal authorities had been notified, and unusual vigilance was being exercised. Under these circumstances Sir George —— was in favour of an immediate arrest, which he felt was quite justified by the suspicious movements of the two men. Tatlock concurred with this, but he was quite prepared to find that the birds had flown, and with the long start they had got they might yet win in the desperate game they were playing.
Trapmore and Redmond were both bachelors. The former lived in apartments in the house of a widow lady and her daughter in South Kensington, the latter with his mother and sisters in the same neighbourhood. He had gone with his people to Eastbourne for the holidays, and Tatlock felt that for the time being he need not concern himself any more about him. All his attention was given to the presumed chief conspirator. Trapmore had left his lodgings, but his landlady had no idea where he had gone to. He had simply said he was off to Brighton for two days, and after that he did not know where he would be, but anyway he would not return for at least three weeks. The day after he left she sent on a parcel which came after his departure, and which he was expecting. She addressed it to the Grand Hotel, Brighton.
To Brighton, therefore, Tatlock went. He found that Trapmore and Petrovitch had both been there. Petrovitch had been staying for some time, but he and Trapmore had both left together and gone to London. Tatlock tried the cafe in Leicester Square, but ascertained that Petrovitch had left some time ago, and they had almost forgotten all about him. From this point then the trace was lost, but Tatlock was not the man to remain long baffled. His resourcefulness was almost inexhaustible, and his deductions led him to surmise that if anyone was likely to know of Trapmore's whereabouts it was the Countess X. But he was not foolish enough to suppose that that clever lady of intrigue would give the desired information for the mere asking. Trapmore, there was every reason to believe, was one of her creatures, and she would have to be met by the same cunning which she so skilfully exercised herself when dealing with others. So one morning a French gentleman called at her residence and sent his card, marked 'pressing,' up to her. The name on the card was M. de la Fosse, Rue Fontenelle 18, Paris.
Monsieur de la Fosse was a little man, dark to swarthiness, with a waxed moustache and a fussy, self-assertive manner. Madame la Comtesse graciously consented to receive him, although she did not know him, and he was shown into a charming little morning room, where she soon followed.
Monsieur bowed very low as the lady entered, and laid his hand on his heart in token of the profound sentiments of his utmost devotion to one so charming, and he apologised profusely for his inability to speak any language but his own. It was very stupid of him, very ignorant, but alas! it was the force of circumstances. He hoped the Countess understood French. Of course the Countess did.
'Ah!' then Monsieur de la Fosse was so happy, so very happy, and once more he bowed and laid his hand on his breast. Monsieur de la Fosse had allowed himself the supreme honour of calling on the Countess to ask her for some information about his dear friend, his more than brother, Terence Trapmore, who, as he understood, had the felicity of knowing the Countess intimately. So much he had learnt from his dear friend and more than brother Terence.
The lady's wonderfully mobile and singularly handsome face evinced the astonishment she felt, and her keen eyes searched the little Frenchman.
She confessed that she had some acquaintance with Monsieur Trapmore, but she thought he had been guilty of some liberty in talking about her to his friend, however intimate the friend was.
Monsieur de la Fosse begged of her to compose herself. His dear friend Trapmore was his more than brother. They had sentiments, tastes, and feelings in common. Moreover he—Monsieur de la Fosse—was a wonderful draughtsman. He had been in the service of the French government as a draughtsman. He knew that his dear friend and more than brother wanted him to assist him in making some drawings of fortifications. He—Monsieur de la Fosse—had come over to London on purpose, but when he called at his dear friend and more than brother's apartments he found, to his inexpressible astonishment, that the dear friend had gone away, and only left a message to the effect that he would not be back for three weeks. Happily Monsieur de la Fosse, as he assured the Countess, was a man of peace and so fond of his dear friend, or he would have been angry, so angry. As it was, he allowed himself the liberty of calling on Madame la Comtesse, thinking she might be able to tell him where he could find Monsieur Trapmore, with whom he had much business of grave importance.
Madame la Comtesse looked scornful, suspicious, half-angry. 'Really,' she said, 'I am not interested in Trap-more, and know nothing of his movements.'
'Alas, alas!' moaned the Frenchman, 'I have made a grave mistake in my friend! He has played me false. He told me he wanted to see me in London about some drawings. Now, when I come to this great city I learn he is not your friend, and he has gone away. It is shameful! It makes me very unhappy. Madame, I take my leave, and beg you to accept the sentiments of my most distinguished consideration. Madame, I am your very humble and obedient servant.'
The Countess smiled again, and the whole expression of her face indicated that she was suspicious of her visitor. As he was about to depart she said with irony:
'If your friend is so devoted to you it is curious he should have asked you to come to London, knowing full well that he was going to Paris.'
Ah, he has gone to Paris. Mon Dieu, est-ce possible? and I will swear he has gone with that Peter Petrovitch. Ma foi, what ill luck for me!'
'You know Peter Petrovitch?' asked the lady, lifting her eyebrows.
'Madame, I know that Peter Petrovitch.' Once more he bowed; once more he laid his hand on his heart.
'Well, I believe they are both in Paris,' remarked the lady, with a wave of her white jewelled hand, as if she meant to convey that the discussion was closed, and she dismissed the subject and her unwelcome visitor at the same time. Monsieur de la Fosse was not dense, so with many bows and florid and perfervid expressions of devotion he took his leave, and when he had left the house behind him a little smile of triumph lurked in the corners of his mouth, for De la Fosse was none other than Tyler Tatlock, the detective. His visit had convinced him of three things—firstly, Madame was the spy she was reputed to be; secondly, she and Trapmore were in league; thirdly, Petrovitch was a Russian agent, and between him and Trapmore was some bond, a bond of treason as far as Trapmore was concerned.
Tatlock's remark to the Countess about Petrovitch was a lucky shot. It was fired quite at random, but hit its mark. Madame knew Petrovitch; she knew Trapmore; and she gave herself away when she disclosed that she knew they had gone to Paris. Tatlock had made a great stride. The problem was now less abstruse.
After an interview with General Sir George at the War Office, Tatlock started for Paris. He did not know the address of the man he was seeking, but in Paris it is infinitely less difficult to trace a foreigner than in London. The compulsory system of registration, and the lists of strangers kept at the Bureau de Police, enables anyone who has a legitimate purpose in so doing to find a person he may be looking for. Within a few hours, therefore, Tatlock learned that Trapmore and Petrovitch had put up at the Hotel du Nord; but both had gone. It was believed that the English gentleman had departed for Vienna, and the Russian for London.
Vienna was within easy distance of the Russian frontier. If, as was reasonable to suppose, he was conveying the stolen drawings with him, the object of his journey to Vienna became apparent. At any rate Tatlock acted on the supposition, and acted quickly, for if he could only succeed in coming up with his man before he reached Russian territory he could foil him in his little game, as he was provided with the necessary official documents to enable him to secure his arrest almost anywhere save in Russia.
Tatlock travelled through to Vienna without break of journey. He had no certain knowledge that Trapmore had gone to Vienna, but there were strong probabilities that he had done so. Anyway Tatlock found himself in the beautiful Austrian capital, and, scarcely pausing to draw his breath when he alighted from the train, he handed in his credentials at the chief Police Bureau, and secured the cooperation of the officials. Next to Russia, Austria has the most perfect system of espionage of any country in the world.
In the 'Register of Arrivals,' kept at the Central Bureau, Tatlock read a very full description of the man he was after—Terence Trapmore, and learned that he was staying at the Hôtel Prada.
To the Hôtel Prada, a first-class house, Tatlock went. And that evening he saw Terence Trapmore at the table d'hôte with a young lady of striking beauty, to whom he seemed devoted. She was handsomely dressed, and wore much jewellery. She was known in the hotel as Fraulein Metrinkska. In reality she was Olga, daughter of Countess X. The police books furnished Tatlock with the following:
'Name—Fraulein Metrinkska, assumed. Real name, Olga, daughter of Countess X., resident in London. Nationality, Polish or Russian. Arrived from Dresden on the 1st. Receives much correspondence from Russia and England. Believed to be a spy in the interests of Russia.'
The following day a visit of inspection and interrogation was paid by the police agents to the Hotel Prada at the instigation of Tatlock. They were armed with an authority to search the baggage of Terence Trapmore and Olga, otherwise Fraulein Metrinkska, for suspected incriminating documents. The visit was like a thunderbolt to the young people. They protested; they argued; they threatened; but it was all useless. It was like banging their heads against an adamantine wall. Their keys were demanded, and ultimately produced, and in Olga's trunk was found a parcel of elaborate tracings and drawings of various parts of the Indian frontier. The discovery told its own tale. Olga had bewitched Trapmore. She had caused him to sully his honour and become a traitor. She had waited in Vienna for his coming with the all-important drawings, which she was going to convey to Russia. The papers were confiscated, as she could not prove any legitimate claim to them. Thus the little plot was frustrated. She was furious. She stormed and raved. She even threatened that the hosts of the Czar would swoop down and wipe Austria off the map. The police agents smiled. Of course, they would prefer no charge against her. She was free to remain or go as she liked.
Terence Trapmore was stricken into dumbness as he realised that his treachery was known. The light went out of his eyes, and a look of blank despair filled them. Pending an answer to a telegraph message Tatlock had despatched to London, asking for instructions, Trapmore was placed under surveillance, which meant that he could not leave the city without official permission.
That night was fair and beautiful. There was scarcely a cloud in the star-gemmed heavens, and the moon shone with an effulgence which filled the city with a sheen of silver, and trembled in rippling wavelets of weird and solemn light on the rolling Danube, into whose blue waters a broken-hearted and desperate man hurled himself and his shame, and passed with a despairing wail to the mystic beyond. Terence Trapmore had dreamed a dream, and Olga was his vision. He awakened to reality, and death beckoned him. Some eyes broke into tears, no doubt, when his end was known, but Olga's didn't. What cared she? Terence Trapmore, the common-place War Office drudge, was to her a mere man, to be used and trifled with, and flung away when done with. She was glad when she heard he was dead; the poor fool who had dared to suppose that he had the power to win her love, she who was so radiantly beautiful. No; she had her idol, but it wasn't Terence Trapmore. Two days later she pursued her journey to Russia, smiling and radiant.
Tyler Tatlock's mission finished when he handed the stolen plans back to the War Office, and thus checkmated Russia's designs as far as these plans were concerned.
Nothing definite was actually proved against Paul Redmond, the second-class clerk, though it was morally certain that he had aided and abetted Trapmore, but the War Office authorities did not deem it advisable to institute public proceedings. For obvious reasons it was better to hush these things up; but Redmond was discharged, and knowing that henceforth he would be a marked man he went abroad. What the Countess X.'s feelings were when she heard of her dupe's death it is not easy to tell, but it is significant that shortly afterwards her effects in Park Lane were sold by auction, and she departed for the Continent. She knew that her mission in London had finished, and that she had been outwitted.
It was a summer evening. Time, between seven and eight o'clock. The scene, Waverley Station, Edinburgh. The train from London had just come in, and the passengers were numerous and miscellaneous. The platform was thronged with an excited, jabbering crowd, made up of passengers and porters, friends and loiterers. It was an animated, bustling scene, full of life, movement, and noise.
A few moments after the train had come to a standstill at the platform, a tall, gentlemanly-looking man, dressed in the height of fashion, and wearing patent leather boots and canary-coloured kid gloves, descended from a first-class compartment and greeted another man who awaited him on the platform. The passenger appeared so dainty and fresh that he did not give one the impression of having travelled the whole of the hot and dusty journey from London. But such was the case. The friend who met him was a burly individual, whose general appearance suggested the flourishing tradesman. His hair was close-cropped. He had bushy red whiskers and moustache, and clean-shaven chin. The two men shook hands warmly, and stood chatting for some few minutes until a porter came up, touched his hat, and inquired of the passenger if he had any luggage.
'Yes, a leather portmanteau, marked in front with a blue cross, and on the top the initials R. B. painted white. You can't mistake it.'
'Where's it from, sir?'
'Euston.'
'Shall I get you a cab?'
'No, I have already got one,' answered the friend. 'It's standing over there, see, by the main entrance.'
'Right, sir. I'll bring the luggage to you,' answered the porter, as he went off to where a crowd was surging round the luggage van, which was being rapidly unloaded by a band of perspiring, grimy men.
The two friends continued their conversation for a little while. The new arrival carried over his arm a handsome rug, and in his hand a brown leather handbag. At last they moved slowly through the swirling human stream, and made their way to the vehicle which had already been engaged by the friend. In this the passenger deposited his rug and bag, and the two men fell to chatting again, lighting up cigars drawn from the passenger's handsome case, which he produced from his pocket.
At last the porter, labouring under the weight of a bulky portmanteau, which he bore on his shoulder, appeared, and the luggage having been deposited on the top of the vehicle the driver was ordered to proceed to a certain fashionable hotel in Princes Street, and the porter having been fee'd—evidently, by the expression on his face, to his entire satisfaction—the two gentlemen were driven away.
These two gentlemen had, all unknown to themselves, evidently been an object of peculiar interest to a little, dark-eyed, sharp-looking fellow, who came by the London train, and alighted at the same time that the handsomely-dressed traveller descended from the first-class carriage. From that moment the little man did not lose sight of him and the friend who met him, until they drove off to the hotel. Then the inquisitive and curious little stranger sauntered leisurely along the platform, claimed a portmanteau from the luggage van, and engaged the services of an outside porter to carry it to an hotel within a biscuit throw of the station, and lighting a cigarette he strolled after him.
Mr. John Rennie was the manager of the Scottish Finance Corporation, Limited. It was a big concern with many ramifications. They had branches in most of the principal towns of Scotland, and their operations embraced a very wide field. Chiefly they were concerned in lending money on mortgage, and in the purchasing and re-selling of estates. Mr. Rennie had occupied the important position of manager for a good many years, and was considered to be an exceedingly shrewd and clever man.
To him there came one morning a fashionably-dressed gentlemanly man, whose visiting-card bore the legend:
Col. John E. Pritchard.
'The Gables,' Richmond.
Army and Navy Club.
Colonel Pritchard had, apparently, important business to transact. He was desirous of raising a first mortgage on what was known as the Strathmain estate, situated in Perthshire. The estate included an old-fashioned and somewhat dilapidated mansion, containing about fifty rooms, with ample stabling, and about three thousand acres of land, only a small portion of which was under cultivation. The chief value of the property lay in its game, which consisted of fish and feather. As was well known, the property had been somewhat neglected owing to family disputes. A brother of the Colonel's, a Mr. Wilfrid Pritchard, who was reputed to have been a 'rapscallion' and ne'er-do-weel, had caused a good deal of bother, but at last he had sold his interests to the Colonel, and betaken himself to 'the wilds of Siberia on a shooting expedition'—at least, so it was reported by the Colonel, who apparently was displaying a laudable desire to retrieve the family fortunes and restore the good name, which, as the Colonel declared, had been so shamefully bespattered by Wilfrid Pritchard. Mr. Rennie received his visitor very courteously. He knew the Strathmain estate well by repute. Its neglected condition had afforded the gossips food for tattle for a long time; and there had been much speculation as to what would be the fate of the property ultimately. It was capable of almost any amount of development, and its value could be trebled.
'I want to explain,' said Colonel Pritchard blandly, 'that my object in raising a mortgage is with a view to developments.'
'What is the present rent-roll?' asked Mr. Rennie.
'Well, there are three farms, but the total amount realised from them is only about six hundred and twenty pounds. They are very much under-rented.'
'And the shootings, what do they realise?'
'Something under a thousand, but there again there has been gross mismanagement.'
'What amount of money are you proposing to raise?' 'I want at least twenty thousand pounds.'
'Is there any charge of any kind on the property at present?'
'None whatever.'
'It is absolutely free?'
'Absolutely.'
The result of this interview was that Mr. Rennie, on behalf of his company, undertook to have the estate surveyed and valued, and, as the Colonel represented the matter as being urgent, it was arranged that the business should be conducted with all despatch, and a week was named as the limit in which a decision might be looked for.
On this undertaking the Colonel went away, seemingly very happy and contented, and Mr. Rennie was of opinion that he had an opportunity of doing a good stroke of business for the Scottish Finance Corporation, Limited, of which he was the managing director, and an exceedingly enterprising one in the interests of his company.
On the evening of the day on which Colonel John E. Pritchard called upon Mr. Rennie with reference to the raising of a loan on the Strathmain estate, the passenger from London was entertaining three gentlemen in a private sitting-room of the hotel in which he was staying. Each man was enjoying the flavour of an excellent cigar from a box that stood on the table. And that the meeting was not a Temperance one was verified by the fact that whisky and brandy were also on the table, and before each gentleman was a glass, which was frequently raised to the lips of the gentle-man, and its liquid contents seemed to be much appreciated.
One of the gentlemen was the same person who had met the passenger from London on his arrival, and was addressed as 'Sandeman.' The other was a little squat man, with clean-shaven face, a somewhat bulbous nose of a vermilion hue, and a general suggestiveness that he loved the flesh-pots of Egypt a good deal more than he loved hard work. He answered to the name of Blagdon. The passenger was familiarly referred to as 'Jack.' The fourth man of the group answered to the name of Nick. He was a man of powerful build and horsy—decidedly horsy—as to his appearance.
These gentlemen smoked a good deal, and consumed liquor freely. The one with the vermilion nose patronised the brandy, but the whisky was evidently to the taste of the others. The business in which they were engaged seemed to be of an important character. Pens, ink, and paper were on the table. And 'Jack,' having filled a sheet of paper with writing, handed it to Sandeman, who perused it carefully, and passed it to Blagdon, who read it thoughtfully with the air, of a professional man, and marked several passages with pencil, and then gave it to Nick, who silently and with grave mien went through it, and having spent ten minutes or a quarter of an hour in mastering its contents said:
'This will have to be altered. It's not clear enough.'
'That's my opinion,' remarked Blagdon. 'Its terms are too vague, and the passages I have underlined in pencil are capable of various legal interpretations.'
'Ay, precisely,' put in Sandeman, speaking slowly and decisively. 'Oor friend Jock's a fine lad, but he's no equal to drawing up an agreement of this kind, except in so far as he would keep the oyster to himself, and gie us the shells.'
There was a little laugh at this sally, though Jack didn't join in it. The expression on his face rather indicated that he resented the soft impeachment. But he betrayed no anger in his voice, as, turning to Blagdon, he said:
Set your great legal brain to work, then, and produce something better.'
This suggestion met with the hearty approval of Sande-man and Nick, so Blagdon recharged his glass as a necessary preparation for the important work. He also threw away the remainder of the cigar he had been smoking, and lit a fresh one. Then, taking a sheet of foolscap paper, he doubled it up at the edge so as to form a margin, and, after this preliminary, he began to write, taking Jack's document as a basis for his own. He was quite an hour before he had completed his task, during which the conversation was general and desultory, though Blagdon worked quietly and in a perfectly absorbed way, so that he seemed quite oblivious of his surroundings. At last he finished. He read over what he had written, made one or two corrections, then with a self-satisfied air he handed it to Jack, with the remark—
'There; I think that meets the case.'
Jack read and frowned, but said nothing. He passed the paper to Sandeman, who expressed his approval by exclaiming—
'Capital, capital,' and he handed the document to Nick, who dwelt upon its contents until at last he also declared that it was all right.
'Very well,' said Jack, 'since you all approve of it, I've no objection to raise. As you are a good writer, Sandeman, make three more copies of this, so that we can each have one.'
Fresh cigars were lighted, more drink poured out, and then Sandeman set to work. It took him a good two hours to accomplish it. Then, the papers having been read, each appended his signature to all four; each folded up his copy and put it into his pocket, and the business of the meeting having been thus satisfactorily arranged, the gentlemen rose, shook and stretched themselves, and, as the hour was nearly eight o'clock, Blagdon expressed an opinion that it was time for the inner man to be attended to, and he suggested that Jack should order dinner; so the door was unlocked—it was strange they should have kept the door locked, but so it was—the bell rung, and when the waiter appeared he was told that the four gentlemen wished to dine; and the next move was for the four gentlemen to adjourn to Jack's bedroom to have a wash and brush up. No sooner had they left than a door at the end of the room opened. It was the door of a cupboard, and there stepped from the dark recess of the cupboard the little sharp-eyed man who had travelled from London in the same train as the 'Passenger.' He went downstairs, had a word or two with the landlord in the entrance hall, and about an hour later he left Edinburgh by the night mail for London.
A week passed, and in accordance with the arrangement previously made Colonel John E. Pritchard called upon Mr. Rennie to know what decision had been arrived at with reference to the mortgage.
'Well,' began Rennie, 'I have had the Strathmain estate carefully surveyed, and the report presented to me would not justify me in recommending my company to advance you twenty thousand pounds.'
'Indeed, how is that?' cried the Colonel, looking somewhat crestfallen.
'Because in its present condition the value of the security would not, in our opinion, sufficiently cover us against contingencies.'
'But I have always understood that the marketable value of the estate was between forty and fifty thousand pounds,' the Colonel said, with obvious anxiety and disappointment in his tone.
Mr. Rennie smiled as he replied softly:
'I am afraid you have been misinformed. There is no doubt the property is capable of much improvement, but it will take a long time and necessitate considerable outlay.'
'Well, what is the best you can do?'
'I have gone carefully into the matter, and don't think we could advance more than fifteen thousand pounds.'
'The deuce!' exclaimed the Colonel, biting his lip.
'I am sorry, but of course we have to look to the possibility of having to foreclose.'
The Colonel seemed terribly put out. He sucked his moustache and drummed irritably on the table with his fingers, until at last, brusquely and suddenly, he said:
'Make it sixteen.'
'I'm afraid I can't do that.'
'Then I'm hanged if I don't try some other firm,' cried the Colonel, as he jumped up with the air of a person who was annoyed and out of temper.
At that moment there was a knock at the door, and, in reply to Mr. Rennie's 'Come in,' a clerk entered, and handed the manager a slip of paper. Rennie glanced at it, and, turning to his visitor, said—'Excuse me for a few minutes, I will not keep you long.'
The Colonel sat down again, and Rennie left the room. He was absent about ten minutes, and when he re-entered he was followed by two tall, powerful men, one of whom approached the Colonel and said—'You are Colonel John E. Pritchard, I believe?'
The Colonel, who had jumped up, looked ill at ease, and stammered out—
'What has it got to do with you?' Then, suddenly changing his manner and tone, he added, 'Yes, that is my name. What do you want with me?'
'I hold a warrant for your arrest on a charge of conspiracy, fraud, and forgery.'
The Colonel's face grew deadly pale, and with a nervous, jerky movement he thrust his hand into his coat pocket, but the two men fell upon him, dragged his hand out, and with it a nickel-plated revolver, which dropped on to the floor, and one of the barrels exploded, but fortunately without damaging anyone. The carpet, however, was burned, and a hole drilled in the wall by the bullet. Very adroitly and rapidly the Colonel was handcuffed. Then, with a ghastly smile, he asked—Upon whose information is this absurd charge preferred?'
'Upon the information sworn to by one Tyler Tatlock, a private detective, of London, and your brother Wilfrid Pritchard.'
'My brother!' gasped the prisoner, as he reeled and seemed as if he would fall, but the men caught him, and supported him. He shook himself free, and with an effort recovered his self-possession.
'I shall have a full and complete answer to this monstrous charge,' he said.
Many a long day had passed since the newspapers had been able to furnish their readers with such sensational reading as that they printed on the morning following Colonel Pritchard's arrest. The story had in it all the elements of a thrilling romance. It appeared that John and Wilfrid Pritchard were the sons of a gentleman who had made a fortune in trade. Wilfrid was the elder brother, and inherited a considerable amount of property, including Strathmain. John had held a commission in the Militia, but had been compelled to resign it on account of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman. Since then he had lived on his wits, and had associated himself with a disreputable barrister, named Blagdon, who had been struck oft the rolls; a Walter Sandeman, who had once kept a public-house in Glasgow, but for a long time had also lived by his wits; and one Harvey Nicolson, a racing tout. This quartette of unprincipled rascals had resorted to many schemes for keeping themselves supplied with coin of the realm, and at last the fertile brain of John E. Pritchard conceived a daring and desperate plan for raising the wind.
His brother Wilfrid Pritchard was a dipsomaniac, and sadly neglected his affairs. John, in connivance with the other three rascals, induced him to accompany him to Paris. There, by means of corruption and bribery, they got him shut up in a private lunatic asylum; and the road being thus cleared, the barrister Blagdon, with the aid of Sandeman and Nicolson, forged a transfer of the property to John, it being arranged that a mortgage should be raised, and the money shared in varying proportions. It was Sandeman who met Pritchard at the Waverley Station the night he arrived from London, and it was Sandeman who had arranged that the Finance Corporation should be applied to for a mortgage.
It chanced, however, that an aunt of the Pritchards, who disliked John very much, but had a strong regard for Wilfrid in spite of his faults, and had tried to reform him, became alarmed and suspicious by his sudden disappearance, and fearing that there had been foul play she enlisted the services of Tyler Tatlock, who shadowed John, followed him to Edinburgh, concealed himself in the cupboard in the room of the hotel, and overheard all that took place when the quartette met and drew up an agreement as to the amount each was to receive for his share in the villainy. Then he hurried south to report the whereabouts of Wilfrid, so that his friends could take steps to ensure his release, and he returned to Edinburgh in time to make his dramatic coup while John was conducting his negotiations with Rennie.
The four wretches had considered themselves so secure that their sudden arrest was like a bolt from the blue, and as the evidence accumulated and the net was tightened around them they felt that their doom was sealed.
The trial that followed in due course was something more than a nine days' wonder, and the result was inevitable from the first. The offence with which they were charged was an exceedingly serious one, and the punishment commensurate with so grave a crime. The sentence that was pronounced made it certain that Society would be in no further danger from the machinations of these accomplished scoundrels for a very long time.
It is perhaps needless to say that Tatlock was highly complimented on his skill in nipping this great conspiracy in the bud, and one more triumph was added to the many that had served to make his name famous as an unraveller of criminal mysteries.
ONE of the most peculiar cases of duplicity that Tatlock was ever called upon to investigate was that which came to be known as 'the Gyde Abduction Case.' It was peculiar in many respects, more particularly in the cunning, the artfulness, and cruelty displayed. Indeed, there are few parallels to it, and it furnishes us with one more powerful example of the depths to which human wickedness is capable of reaching. If the story were the invention of the romance-writer, the superlatively clever people who write the reviews for the papers would pooh-pooh it as absurdly improbable; but one need only go to real life to find the groundwork for comedies and tragedies which make invention seem ridiculous. The everyday life of almost any large community is marked by sensations which out-romance all the romances ever evolved from clever brains. The story here told needs no florid hyperbole to make it attractive. It can be set down in plain, straightforward, narrative form, with the certainty of exercising a fascination over those who take an interest in human problems.
Miss Margaret Farnell was about twenty years or age. She was petite, unsophisticated, very pretty, and of a gentle and confiding disposition. She fell in love with Gilbert Gyde, who was about eight years her senior; by profession a barrister, by inclination a dilettante. He was the son of a wealthy man, who, however, was not very liberal; and as Gilbert was a third son, it seemed as if his prospects were not particularly bright. On the other hand, however, he was clever, and, while he loved not law, he wooed literature, and a facile pen found ready employment by the magazines and big weeklies. A striking feature of this case is that Gilbert's eldest brother, John, reputable heir to a snug estate roughly valued at four thousand a year, was the first wooer of Margaret. For reasons, however, which she, in her woman's way, could no doubt have justified, Margaret gave up John Gyde, and accepted the attentions of Gilbert. This led to family differences on both sides. John was of a vindictive, unforgiving nature, and it was an open secret that he had declared he would never recognise his brother Gilbert again.
James Farnell, Margaret's father, falls to be described as 'a decayed gentleman,' a somewhat vague description truly, and with a certain objectionable suggestiveness about it. Put into plain language, James was the son of a man who had distinguished himself at Oxford, but nowhere else. He succeeded to a fortune, sat in Parliament as representative of a small borough, had a somewhat disreputable connection with a lady of title, squandered his fortune, was compelled by force of circumstances to apply for the Chiltern Hundreds—in other words, resign his seat in Parliament—and afterwards became private secretary to Lord Tintern, with whose youngest daughter he contracted a secret marriage. When this became known to her father he disowned her, and she and her husband had to struggle to live. They had a family of four children, one girl—Margaret—and three boys. Mr. Farnell was clever, well educated, and well connected, but he lacked stability of purpose, and spent his time and energy in railing against Fate instead of exerting himself in trying to improve his position.
Margaret Farnell and Gilbert Gyde were married, not amidst rejoicing, and with the clashing of marriage bells shivering in the air, and flowers and gay dresses lending light, colour, and picturesqueness to the scene. Their marriage took place in a gloomy, mouldy church, on a drizzling, slushy, sloppy day, and with only the gouty old verger and the asthmatical old female pew-cleaner and a cousin of the bride and a friend of the bridegroom present. Nothing could have been more depressing, more sombre, more unorthodox, in the conventional and social sense, than this wedding. Nor was the ceremony followed by congratulations, luncheon, the drinking of health and happiness, and the merrymaking usually associated with marriage in a respectable walk in life. The young couple drove in a musty-smelling common four-wheeler from the church to Euston Station, whence they got the train to Edinburgh, where they intended to spend a week and then go on to Inverness and Loch Maree. Four days after the wedding, however, Tyler Tatlock, the detective, at the urgent solicitation of the distracted bride-groom, was searching for the bride, who had been mysteriously spirited away. The circumstances were curious enough, and pointed, obviously, to a conspiracy. All that could be gathered at the time was this:
Mr. and Mrs. Gyde were staying at the Balmoral Hotel. They had dined as usual at half-past six. Then Mr. Gyde had betaken himself to the smoking-room to indulge in a cigar, while his wife went upstairs to her bedroom to attire herself to attend a swell concert for which her husband had procured tickets. Mr. Gyde sipped his coffee, smoked his cigar leisurely, and glanced over the London papers, as the concert was not to begin until half-past eight.
At a quarter-past eight he went upstairs to see if his wife was ready, but she was not in the bedroom. Her fan, opera-glasses, a pocket scent-bottle, her gloves, and a cambric handkerchief were on the dressing-table, suggesting thereby that she had temporarily gone out of the room. So Mr. Gyde washed his hands, brushed his hair, and put on his hat. It was then half-past eight, and his wife had not come back. Then he noticed for the first time that her hat and cloak were gone. He rang the bell, and inquired of the chambermaid if she knew where his wife was. The maid could give no information, so Gyde went downstairs. He looked in the reading-room, the drawing-room, but failed to find his wife. He sauntered to the door, thinking she might have run out to some neighbouring shop for some trifle necessary for her toilet.
A quarter to nine chimed by the Tron clock. The concert commenced at half-past eight, but still there was no sign of Mrs. Gyde. Gilbert went upstairs again. On the dressing-table there were still the fan, opera-glasses, and other odds and ends, which the lady had evidently placed there. The husband was puzzled, but not alarmed. He felt satisfied that his wife had run out for something she wanted and had had to go farther afield than she anticipated. He would chide her playfully when she came back for keeping him waiting and missing the commencement of the concert. Nine o'clock boomed from the Tron.
Somehow or other the sound of the bell as it struck the hour begot in him the first symptoms of alarm. It emphasised the remarkable fact that his bride of a few days was three-quarters of an hour late for the concert—they ought to have left the hotel at a quarter-past eight. So he hurried downstairs and made inquiries. The head waiter knew nothing, and another waiter to whom he addressed himself knew nothing. He therefore appealed to the young lady bookkeeper in the office in the entrance hall.
'Have you seen my wife, Miss?'
'No.'
'You don't know if she's gone out?'
'No, I don't. But Archie, the hall porter, brought a note to me addressed to her, and I sent it up to her room by James, the waiter.'
This item of information literally astounded Gyde. Who could possibly have sent a note to his wife? The hall porter was appealed to. A youth came into the hall and inquired if Mrs. Gyde was staying there, and he handed a note to the porter, with a request that it be delivered immediately to Mrs. Gyde. The porter took the note to the bookkeeper; the bookkeeper sent it upstairs to Room 47—Mrs. Gyde's room—by James, the waiter. A short time afterwards the lady came downstairs in a great hurry. She'd her hat and cloak on, and went out, so said the porter.
Mr. Gyde was more deeply puzzled, and his alarm grew. What could it possibly mean? Neither he nor his wife had ever been to Edinburgh before, and they knew nobody in the place—that is, no one in the least likely to send a note by hand to his wife, the contents of which had evidently caused her to leave the hotel hurriedly. The circumstance was mystifying and disquieting. The poor fellow went out into Princes Street, and walked a little way in one direction, then turned back and went in the opposite direction, hoping all the time, of course, that he would meet his wife, but he didn't.
Once again the brazen bell of the Tron gave tongue, and announced that half of the tenth hour had expired.
Half-past nine!
Gyde literally ran back to the hotel. Had Mrs. Gyde come in? The hall porter hadn't seen her. The anxious husband rushed upstairs to his room. There still lay his wife's fan, opera-glasses, scent-bottle, &c., on the dressing-table. The mystery was more mysterious. The poor fellow was at his wit's end what to do, until a fearful thought that something tragic had happened came over him, and ten minutes later he was at the head Police Office telling of his woe and beseeching that information be circulated all over the city, without a moment's loss of time, that the lady was missing.
Ten, half-past, eleven, and then midnight chimed, but there was never a sign of his wife's return. Gyde passed a night of maddening suspense. What he suffered cannot be adequately described by mere words. He spent those awful laggard hours in going backwards and forwards between the hotel and the police station. With the urbanity for which the Edinburgh police are noted, they did all they could to calm the distracted husband. One of their detectives who had earned a reputation for cleverness exerted himself to the uttermost, but failed to get any trace of the missing young lady.
It was June, and the dawn of the summer morning found Gyde blear-eyed, haggard, and forlorn. He had quite exhausted his brain in trying to work out some plausible theory to account for his young wife's mysterious disappearance. But the more he struggled with the problem the more puzzled he became. That she had not premeditated flight seemed evident on the face of it, by the fact that her jewellery, which was of some value—in fact, everything except what she stood upright in—she had left behind. Therefore, if her flight had been planned, she had displayed a vast amount of artful cunning to throw him off the scent. But when an unworthy thought tried to fasten upon poor Gyde, he freed himself from it. He would not, could not, think anything unworthy of the dear little woman who, but a few days previously, had linked her destiny with his.
Suddenly it occurred to him to telegraph to Tyler Tatlock. He was not unacquainted with him, having in his capacity as a journalist met him on several occasions. He knew Tatlock to be very clever, though he was not gifted with the all but supernatural powers which the public were inclined to ascribe to him. But Tatlock had over and over again succeeded where many men of vaunted ability had failed. So the sorrowing husband wired to him; a very urgent message it was, and it chanced that when he got it Tatlock was enabled so to arrange his affairs that he left that very night for the north.
When the two men met, Tatlock listened patiently, as was his wont, to the story as told by Gyde. For a moment, truly it was not more than a moment, Tatlock deemed it probable there was another lover in the case. But he dismissed that thought as soon as born. A rapid mental survey of the facts as recorded served to convince him that the young woman had not gone away as a consenting party. He arrived at this conclusion probably more by some subtle, indescribable instinct, than by any process of reasoning. And yet, of course, he did reason. Equally of course, it was indispensable to his task that he should make numerous inquiries about Margaret's acquaintances and position before her marriage. And on this point Gyde afforded all the information he possibly could.
Two very trying and torturing days to Gyde passed, and then Tatlock advised him to return to London. As may be supposed the young man was very averse to do that. He was crushed and broken, but he preferred to linger in the place where he had spent the early hours of his married life. He was argued out of this idea, however, by Tatlock, who said—
'Here you are lonely and desolate. In London you will be amongst your friends. They can give you the consolation that strangers cannot do. Besides, your wife is not in Edinburgh.'
'What! Not in Edinburgh?'
'How do you know that?'
'I guess it.'
'Then can you not guess where she is?'
'Not at present. But take my advice. Go south. Wait patiently. Be hopeful; trust in Providence.'
Gyde recognised the futility of questioning Tatlock at that stage. He was like the Sphinx—solemn, imperturbable, mysterious when occasion required; and no amount of questioning would make him speak if he felt that he had nothing to say. So Gyde wisely refrained from seeking to draw him; and with heavy heart and oppressed spirits he turned his back on beautiful Edinburgh, feeling in so doing as if he were leaving all that held him to life, and that hence-forth he must plod on his way, dragging for ever with him the corpse of his dead hopes.
Amongst his own relatives he found that curiosity was more conspicuous than sympathy. His brother John said some very unkind things to members of the family about Margaret, things in which there was only a half-concealed suggestion that the pretty but fickle Margaret had repented of her marriage, and had thrown herself into the arms of some old lover. This, coming to Gilbert's ears, rendered him furious, and seeking out John he threatened him with personal chastisement—a threat that doubtless would have taken practical shape but for the interference of other members of the family.
Gyde had been back in London a week when Tyler Tatlock called upon him at his chambers.
'What news?' cried the young man with a nervous, feverish anxiety.
'None at present.'
Gyde's heart turned cold again.
'Is there no hope, then, of solving this mystery?' he asked in faltering accents.
'Oh, I don't take such a pessimistic view of the case as that. We shall probably recover your wife shortly. But now I want you to write a letter to my dictation. Don't ask me any questions, don't seek to know to whom you are writing, but do exactly as I desire you to do.'
Gyde had far too strong a faith in Tatlock to set himself in opposition to him, and in a few minutes he had penned, from Tatlock's dictation, the following note:
In reply to yours I undertake to comply with all the conditions you lay down, and will be at the place you indicate at seven o'clock next Wednesday evening.
Gyde signed this brief epistle, and handed it to the detective, who put it in an envelope, sealed it up, and told Gyde to address it to—
34 Edgware Road,
As may be supposed, Gyde's curiosity was aroused to such an extent that he found it very hard to refrain from plying the detective with questions. But he did refrain, for he had given his promise to do so; moreover, he was sure that Tatlock had got a clue, and it was better to let him go to work in his own way.
On the following Wednesday Tatlock turned up again, and instructed Gyde to proceed to a sailors' slop-shop situated in Ratcliffe Highway, and kept by a Chinaman named Woong Sing. He was to enter the shop at seven o'clock precisely, and say to the Chinaman: 'Keys.'
The Chinaman would answer—'Locks.'
The Chinaman would then lead him to a room, where he would very likely meet another man. What would happen then Tatlock did not pretend to know, but every-thing was to be left in his hands. It was all mystifying and strange, but Gyde consented to be thus led, blindfolded as it were, feeling sure that his guide knew what he was about.
'By the way,' said Tatlock, as he was about to take his departure, 'can you fire a pistol?'
'Yes. I think so.'
'Then take this. And for God's sake be careful, for it's loaded. And, mark you, as you value your life conceal the weapon about your person, and under no circumstances produce it unless it be to defend your own life.'
The situation was now thrilling, in addition to being mysterious, but Gyde resolved to play the part sketched out for him to the letter.
Woong Sing's slop-shop was one of many to be found in the unsavoury neighbourhood where Jack Tars fall an easy prey to the land-sharks that swarm there, ever on the look-out for them. It was a stuffy, little, dirty den, the stock-in-trade being oilskins, sou'westers, sea-boots, jack-knives, flannel shirts, and the like. A tall, yellow-skinned, blear-eyed Mongolian stood behind the little counter. It was Woong Sing. To him entered Gilbert Gyde as a neighbouring church clock was striking seven.
'Keys,' said Gyde.
'Locks,' answered the Chinaman, who, motioning his visitor to follow him, led the way up a narrow, dark stair-way, every board of which creaked dreadfully when trodden on, as if in pain. A second flight, no less narrow and no less dark and creaky, was ascended, and Gyde found himself in a small, low-ceilinged, foul-smelling room. Such furniture as there was seemed tumbling to pieces. Without speaking a word the Chinaman, having shown his visitor in, departed. In the centre of the room was a small table with a petroleum lamp burning on it. There was a mouldering couch at one end; a tiny bedstead covered with a filthy counterpane stood in a recess; a few rickety chairs, and a cheap wardrobe that was falling to pieces, completed the furniture.
Wondering what the next act would be in this funny and mysterious little drama, Gyde waited, almost in breath-less expectancy, with his hand in his coat-pocket, clasping the pistol. Presently the door opened, and a dissipated, hard-featured, seedy-looking individual entered. He scrutinised Gyde very closely, who scrutinised him in turn.
Have you brought the money?' asked the seedy one abruptly, in a raspy, rusty voice in keeping with his appearance.
'What money?' asked Gyde, getting more and more mystified.
'What money!' echoed the blear-eyed man. 'Do you mean to say?'
Before he could finish the sentence a third actor appeared on the scene in the person of Tyler Tatlock. The man started, and his blotchy face grew pale. Looking rapidly from Tatlock to Gyde, he asked, addressing the latter:
'What does this mean?'
'It means that you are trapped like a rat, my fine fellow,' answered Gyde. The man drew a revolver quickly. Whether he really meant to use it or not, or he merely intended it as a menace, it is difficult to say, for Tatlock with wonderful agility knocked the weapon out of his hand, and as it fell on the floor he put his foot on it, and said:
'Don't try any tricks, my man, or you'll repent it. Mr. Gyde, have you got a pistol?' Gyde produced his weapon. 'Cover this rascal, please.' Tatlock then stooped and picked up the revolver, glanced at the chambers, and saw they were loaded. 'Now then, my beauty,' he continued, addressing the man, 'you will fully realise that you are trapped. My name is Tyler Tatlock. Perhaps you have heard of me! Ah! your face tells a tale. I am not unknown to you, evidently. Now, then, it may tell in your favour—for, unless I am mistaken, you are only a tool—if you are frank, and answer my questions quickly. What is your name?'
The man looked distressed and unhappy. There wasn't much of the lion at bay about him; he was rather suggestive of a whipped hound whose one yearning desire was to sneak off; but though Tatlock was small of stature, his determined air and fiery eyes told too surely that he was not a man to be trifled with. Besides, there was Gyde with a pistol in his hand also.
'My name is Jerry Worboys,' answered the man.
'And what's your occupation, Mr. Worboys?'
'I've been a coachman in a gentleman's family.'
'The third question. Where is Mrs. Gyde?'
Jerry Worboys hesitated, but a glance at Tatlock was sufficient to make him hesitate no longer.
'She's at her father's house,' growled Jerry.
Gyde fairly staggered, and Tatlock could not suppress his surprise.
'Then you are in league with her father?' suggested Tatlock.
Worboys admitted that he was, and began to whine for mercy. Gyde positively felt faint and ill as he now realised that his own father-in-law was at the bottom of the business. Tatlock opened the door, went to the top of the stairs, and bawled out, 'Woong Sing, Woong Sing.' The Chinaman came upstairs in response to the call. 'Have you a key to this room?' he asked.
'Yes, me have key.'
Then lock this man in. And look here, my Chinese friend, I hold you responsible for him. I am Tyler Tatlock, the detective, and if you let him escape I will ruin you. You understand.'
'Me welly understand. Me no wantee be ruined. Me keepee him all welly secure.'
'How long am I to remain here?' asked Worboys in alarm.
'Until I choose to release you.'
'Woong Sing turned the key in the door, and handed it to Tatlock. They all went downstairs, and Tatlock and Gyde into the street. Both were glad to get out of the evil-smelling den.
'This is a pitiable business,' said Tatlock, 'and, presumably, if you recover your wife, you would prefer to hush the matter up to avoid publicity and scandal.'
'It is a terrible business,' gasped Gyde, mopping his forehead. 'And as my father-in-law seems to be a prime mover in it, there must be no publicity if it can be avoided. But how did you solve the mystery?'
In the fireplace of the bedroom you occupied in Edinburgh I found an envelope addressed to your wife. It was evidently the envelope that had contained the note which had induced her to go out on the night she disappeared. A day or two after you left Edinburgh a letter was delivered at the Balmoral for you by a messenger. I heard of this, and asked the people to let me see the letter. The superscription was the same as the handwriting on the envelope addressed to your wife. I took the liberty of opening the letter. It bore no address, no date, no signature. The writer said he could restore your wife to you, but would only do so on condition that you paid five hundred pounds, which, he suggested, under the circumstances, you could get from your father. In the event of your consenting to do that, the meeting between you and the anonymous writer was to take place at Woong Sing's shop. Your answer was to be addressed to "Peter," 34, Edgware Road. You were also particularly requested to note that when you entered the Chinaman's shop you were to say "Keys" and he would answer "Locks." My first move was to go to Ratcliffe Highway and learn something about Woong Sing. I found he had kept his shop for about ten years. I interviewed him, but he vowed and declared he knew nothing about "Peter." A man whom he had never seen before went there and made arrangements for the meeting. Woong Sing was told that on Wednesday night, precisely at seven o'clock, a stranger would enter, say "Keys," to which Woong was to reply "Locks," then show his visitor upstairs. For this service he was to receive five pounds.
Gyde hurried to Mr. Farnell's house, accompanied by Tatlock, and it was soon disclosed that the missing bride was imprisoned there. Being in desperate straits for money, Farnell had resorted to this extraordinary and dastardly crime to obtain some, believing that Gyde's father would advance the sum demanded. His confederate was a fellow named Peter Johnston, who years before had been a coachman in Farnell's employ. Peter kept a public-house in Chelsea, which was a great resort for betting-men. Farnell frequented the house and kept in touch with the ex-coachman. When he conceived the dastardly scheme of abducting his own daughter, Farnell took Peter into his confidence, knowing that he, too, was pressed for money. Peter had a brother who kept a little grocery shop in Ratcliffe Highway, two or three doors from Woong Sing, and through the brother he became acquainted with the Chinaman. Mrs. Gyde had been lured from the hotel by a very artful trick. Her father went down to Edinburgh and penned the following note:—
My Dear Margaret,
I have been overtaken by a terrible misfortune; ruin and imprisonment stare me in the face. My only hope of salvation is in your husband, but the unhappy differences between him and me prevent my appealing direct to him—at least, until I have had an interview with you. I am sending this by hand. The moment you get it, come out and see me. I will be waiting close to the Sir Walter Scott Monument. I will not detain you five minutes. However astonishing it may seem to you that I should be in Edinburgh, and however strange my request may be, comply with it, otherwise my death will lie at your door.
This note, though it distressed Margaret and put her into a flutter, fulfilled its purpose, for nothing her father did surprised her, and so, without waiting to think, she threw on her hat and cloak and hurried out. When she met her father he appeared to her to be suffering from such mental excitement that he was half mad, and, yielding to his pressing solicitations, she accompanied him to the Waverley Station. They went into the waiting-room, where he had some brandy and water, and she drank a bottle of lemonade. There is no doubt her wretched parent drugged this lemonade, for she remembered very little afterwards until she found herself lying on the seat of a first-class railway carriage, and her father was seated opposite her. When she had recollected her scattered senses, she demanded to know what it all meant. Farnell told her he was taking her to London, and, producing a revolver, he threatened to kill her and himself if she betrayed him. Fairly believing that he had gone mad, she was horrified into silence and a compliance with his wishes.
Arrived at Euston, he compelled her to get into a cab with him, and he took her home and actually imprisoned her in one of the bedrooms. The suffering she endured may be far better imagined than described. In their happy reunion, however, husband and wife forgot their woes, and it was decided to take no action against either Farnell or his accomplice. A few weeks later Farnell did really show signs of mental aberration, and it ultimately became necessary to confine him in an asylum, where he died in the course of the year.
'THE entrance was effected by that side window, and two men at least must have been engaged in the affair.'
Thus spoke Miss Mary Gleeve to Tyler Tatlock in the drawing-room of the 'Old Manor' at Clepperton-on-Rill, Yorkshire.
Clepperton was a quiet out-of-the-world place, beautifully situated in the heart of a purely rural district, and the Old Manor was an ancient mansion somewhat modernised internally to suit present-day requirements. It was a detached, irregularly-built house, standing far back from the road, and surrounded with charming grounds.
Tatlock had been sent for to investigate a rather uncommon burglary, and at the same moment there lay up-stairs in a semi-darkened room, silent and marble-like, the mortal remains of a lady who had turned the allotted span of life. She had long been ill, and had passed away after suffering and a long period of partial coma, from which all the skill of her physicians had been powerless to arouse her. This was Lady Gleeve, relict of Sir Henry Gleeve, a wealthy tradesman, who had been Mayor for five consecutive years of the borough of Clepperton, and had received knighthood during the distribution of Birthday honours in the last year of his mayoralty. He did not live long to enjoy his well-earned distinction and repose. He had but one child, a daughter, who was ten years old at the time of her father's death. Sir Henry left everything he died possessed of to his widow for her sole and absolute use, unless she should marry again, in which event two-thirds of the property were to be held in trust for the benefit of his daughter when she came of age.
Helen Gleeve was a very pretty and strong-minded girl, who did not get on very well with her mother, who was an imperious, unreasoning kind of woman of very humble origin. Sir Henry Gleeve had commenced life in a lowly position, and while still a struggling young man met and fell in love with a young woman who occupied the position of upper housemaid in a gentleman's family. Gleeve married her, and she was destined to become Lady Gleeve. Her husband had never lost his affection for her, and had the greatest faith in her judgment and, as he was fond of thinking, her 'good common sense.'
Unfortunately, the views of Helen Gleeve and her mother did not coincide, and when the girl was still lacking a few months of being nineteen she took her fate in her hands and married Reginald Scott, a well-educated but poor young man, a son of an old East Indian officer, who had had a big family, small income, and years of hard struggling to make both ends meet. Nevertheless, he had managed to give his children a good education, and Reginald had been three years at Cambridge, where he took his M.A. degree. Strangely enough, this young man was Lady Gleeve's pet aversion. She made no secret of the fact that 'she couldn't bear him.' He was forbidden her house, and warned what the pains and penalties would be if he dared to persist in making love to pretty Helen. In spite of this he did dare, and one day Helen went off with him, and they became man and wife. It was romantic, of course, but they were destined to know many hard, bitter days of struggle against poverty and misfortune.
Lady Gleeve vowed she would never forgive her daughter. 'She has gone from my house,' she said, 'and I will tear her out of my heart,' and the amiable lady did. But, having done that, there was a void, a waste, a hollow; she felt her loneliness, she yearned for companionship, so she advertised for a young lady as 'a companion,' and got one. It ended in her adopting this young woman legally. She drew up a will herself, cancelling all former wills, had it properly attested, and stowed it away in a strong box, which was kept in a sort of lumber-room. She did not like lawyers, and never had anything to do with them if she could help it. Hence the reason she made her own will and kept it herself. A previous will which had been prepared by a lawyer left everything to her daughter Helen. When Lady Gleeve made her second will she did not destroy the first, and the two kept each other company in the strong box in the lumber-room at the Old Manor.
Lady Gleeve lay dying, not yet physically dead, but with a dead mind. And one night when she was in this state, and a drowsy nurse watched, and the night light flickered, a burglary was committed at the house. The lumber-room was entered, the strong box opened, and Lady Gleeve's second will carried off, together with an old-fashioned gold repeater watch and some rather valuable antique silver spoons. These things were in the box with the wills, and the burglar or burglars did not go to any other part of the house, but confined themselves to that particular room. Lady Gleeve, of course, knew nothing of the robbery, and thirty-six hours later the undertaker was measuring her for her coffin.
Miss Mary Gleeve, the adopted daughter, had thus to bear a double blow; and it does not necessarily imply that she was not concerned about her foster-mother's death because she betrayed keen anxiety about the robbery; for, if that second will could not be recovered, how was she going to substantiate her claim to the beautiful old Manor House property and a snug fortune? There was the first will, which had been legally prepared, still in existence, whereby all the property passed to Helen Gleeve, and the second will, which cancelled that, and had been drawn up by Lady Gleeve herself, was gone—perhaps destroyed.
The situation was a heartrending one, and Miss Mary Gleeve, by the advice of a gentleman who was paying his addresses to her, placed herself in communication with the renowned Tyler Tatlock. And he, in compliance with a pressing request, sped from London by the fastest train of the day, and had a long interview with the adopted girl.
As already stated, the Old Manor was a large, rambling, detached house. The so-called lumber-room, which as a matter of fact was a well-furnished chamber, was filled with a good deal of superfluous but valuable furniture, nick-nacks, pictures, some bronzes, a rather good statuette or two, bric-à-brac of all kinds, articles de vertu, &c. Except as a treasure store-place the room was not otherwise used. It was lighted by two windows, one at the side overlooking an orchard, the other at one end, which commanded a wide panoramic sweep of country of great beauty. It should be mentioned that the room was situated in the angle of a wing. The burglars had effected an entrance by means of the side window; and they had reached the window by rearing a heavy, cumbersome ladder underneath. This ladder had been lugged from the stable-yard at the back of the house. Strangely enough, a large mastiff was kept in this yard, but he had evidently been an accessory to the crime, for though he had not been tampered with in any way he held his peace.
Having listened to all the details that were to be gathered about the burglary, Tatlock went over certain features in the case that were too obvious to be overlooked. Firstly, the burglar or burglars must have had a pretty intimate knowledge of the house; and, secondly, their primary object was to steal the second will, which gave Miss Mary Gleeve the property. It was this aspect of the case which removed it from commonplaceness and pointed to something very much like a conspiracy.
Tatlock interviewed James, the groom—a very ordinary specimen of his kind; while 'Thetis,' the noble mastiff, was a very extraordinary specimen of his kind. He was a magnificent brute, of immense weight and strength, with enormous jaws. The stable-yard was at the back of the house, and enclosed by a high wall. 'Thetis' was allowed to run loose in this yard all night. The ladder which had been used for the burglary was taken from the yard, where it was kept hanging horizontally underneath a shed. James the groom slept over the stables. The coachman slept in the house. James heard nothing in the night. The dog made no noise. Yet the burglar had got over the wall—for the stable-yard door was kept locked at night—had taken down the ladder, passed it over the wall, and all the time the dog remained silent. James averred that when he came down at six o'clock the animal was as lively as ever, and showed not the slightest symptoms of having been drugged. How was it, then, that such a formidable watch-dog refrained from doing his duty? There was but one explanation of this, according to Tatlock's way of looking at it, and that was: the burglar and 'Thetis' were old chums. That was a point of probability which Tatlock made the most of. At first sight circumstances suggested that James the groom might have had a finger in the pie, but after his interview with him Tatlock felt convinced that the fellow was perfectly innocent. His intelligence was not of a very high order. He was a country bumpkin—too stupid to have concealed all traces of his guilt had he been guilty.
Another point on which Tatlock formed a decided opinion was that of the robbery of the watch and spoons. His idea was that the room was entered for one purpose, and one purpose only—namely, to steal the will; but the cupidity of the burglar was aroused by the sight of the spoons and watch, and he took them. A very critical examination of the ground, which was soft owing to recent rains, led Tatlock to another conclusion; namely, only one man had committed the burglary. On the lawn, where the ladder was lying underneath the window, where there was a flower-bed, and right up to the wall of the stable-yard were very distinct traces of hob-nailed shoes. The footprints were distinctive, inasmuch as from one of the soles several nails were missing. The prints indicated a large boot—a large boot suggested a big man—a big man would have muscular strength, and could have managed to have carried the ladder unaided. This feat would have been impossible to a little, weak man, but certainly not beyond the powers of a powerful one.
Having mentally argued out these various points, Tatlock set to work practically. His chief aim, of course, was the recovery of the lost will, whereby Miss Mary Gleeve was the heiress. Failing that, there was nothing to prevent Mrs. Reginald Scott laying claim to her late mother's property under the original will. Tatlock's first step was to deter-mine by actual experiment if a strong man by his unaided efforts could get the ladder over the stable-yard wall, rear it against the side of the house, and then, having done with it, lay it down on the lawn. To this end the services of a navvy working on a branch railway, ten miles off, were secured. He stood six feet high in his stockings, measured forty-two inches round the chest, and weighed a little over thirteen stones. He was a powerful man, and he succeeded in carrying out the experiment with comparative ease. This was one point proved.
The next step was that James the groom received instructions to creep up to the stable-yard after dark, mount on to the wall stealthily, and as soon as he heard Thetis, the dog, move, to speak softly to him, and then, if the dog did not declare for war, to lower himself down into the yard. James did not readily lend himself to this little service. Although perfectly familiar with the dog, he was not quite sure if Thetis would consider he was justified in allowing even James to enter the stable-yard at night by getting over the wall. Another fear that troubled him was that if he succeeded he might be accused of the robbery. On that score Tatlock reassured him, and the test was carried out, while Tatlock remained at the safe side of the wall. When James reached the top the huge dog sniffed, then uttered a low, deep, menacing growl. A word from the familiar voice, however, and Thetis showed every manifestation of delight, offering no opposition whatever to James's descent into the yard; but as soon as the door was opened, and Tatlock took a few steps forward, there was a rumpus, and had James not interfered, and interfered forcibly too, Tyler Tatlock might have provided a job for an undertaker and a tombstone merchant. Thus were two points settled, and the lines to run upon were pretty clearly indicated.
Clepperton itself was a town of some importance, and municipally it embraced Clepperton-on-Rill, Upper Clepperton, and Marsh Clepperton, which was a very small hamlet, with not more than a couple of hundred inhabitants. Clepperton-on-Rill was of much greater importance. It had a parish church, and numbered about four thousand inhabitants. The majority of them were engaged in agricultural pursuits. A paper mill on the Rill gave employment to nearly a hundred, and there was a very good percentage of country gentry. It need scarcely be said, perhaps, that out of four thousand people there was a residue of loafers, though, with some exceptions, the worst crime that could be charged against them was an undue love of beer, and a constitutional laziness which caused them to prefer idleness to honest work.
Amongst the exceptions was a notorious character named Joseph Waruble, but locally referred to as 'Ginger Joe,' the sobriquet having been conferred upon him on account of his possessing a mop-like head of fiery red hair. He was a big, hulking, powerful fellow, a native of the village, but who had been a thorn in its side nearly the whole of his thirty-five years of life. Poaching had an irresistible fascination for him, and he had suffered various terms of imprisonment, and had done one stretch of two years' hard labour for having severely bashed a gamekeeper who suddenly came upon him as he was setting a trap for partridge. By trade Joe was a bricklayer, and a good one when he liked to work; and as he had periodical fits of virtue, he did work now and again. Curiously enough, Lady Gleeve had interested herself much in the man, who had a wife, a wee, delicate little creature, about half his weight, and it was a redeeming feature in Ginger Joe's character that he treated his wife with extraordinary tenderness, and evinced an unchanging fondness for her. She was clever with her needle, and went occasionally to the houses of the gentry to do sewing. She was frequently employed at the Rectory, and more frequently at the Old Manor. Lady Gleeve had also given Joe a good deal of work. He had practically rebuilt the stables for her, had bricked the stable-yard, put down drain-pipes on her land, and did various jobs of that kind.
Very naturally Ginger Joe came under Tyler Tatlock's observation. He fitted in somehow with the detective's theory of the kind of man likely to have committed the robbery. He had prodigious strength, he knew the Old Manor well, and, what was even more to the point, he and Thetis, the big mastiff; were churns. Practical evidence was furnished of this. By Tatlock's advice Miss Gleeve sent for Joe to come and take up a drain in the stable-yard, which was stopped up. During the operation Tatlock watched him, and noticed that Thetis displayed great affection for him, and the man seemed just as fond of the dog.
Some days later Tatlock, in company with the head constable, waited on Ginger Joe, and demanded to know where he was on the night of September 18. That was the night of the robbery.
Joe tried to shirk the question—he prevaricated, he dodged, he shuffled, and endeavoured by every means within the grasp of his intellect to keep out of the net which was being spread for him. At last he declared that he had been at the 'Dun Cow' pub. until closing time, and then had gone straight home and to bed, as he had partaken of more beer than he could comfortably carry. Unfortunately for his story it was soon proved that on that particular night he had not been at the 'Dun Cow' at all. Being thus discredited, he was promptly arrested on suspicion of having been concerned in the burglary at the Old Manor. Having got him in custody, a search was made at his cottage, and resulted in the discovery of a heavy pair of hob-nailed boots. From the sole of one of these boots several nails were missing. It corresponded exactly with the footprints in the garden and on the flower-bed of the Old Manor.
The finding of the boots stimulated the searchers to increased effort, and places that had not been dreamed of before were now examined, as it was thought probable the silver spoons might be somewhere about, and sure, enough, in a hole under the eaves of the thatch there were the stolen spoons and the gold watch, enveloped in a piece of an old mackintosh, which was covered with a strip of dirty canvas.
The chances against the things being discovered were a thousand to one, nor would they have been save for the fatal boots.
With such clear evidence against him, it was impossible for Ginger Joe to wriggle out of the net that had been cast about for his taking, and now occurred an astounding thing. He was pressed to tell where the stolen will was, but for a time preserved a dogged silence. There were things working in his mind, however, for, ludicrous as it may seem, Joe was mightily hurt at being considered a thief. To snare part-ridges and pheasants, hares and rabbits, was not wrong in his opinion. Nor did he think it was much to his discredit to bash a gamekeeper now and again; but when it came to a question of being accused of house-breaking, of being a common thief, his pride was hurt, his 'honour' wounded, and, unable to restrain himself, he charged the Rev. William Arles with having prompted him to, and bribed him to, commit the deed; but he confessed he was only commissioned to steal the will. But, yielding to a sudden weakness, he snapped up the gold watch and spoons. The temptation overcame him. Immediately after, however, he regretted it, and intended some day when the affair had blown over to return the watch and spoons anonymously.
At first it was thought that his accusation of the Rev. Mr. Arles was the result of a distraught mind. The Rev. William Arles was the curate at the parish church, a position he had held for three years. He was a young man of melancholy temperament, but much respected. He had written a volume of really charming poetry, and was also responsible for some very popular hymns. It seemed, indeed, like madness to suppose that he could have been guilty of prompting a burglary. The story was preposterous; it was the invention of a lunatic's brain. But in a few days con-science smote the Rev. Mr. Arles, and, with brain on fire and heart breaking, he made a confession, which in substance was as follows:
He had been at Cambridge with Reginald Scott, and the two young men had become attached friends. At a later period Arles met and fell desperately in love with pretty Helen Gleeve. She was a dream to him—his star. He wrote poetry about her; he worshipped the very ground she walked upon, but though he knew he could get her mother's sanction to his wooing he lacked the courage to make his passion known. Then he discovered that his college friend Scott was courting Helen, so he buried his secret in his heart, shut his sorrow up, and resolved that no living woman should ever blur the image of Helen as far as he was concerned. Being a constant visitor at the Old Manor, and a friend of Lady Gleeve, who regarded him as her spiritual comforter, he knew the family affairs—knew about the wills, and the strange animosity the mother cherished against her own daughter. And he knew also that his idol, Mrs. Scott, was living with her husband in poverty, while a usurper was to get that which by every moral right was hers. At last the unforgiving mother lay a-dying; then it was he conceived the strange, mad idea of bribing Ginger Joe to steal the second will in order that Helen—the woman he had worshipped—and the friend he honoured should be benefited. It was a curious, quixotic thing to do; but, whatever wickedness there was in the act, no one could say it arose from sordid motives.
For many and many a day the sad, true story was the sensation of Clepperton, and few there were who were not filled with a great sympathy for the miserable young man who had loved and lost, and committed a crime—not to benefit himself, but the woman who could never be aught to him, and would know nothing of his deed. So strong was the sympathy that when the curate was put on trial at the sessions for his offence a very light sentence indeed was given; but to such a sensitive mind the disgrace was fatal, and he passed to a madhouse. Ginger Joe also had his sympathisers, and had it not been for the watch and spoons he would have been let down easily. As it was, he had to submit to twelve months' hard labour.
Of course the will was restored, and the adopted daughter entered into possession of that which the law allowed her under the will. It is to her credit that she offered to settle a by no means inconsiderable sum on Mrs. Scott, but it was refused.
IN one of Glasgow's best suburbs dwelt Mr. Leslie Muir-head, on a charming little estate of which he was the happy possessor. He had made a fortune, and was still nominally in business at the time of the incidents about to be narrated. His warehouse was in Glasgow, and for nearly half a century he had given close and untiring attention to his business, although his personal inclinations were for a studious and scientific life. He had two hobbies to which he devoted all his spare time. One was botany, the other astronomy. When his position was assured, and he purchased the property alluded to, he devoted himself less and less to his business, and more and more to his favourite pursuits. He turned his charming home into a little paradise. The grounds were magnificently laid out, and were, so to speak, a shrine to which botanical devotees made pilgrimages, and were always warmly welcomed by the owner.
Mr. Muirhead did not marry until he was a good deal over thirty, and, much to the disappointment of himself and his life partner, it remained a childless union. The result was he ultimately adopted a niece and nephew, the children of his deceased sister—his only sister, who made an unfortunate marriage. Her husband was a member of a good family, but of dissolute, abandoned habits, with an unconquerable passion for gambling and horse-racing. His name was Crossley, and his wife—who led a very unhappy life—bore him two children, Mary and Ernest, the girl being the firstborn. When they were in their early teens their father was killed by being thrown while riding in a steeplechase. His widow, who was suffering from cancer, survived him only six months. Mary was then about sixteen, Ernest fourteen, and, as their father had left nothing but an evil reputation behind him, their uncle, Leslie Muirhead, took them. The education of both had been neglected, so Mr. Muirhead engaged a first-class resident governess for the girl and sent Ernest to a good school near Edinburgh for a couple of years, and then to France, that he might learn French. It was his uncle's intention to take him into his business, and, as he had a considerable trade connection with France, he thought it would be a good thing for the young man to have a knowledge of the French language. Ernest completed his studies abroad, returned home, and took up a position at once in the Glasgow business, the management of which to a large extent was left in the hands of David Guthrie, who had been in Muirhead's employ for a great many years; indeed, ever since he was a boy.
Long after Muirhead had settled in his new home, and given himself up almost entirely to his favourite pursuits, an incident occurred which caused him the greatest amount of concern and unhappiness. One day, quite early in a new year, when looking over his bank pass-book, he was surprised to find on the debit side the following entry:
'September 25th, cheque, £500,' and this cheque had been payable to bearer.
He taxed his memory, but could not recall any transaction in which he had paid away five hundred pounds. Besides, it wasn't in the least likely he would have drawn a cheque for so considerable an amount payable to bearer. He referred to the counterfoil of his cheque-book. There it was, sure enough: 'Sept. 25th, bearer, 500l.' The cancelled cheque—which, being payable to bearer, required no endorsement—was the same. It was his handwriting, his signature.
He was puzzled as well as concerned. Surely, he thought, he could never have been so absent-minded as to have done such a thing as that. If so, then it was pretty clear that his hobbies were exercising such an influence over his mental powers that his will and his reasoning were subordinated, and that meant mania. To a hitherto clear-headed, straight-dealing man such a thought as this was not pleasant, and let it be stated at once that he was honourable and fair-dealing, sensitive to a fault, singularly punctilious, and entirely free from suspicion, which is generally the result of a grasping, ill-balanced mind.
The discovery was startling in more ways than one. He had been giving an immense amount of attention to his hobbies of late. Not only had he engaged himself in a singularly abstruse astronomical problem, but he had been working at an experiment whereby he hoped ultimately to succeed in producing a crimson lily, which had long been the dream of floriculturists. What he now feared was that his mental health had suffered to some extent, but he resolved to learn more about that five hundred pound cheque, for he could not recall a single incident in connection with it, and he was greatly troubled.
A few days later he went up to Glasgow, and called at his banker's. Though not wishing to make a feature of that cheque, he said incidentally to the manager, after discussing other things—
'Oh, by the way, I seem to have drawn a cheque to bearer for five hundred pounds on the 25th of September last. I suppose you don't happen to know who presented it?'
'Well, Mr. Muirhead, it was so unlike you to draw a cheque like that that when it was presented the cashier brought it to me. But as there was not the slightest reason to doubt your handwriting or signature, the cheque was of course paid, but I told the clerk to take note of the person who presented it. The presentee was a well-dressed woman.'
'A woman!'
'Yes. I hope the transaction was all right,' remarked the manager anxiously.
'Oh, yes; well, as far as I know.'
'As far as you know,' exclaimed the manager, as he looked at his customer in surprise, for this was so unlike Mr. Muirhead.
'Yes. The fact is, I suppose I drew the cheque, but upon my word, for the life of me I can't recall having done so, and haven't the remotest idea what it was for.'
'Really, Mr. Muirhead, excuse me, but—but don't you think you are allowing your hobbies to run away with you a bit?'
The manager was sufficiently well acquainted with Mr. Muirhead to venture this remark.
'That is precisely what I do think,' answered Muirhead, then having an aversion to any further discussion on the subject he passed on to something else.
A few days later, acting on the advice of his wife, who, however, knew nothing of the cheque incident, he was in London with his niece, Mary Crossley, on his way to the Continent for a holiday. He intended to go to Florence, thence to Rome for Easter.
His niece was also needing change, although she had not said so. But she had been looking careworn of late, and unusually pale. He wanted her to consult a doctor, but she had resolutely declined, and as she was a young woman with a will he did not press the subject.
Mr. Muirhead and his niece enjoyed their trip. They spent three pleasant weeks in Florence, then went on to Rome and witnessed the Easter carnival, and from there the programme included a visit to Naples; but Muirhead received a letter from his manager in Glasgow, David Guthrie, that startled him in a way that the mystery about the five hundred pound cheque had quite failed to do. It was a long letter, and after dealing with many business matters it proceeded as follows:
It is my painful duty to inform you now that I have brought to light some very serious discrepancies in the accounts, and various sums, aggregating something like four thousand pounds, cannot be satisfactorily accounted for. I have not made a critical investigation yet, but it is certain there is something wrong, and while I am reluctant to worry you while you are on your holiday I should have been wanting in duty had I failed to bring the matter under your notice. I await your instructions.'
This letter was like the bursting of a bomb-shell at his feet, and it seemed to throw some light on the affair of the cheque. For long years he had carried on business smoothly and pleasantly, and had prided himself on the honesty and uprightness of everyone in his employ. Now there was a traitor in the camp, and it was not altogether unnatural that his suspicions should dwell upon his own nephew. He tried to persuade himself that this was a preposterous thought, but it was no use. He remembered the career of the young man's father, and he felt it was like father like son.
He did not say anything to Mary about the letter he had received, but wrote off immediately to his manager, marked the letter 'strictly private and confidential,' and gave Guthrie peremptory orders to take no steps until he returned, and under no circumstances breathe a syllable to living soul. Mr. Muirhead was a proud man, and if perchance his suspicions were well founded the loss of the money would be as nothing compared with the blow to his pride if it became known that his sister's son was a thief. That son lived with his uncle. He was accorded perfect freedom in the house. He used his uncle's library, and it seemed a perfectly justifiable suspicion that he had got hold of the cheque-book and forged that cheque for five hundred pounds, for Mr. Muirhead felt perfectly certain now that he himself had never drawn the cheque.
On arriving back in Glasgow, Mr. Muirhead lost no time in investigating the discrepancies of the books, and he found that his manager's estimate was understated rather than exaggerated. It was a terribly serious matter, and it affected him as nothing else in the whole course of his life had done, with the exception of his sister's unhappy marriage. It was true that there was no proof that his nephew was the guilty person, but from the position he held the opportunity was afforded him of robbing his uncle. The defalcations were spread over a considerable period, beginning about six months after Ernest Crossley had entered the business, and the frauds had been carried out so ingeniously that the risk of discovery—for a time, at any rate—was reduced to a minimum.
Mr. Muirhead recognised the facts, and he braced him-self up for an ordeal. He told his nephew one evening after dinner that he had something to say to him, and they adjourned to the library. If Ernest had any forethought of what was coming he conducted himself with wonderful composure. He lit his post-prandial cigar, and remarked cheerily:
'Well, uncle, what's the business? Nothing serious, I hope?'
Mr. Muirhead was astonished at his nephew's coolness and composure, for he himself was terribly upset, and betrayed it.
'Yes, I'm grieved to say it is very serious.'
'Oh! I am sorry to hear that.'
'Do you know anything of this cheque?' asked his uncle, as he placed the five hundred pound cancelled cheque before him and scanned his face narrowly.
Still smoking composedly, Ernest took the cheque up, and turned it round about. Then, as he put it on the table again, said with perfect self-possession—Nothing whatever. What about it?'
Mr. Muirhead was dumbfounded. If this young man was guilty, then his power of self-control was absolutely marvellous.
'Well, there is this about it,' said Mr. Muirhead, stumbling in his speech, and painfully betraying his agitation, 'I don't think I drew that cheque myself.'
'But it's your signature,' exclaimed the young man, showing more animation as he examined the cheque again.
'It looks like it,' faltered Muirhead, 'but—but I don't think it is.'
'Don't think it is!' echoed the nephew, now displaying astonishment and keen interest. Then, after a pause, he added, with significance: 'Uncle, don't you think it would be advisable to take a longer holiday?'
Mr. Muirhead felt as if a knife had gone through him, and he really began to think that his mental faculties had become impaired.
He made some excuse to his nephew, said he thought he would go away again soon, and got rid of Ernest, who was going to the house of a neighbour to play a game of billiards.
Muirhead passed a very wretched night. He breathed no word of his distress to his wife, who regarded Ernest as her own son, and loved him as such, and her husband, who was not only just but generous, was willing to bear any amount of suffering himself rather than pain his wife. The more he dwelt upon the matter, however, the clearer it became to him that an investigation was necessary, and he resolved at all hazards to get at the bottom of the mystery. For several reasons he did not feel competent to do this himself, and so he sent for Tyler Tatlock, whom he knew through a friend of his who had availed himself of the detective's services.
At their first interview Mr. Muirhead, in substance, detailed the foregoing particulars to Tatlock. 'As it is certain, Mr. Tatlock,' he went on, 'that a guilty hand and brain have been at work, the necessity for discovering the hand and brain is imperative. For my nephew to rest under suspicion, if that suspicion is not well founded, would be intolerable. But if the lad is innocent, then we are confronted, I venture to think, with a more serious aspect of the case.'
Tatlock saw clearly the lights and shades of the peculiar matter he was called upon to investigate. While family scruples had to be respected, he was asked to unravel a complicated case of crime—crime of a magnitude that seemed to indicate the brain of a practised criminal. And yet there was one point that struck him as peculiar, inasmuch as it was clumsily amateurish in one sense, while in another it was suggestive of deep cunning. The point was the drawing of the cheque for five hundred pounds payable to bearer. It was clumsily amateurish, because it might so very, very easily have led to detection. If the manager at the bank, for instance, whose suspicions seemed to have been slightly aroused, had only allowed them to so far take shape as to put a question or two to the presentee, the whole fraud would probably have been at once exposed. It was artfully cunning, because whoever drew the cheque relied upon the probability, if sufficient time elapsed, of Mr. Muirhead not being able to determine whether he did or did not sign the cheque. This argued, of course, a thorough knowledge of Mr. Muirhead's peculiar temperament, and of his absorption in his hobbies. It was necessarily a rotten reed to bear upon, but the forger's cunning told him that the reed might prove equal to the occasion. He chanced, and temporarily triumphed. On the face of it, every circumstance seemed to fix the guilt on Ernest Crossley. He had access to his uncle's cheque-book. He knew his uncle's affairs, and knew that his uncle's standing at the bank, and his reputation for enthusiasm for his botany and astronomy, would reduce the probability of his eccentric act in drawing a cheque in such a way arousing suspicion. And yet in spite of this very strong circumstantial evidence—many a man has been hanged on evidence no stronger—Tatlock thought that Ernest Crossley did not draw that cheque.
Tatlock's first effort in the task of unravelling was not so much to determine if any one else was implicated as to prove conclusively Ernest Crossley's guilt or innocence. That was necessary to his uncle's peace of mind. If guilty, the sooner the truth was known and the wearying suspense ended the better. If innocent, not a moment should be lost in establishing his innocence. In broad principle, that was the line upon which Mr. Muirhead was anxious Tatlock should proceed.
In the initial stage of this inquiry in the Muirhead affair, Tatlock subjected the forged cheque to a crucial examination, and he compared the writing on it with various specimens of Crossley's handwriting. He maintained, and no doubt correctly so, that a person who forged another person's handwriting, however cleverly it was done, must betray his own handwriting by some minute signs.
This examination enabled him to determine to his own satisfaction that Crossley did not forge that cheque. It need scarcely be said that young Crossley hadn't the remotest idea he was being shadowed, yet for a period of nearly three weeks his movements were closely watched. The places he frequented, the companions whom he associated with, his goings and comings, were all noted, and known to the man with the small eyes, for Tatlock's small eyes were almost able to look into or read the thoughts passing through a person's brain.
Those weeks were weary ones to Mr. Muirhead. He possessed himself with such patience as he could; but it was terribly trying to know that one in whom he had reposed trust and confidence, and upon whom he had lavished affection and tender solicitude, was lying under the suspicion of being a traitor, a forger, a thief.
Let it not be supposed that, while Tatlock was watching a certain thing, he had not an eye to possibilities elsewhere. Your trained hunter does not keep his gaze fixed on one spot, for he knows that if his prey be not in front it may be behind, and so it came to pass that Tatlock struck a trail that seemed to promise a startling development.
Adjoining the grounds in which Mr. Muirhead's house stood was a miniature glen, through which a tiny stream babbled its way to the Clyde. Sometimes on summer evenings young couples, to whom the world was very beautiful, and love an ecstatic dream, lingered there, and talked the soft nonsense which has been talked since the human story began. One evening a man and woman stood beneath a tree in the glen. They were engaged in deep and earnest conversation, and certain movements on the part of the woman seemed to indicate that she was much distressed, her distress arising, as indicated by the man's movement, by some argument on his part urged with a not too tender regard for her feelings. They were not exactly quarrelling, but were agitated rather by difference of opinion. This difference, however, was strong enough to bring the tears to the woman's eyes, as evidenced by her pressing her handkerchief to her face. And the man grew impatient. He thrust his hands into his pockets, and walked away a few yards irritably, only to return almost immediately, and resume the argument, until suddenly the woman threw her arms about his neck, as if in passionate appeal, and he held her and kissed her, and she sobbed audibly. Presently they separated. The woman moved rapidly up the glen, turning occasionally to wave her handkerchief to the man, who lingered and gazed after her, until she was lost in the darkness.
Then he lit a cigar, and by the light of the match revealed his face, and in a few moments he strolled away in a direction opposite to that taken by the woman.
That same night, but later, a well-dressed man sat in a private room of a fashionable restaurant in Glasgow, together with several other men, and a similar number of women, some of them elegantly dressed. The party had been indulging in oysters and champagne. The man referred to was evidently the entertainer—the host. He was addressed by his companions as 'Alec.' He was probably a little under thirty. His face was not altogether pleasant to look upon. It was sensual, and bore unmistakable signs of late hours, and of burning the candle at both ends. His eyes, which were brown, were restless, and he had a habit of glancing furtively about him. His lips were overhung by a well-trimmed moustache, and he had good teeth. His face in repose was harsh; it was the face of a selfish, vain, and cruel man. But he had a strongly fascinating voice. It was soft and silvery. He was called upon for a song, and he rendered a Scottish ballad sweetly, tenderly, and with feeling. He was evidently a force in that little circle. His companions were deferential to him. The women seemed to vie with each other for his attention. Without exception, the women were actresses. One or two of the men were actors, one was a popular music-hall singer, the others were not so easily classed. Alec, the host, if one judged him by his clothes, his rings, his heavy watch-chain, might have been taken for a well-to-do man about town. This Alec was the man who that same evening had talked to the woman in the glen. Tatlock had watched him in the glen, and was watching him now.
Adjoining the room in which the party were assembled was another and smaller room. At the top of the partition that separated the two was a window. That window afforded the watcher a post of observation.
Now, Alec—or, to give him his full name, Mr. Alexander Finlayson—was the lessee and manager of a certain music-hall which made up for in popularity what it lacked in respectability. This Finlayson was a mystery. He had entered into the music-hall business only a year previous to this period, and he conducted it with such lavish expenditure that in spite of its popularity people wondered how it paid. He had a passion for the company of actors and actresses, and music-hall people generally, and to them he was a most liberal entertainer. Although a bachelor, he occupied a swell house in the West End, and kept half a dozen servants. Moreover, he had a yacht on the Clyde, and a house at the coast, to which he was in the habit of taking his friends on Sundays and holidays. He was essentially a night-bird, and those he associated with were night-birds, and little was known of his doings in the day, though it was vaguely rumoured amongst his circle that he had a profitable engagement to attend to during the hours of daylight.
At last the time came when Tyler Tatlock, having faithfully and cleverly carried out his mission, felt he could present a reliable report to Mr. Muirhead, and one day he and Muirhead sat together in the latter's library. Tatlock was grave, Muirhead anxious and excited. The detective had already led up to the main point by some preliminary conversation, and Mr. Muirhead, allowing his impatience to overcome him, exclaimed:
'Well, well, but what about my nephew?'
'Your nephew is absolutely innocent.'
'Thank God! thank God!' cried Muirhead with a fervency which clearly indicated the depth of his feelings, though, alas! the little ray of sunshine was soon to be blotted out by a heavier cloud. Tatlock would fain have spared his patron, but the truth had to be told.
'I am sorry,' he went on, 'that while I am able to exonerate your nephew, I have some very startling information to give you.'
'What is it? Don't keep me in suspense. Let me know the worst.'
'Very well, sir. Although your nephew is innocent your niece is not, for it was she who forged that cheque for five hundred pounds.'
'My niece!' gasped Muirhead, as if he were choking. Then he covered his face with his hands and sobbed. To a man of his high-strung nervous organisation, his artistic temperament, his uprightness, and gentleness of disposition, the revelation was a shock that stunned him.
His niece a thief, a forger! It seemed impossible, and yet it was true, and what Tatlock had learnt may be epitomised in the following particulars:
Reference has been made to his comparison of the writing on the cheque with young Crossley's handwriting, and his conclusion that Crossley was not the forger. Now, there were two persons in Muirhead's house besides himself who had access to his private room. It is not necessary to take Mrs. Muirhead into the calculation. The two persons were Mary and Ernest Crossley; therefore, Ernest being innocent, he turned his attention to Mary. Mr. Muirhead was very much attached to his niece, and, having the most perfect faith in her, he not only accorded her perfect liberty, but she did a good deal of secretarial work for him. She was exceedingly clever with the pen, and a close study of her writing led Tatlock to believe that she had committed the forgery. But, if so, why did she do it? The cheque was presented by, and the money paid to, a woman—that woman was not Mary Crossley, for she was well known at the bank, having transacted a good deal of business there for her uncle. It was impossible, therefore, to avoid the deduction that a second person was implicated; and this led to another question. Was there any connection between the forged cheque and the defalcations at Mr. Muirhead's warehouse? To the solving of this part of the problem Tatlock brought all his energies and ability to bear, and as a consequence he ascertained that Mary had a secret lover, a man named Alexander Finlayson. As soon as Tatlock gained this knowledge he saw that the key was in his possession.
Finlayson was a ledger clerk in Mr. Muirhead's employ. He had been in the service for over fifteen years, and full confidence was placed in him. He was exceedingly clever at figures, and in his own particular department he had supreme control. His salary was four pounds a week. Nevertheless, he was the proprietor of a music-hall, had a swell west-end house, a house at the coast, a yacht on the Clyde, and kept several servants. How was it done? Not, surely, on his salary of four pounds a week. And, despite the fact that he was leading a fast and shameless life, he was meeting Mary Crossley secretly in the little glen adjoining her uncle's property, and Tatlock had seen them meet.
In view of the double life he was leading, and the large income required to keep up his false position as 'a man about town,' and a wealthy one, his books at the warehouse were subjected to expert examination, which brought to light a most ingenious and complicated system of fraud, whereby he had robbed his employer of thousands.
When the truth was revealed and the wickedness exposed, Mary Muirhead was taken to task by her uncle in the presence of Tatlock, and, though at first sullen and defiant, she broke down and confessed the part she had played. She had known Finlayson for more than a year. Mr. Muirhead had given a garden party in his grounds to the people in his employ. At that party Mary and Finlay-son became acquainted. He paid much attention to her, and she fell entirely under his influence.
They corresponded; occasionally she met him in Glasgow, and more frequently at night in the glen adjoining her uncle's place. So completely was she fascinated that when one day he pleaded to her to get him ten pounds, she did it by manipulating her uncle's accounts. That was the beginning. After that he was constantly asking her to obtain money for him. As she had control of her uncle's accounts, she was enabled to do this by presenting him with duplicate bills and by other means. Finlayson also induced her to practise her uncle's handwriting and signature, so that she could copy them. And with what success she did this was proved by the cheque for five hundred pounds which she gave to Finlayson, and he sent one of his actress friends to cash it at the bank.
On the night when Tatlock saw him meet Mary in the glen he endeavoured to persuade his dupe to forge a cheque in her uncle's name for a thousand pounds. At first she refused; but he overcame her scruples, and she consented to do it, but was unable to carry the forgery out, as she found that her uncle now kept his cheque-book locked up in his safe, and she was sure he had become suspicious, and this frightened her.
It was a very sad story of a weak woman, who had inherited some of her father's evil ways, falling into the hands of an unscrupulous villain, who, discerning the flaw in her nature, preyed upon it.
It need scarcely be said that Mr. Muirhead was very greatly affected. The hopes he had built upon his niece were destroyed, his faith broken, and he bowed like a reed in a storm of wind. Nor did he ever entirely recover. He was never the same man again. He sent his niece to Melbourne, where she had a cousin married to a clergyman, but a very short time afterwards she disappeared, and went, as was believed, to America. What became of her is not known.
Much against his will, but from a sense that it was a duty he owed to society, Mr. Muirhead determined to prosecute his fraudulent clerk, Alexander Finlayson, for falsifying the accounts at the warehouse; but the fellow, when he found the game was up, had the grace to put an end to his shameless career by poisoning himself as soon as he learnt that his infamy was known.
Mr. and Mrs. Muirhead have long been in their graves, and Ernest Crossley died of consumption about ten years ago; there is, therefore, no longer any reason for concealing the facts of this little drama of fraud and frailty and misplaced affection.
THE GOLD-SEEKER'S STRANGE FATE AN ASTOUNDING ROMANCE OF REAL LIFE
FOR true romance one must search the pages of real life, not the volumes of fiction. Tyler Tatlock was able to furnish much evidence of this truth, but in no case that he ever had to do with was it exemplified in a more startling manner than in that of Dick Reesland. The Reeslands are an old family. The name appears in Doomsday Book as Reese-de-land. The branch of the family with which this record deals had long been resident in a country district in Yorkshire. Mr. Richard Reesland at one time held an appointment in the Old East India Company's service, but was forced to retire early owing to his health breaking down. He returned home and married a Miss Bindloss, who had a small property. The union resulted in the birth of a son and two daughters. Mr. Reesland died while his children were still very young, but their mother was a sensible and devoted woman, and by studying economy she was enabled to give them a good education.
From his earliest years Dick, the son, displayed a restless, discontented, roving spirit, and, being an only boy, he was a good deal spoilt by his mother. He was a great reader, but beyond that had no inclination for anything, and as he grew in years he chafed at the dull, uneventful life he was compelled to lead; before he was fifteen he displayed such a masterful and determined spirit that he caused his family much distress, and there were not wanting signs that he was getting quite out-of-hand, as the saying is.
One lady, who was very intimate with Dick's mother, and who, in her own estimation, was wondrous wise, declared that she was perfectly sure the boy would do evil things and come to grief if not controlled with a strictness which his mother—according to this philanthropic lady—was incapable of displaying. Now, it was a curious and most fortunate circumstance—so thought the lady—that her 'dear brother' was a clergyman, a worthy, estimable, and truly pious man, and 'so clever too,' and so fond of children, and so successful in managing wayward boys, and so many other things, that really the lady could not enumerate them. But she was successful in persuading Mrs. Reesland to send her boy to her dear brother, who was such an encyclopaedia of all the virtues. The first week that Dick was under his control he took a dislike to him. In a month he had come to hate him with a hatred passing words, for the dear brother was one of those incompetent, arrogant, self-opinionated, dogmatic tyrants, who break the spirit and ruin the dispositions of nearly every child they have to deal with. Dick pleaded to his mother to remove him from the influence of this objectionable teacher, but, thinking it was to the boy's interest that he should remain, she declined, with the inevitable result in such cases—Dick removed himself; and when his people had passed many agonising months of suspense and fear, a letter came from him.
He was in Australia, and was working on some gold diggings at a place called Naraga in the Braidwood district. He was going to make a rapid fortune, he said, and then he would return home. But five years drifted away. His fortune had not been made; he did not return home. At fairly regular intervals he wrote, but seldom twice from the same place. His letters came from China, Japan, India, some of the South Sea Islands, New Zealand, California; and the last one from Australia again. He was then in Melbourne, and said he was going up country. His letters were always bald and brief, and seldom contained anything about himself beyond that he had been somewhere and was going somewhere else.
Years passed, and nothing more was heard of him; then, by the death of an uncle, he succeeded to a large property, which, failing him, would pass to another branch of the family altogether. Now, as may be supposed, his mother—then growing an old woman—apart from her natural desire to once more clasp her long-absent son to her bosom before she laid down the burden of life, was anxious that he should take possession of the property to which he was legally en-titled. It was important, also, in the interest of all concerned, that, if dead, indisputable proof of his death should be forthcoming. Strangely enough, however, his mother firmly believed that he was still living; and when repeated advertising failed to bring forth any information, she resolved on the bold step of enlisting the services of Tyler Tatlock. It was a bold step, because if Tatlock had to go forth and hunt for the trail of the wanderer, it would necessarily be costly, and might be long. As a matter of fact, the task occupied Tatlock a good deal over a year. The great interests that were at stake, however, justified all the expense incurred and the time employed.
Tatlock journeyed direct from England to Melbourne, that being the last place from which Dick had communicated with his friends. He had given an address in Collins Street. It proved to be a lodging-house kept by very respectable people. Dick had stayed there several times. The landlady seemed to think he was peculiar.
He had stated before leaving Melbourne that he was going to Sydney, and, as he was expecting some letters, he gave his address, which turned out to be a lodging-house in Elizabeth Street. When Tatlock arrived his man had gone, his destination being Brisbane. He had incidentally mentioned to a fellow-boarder in Sydney that he was going north from Brisbane. To go north from there meant either to foot it or to travel by one of the coasting steamers, many of which went to Torres Straits, while some crossed the Straits to New Guinea. To Brisbane Tatlock went, only to find that he was a day too late again, and that a stern chase was a long chase. He ascertained, however, that Dick Reesland had taken passage in a coasting tramp, and booked to Cook-town, which is in the Cape York Peninsula. Tatlock had to kick his heels for a fortnight before he could get a steamer bound north, as there was only a monthly service in those days; and to his intense annoyance, while going into Rockhampton, the vessel ran on to a reef. She floated off again with the rising tide, but sustained such damage that ten days were occupied in repairing it. Bad weather had set in when the journey was resumed, and the passage north was long and stormy. Cooktown was reached at last. It was a wild place, far removed from civilisation. Gold in considerable quantities had been found in the neighbourhood, and there was a sparse population, consisting for the most part of gold-diggers. The climate is tropical, the country wild and barren.
Tatlock learned that Dick, who was well known, was a partner with three other men in a quartz reef fifty to sixty miles inland. Out to the reef Tatlock journeyed, only to find that once more he was a day too late; his man had moved on, nor did it seem likely that he would be able to follow him further, for his movements were evidently shrouded in mystery. His partners were reticent, and were not to be drawn, while the statement that their chum had come into a fortune seemed rather to annoy them than otherwise. Indeed, they did not disguise the fact that they resented Tatlock's presence, and it became evident to him that in that wild and lawless region a bullet might put an end to his further usefulness, since he was regarded as an intruder, and the rough characters who were fossicking around had a summary manner of dealing with intruders. To be shot like a dog and buried like a dog could serve no purpose, but Tatlock was not the man to be easily beaten. He might not be a match for the brute force which appeared to be the only law there, but he was infinitely more than a match when it came to a question of diplomacy, and so he deter-mined to retire, for a time at any rate, to Cooktown, and to watch and wait.
The youngest of Dick's three partners was a Chinaman known as Loo Foo. This placid-faced Celestial could have given points to Bret Harte's 'Heathen Chinee.' He was as sly as they are made, and what he did not know in the way of wickedness was scarcely worth considering. It was obvious that the two white men with whom he worked did not love him too well, but Loo not only knew how to hold his own but he was in his way a little despot, and was possessed of some knowledge which gave him a certain power over his white mates. To the observant Tatlock this was plain, and he came to the conclusion that he might learn a good deal by watching Loo Foo.
The small settlement at Cooktown was in close touch with the diggings, as it was at Cooktown the stores were purchased and the gold shipped. The chief store in the settlement was in the hands of a Chinaman, Wing Lo by name, who sold most things required, and, unless he was much maligned, stole things whenever he got the chance. He also called himself a 'shipping agent, importer, exporter, contractor,' and Heaven knows what else. A smug-faced, wily demon was Wing Lo, and with his small eyes Tyler Tatlock saw there was something mysterious going on between Wing and Loo and the other partners of Dick Reesland.
One day three heavily-laden bullock drays entered the settlement from inland, and rounded up with a creak and a groan at Wing Lo's store. There were sacks filled with something, roughly made and heavy cases, and irregularly-shaped bundles. To a non-observant person these little details would have had no meaning. To Tatlock they were significant. 'Inland' was a wilderness. Men had recently brought gold to light, but beyond that Nature had remained undisturbed through the ages. A bee-line through this wilderness from Cooktown for about three hundred miles in length would strike a desolate spot on the eastern shores of the great Gulf of Carpentaria. Now, the question that naturally occurred to Tatlock's mind was—What did these queer-looking packages contain, and where had they come from? Save for the rough diggers and prospectors scattered about inland there was no population. The packages could not be filled with gold; what then were their contents? There was something suspicious about the whole affair, and the suspicion was not allayed when within an hour of the arrival of the drays came Loo Foo and his two white companions on horseback, and during the days that followed they and Wing Lo were very busy. A week later a coasting steamer from the north, and bound to Sydney, came in, and Wing Lo shipped the goods that had come from the interior, and consigned them to an agent in Sydney.
Tatlock had an instinctive feeling that those mysterious packages which were swung on board the steamer contained the key to the mystery, and he resolved to follow the packages, so he quietly slipped on board an hour or so before the vessel resumed her voyage, and in due course reached Sydney once more. He discovered that the goods were consigned to a Chinese firm in Sydney—'Shen, Yen, and Co., exporters and general dealers,' and that the mysterious bales and cases were filled with gold and silver articles, ivory goods, great quantities of silk, boxes of tea, bags of rice, and many other Chinese products. Now Tatlock knew quite well that silk, tea, rice, and the like were not grown on the Cape York peninsula, and the matter therefore required further investigation, so back he went to Cooktown, as being a convenient point of observation, but this time he went as somebody else.
During his stay he had learnt much; he was an apt pupil and quick to gather up ideas, and when he returned it was as a 'fossicker,' prospector, gold-digger. His capacity for assimilating himself to the character he adopted was simply marvellous. He was not only a born actor, but an exceptionally clever mimic. So when he once more appeared at Cooktown he had unkempt hair, wore mole-skin trousers tucked into Wellington boots, a blue flannel shirt, a soft felt slouched hat. On his back he carried his swag, which, besides the inevitable red blanket and 'billy,' included pickaxe, shovel, hammer, &c. And he talked digger language, and bounced and hinted at the rich claims he had been on, but an irresistible desire to rove prevented his staying long anywhere. He hired a Chinese loafer who hung about the wharf always on the look-out for a job he hoped would never come. But for three dollars a week and his grub he condescended to become Jack Coney's 'boy.' Jack Coney, otherwise Tyler Tatlock, next invested in a dray, a couple of horses, a tent, and other necessary paraphernalia for a life in the wilderness, then he set forth towards the interior with his Chinese attendant, Woon. When he arrived at the reef where Loo Foo and his white companions were at work, he fraternised, he talked in digger language, and appeared learned as regards quartz and alluvial cradling and washing, crushing and separating.
Loo Foo and his mates thought Jack Coney a bit of a gasser, but he knew a thing or two, and though he wasn't very big he was slippery, and could handle the shooting-irons. He was a bit too curious and inquisitive for their liking, and poked his nose where he had no business to do. They didn't admit his right to inquire what the old packing cases lying about were there for, nor why they kept a wooden shanty at their claims so carefully guarded and locked. However, all's well that ends well. The gassy little chap announced his intention of moving on. So they liquored up, said 'So long,' and 'Jack' and his 'boy' moved off west. He was surprised to find there was a good track, and this seemed to confirm certain suspicions he had in his mind. He followed the track, and in due time came to the southern end of the Gulf of Carpentaria. He was not surprised to find a long, low, rough log building and three or four pigtails loafing about. He had got on very good terms with his 'boy' Woon, who was a rascal, but useful. He didn't like work, so 'Jack Coney' took good care that he should have little to do, and he did like dollars, and Jack was liberal in that respect. You see, he had to use Woon as eyes and cars, and it was astonishing how much he saw and heard through that medium. Jack shifted his tent almost daily. He was supposed to be prospecting, but he slept with one eye open, as the saying is.
When he had been in the neighbourhood a fortnight, he one morning saw a rakish-looking brig with a sharp prow and a low freeboard standing in towards the shore under a pressure of canvas. Her hull was painted slate colour, very unusual, and there was something about her which suggested that she was not altogether a peaceful trader. She made signals to the shore, and the signals were answered by the pigtails. She was very smartly handled, and her crew evidently knew their business. When within a mile and a half of the shore, her sails having previously been clewed up, she let go her anchor, and afterwards a boat was lowered and manned, and the skipper, a bronzed, bearded, rough, determined-looking fellow, sat in the stern, and was rowed to the shore. There he had a conference with the guardian pigtails, and soon the brig's boats were busy conveying a very miscellaneous lot of goods to the shore, and as they arrived they were quickly stored in the log cabin.
The following day 'Jack Coney' appeared upon the scene, and requested to have a word with the skipper, who was a white man, as was his chief mate, while the rest of the crew were Chinamen. The captain was known to his crew as 'Bill,' and Bill only—'Captain Bill.' It was quite enough for them. But 'Tyler Tatlock when alone with him said:
'Unless I am very much mistaken, I am addressing Dick Reesland.'
Captain Bill looked savage, and exclaimed hotly, 'No, you are not.'
Tatlock smiled as he answered: 'I am certain of it now.'
'And in the name of the fiend who are you?' demanded the skipper, as he twisted his fingers about the butt of a revolver.
Tatlock smiled again. 'An emissary who brings you good news. I have come from England on purpose to find you, and I've had a long search.'
'And what's the good news?' asked the skipper eagerly.
'Ah, then you are Dick Reesland?'
'Oh, well, since you seem to know me—Yes. Now, then, what's your business?'
It did not take Tatlock long to make known the tidings of which he was the bearer, and the sea-smitten, sun-parched salt, Captain Dick Reesland, seemed much troubled, and for some time he remained thoughtful. At last he spoke.
'As you are a detective, and have so cleverly found me out, I suppose you know pretty well what I am. I'm part owner of yonder brig. I'm a ruffian, and my co-partners are ruffians; my crew are devils. We are not legitimate traders, but pirates. Yes, sir, pirates; and we scour these Eastern seas; but we find our victims mostly amongst Chinese coasting vessels, and we get some rich hauls. I do not follow the calling for the sake of the pelf; but the life, the risk, the danger, the excitement appeal to me. Now, the fortune you have come to tell me about does not tempt me, and were it for that alone I do not think I would leave this fascinating calling of mine; but I owe my dear mother something. For her sake I will return. You go back to Cooktown, where I will rejoin you.'
'Can I depend upon your doing that?'
'Sir, if you think my honour is worth anything, I will pledge my honour.'
'I accept the pledge. Give me your hand. I will wait in Cooktown for you.'
'Of course, it may be weeks before we meet, for I have many arrangements to make.'
'I quite understand that.'
So they parted, and 'Jack Coney,' with Woon his boy, slowly made his way back to Cooktown, where he let it be known that his prospecting had not resulted in much. But he thought he would have another try, and go further north. He was in no hurry, however, and people came to the conclusion that he certainly was not, for the weeks slipped by and stretched into months, and still he lingered in the little town. He himself began to think that Dick had played false in spite of his pledged honour. Then a rumour ran that there had been a murder in the interior. Some Chinese diggers had murdered a white man. So said the rumour. A day or two afterwards this was modified. The white man had been shot, but was still living. And yet another version of the story was put in circulation. The white man had not been shot at all, but had shot several Chinamen, and had escaped into the bush, and nobody knew what had become of him.
These contradictory reports will serve to show the difficulty there was in obtaining reliable information from the interior. That there was foundation, however, for the rumours was proved one day by Skipper Bill, or Dick Reesland, coming into the town in a bad way. There was a feverish anxiety to learn news, but Skipper Bill was exasperating beyond endurance. He smiled a ghastly smile when plied with questions, and said he had nothing to tell.
Privately to Tatlock he gasped, 'Yes, the fiends tried to murder me when they heard I was going. Exasperation and a fear that I might betray them drove them wild, and they peppered me. I'm tough, and take a lot of killing, like a cat. But I've got a bullet in my left lung, and I fancy the last chapter is nearly written. Get me down to Sydney as soon as you can. Possibly the hospital people there will be able to fish the bullet out.'
Two days after this Dick Reesland and Tyler Tatlock sailed away in a southern-bound steamer. It was evident that Dick was in a very bad way indeed, and Tatlock was afraid he would not even live to get to Sydney. When they had left Cooktown well behind, Dick told his companion that it was Loo Foo who had shot him. Loo was a deeply-dyed villain, and had a large interest in the pirate business, as well as in the quartz reef. He had established agencies for the sale of the pirates' cargoes in Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne. When Dick told him he was going away Foo feared that his profitable trade would be gone. A quarrel ensued, and Foo winged his man.
'And what did you do?' asked Tatlock.
'Killed him,' answered Dick, with a wan smile.
'A pleasant state of things,' remarked Tatlock reflectively.
'Oh, that's the beauty of a free life, where the only law you recognise is the law of powder and shot. It's the only life worth living. The sky above you, the desert or wilderness around you, or the salt spray of the great ocean saturating every pore in your body. I am returning to the commonplaceness of civilisation simply because my mother's voice has spoken. But—ah, yes; you bet it won't be long before I return to freedom.'
Dick talked hopefully, but it was clear to Tatlock that he was drifting out, and it seemed doubtful if he would last until Sydney was reached. As he himself had said, however, he was tough, and took a lot of killing. Ninety-nine per cent. of men wounded as he was must have succumbed long ago, but he lingered, and, though suffering great agony, he uttered no groan.
Sydney was reached at last; he was carried ashore and to the hospital, and the doctors at once pronounced the case hopeless, as he was too low for an operation to be attempted, but it was marvellous how tough he really proved. For three weeks after arriving in Sydney he wrestled with death. He was cheerful and communicative, and piece by piece, chapter by chapter, as it were, Tatlock gathered from his own lips the following strange story of his life:
He had been cowboy in America; lumberman in Canada. He had served before the mast, and sailed in every sea. In Texas he had fought a lassoo fight with a human scourge, who bore the reputation of having committed a score of murders, and Dick killed his man, for which he was presented with an address and a purse of gold. In Mexico he married a Mexican beauty, in spite of the threats of a rival. Three months later the rival carried off the bride, and left the husband for dead, with a knife sticking in him. But Dick was walking about again, sound and well, a month later. In Cuba he placed himself at the head of a band of insurgents five hundred strong, and he held a village for a fortnight against thousands of Spanish soldiers. A price was set upon his head, but a Cuban belle had fallen in love with him, and guided him for nights and days through swamps and jungles, and nursed him for weeks through the delirium of fever. Finally they escaped, and got to Jamaica, in the West Indies, where the devoted preserver of his life died.
For a short time he was manager of a West Indian cotton plantation, and again came within an ace of losing his life. He was one day bitten in the arm by one of the most deadly snakes in the West Indies—the fer-de-lance. But he had a flask of gunpowder in his pocket. Without a moment's hesitation he poured a quantity of the powder on the wound and fired it. It was a heroic remedy. It made him very ill, but saved his life. After that he turned his back on the West Indies, and sailed to Boston. There he shipped in a South Sea whaler, and put in two years, but cleared out at Honolulu, as the skipper was a tyrant. He next turned up in New Zealand, and went prospecting in the 'Snowy Range,' and discovered a gold mine, which he sold to a syndicate, and moved on.
Melbourne knew him next, but the hot and dusty town had no charms for him, so he organised a small expedition, numbering twenty all told, to go prospecting in New Guinea, and they chartered a schooner to take them to their destination. They were wrecked on a reef, however. They lost everything, as well as half their number, who were drowned. He returned to Melbourne, and shortly afterwards got a passage in a steamer going to Shanghai, where he fell ill with cholera, but pulled through all right, and a rebellion being in full blast he joined the rebel ranks, and had a glorious time for something like six months, until he was captured by the Imperialists and sent to Amoy, where he was to be decapitated. But General Gordon came to his rescue, and on the grounds that he was an Englishman secured his release. For some time after that he wandered about China with no very definite purpose, only he liked to be moving about. One day he found himself at Pekin, went down to Tientsin on the coast, and secured a passage in a Chinese boat going to Shanghai, but fell in with pirates, who killed the crew, but took him prisoner, he being a white man, and they expected that his friends would ransom him. They carried him inland, and when he declined to give the address of any of his friends they tortured him. He managed to escape, and made his way to Hong Kong, where he shipped in a trader for the Philippines, but once again was wrecked. He spent eight days in an open boat in a tropical sea, with five others, and endured the most terrible sufferings. He and one other, the sole survivors of the crew, were picked up by a passing steamer, and carried to Borneo.
For a short time he became a sort of overseer on a guttapercha estate. But it was too monotonous, and he wanted to move on again. He got a passage in a native trader going to New Guinea for a cargo of cocoanuts and native pottery. He spent two months in that wonderful island; was one day captured by cannibals, and was about to be speared for the pot, when he seized a native club from one of his captors, ran amuck amongst them, got down to the coast, and was taken aboard a beche de mer fishing vessel, which transferred him to a pearler that subsequently landed him at Cooktown. A great many Chinamen had flocked there, owing to rumours of gold in the interior. He went out prospecting with Loo Foo and two other white men. They were not very successful; then it occurred to the ingenious mind of Loo Foo that there was good business to be done by preying on Chinese coasters. He proposed it to Dick, who fell in with the idea, for it would keep him moving and afford him the excitement he craved for. They scraped enough money together to buy a small brig, and Loo Foo, who was a born administrator, set about organising the business. Dick knew nothing about business. He hated it, but he could navigate a vessel with any one, and fighting was as the breath of his nostrils.
For a long time the business flourished. By bringing the plunder into the Gulf of Carpentaria, and taking it across the peninsula to Cooktown, where Foo had his spies and agents, they managed to escape detection, which would have been certain had they sailed their vessel into any regular port. How long this state of matters would have gone on it is difficult to say had Tatlock not appeared upon the scene. Sooner or later no doubt the authorities must have become suspicious. As it was, Loo Foo brought about the climax. Naturally when he heard that Dick was going he was furious, for Dick was an essential link in the chain. When persuasion, argument, and even threats failed, he began to fear for his own skin, and on the principle that dead men tell no tales he tried to quieten Dick. He succeeded in putting a bullet into his lung, but got one through his own brain in return, which stretched him low at once. Dick's marvellous vitality enabled him to stave off the inevitable for weeks, but he was conquered at last, and one night, as the darkness was giving place to dawn, he passed.
Tatlock returned to England. His mission was fulfilled; and though he did not restore the wandering and erring son to the anxious and yearning mother, he carried with him a will which the dying man had legally executed, and which prevented the greater portion of the property from passing out of his branch of the family. Moreover, Tatlock learned one of the strangest human stories that have ever been told; while as a feat in the art of detection the way in which he traced the wanderer is perhaps unparalleled.
'GENTLEMEN, I have no hesitation in saying that in all probability our property will prove of unparalleled richness, and those who hold shares in this company will have cause to congratulate themselves. You have heard the report of our engineer at the works. Nothing could be more satisfactory, and, though we have only been incorporated a little over four months, everything points to the prospects of speedy dividends. Necessarily to me it is a source of deep gratification, as your chairman, that I am able to place before you such glowing accounts—accounts which, from personal knowledge, I think I may venture to say are in every way justified. And now I have another pleasurable duty to perform, and one that I hope will meet with your approbation. I have secured the refusal for two months of about two hundred and fifty acres of land immediately adjoining our present property. Beneath this land there are possibly tons of gold waiting our energy and enterprise to bring from the darkness, in which it has lain since the beginning of time, to the light of day. This land belonged to a Mexican, who sold it recently to a small syndicate. This syndicate, however, is practically in the Bankruptcy Court, but they have given me the option of their property. Now, gentlemen, I have paid a deposit on this property, and I propose to at once form a new company to take it over and exploit it, and I am of opinion that we shall prove it to be as rich or even richer than our present possession. Before the shares are offered in the new company to the general public, I think it but right that you should have the privilege of subscribing, and with that end in view I have arranged that everyone present can, before he leaves the room, sign a provisional document pledging himself as many shares as he thinks proper, subject to the company being formed.
It now remains for me to congratulate you on the rosy prospects of our enterprise; and I express the hope that when I next have the pleasure of meeting you I shall be able to announce a substantial dividend on our first year's working. (Loud and prolonged cheering.)
'A vote of thanks terminated the proceedings, which throughout were most harmonious, and the general feeling was that the company had acquired a very substantial property. We understand that the shares are already at a premium. A large proportion of the capital for the purchase of the adjoining property referred to by the chairman in his speech was promised before the shareholders left the room.'
The above is an extract from a report in a financial paper of the statutory meeting of the shareholders in the 'Great Golden Reefs Mines and Land Exploration Company, Limited,' whose registered capital was half a million of money, the whole of which had been subscribed. The property was situated somewhere in California, and the chairman and managing director was a gentleman bearing the picturesque name of Josiah Woodfield Bell Flowers. This gentleman, whose appearance was as picturesque as his name, had burst upon London like a meteor. What his origin was, where the came from, what his connections were, nobody seemed to know, and nobody seemed disposed to ask. Tall, handsome, well-proportioned, and of an age when a man—not a born fool—is supposed to have acquired wisdom, and in addition possessed of a beautiful voice, an insinuating and apparently frank, artless man, Mr. Flowers speedily won the favour of all with whom he came in contact. Ladies vowed he was 'charming,' and 'such a nice man,' with strong emphasis on the adjective, while men declared him to be 'a jolly good fellow.'
Mr. Bell Flowers had come over to begrimed, fog-sodden, and benighted London from the rich, glowing, sun-baked lands of California, and the tales he had to tell of the potential wealth of certain regions he had explored, and in which he had acquired proprietarial and mining rights, set the silly Cockneys agape; and when, with true American philanthropy, he offered his properties for the public benefit subject to the condition that the trifle of half a million pounds sterling was subscribed in shares, of which he as vendor would accept the nominal sum of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds, and with the American aptitude for tall talk he spoke of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, the grateful public flocked to him like sheep, and baaed in chorus—'Give us of your shares. Here are our purses and cheque-books.' Widows and parsons struggling to live respectably on a bare pittance felt that their chance had come at last, and figuratively they threw their money at the head of Mr. Josiah Woodfield Bell Flowers, who was 'such a nice man.'
Mr. Bell Flowers, as such a noble-minded benefactor had a right to do, set himself up a superb mansion in the neighbourhood of Hyde Park, and his palatial residence was ordered in a way that befitted a financial king. Here he gave superb entertainments, and here Mammon worshippers, My Lord This and My Lady That, with an army of their followers, assembled and did honour to their god.
The additional company to which Mr. Bell Flowers referred at the above-mentioned meeting was duly floated, with a capital of three hundred thousand pounds. It was known as 'The Golden Reefs Mines Extension.' Mr. Flowers received a handsome proportion of this, and was elected chairman by an obedient board of guinea-pigs.
Mr. Bell Flowers, being rich, handsome, and still on the right side of the hill of life, and a bachelor to boot, was, as may well be supposed, an object of intense interest to mammas who had unmarried daughters on their hands. These dames hovered around him like flies around a sugar-tub. Mr. Bell Flowers showed that he was susceptible to female charms, for he said pretty things to all of the young ladies, and he gave them lollipops and trinkets, and set many a foolish heart throbbing wildly. But at last it leaked out that this golden god had deigned to smile sweetly on pretty little Sophie Clarges, the only daughter of Mr. 'Jack' Clarges, who was reputed to have made an enormous fortune by Stock Exchange speculations. At any rate, he lived in a very snug little house in fashionable Park Lane, and his wife entertained in a princely way.
Sophie was young—about two-and-twenty—and, while not exactly a beauty, she was passably fair. But anything she lacked physically was more than amply compensated for by the fortune her father had promised to settle upon her, and which was reputed to be the goodly sum of a million pounds. Mr. Jack Clarges' beginnings had been very humble, according to accounts. His father had worked in a coal mine, and so did Jack in his youth, but he was of an ambitious turn of mind, and, leaving the mines, had worked his way up, and finally made his pile on the Stock Exchange.
Mr. Bell Flowers and Mr. Jack Clarges became familiar, and while Jack was not particularly anxious for his daughter to marry anyone, thought it might not be a bad thing if she became the wife of Flowers. However, he did not urge it, nor did he oppose it. He was a good, easy-going sort of fellow, who liked good company and good living, and was not disposed to trouble or concern himself much about anything. His wife, however, was a lady of a very different stamp. Being somewhat coarse, a little vulgar, and somewhat indifferent about the use of the letter 'h,' she found herself—in spite of her wealth—shut off from that exclusive section of society which prides itself on its blue blood, and which shudders at the mere thought of mingling this blue blood with the red of the mere plebeian. She was designing, however, and saw that the dashing, tactful, and pushing Bell Flowers was enabled to pass the gate at which she, like the Peri at the gate of Paradise, could only sit and sigh. So she resolved that her Sophie should become Mrs. Bell Flowers.
Sophie was a dutiful daughter enough, greatly attached to her father, and tolerant of her mother. She had given her heart to a worthy young gentleman of the name of Robert Lacy Eccles, son of a gentleman who had distinguished himself as an officer in the army, but had died wretchedly poor, and left his family—a large one—utterly unprovided for. Robert, who had been educated at one of the great public schools, took to journalism, and had written a couple of novels, one of which had brought him a certain amount of fame. But Bob was poor, was without influence, and, as it seemed to Mrs. Clarges, never likely to gain a footing within that magic circle for which she yearned. So Mrs. Clarges said unto her daughter:
'Sophie, let us have no more nonsense with that vulgar and penniless fellow, Eccles. Ugh! Only to think he should ever have had the audacity to suppose for a moment I should sanction his courting you. I can't imagine how your father ever encouraged him to come to the house. But, there, your father always was stupid, and he seems to think that because Robert holds some obscure position on the "Daily Snarler" he might be of use. It makes me angry to think your father is so low in his tastes. I wish he'd some of my pride, I'm sure. However, Robert shall not come here any more. I have higher aims for you, and you will give every encouragement to dear Mr. Flowers. A nicer gentleman I am sure I wouldn't wish to meet. He's so rich, too, and then he has such influence in society.'
'But, ma,' pleaded her daughter meekly, 'how do you know that Mr. Flowers thinks anything about me?'
'How do I know? Well, upon my soul, child, you would make a saint swear. How do I know, indeed? What do you think I am? Do you think I am so blind that I cannot see? It would be a clever man, my dear, that would deceive me, I can tell you. Why, I can read Mr. Flowers as if he were an open book. He is just breaking his heart about you, and you've only got to play your cards right to secure him.'
Sophie sighed 'heigho,' silently. She had never opposed her own wishes to those of her parents, and she hadn't the moral courage to do so in this instance. Of course, there had been nothing like an engagement between her and Robert, but she liked him ever so much, and she was perfectly well aware that he was just breaking his heart about her.
It was not many days after that conversation with her mother that she and Bob met. When he treated her with the familiarity of old, and showed in a thousand little ways how precious she was in his sight, she gave him to understand—not without an effort—that their 'flirtation,' as she called it, must end. They parted, and many weeks passed. Bob had been very foolish during those weeks. He sought for Lethe where men with sorrows often seek it, when one night in a billiard-room an intimate suddenly exclaimed:
'Oh, by the way, Bob, I heard to-day that the girl you used to spoon, Sophie Clarges, is going to marry Bell Flowers, the millionaire.'
'Oh,' was all that Bob said, but in it he expressed a great volume of feeling.
Some days later he was in the City, and he dropped into Mr. Clarges' office. Clarges liked him, and was always glad to see him.
'I suppose,' said Bob, 'I must congratulate you.'
'On what?'
'Well, I hear that your daughter is engaged to Mr. Bell Flowers.'
'Oh, yes. Well, these things get fixed up somehow. Women folk, you know, are kittle cattle. I suppose my missus has had a finger in that pie.'
'But do you mean to say Sophie is only going to marry him because her mother wishes it?'
'My dear Eccles, do you suppose that Sophie would be likely to marry a man she didn't care about? No, she's not built that way, my friend. Though I haven't been consulted in the matter, I shall throw no obstacle in the girl's way. She's plenty of common sense, and I've all along resolved that I would never try to influence her choice. I used to think at one time she'd rather a sneaking regard for you, but I suppose I was wrong.'
Eccles wilted, as it were, at this remark, and he asked in a manner which seemed to imply that the subject had no interest for him:
'If that had proved to have been the case what would you have said?'
'I've just told you, my boy, I should never stand in the way of the girl's happiness. If she wanted you, and you wanted her, you should have her as far as I am concerned. But, you see, she wants Flowers; so there's an end of the matter. It will be a marriage after my wife's own heart, for I believe she has set her mind on Flowers.'
Robert Eccles gulped down a rising sob, and as he was shaking his friend's hand preparatory to going, he said:
'I suppose Mr. Bell Flowers is all right?'
Robert didn't know himself what induced him to make that remark. It slipped out. It rose in his mind suddenly, and it was uttered as it came. Perhaps it was the mere expression of some vague and shapeless thought which had haunted him. Bell Flowers' name had been before the public for a year or two. He was a much-talked-about man, and, of course, like all men who make themselves conspicuous by success, he had his enemies, for envy and jealousy are powerful factors in the human sum, and malice had shown itself, and some people had dared to hint that the rosy things which had been said about Mr. Flowers' mining properties were not justified.
Mr. Flowers' prospective father-in-law looked at the questioner in a puzzled way at first, then angrily, and he said with unusual warmth:
'What the deuce do you mean?'
Bob apologised, but Mr. Clarges was not satisfied. 'Do you know anything against Flowers?'
'Have you heard anything?'
'Then what's the drift of your remark?'
'Nothing.'
'Now, look here, young Eccles, don't you play with me. I'm a plain, blunt man, as you know, and I'm straight, I am. Now, if Bell Flowers isn't straight I would rather put Sophie into her coffin than she should marry him; so, if you know anything, be frank.'
'Upon my honour, I don't, Mr. Clarges.'
'Then what the deuce do you mean, sir, by your cowardly insinuation?'
It was no insinuation. I—I—'
'I consider it a beastly low action for one man to try and besmirch another out of pure spite. I had no idea you were a fellow of that sort. You've shown yourself in a new light, and you will be good enough to avoid my house and my people in the future. Good day to you.'
Robert Eccles never quite knew how he got out of that office, but he found himself in the street, being hurried along by the human tide. His head was in a whirl; he was sick at heart. He had eaten of Dead Sea fruit, and there was an exceeding bitterness within him. He had loved Sophie and lost her, and now he had offended his best friend.
Mr. Clarges' anger was not appeased for some time. Although a plain and blunt man he had pride, and his pride was wounded. When he went home he could not rest until he had told his wife what had passed between him and Robert. She was furious. She said some very harsh and bitter things about young Eccles. He was a 'sneak,' 'a deceitful, nasty fellow,' that's what he was. And according to her estimate Mr. Flowers was perfect, a gentleman with a great and goodly mind, and when he became her son-in-law she would feel that her cup of happiness was full.
His wife's strength of language somehow jarred on Mr. Clarges' nerves. He was silent, and he asked himself: 'Is Bell Flowers all right?'
The question reminded him that he knew absolutely nothing of Flowers' origin, and he had heard expressions in the City far from complimentary to Mr. Flowers, owing to his very roseate description of the 'Great Golden Reefs' property not having been justified. In fact, now that Mr. Clarges came to think of it, there seemed to be a great deal of mystery about the Golden Reefs. No reports were forth-coming. Nothing had been earned, and as far as could be ascertained not an ounce of gold had been abstracted.
In the meantime the subject of Mr. Clarges' meditations continued to flourish, but as the days passed Clarges could not help having the feeling that he had been somewhat lax in his duty. Although he tried to deafen himself to them, those words of Robert Eccles rang in his ears: 'I suppose Mr. Bell Flowers is all right?' And other questions rose in his own mind. 'Who was Mr. Bell Flowers? Where did he come from? Who were his people? Was there any absolute proof that the properties he sold for such an enormous sum were worth a five-pound note?'
Mr. Clarges had shown strong anger to Bob Eccles, and had severed the friendly connection between them; but, after all, wasn't Bob's remark a perfectly justifiable one, for Bell Flowers was a mystery. The result of these cogitations on Mr. Clarges' part was that, impelled by something he could not quite understand, and influenced by a feeling he could not resist, he went down one morning to the office of Tyler Tatlock, and sought a private interview with the famous detective. He made himself known, and the detective intimated that by repute his visitor was no stranger to him.
'You will appreciate my position, then,' continued Clarges, 'and still more so when I tell you that my only daughter, who is as the apple of my eye, is about to be married to a very well-known gentleman; but, but—the fact is—well—you see it's this way, I—I sus—No, I won't say that, but my prospective son-in-law is rather a reticent man, and never talks about his past. I—I—'
Understanding his visitor's embarrassment, the detective came to his assistance with the remark:
'You wish me to learn something about him?'
'Where does he hail from?'
'The United States, I believe; and he has been a good deal in California.'
'All, some queer people come over here from the States,' remarked Tatlock reflectively. 'But what is the name of the gentleman?' asked Tatlock.
'Mr. Josiah Woodfield Bell Flowers.'
'Bell Flowers; the name seems familiar to me,' mused the detective.
'Very likely. He's well known in the City in connection with the Great Gold Reefs Mines and Land Exploration Company, Limited,' rejoined Clarges.
'Oh, ah! now I remember. A gigantic scheme for making the fortune of somebody, but not the share-holders'.'
'Do you know anything?' asked Clarges anxiously.
'Oh dear no—I only suspect.'
'Suspect what?'
'That the glowing reports issued at the time the company was formed were coloured and spiced to attract the unwary.'
Mr. Clarges had lapsed into silence and thoughtfulness. He seemed much distressed, and passing his hand over his forehead said 'Well, look here, Mr. Tatlock, will you slip away quietly to California; learn what you can about the property and Mr. Flowers, and report to me at the earliest possible moment? My wife is very anxious to hurry the marriage on, but as I intend giving my daughter a large fortune, it is but right I should have some assurance that the man who is to be her husband is worthy of her.'
'I agree with you, sir. I will accept your commission, and, if I may venture to do so, I strongly advise you not to allow this marriage to take place until I have been abroad. A young lady with a large fortune should be carefully guarded. If all is right, you and I will be the only two people who will know that any inquiries have been made, and you may console yourself with the reflection that you have done nothing more than your duty. If all is not right—well, then you will be able to congratulate yourself that you have saved your child from becoming the victim of an adventurer.'
Mr. Clarges acquiesced in the soundness of the proposition, and took his leave in a somewhat relieved frame of mind.
The weeks that ensued from that memorable interview with Tyler Tatlock were anxious ones to Mr. Clarges, for Mr. Bell Flowers urged that the marriage might be allowed to take place at once, and in this he was backed up by Mrs. Clarges, who could not understand why there should be any delay. But her husband insisted that the ceremony should be delayed until Sophie's twenty-second birthday, which was four months off, and in spite of entreaty on the part of his would-be son-in-law, and of a little storming on the part of Mrs. Clarges, he carried his point, and in this he was supported by his daughter, who was by no means in a desperate hurry to take upon herself the cares and responsibilities of wifedom. And, indeed, to tell the truth, she had not quite got over the wrench of severing herself from Robert Eccles. Had she searched her heart, she might have had to confess that she had not ceased to love him—for love him she certainly did at one time—and though she was engaged to Bell Flowers, he was not quite the same in her sight that Bob had been.
At length the long and trying period of suspense for Mr. Clarges ended. Tyler Tatlock returned from his visit to the States, and at once notified Clarges of the fact. The stockbroker did not allow many hours to elapse before he called at Tatlock's office.
'Well, what news?' he exclaimed in his eagerness. Nothing, I'm afraid, that is likely to cause you any gratification.'
Mr. Clarges' countenance fell, and he had many far from agreeable reflections, the while Tatlock unlocked a large safe and took therefrom a bundle of papers, which he proceeded to spread out on his desk, at which he seated himself with the air of one who was conscious of the grave responsibility resting on him.
'In accordance with your instructions,' he commenced, as he sorted his documents and unfolded a sheet of blue foolscap closely covered with writing, 'I proceeded direct to California, and not without considerable difficulty and some risk did I reach the region in which the Great Gold Reefs property is located. Perhaps you could not find in the whole world another such arid, desolate, sun-scorched, snake-haunted wilderness.'
'But are there no mines?' cried the troubled Clarges.
'Of a kind, yes. Long and long ago some mines were worked there and abandoned. Some goldless quartz had been got out of one comparatively recently, and there was a quantity of primitive wooden machinery, and a small stamping engine near the shaft. But the wood had shrivelled up in the fierce sun and fallen in ruins, and the stamping engine was half buried in sand. In a log house in a gully close by dwelt an old negro with his wife and family. He was in charge of the property, such as it was. He was an intelligent fellow, and very communicative. He had been placed there by the person you know as Mr. Flowers, but whom he referred to as Sam Jedling.'
'But how do you know that Jedling and Flowers are the same?'
'Because I showed the old negro the portrait of Mr. Flowers you furnished me with. The old negro grinned from ear to ear, displaying his perfect teeth, and exclaimed, "Yes, yes, that's Massa Sam." Now, I further gathered that a gang of negroes, with two or three white men, one of whom was called "The Boss," worked for a few months at the mines. Every drop of water required, and every scrap of provisions, had to be brought across the desert from a long distance. Two of the white men and several of the niggers died. One of the white men died from sunstroke and two of the blacks from the bite of rattlesnakes, which swarm in that part of the country. The 'Boss,' who was an engineer of the name of Lawson, was unable to continue working owing to being shorthanded. But he hung on for some time, and was joined by Jedling, and the two spent some days in examining the stone that had been brought up, but only a speck of gold here and there could be discovered. At last they finished their inspection, discharged the workmen, placed the old negro as caretaker, undertaking to keep him supplied with provisions, and went off. Lawson returned two or three times, on each occasion with two or three white men, but Jedling never went back.'
Clarges groaned. It began to dawn upon him that a huge swindle had been perpetrated.
'Does the story end there?' he asked with a gasp.
'By no means. I have traced the history to some extent of both Jedling and Lawson. The latter was regarded as an engineer of considerable ability, and a mining expert of long experience. I think myself there is little doubt he was corrupted by Jedling, who from all accounts is a swindler of the deepest dye. He appears to be well known in California, and particularly in San Francisco, where he suffered imprisonment for forging a bill. In the time at my disposal I was unable to learn much about his early career, but you may accept the statement as one of fact that he is an unmitigated scoundrel.
'To sum up, the person you know as Josiah Woodfield Bell Flowers has in conjunction with others committed a gigantic fraud on the British public, and you have narrowly escaped giving your daughter and your money into his clutches, for which escape you may thank God.'
Mr. Clarges bowed his head. He almost felt heart-broken. Yet he was deeply, prayerfully thankful his daughter had not been sacrificed. When Mrs. Clarges learnt the truth she went into hysterics, and was ill for several weeks. Sophie sighed; perhaps in her heart she was not altogether sorry things had turned out as they had. Mindful of the unintentional wrong he had done Robert Eccles, her father sent for him and told him everything, and he made but a feeble attempt to disguise that he was not averse to the young couple billing and cooing if they wished to do so. Needless to say, the young couple availed themselves fully of the unexpected opportunity which had occurred for the renewal of the erstwhile pleasant acquaintanceship, an acquaintanceship that speedily ripened, and culminated in the fulness of time in marriage. But long before then punishment swift and sure fell upon Josiah Woodfield Bell Flowers, otherwise Sam Jedling, which probably was not his legitimate name after all. It was impossible, of course, for Mr. Clarges to hush the fraud up. To make it known was a duty he owed to himself as an honest man, to his position as a stockbroker, and to the public at large. So he swore an information which led to a warrant being issued, and an officer and two men were sent down to Mr. Flowers' splendid house to execute it. It chanced that he was entertaining a party of friends, but when he learned that his short-lived glory had passed, and the bubble was pricked, he bowed his head and said he would resign himself without a struggle to the inevitable.
He was allowed, accompanied by the officer, to retire to his bedroom to change his evening dress for a more suitable costume. While there he unlocked a small drawer in a cabinet, took therefrom a phial, and drawing the cork, poured the contents of the phial down his throat before he could be stopped. The phial contained prussic acid. For an appreciable time he stood bolt upright, a ghastly pallor overspreading his handsome face. Then he made an effort to speak, but Death gripped him, and he fell face forward on the rich pile carpet that covered the floor.
He had lived his life; he had played his part; the glamour of greatness had lured him; but, alas! it was but for an hour of passing glory, and the end—unchristian burial and a dishonoured grave.
A LONG and picturesque valley, with rounded heather-clad hills on either side; here and there a patch of woodland, or a tiny ravine running into the hills, green and cool, with ferns in their season, and moist and misty with some trickling stream. If you mounted to the hill-top and turned your eyes south you observed an extensive panorama of the fair English country, while northward was the line of the Cheviots, guarding, sentinel-like, the land of mountain and flood. It was a lonely valley, sparsely populated, and in one of the loneliest parts of it stood the Gravel Pits Farm, in the occupation, at the period of this story, of two brothers, George and David Sandeman. George was the elder. He was about forty; David not more than thirty-five. They had lived on the farm for about twelve years. It was not a very productive place, but the Sandemans managed to live fairly comfortably, although they were at times hard pressed to make ends meet. They had a long lease of the farm, which at one time they were very anxious to dispose of, but they were advised to hold on, for it was certain that sooner or later a branch railway would be pushed through the valley, and the Sandemans had been assured that whenever the railway did come, it must, in the natural order of things, sweep over the Gravel Pits Farm lands, and bowl the farm itself over. And so they hung on.
And one day men appeared with dumpy levels, theodolites, chains, and poles. And later the brothers got an intimation that their farm and land would be required; and, later still, came a party of gentlemen—they were surveyors—to value the farm; and finally, after some haggling, the Sandemans agreed to accept a price which had been fixed by a board of arbitrators, and they were told that they must clear out in four months. During those four months David Sandeman mysteriously disappeared. George had been away in Scotland. When he returned to his home he was informed that a week before David had gone up the valley in search of a stray pony, but had not come back.
George searched high, and he searched low. He advertised. He offered a reward. He communicated with the police, but not a sign nor trace of the missing man was obtained. He had gone, and no one could say why he had gone, nor what his fate was. When the 'compensation for disturbance' had been settled by the railway company, and the brothers had accepted it, each made a will by which, in the event of the death of either, the survivor was to inherit the deceased's property. It should be mentioned that the brothers were bachelors, and there was a clause in the wills to the effect that marriage on the part of either should render the will null and void. At the expiration of the four months allowed by the board of arbitrators George Sandeman quitted the Gravel Pits Farm, and went to a farm in Perthshire.
For a whole year after that the Gravel Pits Farm remained desolate, forlorn, and owl-haunted. At last one morning a little party of engineers engaged on the new line of railway made the farm their quarters. A few weeks later a band of stalwart navvies, armed with spade, pick, and crowbar, began to demolish the buildings. In the course of their work they made a very startling discovery. They had begun to pull down a barn, over which was a small granary. In this granary was an old box which had been used as a bean bin. One of the navvies struck off the lid with his pick, and the box seemed to be packed full of turf. A great deal of bog turf was cut on the hillsides by the valley dwellers and used as fuel for their fires. The navvy began to prise the sides of the box out with a crowbar, and to scatter the turf, when suddenly he started back with an exclamation of alarm, and called out to a mate near:
'I say, Jim, blowed if there ain't a dead 'un 'ere.'
Yes, sure enough, there was the dead body of a man, and the turf had preserved it to such an extent that, save that the flesh was brown and shrivelled, it did not seem to be decayed. The foreman was called, and he in turn communicated with the superintendent, who gave orders that the work of demolition should be suspended until the police and the coroner had been notified. Necessarily an inquest was ordered, and a medical man was instructed, in the interests of justice, to examine the body. This he did, and he found a hole in the skull and a bullet in the brain. The body was identified beyond all question of doubt as that of David Sandeman. And it was equally certain that David had been murdered.
George Sandeman came from Perthshire to give evidence at the inquest, but he could throw no light on the mystery. The verdict of the coroner's jury was murder—there could be no other—but by whom the murder was done it was impossible at that stage to say.
There were circumstances in connection with this Gravel Pits Farm tragedy which removed it somewhat out of the common, and aroused an extraordinary amount of public interest on account of the elements of romance and mystery surrounding it.
Now, there was one curious fact in connection with this tragedy, which served, as a natural consequence, to heighten the mystery. The bullet extracted from the dead man's brain was an old-fashioned round bullet, and on a rafter in the granary where the body had lain so many months a pistol, rusty and dust-covered, was found. It was a single-barrelled, flint-lock weapon, such as was in use at the end of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century. It was a superior weapon of its class, for the barrel was damascened and the stock was inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The bullet exactly fitted the barrel. It therefore seemed pretty certain that it was with that pistol the crime had been committed, and the granary itself was probably the scene of the crime. When, how, by whom, and why was the murder done? Those four points made up a pretty complex problem, and so keen became the public desire to have it solved that it was submitted to Tyler Tatlock, and an order was given that the demolition of the farm buildings was not to be proceeded with until a full and exhaustive inquiry had been made.
The first thing Tatlock did when he set to work in the matter was to determine the constitution of the household at the period when David disappeared. When it became evident that the property would be acquired by the railway company, the brothers reduced their establishment to the lowest possible limits, and for months before and at the time of the crime it was made up as follows. An old woman named Margaret Westcroft, who occupied the position of housekeeper; a dairy-maid, known as Sarah Giles, a smart, well-figured, good-looking lass of twenty-five; a boy of about fourteen or fifteen named Jimmy Martin. He may be described as a boy-of-all-work. For a pound or two a year and his 'grub' he made himself generally useful. These three persons slept in the farm itself. Of the outside hands there were Ronald Macfarlane, the herdsman, a middle-aged man, who had been in the service of the brothers for some years; a ploughman, Walter Hislop, who had been engaged six months before at the hiring fair in Carlisle; and a waggoner, Peter Grubb, also engaged at the hiring fair at the same time. These three men occupied a little cottage at the rear of the farm, and about fifty yards from the main building. All the people had been discharged, and had scattered about the country at least a year before the discovery of the body in the granary. Margaret Westcroft and Jimmy Martin were examined at the inquest, but could throw no light whatever on the occurrence, if we except a statement that before George Sandeman went away he and his brother had a quarrel, and on the day of his disappearance David seemed very restless and strange in his manner. By dint of perseverance, and not without some trouble, Tatlock interviewed the others, with the exception of Sarah Giles. They did not furnish a scrap of information likely to be of use. Ronald Macfarlane, in fact, had been sent to Carlisle by David with some pigs three days before the crime. When he returned David had been missing for two days. Sarah Giles belonged to Hereford-shire, where her mother, a brother, and a sister lived; but she had quarrelled with her people, and held no communication with them. Consequently they did not know where she had gone to.
Tatlock's opinion was that every one he had seen who went to make up the Sandeman household at the time of the murder had taken no part in, and had no knowledge of; the murder. On this point he differed from the chief constable of the county. This gentleman's view was that George Sandeman had paid one of his servants to kill David, and his going away during the commission of the crime was a blind. The constable urged in support of his view that it was elicited in evidence before the coroner that George—it was noted at the time—when he returned and was informed of his brother's disappearance, did not seem at all surprised, and betrayed no concern at the continued absence of David, nor did he, so it was alleged, make any strenuous efforts to discover him. The constable was very firm in his view, and was anxious to arrest George, but, in the absence of any legal evidence to support such a step, could not do so.
Tatlock's theory was altogether different, and did not in any way incriminate George Sandeman, notwithstanding that there was a very strong public feeling against him. But according to the theory the motive was not desire for gain, but revenge.
It had been stated that on the day of his death David seemed restless and strange in his manner, and that he went up the valley in search of a stray pony and was seen no more. The latter part of the statement, however, was inaccurate, as Margaret Westcroft said her master came in at tea-time, and told her he had not found the pony. At that time Sarah Giles was in the dairy making some butter, and all the men were out on various duties. David was silent and moody. He swallowed down some tea, and, putting on his hat, told his housekeeper he was going into the barn to get some rope which was stored there, and which he wanted. Mrs. Westcroft was bread-baking at the time, and she went on with her duties, thinking no more of David until the hands assembled for their supper, when she inquired where Mr. David was, but nobody could answer the question. He was expected to put in an appearance shortly, but he didn't. This caused no uneasiness, because it was deemed probable he had gone to smoke a pipe with a neighbour who lived lower down the valley, about a couple of miles away, where he was in the habit of spending a good deal of his time.
Tatlock's theory was that David did go into the barn on that fatal evening; that he was murdered in the barn, carried up to the granary, thrown into the bean chest, and covered over at once with the handy turf, the winter stock of which was kept there. Here, again, the idea of revenge stood out prominently, and the deduction was that the murderer was well acquainted with the premises. The barn stood detached from the main building. All the farm-hands being out in the fields, the criminal had no fear of disturbance in his deadly work. Having committed the crime, he could easily slip off and decamp over the hills. One of the most curious and suggestive points in the whole of the case was the fact of the criminal having used such an antiquated weapon wherewith to commit the crime.
Having worked out his theory in his own way, Tatlock proceeded to act upon it. Firstly, the motive of the crime was—revenge. Secondly, the criminal must have been well acquainted with the place. Thirdly, he had carried out his fiendish work by means of an obsolete weapon, such as could only be met with in an old curiosity shop or a museum.
Having determined the constitution of the Sandeman household at the time of the crime, Tatlock next proceeded to learn something of it antecedent to that event, and his inquiries brought to light that about a year before David was slain the brothers had had in their employ, as a sort of overseer, a man named Pierre Verne. He was believed to be a native of France, but had been the greater part of his life in England or Scotland, and had occupied himself with agriculture. It was known that he used to receive letters from France. He was clever in his way, but was singularly taciturn and reserved, and never talked of himself or his past. He and David did not get on very well together, and he was discharged. This was significant on the face of it, though it did not necessarily follow that Pierre Verne was the murderer. But Tatlock certainly deemed it his duty to try and track him. In the course of an interview Tatlock had with George Sandeman in Perth, the latter made a remark to the effect that he believed there had been some love-making between Verne and Sarah Giles. As previously stated, Giles was a good-looking young woman. She was regarded as a coquette—giddy, flighty, vain. She was fond of going to Carlisle—the nearest town—whenever she got the chance, and it was remembered that when she was away Verne frequently went away too. From this there was but one inference to be drawn—Giles and Verne were lovers. In this little fact Tatlock discerned certain potentialities.
'Search for the woman,' say the French, 'whenever there is mischief'; and wiseacres are never tired of declaring that a woman is at the bottom of all mischief. Poor woman! Many sins are laid at her door, but as woman inspires men with sentiments of love, and love is very jealous, such crime as that of the Gravel Pits Farm might have been the result entirely of jealousy. But jealousy of whom? According to the theory, the crime was the result of revenge. Jealousy often prompts revenge. If it did so in this case, was it not allowable to suppose that David Sandeman sought to insinuate himself between the passionate Frenchman, Pierre Verne, and the pretty, giddy Giles?
Turning his attention to Carlisle, Tatlock discovered in the most populous part of the town a tea and cake and sweetie shop, kept by an old lady, Margaret Janwick by name, and her daughter, Harriet. It was a small shop, but did a thriving business, and Mrs. Janwick and her daughter made a comfortable living. Well, Sarah Giles and Harriet Janwick—they were about the same age—had been great chums. It was to the Janwicks that Miss Giles always went when in town; and, as Harriet was a pretty girl, like her friend, fond of a little flirtation and amusement, the two young women went about a good deal. So much did Tatlock unearth, and through it he unearthed a good deal more.
Harriet Janwick possessed a photograph of Sarah Giles and Pierre Verne. They had been taken together during one of their visits to the town.
Here, then, was direct evidence that they had sweet-hearted. They were standing arm-in-arm, Sarah decked out in her Sunday best, Pierre wearing kid gloves, and holding a stick and his hat in his hand. On the back of the photograph was written 'To dear Harriet, from Sarah.' Pierre was a somewhat striking-looking man, but with rather a saturnine expression. He had a good forehead, and an intelligent face, which was decidedly French in its type.
Although Verne and Sarah were ostensibly sweethearts, Miss Janwick did not think her friend cared very much for him. He was absurdly jealous, and grew angry if she even looked at another man. Nevertheless, on one occasion, when they had had a serious quarrel, Sarah wept fit to break her heart.
Miss Janwick confessed that she could never quite make Sarah out. At one time she seemed very serious; and at others she was so flighty and giddy that it was impossible to get her to rivet her attention on anybody or anything. But some little time before Gravel Pits Farm was vacated, Sarah seemed to entirely change in her nature. She grew more thoughtful, more sedate; lost interest in the things that before had pleased her, and appeared to be suffering from dejection. Harriet Janwick had never been able to get a satisfactory explanation of this, though she thought it was due to Pierre Verne having gone away. After his departure Sarah rarely spoke about him, but she did impart to her friend the information that he had gone to Bordeaux, his native town, where he had obtained a situation in some wine merchant's office.
After he had gone away Sarah's visits to Carlisle became less and less. The very last time that she went, that is so far as Miss Janwick knew, was then David Sandeman's strange disappearance was causing a good deal of talk. She visited her friend that afternoon, and stayed to tea. She seemed unusually depressed and nervous, and once or twice burst into tears. When Harriet pressed her for the cause of this, she exclaimed petulantly:
'Oh, nothing. I'm ill, that's all.'
Harriet had never seen her in such a strange mood, and naturally felt much distressed. She was going to visit a cousin, and asked her friend to accompany her, but Sarah replied:
'No. I must get back to that horrid farm; but I wish I hadn't to go, for I hate the place.'
'Why, you used to say you liked being there,' said her friend.
'Yes, so I did one time; but those were happy times.'
'In what way have they changed?' asked Miss Janwick.
'Oh, lors!' exclaimed Sarah half angrily, 'there's no need to ask that. The farm's going to be given up, as you know, and we've all got to clear out. That's one reason. And then Pierre's gone, and David Sandeman's disappeared. Everything's changed.'
Harriet accepted that explanation as a good and sufficient reason for her friend's unhappiness, and, sympathising and condoling with her, she and her mother persuaded her to stay with them all night. She yielded to the persuasion, and later on the two girls and a young man, an acquaintance of Harriet's, went to see a travelling theatrical company.
The piece in which the company appeared was the sensational melodrama of 'Maria Martin,' based upon a well-known case many years ago, in which a young girl was foully murdered in a barn by a man named Martin. During the performance, much to the alarm of her friends, Sarah Giles fainted, and, as Harriet said, 'Sarah seemed about the last girl in the world to faint'; for she had always seemed so strong, so sturdy, with robust, country health. Nevertheless, she went off on that particular night, and had to be carried out into the open air, where brandy was administered to her. When she recovered she said she thought the heat had overcome her. She and Harriet went straight home, and all night Sarah seemed so uneasy and restless that her friend was much concerned about her. The next morning, as the two girls lay in bed talking, the conversation turned upon the mysterious disappearance of Mr. David Sandeman, and she incidentally mentioned that he had made love to her.
'I wonder what has become of him,' remarked Harriet.
'The Lord knows,' answered Sarah with a sigh.
'Perhaps he's been murdered,' suggested Harriet.
This suggestion caused Sarah Giles to cover her face with her hands and burst into tears; and when her friend wished to caress and soothe her, she pushed her away with her elbow, and in sobbing tones said:
'Oh, what a horrible thing you are! Whatever put such an idea as that into your head?'
Miss Janwick tried to justify the suggestions she had thrown out by saying that the valley was so lonely, and referring to a local tradition that a farmer had been murdered in that very valley by a tramp some thirty years before. The end of it all was Sarah Giles sprang out of bed and began to dress herself, and, in the performance of her toilet, she seemed to brighten up and become more like her old self, while during the breakfast she was quite merry. She parted from her friends at noon, and left the town with the country carrier, who was going part of the way, and had offered to give her a lift as far as he went. She promised the Janwicks she would come in the following week on market day, and visit them. Whether she came or not they did not know. Anyway she did not visit them, and they had never set eyes upon her since, nor had she even condescended to write. Both mother and daughter referred to her in somewhat bitter terms, considering she had been ungrateful, as they had shown her much kindness and hospitality.
These new facts which Tatlock had elicited set him pondering. They certainly seemed to throw some light on hitherto dark places. Sarah Giles's conduct and changes of mood, as described by the Janwicks, was full of significance, and her fainting during the performance of Maria Martin' was particularly so. It was like a handwriting on the wall, and yet it was not quite easy to interpret it. It was difficult to suppose that she committed the murder herself. Nevertheless, her behaviour in Carlisle subsequent to the murder indicated apparently some guilty knowledge.
Although Tatlock had managed to put together several parts of the puzzle, the key pieces were still wanting, and he deemed it his duty to betake himself to Bordeaux, armed with that photograph with the inscription on the back:'To dear Harriet, from Sarah.' Of course, the first thing he did was to present himself at the head police quarters, where he was supplied with some information which was almost a story in itself.
Pierre Verne was in the employment of a large firm of wine growers. His duties lay out of doors in connection with the cultivation of the vines. Some time after he had held this position he was joined by a young woman from England who did not speak French, and she was understood to be his wife. They lived together in a small cottage just on the outskirts of Bordeaux. Within a very few weeks of her arrival a baby was brought into the world prematurely, and made all haste to get out of it, for it died within a week of bronchitis. Soon after that event it became known to the workpeople on the estate that Pierre Verne and his English wife were leading a cat-and-dog sort of life. The young woman seemed very unhappy, and it was believed that Pierre was in the habit of beating her. Their cottage was situated in a lonely spot at the edge of a wood. One day Pierre went about inquiring for his wife. He said she had taken herself off, and he wanted to bring her back. But nobody could give him any information. Nobody had seen her. In a few days he ceased to talk about her, and for a time the people forgot the circumstance, until one evening Verne beat a boy who was working in the vineyard mercilessly for some petty fault. The women who were weeding were furious, and one exclaimed:
'I believe now you murdered your poor wife.'
Perhaps as far as she was concerned it was only a meaningless taunt, but it suited the incident and the occasion; it was taken up and repeated by others. He was jeered and hooted, and the suggestiveness of the taunt appealed so forcibly to the people that they talked about it until it seemed to them it must be true. It came to the ears of the police, and they called upon Pierre Verne for some explanation about his wife's sudden disappearance.
His answers were considered so unsatisfactory that he was arrested. Then the murder idea strengthened. It became a sort of phantom that lashed people into a fury against the prisoner. The man was examined according to French procedure. A Judge of Instruction (Juge d'Instruction) examined him, interrogated him pitilessly again and again and again, but throughout the ordeal the man maintained his innocence. The police made the most determined and exhaustive efforts to get evidence. For a long time they were baffled, until at last Verne's nerves gave way. He could stand the torture no longer. The living death he had endured during these months of incarceration maddened him, and, sending for the judge, he laid bare his soul.
Yes, he had killed Sarah, and her body was buried in the wood above his cottage. Sure enough, there it was found. He had strangled her with a silk handkerchief, which was still round her throat. From that moment he lapsed into silence. They could get nothing further from him. Through the awful ordeal of trial he passed silently and apparently indifferent. He heard his doom pronounced unmoved. He endured the suspense and terror of the weeks that intervened between the sentence and the fall of the knife without a murmur or complaint, and when suddenly in the grey dawn of morning he was awakened from his sleep, and told to have courage, he preserved his stoicism. It was only when he went forth and heard the roar of the rabble, and glancing upward saw the gleaming steel blood-red in the light of the dawning day, that he betrayed his human nature. He shuddered and fretted, and sobbed out twice:
'I loved her, I loved her!'
An instant later there was a spurting of hot blood, a mighty shout from the surging mob, and a severed head lay in a basket of sawdust. Justice had smitten! The tragedy was done!
That Pierre Verne slew poor, misguided Sarah Giles there was not the shadow of a doubt. But did he slay David Sandeman? it will be asked.
Well, here are two little items that Tatlock brought to light. From a museum in Bordeaux a flintlock pistol, said to have belonged to Napoleon the First, had been stolen. How, by whom, and when it was not known.
At the time of the crime at the Gravel Pits Farm, Pierre Verne was absent from Bordeaux. He had obtained leave of absence to go to England, where he said he had some business to settle.
The flintlock pistol with the damascened barrel and inlaid stock was identified by the museum people, and returned to them by Tatlock. Circumstantial evidence, then, convicts Pierre Verne of having killed David Sandeman. Sarah Giles in all probability was a party to the crime. At any rate, she knew of it.
Why did Verne kill Sandeman?
Because he was jealous; because Sandeman was his rival; because he desired to be revenged. Why did he kill Sarah Giles? To this question the reader can supply the answer. 'Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.' Through the instrumentality of man the Lord had avenged the double crime.
IT was towards the end of autumn that Mr. John Duff; representative of a very large and well-known Scottish house, trading principally in woollen goods and plaids, left Edinburgh on a periodical business visit to London. Mr. Duff was a commercial traveller of great sagacity and high repute, who had been on the road for the same firm for about twenty years. He was still young, not over forty, and after business was as fond of enjoying himself as most men. In business he was punctilious and attentive. He put up, as usual, at a very quiet but central hotel of a highly respectable character.
On the evening of his arrival Mr. Duff, having dined well, adjourned to the smoking-room to enjoy his cigar, and there he made the acquaintance of a fair-spoken, pleasant, affable gentleman of American nationality, as evidenced by his twang. Some commonplace remark on the part of the American struck the keynote, and he was so pleasant, so full of information, and so desirous, as he said, of forming some friendships in London, which he was visiting for the first time, that Mr. Duff quite took to him, and having exchanged cigars and stood drinks for each other, the American informed his new acquaintance that he bore the somewhat curious and quaint name of Risdom Tillstone. He expressed himself as delighted to know Mr. Duff, and said it was on his programme to visit Scotland.
The acquaintanceship thus begun speedily ripened, so that in the course of two or three days strangers might have supposed the two men had known each other for years. Risdom Tillstone, who was between thirty and forty, was insinuating, self-assertive, and persevering, but withal exceedingly gentlemanly and polished. About the third evening after the beginning of the acquaintance—which was to lead to such extraordinary results—had begun, Mr. Duff had gone to Tillstone's bedroom by his request to look at some American photographs which Tillstone was desirous of showing him. In lifting these photographs from his trunk he inadvertently pulled out a small yellow star attached to a morsel of blue ribbon, and it fell to the floor. Duff stooped, picked it up, and handed it to his new-found friend. The star was evidently made of metal—probably silver, yellowed in some way. As Tillstone held out his hand to receive it a strange expression came into his face. It was a mixed expression of confusion and alarm. He took the ornament, or whatever it was, and thrust it into his pocket, without any comment. The incident was so trifling in itself that Mr. Duff attached no importance to it, but casually remarked:
'Is that a foreign decoration?'
'Yes,' answered Tillstone curtly; and, with the obvious intention of preventing any further questions on the subject, he began to talk of the photographs.
Naturally Mr. Duff was a little curious to know Mr. Tillstone's calling, and with Scottish bluntness asked him point blank:
'What business are you in?'
Tillstone smiled sweetly and blandly as he replied, with a certain significance of intonation:
'I am living the life of a gentleman.'
'But you have been in business, I suppose?'
'Oh, well, yes, a little, I guess. My father, the Judge, farmed somewhat in the State of Nebraska, and I helped him. I guess I had an elegant time.'
It was clear that this was another subject Mr. Tillstone wished tabooed, as he quickly began to talk about something else. For a moment or two Mr. Duff had some thoughts that the American was 'a bit fishy,' but he came to the conclusion, on reflection, that he was a type of a very large class of Yankees, who, having made a 'pile,' come over to 'do Europe.' They generally give themselves airs, and talk 'big,' about their 'people,' and so forth, and seem to have a soul above trade. Duff, however, on the whole, had a high opinion of Tillstone.
Of course, Mr. Duff; having to attend to his business, did not see much of his friend during the day, but their evenings were generally spent together, and, as the Yankee phrased it, they 'had a good time.' A week after the acquaintance began Mr. Risdom Tillstone expressed a strong wish to go to a bal masque advertised to take place at Covent Garden Theatre in a few days, and he asked Mr. Duff to accompany him. It was to be an exceptionally grand ball, and not only a very large but a very select attendance was expected, as the tickets were fixed at two guineas for gentlemen and a guinea for ladies. Mr. Duff somewhat demurred at the price, but his friend offered to pay for him. Duff of course would not permit that, and decided to go. When the night arrived and they were dressed and waiting in the entrance of the hotel while a cab was being whistled up, Duff noticed that his companion had the yellow star pinned to his breast. Possibly it would not have attracted his attention had it not been for the little incident in the bed-room when the star fell on the floor, for it was an insignificant-looking thing, and not conspicuous.
'I see you are wearing that order,' he remarked.
'Yes,' answered Tillstone sententiously, and he jerked his cloak over it, as though he did not wish it to be seen. And in the way in which he uttered the 'yes' there was a suggestion of annoyance.
Nothing daunted, Duff asked: 'What order is it?'
'Oh, nothing of any consequence. But come on, here's the cab.'
This reply set Duff pondering. If it was an order of merit, why was the American so chary of talking about it? He could hardly be accused of undue modesty. And as he did not like to talk about it, why did he wear it? This was a pretty little problem, which, shrewd as he was, Mr. Duff could not solve, and the arrival at the theatre put the matter out of his mind for the time being.
A dance had just finished, and the revellers were promenading the stately ballroom. Duff and his American acquaintance were sauntering slowly amongst the gay and chattering throng, when they came upon a gentleman in conversation with a lady in a domino. Of course, there was nothing in that to attract attention, but the gentleman wore on his breast a small yellow star attached to a piece of blue ribbon. It was a facsimile of the star which Duff had seen fall on the floor in the bedroom of the hotel and again that evening pinned on the breast of his companion. But for that fact he would not have noticed it. But what followed was still more curious; each man wearing the star put his right hand up to his forehead as if making a military salute, and it was done so rapidly it would have escaped the observation of most people. Then the left hand was placed over the breast with equal rapidity. These were evidently signs.
'Excuse me for a few minutes,' said Tillstone, 'I fancy I see a countryman of mine over there,' and he walked quickly away, and in a few moments the strange man followed him.
Duff was amazed, and he watched them, saw them come together, converse for a few minutes, then separate, and Tillstone returned to his friend, who was on the point of asking for some explanation, but checked himself, restrained his curiosity, and remained silent. Necessarily the tiny yellow star with its morsel of blue ribbon now interested Duff very much, and he resolved to try and find out, if possible, at some more opportune moment, what the mystery was.
Two mornings later, while partaking of his breakfast—the American was still abed—he never put in an appearance until midday—Mr. Duff was glancing through a daily paper, as was his wont, when, by the merest chance imaginable, his eye lighted on the following mysterious announcement in the agony column:
Yellow Star. The Ditch. 27. 10.
Mr. Duff, having got yellow star on the brain, was peculiarly interested in the conundrum embodied in this advertisement, but he could make nothing of it. He cut the advertisement out, however, and put it into his pocket-book. A day or two later, his business in London completed for the time being, he prepared to take his departure. Mr. Tillstone was very effusive when it came to saying good-bye, and promised to look him up in Edinburgh in a week or two.
Mr. Duff had been back in Edinburgh a couple of days when his attention was drawn to the following paragraph in the daily paper:
Extraordinary Occurrence.
It may be remembered that some time ago it was announced that the daughter of a Mrs. Leslie, residing in one of the suburbs of London, had apparently been spirited away. Miss Alice Leslie, who was fourteen years of age, used to go daily to a young ladies' school in the neighbourhood. One afternoon she failed to return home as usual, and, in spite of every inquiry, no trace of her could be found. The distracted mother made repeated appeals through the press, and offered a reward of one hundred pounds for the girl's recovery. It has now been allowed to leak out that Mrs. Leslie received an anonymous letter saying that her daughter was safe and sound, and would be restored to her home on the mother consenting to pay a thousand pounds. The writer went on to say that if she failed to pay the money she would never hear of her child again, and if she made the contents of the letter known to anyone it would be the signal for her daughter being put to death. If she was willing to pay the money, she was to be at a certain spot at an hour named, with a cheque in her pocket payable to bearer, and in exchange for that cheque she would receive her daughter.
Mrs. Leslie, who is a wealthy lady—a fact evidently known to the miscreants concerned in the abduction—was so distressed at the threat contained in the letter, that, without consulting anyone, she wrote a cheque to bearer, and went to the rendezvous, a secluded spot in the public park. After waiting some little time she was accosted by a well-dressed woman, closely veiled, who inquired if she was Mrs. Leslie. On receiving answer in the affirmative, the woman demanded to see the cheque, and, the demand being complied with, the woman conducted her to another part of the park, where a man and another woman were waiting with the girl. By this time it was quite dark, and Mrs. Leslie was so overjoyed at meeting her daughter again that she readily parted with the cheque, and failed to take any means to identify the wretches who had taken part in the dastardly conspiracy, and they all disappeared. The cheque was presented the next morning as soon as the bank opened, and the money was paid in gold. This extraordinary story seems incredible, but we have taken steps to verify its accuracy. It appears that Mrs. Leslie, two or three weeks after the recovery of her daughter, mentioned the circumstance to a friend, who strongly persuaded her to communicate with the police. This was done, and every means have been taken to trace the wretches concerned, but so far without result. As it turns out that there have been several cases of the kind during the last year or two in various parts of the country, we understand that Mr. Tyler Tatlock, the well-known detective, has been commissioned to try and bring the guilty parties to book.
According to Miss Leslie's account, while on her way from school she was accosted by a lady-like woman, who inquired if she was Miss Leslie. The woman then said that Mrs. Leslie had been taken suddenly ill, and was anxious that her daughter should hurry home. With great kindness, as it seemed, the woman volunteered to drive her there, and, strangely enough, a cab was waiting close by. Into this cab the distressed girl and the woman got, but instead of being driven home the girl was taken to a house some five miles away. When she began to get anxious, on realising that she was not going in the direction of her home, the woman told her it was all right, and opening a satchel she carried she took out a small scent-bottle, containing a white fluid, which she poured on a hand-kerchief, and she suddenly placed the handkerchief over the girl's mouth and nostrils. Miss Leslie after that became insensible, and remembered nothing more until she found herself lying on a strange bed with the woman sitting beside her. The whole story is so remarkable that we deemed it our duty to thoroughly investigate it before giving it publicity, and we can now vouch for the facts as we have detailed them.'
The foregoing sensational story emanated from one of the well-known press agencies, which gave it an importance that otherwise would have been lacking. Mr. Duff read it with an interest begotten by the unusual features of the case, and yet, despite the authority of the agency in question, he was rather disposed to believe it was the emanation of some enterprising liner on the look-out for good copy. Anyway, Mr. Duff's interest was only of a passing nature, and soon he had forgotten all about it.
In due course, and in accordance with promise, Mr. Risdom Tillstone arrived in Edinburgh, and was welcomed by his friend. He put up at one of the best hotels, and Mr. Duff devoted his evenings to him. At the end of a week they parted, as Duff had to journey to Manchester, so he wished his friend good-bye, and left him in Edinburgh. As he travelled south and opened his daily paper he came across the following advertisement:
'Yellow Star—Caution.'
But for what had gone before this would have had neither meaning nor interest for him, but to his mind 'Yellow Star' had some deep significance, and for the first time he began to think seriously that Tillstone was an adventurer. This opinion was strengthened when he heard that a lady staying in the hotel in Edinburgh where Tillstone had stayed had lost a jewel case containing over two thousand pounds worth of jewels, chiefly diamonds. The report said that the case had evidently been taken from her room one afternoon while she was absent shopping with some friends. A Mr. Risdom Tillstone, an American gentleman who was staying in the hotel, also complained that he had lost a valuable pair of sleeve-links and three diamond shirt-studs. No arrests had been made, and the police seemed baffled. The name of the lady who had been robbed of her jewels was given as Mrs. Combe Phillips, wife of the Mayor of an English provincial town. Her son was studying for the medical profession at the college in Edinburgh, and she had gone there to see him.
After considerable reflection Duff wrote to this lady, and suggested that she should engage the services of Tyler Tatlock, who would recover her jewels if anyone could. He also wrote to Tatlock, mentioning his suspicions to him, and told him what he knew about Tillstone. Adopting Duff's advice, Mrs. Phillips communicated with Tatlock, who saw in that yellow star a sign, as he believed, of deep significance. On commencing his investigations Tatlock found that Risdom Tillstone had departed from Edinburgh and left no address behind him. Nor had he done so at the hotel where he stayed in London. The detective had a long interview with Duff, who frankly confessed that he had been very much attracted at first by Tillstone, whose plausibility was marvellous, while his power of questioning, with a view to eliciting information likely to be of use to him, he had brought to a fine art. Duff could no longer doubt that he had been made a tool of, and had been induced to tell the Yankee a good many things likely to be of use to him in his nefarious transactions.
Tatlock had not long been engaged in this particular business before he established pretty conclusively that the American who called himself Risdom Tillstone had been directly or indirectly connected with the abduction of Miss Leslie, for the girl stated positively that during the time she was kept a prisoner, a little man, whom she took to be an Italian, came to her room and had a long talk with the woman who was practically her keeper in a foreign language the girl did not understand. And once while the man was gesticulating a good deal, and lifted up his arms, she noticed that he had a small yellow star attached to a morsel of blue ribbon pinned inside of his coat. There were now strong indications of the existence of a widespread conspiracy, with ramifications all over the country, while the badge of the conspirators was apparently a yellow star. In addition, the members were able to make themselves known to each other by signs, which fortunately Duff had observed when Tillstone met another yellow star man at Covent Garden Theatre during the bal masque. Inquiry further revealed the fact that on that very night at the theatre a gentleman was deprived of a very valuable gold lever watch and a purse containing nearly ten pounds, while a lady lost a gold hair-pin with a diamond stud. The inference was that this was the work of either Tillstone or his co-conspirator.
Altogether it was a pretty puzzle that Tatlock was asked to solve, and though with his usual caution he refrained from expressing any opinion, he was quite sanguine of being able to clear up the mystery, and he set himself to try and find a key to the advertisements which Duff had observed.
The Scottish advertisement carried its own meaning. There was nothing cryptic about it. But the London one stood in another category. To those for whom it was intended it was no doubt clear enough. To the outsider it was mystery, and yet the more Tatlock studied it the more he was convinced that it was an intimation of some kind couched in pretty plain language. All that was wanted was the key, but that key was, of course, everything. After much puzzling he decided that the numerals '27' and '10' had distinct meanings; that is, '27' represented a date, and '10' the hour of the day. The paper in which the advertisement appeared was dated the 24th of the month; 27 therefore meant the third day from that, and 10 either ten o'clock in the morning or ten o'clock at night.
So much seemed clear, and also that more than two were interested—a number, in fact—and they were scattered, and it was necessary to reach them through a medium which by common consent they had agreed to use for intimations, and the intimation was to the effect that there would be a meeting of the Yellow Star League. Such were Tatlock's deductions. It now remained to determine the place of the meeting.
'I've got it,' mentally exclaimed Tatlock at last. 'Shoreditch.' It was a common thing for Londoners in the East End to refer to Shoreditch as 'The Ditch' when it was more of a market thoroughfare than it is now, and on certain nights the channels of the street were occupied by costermongers' stalls with their flaring naphtha lamps.
Tatlock, then, had so far solved the problem. On the 27th of the month, at ten o'clock (probably at ten o'clock at night), there was to be a meeting somewhere in Shore-ditch. 'Somewhere,' however, was vague. It was a long thoroughfare of all sorts and conditions of buildings, from the huckster's shop to the warehouse. As it was not likely the Yellow Stars would hold their meetings in the open street, their place of assembly must necessarily be in a house. To determine the house was next to impossible without a clue. To get a clue was the task he set himself, and he re-solved on a bold expedient. It was nothing more nor less than the insertion of the following advertisement in the agony columns of all the daily papers:
If this carried the meaning which he thought it would the Yellow Stars would read it thus:—At Shoreditch, on the 14th inst., there was to be a meeting. So far so good, but something more was wanted. If Tatlock's surmises were correct, those who responded to the announcement would have to be spotted. How was that to be done? Shoreditch was not like a country road. A stream of humanity constantly flowed through it. How were the Yellow Stars who mingled in this stream to be distinguished? It was not to be expected they would proclaim themselves. Tatlock had wonderful eyes, and saw much that escaped others, but he couldn't be in two places at once. He couldn't see everything. He therefore secured the services of four trained men from Scotland Yard, and instructed them to observe closely anyone who seemed strange to the neighbourhood.
Although he took these precautions and made his arrangements, let it not be supposed that he relied too much on the possibility of the Yellow Stars walking openly into the trap he had set for them. If, as it seemed, they were an organised body, somebody would be in authority, and that somebody would hardly let his followers be misled by the announcement. So he set another trap, and a very artfully contrived trap it was. He had ascertained that when the Yellow Stars advertised the advertisement was sent to the respective offices by post, the cost being enclosed by means of postage stamps, and no address ever given. This, of course, argued great caution on the part of the band.
Now, it was highly probable that the leader or organiser—whatever he was—would see Tatlock's announcement, and would hasten at once to counteract its effect. He therefore arranged with the publishers, and in the interests of Justice, that if an advertisement was sent it was not to be inserted. The chances then were in favour of somebody calling or writing to know why the announcement had been left out.
Tatlock's surmise proved to be correct. Two days after his advertisement appeared the following was sent to each office:
Yellow Star. The Ditch. 14. 10. No. Beware.
In accordance with the arrangement it did not appear, and after the lapse of a day or two a letter, of which the following is a copy, was sent to each publisher:
137, Crampton Street, Pimlico, S.V.
Please inform me why my advertisement for agony column as follows:—'Yellow Star. 14. 10. No. Beware,' sent to you on 8th inst., with stamps to cover cost, has not been inserted. If amount sent was not sufficient, or whatever the cause of non-insertion, please let me know at once. Stamped addressed envelope enclosed.
(Mrs.) Maria Hutton.
The address given proved to be a little huckster's shop, and the proprietor made a trifle occasionally by allowing people to have letters addressed there. When a sufficient time had elapsed for a reply to be sent, a woman called at the shop and asked for Maria Hutton's letters. She was watched and followed to a very respectable-looking house in the Buckingham Palace Road, which was found to be in the occupation of a man known to the landlord as William Priestly. He had lived there a little over a year, paid his rent very regularly, and was supposed to be a commercial traveller, as he was very frequently away.
Needless to say Mr. William Priestly—all unknown to himself, of course—was very closely shadowed; as the French would say, 'placed under surveillance.' It was understood by the tradespeople in the neighbourhood that he was a married man. Anyway, a lady-like woman, who gave her name as Mrs. Priestly, was an exceedingly good customer. Butcher, grocer, baker, and others were patronised by her, and she paid cash for everything she got. Visitors to the house were numerous. They were of both sexes, and a good deal of eating and drinking went on.
It should be stated here that the reply sent to 'Maria Hutton,' which, of course, was a fictitious name, from the newspaper offices was to the effect that the stamps which had been received were insufficient to defray the charge. More were at once remitted, and by Tatlock's instructions the advertisement was inserted, as he was now confident he had got on the trail of the Yellow Stars. Almost immediately after their announcement appeared, the man who was known as William Priestly—a tall, well-dressed, gentlemanly sort of man—left London by the night train for Edinburgh. He proceeded to a self-contained house close to the Castle, where he was evidently well known, and where he put up. The house had been occupied for about a year by a Mr. and Mrs. Piper, who were supposed to be Americans. They received a good many visitors, and they often went away for days at a time. They kept no servants, and as they were regarded as being 'well-to-do people,' this fact was thought to be rather remarkable. A middle-aged woman, however, also an American, lived with them, and looked after the household affairs, and once a week a charwoman went to the house to clean up, but, strangely enough, there were two rooms she was never allowed to enter. Like Blue Beard's wives she was dying with curiosity to look into those rooms, but unlike Blue Beard's wives she was never afforded the opportunity, for whenever she was in the house the doors were locked and the key taken away.
Now it chanced that while Mr. Priestly was staying in the northern city there was another hotel robbery. It was not at the same hotel where Mrs. Combe Phillips was staying at the time she was robbed, but a well-known and deservedly popular commercial house. The sufferer on this occasion was the representative of a Birmingham whole-sale firm of jewellers, silversmiths, and electro-platers. His name was Reynolds, and a box of very valuable samples, worth over a thousand pounds, was carried off from his room during his temporary absence. He was only away an hour, and he had adopted the usual precaution of locking his door and leaving the key with the hall porter, but the door must have been opened with a duplicate key. It was the busy season, and the house was full. Of course, a police investigation took place immediately, but no results followed. The thief had carried out his work very cleverly, and left never a trace behind him. It appeared that for close on a year hotel robberies had been very frequent in Edinburgh, and though the police had made unusual efforts to try and discover the perpetrators they were in every case baffled. Servants and certain visitors in the different hotels had been suspected, but not an atom of evidence to justify an arrest could be got. Naturally there was a good deal of feeling amongst the hotel proprietors themselves, who thought the police were at fault, and the loss by the commercial traveller of his samples caused a very bitter outcry.
Now it chanced that at the time of this robbery Tyler Tatlock was in Edinburgh, and the reason it so chanced was that he was acquainted with a certain fact that was to lead to great results. The day following Priestly's arrival from the south he paid a visit to the Commercial Hotel to see a visitor there of the name of George Clark, described as 'of London.' When the robbery became known, Tatlock called upon the chief of police, and had a long interview with him. Within a very short time of his leaving the chief's office two arrests were made quietly and without fuss. The men arrested were Mr. George Clark and Mr. William Priestly, who, as may be supposed, were more than astonished. An hour after they were in safe keeping four police officers arrived at the house occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Piper, armed with legal authority to look into those secret chambers which had so aroused the curiosity of the industrious charwoman, and into any other part of the establishment that they had a mind to. Mr. and Mrs. Piper waxed furious. They protested that they were highly respectable. They declared that if their privacy was outraged in such a way they would make somebody suffer for it. Such a thing as the proposed search of the house of such eminently respectable people could not be tolerated in a free country, and as citizens of the United States they guessed they would make the American Eagle screech to such a tune that the British Lion would hide his head and put his tail between his legs. Yes, there would be a fine old rumpus if the police dared to take such a liberty. In spite of all these awful threats, the police had the audacity to dare, for a magistrate's warrant is a powerful instrument, and the outcome of the daring was a marvellous revelation, and the 'respectable' Mr. and Mrs. Piper went to keep Messrs. Clark and Priestly company, and the following day the newspaper press had some splendid copy, and there was more to follow.
To begin with, in those jealously-guarded rooms of the Piper mansions the commercial traveller's jewels were found. But they only represented a trifle of what was there. They were like the lost luggage rooms of a railway station. The contents were numerous and varied, and there wasn't a shadow of doubt that Piper and his lady had no legal claim of any kind to that vast and ill-assorted collection of valuable property.
From Edinburgh that night Tyler Tatlock went forth with a feeling of elation, and travelled as fast as the night express would take him to the British metropolis, and with the energy that characterised him when he had business on hand he soon secured the necessary warrant to justify a police visit to Mr. William Priestly's London house, where discoveries were made which made it certain that the clever detective had let in the light on one of the most gigantic and remarkable conspiracies of modern times. A league, known as 'The League of the Yellow Star,' had been called into existence. The members of it, men and women, were bound together by a remarkable oath, and they were governed by rules and regulations which everyone had to submit to. The ramifications of this infamous League spread out, not only through Great Britain, but over the Continent and through America. All the different branches were in touch with each other. The objects of the League were plunder. The punishment inflicted by the League for any betrayal of its secrets was—Death; and more than one mysterious murder, as was subsequently proved, was due to this astounding organisation. The meeting-place of the League—that is, the London branch of it—was, as Tatlock had so shrewdly guessed, situated in Shoreditch, where they had a warehouse where was found stored thousands of pounds worth of property, as miscellaneous in character as that taken from' the secret rooms of the Pipers' Edinburgh house. Every member of the League was bound to give up all he stole to the chiefs of the organisation, and in return he had a fixed income paid to him, together with a pro rata percentage on the proceeds of the sales of the articles he stole, or on the money he procured.
In addition, he was provided with clothes, with medical aid and comforts if he fell sick, and legal assistance should he unfortunately find himself face to face with a magistrate; and if he were imprisoned his wife and children, if he had any, or any relatives or dependents he liked to name, were supported during his absence. The abduction of Miss Leslie was traced to the League, as well as numerous other abductions and robberies. The gentleman known as Mr. Risdom Tillstone, whose acquaintance Mr. Duff had made in London, was not captured; but there is little doubt that it was he who stole Mrs. Combe Phillips' jewels in Edinburgh. Every member of the League had a small yellow silver star which he could wear at his discretion. This was the badge and sign. If two members met, and were unknown to each other, they could prove themselves true Leaguers by certain signs, consisting of a sort of military salute with the right hand, and the placing of the left hand over the heart, and drawing the right thumb down the breast. Not the least remarkable part of this remarkable organisation was the fact that its members were men and women of more or less culture. In its ranks in London were broken-down lawyers, seedy barristers, a disgraced clergyman, a doctor or two, and many other men and women who had once occupied respectable stations in life.
Those who are interested in knowing what the result of the trials of the prisoners was against whom crime was proved are referred to the records of the period. Tyler Tatlock's duties, as far as the League was concerned, ended with its exposure, but he received thanks and substantial acknowledgments from various quarters; and he was highly complimented on the skill and ability he brought to bear in unravelling the mystery of the Yellow Star.
THE sun of a summer morning streamed through the open window of a London house, and lighted up a sombrely furnished room. It was an unusually large room; the walls were lined with a wooden panelling, and there was a large old-fashioned fireplace, with a carved wooden mantel-piece, on which stood some trumpery ornaments, but over it was suspended a small oval-shaped sixteenth-century mirror. In striking contrast to this some cheap and vulgar coloured prints were hung on the walls. Nor was this the only incongruity, for old and modern furniture were mixed without any regard for taste or art.
In a spacious chair, in an attitude of profound thought, sat a man, his left elbow leaning on the arm of the chair, his index finger laid upon his temples. His eyes, scarcely visible, seemed fixed on space.
The sunlight streaming in fell upon a ponderous mahogany wardrobe, the door of which stood open. On the floor of the wardrobe was a large blotch as of spilled liquor, of a reddish-brown tint, and in the immediate front of the wardrobe the carpet bore a similar stain, although not so easily detected as that in the wardrobe. And the stain was the stain of blood—of human blood. It had soaked into the carpet and was not yet properly dry, and if the hand had touched that part it would have been reddened. There were two windows in the room. Opposite the one that was not opened stood a quaint four-post bedstead. The bedclothes were turned down. The bed had evidently been occupied recently, and the undersheet was a ghastly sight, for it was stained with a huge patch, irregular and uneven. The stain was also a stain of blood—human blood. The pillows were splashed, and on one could clearly be traced the impress of blood-wetted fingers.
The house was one of the large old-fashioned residences which are still to be found in the neighbourhood of the British Museum, and were the town abodes of fashion during the eighteenth and early part of the nineteenth century. But nowadays they are for the most part occupied by indigent people, who eke out their existence by letting apartments. Not a few of these noble houses have been the scenes of strange comedies of real life, and of grim tragedy, but no grimmer tragedy had surely ever been enacted than that which had produced those bloodstains in the sunlit room.
Yes, a tragedy! A woman, only four days agone, had been foully and cruelly slain as—there was no doubt about it—she lay in bed. And when life had ebbed away, or it might have been before it had gone, her body had been thrust into the wardrobe, where the blood continued to ooze before rigor mortis set in. Her age was guessed at about thirty-five. She was exceedingly well developed, well nourished, good-looking, with a great quantity of very dark, almost jet-black hair. It was a case of murder, and even at that moment when the sun filled the room with a brilliant light the coroner's jury was holding the necessary legal inquiry, and the mortal remains of the victim were lying stark and stiff in the parish mortuary.
Exactly a fortnight before the ghastly discovery of the woman's doubled-up body in the wardrobe, a 'gentleman' of fair speech and manners, and sartorially respectable, called in company with a lady, whom he represented as his wife, to inquire about apartments. The tenants of the house, a Mr. and Mrs. Ravel, took in boarding lodgers. The lady and gentleman were foreigners. They gave their names as Luchessi, which is Italian, but they spoke English well, though with an accent. They wanted two bedrooms and a sitting-room. The reason for two bedrooms was, as the gentleman explained, his sister was to arrive that night or the next morning. They were on a visit of pleasure to the British metropolis, and expected to remain for three or four weeks. The best bedroom in the house—the room in which the tragedy was enacted—was vacant, and a smaller one on the other side of the passage, and a small sitting-room on the first floor. 'Nothing,' said the gentleman, could suit them better.' The only meal they would take in the house, probably, would be breakfast. When asked for a reference or a deposit, the gentleman readily pulled out a well-filled purse, and paid a whole month in advance. Nothing could have been more satisfactory to the landlady, who was only concerned in getting her rent. Lodgers came and went. Hers was the class of house where people did not stay long. To her they were mere passing shadows, in whom she took no interest beyond the amount of rent they stipulated to pay during their temporary sojourn under her roof. The gentleman incidentally, as it seemed, remarked that he and his wife had little luggage with them, as, being merely on a flying visit, they had not burdened themselves with anything beyond what was absolutely essential.
Having settled the preliminaries, Mr. and Mrs. Luchessi went away, saying they would return in the evening. Accordingly, about seven o'clock, they drove up in a four-wheeled cab with a third person, a young woman, who was represented as the husband's sister, and whose name was given as 'Miss Bella Luchessi.' They had with them a small portmanteau, a couple of handbags, and a bundle of rugs. Having deposited their things in their respective rooms, they went out almost immediately, and did not return until midnight.
As the day went on, the landlady felt very satisfied with her new guests, although she thought they were perhaps a little eccentric and unduly reserved. They never associated with anyone else in the house. They were quiet, apparently shy, and gave no trouble. They seldom rose before midday. Then they partook of breakfast, which invariably consisted of coffee and bread. After that they went out, and generally returned late. So much and little more did the landlady know of her foreign visitors when the household was stunned by the discovery of the crime. At noon on the day of the discovery the Luchessis had not appeared. Nor were there any signs of them at one o'clock. A chambermaid named Alice Worthington thereupon tapped on Mr. and Mrs. Luchessi's door, and, getting no response, she returned in about a quarter of an hour with the same result. Something induced her to turn the handle. The door, to her surprise, was not locked. She peeped into the room. It was empty. The bed was disarranged, and there was some confusion of portions of the furniture. The girl's attention was drawn to the pillows, which seemed stained in a suspicious manner. She turned the upper clothes down, and started back with horror as she saw that the sheet was saturated with blood. Scarcely able to repress a scream, she tore down breathlessly to her mistress and made known what she had seen. Upstairs went Mr. and Mrs. Ravel to verify the statement, followed by the girl. Yes; it was true enough. The sheet was wet with blood, which had soaked through to the mattress. The landlady ran off to Miss Luchessi's room. That was empty too, but there was no blood there. A scream rang through the house. She rushed back to the big bedroom, to find that her servant had fallen to the floor in a fainting fit, while her husband stood almost spellbound. He had, not knowing what he was going to reveal, opened the wardrobe door, and there, doubled up, was the body of Mrs. Luchessi.
'Murder; my God, murder!' seemed to thrill through the air and fall on the ears of all, and there was an instinctive shrinking back and a general shuddering.
It is an ugly word, no matter when and where uttered. But when, as in this case, it is the exclamatory outburst of horror begotten by the sight of the victim and the victim's blood, its ugliness is intensified. Mr. Ravel recovered his presence of mind.
'Run quickly and get hold of a policeman,' was his order; and the servants, as if only too glad to hurry away from that now accursed room, went pell-mell down the stairs. Then the man picked up Alice Worthington, bore her to a sofa in another room, and bade his wife attend to her, and he himself went down to the street door, where he awaited the arrival of a constable, to whom he quickly imparted the startling news. The two went upstairs, and in a few minutes a doctor, who lived close by, and had been summoned by one of the alarmed servants, followed them. He did not disturb the body, but satisfied himself that life was absolutely extinct. The three retired. Nothing in the room was disturbed. The door was locked, and an intimation of the occurrence conveyed without loss of time to the proper authorities, and in a very short time the telegraph wires were flashing the news of the crime to every seaport, every railway station in London, and every town of importance in the kingdom. From the first it was seen that the murder was one of a somewhat unusual character, and it was deemed probable that the suspected parties, being foreigners, would get out of the country with the least possible delay. Tyler Tatlock was communicated with, and he was urgently requested to try and get on the track of the fugitives.
The man referred to at the opening of this narrative as sitting in a thoughtful attitude in the room where the crime had been committed was Tyler Tatlock himself. He was endeavouring to work out a rational theory for the crime. To him it seemed clear that the murder was a deliberate and deeply-planned one. Three foreigners arrived with very little luggage—nothing but what they could conveniently carry about with them. That in itself was a suspicious circumstance when considered in connection with other things. The woman who passed as Bella Luchessi was, as seemed pretty evident, in league with the man, and if she did not actually kill the other woman she was an accessory to the crime. The object in placing the dead body in the wardrobe was not quite clear, except on one hypothesis. When the body was discovered life had been extinct, according to the medical report, about eight or nine hours. It was two o'clock when the discovery was made.
She had, therefore, probably been killed about six or even before. Anyway, the criminals had gone off without anyone in the house hearing them.
The victim had been stabbed to death as she lay in bed, and possibly while she was asleep. There were indications that the murderer was nervous, and his or her hand unsteady. The woman had been struck in the first instance on the right side, but the knife was turned by the ribs. Another blow had then been aimed full at the bosom, and the weapon had come in contact with the breast bone, the tip of the blade being broken off, and subsequently recovered during the post mortem examination. Notwithstanding that the weapon was now pointless it had been driven with great force into the left breast, and perforated the pericardium. There must have been a tremendous flow of blood from the three wounds, and Tatlock's deduction was that the body had been removed and placed in the wardrobe to prevent the blood soaking through the bed on to the floor, and so through to the ceiling of the room underneath.
Another deduction of his was this. The first and second blow was struck by a woman's hand—Bella Luchessi's. The third and fatal blow, in which great force must have been exerted, by the man. The weapon used was one common in Italy, Spain, and Portugal—a fine blade, about six inches long, shutting up in a handle like a clasp-knife. By touching a spring the blade can be made to fly out, and the knife then forms a dagger of a very formidable kind. This knife, very much bloodstained, had been picked up on the floor between the bed and the wall, showing pretty conclusively that the criminals had become confused, and had lost their heads. There was further evidence of this in a scent-bottle which had been capsized on the dressing-table. The glass stopper of the bottle had come out, rolled to the floor, and the contents of the bottle had been spilled. The scent was frangipanni, a perfume much affected by Continental women.
When the crime was committed the man was not dressed. He had drawn on his trousers afterwards, while his mind was confused and his nerves unstrung. Tatlock came to this conclusion from the fact that round about and beneath a cane-bottom chair at the foot of the bed several English coins were picked up. In drawing on his trousers the contents of a pocket had tumbled out, and he must have been so preoccupied that he did not observe that the coins had fallen. Amongst the money were two sovereigns, a half-sovereign, some silver and coppers. Now, unless a man had been suffering from great mental excitement, he would hardly have left this money scattered about the floor. But what was still stronger evidence of the condition of his mind was that with the coins was a small gold plate with three artificial teeth—front teeth—attached. Tatlock regarded that as of great importance as a clue, and he advised the authorities in describing the man to say that it was probable three of his front teeth were missing. Nothing else was left behind by the fugitives, except a hair-brush, found in the room occupied by Bella Luchessi, and an old travelling-rug. Both of these articles were of foreign make, as was the murdered woman's clothing, which was lying on a couch. The corsets, linen, and other articles were of good quality, and all foreign. The corsets bore the name of a Milan maker. The stockings were English, and had been worn for the first time. And a pair of almost new shoes had the name of a Bond Street shoemaker inside.
This man remembered the shoes being bought a week previous to the murder. A man and two ladies entered his shop, and one of the two ladies asked to see some shoes. She and her companions conversed with each other in a foreign tongue. The lady was very hard to please, and tried on many pairs of shoes before deciding. She was so long about the business that the patience of her companions became exhausted, and they went away, nor did they return. The lady remained in the shop nearly twenty minutes after they had gone. She paid for her purchase with a brand-new five-pound Bank of England note. As soon as this note came into his possession the tradesman, as was his wont in such cases, entered the number of it in a book kept for the purpose.
Such luggage as the fugitives had with them, they could possibly carry. They must have gone off at an early hour, before anyone was about except the servants, who at that time would be occupied in the kitchen and the breakfast-room.
In constructing his theory Tatlock decided that the probabilities were strongly in favour of the criminals having made their way at once to one of the railway stations from which trains started in the morning for the Continent. Now, there were no fewer than seven stations from which a morning 'boat train' left. The question was—Which one of those seven did they go to? The distance from the scene of the crime to the nearest station was relatively considerable, having regard to the fact that the Luchessis were carrying a bundle of rugs and wraps, a couple of hand-bags, and some odds and ends. Probably, therefore, they would go to the nearest cab-stand or hire a passing vehicle. Tatlock also decided in favour of Luchessi being the right name of the people, and for this reason. Assuming that the murdered woman had been deliberately and by preconcerted plan brought to England to be killed, if she had been asked to go under an assumed name her suspicions would have been aroused. There was also the likelihood of the younger woman really being the sister of the man, though, of course, there was something to be said against that theory.
Mr. and Mrs. Ravel testified that the victim always wore a profusion of jewellery. She had numerous rings on her fingers, rings in her ears, a costly gold watch and chain, brooches, and a string of valuable pearls which she used to wear in her hair when she went to a theatre. The landlady had been struck with the beauty of these pearls. But pearls, rings, brooches, everything had gone. Absolutely nothing was left in the victim's pockets. A wedding-ring was on her finger—it fitted too tightly to be removed. The one thing that Tatlock felt a difficulty in deciding was the motive of the crime, but a careful study of all the aspects of the affair left him no alternative but to decide that plunder was at the bottom of it.
Four days had passed, but never a trace of the fugitives had been obtained, and yet not for a long time had such a hue-and-cry been raised. Every paper, even the ultra-respectable ones which affected a pious horror of the sensational, made good copy out of the minutest detail they could lay hold of. And where nothing authentic could be obtained the wildest rumours were published. The public were morbidly eager for information, while the proprietors of the papers were eager for the public's pennies, and so the 'Tragedy in Blank Street' was served up every day ad nauseam.
The five-pound note which had been paid to the Bond Street shoemaker was the first thing to which Tatlock directed his attention. Inquiry at the Bank of England revealed the fact that the note was one of a number paid to the London branch of a French bank, having its head-quarters in Paris. Inquiry at this branch resulted in very important information. The day before the murder a lady entered the bank and presented three letters of credit, aggregating two thousand seven hundred and eighty-four pounds. The letters had been issued by a Milan bank in favour of one Signora Valetta Luchessi. The lady was alone, and, of course, she was asked if she was the Valetta Luchessi alluded to. She stated she was, and furnished satisfactory proofs of her identity. With the exception of ten five-pound notes, the whole of the money was, by her own request, paid to her in gold. She had brought with her a large wash-leather bag to receive it. As the bag was heavy, she requested the bank porter to carry it for her to a cab, which was waiting. The man did this, and he noted that seated in the cab were a lady and gentleman. As he opened the door and placed the bag on the seat, the gentleman said something to Mrs. Luchessi in a foreign language which the porter did not understand.
Tatlock had not much difficulty in finding the driver of this cab—a four-wheeler. But all the man could tell was that on the day in question he was waiting with his cab on the Bloomsbury stand, when a gentleman, accompanied by two ladies, hired him, and he drove them to the bank, and thence to the house where the murder was committed.
The Milan bank was communicated with by telegraph. But all they knew was that they had issued the letters of credit to Signora Valetta Luchessi, who had paid the money chiefly by Italian notes. They knew nothing of the lady, but she had incidentally mentioned that she was going on a pleasure trip with her husband to England. This induced the clerk who transacted the business for her to venture the remark that the sum of money she was taking with her was an unusually large one for such a journey. Whereupon she exclaimed:
'Oh, you don't suppose I'm going to spend all that, do you? I'm putting it in letters of credit by my husband's advice for safety. He says it's just as though I deposited the amount with a banker.'
The clerk was much struck by this remark, and thought the woman very simple. It was in his mind to suggest to her that it would be far wiser and safer to place the greater part of the money to a deposit account in her name, and have a cheque-book; but he refrained from giving expression to his thoughts, as, after all, it was no business of his.
The information thus furnished from Milan on the face of it corroborated Tatlock's theory that the murder was the result of a deep and organised plan, and his deductions now carried him several steps further. The clerk of the Milan bank considered the woman a simpleton. Tatlock came to the conclusion that she had been but recently married, and was entirely under the sway and influence of her husband. He had first of all persuaded her to purchase letters of credit. Then he took her to London that he might murder her, having first influenced her to reconvert her letters of credit into hard cash. A question that may here be asked can be anticipated. If he had so much influence over her, why murder her in order to gain possession of that which he could have had without taking her life? To answer this, Tatlock found it necessary to modify one of his conclusions, namely, that Bella Luchessi really was the supposed husband's sister. If the victim had been old and ugly, it would have furnished a reason for the man wishing to get rid of her; but she was a woman of considerable beauty, with an exceptionally fine figure, and Mrs. Ravel, the landlady of the house, said she had a charming personality. The servants also spoke very highly of her. What, then, induced the man to kill her?
Tatlock had now proved that the party had come from Milan, though it did not follow that they belonged to that city. And he felt pretty sure that Luchessi and his supposed sister would not venture to return to their own country, where they would run great risk of detection. At this stage of the proceedings an Italian who kept a restaurant in the Waterloo Road volunteered the information that one morning—the morning of the crime, as he believed—a man and a woman, Italians, arrived at his place very hot and exhausted, just as he was taking his shutters down. They had several packages and bundles with them, and they said they wanted some breakfast as soon as possible. He supplied their wants, and the man paid for what they had with a five-pound note, which the restaurant keeper had some difficulty in getting changed. His customers went away a little before eight. He had ventured to ask if they had been living in London long or if they had just arrived, but they showed not the slightest disposition to be communicative, although they were his compatriots.
For the information of those who are unacquainted with London, it may be stated that Waterloo Road is on the south side of the Thames, and in this road is now situated the terminus of the South-Western Railway. It at once occurred to Tatlock that their object in going to Waterloo was to take train for Southampton, whence they could get a steamer to Brest, Havre, Cherbourg, the Channel Islands, or to the West Indies, Brazil, or North America. He found a porter at the station who remembered having taken charge of some baggage for two foreigners, a man and woman, on, as he believed, the date of the murder, and his impression was, though he could not be sure, they left by the 9.30 Southampton train. Tatlock did not think it in the least degree likely that the fugitives would make for the Channel Islands, as it would be putting their own necks in a noose, and he rejected all the French ports in favour of America. He ascertained that a steamer left for New York the day following that on which the fugitives presumably arrived in Southampton, and inquiry at the office of the agents elicited the fact that on the day of their arrival a man and a woman booked two steerage passages by the vessel, in the name of Mr. and Mrs. Brown, but the description of them tallied with the description of the couple which Tatlock was so anxious to become acquainted with.
The telegraph cable had not at that time been laid across the bed of the Atlantic. But Tatlock found that by hurrying to Liverpool he could get the National Company's steamer Helvetia, which was timed to sail for New York that week. Her date of sailing only left him twenty-four hours in which to do the journey from Southampton to Liverpool, and make such hurried preparations as were necessary. He managed it, however, and feeling convinced that Mr. and Mrs. Brown were Luchessi and his 'sister' he steamed away in the Helvetia, which, not being a very fast boat, took nine days in which to accomplish the passage. The fugitives, therefore, had a good start, but the pursuer was confident of being able to trace them.
Mention has been made of two artificial teeth picked up with some coins from the floor of the room where the crime was committed.
Those teeth were front ones, and presumably Luchessi's. Apart from the inconvenience he would suffer from their loss, he could hardly fail to remember that their absence would make him conspicuous. His hurried flight from England left him no time to get new ones, and the chances were in favour of his going to a dentist in New York. Any way, Tatlock acted on that assumption, and he took steps to bring the matter under the notice of every dentist in the city, with the result that he ascertained that a Mr. Jabez Choate, practising as a dentist in the Broadway, received a visit from a foreigner who wanted two front teeth made quickly. He gave his name as Alfred Breda, and his address at an hotel in West Street. The teeth were made and paid for, and the transaction closed as far as the dentist was concerned. The payment was made in American money. At the West Street hotel a 'Mr. and Mrs. Breda' stayed for a few days, and the man inquired of the landlord where he could get a considerable amount of English gold and some bank notes exchanged for American currency. The landlord, in response, gave him an introduction to a New York money changer. Having completed their business, the couple left for Chicago by the night train. When they arrived they had not much luggage, but they made considerable purchases in the town, and amongst other things a large Saratoga trunk, which was checked through to Porkopolis.
To Chicago Tatlock sped in the track of the criminals. The American system of checking baggage made it easy to discover the fugitives, because the railway companies deliver it at the place where the owner is going to stay. In this instance it was forwarded to a hotel largely patronised by foreigners, and there the detective found 'Mr. and Mrs. Breda,' but neither answered to the description he carried with him. The woman was described as being very dark, the man as having a clean-shaven face. But Mrs. Breda was a blonde, fair hair and eyebrows. Mr. Breda had a full beard and moustache. This change in their appearance might have stood them in good stead had Tatlock not been at their heels. But one evening in company with two Chicago detectives he entered the billiard-room, where Breda was engaged in a game of billiards. Watching his opportunity, Tatlock suddenly butted against him, nearly knocking him down. Breda was indignant, and asked him what he meant by that. Tatlock roughly told him he should not have got in his way. Breda, who was much the more powerful man of the two, threatened to thrash him. Thereupon Tatlock seized him by the beard, tugging at it forcibly, and, as he anticipated, it came away in his hand. Breda made a dive for his hip pocket, where he had a revolver, but the other two detectives were on the alert, and seized him. He was quickly handcuffed, and he knew then he had been run to earth. The woman was next arrested, and the two were at once conveyed to the police station. An examination disclosed the two artificial teeth in the man's mouth, and the woman's hair was found to have been dyed. These two facts were sufficient to establish their identity, but when their baggage was searched the most ample corroboration was forthcoming. When Luchessi found that he was trapped, he became taciturn and moody; but the woman gave way to passionate and hysterical weeping, and she exhibited such nervous excitement that it was necessary to confine her in a strait jacket.
Several weeks elapsed before Tatlock was able to get the extradition warrant, and in the meantime Luchessi exhausted every form of law available to him to prevent his extradition; but at last the prisoners were handed over to Tatlock, and he conveyed them to New York, where he secured passages in a Liverpool-bound steamer. The woman was very ill, and became worse during the passage. The doctor told Tatlock that he did not think she would live to reach England. Her dangerous condition was made known to her, and with the fear of death upon her she made the following confession:
Luchessi was her lawful husband. He had been a courier for many years, and had made some money, with which he opened a restaurant business in his native town of Milan; but the business was not successful, and he failed. He had formed an acquaintance with a young woman of the name of Rosa Torrino, who had a little property. He suggested to his wife that he should pay court to this young woman, go through a mock marriage, get her to realise her property, take her to England, and there murder her. Mrs. Luchessi, being entirely under her husband's influence, lent herself to this dastardly plot, and agreed to pass as his sister. On the night of the crime poor Rosa Torrino was drugged, and Luchessi insisted on his wife committing the murder. She lost her nerve, and bungled, and he, seizing the broken knife from her hand, plunged it with great force into Rosa's heart. Torrino had formerly lived in England as a lady's maid, and spoke English well. Luchessi acquired great influence over Rosa, and induced her to convert her letters of credit into cash by telling her that they would all go to America and start a business of some kind. He persuaded her that it was better to take hard cash with them to the States, as in converting it into American currency a large profit could be made. The poor woman believed this, and played into the villain's hands.
After this confession Mrs. Luchessi rallied, but died about three weeks later in London.
Inquiry in Milan fully corroborated the wretched woman's story, and after a long and sensational trial, during which Luchessi was most ably defended by one of the foremost criminal counsel of the day, he was condemned, and sentenced to be executed. The sentence was duly carried out at the Old Bailey, and thus ended one of the most remarkable of modern romances of crime.
(TOLD BY TYLER TATLOCK HIMSELF)
BY an extraordinary chance I was travelling one summer night from Marseilles to Paris by the 'Rapide,' when a blood-curdling crime was committed in the train.
From Avignon, seventy-five miles to the north of Marseilles, there is a long run of over seventy miles to Saint-Etienne: at least, that was the arrangement at the period I speak of. The time occupied was nearly two hours. At Saint-Etienne a ghastly discovery was made by some of the company's servants. In a first class compartment a well-preserved and even handsome woman of about fifty was found dead. She had been stabbed in the breast on the left side. She was elegantly dressed, and her things were soaked with blood. It was obvious that death must have been almost instantaneous, for she was still sitting in the corner of the compartment, her head leaning against the cushions.
In the same compartment was a man who seemed dazed and stupefied. His face was covered with blood which had trickled from a wound in his head and had saturated his shirt-front. The excitement necessarily caused by the discovery had attracted my attention and, I need scarcely say, aroused my interest, and, on making myself known to the officials, I was accorded the privilege of being allowed to see a little more than most of the other passengers, who crowded the platform, but were kept at a respectful distance from the blood-soaked carriage by a cordon of gendarmes.
The wounded man, having been stimulated with some brandy, gave the following account of the affair: The lady was a somewhat eccentric Englishwoman known as Mrs. Flora Pennell. The man was travelling with her as her courier. He was an Italian, by name Joseph Stradvari. He had travelled a good deal about Europe with her on various occasions. On this, her last earthly journey, they had been to Monte Carlo, and had remained there for three months. Mrs. Pennell was believed to be wealthy, but had a passion for gambling, and had several times visited Monte Carlo in order that she might enjoy the excitement of the tables. She was generally very fortunate, and during this visit had won something like one hundred thousand francs. She and her courier had travelled from Nice to Marseilles with two gentlemen whose passing acquaintance she had made at the Monte Carlo Casino. At Marseilles, just be-fore the Paris train started, the same two men got into Mrs. Pennell's compartment, and made themselves very agreeable; but, soon after leaving Avignon, the courier was suddenly stunned by a blow on the head. One of the two men had struck him with what he believed was a life-preserver. But whatever it was he was deprived of his senses, and remembered nothing more until he was revived at Saint-Etienne, and he learnt to his unspeakable horror that his mistress had been murdered.
He was able to give a detailed description of the two men, and the telegraph was at once called into requisition. A small leather case belonging to the lady was missing. The courier said that the case contained her jewellery and about five thousand pounds, he believed, in French notes principally. It was her intention on reaching Paris to convert her French money into a draft on her London bankers. They were to spend a week or so in Paris, and then proceed to London, where the lady had a house in Mayfair.
These details I gathered up during the forty minutes' wait at Saint-Etienne. The carriage in which the crime had been committed was taken off the train, and the courier was sent to the local hospital to have his wound dressed. I took my seat again in my own compartment, and the train was once more speeding north towards Paris.
An incident that comes under one's own personal observation appeals to one more forcibly than it otherwise would do. And so it was, I suppose, that I so far interested myself in the matter that I followed the particulars of the French investigations as they were given in the French papers; and when I read in some of the London morning journals a very inaccurate account of the affair, I sent a communication over my own name to the respective editors giving a plain, unvarnished statement of the facts so far as they had come under my own observation.
When three or four weeks had passed, I gathered that the French police had been unsuccessful in their endeavours to trace the criminals, but they proved pretty conclusively that the unfortunate lady had been robbed of even a larger amount than that given by Joseph Stradvari.
One morning, to my astonishment, I received a letter asking me to call at the house in Mayfair which, I learnt on the night of the crime, was the late Mrs. Pennell's London residence. The letter was signed 'Bertha Pennell.' As a matter of course I complied with the written request, and duly presented myself at the address named.
Miss Bertha Pennell was about thirty—an attractive, interesting-looking woman, dressed in deep mourning, and with a settled sadness of face that was pathetic.
I gathered from your letter in the papers, 'she began,' that you were travelling to Paris by the same train in which my poor mother was murdered, and so I thought I should like to see you. I don't know whether you are aware of it, but the French police have quite failed to throw any light on the crime. In compliance with their request I have been over to France three times to give them such information as I could about my mother. But, while they have made a great fuss and a show of doing something, I don't believe that they have given themselves very much trouble, possibly because the murdered person was a foreigner. Then, again, as there have been several robberies and murders on that line, there seems to be a desire to hush the whole affair up. Now, I want to know if you can help me in any way?'
'But you forget, Miss Pennell, I have no locus standi,' I answered. 'This crime was committed in a foreign country.'
'True. But, while you have no right to interfere, you are surely free to conduct an independent inquiry.' Presumably I am.'
'It is probable,' she went on, that the murderer will never be brought to justice in this world. But amongst the property stolen from my mother were a medallion portrait of my paternal grandfather, Admiral Sir John Pennell, and a massive gold repeater watch, which was personally presented to him by George III. My father set great store upon these things, and, as family heirlooms, they have a value beyond price for me. The portrait was painted on ivory, and set in smoked pearls and diamonds. I would give anything if I could recover these two articles.'
I gave Miss Pennell to understand that I was willing to make an attempt to realise her wishes, and, as soon as my arrangements permitted, I went over to France, and had an interview with the police officials at Saint-Etienne. At first they did not seem inclined to be very communicative, but I managed to win their confidence, and I was informed of what had been done. They had utterly failed to trace the two men who were alleged to have travelled with Madame Pennell from Monte Carlo to Marseilles, and subsequently, at the last moment, to have joined the Paris train, and to have got into the same compartment as Mrs. Pennell and her courier. Although the train was not a particularly crowded one on the night of the tragedy, nothing could be learnt about these two men. Neither the conductor of the train nor the ticket-collectors had any recollection of two men passengers being with Mrs. Pennell when the train left Marseilles. Joseph Stradvari had furnished a full description of them, but neither at Monte Carlo nor Nice could they be identified from the description, and yet Stradvari averred that they were in Monte Carlo all the time that he and his mistress were there.
This failure to trace the men seemed to me very remarkable, and another remarkable circumstance was that the railway company were able to account for every ticket issued at Marseilles for the Paris express on the night of the crime. Therefore, if the two men were in the train, they must have been without tickets. Needless to say that the weapon with which the murder was committed had remained undiscovered. Mrs. Pennell had been stabbed with a very long-bladed knife or dagger, which had gone clean through the heart. Great force had evidently been used. Now there was no doubt that the crime was committed after the train left Avignon, because the conductor swore that he saw Mrs. Pennell and her courier on the platform at that station. Between there and Saint-Etienne there was no stop, and as Mrs. Pennell, when discovered at Saint-Etienne, had been dead for more than an hour, the crime must have been committed almost immediately after leaving Avignon.
Having got all the information I could, I went on to Avignon, which is a town of some importance, with a population of something like fifty thousand. There, in a quiet and unostentatious way, I pursued my inquiries. The trains on leaving there, going north, do not get up any speed at first, as there is a big climb up a hill to a little place called Orange. It seemed to me, therefore, that the crime was committed before reaching Orange, as after that the speed at which the train would travel would make alighting from it a matter of such extreme risk that few would care to venture it. Now, the theory was that there were two men concerned in the outrage, and both these men had to effect their escape. That would have been comparatively easy before Orange was reached; afterwards very difficult. I therefore inclined to the belief that the woman was murdered after leaving Avignon and before reaching Orange. If two men escaped from the train, they would in all probability return to Avignon, for Orange was only a small place, and, as strangers, they would have been conspicuous there, and some information concerning them ought to have been forthcoming. But the French police had made exhaustive inquiries, and learnt nothing. For my own part, the more I pursued my investigations the more and more shadowy did these two men become. The description of the men as given by Stradvari had been very widely circulated, but had resulted in nothing. From Avignon I went on to Monte Carlo.
Mrs. Pennell had stayed at the Hotel de France, where she was well known. She lived well, was considered to be very rich, and was looked upon as a representative type of a certain class of eccentric English people whom foreigners regard somewhat with contempt. But Mrs. Pennell's eccentricities—which appeared to be nothing more serious than a masterful and independent disposition—were easily tolerated, for she had plenty of money, and spent it liberally. She entertained a good deal at her hotel, but I could not find anyone who could even vaguely identify the mysterious men who were supposed to have done the deed. Nor was she given, according to the French police theory, to associating with anyone who would accept her hospitality. On the contrary, she stood a great deal upon her dignity, and resented any attempts of mere adventurers to get on terms of familiarity with her. She kept Joseph Stradvari in his place, and always treated him as an inferior and a menial. Nevertheless, she fully availed herself of his services in every way. He wrote her business letters, he did her commissions, paid her bills, and kept her accounts. He was clever in his way, as he spoke four or five languages, was a good accountant, and a capable manager, but he was by no means a favourite. These small details represent the amount of information I picked up; and, having spent three weeks in a useless endeavour to strike a distinct trail, I returned to London with a certain idea taking definite shape in my mind.
Joseph Stradvari was resident in London. I learnt that from the French police. He was a native of Genoa, where his people lived, but he preferred to make his temporary home in London, as he said he was more likely to meet with employment in the British Metropolis.
Soon after my return I made it my business to call upon him, as I wished to hear a recital of the tragic story from his own lips. I found him occupying apartments in the house of a widow lady in a quiet street near Westminster Abbey, and a young Italian woman, represented as his wife, was living with him. The French police made no mention to me of his being married.
When I first called at his residence he was out, but Mrs. Stradvari came to inquire my business. That was my first introduction to her. She was of medium height, and, like most of her countrywomen, intensely dark, with black, fiery, passionate eyes. She spoke English indifferently, but French well, and one thing that struck me as singular was she evinced almost feverish anxiety to know my business.
I fenced her questions, and occasionally got one in of my own, and drew an answer. By this means I learnt that she had only been in England for a short time. She did not like London. The climate was awful. The smoke choked her. The absence of blue sky and sunshine made life unbearable; and then the people were so heavy, so morose. Everything and everybody was so sad, so colourless. Ugh! it made her shiver when she thought of it all. But, grace a Dieu, she and Joseph were going to South America.
What were they going to South America for?
Oh, well, Joseph was tired of roaming about, and was going to take a farm in Southern America, and rear cattle. They were both very fond of country life.
It was not until three days after this interview with Mrs. Stradvari that I saw Joseph. I recognised him again immediately, although when I first met him it was under peculiar circumstances. For reasons of my own I did not tell him that I was in the train when his mistress was murdered, nor did I tell him who I was. I said I had been asked by a relative of the late Mrs. Pennell to call and see him with a view to eliciting some particulars about her affairs. He expressed his willingness to answer anything he could, but prefaced his remarks with a shudder, and by saying it was a horrible, ghastly affair, and he should be glad to forget it all. I began by asking if he could tell me approximately how much money she had spent during the time she had stayed in Monte Carlo. He didn't know exactly, but a good deal. She was extravagant.
'She entertained liberally, did she not?'
'Very—too liberally.'
'What class of people were they?'
'Oh, generally a good class, but sometimes there were adventurers of both sexes. If you have never been to Monte Carlo, you don't know what a very mixed and very peculiar society one meets there. One has to be very careful.'
'Mrs. Pennell was perhaps not as careful as she ought to have been?'
'I was always telling her that.'
'Have you formed any theory to account for her murder yourself?'
'What theory should I form? It is all too terrible, too plain. The murderers, they travel with us. When I am dozing they knock me on the head. Then when I recover I find my dear Madame dead. Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! it is awful!'
'And having committed the crime, they jumped from the carriage?'
'How else would they escape, Monsieur?'
'Have you any idea where the train was when you were attacked?'
'It was soon after we had left Avignon.'
'Before you came to Orange?'
'Yes, without doubt.'
Why are you so confident on that point?'
'I have often travelled there. We had not left Avignon more than ten minutes, and because of a hill the train goes slowly.'
I suppose Madame's death is a great loss to you?'
This question seemed to affect him deeply, and when he answered his voice was husky.
'I am not the same man,' he said; 'she was so good. She pay me so well. I weep for her always.'
'But, of course, a man of your standing will have no difficulty in obtaining an appointment?'
'I seek no more to be a courier.'
'I—I—am tired. I am sick here, Monsieur'—he placed his hand over his heart.
'Have you made enough money that you can afford to retire from your profession?'
'I am going abroad, Monsieur.'
'Abroad!'
'Yes; I go to South America. There I buy a farm.' Then you have made some money?'
'A trifle—a mere trifle. If I have not enough, perhaps I can borrow some. I don't know. Anyway, I go to America.'
This practically closed my interview with Stradvari, and, as I had no purpose to serve in prolonging it, I took my departure, firmly convinced in my own mind that I should ultimately succeed in clearing away the mystery surrounding Mrs. Pennell's death.
The day following the conversation I have recorded as taking place between myself and Joseph Stradvari I crossed over to France once more, and went direct to Saint-Etienne. The chief of the police there was a somewhat pompous and self-opinionated gentleman of the name of Souste. I approached him now with a good deal of deference, and gave him to understand that I was charged with a mission on behalf of the daughter of Mrs. Pennell, and therefore was interested in the case, and was anxious to assist him in solving the mystery, and, if possible, bringing the guilty parties to justice.
He hastened to assure me that his agents had so exhausted the subject that he didn't think a stranger and a foreigner was likely to succeed where they had failed.
'But suppose your agents have been pursuing phantoms?' I ventured to ask.
He was not altogether pleased by the question, and demanded with a certain sharpness of tone to know what I meant, and the following little colloquy ensued:
'You believe in the story of two men having got into the same compartment with Madame and her courier at Marseilles?'
'Certainly.'
'The murder was committed after leaving Avignon?'
'Of that there is no doubt.'
'And before Orange was reached?'
'You have ascertained the speed at which the train was travelling at that time, I presume?'
'Yes, about twenty-two kilometres an hour.'
And you think that two men could escape by jumping off the train while going at such a speed?'
'The risk would be great, but it could be done.'
'If your theory is correct, it was done, Monsieur Souste. Remember, the night was very dark.'
'And the murderers would be labouring under excitement.'
'That is true.'
'For them suddenly to plunge into space from a train moving at the rate of twenty-two kilometres an hour, under such conditions as I have named, would be to run a risk so tremendous that I should set their chances of freedom from injury as fifty thousand to one. In the case of two men the chance of injury to one or other of them would be many times increased.'
'I fail, sir, to see the point of your argument,' remarked Monsieur Souste, with just a trifle of irritability in his tone.
'My point is this. The night being dark, the men being excited, the likelihood of jumping from a rapidly moving train without meeting with serious injury is so small that we may dismiss it as an untenable theory.'
'But perhaps they were injured.'
'Sir, having regard to the exhaustive inquiries you have made, do you think it probable you would have failed to have heard of it if one or both of those men had been injured? Let us assume one was hurt. His companion would make for the nearest village to seek for assistance. At that hour his errand would have attracted great attention, and when the murder became known somebody would surely have come forward with information, or, failing that, your men would have heard of the incident.'
'Then what is your theory?' asked Monsieur Souste, displaying increased interest.
'My theory is that the two men are phantoms.'
'I don't quite follow you,' said Souste, with a puzzled expression on his face that was quite comical.
'What I mean is this. Two men did not get into the carriage at Marseilles or elsewhere.'
'Then who killed Madame Pennell?'
'The courier.'
'Joseph Stradvari?'
Monsieur Souste gasped. The colour left his face. He drew forth his handkerchief, and mopped his forehead. He seemed to be labouring under suppressed excitement that was choking him. The suddenness with which I had sprung my theory upon him had taken his breath away, and for the time rendered him speechless. But at last he re-covered sufficiently to blurt out—
'Impossible!'
It took M. Souste some time to recover from the shock I had given him, but when he did he admitted that I had probability on my side, and it was ultimately agreed that an accredited French detective should return with me to London, and that we should lay such information before a Magistrate as would justify the issuing of a warrant to search Stradvari's baggage. The discovery of any of the late Mrs. Pennell's property amongst his things would secure us a warrant for his arrest on a charge of murder.
This plan was carried out, and in the courier's possession there were found the gold repeater watch, the medallion portrait, many other items of jewellery, and upwards of £4,000 in French notes, which were known to have been in the possession of the unfortunate lady at the time of her death. Stradvari had been too artful to attempt to part with any of the property while the hue and cry was hot. But he had made all preparations for going out to Buenos Ayres. There he would have little difficulty in realising on his ill-gotten gains. His arrest was promptly effected, as also that of the woman with him, and after the usual formalities they were extradited and conveyed to France. In order to save her own head the woman, under the pressure and torture of French methods of judicial interrogation, turned traitor to her partner and revealed the whole plot. She had long been acquainted with Stradvari, and she had once lived in Avignon as maid to a French lady. She had a brother, a ne'er-do-weel, who had been in the French navy, but was discharged in disgrace, after long imprisonment for severely injuring a superior officer. She and her brother, who were sorely pressed for money, urged Stradvari to kill his mistress. The crime was to be committed after leaving Avignon, and the woman and the brother were to be waiting at a certain spot agreed upon as the train passed, and they would carry a small lamp as a signal that they were there. Having secured the property, Stradvari was to toss it out of the window to his waiting confederates, and then slightly injure himself, and stick to the story of the two men having joined the train at Marseilles.
It was a clever and artfully conceived plot, and carried out without a hitch. The woman and her brother walked back to Avignon, whence they got train in a few hours to Marseilles. From there they journeyed to Paris, where the man remained while the woman proceeded to London with the stolen property to wait for Stradvari. The brother's share of the plunder was a thousand pounds, which he very soon commenced to get rid of in riotous living in the French capital, where, after his sister's confession, he was arrested. He had been drinking so heavily, and was so saturated with absinthe, that he was a physical and mental wreck.
The trial that ensued was one of the most sensational that had occurred in France for a long time, and it is satisfactory to know that the criminals met their deserts. Stradvari was guillotined, the brother was sentenced to imprisonment for life, and the woman to fifteen years'.
AT a well-known commercial and family hotel, almost in the heart of grimy, busy Manchester, a gentleman arrived one evening by cab from Victoria Station. He had a foreign appearance, spoke with a foreign accent, but lacked that distinctive something in his bearing which so unmistakably proclaims the 'commercial.' In age he was under forty. He had a dark swarthy complexion, dark hair, dark eyes. He was very cheerful, and seemed to be in perfect health. He had no luggage with him, with the exception of a tolerably large handbag. The porter who carried it up to the gentleman's bedroom noted that it was extraordinarily heavy for so relatively small a bag, and the man mentioned the fact to the manager, who did not attach any importance to it, but, not knowing the stranger and in the absence of larger luggage, he requested him to pay for his room in advance, which he did cheerfully. He gave his name as Karl Reinhardt, and said he was from Dresden, but did not mention if he represented any firm. He intimated that he was expecting letters and telegrams, and that a lady would probably call upon him between seven and eight, and would dine with him. No letters or telegrams came, but the lady did. She was well dressed, and about Reinhardt's own age. They had dinner served to them at a private table, and drank a bottle of German white wine and a bottle of champagne. After dinner they both smoked cigarettes and drank coffee and cognac, and about nine o'clock drove in a cab to the Theatre Royal.
It was long past midnight when the man returned. He came in a cab, and alone. He was somewhat under the influence of liquor, but quiet and orderly, although not very steady on his legs. In handing him his bedroom candle, the porter offered to help him upstairs, but he politely declined the man's proffered aid, put a shilling into his hand, wished him good-night, and mounted to the second floor by himself. Mr. Reinhardt did not put in an appearance during the following morning, but that aroused no suspicion. He had left no request the previous night to be called, and so no one thought of going to his room to disturb him.
When two o'clock had struck and Mr. Reinhardt had not been seen, the manager sent a servant up to ask if he required anything. His boots were still on the mat outside of his door. The servant knocked and knocked and knocked again, but got no response. So she turned the handle; the door wasn't locked, which surprised her. She peeped in and what she saw caused her to rush downstairs to the manager, who at once went to Reinhardt's room.
Reinhardt had taken off his boots and his coat, but nothing else, and he was found lying across the bed quite dead. He had been dead for hours, and was stiff and cold. In the fireplace some papers had been burnt. His bag was open and perfectly empty. There was nothing in his pockets, neither purse, money, pocket-book, nor watch. Not a letter or card of any kind likely to lead to identification. Some name had evidently been marked on his linen, but it was cut out.
As a matter of form, a doctor was of course sent for. The man was dead enough, but the doctor could not say how he had died. There was no wound anywhere, and the calm, placid appearance of the features and the absence of any indication of pain or struggle seemed to negative the suggestion of poison, at any rate of poison the doctor was familiar with.
Necessarily, the usual proceedings in such cases were followed. The coroner was notified, a post-mortem was ordered, and steps taken with a view to try and establish the dead man's identity. These steps resulted in nothing. The post-mortem examination made it clear that the deceased had met his death by chloroform; not taken internally, but by inhalation. There was reason to suppose a very large quantity had been inhaled, and, of course, the question that naturally arose to the mind of all who were interested in the case was, 'Is it murder or suicide?'
If murder, then it was one in which the clement of romance and mystery was very strong. If suicide, then it stood out as being without parallel, as there was no record case of a person having taken his own life by inhaling chloroform. In the dead man's room a careful search was made as soon after the notification of the death as possible. The faint characteristic odour of chloroform was detected on some of the bedclothes, on a sponge on the washstand, and on a towel that lay on the floor; but no bottle or vessel of any kind that had contained the fluid could be found.
The legal investigation brought nothing fresh to light. The result was that an open verdict was returned. Every effort was made to find the lady who accompanied the deceased to the theatre, but without success. The wide publicity given to the case could hardly have escaped her notice, and yet she did not come forward. And so the stranger—no money having been found on his person, and no one claiming his poor remains—was buried as a pauper, and in less than a week after probably the general public had forgotten him.
As may be supposed, the police were not altogether satisfied with the turn matters had taken. The failure to get any evidence of consequence to present to the coroner was very disappointing, and as the open verdict left them free to pursue their inquiries an intimation was sent to Tyler Tatlock to the effect that if he could make it convenient to journey to Manchester he might have the opportunity of exercising his talents on a case after his own heart. He accepted the invitation, and nine days after Reinhardt's body had been discovered in the hotel bedroom he was journeying to Cottonopolis, and as he hurried north by a strange coincidence Manchester was provided with another sensation. A daring and dastardly attempt was made to blow up the jail in Strangeways. An infernal machine of some kind had been placed against the wall of one of the wings, and fired by clockwork. Although considerable damage of a kind was done, there was no great structural injury to the building, but the moral effect on the citizens was tremendous. There had been a good deal of Fenian agitation going on for some time, and many sinister threats uttered, but nobody believed these threats would result in anything.
When Tatlock reached the city it was in a state of red-hot excitement, and leather-lunged newsvendors were yelling 'Houtrage at Strangeways Jail! Hawful explosion!' Tatlock bought a paper, and read the first crude particulars of the outrage; but, of course, his business was with the case of the dead Reinhardt, and at a long interview with the chief of the police he was furnished with full details, and the following day he set to work, and as he studied the mystery he deemed it probable that between Reinhardt's death and the explosion at the Strangeways Jail there was some connection, but he kept that idea to himself. He turned his attention, first of all, to endeavouring to discover what were the chances of someone in the hotel having killed Reinhardt, and these inquiries elicited the following remarkable facts, which, singularly enough, no one had thought it worth while to mention before.
Two days prior to Reinhardt's arrival another traveller, supposed to be an Irishman by his brogue, came to the hotel, and gave the name of James Bingham. His luggage consisted of a leather portmanteau. He was a very quiet, reserved man, and associated with no one in the house. The only meal he took in the hotel was breakfast. After that he went out, and did not reappear until late at night. Three days after Reinhardt's mysterious death Bingham paid his bill, and took his departure. It was known that he drove in a cab with his portmanteau to London Road Station. But that was all that was known. To Tatlock it occurred that it might be advisable to refer to Bingham later on. In the meantime the inquisitive detective pottered about in the bedroom lately occupied by James Bingham. It was a very ordinary room. There was a fireplace with the flue closed down, as is always the case, presumably with a view to preventing hotel guests from breathing too much air. The fireplace itself was screened by a fancy arrangement of tissue paper of divers colours. This fireplace was examined, but yielded nothing. Then there was the ordinary dressing-table, with a swing glass that wouldn't swing; the more than ordinary washstand, and the ditto chest of drawers. Into these drawers the prying Tatlock glanced, and fished from one of them a half-pint label-less bottle which had undoubtedly contained chloroform, and beside it was a large coloured handkerchief which as certainly had had chloroform upon it. It was roughly folded up. When unfolded, Tat-lock detected the faint, sweetish odour of the potent drug. It was much stained, too, especially the blue colour. Now, this was a startling discovery. The chambermaid whose duty it was to attend that particular room had not looked into the drawers. She knew that, as a rule, passing travellers, especially men, seldom used the drawers they found in their bedrooms at hotels.
The syllogism Tatlock propounded to himself when he started on this Manchester case was: First, Reinhardt had been murdered. Second, he had been murdered by someone in the hotel. The conclusion he drew from these premises was that Reinhardt was one of a band of conspirators; he had probably been suspected of being weak-kneed or treacherous, and so had been sacrificed. The bag which he had brought with him to the hotel, and the weight of which had attracted the attention of the porter, had contained something perhaps more deadly than wearing apparel—such, for example, as an infernal machine or machines.
Tatlock examined all the arguments for and against this line of theory, and concluded that if Reinhardt was murdered the murderer was either concealed in the room or came to the room after the arrival of Reinhardt. This justified the belief that the murderer was an occupant of the hotel. No one passed out of the hotel between midnight and the opening hour in the morning. A night porter was on duty all night.
Now, James Bingham occupied a room only three doors removed from Reinhardt's room, and on the same landing. For three days after the crime Bingham remained on. Then he paid his bill, and left. A subsequent search in the room he had occupied brings to light a bottle that had contained chloroform, and a doubled-up coloured handkerchief reeking and stained with the same chemical production. If Bingham was the murderer, the question next suggested itself—why had he left these evidences of his crime behind him? In solving this question Tatlock reasoned thus: The crime completed, what was the most probable thing Bingham would do with the empty bottle and the saturated hand-kerchief? Thrust them into his pocket while he emptied the pockets and bag of his victim. That done, he would get back to his own room as soon as possible. Conscious of the instruments of death being in his pocket, he would pull them out. He would not put them amongst his clothes in his portmanteau, for there was the possibility that they might impart an odour to his things, so he placed them in the empty drawer, intending to take an early opportunity of destroying them, but from that moment they were effaced from the tablets of his memory. The sensational reports in the papers would absorb his attention, and no doubt also he had numerous other things to attend to of pressing urgency, so that when the time came for him to slip away he was too eagerly intent on his purpose to have a spare thought for such trivial items as the empty bottle and the stained handkerchief. And there they were, like handwriting on the wall for those who could read, and Tyler Tatlock read it.
The next stage he took up in his endeavour to get a second link was to ascertain, if possible, what connection there was between Reinhardt and the mysterious woman who dined with him at the hotel and then went to the theatre with him. She surely must have had some guilty knowledge, otherwise why did she not come forward and state what she knew? The press beseeched her to declare herself, and placards had been posted all over Manchester and Salford. But the woman spoke not, nor did she give a sign. That was ominous. She dare not speak, dare not show herself—that was the only logical conclusion one could come to. The cabman who drove her and Reinhardt to the theatre was found, but he had nothing to tell beyond that he had set them down at the door of the theatre, was paid his fare, and drove away. They occupied seats in the dress circle. The performance had commenced some time when they arrived. Being such late comers the money-taker observed them more closely than he would have done otherwise; so did the natty damsel who sold them a pro-gramme, and showed them to the seats they were entitled to occupy, which were at the back of the circle, as there was a pretty full house and the best places were taken.
A sharp-eyed barmaid in the saloon spotted them. They went in to refresh themselves between the acts, and sat at a little table in a corner, and both smoked cigarettes. The fact of the woman smoking was what first attracted the barmaid's attention. She could not gather anything they said, as they conversed in a foreign language, and they continued to sit there long after the act had commenced, so that the barmaid had exceptional opportunity of observing them. From their gestures and facial expression, the young lady came to the conclusion that they were having a heated discussion, and there were indications that the female was somewhat wroth and disgusted with her companion. Her manners and actions suggested that she was urging him to do something which was repugnant to him, and because he refused she reproached him. Of course, all this was conjecture. The barmaid could only base her opinion on looks and actions, but the conjecture was no doubt pretty near the truth. Where they went to when they left the theatre it was impossible to say.
There was yet one other channel in which Tatlock could push inquiries. It has been stated that when Reinhardt had been dead for three days, James Bingham took his departure. He had with him as luggage a pretty large leather portmanteau, which was made conspicuous by having a red band painted round it. He engaged a cab from the hotel door, and was driven to the London Road railway station. All trace of this man would probably have been lost from that moment but for one fact—he placed his portmanteau in the left luggage office. The porter in charge gave him a ticket of receipt. The portmanteau was not reclaimed personally; but three days later a letter was received enclosing the receipt, and asking that the portmanteau should be sent off immediately, addressed to 'James Bingham, left luggage office, Lime Street station, Liverpool.' This was done, and both the attendant in charge of the office at London Road and the porter who conveyed the portmanteau to the Liverpool train were struck by the red band. A cross, a square, a diamond, a star, or flag was no uncommon distinguishing mark on a portmanteau, but it was not often a band was painted right round it.
At the Lime Street Station depot they remembered the receipt of the portmanteau, which was claimed the same day by a man who said he was James Bingham. The portmanteau was, by the owner's request, put on a four-wheeled cab. The porter who carried it out of the station noted that the number of the cab was 1313. The reason why he noticed it was a peculiar one—he was a very superstitious man, and had a horror of the number 13, and in this combination of figures there were two thirteens, a circumstance which fixed in his memory the fact of the peculiarly marked bag having been taken away on it. The cab was easily discovered, and the cabman related that on the day in question he took up a fare at the Lime Street station, and a portmanteau with a red band round it was placed on the top of his cab. He was ordered to drive to the landing-stage on the Mersey. On the way the wheels of his cab got into the points of one of the crossings of the dock railway, and was overturned. The portmanteau was hurled from the top of the cab, and, to the amazement of those who witnessed the accident, there was a loud explosion, and a volume of smoke issued from the portmanteau. The traveller scrambled out of the overturned cab. He looked confused and frightened, and swore roundly at cabby for the mishap. The portmanteau was partially wrecked, and while Bingham guarded his damaged property he sent the cabman to a ship's chandler close by to obtain a box of some sort. He returned with a small packing-case, into which the remains of the portmanteau were stuffed. By this time the crowd had restored the cab, which was but little damaged, to its proper position. The case was hoisted to the roof, and the traveller, bidding cabby drive as fast as possible, got inside once more. He reached the landing-stage without further mishap, and went on hoard of a tender with his luggage, and was taken out with numerous other passengers to the Pennsylvania, which was on the point of starting for New York. Half an hour later she steamed down the Mersey, carrying the mysterious Bingham and his exploding portmanteau with her.
This incident was not known until it was too late to stop him, and unfortunately the Atlantic cable had not yet come into existence. As soon as possible, however, an intimation was sent to the New York police that it might be advisable to take charge of Mr. Bingham and subject him to an examination. But he had got a good start, and, alarmed no doubt by the explosion, he tarried not, and all trace of him was lost. It was much to be regretted that he was thus able to elude the attentions of those who were so anxious to be more intimately acquainted with him, but circumstances had played into his hands; fortune, luck, or chance, whatever one likes to call it, had favoured him, and he was enabled to hide himself in the great crowd. The man known as Reinhardt remained in his pauper's grave. In spite of the world-wide publicity given to the case by the press, no one deemed it his business or duty to come forward and throw light where there was so much darkness. No man can achieve the impossible, but Tyler Tatlock did all that man can do, and by his skill and cleverness he was enabled to lift one little corner of the veil which shrouded the mystery. The glimpse thus obtained made it tolerably certain that Reinhardt was a conspirator, and that he fell a victim to the jealousy or suspicion of his co-conspirators, and that between his death and the explosion at the jail there was some connection. Many years have passed, but to the present day that Manchester mystery remains a mystery still.
STANDING back from the high road that runs between Edinburgh and Berwick, and within a mile or so of the latter town, there stood up to a few years ago an old house known as 'Scotter's Farm.' There is a story in connection with that farm; which for ghastly weirdness would be hard to beat. It will be necessary at a later stage of the narrative to enter into some description of the house and its surroundings. But now it is meet that we should record the truly remarkable and even appalling circumstance that brought a curse, as it were, upon Scotter's Farm, until, being shunned by all men as a ghost-haunted spot, it was razed to the ground and the land knew it no more. Years before that came about a young Scot named David Robb went forth from his native country to seek his fortune, as many thousands have done before him. We are not concerned with the early history of this young man, who was destined to become the central figure of a tragic drama.
Briefly, he went first to New Zealand. He did not remain very long there, and seems to have shifted his ground to Australia, and is known to have worked for some time on the Ballarat gold diggings. For a good many years afterwards he appears to have led a nomadic life, shifting his ground and turning up unexpectedly in out-of-the-way quarters. But what we are now interested with is his doings in his later stages. He comes into prominence in Birmingham, England, after long drifting about the world and leading a strange life of adventurous ups and downs. At this period he was in partnership with a Jew named Israel Behrens, and nominally their business was that of electro-platers and needle manufacturers. Indeed, they seem to have gone in for all sorts of things, and amongst others they engaged in the disreputable trade of producing spurious antiquities. Notwithstanding the very miscellaneous character of their enterprise, it is extremely doubtful if they were as successful pecuniarily as they no doubt desired to be.
It is evident that both men were somewhat eccentric, and of miserly habits. They did not, as far as was known, associate themselves with womankind, but lived together in a small house in a somewhat lonely situation in the suburbs. Three times a week an old woman went to their place to clean up and put things in order, but with that exception no stranger ever entered their dwelling. They generally went out together in the morning to their place of business in the town. They took a mid-day meal together in a cheap eating-house, and returned together to their lonely miserable home in the evening.
In the conduct of their business they seem to have been shrewd and even clever; hard bargain-drivers, keen traders. They had a small manufactory in rather a squalid part of the town, and they gave employment to about fifty workpeople of both sexes. They treated their employees fairly, although somewhat hard taskmasters, for they insisted on having their pound of flesh. They went on in this manner for years. No one actually knew whether they were making money or not, though there was a general belief that they were doing well and hoarding their gold. They kept a banking account in their joint names purely for trading purposes. Their business liabilities were always promptly met, and, as was subsequently disclosed, their banking transactions were only arranged to embrace the affairs of their trade. The margin over and beyond these requirements was very narrow indeed. Of course, this state of matters could not long be kept secret, and in business centres where Robb and Behrens were known much wonder and curiosity were expressed by the hard-headed Birmingham money-spinners.
One morning David Robb appeared at his place of business alone. The clerks and workpeople marvelled, because week in and week out for years Robb and Behrens had arrived together and departed together, so that it had come to be said secretly amongst the toilers that the two heads were suspicious of each other, and one was afraid to trust the other out of his sight.
The unusual circumstance of Robb appearing first on the occasion in question so affected the curiosity of the chief clerk that he could not resist the temptation to inquire of Robb if Mr. Behrens was ill.
'No,' answered Robb. 'He came into the town with me as usual, but had to make a call.'
Noon came, bringing the dinner-hour, and the workpeople suspended their labours. Robb, as was his wont, went to his cheap eating-house and fed. And there again surprise was expressed that he was alone. He returned to his factory with the rigid punctuality that marked his coming and going. The bell that recalled the workpeople to their toil was still ringing.
'Hasn't Mr. Behrens turned up?' he asked of his clerk.
'No,' was the answer.
'It's very strange,' muttered Robb, with seeming concern.
The day wore itself out. The toil ceased. Robb locked up and went home.
The following day on his way to the factory he called in at the head police station, and to the superintendent he made the following statement:
'My partner, Mr. Israel Behrens, left home with me yesterday morning. We parted in the town, as he said he wanted to make a call. On getting back to my house last night I found that he had returned during my absence, cleared out all the money that he could lay his hands on, and has disappeared, leaving no trace behind him. You must capture him; return my money or I am ruined.'
The superintendent asked numerous questions, as he was bound to do, and he got a full and detailed description of the absconder. Twenty-four hours later all Birmingham knew of the disappearance of Behrens, for placards were freely posted about offering a reward of fifty pounds for the capture of the Jew, while particulars were sent to every police station in the kingdom.
A week went by. Behrens had not been heard of. He had carried off, according to Robb, upwards of ten thousand pounds and some valuable business papers. Robb manifested great distress, and became moody and sullen. He called frequently at the police station to know if his missing partner had been heard of. The same answer met him each time: 'No.'
Then he went down to his factory, transacted his affairs, and returned at night to his lonely abode. Those who knew him noted a marvellous change in the few days. His iron-grey hair seemed to grow whiter, the wrinkles in his face deepened, his whole appearance was suggestive of one who was bowed and broken beneath an insupportable burden. This did not cause any great surprise, for it was taken as a matter of course that the loss of such a large sum was bound to very seriously affect a man of his penurious and miserly habits.
The chief superintendent of the police of Birmingham, having failed to get any clue, placed himself in communication with Tyler Tatlock, whom he knew very well, and requested him, in the interest of justice, and with a view to upholding the majesty of the law, to try and strike Behrens' spoor. So Tatlock went down to the great Midland town and took up the running. It was in the order of things that he should seek an interview with Robb. When he made himself known and stated his errand, Robb, as Tatlock records, seemed by no means pleased.
'I was content,' he growled, 'to leave this matter in the hands of the Birmingham police. I don't know what they wanted to go outside of their own province for. It seems to me in the nature of a confession of incompetency and incapacity to bring you on the scene.'
Tatlock suggested that his presence did not indicate either incompetency or incapacity on the part of the Birmingham authorities, and that it was quite in accordance with custom for an expert to be called in in cases which presented more than ordinary difficulties.
Robb seemed to give an unwilling assent to this, and after a time showed more disposition to discuss the matter and supply the detective with the information he asked for. Tatlock probed deeply, as was his wont. A knowledge of the habits and character of a man enabled him to form some idea of what that man would be likely to do in certain circumstances. From what he was told on this occasion he came to the conclusion that Behrens was hardly likely to betray his whereabouts by lavish expenditure. Needless to say, Robb did not endeavour to find any extenuating circumstances for his late partner. Indeed, he spoke with such bitter invective, such ill-concealed contempt and hatred, that Tatlock was surprised, and came to the conclusion that there was some long-standing feud between them.
'It seems to me,' he remarked, 'that you and your partner did not get on very well together.'
'No, we did not,' Robb answered, with a touch of fierceness in his tone.
'Because he was selfish, grasping, and deceptive.'
'And yet you lived under the same roof, and walked very closely in the same path. In fact, you were companions held together by a common interest, a common desire.'
'Not quite,' growled Robb. 'That is only what outsiders thought.'
'In what way did you differ?'
'He was untrustworthy.'
'Why, then, did you not take greater precautions to insure yourself against becoming his victim?'
Robb displayed much irritation under this questioning, and said angrily: 'Look here, I don't know that it is part of your business to lay bare the whole of my dealings with my late partner. You've been asked, not with my consent, to find him. All I've got to say is, find him, and get my money back if you can.'
Tatlock did not enter into any further argument. He saw the futility of it, but he formed an opinion of Robb by no means favourable to him. For some time he devoted his energies to trying to get trace of Behrens, but failed. Of course the quest was rendered harder by the isolated life the Jew had led. He had formed no friendships. He had few acquaintances, and those few could tell but little about him, beyond saying he was very quiet, very reserved, very secretive.
In the course of a few weeks the disappearance of Behrens had passed out of public memory. Tatlock had failed to find him, and when six months had gone David Robb had gone too, and Birmingham knew him no more. He was at pains to let it be known that the loss he had sustained through his partner's rascality had ruined him. So he sold the business and his household effects.
About three years from this time the disappearance of Israel Behrens became a subject of conversation once more in the needle town, owing to the arrival of a man named Samuel Behrens. He was the brother of Israel, but had not seen him for a very long period. Occasionally at long intervals letters had passed between them. Samuel had been in Australia. He had made some money, and resolved to visit England and find out why his brother had remained silent for such an unusually long time. When he heard the story of his brother vanishing, he was shocked, and he repudiated with passionate vehemence the charge of theft preferred against Israel, and even of his being a miser. He said that he and his brother were born in Russia. Their mother was a gentlewoman of good birth. Their father was a trader in furs, and was very outspoken against the barbarities practised against the Jews in the name of the Czar. One day Behrens the elder was seized, and, under the infamous Russian laws, was thrown into that living tomb, the prison of Peter and Paul at St. Petersburg. When his wife moved on his behoof, she too was arrested, and a lying charge formulated, so as to bring her under the iniquitous law too. She was scourged and persecuted until her heart broke, and she died.
At last Behrens was put on trial—a hideous mockery, as all such trials are in Russia—and, of course, he was sentenced for life to Siberia. Samuel and Israel were then youths. Samuel was the elder. They had been cared for by an aunt, and after a time were sent to England, the land of liberty. They both made a solemn vow that they would labour, toil, and save in order to get money to effect the liberation of their unhappy father. It was true he had been sentenced for life, but every official, whether high or low, in Russia is open to bribery and corruption, and if there is money enough even a Siberian life-prisoner may be set free. In pursuance of their object Samuel went to Australia, while Israel elected to remain in England, and, making the acquaintance of David Robb somewhere or other, he subsequently entered into partnership with him in Birmingham.
Such was Samuel's strange story, and when people spoke of the serious charge that hung over his brother's head he was furious, and expressed a firm belief that his brother was dead. Naturally he was anxious to come face to face with David Robb, but he also had vanished, leaving no trace behind. Of course, Samuel learnt of Tatlock's efforts, and he resolved to go to him and ask him to try again to clear up the mystery surrounding his brother. The story appealed to Tatlock, and, knowing what he did of Robb, he began to think that Robb himself was responsible for his partner's disappearance, consequently it was necessary that Robb should be traced.
The quest began. Tatlock found himself once more in Birmingham, taking up the old threads in the hope of finding a clue. From the fact of Robb having led such a nomadic life, the belief was justified that he would go abroad again, but somehow Tatlock did not hold to that belief. His argument was that, as Robb was growing old—he was much older than Behrens—a longing for his native land might restrain him from wandering farther afield. It was remembered in Birmingham that when he left the town he took many packages with him, including a large wooden case. These things were supposed to be such remnants of his household effects as he wished to preserve. They were sent by goods train to Liverpool. This fact was disclosed by the railway company's records.
To Liverpool Tatlock went. There he discovered that the goods had been claimed and a receipt given for them by Robb himself. And he discovered more than that. A poor man named John Saunders, who owned a horse and cart, had been hired by Robb to remove the things from the railway station to a lodging-house in a street in Toxteth Park, where Robb had hired two rooms. When the job was finished the man wanted his payment. Robb raised some pettifogging quibble, and offered half the amount agreed upon. The man refused to accept it. Robb swore he would not pay more, so Saunders issued a summons against him in the County Court, and obtained judgment. Even then he tried to shirk payment, and the bailiff was sent to seize his goods. Then, and not till then, did he pay.
Tatlock learned that Robb remained nearly two months in the lodging-house, earning the reputation of being a skinflint and half-mad. At last he took himself off, and he and his belongings were conveyed to Glasgow by steamer. In Glasgow he stayed for a short time in a house situated in the Broomielaw, and finally removed from there to Scotter's Farm, near Berwick.
This farm was a very tumble-down, ramshackle place. It had at one time been an important holding, and in its palmy days had comprised upwards of two thousand acres of land. But first the railway cut the estate up. Then a factory was built on the land, and finally a family dispute arose about the ownership. The lawyers, as they always do, sucked the juice away. And when, after years of litigation—and, of course, as long as there was anything to be got the lawyers hung on—the case was settled, there was only a wretched wreck for the victor. The house, as might be supposed, had fallen into decay, and, as there was no land to farm, it was a farm only in name. The owner was too poor to renovate it. He would have got nothing by pulling it down, and so his only hope was that he might find somebody who would become a tenant. That somebody came along at last in the person of David Robb, who took the place on a three years' agreement at a low rental.
Nothing was known in the neighbourhood of the new tenant at this time, and much curiosity was manifested to learn what manner of man he was who was coming to the miserable 'hovel,' as it was termed, and what he intended to do with it.
At last the 'new tenant' came himself, an old, haggard-faced, grey-haired man, with white cheeks, and a vacant expression in his eyes. There were no bairns or wife, only a cart laden with packages. Curiosity was aroused still more. Kindly-disposed neighbours asked if they could be of any service.
They were rebuffed with a grumpy 'No.'
The new tenant, having got his packages in, bolted and barred the place, and went down to Berwick, where he sought out a second-hand huckster's shop, and haggled and bargained and haggled again about some odd articles of rubbish of furniture. He bought a little coal and some wood, and he secured the services of an old woman older than himself to act as housekeeper. She did not remain with him long. She asserted that he was a terrible old man, so mean and stingy that he begrudged every mouthful of food she ate, and from morning till night was nagging at her on the importance of practising economy. So the new tenant was left to himself, and, though some sympathised with him, the majority of those round about regarded him with horror and loathing. Thus things went on for a little while, and the neighbourhood ceased to take any concern in the new tenant.
One day a visitor called upon him. It was Samuel Behrens. The two men had never met before. Samuel went there at the suggestion of Tyler Tatlock. When Samuel made himself known Robb was strangely perturbed, and was particularly anxious to know how he had been discovered. He vehemently protested that it was shameful to disturb him in his old age and misery, and he poured out a torrent of violent abuse on his late partner, who, he averred, had ruined him.
Naturally, Samuel asked many questions, but to all of them Robb either returned evasive answers or would not answer at all. When Samuel declared his unshaken belief in his brother's integrity and unsullied honour, Robb grew more and more excited. He gave way to incoherent ravings, and repeated again and again that Israel Behrens had ruined him. Samuel's endeavours to elicit some plain and definite explanation as to his brother's faults and failings only served to increase Robb's anger, and from abuse he fell to threats, and displayed so much violence that Samuel became frightened, and moved towards the door with the intention of taking his departure. Then Robb's manner changed. From a violent, threatening, passionate madman, he became a pleading, fawning, cringing creature. He threw his arms about his visitor's neck. He moaned, sighed, and sobbed. He declared that he was a lonely, broken, miserable old man, and it was all through his late partner, who had wrecked him. But he was willing to forget it all, he said, and bestow his confidence and affection upon Samuel. He used every art and wile he was capable of to persuade him to remain.
'Make this your home,' he cried. 'Live with me. I have a few pounds, and all, all shall be yours.'
Samuel was not impressed by this sudden display of regard. On the contrary, his fear of the strange old man increased. There was something in Robb's manner which made Samuel desire to get out of the house as speedily as possible. But when he would have gone Robb barred his way, and pleaded to him to remain.
'The world thinks bad of me,' he exclaimed, 'but you need not. We will be friends, eh; friends, very good friends. You shall protect me, and when evil things are said, you shall give the lie to them. You will stay, won't you?'
Samuel by this time had come to the conclusion that he was face to face with a very cunning and very dangerous madman, and, thinking it was better to humour him for a little while until a more favourable moment occurred for him to get away, he said he would remain for a time at any rate. At this a cunning expression spread itself over the haggard face of Robb, who invited his guest to seat himself by the hearth, on which burned a handful of wood. Suddenly, and without any preliminary warning, Robb sprang at the other, and with a knife he had concealed hacked at Samuel's throat. Then ensued a fierce, terrible struggle. Although wounded and bleeding profusely, Samuel fought desperately for his life. He was much inferior in strength to his opponent, but he made a bold bid for victory. He succeeded by extreme exertion in wrenching the knife from the hand of the other and flinging it away, though he was terribly cut and gashed about the fingers. Not to be easily denied in his fell purpose, which unquestionably was to murder the other, Robb renewed his exertions, striving with all the strength which the passion of madness gave him to slay his victim; but in the end the staying powers of the younger man told. Robb showed symptoms of exhaustion, and taking advantage of this Samuel made a supreme effort, which enabled him to fling his opponent off. Then, smothered in blood, his clothes hanging in rags, faint, half-blind, and terrified, he escaped and sought shelter in the nearest house, where the services of a doctor were secured as speedily as possible.
When Samuel had recovered his presence of mind, he sent an urgent message to Tatlock, who was staying at an inn in the town, waiting to hear the result of the interview, but never for a moment anticipating anything of this kind. No time was lost in acquainting the police with what had happened at Scotter's Farm, and in less than a couple of hours Tatlock, accompanied by two policemen, went up to the farm. They experienced no difficulty in obtaining entrance, for the door was open. All was silent. They entered the kitchen. Blood seemed to be everywhere. There was a pool of it on the floor, and doubled up in a corner was Robb. They spoke to him, but he answered not. They touched him, but he gave no sign, and when they attempted to lift him up they found he was dead.
From the kitchen they went to other parts of the house, and in one of the rooms they made a horrible discovery. In a large wooden case was a body, the withered, mummified body of a man. Subsequent investigation left not the shadow of a doubt that it was the body of Israel Behrens, and his partner had murdered him. How, it was not easy to say. Since the crime the murderer had kept the ghastly evidence of his deed by him, possibly under the impression that it was the surest way of preventing the crime being discovered.
Hoards of money were also found in a box, mostly in notes and gold, and there was every reason to suppose that Robb had killed his partner in order to possess himself of his money, the perpetration of the crime being rendered comparatively easy by the isolated lives the two men led, and the unusual way in which they conducted their business. Robb's own death was due to excitement acting on a weak heart. That he was mad admitted of no questioning, but it was the madness of the miser, combined with peculiar and clever cunning.
It was some time before Samuel Behrens recovered from the shock and the wounds he had received. But he ultimately did so, and he succeeded, as his brother's heir, after some trouble, in obtaining possession of the bulk of the money found in Robb, the madman's, house. Scotter's Farm no longer exists, but the curious who may find themselves in the neighbourhood may still hear the story of the strange old man and his awful crime, which is not likely to be ever forgotten by the good folk of Berwick. David Robb and Scotter's Farm have been indelibly woven into the traditions of the countryside.
IN compliance with an urgent request Tatlock called at the American Embassy in London, and had an interview with the Ambassador.
'I want you,' said the Ambassador, 'if you can make it convenient to do so, to proceed at once down to Edinburgh, and put up at the Hotel Balmoral, where a certain James Washington Jackson is staying. I further want you to watch this man closely, and find out all you possibly can about him—trace his career, in fact, from his cradle to the present day. If it can be done. Needless for me to say, the utmost caution must be exercised in order that Jackson's suspicions may not be aroused. My Government have instructed me to take steps to shadow Jackson, and to employ the best talent in England to that end.
'My Government have reason to suppose that Jackson is a notorious character, one of the cleverest rascals in the world, who has travelled everywhere, passed under many names, but whose real name is Shapcott Darlton, who years ago forged an immense number of United States bonds, and is believed to have poisoned Judge Bronson, who tried and condemned to death Darlton's brother, who was charged with shooting the husband, brother, and father of a young lady with whom he had been intriguing in the State of Nebraska. Darlton was, it appears, a man of protean character, and so clever that he outwitted everyone, and finally disappeared from the country. For years nothing has been heard of him, but Jackson is suspected. Of course we want unmistakable proof, and we look to you to supply us with that proof if it can be obtained. Without it we should not, as you know, be justified in arresting Jackson and asking for his extradition.'
Tatlock intimated that he grasped the situation, and thoroughly understood all that was required of him, and in the course of the next few days he had located himself in Edinburgh.
It was the summer season, and the city was full of strangers coming and going. Tatlock had some difficulty in obtaining a room at the Balmoral, but as he expressed his willingness to occupy a garret at the top of the house until the departure of someone enabled him to be more fittingly accommodated he was duly installed in the house, and de-scribed himself in the visitors' book as Ebenezer Gurney, of Manchester. He had attired himself in a tourist suit, consisting of tweed jacket and knickerbockers. He wore spectacles, and an admirably fitting wig of long dark brown hair gave him a somewhat artistic finish.
He had not been long in the house before he spotted his man, who seemed to be the central figure of a little group of people, consisting of two or three men and four ladies, three being young and pretty, the daughters of the fourth, a charming woman of about fifty-five. She was known as Lady Gwendoline Tarrant, of reputed wealth, and was conspicuous for her philanthropic qualities. She was the widow of Sir Richard Tarrant, Bart., who had sat as a Conservative in the House of Commons for many years, and was the owner of Bingley Hall and thousands of broad acres in the hunting county of Leicestershire, besides a town house in Berkeley Square, London. One of the men in her party was a nephew; the others were friends, one being the affianced of Ruth Tarrant, the youngest daughter.
James Washington Jackson was a singularly attractive and fascinating man—tall and powerful, with a strongly marked face, keen, bright, dark eyes, perfect teeth, a good complexion, and regular features. His cheeks and chin were clean shaved, but a well-trimmed moustache shaded his mouth. He had a pleasant musical voice and a polished, gentlemanly manner. In age he was about thirty-two or three, and his general appearance suggested the well-trained gentleman. There was a slight American accent in his speech, which was far from unpleasant. There was nothing about him to indicate that he was the villain the American Ambassador seemed to think he was. And Tatlock himself was at first inclined to believe a mistake had been made. It did not take the detective long to discover that Mr. Jackson was paying court to one of Lady Tarrant's daughters, Miss Beryl Tarrant, a very charming young woman of three-and-twenty, and it was obvious that he was a persona grata with the family and their friends.
For four days Tatlock closely watched the movements of Mr. Jackson, but saw not a sign to warrant a suspicion of the man's honesty. At length the party took their departure and journeyed through the Trossachs. Tatlock went with them, though he was not of their party, and no one suspected that this quiet, demure, unostentatious little gentleman, who was so primly dressed, and moved about as though even with his spectacles he had a difficulty in seeing, was shadowing them.
Mr. Jackson was either very well acquainted with the country, or had been at special pains to post himself up, for he constituted himself the guide of the party, and his knowledge seemed of the cyclopaedic order. He had the story of Rob Roy at his tongue's end. Ellen's Isle aroused his poetic fervour. He recited with correct intonation and an obvious appreciation of its beauties the stirring description of the fight between Fitzjames and Roderick Dhu. He expatiated on the merits of Scott, and rattled off long quotations with a grace and facility that greatly impressed his listeners, and drew around him a number of curious and admiring strangers, who regarded the well-informed and well-spoken gentleman as a man worth knowing.
From Glasgow the party visited Ayrshire, and trod the scenes that are endeared for ever to Scotsmen by the genius of Burns. And here again Mr. Jackson was equally at home, and proved himself as familiar with the ploughman poet as he was with Scott.
Returning to Glasgow, they rested for a couple of days and then took their departure for Oban, from whence they visited Staffa and Iona, and afterwards continued their journey to Inverness.
During all this time Tatlock had kept in touch with them, and yet had avoided attracting their notice in any way. And his mission so far had been fruitless. He had learnt nothing about Jackson beyond that he was exceptionally clever, singularly well read, a good talker, but a poser; on the other hand, he was vain, and in some respects frivolous, and it was clear he liked to be regarded as a person of importance. In all this, of course, there was nothing that warranted suspicion of the man's honesty, but by this time Tatlock had come to the conclusion that beneath Jackson's affable and polished manner there lurked a demon.
The first glimpse he got of this was at Oban. After landing from the trip to Staffa, Jackson was coming over the gangway from the steamer, when a small nail, which had been carelessly left sticking out in the rail, ripped one of Jackson's kid gloves—he was wearing light-coloured gloves that fitted him to perfection. This trifling incident would never have disturbed the equanimity of a well-balanced mind, but the effect on Jackson was marvellous, magical. His usual expression underwent a complete change. From his eyes flashed a light of such wrath and fury that the man looked positively demoniacal. A deep frown furrowed his brow, his lips were compressed, he ground his teeth, and a fiery passion displayed itself in every feature.
It chanced that Tatlock was standing on the landing—place amongst the crowd when this little incident occurred. Jackson's exhibition of temper came and passed like a flash, but it did not escape the watcher, who was able also to gauge its significance, and from that moment Tatlock decided that his man was a consummate actor, and that there was infinitely more of the fiend than the saint in his composition. Possibly no one else saw the change. At any rate, if they did, they did not attach the same importance to it that Tatlock did. A minute after the little accident Jackson was laughing and chatting to Beryl Tarrant, and making a joke about the torn glove.
A few days were spent in Inverness, and the battlefield of Culloden was visited. Then the party moved on to Loch Maree. It was here that Tatlock's patience and perseverance in watching and waiting were rewarded. The day after their arrival a special messenger came over from the post office five miles away with a telegram for Mr. Jackson. Tatlock a little later became aware that Jackson had made arrangements with the landlord to be driven with all speed to the nearest railway station, as he had to catch the train that night for London. There was consternation amongst the Tarrant party when Jackson announced his departure, but he consoled them by promising to be back in five days, when they would continue their tour to the Isle of Skye.
Tatlock recognised the necessity of still keeping an eye on the man he was shadowing. The difficulties of the situation created by the receipt of that telegram were very great, but Tatlock was equal to them. It was of course of the highest importance that he should avoid arousing Jackson's suspicions, as that might have frustrated the whole plan for acquiring the necessary information about him. So he put a knapsack on his back containing a few necessary articles, and, leaving the rest of his things in the hands of the landlord, told him he was going to make a little tramp in the district, and would be back in a few days. Then he slipped quietly away, steered for a farm he had spotted, and bargained with the farmer to drive him to the station to catch a train due before the one by which Jackson was going to travel. This train was caught. Tatlock left his knapsack in the left luggage office of the station, and proceeded to Inverness. He was at the station when the next train arrived, bringing Jackson, and the two men travelled then to Edinburgh, though Jackson was all unconscious that he was being shadowed.
The next day they went up to London, and Jackson engaged a room at the London and North-Western Hotel; so did Tatlock. At this hotel Jackson was met by a superbly dressed, handsome woman, and it was evident she imparted some unpleasant news to him. They had ordered supper, and sat together at a small table in the dining-room. The woman handed Jackson a letter to read. As he read it he bit his lip and frowned deeply. The contents of that letter annoyed him greatly. When he had read it he sank into a fit of abstraction; then he slowly tore the letter into minute pieces and dropped them into a tumbler on the table.
Tatlock addressed himself to a waiter. You see that tumbler with pieces of paper in it on the table where that lady and gentleman are sitting. Bring it to me without attracting attention, and you shall have a sovereign.
The waiter was naturally curious, but he was also discreet. A sovereign was not to be sneezed at for so small a service, and he secured it. As soon as he was in possession of the fragments of the letter Tatlock went to his room, and with infinite patience succeeded in putting that letter together, and this is what he read:
The Club, Boston, U.S.A.
My dear Julia,
A catastrophe has happened. Dear Old Joe has been nabbed, although they may have a difficulty in proving anything against him, for you know how cautious he is. But, if anything is discovered, it will be awkward for all concerned. Get hold of the boss without a moment's loss of time, and put him on his guard. He is so prolific in resource that he may be able to suggest some means of throwing a shield over Joe, whom we must try and save at all costs. I am watching developments, and ready to skip at a moment's notice. I will write more fully by the next mail. But give the boss the tip immediately. Perhaps he will come across the pond.
Yours eternally,
Jacinithia.
This letter revealed a good deal, and left no room to doubt that Jackson was the 'boss' referred to, and that he was a rascal. Tatlock soon determined on the course to pursue. In a few hours he was travelling back to Scotland, and as fast as trains and coach would take him he made his way to Loch Maree, where he found Lady Tarrant and her daughters and friends still staying there. When he had made himself presentable after his long journey, he sought an interview with Lady Tarrant, and opened the ball by asking her how long she had known James Washington Jackson.
'Only three months,' she said. She had made his acquaintance at Grasmere, in the English Lake Country. He represented himself as being a nephew of the renowned Stonewall Jackson, who won fame during the American Civil War. His father, according to his account, was a very wealthy man, and was a High Court Judge in the State of Pennsylvania.
'Of course, you have no reason to doubt the truthfulness of these statements?'
'And Mr. Jackson is engaged to one of your daughters?'
'Yes, to Beryl. They are very fond of each other.'
'I presume I am right in supposing that if you were assured that Mr. Jackson was an adventurer you would not allow your daughter to see him again?'
Lady Tarrant uttered a little suppressed scream. The bare suggestion of such a possibility shocked her. Then she was indignant, and said some harsh things.
'Madam,' said Tatlock, 'please have a little patience. I have a duty to perform, and before long I think I may be able to prove to you that Mr. Jackson has deceived you, and that he is not the person he represents himself to be. Failing that, nothing remains for me to do but offer my abject apology. You will, however, confess that it is better to suspect than to be deceived. If Mr. Jackson became the husband of your daughter, and turned out to be an impostor and a scamp, you would be sorry, but sorrow would be of no avail. Better, therefore, to err on the side of caution.'
Lady Tarrant could not find fault with the logic of this argument, and the result was she promised to be silent and secret until the time came to speak, and she undertook to assist Tatlock in every way.
In the course of conversation she had mentioned incidentally that Jackson had placed in her care when he went away a small despatch box, saying that it contained valuables, and he asked her to guard it jealously till his return. No doubt he was under the impression that this box could not be in safer hands than those of his prospective mother-in-law. And this impression would have been right under other circumstances. As matters now stood, Tatlock re-quested her to let him have the box for a short time. At first she was very reluctant to do this, but yielded at last to his arguments, subject to a condition that it should be opened in her presence. This was agreed to, the services of a village blacksmith were secured, and he succeeded after some difficulty in picking the lock.
The contents of the box were principally papers, but amongst them were several United States bonds, cheque books of various English banks and of the Bank of New York. There were scores of letters, and these, together with other documents, proved that 'Jackson' was an assumed name; that the man had passed under many aliases, but that his real name was Shapcott Darlton. There was also a book containing the names and addresses of a large number of titled and wealthy people in England and elsewhere. Amongst them was the name of Lady Tarrant, with this comment:
'Rich, with unmarried daughters. Said to be an old fool and easily gulled.'
Lady Tarrant almost had a fit when she read this. It was a terrible blow to her pride and self-respect, and she could not avoid an articulate prayer of thankfulness that she had so narrowly escaped the trap set for her by the clever rascal Darlton, who, although a man of immense cleverness and ability, chose to walk in the paths of vice rather than apply his talents to the benefit of his fellow-beings, as he might have done, while enriching himself at the same time. Of course his abilities, added to his polished and plausible manner, made him terribly dangerous. He was the head of a little band of educated and expert rogues, all related by ties of blood, and who resorted to the most daring and complicated crimes in various parts of the world in order that they might enrich themselves.
Tatlock's task had finished. He briefly telegraphed at follows to the American Ambassador: 'Jackson is Shapcots Darlton.'
In a very short time afterwards Darlton was arrested, and his box of documentary evidence was seized. The woman he had met at the London and North-Western Hotel turned out to be his cousin, and the person who had sent the warning to her from America was another cousin. In due course the man and woman were extradited and sent hack to the States, where they were subsequently found guilty of many crimes, and sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.
ONE blistering August day, when London was sweltering under a tropical sun and the one aim and object of every-one seemed to be to get cooling drinks, two young men, carrying between them a solicitor's deed-box, slowly and wearily toiled up Chancery Lane. Horses, pedestrians, drivers, everyone suffered from languidness begotten of the heat. The wood pavement sweated out its tar until the atmosphere reeked with a sickening odour. The stones were hot, the walls of the houses were hot, the iron railings would have blistered the hands that touched them. The sky was cloudless; there was no wind; the sun's rays were like a thrice-heated fiery furnace. The policemen on point-duty mopped their steaming faces, and puffed and groaned. Italian ice-cream vendors did a roaring trade at the street-corners, and everywhere where they could be obtained cooled drinks, drinks, drinks were in brisk demand.
The two young men carrying the deed-box, on which was painted in white letters 'Re Edward Burley, Esq., Deceased,' moved with an evident sense of oppression. They swung the box between them with the air of men who were longing to creep into some cool and shady corner and go to sleep. They were lawyers' touts and clerks; they were ill paid, they fed coarsely, and they were cunning after their kind; but still they were human, and never having seen much of the sun, for they had never been out of England, they were overcome.
Coming from the opposite direction, a stranger stopped and addressed them. He wore a top-hat and frockcoat, its hideous blackness relieved by a splash of red at the buttonhole—a crimson rose. He didn't seem much affected by the heat, though, as he stopped, he removed his headgear and mopped his forehead.
'Can you tell me where Crim, Crisp & Co.'s place is?' he asked of the clerks.
'Why, you're coming away from it,' answered one. 'It's up in Gray's Inn, out of Holborn.'
'What a nuisance!' exclaimed the stranger, irritably. 'Some fool told me it was in the Middle Temple.'
The clerks laughed in chorus. 'We are going towards Gray's Inn, and will direct you, if you like.'
'It's very kind of you.' He turned in his steps and went with them. Presently he stopped. There was a tempting-looking public at the corner of a street. 'By Jove, I'm parched,' he said. 'I must go and have a drink.' He moved towards the door. The clerks looked longingly. He halted. 'Will you fellows join me?' Of course the fellows would.
The three went in through a side doorway. On the door was painted the legend 'Private Bar.' The stranger was affable, courtly, and liberal. 'Three large whiskies and soda, with a huge block of ice in each,' was his order. The ice fluid was grateful to the cracked lips and parched throats of the clerks. They had put the deed-box on a fixed seat against the panelling of the compartment. The bar was pretty full, and people came and went. The whiskies and soda were consumed, and with princely liberality the courteous stranger commanded the glasses to be replenished. But joy and pleasure were ever evanescent. Twenty minutes or so had passed. The clerks felt hotter than ever, but their throats were not so parched. They turned to go, and to their amazement found that the deed-box had gone before them. Possibly it was a teetotal deed-box, and objected to a public-house bar. Anyway, it had disappeared. The young men rushed out. They looked north and they looked south, but the box was not visible.
The stranger commiserated with them, and wondered what sort of 'bally rascal' it was who was mean enough to steal a lawyer's deed-box. Agitated with a great distress, the young men discussed the situation. It was a very serious one for them. It meant ruin, for they would be dismissed without character, and even a lawyer's clerk must have a character of some sort for appearance sake. There was but one thing to do under the circumstances, and they did it. That was, they hurried off to the nearest police station to make known their loss, and of course they parted from the stranger, and saw him no more. As may be surmised, the case passed into the hands of Tyler Tatlock, for it was far more serious a matter than appears on the surface, and the police failed to trace the thief.
Clinton & Hills were lawyers. They had been established for some time in dingy chambers in Fleet Street, but had taken more commodious offices in Holborn, for big fees and silly clients had enriched them. To these offices they were removing on the day that the box disappeared. They had had the management for some years of the estate of a Mr. Edward Burley. He had been a wealthy man and a client of theirs for a very long time. He was regarded as an eccentric man; secretive as to his affairs, though the solicitors knew a good deal about them. He left the bulk of his property, the net value of which was about ten thousand a year, to a nephew, who was a minor at the time of his uncle's death, and the solicitors were appointed his guardians. The stolen deed-box contained documents of the utmost importance, and failing their recovery no end of complications might arise. The two youths who had been entrusted with the important duty of carrying the box to the new offices told a plain, unvarnished talc, for they were cute enough to see that any other might place them in an exceedingly awkward predicament, so for once in their lives they were truthful.
From the first Tatlock was firmly of opinion that the stranger who had accosted them and treated them to drinks was in collusion with somebody else; that the whole business was a plant, and he set to work to discover if possible who was likely to be so far interested in the estate of the late Mr. Burley as to think it worth while to steal the deeds. A mere stranger would surely never have walked off with a box of deeds relating to property of which he knew nothing. The theory, therefore, was that whoever stole the deeds knew a good deal of Mr. Edward Burley's affairs. Tatlock worked from this hypothesis. It was obvious to him that the theft was the result of a deep-laid scheme, and was carried out by some person who was well posted up in the doings of Clinton & Hills. Necessarily the detective took every means to find out if the two clerks were in any way in collusion, and he satisfied himself that the story they told was a perfectly correct one.
Clinton & Hills were not able to furnish Tatlock with any serviceable information with reference to Mr. Burley's domestic and purely private affairs. Clinton was a man well advanced in years, and had known Burley for a very long time. Hills was a young man of about thirty, and had been Clinton's partner for six years. They agreed in the opinion that Burley had been somewhat of a mystery, and, as far as they were concerned, he never talked of his past. Tatlock was convinced that in the man's past would be found a clue to the robbery, so he worked accordingly.
Burley was practically a self-made man, and a money-grabber. He was unfortunate in being violent-tempered, and of a selfish and unfeeling disposition. Tatlock gathered up these facts with comparative ease, for the prominent characteristics of a man are generally known to a pretty wide circle of people; but his further information which enabled him to solve the problem was only acquired by the exercise of great tact, discretion, and ingenuity, and at the cost of much patient toil.
He discovered that Burley had married when he was a little over twenty and very poor. He was married at Christchurch, Whitechapel, and the register set forth, amongst others, the following particulars:
Marriage between Edward Burley, bachelor, importer and agent; father's occupation, carpenter; and Emma Amelia Scranns, spinster, shop assistant; father's occupation, market gardener.'
For some years after the marriage the young couple lived in the neighbourhood of Whitechapel, and Burley's financial progress could be traced. At first they occupied a small house at a rental value of twenty-four pounds. Soon after they removed into one worth forty. Later still into one worth seventy, and ten years after marriage they were tenants of a comparatively palatial abode in a square situated between Bow Road and Commercial Road East.
No children came to bless the union of Mr. and Mrs. Burley, and there was a crystallised belief that their conjugal life was far from happy. Indeed, it was a tradition of the neighbourhood that Mr. Burley used to 'bash his missus,' and at last she 'took up' with a young Jew, and her liege lord and master kicked her out.
After this little incident in his domestic affairs Mr. Burley shook the dust of Whitechapel from his shoes, and, washing his hands of all and sundry, trekked west. About this time there was a hiatus of some two years that could not be easily filled up, but there was reason for the belief that Mr. Burley travelled abroad.
When next the trail was picked up he was living in a big house in Russell Square and had a small riverside residence on the banks of the Thames, near Henley. He had set up his carriage, had numerous horses and traps, kept a butler and several other servants, was believed to be a widower, was looked upon as eminently respectable, but 'close-fisted.' He had a housekeeper, a Mrs. Doyle, who had a son, a youth at this time between twelve and fourteen, in whom Mr. Burley took great interest. This son, Thomas Doyle, was a pupil at the City of London Schools, and was said to have brains. Before he was twenty he went up to Oxford, but the chief thing in which he seemed to have distinguished himself was extravagance. He plunged into debt. Mr. Burley paid his debts and forgave him. Encouraged by that, he took a still deeper plunge, but this time Burley declined to pay any more. There was a scandal, and young Doyle was rusticated. He disappeared after that, and there was reason to believe that he went abroad; but his mother continued to live for years under Mr. Burley's roof, until the measure of her years being full she passed away. Mr. Burley only survived her by two years. For years before he died he had a manservant, who acted as his valet. He was a Scotsman, by name James Gillespie. This man was with him up to his death. Tatlock discovered Gillespie in this way: In the house adjoining Burley's house in Russell Square was a servant whose sister had been a housemaid in Burley's service. This sister married Gillespie, and they took a small hotel in the neighbourhood of Henley. From Gillespie the following information was gleaned by Tatlock:
For two or three years before Mr. Burley's death a man was in the habit of visiting him occasionally. It was made evident that he was not a welcome guest. There were many signs to indicate this. He was known to the house-hold as Mr. Moore, and it was generally believed that there was some relationship between Mr. Moore and Mr. Burley. A very short time before Burley's death, and being then in delicate health, he was visited by Moore, who sat with him in his bedroom. Gillespie remembered that particular visit very well indeed, and he knew that between his master and the visitor there was a violent altercation. At last the bell of the room was rung violently, and, on Gillespie hurrying up, he found his master unconscious in his chair, while Moore was pale and agitated. He said he believed Mr. Burley was in a fit, and urged that the doctor should be summoned immediately. This was done, and as the doctor lived in the neighbourhood he was soon at Mr. Burley's house. He diagnosed the 'fit' as apoplexy, and pronounced it a serious case, and he got in a colleague, who confirmed this. The usual course in such cases was adopted, and at length the patient showed signs of being relieved.
The medical men did not consider it advisable to leave the sick man, they dined in the house together with Mr. Moore, who seemed much concerned about Burley, and was particularly anxious to know if he was likely to re-cover his faculties or not. To this the medical men gave a cautious reply. The attack was a bad one, they said, but still they were hopeful that their patient would rally. It was useless, however, to attempt to disguise the fact that he was in a dangerous condition. Moore was asked if he knew any of Burley's relations. He replied that he did not think there were any Mr. Burley would care to have about him. Nevertheless, the doctors urged that it was a duty on Moore's part to inform these relatives that Burley's life was hanging by a thread. He promised to do this on the following day, and expressed his intention of staying in the house all night. Of course no one had the power or authority to object to this.
The doctors took it in turns to watch by the bedside of the stricken man. One stayed the first half of the night, and was relieved by his colleague at four o'clock. Moore slept in a room leading out of Burley's room, though connected with the landing by an independent door. Although the word 'slept' is used, it would appear as if he slept but little or not at all, for he was constantly in and out of the patient's room, and seemed restless and ill at ease. About nine o'clock the medical watcher was alarmed by noticing a change for the worse in Burley's condition, and he sent a post-haste message to his colleague. Before the latter could arrive, however, the struggle was over. Burley was dead. Moore said that as one who all his life long had known Burley, he would avail himself of his position to seal up some of the effects. This he did in the presence of the doctors, affixing tape and seal to a cupboard in the bedroom, to the deceased man's desk, and to sundry drawers and boxes. He then left the house, saying he would call upon Mr. Burley's solicitors, whom he knew. He did that about midday, but previous to doing so he called at Burley's bank, as Tatlock discovered, and cashed an open cheque for £4,000. It was dated two days previously, and was made payable to George Moore.
As it was very unusual for Burley to give an open cheque for so large an amount, the cashier took it to the manager, who, while surprised, believed it to be all right. Nevertheless, Mr. Moore was asked if he had business connections with Mr. Burley. He seemed indignant at being questioned, and handed the cashier his card, on which was printed 'George Moore, 37 Ebury Street, Pimlico.' In the end the cheque was cashed, the amount being paid chiefly in Bank of England notes. An hour later those notes were converted into gold at the Bank of England by, there is little doubt, Moore himself.
In all these various incidents Tyler Tatlock saw good reason for thinking that the mysterious George Moore might be able to throw some light on the disappearance of the deed-box, more especially as there was reason to think the signature on the £4,000 cheque was a forgery. This could not be proved, of course, as Mr. Burley was dead, but critical examination and comparison with scores of other cheques signed by Burley revealed differences sufficiently marked to arouse suspicions. Experts, in fact, declared that the cheque was a forgery, but in the absence of Burley himself no charge of forgery could have been legally sustained.
As Tatlock worked the problem out he came to the conclusion that George Moore and Thomas Doyle were one and the same, and that Doyle was Burley's son. The description given by the doctors and Gillespie of Moore, and the description of the stranger who met Clinton & Hills' clerks as they were carrying the deed-box, were identical.
Now, it was obvious that while he lured the young men into the public-house he must have had a confederate at hand to carry off the box, and scarcely less obvious that there was a traitor in Clinton & Hills' office who gave Doyle the tip about the box. Tatlock kept this thought to himself, but he watched and probed. Besides the two youths who carried the box, there were four other clerks in the offices. But against no one of these could he get a tittle of anything that would warrant him in suspecting him. Then Tatlock said to himself:
'Thomas Doyle was Burley's son, and between them was ill blood. A quarrel between them brought on the attack of apoplexy from which Burley died. Instead of the son inheriting a share at least of his father's property, it was all left to a nephew. Doyle, enraged and desperate, thought that if he could get hold of the documents in possession of Clinton & Hills' they might be of value to him. Some-body in Clinton & Hills' office gave him information. 'Who was it? Not the clerks, because I've tested them. One of the partners, then? This is startling, but quite feasible. Which of the partners? Not Clinton. He is an old man, and very well off. Hills, then? Yes, probably. He is young, fast, extravagant. At any rate, he must be watched.'
Falling in practically with this line of argument, Tatlock did watch. Hills was not well off. He had a fourth share only in Clinton & Hills. That fourth share had been bought for him by a brother. Hills was single, but engaged to be married. One day he left England for a short holiday. He went to Paris. Tatlock went with him, but all unknown to him. The night of his arrival in Paris Hills dined at the Cafes de la Paix with Thomas Doyle alias George Moore. The detective hastened back to London, and reported to Mr. Clinton, who was shocked, but decided to take no steps till his partner came back. When he did he was questioned. He realised that his guilty secret was discovered, and did the best thing he could perhaps for himself under the circumstances—he went home and put an end to his existence.
Doyle was arrested in Paris, and in his possession was found all the deeds and papers. He declared himself the son of the late Mr. Burley, said that he and Hills had discussed the matter, and resolved that the deed-box should be stolen, and later on, when all chance of recovering it had passed, arrangements should be made to return it to the guardians subject to the payment of a large sum of money, which the partners in guilt were to share.
It was a pretty and ingenious plot, frustrated by the cleverness of Tatlock; but Doyle slipped through the meshes. He employed an exceedingly able French advocate to oppose the extradition, and owing to some technical flaw in the indictment he succeeded in getting his client released while fresh papers were being prepared in London. In the meantime Doyle disappeared, and was heard of no more.
THE great American liner, the City of Baltimore, which had been lying in the Mersey all ready for sea, had blown her final warning whistle; all visitors had been cleared from her decks, her anchors were tripped, and her mighty engines were beginning to pulse and throb through every fibre, timber, and plate of the floating city, when the scream of a tug's whistle was heard, and a tiny tug was seen to put forth from the landing-stage, and to tear through the yellow waters of the muddy river at her best speed towards the slowly-moving ship. She was flying a signal at her mast-head, and this signal caused the captain of the liner to telegraph 'Dead slow' to his engine-room. In a few minutes the tug snorted and puffed up alongside the City of Baltimore, looking in comparison like a barnacle against the side of a whale. From the liner a rope was thrown and dexterously caught on board the tug, which steamed up right amidships of the big vessel, from which a rope ladder was lowered, and the gruff voice of the captain sang out: 'Now, then there, bear a hand. Make haste, please.'
A little, dapper, agile man sprang from the rail of the tug on to the rope ladder, mounting swiftly, and, like a practised hand, he stepped lightly on to the big ship's deck, and was received by the purser and one of the officers, while a crowd of passengers, whose curiosity had been aroused, pressed eagerly round to get a glimpse of the last passenger, who had only saved his passage apparently by the 'skin of his teeth.' A leather portmanteau was pulled up after him from the tug, which was instantly cast adrift, and headed back for the landing-stage. The engines of the liner now revolved more rapidly, and the great vessel stately and grace-fully proceeded towards the sea.
The passenger who had arrived by the tug was a little man, with small piercing eyes, which were almost hidden at times when his brow was contracted. He was neatly dressed, and wore a broad-brimmed soft felt hat. He requested the purser to conduct him at once to the captain, as he bore a letter from the owners, and must deliver it at once. This statement was, of course, a passport to the captain's presence, and a quarter of an hour later the purser was summoned, and to him the captain spoke thus:
'Mr. Arnold, you must find a berth for this gentleman, Mr. Walter Bilby. A berth for himself, you understand?'
'But, sir,' protested the purser, 'I have not a vacant berth in the ship.'
'Mr. Arnold, I said you must find one.'
The purser knew the skipper too well to risk his position by attempting to argue against a matter which the skipper had said 'must' be done. So the worried purser went away scratching his head, and he held a consultation with the chief steward, and, as two heads are always better than one, the problem was ultimately solved by the steward himself giving up his cabin to the stranger, while he himself under-took to sleep on the floor in the purser's room.
The City of Baltimore was unusually crowded, for it was the autumn season, and Americans who had been 'doing Europe' were flocking back to their country in crowds. There were over a hundred passengers in the saloon alone, and upwards of five hundred second and third class. When the Baltimore had cleared the Tuskar, and began to face the swell of the sea, the majority of the passengers disappeared, and the stewards were in great request. But dapper little Mr. Bilby was evidently a seasoned traveller, as he was in no ways affected, and, smoking a big and strong cigar, he paced up and down the quarter-deck, in spite of the roll and pitch, with perfect ease.
Naturally there was much curiosity on the part of his fellow-voyagers to know who this late passenger was; evidently a person of some importance, or the big liner would not have waited for him. But Mr. Walter Bilby was not a communicative person, and he showed no disposition to satisfy the curiosity. Nevertheless, he was voted a pleasant fellow, for he could sing a good song and tell a good story. He did not exclude himself from the smoking-room, nor did he object to take a hand at cards, though all efforts to draw him out failed. But though this was the case as far as he was concerned, he was himself enabled to learn something of a good many of his companions, for he had a wonderful, insinuating, and artful way that was perfectly irresistible. An apparently chance remark, or carelessly asked question, drew a considerable amount of information from others. The impression he created is best illustrated by the following remarks of one man to another as the two stood talking on the deck that evening:
'I say, isn't that fellow Bilby a curious cuss? His eyes are precious small, and almost invisible sometimes, but upon my soul they make one feel as if they were peering into your brains. He seems to me the sort of fellow that would worm your heart's secrets out of you, but it's very little you would learn about him in return.'
Man number two acquiesced in the general correctness of this criticism, and the two agreed that Mr. Walter Bilby was somewhat of a mystery.
Amongst the lady passengers in the saloon was one who puzzled and mystified her sex no less than Mr. Bilby puzzled his. She was of somewhat masculine type, as her features were rather large. But she had a good complexion, so delicate and fresh that it was the envy of the women. Her eyes were blue, her hair, of which she had a great quantity, was tawny in hue. She had delicate and beautifully shaped hands, and wore a number of diamond rings. She occupied a berth by herself, and studiously held aloof from all her fellows. Her age might have been guessed at anything from twenty-five to forty. She spent her days in a deck chair, and seemed interested in a book, and her manner was so disdainful, so cold, so repellent, so stand-offish, that the women by tacit consent avoided her. Some of the men, however, tried to ingratiate themselves, but succeeded no better, with one exception. Mr. Bilby, to the astonishment of all, so far overcame her reserve that occasionally he sat beside her, and they chatted and laughed, and two or three times he carried her wraps down to her cabin for her.
One morning, after she had made herself comfortable in her deck chair on the leeside of the hurricane house, Mr. Bilby came on deck, and spying her out approached her. She was known on board as Miss Veronica Broadwood. The following conversation between her and Bilby was overheard by some of the other passengers:
'I wish, Miss Broadwood, you would do a little favour for me.'
'With pleasure if I can. What is it?'
'Oh, I am sure you can if you will try. It's a very small matter. I have a smoking-cap for which I have a great liking. It was given to me and elaborately embroidered by a young lady to whom I was much attached. By some carelessness I have managed to unravel a great deal of this embroidery, and I am much distressed. Will you kindly put it on again? I shall be so greatly obliged if you will.'
Miss Broadwood laughed, though there was a troubled expression on her face.
'My dear sir,' she exclaimed, 'it's absolutely beyond me—'
'Surely not.'
'Yes, it is indeed.'
'But it is only a question of sewing it on the velvet in accordance with the rest of the pattern.'
'That may be, but I cannot sew.'
'Cannot sew?'
'No. I hate it.'
'Do you never use the needle?'
'Never.'
'How strange! I thought every woman was more or less clever with the needle.'
'A popular error, Mr. Bilby. At any rate, if that is a general rule, then I am the one exception.'
'Well, well, you do astonish me. Why, I should have thought those shapely and delicate hands of yours would have been capable of executing the most exquisite needle-work.'
'If my hands have given you that impression, I am afraid they are deceptive.'
'Obviously—obviously. Well, I am sorry. I must see if I cannot get some other lady to oblige me.'
'Oh, you will have no difficulty in doing that.'
'How do you know?'
'Because you are so fascinating. What woman could resist you?'
'You've resisted me any way.'
'Don't say that.'
'But you won't oblige me.'
'Haven't I told you that I can't use the needle at all?' answered Miss Broadwood, with a certain sharpness which indicated that the subject must be dismissed. Bilby took the hint, and something else was talked about.
The City of Baltimore was a very comfortable but not a fast boat, and she usually took nearly ten days to complete the passage to New York. During the last day or two Mr. Bilby, it was noticed, became more than ever attentive to Miss Broadwood, which called forth from one lady the remark—made to another young lady—'I declare, that fellow Bilby is flirting with that she-cat, Miss Broad-wood. Well, what he can see to admire in her, goodness knows—the stuck-up hussy. I'll bet she's some adventuress on the look-out for a fellow with money.'
This was a little spiteful, but feminine, though it was but an echo of the sentiment of the rest of the ladies in the floating community.
As the vessel proceeded up East River to her berth Mr. Bilby became even more closely attentive to Miss Broad-wood. He wished to know if he could be of use to her. Might he inquire where she was going to stay?
She thanked him very much, but she would not trouble him in any way. She did not quite know where she was going to. She expected friends to meet her, and they would make all arrangements. Possibly she would only stay in New York a few hours.
When the vessel was berthed and the custom-house officers were examining the passengers' baggage, Mr. Bilby strolled to the section where the ladies' baggage was being subjected to scrutiny. Miss Broadwood, unlike most of her sex, had only a comparatively small box. Nevertheless the officers were turning everything out of it, while the lady herself stood by, looking pale and anxious. For a woman of position, as she seemed to be, she had an astonishingly meagre and scant wardrobe, which caused one of the men to exclaim ironically:
'Well, madam, I guess European shopkeepers ain't much better off for your visit, and the revenue of this country won't benefit by your trip.'
Miss Broadwood did not reply, though she looked very indignant. She peremptorily ordered the man to put all her things back. That done, she locked her trunk, and instructed one of the licensed porters to convey it for her to an address she gave in Twenty-Fifth Street. She then joined two gentlemanly-looking men who had evidently been waiting for her, and the three drove in a carriage to Delmonico's, where they dined sumptuously, the party being swelled by two other men and two ladies, who also arrived in a carriage.
The next morning pretty early Miss Broadwood called in a state of excitement at the chief Police Bureau to coin-plain that on the previous evening she had handed her trunk to a licensed porter, No. 107, for conveyance to an address in Twenty-Fifth Street, but he had failed to deliver the box, and she was terribly distressed about it. The officer on duty asked her if she was sure she had given her property into the charge of a licensed man. She said there was no mistake about it. She looked at his badge, and he showed her his licence. The officer was puzzled. All the licensed men were vigilantly superintended, and robbery by one of them was almost an unknown thing. However, he promised that very active steps should be made at once to get on the track of the man and recover the lost trunk.
Miss Broadwood was in a great state of mental commotion, and declared that she would pay a reward of a hundred dollars if the box was at once restored to her with its contents intact. The officer said he would do his best, and communicate with her immediately he heard anything. On this understanding Miss Broadwood took her departure, looking disconsolate and downcast. She had not been gone very long before another curious thing happened. The officer received a fresh visitor, and this time it was Mr. Bilby. This gentleman remained at the Bureau for over an hour, and had a long interview with the chief. Then he went away.
In the course of that day Miss Broadwood sent repeated, urgent messages to the station to inquire if her lost property had been heard of. To the last message an answer was returned to the effect that the police hoped to give her some information about the trunk in a few hours.
The principal houses in Twenty-Fifth Street were very imposing, and proportionately as high-rented as they were high architecturally. They were let out in flats, and occupied by people of means and position. The address Miss Broadwood had given was at one of the most imposing buildings in the thoroughfare, on the third floor of a ten-storeyed structure. Night had closed in when a dozen men assembled at the main entrance. They had come in twos and threes from different directions. There was a hurried consultation amongst them, carried on in low tones. Then almost noiselessly they filed up the stairs to floor three, and gathered about the door on which was an obtrusive brass plate setting forth that the flat was the residence of 'Mr. Aaron Gristwold.' One of the men, who seemed to be the leader, rang the bell. In a few minutes the door was opened by a black manservant.
'Is Mr. Gristwold in?' was the query.
'I guess he is, but he's mighty busy. What do you want?'
'To see him,' was the curt answer, and the leader, brushing aside the nigger, swept in and was followed by the others. Several of them had revolvers in their hands. One man kept the nigger quiet, and the others marched down the passage, pushed open a door, disclosing a brilliantly-lighted room, filled with men and three or four women, including Miss Broadwood.
'Hands up!' cried the leader.
The party thus suddenly disturbed were thrown into a state of consternation. The table was littered with papers, and some of the party made a grab at them, but the intruders presented their revolvers, and in a stern, commanding voice the leader exclaimed: 'Hands up, or by God we'll shoot!' Miss Broadwood suddenly drew a small revolver from her pocket and placed it to her mouth; but before she could fire, one of the intruders rushed at her and seized her, wresting the weapon away.
The leader was the celebrated New York detective Josh Bryant, and the others were policemen, who, thanks to 'Mr. Bilby,' otherwise Tyler Tatlock, had thus swept into their net a nest of notorious scoundrels, including one of the cleverest forgers in the world, Jack Humphrey by name, but who had passed under as many aliases as there are days in the year, the latest being 'Miss Broadwood.'
To explain how this dramatic scene had been brought about it is necessary to state that a large number of United States bonds had been sold in London. These bonds, however, were forgeries. Tatlock was employed to trace the delinquent, and he obtained information to the effect that a man named 'Walter Nolan,' who had been staying at one of the large West End hotels, had sold the bonds. There was every reason to believe that Nolan was the much-wanted Jack Humphrey, who had been on the stage and was accounted an excellent actor. He was a little, effeminate man, with singularly delicate-looking white hands, and had made his mark as the impersonator of female characters, his voice being very like a woman's. When Tatlock went to the hotel he found the bird had flown. He was traced to the Euston Station, and there was every reason to believe he had gone to Liverpool, and, as he was known to be unsurpassed in the art of disguising himself, it was feared that he might get clear away.
But those who thought so reckoned without their Tatlock. Humphrey was known to have his principal quarters in New York, and to be the head of a gang there of as clever swindlers as ever preyed upon society. Tatlock surmised that the fellow would take the first boat sailing for America. That boat was the City of Baltimore. Tatlock rushed to the office of the owners, and secured the list of passengers. It was a long list, and did not help him. Yet instinctively he felt sure that his man would be on board, for, knowing that the scent was hot, he would hasten to get out of the country where the hounds were baying at his heels, so he made known his business to the owners. There wasn't a moment to lose, as the vessel was weighing anchor. But Tatlock rushed down in a cab to the landing-stage in the company of an official of the firm, who took 'Mr. Bilby' off in one of the tugs, flying a private signal to the captain that he must take this last passenger on board and find him a berth in the saloon. That order was law to the captain, and he obeyed it.
Tatlock had not been long on board before he began to suspect that there was something strange about Miss Broad-wood. He shadowed her, and at last hit upon the clever device of asking her to do some sewing for him. Her confession that she could not use the needle convinced him that 'Miss Broadwood' was not a woman. In the meantime he took the captain into his confidence, and when the ship reached the East River a message was sent to the custom-house officials to thoroughly search Miss Broadwood's trunk. Although it contained a good many articles of feminine attire there were some men's clothes, and several coils of different coloured hair. But acting on advice the officers asked no questions about this extraordinary circumstance.
When the licensed porter had started on his journey with the trunk to the address given he was overtaken by a detective from the custom-house and ordered to proceed to a police depot. There the trunk was subjected to a critical examination. It was found to be beautifully and ingeniously constructed, with double sides and lids which were well calculated to escape any but the closest scrutiny. These sides were lined with a quantity of forged bonds, banknotes, and mortgage deeds, which no doubt would have been palmed off on unsuspecting victims had it not been for Tatlock. As it was, the New York police, thanks to Tatlock, captured most of the notorious gang, and though Tatlock had not the satisfaction of conveying 'Miss Broadwood' back to England, as the rascal had to be tried first of all in the United States for crimes committed there, he was warmly congratulated on breaking up the exceedingly clever band of wretches whose depredations had been carried on for years, during which they had obtained immense sums of money.
The ruling spirit of the band was unquestionably Jack Humphreys of the many aliases, and on both sides of the Atlantic there was a sigh of relief that this marvellously clever and artistic swindler had been laid by the heels at last. In recognition of the valuable service rendered in this remarkable case Tyler Tatlock was publicly presented with a purse of gold, some plate, and a magnificently-illuminated address, subscribed for by merchants and bankers both in London and New York.
MADAME IRENE was a Spanish lady naturalised in England, where she had spent the greater part of her life. She was a widow of an uncertain age, but with a very certain income, which enabled her to live in excellent style and indulge an extravagant hobby for collecting works of art and miscellaneous knicknacks which are generally classified as bric-a-brac. Her beautifully-situated house on Richmond Hill was a storehouse of valuable art treasures, and there she entertained in a princely way, and proudly displayed her collections to anyone who took an interest in such things.
To Tatlock she went one day full of moaning and wailing. It was a distressful story she had to tell, and her artistic soul was stirred to its depths. She had just returned from a treasure-hunting expedition in Italy. She had been to quaint Bologna, the mouldering old city of a dead glory. While there she heard of one, Jacob Weinberg by name, a Jew curio-dealer, who was said to possess a wonderful Rubens. She was told of a Madonna which was reputed to be matchless. Of course she sought out Weinberg and saw the Madonna. 'A lovely head! Oh, so beautiful, so wonderful, so poetically sad, so full of divine sorrow!' Thus she rapturously described this 'unique work of art.' She bargained with Weinberg. He had elevated bargaining to a science. He demanded a sum that nearly drove her into hysterics. He expatiated with glowing warmth on the merits of the head. He declared it should never—no, never—leave his possession unless the price he asked was paid. She offered him one-third, and he wept with a wordless sorrow. When he recovered he called her attention with enthusiastic ardour to the beauty of the colouring, to the pathetic tenderness of the eyes, to the wistful, pleading, yearning expression of the saintly face. She increased her price by a hundred or two. He wept again, and vowed he would rather die than part with it unless the small value he had put upon it was paid. To sell it for less would be a sin and outrage against art. Madame wanted the treasure, but she was not without commercial instinct, and she refused to budge an inch. The Jew wailed and wept. He grew heated, he protested, he appealed. 'Art was art,' he said, and not butcher's meat.' Day after day for a whole week did the Jew and the lady struggle for mastery, and in the end the lady won, but it was at the cost of the Jew's heart, for that gentleman declared by all his fathers and prophets that that important organ of his anatomy was burst asunder. Nevertheless he was enabled to give her a receipt for her very substantial cheque, and to receive her instructions for its despatch to London. And he insisted upon her seeing with her own eyes the packing of the precious treasure. She failed not to do this. Had it been a newborn babe, or a bottle of a rare vintage port, it could not have been handled with greater tenderness. Madame saw it securely packed up in its case, the lid of which was screwed, and the address label fixed. Then, full of emotional joy, the lady took her departure and journeyed to Rome.
Two months later she arrived at her Richmond residence. Her anxious inquiries elicited the fact that a wooden case had arrived from abroad. Her heart palpitated with joy. She depicted the delight and envy of the world of art when she invited its chief representatives to view her wonderful find. It was a proud moment for her when her careful carpenter commenced to loosen the screws of the box. With what a loving regard for the precious contents of the box were the screws withdrawn! How cautiously was the lid removed and the top wrapping taken out! Then a cry of horror burst from the lips of Madame Irene, for, instead of her Madonna coming to view, all that could be discovered was a quantity of fine shavings and bits of paper. The Madonna was not there; she had been spirited away.
The shock to Madame's nerves was great. The loss from the mere monetary point of view was a very serious one, while from the art standpoint it was irreparable unless the picture could be regained.
The next post that went out carried with it a letter from the lady to the Jew. And a few posts later came a letter from the Jew to the lady. He had despatched the picture within a few hours of her seeing it packed. He was 'tremendously' distressed. The treasure had been stolen en route; probably by the rascally Italians, or still more rascally French, while the package was in transit. He was sure it could not have been abstracted on the English lines, for the English railway people and carriers were so honest. He instituted inquiries, and so did Madame, but to all and sundry it seemed a profound mystery. The Italian authorities indignantly repudiated the insinuation that the theft was committed while they had charge of the box. But the French! Yes. Was it not well known that the French railway employees were as villainous as they could be?
The French, on their part, were very blunt in their condemnation of the Italian system of conveying goods. No proper check, they alleged, was kept, and the Italians were so wanting in principles and morality that anything was possible amongst them. The English railway company were emphatic in declaring that it was next to impossible that the picture could have been stolen on their system.
Weeks were thus consumed in useless correspondence and inquiry, until in despair Madame invoked the aid of the great English detective. She had paid a very large sum for the painting, and she wanted her money back or the picture. The recovery of the picture was probable; the recovery of the money next to impossible. The Jew had delivered the property to the Bologna Railway people for transmission to England. He had paid all charges on it for transit, as he had agreed to do, and there his responsibility ended. His distress almost drove him mad, and his very elastic heart was once more broken as he thought of the unmitigated wickedness of anyone who would steal a Madonna.
Tatlock listened patiently to the story, which was told somewhat disjointedly, but with impassioned gesture. Now and again he dropped in a question, which was the means of eliciting a good deal of straightforward information, calculated to help him in working out a theory, and Madame felt a trifle happier when he took leave of her, with the assurance that he would use every endeavour to recover her picture.
As was his wont he thought the whole matter out very carefully, and examined all the possibilities. He knew that on the Continental lines robberies were of frequent occurrence. However charitably disposed one might be, it was impossible to acquit the companies of a laxity of supervision, which made crime comparatively easy. Complaints were numerous of the ransacking of passengers' luggage and the pilfering of small things, but the theft of the picture seemed to Tatlock to point to an organised plan and a pre-knowledge of the valuable contents of the wooden case. He had been careful to ascertain that when the case was opened at Richmond there was no appearance of its having been previously disturbed. It had passed through the English Custom House without examination, the 'declaration of contents' being accepted as accurate. It was very obvious, therefore, that if the picture had been stolen while in transit the thieves must have been well prepared, and have had facilities afforded them for carrying out the robbery; nor was it less clear that they were no ordinary pilferers, for the vulgar luggage-rifler would hardly be likely to carry off a unique work of art, which could only be disposed of at very great risk and under exceptionally favourable circumstances.
Tatlock had a free hand with regard to his investigations. Madame, with the enthusiasm of the art worshipper, had told him he was to spare no expense if he thought there was the faintest chance of recovering the Madonna. From the first he was of the opinion that the chances were very good, for whereas a watch, or ring, or the like, could have easily been disposed of, there was no open market for a painting by so celebrated an artist as Rubens. A genuine Rubens was far too rare for the typical pilferer to be able to offer it for sale without attracting attention to himself. A collector or dealer would to a certainty inquire about its history, and wish to know how it came into the possession of the vendor. These facts were so indisputable that it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that the guilty parties were no ordinary railway thieves.
As already stated, there had been quite a mass of correspondence on the subject. Each company over whose system the package travelled was excessively desirous of repudiating any suggestion that laxity of supervision on their part had rendered the thief's way easy. Each company tried to pose as the embodiment of all the virtues, and declared with an emphasis the outcome of firm conviction that 'it is impossible that the picture could have been stolen while it was passing over our line,' and, further, each Continental company, with the smug consciousness of exalted virtue, hinted in what might almost be described as veiled allegory that if the picture had really been stolen in transit the search-light of exhaustive inquiry should be directed on the English system. They did not make any definite accusation, but told pretty fairy stories of things that were said to have happened on English railways. Tatlock, who carefully examined this correspondence, knew what value to attach to the protestations of sweet innocence. Nor was it from any insular prejudice or obliquity of vision to the sins of his compatriots that he made up his mind that it was impossible the Madonna could have been stolen in England. The box was put on hoard of the steamer at Boulogne. The passage across the Channel occupied a little over an hour, and there was absolutely no opportunity for the box to be opened, the picture taken out, and the packing replaced in its original state unless captain and crew were in league. Such an idea as that was too absurd for consideration. Landed at Folkestone, and being marked to be expedited by grande vitesse—that is to say, by express, which meant passenger train instead of ordinary goods—it was placed with the passengers' luggage in the London boat train at Folkestone. In London it came under the notice of the custom-house authorities, but they did not open the box, and in less than twenty-four hours it was delivered at its destination.
Tatlock's inquiries and investigations were of a very exhaustive nature, and the result was that he came to the conclusion that the Madonna had never left Bologna. That suggested one or two probabilities, and narrowed the area of search considerably. One day, in the character of an art treasure seeker, he called upon Jacob Weinberg, a German Jew long resident in Italy. He was a striking-looking man, seventy years of age if a day. His singularly lined and drawn face bore in it evidence of a life spent in greed for gain. His small and somewhat vicious-looking eyes were strangely suggestive of a sleepless watchfulness for chances of money-making. Jacob Weinberg was a little man, with a restless, nervous temperament, and a wonderful command of the voluble language of persuasion, which men of his calling and religion possess to a greater or lesser degree. He displayed a passionate eagerness to trade, and a feverish anxiety lest a possible customer should depart without purchasing.
He lived in a mouldy old house that had once been a palace. Bologna is full of palaces, and the cobbler who patches your shoes beats his leather and plies his awl under a roof which probably, in the times of long ago, may have sheltered some representative of Italy's wealth and grandeur in the days of her greatness. Jacob Weinberg took snuff in a somewhat disagreeable manner; his garments were ancient and patched, and he evidently attached no weight to the axiom that 'cleanliness is next to godliness.'
As 'Mr. John Sturgess, of London,' Tyler Tatlock inspected the art treasures in Jacob Weinberg's storehouse, and he priced this and that, and made numerous inquiries. The old Jew had somewhat of a European reputation. He was in correspondence with many notabilities, and often received commissions to ransack the capitals of the Continent in search of some particular work of art that was much coveted. That he was an authority in such matters was undoubted, and in his way he was a character of much originality.
When 'Mr. Sturgess' had finished his inspection he alluded to the loss of the Madonna, and this allusion drew from the Jew an exclamation of surprise.
'Ah, you know Madame Irene?'
'A little.'
'She is to be pitied: she is to be pitied. It is sad that she should lose that fine head I sold her. Who could have stolen it, I wonder?'
'I wonder, too,' replied Tatlock reflectively.
'It could not have been done by any ordinary thief. It was all so cleverly managed.'
'Have you any theory of the robbery?' asked Tatlock.
'Yes, yes.'
'What is it?'
'Madame Irene got that Madonna very cheap. She beat me down; she is so clever, and I—I am weak, you know. She is so charming a lady that she made a triumph over me. It gave her great joy, and she must have talked about it. That is so very like a woman, you know. Madame is a great lady, and I am a poor Jew—very, very poor. But I love art, and I make many sacrifices. I like my patrons to have good things; and sometimes I lose in my bargains.'
'But how does that square in with the theory of the robbery?'
'Ah, I come to that. Madame she made a big story, no doubt. She tells people she has bought a genuine Madonna, and that she squeezed poor old Weinberg until she got her picture for the price of dirt. She boasts about that picture, and the story spreads. Then somebody who hears it makes a fine plan to steal it.'
'But surely more than one person must have been mixed up in the affair?'
'Beyond doubt. It is a business. Several persons perhaps have an interest. They provide money. They give a big bribe to some official on the railway. In Italy the officials are such rascals. They get so little wages that they can be easily bought. If you comprehend that, then the rest is easy.'
'Then you believe that the head has never left Italy?'
'I believe the robbery was done in Italy; but now the Madonna may be the other side of the world.'
'I suppose you have done your best to help Madame in her search for the lost treasure?'
'Truly, truly have I. But it has been so cleverly done. It is so difficult to trace the thieves.'
'Then you don't think the picture is likely to be recovered?'
'Alas, I fear not.'
Tatlock dismissed the subject, and soon after, much to Weinberg's disgust, he departed without making a purchase. The following day he had to answer an anxious letter of inquiry from Madame Irene, in which she urged him to candidly tell her whether he had got any clue, and if he thought it likely he would recover the painting. In reply he said:
'It is impossible for me to say at present what the chances are of recovering the Madonna. The robbery seems to have been effected in a very clever manner. Of course the railway officials here are very indignant at the mere suggestion that the picture was stolen on any part of their system. They declare it would be absolutely impossible for such a thing to be done without there was a widespread conspiracy, which would necessarily involve a good many of the employees. From my own investigations I am pretty well convinced the theft was not committed on the Italian railways, and, though I do not wish to raise your hopes too much, I think it possible I shall ultimately succeed in solving the mystery.'
In less than a week of the date of despatch of this letter to Madame, Tyler Tatlock was in Milan, and one evening, accompanied by two gendarmes and an Italian detective, armed with the necessary legal authority for a domiciliary visit, he went to an old house in the Rue Cavour. It was a sort of lumber place for the storage of all kinds of bric-à-brac and the like, and, after much rummaging about in what seemed most unlikely corners, the stolen Madonna was brought to light. Carefully packed and enfolded in long strips of canvas, it had been concealed on the beams of the roof in a loft where the spiders and dust were seldom disturbed. Forth from that house as a prisoner went a young Jew named Moses Weinberg, son of Jacob Weinberg, of Bologna, and the telegraph was set in motion to Bologna, carrying instructions that Jacob was to be arrested. And when the morrow dawned Madame Irene, to her joy and delight, was telegraphically informed by Tatlock that the lost Madonna had been recovered.
It was another triumph for Tatlock. His investigations had led him to suspect that old Weinberg could throw some light on the robbery. Link by link he worked out a chain of circumstantial evidence, and his deductions forced him to the conclusion that the Madonna was abstracted from the case by Weinberg himself after Madame had seen it packed and had herself gone away; and when Tatlock learned that Weinberg's son managed a branch establishment in Milan, and that the son had visited the father a few days after Madame had made her purchase, then were his suspicions deepened, and he resolved to lay such information in Milan as would insure him the cooperation of the Milan police. It was a clever move, the result of accurate theorising, and, as was determined at a later stage, old Weinberg, annoyed at Madame's persistency in beating him down in price, resolved that, though he took her money, she should not have the picture, which he resolved, when the affair had blown over, to sell to another customer. That little bit of greed was his ruin, and he did not live to complete the sentence that was passed upon him.
THE following story—alas! too true—records one of those grim tragedies of real life the recital of which moves one to the pathos of tears, unless one is strangely emotionless. It needs no pen-dressing, no florid colouring to heighten its dramatic interest; it is best told in the plain and homely language of everyday life. Tatlock confesses that during his long experience none of the many cases he had to deal with stirred him to his depths as this one did.
A gentle lady, tenderly nurtured and brought up, married, when she was only seventeen, Richard Ernest Merford, who held a commission in the army. He was one of a large family. His father was a country clergyman, who had practised a life of self-denial and self-suppression in order to educate his children well and bring them up respectably. It was said of Richard Merford that he was one of the handsomest men the world had ever seen. Whether that was true or not matters little, for it is not with him the narrative is mainly concerned. Two children were born unto him, a girl and a boy, the latter being named Gabriel, who grew up handsome and reckless, like his father before him. Captain Richard Merford died before he had turned forty. During his short life he discounted the future in every possible way. A small fortune he had inherited was dissipated; he alienated his friends; he blighted his career, and a scandal, in which the name of a lady of title was involved, compelled him to resign his commission. Then followed a few brief years of mad recklessness on the turf, until, wrecked with disease and broken-hearted, he sank into a dishonoured grave.
Mrs. Merford, who was a sweet woman, had borne with exemplary patience shame, contumely, and misery, struggling with heroic devotion to screen her girl and boy from the father's blighting influence. Fortunately for herself she had had a small income settled upon her, and so bound with the bonds of legal strictness that it was completely out of her husband's reach. When he died she continued to be-stow unremitting care and attention on her children; and particularly was she mindful of the boy, who was as the apple of her eye; her soul's delight. Gabriel spent some years at a public school, and then went up to Oxford; but he disappointed his tutors, and left without taking honours, and with a somewhat unsavoury odour clinging to his name. Not that he had committed, so far as was known, any grievous fault; but he was credited with many youthful follies which greatly pained all who were interested in his welfare.
On leaving college considerable influence was brought to bear by his mother's relatives, and after a few months' travelling abroad he secured an appointment as private secretary to a member of Parliament, who was immensely wealthy. For three or four years he seems to have fulfilled his duties to the entire satisfaction of his employer and with credit to himself. His employer, whom we will refer to for the purpose of the story as 'Mr. Grantly,' took great interest in him, and indicated his desire to promote his interests in every way. But heredity was strong in the young man, and some of the vices which had ruined and destroyed his father began to manifest themselves, and led him into debt. In a moment of desperation he confessed his errors to Mr. Grantly, who generously, on receiving his solemn promise to reform, paid off his liabilities, and rein-stated him in his estimation.
Mr. Grantly had three daughters, the youngest, Virginia, being about nineteen. She was a girl of surpassing beauty and high accomplishments. As might have been expected, between this beautiful girl and her father's hand-some secretary a strong attachment sprang up. Mr. Grantly, having full confidence in young Merford, treated him almost as one of his family, and, as it chanced, the secretary and Virginia were thrown much together. She was a very clever linguist, and as her father had a large foreign correspondence she attended to his foreign letters, the consequence being that she and Merford saw a great deal of each other.
It was to be revealed at a later stage that he frequently urged her with passionate pleading to go through a secret marriage with him. But against this deception she set her face with stubborn determination; and no less passionately she prayed him to go boldly to her father in an honourable, straightforward way, and ask his permission to marry her. Merford declined for some time to do this, much to the young lady's amazement, for she was very sanguine that her father, who loved her devotedly, would not stand in the way of her happiness. Nevertheless Merford maintained a stubborn obstinacy, and used every argument he could think of to bring her to his way of thinking. Virginia, however, was too dutiful and loyal, and had too high a regard for honour and truth, to deceive her father; and when Merford realised this, and he had exhausted his arguments, he sought a private interview with Mr. Grantly, and nervously and excitedly declared his passion for Virginia, and craved per-mission to marry her.
Mr. Grantly, who had never suspected anything, was quite taken aback, and had hard work to conceal his anger and annoyance. As was only natural in the case of a man of his standing and ability, he said that he would commit himself to no hasty decision one way or the other. In the meantime he would talk to Virginia, and ascertain her feelings in the matter, for he had her happiness deeply at heart. Subsequently he made known his views to his secretary, and they are best expressed, perhaps, in his own words.
From what I have seen and heard, you have succeeded in entirely winning the trust and love of my daughter, and though, if I had been referred to at an earlier date, I should resolutely have set my face against your becoming my son-in-law, I fear that matters have gone too far now, and I therefore countenance an engagement between you, subject to the following conditions:—You shall pledge me your solemn word of honour that for two years you will hold no communication with her. During that time she shall live out of England with some relatives. If at the end of the two years you are still both of the same mind I will sanction your marriage, and will liberally dower my daughter, so that you may have no financial anxiety as regards the future.'
Merford expressed himself as satisfied with the conditions, and gave the necessary promise to refrain from making any attempt to communicate with Virginia during the stipulated time. Twelve months later Mr. Grantly died somewhat suddenly after a trying and exhausting Parliamentary session. When his will became known to the family it was found that he had added a codicil, embodying in effect the verbal conditions he had made with Merford, and setting forth that if at the end of the two years Virginia was still desirous of becoming the wife of Merford, and subject to his keeping his promise not to communicate with her, he was to receive from the estate the sum of twenty-five thousand pounds, and provision was made for settling three thousand pounds a year on her for life, and her children, in the event of any being born, were not forgotten. Indeed, Mr. Grantly's generosity and foresight were displayed in a very marked manner. Until the expiry of the stipulated two years Merford was, in the event of the testator's death, to continue to act as secretary, and was charged with the duty of collating, sorting, and arranging the deceased's papers.
The foregoing may be taken as a sort of prologue to what follows. Mr. Grantly had been in his grave about six months, when Tyler Tatlock was called upon to investigate the circumstances attending the death of a young woman, known as Mrs. Sherrington, and her daughter, Ada, aged four and a half. For some time Mrs. Sherrington and her child had occupied a picturesque but lonely little cottage standing in about an acre of garden near Maidenhead. Mrs. Sherrington led a very secluded life, and had aroused the curiosity of the neighbourhood, for nothing was known about her, and she seemed determined that nothing should be known, for she visited no one, and did not encourage anyone to call upon her. She kept no servant, but twice a week a Mrs. Rogers, a charwoman from Maidenhead, went to the cottage to do the washing and help to clean up.
One morning she went as usual—it was Friday—and she found the house shut up. She knocked and waited and waited, and knocked again; but, getting no response, she became alarmed, because she knew that Mrs. Sherrington was expecting her. So she appealed to a rural constable who was passing, and expressed her fears that something was wrong. He was induced to obtain a ladder, which he reared against an upper window that was unfastened. Lifting the window, he got in, reappearing a few moments later with the startling information that Mrs. Sherrington and her child were lying on the bed, both dead, and he hurried off to make the affair known in the proper quarter. A doctor who was called in said the woman and child had been dead many hours, and, as they had both vomited very much, he was of opinion they had both partaken of some poisonous food. Of course a coroner's inquest was held, and the poison theory confirmed. In a dust-bin at the back of the house a broken pie-dish containing some remnants of a rabbit pie was found, and, as the medical evidence proved that the dead woman and child had partaken of rabbit pie shortly before death, the contents of the stomachs and the remains of the pie, which had been partly devoured by a cat, which was lying dead under a hedge a few yards away, were subjected to analysis, and the fact revealed that the pie was poisoned with arsenic, and mother and child had died from arsenic poisoning.
Here at once was a first-class sensation, and it flew on the wings of electricity from John o' Groat's to Land's End. It was just the kind of mystery the public delight in, and mystery it remained for some time. Adjournment after adjournment of the inquest became necessary, until the difficult analytical work had been completed, and when that was done there was no room to doubt that mother and child had died from eating rabbit pie which was almost saturated with arsenic. Then, of course, arose the question, Who put the arsenic in the pie?' For the time being that question was more difficult of answer than the most complicated of any of Euclid's problems. No arsenic was found in the house. Mrs. Rogers was almost the only witness. She testified to the secluded life Mrs. Sherrington lived. She never heard of arsenic being used for any purpose in the house, and did not consider it possible that her mistress could have put it in the pie wilfully. Mrs. Sherrington always seemed very happy, and was passionately fond of her child. Mrs. Rogers was aware that on two or three occasions a gentleman visited her mistress, but Mrs. Rogers had never seen him. Sometimes amongst the clothing she washed at the cottage she had found a gentleman's shirt and collars.
Jim Schofield was the next witness. He was a farm labourer, an unlettered and ignorant man, but with a certain native shrewdness and considerable intelligence. The cottage occupied by Mrs. Sherrington stood on his master's land. The farm fields surrounded it, and Jim worked in those fields early and late. He knew Mrs. Sherrington, because he kept her garden tidy, for which she often gave him a good square meal and a shilling or two. He had occasionally seen a gentleman go to and leave the house. On the day that Mrs. Sherrington and her little girl died it happened that Jim was working in the field which was separated from Mrs. Sherrington's garden by an oak paling only. Between three and four in the afternoon he saw the gentleman open the wicket gate, go up the garden path, and knock at the door of the house. In a few moments the door was opened. Mrs. Sherrington and the little girl appeared, and embraced affectionately the man, who in turn embraced them. The witness remained working in the field in full view of the cottage until seven o'clock, but did not see the man leave. A few days before his master and some friends had been out rabbit-shooting. Three of the rabbits shot were sent to Mrs. Sherrington, and Jim took them. He never saw her again after that.
This was about all the evidence there was to offer, and when everything had been weighed and examined it was made evident beyond all dispute that the woman and child had died from eating rabbit pie poisoned with arsenic, but there was nothing to prove how the arsenic got into the pie.
Of course this was the only verdict that could be returned under the circumstances, but the police were fully convinced they were face to face with a mysterious case of murder, and they enlisted Tatlock's services without delay. He states that he had rarely had anything submitted to him which looked so hopeless from the start as this case did. A careful search of the premises failed to bring to light any document or letter calculated to be of use. Mrs. Sherrington either had no correspondents or destroyed her letters as soon as read. But in the pocket of the dress she had worn on the day she died was a note written on half a sheet of note paper. It was without date or address, and was worded as follows:—
Dearest Ada,
I will run down to see you to-morrow (Thursday). I shall arrive at the house between three and four. Kiss the Babs for me.—
Lovingly yours, G.
Now it happened that it was between three and four on a Thursday that Jim Schofield saw the gentleman he had seen on two or three occasions go into the cottage. The deduction, therefore, was that the 'gentleman' and the writer of the note were the same. In a drawer in Mrs. Sherrington's bedroom, amongst a quantity of linen, a gentleman's white shirt was found, marked in one corner with the initials 'G. M.' These things and a detailed description of the mysterious visitor, the description being supplied by Jim Schofield, were all that Tatlock had to guide him in the initial stage of the inquiry. He ascertained that Mrs. Sherrington had rented the cottage two years previously to her death from a farmer named Archibald Gifford, the rent being twenty pounds a year, payable quarterly. The instalments were paid with great punctuality and regularity. In Maidenhead was a grocer's shop kept by John Hunter. At this shop Mrs. Sherrington had been in the habit of obtaining her supplies of groceries. Once she ran up an account of ten pounds odd, which was not forthcoming at the time it was expected, and, two or three applications having failed to get a settlement, John Hunter gave the debtor peremptory notice that if the amount was not forthcoming by a certain date he would pass the matter into his solicitor's hands. The result was that before the date came round Mrs. Sherrington presented a cheque in payment. The cheque was for fifteen pounds. It was drawn in favour of Ada Sherrington, and it was signed Alfred Smalley. The grocer cashed the cheque, deducting his account, and handed the balance to his customer. It was a crossed cheque, and he paid it into his bank in the usual way.
Now Tatlock noted that the brief letter found in Mrs. Sherrington's pocket and signed 'G.' had, according to the post mark on the envelope, been posted in Paddington, and the branch bank on which the cheque was drawn was also in Paddington. This to him was significant. It was suggestive that the drawer of the cheque and 'G.' both lived in Paddington; and was there not a probability, he argued, that 'G.' and Alfred Smalley were one and the same person? Inquiries at the bank elicited the fact that Alfred Smalley had had a small current account there for about two years. They did not know what or who he was, but, according to his address in their books, he lived at 27 Ebury Street, Pimlico. This proved to be a house kept by a woman who took in lodgers. She received letters from Alfred Smalley, who had once lodged at her house, though not in the name of Smalley, but Gabriel Merton. The initials marked on the shirt were 'G. M.' The lodging-house keeper further informed Tatlock that her late lodger had, she believed, been living at the house of Mr. Grantly, the member of Parliament. She did not know what Merton's occupation was, but she thought he was 'a sort of a superior kind of servant—a gentleman's wallet or something.'
Following up the clue thus obtained, Tatlock proceeded to the house of the late Mr. Grantly, and learnt Merton's true position; but Merton had suddenly disappeared a fort-night ago, leaving word that he had been called to the death-bed of a relative, and would return in a few days. But he had not returned, and had sent no word of explanation. The late Mr. Grantly interested himself in farming, and carried on a model farm in Essex. At this farm large quantities of arsenic were used for sheep. Merton had recently spent much time at the farm.
The gathering up of these facts placed Gabriel Merton under grave suspicion, which was greatly strengthened when it was ascertained that he had closed his account at the bank and removed all his things from Mr. Grantly's house. If he were honest and guiltless why had he gone off so strangely and tried to destroy his tracks? Of course Tatlock learnt the story of Merton's life, for it seemed to have been pretty well known to the late Mr. Grantly and members of his family. Merton's description and the description of the strange man who was in the habit of visiting Mrs. Sherrington were identical, and all over the country this description was circulated. A little later it was announced to Tatlock by a firm of shipowners that a young man answering the description in every way, though known to them as William Smith, had sailed in a ship of theirs called the 'Somersetshire' for Melbourne. He had booked a saloon passage, and the date of his sailing tallied with the date of Merton's leaving Mr. Grantly's house. The 'Somersetshire' was a sailing ship, but a fast one, and she had been gone three weeks.
Tatlock laid all the facts as he had gathered them up before the authorities, but they did not seem able to make up their minds as to whether or not Gabriel Merton, Alfred Smalley, and William Smith were one and the same. But Tatlock never wavered nor doubted. He was convinced, and urging the necessity for action on the part of the authorities, he was at last furnished with a warrant of arrest and commissioned to start in pursuit. A stern chase is a ong [sic] chase, and Merton had got a good start; but Tatlock secured a berth in a P. and O. boat from Southampton for Alexandria. Thence overland to Aden (it was long before the opening of the Suez Canal). At Aden he got a trading steamer just starting for Melbourne. She was a slow boat, and the passage was long and stormy.
On arriving at Melbourne he learnt that the 'Somerset-shire' had arrived weeks ago, discharged her cargo, and gone to Newcastle, on the Hunter River, to load coal for China. Of course her passengers had dispersed far and wide, and for the moment the trail of William Smith was lost. But Tatlock found that a Mr. Collins, head of the firm of Collins & Co., printers, Melbourne, had come out in the 'Somersetshire,' and to him Tatlock went in the bare hope of picking up a thread. Nor was he disappointed. Collins had become somewhat interested in William Smith, who seemed to hold himself aloof from every one. But Collins succeeded in winning his confidence to some extent, inasmuch as he asked many questions about Australia, and particularly how best to reach some gold diggings in the Braidwood district of New South Wales. After going on shore he dined, by invitation, two or three times at Mr. Collins's, and finally called to say good-bye, as he was off on a bush tramp, and was going to make his way to the diggings he had spoken of, as he intimated that he had a cousin there.
Having thus got on the trail again, Tatlock was speedily following it, accompanied by two experienced men of the mounted police force. It was a rough and trying ride through some of the finest of Australian scenery, which, at any other time, would have filled Tatlock with delight. But now he was so intent on running his quarry down that he had little thought for anything else. At last, after rapid travelling, they crossed into New South Wales, reached Braidwood, and learnt that a man answering the description of the one wanted had gone to a very wild spot called Naraga, where some quartz and alluvial diggings were being worked. Forth the trackers went, and, not without some difficulty, reached their destination, which, up to a recent period, when some prospectors had discovered gold, had been one of Nature's unbroken solitudes. William Smith was found at last, and from a portrait Tatlock carried he had no difficulty in recognising him as Gabriel Merton. When the warrant was read over to him he seemed aghast, but quickly recovering himself vowed and declared that the suspicion against him was infamous.
Protestations, however, were useless. He was arrested, deprived of all weapons, and escorted under a watchful guard to Sydney. A week later he was being conveyed back to England as a prisoner. Tatlock found him an interesting, intelligent, and clever fellow, and did what he could and dared to ameliorate the harsh conditions of his position as a prisoner charged with a dreadful crime. The prisoner's behaviour was all that could be desired. He gave no trouble, and conformed without a murmur to the rules to which he was subjected. Without being sullen he was silent and reserved, and seemed to have resigned himself to his fate.
When the vessel, which was bound to Liverpool, reached the mouth of the Mersey all hands were startled by the discovery that the prisoner passenger had strangled himself in his cabin. He left a document for Tatlock, in which he told the terrible story of his life, and acknowledged that he was Gabriel Merton and had been known as Alfred Smalley. When at Oxford he had made the acquaintance of a publican's daughter, and secretly married her. He placed her under an oath to keep the marriage secret until he gave her permission to divulge it. At his request she went to live with her child at the cottage near Maidenhead. As was inevitable, his folly came home to him, and when he found that but for this obstacle he might have married Miss Grantly and a fortune he was maddened, and in a moment of desperation he resolved to rid himself of his wife and child by the awful expedient of murder. At first he did not realise the enormity of his offence. When he did he was overwhelmed, and, unable at last to withstand the fearful strain and suspense, as he gathered that no effort was to be spared to bring the crime home to the guilty person, he resolved upon flight, the end of which was to be the dark tragedy that closed his career in sight of his native land. Had he been stronger-minded, more self-reliant, and a clever criminal, he might have managed to escape earthly punishment. As it was, his sin found him out, and the cruel deaths of his wife and daughter were revenged. In his confession he stated that he had obtained the arsenic at Mr. Grantly's farm, and had availed himself of the opportunity afforded by the temporary absence of his wife from the cottage to poison the pie which she had specially pre-pared, and which stood upon the table ready for supper.
The revelation of his awful wickedness killed his aged mother, who sank beneath the shock; and the sweet girl who had believed him true and honourable, and had loved him passionately, renounced the world and its ways and went into a convent.
A MEMORABLE CHRISTMAS
CHAPTER I — LIKE GLIDING WATER
'DYING, I bequeath to you a precious legacy—my daughter, and between dead lips I pledge you and her.'
Speaking these words, with a sad smile on his pale and wasted face, Herbert Lindmark raised with trembling white hand a tumbler of hot spirit to his lips and drank. Then replacing the glass on the table, he put his silk handkerchief to his eyes to wipe away a tear.
Herbert Lindmark, B.A. and Barrister-at-Law, was quite a young man, being at this time under thirty; but he was drifting away, silently but surely, like gliding water to the great ocean of eternity.
Scarcely a year had passed since Mr. Lindmark, having eaten all his dinners and passed his examinations, had been called to the bar. But though he had installed himself in sumptuous chambers in Lincoln's Inn, he had never yet held a brief. He had distinguished himself at his college, and might have distinguished himself in the profession he had chosen, had not a want of stability of character and a fatal weakness of purpose proved his ruin. His life had been short, but he had spent it recklessly. To use a popular phrase, he had 'burnt the candle at both ends,' and though a strong and robust man may sometimes do this and yet live to a green old age, Lindmark's constitution was too delicate and his frame too weak to withstand the liberties which had been taken with them. And so on this cold bright Christmas morning, Herbert Lindmark, Esq., Barrister-at-Law, knew and felt that he was trembling on the borders of the unknown. The scene is a comfortable room in his chambers, and a bright fire sends out warmth and a ruddy glow, and imparts a sort of crimson stain to the old dark oak furniture, and the quaint knick-knacks that had been Lindmark's hobby.
The words with which this chapter opens were ad-dressed to his confidant and bosom friend, John Gyde, his junior by several years. The two young men had been at school and college together, and since their first meeting a friendship had sprung up that had never grown cold for a single day. John Gyde, like his friend, aspired to wear silk, but though he was studying very hard he had not yet attained to the dignity of a 'call' even.
Between these two young men the contrast in character was so marked that their unalterable friendship presented one of those psychological problems that it is not easy to find solutions for by any process of ordinary reasoning. Lind-mark had been wild and reckless; Gyde steady, plodding, and rather humdrum, and it was obvious that if ever he gained any marked position in his profession it would rather be by unalterable determination to reach some given end, than by any extraordinary ability. His friend, on the other hand, had shown certain mental power that at times flashed out with the brilliancy of genius; but this, alas seems ever to be a fatal gift, and the sons of genius die young.
Lindmark's career had been a short one, but it had had its tinge of romance. He had come of good stock, and his father's boast was his patrician descent. Young Lindmark's mother dying while yet in her prime, his father had married again; but the second wife proved an clement of strife in the family; she did not take kindly to the children, and Herbert, who was the youngest of three sons, was sent early to school. During his school years he showed such marked ability that when he went to Oxford his friends predicted a brilliant future for him. He had ever been wayward, fitful, and impulsive, however, so that those who had watched him narrowly and knew him best, shook their heads dubiously and expressed fears that he would come to grief.
He had not been long at Oxford before he made the acquaintance of Dorothy Whymper, whose singular beauty of face and figure earned for her the position of the 'Belle of Oxford.' Her parents, unfortunately, were not only humble, but very vulgar. They kept a small public-house that was a noted rendezvous of betting men, and her father himself combined with the business of a publican the debasing occupation of a 'Professional Bookmaker.' These facts, however, did not deter Herbert Lindmark from becoming infatuated with the publican and bookmaker's daughter; and blind to the future, indifferent to all con-sequences, reckless of self and reputation, he secretly married her, and a few months afterwards she bore him a daughter. It was then he began to realise the false step he had taken; a truth that was brought more forcibly and painfully to him by the unprincipled importunities for money which her father was constantly making under the threat of publicly announcing the marriage. At length, when driven to desperation, Herbert determined to go to his own father like a prodigal son, and, confessing his fault, sue for pardon. The confession, however, almost stunned Mr. Lindmark. It was a crushing blow to his pride. Sternly refusing to see his daughter-in-law, he ordered his son never again to darken his doors. Herbert obeyed the order to the letter, and between him and his irate parent a reconcilation [sic] was never effected, as Mr. Lindmark died soon afterwards, his end being accelerated, so people said, by his son's mésalliance.
His father's death was certainly a blow to Herbert, who began to feel the penalty of his error, for his marriage relations proved unhappy. His wife was vain and extravagant, and at that time, owing to his slender means, he was unable to gratify her taste, the result being disastrous to his domestic peace. It was destined, however, that this should not last long, for Mrs. Lindmark fell into a rapid decline, and left him a widower. Possibly he felt this to be a relief, and as he noticed that his daughter Dorothy gave promise of inheriting all her mother's extraordinary beauty, he determined that he would use every endeavour to prevent her developing her mother's mental characteristics.
Fortunately about this time he came into a small but comfortable fortune left to him by an aunt, and this enabled him to make such provision for his child as would secure her being well brought up. None of his own relations would ever recognise her, and as he was painfully anxious that she should not be subject to the baneful influences of her mother's connections, he had placed her under the care of an English lady resident in Paris.
This, then, was Herbert Lindmark's little history; and now at an age when many men can scarcely be said to have passed their youth, his frail constitution had broken down through over-study and dissipation, and he knew only too well that he must die.
His friend John Gyde was the only son of a barrister who had gained some eminence in his day, but he had been dead three years, and young Gyde's widowed mother was the only life between him and the possession of a snug little estate in Devonshire, which comprised a very quaint and curious old house known as the 'Raven's Nest,' which had been in his family for many generations. Gyde, notwithstanding that he came from a legal stock, had never shown much love for the law, but at the earnest entreaties of his friend Lindmark he had taken chambers in the Inn, and was plodding on with his studies in a manner that was peculiarly characteristic of him.
It had been his intention to have spent the Christmas, upon which this story opens, with his mother in Devonshire, but the serious illness of his friend had induced him to remain in town. Gyde knew very well that his friend was dying, but still he tried to cheer him, and in answer to his remark he said:
'Tut, man, don't talk of dying yet. You are worth twenty dead men. Come, I drink to your better health.'
They clinked glasses, and drained a bumper, and then with forced gaiety Gyde continued, 'So Dorothy is coming to-day, and if I outlive you, I am to be her guardian.'
'Yes, Mrs. Turner and she would arrive from Paris last night and stay at an hotel. They will be here by twelve o'clock. As regards your outliving me, that is a certainty, and for our old friendship's sake I have appointed you Dorothy's guardian. I know how faithfully you will per-form your trust, and that makes my coming end less difficult to face. Her fortune will be about three hundred a year, so that her future is secure, save in one thing.' Lindmark paused, covered his face with his hand for a moment, then said: 'That one thing is marriage; I suppose she will want to marry some day; and if I could live till that time, the husband I would choose for her would be the counterpart of yourself.'
'You flatter me,' said Gyde thoughtfully; 'but one thing you may rely upon, I will guard her jealously, and no man shall ever have my consent to wed her unless he is of sterling worth.'
'God bless you,' Lindmark exclaimed in a choking voice as he grasped his friend's hand. 'But away with this melancholy. It is the last Christmas I shall spend with you; let us try and get some pleasure out of it.' Then, with a great sigh, he added: 'Ah, old fellow, we have known some jolly Christmases together, eh?'
'Yes, and I would fain hope we may yet know others.'
Lindmark shook his head sadly, as, filling his own and his friend's glass from the punch-bowl, he said, 'A toast—to be drunk in silence—To the memory of departed pleasures.'
Gyde humoured his friend, knowing his peculiarities, and drank the toast. After this, and under the influence of the liquor, Lindmark grew more cheerful, and trilled snatches of songs; but every now and then was interrupted by a cough that almost asphyxiated him, and left him pale and gasping. Thus the morning slipped away, and it was a great relief to Gyde when he heard the bell ring, and the old housekeeper came in to announce the arrival of 'Mrs. Turner and Miss Dorothy.' In a few minutes the door of the apartment was flung open, and a young, bright, and laughing girl burst into the room with a joyous cry of delight, and flying to Lindmark, and throwing her arms round his neck, she exclaimed, 'Oh, my dear, dear papa, I am so glad to see you!' Then suddenly, as she heard the hacking cough and saw the bloodless face, she drew back in alarm and said, 'Oh, papa, what is the matter? You are ill, and you have never told me anything about it.'
He pressed the fair head to his shrunken chest, and with a ghastly smile he answered:
'No, darling, I have not told you. I did not think it necessary to do so. But come, come, we mustn't talk of illness now. I want this to be a very pleasant Christmas to you, so that in after years it may live in your memory. Possibly, dear'—here his voice faltered—'possibly, dear, you and I will not be able to spend next Christmas together; but if I could only get a little stronger I would go away to some warm climate, and I might then get perfectly well again.'
Lindmark spoke thus to calm the fears of his child, but he knew perfectly well that his days were numbered, and that if his life stretched out for another three months it was as much as it would. Knowing the hopelessness of his case, he had become, as it were, despairingly reckless, and was rather disposed to hasten the coming end, and so cut short the torturing suspense, than make an attempt to delay it.
His daughter was deeply affected, and cried very much, but she was too young to fully realise the dreadful truth, and under the influence of her father's forced laughter, and Gyde's jokes, she grew merry as a cricket. She sat on Gyde's knee and pulled his beard; then she played havoc amongst her father's books, and next, with sweet wilfulness, rattled off a stirring piece on the piano. She was, indeed, a young wild beauty, and her presence was like a burst of glad sunshine.
At this time Dorothy Lindmark was about eleven years of age, with a face of perfect sweetness. She was beautiful, and she knew it, and she had so often heard people exclaim when they first beheld her, 'What a pretty child; what beautiful hair she's got; what bonny eyes!' that she had become very vain. Her skin was almost waxen in its fairness, and her mouth was exquisitely shaped. Her eyes were hazel and languid, while an astonishing wealth of fair hair fell in ripples about her shoulders.
Mrs. Turner, under whose care Dorothy had been in Paris, was a stiff and severe lady of a very uncertain age. Rigid as to her morals and unbending as to her discipline, she had been iron-handed with Dorothy, who consequently felt like a bird escaped from its cage whenever she got a holiday.
The poor child was very happy on this Christmas afternoon, in spite of the severe looks that Mrs. Turner gave her every now and then, for this lady seemed to think that a child should be stiff, conventional, and silent. But Dorothy, when she was with her father, knew that she could do much as she liked, and for the sake of these brief snatches of joyous freedom she was ready to endure any amount of extra discipline that Mrs. Turner liked to impose.
The dinner passed off very merrily, and Herbert Lindmark seemed in unusually high spirits, and, much to good Mrs. Turner's amazement, he allowed his daughter to partake of a little glass of sherry, and to follow this with a glass of champagne; and the lady's indignation reached a point when it burst into a wordy protest as she witnessed her charge attack a third helping of the rich Christmas pudding, very freely moistened with brandy sauce. But Lindmark, who had never brooked authority, would tolerate no interference now, and said politely:
'Excuse me, Mrs. Turner, if I say that I wish Dorothy to do as she likes to-day.'
The lady felt the rebuke and held her peace, though, as the saying is, her blood boiled; but she was a worldly-minded and selfish woman, and knew that she could not afford to quarrel with Mr. Lindmark.
Mrs. Turner was the widow of an officer in the army who had been dead nearly a dozen years. He left her with one son and a hundred a year, and on this scant income she had lived in genteel poverty in Paris. The sixty guineas a year, therefore, which Mr. Lindmark allowed her for Dorothy's keep and education was not to be lightly thrown away. Now, notwithstanding that Mrs. Turner had highly respectable connections, and had been well brought up and well educated herself, she was a designing if not an unscrupulous woman, and she was rather fond of boasting that anything that she set her mind upon she almost invariably accomplished. One of the things upon which her mind had long been set was the marriage of her son to Dorothy when the children were old enough, as she believed Dorothy to be an heiress, and, therefore, a prize worth hooking, seeing that her son's inheritance was only a reversionary interest in the two thousand pounds from which she derived her modest income. Alfred Turner was more French than English, having been in France the greater part of his life; and as a natural consequence he had become impregnated with the insincerity and easy morality which is so conspicuous of French youth; his mother had been to great pains to thoroughly imbue him with the very French social doctrines that marriage should be a marriage of convenience and money; if love comes afterwards well and good, but if it does not it's of no consequence as long as the money is there; but under no circumstances must love be considered before the financial question. It is a pernicious doctrine, but it accorded well with Mrs. Turner's own views, and she preached it.
Alfred Turner was strikingly handsome, but exceedingly forward, and quite as fast as the most lively of his French companions; and in spite of his youth scandal had already coupled his name in a very compromising manner with that of a young lady whose husband occupied a diplomatic position abroad. To Dorothy he had always strenuously endeavoured, in accordance with his mother's promptings, to exhibit the best side of his character, and at times to display devotion, that had it been sincere would have been worthy the name of chivalry. Under these circumstances there was no wonder that the child had come to enjoy the society of her boy lover, and to feel proud and happy when he told her that some day she should be his 'wee wifie.'
To return, however. When the dinner had been cleared away, and the dessert discussed, Dorothy played several pieces on the piano by her father's request, and as the time drew near for her and Mrs. Turner to take their departure—for it was necessary for them to return to the hotel to sleep—Mr. Lindmark requested Dorothy to go with him to another apartment, as he wished to have a quiet half-hour with her.
The child had spent a happy and joyous day, and one that was likely to live green in her memory for many a long year, for it was the first Christmas she had spent with her father for five years. In spite of his flushed face, his apparent high spirits, and seeming improvement in health, it is probable that Lindmark had an impression that his end was very near, and that this might be the last opportunity he would ever have of saying what he wished to say to his daughter. Had this not been so, it is hard to understand why he should have cast a shadow over the child's gaiety, and have changed her gladness to sorrow.
Sinking into a large cushioned chair that had been wheeled up before the fire, he drew her between his knees; and as her soft cheek was laid lovingly against his, and her arms were twined about his neck, he said in tremulous tones, 'Dolly, my darling, this is Christmas night, and I have something solemn to say.' He paused, for, though he often boasted of being very stoical, he was nearly breaking down in this supreme moment. 'I am afraid, Dolly,' he continued tenderly, 'that you will never spend another Christmas day with me.'
'Why, papa?' she cried in anxious alarm, as starting back from him to arm's length, and looking into his now ashen face and burning eyes, she guessed the truth, child as she was.
He laughed a little melancholy laugh as he made answer, the while toying nervously with her golden hair, 'Because, my pet, I am afraid I shall never recover from my illness. There, there, my precious darling, don't fret like that,' he added as he strained her to him, and kissed her tenderly. Then, after a great effort to steady his voice, he went on: Young as you are, dear, I wish you as my daughter to meet the inevitable with strength of mind and fortitude. What I wish to say now, and I wish you to ever remember the words, as words coming from between dead lips, is that I have appointed my dear companion and faithful friend John Gyde your legal guardian. I know that he will watch over you with tender and fatherly care; and when you shall come to be old enough to understand such things, it will give me pleasure now to think that he might even have the right to shield you as his wife. But do not forget that I have never mentioned it to him. As the years pass on and you gain discretion and wisdom, you must use them to determine your own happiness; and that you should do so is my solemn admonition now.'
This was all he had to say, and he was glad he had said it. It had cost him a tremendous effort, but it was done and he felt lighter, for it had seemed to him a duty he owed to his child to speak a few words that should sink into her heart and influence her conduct in after life.
Dorothy made no reply. How could she? She was too young and too inexperienced to understand the stupendous mystery of death, and the equally stupendous mystery of life, with all its great responsibilities and solemn duties. She, therefore, did as any other child would have done, she caressed her father with childish fervour, and pressing her face to his breast she fretted passionately.
And so they sat with the ruddy glow of the firelight playing about them, and calling into being strange shadows that were, perhaps, typical of the shadows that were coming into the girl's life. Suddenly, on the cold still night air, a church clock slowly tolled out eleven; and with a little start Lindmark raised the face of his daughter, who had grown very quiet, and kissing her, said:
'Come, my darling, it is time you went to bed.'
As Dorothy came into the lamplight of the other room, where Gyde and Mrs. Turner were sitting, her face was flushed, her eyes tearful, and her hair disarranged. Neither Mrs. Turner nor Gyde, however, made any remark, although they both noticed these signs.
In a little while Dorothy stood arrayed in a heavy fur-cloak, and her sweet face framed in a woollen hood that made her look, if possible, even more charming. But an expression of thoughtfulness had come into that face, and caused her to appear older than her years.
With her arms round her father's neck, she clung to him for some minutes; and when at last she tore herself from him, after many warm embraces, he said:
'Remember, Dolly, you come and see me quite early tomorrow.'
'May I come at nine o'clock, papa?' she asked between her sobs.
'Yes, my darling, if you wish it.'
Mrs. Turner, who wisely witnessed the scene without making any remark, was glad enough when she and her charge were descending the stairs, piloted by John Gyde, who was to escort them to their hotel at Charing Cross, and then return to pass the night at his friend's chambers.
As soon as he was alone, and the sounds of the descending footsteps had died away, Lindmark uttered a great sob, and sank like a lump of lead upon the couch. In a few minutes he struggled to his feet, and seizing a bottle half full of champagne that stood on the table, he poured out a tumblerful of the wine and drained it at a draught. For a few brief moments it gave him a deceptive strength; but suddenly there spread over his face a ghastly pallor, and a little frothy blood oozed from between his lips. Clasping his hands to his face in a paroxysm of anguish, he uttered a deep moan of pain, then staggering back he fell, with his body on the floor and his head resting against the couch. It was long past midnight when Gyde strolled leisurely back through the silent and deserted streets. It was bitterly cold; the air was keen with frost, and the stars glittered superbly. Gyde was very thoughtful, and a shade melancholy. He thought of the severe and rigid Mrs. Turner; of the sweet child-face of Dorothy as he had last seen it framed in its woollen hood; and of the pallid wasted face of his dying friend, and he dreamed and speculated upon the future; wondered what his own future would be; what Dorothy's future would be; and whether his friend had any future. The latter part of his speculation was soon answered, for when, a few minutes later, he entered Herbert Lindmark's chamber, he found the silence which could never be unsealed. The current of Lindmark's life, like gliding water, had merged itself into the ocean of mystery which is called Death.
CHAPTER II — WITH A PASSIONATE WAIL OF PITIFUL PAIN
IVY-COVERED and honeysuckled, with quaint gable ends, and oriel windows, a smoothly shaven lawn sloping down to the brink of the river that flowed ever onward with a murmuring song, a few old elm trees overshadowing the house that stood in a scene of romantic beauty. Such was the 'Raven's Nest,' the peaceful country home of John Gyde, Esq., who was able to put Barrister-at-Law after his name, but who had never held a brief, and was never likely to do.
During the seven years that had passed since his friend Lindmark's death on that memorable Christmas night, many changes had taken place in John Gyde's circumstances. He had been called to the Bar, and had come into his fortune through his mother's death. The law had never been particularly attractive for him; he preferred the retirement and pleasures associated with the life of a country gentleman. Although not wealthy, John had ample means for the gratification of his simple tastes. His home, while not luxurious, might have served as a model for the most perfect comfort. Scarcely yet in the prime of life, and healthy and vigorous, he seemed destined to know a great many peaceful years. A handsome man and favoured by fortune, he might have had his pick of Devonshire beauties, but he had chosen to remain single, much to the astonishment of many a designing mother; and to the sorrow of many a young lady who would have lived in sackcloth and ashes for a whole year to have become the mistress of the Raven's Nest.' But Gyde avoided all the snares that were set for him, and was proof against the languishing looks and sweet smiles lavished upon him. He was a perplexing riddle to the Devonshire feminine world; and not a few shrewd ladies of uncertain age shook their heads sagely, and said, 'Ah! depend upon it, Mr. John Gyde has designs upon his ward.' Now, Mr. John Gyde's ward upon whom he was said to have designs was Dorothy Lindmark, the daughter of his dead friend, and his sacred trust given to him between dead lips.
Dorothy, or 'Doll,' as he delighted to call her, was in her nineteenth year. Beautiful as a child, she was infinitely more beautiful now that the stamp of womanhood had set its seal upon her.
For three years after her father's death, which had been a sore trial to her, she had remained in Paris under Mrs. Turner's charge. But one day she had written a hurried letter to her guardian asking him to take her away at once. On receiving this note he had lost not a moment in starting for Paris, and on arrival there he found his ward evidently unhappy. The cause of her unhappiness she would not state, though she persisted in her desire to be removed, and on his ordering her things to be packed up ready for the home-ward journey, a scene ensued between him and Mrs. Turner. The lady was evidently unprepared for this summary mode of doing business, and at first was disposed to be obstinate, but at last, recognising how fruitless it would be to oppose Dorothy's legal guardian, she withdrew her opposition, but proceeded to heap opprobrium upon the girl, accusing her of inconstancy and ingratitude, an accusation that was supported by Mrs. Turner's son Alfred. This was the first occasion upon which Alfred and Gyde had met, and it was nearly being marked by what at first threatened to be a serious quarrel. But with great dignity and firmness, Gyde told the young man that he did not recognise him, and would have nothing to say to him. Turner felt himself very effectually snubbed, and like all mean-spirited men he felt very bitter; and he made use of these words just as Gyde and his charge were on the point of leaving the house:
'Look here, Mister Gyde'—he strongly emphasized the word Mister—'look here, Mister Gyde, you've insulted me, and there's bad blood between us. If you were going to stay in France, I would call you out and shoot you like a cur. But don't think I'll forget you. Some day, perhaps, I'll retaliate.'
Gyde attached no importance to these words. He looked upon them as the frothy outpourings of a vanity-stricken boy, whose vanity had been wounded, and as such beneath contempt. He therefore did not even make reply, and in a little while had turned his back upon Paris, and was glad to have 'Doll' safely under his care.
For a year after this, John Gyde's life was very bright and very peaceful; and all his energies, all his concern, all his thoughts, were devoted to and of his ward. Her happiness and pleasure were his constant study, and in order that she should not go from his watchful care he engaged a most accomplished governess for her, but suddenly, like a flash of lighting from a summer sky, came a blight upon his peace, and a shadow on his hearth. The governess one morning sent a request that he would grant her an interview, and on his doing so she almost stunned him by expressing strong suspicion that Dorothy was secretly corresponding with a gentleman.
Gyde heard this statement in silence, and with the almost stately dignity that was part of his character, and on dismissing her, he promised to investigate the matter. For several days afterwards he said nothing, but his troubled face told how great the shock had been; and yet he could not bring himself to believe it could possibly be true. He had such faith in Doll, and that faith was not to be destroyed lightly. Still his interest in his beautiful house and grounds seemed suddenly to cease. He was frequently observed walking in gloomy silence in some of the bye-paths, or sitting dejected and thoughtful in his favourite seat under the great ivy-clad elm that was such a graceful ornament in the centre of the lawn. This change in his manner was not likely to escape notice. The housekeeper noticed it, the chambermaids noticed it, the gardener, the groom, the coachman noticed it, and wondered and talked amongst themselves as to the cause, and last, not least, Dorothy herself noticed it, and one morning followed him into the grounds, and said:
'John'—he had taught her to call him John—'there is something the matter with you. I wish you would tell me what it is.'
Then ensued within himself a terrible struggle. Was he to doubt and lose faith; or should he say nothing, but go on believing that it was impossible for her to deceive him? With such a man, so sterling, so rugged in his honesty, so strong in the grand old chivalry, a struggle between doubt and faith was likely to be very severe, and it was. But at length it seemed to him that it was his duty to tell her what he had heard, and in a few well-chosen sentences he did so.
At first she seemed covered with shame and confusion, and then indignantly denied it. It was sweet music to his ears that denial, and in a moment he had caught her in his arms, and while he caressed her he craved her pardon for ever thinking for one brief instant that she could possibly be guilty of deception.
It followed as a matter of course that the unfortunate governess was dismissed. But she went in sorrow and not in anger, and protested strongly that she had spoken truly. This protest, however, had no influence with John. His ward's denial had built his faith up whole again, and as against that denial all the protests in the world would have been unavailing, and so the peace and the brightness came back; the shadow went from off his hearth, and joy reigned once more in the 'Raven's Nest.'
It is possible that no man ever watched a girl bud and blossom, as it were, into womanhood with more tender solicitude, and more fervent admiration, than he did. Not ordinarily a demonstrative man, he became demonstrative over her. With her growth grew his love also, and John Gyde fondly dreamed of the time when his ward would become his wife. He had dreamed this dream from the memorable Christmas, when his dear friend Lindmark had said, 'Between dead lips,' and with the solemn knowledge of his near end: 'I suppose she will want to marry some day; and if I could live till that time, the husband I would choose for her would be the counterpart of yourself.' Gyde had gazed on her childish face that night, as wrapped in her hood she was a study for a painter, and he said to himself: 'I understand poor Herbert's meaning, and I will try and teach her to love me.' And then, as he returned to his friend's chambers on that bright frosty night, after he had escorted Dorothy and Mrs. Turner to their hotel, he mused thus: 'Poor child, I will be a father to you; and some day, perhaps, a husband to you. But, whether or not, I will try earnestly to make your life a sweet harmony, devoid of one jarring note. Hitherto I have gone through the world purposeless almost. Now I have a purpose, and that purpose shall be an attempt to make from one of the sweetest of children one of the most perfect of women.'
This was, perhaps, a romantic dream, but John was a young man and might be forgiven. At any rate, from the moment that he, with wonderful gentleness, broke to Dorothy the news of her father's sad death on that memorable Christmas night, up to the present moment, his purpose had become fixed and unalterable, and with true nobleness, and a great-hearted chivalry, he had tried to accomplish it; but never once had he breathed a syllable of love to her. Before he did that he wanted to learn her heart, and to know whether she could give him something more than affection—give him what a true man desires from a true woman—pure love, love that shall find no delight in aught else but the loved object; love that shall feel that in its object it finds its hope, its trust, its world, its bliss, its heaven. 'She shall never become mine from a mere sense of duty,' he said to himself, and John Gyde was too true a gentleman ever to depart from that.
The peace that came back to him when Doll denied that there was any truth in her governess's suspicions was not to remain long undisturbed. He was an observing man, and he noticed often there was a little cloud of trouble in her face, and the lightness of spirits which had hitherto so distinguished her gave place to a certain thoughtfulness that at times almost became abstraction.
Naturally enough this troubled him very much; but once, and only once, did he venture to question her as to the cause of this change, and her answer was: 'I think, John, you are getting morbidly nervous. There is really no change in me.' But there was a change, and John saw it; and when he had endured anxiety many weeks he was tempted into questioning her maid as to whether she knew of any-thing likely to cause her young mistress trouble.
This maid was a French girl, a few years older than Dorothy, who had known her in Paris, and had begged her guardian to allow her to take her into her service, a request that was at once granted, when John had made the necessary inquiries about the girl's character. She was known as Marie Delorme, and, as she had always exhibited great devotion and attachment for her mistress, John had allowed her many advantages and great freedom; in fact, had treated her more like a member of his family than a servant.
In reply to his questioning she expressed great surprise, and said that she knew of nothing that could cause Dorothy any concern.
John did not feel satisfied, but what could he do? 'I will be patient and wait,' he thought, 'and some day she will make me her confidant.'
Save for this little trouble in his own heart, and which he kept to himself, John Gyde's domestic life went on smoothly enough, and Doll reached her nineteenth birthday. Beauty itself had set its seal upon her. Men loved her, and women envied her.
It was soon after this, and on Christmas day, that John Gyde determined to speak to her of himself for the first time. He selected Christmas day, because that day had been marked with a red cross in the calendar of both their lives; if a certain sadness was associated with it, it was a purifying sadness, and one that certainly knit them together in a bond of close acquaintance, and which he hoped would bind them in a still closer bond that only death itself could sever.
For years it had been his custom—a custom hallowed by his father and mother for nearly half a century—to keep open house at Christmas time, so that the 'Raven's Nest' had become famed for its hospitality. John had the good old-fashioned notion—a notion that would be better for our common humanity were it more often acted up to—that Christmas time was a time of peace; that is, a time of peace in the sense that the truest charity of the heart should be exercised towards one's fellows, and that injuries should be forgiven, and friendships cemented.
It was a white Christmas truly this, for the weather had been singularly severe for many days. A great snowstorm had swept over the country, and this had been followed by an extraordinarily low temperature, so that the land was locked in the grip of a powerful frost that hardened the snow to iron, and bound up streamlets and ponds in ice of more than a foot in thickness.
John, his guests, and his ward worshipped in the village church that morning, and Dorothy herself had helped to make the church bright with flowers and holly.
'Doll, I should like to have a quiet half-hour with you in the library before dinner, if you will grant me the favour,' he said, as they returned from church.
It struck him that his request caused her some annoyance, judging from a look that came into her face, and he said quietly:
'Never mind, my dear. If it's not agreeable to you to give me the half-hour, I can say what I've got to say some other time.'
'Oh no, John. I will come, of course, if you wish it.'
The manner in which this was said troubled him, because he fancied that they were words that did not come from the heart. But he reasoned with himself thus—'John, John, do not be unjust; you are growing suspicious, and are inclined to misinterpret Dorothy's acts and words.' And so some time afterwards, when she presented herself at his library door, he took both her hands in his, and looking into her fair, sweet face, he said:
'Doll, I have done you a wrong in my heart, because I thought when I asked you to come here that you seemed unwilling to come. I sue for your pardon.'
During all the years that he had known her he had never once, not even when she was a child, kissed her. He had purposely avoided doing this, as he had purposely avoided doing anything that might raise the foul breath of scandal against her fair fame. Throughout, his conduct towards her, both in public and private, had been studied and reserved. In all his bearing he had been her legal guardian, and he could have defied the world to say that for a single instant the guardian had ever become merged into the lover. Yet now he was tempted—so strongly tempted—that he almost yielded to kiss her fair white forehead. But he resisted, and led her to a scat.
'Doll,' he commenced, as she did not answer his remark, 'if I did not know that on this day you always think solemnly of that memorable Christmas, eight years ago, when your dear father and my friend died in his chambers in Lincoln's Inn, I would not have ventured to remind you of it. But I have something to say, and it seems to me that this is the proper and fitting day upon which to say it. Eight years ago, on that sad Christmas morning, your father and I had been talking of your future. He told me that he had appointed me your guardian, and said: "Dying, I bequeath to you a precious legacy: my daughter, and between dead lips I pledge you and her;" and subsequently he added words that burnt themselves into my brain. After speaking of the fortune you would have, he said: "Her future is secure save in one thing—that one thing is marriage. I suppose she will marry some day, and if I could live till that time the husband I should choose for her would be the counterpart of yourself."'
As he repeated this, Dorothy, who had become very pale, suddenly pressed her handkerchief to her face, and letting her head fall upon the arm of the sofa upon which he sat, she burst into tears. This emotion seemed so natural to Gyde that, though he did not like to see her weeping, he did not attempt to disturb her; but wishing to get done with what he had determined to do, and believing that no more favourable opportunity than the present could occur, he continued:
'Those words of your father's were pregnant with a great meaning for me. I know that he meant that he wished you to become my wife when time had ripened you. I would ask you now whether during the years that I have humbly striven to justify the trust he reposed in me, and to do my duty to you, I have in your estimation proved myself worthy of asking you for your love, of asking you to become my wife?'
He had spoken hastily, and with apparent trepidation, as if his feelings were not altogether under his control.
Looking up as he uttered the last word, she exclaimed with a passionate sob—
'Oh, John, forgive me. It cannot be. I cannot love you, excepting as a dear, dear, good true friend.'
'So ends my dream,' he said, with a deep sigh that told only too well how his heart had rent. Then rising, he crossed to her, and laying his hand on her head as if in blessing, he said: 'I will always be your good and true friend; and never again will I ask you to let me be anything else. I will leave you to compose yourself, my dear, for the dinner-bell will ring soon.'
He had controlled himself now with a mighty effort, and he waited a few moments to see if she would make reply, or stay him from going; but she did not raise her head even to look at him, and her only utterances were sobs. So he went forth from the room a changed man.
It was a merry and jovial party that sat down that Christmas night to partake of the hospitality of the 'Raven's Nest.' But at the festive board was a skeleton, though only two persons saw it. Those two were John Gyde and his ward, Dorothy Lindmark. She was slightly paler than usual, and her face wore an expression of anxiety. He was, as he ever was, the hospitable host, the courtly gentleman, with ready wit and keen anticipatory attention to the wants of his guests. Alas, how little did those guests dream that these two people felt that the festivities were a mockery so long as the skeleton was there confronting them!
So sped the night away with jest and song. The holly glistened on the wall, and beneath the laughing mistletoe many a bearded face touched ruby lips. But silence at last reigned throughout the house. The guests had gone to their rooms, and all was quiet where laughter a little while ago had made the rafters ring. John Gyde had not yet retired, but feeling lonely and sad he had betaken himself to his snug little sanctum that he was fond of calling his study; where, in dressing-gown and slippers, he had ensconced himself in his great easy chair wheeled before the fire. He had lit a cigar, but it had been a mechanical act, and, with his elbow resting on the arm of the chair and his hand supporting his head, he was gazing dreamily into the glowing embers, and his other arm, with the cigar between the long white fingers, hung listlessly over the other side of the chair.
Never before had Doll gone to bed without first coming to wish him good-night, but this night she had suddenly disappeared without word or sign to him; and subsequently, on making inquiries, he was informed that she had complained of a violent headache, and had retired much earlier than usual.
'Ah, poor child,' he thought, 'I have done her a wrong in speaking of love. I ought to have known that she did not love me, and should have kept my love an inviolable secret. Poor Doll, how bright your life should be, could I order it as I could wish! It is eight years ago since your father died, and the trust he placed in my hands, as he spoke from the brink of the grave, I have held as something sacred, and have humbly tried to do my duty. Dear old Lindmark, well do I remember your strange words on that memorable Christmas night—"Dying, I bequeath to you a precious legacy—my daughter; and between dead lips I pledge you and her!" I wonder, if your poor dead lips could speak to-night, if they would praise or blame me.'
Thus John Gyde ruminated, and as the last thought passed through his brain he was suddenly startled into vigilance by a strange sound. It was a metallic sound like the falling of an iron bar, and it echoed hollow and strangely through the silent house. Now, Gyde was not a superstitious man. He was too intelligent and strong-minded for that; but for the moment that sound begat a feeling in him that had had no counterpart during his whole life, a feeling, no doubt, that was consequent on his then frame of mind, for, coming coincident with the memory of his dead friend, it was strange. But he was not the man to accept effects without trying to learn something of causes; and if superstition did for the single instant touch him, he had soon shaken it off, and, flinging his scarcely burnt cigar into the grate, he rose and listened.
In order to make what followed more intelligible to the reader it is necessary to briefly describe the ground plan of the house.
The main entrance was by a large old-fashioned porch reached by a flight of stone steps from the carriage drive. From the porch a massive oaken door gave entrance to the hall, which was a spacious passage with rooms on either side, one of these rooms nearest the entrance being John's snuggery, the window of which looked over the lawn and the river. The main staircase led up from the hall. This staircase, which was of dark polished oak, was guarded by massive carved balustrades, and the lower pilaster was surmounted by a griffin rampant, its fore paws resting on a shield, this being the coat of arms of the Gyde family—their motto, 'Animo, non astutia.' The head of the first flight of stairs was ornamented by beautifully arranged plants, that were backed by an exquisite stained-glass window. This landing and window, of course, faced anyone entering the house. As a precaution against any contingency that might arise the master of 'Raven's Nest 'insisted upon a light being kept burning all night on this landing, and it was the duty of the butler, the last thing after the gas was turned out in the house, to place a small lamp in a niche in the wall at right angles with the stained-glass window, and the lamp was so placed on this particular night. Between the stair and the wall, the passage necessarily contracted to narrower limits, ran the full length of the house, then turned sharply to the left, descended a flight of steps to the basement, where a door gave egress to the grounds. This door at night was not only securely bolted by two large bolts, one at the top and one at the bottom, but a massive iron bar, working on a centre swivel, rendered it more secure. This bar, if it was unfastened carelessly and allowed to swing by its own weight on its swivel, always made a rattling noise. Of course, Gyde was acquainted with this fact, and as he stood he instantly solved the mystery of the sound that had startled him—it was the falling bar that had made it. The bar being moved at that time of night indicated something wrong, he thought, and by one of those strong instincts, or promptings, that come to men in supreme moments, Gyde turned down his own lamp, drew back the heavy tapestry curtains that screened the bay window of the room, and, stepping into the recess, he lifted one of the laths of the venetian blind and peered out, and by the weird light of the stars he saw what he believed to be the figure of a man creeping along the lawn towards the shrubbery at the back of the house.
John was quick to act. He stepped back, drew the curtain again, touched the bell-pull that communicated with the butler's sleeping-room, opened a drawer in his desk, and took therefrom a revolver that he always kept loaded as a precautionary measure against midnight intruders, for he held the good old-fashioned faith that an Englishman's house is his castle, and that he has a right to defend it. Thus armed, he quietly opened the door of his study and stepped into the hall, and as he did so he started again, and back came that feeling of—shall I say superstition?—for there on the landing, thrown into strong relief by the green plants and the stained window, was a white shrouded figure.. It seemed to wave an arm to him, and then suddenly disappeared.
'What is this mystery?' he thought. 'Can it be possible for the dead to come back?' He stood irresolute. What man would not under such circumstances? But the feeling went as quickly as it came, and he was the strong, bold man again, for he fancied he heard somebody moving at the bottom of the passage.
Grasping his revolver firmly and making but little noise with his slippered feet, he hurried in the direction, and when he reached the angle, already spoken of, the cold blast of air that came up told him plainly that the door below was open.
'So; burglars!' he thought.
He hurried down the flight of steps. The door was open, and the rush of keen frosty air made him shiver. He stood and listened. It was strange how silent every-thing was. His heart throbbed and he heard it, and out-side the leaves rustled like the sweep of wings. Then came another sound; it was a footstep on the gravel he was sure. John stepped boldly out and cried, 'Who is there?' There was no answer, unless the night wind sighing in the leaves with ghostly moan answered. Gyde passed through the shrubbery, and got a full view of the lawn, and his eyes, now accustomed to the darkness, saw a figure near the ivy-clad elm tree.
'Who are you? If you are a stranger, you are trespassing on my grounds; stop, or I'll fire,' Gyde shouted.
But the figure did not answer, and did not seem to stop, so Gyde levelled his weapon, and cried, 'If you value your life, stop!'
Suddenly the figure was lost in the shadow thrown by the trunk of the tree, and then, with the intention of inducing a wholesome fear of his authority in the breast of the trespasser, Gyde fired towards the tree. Instantly a piercing scream rose on the night wind—it was the scream of a woman. With an awful, sickening fear in his breast, John rushed forward. He saw a man speed away across the lawn to the river, and he saw the huddled-up form of a woman lying at the foot of the tree. He stooped down and raised her. Then, with a passionate wail of pitiful pain, he exclaimed—' God forgive me! It's Doll!'
CHAPTER III — ERRORS, LIKE STRAWS UPON THE SURFACE, FLOW
THE pistol-shot and the woman's scream had aroused the household, but previous to this the alarm-bell rung by John had disturbed Mr. Septimus Smith, the butler, from his first sleep. This gentleman had been entertaining his fellow-servants in his own snuggery to a very recherche' little supper, and he had imbibed slightly more of his master's port wine than was good for him, or than his master might have approved of. So, on retiring, Mr. Septimus Smith, being in a somewhat absent state of mind, had neglected to perform his usual nightly toilet, and no doubt he was a little amazed himself, when startled into wakefulness by the warning bell, to find that he was still attired in his pantaloons and claw-hammer coat, and that he had even neglected to remove his boots; while a candle that he had left burning had a snuff fully an inch long surmounted by 'a death's head.' However, all things in the end are generally wisely ordered, and this was especially the case with Mr. Septimus Smith, who, notwithstanding that he was a little unsteady on his pins, and slightly muddled in his head, was ready prepared for any emergency, even to a lighted candle.
'I wonder what that bell means,' was Mr. Septimus Smith's sage reflection as he sat bolt upright and rubbed his eves; and then, after a pause of some duration, he added with a resigned philosophy that was really touching and beautiful: 'I suppose as it's Christmas time master's been a-making a beast of hisself, and wants me to help him up to his bed. But I consider as how such a duty as that would be unbecoming to a gentleman of my standing, so I ain't a-going to do anything as is against my dignity.'
Having thus expressed his views, Mr. Septimus Smith was addressing himself to sleep once more, when there arose on the night air the sounds of a pistol-shot and a woman's scream. The effect on Mr. Smith was almost electrical, and with upraised hair, pale face, and trembling limbs, he was suddenly standing in the centre of the room as though he had been shot from the bed by a catapult.
'Oh, lud; oh, lud!' he cried, 'there's murder a-being done!' Then he cautiously peeped out on to the passage, as he heard an uproar and many anxious inquiries being addressed to each other by frightened servants and guests. In a few minutes more, Mr. Septimus Smith was heroically bringing up the rear of an excited little crowd of guests and servants all struggling towards the stairs, on which they were met by Marie Delorme, Dorothy's French maid. Covered with shame and confusion, this young lady was struggling up as the guests were struggling down, and from the fact that her hair was disordered and hanging down her back, and that her only garment was a robe de nuit, it might have been safely assumed that shewas the ghostly figure that Gyde had seen on the landing. Such, then, were the details of an exciting picture as, 'pale as death,' and bearing the inanimate form of Dorothy in his arms, John Gyde rushed into the hall.
'For the love of Heaven,' he cried, in a passionate appeal, 'some of you ride to the village for Dr. Williams Don't spare the horses; don't wait for anything; go as you are—go at once!'
Instantly there was wailing and weeping amongst the women folk, but men sprang forward in answer to that heart-broken appeal. There was necessarily confusion; lights were procured, the stables opened, two or three of the horses hastily saddled and being ridden at a mad gallop along the hard frost-bound ground.
In the meantime, John Gyde had conveyed his burden into the dining-room, and laid her on the great wool rug. She was fully dressed, and wore a bonnet; and in addition to a heavy cloak she had a woollen shawl round her shoulders. Willing hands soon removed these things, which were saturated with blood, and it was then seen that there was a jagged wound in the fleshy part of the left side of the neck.
Amongst many accomplishments that Gyde had acquired was a smattering of that of surgery. He had studied it a bit because, as he said, 'one never knew when it might be useful.' As in most country houses, the 'Raven's Nest' was provided with a well-stocked medicine chest, and this and John's knowledge served him in good stead now, for he was enabled to apply some simple remedies that were effectual in stopping the outflow of that precious life current.
For one long hour—an hour hideous with a sort of nightmare distortions to John Gyde—the poor fellow bent over the silent form of his ward, and never once for the briefest instant relaxed his efforts to save the darling life. His brain was on fire, his heart like lead, and he felt that if she died he must either go raving mad or kill himself. At the end of this hour the excited messengers who had ridden to the village returned heated and anxious, bringing with them Dr. Williams, who bore a high local reputation as a surgeon. He was an elderly man, calm and staid. Entering the room, he removed his hat, muffler, and gloves, directing a keen, searching professional glance at the still unconscious Dorothy, nodding to Gyde, and bowing to the assembled ladies and gentlemen, and doing these things simultaneously in a sense, and with the grave professional air of a man who thoroughly understands his business; and as a further proof that hedidso, he remarked to those assembled:
'Permit me to request that you withdraw, ladies and gentlemen, if you please.'
The ladies and gentlemen were not at all loth to do this, and the ladies, suddenly awakening to the fact that being en déshabillé they were in a very unpresentable condition, scampered off to their rooms; while the gentlemen gathered in the billiard-room to discuss the mysterious affair, and suggest all sorts of theories to account for it; for John Gyde had been too much distressed to offer any explanations. Of course, Gyde remained by Dorothy's side, and as Dr. Williams stooped down and first of all felt the pulse, he said—
'What is the history of this case, Mr. Gyde?'
The sad story was soon told. Much as John would have liked to have screened Dorothy, he could not pervert the truth.
'I find that the bullet has passed right through the neck and has been within an ace of severing the carotid artery.'
'Will she live, Doctor?' Gyde asked in agonised voice.
'She may,' the Doctor replied in that pronounced professional way which indicated that, in order not to compromise himself, he clearly meant that there was an ellipsis to be supplied to complete his sentence, and the ellipsis was or may not.
In all probability, John Gyde was not slow to take it in this way, for with a choking sensation in his throat he gasped:
'Save her life, Doctor; she is too young and too beautiful to die.'
He could say no more; he felt, in fact, as if he would fall down dead himself if he remained another minute, and so somehow he got out of the room and into his own room. Then, in his solitude and loneliness, his lacerated heart found vent for its pain. Such sorrow as John Gyde suffered that night is too sacred for mere words. The sad night passed away, and the morning, bright and clear and cold, came as a relief. A programme of amusements had been drawn up the day previous for Boxing Day, but, of course, it was abandoned, and most of the guests, out of respect for the dreadful blow that had fallen upon the unhappy master of 'Raven's Nest,' prepared to take their departure.
Dr. Williams remained with his patient all night, and brought all his skill to bear on the case. At eight o'clock he felt that he could venture to go away.
Blear-eyed, haggard, careworn, ghastly in his sorrow and weariness, Gyde met him in the hall.
'What is your report now, Doctor?' he asked in a hoarse whisper.
'I venture to think we may hope; but I warn you that her life hangs by a thread. Absolute quietude is imperative. The slightest excitement will kill her. You must not go near her under any circumstances. I have left the necessary instructions for her treatment during my absence. I will return at twelve.'
John retired again to his room, but he summoned Mr. Septimus Smith, and by that gentleman sent a message to his guests, expressing his sense of dreadful sorrow for the sad and sudden termination of the festivities, and he asked their indulgence and sympathy in his bereavement.
Of course, after this it would have been discourteous for anyone to have remained, and in a few hours they had all gone, and the silence of an unrelieved sorrow brooded mournfully over the 'Raven's Nest.'
And so a week passed during which hope rose and fell. During this time John was not allowed to go near the patient. It was a torturing trial for him, and the suspense was cruel, but he endeavoured to bear it with fortitude.
On the eighth day from the time of the accident a little incident occurred that was pregnant with a great meaning. Marie Delorme, who had kept her room during the week on the plea of illness from sorrow for her mistress, descended to the dining-room, where Dorothy still lay, for it had not been considered safe to remove her. Fortunately the Doctor happened to be present, otherwise the consequences might have been more serious. Dorothy grew excited on seeing Marie, and with a shriek she exclaimed:
'Take that woman away. Don't let her come near me. All this is through her.'
What more might have been said it is difficult to tell had not Marie heat a hasty retreat; but even those few words were significant. Dr. Williams thought it wise in the present state of matters to keep this scene a secret, but it took all his skill and tact to soothe the excited patient; and for some hours afterwards there was danger of grave complications arising in the case.
On the following morning, Marie having failed to see her master, requested the coachman to drive her to the station, as she was so ill that she wished to go home to her friends without a moment's delay. Of course, the coachman complied with the request, and taking her boxes and belongings, and even some of the belongings of her mistress, Marie Delorme departed, and was heard of no more.
This incident had no effect upon Gyde. He was too absorbed, too sorrowful, too broken, to bestow any thought upon such a matter. Of course, there had been a good deal of scandal arising out of the 'Shooting affair up at the Raven's Nest'—as in local parlance it had come to be spoken of. The small-brained people, the silly chatterers, and the would-be wiseacres (who exist in every community) had many spiteful things to say, and not a few sinister rumours floated about. But if Gyde heard them at all, he certainly did not heed them. He knew well enough that your human drone who is only conspicuous by his objection-able buzz cannot live against contempt. Nothing wounds brainless gossips so much as to find that their impertinences pass unnoticed.
During these dark and dreary days John Gyde saw no company. To all comers alike the invariable answer was, 'Master cannot be seen.' They were agonising days indeed to the poor fellow; days filled with dreadful suspense and crushing anxiety.
At last, when a fortnight had drifted away, Dr. Williams reported his patient quite out of danger. Then John felt as if he had been relieved from a hideous incubus, and he breathed freely for the first time since that awful night. During the fortnight he had not been allowed to sec his ward, and the Doctor said that at least another week must pass before he could sanction an interview.
It was a long weary week to John Gyde; but at length, towards the end of January, on a brilliantly bright morning, when the air was keen with frost, and the sunlight streamed in a golden flood from a cloudless sky, John found himself in Dorothy's room.
It was a charming room, occupying one of the best positions in the house, and commanding a perfectly enrapturing panorama of river, woodland, and fell. In fitting it up for his ward he had exercised the most exquisite art tastes, and no expense had been spared. Here, with a fleecy, snow-white shawl wrapped around her, Dorothy sat before a glowing fire. Pale and thin she was, but very beautiful in spite of it. As soon as the door had closed and John was alone with her, he threw himself at her feet, and taking her delicate white hand kissed it fervently.
'Doll, my darling child; how can you ever forgive me?' he cried, forgetting in his utter unselfishness that he was the wronged one and she the sinner.
'John, you must rise,' she said in a voice that only too painfully told how ill she had been. 'It is not your place to kneel to me, but mine to you. Willingly would I perform that act of penitence if my strength would permit me, but I am too weak. Nay, do not interrupt me,' she said quickly as he was about to speak. 'My heart will break; I shall die if you don't let me relieve my over-burdened conscience.' He rose to his feet and seated him-self at a respectful distance from her. 'Ah, John,' she continued with a sob, 'I have grown very old during my illness. Before this just punishment came upon me, I was a giddy, wicked, thoughtless girl. But now I would fain hope that I am wiser. Since my dear father's death you have been more than a father to me; and now, as a wilful and disobedient daughter, I ask you to forgive me.'
'If I have anything to forgive, Doll,' he cried, 'it goes without saying that my forgiveness is yours.'
'I do not deserve your kindness,' she said; 'you should punish me; you should heap reproaches upon me; you ought to spurn me; I am unworthy even to be in your presence. But I felt that I could not live without I heard from your own lips that you would forgive me.'
'Oh, Doll, do not talk like that!' he said. 'Do not speak of yourself in such a severe manner. At the most you were guilty of some girlish escapade for which you have been visited with a punishment all too heavy and dreadful. I know not what that escapade was. I have waited to learn it from your own lips. But now I do not want to know. I only want to see you go strong and well again.'
'John,' she said solemnly, and looking at him with tearful eyes, 'your great good heart would look lightly upon my faults; and even the hideous sin I was nearly guilty of you speak of as an escapade. Oh, how you will hate me when you know the truth! How you will detest me for the deception I have practised towards you! Why did you not kill me on that night? Why did your bullet not go through my wicked heart?'
She broke down and wept passionately; and he, to calm the feeling that was agitating him, and all but wringing tears from his own eyes, rose and paced the room. Presently she recovered herself, and in a voice that was broken by 'rifting sobs,' she said:
'The truth must be told. You must hear it, John. Oh, that dreadful night! I had arranged to go away with Alfred Turner, and it was he who, like a craven as he is, fled from me when you fired.' Gyde's face darkened with an expression of fierce anger; he clenched his fists and bit his lip. 'He persecuted me, John, and never let me rest. And he found an able ally in Marie Delorme. She was always urging me to fly with him; she was everlastingly singing his praises in my ears. When I denied my governess's statements about the correspondence I was guilty of a base falsehood; but I was prompted to it by Marie, who carried my letters to Turner and brought his back to me. On that dreadful night the plot was all arranged by her. Turner had come up the river in a boat, and it had been pre-arranged that I was to meet him at one o'clock in the morning and go away to become his wife. Marie followed me downstairs. She was to see me out of the house, and the next morning was to raise the alarm about my flight, and in the course of time join me and Turner in Paris. That is the pitiable story, John. I was mad then—I am sane now. I have outraged my dead father's memory; I have outraged your hospitality, insulted your honour, betrayed your trust, but in the most solemn manner I promise that whatever punishment you like to inflict upon me I will bear it uncomplainingly, and the rest of my life shall be devoted to penitence for my heinous sin.'
She was sobbing very bitterly now, and her sobs found an echo in his breast. It was only with a supreme effort he could say, as standing before her he took her white soft hand into his own:
'Doll, what you term a "heinous sin," I still look upon as a girlish escapade, and would never have happened but for the evil influence of Marie Delorme. Your punishment has been too heavy already. No further word; no act of mine shall add to it.'
There was a pause—a long pause. She leaned wearily back in the chair and silently sobbed; and he, with his back to her, stood in the bay window gazing across the snow-covered, sunlit country, but seeing it not, because in his eyes was a blinding mist of tears. Presently he turned, and walking to her chair he stood behind it, and as he looked down on the bowed head, he said, with touching tenderness:
'Doll, circumstances have caused me to alter a resolution I made, and I venture to ask you now if you remember our interview last Christmas day in the study?'
'Yes,' she faintly murmured, the while she trembled like an aspen-leaf.
'Oh, Doll,' he cried, with a great passionate sigh, 'may I still hope to call you some day by the name of wife?' She turned her face upwards, and murmured:
'John, you are wronging yourself. I am not worthy of you. You must have a better woman than I.'
In another moment he was kneeling at her feet again. Her face, wet with streaming tears, was pressed to his, and for the first time in their lives their lips met in a kiss of passionate love. That kiss sealed his forgiveness, her sincere penitence.
It was a long time before either of them could speak. Each heart was too full for words. At last she found her voice. With her arms locked around his neck, her breath playing on his cheek, she said softly:
'John, my father speaks again from between dead lips. On that sorrowful night when he died, and he held me between his knees, he said, "What I wish to say now and I wish you to ever remember the words, as words coming from between dead lips, is that I have appointed my dear companion and faithful friend, John Gyde, your legal guardian. I know that he will watch over you with tender and fatherly care; and when you shall be old enough to understand such things it will give me pleasure now to think that he might even have the right to shield you as his wife." During my madness I forgot these words. I will never forget them again. The dead lips shall never cease to speak to me.'
Christmas has once more come, and a crowd of people have assembled to partake of the splendid hospitality of the 'Raven's Nest,' from which the shadow that had erstwhile rested there had been lifted, for that morning John Gyde and sweet Dorothy had been made man and wife in the ivy-covered church on the hill, and never did woman take for her wedded husband a truer or nobler man than Dorothy Lindmark took when she became Gyde's wife. All that year he had tenderly nursed her; wooing her back to health and happiness. During the summer he had travelled with her in Switzerland, and when they had returned she was perfectly strong again. The wound in her neck had quite healed, though an ugly scar remained. Some folks wondered why John and Dorothy had chosen Christmas day for their marriage day. They allowed these folks to wonder; but they themselves knew that Christmas must ever be a memorable time to them; for it was on a solemn Christmas night that the wish that they should become man and wife had been expressed 'Between Dead Lips.'
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A Divergent Hunger Maze Game: A Review of The 5th Wave
January 23, 2016 May 8, 2018 admin 0 Comments Gary Westfahl
It seems to be the new pattern for Hollywood success: write a young adult novel about an apocalyptic future society wherein likable teenagers are oppressed by evil adults, ostensibly for some noble purpose; stretch the story out into (at least) a trilogy; sell the rights to film producers anxious to exploit a pre-sold property, designed to appeal to a coveted target audience, that requires no expensive stars; and achieve fame and fortune from the resulting three (or four) popular movies based on your work. As I argued in a previous review, Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game (1985) provided an early model for these stories; then came Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy (2008-2010), James Dashner’s Maze Runner tetralogy (2009-2012), and Veronica Roth’s Divergent trilogy (2011-2013). Now, having begun his own as-yet-incomplete trilogy with The 5th Wave (2013), Rick Yancey is stepping forward to claim his piece of the pie.
Though the film series launched with Divergent in 2014 somehow escaped my attention, I have been dutifully watching and reviewing all adaptations of the other listed texts, and confronting a year that is not offering an over-abundance of meritorious science fiction films, I reluctantly selected The 5th Wave to complete my quota of 2016 reviews. For there is only so much one can say about films that relentlessly celebrate the unalloyed wonderfulness of young people and reprehensible perfidy of adults (with some rare exceptions), and in my last examination of such a film, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015), I fear that I was beginning to run out of things to say (so I will decline to provide the link, though I can’t prevent you from searching for that review, or the other six that fall into this category). As I consider The 5th Wave, therefore, the only logical strategy is to focus on what is different about Yancey’s approach to this lucrative genre.
The obvious innovation is that whereas the other series featured human adults in charge of repressive regimes as the villains, The 5th Wave involves sinister aliens who are seeking to conquer the Earth (though all the aliens we see happen to look like human adults). So this film is also part of a long tradition of novels and films about alien invasions, dating back to H. G. Wells’s The War of the Worlds (1898) and still thriving today, as evidenced by this film and another one on my 2016 list, Independence Day: Resurgence. But how might an author shoehorn the Collins-Dashner-Roth formula into a story about an alien attack? It is hard to imagine aliens who would only target young people, or aliens who would forge an alliance with human adults to terrorize young people. Yancey’s answer is ingenious and revelatory: his aliens begin their assault by disabling all of Earth’s technology with an electromagnetic pulse; they then trigger a massive earthquake that floods the world’s coastal cities; they unleash a deadly virus that, in the novel at least, kills all but a handful of Earth’s people; and they unveil an army of human quislings, secretly implanted long ago with a controlling alien intelligence, to begin slaughtering the survivors. Finally, as their final and utterly devastating “5th Wave,” the aliens turn to the most terrifying weapon that humans could possibly imagine: their own children.
Yes, that is Yancey’s story (though describing it in full requires a mild “spoiler”): as heroine Cassie Sullivan (Chloë Grace Moretz) struggles to stay alive in her devastated world, aliens pretending to be human soldiers recruit her kid brother Sam (Zackary Arthur), her heartthrob Ben Parish (Nick Robinson), and other youths and send them through basic training so that, imagining they are killing aliens, they can be sent out to shoot down any humans who managed to live through the pulse, earthquake, plague, and alien snipers. In the minds of these aliens, in other words, there is no reason to bother with trivial menaces like another global earthquake or another lethal disease when they can now deploy the ultimate, unstoppable force, a well-trained twelve-year-old. (Orson Scott Card nods approvingly.)
It is at this point that Yancey’s saga begins to seem very, very similar to other stories about alien invasions. He begins his novel by announcing that he is taking a different, more realistic approach, as narrator Cassie sarcastically describes “the aliens we imagine”: “They swoop down from the sky in their flying saucers to level New York and Tokyo and London, or they march across the countryside in huge machines that look living mechanical spiders, ray guns blasting away, and always, always, humanity sets aside its differences and bands together to defeat the alien horde. David slays Goliath, and everybody (except Goliath) goes home happy.” Such stories, Cassie concludes, are “crap …. like a cockroach working up a plan to defeat the shoe on its way down to crush it.” And Yancey has a point: if advanced aliens with superior technology did decide, for some reason, to attack the Earth, they would undoubtedly possess weapons that humans could not possibly resist, making their victory inevitable.
However, Yancey is eventually forced to contradict his own logic, knowing that Hollywood is never going to purchase the rights to a story about a successful alien invasion that concludes with the death of the last person on Earth and the triumph of the alien assailants. Like all other authors who have sought to profit from such adventures, he needs to assume that, despite their formidable resources, the aliens would begin to make one stupid mistake after another, enabling the beleaguered humans to defeat them. Thus, Yancey’s aliens failed to consider the possibility that some of the alien-infested youths who grew up as human beings might retain some affection for the species, or that it might prove counterproductive to train children to become efficient killers if they manage to figure out what is really going on. In other words, the aliens’ fatal flaw was making the common adult mistake of underestimating the intelligence of Earth’s brilliant children – interestingly, also the mistake that doomed Cassie’s father Oliver (Ron Livingston); for when soldiers suddenly appear and begin barking out orders, a properly suspicious Cassie advises her father that they don’t need to obey people who happen to be wearing uniforms, yet Oliver naïvely trusts the soldiers until it is too late. These crafty aliens, then, may be able to outwit Earth’s adults, but they have clearly met their match in Cassie and her fellow teenagers.
So, his saga is still unfinished, but based on the conclusion of The 5th Wave and events in its sequel The Infinite Sea (2014), it seems likely that Yancey will end up telling yet another story about how “humanity” – young humanity – “sets aside its differences and bands together to defeat the alien horde.” Still, there is one aspect of Yancey’s novel that does raise the possibility of a slightly different conclusion: we are told that the aliens were initially divided about the plan to eradicate the human race, as some supported an effort to achieve peaceful “Coexistence” with humanity. Perhaps, then, there will emerge a faction of “good aliens” who join with humans in order to defeat the “evil aliens.” But unsurprisingly, given Hollywood’s proclivity for the black-and-white simplicity of melodrama, the film says nothing about dissenting (and potentially sympathetic) aliens; instead, one of the alien-occupied snipers announces that people in his situation must make a choice between being an (obviously evil) alien or being an (obviously good) human, and the film thereby conveys the message that the only good alien is a dead alien.
The other differences between the novel and the film are relatively inconsequential; one of the secret of Collins’s, Dashner’s, Roth’s, and Yancey’s success is to write novels that read like screenplays in the form of prose, so that turning them into screenplays is relatively effortless. Here, all screenwriters Suzannah Grant, Akiva Goldsman, and Jeff Pinkner had to do was a little polishing and streamlining: an early account of an awkward date between Cassie and another boy is replaced by a scene at a party, where Cassie has a cute encounter with Ben; the characters of the subtly sinister Dr. Pam and the viciously sadistic drill instructor Reznik are combined into a subtly sinister, female Sergeant Reznik (Maria Bello); one of Ben’s fellow soldiers, Dumbo (Tony Revolori), now makes an early appearance as a survivor of the flood; the young man who rescues Cassie, Evan Walker (Alex Roe), no longer bakes bread, but he is observed engaging in the appropriately manly task of chopping wood; and the novel describes the aliens as disembodied intelligences, while the film more evocatively suggests that they are physical parasites resembling large insects residing inside human brains. Discussing more substantive alterations in Walker’s character and other changes would again take me into spoiler territory, but there are no significant surprises in the film, and if you have recently read the novel, you may find the film rather boring. Trust me on that. (And even people who were not familiar with the novel may have felt the same way; the audiences for the films I watch usually respect the no-cell-phones rule, but during an early showing of The 5th Wave in Glendora, California, I regularly glimpsed the glowing screens of smartphones.)
There is also one way in which the novel is superior to the film: its sense of humor. While Dashner departs from the norm in writing a third-person narrative, Collins, Roth, and Yancey allow their young protagonists to narrate their own stories, granting them the opportunity to display distinctive personalities and present themselves as perceptive and occasionally witty. The above quotation is one of many examples of Cassie’s amusing language, and when Ben enters the alien base with a story that he knows is implausible, he states that “I don’t need” the commander “to buy it. Just rent it for a few hours” – and provide him with time to take action. Yet there are few if any times in the film when Cassie or Ben is funny, even though Cassie provides some voiceover narration that would have allowed for greater use of Yancey’s prose. Also recalling Jennifer Lawrence’s doggedly dour Katniss Everdeen, one wonders why these young adventurers are always so serious, particularly when adult heroes who wisecrack their way through one dangerous situation after another are so commonplace. Perhaps this is yet another sign that young people today have an exaggerated sense of their own importance: “Hey, the fate of the entire human race rests upon my sixteen-year-old shoulders,” the film’s Cassie might say, “and you expect me to be telling jokes?” (Strangely, the only mildly amusing thing that Cassie says in the film relates to the youthful tendency to take things too seriously: “When you’re in high school, just about everything seems like the end of the world.”)
Another small but telling difference between the novel and the film relates to our increasingly secular society. In previous films about alien invaders, it was not unusual for the survivors to thank God for saving them (as in the original The War of the Worlds [1953] and The Day of the Triffids [1963]); the scene that opens both the novel and the film – Cassie mistakenly shoots a man who is holding a crucifix, not a weapon – suggests that individuals in her world are similarly seeking solace in their religious faith; and when Sam has trouble falling to sleep, first he and Cassie, and later he and Ben, jointly recite the prayer, “Now I lay me down to sleep ….” However, the film bizarrely replaces that prayer with the Coldplay song “Don’t Panic” (1999), about living “in a beautiful world,” and the only other references to religion that I recall were sacrilegious curses, as Cassie and another character almost simultaneously react to a bleeding wound by screaming “Jesus!” (Perhaps there is a hidden meaning here, for this comes at the time when Cassie has been rescued by a man, literally her “Savior,” who is both a human and an alien – and this is also one way to describe Jesus Christ).
As a final topic for discussion, viewers bored by a film must search desperately for something to be interested in, and I found myself obsessively trying to sort out the film’s geography. The novel establishes that the story takes place in southwestern Ohio, as indicated when Cassie smells Cincinnati burning and characters’ plans to make their way to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, and the film seems to reinforce that setting by showing a map including Antioch College and making Cassie a student of Franklin High School (presumably the Franklin High School of Franklin, Ohio, though that school’s nickname is the “Wildcats” while the film refers to the school’s nickname as the “Panthers”). However, the refugee camp that Cassie, Sam, and Oliver reach, Camp Cuyahoga, would most likely be found at the other, northeastern end of the state, either in the town of Cuyahoga Falls or the surrounding Cuyahoga County, and that is also the only logical place where an earthquake-induced tsunami from Lake Erie would imperil Cassie and Sam within one minute, a dramatic moment added to the film. Perhaps someone belatedly noted the film’s confused geography, which would explain why the film’s closing disclaimer unusually states not only that the film’s “story” and “characters” are “fictitious,” but that its “locations” are as well. (Were the producers afraid that Ohio’s Franklin High School would sue them for misrepresenting their nickname?) There are other, even more trivial issues that fleetingly caught my attention, including the significance of the film’s odd references to Spider-Man, Tim Burton’s Big Fish (2003), and “London Bridge Is Falling Down,” but these merit no extended discussions.
By now, it should be more than evident that I really didn’t enjoy watching The 5th Wave, though it is hard to explain why, for by any conventional evaluation, it qualifies as a well-crafted diversion, not unlike many successful films of the recent past. Perhaps the problem is that the film is artfully following an overly familiar, even an exhausted pattern; considered as yet another effort to foreground the plight of virtuous and wrongly persecuted youth, Yancey’s creation, counting Card, Collins, Dashner and Roth as one through four, might indeed be described as a “fifth wave” of this kind, but this film feels more like a fifteenth wave – or a fiftieth wave. To mix metaphors, Yancey may have jumped on board this gravy train a bit too late, precisely at the moment when it was about to derail, and his dreams of endless wealth may be crushed by this film’s unexpected failure. At least, I’ll frankly admit, that’s the outcome I’m hoping for, since this would prevent the production of the sequels that I am most definitely not looking forward to reviewing.
Directed by J Blakeson
Written by Susannah Grant, Akiva Goldsman, and Jeff Pinkner, based on the novel by Rick Yancey
Starring Chloë Grace Moretz, Nick Robinson, Alex Roe, Zackary Arthur, Liev Schreiber, Maria Bello, Maika Monroe, Tony Revolori, Cade Canon Ball, Alex MacNicholl, Nadji Jeter, Flynn McHugh, Ron Livingston, and Maggie Siff
Gary Westfahl has published 24 books about science fiction and fantasy, including Science Fiction Quotations: From the Inner Mind to the Outer Limits (2005), A Sense-of-Wonderful Century: Explorations of Science Fiction and Fantasy Films (2012), and William Gibson (2013); excerpts from these and his other books are available at his World of Westfahl website. He has also published hundreds of articles, reviews, and contributions to reference books. His most recent books are the three-volume A Day in a Working Life: 300 Trades and Professions through History, (2015) and An Alien Abroad: Science Fiction Columns from Interzone, soon to be available from Wildside Press.
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Actress Alfre Woodard's Blissful Family Life with her Husband and Children!
Published on: Nov 12, 2016 @ 09:11 AM
Not every celeb who gets married ends up having a divorce some years later because some of them are meant to stay for a lifetime and fortunately even after that too. Alfre Woodard sets a fine example of it with the family she has right now. She has a husband who is loving and responsible towards the family and children who carry the pride of the family proudly. Let’s know more about it.
Alfre Woodard is married to Roderick M. Spencer who is a producer and a teacher who teaches screenwriting and directing at the Emerson College since October 21, 1983. The couples are from the same field must be understanding, and that might be the reason for their long term married life as the couples have stayed married for over three decades now.
Caption: Alfre Woodard with husband Roderick Spencer arrive at the 41st NAACP Image awards in 2010.
Source: gettyimages.com
The 64 years old still feels young from within her heart and says that she will keep on feeling that way; like she used to feel that she was hot when she first met her husband. In the long run of over three decades, the couples have not produced any children of their own but have adopted a boy and a girl who are all grown up.
Caption: Alfre Woodard Reflects on Her Career, Family, and Getting Older but still feeling younger.
Caption: Alfre Woodard with daughter Mavis Spencer arrive at the 67th Annual Golden Globe Awards in 2010.
Alfre and Roderick’s daughter Mavis Spencer is a 2010 Miss Golden Globe and is currently in her early 20s. The couple’s son Duncan’s current bio is not revealed. However, he has grown up to become a handsome man.
Caption: Alfre Woodard with her son Duncan Spencer at the premiere of Annabelle in 2014.
Source: aceshowbiz.com
In this over three decades long married life, no news about the couple’s love life issue was reported and neither there have been any rumors about their divorce. The couples have been living their family life so prolifically that tabloids never found a spot where they could come up with a question rumor about their family life.
The Emmy award winning actress is quite famous for her work in various movies. She can recently be seen in Luke Cage (TV series), Knucklehead, Haunted, Burning Sands, and So B. It. With all her work during her career as an actress, Alfre Woodard has successfully grasped herself a staggering net worth of $13 million dollars.
#Film actress #television actress
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Statement by the President of the European Council on the meeting with the leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union
Brussels, European Union. Herman van Rompuy, President of the European Council, stated at the meeting with leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union the following: "I have put the accent this morning on European identity, on Europe, for who the most essential value is the respect for each and every person, a respect resulting in equal rights for everyone, nondiscrimination in all its forms, as well as solidarity and brotherhood. Today, thanks to the value we attach to each person, we are able to build a European Union that is founded on more solidarity, also between young and old."
Statement by the President of the European Commission on the meeting with the leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union
Brussels, European Union. José Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, stated at the meeting with leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union the following: "Europe is built on solidarity, but this solidarity is challenged in the crisis. When people suffer, the temptation is big to follow populist ideas and turn the European Union into a scapegoat. In reality, the EU is the only framework where both solidarity and the necessary reforms can be brought together for the common European good. We therefore should spare no effort to work hand in hand and restore solidarity between nations, between states and within states, between the rich and the poor, the old and the young. Today's meeting is an important contribution to this aim and I am encouraged by the commitment shown by all participants."
Statement of EP's Vice-President during the meeting with the leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union
Brussels, European Union. László Surján, Vice-President of the European Parliament, stated at the meeting with leaders of Freemasonry in the European Union the following: "In the European Parliament, we believe that intergenerational solidarity has helped citizens survive the recent crisis. Further, intergenerational solidarity is of paramount importance for the whole of society for other reasons - just to mention pension systems or the transfer of knowledge and experience from one generation to other."
The Presidents of the European Commission and European Council met with leaders of Freemasonry in Europe
Brussels, European Union. Yesterday in the European Union's capital was held the traditional meeting of EU's leaders and Freemasonry's representatives of the Member States. On behalf of the EU participated José Manuel Durão Barroso (President of the European Commission), Herman van Rompuy (President of the European Council) and László SURJÁN (Vice-president of the European Parliament) and on behalf of the Craft attended: Grand Orient of Belgium, the United Grand Lodges of Germany, the Grand Orient of France, Droit Humain (Belgium, France and Spain), International Masonic Order DELPHI (Greece), Women's Grand Lodge of Belgium, Women's Grand Lodge of France, the Grand Orient of Hungary, the Grand Orient Lusitano (Portugal) and the Grand Lodge of Italy.
Also, the event was also attended, among others, by Commissioner Janusz Lewandowski, Schulz's assistant (President of the European Parliament), Jean-Claude Thebault (Director of BEPA) and Katharina von Schnurbein (Advisor for BEPA). The leaders of the European Union and of the Craft discussed during the session on inter-generational solidarity and the establishment of parameters for the society of tomorrow in Europe.
In his speech, Herman van Rompuy, President of the European Council said that he wanted to emphasize two principles underlying solidarity: the "European identity" and the "transmission" (to be read as perpetuation, propagation). Rompuy said Europe is based on four core values: Greece, Rome, Christianity and the Enlightenment, and that those form our identity.
Romania will host in 2014 the most important Masonic meeting in the world
Bucharest, Romania. In accordance with the decision which was adopted in Cartagena de Indias (Colombia), the National Grand Lodge of Romania was charged with organizing the World Conference of Grand Lodges in 2014. By this, from now and until 2014, Romania holds the presidency of the World Conference.
The most important Masonic event in the world takes place every 18 months (one year and a half) and is held in turn by various Grand Lodges. The event will take place for the first time in history in the Central and Eastern Europe and the first country responsible with its organization will be Romania, the country with the largest Masonic community in this part of Europe, except Turkey.
Dr. Radu Balanescu, Grand Master of the NGLR holds the office of Executive Chairman of the World Conference and he will coordinate the events that will take place in 2014 at the Parliament Palace, the most likely location given its infrastructure, the second largest building in the world after the Pentagon.
The 12th World Conference of Masonic Grand Lodge was held in India
Chennai, India. From 21st to 23rd November 2012 in India was held the XII World Conference of Regular Grand Lodges, event hosted for the second time by the Grand Lodge of India. On the first day participants gathered at Freemasons' Hall in Chennai where they had the opportunity to socialize.
This year's conference was opened by Balaram Biswakumar (Grand Master of India), Thomas Jackson (Executive Secretary) and Radu Balanescu (Grand Master of the National Grand Lodge of Romania). The two working sessions of the World Conference were attended by the Grand Lodges/Orients of Germany, Italy (GOI), Brazil (GOB and CMSB), Venezuela, Haiti, California, Ontario, British Columbia, Utah, Peru, France (GLNF), Turkey, Panama, Austria, Paraguay (GLSP), Bolivia, Colombia, South Africa, Spain, Hungary, Romania, Russia, Madagascar, Croatia, Moldova, Congo, Bulgaria, Mauritius, Serbia, Cyprus and Albania.
Romania was represented by Grand Master Radu Balanescu who took office as Executive President of the World Conference, the most important Masonic office ever to be held by a Romanian Freemason since 1989.
Grand Orient of France warned EU's leaders attending the European Council
Brussels. European Union. A week before the European Council in which 27 Presidents or PM of EU's member states will attend, the Grand Orient of France issued a statement drawing the attention of European leaders that it is not advisable to reduced the food aid budget.
Thus, GOdF welcomed the initiative to establish FEAD (Fund for European Aid to the Most Deprived), but disagrees with a lower level of funding for food aid. The Freemasons are warning the Heads of State and Government that fighting poverty is one of the five objectives for implementing the EU 2020 strategy.
Sovereign Grand Commander of Guatemala to visit the Supreme Council of Cuba
Havana, Cuba. On November 17, 2012, the Sovereign Grand Commander of Guatemala, Brother Estuardo Ordoñez will be received by the Sovereign Grand Commander of Cuba, Brother Lazaro F. Cuesta Valdes. The host of this event will be the Galileo Sovereign Chapter #81.
The Grand Lodge of the Philippines inaugurated in Manila the Masonic Museum
Manila, Philippines. Three hours ago was inaugurated the Masonic Museum of the Grand Lodge of the Philippines. The event took place in the presence of the Grand Lodge leaders, authorities and special guests. The Grand Lodge of the Philippines is preparing to celebrate its first centenary, being the largest Masonic organization in Southeast Asia.
Pope Benedict XVI appoints Brother Vanderlei Bagnato member of the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences
Vatican City, Vatican. On November 7, 2012, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Brother Vanderlei Bagnato as member of the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
The professor and researcher Vanderlei Bagnato is a member of Estrela da Libertade (Liberty Star) Lodge #2877 of São Carlos, under the jurisdiction of the Grand Orient of São Paulo State, federated to the Grand Orient of Brazil.
Supreme Council of Mexico is awarded by the Supreme Council of Spain. Manuel Jiménez Guzmán will receive the award on behalf of the Supreme Council of Mexico
Malaga, Spain. Starting today and until tomorrow, the Supreme Council of Spain organizes its Annual Communication during which will examine the role of women in Masonic Lodges. At the conference held on the subject will attend 10 Supreme Councils of the world., including the Sovereign Grand Commander of Mexico.
The new leader of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Madrid, the scientist and Brother Jesús Soriano Carrillo will award this year's prize to the Supreme Council of Mexico in gratitude for its support given to Spanish Brethren during exile.
APMR's Secretariat General salutes the Supreme Council of Mexico and congratulate Brother Manuel Jiménez Guzmán (Sovereign Grand Commander) for receiving this prize.
Barack Obama was re-elected President of the United States
Washington, United States of America. Barack Obama (Barack Hussein Obama II) was re-elected last night as President of the United States of America. This is the second and last term of Obama at the White House.
photo: White House (Pete Souza)
London, United Kingdom. During8 to 13 November 2012, the Duke of Kent (Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England) will pay an official visit to the Falkland Islands on the occasion of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.
Second International Meeting of the European Research Lodges
Barcelona, Spain. From 8 to 9 November 2012, the Grand Lodge of Spain organizes the II International Meeting of the European Research Lodges. The event will take place at ARUS Library and will be supported by the Provincial Grand Lodge of Catalonia, Barcelona City Council and Barcelona'a Provincial Council.
The meeting will be attended by representatives of Research Lodges from Spain, Germany, England, Romania, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and Portugal. Brother Gabriel Tocu (Quatuor Coronati Lodge - National Grand Lodge of Romania) will hold a conference on 8 November. Subject: The need for a hermeneutic approach to Freemasonry.
United for Freemasonry: Euclides Acevedo and Alberto Quiñonez
Asuncion, Paraguay. Euclides Acevedo (Grand Master of the Symbolic Grand Lodge of Paraguay) and Alberto Quiñonez (Grand Master of the Centennial Symbolic Grand Lodge of Paraguay) participated today in a TV program on Unicanal. he subject was issued by the Masonic monument raised by the Symbolic Grand Lodge Masonic in front of Silvio Petirossi International Airport. Also participated in the discussion José Tomás Martínez (National Council for Laity) and Nicolas Delgado (Director Azul y Oro Radio).
Since the beginning of the discussion, José Tomás Martínez began a brutal and unjustified attack against Freemasonry, citing Papal Bulls issued several centuries ago and saying that Freemasonry is an occult society that harms society. Also, Martínez invoked "Cardinal Ratzinger;s decisions" that, he stated, are against Freemasonry.
Euclides Acevedo intervened in the discussion, bringing counterarguments and recognizing publicly that throughout history in Freemasonry were initiated Popes, bishops and priests. Alberto Quiñonez constantly supported Acevedo, claiming that Mr Martin is partisan. Moreover, Quiñonez said that one of the golden rules of Freemasonry is to respect the Constitution of the Republic.
Regarding the scandal that was generated by the Masonic monument in Paraguay, the Director od Radio Azul y Oro explained that the radio only served to provide a point of view and that it is not a revolt of the people, but the opinion of a small group of people.
The TV program can be heard on APMRTV.
Thomas Jackson did a review of Gustavo Raffi's recent book
Rome, Italy. The Executive Secretary of the World Conference of Masonic Grand Lodges did a review of the recent book published by Grand Master Gustavo Raffi. He describes Raffi as it follows:
"Gustavo Raffi is in his 13th year serving as Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy, is a civil and maritime law lawyer (...). His leadership of the Grand Orient has been extraordinary and visionary and, in some eyes, controversial. His success may be measured in the tripling of the membership numbers during his term of office (...)".
Grand Lodge Valle de Mexico and Mexico's Supreme Council want a better future for the nation
Mexico City, Mexico. On 25 October 2012, leaders of the Grand Lodge Valle de Mexico and of the AASR Supreme Council of Mexico met to review and discuss the current state of the Mexican society and to provide perspectives for the future.
Grand Orient of Brazil to hold elections for the offices of Grand Master and Deputy Grand Master
Brasilia, Brazil. On March 9, 2013 there will take place elections for the offices of Grand Master and Deputy Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Brazil. The current Grand Master Jose Marcos da Silva (President of the Inter-American Masonic Confederation) will run for another term, and he makes team with the current Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Goias, Brother Barbosa Nunes running for Deputy Grand Master.
Queen Silvia present at the awards ceremony of the Masonic Foundation of Sweden
Stockholm, Sweden. On October 11, 2012 at the Palace of Bååtska, Her Majesty Queen Silvia of Sweden was received by the President of the Masonic Foundation, Stone Svensson. The Queen of Sweden personally handed diplomas to the 32 winners in pediatric research.
The 12th World Conference of Regular Grand Lodges to be hosted by the Grand Lodge of India
Chennai, India. The largest Masonic organization on the largest continent in the world, Asia, the Grand Lodge of India will host this year's XII World Conference of regular Grand Lodges. The event will take place from 22 to 25 November 2012, during which will take place also the 51st Grand Festival of the Grand Lodge of India.
This year's theme is "The role of Freemasonry role in Universal Peacekeeping," an international hot topic given the political, economic and social development crossed by the international community.
The Executive Chairman of the World Conference of Regular Grand Lodges, Most Worshipful Grand Master Capt. Dr. Balaram Biswakumar expressed his joy to receive in India all the Grand Lodges in Amity with the Grand Lodge of India.
The Masonic Press Agency of Romania will publish new information as the events take place.
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Middle School/High School Principal North Central Area Schools 07/18/2019 07/09/2019
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Supervisor of Special Education Rochester Community Schools 07/19/2019 07/11/2019
Financial Accountant Oakland Schools 07/19/2019 07/11/2019
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My Legendary Girlfriend
Mr Commitment
Turning Thirty
His 'N' Hers
Brand New Friend
The Life and Soul of the Party
The Importance of Being a Bachelor
The Stag and Hen Weekend
Turning Forty
Seeing Other People
The Hope Family Calendar
The Man I Think I Know
Meet Melissa and Paul: Five years after they split up he's still looking for love in all the wrong places while she wants the one thing she can't have: Paul.
Meet Chris and Vicky: They're so in tune they even brush their teeth in time with each other. So what is Chris doing risking it all for a meaningless affair?
Meet Cooper and Laura: He wants to settle down, she wants to take a grown-up gap year but can their relationship really survive a year apart?
Set across a year of leaving dos, birthday parties and anniversary celebrations The Life and Soul of the Party is a warm, funny and moving tale celebrating love, life and those special moments we've all spent in the kitchen at parties.
by Mike Gayle
Amazon.co.uk Amazon.com
Q & A (for those of you who've read the book)
Tell us how you came up with the idea for The Life And Soul Of The Party.
It's corny but it's true! It actually came to me during a party. It was a leaving party for a couple of mates who were heading off to start a new life in New Zealand. The atmosphere was really fun and buzzing and one of the people I was talking to commented how everyone loves any excuse for a good get together. This led to a conversation about how crucial parties are to your social life when you're in your thirties and within seconds I was sitting there with a big grin on my face because I realised that I'd just found the idea for the next book.
How did the idea progress from there?
Once I knew that the book would be about parties the idea just snowballed. I began thinking about all the different sorts of parties that I'd been to and about all the things that might happen. But I think the idea really began to crystallise when I moved from thinking about the central theme of the book to who the lead character was going to be.
And that's Melissa isn't it?
I suppose it is in a round about kind of way. To begin with I thought I could get away with it being an ensemble piece but then I recalled how when I've read books or seen films like that I always find that I like one set of people more than I like the others and once that happens I find the others irritating because I feel like they're taking up valuable air time! Once you make it clear who the lead is people tend to be a lot more forgiving about secondary characters...or at least I'm hoping they are. Life and Soul of The Party is me having it both ways. Yes, there is a lead character but it's also an ensemble piece featuring other characters that you actually like and a story line that you're actually interested in!
Did it feel like a big move to have a woman as the lead character in a Mike Gayle novel?
Not at all. My main concern was just making sure that Melissa felt like a real person. And although she's the backbone of the story I very much feel that this isn't a book so much about men and women but rather it's a book about people in their thirties trying to make sense of the stuff that life sometimes throws at them.
Tell us how you came up with Melissa's character?
A lot of Melissa's character stemmed from the initial thinking that I did about Paul. With Paul I wanted to create someone who was like a lot of the hopeless cases that my female friends used to go out with when they were in their twenties. I wanted him to be quite insensitive and self–involved but then the more I thought about him the more I realised that perhaps it might be more interesting if he used to be like that but was on the brink of making a big change in his life. The more fixed I became on this idea the more I began to think about who might be on the other side of the relationship and gradually Melissa began to emerge.
So who exactly is Melissa?
That's a really difficult question! All I know is that I really like her and if she existed in the real world she'd definitely be someone that I could see myself hanging out with. To me she's like a snapshot of lot of my female friends from my twenties only ten years later when everyone else has moved on (through no fault of her own) she's still living the same life she was then and desperately wants to move on. I also wanted her to be bright, quirky and funny but at the same time I wanted to have a darker side to her that would be linked to the fundamental flaw in her character: her absolute inability to get over Paul.
Do you feel happy with the way she turned out?
Absolutely. I love the fact that there are moments in the book when she's incredibly strong and others where she's bordering on being pathetic. To me it makes her more real. She's not just one thing or the other and I love how these two sides of her character wrestle throughout the book.
The book begins with Melissa receiving the news about Paul. What made you choose that as your starting point?
This actually wasn't the original starting point for the book. The early drafts all started with the New Year's Eve party and although they were good I couldn't help but think that something was missing. Talking over the beginning with my wife she made the suggestion to move things around and as soon as she said it I knew that she'd fixed the problem. A single cut and paste action and suddenly the entire book was working at a completely different level. Knowing that Paul is no longer alive from the outset changes everything and makes even the smallest details seem more poignant.
The Life And Soul Of The Party is once again set in Chorlton in Manchester. What is it about this place that has you coming back for a second time given that Brand New Friend was set there too?
When I wrote Brand New Friend I had briefly considered making it part of a "Chorlton Chronicles" trilogy just because I thought it would be funny given my feelings about this great suburb but then I went on to set the next book in Brighton and Crete so that idea got put on the shelf. It probably would have stayed there too had I not gone to my friend's leaving do which just happened to be taking place in a well-known pub in Chorlton! Only one more book left and my trilogy will be complete! Whether that'll happen though is another story!
And finally, tell us something that we don't already know about The Life And Soul Of The Party.
The scene in the book where Melissa talks about the difference between boys in the eighties who fancied Ally Sheedy and the ones who fancied Molly Ringwald is actually based on a debate that has been raging amongst me and my friends for some years. And just for the record: for me it's Ringwald all the way!
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© 2019 Mike Gayle Author. All rights reserved. Designed by Essential Design (NW) Ltd.
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Forgotten Gems: Vavel-Vavel
This Greek band was formed in 1986 and ended up releasing this self-titled LP (on the record label Famous) later that same year. That LP would end up being a very hot ticket item. It ended up being on the rare side of things and before it was eventually re-released on CD by Unisound it was heavily bootlegged on CD. As for the vinyl copies? Well, if you could actually find one for sale it could end up going for as much as $200! Rather amazing for a band that people seem to have extreme reactions to-they either love the band or hate them. It should be noted that the CD re-release (which I have-mine being number 212 of 3,000) can be had for under $10.00 (the copy I got on Ebay sold for $3.00!) so if your adventurous (and/or curious) there is not much of a financial obligation involved. This one release would prove to be the only album the band released until 2002's "The Second Death". Supposedly the band's collapse was due in part to bad management and the lack of interest from record companies. Whatever the case this is an interesting album through and through (if not consistently at least in the sense that it keeps your interest) and a cult eighties heavy metal release. "Epic Power Metal" is the term most people opt for when describing this Greek band. That term doesn't quite cut it for me though. This is far more traditional heavy metal meets early progressive metal then epic power metal. To be fair there are moments when things get heavy enough to qualify as power metal, but more then anything this is heavy traditional metal. Everything from the guitar work to the bass and drums (and even the keyboard/synthesizer arrangements ) is right in line with everything early eighties heavy metal had to offer and I'd be ever so tempted to call this is a must-have if not for one slight problem and that is vocalist Pavlos Gavrilidis. To say he's uneven is putting it mild. More often than not he falls flat on his face making the music seem so out of place. There are very few moments when he gets everything just right and I suspect that has a lot to do with the various feelings associated with Vavel. If the band had been blessed with an average lead singer then this good album could have been something quite magical. As is his voice drags the release down a notch or two. It isn't enough to say skip the whole affair, but it must be noted that he is below-average at best. Still I find this one album to be quite enjoyable if for no other reason than the fact that it is a bit of an unknown release and that it represents everything I love about early to mid-eighties heavy metal. Is it worth $200.00 for an LP? Not for me. How about under $10.00 for a CD? Yeah, I could go for that especially when it means Greek heavy metal that is rare and fairly unknown. It isn't a sure thing, but it is certainly interesting and has the unmistakable feel of old-school hard and heavy music.
Labels: Forgotten Gems, Vavel
Forgotten Gems: Criminal-Dead Soul
Confidence-Prelude
Tysondog-Hammerhead 2012
The Nukes-Demonstration Cassette 2012
French Metal Friday: Der Kaiser
The Cory Smoot Experiment-When Worlds Collide
Divider/Colony-Split 7 inch.
Electric Wizard-Witchcult Today re-issue
Order Of Nine-Seventh Year of the Broken Mirror
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Out of Reach Minnesota 2017
Written by Gabriela Norton
When families pay too much for rent, they’re forced to sacrifice to make ends meet — cutting back at the grocery store or delaying a trip to the doctor.
Building on the annual report produced by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, Out of Reach Minnesota 2017 reveals that households in every corner of Minnesota are spending thousands of dollars more than they can afford each year just to pay the rent for a modest apartment.
Key findings from MHP's 2017 report include:
The amount a renter household needs to earn to afford a modest apartment (the state "housing wage") increased by 5 percent — a higher rate of change compared to the 3 percent increase from 2015 to 2016.
Minnesota has climbed to #21 on the list of most expensive states in the nation, up from #24 just five years ago, rising above states like Texas and Arizona.
To afford a two-bedroom apartment, the median-income renter in Minnesota would need a 13 percent raise.
A full-time minimum wage earner can’t afford even a one-bedroom apartment in any of Minnesota’s 87 counties.
The lowest income households — those earning 30 percent or less of area median income — can afford a modest one-bedroom apartment in only four of Minnesota’s 87 counties. Even efficiencies are not affordable in 35 counties.
When rent is out of reach for those who are fully employed, our communities pay the price. We cannot afford to let housing costs continue to climb, while wages remain stagnant.
Housing is far more expensive than renters can afford
In Minnesota, the rent for a modest two-bedroom apartment is out of reach for even median-income renters, who have to pay more than $1,300 more per year than they can afford for housing. Challenges are even steeper for those earning minimum wage; they have to pay more than $5,600 more per year than they can afford for a two-bedroom and nearly $3,300 more per year than they can afford for a one-bedroom. When households are spending thousands of dollars beyond their means for housing, they must make sacrifices in other areas, like healthcare and groceries.
Communities of color are disproportionately impacted.
The growing gap between wages and rent has a disproportionate impact on communities of color. Statewide, the median wages earned by Black and Native American workers is half that of White and Asian workers. In the Twin Cities, these disparities are particularly stark. For instance, in Hennepin and Ramsey counties, the median income for a household of color is, on average, 40 percent less than the median income for a White household.
Minimum wage workers must work more than one job to afford rent for a modest apartment in every Minnesota county.
A minimum wage earner would have to work more than 40 hours per week to afford even a one-bedroom apartment in all Minnesota counties. Statewide, a one-bedroom apartment costs $269 more per month than a minimum wage earner can afford. In non-metro areas, minimum wage workers must work 45 hours per week to afford a modest one-bedroom apartment, and 58 hours per week for a two-bedroom. Minimum wage workers in the Twin Cities metropolitan area must work 70 hours per week to afford a modest one-bedroom apartment and 88 hours per week for a two-bedroom — the highest number for major metropolitan areas in the state.
Across the income spectrum, renters face wide gaps between rent and what they can afford.
In 69 percent of Minnesota counties, the median-income renter can’t afford rent for a two-bedroom apartment. At the state level, there is a more than $100 monthly gap — or $1,200 annual gap — between median renter income and what’s needed to afford a two-bedroom apartment. In non-metro areas the gap decreases, but only to $45 per month or $540 per year.
The lowest income households in Minnesota — those earning 30% or less of area median income — can only afford $611 per month in rent. A household individual earning 30 percent of area median income can afford a modest one-bedroom apartment in only four of Minnesota’s 87 counties: Waseca, Sibley, Kittson, and Lyon. In 29 counties, the monthly gap exceeds $100.
See more tables in the Minnesota report and visit the NLIHC Out of Reach website for additional information about Minnesota’s rental affordability by county and metro area.
For more information and data notes for Out of Reach, contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 651-925-5557, or see "How to Use the Numbers/Where the Numbers Come From" at the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC) 2017 Out of Reach.
Rental Snapshots
Housing Continuum
State of the State's Housing 2019
County Profiles
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September 30, 1990, The Washington Post
The Haus Hollein Built
Vienna's version of Trump Tower
The Viennese have a tradition of baiting their architects. Even before the imperial Opera House opened in 1869, a local critic likened the building to an “elephant lying down to digest its dinner.” One of the two men responsible for the neo-Renaissance structure, Eduard van der Nuell, felt so downtrodden by popular abuse that he hanged himself. His partner, August von Siccardsburg, is said to have died of despair two months later. The modernist Adolf Loos proved somewhat better at coping with vituperative attacks on his revolutionary simplicity, though he bitterly mused, “All Vienna has taste, only Loos has none.”
Perhaps this is why it has taken nearly a quarter of a century for the city’s most celebrated contemporary architect, Hans Hollein, to realize a major project in his hometown. Recipient of the 1985 Pritzker Prize for architecture, Hollein is at last receiving his due among the Viennese after designing half a dozen gemlike shops dotting the downtown area of the Austrian capital. Hollein’s most important inner-city project opened this month in the heart of the historic First District, across from St. Stephen’s Cathedral.
The eight-story building, known as the Haas Haus, contains shops and offices, with a coffeehouse and restaurant on the upper floors overlooking the cathedral’s Gothic spires. Its marbled atrium, whose glossy detailing and tony tenants invite comparisons to New York’s Trump Tower, has already become a favored meeting spot of local burghers. This is not to say that the Haas Haus has gained total acceptance among the conservative, often churlish Viennese. “I get anonymous letters saying I should jump off the top of the Haas Haus,” Hollein said in an interview. “I got a postcard from the `Storm Troopers Against Degenerate Architecture.’ … I reported it to the police and they said it was very dangerous.”
At a ceremony dedicating the new building, Mayor Helmut Zilk noted that “turbulent altercations and venomous polemics about architecture are nothing new in Vienna. There is scarcely any significant structure in Vienna whose planners have not come under fierce attack.”
Located at a corner where the posh Graben pedestrian shopping street meets the Stephansplatz promenade fronting the cathedral, the Haas Haus replaces a dreary 1950s building put up after a collection of 19th-century structures were destroyed during World War II air raids. Hollein’s bold new design nearly never got underway. Its construction required a change in the municipal law that had long kept modern buildings out of the downtown area, giving it a museum-like air.
The law obliged any building within the protected First District to match its neighboring structures in style and form. But in the case of the Haas Haus, this ranges from Gothic to Baroque to turn-of-the-century, illustrating how arbitrary the conservation measures could be to implement. “It is good that Vienna has made this breakthrough,” Hollein said of the legal modification. “Now there’s a different attitude toward modern architecture … not always looking to the past, but toward the future.”
Hollein has used curved contours to recall the lines of the Roman fortifications that once stood on the Haas Haus site. Beginning with a straightforward facade of pale green granite matching the color of an adjacent post-war building, he switches to a brash reflective glass that curves onward until a cylindrical tower juts out from the end of the building closest to the cathedral. This tower cantilevers out in an effort to delineate a medieval square, long since vanished from the juncture of the Graben and the Stephansplatz.
“It’s nice to know that this is not an accidental curve, but it has a history and a reason,” said Hollein. “I think it’s something which a work of art should have. … It’s not just on the surface-you have occasions to penetrate deeper into a situation, physically and mentally.”
In all of his projects, Hollein seeks to follow through on his long-held dictum that architecture has two foundations between which it has fluctuated through civilizations and over the centuries-“one is that architecture is a ritual thing, and on the other side it is a means for the preservation of body temperature. … In the Haas Haus, of course, the ritual component has partly to do with addressing the sense and importance of the place.”
As if to draw attention to this “ritualistic” element, Hollein has placed an elegant classical temple atop the lively roof, which complements the silhouette of spires, pavilions and statuary crowning its neighbors. The multifarious roofscape and interplay of windows on the building’s lone flat side wall place it clearly in line with his previous work.
“A building is a three-dimensional thing, beyond the mere part of the shape that comes from the envelope you create from the sight lines and the laws about cornice lines,” he said. “But then within these restrictions and limitations you work out something which not only is the fulfillment of the necessary cubic meters but also goes another step beyond that. That’s architecture.”
A walk through the narrow streets around the Haas Haus provides a quick tour of the past three decades of Hollein’s career, during which he has also created museum installations, stage settings, furniture, a grand piano, tableware and sunglasses. The award-winning Retti candle shop, which Hollein designed in 1964 entirely of sheet aluminum, is two minutes away. The 1967 Boutique Christa Metek, in the then-fashionable colors of orange and apple green, is also nearby, as are his two jewelry stores of sumptuous metals for the Viennese firm of Schullin.
Next door to the Haas Haus is one of Hollein’s idiosyncratic travel agencies, where he delighted in ironic allusions to exotic destinations. The largest was the state-owned Austrian Travel Bureau, opened along the Ringstrasse opposite the opera in 1976, outfitted with brass palm trees, a ruined Greek column and Rolls-Royce grillwork at the cashiers’ counter. Unfortunately, these were furtively destroyed by the bureau last winter when it handed the premises over to a delicatessen.
“This was a blatant act of vandalism that showed that some of the top people in Austria have no idea about culture,” said Hollein, “which is one of the key elements why tourists come here.” Indeed, many architectural enthusiasts make pilgrimages to the city to see his work, invariably described as displaying a typically Viennese sensibility.
“Of course, I grew up in Vienna and I studied partly in Vienna, so I think you can’t avoid having some Viennese elements in your thinking and your products,” said the architect, who at 56 has spent more than a decade studying and teaching at American and West German universities. “But I’ve never made any conscious attempts to sort of recapitulate Viennese architectural history, especially turn-of-the-century history, or to give my architecture a specific Viennese content. So if it has one it’s subconscious, which may be a very Viennese element.”
Like many Viennese artists, Hollein has been obsessed with death in his work, notably in his installation projects. One of these entailed the construction of a mock archaeological site, for which exhibition visitors were given shovels to dig up remains and thereby get involved with the dead. At an installation at the 1972 Venice Biennale, he recalled being impressed during a trip to Mexico with the use of blood on crucifixes and on sacrificial altars of Indian ruins, as well as by the bloodstained uniform of the murdered Archduke Franz Ferdinand on display in Vienna’s Museum of Military History.
Hollein believes that a culture’s capacity for death rites is linked to its capacity for living. And so he has decorated the top level of the Haas Haus shopping arcade, a glittering temple of late 20th-century consumerism built across from an ancient cathedral where tourists now outnumber worshipers, with a coffinlike sculpture. “Had I grown up in Duesseldorf,” he said, conceding the morbid influence of his native heritage, “it might never have happened.”
Outside the Haas Haus, Hollein hopes to heighten the ceremonial feel of the structure by setting a row of three pillars of green granite into the pavement leading to the entry. The pavement pattern echoes the building’s curved facade, arrayed in ancient granite cobblestones accented with green quarzite and red granite slabs inset with flat lighting fixtures. But the plan for the towering pillars is opposed by some citizens and conservative city administrators who, relishing another esthetic debate, regard them as superfluous.
Mayor Zilk is pledged to support Hollein’s wish to install the pillars as well as to design renovated facades for nearby buildings. “The Haas Haus of Hans Hollein is a symbol for the renewed international openness of Vienna,” he said, “an important success in the tenacious struggle against a falsely understood historical consciousness, a provincial local patriotism and sentimental inertia. Those who want Vienna to emerge as a metropolis and world city should not stick merely to the imperial glory of bygone days, but also need to show the courage to confront the new.”
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Exploring the Northern Dimension
About ND
NDI Think Tank
ND Newsflash
ND Institute
NCM published Nordic Bioeconomy Programme: 15 Action Points for Sustainable Change
Nordic Council of Ministers and Nordic Council of Ministers Secretariat have published the Nordic Bioeconomy Programme: 15 Action Points for Sustainable Change, which combines environmental, social and economic ambitions for a more sustainable Region. The bioeconomy is of fundamental importance to the national economies of the Nordic countries, and especially important for rural development in large parts of the Region. The programme aims to create new industries and value chains and to facilitate and guide the transition of bio-based industries into technology advanced industries, and to optimise the production and value creation of biomass. The programme sets out a vision for the Nordic bioeconomy based on four pillars:
competitive bio-based industries
resilient and diverse ecosystems
inclusive economic development
To reach this vision, the programme defines 15 action points under three thematic areas: Innovate – Accelerate – Network. The focus is on development of new policies on regional, national and Nordic level, for increased funding, better education, labelling and certificates, bioeconomy clusters and several other areas. The programme also contains an appendix with sustainability principles that can be seen as a step towards developing common ground and good practices for a sustainable bioeconomy in the Nordic Region.
Read the Programme at the NCM website.
Tags: Environment, Publication, Nordic
This website generates, gathers and disseminates knowledge and information on the Northern Dimension. The website is maintained by the Northern Dimension Institute (NDI), which is an open network community of universities and research institutes.
If you wish to contribute to the website, please contact our team!
Website development and maintenance is co-funded by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland and the European Commission.
Site design and building: Unigrafia
ND Newsflash No. 2/2019 (June)
ND Newsflash No. 1/2019 (March)
ND Newsflash No. 4/2016 (Dec)
ND Newsflash No. 3/2016 (Sep)
ND Newsflash No. 3/2015 (Nov)
ND Newsflash No. 2/2015 (May)
ND Newsflash No. 1/2015 (Feb)
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- P&C net premiums written increased 5.6% to $7.5 billion and Global P&C net premiums written, which excludes Agriculture, increased 6.1% to $7.1 billion.
- P&C combined ratio was 88.4% compared with 88.0% prior year. P&C current accident year combined ratio excluding catastrophe losses was 88.1% compared with 87.5% prior year. P&C underwriting income was $824 million, up 2.1%.
- Adjusted net investment income was $890 million, pre-tax, up 4.0%.
- Operating cash flow was $1.6 billion.
ZURICH, July 24, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Chubb Limited (NYSE: CB) today reported net income for the quarter ended June 30, 2018 of $1,294 million, or $2.76 per share, compared with $1,305 million, or $2.77 per share, for the same quarter last year. Core operating income was $1,253 million, or $2.68 per share, compared with $1,180 million, or $2.50 per share, for the same quarter last year. The property and casualty (P&C) combined ratio was 88.4%. Book value per share decreased 0.1% and tangible book value per share increased 0.5% from March 31, 2018 and now stand at $109.97 and $66.00, respectively. Book value and tangible book value per share growth were unfavorably impacted by realized and unrealized losses of $407 million after-tax in the company's investment portfolio, driven by rising interest rates. In addition, foreign currency movement (FX) unfavorably impacted book value by $457 million after-tax and tangible book value by $200 million after-tax.
Chubb Limited
Second Quarter Summary
(Per Share - Diluted)
(0.8)%
Chubb integration expenses, net of tax
(80.0)%
Amortization of fair value adjustment of acquired invested
assets and long-term debt, net of tax
Adjusted net realized (gains) losses, net of tax
Core operating income, net of tax
For the three months ended June 30, 2018 and 2017, the tax expenses (benefits) related to the table above were $(3) million and $(22) million, respectively, for Chubb integration expenses; $(11) million and $(20) million, respectively, for amortization of fair value adjustment of acquired invested assets and long-term debt; $14 million and $19 million, respectively, for adjusted net realized gains and losses; and $218 million and $223 million, respectively, for core operating income.
For the six months ended June 30, 2018, net income was $2,376 million, or $5.07 per share, compared with $2,398 million, or $5.08 per share, for 2017. Core operating income was $2,350 million, or $5.01 per share, compared with $2,355 million, or $4.99 per share, for 2017. The P&C combined ratio was 89.2% for the six months ended June 30, 2018. Book value per share decreased 0.3% and tangible book value per share increased 0.2% from December 31, 2017. Book value and tangible book value per share were unfavorably impacted by net realized and unrealized losses of $1,345 million after-tax in the company's investment portfolio. In addition, FX unfavorably impacted book value by $147 million after-tax and tangible book value by $64 million after-tax.
Six Months Ended Summary
For the six months ended June 30, 2018 and 2017, the tax expenses (benefits) related to the table above were $(5) million and $(59) million, respectively, for Chubb integration expenses; $(20) million and $(44) million, respectively, for amortization of fair value adjustment of acquired invested assets and long-term debt; $11 million and $17 million, respectively, for adjusted net realized gains and losses; and $367 million and $414 million, respectively, for core operating income.
Evan G. Greenberg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Chubb Limited, commented: "Chubb's second quarter after-tax core operating income per share was up over 7% from prior year, driven by excellent underwriting and investment results. Our 88.4% P&C combined ratio benefited from current accident year results and positive prior year reserve releases, while adjusted net investment income was up 4%.
"P&C net premiums written increased 5.6% in the quarter, with strong performances in many of our businesses globally such as our U.S. commercial and personal lines divisions and our Asia and Latin America P&C operations, both of which generated double-digit growth. We are benefiting from contributions that are only possible because of the scale and capabilities created by today's Chubb. This includes a number of growth initiatives, by example, in our North American and international middle market and small commercial divisions, and the level of investment we are making in our digital efforts to improve our competitive profile.
"We are taking advantage of market conditions that continue to improve in the U.S. and some territories outside the U.S. with commercial P&C price increases this quarter in those locations the best we've seen in some time. We wrote more new business while renewing our customers at record retention levels. In sum, our organization is running on all cylinders and we're optimistic about our ability to continue to perform at a high level."
Operating highlights for the quarter ended June 30, 2018 were as follows:
(in millions of U.S. dollars except for percentages)
Net premiums written (including favorable FX of 1.5 pts)
Net premiums written – excluding merger-related actions
Underwriting income
Combined ratio
Current accident year underwriting income excluding catastrophe losses
Current accident year combined ratio excluding catastrophe losses
Global P&C (excludes Agriculture)
The year-over-year increase in certain large structured transactions adversely impacted the P&C combined ratio by 0.3 percentage point, comprising a 1.0 percentage point increase in the loss ratio and a 0.7 percentage point decrease in the expense ratio.
Net premiums earned increased 5.9%.
Total pre-tax and after-tax catastrophe losses were $211 million (3.0 percentage points of the combined ratio) and $173 million, respectively, compared with $200 million (3.0 percentage points of the combined ratio) and $152 million, respectively, last year.
Total pre-tax and after-tax favorable prior period development were $191 million (2.7 percentage points of the combined ratio) and $158 million, respectively, compared with $170 million (2.5 percentage points of the combined ratio) and $144 million, respectively, last year.
Adjusted net investment income was $890 million, up 4.0%, which was just above the guidance range due to higher-than-projected private equity distributions.
Operating cash flow was $1.6 billion.
Share repurchases totaled $324 million, or approximately 2.4 million shares, during the quarter.
Net loss reserves increased $194 million adjusted for FX.
Details of financial results by business segment are available in the Chubb Limited Financial Supplement. Key segment items for the quarter ended June 30, 2018 are presented below:
Total North America P&C Insurance
Net premiums written
North America Commercial P&C Insurance
Net premiums written – Major accounts retail and excess and surplus (E&S) wholesale
Net premiums written – Middle market and small commercial
North America Personal P&C Insurance
North America Agricultural Insurance
Overseas General Insurance
North America Commercial P&C Insurance: Net premiums written in the middle market and small commercial divisions increased 4.4%. This growth reflects a 5.7% increase in P&C lines and an increase of 1.6% in financial lines. Net premiums written in the small commercial division increased 26.5%.
Global Reinsurance: Net premiums written increased 3.8%, or 1.5% in constant dollars. The combined ratio was 79.3%, compared with 60.2%. The current accident year combined ratio excluding catastrophe losses was 83.5%, compared with 77.0%, reflecting a shift in the mix of business from property catastrophe business towards casualty business, which generally has a higher loss ratio.
Life Insurance: Segment income was $77 million, up 51.2%, which included International life insurance income of $25 million, up $16 million, or 168.2%. International life insurance net premiums written and deposits collected increased 18.7%, or 16.0% in constant dollars. Combined Insurance North America segment income was $37 million, up 9.2%, and net premiums written increased 6.9%.
Please refer to the Chubb Limited Financial Supplement, dated June 30, 2018, which is posted on the company's investor relations website, investors.chubb.com, in the Financials section for more detailed information on individual segment performance, together with additional disclosure on reinsurance recoverable, loss reserves, investment portfolio, and debt and capital.
Chubb Limited will hold its second quarter earnings conference call on Wednesday, July 25, 2018, beginning at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. The earnings conference call will be available via live webcast at investors.chubb.com or by dialing 888-204-4368 (within the United States) or 323-994-2082 (international), passcode 9463834. Please refer to the Chubb investor relations website under Events and Presentations for details. A replay of the call will be available until Wednesday, August 8, 2018, and the archived webcast will be available for approximately one month. To listen to the replay, please click here to register and receive dial-in numbers.
Chubb is the world's largest publicly traded property and casualty insurance company. With operations in 54 countries and territories, Chubb provides commercial and personal property and casualty insurance, personal accident and supplemental health insurance, reinsurance and life insurance to a diverse group of clients. As an underwriting company, we assess, assume and manage risk with insight and discipline. We service and pay our claims fairly and promptly. The company is also defined by its extensive product and service offerings, broad distribution capabilities, exceptional financial strength and local operations globally. Parent company Chubb Limited is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: CB) and is a component of the S&P 500 index. Chubb maintains executive offices in Zurich, New York, London and other locations, and employs approximately 31,000 people worldwide. Additional information can be found at: www.chubb.com.
All comparisons are with the same period last year unless otherwise specifically stated.
Regulation G - Non-GAAP Financial Measures
In presenting our results, we included and discussed certain non-GAAP measures. These non-GAAP measures, which may be defined differently by other companies, are important for an understanding of our overall results of operations and financial condition. However, they should not be viewed as a substitute for measures determined in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP).
Throughout this document there are various measures presented on a constant-dollar basis (i.e., excludes the impact of foreign exchange (FX)). We believe it is useful to evaluate the trends in our results exclusive of the effect of fluctuations in exchange rates between the U.S. dollar and the currencies in which our international business is transacted, as these exchange rates could fluctuate significantly between periods and distort the analysis of trends. The impact is determined by assuming constant foreign exchange rates between periods by translating prior period results using the same local currency exchange rates as the comparable current period.
Adjusted net investment income is net investment income excluding the amortization of the fair value adjustment on acquired invested assets, which was $62 million in Q2 2018. Refer to page 3 in the Financial Supplement for the fair value adjustment in other periods. We believe this measure is meaningful as it highlights the underlying performance of our invested assets and portfolio management in support of our lines of business.
Adjusted net realized gains (losses), net of tax includes net realized gains (losses) and net realized gains (losses) recorded in other income (expense) related to unconsolidated subsidiaries, and excludes realized gains and losses on crop derivatives. These derivatives were purchased to provide economic benefit, in a manner similar to reinsurance protection, in the event that a significant decline in commodity pricing impacts underwriting results. We view gains and losses on these derivatives as part of the results of our underwriting operations, and therefore realized gains (losses) from these derivatives are reclassified to adjusted losses and loss expenses. The P&C combined ratio includes adjusted losses and loss expenses in the ratio numerator.
Underwriting income, P&C underwriting income and Global P&C underwriting income are calculated by subtracting losses and loss expenses, policy benefits, policy acquisition costs and administrative expenses from net premiums earned. P&C underwriting income also includes gains (losses) on crop derivatives. We use underwriting income and operating ratios to monitor the results of our operations without the impact of certain factors, including adjusted net investment income, other income (expense), interest and income tax expense and adjusted net realized gains (losses).
Current accident year underwriting income excluding catastrophe losses is underwriting income adjusted to exclude catastrophe losses and prior period development (PPD). We believe it is useful to exclude catastrophe losses, as they are not predictable as to timing and amount, and PPD as these unexpected loss developments on historical reserves are not indicative of our current underwriting performance. We believe the use of these measures enhances the understanding of our results of operations by highlighting the underlying profitability of our insurance business.
Segment income (loss) includes underwriting income, adjusted net investment income, other income (expense) – operating, and amortization expense of purchased intangibles.
Core operating income, net of tax excludes adjusted realized gains and losses, Chubb integration expenses, and the amortization of the fair value adjustments of acquired debt and invested assets related to the Chubb Corp acquisition. We believe this presentation enhances the understanding of our results of operations by highlighting the underlying profitability of our insurance business. We exclude adjusted net realized gains (losses) because the amount of these gains (losses) is heavily influenced by the availability of market opportunities. We also exclude Chubb integration expenses related to the acquisition due to the size, complexity, and volume of this acquisition, which may not be indicative of such future costs. We believe that excluding the Chubb integration expenses facilitates the comparison of our financial results to our historical operating results. References to core operating income mean net of tax, whether or not noted.
P&C combined ratio is the sum of the loss and loss expense ratio, acquisition cost ratio and the administrative expense ratio excluding the life business and including the realized gains and losses on the crop derivatives. These derivatives were purchased to provide economic benefit, in a manner similar to reinsurance protection, in the event that a significant decline in commodity pricing will impact underwriting results. We view gains and losses on these derivatives as part of the results of our underwriting operations.
Current accident year P&C combined ratio excluding catastrophe losses excludes the impact of catastrophe losses and PPD. We believe this measure provides a better evaluation of our underwriting performance and enhances the understanding of the trends in our property and casualty business that may be obscured by these items.
Global P&C performance metrics comprise consolidated operating results (including corporate) and exclude the operating results of the company's Life Insurance and North America Agricultural Insurance segments. We believe that these measures are useful and meaningful to investors as they are used by management to assess the company's global P&C operations which are the most economically similar. We exclude the North America Agricultural Insurance and Life Insurance segments because the results of these businesses do not always correlate with the results of our global P&C operations.
International life gross and net premiums written and deposits collected and Life Insurance gross and net premiums written measures presented in this release includes deposits collected on universal life and investment contracts (life deposits). Life deposits are not reflected as revenues in our consolidated statements of operations in accordance with GAAP. However, we include life deposits in presenting growth in our life insurance business because new life deposits are an important component of production and key to our efforts to grow our business.
Core operating return on equity (ROE) or ROE calculated using core operating income are annualized financial measures. The ROE numerator includes income adjusted to exclude after-tax adjusted net realized gains (losses), Chubb integration expenses, and the amortization of the fair value adjustment of acquired invested assets and long-term debt. The ROE denominator includes the average shareholders' equity for the period adjusted to exclude unrealized gains (losses) on investments, net of tax. Core operating ROE is a useful measure as it enhances the understanding of the return on shareholders' equity by highlighting the underlying profitability relative to shareholders' equity excluding the effect of unrealized gains and losses on our investments.
Net premiums written excluding merger-related actions is a non-GAAP performance measure. Since the acquisition of the Chubb Corp, we have entered into new reinsurance agreements with third-party reinsurers for the Chubb Corp businesses and have taken other merger-related actions, including exiting certain types of business that do not meet our underwriting standards or adhere to our risk diversification strategy. We believe that this measure is meaningful to evaluate trends in our underlying business on a comparable basis.
Book value per common share, net of tax is shareholders' equity divided by the shares outstanding. Tangible book value per common share, net of tax is shareholders' equity less goodwill and other intangible assets, net of tax, divided by the shares outstanding. We believe that goodwill and other intangible assets are not indicative of our underlying insurance results or trends and make book value comparisons to less acquisitive peer companies less meaningful. In addition, we disclose per share measures for book value and tangible book value that exclude the impact of foreign currency fluctuations in order to adjust for the distortive effects of fluctuations in exchange rates.
Other income (expense) – operating excludes from consolidated Other income (expense) the portion of net realized gains and losses related to unconsolidated entities and gains and losses from fair value changes in separate account assets that do not qualify for separate account reporting under GAAP. Net realized gains (losses) related to unconsolidated entities is excluded from core operating income in order to enhance the understanding of our results of underwriting operations as they are heavily influenced by, and fluctuate in part according to, market conditions.
Chubb integration expenses include all internal and external costs directly related to the integration activities of the Chubb Corp acquisition, consisting primarily of personnel-related expenses, including severance and employee retention and relocation; consulting fees; and advisor fees.
See reconciliation of Non-GAAP Financial Measures on pages 31-37 in the Financial Supplement. These measures should not be viewed as a substitute for measures determined in accordance with GAAP, including premium, net income, return on equity, net investment income, and effective tax rate.
NM - not meaningful comparison
Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements:
Forward-looking statements made in this press release, such as those related to company performance, including 2018 performance and growth opportunities, pricing, economic and market conditions, and our expectations and intentions and other statements that are not historical facts reflect our current views with respect to future events and financial performance and are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially, including without limitation, the following: competition, pricing and policy term trends, the levels of new and renewal business achieved, the frequency and severity of unpredictable catastrophic events, actual loss experience, uncertainties in the reserving or settlement process, integration activities and performance of acquired companies, loss of key employees or disruptions to our operations, new theories of liability, judicial, legislative, regulatory and other governmental developments, litigation tactics and developments, investigation developments and actual settlement terms, the amount and timing of reinsurance recoverable, credit developments among reinsurers, rating agency action, possible terrorism or the outbreak and effects of war, economic, political, regulatory, insurance and reinsurance business conditions, potential strategic opportunities including acquisitions and our ability to achieve and integrate them, as well as management's response to these factors, and other factors identified in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the dates on which they are made. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
Summary Consolidated Balance Sheets
(in millions of U.S. dollars, except per share data)
Insurance and reinsurance balances receivable
Reinsurance recoverable on losses and loss expenses
Goodwill and other intangible assets
Unpaid losses and loss expenses
Total shareholders' equity
Total liabilities and shareholders' equity
Book value per common share
Tangible book value per common share
Book value per common share excluding cumulative translation losses (1)
Tangible book value per common share excluding cumulative translation losses (1)
Cumulative translation losses were $1.4 billion in 2018 ($1.0 billion on tangible and $356 million on intangible net
assets) and $1.2 billion in 2017 ($914 million on tangible and $273 million on intangible net assets).
Summary Consolidated Financial Data
(in millions of U.S. dollars, except share, per share data, and ratios)
Gross premiums written
Net premiums earned
Losses and loss expenses
Policy acquisition costs
Administrative expenses
Net realized gains (losses)
Gains (losses) from separate account assets
Amortization of purchased intangibles
Chubb integration expenses
Core operating income
Weighted average diluted shares outstanding
P&C combined ratio
Loss and loss expense ratio
Policy acquisition cost ratio
Administrative expense ratio
P&C underwriting income
Consolidated Supplemental Segment Information
(in millions of U.S. dollars)
Global Reinsurance
Segment income (loss)
Life Insurance gross and net premiums written includes deposits collected on universal life and investment
contracts in 2018 (Q2 $392 million, YTD $771 million) and 2017 (Q2 $316 million, YTD $626 million).
SOURCE Chubb Limited
For further information: Investor Contact, Helen Wilson: (441) 299-9283; helen.wilson@chubb.com; Media Contact, Jeffrey Zack: (212) 827-4444; jeffrey.zack@chubb.com
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Location: The Villages, FL
Dr. James H. Rogers, DMD, MD
Dr. Gordon C. Schwenk, M.D., F.A.C.S.
3330 S.W. 33rd Road, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-9311
Dr. Abbas Ali M.D.
4730 SW 49th Rd, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Kalpesh Solanki D.O.
1015 SE 17th St, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Asad U. Qamar MD, FCCP, FACC, FSGC, FSCAI, FAAC
4730 SW 49th Rd., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Seaborn Hunt III MD
3220 SW 31st Rd, suite 301, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 873-7200
Dr. Robert Corwin, MD
Dr. Michael J. Freeman M.D, P.A.
Dr. Joseph R. Alonso MD, FACC
3310 SW 34 th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Robert L. Feldman MD FACC
Dr. Lan Luo MD, FACC
3310 SW 34th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Rakesh Prashad, MD, FACC, FACP, FSCAI
3310 SW 34th St, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Kun Xiang, MD, PhD
Dr. Michael H. Hards, DDS, MAGD, FICOI, FAAIP
540 Fieldcrest Drive, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 205-7667
Dr. Richard P. Hall II, DMD, MAGD, AFAAID
540 Fieldcrest Dr, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 205-7667
Dr. Edward J. Farrell, DMD, MAGD, AFAAID
Dr. Roger Bryant
339 Colony Blvd., The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 391-5518
Dr. Robert L. Penrod
339 Colony Blvd., The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352)391-5518
Dr. Mundi Buechele
7621 SW State Rd 200, Ocala, Florida 34476, United States (352)401-0707
Dr. Reynaldo F. Gonzalez
7621 SW State Rd 200, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 401-0707
Dr. Reid W. Montini, D.M.D., M.S., P.A.
3201 S.W. 34th Ave., Suite 202, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 237-3366
Luis F. Rosario, DDS
1120 SE 18th Pl, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352)732-4427
Ronald E. Caylor, DMD,
Dr. Robert Ford
11962 County Rd. 101, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 751-3534
Dr. Ford Robert E DDS
1800 S.E. 17th St, Ste. 500, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352) 368-9099
Dr. James H. Rogers, DMD, MD 3320 SW 34th Cir, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 629-8154
Dr. Gordon C. Schwenk, M.D., F.A.C.S. 3330 S.W. 33rd Road, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-9311
Dr. Abbas Ali M.D. 4730 SW 49th Rd, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Kalpesh Solanki D.O. 1015 SE 17th St, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Asad U. Qamar MD, FCCP, FACC, FSGC, FSCAI, FAAC 4730 SW 49th Rd., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)854-0681
Dr. Seaborn Hunt III MD 3220 SW 31st Rd, suite 301, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 873-7200
Dr. Robert Corwin, MD 2750 SE 17th Street, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 508-8655
Dr. Michael J. Freeman M.D, P.A. 2750 SE 17th Street, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 508-8655
Dr. Joseph R. Alonso MD, FACC 3310 SW 34 th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Robert L. Feldman MD FACC 3310 SW 34 th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Lan Luo MD, FACC 3310 SW 34th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Rakesh Prashad, MD, FACC, FACP, FSCAI 3310 SW 34th St, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Kun Xiang, MD, PhD 3310 SW 34 th St., Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352)873-0707
Dr. Michael H. Hards, DDS, MAGD, FICOI, FAAIP 540 Fieldcrest Drive, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 205-7667
Dr. Richard P. Hall II, DMD, MAGD, AFAAID 540 Fieldcrest Dr, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 205-7667
Dr. Edward J. Farrell, DMD, MAGD, AFAAID 540 Fieldcrest Dr, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 205-7667
Dr. Roger Bryant 339 Colony Blvd., The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 391-5518
Dr. Robert L. Penrod 339 Colony Blvd., The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352)391-5518
Dr. Mundi Buechele 7621 SW State Rd 200, Ocala, Florida 34476, United States (352)401-0707
Dr. Reynaldo F. Gonzalez 7621 SW State Rd 200, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 401-0707
Dr. Reid W. Montini, D.M.D., M.S., P.A. 3201 S.W. 34th Ave., Suite 202, Ocala, Florida 34474, United States (352) 237-3366
Luis F. Rosario, DDS 1120 SE 18th Pl, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352)732-4427
Ronald E. Caylor, DMD, 1120 SE 18th Pl, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352)732-4427
Dr. Robert Ford 11962 County Rd. 101, The Villages, Florida 32162, United States (352) 751-3534
Dr. Ford Robert E DDS 1800 S.E. 17th St, Ste. 500, Ocala, Florida 34471, United States (352) 368-9099
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You are at:Home»Advertising
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| 0.364404
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The M.A. in Film Studies prepares students for further study at the doctoral level and/or careers in film criticism, art administration, or archive and preservation work. Completion of the M.A. in Film Studies requires 50 hours of coursework, a successful first-year review and either an approved and defended written thesis or passing of a comprehensive exam. The Film Division encourages M.A. candidates to become actively involved in their field by making public, scholarly presentations and contributing to professional publications.
M.A. COURSE DISTRIBUTION REQUIREMENTS
A minimum of 26 credit hours in core courses and a minimum of 15 credit hours in elective courses must be taken.
The combined minimum credit hours for core courses, elective courses, and thesis hours are 50 hours.
The Director of the M.A. program must approve each student’s planned course registration each term. It is the responsibility of the student to schedule a meeting with the Director of the M.A. program every semester to finalize a plan for course registration.
Students are required to take a minimum of five Film Topics electives.
When taken in Spring Semester, Film Festival Practicum and Media Arts Management can be counted as one of the five required Special Topics electives. This assumes the student will be fully engaged in the Athens International Film + Video Festival pre-screening process.
A student who is teaching a stand-alone class is eligible to register for Teaching Practicum. This does not count as one of the five required Special Topics electives.
A maximum of three courses is allowed from outside the Film Division.
REQUIRED CORE COURSES
Film Studies I, Film Theory I, Film Theory II, Film History I, Film History II, Film Thesis Seminar (two semesters) – thesis track students Film Thesis Seminar (one semester)/Individual Readings (one semester) – exam track students
ELECTIVE COURSES (examples)
Film Aesthetics, Experimental Film Issues in Documentary, Film Topics Seminars, Film Festival Practicum, Media Arts Management
M.A. 1ST YEAR REVIEW
Near the end of the Spring Semester, a Faculty Committee evaluates all first-year M.A candidates. The Committee assesses the candidate’s goals for future study as well as what they have accomplished in the program. The Committee’s evaluation functions as the most important feedback a student receives during their first year, giving the candidate an objective sense of their progress and determining their course work for the following year. In certain circumstances a candidate could be advised not to continue with the program.
1ST YEAR REVIEW PROCEDURE
A schedule for submission of review materials to the Committee will be posted during the Spring Semester. Students will be required to submit:
A sample of revised scholarly written work. The written work should be a minimum of 5000 words long and formatted according to MLA standards.
A statement (approximately 500 words) describing the progress made in the first year of study, as well as indicating likely areas of research for the second year.
Candidates will meet with the Committee and give an oral presentation on the materials submitted. At that meeting, the Committee will present the candidate with an evaluation of their progress and plans.
M.A. THESIS
The M.A. thesis is an original scholarly monograph of at least 50 pages in length. The thesis must be written under the direction of a member of the film studies faculty. In order to insure that the thesis is of current interest to the discipline of film studies, a Thesis Committee selected by the M.A. candidate as well as the Director of the M.A. Program must approve it. Thesis Committees must include the Thesis Advisor, a second faculty member from the Film Division, and a third faculty member from a discipline outside the Film Division.
The variable-credit Written Thesis course hours (usually a minimum of ten) are generally concentrated in the second year of the candidate’s program of study. The Film Division recommends that candidates planning to apply to doctoral programs after receiving their degrees should complete the thesis in Spring Semester of their second year or by the following summer.
THESIS PROCEDURE
The candidate chooses a Thesis Advisor to chair the Thesis Committee. The Thesis Advisor must indicate in writing his or her willingness to serve in this capacity. In consultation with the Thesis Advisor, the candidate chooses a prospective Thesis Committee and contacts prospective members to confirm their willingness to serve.
In consultation with the Thesis Advisor, the candidate develops a formal Thesis Prospectus, and submits it to the members of the Thesis Committee. The Thesis Committee has the option to approve, to reject, or to request modifications to the Thesis Prospectus. Once the Thesis Prospectus meets the Thesis Committee’s approval, each Committee member, as well as the Director of the Division sign a Thesis Prospectus approval form. The form is then placed on file with the Division, accompanied by a copy of the Thesis Prospectus. The candidate must complete the proposed thesis in compliance with the Thesis Prospectus as approved by the Thesis Committee and Director.
The Thesis Advisor determines when the thesis is ready to be presented to the remainder of the Thesis Committee for defense.
The formal oral defense of the thesis before the Thesis Committee must be scheduled no later than the eighth week of the final semester of study. It is the candidate’s responsibility to provide each member of the Thesis Committee with a paper copy of the thesis at least a week in advance of the defense. At the defense, the candidate will be asked to provide an opening statement describing the thesis project, and will be required to respond to questions and comments from members of the Thesis Committee. The Thesis Committee will then meet to determine the outcome of the defense, and will immediately inform the candidate whether the thesis is approved as submitted, conditionally approved, or not approved.
The candidate completes any requested revisions under supervision of the Thesis Advisor. Once these revisions are approved by the Thesis Committee, the final version of the thesis is submitted electronically to the Head of the Film Division and the Office of the College of Fine Arts (COFA Dean's office, Jennings House) in accordance with their graduation deadlines.
The thesis must be properly formatted in accordance with current MLA Handbook. Candidates can access a .pdf document with the Graduate College guidelines for thesis format, as well as College deadlines in the submission process, at the Graduate College’s Thesis and Dissertation Services website: www.ohio.edu/graduate/etd/
Students are required to submit their thesis electronically. Students are encouraged to take advantage of the Electronic Thesis and Dissertation (ETD) process. Theses submitted electronically are processed through the Graduate College and are made available to the public through OhioLink. For further information and training seminars, go to www.ohio.edu/graduate/etd/ or contact the Graduate College’s Thesis and Dissertation Services office.
Students not planning to go on to a doctoral program immediately after completion of the MA may meet formal degree requirements with course work and a written examination on two areas, which the student selects from one list focusing on film theory and another list focusing on film history. The examination will be administered as a take-home. Students will have from Monday morning at 9:00 a.m. to Friday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. to complete the examination and are permitted to consult research materials.
Students taking the exam must compile a bibliography of 10 books or 20 articles as well as a 15-movie filmography for each area before their final semester of classwork. In addition, in their final semester, they must register for five hours of Independent Study with their advisor during which they will prepare for the examination. Exams are offered in the last semester of the student’s coursework.
For the MA exam, students choose one area from each list:
Film Theory, origins to 1965
Film Theory, 1965 to 1990
Film Theory, 1990 to the present
Feminist Film Theory
Film Theory and Postcolonial Studies
Film, Technology, and New Media
Genre Theory
Marxist Film Theory
Narrative Theory
Psychoanalytic Film Theory
Queer Film Theory
U.S. Cinema, origins to 1960
U.S. Cinema, 1960 to present
European Cinema, origins to 1960
European Cinema, 1960 to present
Asian Cinemas
Latin American Cinemas
Required Core Course Descriptions
Film Studies I (FILM 5150): Offers an in-depth examination of the various formal dimensions of film introducing selected key events and movements in film history and selected texts in classical film theory. Weekly screenings.
Film Theory I: Survey of classical film theory including Soviet montage theory, realist theory, medium-specific formalism, and early writings on sound cinema. Weekly screenings.
Film Theory II: Survey of post-classical film theory, including semiotics, psychoanalytic, feminist, post-colonial and contemporary film theory. Weekly screenings.
Film History I (FILM 5310): History of international cinema from the origins through 1940. Weekly screenings.
Film History II (FILM 5320): History of international cinema from 1940 to the present. Weekly screenings.
Film History III (FILM 5330): Advanced studies in film history and film historiography. Weekly screenings.
Check the Ohio University Catalog for additional Film Courses
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Sessions of the Commission
Visits to Municipalities
Campaign for Protection of Heritage at Risk
Projects and Conferences
European Heritage Award 2010 Celebrating Excellence awarded to The Commission to Preserve National Monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Regional Cultural and Natural Heritage Programme for South Eastern Europe
Integrated Rehabilitation Project Plan/Assessment of Architectural and Archaeological Heritage (IRPP/SAAH)
Press conference following the 14th session was held on <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />10th May 2004.
Dubravko Lovrenović, chairman of the Commission, informed the journalists about the conclusions of the Commission.
Seventeen Decisions were issued on proclamation of the following properties National Monuments:
The historic site of the remains of the church and necropolis with stećak tombstones of Grčka glavica in the village of Biskup, Konjic municipality, FBiH
The archaeological site of the remains of the Roma settlement and medieval necropolis with stećak tombstones in Vranjevo selo near Neum , Neum municipality, FBiH
The historic site of the Hutovo's town (Hajjibeg town), Neum municipality, FBiH
The historic site of the Old town of Koštun (Koštur) in Dabrica, Berkovići municipality, RS
The historic site of the Old town of Vinac, Jajce municipality, FBiH
The historic monument of the Abbot church of Cistercit of stricter rite – «Marija Zvijezda» (Uznesenje Blažene Djevice Marije) in Banja Luka together with movable properties in Banja Luka, RS
The burial ground of the cemetery on Presjeka near Ustikolina, Foča municipality
The architectural ensemble of the Metropolitan's residence (Bishop palace) in Mostar, FBiH
The historic building of the Clock tower in Mostar, FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Karađoz-beg mosque in Mostar, FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Roznamedži Ibrahim-efendija mosque in Mostar , FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Nezir-aga mosque in Mostar, FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Nesuh-aga Vučijaković mosque in Mostar, FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Sevre hajji Hasan mosque in Mostar, FBiH
The site and remains of the historic building – Selimija (Sultan Selim II) mosque in Knežina near Sokolac, RS
The historic monument of the church of St Anne in Neumski Gradac, Neum municipality, FBiH
The architectural ensemble of the Residential complex of Biščević-Lakšić in Mostar , FBiH
The cemetery on Presjeka near Ustikolina and the Old Town Koštur were added on the List of the endangered monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
He said that the exhibition "Cultural memory -- a vanishing treasure" would be presented in Jajce in the beginning of June, during the theater games, and in July in Mostar, within the opening ceremony of the Old Bridge.
He told the journalists that after the visit of Robert Pickard, a Council of Europe expert, a working group was established with the task of drafting the contents of the Law on Protection of Cultural Heritage of Bosnia and Herzegovina by this session. The group was composed of representatives of the Ministries of Physical Planning of the Republic of Srpska, Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Brčko District, Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Commission to Preserve National Monuments. Two meetings were held and a proposal of the contents was defined, which would be used as a basis to draft the first draft of the law by the following session, to be held from July 6, 2004. He pointed out two important issues in the law; expansion of the Commission's mandate and the establishment of a budget for the implementation of the Commission's decisions.
The Commission initiated opening of the account for the protection of endangered heritage in the region after the incident with the ancient monastery Hilandar on the Holy Mountain on March 4, 2004. After that, there was a systematic destruction of monuments in Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro. Federal Ministry of Culture and Sports accepted the initiative of the Commission, and an account was opened to which funds may be paid for restoring the monuments.
Amra Hadžimuhamedović said that Ćejvan-ćehajin hamam in Mostar was a 16th century monument, of unique spatial arrangement. It is one of the rare monuments of that type and purpose in Bosnia and Herzegovina, whose remains presented a good basis for presentation of that type of monument in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Considering that the monument is placed in the core of the Mostar old town, she pointed out the importance of a good quality adaptation and restoration of that monument, particularly because Mostar is considered for the World Heritage List. There are two positions within the World Heritage Committee regarding the candidacy of Mostar. One is that only the bridge with towers may be included on the List, and the other is that the historic core of old town should be included on the List. Proponents of the first position, which is not well liked among the social actors in Bosnia and Herzegovina, say that the historic core underwent changes that are not suitable for the protection of the cultural heritage. The position of the Commission is that the restoration project of Ćejvan-ćehajin hamam is one of those where standards mandatory for historic cores - candidates for the World Heritage List-- were not observed. She said that the funds for the restoration were provided by the French Government, for which the Commission was grateful. Considering that the project has reached international proportions, that it is backed by UNESCO, the responsibility of Bosnia and Herzegovina based on the position of the Commission is even greater to ensure that the project is conducted in accordance with the highest standards. Unfortunately, those responsible for that project did not show adequate knowledge and they did not apply international standards, and the implementation of the project exposed the monument to destruction. In the Decision concerning the hamam, the members of the Commission tried to ensure that the wrong approach would be corrected. At the last session, all stakeholders were invited to a meeting in order to discuss all facts and improve all that can be improved. Unfortunately, only the following individuals came to the meeting: Prof. Dr. Muhamed Hamidović, dean of the School of Architecture and the signatory of the report on the review of the project; Dr. Sabira Husedžinović, docent at the School of Architecture and the signatory of the report on the review of the project; representative of the Federal Ministry of Physical Planning and Environment; Prof. Dr. Sead Avdić, chairman of the State Commission for Cooperation with UNESCO. Architects, contractors and the supervising body did not attend. Everyone at the meeting agreed that the inadequate project was leading to destruction of the monument. Reviewers said that they felt uncomfortable about their inclusion in such a project and fully supported the position of the Commission. Everyone agreed it was necessary to cease further restoration works that lead to the destruction of the monument. She expressed regret that this might hurt the relationship of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the French Government, whose friendly intention was to help the restoration of heritage in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Commission concluded in that respect that it was in the interest of those who wished to help the restoration of heritage in Bosnia and Herzegovina that their projects are in accordance with standards applied in their countries. The Commission expects that the French Government and the experts of UNESCO would understand that. She pointed out that the responsible body, architects and contractors showed a complete lack of understanding of the Commission's powers, their obligations toward the authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and primarily their obligations toward a monument of high value to produce a decision to cease works on the monument. Apart from that, she said, these actors were trying to put pressure on the Commission to Preserve National Monuments by using all means at disposal that are not appropriate for this type of communication with the highest authorities, such as the Commission, and by denying expertise of the Commission members. As in all prior cases, the Commission would not succumb to any pressures. The Commission was trying to do its job professionally, in line with the knowledge and expertise of its members, and it would persist in its professionalism and the responsibility for the protection of heritage. She stressed that the criteria of the Commission were not political criteria, and the Commission would like to leave political decision making to the political authorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The goal and the task of the Commission was to preserve the monument from destruction.
Within the regional program for the protection of cultural and natural heritage, the Commission showed a strong interest for the project of the Council of Europe and the EU. Technical assessment of the needs for 20 assets that the Commission proposed for the priority list of this project is in its end stage. After that, it is expected that these projects would be presented to the development bank of the Council of Europe and the EU, and that funds for their salvation would be secured in that way.
Round table "Culture" at the Adriatic-ionian initiative was held in Portorož, Slovenia. The Commission was represented by Lidija Fekeža, M.A., and Mirela Mulalić Handan, executive officer. The heritage of Bosnia and Herzegovina received a due attention within this initiative, and the Commission representatives particularly contributed to assessing the influences on heritage.
Tina Wik informed the journalists about the Old Town Koštur that was added on the List of the endangered monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Remains of the fortresses from the Middle Ages are part of the rich Bosnian landscape that reminds of the past, which is not fully appreciated in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and which deserves a better treatment. These remains stress the beautiful dramatic aspect of the Bosnian history in the Middle Ages. All remains are at risk, mostly because of the lack of maintenance and funds. The Commission would like to raise public awareness regarding the importance of fortresses from the Middle Ages. Maintenance is expensive, but at least sites could be cleared of waste and weed, which is why it is important to raise awareness. Fortresses dating back from the Middle Ages are of different size and condition, but they all require continuous attention and maintenance. The Papaz tower in Jajce is falling apart, as well as parts of the Travnik fortress, and there are other fortresses for which there are no available data.
Zeynep Ahunbay informed the journalists about the visits to the municipalities of Kupres, Tomislavgrad and Livno. The restoration of Džudža Džafer's mosque in Tomislavgrad was recently completed, and unfortunately, the mosque was damaged by inappropriate restoration. The sofa was changed and a new room was added above the entrance. The Livno Municipality has rich and well-preserved cultural heritage, but it is important to ensure better professional help to improve the condition of suburban houses, the bridge, the mill, and the houses in the Old Town. The inclusion of the public and of experts would certainly improve the condition of these interesting monuments. The Commission visited the monastery in Gorica with a rich collection of archeological findings and paintings. It is important to publish information about this rich heritage in order for the public to have a better understanding and to preserve the heritage.
Dubravko Lovrenović added that there was an NGO in Kupres engaged in the protection of heritage, called «Kupreška visoravan», headed by Blanka Magaš. The Livno Municipality earmarked KM 150,000 in the budget for the protection of monuments, and the construction of the county museum was in its final stages. The museum building was mostly financed by contributions by the inhabitants of Livnom, and the investment amounted to more than KM 1,000,000. Society for the protection of cultural, historic and natural assets of Jajce informed the Commission about construction that is conducted with heavy machinery, in the close proximity of the Papaz tower in Jajce. This causes stress to the walls and particularly the Papaz tower, which is at risk, pieces are falling, and human casualties are not to be excluded considering that housing and business premises are situated under the tower.
Representatives of the Commission answered questions of journalists regarding the expansion of the Commission's mandate in the new Law on Protection of Cultural Heritage of Bosnia and Herzegovina (the current mandate of the Commission is to pass decisions designating assets as national monuments and to define the necessary measures for protection). Considering that the establishment of a state-level Ministry of Culture cannot be expected in the near future, the Commission concluded that its mandate needed to be expanded in terms of establishing a registry of cultural assets in Bosnia and Herzegovina and ensuring funds for the implementation of Commission's decisions. There are funds used for the protection, restoration and reconstruction of the monuments, but the procedure for activating those funds is very slow. The Commission is often forced to address different institutions, from municipal to the state level, requesting urgent funds for certain monuments, but so far without success. Provision of funds for the implementation of Commission's decisions would mean a more efficient protection of the monuments, by using the funds for the protection of heritage. The budget still did not exist and should be dealt with in the new Law. There is a possibility to ensure the budgetary funds via taxation, via municipal, cantonal, Entity and state budgets, via concessions, etc.
BiH jezici
Commision to preserve national monuments © 2003. Design & Dev.:
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*This Space For Rent*
Penny Can »
The Lobby »
Author Topic: Politics (Read 5726 times)
Neumatic
Re: Politics
Oh, it gets worse, he supports "biblical justice.".
Chiprocks1
Tell me a joke...
Fmr. President George H.W. Bush Dies At The Age Of 94 | The 11th Hour | MSNBC
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1j7nt3Q7rw
Chip's Rockin' Art
Michael Scott To Meredith: "You've slept with so many men, your starting to look like one. BOOM! Roasted! Go here.
Drumpf in full meltdown mode. So, he is doing everything he possible can to change the narrative today by naming 3 cabinet positions for Attorney General, UN Ambassador and Chief of Staff. Nice try dumbf*ck, but it's not going to change the fact that Mueller is still going to release both Cohen and Manafort's filings today. But what I think this is all about is a forthcoming indictment of Adolf Jr. It's coming and no matter what Drumpf says and does, it's not going to change this outcome. Your days are numbered.
Yesterday when news broke that Adolf Drumpf was going to deliver a speech from the Oval Office (tonight), I KNEW, absolutely KNEW that there would be a bombshell being dropped today to neuter Drumpf's impending propaganda Wall Speech. Well, I was right. News about Paul Manafort handing Polling Data to the Russian's was one bombshell (there's your collusion/conspiracy right there). The 2nd bombshell is Natalia Veselnitskaya being indicted as well. Hahaha. Try and stay on topic Adolf. You're going to hang yourself in front of millions of American's as you scream as you try to rant your way out of this.
Roger Stone indicted and arrested at the break of dawn. Other's are expected to be indicted as well, with days. My money is on Adolf Jr.
Robert Mueller has turned in his Report to Barr as of 5 minutes ago. So, here we go. Let's see the domino's fall and Drumpf and his corrupt Administration will get what's coming to them.
There's a lot more dominos than you think. There's three different investigations (the "three Cs") of which Mueller is only one. And the guy is a pro, and operated under a narrow purview of Russian Election Collusion, and the DOJ basically told him that he couldn't indict the President. No doubt why they never pressed Drumpf for a sit-down interview.
What you really have to look for is the SDNY stuff. POTUS can't pardon state crimes, and he's no doubt on the hook for something there. The money laundering, the hush money, etc. He's in deep with the Russian mob, which is one of the main reasons why this project was so massive and has so many dimensions.
So don't get disappointed in what might feel like an underwhelming result, there's plenty more in the pipe. Imagine a guy who smokes, eats garbage, does drugs, drives wrecklessly, drinks and drives, etc but seems to be perfectly fine. Something's gonna get that guy.
Meanwhile, there are plenty of impeachable offenses being racked up. Right now impeachment might not be possible with enough Repugs in the Drumpf corner, but another election can change that. That's another thing that has to be done right, the Nixon way. Right now there's the risk of it being done the Ken Starr way.
Yeah, I've been following all the investigations, especially that of the SDNY, which is of course Drumpf's biggest liability, more so than the Mueller Report. I like how everyone in the White House is "Celebrating" with the news that there aren't any more indictments. Mueller is way smarter than everyone else and my money is on other people in other departments picking up where he left off. So, with no big revelations (we still have to wait on that) regarding the Report, I for one do not believe Drumpf and his cronies are "out of the woods". His business is going to be R.I.C.O.'d. He will lose it all. He's just too stupid to realize that right now.
Newswire is saying that Mueller Report Summary is to drop within the next 30 minutes to Congress and the Public. I have a feeling Barr is scrubbing the hell out of this to cover for Drumpf. If this is the case, then Congress MUST call Mueller to Congress for a Public hearing. I don't trust Barr. Period. The only way I will accept the report is to hear from the man himself: Good or Bad.
You better believe that sh*t is scrubbed, that's what Barr is for.
In 30 minutes, Barr will be holding a Press Conference regarding the "full" redacted Mueller Report to be released after the fact. WTF! Really? You're going to go out and run your mouth on behalf of Drumpf when you criticized Comey for his Presser regarding Clinton? Barr isn't even trying to hide the fact that he is Drumpf's b*tch. I think he is relishing his new found infamy. No one knew who he was back in the Bush years....so he's soaking it all up now. I do wonder if Mueller is saying silent and is purposely letting Barr hang himself publicly so that there is plenty of evidence of his corruption before Mueller steps in and gives the real facts about the Report and Barr.
What a f*cking hack Barr is! He f*cking stood up at the podium and actually said "No Collusion" 6 different times. Yeah, he is definitely corrupt and parroting Drumpf's talking points.
So, this morning on the News Shows they are ripping Barr apart and rightly so. But the "revelation" that Barr has a history of willfully and intentionally misleading both Congress and the Public is what they are focusing in on. This is news to me since I never knew or followed him back in the day. What I want to know is why no one else in the Senate during his confirmation ever called him out on this pattern of his. Maybe it was addressed a little. I dunno. I don't remember anyone bringing this up. If they didn't, well then, we have some sh*tty Lawmakers and Interns that didn't do their jobs in digging this stuff up beforehand. I know it wouldn't have mattered as the Drump Sheep on the Hill were going to confirm him regardless. I just think people as a whole should have been very clear on his past beyond "the guy that pushed for pardons" during the Bush Administration.
Lindsay Graham just called Adolf "....a f*cking idiot" on live TV during his opening remarks for the Barr Congressional Testimony. It doesn't matter if Lindsay read "......a f*cking idiot" off a written page. That will now become a soundbite for ages. They are going to replay that over and over and over to mock Adolf till the end of time.
And yes, he IS a f*cking idiot.
BTW, Lindsay is one as well.
BIG NEWS UPDATE!
Robert Mueller is set to make a public statement in an hour on Russia. Nothing more has been said. Not sure if this is behind closed doors (Not public) or an actual Press Conference (Public). Either way, it should have been done when the Report was turned in to avoid that Fat Whale Barr from spinning it to his and Adolf's will.
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Mozambique Moving Forward With National Natural Capital Program
Drought and deforestation highlight the importance of factoring natural capital into long-term development decisions
By Jill Schwartz | July 25, 2016
A makeshift boat in a dry portion of a reservoir outside Maputo. Credit: WWF/Jill Schwartz
Just as I am dozing off in the back seat, my body starts flopping to the beat of the bumpy road beneath me. I look up and see that it’s because our driver has turned off of the asphalt two-lane road that led us out of Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, and onto a dirt path that’s barely as wide as our car. Other than a few sparse, low-lying shrubs, the area is barren and appears lifeless.
“Wow,” says WWF-Mozambique water specialist Herminio Mulungo, from the front seat. It’s the first thing he’s said that I have not needed him to translate from his native Portuguese to English.
Then “wow” again. And “wow” again. And again.
Herminio gets out of the car and walks to a rusty metal rowboat perched atop dry land.
“That’s the reservoir out there,” he says, pointing to a faint glimmer of water in the distance.
“Three months ago, the reservoir came all the way up to where we are standing. We would’ve been more than knee deep in water here.”
This empty portion of the reservoir is a dramatic sign of how Southern Mozambique is suffering from a terrible drought. The conditions are influenced by El Nino, which in 2015 inundated the land with rain, causing severe flooding followed by an extended drought.
Water behind this dam about an hour and a half outside Maputo (Mozambique’s capital city) is at the lowest levels seen in over two decades. Credit: WWF/Jill Schwartz
I see other signs of the drought up the road. A woman uses a plastic jug to water her small farm plot, one plant at a time. A man stands in a nearly dried up river, trying to fill up a few pails—and risking his life, as I heard many stories of people being attacked by crocodiles while trying to fetch water for their families.
We stop at a dam, and the operator shows me the water line, nearly 30 feet below what it should be. He tells me this is the second lowest he has seen the water since he started working there 25 years ago.
Interestingly, about an hour’s drive from here, nearly 50 government officials from Mozambique are packed into a small conference room and are deep into their fourth day of discussions about how to take stock of the country’s forests, rivers, mangroves and other natural assets and how they can play an important role in preventing and mitigating the impacts of droughts, enhance security from coastal storms, provide reliable drinking water, and more. They are exploring how people and nature benefit from natural assets, as well as how decisions might change if these benefits were factored into development decisions.
Those are the kinds of questions posed and pondered during the weeklong workshop hosted by WWF and the Natural Capital Project. The governments of each of the 10 provinces in Mozambique are represented, mainly by land use planners. They will play an important role in bringing to life the country’s Natural Capital Program, which is one of only several national level programs of its kind in the world. The program was created in 2015, after the country adopted a new five-year plan that includes five priorities—one of which is the sustainable management of natural resources and the environment.
Satellite imagery shows deforestation in Mozambique from 2000 (left) to 2012 (center) and projections to 2019 (right) if current rates continue. (Imagery from the government of Mozambique).
The directors of the Mozambique Ministry of Land, Environment and Rural Development and Ministry of Economy and Finance kicked off the workshop. Participants are learning about spatial planning, mapping natural capital (the natural assets that provide benefits to people and wildlife), how to connect this work to environmental impact assessments, the importance of communications in building support for the Natural Capital Program, and more. They have small group discussions about what data they need and how to obtain that data. And they are using activities, like an adaptation of NatCap’s Best Coast Belize game, to begin to think about nature’s values and how those values are affected by the choices we make, such as where to build roads and resorts to minimize harms and maximize benefits.
The previous week, WWF and Natural Capital Project staff led a workshop on how to use NatCap’s InVEST software to, among other things, model coastal vulnerability and seasonal water yield, all as part of an effort to assess Mozambique’s natural capital. The workshop was for a team of students from Eduardo Mondlane University who will be responsible for gathering and assessing data that will be used to create natural capital plans in Mozambique.
“During those two weeks, a solid foundation for starting the country’s natural capital assessment was created,” said Nasser Olwero, director of Information Science at WWF’s Science and Innovation Program, a longtime member of NatCap’s WWF team, and one of the workshop leaders. “Mozambique is poised to be a leader in making informed decisions about how it grows.”
NatCap’s Lisa Mandle is also engaged in the project. “NatCap is looking forward to continuing to support Mozambique in developing and implementing its Natural Capital Program,” Mandle said. “We’re excited to share the goal of advancing sustainable, equitable development that improves human well-being through conservation and wise management of Mozambique’s natural assets.”
Jill Schwartz
SENIOR DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS, WWF
Jill Schwartz is a senior director of communications at World Wildlife Fund. In this role, she oversees communications related to WWF-US’ work to conserve the world’s forests and its work related to natural capital.
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National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) Inspire … Then Educate
A Commitment to a Powerful Story
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NCESSE and Clarke Institute Honored to also Provide Certificates of Accomplishment to Mission 9 Teachers, Local Partner Orgs, and Individuals
Published on December 1, 2015 by Jeff Goldstein in News
The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program would not be possible without the passion and unwavering dedication to our children of all the teachers and administrators in the SSEP communities, the Local Partner Organizations that embrace the spirit of community and the importance of education, and the individuals that step to the plate as quiet heroes serving as e.g., research advisors to the student teams, and on the community’s Step 1 Review Board. The National Center for Earth and Space Science Education can provide the programmatic framework, but SSEP’s ability to inspire and engage the next generation of scientists and engineers is firmly in the hands of all the educators, organizations, and individuals on the ground.
It is therefore with great pride that the Center, and its international arm, the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Space Education, make available SSEP Mission 9 to ISS Certificates of Accomplishment for each of these groups. It is a special thank you to everyone that made SSEP possible for the thousands of students—we as a team—are inspiring to reach for the stars.
Click for Zoom
Certificate of Accomplishment for Teachers and Administrators
Teaching … the eternal bond between young and old that is at its heart – joy.
Certificate of Accomplishment for Local Partner Organizations
It Takes a Community to Educate a Child
and a Network of Communities to Reach a Generation
Certificate of Accomplishment for Individuals
When Quiet Heroes Step to the Plate
Mountains Move
About the Certificates
The certificates are provided to the Community Program Director as a PDF file. They are ready to be printed in color by the community, and given to teachers and administrators, local partner organizations, and individuals that have participated in the program. The certificates include imagery, logos, and ISS insignia, as well as electronic signatures for Dr. Jeff Goldstein, SSEP Director, and Jeffrey Manber, Managing Director of NanoRacks, LLC.
The certificates are designed so that they can be customized to each community by including the name of the community and name of the community leader who will sign the certificates. The community leader may also provide an electronic signature to be incorporated in the certificate.
An Important Note: NCESSE can only make certificate masters available to the SSEP Community Directors and Co-Directors in a community, or to some other designated community leader. We have already sent word out to the Directors and Co-Directors for Mission 9 to ISS as to how they can obtain certificate masters for their community.
The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) is a program of the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) in the U.S., and the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Space Education internationally. It is enabled through a strategic partnership with NanoRacks LLC, working with NASA under a Space Act Agreement as part of the utilization of the International Space Station as a National Laboratory. SSEP is the first pre-college STEM education program that is both a U.S. national initiative and implemented as an on-orbit commercial space venture.
The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), and Subaru of America, Inc., are U.S. National Partners on the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program. Magellan Aerospace is a Canadian National Partner on the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program.
Countdown to Currently Scheduled Launches for the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program
Completed SSEP MissionsM - Mission, L - Launch Date, R - Return to Earth Date
M12: L - 06/29/18 SpaceX-15, R - 08/03/18 SpaceX-15 M11: L - 08/14/17 SpaceX-12, R - 09/17/17 SpaceX-12
M10: L - 06/03/17 SpaceX-11, R - 07/02/17 SpaceX-11
M9: L - 02/19/17 SpaceX-10, R - 03/19/17 SpaceX-10
M8: L - 07/18/16 SpaceX-9, R - 08/26/16 SpaceX-9
M5: L - 07/13/14 Orb-2, R - 10/25/14 SpaceX-4
M4: L - 01/09/14 Orb -1, R - 03/10/14 Soyuz 36S
M3b: L - 01/09/14 Orb-1, R - 03/10/14 Soyuz 36S
M3a: L - 09/18/13 Orb-D1, R - 11/10/13 Soyuz 35S
M2: L - 10/07/12 SpaceX-1, R - 11/19/12 Soyuz 31S
M1: L - 05/22/12 SpaceX-D1, R - 07/01/12 Soyuz 29S
STS-135 (Atlantis): L - 07/08/11, R - 07/21/11
STS-134 (Endeavour): L - 05/16/11, R - 06/01/11
LIVE FEED FROM ISS (adjust volume below)
Excellent SSEP Overview
January 9, 2014, Mission Control, Houston, interviews
SSEP Director Dr. Jeff Goldstein, during Orb-1 Launch of the 23 SSEP Mission 3b/4 Experiments
We've Got to be that Light - A Gift to America's Teachers
Symphony of Science Remix, NSTA Keynote Address,
March 2011, Dr. Jeff Goldstein, NCESSE Director
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NCESSE News
New Flight Opportunity for School Districts: Announcing Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) Mission 14 to the International Space Station, Starting September 2019Posted by Jeff Goldstein on March 29, 2019
THE SOLUTION to the Mission 12 Student Challenge: Understanding Weightlessness – You Want Me to Take a Bathroom Scale Where?Posted by Jeff Goldstein on September 25, 2017
The Tradition Continues – To the Students, Teachers, and Communities Starting SSEP Mission 12 to ISS, Welcome Aboard America’s and Canada’s Space Programs, NASA Johnson Style (with Some One Direction)Posted by Jeff Goldstein on September 19, 2017
SSEP Mission 12 to the International Space Station Has Begun: Welcome Aboard to 18,300 Participating Students Across 31 Communities in the U.S., Canada and BrazilPosted by Jeff Goldstein on September 19, 2017
For the 18,800(!) Student Researchers Now Engaged in SSEP Mission 12 to ISS – A Challenge for the Start of Program: Understanding Weightlessness – You Want Me to Take a Bathroom Scale Where?Posted by Jeff Goldstein on September 13, 2017
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Carl Jung does some Liverpool dreamin’
In my previous post, I wrote about being invited to the Liverpool School of Language, Music, Dream and Pun by Allan Williams, “the man who gave away the Beatles.” To forestall disappointment, I should say that I never took up his offer. If you want a detailed account of what went on in that fabled and possibly ribald institution, let me know, and I’ll make something up for you.
What I can tell you is that the Liverpool School of Language, Music, Dream and Pun was situated, rather disappointingly, in an old fruit warehouse. The man who started the club in 1974, Peter O’Halligan, had decided that this disused industrial building on Mathew Street was the site of Carl Jung’s dream about Liverpool.
There aren’t a lot of famous dreams. I’ve never been able to generate any buzz about my nightmare involving myself, Dick Cheney, and a saddle pony named Poppet. But Jung’s dream is famous, so let’s take a look.
“I found myself in a dirty, sooty city,” wrote the famous psychologist in 1927. “It was night, and winter, and dark, and raining. I was in Liverpool. With a number of Swiss, I walked through the dark streets.”
So far, I’m with Jung all the way, except for the Swiss and the fact that he only dreamed about walking through Liverpool’s dark and rainy streets. I really did walk through them, many times, and blimey, did I get wet.
“I had the feeling that we were coming up from the harbour,” Jung continues, “and that the real city was actually up above … in the centre was a round pool, and in the middle of it a small island. While everything round about was obscured by rain, fog, smoke and dimly-lit darkness, the little island blazed with sunlight.
Magnolia tree
“On it stood a single tree – a Magnolia – in a shower of reddish blossoms. It was as though the tree stood in the sunlight and was at the same time the source of the light.”
Okay, so Carl gets a bit a fanciful here. Of course, it was a dream. A dream, he says, that represented his situation at the time. “I can still see the greyish-yellow raincoats, glistening with the wetness of the rain. Everything was extremely unpleasant, black and opaque – just as I felt then. But I had had a vision of unearthly beauty, and that was why I was able to live at all.
“Liverpool,” he concludes, “is the ‘pool of life.’”
Moments that make everything worthwhile
You either feel that way about Liverpool or you don’t. Alan Bennett famously doesn’t. Liverpudlians, he says in Writing Home, “all have the chat, and it laces every casual encounter, everybody wanting to do you their little verbal dance.”
I love Writing Home, but I also love the Liverpudlians’ little verbal dance. I’m guessing that Eddie Izzard does too. “I was walking past a building site in Liverpool,” my favorite “action transvestite” comedian and actor told James Rampton of the Independent in 2004, “and a brickie [brick-layer] shouted at me from the scaffolding, ‘Hey Eddie, where’s your lippie?’ I said I’d left it at home, and he replied: ‘Wanna borrow mine?’ Moments like that make everything worthwhile.”
I had lots of moments like that in Liverpool. Like Jung, I can still see the greyish-yellow raincoats glistening with the wetness of the rain, but I also see Pier Head and its trio of beautiful buildings, the Three Graces, past which the Mersey River flows into the Irish Sea.
And I see myself riding back to my flat in Mossley Hill one night on a bone-rattling train, looking out at the sky, still some light in it at ten o’clock, a dark pale blue (a contradiction that is somehow very Liverpool), with skeins of dark grey clouds laid over it and one bright star; and in the foreground, tall brick houses with rows of chimney-pots.
The light, and the source of the light.
Too square for the school
I didn’t go to Peter O’Halligan’s club because, like Betsy Ray, “I could never be a Bohemian.” I suspected that in addition to being the School of Language, Music, Dream and Pun, the club at 18 Mathew Street might also be a School of Drink, Drugs, and Unbridled Licentiousness. Even at 30, I was a one-glass-of-wine-with-dinner girl, and too square for that scene.
But maybe I was wrong. Or maybe I was right and I’d have enjoyed myself anyway. So thanks for the badge, Mr. Williams, and I wish I’d given the place a try. It’s part of the history of a city I love, commemorated now in a plaque on the building. And on this page too.
(Image of Magnolia Tree, Enterprise, Florida, by A.F. Styles, 1832-1910, courtesy Wikimedia Commons)
Categories: Travel Author: Rhiannon
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2 thoughts on “Carl Jung does some Liverpool dreamin’”
Larry Sidorczuk says:
Hello, mini-girl.
I came across your travel blog quite by accident, and having read your posting about the Liverpol School of Language, Music, Dream and Pun, it intrigued me. It’s a shame that you didn’t take up the opportunity of going to visit it [as invited by Alan Williams] as it was so important within the counter-cultural scene in Liverpool during the mid-1970’s. Did you know that he once played the part of “Howard the Singing Dolphin” in Ken Cambell’s Science Fiction Theatre’s production of “Illuminatus” at the School! And to slightly correct you, it wasn’t anything to do with drink or drugs – it lived on the visions and energy of Jung’s Liverpool Dream which, by itself, was pretty powerful stuff. We held a special anniversary event to mark to the 30th Anniversary of the Golden Scarab Festival at the Liverpool School back in 2007 [you can watch a video of it here :
http://liverpoolstories.blogspot.com/2007/06/liverpool-school-of-language-music.html.
Finally, although the plaque itself was initially planned to go up on the wall in Matyhew Street, it’s been since donated to go on permanent display at the new Museum of Liverpool Life down by the Pier Head as part of the “Creative City” gallery.
Keep dreamin!
Rhiannon says:
Larry, I’m so pleased with your comment. I actually found and watched the video while I was writing this post, so your name is familiar to me in a “dreamin'” context. I’m happy to learn that my American-Puritanical suspicions about the School were unfounded, and you’re right, I should have gone. I was in Liverpool in September and was told about the new Museum of Liverpool Life, but didn’t get a chance to see it — next visit, next year, I hope. Thanks for taking the time to write to me. And yes, we must all keep dreaming, now more than ever. “I’ll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours” — Bob Dylan. Cheers!
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9 Days That Changed the World
Newt Gingrich and John Paul II; Spain’s Catholic Voice
US Politician Documents 9 Days That Changed the World
By Elizabeth Lev
ROME, JUNE 17, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Over the past few months, mainstream media has done as much to sully the reputation of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI as the BP oil spill has done to pollute the Gulf of Mexico.
The U.K. Telegraph and the New York Times have both been busily trying to tar these great Popes with their broad brush of sex abuse scandals, hoping to reduce their papacies to the same tawdry tenure of many politicians.
One politician, former house Speaker Newt Gingrich, well aware of how scandal can obscure great achievements, decided to highlight one of the great lasting contributions of Pope John Paul II in a documentary titled “Nine Days That Changed the World.”
Produced by Citizens United, an advocacy group active in promoting traditional American values, and hosted by Newt Gingrich and his wife Callista, the 94-minute film traces the historic visit of John Paul II to Poland the year after his election to the pontificate. The ramifications of the Pope’s visit were enormous and the film convincingly shows that those few days in Poland set in motion a series of events that would play a pivotal role in overthrowing Communist rule in Europe.
Gingrich, who converted to Catholicism a year ago, mostly through his wife’s witness and an encounter with Benedict XVI, presents the story as an extraordinary example of “freedom through faith.” Old video footage, interviews and location shots are expertly woven by director Kevin Knoblock into a smooth and compelling narrative.
In the film, George Weigel, author of the John Paul II biography “Witness to Hope,” explains the historical context of the visit, as well as the exciting interplay between the Communist regime and a Pope determined to awaken the Christian memory and identity of his people. Jerzy Kluger, the Pope’s childhood friend, offers insights into the sentiments of this remarkable Pontiff.
Former Polish President Lech Walesa discusses the role the visit played in the foundation of the Solidarity Movement, which would become the first recognized free trade union in the Communist bloc, counting over 10 million members by 1981.
Theologians Dominican Father Wojciech Giertych and Legionary of Christ Father Thomas Williams contextualize the spiritual meaning of the papal visit to a land that had been sucked dry of religion. John Paul II revived the faith of the Polish people, erecting crosses where they had been taken down, praying in places that seemed bereft of both hope and love, as in his visit to Auschwitz, and reminding the Polish people of Christianity’s rich history on their soil.
Many interviews with those who were present during the visit, even if just standing in the crowds in Warsaw, testify to the overwhelming influence John Paul II’s visit had on the third of the Polish population that came to see him. Pope John Paul II personally brought the Polish people the message he gave to the world on Oct. 22, 1978, days after his election: “Be not afraid. Open wide the doors to Christ. To his saving power upon the boundaries of states, economic and political systems, the vast fields of culture, civilization and development. Do not be afraid!”
A few interesting facts emerge in the story. Originally, John Paul II had asked to make a short two-day visit in May 1979, on the millennium anniversary of the martyrdom of St. Stanislaus, the 11th-century bishop of Krakow, who was martyred by the king of Poland after Stanislaus openly criticized his unjust and oppressive rule. The Communist authorities refused, fearing the effect of having the Pope addressing the Poles on that historic occasion. They compromised with a nine day visit in June instead, a decision they would live to regret.
The film is very moving on many levels. Seeing the charismatic and athletic John Paul II wooing and winning his people with words, gestures and warmth brings waves of loving nostalgia to all those who knew him. John Paul II’s deference to Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński, primate of Poland, is particularly touching.
The filmmakers endorse the prevailing theory that the attempted assassination of John Paul II on May 13, 1981, by Mehmet Ali Agca (who recently was given space by the Associated Press for his criticisms of Benedict XVI) was really engineered by Communist leaders who perceived the Pope as their greatest threat. Former CIA director James Woolsey explains this connection in the film.
While the film is an uplifting triumph, there is one sad note. Two of the people interviewed for the film were on the plane carrying the Polish president, which crashed on April 10, 2010. One of the victims was Anna Walentynowicz, a Solidarity leader with Lech Walesa, whose testimony was one of the highlights of the film.
The “Nine Days that Changed the World” project is a heartening example of the great vocation of laypeople: a politician, using a solid study of history and the innovative dazzle of media, to recount the inspiring and uplifting truth.
For more information: www.ninedaysthatchangedtheworld.com
Posted in Country, Popes on June 20, 2010 by Dennis Mallon.
← Eucharist Is Not Understood, Laments Pope
VISITOR’S INITIAL INTERVIEW →
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Regional and Local Economic Development Initiative
Research output 2012-2017
Fifteen Entrepreneurs Honoured in Business School Champions Programme
The Graduate School of Business and Leadership’s Regional Local Economic Development Initiative celebrated the success of its Champions Programme with 15 social entrepreneurs being honoured for their hard work and contribution towards their communities. The Champions Programme is a social entrepreneurship development intervention offered to social entrepreneurs to accelerate and extend changes...
Alumni Network for KZN’s Social Entrepreneurs Launched
The Local Economic Development Champions Alumni Network – which is a platform where KwaZulu-Natal’s social entrepreneurs can regularly network, share resources and enhance collaborations – is the latest deliverable development from the partnership between the KwaZulu-Natal Economic Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs Department (EDTEA) and the University of KwaZulu-Natal. The...
GSB&L Hosts Local Economic Development Winter School
Effective Local Government for Radical Economic Transformation was the theme of the recently held Regional and Local Economic Development Initiative (RLEDI) Winter School. The two-day event, held at the Royal Hotel in Durban, was hosted by the Graduate School of Business and Leadership (GSB&L) in partnership with the KwaZulu-Natal Economic...
Guest Lecture Explores Role of Small Towns in Post-Apartheid South Africa
The role of small towns in post-apartheid South Africa was the topic of a guest lecture delivered at the Graduate School of Business and Leadership (GSB&L) by the Director of the Centre for Small Towns Regeneration Ms Phila Xuza. As a leading strategist, scholar and practitioner of spatial economic development...
Former GSB&L Champion Giving Former Substance Abusers a Second Chance
Entrepreneur and co-founder of Iziko Stoves Mr Lindo Duma is positively transforming the Durban community by employing rehabilitated substance abusers and helping them reintegrate into society. Iziko Stoves are innovative cooking and braai stoves made from recycled geysers, gas cylinders and paint drums. The stoves can utilise various fuel sources...
GSB&L’s Champions Programme’s Entrepreneurs are bringing Local Economic Development to their Communities
The Graduate School of Business and Leadership’s Regional Local Economic Development Initiativecelebrated the success of its Champions Programme as 12 social entrepreneurs recently showcased how their entrepreneurial ventures are benefiting their communities. The Champions Programme is a community development initiative that is part of a partnership between the KwaZulu-Natal Economic Development,...
Young Researchers 2017
LED Young Researchers 2015
LED Champions
Young researchers programme
Annual Winter School
Journal: Skills@work
Building Capacity for LED
Local Economic Development (LED) has been practiced globally by the state and communities as a response to locality-specific development problems. LED can provide a flexible and an effective approach to enhance economic growth and reduce poverty.
In KwaZulu-Natal, and in South Africa more broadly, there is a need to build the capabilities of those involved in development and transformation to improve the success of LED interventions.
After a successful pilot programme funded by Gijima KZN, The Regional and Local Economic Development Initiative was launched early in 2012. The initiative is fully funded and supported by the KwaZulu-Natal Economic Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs (EDTEA) and has an academic home at the Graduate School of Business and Leadership on the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Westville campus.
The initiative includes a coordinated and integrated programme of teaching, learning and applied research in LED. The main aim of the Programme is to overcome current gaps in capacity for LED in KwaZulu-Natal.
Programme Aims:
To promote LED research and learning
To build critical thinking in relation to LED
The creation of a professional network of LED graduates
To strengthen the implementation practice of LED institutions
The Graduate School of Business and Leadership’s Regional Local Economic Development Initiative celebrated the success of its Champions Programme with 15 social…
The Local Economic Development Champions Alumni Network – which is a platform where KwaZulu-Natal’s social entrepreneurs can regularly network, share…
Effective Local Government for Radical Economic Transformation was the theme of the recently held Regional and Local Economic Development Initiative…
The role of small towns in post-apartheid South Africa was the topic of a guest lecture delivered at the Graduate…
Entrepreneur and co-founder of Iziko Stoves Mr Lindo Duma is positively transforming the Durban community by employing rehabilitated substance abusers…
Business School’s Young Researchers ready to Contribute to the Growth of LED
The Graduate School of Business and Leadership’s (GSB&L) Regional and Local Economic Development Initiative (RLEDi) celebrated the graduation of eight of its…
UKZN Graduate School Hosts International Entrepreneurship Weekend for Women
The South African edition of the Global Startup Weekend Women (GSWW) was held for the first time in Durban this…
Mission More Than Accomplished for Young Doctoral Graduate
When Dr Pfano Mashau joined UKZN’s Graduate School of Business and Leadership (GSB&L) through its Regional and Local Economic Development…
The Graduate School of Business and Leadership’s Regional Local Economic Development Initiativecelebrated the success of its Champions Programme as 12 social…
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July 10.2014 – Nashville Stars! Garth Brooks News!!
Garth Brooks announced his long awaited return to the road today (July 10), as well as a new studio album!
Brooks, the best selling solo artist of all time, has long held out from making his music available to digital outlets, also revealed plans to release his music digitally within the next two or three weeks. “When it is used right, [digital] can do wonders for the artists and the songwriters,” said Brooks, adding, “we play our own way.” Therefore, the music will be exclusively at GarthBrooks.com and for a limited window it will be available at what he said is a “stupid” low price.
He didn’t reveal the location of the opening concert today. Instead, he will fulfill a promise to a fan named Andy, who he met at one of his concerts in Las Vegas, and call Andy on July 14 to reveal the opening city. Brooks said he is proud of the low ticket price for the upcoming run, but didn’t give details, which will be made public in the next ten days.
No release date has been set, but expects it to be available in the next two months. Addressing the new project, he said, “Garth music is ever evolving and stands the test of time.”
← July 10.2014 – Story Behind The Song “Home” by Blake Shelton July 10.2014 – Quote Of The Day! →
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Find solution and avoid any strike
The industrial action at the local branch of FirstCaribbean International Bank (FCIB) is into its third week. The workers’ union, the Commercial Technical and Allied Workers’ Union (CTAWU), met with its general membership on Monday, and called on them to join the picket line.
General Secretary of the union, Lloyd Small, said he was pleased with the response of the general membership and hinted that the union’s response could escalate if the situation did not improve. {{more}}
Up to press time, the bank had not responded to Minister of Labour, the Hon. Rene Baptiste’s compromise proposal on redundancy payments, already accepted by the union. The minister had initially given the bank up to last Monday to respond, but they requested an extension until today. The bank seems reluctant to budge on the redundancy package they have proposed or to pay salaries to workers who called in sick two weeks ago.
It could be that the bank, which has branches in sixteen countries, is seeking to harmonise benefits throughout its branches and fears that giving in to the workers’ demands here may trigger calls for similar benefits in the other territories where they have branches.
But one size can’t fit all.
FCIB itself acknowledges this in the “FirstPartnership Principles Agreement” it referred to in the notice published by the bank
in last week’s issue of Searchlight.
This agreement was signed by FCIB and eleven trade unions from around the region, including CTAWU. It outlines the principles the signatories hope will guide the relationship between the Trade Unions and FirstCaribbean across the Caribbean.
In a statement issued by the bank on the date of signing, July 4, 2005, the bank said that the agreement “is not intended to replace the individual country negotiations which are held in unionized countries.” They also stated that the agreement, while setting out a single partnership framework, allows the individual unions the “flexibility to support local conditions.” That flexibility is what is needed now.
Another worrying factor is the mistrust that seems to be creeping into the negotiations. This is apparent from the statements published by both the bank and the union relating to the negotiations. This is unfortunate, because acrimony between unions and employers is never good, and the workers are usually the ones to suffer.
And if settlement is not reached soon, this impasse could grow to include workers from other sectors. Although the CTAWU has not flexed its muscle in the recent past, it is still the country’s largest trade union, with approximately 3000 members.
St. Vincent and the Grenadines can ill-afford the loss in productivity and the disruption a general strike could cause.
We call on both the union and the bank to recall the broad-based principles of honesty, mutual trust, respect and integrity contained in the agreement they signed last July, and work towards resolving the matter in the shortest possible time for the good of the workers, the bank and the country.
Shaunelle does the double
Handal Roban bags bronze at NACAC championships
Hotel Alexandrina receives International Service Excellence Certification
Rivals pair top twenty/20 batting, bowling statistics
Lasagna Stuffed Chicken
True to form for West Indies
Murderer gets less than 7 years for cutting wife’s throat
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Writers’ Open Studio
Weekly Writing Studios at the Salem Athenaeum.
The building will be open from 8:40-11:30 every Tuesday (unless announced otherwise). Feel free to come by and write in a quiet peaceful setting.
Come for as long as you’d like–for 20 minutes or all three hours.
Categories: Groups Writers
Salem Writers’ Group
All are welcome to bring work-in-progress to share with the group for feedback. The group is facilitated by J.D. Scrimgeour, Professor of English, Salem State University.
La Tertulia is a group of members interested in keeping their Spanish speaking skills in practice.
Meets the 2nd and 4th Tuesday
from 6:00 to 8:00 PM
Categories: General Groups
Incessant Pipe: Contentions
Philosophy, Science, and Ideas. Come sit around a medium-large table and discuss the big stuff.
2nd Wednesdays at 7:00 p.m.
Salon: Storytelling—Heat
The Summer Salon series kicks off this evening!
Join several storytellers who share true stories from their lives, told live without notes. The evening’s theme is “heat.” Among the storytellers will be Judy Bedell, Peter Eschauzier, Colleen Michaels, and Bill Scannell. J.D. Scrimgeour hosts.
Judy Wang Bedell came to the U.S. from Beijing, China for graduate school and then stayed in the US to live and work. She is a Salem resident and has lived in the city for 24 years.
Peter Eschauzier was born in 1940 in Modjokerto, Java, Indonesia. He grew up in the Netherlands, West Newton, MA, Roslyn, New York, and Switzerland. He served in the US Navy from 1963-68, and then worked as a pilot for many years. He served on the Board of Directors of Historic Salem and was the President of the Grey Eagles, representing the retired pilots of American Airlines.
Colleen Michaels writes poems and tells stories. She directs the Writing Studio at Montserrat College of Art, where she’s been hosting the Improbable Places Poetry Tour for 10 years. Her poems have appeared in journals and anthologies, on the ceiling of the PEM and the stairs to Crane Beach, and on bar coasters under pints.
Bill Scannell grew up in Worcester, MA and attended school there. He graduated from Skidmore College, and, thereafter, Suffolk University Law School. He is married and the father of three children.
J.D. Scrimgeour is the Chair of the Athenaeum Writing Committee.
Please join us on Fridays in July and August for one or more of these special evenings!
July 12: Storytelling hosted by J.D. Scrimgeour
July 19: Dave Williams — Polling
July 26: Margie Lavender and Dean Lahikainen— Harmony Grove Cemetery
August 9: Boston Saxophone Quartet
August 16: James R. Scrimgeour and Carl Carlsen — Dogtown
August 23: Vicky Sirianni — Palladio
Categories: General Programs
Re-appraisal Reading Circle
Re-appraisal Reading Circle will meet tonight to choose authors for next year.
Salon: Dave Williams—The Art and Science of Polling
Dave Williams will present a retrospective of the history of survey research in political campaigns from FDR to today and how technology and procedural changes have impacted the reliability of modern polling.
Since the founding of Williams and Associates by David E. Williams in 1989 the company has consulted with both corporate and political clients including the campaign committee for Presidents Rupiah Banda (Zambia), Ali Bongo Ondimba (Gabon), Governor William F. Weld (R MA), GTE/Sylvania, Hydro-Quebec, the National Association of Government Employees, the Providence Journal-Bulletin, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard University (Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study), the US Agency for International Development, and the United States Department of State.
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WAITROSE PARTNERS IN SCOTLAND BREAK THROUGH 1,000
Who says there’s no hope for upmarket food stores in poverty-riven, food bank Scotland with no-one wanting to work in supermarkets?
Waitrose, the high-end food store wing of department store giant John Lewis, has just recruited 150 new Partners with recruitment for the new branch in Milngavie now complete.
More than 1,900 applications were received for jobs at Waitrose Milngavie, the highest number ever for a new Scottish branch.
It’s the supermarket’s seventh branch in Scotland and brings the number of Scottish Waitrose Partners to more than 1,000.
Vacancies were a mix of full-time and part-time positions and ranged from food service assistants to customer service and administration assistants.
The new Partners will receive training in venues in Waitrose’s branches on Byres Road, in Stirling and in Newton Mearns.
DAVID SHARP, branch manager for Waitrose Milngavie, said: “We had an incredible response to our recruitment drive in Milngavie and the calibre of the applicants was outstanding.
“We’ve adapted how we recruit for this branch, to reflect the demand for more full-time positions in the local area.
“Waitrose is employee-owned, which means that all of our new Partners will have a say in how the business is run, and access to all the benefits that come with working in the John Lewis Partnership.
“Each year our Partners will receive their share of our profits through the bonus scheme – meaning that a substantial proportion of Waitrose Milngavie’s profits will stay in the local community.”
Waitrose Partners receive a range of benefits. In 2014/15, each Partner received a bonus of 11%, which equated to six weeks additional pay. After three months, each Partner will be entitled to a discount on shopping in John Lewis and Waitrose.
Waitrose Milngavie will open at 8am on Thursday 11 June. Waitrose already has two branches in Edinburgh (Comely Bank and Morningside), one in Glasgow (Byres Road) and in Newton Mearns, Helensburgh and Stirling.
Meanwhile aspirational Corstorphine in Edinburgh holds its breath for a transformational Waitrose store coming soon.
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AOL Acquires TechCrunch
Written by Frederic Lardinois on Sep 28, 2010
After a few hours of wild speculation, TechCrunch founder and co-edit Mike Arrington and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong just announced that AOL has indeed acquired TechCrunch. According to Arrington, TechCrunch will be a fully owned subsidiary of AOL, but his team will have no "editorial boundaries" and AOL will allow the blog to operate as usual. Arrington will stay on with AOL for "at least 3 years," which – presumably – is part of the agreement. The financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Congrats to Mike and the rest of the team.
Below is the full press release.
AOL To Acquire TechCrunch Network Of Sites
Leading Authority on Tech News Will Expand AOL’s Growing Offering of World-Class, Audience-Relevant Content
San Francisco, CA, September 28, 2010 – AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL) today announced that it has agreed to acquire TechCrunch, Inc., the company that owns and operates TechCrunch and its network of websites dedicated to technology news, information and analysis. TechCrunch and its associated properties and conferences will join the AOL Technology Network while retaining their editorial independence, further bolstering AOL’s position as one of the world’s leading providers of high-quality, tech-oriented content. The announcement will be made on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco, CA.
Founded by Michael Arrington, TechCrunch operates a global network of dedicated properties from Europe to Japan, as well as vertically-oriented websites, including MobileCrunch, CrunchGear, TechCrunchIT, GreenTech, TechCrunchTV and CrunchBase. The TechMeme Leaderboard ranks TechCrunch as the No. 1 source of breaking tech news online, followed by AOL’s Engadget.*
"Michael and his colleagues have made the TechCrunch network a byword for breaking tech news and insight into the innovative world of start-ups, and their reputation for top-class journalism precisely matches AOL’s commitment to delivering the expert content critical to this audience," said Tim Armstrong, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of AOL. "TechCrunch and its team will be an outstanding addition to the high-quality content on the AOL Technology Network, which is now a must-buy for advertisers seeking to associate their brands with leading technology content and its audience."
Heather Harde, Chief Executive Officer of TechCrunch, said: "TechCrunch and AOL share a motivating passion for quality technology news and information, and we’re delighted about becoming part of the AOL family. This represents a compelling opportunity to extend the TechCrunch brand while complementing the great work of sites like Engadget and Switched. Our contributors, and our audiences, can look to the future with excitement about what we can build when we have the significant resources of AOL behind us."
Michael Arrington, Founder and Co-Editor of TechCrunch, said: "Tim Armstrong and his team have an exciting vision for the future of AOL as a global leader in creating and delivering world-class content to consumers, be it through original content creation, partnerships or acquisitions. I look forward to working with everyone at AOL as we build on our reputation for independent tech journalism and continue to set the agenda for insight, reviews and collaborative discussion about the future of the technology industry."
TechCrunch also hosts industry-leading conferences and events, including The Disrupt series, The Crunchies Awards and various meet-ups worldwide. These conferences bring together industry innovators, entrepreneurs and financing sources to exchange ideas, forge new relationships and discuss the current and future industry trends.
"Engagement with thought leaders is as important to AOL as our engagement with our contributors, audiences, publishers and advertisers, and TechCrunch’s conferences and websites will give us a promising, additional springboard to join and amplify these conversations. We’re committed to quality in everything we do at AOL, and look forward to working with Heather, Michael and the TechCrunch team to extend the brand," said David Eun, President of AOL Media and Studios.
The AOL Technology Network consists of AOL’s tech-oriented properties including Engadget, the Web magazine about everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics; Switched, which covers the intersection of the digital world with entertainment, sports, art, fashion and lifestyle; TUAW, the unofficial Apple weblog; and DownloadSquad, the weblog about downloadable software and other computer subjects. The AOL Technology Network ranks in the top five for tech news according to comScore Media Metrix, August 2010 data, and leads the top five in average time spent and average visits per user.
This acquisition will further AOL’s strategy to become the global leader in sourcing, creating, producing and delivering high-quality, trusted, original content to consumers. TechCrunch will remain headquartered in San Francisco, CA, as a wholly owned AOL unit. Deal terms were not disclosed.
Posted Under: Breaking News, News
acquisitionaolmergertechcrunch
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Royals add Duda to big league roster, waive Goodwin
SURPRISE, Ariz. (AP) The Kansas City Royals selected the contract of first baseman Lucas Duda from Triple-A Omaha and waived outfielder Brian Goodwin on Monday as they continued to shape their opening day roster.
Duda attended spring training with Minnesota on a minor league contract, was released last week and signed a minor league deal with the Royals on Friday. He gets a $1.25 million, one-year contract from Kansas City and the chance to earn $250,000 in performance bonuses.
He hit .242 with 13 homers and 48 RBIs in 87 games for the Royals last season and was traded to Atlanta in August. Duda appeared in 20 games down the stretch, hitting .222 with a homer and two RBIs.
Duda was 0 for 3 in three games during the Braves' Division Series loss to the Dodgers.
Goodwin hit .200 with three homers and 12 RBIs for the Nationals last season before a late-July trade to Kansas City. He played in 27 games for the Royals, hitting .266 with three homers and 13 RBIs.
Kansas City opens the season Thursday against the Chicago White Sox.
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Following the meeting with the French Senate last week, His Excellency Mr. Buddhi K. Athauda, Ambassador of Sri Lanka to France also met with members of the France-Sri Lanka Friendship Group of the French National Assembly, the other House of the French Parliament yesterday at the Petit Hotel of the National Assembly in Paris.
Mr. Joaquim Pueyo, the President of the National Assembly Group warmly welcomed the Ambassador and articulated on the necessity to continue the well formulated initiation of mutual bilateral relations with Sri Lanka and expressed their solidarity to Sri Lanka at all times.
Ambassador Athauda briefed the Members about the prevailing political situation in Sri Lanka and emphasized that Sri Lanka as a nation has not resorted to violence or autocratic rule. Neither the executive nor the legislature has disregarded the balance of powers which is predominant in a democratic nation. He further explained that law and order has prevailed in Sri Lanka and that the country will continue to uphold fundamental human equality and dignity and will confidently provide a feasible mechanism for pursuing social justice as all democratic nations do.
Explaining the policy of the French Government to give special focus on renewable energy, the Members of the National Assembly explained that under its commitment to the EU renewable energy directive of 2009, France has a target of producing 23% of its total energy needs from renewable energy by 2020 and reducing nuclear energy consumption from 70% to 50%. They were willing to share their expertise and plans with Sri Lanka with the firm objective to move towards green economies together with many other countries.
During the discussions that followed, Ambassador Athauda highlighted the importance of strengthening the initiated support given by France for the restructuring of the City of Colombo and its urban development projects which which will be put into force in the coming months. In response to the question posed by the Members on the boost of the Tourism Industry, Ambassador Athauda also requested French experts to share their expertise to develop tourist infrastructure including untapped natural sites to attract tourists in a sustainable manner.
H.E the Ambassador was accompanied by Embassy officials for his meeting with the Members of the National Assembly.
(Ambassador Athauda with Mr. Joaquim Pueyo, President of the Group)
(Ambassador Athauda with Mr. Joaquim Pueyo President and Mr. Michel Delpon, Vice-President)
Embassy of Sri Lanka in Paris
SL Trade News
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April 24, 2018 By c71558x1
J&R Adventures presents
jbonamassa.com
Hailed worldwide as one of the greatest guitar players of his generation, Joe Bonamassa has almost single-handedly redefined the blues-rock genre and brought it into the mainstream. Backed by a stellar band of legendary musicians including Anton Fig (drums), Michael Rhodes (bass), Reese Wynans (piano, Hammond organ), to bring a whole new life to the show which will feature new songs alongside career-spanning favorites. By exceeding his own vertiginously high artistic goals, Bonamassa has shattered all expectations with this record and has reached new audiences – no mean feat when you continue his astonishing track record of hits, which now includes 16 #1 Billboard Blues Albums (more than any other artist in history) and in 2014, the guitarist received his first-ever Grammy nomination (for Best Blues Album) for the album Seesaw, his second collaboration with blues singing star Beth Hart. “They’re calling him the future of blues, but they’re wrong – Joe Bonamassa is the present; so fresh and of his time that he almost defines it.” – Classic Rock Magazine
Download a Free Song from Joe Bonamassa at www.jbonamassa.com/freemp3
This is not a State Theatre produced show. Member Benefits & Gift Cards do not apply.
Tue, April 24, 2018 at 8:00 PM
$149/$129/$99/$89
Next ArticleKATHLEEN MADIGAN
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#253 Tim T. Nakamura
(Director of Public Safety & Emergency Preparedness)
Tim T. Nakamura is currently the Director of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness for College of the Desert. But Tim has been coming to COD since he was ten years old. In the late 80’s and early 90’s there was a Japanese language school offered on Saturdays here at COD. The class was held in LA 13 and his parents sent him there to learn how to speak Japanese. He continued to attend Japanese classes at COD on Saturdays until he was about 15 years old. A few years later after graduating from Palm Desert High School, Tim put those Japanese language skills to the test when he was hired to serve as a Japanese Interpreter for a Japanese Paramedic exchange program. Tim is an Alumnus from College of the Desert and holds two Associate degrees in Liberal Arts and Police Science. He is also a graduate of Victor Valley College and obtained an Associates in Respiratory Therapy as well as Loma Linda University’s Emergency Medical Care Bachelors of Science program. In addition to those undergraduate degrees, Tim also possesses a Master’s degree in Forensic Psychology from Argosy University and a Master’s degree in Education from Pepperdine University. Tim is currently working on his dissertation for his Doctorate in Clinical Psychology.
Tim is a United States Army Veteran. He served as a medic and non-commissioned officer until he left active duty in 2008. Tim is also a graduate of the Ben Clark Training Center Peace Officer Academy. He has served as a Level I Reserve Deputy Sheriff for the Imperial County Sheriff's Office providing solo patrol for Imperial County for the past five years. In the time that he has been here at COD, Tim has also served as the Interim Director of the Public Safety Academy where he continues to teach for the Basic Peace Officer Training program and the Emergency Medical Responder course.
“My academic interests arose out of my matriculation through my experience at COD. It is such a rewarding and humbling experience to be able to give back to COD by returning as an adjunct faculty and director. COD has always been a part of my life. I am proud to say that my diverse education and career experiences began here and I look forward to many more years at COD. Little did I know that when I took the road less traveled, it not only made all the difference but that it would lead me back to COD.”
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WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY: Rita Lee Chapman, Author
Rita Lee Chapman, Author
DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS
MISSING IN EGYPT
WINSTON - A HORSE'S TALE
Australian author Rita Lee Chapman brings us her latest novel, DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS, described as a crime mystery thriller about “a woman whose first husband's exploits are wreaking havoc with her new life.” The author of a romantic travel mystery and a book for horse lovers, Chapman wanted to appeal to both male and female readers so turned to crime fiction.
Chapman is spending her retirement writing novels. Besides writing and reading, she enjoys playing tennis, socializing with friends, and walking around Australia’s beaches, rivers, and lakes.
Don't miss the short excerpt from DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS following the interview.
Q: You’ve written a romantic travel mystery and a book for horse lovers. What drew you to write your latest book, a crime mystery, DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS?
Rita Lee Chapman: I wanted to write something that could appeal to both male and female readers. WINSTON – A HORSE’S TALE was very definitely targeted at horse lovers and I felt that MISSING IN EGYPT probably appealed to women more than men. Actually it’s very hard to write for men as most seem to prefer very straight-forward, down-to-earth writing, without the frills and romance! I thought J.K.Rowling achieved it well with her book, The Silkworm, written under the pen-name of Robert Galbraith, as I really did think it was written by a man.
I enjoy reading crime mysteries and watch quite a few crime shows on TV, so I thought it would make an interesting change. Also, you get to kill some of your characters off!
Q: How do you create compelling characters that engage readers? When writing in different genres such as you’ve done, do you find that you create characters in a similar manner? Or, do you reveal unique characteristics differently depending on the genre?
Rita Lee Chapman: Creating characters is similar in any genre. Possibly my female lead characters may display similar characteristics as, so far, they have always been nice people! In DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS Cathy’s husband, Geoffrey, was born in the East End of London and his speech and expressions were fun to write. I could hear Dennis Waterman’s voice (from The Minder and New Tricks) speaking to me as I wrote. I also enjoyed writing the Sargeant’s character.
Q: Reviewers tout DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS as “chilling.” How do you create a “chilling” story? How relevant is suspense toward a compelling read?
Rita Lee Chapman: I think readers expect suspense in a mystery or crime novel. You have to be a bit ruthless and try to add some shock value. I must say I was surprised by the use of the word “chilling” in a review of DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS, but then I knew what was going to happen! I do think what one reader would find chilling, another might not.
Q: Why did you choose to write DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS in first person? Did you find it helpful or restrictive?
Rita Lee Chapman: I like writing in the first person; I think it is easier to portray what your characters are thinking and feeling. I overcame any restrictiveness by switching characters.
Q: Do you find the concept of heroes vs villains useful in developing a compelling plot?
Rita Lee Chapman: Definitely. I think every crime mystery has to have at least one hero and a villain.
Q: Do you write your books strictly to entertain readers or do you try to deliver a message or educate as well?
Rita Lee Chapman: DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS was just for entertainment, but I did try to deliver a message in WINSTON – A HORSE’S TALE. So much cruelty to animals is caused by well-meaning people not knowing any better. When I wrote MISSING IN EGYPT, I had recently visited Egypt and been amazed – it is so different to anywhere else in the world. So many of their temples are in such great condition that it is not hard to imagine how they must have been in their heyday. I wanted to try and capture the essence of Egypt for those who had been unable to visit and those who wanted to relive the experience.
Q: You selected Egypt as the setting for your romantic travel mystery, MISSING IN EGYPT, because it is “a mysterious and intriguing country,” ideal for a mystery. What about the setting for DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS? Did it help define the backstory for your crime mystery?
Rita Lee Chapman: My books, so far, have all been based partly in Australia, because that’s where I live it’s the most familiar to me. It’s also beautiful, by the way. I have also been lucky enough to have travelled to several different countries and I like to include those experiences in my stories.
Q: Do you like to mix romance and mystery? What about humor? Does it help to flesh out your characters and engage readers?
Rita Lee Chapman: Yes, I love to mix romance and mystery. Romance makes the world go around! Most people have a love interest in their lives so I think it makes the characters more engaging. As for humour – I’d love to write comedy but the best I can manage is a few one liners.
Rita Lee Chapman: At the moment I’m busy promoting DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS but I am thinking about writing another book in the MISSING IN…. series. I’d like to follow up on Anna’s later life and see what else she gets up to. I think we’ve both learned a lot since MISSING IN EGYPT!
Q: Tell us about Rita Lee Chapman. What do you like to do when you’re not writing?
Rita Lee Chapman: Like most writers, I’m a prolific reader. Some of my favourite authors are Kate Morton, Bryce Courtenay, Barbara Bradford Taylor, Colleen McCullough, Dick Francis, Mary Higgins Clark, Jeffrey Archer, Fiona Walker and Rebecca Bryn.
I also like playing tennis (enthusiastically, but not very well), walking around our lovely rivers, lakes and beaches and socialising. We have made some lovely friends since we retired to Queensland and share some great lunches and dinners.
Thank you for having me on your blog, Joyce, it’s been fun.
About Rita Lee Chapman
Rita Lee Chapman was born in London and moved to Australia in her early twenties. It was only when she retired that she wrote her first novel, MISSING IN EGYPT, a romantic travel mystery.
WINSTON – A HORSE’S TALE followed, written for horse lovers like herself. “It was the book I had to write.”
Her latest book, DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS, is her first foray into crime mystery.
About DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS
An ex-husband, a new love, a stalker. Cathy Thompson’s link to her ex-husband fills her life with threats and intimidation. She must either trap her stalker or find Geoffrey to put an end to her life of fear.
Excerpt from DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS
Chapter 3 Love Calls Again
I remember turning the radio dial to my favourite station as I went up the hill towards work. As I coasted down the other side I touched the brakes lightly to steady the car as I approached the sharp left-hand turn. It was a bad corner, where trucks often misjudged the angle and spilt their load across the road. I remembered the feeling of fear as I pushed the brake pedal harder, still without any response. I pumped the brake a couple of times but my foot was flat to the floor and the car was out of control and heading towards the safety barrier. I knew there was at least a fifteen foot drop on the other side. I was told afterwards by the police that the driver of the car behind me said the car flew over the guardrail, landed half way down the hill, rolled and landed on its side at the bottom. I remember the sound of metal against metal as the car hit the guardrail, but I was going too fast for it to stop us. I could recall the feeling of flying through the air and the thud as the car landed but I was unconscious when they pulled me out.
About MISSING IN EGYPT
MISSING IN EGYPT will intrigue you with its twists and turns, romance and adventure as well as its insights into Australian and Egyptian cultures. Australian Anna Davies travels to Egypt with her lover to help him search for his brother, who disappeared whilst on holiday. The Valley of the Kings, Abu Simbel and the Temple of Karnak are amongst the settings for their search. Will they be able to track him down and find him alive - or is Ramy already dead? What tragedies await Anna and Kareem as they come closer to retracing his footsteps? This fast-paced action plot will keep you guessing until the end.
About WINSTON –A HORSE’S TALE
One for horse lovers! Winston is a good-looking palomino horse whose life involves several different owners and many adventures. As you read his story, told by Winston himself, you will appreciate horse ownership from the horse’s point of view. Born on a country property in Australia, Winston
tells of his breaking-in and education and the different people he encounters – good, bad and ignorant. As well as his own story, Winston includes the experiences of other horses he meets along life’s way.
Whether it’s jumping, eventing, hunting or just hacking, Winston tries hard to please his rider. Follow his successes and his failures from his breaking-in to his show jumping win. It is an eventful life – the story of one Australian horse out of thousands, but one that you will remember.
DANGEROUS ASSOCIATIONS purchase links
LargePrint Edition
MISSING IN EGYPT purchase links
WINSTON – A HORSE’S TALE purchase links
Goodreads’author page
Posted by Joyce Strand at 6:37 PM No comments:
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY: Erin Zarro, Author, SciFi, Fantasy, Horror
Erin Zarro, Author
GRAVE TOUCHED
FEY TOUCHED
Erin Zarro likes SciFi and Fantasy because “anything goes.” She places her latest novel GRAVE TOUCHED, the second of the Fey Touched Books, in the science fantasy genre. Reviewers tout her “ability to write with such emotion and feeling” and appreciate her characters, which Zarro attributes to the “distinct voice” she gives each one.
Zarro is working on the third Fey Touched book in addition to the next novella in a series about women rescuing men. She also loves horror and believes it “speaks to the very core of a person.” She lives in Michigan with her husband and cat and, when not reading or writing, enjoys photography and camping and hopes to re-learn French.
Q: What draws you to write in the genres of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror? And in which genre would you place your newest novel, GRAVE TOUCHED (FEY TOUCHED BOOK 2)?
Erin Zarro: I'm drawn to sci-fi and fantasy because anything goes. You can make up your own world, or create a futuristic version of our world (which is what I did with the Fey Touched series) and there are no limits and no rules. As for horror, I think it has a lot to do with the horror novels I'd read throughout my life – horror speaks to the very core of a person in different ways. Everyone has a bit of darkness within. And, I'm on a mission to scare myself. ;)
I'd place my Fey Touched series in the science fantasy genre. There's genetic engineering and time travel mixed with alchemy (magic) and healing. The series is firmly in both, not one or the other.
Q: Can you explain your title, GRAVE TOUCHED – without spoiling the plot for future readers?
Erin Zarro: Grave Touched came along when I thought about the Hunters' afterlife, and what would happen if something went wrong. Except the Hunters don't bury their dead. So it was a challenge to come up with something that fit within the FT world because I really liked the name Grave Touched.
Q: How do you make your story believable? How important is credibility to readers of your genre?
Erin Zarro: Very important. I try to use actual scientific things that could be plausible in a few hundred years, such as telepathy, time travel using virtual reality, and...some other stuff I can't reveal. I try to build from what could happen and go from there. I hope I succeeded. ;) But yes, to tell a good story, it must be believable within the constraints of our world and future.
Q: A reviewer of the first FEY TOUCHED book praises your characters as “fascinating, their motivations clear and their storylines are compelling.” How do you engage your readers to care about your characters in a make-believe world?
Erin Zarro: I think voice had a lot to do with it. When I write characters, they all have a very distinct voice and way of looking at things. I try to go deep into the character's psyche and figure out what makes him or her tick. It's always an organic process – I never plan on those details ahead of time.
There is also my characters' motivations. I gave them some pretty heavy stuff. And that's what drove the story and their character progression.
Q: How helpful was the use of humor either to create your characters or tell your story?
Erin Zarro: I had a lot of humorous moments in FEY TOUCHED, and some in GRAVE TOUCHED. It goes back to a character's voice. Some characters use humor to cope with things. Others are just funny. I like having a bit of comedic relief, especially in tense scenes.
Q: Did you write GRAVE TOUCHED strictly to entertain or did you want to deliver a message or educate your readers?
Erin Zarro: Probably a bit of both. I wrote it primarily to answer a question I had that intrigued me. But I did want to show how important love is, how it can change absolutely everything.
Q: Does the concept of villains vs heroes apply to GRAVE TOUCHED? What makes a good villain?
Erin Zarro: There were two main villains, and I had a blast writing them. There was a definite line in the sand with my Hunters and the villains. I think a good villain must have a driving force – something he or she wants so badly, he or she will do anything to get it. But I also learned that there was a human side to both villains, and that made them more real to me. So I think they need both a driving force and a human side to be a good villain.
Q: In addition to writing novels, you also have written and published books of your poetry. Do you still write poetry? What can you say in poetry better than in prose? Do you prefer one over the other?
Erin Zarro: I do write poetry sometimes, though not as much as I used to. Poetry is a different form of expression, and there are fewer words to express what you're feeling or thinking, so it's very challenging. I don't typically write formal poetry, but I will occasionally, and that's even more challenging to say what I need to say and follow the rules.
I think some things can be said better in poetry, if they are handled right. I love using metaphor to express myself, and I think it's a bit easier in a poem.
I prefer novel writing, simply because I am long winded. ;)
Erin Zarro: Well, I have a novella in the works that continues the story I started in UNDER HER PROTECTION, an anthology about women rescuing men. I'm also working on Fey Touched book #3, Ever Touched, figuring out plot and character stuff (although I do very little planning ahead), and I have an older project I'm rewriting on Sundays.
Q: Tell us about Erin Zarro. What do you like to do when you’re not writing?
Erin Zarro: Reading mostly. ;) Photography, watching TV (I have a few series I'm addicted to, such as Game of Thrones and Bones), camping in the summer, and relearning French.
About Erin Zarro
Erin Zarro is a poet and novelist living in Michigan. She's married to her Prince Charming, and they have a cat, Hailey, who she believes is part vampire.
To pay the bills, Erin works as an office manager for a small marketing firm. In her spare time (what's that?), she writes madly. She also enjoys photography, music, website design, and, of course, reading!
She is terribly hard to scare, loves a damn good story, and wants to be a full time novelist when she grows up. She self-published her first novel, FEY TOUCHED, through Turtleduck Press in 2012. Currently she is working on Fey Touched book #3, Ever Touched, as well as a few other projects.
About GRAVE TOUCHED
FEY TOUCHED – humans, genetically engineered for immortality and flight, tasked with protecting the rest of the world from rogue Fey...
GRAVE TOUCHED – dead souls in search of living bodies to possess, especially those who’ve had a brush with death...
When Fey Touched Hunter Emily wakes up in a hospital, she doesn’t know that she was in fact dead. Nor does she know that her lover, Nick, broke all kinds of rules to bring her back. But the grave touched do.
Fey Touched Healer Asha does know that her mate, Joe, saved her when her abilities nearly killed her. And she knows the voices in her head are the grave touched trying to stake their claim. Asha needs Joe’s help again, but unfortunately she’s the only one who believes the grave touched exist.
The grave touched are plotting to take over the corporeal world, and they’re gaining strength. Only Emily and Asha stand in their way – and both are about to be possessed.
Grave Touched.
About FEY TOUCHED
Asha is the Queen of the Fey, genetically engineered immortal humans who feed on human souls to survive. But she's running from her people. When she is found by her enemy, one of the Hunters of the Fey, she expects to die. Yet he's oddly intrigued by her, and Asha finds herself falling in love with him, hoping she can find safety and the home she's been seeking. Then she's kidnapped, and everything changes.
Fallon is a Hunter. She's looking for her long-lost sister, using an addictive drug to search through the stream of time. Her addiction leaves her dangerously exposed to her enemies but, consumed by her search, she doesn't care...until her fellow Hunters start dying from a mysterious illness. She is torn between duty and desire, and must find an answer before they all die.
What Fallon doesn't know is that Asha might just be the key to saving them all, if only she can find her.
And time is running out.
Purchase Links for GRAVE TOUCHED
Amazon Paperback
Kobo Nook iTunes
Twitter: @ekendall
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY: Tom Reitze, Author
Who is Tom Reitze? What kinds of stories does he write?
Tom Reitze wants to tantalize us by easing us into his writings one short story at a time in a collection he calls STORIES OF A DIFFERENT NATURE. He at least lets us know that he doesn’t write in a specific genre. Rather he says his “genre is somewhat like a tossed salad.”
He has written a book, but he’s holding that back, too. For now, he just wants to let you know about his first short story in his new collection, just published, titled DATE WITH A CHAIR. He’s only telling us that he didn't write it "to produce joy and happiness", but it might stir some controversy.
When he’s ready, he’ll let us know about his next story in our series of interviews. Until then, he’s revealing himself by responding to one question at a time.
Q: Before I ask you specifically about your first short story, can you tell us what caused you to decide to write and release a series of short stories? Are they related to each other? What can you tell us about them in general? What genre are they?
Tom Reitze: About five or six years ago I wrote a full-length book that I desperately want to publish. I wanted to present my personal beliefs, which are based on logic and those developed by simply living, as a contrast against those that people have by accepting unbending doctrine. I hope I did a good job because it took four years to complete the book. But I will say it was no task of fatigue. I loved every minute writing it. It would take a big effort to publish it though, so as a first foray into the business I thought I would start with something smaller. I’ve found writing short stories to be very enjoyable. So once I started I kept going.
The stories are not really related. But many of them do have a common thread of the supernatural. But they vary in nature from the series to the comical.
There are different styles of writing that I use, and I cross a wide range of subject matter. I think you will see that as more of the stories are released. I enjoy writing humorous material, but sometimes I’m pulled towards darker side of things. I think it depends on my mood, or perhaps some gray event that stirs my thought process .
Ha! As to genre, they’re splattered all over the place. I think I would get bored not letting my mind wander to any place it wants to. I think my genre is somewhat like a tossed salad.
Q: Do you believe paranormal fiction offers a useful vehicle to both tell your story and to deliver message or educate your readers? Or do you use it basically to make your story entertaining?
Tom Reitze: Yes I think that is true, paranormal fiction is a good method for conveying information. I’m not sure I believe in it, but I do think it is a good way to put some of my ideas out in the open. Many people are interested in the subject; maybe it will draw them to my work. Let the reader decide if what is presented is viable. I never want to present myself as understanding everything. I believe everyone’s opinion counts.
I think the entertainment value is what most people are looking for in these types of work. I also believe you can use the element of the paranormal to capture peoples attention and have them pay a little bit more attention to the details of the story. That way you can convey some ideas people would overlook otherwise. I think that goes for writing humorous pieces as well. Don't get me wrong, I'm not out to present some great insight I think I have. The stories are often presented as nothing more than what you see. Then there are times I will present some that are more serious. The intent then is to have the reader continue to contemplate the story after the last page is turned. You'll have to wait some time for one of those though. They are somewhat rare.
Q: What can you tell us about your first story, DATE WITH A CHAIR? Will it scare us? Amuse us? Make us happy?
Tom Reitze: This first story is not one I created to produce joy and happiness. Those are coming; don’t worry—along with tales of mystery, the supernatural, sheer craziness, and the power of love and kindness. I think this one will capture your attention in that it’s presented in an unusual location, with a strange juxtaposition between the main characters. A third character enters the scene and muddles the situation even further.
This story may present some controversy. I’m waiting myself to see the reaction to a few of the concepts it presents. Will it scare you? It’s not a deep thriller if that’s what you mean. But I think it is somewhat captivating and I hope people read it freely and with an open mind. I hope people capture the basic proposal that is the support of the story, and it makes them think a bit.
Q: What’s next? Or do you prefer to keep it a secret until it’s ready for release?
Tom Reitze: Well, I like to keep the specifics of what’s next locked in my closet. However, I will say again, my stories cover a wide range of topics. You could find any kind of tale popping up next. There are silly ones, and some I hope that might make the reader sit back and think about things a little differently. I hope people appreciate them, and maybe even allow their minds to be opened by a few of them.
About Tom Reitze by Tom Reitze
“I am a very opinionated individual and was sure I knew what was wrong with society and how to fix it. I planned to write a series of editorials and bind them into a book. Before I started, I realized no one in the world would give a damn about what this unknown writer had to say. I decided to expose my feelings in the form of fictional stories, something people would be more likely to read.
"My 22 lb. cat, Horus agrees. He is very opinionated as well.
"I am contradictory. I will present one idea at one time, and then write another story that presents the opposite concepts. I like to believe I am a person willing to listen to and consider both sides of an issue. Some of my writing is serious, some of it is supernatural in nature, and some of it is humorous (I hope).”
About STORIES OF A DIFFERENT NATURE by Tom Reitze
“STORIES OF A DIFFERENT NATURE is my first foray into eBooks. One at a time they will sneak out and onto Amazon over the next several months. There is a novella ready to make a surprise appearance “between the stories” as well. Watch for them. Give them a try. Let me know what you think at dragonflybooksandart.com and review them on Amazon.
"Horus and I are ready for you to read the stories. I hope you like them.”
Amazon e-book
Twitter - https://twitter.com/tomwritez
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY: Jaimie Hope, Author
Jaimie Hope, Author
THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME:
THE SARA RHEA CHRONICLES
Jaimie Hope brings us a novel, THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME: THE SARA RHEA CHRONICLES, based on her own experiences. Reviewers say there were “times when I laughed out loud and other times…my eyes were blurred with tears.” Hope admits it is a mixture of romance, new adult, and even suspense. She believes her characters become real when she puts them in “real-life” situations.
Hope also writes children’s books and has published a new adult novel along with her autobiobraphy, and she runs her own business, Back To Basics Publishing and Author Services. She is working on Book 2 of THE SARA RHEA CHRONICLES, along with many other works. When she’s not writing, she likes music, movies, and sports.
Don't miss the excerpt following the interview.
Q: You have based your book, THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME: THE SARA RHEA CHRONICLES, on a true story. What inspired you to write it? Is it about your life?
Jaimie Hope: While I took a lot of creative licenses writing it, this story is based on real-life experience I had after moving back to New York from Florida.
Q: How would you characterize THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME? Is it contemporary women’s fiction? New adult? Memoir? Suspense? Romance?
Jaimie Hope: Honestly, I would describe it as all of the above. Well, maybe not Memoir since I did add fiction to facts. However, it is definitely a Romance and a New Adult book. I didn’t realize it was Suspense until I started getting messages from readers asking if I was going to write a sequel so they could find out what happened.
Q: Your reviewers say the book caused them to feel deep emotions and that your characters were “easy to relate to.” How did you enable your readers to embrace your characters so that they cared so much what happened to them? Were your characters based on real people?
Jaimie Hope: The main characters were based on real people that I know well. While I think knowing their personalities helped, I think putting characters in real life situations gave them their relatability.
Q: How helpful is humor to telling your story and/or creating your characters?
Jaimie Hope: Humor is a key element to character development and plot for me. It helps the reader get out of their own heads and into the story when they can feel they are having fun along with the characters. Also, humor in a character helps make them relatable since most of the humor is by way of sarcastic interaction.
Q: Did you write THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME primarily to entertain or were you trying to educate or deliver a message?
Jaimie Hope: I started out writing this book with the goal of entertaining, but there is most definitely messages in it.
Q: You have also written children and young adult books and your autobiography. Which do you enjoy more—writing a book for adult, child or youth readers? How do you approach one over the other?
Jaimie Hope: Each genre is so different that it’s hard to say I like writing this genre more than that genre.
Children’s books are much harder to write than novels for adults. Trying to write a full story in the confines of a few pages is harder than it looks. Then there is the task of balancing the words of the manuscript. The words can’t be beyond the comprehension of the age group, but it also can’t be so simple that it seems like you’re talking down to them. It also has to teach them something while being entertaining. After that is done, there’s the illustration list to be created. It’s a lot of work, but very rewarding.
That’s not to say that writing for Young Adults or Adults is any easier, it’s not. However, you don’t have page number constraints, your story ends when it ends. You also don’t have to worry as much about your word choice to get your point across. It sounds easier when you look at it that way, but that’s not necessarily true. Being able to write a book filled with as many pages as you deem necessary and whatever words fly out of your fingertips as you strike the keyboard gives you more time for your story to unravel. It’s important to pay attention to the characters and how they’re developing. If they aren’t developing, the story probably isn’t moving. A story that isn’t moving isn’t one anyone wants to read.
Q: Does the concept of “heroes vs. villain” play a part in telling your story? How would you describe a villain? Do you need a villain to have a hero?
Jaimie Hope: I didn’t do the hero vs. villain thing in my story. Readers might disagree with me and argue they thought one character was a villain of sorts, but it wasn’t what I intended. I define a villain as someone who purposefully tries to foil the plot for the main characters. None of my characters did that.
No, I don’t think you need to have a villain to have a hero. All that is necessary for a character to be considered a hero is for them to grow and overcome something.
Q: Your biography says that you decided to become a writer in high school. What made you decide to be a writer? Have you enjoyed it?
Jaimie Hope: I’ve actually had an interest in writing and telling stories since I was very young. At that time, I also wanted to do a number of different things as well. Writing for the school newspaper really fanned the flames and re-stoked the flames of writing for me. Now more than eight years and eleven books later I can honestly say that I wouldn’t have wanted it to be any other way.
Q: What’s next? I assume since this is “Book 1” that there will be at least one more Sara Rhea Chronicle? Other books?
Jaimie Hope: There will always be another book! Book 2 is in the works, so is a new Children’s book and many other works.
Q: Tell us about Jaimie Hope. What do you like to do when you’re not writing?
Jaimie Hope: When I’m not writing I am usually doing something else in the creative/literary realm. In addition to writing, I am also a business owner. I own and operate Back To Basics Publishing and Author Services, which offers everything from editing to marketing assistance to authors. I am also a blog host with a blog tour company and an Internet radio talk show host.
When I’m not working I enjoy all things music, watching movies and sports.
Jaimie Hope was born November 3, 1976, in New York. It wasn't until high school, where she joined the newspaper staff, that she decided she wanted to be a writer. After graduation, the author went to college and received an Associate's degree in 1999. In 2002, she moved to Florida where she was an active volunteer in the local historical society and the Deltona Regional Library. In 2006, she moved back to New York where she released her first Children's book, The Adventures of Baby Jaimie. She followed it with a Young Adult novel, Bless The Broken Road. She also published her autobiography, Roll With It. She is planning to re-release book one of her New Adult Romance/Paranormal trilogy, The Sara Rhea Chronicles: The Road That Leads To Home and a new Children's Book series, along with releasing all her other self-published titles under her new publishing company, Back To Basics Publishing and Author Services in the fall of 2014.
About THE ROAD THAT LEADS TO HOME: THE SARA RHEA CHRONICLES
Sara's life was going along peacefully until she got the early morning phone call that changed everything. Now she finds herself heading back where she began, home. Not only does she have to deal with a difficult older sister and helping to keep the family’s inn afloat; Sara has to work alongside her high school sweetheart, who still looks as gorgeous as ever and her feelings that she saw all this coming. Her dreams and nightmares seem to come true right before her eyes. It has to all be a coincidence, doesn't it?
“He was with someone when I came home from college.”
“No, not really. He went out with her once. He wanted you to think he had someone since he told you he wouldn’t wait for you. He wanted you to be jealous. Guess it worked. He was crushed when you moved to Florida. He really thought you were going to stay, everyone did.”
“So did I. It just didn’t work out that way.” Reflectively she added, “It's funny how things turn out. When I was growing up, I didn’t think I’d ever leave this area. I never wanted to. Most kids I went to school with couldn’t wait to graduate so they could travel, but James and I just wanted to stay here.”
“I thought when I came back I would take my place here at the inn, but when I got here, I found out there really wasn’t a place here for me anymore.”
“You’re a Rhea, you always have a place here.”
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Articles / Egypt Independent / June 25, 2012
Nayef’s demise: Relief for the Brothers?
The demise of Saudi Crown Prince Nayef will have significant repercussions not only in the Gulf but also on the whole region, including Egypt.
Over the past 18 months, both Saudi Arabia and Egypt have seen major developments: the fall of former President Hosni Mubarak, the death of former Saudi Crown Prince Sultan, a new Egyptian Parliament and its recent dissolution, the death of the second Saudi crown prince and now a new Brotherhood president in Egypt. While one country has seen changes induced by a popular uprising, the other was the result of divine intervention.
While eyes were fixated on the results of Egypt’s presidential runoff, the news coming from Saudi Arabia was still significant. After all, Saudi-Egyptian relations are multilayered, deep and complex. As of 2011, Saudi Arabia had investments totaling US$10 billion in Egypt with bilateral trade exceeding $3.5 billion annually. The pace of financial aid from Saudi Arabia to Egypt picked up significantly following a high-profile visit led by the Muslim Brotherhood to apologize to Saudi leadership in the aftermath of protests against the Saudi government in Cairo.
Earlier this month, Saudi Arabia approved $430 million in project aid to Egypt, in addition to a $750 million line of credit to import petroleum products. This came a few days after a separate $1.5 billion was transferred from Riyadh to Cairo as direct budget support. The Saudi government has recently financed large infrastructure projects in Egypt, including “$60 million for supplying drinking water to the Cairo district of Nasr City, $80 million to renew and replace irrigation pumps and $90 million to build seed storage silos,” according to a statement by the Saudi embassy in Cairo to Reuters.
Amid all these financial strings between the two countries, it is quite significant that the late Crown Prince Nayef had vocalized his suspicion of Egypt’s major political player, the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2002, Prince Nayef was quoted as saying, “Without any hesitation I say it, that our problems, all of them, came from the direction of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Additionally, immediately following the fall of Mubarak, the Saudi government withdrew public school books that included references to the Muslim Brotherhood founder, Hassan al-Banna, claiming they “incite violence.” Probably in an attempt to mend ties with Nayef, the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party issued an official statement last November congratulating the late crown prince on his appointment.
In a reflection of the significance of Saudi-Egyptian relations, during the busy presidential elections schedule, both presidential contenders in the runoff took time to send condolences on the demise of the crown prince. Egyptian social media users also took a break from following the polarizing presidential election runoff to comment on the passing of Prince Nayef, with one user referring to him as the “Omar Suleiman [former intelligence chief] of Saudi Arabia.” In fact, Prince Nayef publicly received Suleiman last November in Riyadh.
At a time when the future of the Muslim Brotherhood as an organization hangs in the balance awaiting a September court ruling on its potential dissolution, the group will probably welcome one less regional adversary. This is especially true since Morsy inherits the presidency at a time when Egypt’s economy is struggling.
Not only was Nayef hostile to the Brotherhood, but his replacement could be highly agreeable to the group. Prince Nayef’s younger brother, Salman, a former governor of Riyadh, was swiftly appointed as new crown prince. Salman, 76, is well known in diplomatic circles, having received countless ambassadors and delegations over a career spanning several decades. Additionally, Prince Salman’s sons’ business interests include the Saudi Research and Marketing Group media empire that publishes a number of newspapers, including Asharq Al-Awsat. Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood may find it much easier to work with a Saudi crown prince and future king who is more business-minded rather than one who was known for building Saudi Arabia’s daunting security force that targeted dissidents. This is particularly the case since the Brotherhood has repeatedly stressed that investments and private sector commerce are priorities in their vision for Egypt.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s immediate public reaction to Prince Nayef’s passing may have been to issue a statement of condolence — but internally the group is probably breathing a sigh of relief.
This article was originally published in Egypt Independent on June 25, 2012.
Tagged With: Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi Arabia
Opening panel of the Gulf Research Meeting in Cambridge: Dr. Christian Koch to GCC Secretary General Abdullatif Al… https://t.co/NPpimqHTlO - about 11 hours ago
Dr. Abdulaziz Sager, founder & chairman of the Gulf Research Center launching the 2019 Gulf Research Meeting at Cam… https://t.co/gwM3AVy9gg - about 12 hours ago
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CD Review: Mark209 – From The Heart Of Nashville
April 20, 2012 By: Aaron Category: CD Reviews, Mark209, SG Artists, SG Music
Producer: Billy Coren
Label: Music City Media Group
Website: www.mark209.com
Song titles: The Blood of One Man; Book of Life; Count Me In; Daddy; Down In Bethlehem; Get Up In Jesus’ Name; Already On The Phone; In God We Still Trust; My Home In Heaven; That’s How Jesus Sees Me; Tougher Than Nails; Who Prayed For Me; Wine Into Water; The Tree
Last year, after the departure of baritone Ed Crawford from the Mystery Men Quartet, and the subsequent hiring of Jimmy Reno a short time later, it was announced that the group would be changing their name. During the week of NQC 2011, the new name was announced; the quartet would be called Mark209, a reference to mile marker 209 that leads into Nashville. It is fitting, then, that the group’s first project of original songs would be titled From The Heart Of Nashville.
Fans of the Mystery Men Quartet may find a lot of this project very familiar; that’s because all but two of the songs can be found on the Mystery Men’s Blue Collar Gospel project. Before you blow this off as a “get something out quick” effort, I’d encourage you to take a listen to it. I admit that, seeing the song titles, I went into this fully expecting something of that nature. However, I appreciate the fact the current lineup of Nathaniel Justice, Jym Howe, Jimmy Reno, and Joe Armstrong took the time to go back and re-record most, if not all, of the vocals on the project. Their vocals take the sound that Blue Collar Gospel had and refines it, making this CD an improvement over the original. The new tracks, “Down In Bethlehem” and “In God We Still Trust” fit seamlessly into the track list, though the latter has been recorded so much that another song may have been a better choice. I also appreciate the fact that the mix has been tweaked and improved as well. Two of the issues most of the tracks had the first time around were that the instruments were unevenly mixed (for example, the cymbals were louder than everything else to the point of distraction), and the vocals often sounded muddy behind the instrumentation. Both were resolved this time.
Being from Nashville, you would expect the country music influence to be very prevalent in Mark209’s sound, and the group certainly delivers that in both sound and lyrical content. The opener, “The Blood Of One Man,” is a straight-ahead gospel tune with that genre’s feel, as is the next track, “The Book of Life,” which highlights the quartet’s ensemble work and harmony. Other such tunes include “He’s Already On The Phone,” another harmony feature that also gives lead singer Jym Howe a solo verse, and “My Home In Heaven,” the group’s current radio single penned by Woody Wright, which has seen some favorable chart action.
The other component of a country influence manifests itself in “story songs,” and this project has its fair share of such songs with a Christian message. Bass singer Joe Armstrong delivers “Daddy,” which centers around a father figure who was a simple man of simple means, whom the singer imagines will have a similar home in Heaven near his mansion. “Who Prayed For Me” is a baritone feature for Jimmy Reno, and a thanks to an anonymous person that prayed for the storyteller during various parts of his life. Reno also sings “Tougher Than Nails,” which relates the story of a father teaching his bullied son the “turn the other cheek” lesson through the example of Jesus’ life, and tenor Nathaniel Justice carries a thoughtful ballad in “That’s How Jesus Sees Me.”
Other high points in the project come in the form of “Wine Into Water,” a tender prayer for help from God, and the project’s closer, “The Tree,” which reflects on the fact that the Creator made the tree He would be crucified upon.
This project is one of the better debuts that I have heard in the past couple of years. It defines Mark209’s sound very well, and each member of the group is featured fairly equally, so the listener gets a taste of each vocalist’s style. Fans of the Mystery Men, as well as country-flavored gospel music, will appreciate this effort from Mark209, and I would encourage the uninitiated to give this CD a spin as well. From The Heart Of Nashville receives 4 stars.
Tags: Blue Collar Gospel, Ed Crawford, From The Heart Of Nashville, Jimmy Reno, Joe Armstrong, Jym Howe, Mark209, Mystery Men Quartet, Nathaniel Justice
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Home VISITORS ABOUT TIFTON HISTORY
In the mid 1800s, Captain Henry Harding Tift left his home in Mystic, Connecticut for the piney forests of South Georgia to harvest timber for the family shipbuilding business. Little did Captain Tift know that the sawmill he built to prepare the lumber for shipping, and the train tracks that were laid to ship the lumber would be the beginning of Tifton, Georgia.
As Tifts Town (as it was known until 1890 when the name was changed to Tifton) grew, Captain Tift and his associates adopted the same town layout that Mystic, Connecticut had, with even numbered streets running east and west as one traveled north from the center of town, and odd numbered streets following the same suit as one traveled south. Tifton had no town square and the City was crisscrossed with rail lines, all heading from the center of town like spokes on a wagon wheel. The town boasted the same grand facilities as many small South Georgia towns a courthouse, a town hotel, commercial buildings and other features. Many of these buildings featured interesting interior and exterior architectural embellishments of the times. As the town grew, Tifton built an opera house, several silent movie theatres, churches, and saloons. At the turn of the century, a thriving community had evolved from the pine forests and electrical lighting was the rage. The Myon Hotel, built in 1906 was billed as the grandest hotel south of Atlanta, entertained many a guest in splendid surroundings.
Tifton grew and so did the opportunity for commerce. The once dirt roads were paved. Captain Tift set aside land for a public park. Governmental offices were being created and filled. Tifton now had its own telephone system. Indoor plumbing was the norm and plans were being made to construct a grand movie theatre at the center of town. The Tift Theatre was built, the Myon Hotel business was booming, and nearly all the businesses of the community were located within a twelve block area. Town streets were the setting for parades, tobacco balls, pageants, and community activities. Men and women returned home from World War II and enjoyed the air-conditioned comfort of the Tift Theatre complete with color movies and improved sound. Children could walk safely to the corner drug store for a hotdog and cold coke. The Post Office was a place to meet your neighbor and catch up on the latest gossip, or maybe the barbershop across the street held more interesting company. Progress met the south when President Eisenhower proposed a new road system that would allow travelers to get from place to place in record time. He would call it the interstate system and it began, right here in Tifton, Georgia.
Unfortunately, the interstate was a major contributor of the demise of many downtown’s. As the system was built, new areas of development came along side these roadways. Since WWII, many women had joined the workforce and did not have the time or luxury of staying home with children while father was at work. Quietly, the communities focus on town activities shifted from the town center to the new suburbs. With more income for families, automobiles that were once extravagant luxuries were in every driveway, and they were ready to travel the interstate for destinations beyond home. Tifton was growing and changing. Hotels were being built along the interstate to accommodate the travelers. Service stations and shopping areas were going where the development was occurring, on the interstate.
Like many communities in the 1970s and 1980s, the people of Tifton realized that they had lost a sense of community. Granted, thousands of cars were driving through daily on the interstate, but where was the corner drug store that had served those great hotdogs just a few years ago? One by one, many of the stores that lined Main Street in downtown Tifton were closing or relocating from Main Street. The opening of a new mall at the interstate lured more stores away. The once grand Myon Hotel was now a boarding house that was home to flocks of pigeons and unmentionables. Many grand buildings that once were the pride of downtown were vacant and deteriorating. Some had been passed on to the next generation of owners who did not live in Tifton, adding apathetic, absentee landowners to the problem. This transition did not happen overnight, but the end result was the same, downtown was deteriorating rapidly.
Tifton had basically walked away from its heritage, its core and its future. A once thriving, family filled, historic resource was very close to being gone. Some advocated removing all traces of the Tifton that grew from the pine forests. Fortunately, several community “old timers” who had fond memories of downtown Tifton and still had a spark of hope for its resurgence came to the rescue.
The City itself became the catalyst that would begin the rejuvenation of downtown Tifton. The City of Tifton needed a new home, having expanded to the point of outgrowing City Hall. A bold step was made when City leaders decided to look at the once grand Myon Hotel as a home for administrative offices. The infrastructure was in place to support the move, and private support was generated for the project. The City investigated all funding sources including historic preservation incentives offered by the state and federal government, as well as grant and foundation dollars. The City partnered with a local developer who purchased one half of the building and the project began. Completed in 1986, the Myon is once again one of the finest buildings south of Atlanta. Now serving as the home of the City of Tifton, the building also houses apartments, professional offices and retail space.
Following the Myon restoration, other projects began to happen, including the purchase and renovation of the Golden Building, the Tift Theatre and others. Since 1986, the tax base of downtown Tifton has shown tremendous growth, averaging a 13% increase from year to year. With the redevelopment and rehabilitation of buildings, new and existing businesses are retuning to downtown. The Downtown Development Authority was formed in 1986 to oversee the renovation process. Pledging to make downtown the center of community activity that it once was, the DDA has been instrumental in recruiting residential, commercial, cultural and governmental activities for the downtown area.
Many of the buildings that had become pigeon aviaries are now shining examples of historic preservation and downtown development. The Tifton Museum of Arts and Heritage, once a church, was built by Captain Tifts entourage of shipbuilders. The church’s interior features are truly unique. The once vacant post office now houses the Tifton-Tift County Public Library. Brumby Crossing, a former cotton and tobacco warehouse,is now home to retail stores and private offices. Another renovation has been the former Williams Brothers Grocery Warehouse. More projects are on the drawing board for ongoing downtown development. People have found loft apartment living desirable and second and third story building space now has a new use. Green space was preserved creating quiet hamlets in which a brown bag lunch could be enjoyed or an evening street dance could be held. The most recent renovation is the old gas station at the corner of Highway 82 and Main Street. Renovated by the City of Tifton, it now houses the City’s Business Development Center and Tifton Welcome Station. A new Criminal Justice Center adjacent to the Business Development Center now stands where dilapidated buildings once were.
The process of downtown renovation is never complete. Its continuing implementation rests on the shoulders of the community who make a conscientious decision to support the businesses, programs, and projects that downtown presents. Tifton continues to take advantage of opportunities to recreate a haven that brings back that sense of community, a tangible feeling that one is “home”, and that a great hotdog is waiting for you at the corner drugstore.
Today Tifton has 15,000 plus residents, serves a seven county area and is expected to be named the next regional hub in South Georgia.
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Dispatch Box No.1
Poems by Wilfred Owen
War Requiem
1916 - The Somme
It took place between July 1st, 1916 and November 13th, 1916 and it resulted in over a million casualties. The Battle of the Somme was planned as a joint French and British operation. The idea originally came from the French Commander-in-Chief, Joseph Joffre and was accepted by General Sir Douglas Haig, the
British Expeditionary Force (BEF) commander, despite his preference for a large attack in Flanders. Although Joffre was concerned with territorial gain, it was also an attempt to destroy German manpower.
At first Joffre intended for to use mainly French soldiers but the German attack on Verdun in February 1916 turned the Somme offensive into a large-scale British diversionary attack. General Sir Douglas Haig now took over responsibility for the operation and with the help of General Sir Henry Rawlinson, came up with his own plan of attack. Haig's strategy was for a eight-day preliminary bombardment that he believed would completely destroy the German forward defences.
General Sir Henry Rawlinson was was in charge of the main attack and his Fourth Army were expected to advance towards Bapaume. To the north of Rawlinson, General Edmund Allenby and the British Third Army were ordered to make a breakthrough with cavalry standing by to exploit the gap that was expected to appear in the German front-line. Further south, General Fayolle was to advance with the French Sixth Army towards Combles.
Haig used 750,000 men (27 divisions) against the German front-line (16 divisions). However, the bombardment failed to destroy either the barbed-wire or the concrete bunkers protecting the German soldiers. This meant that the Germans were able to exploit their good defensive positions on higher ground when the British and French troops attacked at 7.30 on the morning of the 1st July. The BEF suffered 58,000 casualties (a third of them killed), therefore making it the worse day in the history of the British Army.
Haig was not disheartened by these heavy losses on the first day and ordered General Sir Henry Rawlinson to continue making attacks on the German front-line. A night attack on 13th July did achieve a temporary breakthrough but German reinforcements arrived in time to close the gap. Haig believed that the Germans were close to the point of exhaustion and continued to order further attacks expected each one to achieve the necessary breakthrough. Although small victories were achieved, for example, the capture of Pozieres on 23rd July, these gains could not be successfully followed up.
On 15th September General Alfred Micheler and the Tenth Army joined the battle in the south at Flers-Courcelette. Despite using tanks for the first time, Micheler's 12 divisions gained only a few kilometres. Whenever the weather was appropriate, General Sir Douglas Haig ordered further attacks on German positions at the Somme and on the 13th November the BEF captured the fortress at Beaumont Hamel. However, heavy snow forced Haig to abandon his gains.
With the winter weather deteriorating Haig now brought an end to the Somme offensive. Since the 1st July, the British has suffered 420,000 casualties. The French lost nearly 200,000 and it is estimated that German casualties were in the region of 500,000. Allied forces gained some land but it reached only 12km at its deepest points.
The Battle of the Somme - The Albion Country Band
From the record Battle of the Field
WW.1 Archives
macromedia shockwave is required to view
parts of this site.get it here
Hawthorn Crater
General Edmund Allenby
During the early years of the
First World War Allenby
commanded the cavalry
division of the
British Expeditionary Force (BEF)
on the Western Front.
Following First Ypres Allenby
was promoted to commander
of the Third Army.
the British army sent to
France and Belgium in
Encyclopedia of World War I
an A to Z listing of all
manner of World War I material.
The encyclopedia currently
includes some 3,100 entries.
Sir Douglas Haig
the most controversial of
the First World War generals
Click here to read Haig's
wartime despatches
Sir Henry Rawlinson
Notwithstanding the Somme
fiasco Rawlinson is generally
regarded as a highly
competent field commander
Wales and the First World War
Letters and diaries which have
survived from the First World War
can help to answer these questions.
we can see the war and life in the
trenchesthrough the eyes of three
Welsh soldiers, each with
very different viewpoints.
this website is bilingual
in Welsh and English
The Tales of The Fallen Website
is © 2003/2004/2005/2006/2007/2008
2009/2010/2011/2012/2013/2014
albionchronicles
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