that was almost dazzling: she sobbed convulsively for some moments, but he kindly reassured her.

"I am too vile a creature," she continued, " to expect that you should accede even to my dying wishes-you above all others in the world whom I have used so vilely. My parents abandoned me in my misery, when they might have rescued me from it and restored me at least to virtue, if not to happiness; for I had suffered too much under the stern dominion of vice, not to have rejoiced in a release from her detested and intolerable thraldom. But they spurned me in the rigour of their outraged dignity—they left me to the desolation of guilt and the harrowings of despair. Alas! have you not done more than enough for your bitterest enemy, that I should still expect a richer token of your forgiveness than you have already bestowed upon me.”

"I call Heaven to witness," said Leslie, solemnly, but at the same time trembling with emotion, “that whatever you request I will not refuse it. I am secure in its propriety. This is not a time when you could entertain a questionable desire. I give you my promise, with the most perfect confidence, that you can now ask nothing which I can hesitate to grant. Talk not of what I have done. How little have I given in comparison with what I have received. I am but an humble instrument in wiser hands, permitted, I trust, to pluck the thorns from the death-bed pillow of a contrite offender. State your request-I am prepared to do your bidding."

She suddenly raised her head from his shoulder, and looking anxiously in his face for an instant, said, with unwonted energy, "Bestow upon me a pledge of your forgiveness-kiss me, and I shall die happy."

Leslie instantly bent his head toward her, and imprinted a fervent kiss upon her forehead.

"God be praised! I am happy,—quite happy.”

She sank back upon her pillow. Her eyes were lit for a moment with an almost supernatural lustre. There was in them a brightness so intense and unearthly that it seemed as if the etherealised spirit had irradiated them in its transit from the tabernacle of clay to the glory that was about to be revealed to it; while there was at the same time visible in them such an expression of sublime confidence, that Leslie perceived she was dying with the impression of divine forgiveness upon her departing soul. Her tongue gently murmured, as if in prayer. He again kissed her cold, pale forehead. She drew his hand, which she still retained, towards her, and pressed it fervently against her bosom. The heart seemed still. She looked in his face; a smile passed over her countenance, and trembled upon her colourless lips; his ear just caught the faint blessing, as it escaped from her faltering tongue, and then, with one full deep-drawn sigh, she yielded up her spirit to the God who gave it.

CULZEAN CASTLE, AYRSHIRE,

SCOTLAND.

THE SEAT OF THE EARL OF CASSILIS.

THIS noble building stands upon a rock on the western coast of Scotland, between Carrick and Kyle. It gives its name to the bay in which it is situated.

Upon the rock serving as the foundation of Culzean Castle, formerly stood a fortress, some remains of which form part of the present building, erected in 1789, by Archibald eleventh earl of Cassilis.

This romantic residence overhangs the sea at a height of eighty feet above its level, and parts of it seem to cling to the sides of the rock, there defying the lashings of the surge and the violence of the storm. In the bay beneath some rocks appear, raising their crests above the waves, and offering an aspect of danger to the mariner, who should venture, without an experienced pilot, within the labyrinth which they form, whilst other sunken rocks around render the danger real.

The ancient building in which the noble family of the Kennedies resided till towards the end of the last century, was nothing better than one of those old feudal castles so common iu Scotland, denoting the characteristics of baronial power rather than affording any of the elegancies of life. The present building displays all the modern