And then she opened the piano, and struck a few notes. There was something caressing in the way in which she touched the keys; whoever she was, she knew how to make sweet music; sad music, too, full of that undefinable longing, like the holding out of one's arms to one's friends in the hopeless distance. string, and a small bladder. The blad- I am without luggage," laughed the der was the key of the apparatus. girl. The wounded alligator rushed into the water and tried to hide himself, but wherever he went the tell-tale bladder showed his position. It is essential that the water should not be very deep, say about six feet. The position of the alligator being thus known, he is then jobbed with spears and pointed bamboos until his life is weary, and at last one of the shikarees chops off his head with his Burmese dao or axe, and there is an end. The use of the bladder is suggestive of the ligger, which is so well known in the Norfolk Broads, and when you are trying to haul a twenty pound jack into your boat, please remember that the bite of his sharp teeth is hardly less formidable than an alligator's. C. T. BUCKLAND, From Blackwood's Magazine. IT was about four in the afternoon when a young girl came into the salon of the little hotel at C. in Switzerland, and drew her chair up to the fire. "You are soaked through," said an elderly lady, who was herself trying to get roasted. "You ought to lose no time in changing your clothes." "I have not anything to change," said the young girl, laughing. "Oh, I shall soon be dry!" "Have you lost all your luggage?" asked the lady sympathetically. 66 No," said the young girl, "I had none to lose." And she smiled a little mischievously, as though she knew by instinct that her companion's sympathy would at once degenerate into suspicion. "I don't mean to say that I have not a knapsack," she added considerately. "I have walked a long distance - - in fact from Z." "And where did you leave your companions?" asked the lady, with a touch of forgiveness in her voice. "I am without companions, just as The lady bending over the fire looked up at the little girl, and forgot that she had brought neither friends nor luggage with her. She hesitated for one moment, and then she took the childish face between her hands and kissed it. "Thank you, dear, for your music," she said gently. "The piano is terribly out of tune," said the little girl suddenly, and she ran out of the room and came back carrying her knapsack. "What are you going to do?" asked her companion. "I am going to tune the piano," the little girl said; and she took a tuninghammer out of her knapsack, and began her work in real earnest. She evidently knew what she was about, and pegged away at the notes as though her whole life depended on the result. The lady by the fire was lost in amazement. Who could she be? Without luggage and without friends, and with a tuning-hammer! Meanwhile one of the gentlemen had strolled into the salon; but hearing the sound of tuning, and being in secret possession of nerves, he fled, saying, "The tuner, by Jove ! A few minutes afterwards Miss Blake, whose nerves were no secret possession, hastened into the salon, and in her usual imperious fashion demanded instant silence. "I have just done," said the little girl. "The piano was so terribly out of tune, I could not resist the temptation." Miss Blake, who never listened to what any one said, took it for granted that the little girl was the tuner, for whom M. le Propriétaire had promised to send; and having bestowed on her a condescending nod, passed out into the garden, where she told some of the visitors that the piano had been tuned at last, and that the tuner was a young woman of rather eccentric appearance. "Really it is quite abominable how Women thrust themselves into every profession," she remarked in her masculine voice. "It is so unfeminine so unseemly." There was nothing of the feminine about Miss Blake; her horse-cloth dress, her waistcoat and high collar, and her billy-cock hat were of the masculine genus; even her nerves could not be called feminine, since we learn from two or three doctors (taken off their guard) that nerves are neither feminine nor masculine, but common. "I should like to see this tuner," said one of the tennis-players, leaning against a tree. "Here she comes," said Miss Blake, as the little girl was seen sauntering into the garden. "It has been confoundedly annoying having it out of tune," he said. "I've had to give up singing altogether. But what a strange profession you have chosen! Very unusual, isn't it ?" "Why, surely not," she answered, amused. "It seems to me that every other woman has taken to it. The wonder to me is that any one ever scores a success. Nowadays, however, no one could amass a huge fortune out of it." "No one, indeed!" replied Oswald Everard, laughing. "What on earth made you take to it?" "It took to me," she said simply. "It wrapt me round with enthusiasm. I could think of nothing else. I vowed' that I would rise to the top of my profession. I worked day and night. But it means incessant toil for years if one wants to make any headway.”. "Good gracious! I thought it was merely a matter of a few months," he said, smiling at the little girl. greater possibilities. The men put up their eye-glasses, "A few months!" she repeated and saw a little lady with a childish scornfully. "You are speaking the face and soft brown hair, of strictly language of an amateur. No; one has feminine appearance and bearing. to work faithfully year after year; to The goat came towards her and began grasp the possibilities and pass on to nibbling at her frock. She seemed to You imagine: understand the manner of goats, and what it must feel like to touch the played with him to his heart's content. notes, and know that you are keeping One of the tennis-players, Oswald the listeners spellbound; that you are Everard by name, strolled down to the taking them into a fairyland of sound, bank where she was having her frolic. where petty personality is lost in vague Good-afternoon," he said, raising longing and regret." his cap. "I hope the goat is not worrying you. Poor little fellow! This is his last day of play. He is to be killed to-morrow for table d'hôte.” "What a shame!" she said. Fancy to be killed, and then grumbled at !" 66 "That is precisely what we do here," he said, laughing. "We grumble at And I own to beeverything we eat. ing one of the grumpiest, though the lady in the horse-cloth dress yonder follows close upon my heels." "I confess I had not thought of it in that way," he said humbly. "I have only regarded it as a necessary everyday evil; and to be quite honest with you, I fail to see now how it can inspire enthusiasm. I wish I could see," he added, looking up at the engaging little figure before him. "Never mind," she said, laughing at his distress; "I forgive you. And after all, you are not the only person who looks upon it as a necessary evil. My poor old guardian abominated it. He made many sacrifices to come and listen to me. He knew I liked to see his kind old face, and that the presence I of a real friend inspired me with con "She was the lady who was annoyed at me because I tuned the piano," the "Still it had to be little girl said. done. It was plainly my duty. seemed to have come for that purpose." | fidence." "I should not have thought it was | house. But there is no escape from nervous work," he answered. these fiends; I believe they are swarm"But surely you spoke of singing. ing about in the air like so many Are you not nervous when you sing ?" | bacteria. And how, in the name of "Sometimes," he replied rather goodness, you should deliberately stiffly. "But that is slightly differ- choose to be one of them, and should ent." (He was very proud of his sing-be so enthusiastic over your work, puzing, and made a great fuss about it.) zles me beyond all words. Don't say "Your profession, as I remarked be- that you carry a black bag, and present fore, is an unavoidable nuisance. cards which have to be filled up at the When I think what I have suffered most inconvenient time; don't from the gentlemen of your profession, He stopped suddenly, for the little I only wonder that I have any brains girl was convulsed with laughter. She left. But I am uncourteous." laughed until the tears rolled down her "No, no," she said. "Let me hear cheeks; and then she dried her eyes about your sufferings." and laughed again. "Whenever I have specially wanted to be quiet," he said, and then he glanced at her childish little face, and he hesitated. "It seems so rude of me," he added. He was the soul of courtesy, although he was an amateur tenor singer. "Please tell me," the little girl said, in her winning way. "Well," he said, gathering himself Mogether, "it is the one subject on which I can be eloquent. Ever since I can remember, I have been worried and tortured by those rascals. I have tried in every way to escape from them, but there is a cruel fate working against me. Yes; I believe that all the tuners in the universe are in league against me, and have marked ine out for their special prey." "Excuse me," she said, "I can't help myself; it's so funny." "It may be funny to you," he said, laughing in spite of himself; "but it is not funny to me." "Of course it isn't," she replied, making a desperate effort to be serious. "Well, tell me something more about these tuners." "Not another word," he said gallantly. "I am ashamed of myself as it is. Come to the end of the garden, and let me show you the view down into the valley." She had conquered her fit of merriment, but her face wore a settled look of mischief, and she was evidently the possessor of some secret joke. She seemed in capital health and spirits, and had so much to say that was bright "All the what?" asked the little and interesting, that Oswald Everard girl, with a jerk in her voice. "All the tuners, of course," he replied, rather snappishly. "I know that we cannot do without them; but, good heavens they have no tact, no consideration, no mercy. Whenever I've wanted to write or read quietly, that fatal knock has come at the door, and I've known by instinct that all chance of peace was over. Whenever I've been giving a luncheon-party, the tuner has arrived, with his abominable black bag, and his abominable card, which has to be signed at once. On one occasion I was just proposing to a girl in her father's library, when the tuner struck up in the drawing-room. I left off suddenly, and fled from the found himself becoming reconciled to "Oh, I don't think anything of that," she said; "I had a splendid time, and I caught four rare butterflies. I would not have missed those for anything. As for the going about by myself, that is a second nature. Besides, I do not belong to any one. That has its advantages, and I suppose its disadvantages; but at present I have only discovered the advantages. The disadvantages will discover themselves! " "I believe you are what the novels call an advanced young woman," he said. "Perhaps you give lectures on woman's suffrage or something of that at that moment the table d'hôte bell sort ? rang. cashier. 66 Ach, Fräulein!" he said. "You are not really serious?" "I don't It will "Yes, I am," she said. want them to know my name. only worry me. Say I am the young lady who tuned the piano." "I have very often mounted the The little girl hastened to the bureau platform," she answered. "In fact, I and spoke rapidly in German to the am never so happy as when addressing an immense audience. A most unfemiinine thing to do, isn't it? What would the lady yonder in the horsecloth dress and billy-cock hat say ? Don't you think you ought to go and help her to drive away the goat? She looks so frightened. She interests me deeply. I wonder whether she has written an essay on the Feminine in Woman.' I should like to read it; it would do me so much good." "You are at least a true woman," he said, laughing, "for I see you can be spiteful. The tuning has not driven that away." "Ah, I had forgotten about the tuning," she answered brightly; "but now you remind me, I have been seized by a great idea.' "Won't you tell it to me?" he asked. She had scarcely given these directions and mounted to her room when Oswald Everard, who was unusually interested in his mysterious companion, came to the bureau and asked for the name of the little lady. "Es ist das Fräulein welches das Piano gestimmt hat, "answered the man, returning with unusual quickness to his account-book. No one spoke to the little girl at table d'hôte; but for all that, she enjoyed her dinner, and gave her serious attention to all the courses. Being "No," she answered. "I keep my thus solidly occupied, she had not great ideas for myself, and work them much leisure to bestow on the converout in secret. And this is one partic-sation of the other guests. Nor was it ularly amusing. What fun I shall specially original; it treated of the shortcomings of the chef, the tasteless"But why keep the fun to your-ness of the soup, the toughness of the self?" he said. "We all want to be beef, and all the many failings which amused here; we all want to be stirred up; a little fun would be a charity." "Very well, since you wish it, you shall be stirred up," she answered; "but you must give me time to work out my great idea. I do not hurry about things, not even about my professional duties. For I have a strong feeling that it is vulgar to be always "For my own part," said a sternamassing riches! As I have neither a looking old man, "I have no words to husband nor a brother to support, I describe what a gracious comfort music have chosen less wealth and more lei- has been to me all my life. It is the sure to enjoy all the loveliness of life! noblest language which man may unSo you see I take my time about every-derstand and speak. And I sometimes thing. And to-morrow I shall catch think that those who know it, or know butterflies at my leisure, and lie something of it, are able at rare moamongst the dear old pines, and work ments to find an answer to life's perat my great idea." plexing problems." "I shall catch butterflies," said her "And I too shall companion. lie amongst the dear old pines." "Just as you please," she said; and go to complete a mountain-hotel dinner. But suddenly, so it seemed to the little girl, this time-honored talk passed into another phase; she heard the word music mentioned, and she became at once interested to learn what these people had to say on a subject which was dearer to her than any other. The little girl looked up from her plate. Robert Browning's words rose to her lips, but she did not give them utterance: God has a few of us whom he whispers in | heard her at New York, Leipsic, London, Berlin, and even Chicago." the ear; The rest may reason, and welcome; 'tis we musicians know. "I have lived through a long life," said another elderly man, "and have therefore had my share of trouble; the grief of being obliged to give up music was the grief which held me longest, or which perhaps has never left me. I still crave for the gracious pleasure of touching once more the strings of a violoncello, and hearing the dear, tender voice singing and throbbing and answering even to such poor skill as mine. I still yearn to take my part in concerted music, and be one of those privileged to play Beethoven's string quartettes. But that will have to be in another incarnation, I think." He glanced at his shrunken arm, and then, as though ashamed of this allusion to his own personal infirmity, he added hastily : "But when the first pang of such a pain is over, there remains the comfort of being a listener. At first one does not think it a comfort; but as time goes on, there is no resisting its magic influence. And Lowell said rightly, that one of God's charities is music.' 66 999 "I did not know you were musical. Mr. Keith," said an English lady. "You have never before spoken of music." "Perhaps not, madam," he answered. "One does not often speak of what one cares for most of all. But when I am in London, I rarely miss hearing our best players." At this point others joined in, and the various merits of eminent pianists were warmly discussed. "What a wonderful name that little English lady has made for herself!" said the major, who was considered an authority on all subjects. "I would go anywhere to hear Miss Thyra Flowerdew. We all ought to be very proud of her. She has taken even the German musical world by storm, and they say her recitals at Paris have been brilliantly successful. I myself have The little girl stirred uneasily in her chair. The "I don't think Miss Flowerdew has ever been to Chicago," she said. There was a dead silence. admirer of Miss Thyra Flowerdew looked much annoyed, and twiddled his watch-chain. He had meant to say Philadelphia, but he did not think it necessary to own to his mistake. "What impertinence!" said one of the ladies to Miss Blake. "What can she know about it? Is she not the young person who tuned the piano? ' 'Perhaps she tunes Miss Thyra Flowerdew's piano," suggested Miss Blake, in a loud whisper. "You are right, madam," said the little girl quietly. "I have often tuned Miss Flowerdew's piano." There was another embarrassing silence; and then a lovely old lady, whom every one reverenced, came to the rescue. "I think her playing is simply superb," she said. "Nothing that I ever hear satisfies me so entirely. She has all the tenderness of an angel's touch." "Listening to her," said the major, who had now recovered from his annoyance at being interrupted, 66 one becomes unconscious of her presence, for she is the music itself. And that is rare. It is but seldom nowadays that we are allowed to forget the personality of the player. And yet her personality is an unusual one; having once seen her, it would not be easy to forget her. I should recognize her anywhere." As he spoke, he glanced at the little tuner, and could not help admiring her dignified composure under circumstances which might have been distressing to any one; and when she rose with the others, he followed her, and said stiffly: "I regret that I was the indirect cause of putting you in an awkward position." "It is really of no consequence," she said brightly. "If you think I was impertinent, I ask your forgiveness. I |