Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 16

by Unknown

OR, THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF RODERIC GRAY.

Courteous reader, thou must be aware that there is no virtue which conferreth greater benefits upon its possessor than the virtue of perseverance. It can scale precipices, overtop mountains, encompass seas. Perseverance is a mighty conqueror; it fighteth against odds, and neither turneth its back nor is dismayed. Its progress may be slow, but in the end it is sure. As a snail ascendeth a perpendicular wall, it may fall or be driven back to the ground, but it will renew the attempt. It suffereth longer than charity, and hence came the adage, that "they who look for a silk gown always get a sleeve o't." It has been said, "Great is truth, and it will prevail;" and in addition thereunto, I would say, "Great is perseverance, for it also will prevail." The motto of every man should be, "nil desperandum." Every one should remember that real honour and esteem do not seek a man on whom they are to alight—the man must seek them; he must win them, and then wear them.

Instead, however, of detaining the reader with dull and general remarks on perseverance, I shall at once lay before them a copy of the autobiography of Roderic Gray, whose history will illustrate its effects in particulars:—

I was the son of poor but of honest parents. (With this stereotyped piece of history concerning poverty and honesty, Roderic Gray began his autobiography.) Yes, I repeat that my father and my mother were very poor, but they were sterlingly honest. They had a numerous family, and many privations to contend with; and the first thing I remember of my father was a constant, I may say a daily, expression of his, "Set a stout heart to a stey brae." Another great phrase of his, when any of us were like to be beaten by ought that we were attempting, was, "Try it again—never be beat—step by step brings the mountain low." My mother was of a disposition precisely similar to my father. Almost the first thing I remember of her is, what was her favourite expression, "Try it again, as your faither says—practice makes perfiteness."[7]

These expressions of my honoured parents were the rudiments of my education. They left an impression upon my heart and upon my brain, before I was sensible of what an impression was. There is often a great deal more conveyed through a single sentence, than we are apt to imagine. Our future destiny may be swayed by the hearing of one little word, and that word may be spoken in our hearing at a very early period of our lives. Many a father, when years began to sober down the buoyant tumult of his spirits, has wondered at and grieved over the disposition and actions of his son, marvelling whence they came; whereas the son received the feelings which gave birth to such actions, while he was but an infant, from the lips of his father, as he heard that father recount the deeds, the exploits, the feats of bravery of his young manhood. From the hour that a child begins to notice the objects around it, or to be sensible of kind or of harsh treatment, from that moment every one who takes it in their arms, every object around it, become its instructors. I find I am digressing from my autobiography, but I shall go on with it by and by, and as I have mentioned the subject of education, I shall say a few more words upon that topic, and especially on the education of the young, which, though it detain the reader for a short space from my history, will neither be uninstructive, nor without interest.

Some years ago, I met with a modern Job, who said he had read through the large edition of Johnson's Dictionary; and I do regret, with considerable sincerity, having neglected to ask the gentleman whether, in the course of his highly entertaining reading, he met with any word so murdered, butchered, abused, and misunderstood, as the poor polysyllable—education. Many wise people conceive it to signify many multitudes of words—of dead words and of living words, of words without symbols; or, in plain language, they say (or they act as if they said) that education means to make a man's head a portable lexicon of all languages. This is what they term the education classical. Some very wise men go a step farther with the meaning of the term. They shake their heads in contempt at the mere word-men. They mingle more of utility with their idea of the signification. They maintain that education meaneth also certain figures, whereby something is learned concerning pounds and pence, and square inches and solid inches. Here the general idea of education terminates; and this is the education mercantile and mathematical. There are, however, a third class of philosophically-wise men, who affirm that education means the macadamising, on a small scale, of blue stones and grey ones; in describing comets with tails, and planets without tails; in making the invisible gases give forth light in darkness, as the invisible mind lighteth mortality. This is the education scientific. Thus the artillery of all the three is directed against the head. The head is made a gentleman, a scholar, a philosopher, while the poor heart is suffered to remain in a state of untutored, uncared-for barbarity and ignorance. And in all this parade, concerning what education in reality imports, it is overlooked, that the heart from whence all evil proceeds—the heart where all good is received—is the soil where the first seeds of education ought to be sown, watered, watched over, pruned, and reared with tenderness. And it is not until the heart has become a sturdy savage, hardened in ignorance, that any attempts are made to curb it within the limits of moral obligation. A more insane idea cannot be conceived by a rational man, than supposing that education begins by learning to know that one letter is called A, a second B, and a third C. Education begins with the first glance which the mother bestows upon her child in answer to its first smile. Before the infant has lisped its first word, the work of education has made progress. The mother is the first, the fondest, the most important and responsible teacher. It is hers to draw out the young soul, which dreams in the smiles and the laughing eyes of her infant; it is hers to subdue, and in gentleness to root up, the first germ of evil that springs into existence; it is hers to unfold, by a thousand ways and a thousand tendernesses, which a mother's heart can only conceive, and a mother's eye only can express, the first shadows of right and of wrong; it is hers to teach feelings of love, of gentleness, and gratitude—to give a direction and a colouring to the embryo passions which shall mark the future character and destiny of her yet sucking child. Nor is there an object upon earth more worthy the admiration, we had almost said the envy, of an angel, than a Christian mother gazing, in the depth of her affection, upon the babe of her bosom, watching its faculties expand like young flowers—bending them to the sun of truth, gently as the linnet bends the twig where it thrills its little song to cheer its partner. But, when the infant leaves the lap of its mother, and other duties divide her care, it is then necessary that a teacher, equally affectionate and equally efficient, be provided; for children seek, and will find, teachers of good or of evil in every scene, and in every playmate. It is now that the Infant School must mature the education which the mother has, or ought to have, begun. Some disciple of moth-eaten customs, whose ideas are like the flight of a bat, and whose imagination is hung round with cobwebs, may snarl out his mouthfuls of broken humanity, and inquire, what could be learned by infants of two or of five years of age, to compensate for blighting their ruddy cheeks like tender plants in a frost-wind, by mewing them up and crowding them together within the dismal walls of a noxious schoolroom, through the midst of which a male or a female tyrant continue their dreary tramp, tramping to and fro within the hated circle of their terror, and flourishing fear and trembling in their hand, in the shape of a birch, the bark of which has yielded to their work of punishment? I readily admit that, in such a place, and under such a teacher, nothing could be learned—nothing experienced—but an early foretaste of future misery. This is no picture of an infant school—this is no part of its discipline. Never would I confine the little innocents within the walls of a prison-house—never would I behold them trembling beneath the frown of a taskmaster. I would not curtail one of their infant joys, nor cut off one of their young pleasures. I would not mar their merry play, nor curb the glee that wantons in their little clubs. But I would mingle education with their joy and with their pleasures—health and lessons with their play—and affection and forgiveness in their little bands. Thus their joys or their pleasures, their play and their companions, become their teachers. By an infant school I would not mean a room where a hundred children may be crowded together in an unhealthy atmosphere. The situation and comforts of the school are almost as important as the nature of the instruction, or the character and disposition of the teacher. The situation should be airy and healthy, and the room well ventilated, with a small play-ground attached. For the play-ground is almost as necessary as the school, and both are regarded by the pupils as places of loved amusement, where the presence of the teacher inspires no terror, no restraint, but where he mingles in their sports and directs them as an elder playmate, while they regard him as such, and in return love him as a parent. And while all appears unrestrained mirth on the little yard, or the little green; and exercise gives play to the lungs, vigour to the system, and health to the blood, and the small gymnasium rings with the joy of the happy beings, no incident, however trifling, is suffered to pass unimproved, to "lead them from nature up to nature's God," to eradicate evil propensities, and cherish a love of truth, justice, mercy, and mutual love. Their sports, their tempers, their little wrongs, or quarrels, all become monitors in the hands of the teacher, to render his infant charges the future good men, or the excellent women. The schoolroom is only changing the scene of amusement, and tasks which I remember were to me the very essence of purgatory, pain, and punishment, are rendered to them an exquisite pastime. The pence table they carol merrily to the tune of "Nancy Dawson." With two or three sets of merry motions, they chant the formidable multiplication table, which affords them all the hilarity of chasing a butterfly, or romping on the meadow. Nothing is given them in the shape of a task, but every new lesson is a new pleasure. They are not so much taught by words, as by bringing the thing signified under their observation. I should be sorry if the objects of infant schools should ever be so perverted as to attempt making them nurseries for infant prodigies. I care no more for precocity of talent than I do for a tree that has blossomed before its time, the fruit of which is sure not to be worth the gathering. The design of infant schools is not to make ignorant parents vain of their children, but to make all parents happy in their children. It is not so much the quantity of what they learn that is to be regarded, as the quality of what they learn. They will learn cheerful obedience to their parents, their instructors, and their future masters; they will learn the most important of all lessons to their after happiness, the government of their temper; they will learn conscientiousness in all that they do; they will learn sincerity; they will learn habits of order, of cleanliness, and of courtesy; they will learn method and dislike confusion; they will learn to bestow neatness, without vanity, on their persons; and order in all things. They will acquire a knowledge of geography, of the animal, the vegetable, and the mineral kingdoms, not as words but as things that exist, and of which they have an understanding. They will acquire much to amuse and delight the fireside of their parents—much to surround it with edification and instruction. And instances have been, where they have there conveyed upon their lisping tongues conviction and conversion to a parent's heart; while their Maker from the lips of babes and of sucklings perfected praise. They will be taught to feel that there is ever in the midst of them a God of love, of mercy, and of power, who is angry with the wicked every day. They will be taught to love the creatures He has framed, to know his Word, and revere its precepts—to love virtue for virtue's sake. It may be urged that much of the good produced by infant schools will be afterwards destroyed, by their mingling in other schools in riper years, with children whose passions have been permitted to run wild, and especially where evil examples may exist on the part of the parents. That these will have a prejudicial effect to a certain extent, is not to be denied. But for them there is also a preventive and a remedy. The infant school is the nursery of the Sabbath school, where all the good begun will be strengthened and confirmed. Great as the moral and religious change is which Sabbath schools have effected upon society, their effect would have been tenfold, had not the moral culture of the child been so unheeded before sending it to the school, and its heart so hardened by years and neglect, as to render an abiding impression impossible. But religious instruction, whether implanted in our minds by our father's fireside, in the infant school, or the Sabbath school, will never be forgotten. It will not depart from us. We may endeavour to shake it off, but it will struggle with us as Jacob with the angel. It will be a whisper in our souls for ever. We may grow up, and we may mingle with the world, and we may cast our Bibles far from us—and we may become wicked men and thoughtless women, but these whispers of eternal truth, though even thought to be forgotten by ourselves, will return and return again; and, when we wander in solitude, or lie sleepless on our pillow in the darkness of midnight, they will rush back upon our guilty minds, in texts, in verses, and in chapters, long, long forgotten.

But to return to my history. I have said that the first of my education was the sayings which I heard from the lips of my father and mother. They gave an inclination to my spirit, as the hand bendeth the twig. They became to me as monitors that were always present. I often think that I hear the voice of my honoured father saying unto me still, "Whatsoever ye take in hand, persevere until ye accomplish it." That maxim became with me a principle, which has continued with me from childhood unto this day.

Before proceeding farther, it is necessary for me to say that my father was not only a poor man, but his occupation was one of the humblest which a peasant could occupy. He filled no higher situation than that of occasional barnman, and hedger and ditcher, upon a farm near Thornhill, in Dumfries-shire. Neither was he what some would call a strong-minded man, nor did he know much of what the world calls education; but, if he did not know what education was, he knew what the want of it was, and he was resolved that that was a knowledge which his children should never acquire. It was therefore his ambition to make them scholars to the extent of his means. But, when I state that his income did not exceed six shillings, you will agree with me that those means were not great. But my father's maxim, persevere, carried him over every difficulty. When my mother had said to him, as a quarter's wages became due—"Robin, I will never be able to stand thir bairns' schooling—sae mony o' them is a perfect ruination to me."

"Nonsense, Jenny," he would have said, in his own half-laughing, good-natured way; "the back is aye made fit for the burden. Just try anither quarter, though we have to be put to our shifts to make it out. I'm no feared but that we will make it out some way or other. We have always done it yet, and what we have done, we can do again. Let us give them a' the schooling we can, poor things; and the day will come when they will thank us, or mair than thank us, for a' that we have wared upon them. O Jenny, woman! had I been a scholar, as I am not, instead o' being the wife o' a labouring man the day, ye would have been my wife—but a leddy."

A thousand times since, it has been a matter of wonder to me how my parents, out of their niggard income, provided food, clothing, and education for their family, which consisted of five sons and four daughters, all of whom could not only read, write, and cast accounts; but, though I say it who perhaps ought not to say it, his sons, in point of "schooling" in higher branches, were the equals, and perhaps more than the equals, of the richest farmer's sons in the neighbourhood. And never did a quarter-day arrive, on which any of the nine children of Robert and Janet Gray went before his teacher without his money in their hand, even as the brethren of Joseph, the patriarch, carried the money in their sacks' mouth. For it was not with my revered parents, as now-a-days it is with too many, who regard paying a schoolmaster his fees somewhat in the same light as paying a physician after his patient is dead, or a lawyer when the cause is lost.

Every Saturday night my father, though no scholar himself, caused us to bring home our books and our slates, and in his homely way he examined us—or rather he examined them (the books and the slates)—as to the proficiency we had made. Of figures he did know something: grammar, he said, was a new invention, and there, for a time, his examinations were at fault, and he knew not how to judge or to decide. But (I being the eldest) as I grew up, he transferred the examination of my younger brothers, as regarded grammatical proficiency, to me. And well do I remember, that every weekly examination closed with the admonition—"Now, bairns, persevere. Ye see how your mother and me have to fecht late and early to keep ye at the schule; and it is my greatest ambition to see ye a' scholars. Learning is a grand thing; it is a fortune equal to the best estate in the kingdom—ay, even to the Duke o' Buccleugh's; but oh, the want o' it is a great calamity, as nane can tell ye better than your faither. Therefore, bairns, persevere; always strive to be at the head o' your class, and if I live to be an auld man, I shall see some o' ye leddies and gentlemen."

Thus the word persevere was for ever rung in our ears; and I believe, before any of us knew its meaning, we one and all put it in practice. And often, when the frost lay white upon the ground, before the sun got up, and even when the ice drew itself together like a piece of lace-work on the shallow pools, at the head of all the classes in our school, which were just like stepping-stairs, a barefooted and barelegged laddie, but with hands and face as clean as the linen on his back, might have been seen as the dux of every class: and all those barefeeted or barelegged laddies were the bairns of Robert Gray.

"Persevere as ye are doing, Roderic," my old teacher used to say, "and ye will live to be an ornament to your country yet." I doubt all the ornament I have been to my country is hardly of a higher kind than that of a stucco or a paste-board figure on a mantelpiece, and perhaps not so much. However, be that as it may, I have the consolation to think that I have not passed through the world exactly as if I had been a cipher.

I know it is a difficult and a delicate thing for a man to write a sketch of his own life, without committing shipwreck on the shoals and quicksands of egotism; but I will endeavour to steer clear of this, and while it is certain that I will "set down nought in malice," I trust that I shall be able to show that I will "nothing extenuate."

My father's precept of perseverance carried me through my schoolboy days gloriously, even as it had borne him through the expense of paying out of his scanty earnings for the education of nine children. I wanted three days of completing my thirteenth year when I left the school, but then I had begun to read Homer in Greek—I had read Horace in Latin, and I was acquainted with Euclid. My father was proud of me, my master was proud of me, for I had persevered. It was seldom that the son of a cottar, or the son of any one else, left the school at such an age so far advanced.

Many said that before I was twenty they would see me in a pulpit—but they were mistaken. My father's habitual word, persevere, had taken too deep root in my heart, until it produced a sort of mental perpetual motion, which ever urged me onward—onward! and I found that the limits of a pulpit would never confine or contain me. I felt like a thing of life and happiness, that rejoiced and shook its wings beneath the sunshine of freedom, and I longed to expand my wings, even though they should fall or break under me.

I have said that I left school three days before I had completed my thirteenth year, and on the day that I did so, I was to become tutor in the family of a Colonel Mortimer, of the Honourable the East India Company's service. I was to be at once the playmate and instructor of two children; the one five, the other seven years of age—both boys. But his family contained another child—Jessy Mortimer—a lovely, dark-eyed girl of fifteen. The sun of an eastern clime had early drawn forth her beauty into ripeness, and although but two years older than myself, she was as a woman, while I was not only a mere boy, but, if I might use the expression, something between what might be termed a boy and a child; and certainly at the very age when children are most disagreeable to persons of a riper age. Yet, young as I was, from the very day that I beheld her, my soul took up its habitation in her eyes. I was dumb in her presence, I opened not my mouth. I was as a whisper, a shadow, in the family—a piece of mechanism that performed the task designed for it. It was a presumptuous thing in the son of a humble barnman to fix his eyes and his heart upon the daughter of an East India colonel, and one two years older than himself; but the heart hath its vagaries, even as our actions have.

For the first two years that I was in the house of Colonel Mortimer, I may say that, save in my class-room, my voice was not heard above my breath. But, as my voluntary dumbness became more and more oppressive, so also did my affection, my devotion, for Jessy become the more intense. The difference between our ages seemed even to have become more marked, and I felt it. Yet I began to think that her eyes looked upon me more tenderly; and the thought increased the devotion which for two years I had silently cherished. There seemed also a music, a spirit of gentleness and of kindness, in her voice, which first inspired me with hope.

Thus did five years pass on, and during that period I hardly ventured to lift up my eyes in her presence; though throughout that period I had said within my heart, Jessy Mortimer shall be my wife, and that was a bold thought for the son of a barnman to entertain towards the daughter of a wealthy nabob. But throughout my whole life I had endeavoured to put into practice my father's counsel concerning perseverance; and most of all was I determined to follow it in the subject which was deepest in my heart.

I remember the first time I ever spoke to Jessy. When I say the first time I spoke to her, I mean the first time that my soul spoke to her through my lips. For more than five years we had exchanged the common civilities of society with each other; but the language of the heart is ever a sealed volume, when the cold-fashioned ceremonies of society have to be observed.

But to proceed. I was now upwards of eighteen, and the children under my tuition were to be removed to a public school. It was no disgrace to me that they were to be so removed, for I knew it from the beginning of my engagement. Yet I felt it as disgrace—as more than disgrace—because that it would tear me from the side of Jessy, on whom my eyes lived and my mind dreamed. I had no wish to be a teacher, no ambition to become a minister; and her father had procured for me a situation as a clerk to a broker in London. But to me the thoughts of departure were terrible. Everything within and around the colonel's establishment had become things that I loved. I loved them because Jessy loved them, because she saw them, touched them, was familiar with and in the midst of them. They had become a portion of my home. I was unhappy at the thought of leaving them; but, beyond every other cause, my mind was without comfort at the thought of leaving her—it was hopeless, desolate. It was like causing a memory by force to perish in my heart.

It was in the month of September; I was wandering amidst the wooded walks upon her father's grounds. The rainbowed bronze of autumn lay upon the trees, deepening as it lay. The sun hung over the western hills; and the lark, after its summer silence, carolled over the heads of the last reapers of the season, to cheer their toil. A few solitary swallows twittered together, as if crying, "Come—come!" to summon them to a gathering and departure. The wood-pigeon cooed in the plantations, and as the twilight deepened, the plaintiveness of its strain increased. As I have said, I was then wandering in the wooded walks upon Colonel Mortimer's grounds, and my thoughts were far too deep for words. While I so wandered in lonely melancholy, my attention was aroused by the sound of footsteps approaching. I looked up, and Jessy Mortimer stood before me. I was too bashful to advance—too proud, too attached towards her, to retire.

We stood as though an electric spark had stricken both. I trembled, and my eyes grew dim; but I saw the rose die upon her cheeks. I beheld her ready to fall upon the ground, and, half unconscious of what I did, I sprang forward, and my arm encircled her waist.

"Jessy!—Miss Mortimer!" I cried. "Pardon me—speak to me."

"Sir!" she exclaimed—"Roderic!" I approached her—I took her hand. We stood before each other in silence. She drew herself up—she fixed her eyes upon me. "Sir," she returned, "I will not pretend to misunderstand your meaning; but remember the difference that exists in our situations."

"I remember it, Miss Mortimer—I do. I will remember it, Jessy. There is a difference in our situations."

I sprang from her—I thought I felt her hand detaining mine; and, as I rushed away, I heard her exclaiming, "Stay, Roderick! stay!" But wounded pride forbade me—it withheld me. I thought of my father's and of my mother's words—"Persevere! persevere!" And while I thought, I felt a something within, which whispered that I should one day speak to the daughter of Colonel Mortimer as her equal.

As I rushed away, I turned round for a moment to exclaim, "Farewell, Jessy!—we shall meet again!" Me-thought, as I hurried onward, I heard the accents of broken-hearted agony following after me; and through all, and over all, her voice was there. But I would not, I could not return. It was better to feel the arrow in my soul, than to have a new one thrust into it.

In a few days I took my departure towards London. I carried with me the letters of introduction which her father had given me. The broker to whom he recommended me was a Mr Stafford. He received me civilly, but at the same time most coldly, and pointing with his finger to the desk, said, "You will take your place there."

I did so, and in a very few weeks I became acquainted with the minutiæ of a broker's office. I perceived the situation which my senior clerks occupied, and I trusted one day to be as they were. I had heard them tell of our master having come to London with only half-a-crown in his pocket; and I thought of my father's maxim, "persevere," and that I might do even as my master had done.

There were a dozen clerks; and three years had not passed, until I occupied one of the chief seats in the counting-house. I became a favourite with my employer, and one in whom he trusted.

During that period I had heard nothing of my early benefactor—nothing of Jessy; but my thoughts were full of them.

Now it came to pass, somewhat more than three years after I had arrived in London, that, one day as I was passing up Oldgate, a person stopped me, and exclaimed, "Roderic!"

"Esau!" I returned; for his name was Esau Taylor.

"The same," he replied, "your old schoolfellow."

Hunger sat upon his cheeks—starvation glared from his eyeballs—necessity fluttered around him as a ragged robe. The shoes upon his feet were the ghost of what they had been. His whole apparel was the laughingstock of the wind; but my father had taught me to despise no one, however humble. It was a saying of his, "Look to the heart within a breast, and not to the coat that covers it;" and therefore I received Esau Taylor kindly. He was the son of an extensive farmer in our neighbourhood, and although I wondered to find him in a situation so distressed, I recollected that in London such things were matter of everyday occurrence. Therefore I did not receive him coldly, because of the shabbiness of his coat, and the misery of his appearance. I knew that I was the son of a barnman, and that my father's coat might be out at the elbows.

"Ha, Esau! my dear fellow," said I to him, "when did you come to town?"

"Several weeks ago," he replied.

"And what have you been doing?" said I.

"Nothing, nothing," he rejoined.

"Well," said I, "will you meet me in this house to-morrow? You were always good at figures, Esau; you can keep accounts. I think I can do something for you; and if you persevere, I doubt not but that you may arrive at the top of the tree, and become the managing clerk of the establishment."

"Thank you! thank you! thank you!" said Esau, grasping my hands as he spoke.

"Ah!" said I, "there is no necessity for thanks; I am a plain, blunt person. I did not know you personally in the place of my nativity, but I remember having seen you. I remember also your friends; and as a townsman it will give me pleasure to know that I can be of service to you."

Esau grasped my hand, and he shook it as though he would have taken it from the elbow. I was certain that he would obtain the situation which I had in view for him. We sat down together—we talked of old times, when the feelings of our hearts were young; and, amongst other things, we spoke of Jessy Mortimer. I sat—I drank with him—we became happy together—we became mad together. My Jessy—Jessy Mortimer was before me. Her presence filled my thoughts—it overshadowed me. I could think of nothing else—I could speak of nothing else. I drank to her in bumpers; but Esau sat as calm as a judge with the black cap upon his head. I marvelled that the man had so little of what is called sympathy in his soul. He appeared before me as a dead man—a thing that moved merely as it was moved. I almost despised, and yet I trusted him, because he was connected with the part of the country to which I belonged.

Now, as I have informed you, we sat together, we drank together, and the name of Jessy Mortimer overcame me; but I sat till I forgot her, until I forgot myself—my companion—everything! In this state I was left sitting; and when consciousness returned, I was alone, bewildered. My companion had left me. My first sensation was that of shame—of burning shame. I felt that I had abused the time and the confidence of my employer, and the thought rendered me wretched.

It was two days before I ventured to call again at the office, where I had become a confidential clerk. My master passed me as I entered, but he neither spoke to nor noticed me. His coldness stung me. I felt my guiltiness burning over me. But my confusion was increased, when I learned that I was not only discharged, but that my place was to be supplied by Esau Taylor!

"Impossible!" I exclaimed.

"Deem it so," said my informant. "But you have cherished an adder that has stung you; and, with all your knowledge, you are ignorant of the world, and of the people that live, breathe, and act in it. Take my counsel, and regard every man as though he were your enemy, until you have proved him to be your friend."

There was something in his words that more than restored my wandering thoughts into their proper channel.

I found that I had performed an act of kindness towards a villain—for I had not only treated Esau Taylor hospitably, but knowing that in London a good coat is of as much importance as a good character, I had furnished him with wearing apparel from my own wardrobe. A few days afterwards I met him in the Strand, arrayed in my garments, and he passed me with a supercilious air, as though I were a being only fit to be despised. I walked on as though I saw him not, conscious that, if he had a soul within him, it must be burning with the coals of fire which I had heaped upon his head.

I soon found it was much easier to lose a good situation than to obtain an indifferent one, and that one act of folly might accomplish what a thousand of repentances could not retrieve.

In a few months I found myself in a state of destitution; and while the coat which I had given to Esau Taylor was still glossy upon his back, mine—my last remaining one—hung loose and forlorn upon my shoulders. Yet, although I then suffered from both cold and hunger, the words which my parents had made a portion of my character departed not from me, and the words "persevere!—persevere!" were ever in my heart, kindling, glowing as a flame, until, in solitary enthusiasm, I have exclaimed aloud, as I wandered (not having a roof to shelter me) upon the streets at midnight, "I will persevere."

I was glad to accept of employment as copying clerk to a law stationer, at a salary of seven shillings a-week. It was a small sum, and I have often thoughtlessly wasted many times the amount since; but it made me happy then. It snatched, or rather it bought from the gripe of death—it relieved me from the pains and the terrors of want. My situation was now sufficiently humble, but my spirit was not broken; neither had I forgotten Jessy Mortimer, nor did I despair of one day calling her mine.

During the days of humiliation which I am recording, I was struck with an incident, which, although trifling in itself, I shall here relate; for from it I drew a lesson which encouraged me, and made me resolve, if possible, to carry my maxim into more active practice. Frequently on a Saturday afternoon, when the labours of the week were over, instead of returning to my wretched garret (for which I paid a shilling a-week, and which contained no furniture save a shake-down bed and a broken chair), I was wont to go out in the country, and to seek the silence and solitude of the woods and the green lanes. On such occasions

"My lodging was on the cold ground,"

and on the Sabbath mornings, I was wont to steal, as if unobserved, into the first country church, or rather place of worship, which I found open. I was there unknown; and in a congregation of English peasantry, the one-half of whom were in their smock-frocks, there were none to observe the shabbiness of my garments. And in the plainness of everything around me, there was something that accorded with my frame of mind, and in the midst of which I felt happier, and more at ease, than I could in the splendid cathedral or the gaudy chapel of a great city. It was in the month of May, and the sweet blossom, like odoriferous snow, lay on the hawthorn. The lark sang over me its Sabbath hymn. The sun had just risen, and, like the canopy of a celestial couch on which an angel might have reposed, the clouds, like curtains of red and gold, seemed drawn asunder. I sat beneath a venerable elm-tree, over which more than a hundred winters had passed; but their frosts had not nipped the majesty of its beauty. Above me a goldfinch chirmed and fed its young, and they seemed ready to break away upon the wing. It chirped to them, it fluttered from branch to branch, to allure them from the nest. One bolder than the rest ventured to follow, but ignorant of the strength of its wings, it fell upon the ground. The parent bird descended, and with strange motions mourned over it, anxiously striving again to teach it to ascend and regain its nest. My first impulse was to take up the little flutterer, to climb the tree, and replace it in the home which its first parent had built; but I lay and watched its motions for a few minutes. Again and again by a bold effort it endeavoured to reach the lofty branch where its parent had poised its nest, but as often it fell upon the ground, and its little breast panted on the earth. At length it perched upon the lowest twig, and from it got to others higher and higher, turning round proudly as it ascended, as if conversing with its parent, happy in what it was achieving, until the nest was regained.

"There," I exclaimed—"there is an example of perseverance; and a lesson is taught me by that little bird. It attempted too much at once, and its efforts were unsuccessful; it endeavoured to rise step by step, and it has gained the object it desired. That bird shall be my monitor, and I will endeavour to rise step by step, even as it has done."

I returned to London, and as I went, the attempts of the little bird were the text on which my thoughts dwelt. By sedulous attention to my duties, I began to rise in the esteem of my employer, the law stationer, and he increased my salary from seven shillings to a guinea a-week. I said unto myself, that, like the young bird, I had gained a higher branch.

Within twelve months he obtained me a situation in the office of an eminent solicitor, where I was engaged at a salary of a hundred pounds a-year. This was the scaling of another branch; and I again found myself in circumstances equal to those I had enjoyed previous to the treachery of Esau Taylor. I did not, in order to ingratiate myself with my employer, practise the bowing system, with which my countrymen have at times been accused; but I strove to be useful, I studied to oblige, and was rewarded with his confidence and favour.

It became a part of my employment to draw up abstracts of pleadings. On one occasion, I had drawn out a brief, which was to be placed in the hands of one of the most eminent counsel at the bar. He was struck with the manner in which the task was executed, and was pleased to pronounce it the clearest, the ablest, and best arranged brief that had ever been placed in his hands. He inquired who had drawn it out; and my employer introduced me to him. He spoke to me kindly and encouragingly, and recommended me to persevere. The word rekindled every slumbering energy of my soul. I had always endeavoured to do so, but now stronger impulses seemed to stir within me, and there was a confidence in my hopes that I had never felt before. He suggested that I should prepare myself for the bar, and generously offered to assist me. Through his interest, and the liberality of my master, I was admitted a student of the Inner Temple. My perseverance was now more necessary than ever, and again I thought of the little bird and its successful efforts. I had gained another branch, and the topmost bough to which I aspired was now visible.

I allowed myself but five hours out of the twenty-four for repose; the rest I devoted to hard study, and to the duties of assistant reporter to a daily newspaper. But often, in the midst of my studies, and even while noting down the strife of words in Parliament, thoughts of Jessy Mortimer came over me, and her image was pictured on my mind, like a guardian angel revealing for a moment the brightness of its countenance. My hopes became more sanguine, and I felt an assurance that the day would come when I should call her mine.

I had many privations to encounter, and many difficulties to overcome, but for none did I turn aside; my watch-word was "onward," and in due time I was called to the bar. I expected to struggle for years with the genteel misery of a briefless barrister, but the thought dismayed me not.

Before, however, I proceed farther with my own career, I shall notice that of Esau Taylor. There was no species of cunning, of treachery, or of meanness, of which he was not capable. There was none to which he did not resort. His brother clerks hated him; for, to his other properties, he added that of a low tale-bearer. But he was plausible as Lucifer, and with his smooth tongue, and fair professions, he succeeded in ingratiating himself into the chief place in his master's confidence; and eventually was placed by him at the head of his establishment; and, in order further to reward what he considered his singular worth and honesty, he permitted him to have a small share in the firm. But Esau was not one of those whom a small share, or any portion short of the whole, would satisfy. This he accomplished more easily and more speedily than it is possible that even he, with all his guilty cunning, had anticipated.

The merchant from whose employment he had supplanted me, and over whom his plausibility and pretended honesty had gained such an ascendency, had a daughter—an only child—who, about the time of Taylor's being admitted into a sort of partnership, returned from a boarding-school in Yorkshire. He immediately conceived that the easiest way to obtain both the father's business and his wealth would be by first securing the daughter's hand. Of anything even bordering upon affection his sordid soul was incapable: but to obtain his object he could assume its appearance, and he could employ the rhapsodies which at times pass for its language. The maiden was young and inexperienced, and with just as much of affectation as made her the more likely to be entangled in the snares of a plausible hypocrite, who adapted his conversation to her taste. The girl began to imagine that she loved him—perhaps she did—but more possibly it was a morbid fancy which she mistook for affection, and which he well knew how to encourage.

She became pensive, sighed, and drooped like a lily that is nipped by the frost, and seemed ready to leave her father childless; and the merchant, to save his daughter, consented to her union with Esau Taylor, his managing clerk and nominal partner.

The old man lived but a few months after their union, bequeathing to them his fortune and his business; and within a year and a-half his daughter followed him to the grave; to which, it was said, she was hurried through the cruelty and neglect of her husband.

Esau was now a rich man, a great man, and withal a bad man—one whose heart was blacker than the darkness of the grave, where his injured, I believe I may say his murdered, wife was buried.

We had not met each other for more than five years, and it is possible that he had half forgotten me, or, if he remembered me, considered me unworthy of a thought.

I have told you that I was called to the bar, and for ten months I attended the courts in my gown and wig, sitting in the back benches, and listening to the eloquence of my seniors, with a light pocket, and frequently a heavy heart.

I was sitting one evening in my chambers, as they were called—though they contained nothing but an old writing-desk, two chairs, and a few law books; I was poring over a volume of olden statutes, mincing a biscuit, and sipping a glass of cold water, when the bell rang, and on opening the door, my old master, the solicitor, stood before me, and he had what appeared to be a brief in his hand. My heart began to beat audibly in my bosom.

"Well, Roderic," said he, entering, "I always promised that I would do what I could for you, and now I am determined to bring you out. Here is a case that may make your fortune. You will have scope for argument, feeling, declamation. If you do not produce an impression in it, you are not the person I take you for. Don't tremble, don't be too diffident; but, as I say to you, throw your soul into it, and I will answer for it making your fortune. Here are fifty guineas as a retaining fee, and it is not unlikely that my fair client to-morrow may give you fifty more as a refresher."

"Fifty guineas!" I involuntarily exclaimed, and my eyes glanced upon the money. I felt as though my fortune were already made, and that I should be rich for ever.

"Come, Roderic," said he, "don't think about the retainer, but think of the case—think of getting another."

"What is the case?" I inquired.

"That," replied he, "your brief, which is as clearly and fully drawn up as if you had done it yourself, will explain to you. In the meantime, I may state, that your client, the defendant, is a young lady of matchless beauty, great fortune and accomplishments. When you see her, you will be inspired. She is the orphan daughter, and now the sole surviving child, of an officer who had extensive dealings with a house in the city. Of late years the prosecutor was his broker. Some time after the father's death, the prosecutor made overtures of marriage to the defendant, which she rejected. He has now, stimulated by revenge, set up a fictitious claim for twenty thousand pounds, which he alleges her father owed to the house of which he is now at the head; and for this claim he now drags my client into court. Now, I trust that we shall not only be able to prove that the debt is fictitious, but to establish that the documents which he holds, bearing the colonel's signature, are forgeries. It is a glorious case for you—here is your brief, and I shall call on you again in the morning."

I took the brief from his hand, glanced my eyes upon the back of it, and read the words—"Taylor against Mortimer."

"Taylor against Mortimer!" I exclaimed, starting from my seat; "what Taylor?—what Mortimer? Not Jessy—my Jessy? Not the villain, Esau?—the supplanter——the——"

"Hold, hold," said the solicitor, in surprise; "such are, indeed, the names of the parties; but, if you are in an ecstasy already, I must take the brief to one who will read it soberly."

"No!" I cried, grasping the brief in my hand—"take back your fee—I will plead this cause for love."

"Keep the money—keep the money," said he, dryly; "it will be of as much service to you in the meantime as love. But let me know the cause of this enthusiasm."

I unbosomed my soul to him. I did not see Miss Mortimer until the day of trial, in the court; and, when I rose to plead for her, she started, the word "Roderic!" escaped from her lips, and tears gushed into her bright eyes. It was at the same moment that Esau Taylor saw and recognised me—his eyes quailed beneath my gaze; his guilt gushed to his face. I commenced my address to the jury—I drew the picture of a fiend. Taylor trembled. Every individual in the court was already convinced of his guilt. He endeavoured to escape amidst the crowd. I called upon the officers to seize him. I gained the cause, and with it, also, won the hand of Jessy Mortimer, to obtain which, from boy-hood I had persevered. Taylor was committed to prison, to stand his trial for the forgeries; but, before the day of trial came, he was buried within the prison walls, with disgrace for his epitaph.

---

THE IRISH REAPER.

Some years ago, I was proceeding from Runcorn to Manchester, in one of the passage-boats which ply upon the Duke of Bridgewater's canal. There could not be less than a hundred passengers, and they were of as motley a description as the imagination of man could conceive even in a dream. The boats exactly resemble a long, low, flat-roofed wooden house; but sufficiently lofty for a middle-sized person to stand erect between the floor and the roof, or rather the deck. At one end sat about a dozen Primitive Methodists, alternately reading passages of Scripture, or bursting forth, at the extreme pitch of their voice, into a squall of music, singing hymn upon hymn, till my very ears ached, and the timbers of the boat might have started. Near them sat a number of young, rosy-cheeked Welsh women, staring at the vocalists with a look of wondering vacancy, that the goats on their own mountains could not have surpassed. There were, also, manufacturers' wives and children returning from a seven days' visit to Runcorn, for the benefit of a salt-water dip in the Mersey; and six or eight prim, sober, sleek, silent, well-dressed Quakers; with a more than sprinkling of the boys of the Emerald Isle. The loud laugh of one of them was ever and anon heard above the shrill music of the Ranters. He was about five feet seven inches high, and exceedingly strong and well made. He wore an old greatcoat, of a yellowish blanket colour, and a hat, the crown of which had fallen in with service, and its brim was equally turned up before and behind, and on both sides. His feet were thrust into a pair of brogues of true Irish manufacture, which, with a pair of coarse blue worsted stockings and corduroy inexpressibles, completed his outward man. He carried an apparently empty sack under his arm, and was surrounded by about a dozen of his countrymen, who seemed to regard him as an oracle, heartily echoing back his boisterous laughter, and exclaiming, "Well done, Mister M'Carthy!—faith, and it's you that's your mother's own son, at any rate."

O'Connell had sailed from Liverpool on the previous day, and his countrymen were discussing his political merits.

"Why, bad luck to ye," exclaimed our hero with the greatcoat, in answer to one who had held forth in praise of the counsellor; "and it is you, Mick Behan, that says every man in Ireland should pay the O'Connell rint?—but I'll tell you a bit of a parable, as Father O'Shee says, and a parable, too, of my own natural mother's making. 'Larry,' says she to me—'Larry M'Carthy, don't be after planting those big potaties for seed; for they've a hole in their heart a little Christian might slape in?"

"You're no better thin a Sassenach, Larry," interrupted the aforesaid Mick; "can't you spake your maneing like a man, if you have any maneing at all, at all."

This was like to have ended in an Irish row in reality; though the majority evidently sided with Mister Larry M'Carthy, not because they agreed with him in opinion, but because, as afterwards appeared, he was their master or employer. The disputants paused for a moment, and a loud groan, as if from one in great bodily pain, mingled with the wailings of a woman, was heard from the farther corner of the boat. Larry turned round, to use his own expression, "like a flash of lightning," and the next moment he stood by the side of the sufferer, who was a tall, bony-looking figure; but, save the skin that covered them, there was little of his mortal man but the bones left. It was only necessary to look on his features, wasted as they were, to tell that he, too, was an Irishman. A young wife sat beside him, whose countenance resembled beauty personifying sorrow; she had a child at her breast, and two others, the eldest not more than five years of age, stood by her knee Larry looked upon the group, and his heart was touched.

"Och! and what may be ailing ye, countryman?" said he; "sure and ye wouldn't be after dying among friends would ye?"

"Ohon! and is it a friend that would be asking after my own Patrick!" replied the poor wife. "Sure, then, and he is ill, and we're all ill togidder; and it is six blessed months since he earned the bridth of tinpinny. Oh, blackness on the day that the rheumatiz came on him——"

"Shure now, and is that all?" interrupted Larry; "and, belike, the doctors have been chating you; for I tell you, honey, and you, too, Patrick, those 'natomy chaps know no more about the rheumatiz than holy Solomon knew about stameboats. But, belike, I'm the lad that disn't know neither; but maybe your chating yoursilf if ye think so. I'll tell ye what it is: the rheumatiz is a wandering wind between the flesh and the bone; and, more than that, there is no way to cure it but to squaze it out at the ends of the fingers or toes."

"Oh, my childer's sorrow on it, thin!" replied the suffering man's wife; "but, more and above the rheumatiz, Patrick got his leg broke last Fibruary——"

"Ay, splintered, honey," added the husband; "and the doctors—bad luck be wid them!—can't make nothing on't; and I am now goin to the great Salford bone-doctor."

"And maybe he won't be curing the bit bone without the money?" said Larry, with an expression of sympathy.

The sufferer shook his head, and was silent; his wife burst into tears.

"I will work, I will beg, I will die, for my Patrick," she exclaimed, and pressed the child closer to her breast.

"You had better be barring the dying, honey," returned Larry; "and wouldn't a raffle, think ye, among friends, be more gintale thin begging among strangers?"

"Ohon! and is it friends you say?" replied she.

"Yes, shure, and it is friends that I say," answered Larry; "and a raffle is what no gintleman need be ashamed on."

The boat at this moment stopped opposite an inn at the side of the canal; Larry borrowed a quart measure from the skipper, and sprang ashore. In a few minutes he returned with a quantity of rum, and, handing it first to the wife, and then to her lame husband, said, "Come, warm up thy ould bones with a drop of the cratur." He called the rest of his countrymen around him, and handed the liquor to each. When gathered together, there might be about sixteen or eighteen of them in all.

"Arrah, now, and these are all my men," said Mister Larry M'Carthy, with a look of comical consequence, to his infirm countryman; "and where would you be finding better? We are goin up to a bit of work in Lancashire; for the Inglish are no better than born childer at our work;[8] and," raising the liquor to his head, he added, "here's the Holy Virgin be with us, countryman, and better luck to your bad leg; and, should it ever be mended at all—though you mayn't be good for much at hood-work iny more, you have still a stout bone for a barrow—and you won't be forgetting to ask for Larry M'Carthy. And, now, boys," continued he, turning to his workmen, "here is this poor man, and more than this, I'm saying, our own lawful countryman, with the rheumatiz and a broken leg, and his wife, too, as you see, and those three little cherubims, all starving, to be sure, and he going to the doctor's without a penny! Sure you won't disgrace Ould Ireland—just look at the childer—and I say that a raffle is the gintale way of doing the thing."

So saying, he thrust his hand into his pocket, and pulled out a small canvas bag well filled with silver, and tied round the mouth with a strong cord. He took off his indescribable brown hat; he threw in a piece or two of silver, and went round, shaking it among his countrymen. Each took out a bag similar to Larry's, and threw his mite into the hat. He then, without counting them, emptied its contents into the lap of the poor woman; and I should think, from their appearance, they must have amounted to thirty or forty shillings. She burst into tears. The lame man grasped his hand, and endeavoured to thank him.

"Don't be after spakeing," said Larry; "did you think we warn't Christians?"

Such was the Irish raffle. Larry instantly resumed his jokes, his jests, and his arguments; but I could do nothing during the rest of the passage but think of the good Samaritan, and admire Mister Larry M'Carthy.

---

In the September of 1834, I was wandering by the side of a country churchyard, situated near the banks of the Tyne. The sun had gone down, and the twilight was falling grey upon the graves. I saw a poor-looking man, whose garments fluttered in tatters with the evening breeze, and who, by his appearance, seemed to be an Irish reaper, rise from among the tombs. He repeatedly drew the sleeve of his coat across his eyes, and I could hear him sobbing heavily, as though his heart would burst. As we approached each other, I discovered that he was my old canal-boat companion, the then merry and kind-hearted Larry M'Carthy; but no more like the Larry I had then seen him than a funeral to a bridal.

His frame was wasted to a skeleton, and hunger and misery glistened in his eyes together.

"Ha!" said I, accosting him, "is it possible that sorrow can have laid its heavy hand upon the light heart of Larry M'Carthy?"

"Shure," said he, drying away the tears that ran down his wan and wantworn cheeks, "and it is true, and too true, and heavy is the hand, shure enough; but not so heavy as it should be, or it would be weighing me into that grave." He pointed to the grave I had seen him leave, and added, "But how do you know me, sir—and who tould ye my name?—as I don't know yours—for, shure, and mine is Larry M'Carthy, as my father and mother, and his rivirence, wid my natarel sponsors, to boot, all, every one of thim, say and affirm."

I reminded him of the canal-boat and the raffle, and inquired the cause of his distress, and his visit to the grave.

"Arrah, master," said he, "and you touch a sore place when you ask me to tell it. Perhaps you don't know—for how should you—that, not long after the time you spake of in the canal-boat, I came down to what ye call the Borders here, to a bit o' navigating work that was to be a long job. I lodged wid a widow—a dacent ould woman, that had a daughter they called Mary—and, och! you may be thinking that ever Mary had an equal, but it's wrong that ye are, if ye think so. Her eyes were like drops of dew upon the shamrock; and, although she was not Irish but Scotch, it was all one; for, ye know, the Scotch and Irish are one man's childer. But, at any rate, she had a true Irish heart; and, but for the sae or the Channel, as they call it, she would have been Irish as well as me. The more I saw of Mary, I loved her the more—better than a bird loves the green tree. She loved me, too; and we were married. The ould woman died a few weeks before Mary presented me with two little Larrys. I might have called them both Larry; for they were as like each other as your two eyes, and both of them as like me, too, as any two stars in the blessed firmament are like each other, where nobody can see a difference.

"Mary made the best wife in Christendom; and, when our little cherubs began to run about our knees, and to lisp and spake to us, a thousand times have I clasped Mary to my breast, and blessed her as though my heart would burst with joy. 'Sure,' I used to say, 'what would my own mother have said, had her ould eyes been witness to the happiness of her son, Larry M'Carthy?'

"But often the thought came staleing over me, that my happiness was too like a drame to last long; and sure and it was a drame, and a short one, too. A cruel, mortal fever came to the village, and who should it seize upon but my little darlints. It was hard to see them dying together, and my Mary wept her bright eyes blind over them. But bad luck was upon me. The 'pothecary tould us as how our lovely childer would die; and on the very day that he said so, the wife that was dearer to me than Ould Ireland to Saint Patrick, lay down on the bed beside them—and och, sir! before another sun looked in at our window, a dying mother lay between her dead childer. I wished that I might die, too; and, within three days, I followed my wife and my little ones together to the same grave. It was this arm that lowered them into the cold earth—into the narrow house—and, sure, it has been weak as a child's since. My strength is buried in their grave. I have wrought but little since; for I cannot. I have no home now; and I take a light job anywhere when it comes in my way. Every year, at reaping time, I visit their grave, and bring with me a bit of shamrock to place over it, and that it may be a mark where to bury me, should I die here, as I hope I will."

Within ten days after this, I beheld the body of the once lively and generous-hearted Larry M'Carthy consigned to the grave, by the side of his wife and children.

---

GRACE CAMERON.

In the centre of a remote glen or strath, in the West Highlands of Scotland, stands the old mansion-house of the family of Duntruskin. At the time of the rebellion of 1745-6, this house was the residence of Ewan Cameron, Esq., a gentleman of considerable landed property and extensive influence in the country. Mr Cameron was, at the period of our story, a widower, with an only child. This child was Grace Cameron, a fine, blooming girl of nineteen, with a bosom filled with all the romance and high-souled sentiment of her mountain birth and education. In the commotions of the unhappy period above alluded to, Mr Cameron, although warmly attached to the cause of the Pretender, took personally no active part; but he assisted in its promotion by secret supplies of money, proportioned in amount to his means. In the result of the struggle—which, although he was not yet aware of it, had already arrived at a consummation on Culloden Muir—neither he nor his daughter had anything to fear for themselves; but this did not by any means relieve them from all anxiety on the momentous occasion. The father had to fear for many dear and intimate friends, and the daughter for the fate of a lover, who were in the ranks of the rebel army. This lover was Malcolm M'Gregor of Strontian—a warmhearted, high-spirited young man, the son of a neighbouring tacksman, to whom Grace had been long attached, and by whom she was most sincerely and tenderly loved in return. M'Gregor at this period held a captain's commission in the service of the Prince, and had distinguished himself by his bravery in the various contests with the royal troops that had occurred during the rebellion.

Having given this brief preliminary sketch, and advising the reader that the precise period at which our tale opens is on the second day after the battle of Culloden, and the locality a certain little parlour in Duntruskin House, we proceed with our story. Seated in this little parlour, on the day in question, Grace Cameron—occasionally employing her needle, but more frequently pausing to muse on the absent, to reflect on the past, or to anticipate the future—awaited, with intense anxiety, some intelligence regarding the movements and fortunes of the rebel army, with whose fate she deemed her own connected, since it was shared by one who was dearer to her than all the earth besides.

Grace did not expect any special communication on this important subject; but she knew that common fame would soon bring a rumour of every occurrence of consequence which should take place at this interesting crisis. With this expectation, she anxiously watched from her window the approach of every stranger to the house; and, when one appeared, was the first to meet and to question him regarding the events of the day. At length a report reached her, in which all agreed—for her informers had differed widely in others—that a great event had taken place, that a sanguinary battle had been fought; but, this admitted, the usual discrepancies and contradictions followed. Some declared that the Prince's army was defeated, and that a number of his leading men had been killed and taken prisoners; others, with equal confidence, asserted that the rebels were victorious, and that the king's troops were flying in all directions. Elated and depressed by turns by these conflicting rumours, Grace awaited, in dreadful anxiety, some certain intelligence regarding what had taken place. It was while in this state of mind, and while gazing listlessly, and almost unconsciously, from her little parlour window on the wide prospect which it commanded, that her eye was suddenly riveted on one particular spot. This was an abrupt turn in the great road leading to Inverness, which passed Duntruskin House at the distance of about half-a-mile, and from which, at this moment, the sun's rays were suddenly reflected, in bright, brief, and frequent flashes, as if from many surfaces of polished steel. Grace's heart beat violently; for she instantly and rightly conjectured that the dark body which now gradually, but rapidly, came in sight, and from which the coruscations which had first attracted her attention emanated, was composed of armed men; but whether they were rebels or king's troops, the distance prevented her from ascertaining. In this state of doubt, however, she did not long remain. Their rapid approach soon showed her that they were a party of royalist dragoons—a circumstance which threw her into the utmost terror. Nor was this feeling lessened by her perceiving them leave the highway, and make directly for the house. On seeing this, Grace, in the greatest alarm, hastened to seek out her father, whom she found busily engaged in writing, and utterly unconscious of the threatened visit. When informed of it, his countenance became pale, and his whole frame agitated; for he dreaded that his secret connection with the rebels had been discovered, and that he was now about to be apprehended; and these were also the fears of his daughter. Without saying a word, however, in reply to what had just been communicated to him, Mr Cameron threw down his pen, started hastily to his feet, and hurried to the window, beneath which, so rapid had been their motions, the troopers were already drawn up. The commander of the party—for there was only one officer—was a little thickset man, about forty-two years of age, with a red, florid, vulgar countenance, expressive at once of gross sensuality, much indulgence in the bottle, and a total absence of all feeling. In the manner of his dress he evidently affected the military dandy: his shirt neck reached nearly to the point of his nose; his gloves were of the purest white; a showy silk handkerchief was carelessly thrust into his breast, with just enough left projecting to indicate its presence. Notwithstanding this display of finery, however, and in despite of a splendid uniform made after the smartest military fashion of the time, Captain Stubbs was still exceedingly unlike a gentleman, and still more unlike a soldier. The first he was not, either by birth or education; the latter he had neither talents nor energy of character sufficient ever to become. The absence, however, of these qualities in Captain Stubbs was amply supplied by others. He was vain, irascible, conceited, and cruel; brutal and overbearing in his manners; and coarse and utterly regardless of the feelings of others in his language. He was, moreover, both an epicure and a glutton; and, to complete his very amiable character, a most egregious coward.

Having drawn up his party in front of the house as already mentioned, Captain Stubbs, before dismounting, threw a scrutinising glance at several of the windows of the building, as if to ascertain what sort of quarters he might expect—a point with him of the last importance. In the course of this brief survey, his eye alighted on that occupied by Mr Cameron and his daughter, whom he saluted with an insolent and familiar nod. In the next instant he was at the door, where he was met by Mr Cameron himself, with a countenance strongly expressive of the alarm and uncertainty which he felt, and could not conceal, regarding the issue of the interview now about to take place.

On their meeting—"Ha," said Stubbs, addressing the latter, "you are, I presume, Mr—Mr——Hang me, I forget your name, sir! Mine, sir, is Captain Stubbs, of the —— regiment of dragoons. I find your name is in my list of—of"—here the captain (who had by this time been conducted to the dining-room), perfectly indifferent as to the particular of finishing his sentence, began to pull off his gloves, and to detach his spurs from his boots, with the air of one who is determined to be quite at home—"of—of," he continued to repeat, with the utmost disregard of ordinary politeness, and with the most profound contempt for the feelings of his host, who, taking alarm at the ominous hiatus, which he fully expected would be filled up by his being ranked amongst the proscribed, waited patiently and meekly the conveniency of Captain Stubbs—"of—of," repeated the captain slowly, after having divested himself of his accoutrements, and otherwise prepared himself for an hour or two's enjoyment—"of the friends of the government," he at length said; and the words instantly relieved both his host and his daughter from the most dreadful apprehensions. "So I have just beat you up," continued Captain Stubbs, "en passant, as 'twere, to tell you of the total defeat of the rebels, at a place called Culloden, and to have a morsel of dinner—eh, old boy?—and an hour or two's quarters for the men and horses."

"Much obliged for the honour," replied Mr Cameron, ironically, and accompanying the expression with a polite and formal bow; but, at the same time, cautiously guarding against any expression of his real feelings on this occasion, amongst which was a strong inclination to kick the redoubted Captain Stubbs to the door. His prudence, however, prevented him embroiling himself in this or any other way with a visiter who had the means of retaliation so much in his power.

Immediately after making the announcement above recorded, Captain Stubbs added, "And now, Mr—A—a——Pray, what the devil's your name, sir?"

"My name, sir," replied the party interrogated, "is Cameron—Ewan Cameron."

"Ah! Cameron—ay, Cameron," repeated Captain Stubbs, knitting his brows, and endeavouring to look very dignified. "Why, then, sir, I want some brandy and water; and pray, see that some of your fellows look after my horses." Having been provided with, and having swallowed a very handsome modicum of the beverage he had called for, Captain Stubbs went on—"I say, Cameron, can any of your brutes, your Hottentots, prepare me a fowl, à la Condé?"

"Why, Captain Stubbs," replied Mr Cameron, whose anxiety to keep well with the government and all connected with it induced him to suppress the resentment which the amazing insolence of his guest was so well calculated to excite—"our cookery is in general of a very plain sort."

"Ay, oh! boiled beef and cabbage, I suppose," interrupted Captain Stubbs, with a sneer.

"But my daughter," continued Mr Cameron, without noticing the impertinent interruption, "has, I believe, some little skill in these matters, and will be happy, I doubt not, to make some attempt to produce the dish you speak of; I will not, however, answer for her success."

"Your daughter, Mr A—a—a; ay, your daughter," said Captain Stubbs; "why, let me see—yes, let her try it; but, zounds, if she spoil it, it shall be at her peril. No, no," he added, after a moment's thought—"I'll tell you what, Mr Cameron—as it would be a devil of a business to have the thing botched, I suppose I must give instructions about it myself: so, pray, order every one out of your kitchen but your cook, and I shall go down-stairs presently, and see the thing properly done. In the meantime, Mr Thingumbob, call in your daughter, that I may have some conversation with her on the subject, that I may learn how far she may be trusted in this affair."

Mr Cameron immediately rung the bell, and desired the servant who obeyed the summons to inform his daughter that he wished to see her immediately. "And, that she may not be altogether unprepared," he added, "say to her that I wish to introduce her to Captain Stubbs."

"Ah!" ejaculated the latter, with a supercilious nod, in acknowledgment of his acquiescence in the terms of the message. In a few minutes, Miss Cameron entered the apartment. "Ah! Miss Cameron, I presume," said the captain, with a haughty inclination of his head, but without moving from his seat. "Your father, madam," he continued, "tells me that you know something of le grand cuisine. Now, pray, madam, how do you compound your sauce for a fowl, à la Condé? Eh, ma'am? Answer me that, if you please. Do you use chopped veal or not? If you don't, you spoil the dish—that's all. I've seen mutton used, but it's downright abomination."

"Why, sir," replied Miss Cameron, haughtily, shocked and disgusted with the insolence and gross epicureanism of the brute, "I am not accustomed to be catechised on these subjects, or on any other, in the very peculiar manner which you seem to have adopted."

"No!" exclaimed the gallant captain, starting up to a sitting posture, and at the same time seizing his shirt-collars with finger and thumb, and tugging them up at least another inch higher on his face. "I say, you are uncivil, and confoundedly unpolite, madam. I am a king's officer, madam—and a soldier, madam—and, by heavens, neither man nor woman shall insult Captain Stubbs with impunity!"

"Nobly said, captain!" replied Miss Cameron, with an air of the mock heroic; "draw your sword, sir, and lay your insulter dead at your feet; or, if you are not altogether so sanguinary, you may send me a challenge by my waiting-maid, who, I daresay, will have no objection to act as my second in any little affair of honour—such as this is likely to be."

"Miss Cameron, madam—Mr Cameron," stuttered and sputtered out Captain Stubbs, starting to his feet, his face reddening with rage, and every feature exhibiting symptoms of the high indignation which he felt—"Mr Cameron, sir, I command you, sir, in the king's name, to turn your daughter out of this apartment, otherwise I shall order up half-a-dozen of my fellows, with pistol and sabre, to drive her from my presence; and it is not improbable, sir, that I may have her apprehended, and tried, and shot as a rebel, sir."

Whilst delivering himself of this appalling speech, Captain Stubbs strutted up and down the apartment, chafing with rage; at one time impatiently tugging on his gloves, at another buttoning up his coat with an air of determination, which he thought, no doubt, would strike terror into the breasts of his auditors.

Mr Cameron, unwilling that matters should be carried any farther, and still desirous to keep up appearances with his guest, now approached his daughter; and, taking her gently by the hand, and at the same time leading her towards the door—

"Grace," he said, "I think you had better retire. You do not appear disposed," he added—smiling in his daughter's face as he spoke, but taking care to conceal this expression of his real feelings from the enraged captain—"to make yourself agreeable to-day; and therefore it may be as well that you carry your temper to some other quarter."

"Oh, certainly, sir, since it is your pleasure," replied Miss Cameron, tripping towards the door, where she stood for an instant—looked full at the captain—said she would expect to hear from him at his convenience, as to time, place, and weapons—made him a stately curtsey, and left the apartment.

When she had gone—"Don't think I am afraid of her, Mr Cameron," said Captain Stubbs. "I am a man, sir, and a soldier, sir," he continued, still pacing the room, in great indignation at the treatment he had received from his fair antagonist, "and not to be frightened with trifles; but I say, Mr A—a—," he added, in a more subdued tone, "as I am not a man to permit such small occurrences as this to direct my attention from any important object I may have in view, I beg to know distinctly what you have for dinner, and I insist upon you, at the same time, recollecting, sir, that I am a king's officer, sir, and have a right to civil treatment."

"What sort of dinner you are to have, Captain Stubbs," replied Mr Cameron, "I really do not exactly know; but you may rest assured that, in so far as it lies with me, you shall have civil treatment; and I request of you to point out to me in what way I may contribute to your comfort."

"Ah! well—very well," replied Captain Stubbs. "Am I, then, or am I not, to have a fowl à la Condé, sir—eh?"

"Surely, sir," said his host; "if any of my people can prepare such a dish as you speak of, you shall have it."

"What the devil, then!" exclaimed Stubbs, passionately; "and am I to lose my dinner if your Hottentots shouldn't happen to know how to cook it? No! hang me, sir, I'll superintend the thing myself. I'll do it with my own hands, if you will show me the way to your kitchen."

With this request Mr Cameron immediately complied, by marshalling the captain to the scene of his proposed labours. On arriving in the kitchen, he forthwith prepared himself for the work he was about to undertake, by throwing off his regimental coat, rolling up his shirt-sleeves to his shoulders, and seizing on a large carving-knife which happened to be lying within his reach. Thus prepared, Captain Stubbs, after having been provided, by his own special orders, with a pair of choice fowls, lemon juice, bacon, parsley, thyme, bay-leaf, cloves, &c. &c., commenced operations; and, forgetting his dignity in his devotion to good living, he might now be seen smeared, from finger-ends to elbows, with grease and offal, earnestly engaged in disembowelling, with his own hands, the fowls on which he meant to exercise his gastronomic skill.

Leaving Captain Stubbs, of his majesty's —— regiment of horse, thus becomingly employed, we shall return to a personage who, we should suppose, will be fully more interesting to the reader. This is Grace Cameron. That lady, on leaving the presence of her father, and him of the fowl à la Condé, returned to her own apartment, when, recollecting that the dragoons were still in front of the house, she walked up to the window, to gratify her curiosity by taking another peep at the warlike display; and it was while thus employed that Miss Cameron, for the first time, perceived that there was a prisoner amongst the soldiers. The prisoner was a boy of about thirteen or fourteen years of age. He was mounted behind one of the dragoons, to whom he was secured by a cord, which was passed round the bodies of both. Grace thought she perceived that the boy looked up at the windows of the house with more earnestness and anxiety than curiosity; and, when his eye at length rested on that she occupied, he threw a peculiar intelligence into his look, accompanied by certain expressive but almost imperceptible signs, that convinced her that he was desirous of holding some communication with her. Satisfied of this, Grace raised the window at which she stood, and beckoned to the serjeant of the troop to approach nearer. He rode up to within a few yards of the house.

"Is that poor boy a prisoner, sir?" inquired Miss Cameron.

"Yes, ma'am," replied the serjeant, touching his hat.

"For what has he been taken up? What has he done?"

"Done, ma'am! Lord love you, ma'am—excuse me—he has done nothing as I knows of; but our captain suspects him of being a rebel."

"Where did you fall in with him?"

"Why, ma'am, we picked him up on the road as we came along this morning. Captain saw him skulking behind a hedge. 'There's a blackguard-looking rascal, serjeant,' says he. 'He has the rebel cut about him as perfect as a picture. Pick him up, and strap him to one of the fellows, and we'll see what the cat-o'-nine-tails will bring out of him.'"

"Gracious heaven!" exclaimed Grace, shocked at this instance of military despotism, "is it possible that such a state of things exists—that you can apprehend and punish whomsoever you please, without a shadow of crime being established against them? You cannot have such a power, serjeant. It is impossible."

"Oh, bless you, ma'am, but we have, though," replied the serjeant. "Captain may hang or shoot a dozen every day, if he has a mind, without ever axing them a question. We could never get through our work otherwise; and, as to this young rogue's being a rebel, there's no doubt of it. He's all in rags; and, as captain says, every poor-looking ragged rascal is sure to be a rebel."

"Pretty grounds, truly, on which to subject a man to the treatment of a felon!" said Miss Cameron. "However," she continued, "will it be any dereliction of your duty, serjeant, to permit me to speak for a moment with the unfortunate lad?"

"By no means, ma'am," replied the serjeant. "Provided he's kept fast till captain's pleasure is known regarding him, I don't see it signifies a pinch of gunpowder who speaks to him."

Availing herself of the permission granted her, Grace was in an instant afterwards beside the prisoner, whose looks brightened up with an expression of extreme delight as she approached him. After asking the lad a few trivial questions, she observed him cautiously stealing something forth from a concealment in his dress. It was a letter. Watching an opportunity, he slipped this document unperceived into her hand.

Trembling with agitation, although she knew not well for what, Grace crammed the letter into her bosom, and saying to its bearer that she would speak with him again, she hurried into the house, and sought a retired apartment, when, pulling it from her bosom, she discovered, from the handwriting of the address, that it was from Malcolm M'Gregor. With a beating heart and trembling hand, she opened it, and read—

"Dearest Grace,—All is lost. The Prince's army is defeated and dispersed, and I am now a wandering fugitive in my native land, with the axe of the executioner suspended over my neck. This is a dreadful reverse, and carries with it destruction to all our hopes—to mine, individually, utter annihilation. I have only time to add, dearest Grace, that, if I can escape the bloodhounds that are in pursuit of us, I must seek safety in a foreign land. I will, however, endeavour to see you before I go. I must see you, Grace, and shall do so at all hazards. I have hitherto escaped unhurt. God bless you," &c. &c.

With mingled feelings of joy and grief—joy to find that her lover still lived, and had escaped the dangers of the battle-field, and grief for the unfortunate position in which he was now placed—Grace returned the letter to her bosom, and hastily left the apartment, when she was met by her father, who insisted upon her joining Captain Stubbs and himself at dinner; requesting her, at the same time, to conduct herself in a conciliatory way to the captain, and thus to endeavour to make her peace with him, as he was such a man, he said, as might occasion them trouble, if allowed to leave the house with any feelings of irritation towards them.

Obedient to her father's commands, Grace joined the party, and not only avoided giving Stubbs any farther offence, but got so far into his good graces that she actually prevailed on him to order the release of the boy who had been the bearer of Malcolm's letter—an order which Grace took care to see immediately fulfilled; nay, Captain Stubbs not only did this, but began, after dinner, when his temper had been mollified by the good things of which he had partaken, to play the gallant—and in this character he was standing at a window with Miss Cameron, when, suddenly dropping the awkward badinage which he had been attempting—

"But who the devil have we got here?" he exclaimed, his eye having caught a man in a mean dress, who, on discovering the dragoons as he approached the house, suddenly stopped short, and, in evident surprise and alarm, sprung to one side of the road, and endeavoured to conceal himself behind a low and rather thin hedge that ran parallel to the house, and directly in front of it. Stubbs pointed him out to Miss Cameron; she started, and turned pale; for, meanly dressed as he was, she at once recognised in the stranger her lover, Malcolm M'Gregor. He had come, she doubted not, in this disguise, to pay the visit which his letter had promised. In the meantime, Stubbs, flushed with the wine he had drunk, and desirous of showing Miss Cameron his promptitude and energy on sudden emergencies, threw up the window violently, and called out to the soldiers to pursue the fugitive, and to fire upon him, if he did not surrender himself. It was in vain that Miss Cameron—at this trying moment forgetting the additional danger to which the warm and earnest expressions of her interest in the fate of her lover would subject him—implored Captain Stubbs to allow him to escape.

"For Heaven's sake," she exclaimed, in the agony of her feelings, and seizing him almost convulsively by the hand as she spoke, "do not commit murder! Do not send the soldiers after him, captain. I will do anything for you—I will go on my bended knees to you," said the distracted girl, "if you will call your men back, and allow him to escape." To this appeal Stubbs made no other reply than by repeating, with additional vehemence, his orders to the soldiers; half-a-dozen of whom, with the serjeant at their head, now galloped furiously off in the direction which he pointed out. Then, turning round to Miss Cameron, with a look of mingled triumph and self-complacency—

"Why, madam," he said, "we must do our duty. We soldiers mustn't stand on trifles. The fellow must be shot; and, if he isn't shot, he must be hanged—that's all; so there's but two ways of it—eh? Tight work that, madam, isn't it—eh?"

At this instant, the report of a carbine was heard, and immediately after, another and another.

"Oh heavens! they have killed him, they have killed him!" exclaimed Miss Cameron, covering her face with her hands, and throwing herself into a seat, in an agony of horror and despair. "They have murdered him, the ruthless savages. Oh Malcolm, my beloved Malcolm! that you had never loved me, that you had never looked on this fatal face!—for it is I, and I alone, that have been the cause of your cruel and untimely death." And here the violence of her feelings choked her utterance, and she burst into a flood of tears.

Fortunately Captain Stubbs was too intently occupied in watching the proceedings of the party who were in pursuit of the fugitive, to hear all that Miss Cameron had permitted to escape her in her agony; or, indeed, to notice her distress at all. Quizzing-glass in hand, he was employed in looking at the chase, and ever and anon giving utterance to the various feelings which its various turns excited.

"Ha, you've pinned him at last, serjeant," muttered the captain, in his own peculiar and elegant phraseology, on perceiving the fugitive stumble and fall, immediately after a carbine had been discharged at him by the officer just named.

"No, you blind rascal," again muttered Stubbs, on seeing the fallen man taking once more to his feet, and clearing hedges and ditches with an activity that sufficiently showed he had sustained, at any rate, no serious injury. "You haven't touched him. I'll have you back to the ranks again for that, you scoundrel, or my name's not Stubbs." And, after a moment's pause—"Ay, ay, you villain," he added, "he's off, he's off; you'll never get within shot of him again. Hang me, if I don't get every man of you flogged to death for this!"

When Captain Stubbs said the fugitive had escaped, he was right. The nature of the ground had been all along greatly in his favour, being so interspersed and encumbered with hedges, ditches, walls, and trees, that the dragoons had little or no chance of ever being able to overtake him, should he escape their carbines; and these had hitherto been discharged at him without effect.

The last effort of the fugitive—that which secured his final escape, and which had called forth the expressions of Captain Stubbs' displeasure—was his plunging into a thick plantation that grew on the face of a steep and rocky hill, where it was impossible for the troopers to pursue him. The latter finding this, two or three shots were discharged at random into the wood; a volley of oaths followed, and the pursuit was abandoned.

The dragoons turned their horses' heads towards Duntruskin House, where they soon after rejoined their comrades.

During the pursuit, Miss Cameron awaited its result in deep but silent wretchedness, till, aroused by the delightful intelligence communicated involuntarily by Stubbs, that the fugitive yet lived—

"He is not killed, then!" she exclaimed, in a paroxysm of rapture, starting from her seat, her face flushed with joy, and her soft dark eye beaming with inexpressible happiness. "He is not killed, then!" she said, rushing wildly to the window. "Oh, thank God, thank God for his mercies!" she exclaimed, on perceiving that the fugitive appeared to be still unhurt, and that he was continuing his exertions to escape, with unabated energy.

Unable, however, to look longer upon the doubtful and critical struggle between the pursuers and the pursued, she had again retired from the window, and again her fears for the eventual safety of her lover had returned. These, however, Captain Stubbs' latter exclamations had once more removed.

"Off! is he off?" she wildly repeated, taking up the words in which the joyful event had been communicated; and she again flew to the window. "Dear Captain Stubbs," she exclaimed—forgetting in the excitation of the moment all former feelings and antipathies regarding him she addressed—"is he indeed off? Has—has"—and she was about to pronounce the name of M'Gregor, when a sudden recollection of the imprudence of doing so struck her, and she merely added, "has the man really escaped?" Having quickly satisfied herself that it was so, Miss Cameron, unable longer to control the warm and overflowing sense of gratitude which she felt towards the Omnipotent Being who had protected the beloved object of her affections in the moment of peril, clasped her hands together, looked upwards with a countenance strongly expressive of thankfulness and joy, and breathed a short but fervent prayer of thanksgiving.

The scene was one which Stubbs could not comprehend. He thought it very odd, but he said nothing. In a few seconds after, Grace left the apartment—a step to which she was urged by two motives. Captain Stubbs had threatened that he would instantly go himself, with his whole troop, on foot, to search the wood in which the fugitive had concealed himself—a measure which, if executed, would almost certainly secure the capture of M'Gregor, or, at least, render it a very probable event. The other motive, proceeding from this circumstance, was, to see whether she could not fall on any means of preventing the threatened expedition.

On leaving the apartment, Grace met the serjeant on his way to Captain Stubbs, to make his report of the proceeding in which he had just been engaged. Without well knowing for what precise purpose, but with some general idea that she might prevail on him, by some means or other, to second her views in defeating the object of Stubbs' proposed search, she stopped him, and hurriedly conducted him into an unoccupied apartment.

"Oh, serjeant!" she exclaimed, in great agitation, and scarcely knowing what she said, "will you—will you do me a favour—a great favour, serjeant? For God's sake, do not refuse me!"

The man looked at her in utter amazement.

"Your captain," continued Grace, "proposes renewing the pursuit of the person that has just escaped you. I am interested in that person. Now, serjeant, will you do what you can to prevent this search taking place, or to render it unavailing if it does?" And with these last words she put a purse, containing ten guineas, into the serjeant's hand.

The man looked from the gift to the giver, and again from the latter to the former, in silent astonishment, for several seconds. At length—

"Why, miss," he said, "since you are in such a taking about this matter, and as I don't mind a poor fellow's escaping now and then, I will do what I can to serve you in the case." And he put the purse into his pocket.

"Oh, thank you, serjeant, thank you!—God bless you for these words!" said Grace, in a rapture of joy. "But how—how, serjeant, will you manage it?"

"Oh, leave me alone for that, miss," replied the latter; "I knows how to manage it, and I'll do it effectually, I warrant you. I can send captain in any direction I please on the shortest notice. He don't like the smell of gunpowder, though he be a soldier; and, when he can, always follows the wind that brings it."

In a few minutes after, Serjeant Higginbotham was in the presence of the pink of chivalry, Captain Stubbs. Having informed the latter briefly of the result of the pursuit, he added, that, when he was out, he had seen "something suspicious."

"What was it?" inquired Stubbs, in a tone and with a look of alarm.

"Why, sir," responded the serjeant, "a crowd of people assembled on the face of the hill where the fellow escaped us."

"The devil! Are they rebels, think you, serjeant?" said the captain, with increased perturbation.

"And, please your honour, I think as how there is no doubt of it," replied Higginbotham.

"In great force, you say, serjeant?" added Stubbs; "in overwhelming force—madness to attack them—you can depone on oath before a court-martial?"

"To be sure I can, sir," rejoined the former.

"That's a good fellow; order my horse to the door instantly, and let the men fall in."

These orders were immediately obeyed; and in the next instant Captain Stubbs appeared at the door.

"In what direction are these rascals?" he said, addressing the serjeant, as he was about to mount his charger.

"In that direction, your honour," replied the latter, pointing towards the place of M'Gregor's concealment.

"Ah!" ejaculated Captain Stubbs; and, in a moment after, he was in full gallop, followed by his whole troop, in the opposite direction.

We should certainly fail, were we to attempt to describe the joy of Grace Cameron when she beheld the departure of the dragoons. That joy, as will readily be believed, was extreme.

For some time after the troopers had left the house, Grace continued to keep her eye on the spot where M'Gregor had disappeared, in the hope that he would again show himself. Nor was she mistaken. Malcolm appeared also to have been able to see from his hiding-place the departure of the soldiers; for they had not been more than a quarter-of-an-hour gone, when he again appeared at the skirts of the wood where he had been concealed, and made towards the house. On recognising him, Grace hastened out to meet him.

This meeting we need not describe, as it very much resembled all other meetings of a similar kind—only that it was, perhaps, a little more interesting, from the peculiar situation of the parties. The lovers had much to say to each other, and much was said in a very small space of time. Amongst other things, Malcolm informed Grace that it was his intention to request her father for an asylum for three or four days, when, he said, it was his intention to proceed to the coast, and to endeavour to effect his escape from thence to France.

The asylum that Malcolm requested was readily granted by Mr Cameron, and a place of concealment was found for him, which promised every security—and there was need that it should; for, on the following day, the surrounding country was filled with soldiers, who were everywhere making the strictest search for the fugitive insurgents; and of these several parties had already paid domiciliary visits to Duntruskin House.

The constant state of terror and alarm for the safety of her lover, in which these visits kept Grace Cameron, and the imminent risk he ran of being discovered, at length suggested to the romantic girl an undertaking which well accorded with her strong affection and noble spirit; but which certainly, had it been known, must have appeared to all but herself as utterly hopeless.

On the second day after the occurrence just related, Grace, seizing such an opportunity as she thought favourable for her purpose, suddenly flung her arms around her father's neck, and said, smiling affectionately in his face as she spoke—

"Father, I am going to ask you a favour."

"Well, Grace, my dear," replied he, "I tell you, before you ask it, that, if it be reasonable in itself, and within my power, I shall grant it."

"Thank you, my dear father," said Grace; "but I am afraid you will not think it reasonable. Nevertheless, you must grant it."

"Nay, Grace, that's more than I bargain for," rejoined Mr Cameron, laughing. "But let me know what it is you want, and I shall then be better able to judge of its propriety."

"Well, then, father," replied Grace, "will you allow me to go from home for two days, to take my pony with me—for I mean to travel—and allow Macpherson to accompany me?"

"Where do you propose going to, Grace?" inquired her father, rather gravely.

"That's a question, father," said his daughter, "that relates to a part of the bargain I mean to drive with you which I have not yet arrived at, and which will seem to you the most unreasonable of the whole, I daresay. You must not ask me where I am going to, nor what I'm going to do. On my return, you shall know all."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Mr Cameron; "why, this is certainly strange, Grace—I don't understand it; and, what is more, I must say I do not like it; but, as I have every reliance on your good sense and discretion, my child, I will grant your request. But I really wish you would tell me what it means; for you cannot suppose that I can be otherwise than uneasy till you return."

"I have your unconditional consent, father, to my terms," said Grace, playfully; "so you must not put any questions; and, as to your being uneasy about me, I assure you there is not the slightest occasion; for my project involves no chance whatever of personal injury to myself."

"Well, well, Grace," replied her father, "since you assure me of that, and since I have certainly given my consent to your request, I will keep my word. You may go when you please."

Delighted with her success, Grace flew to give the necessary orders regarding her intended journey; and amongst these were instructions to Macpherson—a favourite servant of long standing in the family—to have her pony, and a horse for himself, in readiness at an early hour on the following morning. When this hour arrived, it found Grace and her attendant jogging forward, at a pretty round pace, on the road leading to the town of Inverness.

Leaving her to prosecute her mysterious journey, we shall return to Duntruskin House, where a scene was about to occur of no ordinary interest.

On the second day after Grace's departure, a young Irish officer, who had been in the service of the Pretender, and who was well acquainted with both Mr Cameron and M'Gregor—with the latter intimately, as they had served together—arrived at Duntruskin House. He, too, was a fugitive, and was now endeavouring to find his way back to Ireland, and to avoid the numerous military parties that were scouring the country.

This gentleman, whose name was Terence Sullivan, was a genuine Milesian. He was frank, open, generous, warmhearted, and brave to a fault; for he was rash and impetuous, and never stopped an instant to reckon on the odds that might be against him in any case, either of love or war. On he went, reckless of consequences and fearless of results. Terence was thus, in truth, rather a dangerous ally in cases where either caution, deliberation, or forbearance, was necessary, and where their opposites were attended with peril. Such as he was, however, he now appeared at Duntruskin, on his way to the coast for the purpose already mentioned. But Mr Sullivan brought a piece of intelligence with him which it was rather singular he should have fallen in with; and it was intelligence that greatly surprised and alarmed both Cameron and M'Gregor. This was, that the place of concealment of the latter was known, and that he might every moment expect to be apprehended; and, to show that his information was well founded, he described the place of M'Gregor's retreat with such accuracy that it was instantly recognised, and left no doubt that a special information on the subject had been laid by some person or other. Sullivan said that the way in which he came by the intelligence was this:—He had slept on the preceding night in a small public-house, and having been much fatigued, had retired early to bed. This bed was in a recess in the wall, with a sliding-door on its front, which he drew close. Soon after he had lain down, a party of military came to the house in quest of refreshments; and, being shown into the apartment where he lay, he overheard all that passed amongst them; and part of this conversation, he said, was what he had just communicated.

On receiving this startling intelligence, Mr Cameron hastened to inform M'Gregor of his danger, when an earnest conversation ensued between them as to what steps the latter ought now to take to secure his safety.

Leaving them for an instant thus employed, we will return to Terence, who, having been left alone by Mr Cameron while he went to speak with his protegé, had taken his station at a window which overlooked the approach to the house, and was there humming away, with great spirit, one of his lively national airs, when his eye was suddenly caught by the red coats of a party of dragoons advancing towards the house. Terence's eye instantly brightened up with an almost joyous expression when he saw them; for he anticipated some amusement in the way of fighting, as he took it for granted that the house was to be defended to the last extremity. Having at once settled this point, he hurriedly looked about the apartment, to see whether he could not find any eligible weapon wherewith to resist the approaching foe; and in this particular his luck was singularly great indeed. Over the fireplace there hung a rifle gun and a flask of powder, and on the mantelpiece were several bullets that fitted to a hair—the very things wanted. Never was man so fortunate. Delighted beyond measure with his good luck, Terence seized the rifle, loaded it in a twinkling, and again took his place at the window, which he now banged up to its utmost height, and stood ready for mischief; never dreaming that it was at all necessary to consult the master of the house as to the manner in which he meant to receive his visiters, or conceiving that anything else could be thought of in the case but fighting.

"Blessings on them, the darlings! There they are," said Terence to himself, as he stood at the window in the way already described, "as large as life, and as lively as two-year olds." Muttering this, he raised his rifle, and, putting it on full cock, "You'll see now, my jewels," he added, "how beautifully I'll turn over that fellow on the white charger."

He fired, and almost in the same instant the unfortunate man whom he had selected fell lifeless from his horse.

Terence gave a shout of joy and triumph at the success of his shot, and was proceeding with the utmost expedition to reload, when his arm was suddenly seized from behind by Mr Cameron, who, in amazement at his proceedings, and in great distress for their very serious result, which he had seen from another part of the house, had hastened to the apartment where he was.

"Good heavens, Mr Sullivan! what is the meaning of this?—what are you doing?—what have you done?" he exclaimed, in great agitation. "We shall be all put to the sword—by the laws of war, our lives are forfeited. It was foolish—it was madness, Mr Sullivan!"

"Faith, my dear fellow," replied Terence, not a little astonished that his proceedings should have been found fault with, "you may call it what you please; but no man shall ever convince Terence Sullivan that it's either folly or madness to kill an enemy when you can."

At this moment they were joined by M'Gregor; and in the next instant the commanding officer of the troop—a very different man from Stubbs—entered the apartment, with his drawn sword in one hand, and a pistol in the other, and followed by about a dozen of his men; the remainder being drawn up in front of the house.

"Gentlemen," said the officer, on his entrance, "you perceive, I trust, that further resistance will be vain, and can only bring down destruction on your own heads."

"Not so fast, my good fellow—we perceive nothing of the kind," exclaimed Terence, forcibly releasing himself from the grip which Mr Cameron still held of him, and, in the next instant, preparing his rifle for another charge. "Just keep off a bit, and let us have fair play for our money. Shot about, my beautiful fellows. It's all I ask, and no gentleman can refuse so reasonable a request."

"Terence, Terence!" exclaimed Mr Cameron, again laying his hand on the right arm of his hot-headed friend, "listen to me, I beseech you, as a special favour. I request of you, I beg of you, to desist."

"Well, well, my dear fellow," replied Terence, somewhat doggedly, and at the same time resting the butt of his rifle on the floor, "do as you please, only it's a cursed pity you wouldn't allow a few shots to be exchanged between these gentlemen and me, if it were only for the respectability of your own house."

"Don't you know, sir," here interposed the commanding officer of the party, addressing Terence, "that by the laws of war I could——"

"Och, no more of that blarney, if you please, my dear fellow," interrupted Terence, impatiently. "Mr Cameron has told me all about that already."

"If he has, then, sir," said the officer, haughtily, "you know the extent of the obligation you lie under to my clemency."

Terence was about to reply to this insinuation, and probably in no very measured terms, when he was stopped short by Mr Cameron, who dreaded that some immediate act of violence would result from the continuance of this irritating conversation.

"Mr Cameron," said the officer, now proceeding to the real purpose of his visit, "my business here is to make this gentleman"—and he bowed slightly to M'Gregor—"my prisoner, although this is not precisely the spot in which I expected to find him. I feel it to be a painful duty, sir," he said, now directly addressing Malcolm; "but it is unavoidable."

"I am aware of it, sir," replied the latter, "and am obliged by the consideration which induces you to say it is unpleasant to you. I have no doubt it is. I am ready to attend you, sir."

The officer bowed, and now turning to Terence, "You will please, also, sir, consider yourself as my prisoner. Your rashness and folly have placed you in a very precarious predicament. Serjeant," he added, addressing a non-commissioned officer, "remain here, keeping six men with you, with these gentlemen, till I return; and see that you guard against escape."

Saying this, he again bowed, and left the apartment. In a minute after he was mounted, and off with his troop, in pursuit of some object of a similar kind with that which had brought him to Duntruskin.

"This is a devil of a business, Mac," said Terence, when the officer had left the apartment; then sinking his voice, so as to be heard only by Malcolm—"but I think we three might clear the room of these fellows, if we set to it with right good-will. What say you to try? I'll begin."

"Hush," said M'Gregor, under his breath—"madness, Terence, madness. We are fairly in for it, and must just abide the consequences. Our doom is sealed. In plain English, we must hang for it, Terence."

"Faith, and that we won't, if we can help it, Mac; and we'll try whether it can be helped or not," said Terence. "We'll get the fellows drunk, if we can, and that will be always one step gained.—I say, serjeant," he added, now speaking out, and confronting the person he addressed, "I think you're a countryman of my own."

"I don't know, sir," replied the serjeant, in a brogue that at once showed Terence's conjecture was right—"I am from Ireland."

"I thought so," rejoined the latter. "I saw potatoes and butter-milk written on your sweet countenance as plain as a pike-staff. Perhaps, now, you wouldn't have any objection to take a small matter of refreshment yourself, nor to allow your men to partake of it, if our friend, Mr Cameron here, would be kind enough to offer it."

"No, certainly not, sir," replied the serjeant.

"Mr Cameron," continued Terence, and now turning to the person he named, "would ye be good enough to order a little whisky for the lads here; for we'll have a long march of it by and by, and they'll be the better of something to help them over the stones."

A large black bottle of the stimulative spoken of by Terence was instantly brought; when the latter, installing himself master of the ceremonies, seized it, and began to deal about its contents with unsparing liberality.

"Come now, my lads," he said, after having completed three rounds of the black-jack, "make yourselves as comfortable as a rat in a corn-chest. Here's the stuff," he continued, slapping the bottle, and commencing a fourth progress with it, "that'll make ye forget the sins and sorrows of your wicked, lives. Won't it now, serjeant?"

"Troth and it will, sir, I'll be sworn," replied the latter, whose eyes were already twinkling in his head, and his articulation fast thickening into utter unintelligibility; "it's as good for one as a sight of the quartermaster at pay-day."

"Right, serjeant, right," exclaimed Terence; "I see your education hasn't been neglected. You have had some experience of the world, serjeant, and know some of its hardships."

"Faith, and it's yourself, sir, may say that of a man who has been hundreds of times in the saddle thirteen days out of the fortnight; living in the air, as one may say, night and day, and never allowed to put his foot on the ground, no more than if it had been covered with china tea-cups."

"No joke, serjeant—by my faith, no joke," replied Terence; and again he made a round with the bottle, a proceeding which brought matters fairly to a crisis. The faces of the soldiers suddenly became as red as their coats; their eyes began to dance in their heads; and they were now all talking together at the tops of their voices, shouting out at intervals, "Long life and glory" to their entertainer. Nor was the serjeant himself in any better condition than his men; but his genius, under the influence of liquor, took a musical direction, and he began trolling scraps of songs; for, as his memory failed him in almost every instance in these attempts, he was compelled to make up by variety what he wanted in continuous matter. Thus favourably, then, were affairs going on for Terence's design; and there was every appearance that the men would soon be in such a state as should render escape from them a matter of no very difficult accomplishment. But lo! just as the flow of mirth and good-fellowship had attained its height, another serjeant, detached with an additional half-dozen of men, from the troop that had visited the house in the morning, suddenly entered the apartment, with orders from the commanding officer, to the effect that the party which had been left with the prisoners should proceed immediately to Fort George with Sullivan, and that they themselves were to remain with M'Gregor till their officer came.

This, as will readily be believed, was by no means welcome intelligence, as it threatened to render the attempt to unfit the soldiers for their duty abortive, in so far as the object of doing so was concerned. This, indeed, it fully effected as regarded Malcolm's escape, since he was to be left behind; while it rendered Terence's much more precarious than if the debauch had been allowed to proceed.

Terence, however, did not feel that all chance of escape was yet lost. He hoped that what he had not had time to effect at Duntruskin, he should be able to accomplish while they were on the march; and he resolved to watch with the utmost vigilance for such an opportunity as was necessary to success in his intended attempt.

In the meantime, preparations were made, in obedience to the order just received, for the march of Terence's escort with their prisoner. An affecting parting now took place between M'Gregor and Sullivan, especially on the part of the former, who deemed it a last farewell—an opinion, however, in which he was by no means joined by his friend, who, with the natural buoyancy of his disposition, and cheerful and sanguine temper, entertained strong hopes of being able to give his guards the slip; and he bade Malcolm good-by with all the hilarity of manner and brightness of countenance which these hopes inspired.

The drunken troopers now staggered out of the apartment one after the other—their swords tripping them at every step, and several of them with their caps turned the wrong way—next came Terence, and lastly the serjeant, trolling, as he left the room—

"I'm bother'd with whisky, I'm bother'd with love;
I'm bother'd with this, and I'm bother'd with that;
I'm bother'd at home, and I'm bother'd abroad;
And it's all botheration together, says Pat."

M'Gregor went to the window, to see what he had no doubt was the last of his poor friend, Sullivan—and he soon had this melancholy satisfaction. In a few minutes, the party appeared proceeding down the avenue, with Terence in the centre, mounted on one of the dragoon's horses—a favour which his uproarious good-fellowship at Duntruskin had procured for him. He caught a sight of Malcolm just as he and his escort were about to take a turn in the road that would conceal them from each other, and waved an adieu, accompanied by one of his characteristic shouts, which, though plainly enough indicated by his gestures, was, from the distance, unheard by him for whose edification it was intended.

In about an hour after the departure of Terence Sullivan, the commanding officer of the party, who had been at Duntruskin House in the morning, appeared riding up the avenue at the head of his troop. In a few minutes afterward, he was again in the apartment with M'Gregor.

"We will now proceed, sir, if you please," he said, on entering. "Are you ready?"

"I believe I must say I am, sir," replied Malcolm, with as much composure as he could command.

"Nay," said the officer, who marked his agitation; "you need not say you are, if you are not. Is there anything you wish yet done before you go? Any one you wish to see?"

"There is—there is one I wish to see, sir—one to whom I should have wished to have bidden farewell," said Malcolm, with an emotion which he could not conceal; "but I know not when she may be here, and——"

"She is here, Malcolm—she is here," said Grace, at this instant rushing into the apartment.

Malcolm flew towards her. "God be thanked, Grace, you are come! I would have been miserable, if I had not seen you before I went. A few minutes later, Grace, and we should never have beheld each other more. We have now met," he added, "for the last time."

"No, no, Malcolm; we have not, we have not," said Grace, hurriedly, and in great agitation, taking a letter from her bosom, which, with a blush and a curtsey, she presented to Major Ormsby—the name of the officer already so often alluded to. He bowed as he received it; and, unfolding it, began to read. The perusal did not occupy him an instant. The matter was short but effective. Having read it, he advanced towards Malcolm with extended hand, and said—

"Allow me, sir, to congratulate you on your restoration to freedom, and to an immunity from all danger on account of certain late transactions which you wot of." And, as he said this, he smiled significantly. "You are at liberty, Mr M'Gregor. I have no more control over you, and have therefore to regret that I shall not have the pleasure of your company to Fort-George, as I expected."

"What does all this mean, sir?" inquired Malcolm, in the utmost amazement.

"Why, sir, it means simply that you are a free man," replied Major Ormsby. "And here is at once my authority for saying so and my warrant for releasing you." And he read:—

"This is to discharge all officers of his majesty's government, civil and military, and all other persons whatsoever, from apprehending, or in any other ways molesting, Malcolm M'Gregor, Esq. of Strontian, for his concern in the late rebellion; and, if he be already taken, this shall be sufficient warrant for those detaining him to set him at liberty, which they are hereby required to do forthwith.

"Cumberland.

"At Inverness, the 19th day of
April, 1746."

"Grace," exclaimed Malcolm, in a transport of joy, when Major Ormsby had concluded, "this is your doing, noble and generous girl. It is to you, and to you alone, that I am indebted for life and liberty. But how, how on earth, Grace, did you accomplish it?" he added, taking her affectionately by the hand.

The explanation was a brief one. She had gone to Inverness—had sought and obtained an interview with the Duke of Cumberland—had implored him for a pardon to her lover, and to the amazement of those who were present on the occasion, had succeeded. Her youth, her beauty, the natural eloquence of her appeal, and the romance of the circumstance altogether, had touched the merciless conqueror, and had betrayed him for once into an act of humanity and generosity.

After partaking of some refreshment, Major Ormsby with his troop left Duntruskin, and the happiness of Malcolm would have been complete only for one circumstance. This was the miserable situation of his poor friend, Sullivan; presenting, as it did, such a contrast to his own. This, however, was a ground of unhappiness which was soon and most unexpectedly to be removed. In less than two hours after the departure of Major Ormsby, as Malcolm, Miss Cameron, and her father were sitting together, talking over the events of the preceding two or three days, to their inexpressible amazement, Sullivan suddenly burst into the apartment, with a loud shout.

"Haven't I done them, after all, Malcolm?" He exclaimed—"done them beautifully! Didn't I tell you, now, I would give the drunken rogues the slip somewhere? Och! and just give me a bottle of whisky in my fist, and I'll take in hand to bother a saint, let alone a serjeant of dragoons."

We need not describe the joy of the party whom Terence on this occasion addressed, when he appeared amongst them. It was very great, and very sincere. Terence, however, was immediately hurried off by M'Gregor, who dreaded an instant return of the dragoons in quest of him, to a place of concealment at a little distance from the house, where he remained for two days, when he was secretly conveyed by his friend to the coast, and embarked on board a small wherry, hired for the purpose, for his native land, where he arrived in safety on the evening of the following day.

Within a year after these occurrences, Grace Cameron was fully better known in the country by the name of Mrs M'Gregor, than by that which we have just written.

---

THE MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE.

In the very midst of apparent contentedness and happiness, W—— B——, a merchant in Dumfermline, disappeared all at once. No one could tell whither he had gone; and his wife was just as ignorant of his destination or fate as any one else. That he had left the country, could not be supposed, because he had taken nothing with him; that he had made away with himself, was almost as unlikely, seeing that it is not generally in the midst of gaiety and good humour that people commit suicide. Every search, however, was made for him, but all in vain—no trace could be found of him, except that a person who had been near the old ruin called the Magazine, part of the old castle in the neighbourhood of the town, reported that, on the night when he disappeared, he, the narrator, heard in that quarter a very extraordinary soliloquy from the lips of some one in great agony; but that all his efforts (for it was dark) could not enable him to ascertain who or where he was. So far as he could recollect, the words of the person were as follows:—

"The self-destroyer has nae richt to expect a better place." (Groans.) "A' is dark and dismal—a thousand times mair sae than what my fancy ever pictured upon earth. But there will be licht sune, ay, and scorchin fires, and a' the ither terrors o' the place whar the wicked receive the reward o' their sins. If I had again the days to begin, which, when in the body, I spent sae fruitlessly and sinfully, hoo wad I be benefited by this sicht o' the very entrance to the regions o' the miserable? and yet does not the great Author o' guid strive, wi' a never-wearyin energy, by dreams and visions, and revelations and thoughts, which vain man tries to measure and value by the gauge o' his insignificant reason, to show him what I now see, and turn him to the practice o' a better life. This is a narrow pit—there is neither room for the voice o' lamentation, nor for the struggle o' the restless limbs o' the miserable; the light, and the air, and the space, and the view o' the blue heavens, and the fair earth, which mak men proud, as if they were proprietors o' the upper world, and sinfu, as if its joys were made for them, are vanished, and a narrow cell, nae bigger than my body, wi' nae air, nae licht, nae warmth—cauld, dark, lonely, and dismal—is the last and eternal place appointed for the wicked." (Groans.) "On earth men, though sinners, hae the companionship o' men; here my only companion is a gnawin conscience, the true fire o' the lower pit, and a thousand times waur than a' the imagined flames which haunt the minds o' the doers o' evil."

These dreadful words were spoken at intervals, and loud groans bespoke the agony of the sufferer. The individual who heard them, at a loss what to conceive, became alarmed, ran away to get assistance, and, in a short time, returned, with a companion and a light, to search among the old ruins for the individual who was thus apparently suffering under the imagined terrors of the last place of punishment. They looked carefully up and down throughout the place called the Magazine, among the ruins of the castle, and in every hole and cranny of the neighbourhood, but neither could they see any human being, nor hear again any of the extraordinary sounds which had chained the ear of the listener, and roused his terrors. The idea of a supernatural presence was the first that presented itself; and a ghost giving its hollow utterance to the lamentations of its suffering spirit, confined, doubtless, in some of the vaults of the castle, and struggling for that liberty which depends upon the performance of some penance upon earth, was the ready solution of a difficulty which defied all recourse to ordinary means of explanation. Having ascertained that nothing was to be seen or heard, the two friends returned to the town, where they told what had happened. The disappearance about that time of W—— B—— suggested to many a more rational explanation of the mysterious affair; and a number of people adjourned to the Magazine, for the purpose of exploring its dark recesses more thoroughly, under the conviction that the missing individual might be concealed in some part that had not been searched. Every effort was employed, in vain. They penetrated all the holes, and explored all the dark corners—nothing was to be seen, nothing heard; and the conclusion was arrived at, either that the narrator was deceiving or deceived, or that the spirit had ceased to issue its lamentations.

For many days and many years afterwards, no trace could be had of W——B——, nor was there ever even so much as whispered a single statement of any one who had seen him either alive or dead. The food for speculation which the mysterious affair afforded to the minds of the inhabitants was for a time increased by the total want of success which attended all the efforts of inquiry; and, after the fancies of all had been exhausted by the vain work of endeavouring to discover that which seemed to be hid by a higher power from human knowledge, the circumstance degenerated into one of the wonders of nature, supplying the old women with the material of a fireside tale, for the amusement or terror of children. But it would seem that the energies of vulgar everyday life are arrayed with inveterate hostility against the luxury of a mystery so greedily grasped at by all people, however thoroughly liberated from the prejudices of early education or of late sanctification; and accordingly, one day many years after the occurrences now mentioned, as some boys were amusing themselves among the ruins of the old castle, they discovered lying in a hole—called the Piper's Hole, from the circumstance of a piper having once entered it with a pair of bagpipes, which he intended to play on till he reached the end of it, but never returned—the body of a man, reduced to a skeleton, but retaining on his bare bones the clothes which he had worn when in life. It was the body of W—— B——. On searching his pockets, there was found in one of them a few pence, and in another a bottle, with a paper label, marked "Laudanum."

This discovery cleared up all mystery. The unfortunate man had intended to kill himself in such a way as would put his suicidal act beyond the knowledge of his friends, and had resorted to the extraordinary plan of creeping up into the dark and narrow passage, where the action of the fatal soporific had produced the delusion that he was in the place appointed for the wicked, with the soliloquy already detailed, and then death. The physical mystery was cleared up; but a mystery of a moral nature remains, which will bid defiance to the revealing efforts of philosophers—the strength and peculiarity of feeling which, working on a sane mind, produced a purpose so extraordinary, and the resolution to carry it into effect.