voyage only, but he expected delay, for with November had come storm and cold, fierce winds and roaring seas. Edging along from port to port, taking advantage of every tide and favorable breeze, and lying to, when sailing was impossible, six weeks were gone before he reached Kirkwall in the Orkneys. Here he intended to take in his last cargo before steering for home. A boat leaving Kirkwall as he entered, carried the news of "The Solan's" arrival to Lerwick, and then Snorro watched anxiously every tide for Jan's arrival.

But day after day passed and "The Solan" came not. No one but Snorro was uneasy. In the winter, in that tempestuous latitude, boats were often delayed for weeks. They ran from shelter to shelter in constant peril of shipwreck, and with a full cargo a good skipper was bound to be prudent. But Snorro had a presentiment of danger and trouble. He watched night after night for Jan, until even his strength gave way, and he fell into a deep sleep. He was awakened by Jan's voice. In a moment he opened the door and let him in.

Alas! Alas, poor Jan! It was sorrow upon sorrow for him. "The Solan" had been driven upon the Quarr rocks, and she was a total wreck. Nothing had been saved but Jan's life, even that barely. He had been so bruised and injured that he had been compelled to rest in the solitary hut of a coast-guardsman many days. He gave the facts to Snorro in an apathy. The man was shipwrecked as well as the boat. It was not only that he had lost everything, that he had not a penny left in the world, he had lost hope, lost all faith in himself, lost even the will to fight his ill fortune any longer.

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC 1:BRARY

TIL

JAMES MATTHEW BARRIE,

BARRIE, JAMES MATTHEW, a Scottish author, born at Kirriemuir, Forfarshire, May 9, 1860. From the Dumfries Academy he entered the University of Edinburgh, graduated in 1883, and soon afterward engaged in editorial work on "The Nottingham Journal." While thus employed he contributed sketches and other articles to various London newspapers. In the spring of 1885 he went to London seeking a wider field, and in the autumn of that year published his first "Auld Licht Idyls," in "The St. James's Gazette." His first volume, "Better Dead," appeared in 1887. "When a Man's Single" and "Auld Licht Idyls" followed in 1888; "An Edinburgh Eleven" and "A Window in Thrums" in 1889; "My Lady Nicotine" and "A Holiday in Bed" in 1890; "The Little Minister" in 1891; "A Tillyloss Scandal" in 1892; and "An Auld Licht Manse" and "Two of Them" in 1893; "Sentimental Tommy" (1896); "Margaret Ogilvy" (1896), a biography of his mother. He has also written numerous short sketches and three comedies: "Walker, London" (1892); "Jane Annie" (1893); and "The Professor's Love Story." Thrums, the scene of many of his sketches, is Kirriemuir, painted with a loving hand. His peculiar talent for depicting Scottish village life and rustic characters with fidelity, pathos, humor, and poetic charm, has brought him fame.

THE AULD LICHTS.

COURTSHIPS.

WITH the severe Auld Lichts the Sabbath began at six o'clock on Saturday evening. By that time the gleaming shuttle was at rest, Davie Haggart had strolled into the village from his pile of stones on the Whunny road; Hendry Robb, the "dummy," had sold his last barrowful of "rozetty [resiny] roots" for firewood; and the people, having tranquilly supped and soused their faces in their water pails, slowly donned their Sunday clothes. This ceremony was common to all; but here divergence set in. The gray Auld Licht, to whom love was not even a name, sat in his high-backed arm

chair by the hearth, Bible or "Pilgrim's Progress" in hand, occasionally lapsing into slumber. But though, when they got the chance, they went willingly three times to the kirk there were young men in the community so flighty that, instead of dozing at home on Saturday night, they dandered casually into the square, and, forming into knots at the corners, talked solemnly and mysteriously of women.

Not even on the night preceding his wedding was an Auld Licht ever known to stay out after ten o'clock. So weekly conclaves at street corners came to an end at a comparatively early hour, one Colebs after another shuffling silently from the square until it echoed, deserted, to the townhouse clock. The last of the gallants, gradually discovering that he was alone, would look around him musingly, and, taking in the situation, slowly wend his way home. On no other night of the week was frivolous talk about the softer sex indulged in, the Auld Lichts being creatures of habit who never thought of smiling on a Monday. Long before they reached their teens they were earning their keep as herds in the surrounding glens or filling "pirns" for their parents; but they were generally on the brink of twenty before they thought seriously of matrimony. Up to that time they only trifled with the other sex's affections at a distance filling a maid's water pails, perhaps, when no one was looking, or carrying her wob; at the recollection of which they would slap their knees almost jovially on Saturday night. A wife was expected to assist at the loom as well as to be cunning in the making of marmalade and the firing of bannocks, and there was consequently some heartburning among the lads for maids of skill and muscle. The Auld Licht, however, who meant marriage seldom loitered in the streets. By and by there came a time when the clock looked down through its cracked glass upon the hemmed-in square and saw him not. His companions, gazing at each other's boots, felt that something was going on, but made no remark.

A month ago, passing through the shabby familiar square, I brushed against a withered old man tottering down the street under a load of yarn. It was piled on a wheelbarrow which. his feeble hands could not have raised but for the rope of yarn that supported it from his shoulders; and though Auld Licht was written on his patient eyes, I did not immediately recog nize Jamie Whamond. Years ago Jamie was a sturdy weaver and fervent lover whom I had the right to call my friend.