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har80679_FC.qxd 12/11/09 6:23 PM Page ii

Commonly used Power

and Converter Equations

Instantaneous power: p(t) ⫽ v(t)i(t)

t2

Energy: W ⫽ p(t)dt
3
t1

t0 ⫹T t0 ⫹T
W 1 1
Average power: P ⫽ ⫽ p(t) dt ⫽ v(t)i(t) dt
T T3 T3
t0 t0

Average power for a dc voltage source: Pdc ⫽ Vdc Iavg

1 T 2
rms voltage: Vrms ⫽ v (t)dt
BT3
0

rms for v ⫽ v1 ⫹ v2 ⫹ v3 ⫹ . . . : Vrms ⫽ 2V 1,2 rms ⫹ V 2,2 rms ⫹ V 3,2 rms ⫹ Á

Im
rms current for a triangular wave: Irms ⫽
13

Im 2
rms current for an offset triangular wave: Irms ⫽ a b ⫹ I dc
2
B 13

Vm
rms voltage for a sine wave or a full-wave rectified sine wave: Vrms ⫽
12
har80679_FC.qxd 12/11/09 6:23 PM Page iii

Vm
rms voltage for a half-wave rectified sine wave: Vrms ⫽
2

P P
Power factor: pf ⫽ ⫽
S Vrms Irms

I 2n
Aa
Total harmonic distortion: THD ⫽ n⫽2
I1

1
Distortion factor: DF ⫽
A 1 ⫹ (THD)2
Irms
Form factor ⫽
Iavg

Ipeak
Crest factor ⫽
Irms

Buck converter: Vo ⫽ Vs D

Vs
Boost converter: Vo ⫽
1⫺D

D
Buck-boost and Ćuk converters: Vo ⫽ ⫺ Vs a b
1⫺D
D
SEPIC: Vo ⫽ Vs a b
1⫺D

D N
Flyback converter: Vo ⫽ Vs a b a 2b
1 ⫺ D N1

N2
Forward converter: Vo ⫽ Vs D a b
N1
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page i

Power Electronics
Daniel W. Hart
Valparaiso University
Valparaiso, Indiana
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page ii

POWER ELECTRONICS

Published by McGraw-Hill, a business unit of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 1221 Avenue of the
Americas, New York, NY 10020. Copyright © 2011 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights
reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means,
or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written consent of The McGraw-Hill
Companies, Inc., including, but not limited to, in any network or other electronic storage or transmission,
or broadcast for distance learning.

Some ancillaries, including electronic and print components, may not be available to customers outside
the United States.

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 DOC/DOC 1 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0

ISBN 978-0-07-338067-4
MHID 0-07-338067-9

Vice President & Editor-in-Chief: Marty Lange

Vice President, EDP: Kimberly Meriwether-David
Global Publisher: Raghothaman Srinivasan
Director of Development: Kristine Tibbetts
Developmental Editor: Darlene M. Schueller
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Project Manager: Erin Melloy
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Design Coordinator: Brenda A. Rolwes
Cover Designer: Studio Montage, St. Louis, Missouri
(USE) Cover Image: Figure 7.5a from interior
Compositor: Glyph International
Typeface: 10.5/12 Times Roman
Printer: R. R. Donnelley

All credits appearing on page or at the end of the book are considered to be an extension of the
copyright page.

This book was previously published by: Pearson Education, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hart, Daniel W.
Power electronics / Daniel W. Hart.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-07-338067-4 (alk. paper)
1. Power electronics. I. Title.
TK7881.15.H373 2010
621.31'7—dc22
2009047266

www.mhhe.com
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page iii

To my family, friends, and the many students

I have had the privilege and pleasure of guiding
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page iv

BRIEF CONTENTS

Chapter 1 Chapter 7
Introduction 1 DC Power Supplies 265

Chapter 2 Chapter 8
Power Computations 21 Inverters 331

Chapter 3 Chapter 9
Half-Wave Rectifiers 65 Resonant Converters 387

Chapter 4 Chapter 10
Full-Wave Rectifiers 111 Drive Circuits, Snubber Circuits,
and Heat Sinks 431

Chapter 5 Appendix A Fourier Series for Some

Common Waveforms 461
AC Voltage Controllers 171
Appendix B State-Space Averaging 467

Index 473
Chapter 6
DC-DC Converters 196

iv
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page v

CONTENTS

Chapter 1 2.5 Effective Values: RMS 34

Introduction 1 2.6 Apparent Power and Power
Factor 42
1.1 Power Electronics 1
Apparent Power S 42
1.2 Converter Classification 1
Power Factor 43
1.3 Power Electronics Concepts 3
2.7 Power Computations for Sinusoidal
1.4 Electronic Switches 5 AC Circuits 43
The Diode 6
2.8 Power Computations for Nonsinusoidal
Thyristors 7 Periodic Waveforms 44
Transistors 8
Fourier Series 45
1.5 Switch Selection 11 Average Power 46
1.6 Spice, PSpice, and Capture 13 Nonsinusoidal Source and
1.7 Switches in Pspice 14 Linear Load 46
The Voltage-Controlled Switch 14 Sinusoidal Source and Nonlinear
Transistors 16 Load 48
Diodes 17 2.9 Power Computations Using
Thyristors (SCRs) 18 PSpice 51
Convergence Problems in 2.10 Summary 58
PSpice 18 2.11 Bibliography 59
1.8 Bibliography 19 Problems 59
Problems 20

Chapter 3
Chapter 2 Half-Wave Rectifiers 65
Power Computations 21
3.1 Introduction 65
2.1 Introduction 21 3.2 Resistive Load 65
2.2 Power and Energy 21 Creating a DC Component
Instantaneous Power 21 Using an Electronic Switch 65
Energy 22 3.3 Resistive-Inductive Load 67
Average Power 22 3.4 PSpice Simulation 72
2.3 Inductors and Capacitors 25 Using Simulation Software for
2.4 Energy Recovery 27 Numerical Computations 72

v
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page vi

vi Contents

3.5 RL-Source Load 75 Capacitance Output Filter 122

Supplying Power to a DC Source Voltage Doublers 125
from an AC Source 75 LC Filtered Output 126
3.6 Inductor-Source Load 79 4.3 Controlled Full-Wave Rectifiers 131
Using Inductance to Resistive Load 131
Limit Current 79 RL Load, Discontinuous Current 133
3.7 The Freewheeling Diode 81 RL Load, Continuous Current 135
Creating a DC Current 81 PSpice Simulation of Controlled Full-Wave
Reducing Load Current Harmonics 86 Rectifiers 139
3.8 Half-Wave Rectifier With a Capacitor Controlled Rectifier with
RL-Source Load 140
Filter 88
Controlled Single-Phase Converter
Creating a DC Voltage from an
Operating as an Inverter 142
AC Source 88
4.4 Three-Phase Rectifiers 144
3.9 The Controlled Half-Wave
Rectifier 94 4.5 Controlled Three-Phase
Rectifiers 149
Resistive Load 94
Twelve-Pulse Rectifiers 151
RL Load 96
The Three-Phase Converter Operating
RL-Source Load 98
as an Inverter 154
3.10 PSpice Solutions For
4.6 DC Power Transmission 156
Controlled Rectifiers 100
4.7 Commutation: The Effect of Source
Modeling the SCR in PSpice 100
Inductance 160
3.11 Commutation 103
Single-Phase Bridge Rectifier 160
The Effect of Source Inductance 103
Three-Phase Rectifier 162
3.12 Summary 105 4.8 Summary 163
3.13 Bibliography 106 4.9 Bibliography 164
Problems 106 Problems 164

Chapter 4 Chapter 5
Full-Wave Rectifiers 111 AC Voltage Controllers 171
4.1 Introduction 111 5.1 Introduction 171
4.2 Single-Phase Full-Wave Rectifiers 111 5.2 The Single-Phase AC Voltage
The Bridge Rectifier 111 Controller 171
The Center-Tapped Transformer Basic Operation 171
Rectifier 114
Single-Phase Controller with a
Resistive Load 115 Resistive Load 173
RL Load 115 Single-Phase Controller with
Source Harmonics 118 an RL Load 177
PSpice Simulation 119 PSpice Simulation of Single-Phase
RL-Source Load 120 AC Voltage Controllers 180
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page vii

Contents vii

5.3 Three-Phase Voltage 6.11 Discontinuous-Current Operation 241

Controllers 183 Buck Converter with Discontinuous
Y-Connected Resistive Load 183 Current 241
Y-Connected RL Load 187 Boost Converter with Discontinuous
Delta-Connected Resistive Load 189 Current 244
5.4 Induction Motor Speed Control 191 6.12 Switched-Capacitor Converters 247
5.5 Static VAR Control 191 The Step-Up Switched-Capacitor
Converter 247
5.6 Summary 192
The Inverting Switched-Capacitor
5.7 Bibliography 193 Converter 249
Problems 193 The Step-Down Switched-Capacitor
Converter 250
6.13 PSpice Simulation of DC-DC
Chapter 6 Converters 251
DC-DC Converters 196 A Switched PSpice Model 252
An Averaged Circuit Model 254
6.1 Linear Voltage Regulators 196 6.14 Summary 259
6.2 A Basic Switching Converter 197 6.15 Bibliography 259
6.3 The Buck (Step-Down) Problems 260
Converter 198
Voltage and Current Relationships 198
Output Voltage Ripple 204
Capacitor Resistance—The Effect
on Ripple Voltage 206 Chapter 7
Synchronous Rectification for the DC Power Supplies 265
Buck Converter 207
7.1 Introduction 265
6.4 Design Considerations 207
7.2 Transformer Models 265
6.5 The Boost Converter 211
7.3 The Flyback Converter 267
Voltage and Current Relationships 211
Continuous-Current Mode 267
Output Voltage Ripple 215
Discontinuous-Current Mode in the Flyback
Inductor Resistance 218 Converter 275
6.6 The Buck-Boost Converter 221 Summary of Flyback Converter
Voltage and Current Relationships 221 Operation 277
Output Voltage Ripple 225 7.4 The Forward Converter 277
6.7 The Ćuk Converter 226 Summary of Forward Converter
6.8 The Single-Ended Primary Inductance Operation 283
Converter (SEPIC) 231 7.5 The Double-Ended (Two-Switch)
6.9 Interleaved Converters 237 Forward Converter 285
6.10 Nonideal Switches and Converter 7.6 The Push-Pull Converter 287
Performance 239 Summary of Push-Pull Operation 290
Switch Voltage Drops 239 7.7 Full-Bridge and Half-Bridge DC-DC
Switching Losses 240 Converters 291
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page viii

viii Contents

7.8 Current-Fed Converters 294 8.7 Amplitude and Harmonic

7.9 Multiple Outputs 297 Control 342
7.10 Converter Selection 298 8.8 The Half-Bridge Inverter 346
7.11 Power Factor Correction 299 8.9 Multilevel Inverters 348
7.12 PSpice Simulation of DC Multilevel Converters with Independent
Power Supplies 301 DC Sources 349
Equalizing Average Source Power
7.13 Power Supply Control 302
with Pattern Swapping 353
Control Loop Stability 303
Diode-Clamped Multilevel
Small-Signal Analysis 304 Inverters 354
Switch Transfer Function 305 8.10 Pulse-Width-Modulated
Filter Transfer Function 306 Output 357
Pulse-Width Modulation Transfer Bipolar Switching 357
Function 307
Unipolar Switching 358
Type 2 Error Amplifier with
Compensation 308 8.11 PWM Definitions and
Design of a Type 2 Compensated
Considerations 359
Error Amplifier 311 8.12 PWM Harmonics 361
PSpice Simulation of Feedback Control 315 Bipolar Switching 361
Type 3 Error Amplifier with Unipolar Switching 365
Compensation 317 8.13 Class D Audio Amplifiers 366
Design of a Type 3 Compensated 8.14 Simulation of Pulse-Width-Modulated
Error Amplifier 318 Inverters 367
Manual Placement of Poles and Zeros
Bipolar PWM 367
in the Type 3 Amplifier 323
Unipolar PWM 370
7.14 PWM Control Circuits 323
8.15 Three-Phase Inverters 373
7.15 The AC Line Filter 323
The Six-Step Inverter 373
7.16 The Complete DC Power Supply 325
PWM Three-Phase
7.17 Bibliography 326 Inverters 376
Problems 327 Multilevel Three-Phase
Inverters 378
8.16 PSpice Simulation of
Chapter 8 Three-Phase Inverters 378
Six-Step Three-Phase
Inverters 331
Inverters 378
8.1 Introduction 331 PWM Three-Phase
8.2 The Full-Bridge Converter 331 Inverters 378
8.3 The Square-Wave Inverter 333 8.17 Induction Motor Speed
8.4 Fourier Series Analysis 337 Control 379
8.5 Total Harmonic Distortion 339 8.18 Summary 382
8.6 PSpice Simulation of Square Wave 8.19 Bibliography 383
Inverters 340 Problems 383
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page ix

Contents ix

Chapter 9 Chapter 10
Resonant Converters 387 Drive Circuits, Snubber Circuits,
and Heat Sinks 431
9.1 Introduction 387
9.2 A Resonant Switch Converter: 10.1 Introduction 431
Zero-Current Switching 387 10.2 MOSFET and IGBT Drive
Basic Operation 387 Circuits 431
Output Voltage 392 Low-Side Drivers 431
9.3 A Resonant Switch Converter: High-Side Drivers 433
Zero-Voltage Switching 394 10.3 Bipolar Transistor Drive
Basic Operation 394 Circuits 437
Output Voltage 399 10.4 Thyristor Drive Circuits 440
9.4 The Series Resonant Inverter 401 10.5 Transistor Snubber Circuits 441
Switching Losses 403 10.6 Energy Recovery Snubber
Amplitude Control 404 Circuits 450
9.5 The Series Resonant 10.7 Thyristor Snubber Circuits 450
DC-DC Converter 407 10.8 Heat Sinks and Thermal
Basic Operation 407 Management 451
Operation for ωs ⬎ ωo 407 Steady-State Temperatures 451
Operation for ω0 /2 ⬍ ωs⬍ ω0 413 Time-Varying Temperatures 454
Operation for ωs ⬍ ω0 /2 413 10.9 Summary 457
Variations on the Series Resonant DC-DC 10.10 Bibliography 457
Converter 414 Problems 458
9.6 The Parallel Resonant
DC-DC Converter 415 Appendix A Fourier Series for Some
9.7 The Series-Parallel DC-DC Common Waveforms 461
Converter 418
9.8 Resonant Converter Comparison 421 Appendix B State-Space Averaging 467
9.9 The Resonant DC Link Converter 422 Index 473
9.10 Summary 426
9.11 Bibliography 426
Problems 427
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page xi

PREFACE

T
his book is intended to be an introductory text in power electronics, primar-
ily for the undergraduate electrical engineering student. The text assumes
that the student is familiar with general circuit analysis techniques usually
taught at the sophomore level. The student should be acquainted with electronic
devices such as diodes and transistors, but the emphasis of this text is on circuit
topology and function rather than on devices. Understanding the voltage-current
relationships for linear devices is the primary background required, and the concept
of Fourier series is also important. Most topics presented in this text are appropriate
for junior- or senior-level undergraduate electrical engineering students.
The text is designed to be used for a one-semester power electronics
course, with appropriate topics selected or omitted by the instructor. The text
is written for some flexibility in the order of the topics. It is recommended that
Chap. 2 on power computations be covered at the beginning of the course in
as much detail as the instructor deems necessary for the level of students.
Chapters 6 and 7 on dc-dc converters and dc power supplies may be taken before
Chaps. 3, 4, and 5 on rectifiers and voltage controllers. The author covers chap-
ters in the order 1, 2 (introduction; power computations), 6, 7 (dc-dc converters;
dc power supplies), 8 (inverters), 3, 4, 5 (rectifiers and voltage controllers), fol-
lowed by coverage of selected topics in 9 (resonant converters) and 10 (drive and
snubber circuits and heat sinks). Some advanced material, such as the control
section in Chapter 7, may be omitted in an introductory course.
The student should use all the software tools available for the solution
to the equations that describe power electronics circuits. These range from
calculators with built-in functions such as integration and root finding to
more powerful computer software packages such as MATLAB®, Mathcad®,
Maple™, Mathematica®, and others. Numerical techniques are often sug-
gested in this text. It is up to the student to select and adapt all the readily
available computer tools to the power electronics situation.
Much of this text includes computer simulation using PSpice® as a supple-
ment to analytical circuit solution techniques. Some prior experience with
PSpice is helpful but not necessary. Alternatively, instructors may choose to use
a different simulation program such as PSIM® or NI Multisim™ software instead
of PSpice. Computer simulation is never intended to replace understanding of
fundamental principles. It is the author’s belief that using computer simulation
for the instructional benefit of investigating the basic behavior of power elec-
tronics circuits adds a dimension to the student’s learning that is not possible
from strictly manipulating equations. Observing voltage and current waveforms
from a computer simulation accomplishes some of the same objectives as those

xi
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page xii

xii Preface

of a laboratory experience. In a computer simulation, all the circuit’s voltages

and currents can be investigated, usually much more efficiently than in a hard-
ware lab. Variations in circuit performance for a change in components or oper-
ating parameters can be accomplished more easily with a computer simulation
than in a laboratory. PSpice circuits presented in this text do not necessarily rep-
resent the most elegant way to simulate circuits. Students are encouraged to use
their engineering skills to improve the simulation circuits wherever possible.
The website that accompanies this text can be found at www.mhhe
.com/hart, and features Capture circuit files for PSpice simulation for students
and instructors and a password-protected solutions manual and PowerPoint®
lecture notes for instructors.
My sincere gratitude to reviewers and students who have made many
valuable contributions to this project. Reviewers include
Ali Emadi
Illinois Institute of Technology
Shaahin Filizadeh
University of Manitoba
James Gover
Kettering University
Peter Idowu
Penn State, Harrisburg
Mehrdad Kazerani
University of Waterloo
Xiaomin Kou
University of Wisconsin-Platteville
Alexis Kwasinski
The University of Texas at Austin
Medhat M. Morcos
Kansas State University
Steve Pekarek
Purdue University
Wajiha Shireen
University of Houston
Hamid Toliyat
Texas A&M University
Zia Yamayee
University of Portland
Lin Zhao
Gannon University
A special thanks to my colleagues Kraig Olejniczak, Mark Budnik, and
Michael Doria at Valparaiso University for their contributions. I also thank
Nikke Ault for the preparation of much of the manuscript.
har80679_FM_i-xiv.qxd 12/17/09 12:38 PM Page xiii

Preface xiii

Complete Online Solutions Manual Organization System (COSMOS). Pro-

fessors can benefit from McGraw-Hill’s COSMOS electronic solutions manual.
COSMOS enables instructors to generate a limitless supply of problem mate-
rial for assignment, as well as transfer and integrate their own problems
into the software. For additional information, contact your McGraw-Hill sales
representative.
Electronic Textbook Option. This text is offered through CourseSmart for both
instructors and students. CourseSmart is an online resource where students can
purchase the complete text online at almost one-half the cost of a traditional text.
Purchasing the eTextbook allows students to take advantage of CourseSmart’s Web
tools for learning, which include full text search, notes and highlighting, and e-mail
tools for sharing notes among classmates. To learn more about CourseSmart options,
contact your McGraw-Hill sales representative or visit www.CourseSmart.com.
Daniel W. Hart
Valparaiso University
Valparaiso, Indiana
Discovering Diverse Content Through
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He started. The door leading into the outside world shut with a
clang. His chains fell into their place once more upon the limbs of his
body and soul.

He called a waiter, gulped down another peg, and got into a cab for
the Podley Institute.

The pleasant numbness had gone from him now. Once more he was
upon the rack. What he saw with his mental vision was as the wild
phantasmagoria of a dream . . . a dark room in which a magic
lantern is being worked, and fantastic, unexpected pictures flit
across the screen. Pictures as disconnected as a pack of cards.

Rita was waiting upon the steps of the Institute.

She wore a simple coat and skirt of dark brown tweed with a green
line in it. Her face was pale. Her eyes were without sparkle—she also
was exhausted by pleasure, come to the end of the Arabian Nights.

She got into the taxi-cab which was trembling with the power of the
unemployed engines below it.

Tzim, tzim, tzim!

"Where shall we go, Gilbert?" she said, in a languid, uninterested

voice.

He answered her in tones more cold and bloodless than her own. "I
don't know, Rita, and I don't care. Ce que vous voulez, Mademoiselle
des livres sans reproche!"

She turned her white face on him for a moment, almost savage with
impotent petulance. Then she thrust her head out of the window
and coiled round to the waiting driver.

"Go to Madame Tussaud's," she cried.

Tzim, tzim, bang-bang-bang, and then a long melancholy drone as
the rows of houses slid backwards.

Gilbert turned on her. "Why did you say that?" he asked bitterly.

"What difference does it make?" she replied. "You didn't seem to

care where we went for this last hour or two. I said the first thing
that came into my mind. I suppose we can get lunch at Madame
Tussaud's. I've never been there before. At any rate, I expect they
can manage a sponge cake for us. I don't want anything more."

—"Yes, it's better for us both. It's a relief to me to think that the end
has come. No, Rita dear, I don't want your hand. Let us make an
end now—a diminuendo. It must be. Let it be. You've said it often
yourself."

She bit her lips for a second. Then her eyes flashed. She put her
arms round his neck and drew him to her. "You shan't!" she said.
"You shan't glide away from me like this."

Every nerve in his body began to tremble. His skin pricked and grew
hot.

"What will you give?" he asked in a muffled voice.

"I? What I choose to give!" she replied. "Gillie, I'll do what I like with
you."

She shrank back in the corner of the cab with a little cry. Lothian's
face was red and blazing with anger.

"No names like that, Rita!" he said roughly. "You shan't call me that."

It was a despairing cry of drowning conscience, honour bleeding to

death, dissolving dignity and manhood.

However much he might long for her: however strongly he was

enchained, it was a blot, an indignity, an outrage, that this girl
should call him by the familiar home name. That was Mary's name
for him. Mrs. Gilbert Lothian alone had the right to say that.

Just then the taxi-metre stopped outside the big red erection in the
Marylebone Road, an unusual and fantastic silhouette against the
heavy sky.

They went in together, and there was a chill over them both. They
felt, on this grey day, as people who have lived for pleasure,
sensation, and have fed too long on honeycomb, must ever feel; the
bitterness of the fruit with the fair red and yellow rind. Ashes were in
their mouths, an acrid flavour within their souls.

It is always and for ever thus, if men could only realise it. Since the
Cross rose in the sky, the hectic joys of sin have been mingled with
bitterness, torture, cold.

The frightful "Colloque Sentimental" of Verlaine expresses these two

people, at this moment, well enough. Written by a temperamental
saint turned satyr and nearly always influenced by drink; translated
by a young English poet whose wings were always beating in vain
against the prison wall he himself had built; you have these sad
companions. . . .

Into the lonely park all frozen fast,

Awhile ago there were two forms who passed.

Lo, are their lips fallen and their eyes dead,

Hardly shall a man hear the words they said.

Into the lonely park all frozen fast

There came two shadows who recall the past.

"Dost thou remember our old ecstasy?"

"Wherefore should I possess that memory?"
 "Doth thy heart beat at my sole name alway?
Still dost thou see my soul in visions?" "Nay!"—

And on such a day as this, with such a weight as this upon their
tired hearts, they entered the halls of Waxwork and stood forlorn
among that dumb cloistered company.

They passed through "Room No. 1. Commencing Right-hand side"

and their steps echoed upon the floor. On this day and at this hour
hardly any visitors were there; only a few groups moved from figure
to figure and talked in hissing whispers as if they were in some
church.

All around them they saw lifeless and yet half convincing dolls in rich
tarnished habiliments. They walked, as it were, in a mausoleum of
dead kings, and the livid light which fell upon them from the glass
roof above made the sordid unreality more real.

"There's Charles the First," Rita said drearily.

Gilbert glanced at the catalogue. "He was fervently pious, a faithful

husband, a fond parent, a kind master, and an enthusiastic lover and
patron of the fine arts."

"How familiar that sort of stuff sounds," she answered. "It's written
for the schools which come here to see history in the flesh—or wax
rather. Every English school girl of the upper middle classes has been
brought here once in her life. Oh, here's Milton! What does it say
about him?"

—"Sold his immortal poem 'Paradise Lost' for the sum of five
pounds," Lothian answered grimly.

"Much better to be a modern poet, Gilbert dear! But I'm

disappointed. These figures don't thrill one at all. I always thought
one was thrilled and astonished here."
"So you will be, Cupid, soon. Don't you see that all these people are
only names to us. Here they are names dressed up in clothes and
with pink faces and glass eyes. They're too remote. Neither of us is
going to connect that thing"—he flung a contemptuous movement of
his thumb at Milton—"with 'Lycidas.' We shall be interested soon, I'm
sure. But won't you have something to eat?"

"No. I don't want food. After all, this is strange and fantastic. We've
lots more to see yet, and these kings and queens are only for the
schools. Let's explore and explore. And let's talk about it all as we
go, Gilbert! Talk to me as you do in your letters. Talk to me as you
did at the beginning, illuminating everything with your mind. That's
what I want to hear once again!"

She thrust her arm in his, and desire fled away from him. The Dead
Sea Fruit, the "Colloque Sentimental" existed no more, but, humour,
the power of keen, incisive phrase awoke in him.

Yes, this was better!—their two minds with play and interplay. It
would have been a thousand times better if it had never been
anything else save this.

They wandered into the Grand Saloon, made their bow to Sir
Thomas Lipton—"Wog and I find his tea really the best and
cheapest," Rita said—decided that the Archbishop of Canterbury had
a suave, but uninteresting face, admired the late Mr. Dan Leno, who
was posed next to Sir Walter Scott, and gazed without much interest
at the royal figures in the same room.

King George the Fifth and his spouse; the Duke of Connaught and
Strathearn—Prince Arthur William Patrick Albert, K.G., K.T., K.P.,
G.C.M.C.; Princess Royal of England—Her Royal Highness Princess
Louise Victoria Alexandra Dagmar; and, next to these august people,
little Mr. Dan Leno!
"Poor little man," Rita said, looking at the sad face of the comedian.
"Why should they put him here with the King and the Queen? Do
they just plant their figures anywhere in this show?"

Gilbert shook his head. In this abnormal place—one of the strangest

and most psychologically interesting places in the world—his freakish
humour was to the fore.

"What a little stupid you are, Rita!" he said. "The man who arranges
these groups is one of the greatest philosophers and students of
humanity who ever lived. In this particular case the ghost of Heine
must have animated him. The court jester! The clown of the
monarch—I believe he did once perform at Sandringham—set cheek
by jowl with the great people he amused. It completes the picture,
does it not?"

"No, Gilbert, since you pretend to see a design in the arrangement, I

don't think it does complete the picture. Why should a mere little
comic man be set to intrude—?"

He caught her up with whimsical grace. "Oh, but you don't see it at
all!" he cried, and his vibrating voice, to which the timbre and life
had returned, rang through "Room No. 2."

—"This place is designed for the great mass of the population. They
all visit it. It is a National Institution. People like you and me only
come to it out of curiosity or by chance. It's out of our beat.
Therefore, observe the genius of the plan! The Populace has room in
its great stupid heart for only a few heroes. The King is always one,
and the popular comedian of the music halls is always another.
These, with Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Toftrees, satisfy all the hunger for
symbols to be adored. Thus Dan Leno in this splendid company.
Room No. 2 is really a subtle and ironic comment upon the
psychology of the crowd!"

Rita laughed happily. "But where are the Toftrees?" she said.
"In the Chamber of Horrors, probably, for murdering the public taste.
We are sure to find them here, seated before two Remingtons and
with the actual books with which the crime was committed on
show."

"Oh, I've heard about the 'Chamber of Horrors.' Can we go, Gilbert?
Do let's go. I want to be thrilled. It's such a funereal day."

"Yes it is, grey as an old nun. I'm sorry I was unkind in the cab,
dear. Forgive me."

"I'll forgive you anything. I'm so unhappy, Gilbert. It's dreadful to

think of you being gone. All my days and my nights will be grey now.
However shall I do without you?"

There was genuine desolation in her voice. He believed that she

really regretted his departure and not the loss of the pleasures he
had been giving her. His blood grew hot once more—for a single
moment—and he was about to embrace her, for they were alone in
the room.

And then listlessness fell upon him before he had time to put his
wish into action. His poisoned mind was vibrating too quickly. An
impulse was born, only to be strangled in the brain before the
nerves could telegraph it to the muscles. His whole machinery was
loose and out of control, the engines running erratically and not in
tune. They could not do their work upon the fuel with which he fed
them.

He shuddered. His heart was a coffer of ashes and within it, most
evil paramours, dwelt the quenchless flame and the worm that dieth
not.

. . . They went through other ghostly halls, thronged by a silent

company which never moved nor spake. They came to the entrance
of that astounding mausoleum of wickedness, The Chamber of
Horrors.

There they saw, as in a faint light under the sea, the legion of the
lost, the horrible men and women who had gone to swell the red
quadrilles of hell.

In long rows, sitting or standing, with blood-stained knives and

hangmen's ropes in front of them, in their shameful resurrection
they inhabited this place of gloom and death.

Here, was a man in shirt-sleeves, busy at work in a homely kitchen

lit by a single candle. Alone at midnight and with sweat upon his
face he was breaking up the floor; making a deep hole in which to
put something covered with a spotted shroud which lay in a
bedroom above.

There, was the "most extraordinary relic in the world," the knife of
the guillotine that decapitated Marie Antoinette, Robespierre, and
twenty thousand human beings besides.

The strange precision of portraiture, the somewhat ghastly art which

had moulded these evil faces was startlingly evident in its effect
upon the soul.

When a great novelist or poet creates an evil personality it shocks

and terrifies us, but it is never wholly evil. We know of the monster's
antecedents and environment. However stern we may be in our
attitude towards the crime, sweet charity and deep understanding of
the motives of human action often give us glimmerings which enable
us to pity a lamentable human being who is a brother of ours
whatever he may have done.

But here? No. All was sordid and horrible.

Gilbert and Rita saw rows upon rows of faces which differed in every
way one from the other and were yet dreadfully alike.
For these great sinister dolls, so unreal and so real, had all a
likeness. The smirk of cruelty and cunning seemed to lie upon the
waxen masks. Colder than life, far colder than death, they gave forth
emanations which struck the very heart with woe and desolation.

To many visitors the Chamber of Horrors is all its name signifies. But
it is a place of pleasure nevertheless. The skin creeps but the
sensation is pleasant. It provides a thrill like a switchback railway.
But it is not a place that artists and imaginative people can enter
and easily forget. It epitomises the wages of sin. It ought to be a
great educational force. Young criminals should be taken there
between stern guardians, to learn by concrete evidence which would
appeal to them as no books or sermons could ever do, the Nemesis
that waits upon unrepentant ways.

The man and the girl who had just entered were both in a state of
nervous tension. They were physically exhausted, one by fierce
indulgence in poison, the other by three weeks of light and feverish
pleasure.

And more than this.

Each, in several degree, knew that they were doing wrong, that they
had progressed far down the primrose path led by the false flute-
players.

"I couldn't have conceived it was so, so unnerving, Gilbert," Rita

said, shrinking close to him.

"It is pretty beastly," Lothian answered. "It's simply a dictionary of

crime though, that's all—rather too well illustrated."

"I don't want to know of these horrors. One sees them in the
papers, but it means little or nothing. How dreadful life is though,
under the surface!"
Gilbert felt a sudden pang of pity for her, so young and fair, so
frightened now.—Ah! he knew well how dreadful life was—under the
surface!

For a moment, in that tomb-like place a vision came to him, sunlit

and splendid, calm and beautiful.

He saw his life as it might be—as doubtless God meant it to be, a

favoured, fortunate and happy life, for God does not, in His
inscrutable wisdom chastise all men. Well-to-do, brilliant of mind,
with trained capacity to exact every drop of noble joy from life;
blessed with a sweet and beautiful woman to watch over him and
complement him; did ever a man have a fairer prospect, a luckier
chance?

His Hell was so real. Heaven was so near. He had but to say, "I will
not," and the sun would rise again upon his life. To the end he would
walk dignified, famous, happy, loving and deeply-loved—if only he
could say those words.

A turn of the hand would banish the Fiend Alcohol for ever and ever!

But even as the exaltation of the thought animated him, the

dominant false Ego, crushed momentarily by heavenly inspiration,
growled and fought for life.

Immediately the longing for alcohol burned within him. They had
been nearly an hour among the figures. Lothian longed for drink, to
satisfy no mere physical craving, but to keep the Fiend within
quiescent.

He had come to that alternating state—the author of "Dr. Jekyll and

Mr. Hyde" has etched it upon the plate for all time—when he must
drug the devil in order to have a little license in which to speak the
words and think the thoughts of a clean man leading a Christian life.
So the vision of what might be faded and went. The present
asserted itself, and asserted itself merely as a brutish desire for
poison.

All these mental changes and re-adjustments took place in a mere

second of time.

Rita had hardly made an end of speaking before he was ready with
an answer.

"Poor little Rita," he said. "It was your choice you know. It is
horrible. But I expect that the weather, and the inexorable fact that
we have to part this afternoon for a time, has something to do with
it. Oh, and then we haven't lunched. There's a great influence in
lunch. I want a drink badly, too. Let's go."

Rita was always whimsical. She loved to assert herself. She wanted
to go at least as ardently as her companion, but she did not
immediately agree.

"Soon," she said. "Look here, Gilbert, we'll meet at the door. I'm
going to flit down this aisle of murderers on the other side. You go
down this side. And if you meet the Libricides—Toftrees et femme I
mean, call out!"

She vanished with noiseless tread among the stiff ranks of figures.

Gilbert walked slowly down his own path, looking into each face in
turn.

. . . This fat matronly woman, a sort of respectable Mrs. Gamp who

probably went regularly to Church, was a celebrated baby farmer.
She "made angels" by pressing a gimlet into the soft skulls of her
charges—there was the actual gimlet—and save for a certain
slyness, she had the face of a quite motherly old thing. Yet she, too,
had dropped through the hole in the floor—like all her companions
here. . . .
He turned away from all the faces with an impatient shudder.

He ought never to have come here. He was a donkey ever to have

let Rita come here. Where was she?—he was to meet her at the end
of this horrid avenue. . . .

But the place was large. Rita had disappeared among the waxen
ghosts. The door must be this way. . . .

He pressed onwards, walking silently—as one does in a place of the

dead—but disregarding with averted eyes, the leers, the smiles, the
complacent appeal, of the murderers who had paid their debt to the
justice of the courts.

He was beginning to be most unpleasantly affected.

Walking onwards, he suddenly heard Rita's voice. It was higher in

key than usual—whom was she speaking to? His steps quickened.

. . . "Gilbert, how silly to try and frighten me! It's not cricket in this
horrid place, get down at once—oh!"

The girl shrieked. Her voice rang through the vault-like place.

Gilbert ran, turned a corner, and saw Rita.

She was swaying from side to side. Her face was quite white, even
the lips were bloodless. She was staring with terrified eyes to where
upon the low dais and behind the confining rail a figure was standing
—a wax-work figure.

Gilbert caught the girl by the hands. They were as cold as ice.

"Dear!" he said in wild agitation. "What is it? I'm here, don't be

frightened. What is it, Rita?"

She gave a great sob of relief and clung to his hands. A trace of
colour began to flow into her cheeks.
"Thank goodness," she said, gasping. "Oh, Gilbert, I'm a fool. I've
been so frightened."

"But, dear, what by?"

"By that——"

She pointed at the big, still puppet immediately opposite her.

Gilbert turned quickly. For a moment he did not understand the

cause of her alarm.

"I talked to it," she said with an hysterical laugh. "I thought it was
you! I thought you'd got inside the railing and were standing there
to frighten me."

Gilbert looked closely at the effigy. He was about to say something

and then the words died away upon his lips.

It was as though he saw himself in a distorting glass—one of those

nasty and reprehensible toys that fools give to children sometimes.

There was an undeniable look of him in the staring face of coloured

wax. The clear-cut lips were there. The shape of the head was
particularly reminiscent, the growing corpulence of body was
indicated, the hair of the stiff wig waved as Lothian's living hair
waved.

"Good God!" he said. "It is like me! Poor little girl—but you know I
wouldn't frighten you for anything. But it is like! What an
extraordinary thing. We looked for the infamous Toftrees! the
egregious Herbert who has split so many infinitives in his time, and
we find—Me!"

Rita was recovering. She laughed, but she held tightly to Gilbert's
arm at the same time.
"Let's see who the person is—or was—" Gilbert went on, drawing the
catalogue from his pocket.

"Key of the principal gate of the Bastille—no, that's not it. Number
365, oh, here we are! Hancock, the Hackney Murderer. A chemist in
comfortable circumstances, he——"

Rita snatched the book from his hand. "I don't want to hear any
more," she said. "Let's go away, quick!"

In half an hour they were lunching at a little Italian restaurant which

they found in the vicinity. The day was still dark and lowering, but a
risotto Milanese and something which looked like prawns in polenta,
but wasn't, restored them to themselves.

There was a wine list in this quite snug little place, but the proprietor
advanced and explained that he had no license and that money must
be paid in advance before the camerière could fetch what was
required from an adjacent public house.

It was a bottle of whiskey that Gilbert ordered, politely placed upon

the table by a pathetic little Genoese whose face was sallow as
spaghetti and who was quite unconscious that for the moment the
Fiend Alcohol had borrowed his poor personality.

. . . "You must have a whiskey and soda, Rita. I dare not let you
attempt any of the wines from the public house at the corner."

"I've never tried it in my life. But I will now, out of curiosity. I'll taste
what you are so far too fond of."

Rita did so. "Horrible stuff," she said. "It's just like medicine."

Gilbert had induced the pleasant numbness again. "You've said

exactly what it is," he replied in a dreamy voice.—"'Medicine for a
mind diseased.'"
They hardly conversed at all after that.

The little restaurant with its red plush seats against the wall, its
mirrors and hanging electric lights, was cosy. They lingered long
over their coffee and cigarettes. No one else was there and the
proprietor sidled up to them and began to talk. He spoke in English
at first, and then Gilbert answered him in French.

Gilbert spoke French as it is spoken in Tours, quite perfectly. The

Italian spoke it with the soft, ungrammatical fluency of his race.

The interlude pleased the tired, jaded minds of the sad companions,
and it was with some fictitious reconstruction of past gaiety and
animation that they drove to St. Pancras.

The train was in.

Gilbert's dressing-case was already placed in a first-class

compartment, his portmanteau snug in the van.

When he walked up the long platform with Rita, a porter, the Guard
of the train and the steward of the dining-car, were grouped round
the open door.

He was well known. All the servants of the line looked out for him
and gave him almost ministerial honours. They knew he was a
"somebody," but were all rather vague as to the nature of his
distinction.

He was "Mr. Gilbert Lothian" at least, and his bountiful largesse was
generally spoken of.

The train was not due to start for six minutes. The acute guard,
raising his cap, locked the door of the carriage.

Gilbert and Rita were alone in it for a farewell.

He took her in his arms and looked long and earnestly into the
young lovely face.

He saw the tears gathering in her eyes.

"Have you been happy, sweetheart, with me?"

"Perfectly happy." There was a sob in the reply.

"You really do care for me?"

"Yes."

His breath came more quickly, he held her closer to him—only a little
rose-faced girl now.

"Do you care for me more than for any other man you have ever
met?"

She did not answer.

"Tell me, tell me! Do you?"

"Yes."

"Rita, my darling, say, if things had been different, if I were free to

ask you to be my wife now, would you marry me?"

"Yes."

"Would you be my dear, dear love, as I yours, for ever and ever and
ever?"

She clung to him in floods of tears. He had his answer. Each tear
was an answer.

The guard of the train, looking the other way, opened the door with
his key and coughed.
"Less than a minute more, sir," said the guard.

. . . "Once more, say it once more! You would be my wife if I were

free?"

"I'd be your wife, Gilbert, and I'd love you—oh, what shall I do
without you? How dull and dreadful everything is going to be now!"

"But I shall be back soon. And I shall write to you every day!"

"You will, won't you, dear? Write, write—" The train was almost
moving.

It began to move. Gilbert leaned out of the window and waved his
hand for a long time, to a forlorn little girl in a brown coat and skirt
who stood upon the platform crying bitterly.

The waiter of the dining-car, knowing his man well, brought Lothian
a large whiskey and soda before the long train was free of the sordid
Northwest suburbs.

Lothian drank it, arranged about dinner, and sank back against the
cushions. He lit a cigarette and drew the hot smoke deep into his
lungs.

The train was out of the town area now. There was no more jolting
and rattling over points. Its progress into the gathering night was a
continuous roar.

Onwards through the gathering night. . . .

"I'd be your wife, Gilbert, and I'd love you—if you were free."
 CHAPTER V

THE NIGHT JOURNEY FROM NICE WHEN MRS. DALY SPEAKS

WORDS OF FIRE

"Into a dark tremendous sea of cloud,

It is but for a time; I press God's lamp
Close to my breast: its splendour, soon or late
Shall pierce the gloom. I shall emerge one day."

—Browning.

A carriage was waiting outside a white and gilded hotel on the

Promenade des Anglais at Nice.

The sun was just dipping behind the Esterelle mountains and the
Mediterranean was the colour of wine. Already the Palais du Jetée
was being illuminated and outlined itself in palest gold against the
painted sky above the Cimiez heights, where the olive-coloured
headland hides Villefranche and the sea-girt pleasure city of Monte
Carlo.

The tall palms in the gardens which front the gleaming palaces of
the Promenade were bronze gold in the fading light, and their fans
clicked and rustled in a cool breeze which was eddying down upon
the Queen of the Mediterranean from the Maritime Alps.

Mary Lothian came out of the hotel. Her face was pale and very sad.
She had been crying. With her was a tall, stately woman of middle-
age; grey-haired, with a massive calmness and peace of feature
recalling the Athena of the Louvre or one of those noble figures of
the Erectheum crowning the hill of the Acropolis at Athens.
She was Mrs. Julia Daly, who had been upon the Riviera for two
months. Dr. Morton Sims had written to her. She had called upon
Mary and the two had become fast friends.

Such time as Mary could spare from the sickbed of her sister, she
spent in the company of this great-souled woman from America, and
now Mrs. Daly, whose stay at Nice was over, was returning to
London with her friend.

The open carriage drove off, by the gardens and jewellers' shops in
front of the Casino and Opera House and down the Avenue de la
Gare. The glittering cafés were full of people taking an apéritif
before dinner. There was a sense of relaxation and repose over the
pleasure city of the South, poured down upon it in a golden haze
from the last level rays of the sun.

Outside one of the cafés, as the carriage turned to the station, some
Italians were singing "O Soli Mio" to the accompaniment of guitars
and a harp, with mellow, passionate voices.

The long green train rolled into the glass-roofed station, the brass-
work of the carriage doors covered thick with oily dust from the
Italian tunnels through which it had passed. The conductor of the
sleeping-car portion found the two women their reserved
compartment. Their luggage was already registered through to
Charing Cross and they had only dressing bags with them.

As the train started again Mrs. Daly pulled the sliding door into its
place, the curtains over it and the windows which looked out into the
corridor. Then she switched on the electric light in the roof and also
the lamp which stood on a little table at the other end.

"There, my dear," she said, "now we shall be quite comfortable."

She sat down by Mary, took her hand in hers and kissed her.
"I know what you are experiencing now," she said in her low rich
voice, "and it is very bitter. But the separation is only for a short,
short time. God wants her, and we shall all be in heaven together
soon, Mrs. Lothian. And you're leaving her with her husband. It is a
great mercy that he has come at last. They are best alone together.
And see how brave and cheery he is!—There's a real man, a
Christian soldier and gentleman if ever one lived. His wife's death
won't kill him. It will make him live more strenuously for others. He
will pass the short time between now and meeting her again in a
high fever of righteous works and duty. There is no death."

Mary held the firm white hand.

"You comfort me," she said. "I thank God that you came to me in my
affliction. Otherwise I should have been quite alone till Harold
came."

"I'm real glad that dear good Morton Sims asked me to call. Edith
Sims and I are like" . . . She broke off abruptly. "Like sisters," she
was about to say, but would not.

Mary smiled. Her friend's delicacy was easy to understand. "I know,"
she answered, "like sisters! You needn't have hesitated. I am better
now. All you tell me is just what I am sure of and it is everything.
But one's heart grows faint at the moment of parting and the
reassuring voice of a friend helps very much. I hope it doesn't mean
that one's faith is weak, to long for a sympathetic and confirming
voice?"

"No, it does not. God has made us like that. I know the value of a
friend's word well. Nothing heartens one so. I have been in deep
waters in my time, Mary. You must let me call you Mary, my dear."

"Oh, do, do! Yes, it is wonderful how words help, human living
words."
"Nothing is more extraordinary in life than the power of the spoken
word. How careful and watchful every one ought to be over words.
Spoken, they always seem to me to have more lasting influence than
words in a book. They pass through mind after mind. Just think, for
instance, how when we meet a man or woman with a sincere
intellectual belief which is quite opposed to our own, we are chilled
into a momentary doubt of our own opinions—however strongly we
may hold them. And when it is the other way about, what strength
and comfort we get!"

"Thank you," Mary said simply, "you are very helpful. Dr. Morton
Sims"—she hesitated for a moment—"Dr. Morton Sims told me
something of your life. And of course I know all about your work, as
the whole world knows. I know, dear Mrs. Daly, how much you have
suffered. And it is because of that that you help me so, who am
suffering too."

There was silence for a space. The train had stopped at Cannes and
started again. Now it was winding and climbing the mountain valleys
towards Toulon. But neither of the two women knew anything of it.
They were alone in the quiet travelling room that money made
possible for them. Heart was meeting heart in the small luxurious
place in which they sat, remote from the outside world as if upon
some desert island.

"Dear Morton Sims," the American lady said at length. "The utter
sane goodness of that man! My dear, he is an angel of light, as near
a perfect character as any one alive in the world to-day. And yet he
doesn't believe in Jesus and thinks the Church and the Sacraments—
I've been a member of the Episcopalian Church from girlhood—only
make-believe and error."

"He is the finest natured man I have ever met," Mary answered.
"I've only known him for a short time, but he has been so good and
friendly. What a sad thing it is that he is an infidel. I don't use the
word in the popular reprehensible sense, but as just what it means—
without faith."

"It's a sad thing to us," Mrs. Daly said briskly, "but I have no fears
for him. God hasn't given him the gift of Faith. Now that's all we can
say about it. In the next world he will have to go through a
probation and learn his catechism, so to speak, before he steps right
into his proper place. But he won't be a catechumen long. His pure
heart and noble life will tell where hearts and wills are weighed.
There is a place by the Throne waiting for him."

"Oh, I am sure. He is wonderfully good. Indeed one seems to feel

his goodness more than one does that of our clergyman at home,
though Mr. Medley is a good man too!"

"Brains, my dear! Brains! Morton Sims, you see, is of the aristocracy.

Your clergyman probably is not."

"Aristocracy?"

"The only aristocracy, the aristocracy of brain-power. Don't forget I'm

an American woman, Mary! Goodness has the same value in Heaven
however it is manifested upon earth. The question of bimetallism
doesn't trouble God and His Angels. But a brilliant-minded Saint has
certainly more influence down here than a fool-saint."

Mary nodded.

Such a doctrine as this was quite in accord with what she wished to
think. She rejoiced to hear it spoken with such sharp lucidity. She
also worshipped at a shrine, that of no saint, certainly, but where a
flaming intellect illuminated the happenings of life. In his way, quite
a different way, of course, she knew that Gilbert had a finer mind
than even Morton Sims. And yet, Gilbert wasn't good, as he ought to
be. . . . How these speculations and judgments coiled and recoiled
upon themselves; puzzled weary minds and, when all was done,
were very little good after all!

At any rate, she loved Gilbert more than anything or anybody in the
world. So that was that!

But tears came into her eyes as she thought of her husband with
deep and yearning love. If he would only give up alcohol! Why
wouldn't he? To her, such an act seemed so simple and easy. Only a
refusal, that was all! The young man who came to Jesus in the old
days was asked to give up so much. Even for Jesus and immortality
he found himself unable to do it. But Gilbert had only to give up one
thing in order to be good and happy, to make her happy.

It was true that Dr. Morton Sims had told her many scientific facts,
had explained and explained. He had definitely said that Gilbert was
in the clutches of a disease; that Gilbert couldn't really help himself,
that he must be cured as a man is cured of gout. And then, when
she had asked the doctor how this was to be done, he had so little
comfort to give. He had explained that all the advertised "cures"—
even the ones backed up by people of name, bishops, magistrates,
and so on, were really worthless. They administered other drugs in
order to sober up the patient from alcohol. That was easy and
possible—though only with the thorough co-operation of the patient.
After a few weeks, when health appeared to be restored, and the
will power was certainly strengthened, the "cure" did nothing more.
The pre-disposition was not eradicated. That was an affair to be
accomplished only by two or three years of abstinence and not
always then.

—"I'll talk to Mrs. Daly about it," the sad wife said to herself. "She is
a noble, Christian woman. She understands more than even the
doctor. She must do so. She loves our Lord. Moreover she has given
her life to the cause of temperance." . . .
But she must be careful and diplomatic. The natural reticence and
delicacy of a well-bred woman shrank from the unveiling, not only of
her own sorrow, but of a beloved's shame. The coarse, ill-balanced
and bourgeois temperament bawls its sorrow and calls for sympathy
from the sweepings of any Pentonville omnibus. It writes things
upon a street wall and enjoys voluptuous public hysterics. The
refined and gracious mind hesitates long before the least avowal.

"You said," she began, after a period of sympathetic silence, "that

you had been in deep waters."

Julia Daly nodded. "I guess it's pretty well known," she said with a
sigh. "That's the worst of a campaign like mine. It's partly because
every one knows all about what you've gone through that they give
you a hearing. In the States the papers are full of my unhappy story
whenever I lecture in a new place. But I'm used to it now and it
doesn't hurt me. Most of the stories are untrue, though. Mr. Daly
was a pretty considerable ruffian when he was in drink. But he
wasn't the monster he's been made out to be, and he couldn't help
himself, poor, poisoned man. But which story have you read, Mary?"

"None at all. Only Dr. Morton Sims, when he wrote, told me that you
had suffered, that your husband, that——"

"That Patrick was an alcoholic. Yes, that's the main fact. He did a
dreadful thing when he became insane through drink. There's no
need to speak of it. But I loved him dearly all the same. He might
have been such a noble man!"

"Ah, that's just what I feel about my dear boy. He's not as bad as—
as some people. But he does drink quite dreadfully. I hate telling
you. It seems a sort of treachery to him. But you may be able to
help me."

"I knew," Mrs. Daly said with a sigh. "The doctor has told me in
confidence. I'd do anything to help you, dear girl. Your husband's
poems have been such a help and comfort to me in hours of sadness
and depression. Oh, what a dreadful scourge it is! this frightful thing
that seizes on noble and ignoble minds alike! It is the black horror of
the age, the curse of nations, the ruin of thousands upon thousands.
If only the world would realise it!"

"No one seems to realise the horror except those who have suffered
dreadfully from it."

"More people do than you think, Mary, but, still, they are an
insignificant part of the whole. People are such fools! I was reading
'Pickwick' the other day, a great English classic and a work of genius,
too, in its way, I suppose. The principal characters get drunk on
every other page. Things are better now, as far as books are
concerned, though the comic newspapers keep up their ghastly fun
about drunken folk. But the cause of Temperance isn't a popular
one, here or in my own country."

"A teetotaller is so often called a fanatic in England," Mary said.

"I know it well. But I say this, with entire conviction, absolute bed-
rock certainty, my dear, the people who have joined together to go
without alcohol themselves and to do all they can to fight it, are in
the right whatever people may say of them. And it doesn't matter
what people say either. As in all movements, there is a lot of error
and mistaken energy. The Bands of Hope, the Blue Ribbon Army, the
Rechabites are not always wise. Some of them make total
abstinence into a religion and think that alcohol is the only Fiend to
fight against. Most of them—as our own new scientific party think—
are fighting on wrong lines. That's to say they are not doing a tenth
as much good as they might do, because the scientific remedy has
not become real to them. That will come though, if we can bring it
about. But I tire you?"

"Please go on."
"Well, you know our theory. It is a certain remedy. You can't stop
alcohol. But by making it a penal offence for drunkards to have
children, drunkenness must be almost eliminated in time."

"Yes," Mary said. "Of course, I have read all about it. But I know so
little of science. But what is the individual cure? Is there none, then?
Oh, surely if it is a disease it can be cured? Dr. Morton Sims tried to
be encouraging, but I could see that he didn't think there really was
much chance for a man who is a slave to drink. It is splendid, of
course, to think that some day it may all be eliminated by science.
But meanwhile, when women's hearts are bleeding for men they
love . . ."

Her voice broke and faltered. Her heart was too full for further
speech.

The good woman at her side kissed her tenderly. "Do not grieve,"
she said. "Listen. I told you just now that so many of the great
Temperance organisations err in their rejection of scientific advice
and scientific means to a great end. They place their trust in God,
forgetting that science only exists by God's will and that every
discovery made by men is only God choosing to reveal Himself to
those who search for Him. But the Scientists are wrong, too, in their
rejection—in so many cases—of God. They do not see that Religion
and Science are not only non-antagonistic, but really complement
each other. It is beginning to be seen, though. In time it will be
generally recognised. I read the admission of a famous scientist the
other day, to this effect. He said, 'It is generally recognised that any
form of treatment in which the "occult," the "supernatural," or
anything secret or mysterious is allowed to play a dominant part in
so neurotic an affection as inebriety, often succeeds.' And he closed
a most helpful and able essay on the arrest of alcohol with
something like these words:
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