but if you please to accept of that, I will bring you some. Beaum. Thank you-we will trouble you for some. Mary. Will you please to walk in out of the sun, gentlemen; ours is a very poor house, indeed; but I will find you a seat to sit down on, while I draw the water. Harf. (to Beaumont.) The same good creature as ever! let us go in. Scene II.-The Inside of the Cottage. An old Man sitting by Hearth. Beaum. We have made bold, friend, to trouble your wife for a little water. John Beech. Sit down-sit down, gentlemen. I would get up to give you my chair, but I have the misfortune to be lame, and am almost blind, too. Harf. Lame and blind! Oh, Beaumont! (aside.) John. Ay, sir, old age will come on! and, God knows, we have very little means to fence against it. Beaum. What, have you nothing but your labour to subsist on ? John. We made that do, sir, as long as we could; Dut now I am hardly capable of doing anything, and my poor wife can earn very little by spinning, so we have been forced at last to apply to the parish. Harf. To the parish! well, I hope they consider the services of your better days, and provide for you comfortably. John. Alas, sir! I am not much given to complain; but what can a shilling a week do, in these hard times ? Harf. Little enough, indeed! And is that all they allow you? John. It is, sir; and we are not to have that much longer, for they say we must come into the workhouse. Mary. (entering with the water.) Here, gentlemen. The jug is clean, if you can drink out of it. Harf. The workhouse, do you say? Mary. Yes, gentlemen-that makes my poor hus band so uneasy-that we should come, in our old days, to die in a workhouse. We have lived better, I assure you-but we were turned out of our little farm by the great farmer near the church; and since that time we have been growing poorer and poorer, and weaker and weaker, so that we have nothing to help ourselves with. John. (sobbing.) To die in a parish workhouse-I can hardly bear the thought of it but God knows best, and we must submit. Harf. But, my good people, have you no children or friends to assist you? John. Our children, sir, are all dead, except one that is settled a long way off, and as poor as we are. Beaum. But surely, my friends, such decent people as you seem to be must have somebody to protect you. Mary. No, sir-we know nobody but our neighbours, and they think the workhouse good enough for the poor. Harf Pray, was there not a family of Harfords once in this village ? John. Yes, sir, a long while ago-but they are all dead and gone, or else far enough from this place. Mary. Ay, sir, the youngest of them, and the finest child among them, that I'll say for him, was nursed in our house when we lived in the old spot near the green. He was with us till he was thirteen, and a sweet-behaved boy he was-I loved him as well as ever I did any of my own children. Harf. What became of him? John. Why, sir, he was a fine, bold, spirited boy, though the best tempered fellow in the world; so last war he would be a sailor, and fight the French and Spaniards, and away he went, nothing could stop him, and we have never heard a word of him since. Mary. Ay, he is dead or killed, I warrant; for if he was alive, and in England, I am sure nothing would keep him from coming to see his poor daddy and mammy, as he used to call us. Many a night have I Jain awake thinking of him! Harf. (to Beaum.) I can hold no longer! Beaum. (to him.) Restrain yourself awhile. Well, my friends, in return for your kindness, I will tell you some news that will please you. This same Harford, Edward Harfor Mary. Ay, that was his name-my dear Ned. What of him, sir? Is he living? John. Let the gentleman speak, my dear. Beaum. Ned Harford is now alive and well, and a lieutenant in his majesty's navy, and as brave an officer as any in the service. John. I hope you do not jest with us, sir. Mary. O, thank God-thank God! If I could but see him! John. Ay, I wish for nothing more before I die. Harf. Here he is-here he is-my dearest, best benefactors! Here I am, to pay some of the great debt of kindness I owe you. (Clasps Mary round the neck, and kisses her.) Mary. What this gentleman my Ned! Ay, it is, it is—I see it, I see it. John. O, my old eyes!—but I know his voice now. (Stretches out his hand, which Harford grasps.) Harf. My good old man! O, that you could see me as clearly as I do you! John. Enough enough. It is you, and I am contented. Mary. O, happy day! O, happy day! Harf. Did you think I could ever forget you? while it is since we parted! Mary. Fifteen years, come Whitsuntide. at a long Harf. The first time I set foot in England all this long interval was three weeks ago. John. How good you were to come to us so soon. Mary. What a tall, strong man you are grown !— but vou have the same sweet smile as ever. John. I wish I could see him plain. But what : significs!--he's here, and I hold him by the hand. Where's the other good gentleman ? Beaum. Here-very happy to see such worthy people made so. Harf. He has been my dearest friend for a great many years, and I am beholden to him almost as much as to you two. Mary. Has he? God bless him, and reward him! Harf. I am grieved to think what you must have suffered from hardship and poverty. But that is all at an end; no workhouse now! John. God bless you! then I shall be happy still. But we must not be burdensome to you. Harf. Don't talk of that. As long as I have a shilling, it is my duty to give you sixpence of it. Did you not take care of me when all the world forsook me, and treated me as your own child when I had no other parent; and shall I ever forsake you in your old age? Oh, never-never! Mary. Ay, you had always a kind heart of your I always used to think that our dear Ned would, some time or other, prove a blessing to us. own. Harf. You must leave this poor hut, that is not fit to keep out the weather, and we must get you a snug cottage, either in this village or some other. John. Pray, my dear sir, let us die in this town, as we have always lived in it. And as to a house, I believe that where old Richard Carpenter used to live in is empty, if it would not be too good for us. Harf. What, the white cottage on the green? I remember it-it is just the thing. You shall remove there this very week. Mary. This is beyond all my hopes and wishes. Harf. There you shall have a little close to keep a cow-and a girl to milk her, and take care of you both -and a garden, well stocked with herbs and roots— and a little yard for pigs and poultry-and some good, new furniture for your house. John. O, too much! too much! Mary. What makes me cry so, when so many good things are coming to us? Harf. Who is the landlord of that house? Harf. I'll go and speak about it directly, and then come to you again. Come, Beaumont. God bless both! John. God in Heaven bless you! TWENTY-FOURTH EVENING. you PERSEVERANCE AGAINST FORTUNE. THEODORE was a boy of lively parts and engaging manners; but he had the failing of being extremely impatient in his temper, and inclined to extremes. He was ardent in all his pursuits, but could bear no disappointment; and if the least thing went wrong, he threw up what he was about in a pet, and could not be prevailed upon to resume it. His father, Mr. Carleton, had given him a bed in the garden, which he had cultivated with great delight. The borders were set with double daisies of different colours, next to which was a row of auriculas and polyanthuses. Beyond were stocks, and other taller flowers and shrubs; and a beautiful damask rose graced the centre. This rose was just budding, and Theodore watched its daily progress with great interest. One unfortunate day the door of the garden having been left open, a drove of pigs entered, and began to riot on the herbs and flowers. An alarm being sounded, Theodore and the servant boy rushed upon them, smacking their whips. The whole herd, in affright, took their course across Theodore's flower-bed, on which some of them had before been grazing. Stocks, daisies, and auriculas were all trampled down, or torn up; and, what was |