There is a principle in human nature which has been taken far too little account of by both philosophers and peasants. It has been the dominant principle in many of the important decisions that have sealed the fate of nations as well as of individuals. The principle is expressed by a word which is always pronounced in one way by the cultured, and in quite a different way by the unlettered. The word in its illiterate use is "contr_air_yness," and but for the principle expressed by this word the Bronte girls would never have made their mark in literature, and this history would never have been written. "Curse King William," shouted the fiery little man, supported by a hoarse shout from the other half-tipsy guests, all of whom had turned fierce and glaring eyes on the supposed Protestant. "I cannot curse King William," replied Hugh, smiling. "He never did me any harm; besides, he is beyond the region of my blessings and cursings. But," added he, warming with his subject, "I should not mind cursing the Pope, if he is the author of your fierce and besotted religion." Alice first saw the danger, and uttered a sharp cry. Suddenly the family party sprang upon Hugh, as the ambushed Philistines once flung themselves on Samson, but he shook them off, and left them sprawling on the floor. Alice drew him from the house, bleeding and disheveled, and after a tender parting in the grove beside the stream, he started on foot for Mount Pleasant. Two immediate results followed that conflict. Hugh Bronte became a furious Protestant and a frantic lover. There was no lukewarmness or indifference as to his Protestantism. The Bronte _contrairyness_ had met the kind of opposition to give it a stubborn set, and he there and then became a Protestant, double-dyed, in the warp and in the woof. The process of his conversion, such as it was, was prompt, decisive, effectual. It was somewhat orange in hue and militant in fibre, and was a genuine product of the times. Hugh's love for Alice was fanned into a fierce flame by the events of that night. When he first met her he had been dazzled by her rare beauty. He had seen few women, and never one like Alice. For the first time he had come under the spell of a simple but beautiful girl. They were young, shy lovers; very happy in each other's company, but each sufficiently self-possessed to be happy enough in self. From the crucible of contradiction on that night the jewel love had leaped forth. Each was drawn out from the self-centre in which each had been concentrated in self; he to declare his love in the face of relentless foes, and she to cling to him, and protect him, when bruised and torn by her friends. Beneath the pines, that night, they pledged, with mingling tears, undying love. They parted, but their hearts were one; and persecution, poverty and bereavement only welded them more closely together in the changing years. III. LOVE'S SUBTERFUGES.