few of the biggest and bravest boys who stood unmoved were spared its infliction, for a better, at least safer object whereon to wreak his fury had caught Mr. Groper's attention. On one of the lower branches of the chesnut tree was seated a pretty little girl of five or six years old; she had been lifted up by one of the biggest boys, and, in the general flight and panic, forgotten and left upon her now dangerous pre-eminence, was crying bitterly at her desertion. Mr. Groper approached, and looked up; the child smiled through her tears, and stretched out her little arms at sight of a deliverer. Mr. Groper raised

his armto help the poor infant down? No to inflict two brutal lashes on the face and shoulders of the little suppliant: --the child screamed, and letting go the bough by which she had kept her seat fell to the ground from a considerable height. There the worthy Gregory left her he saw one of the boys who had been standing near approaching with fury in his eyes, and he thought it prudent to retreat. Two or three strides of his long gaunt legs took him across the road and his foot was on the door-step of his house when he was startled by a voice at his ear: turning round he saw a wretched, emaciated-looking matchwoman, half gypsy, half ballad singer, standing behind him.

"A hap'orth of matches, sir, only please to take a hap'orth of matches for the sake of a poor starving destitute cretur, and a blessing from the Lord be upon ye!"

Mr. Groper did not care for such blessings; he entered his house and banged the door violently in the woman's facethen, remembering how he had left his front window open, hastened to the parlour that he might shut that too-the beggar was standing opposite-he cursed her for an insolent baggage, held up the horsewhip he had not laid aside, pulled down the sash, and then retreated out of sight but not out of hearing of the woman's voice. She had thrown aside her professional whine and now spoke out loudly and angrily.

"Aye, hide ye'r head, ye cowardly black-hearted villin! Well may ye hide ye'r head! for didn't I see ye lashing the poor innocent babby that cried to ye for help! and didn't the Lord Almighty see ye too, and wont he reward ye! Come

hither my brave gentleman," she continued in a mocking tone, 66 come hither and I'll tell ye ye'r fortune, though ye never crossed my hand with a pennyno need to read it in the lines of ye'r griping palm—I spelt it in the black letters of ye'r face plain as the figures on the church clock yonder."-The beggar woman paused and peered in at the window, she did not see the object of her denunciations and thought he had taken refuge in an inner room-she could not pursue him but seemed resolved that her voice at least should reach his ear. She raised it to the highest pitch in which she was wont to bawl forth her ballads, and ended her prophecy in a doggrel rhyme Deep under ground ye first drew breath, Deep under ground ye'll meet your death! Just there! where stands yon chestnut tree Amongst its roots-your grave shall be !

As the woman ended, she shook her head and held up her wasted fist in threatening farewell at Groper's windows ere she turned to depart. The gentleman of the house had seen, and heard her, too, from the ambush of his window-curtain, and during the next few days thought more of her dark words than he would have liked to have owned, for a few vapours of northern superstition had clung to him from his subterraneous birth-place. But all this wore off in a short time as well as another uncomfortable apprehension (of consequences) on the score of the little child who had been the victim of his fury. Her father was a respectable gardener named Joseph Delves, a stout independent sort of fellow, and one likely enough to call the coal merchant over the coals, especially if anything serious resulted from the child's fall-but this also passed over, and the boys and girls of H-returned to their sports around the chesnut tree, more numerous and noisy than ever. Mr. Groper still threatened; and now and then put them to flight by the strong arm of his coal-heavers-for he shunned personal conflict after the memorable day of the horsewhip-but he could not destroy the many-headed hydra which preyed upon his peace-spite of his withering curses loud and deep, the stately tree still flourished and still stared him in the face, till at last it seemed to have fairly stared him out of countenance.

All at once did Mr. Groper seem to have resigned himself to his situation

all at once he ceased from swearing at the leaf crowned monarch of H- and his attendant satellites, and almost simultaneously the Monarch's Green Court became less crowded and less noisy. It was still, however, a place of resort for the townsfolk young and old-and one day when a few children were playing there (wonder of wonders!) Gregory Groper reined up his horse on passing, looked on them complacently, and grimly smiled as he bade them "go on with their games." The day after not one child was seen on the spot. Mr. Groper's smile had scared them all away. It certainly looked strange, but when some of the neighbours heard it, the cheerful and charitable, those "hoping all things" and living on the sunny side, they thought "Mr. Groper must be growing more kind and sweettempered in his old age." Those who lived in the shade, shook their head, shrugged their shoulders, and feared there was "no good" lurking beneath the unwonted smiles of the dealer in subterraneous combustibles.

It was the month of July-at the close of a sultry day, that before the door of a little green grocer's shop situate not far from Mr. Groper's on that same side of the way, sat a little, hale fresh-coloured old man in a blue apron, master of the shop aforesaid he was smoking his pipe, and his eyes naturally seeking relief from the dry-heated pavement and sun-baked brick-work of the opposite houses, as naturally rested on the refreshing green of the horse-chesnut tree; his favourite chesnut tree, beneath which he had played when a little boy, and sat as an aged man. Though nearly all the inhabitants of Hentertained the highest respect and veneration for this "Pride of their town, to old Joseph Delves late 'gardener' now green grocer;" it was especially and professionally dear, it was the living object he loved most to look upon next to his good and pretty daughter and his affectionate and faithful wife. Well-as we were saying, old Joe sat smoking his pipe, and looking, between each puff, at this object of his idolatry, as it glowed richly in warmth of sunset, when all at once he took his pipe from his lips, placed it in his left hand and rubbed his eyes with his right-then looked again and presently called his old woman who was in the lit

turned the old woman, shading her eyes with her hand as she raised them towards the glowing sky in the desired direction

-“ Well master, was that all you wanted to say?" for at first she perceived nothing unusual to attract her attention, but looking again she suddenly exclaimed, “Lark a mercy! if the top on't ar'nt turning all yellow, and this only St. Swithen's day -but perhaps it's only my old eyes and you'rn too-if Susan was here she'd see in a minute, but she's stepped out with a basket of pears." The old lady dived, as she spoke, into the depths of her pocket, and, having brought up and adjusted her spectacles, renewed her scrutiny of the vegetable phenomenon. "Well, the tree's blighted sure enough, or else it's the lightning last night has catched hold on't -what a pity surely!" and the dame turned to re-enter the house. "Pity indeed!" re-echoed her husband rather sharply, for he did not think the alarm and consternation of his better half at all commensurate with the occasion or with what he felt himself" Pity indeed! I'd rather lose"- a cough filled up the hiatus, but he did'nt mean his good old wife, though a little angry with her just then-" rather than any thing should happen to that ere tree!"

Early next morning Joseph Delves was examining closely the mischief he had seen from far; he found only two evident symptoms of a premature break up in the constitution of his old cotemporary, and for weeks and months did he watch its progress with aching eyes and heart, as branch after branch assumed the "feuille morte" hue of its departed fellow-members, bespeaking that the chesnut body. was sick even unto death. The old gardener grieved sadly, and in his wife's opinion very foolishly; most of the aged pair's sympathies were alike, but one had lived the greater part of his time without doors, the other within-so one day when Joe was sitting in a melancholy mood gazing on his old dying acquaintance, Mrs. Delves roused him from his reverie by a smart tap on the back" Why man," said she, "I never see'd how you takes

on about that 'ere senseless old tree, just for all the world as if it was flesh and blood. For my part I can't understand them unaccountable likes and dislikes as some people takes to dumb things and stocks and stones. There's you you foolish old body! just ready to cry 'cause that tree's a dying-and there's Master Groper as lives over against it-I warrant he'll be the man to laugh (if so be he knows how) the day he gets rid on't."

Old Joseph looked up in his wife's face

was silent and seemed to think a few moments-a new light had dawned upon him relative to his favourite's approaching demise-he struck the stick on which he had been leaning sharply on the ground, as if to clench the conclusion at which he had arrived.- Aye -I have it! that rascally Groper—I'll tell ye what dame! the tree's pisoned, and he's the one as did it! it's as plain

as

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a snail's path over a ripe peach." The matter was settled, at least in the opinion of the old gardener, and his professional reputation enabled him to graft the same notion into the minds of his neighbours, so that in the course of a few days, superadded to his former real and attributed offences, Mr. Gregory Groper was looked on by the little community of H, as the cowardly and insidious murderer, the "Pisoner," of their boasted and time-honoured horsechesnut-tree.

A word more of Joseph Delves and his family. How was it that he whose bright and loving nature could attach itself even to a tree-how came it that he had planted himself on the dark side of the way. Truly, in the days of his activity, his own sunny garden was the paradise of his existence from early dawn to sunsetwhen it mattered little where his rooftree stood and since age had obliged him to adopt a quieter branch of his calling, he still continued on the dark side of the way, because shade was best adapted to his stock in trade-gloom was most congenial to the hearts of cabbages severed from their parent stalks-to carrots growing pale at separation from their mother earth, and to thyme wasting away from want of employment.

Besides these considerations of vital import, there were things which made it immaterial to old Joseph whether his

dwelling were in sun-light or in shadefirst, there was his own cheerful temper, unclouded by remembrance of dark deeds or bitter sorrows, from both of which his peaceful life had been free-there was his contented and happy wife, the very counterpart of John Anderson's helpmate; and last, yet foremost of all, their pretty daughter Susan, the pride of their old eyes, the joy of their old hearts, the sun-light within doors making up for its absence without. This, their one little ewe lamb," was none other than that towards which Mr. Groper had enacted the part of wolf. She was the child who now nearly ten years ago had been the object of his brutal rage. No wonder

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that the old gardener thought him capable of " pisoning" his favourite tree--in fact, the name of "Groper," senior and junior, was, to do Master Joseph justice, the only word which ever stirred up the one drop of gall and bitterness in his composition. Think not that he visited the offence of the father on the son, or would have borne in mind any offence for the space of ten long years, but there were other and more recent causes of heart-burnings and fears. Young Groper though of a less gloomy and vindictive temper than his father, was coarse in his manners, and not over scrupulous in his morals. He had cast an admiring eye on Susan Delves, and the rich coal-merchant's son had thought himself entitled to speak words to the poor green-grocer's daughter, which she presumptuously dared to treat with scorn-the baffled suitor chafed, and even hinted vengeance, but the Delves' family cared little for his threats they looked for protection to the Power above which had guarded Susan when she fell unhurt from the chesnut bough. At length Mr. Groper junior, went so far as to think and talk of marriage, not only to the gardener's daughter herself but to his astonished and incensed father-the proposal was met by both alike.

On a fine afternoon early in April, an unusual sensation was seen to agitate the quiet street of H-, groups of two and three were now and then stopping to talk mysteriously-but nearly every person, man, woman and child, seemed bending his or her course from either end of the town towards its centre, containing Mr. Groper's house and the open

plot, whereon as yet stood the wasted remains of the defunct horse-chesnut-tree. But the hour had now arrived when it was no longer to cumber the ground. A mandate had gone forth for its removal from the face of the earth, and the town'speople were gathering to see its execution. A crowd had already collected-some watching the preparations for the approaching "fall"-others casting sinister looks in the opposite direction towards the house of the "wicked pisoner."

Mr. Groper usually dined in his front parlour, but on this day orders were given to lay the cloth in the back-a thing so unusual that even the taciturn dealer in coals seemed to think himself called upon to account for it; and he condescended to tell Betty, his drudge of all work, that "it was very cold" (a fact she was certainly too well exercised to be aware of)" and he must have a bit of of fire in the little back room, to be snug and comfortable." Mr. Richard Groper, junior, was destined to have a share in this rare bit of comfort-he dined at home that day-but as he sat opposite his respected parent he couldn't help thinking that his father seemed more than commonly uncomfortable and absent-he forgot to take onion sauce with his roast shoulder of mutton, helped his son to the slices off the blade-bone, which he was in the habit of appropriating to himself, and agreed to Mr. Dick's observation that it was 66 uncommon hot," after having before remarked that it was "miserably cold." These contradictory opinions on the state of the atmosphere had made up the sum total of conversation during dinner, but the silence within had been broken by a tumult of sounds from without, which penetrating from the street even to the "parlour of refuge," gave token that -the consummation of the chesnut-tree's fate was nigh-" even at the door." By the time dinner was over, the confused hum of voices and continued blows of the axe were succeeded by the sailor-like chaunt of the men employed in lowering the giant tree as they pulled in unison at the ropes attached to its upper branches. All at once arose a deafening shout, followed by a tremendous crash that shook the house to its foundation.

"There he goes! by Jove!" exclaimed the young man, letting fall a nut he was about to crack with his teeth.

'Aye, he's down safe enough," rejoined the old one, with a sardonic smile, raising a glass of port to his lips.

The late hub-bub without, was now succeeded by a dead silence. "It's all over," thought Mr. Groper as he set down his empty glass-but it seemed there was something more to come-for presently a wild discordant yell met the startled ears of the listeners in the back parlour-it was followed by a loud sharp sound, and that by a clatter of shivered glass in the adjoining room.

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Hang the rascals if they haven't broke our windows!" cried Groper the younger, starting up and turning very red.

"Stay here, Dick," said the elder, looking very pale ;-" Stay here, and just ring the bell." The son obeyed, wondering what would come next, and next there came a second hissing yell, another volley of stones, and another smash of glass. The servant girl also came rather quicker than usual, for she was rather frightened and glad for once to get into her master's company. "Heart alive!" she exclaimed, as she opened the door, "the mob's a breaking all the windows, and swears they'll pull down the ouse about our ears 'cause

"Confound you!" said the master, "Take a jug of beer I say, a large one, to the people who've been getting down the tree, instantly!"--but Betty stood and stared. Mr. Groper stamped with impatience-smash went another pane in the front parlour. Mr. Groper took up the nut-crackers-Betty winced as if she thought they could have cracked a skull -shut the door quickly, and proceeded to obey, in trembling, her master's most marvellous, most incomprehensible command.

"They're quieter now," said the son to the father, a few minutes after the administration of the latter's composing draught, and in fact the people were dispersing their wrath expended in the sacrifice of half the panes in the " pisoner's" front window, as an atonement to

the chesnut's injured shade, their thirst for vengeance allayed by the criminal's wonderful forbearance, or quenched for a season in his jug of beer; for Betty, improving on her instructions, had given it to the ringleaders of the row- the fellows near the door, not the fellers of the tree.

Mr. Groper's placability was wonderful; he told Betty to close the shutters in the front parlour, and bid the "glazier come early in the morning"-then, all in the street being quiet, he drew his chair closer to the "little bit of fire," took a few more glasses of port to drown the remembrance of his panes-pushed the bottle to his son, and followed up all with —“ Dick, I want to talk to you.”

This was something unusual, for there had been little "talk" between the father and son since they had "talked" about Susan Delves-the former felt pretty sure of the young man's sullen acquiescence to his forbidding will in that matter, but he wanted to be quite certainhe had that morning received a letter from a trading correspondent at Whitby, a rich ship-owner with an only daughter, from which he gathered that her "joint stock" partnership with his only son might be an advantageous speculation.

The father and son sat long-what they said is immaterial-suffice it that Mr. Groper found, much to his satisfaction, that Dick had given up all serious thoughts of the gardener's daughter, and obtained his promise that he would think seriously of the young lady at Whitby, to whose father he was to be forthwith dispatched on a trading embassy. It was even settled that Dick should start on the morrow for London-there to equip himself for wooing, and proceed from thence on his northern journey. In aid of these joint purposes Mr. Groper furnished his son with a fifty pound draft— ended the evening with a jorum of rum punch, shook Dick very warmly by the hand when they parted for the night, and crowned all with the bestowal of his blessing.

Mr. Groper entered his bed room, locked the door, and then proceeded to disencumber his gaunt person of its habiliments, in a more complacent frame of mind than he had once experienced since the day on which he had contracted to supply the Devlebridge Railroad.

In

spite of his panes he had reason to be pleased; fine prospects seemed opening to the house of Groper through the unlooked-for suppleness of Dick, its youngest branch-a fine prospect would be visible on the morrow through the removal of the old branches of the chesnut treetwo loads were at once lifted off his breast he had never felt more relieved after throwing a sack of coals down an area. He extinguished his candle, but, before stepping into bed, Mr. Groper could not forbear going to the window (his bed-room was a front one) just to look out-no longer for the accursed tree, but for the blessed vacuum it had left. All without was dark and silentthe townspeople were all snug in their beds, and not a glimmer was seen from a single casement, save one solitary, far-off twinkle from the window of the dressmaker whose consumptive apprentice was sitting up to finish a Sunday bonnet for the parson's wife- not even a star looked down on the street of H, they all "wept behind the clouds o'er the chesnut's fall." There was barely sufficient light to distinguish the dark mass of building which formed the opposite side of the street from the empty space where the noble tree had stood; still the blank was discernible, and with what rapture did Mr. Groper gaze on it! he held his breath for joy-then heaving a longdrawn respiration, murmured "it is gone! gone for ever!"

In this happy consciousness, this blissful certainty, Mr. Groper pulled his nightcap closer over his ears, and retreated one step backwards from the window--started one step forwards-then stood motionless-the church clock struck one! but he did not start at the sound of the clock, it was no sound that made him start-but a sight of something that appeared, where he had just gazed on vacancy. Where the tree had stood there now glimmered low upon the ground a blueish light, resembling that seen by belated travellers sitting upon graves: Mr. Groper rubbed his eyes, he thought it wondrous strange, that light which never flickered though the wind was howling in the chimney; and he stood looking at it, till " thick coming fancies" took possession of his mind, and shadowy forms arose out of the void before him. At one moment (the sepulchral light