to this the four travellers applied their knuckles. They had not long to wait; the board was removed by an ill-dressed man, of perhaps fifty years of age, who welcomed them into a tolerably neat kitchen, well-warmed by a blazing fire. To an inquiry as to whether they could see the Baron, he anounced himself as Baron, and Sovereign Chief of New Zealand. He reiterated his welcome; introduced them to his wife, who confidently believed that her husband was a sovereign, because he had told her so twenty times a day for the last three years; and he finally asked them if they were fond of music. The guests pleaded guilty to the taste, but they also honestly confessed that they were exceedingly hungry. "You shall have all we possess," said the ex-King of Nebuhwa. "Kätchen," added he to his consort, "get the bread, and bring out the Beethoven." The The Queen took the loaf and the duet out of a large fish-kettle which lay in one corner of the apartment. The King placed upon the table a guitar, four pewter plates, a violin, and a piece of cheese. Their Majesties dispensed their hospitality with much grace, a quality that is seldom wanting where there is good-will. They apologized for the absence of wine, spirits, and beer, but they praised the virtues of the water of Hokianga. beverage having been poured into horns, and each guest supplied with cheese and bread, her Majesty, at a signal from the King, who had assumed the violin, took up the guitar, and in a minute they were deep in the melodious mysteries of Beethoven. That Titan's music on the guitar, was something of an anomaly; but the truth is, that the lady's copy was written for the piano, and it was her German ingenuity that adapted it to the only instrument she possessed. The guests had long terminated their repast, and ventured, as the duet proceeded, to make an occasional remark, which was speedily hushed by the chef d'orchestre, who would tolerate no commentaries during the interpretation of so splendid a text. The duet was finished only to be recommenced; detached passages were repeated over and over again; and the guests meanwhile were awed into absolute silence by the look, speech, and action of their host. It was a singular exhibition in a singular locality:-Beethoven in New Zealand, and free-born Englishmen subdued at Hokianga by the despotism of a French monarch in a foreign territory. "You play superbly, Baron," at length said one of the four travellers. "Sir," said the sovereign chief, "it is impossible to play ill on such an instrument as this. I adore my wife; I love my subjects, whom I would dress like Parisians if they would only heed me; but I venerate my violin." "He has caught heathenism, and worships his fiddle," whispered Chalton to a missionary on his right hand. "This violin, Sir," resumed the Baron, "has seen as many lands as the Wandering Jew. It had been all over the world before it got into the hands of Platt; and it has been all over the world since it left them." "And who is Platt?" said the missionary. "Platt, Sir," answered the Baron, "was one of the first violinplayers in England; but he was afflicted with modesty, and consequently was only known to his friends. He led your Duke of Cumberland's private band at Kew-and what a well-dressed band that was! it did honour to its tailor; and it had a European reputation for excellence. I wish I were as rich as a duke, and possessed so great a maestro di capella. The Baron then proceeded to enlarge upon his position and prospects, entered into discussion on his rights, and pronounced himself a sterling king, in spite of Lord Stanley, the British Queen, or the English Ministry. "I would make these islanders,” said he, "the best-dressed people out of France—and if they could but acknowledge my principles, I would myself furnish them with paletots; but they denounce my tyranny, and laugh at me when I offer to put them into the dignity of trousers." To hear this mock potentate speak of his people, his dominions, religious toleration, the rights of man, and the duties of monarchs, one might have concluded that he really was a recognized sovereign, with an actual kingdom, a people to protect, parties to reconcile, a faith to uphold and responsibilities to oppress him. Beyond his musical instruments, his solitary instrumental duet, his fish-kettle, an old 'Journal des Modes,' and some needles, he can scarcely be said to have had at this moment a single possession incontestably his own. As the party of travellers, after sleeping in the hut, proceeded on the following morning to their boat, they were accompanied to the beach by their entertainer, who expressed his hopes of meeting with them again. But this was not to be. THE EPILOGUE. Four years afterwards, a solitary English traveller, named Chalton, was standing in the centre of a wide district, near to where the last mentioned guests had spent a summer night in 1839. He was apparently in search of some locality, and two chiefs were closely watching him. A couple of Wesleyan natives were not far off. They were assisting him in making a survey for a road. "There used to be a hut on that hill in the distance," said he to one of the chiefs. 66 King Thierry's hut," answered both the chiefs at once. "True," rejoined the inquirer; "why is it no longer there?" "Zealanders' gods are not sleeping," replied one of the chiefs. "Thierry and his priests were cruel to his people. The island spirits told us, in our dreams, to punish him. We burned the hut down last moon." "And Thierry and his wife?" asked the astounded engineer. "The good lady perished in the flames. The people from the other side of the island saved King Thierry.” "Ah!" exclaimed Chalton, partly relieved; "what are they "Ah!" exclaimed Chalton, partly relieved; "what are they going to do with him?" "Oh, nothing!" cried the chiefs, somewhat eagerly. "The Government will not let the people keep him a captive.". "The Government can't get him," said one of the chiefs. "And the tribe haven't got him," said the other. 66 'Why, what have they done to him?" "Hem!" growled somewhat unctuously the elder chief of the two, "they have eaten him!" Such is said to have been really the fate of the little prisoner who used to mend the garments of M. de Bohun in the prison of Orléans; of the costumier of the court masquerades at the Congress of Vienna; and of the wandering adventurer in distant seas, where he could find no one who would either acknowledge his fiats or accept his fashions. He was unable to establish himself in the world either as monarch of men or as maker of their habits. And having thus spoken of a mock king, let us consider now our English liege ladies at their respective toilets. 89 THE TIRING-BOWERS OF QUEENS. "I could accuse the gaiety of your wardrobe SHIRLEY. LET us not presume to look into the primitive boudoirs of the Queens before the Conquest, and only reverently into those of the sovereign ladies who succeeded. "Tread lightly, this is sacred ground!" is an injunction not to be forgotten in this locality. The first Queen after the Norman invasion, Matilda of Flanders, who was pummelled into loving her ungallant wooer William, had a costly wardrobe. Before her death, she disposed of the most valuable of her garments by will, and named therein the dressmaker who had provided them for her, a species of advertisement that ought to have made Madame Alderet's fortune. "I give," says the royal testatrix, "to the Abbey of the Holy Trinity my tunic, worked at Winchester, by Alderet's wife; and the mantle embroidered with gold, which is in my chamber, to make a cope. Of my two golden girdles, I give that which is ornamented with emblems, for the purpose of suspending the lamp before the great altar." The abbey named was at Caen, and the nuns connected therewith came in for all Matilda's petticoats, -no indifferent legacy, for they were stiff with gold and dust. |