The Strand Magazine, Vol. 01, Issue 02, February 1891: An Illustrated MonthlyVarious
General
The Strand Magazine, Vol. 01, Issue 02, February 1891: An Illustrated Monthly
Various
English literature -- Periodicals; Short stories, English -- Periodicals
The very lamps suspended from the ceiling are made to sway to and fro in
case of rough and windy weather. The whole thing is an ingenious idea,
delightfully carried out, and to-night Mr. Wyndham's cabin is seen at
its best. There is to be a supper-party at the conclusion of the
performance downstairs, and the tables for the time being are burdened
down with every luxury. Fairy lamps are peeping out amongst the pines
and hot-house grapes, and the lamps hanging from the roof are surrounded
with flowers and ferns, whilst the electric light shines out brilliantly
from amongst the blossoms.
[Illustration: MR. WYNDHAM'S DRESSING-ROOM.]
_The Minister's Crime._
BY MACLAREN COBBAN.
I.
"There is really little use in my continuing to call," said the doctor;
"it will only be running you into useless expense. I may go on
prescribing and prescribing till I get through the whole pharmacopoeia,
but I can do him no good; what he needs is not drugs but air--a bracing
air. Get him away out of this, and let him run wild in the country,
or--if your engagements won't let you get to the country--remove to some
open suburb north or south."
[Illustration: THE DOCTOR'S VISIT.]
The doctor sat in a little parlour, in a shabby-genteel street of
close-packed middle London. Opposite him was the patient, a child of
three or four, on his mother's knee and clasped about with his mother's
arms, while his father, the Rev. James Murray, stood anxiously
listening. The boy--the first-born, and the only child of his
parents--had a month or two before been stricken down with an infant's
ailment, and though that had passed, he continued so weak that the
doctor had tested the soundness of heart and lungs, and the outcome of
his examination was that the only hope for the child was change of air.
"I only wish," said the father, "that I could take him away. I must try,
though I don't see at present how I am to do it."
He turned away to the window to hide the emotion that would rise to
choke him when he met the large, weary blue eyes of his boy bent on him,
as if in appeal that he might not be allowed to fade and wither and die,
like a flower before it has fairly bloomed.
"Can't you at least send the boy away with his mother?" asked the
doctor.
"I must try," said the father without turning round. "I must see what
can be done."
"In the meantime," said the doctor, rising, "go on with the cod-liver
oil and malt extract."
The doctor went, and still the Rev. James Murray stood by the window,
striving to keep down the emotion that demanded to have its way. The
wife rose with the child in her arms and went close to her husband.
"James, my dear," said she in a low voice (and she took his hand),
"don't, my dear!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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