In

Now Constantia always was different from the other girls-liked solitude and books, talked little, and had a trick of reverie. short, was what young people call "interesting," and old people "romantic"-the sort of creature who, did she grow up a remarkable woman, would have her youthful peculiarities carefully and respectfully noted, with "I always said there was a great deal in that girl;" but who, did she turn out nothing particular, would be laughed at, and probably would laugh at herself, for having been "very sentimental when she was young." Nevertheless, having at one time of my life shared that imputation, I was tender over the little follies of Constantia.

"I think the girl reads too much, and sits with her eyes too wide open, Martha;-is rather unsocial, likewise. She wanted to get out of the way of the weddings, and positively refused to be Angeline's bridemaid."

Poor

“Ah!” sighed Martha, "that's it. foolish child, to think of falling in love" I almost jumped off my chair. "I'll not hear a word of it-I declare I will not! I'll keep the young fellow off my premises with man-traps and spring-guns. I'll go back to India if you tell me of another 'engagement."

"No chance of that;" and Martha shook her head more drearily than ever. "Poor child, I fear it is an unfortunate attachment!"

I brightened up-so much so that my sister looked, nay, gently hinted, her conviction that I was a "brute." She expected I would have been as sorry as she was!

"No, Martha; I am rather glad. Glad, after my experience of these 'fortunate' loveaffairs, to find that one of my sisters has the womanly courage, unselfishness, and simplicity to conceive an unfortunate' attachment."

Perhaps this speech hurt Martha, and yet it need not. She and I both knew and respected one another's youth; and if we differed in opinion concerning our middle age, why-I was as likely to be wrong as she.

She did not at first reply; and then, with out comment, she explained to me her uneasiness about Constantia. The girl had long played confidante to Mr. Archer in the matter of Angeline, and, as often happens, the confidante had unwittingly taken too great interest in one of her principles, until she found her self envying the lot of the other. When Mr.

VOL. V.

I was touched. Now, no doubt Constantia had been very foolish; no doubt she had nourished and encouraged this fancy, as romantic girls do, in moonlight walks and solitary dreams; hugging her pain, and deluding herself that it was bliss. Little doubt, likewise, that the feeling would wear itself out, or fade slowly away in life's stern truths; but at present it was a most sincere passion, sad and sore. Foolish and romantic as it might be, in itself and in its girlish demonstrations, I could not smile at it. It was a real thing, and as such to be respected.

Martha and I held counsel together, and acted on the result. We took Constantia under our special charge; we gave her books to read, visits to pay, work to do; keeping her as much as possible with one or other of us, and out of the way of the childish flirtation of Cuthbert and Charlotte, or the formal philandering of Sir Roland and the future Lady Griffith Jones. And if sometimes, as Lizzie told me-my little Lizzie, who laughed at love and lovers with the lightness of sixteenConstantia grew impatient with Lotty's careless trifling, and curled her lip scornfully when Angeline paraded the splendours of her trousseau, we tried to lead the girl's mind out of herself, and out of dreamland altogether, as much as possible.

66

"But suppose," Lizzie sagely argued'suppose, when Angeline is married, Mr. Archer should come back? He always liked Constantia extremely. She understood him far better than Angeline. Who knows but

I shook my head, and desired the little castle builder to hold her tongue.

She was our sole sharer of the secret; and I must say, though she laughed at her now and then, Lizzie was extremely loving and patient with Constantia. After a time, we left the two girls wholly to one another, more especially as my time was now taken up with my friend Launceston.

O the comfort, the relief, of the society of a man!-a real honest man-who had some sterling aim and object in life-some steady work to do some earnest interest in the advance of the world, the duties and pursuits of his brother men: who was neither handsome, witty, nor accomplished; who rarely shone in ladies' society; in fact, rather eschewed it than otherwise. For, he said, nature had unfitted him to act the part of a mere admirer, and

98

adverse fortune forbade him to appear in the character of a lover; so he held aloof, keeping his own company and that of one or two old friends like myself.

I was fond of Launceston; I wished my family to like him too; but they were all too busy about their own affairs. Evening after evening I could not get any of my sisters to make tea for us, or give us a little music afterwards, except the pale, dull-looking Constantia, or my bonny rose of June, little Lizzie. At last we four settled into a small daily company, and went out together, read together, talked together continually. I kept these two younger ones as much as possible in our unromantic practical society, that not only my mind, but Launceston's, in its thorough cheerfulness and healthiness of tone, might unconsciously have a good influence upon Constantia.

The girl's spirit slowly began to heal. She set aside her dreaming, and took with all the energy of her nature to active work-women's work-charity school-teaching, village-visiting, and the like. She put a little too much "romance into all she did still; but there was life in it, truth, sincerity.

"Miss Constantia will make an admirable lady-of-all-work," said Launceston in his quaint way, watching her with his kindly and observant eyes. The world wants such. She will find enough to do."

And so she did: enough to steal her too from my side, almost as much as the three fiancées. The circle in my study dwindled gradually down to Lizzie, Launceston, and me.

We were excellent company still, we three. I had rarely had so much of my pet sister's society: I had never found it so pleasant. True, she was shyer than usual, probably from being with us two, older and wiser people men likewise; but she listened to our wisdom so sweetly-she bore with our dry, long-worded learning so patiently-that my study never seemed itself unless I had the little girl seated at my feet, or sewing quietly in the windowcorner. And then she was completely a "little girl;" had no forward ways-no love notions, or, ten times worse, marriage notions, crossing her innocent brain. I felt sure I could take her into my closest heart, form her mind and principles at my will, and one day make a noble woman of her, after the pattern of But I never mention that sacred name. I loved Lizzie-loved her to the core of my heart. Sometimes with fatherly more than even brotherly pride, I used to talk to Launceston of the child's sweetnesses, but he always gave me short answers. It was his way. His

laconism in most things was really astonishing for a man under thirty.

One day, when Angeline's grand wedding was safely over, and the house had sunk into a pathetic quietness that reminded one of the evening after a funeral-at least so I thought

Launceston and I fell into a discussion, which stirred him into more demonstrativeness than usual. The subject was men, women, and marriages.

"I am convinced," he said, "that I shall never marry."

It was not my first hearing of this laudable determination; so I let it pass, merely asking his reasons.

"Because my conscience, principles, and feelings go totally against the system of matrimony, as practised in the world, especially the world of womankind-all the courting and proposing, the presents and the love-letters, the dinners to relatives and congratulations of friends, the marriage guests and marriage settlements, the white lace, white satin, and white favours, carriage, postilions, and all. Heigh-ho, Heathcote, what fools men are!"

I was just about to suggest the possibility of naming one, say two, wise individuals among our sex, when in stole a white fairy— my pretty Lizzie, in her bridemaid's dress. Her presence changed the current of conversation, until from some remark she made about a message Angeline had left as to the proper way of inserting her marriage in the Times newspaper to-morrow, our talk imperceptibly fell back into the old channel.

"I, like you, Launceston, hate the whole system of love and marrying. It is one great sham. Beginning when miss at school learns that it is the apex of feminine honour to be a bride-the lowest deep of feminine humiliation to die an old maid. Continuing when she, a young lady at home, counts her numerous 'offers;' taking pride in what ought to be to her a source either of regret or humiliation. Ending when, time slipping by, she drops into the usual belief that nobody ever marries her first love; so takes the best match she can find, and makes marriage, which is merely the visible crown and completion of love, the pitiful dishonoured substitute for it. I declare solemnly, I have seen many a wife whom I held to be scarcely better than-no wife at all."

I had forgotten my little sister's presence; but she did not seem to hear me-nor Launceston either, for that matter. His earnestness had softened down; he sat, very thoughtful, over against the window where Lizzie had taken

"Come here, my little girl," I said; "I should not like thee to go the way of the world; and yet I should be satisfied to give thee away some day, quietly, in a white muslin gown and a straw bonnet, to some honest man who loved thee, and was loved so well, that Lizzie would never dream of marrying any other, but would have been quite content, if need be, to live an old maid for his sake to the end of her days. That's what I call love-eh, my girl?"

Lizzie drooped her head, blushing deeply. Of course; girls always do.

Launceston said, in a tone so low that I quite started. "Then you do believe in true love, after all?"

"It would be ill for me, or for any human being, if I did not. And I believe in it the more earnestly because of its numberless counterfeits. Nay" and now when, after this gay marriage-morning, the evening was sinking gray and dull, my mind inclined pensively, even tenderly, to the sister who had gone, the other two sisters who were shortly going away from my hearth for ever—“nay, as since in the falsest creeds there lurks, I hope, a modicum of absolute truth, I would fain trust that in the poorest travesty or masquerade of love, one might find a fragment of the sterling commodity. Still, my Lizzie, dear, when all our brides are gone, let us congratulate ourselves that for a long time we shall have no more engagements."

"You object to engagements?" said Lizzie, speaking timidly and downfaced-as I rather like to see a young girl speak on this subject.

"Why, how should you like it yourself, my little maid? To be loved, wooed, and wedded in public, for the benefit of an amused circle of triends, neighbours, and connections. To have one's actions noticed, one's affairs canvassed, one's feelings weighed and measured; to be congratulated, condoled, and jested with-horrible! literally horrible. My wonder is that any true lovers can ever stand it."

Perhaps you are right," said Launceston, vehemently. "No man ought to place the girl he loves in such a position. Whatever it costs him, he ought to leave her free-altogether free-and offer her nothing until he can offer ber his hand, at once, and with no delay."

"Bless my soul, Launceston, what are you in such excitement about? Has anybody been offering himself to your sister? Because you mistock me. Ask her, or Lizzie, or any good woman, if they would feel flattered by a gen

what did you mean? A-a friend of mine would like to know your opinion on this matter."

"My opinion is simply-an opinion. Every man is the best judge of his own affairs, especially love-affairs. As the Eastern proverb says, 'Let not the lions decide for the tigers.' But I think, did I love a woman"-(and it pleased me to know I was but speaking out her mind who years ago lived and died, in her fond simplicity wiser than any of these)— "did I love a woman, I would like to tell her so-just to herself, no more. And I would tell her so at once-whether I were poor or rich, prosperous or hopeless; whether we could be married next month, next year, or not for the next twenty years. If she loved me as I her, it would be no matter we could wait. And meantime, I would like to give her my love to rest on to receive the help and consolation of hers. I would like her to feel that through all chances and changes she and I were one; one neither for foolish child's-play nor headlong passion, but for mutual strength and support, holding ourselves responsible both to Heaven and each other for our life and our love. One, indissolubly, whether we were ever married or not; one in this world, and-we pray-one in the world everlasting."

Was I dreaming? Did I actually see my friend Launceston take, unforbidden, my youngest sister's hand, and hold it-firmly, tenderly, fast? Did I hear, with my own natural ears, Lizzie's soft little sob, not of grief certainly, as she slipped out of the room, as swift and silent as a moonbeam?

.

Eh! what? Good heavens! Was there ever any creature so blind as a middle-aged elder brother!

Well, as I told Launceston, it was half my own fault; and I must bear it stoically. Perhaps, on the whole, things might have been worse, for he is a noble fellow, and no wonder the child loves him. They cannot be married just yet-meanwhile, Lizzie and I keep the matter between ourselves. They are very happy -God bless them! and so am I.

ODE TO EVENING.

[William Collins, born at Chichester, 25th December, 1720; died 1756. After taking his bachelor's degree at Oxford he proceeded to London about 1744, where he found a friend in Dr. Johnson, who was himself, at the time, struggling to win a place in literature. Collins published his Oriental Eclogues whilst at college, and his Odes in 1746. It is said that the slowness of the sale of the Odes so irritated him that he burned the re

maining copies of the edition. He became embarrassed and despondent, and although a legacy of £2000 relieved him from immediate necessities, he sunk into a sort of intellectual languor from which he sought relief in intoxication. He was for a time confined in a lunatic asylum, and afterwards retired to Chichester, where his sister attended him till his death. Campbell says that his "works will abide comparison with whatever Milton wrote under the age of thirty."]

If aught of oaten stop, or pastoral song,
May hope, O pensive Eve, to soothe thine ear
Like thy own modest springs,
Thy springs, and dying gales;

O nymph reserved, while now the bright-haired

sun

Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts, With brede ethereal wove,

O'erhang his wavy bed.

Now air is hush'd, save where the weak-eyed bat. With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing. Or where the beetle winds

His small but sullen horn.

As oft he rises. 'midst the twilight path, Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum: Now teach me, maid composed,

To breath some softened strain,

Whose numbers stealing through thy darkening vale,

May not unseemly with its stillness suit,
As musing slow I hail

Thy genial loved return!

For when thy folding star arising shows
His paly circlet, at his warning lamp
The fragrant hours and elves
Who slept in buds the day,

And many a nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge,

And sheds the freshening dew, and lovelier still
The pensive pleasures sweet
Prepare thy shadowy car.

Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene, Or find some ruin 'midst its dreary dells, Whose walls more awful nod

By thy religious gleams.

Or if chill blustering winds, or driving rain Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut, That from the mountain's side

Views wilds and swelling floods,

And hamlets brown, and dim discovered spires,
And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er all
Thy dewy fingers draw
The gradual dusky veil.

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,

And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!
While summer loves to sport
Beneath thy lingering light;

While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;
Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air,
Affrights thy shrinking train,
And rudely rends thy robes;

So long, regardful of thy quiet rule,
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace,
Thy gentlest influence own,
And love thy favourite name.

EUREKA.

BY DR. J. G. HOLLAND.

Whom I crown with love is royal; Matters not her blood or birth; She is queen, and I am loyal

To the noblest of the earth.

Neither place, nor wealth, nor title
Lacks the man my friendship owns;
His distinction, true and vital,

Shines supreme o'er crowns and thrones.
Where true love bestows its sweetness,
Where true friendship lays its hand,
Dwells all greatness, all completeness,
All the wealth of every land.

Man is greater than condition,
And where man himself bestows,
He begets and gives position

To the gentlest that he knows.

Neither miracle nor fable

Is the water changed to wine; Lords and ladies at my table

Prove Love's simplest fare divine.

And if these accept my duty,

If the loved my homage own,

I have won all worth and beauty; I have found the magic stone.

THE GARDENER OF THE MANOR.

[Hans Christian Andersen, born at Odeuze, 2d April, 1805. The Danish novelist. His father was a shoemaker, and too poor to give his son any education, save that afforded by the charity school; but after various struggles, Andersen was admitted to one of the government schools through the influence of Counsellor Collin, who was the first to suspect the genius of the youth. He tried the stage, wrote plays and failed; but he gradually earned reputation by his poems, and by his romances. Thanks to a government pension, he was enabled to travel in Europe and America. His principal works are: The Improvisatore; O. T.; Only a Fidler (which embodies his own bitter and sweet experiences); The Sandhills of Jutland: Tales for Children; The Wild Swans, a fairy tale; The Tee Maiden: The Story of my Life, &c. His tales for children have become popular in all languages; and the Leipsic editions of his works number thirty-five volumes.]

About one Danish mile from the capital stood an old manor-house, with thick walls, towers, and pointed gable-ends. Here lived, but only in the summer season, a rich and courtly family. This manor-house was the best and the most beautiful of all the houses they owned. It looked outside as if it had just been cast in a foundry, and within it was comfort itself. The family arms were carved in stone over the door; beautiful roses twined about the arms and the balcony; a grass-plot extended before the house with red-thorn and white-thorn, and many rare flowers grew even outside the conservatory. The manor kept also a very skilful gardener. It was a real pleasure to see the flower-garden, the orchard, and the kitchen-garden. There was still to be seen a portion of the manor's original garden, a few box-tree hedges cut in shape of crowns and pyramids, and behind these two mighty old trees almost always without leaves. One might always think that a storm or waterspout had scattered great lumps of manure on their branches, but each lump was a bird's-nest. A swarm of rooks and crows from time immemorial had built their nests here. It was a townful of birds, and the birds were the manorial fords here. They did not care for the proprietors, the manor's oldest family branch, nor for the present owner of the manor-these were nothing to them; but they bore with the wandering creatures below them, notwithstanding that once in a while they shot with guns in a way that made the birds' back-bones shiver, and made every bird fly up, crying, "Rak, Rak!"

The gardener very often explained to the master the necessity of felling the old trees,

as they did not look well, and by taking them away they would probably also get rid of the screaming birds, which would seek another place. But he never could be induced either to give up the trees or the swarm of birds: the manor could not spare them, as they were relics of the good old times, that ought always to be kept in remembrance.

"The trees are the birds' heritage by this time!" said the master. "So let them keep them, my good Larsen." Larsen was the gardener's name, but that is of very little consequence in this story. "Haven't you room

enough to work in, little Larsen? Have you not the flower-garden, the green-houses, the orchard, and the kitchen-garden?" He cared for them, he kept them in order and cultivated them with zeal and ability, and the family knew it; but they did not conceal from him that they often tasted fruits and saw flowers in other houses that surpassed what he had in his garden, and that was a sore trial to the gardener, who always wished to do the best, and really did the best he could. He was good-hearted, and a faithful servant.

The owner sent one day for him, and told him kindly that the day before, at a party given by some friends of rank, they had eaten apples and pears which were so juicy and wellflavoured, that all the guests had loudly expressed their admiration. To be sure, they were not native fruits, but they ought by all means to be introduced here, and to be acclimatized if possible. They learned that the fruit was bought of one of the first fruit-dealers in the city, and the gardener was to ride to town, and find out about where they came from, and then order some slips for grafting. The gardener was very well acquainted with the dealer, because he was the very person to whom he sold the fruit that grew in the manorgarden, beyond what was needed by the family. So the gardener went to town and asked the fruit-dealer where he had found those apples and pears that were praised so highly.

"They are from your own garden," said the fruit-dealer, and he showed him both the apples and the pears, which he recognized. Now, how happy the gardener felt! He hastened back to his master, and told him that the apples and pears were all from his own garden. But he would not believe it.

"It cannot be possible, Larsen. Can you get a written certificate of that from the fruitdealer?" And that he could; and brought him a written certificate.

"This is certainly wonderful!" said the family.