,

It was a February afternoon, and the welcome rain was coming down in sheets, as is its way when it does come down in California.

In a room at the Grand Hotel at Santa M- sat two mer, old friends who had accidentally met here, looking out upon the driving rain and the great white breakers of the rising tide, which fell with a roar upon the pebbly beach not far away.

Frank Ellender was a leading Philadelphia surgeon, and Walter Austin senior member of a prosperous Saint Louis law firm, and this was the first time that they had met since the divergence of their paths in life had gradually broken up the intimacy that had existed between them in their happy boyhood and college days.

The stillness of the cosy room, the patter of the rain, the roaring and booming of the restless ocean, all combined to make them communicative, and they sat chatting of old and new experiences. With the deepening shadows of the evening their conversation drifted insensibly into the shadowy realms of the unknown, and now it appeared that both the man of law and he of medicine had indulged in speculations regarding this region which, perhaps, they would scarcely have voiced at any other place and time.

"I must tell you a story," the doctor said, "the strangest thing my whole experience has given me. I will give you the facts, and you may draw your own conclusions.

"When I entered the army in the fall of '61, I took with me a young man of eighteen years Harry Clary the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. Mrs. Clary would gladly have kept her boy at home, but he was im

petuous, self-willed, and determined to go,- which meant that he would go. I, too, was much opposed to his going, but since I knew that I could not prevent it I took him with me, where I could in some measure watch over him.

"The rigid discipline of the army was very irksome to him, and he longed to go to the front. Poor boy, he was not destined to reach it, for before many weeks had passed he was stricken down with typhoid fever, and in spite of all our efforts he gradually sank, and died. about the third week of his illness."

Doctor Ellender paused, and looked meditatively out of the window.

"Harry Clary was dead," he said slowly, "according to all signs. Not only could neither I nor other physicians discover any signs of life, but we found apparently positive signs of death. Rigor mortis set in somewhat tardily, as would be expected from his enfeebled condition; the capillary circulation had entirely ceased. He was dead. Yet in twenty-four hours he returned to life!" "O well," said the lawyer in a disappointed tone, "cases of apparent death are not unknown, and doctors have before this been mistaken in their diagnosis, even such an old and experienced man as you must have been thirty years ago might fall into an error in such a case."

The doctor vouchsafed no reply, but continued his story.

"His mother was the first to recognize the signs of returning life, in a slight movement of the eyelid. I doubted the correctness of her observation, but to satisfy her we applied restoratives, and after six hours of hard work, of alternate hope and despair, he was breathing Then he opened his eyes, but conscious ness had evidently not returned, for he

looked at us with a strange expression of fear and unrest, and tried to get up. His surroundings seemed unknown to him, and even his own mother he failed to recognize. All this, when he had been perfectly conscious at the time of his death, and for days before. "From this time he made an uninterrupted physical recovery, but his past was an utter blank to him, and always has remained so.

"Nor was that

When he awoke, he knew not a word of English, yet he spoke, and what sounded like a language. He evidently attached an intelligent meaning to his words, though they were harsh and uncouth to us, and resembled no civilized tongue.

"Not only was his language changed, but even his character and his mental habits had undergone a complete transformation. From an impatient, quick, vehement boy he became slow and deliberate in speech and action, and unusually patient. Imperious and selfwilled before, he now submitted quietly to whatever we chose to do for him, and obeyed our instructions as far as he was able to comprehend them. I tell you, Austin," the physician exclaimed with sudden energy, bringing his feet down from their elevated position, placing his hands upon his knees, and facing his companion, "I never saw such a change in any human being before, nor would I have considered it possible had I not met with it myself. Though Clary recovered, he has been so altered in disposition, habits, and mental tendencies, that I have never been able to feel towards him as if he were the same individual that he was before that attack of fever.

"Neither was there any mental deterioration," Doctor Ellender continued, resuming his former comfortable position, "as is found in those rare cases of double and alternating personality that are on record. These are merely a form of insanity, and the secondary personVOL. XX-48.

âlity is always mentally and morally inferior to the individual in his own true character. Clary, on the other hand, though very different from his original self, was both morally and mentally vastly improved, and is one of the sanest men I know. His mind is thoroughly well balanced. Moreover, in him the change has been permanent.

"Owing to the complete loss of all his previously acquired knowlege, of course we could only very imperfectly communicate with him after his return to life. He knew nothing whatever of the uses of the thousand and one articles that entered into our daily life. He had to learn the use of knife and fork, and even how to put on his clothes, nor did he recognize at that time, or subsequently, any of his former friends and acquaintances, nor the places with which he had been familiar. He was intelligent, however, and evidently anxious to learn, and soon picked up English, so that we could in a few weeks make ourselves understood. It was noticeable that he learned the language not as a little child might do, but rather as an intelligent adult foreigner would have done. On the other hand his own language, if language it was, seemed to pass rapidly from his memory, and even after the first few days he used it very little, apparently because he had forgotten it, and not from any special intention.

"His past life was, and always has remained, a perfect blank to him, except for a few vague and uncertain reminiscences that sometimes tantalize him. Even these seemed to have no connection with his former home and compan ions.

"Quite as remarkable was the change in his mental character. He had been a boy of active habits, but not remarkably bright, nor had he ever shown any marked mental tendencies. After his recovery, however, he developed a passion for the natural sciences.

night I could even understand the talk of those Indians among themselves. I do not mean that I could have translated their words, but I somehow understood their conversation.'

"And what do you think they said?' I asked somewhat skeptically, for I naturally thought his imagination was running away with his good sense.

"We walked on in silence for a while, then he passed his hand over his forehead. Strange what curious dreams, experiences, and ideas, we sometimes have, is n't it?' he said. 'But I think they are best forgotten, so let us neither think nor speak of this again.'

"That was the last time he mentioned the matter to me; but it was late before

"Much of it' he said 'was of no special importance. They chaffed each other about their personal appearance. Two of the women picked us out for lovers, they said, and the others laughed at them.

"One old woman, who had crowded close to me, said a queer thing, though. She said "He looks like an Indian himself," and I do,' he added. 'I recalled my features, and I do look like an Indian, though my hair is brown and my eyes are gray.'

"When Clary said this I turned and looked at him. The gathering twilight darkened still more his deeply sunburned skin, and I was almost startled to see the strong resemblance in general outline between his face and those of the men and women we had just left.

afterwards that he had been back to the Indian village again that evening."

Here Doctor Ellender stopped. "Well," said the lawyer, "what is the end of your story?"

"There is no other end; that is all I can tell you. We learned later, however, that the old woman who had first recognized his resemblance to the Indians had lost a son, a promising young medicine-man, who had been accidentally killed on the same day that Harry Clary returned to life."

"And do you mean " said the lawyer, - then stopped, unwilling to put the absurd question into words.

"I mean nothing at all. I have told you the facts as they came to my knowledge. I do not presume to offer any explanations. You may think whatever you please.”

Theoda Wilkins.