McNeil

“ He awoke all at once with the snap of a fighting man who is alert to ever present danger. A hand lay warm and hard [Pg 160] over his mouth, and above it his eyes met McNeil's. When he saw that Ross was awake McNeil withdraw his hand. The morning sunlight was warm about them. Moving clumsily because of his stiff, bruised body, Ross crawled out of the hollow. He looked around, but McNeil stood there alone. "Ashe?" Ross questioned him. ”

“ On the further side of the fire they had built up a wall of green logs, so that the heat was thrown into the hut. We were snug and warm.
JOHN McNEIL
"Boys," said McKinstry, "when we get through with this war, you must come to the Amoskeag Falls, and visit your old friends. We've got some fine men there,—one's a great wrestler. I don't think your Jonas Parker could have stood up very long against him. His name is John McNeil. He is six feet six inches high, and used to be strong as a bull. ”

“ The room was dimly lighted by a ruddy glow from the coals still burning in the fireplace; and by this light, Thure, the moment he sprang through the door, saw a figure start up suddenly from near the bunk where he slept and turn a pock-marked, face, white with fear, toward him; and then, as his momentum carried him into the room and before he could lift a hand in self-defense, he saw the right hand suddenly swing up a heavy club, as the figure leaped toward him, and—a blinding crash and he knew no more for the present.
Bud was more fortunate. ”

“ There will be no further interruptions," and the alcalde quietly laid a couple of big revolvers down on top of the barrel, one on each side of the Bible.
At this moment and when all eyes were bent on the alcalde, Thure felt a slight jerk on his coat sleeve, and, glancing down, saw that the smaller of their accusers, the pock-marked man, had moved up close to his side and that it had been his hand that had jerked his sleeve.
"Read at once," and the man swiftly slipped a piece of paper into his hand. "It is your only hope," and he moved away, not having once even glanced toward Thure. ”

“ There were many degraded white men, chained to Chinese autocratic dispensers of the drugs they craved, who would be willing to play the spy.
It was only the working of a sixth sense developed in the wilds, but McNeill, though he could pick out no special person on the busy streets, thought enough of the hunch to slip an automatic in his pocket when he took seat in the tonneau of the big car that was soon gliding south to the fashionable suburb. ”

“ In politics Mr. McNeill is a Liberal and a Repealer, but, above both, a lover of his country, and a gentleman who has done a good deal to foster its industries and improve the social condition of its people. He was married, first at Barton, on 25th December, 1852, to Ann Eliza, daughter of William Thomas. This estimable lady died 1st October, 1869. His second marriage was solemnised at Bloomfield, Digby county, 24th January, 1870, when he united with Alice Maria, second daughter of Edwin Jones. ”

“ We are the ones to judge of its merits," commanded the alcalde, his face flushing with interest, while the surrounding crowd became breathless.
Bud was looking at the two men; and he saw both of them start at the words of Thure and glance apprehensively into each other's eyes.
"The miner said," and Thure turned his eyes full upon Bill Ugger, "that one of his murderers was a large, red-headed man with a broken nose; and that the other," and his eyes turned to the face of Spike Quinley, "was a small man, with a pock-marked face." ”

“ Either Stackpole was crazy, or we've struck the wrong canyon; and, in either case, we might just as well give up the search and get back where we know there is gold. However, I will put the matter to a vote; and we will do as the majority wishes. Shall we start back for the diggings in the morning? All in favor of starting back in the morning stand up," and Mr. Conroyal's eyes glanced over the little company seated around him.
All arose slowly to their feet, except Thure and Bud, who looked almost ready to cry at this untimely ending of all their romantic dreams. ”

“ Marshall said, when they reached the outskirts of Hangtown. "I am real sorry that your venture turned out the way that it did; but a man has got to expect any sort of luck in the diggings, and usually it is the worst sort that he gets dealt out to him, at least that has been my experience," and he smiled bitterly.
Marshall now stood for a moment, irresolutely, his eyes fixed on Thure and Bud; and then, suddenly, he thrust one of his hands deep into his trousers pocket and drew out a little roll of buckskin, carefully folded and tied. ”

“ McNeill knew what strange tricks imagination plays when one allows any subject of peculiar interest to one's mental or physical welfare to once become dominant. Still he was glad to find the fog had lifted when his car was ordered and he stepped out into the quiet Californian night. Cox pressed him hard to stay until the next morning, when they would motor down together and complete the negotiations that would set McNeill free to go to New York—and Helen. ”

“ Although a vehement controversialist, Hugh McNeile was a man of simple and sincere piety of character. Sir Edward Russell, an opponent alike of his religious and his political opinions, bears witness to the deep spirituality of his teaching, and describes him as an absolutely unique personality. “He made himself leader of the Liverpool people, and always led with calm and majesty in the most excited times. ”

“ McNeill," she went on seriously. "My life—more than that. I do not know how I can repay you."
"I do," said McNeill. "I'll tell you how on the trip, perhaps."
But the girl, however grateful, was not to have her maidenly defenses overrun in the first assault.
"It will be nice to have some one to talk to," she said. "But I thought that your profession kept you in China, though I can imagine that father's folly may have jeopardized your usefulness."
"I am not a professional guide and interpreter, if that is what you mean," said McNeill. "Only upon occasion. I have made certain discoveries. ”

“ We never killed the man! Oh, Ham, we never killed the man! You, surely, will believe us!" and Thure and Bud both, with faces white with excitement and hope, sprang eagerly to the side of the big fellow.
"Shut up! Stand back!" and he pushed the boys away. "See here," and he swung around in front of the alcalde, "you know me; an' you know I'd never try tew save th' neck of no criminal. But I know them boys, know their dads an' mas; an' I know they never committed no murder. Who seen 'em dew it? Whar are th' witnesses?" ”

“ Conroyal, when they made ready for bed, "and keep somebody on guard night and day all the time; for now that we have found the secret of Crooked Arm Gulch them devils are likely to be down upon us at the first unguarded moment. We will put four men on guard again to-night. Rex, you and Dill and Bud and his father can stand guard for the first half of the night; and you can call Ham and Frank and Thure and me to relieve you about one o'clock. Now, get to your stations and we will get to our blankets. Good night, everybody," and he began rolling himself up in his blanket. ”

“ After severe fighting the Arabs were repulsed with loss. Sir Gerald Graham [q. v. Suppl. I] , who had started out to McNeill's assistance, soon returned on hearing that reinforcements were not required. Graham deprecated the sharp criticism to which McNeill's conduct was subjected on the ground of lack of caution (Lond. Gaz. 25 Aug. 1885) . For his services in the campaign he received two clasps. He retired from the service in 1890. Inheriting the family estates in the Hebrides, McNeill was made J.P. and D.L. for Argyllshire in 1874. ”

“ Then it was that the young girl told her friends a secret which McNeill had confided to her before leaving New Salem.
He had told her what she had never even suspected before, that John McNeill was not his real name, but that it was John McNamar. Shortly before he came to New Salem, he explained, his father had suffered a disastrous failure in business. He was the oldest son; and in the hope of retrieving the lost fortune, he resolved to go West, expecting to return in a few years and share his riches with the rest of the family. Anticipating parental opposition, he ran away from home ”

“ We got intew th' city this mornin'; an' was a-standin' on th' street a-lookin' at th' humans a-passin' by, when who should come a-ridin' along right afore our eyes, but them tew identickle young fellers what we had seen kill that man; an', of course, bein' honest an' law-abidin' men, me an' Spike seen tew it that they didn't git away a second time. Now, I reckon, that's all I've got tew tell, only," and again his eyes turned vindictively to Thure and Bud, "thar ain't ben no mistake made an' you've got th' right men ”

“ As they passed along by the various camps in the outskirts of the town, a man, holding a long-handled frying-pan over the coals of his camp-fire, looked up and then remarked casually:
"Queer shootin' scrap that down on the levee last night!"
"Heer'd th' shootin', but that's all I heer'd," answered Ham, halting for a moment. "What might thar be queer 'bout it?"
"Both on 'em bosum friends 'til they gits a lot of French Ike's whiskey down 'em. Then one calls t'other a liar, an' both on 'em pulls their guns an' shoots ”

“ The cliff, black at the base, rising gradually into thinner gray, drove through the air like the edge of a coming world. A chill breeze swept out from the hollow, breathing of waking grasses and of dew. ”

“ Across the moor of gray house eaves the mist wavers. Day troubles it. A pink light rises to the zenith, and the mist shifts and slips away in layers, pink and gold and white. Now far beyond the grayness, to the west, the cone of Fuji flashes into splendor. It, too, is pink. Its shape is of a lotos bud, and the long fissures that plough a mountain side are now but delicate gold veining on a petal. Slowly it seems to open. It is the chalice of a new day, the signal and the pledge of consecration. Husky crows awake in the pine trees, and doves under the temple eaves. ”

“ Sometimes at twilight a group of shadowy human figures, gray as the doves themselves, crept out from the nunnery gate, crossed the wide, pebbled courtyard of the temple and stood, for long moments, by the gnarled roots of the camphor tree, staring out across the beauty of the plain of Yeddo ”

“ Thus the day comes to modern Tokyo, which the old folks still call Yeddo.
On such a midsummer dawn, not many years ago, old Kano Indara, sleeping in his darkened chamber, felt the summons of an approaching joy. Beauty tugged at his dreams. Smiling, as a child that is led by love, he rose, drew aside softly the shoji, then the amado of his room, and then, with face uplifted, stepped down into his garden. The beauty of the ebbing night caught at his sleeve, but the dawn held him back. ”

“ But to know the full charm of the great city, one must wake with it at some rebirth of dawn. This hour gives to the imaginative in every land a thrill, a yearning, and a pang of visual regeneration. In no place is this wonder more deeply touched with mystery than in modern Tokyo.
Far off to the east the Sumida River lies in sleep. Beyond it, temple roofs—black keels of sunken vessels—cut a sky still powdered thick with stars. Nothing moves, and yet a something changes! The darkness shivers as to a cold touch. A pallid haze breathes wanly on the surface of the impassive sky. ”

“ Poor suffering one, this flesh is only the petal fallen from a perfected bloom! Whether her tender body, or this racked and twitching frame upon your bed, all flesh is illusion. Think of your soul and its immortal lives! ”

“ She tried to force herself to think of him merely as an artist would think; how the lines of the shoulders and the throat flowed upward, like dark flame, to the altar of his face. How the hair grew in flame upon his brow, how the dark eyes, fearless and innocent with the look of primeval youth, indeed, held a strange human pain of searching. The mere remembered pictures of him rose and fell with her as sea-flowers, or long river grass; but when there came remembered shiver of his words, "I drink no more until my cup of troth with the maiden yonder!" ”

“ Catching her anew he would crush her against his breast, fondling her with that tempestuous gentleness that surely no mere man of earth could know, would drag up her faint soul to him through eyes and lips until she felt herself but a shred of ecstacy caught in a whirlwind of immortal love. ”

“ First came the sonorous impact of the swinging beam against curved metal, then the "boom," the echo,—the echoes of that echo to endless repetition, sifting in layers through the thinner air upon them, sweeping like vapor low along the hillside with a presence and reality so intense that it should have had color, or, at least, perfume; settling in a fine dew of sound on quivering ferns and grasses, permeating, it would seem, with its melodious vibration the very wood of the houses and the trunks of living trees. ”

“ And it was at that stage in his meditations that a Rolls-Royce drew silently up beside him, and the cheerful voice of the subject of his thoughts hailed him delightedly.
"The very man, and the very spot!"
McIver turned round and nodded briefly.
"Morning, Captain Drummond! I was just going round to your house to see you."
"But, my dear old top," cried Hugh, "don't you see where you are? The portals of the Regency positively beckon us. Behind those portals, a cocktail apiece, and you shall tell me all your troubles." ”