never have shed tears over anything but the loss of his money.'

'And that's the reason you offered me a seat in your office?'

'That, and no other. I don't mind telling you I was under considerable obligations to Denny at that moment. He'd a very large sum in our bank, and if he'd withdrawn it just then, we should have been rather pressed. And then, Blake, I must say that I was very glad to have an opportunity of serving you.'

'You're very kind.'

'Oh, of course, I had a motive; it wasn't likely I should give you seventy-five pounds a year-and really, Blake, you're very little use to me-unless I'd had a motive. Well, old Denny has humbugged us both, and we must begin again on a different footing. You must put your shoulder to the wheel, Blake, and try again. It's no use your stopping with me; I couldn't afford to keep you, and there's no prospect before you.'

Of course, I wouldn't stop with you after what I have heard,' said Charlie slowly. I'm obliged to you for speaking out so plainly. It isn't a pleasant thing being humbugged. I shan't trouble you again, I assure you, Mr Hutton. Good-bye. I daresay you'll send Mary home.'

'Oh, nonsense! Stop, and have supper, and so on.' But Charlie had already disappeared in the shrubbery; Hutton heard the branches cracking, and then a footstep on the path leading to the river.

Hutton listened intently for a while, but heard nothing more.

He won't go and do anything foolish, I should think. Well, it's no business of mine. It's precious lucky I found it all out before Fanny and he came to an understanding.'

'What have you done with Charlie?' said Mary Blake, as Mr Hutton entered his drawing-room, blinking and winking at the brightness of the light, in contrast to the dark summer-house.

Oh, Charlie's gone home, I fancy,' said Hutton. 'He had a headache, I think, didn't feel very well.' Fanny looked uneasily at her father.

'I think I'd better go home too,' said Mary, rising from her chair a little alarmed: perhaps Charlie really had been hurt by the upset, and was now feeling it.

'Oh, don't go, don't go,' said Hutton. There's nothing the matter with Charles, to take you home. Ellis shall put the old mare in the dog-cart, and drive you home by-and-bye. I want a rubber, and if you go away, I shan't get one. Oh, I've always got a motive. Selfish fellows we lawyers, aren't we?'

'It's all right,' whispered Fanny in Mary's ear, as she went to get out the card-table: 'Charlie and the governor have had a little bit of a tiff, I fancy, but it will blow over.'

Nevertheless, the whist was not successful. Tom was Mary's partner, and they both played shamefully. Fanny seemed in a sort of maze, constantly played false cards, and forgot all about the trumps. Hutton pished and pshawed, and finally threw down his cards-they were very bad ones-and vowed he wouldn't play with such a set of people. At that moment a servant came in and announced that Mr Denny was waiting in the hall to speak to Mr Hutton on business of great importance.

Hutton went down-stairs grumbling at being disturbed.

'Oh, Mr Hutton, where is he, how is he?' cried Denny, who seemed to be in a state of the utmost anxiety. 'Is he dead? Tell me the worst at once. I can bear it; only tell me.' 'Whom do you mean?' 'Blake!-young Blake!'

'Why, he's as well as ever he was, I expect. Suffers from nothing but consumption of victuals.' 'When did you see him? Quick! when did you see him?'

'Half an hour ago-in the garden here.' 'Heaven be praised!' cried Denny, sinking into a chair, and clasping his hands. 'He wasn't hurt, then?"

'Hurt! Why should he be hurt?'

'O dear, my carter brought me home such a tale! He'd been for a load of roots to Farmer Rogers, and when he was there, a boy came in with such a lamentable story! He'd seen Mr Tom driving in his dog-cart, and Mr Blake with him, and Miss Fanny; and all of a sudden the horse twisted round, and they were all pitched out, and smashed almost to pieces. I didn't hear it till just now, and then I ran up as fast as ever I could. But he's safe, you say? Oh, I'm so thankful, Mr Hutton; and yet I had a sort of confidence in all my trouble, sir; I thought the Lord wouldn't desert ine after all these years'

'You don't ask after Fanny and Tom, then,' said Hutton grimly.

"O dear me, yes; I ought to have mentioned them. They ben't hurt, though, be they, Mr Hutton? Perhaps 'twas all a lie my carter told me.'

'I have heard nothing at all about it; but I'll go up-stairs and ask.'

'Tom,' he said, putting his head into the drawingroom, have you had a spill to-day?'

'A bit of one, father,' said Tom, looking rather sheepish: the chestnut bolted-wild little beggar.' 'Did she cut herself at all?'

'No, father.'

one. My word, he opened his eyes when I told him your intentions about him.'

"What!' cried Denny, jumping to his feet: 'you didn't tell him that? O Hutton, you 're a fool, fool, fool! He'll go away to Africa now, and I shall lose my farm. O dear, O dear! Where is he, Hutton? Where is he now ?'

'I don't know; he left me when I told him that-bolted off towards the river.'

'Towards the river!' screamed Denny. 'Why didn't you stop him? Don't you see are you a fool?-he loses his gal and his expectations all at a blow; and he goes and throws himself into the river! O dear, O dear, O dear, it's all over with me now! I shall never get over the loss of the Manor farm.'

Hutton looked at him doubtfully. Certainly Charlie Blake had had more than one misfortune that night; and what Denny had suggested had occurred to him as possible, in a sort of inert, uneasy thought; but after all it was no business of his. Denny was interested in the matter. Let him look to it.

'There's none of you care for him like me,' said Denny, looking reproachfully at Hutton; 'although you pretend to be his friends-driving him to despair like that. Hutton, if anything has happened to him, I shall look to you to make it good!' 'You may look as long as you like,' said Hutton, with a sneering laugh. What nonsense you talk, Denny, as if a fellow would go and throw himself in the water for nothing.'

'Ah! you haven't studied him as I have,' cried Denny; don't you tell me about him. Come, I'll go and look after him myself, and won't trouble any of his fine friends; only tell me the way he

went.'

Hutton directed him to cross the shrubbery, and make his way out of a little iron wicket, which opened on a field-path leading to the river-bank. 'Depend upon it, he's safe at home by this time,' said Hutton, letting him out of the hall-door.

If

'He's not at home, I tell you,' cried Denny. anything has happened to that young man, I shall blame you.'

The night was clear and moonlit, and the river could be seen from the iron wicket, winding through the river-valley in many a curl and fold. There was no one visible along the river-banks. A few cows were lying on the grass by the river; a horse was standing by the railings in a sort of half-doze, bats flitted about, and sometimes a frog lazily croaked from the ditch. But there was no other sign of life. Denny marched along till he came to the river-bed, and looked carefully up and

down the stream.

But as he stood looking here and there, expecting he hardly knew what, he heard a sound that seemed like a suppressed groan, and turning hastily round, he saw, under the raised embankment of the bridge that carried the road over the river, a figure lying, still and motionless. Denny turned quite faint and shivery, and made his way quickly to the spot.

When Charlie left Mr Hutton, he felt a great lump in his throat, and a sensation of trouble and oppression all over him. He had been altogether humiliated and put to shame. He had found that the only value attached to him was as a sort of animated title-deed; that he had not only been deceived, but made a fool of; that he would be a

319

laughing-stock for everybody. At one blow, all his hopes had been destroyed, all his self-respect. It was a very bitter thing this for him to thole. All kinds of mad revengeful thoughts rose within him. He would go and do something desperate. It was better to be infamous than ridiculous. But as he came to the river-brink, the stillness and quiet of the night, and the beauty of the scene around him, came upon him with tranquillising and soothing effect. There were many things, after all, of which no misfortune could deprive him. He sat down by the river-brink and began to smoke a pipe, but finding that the night-breeze swept chillily along the river-side, he took shelter under the bank that carried the road up to the level of the bridge, and began to chew the cud of bitter regretful thought.

The night was so still and tranquil that he had no desire to seek the shelter of a roof. It was better to lie there in the open, watching the twinkling stars, and the gleam of the moon on the ripples, than to sit and stew over his troubles in the dull solitude of his room. But after a while he got quite chilly and benumbed, and thought of starting homewards, when he heard a footstep approaching, and saw in the bright moonlight the gaunt form of Denny coming down the path towards the river. He watched him, wondering what the old man could be doing down here at night, and he wondered still more when he saw him groping and peering among the rushes. But in a moment it struck him-Denny had come down from the Limes; he had been to see Hutton! The two old rascals had put their heads together, and Denny had heard of his rejection. And he thought that he, Charlie, had thrown himself into the river!

The idea of the old fellow's trouble and perplexity amused the lad greatly; and it struck him too, what a wonderful pull he had upon him, in his selfish dread of losing sight of his Charlie and his lease together.

'Is he asleep, or is he-oh, he cannot be !-dead?' whispered Denny to himself, as he stooped down and touched Charlie on the shoulder. At this, Charlie began to revive, stretched himself out, gave a groan or two, and turned on his elbow.

That's right, my dear lad. Oh, you're coming on finely. You remember me-Denny, your good friend?'

'Friend!' said Charlie, with another groan; 'I have no friends!'

'O yes, you have: there's me-there's Denny! Never mind what that rascal Hutton told you; it was all a lie. I'm more your friend than ever, Charlie. Rouse up, my dear lad, rouse up. You shall have your gal, and everything shall be all right, if you'll only speak to me.'

It's too late,' said Charlie wildly, springing to his feet, and staggering off towards the river-it's too late now.'

You

him. 'Charlie, stop! O Charlie, for my sake, for my sake!'

The noise of falling waters was now plainly to be heard, and in a few moments they came to a broad sweep of greensward, where there was a steep embankment of stone, and a swirling pool of dark waters striped with foam.

Charlie stopped here, and folding his arms on his chest, confronted Denny with haggard stare. 'It's no good saying anything to me,' he said; 'I have made up my mind. Leave me alone, or prepare to share my fate.'

There was a painful pause, and then an altercation. Denny was successful in persuading Charlie to desist from his intention. "There's nobody in the world,' he said, 'I care about but you. Let us leave that nasty pond; come this way, come this way! I'll make my will to-morrow, Charlie; and you shall have everything-everything!'

Charlie consented to live on these terms, and finally saw old Denny home to the Manor farm; for the poor man was quite knocked up with the efforts and troubles of the night. Then he made his way home, making the woods ring with his laughter.

A FINE SENTIMENT FINELY EXPRESSED.

Among the sentiments expressed by Mr Froude in his work, The English in Ireland, we find the following on Liberty,' which it would be well for many to take seriously to heart; for on almost no subject is there more vague or incorrect opinion.

'There is no word in human language which so charms the ear as liberty. There is no word which so little pains have been taken to define, or which is used to express ideas more opposite. There is a liberty which is the liberty of a child or a savage, the liberty of animals, the vagrant liberty, which obeys no restraint, for it is conscious of no obligation. There is a liberty which arises from the subjugation of self and the control of circumstances, which consists in knowledge of what ought to be done, and a power to do it obtained by patient labour and discipline. The artisan or the artist learns in an apprenticeship under the guidance of others to conquer the difficulties of his profession. When the conquest is complete he is free. He has liberty-he commands his tools, he commands his own faculties. He has become a master. It is with life as a whole, as with the Those occupations into which life is divided. only are free men who have had patience to learn the conditions of a useful and honourable existence, who have overcome their own ignorance and their own selfishness, who have become masters of themselves. The first liberty is the liberty of anarchy, which to a man should be a supreme object of detestation. The second liberty is the liberty of law, which has made the name the symbol of honour, and has made the thing the supreme object of desire. But the enthusiasm for true liberty has in these modern times been transferred to its opposite. With a singular inversion of cause and effect, men have seen in liberty not the exercise and the reward of virtues which have been acquired under restraint, but some natural fountain, a draught from which is to operate as a spell for the regeneration of our nature. Freedom as they picture it to themselves is like air and light, a condition in which the seeds of excellence

are alone able to germinate. Who is free? asked the ancient sage, and he answered his own question. The wise man who is master of himself. Who is free? asks the modern liberal politician, and he answers, the man who has a voice in making the laws which he is expected to obey. Does the freedom of a painter consist in his having himself consented to the laws of perspective, and light and shade? That nation is the most free where the laws, by whomsoever framed, correspond most nearly to the will of the Maker of the universe, by whom, and not by human suffrage, the code of rules is laid down for our obedience. That nation is most a slave which has ceased to believe that such divinely appointed laws exist, and will only be bound by the Acts which it places on its statute-book.'

MAY BLOSSOMS.

HARK! how rejoicingly the rivers flow;
Sunshine and May have met !

Welcome to May! her hand hath touched each brugh,

And 'mid green leaves, like pearls upon her brow, Young hawthorn buds are set;

Through the dim woods her dew-bathed feet have

trod,

And left flower-prints upon the mossy sod.

On dale and upland a warm radiance lies
All through the golden hours;
Leaf-traceried elms and feathery lindens rise
In stately columns to the glowing skies,
Thick with their honeyed flowers;
And the dark chestnut lifts against the light
Pyramids of blossom, rose-tinged or white.

Round ancient manse and grange with lichens hoar,
The sweet May-flowers are bright,

And little children from each cottage door
Forth to the daisied fields in glad troops pour,
Till with the closing night,

Homeward they wend through the soft gathering gloom,

Baskets and hands o'er-filled with meadow-bloom.

By brier-tangled copse and lone lagoon,
The flower-boy wanders now,
Humming the while some quaint half-drowsy tune;
Twisted oak-branches from the sultry noon
Shelter his sunburnt brow;

And blue-bells quiver where his footsteps pass Through last year's withered leaves and waving grass.

In green-old forests with their sun-flecked floors,
Shadows of beauty dwell;

By many a silent tarn's untrodden shores
Her boat of pearl, the water-lily, moves;
And the low breezes swell

In whispers faint, along the thymy lea,
Bearing the heath-flower's fragrance as they flee.

And it is pleasant on the turf to lie,
Beside clear prattling streams,
Beneath the silver-clouded soft spring sky;
Filling the shadows of futurity

With Hope's air-woven dreams-
Dreams more beautiful than buds of May,
And fading in their glory e'en as they.

Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Pater

noster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH Also sold by all Booksellers.

her two sons; the eldest, George Earl Marischal, being at the time only twenty-two years of age, At the battle of Sheriffmuir, the two brothers had each the command of a squadron. Rather tardily, James arrived from France, and tried to revive the drooping hopes of his party, by marching southwards from Peterhead, taking with him Earl Marischal, who rode on his left hand in entering Dundee. As history tells, it was altogether an ill-managed affair. James was glad to quit the country. His adherents were scattered; Earl Marischal and his brother fled to the continent; the title and estates were forfeited. The countess, a primary cause of the family ruination, remained in Scotland in some comparatively obscure way'sad and sabbing,' but with as undaunted a spirit as ever. If there be any truth in the ballad, it was fortunate she could console herself with a song for the loss of an earldom; but this was a species of consolation to which the Jacobites of all ranks had a special aptitude. We leave her singing in her 'wee croo house,' to follow the fortunes of her two sons.

It would be difficult to say which of the exiled Keiths possessed the nobler nature or the sounder understanding. They had been well educated, and, but for the unfortunate political escapade, would have been distinguished ornaments of society in their native country. To Britain they were lost. The terrible reverse they had undergone transformed them into foreigners. We hear of them as playing an important role in France, Spain, Germany, Russia, growing gray in the service of one country or other, admired and honoured for their ability and uprightness. Never was there a reproach on the Keiths. In England, there were regrets that men so estimable had by circumstances been wafted so egregiously out of their proper sphere.

In telling the story of the two brothers, we must at times speak of them separately; for they did not remain together, and it happened that George, the elder, was the survivor. Arriving in Paris, in May 1716, their prospects were sufficiently dreary. James, who wrote a fragment of his autobiography, says that, for a time, he lived by 'selling horse-furniture, and other things of that nature which an officer commonly carries with him; and though I had relations enough in Paris who could have supplied me, and who would have done it with pleasure, yet I was then either so bashful, or so vain, that I would not own the want I was in.' In this semi-destitute condition, the two brothers were induced to go to Spain, and take part in a fresh expedition to recover the British crown for the Stewarts. This was the ill-fated attempt of 1719. Landing at Stornoway, and crossing to Loch Duich in the mainland, the party were signally defeated at Glenshiel; the Spanish troops concerned in the affair being taken prisoners of war. With some difficulty and hairbreadth escapes, the two Keiths got safely back to the continent. For some years, James led a wandering life, dependent on the good offices of friends. As a soldier of fortune, and anxious for employment, he offered his services to Russia, and they were gladly accepted. This was about the year 1730, when Russia was making great efforts to improve and consolidate her naval and military system. As a brave and skilful general, Keith was appreciated for his services. But the business of encroaching on Polish and other

nationalities, was distasteful to his sense of justice, and after more than ten years of active military duty, he was fain to quit the Russian service, and in 1747 entered that of Frederick the Great, of Prussia. General James Keith was now in his proper element. By Frederick he was engaged in various important enterprises, and at length was raised to the dignity of a Field-marshal. The career of Marshal Keith was of no long duration. In the Seven Years' War, he performed brilliant acts of daring. Ordered to maintain a particular position, he was killed by a cannon-shot at the battle of Hochkirchen, in 1758.

The career of the elder brother, who is uniformly spoken of as Earl Marischal, was of a more peaceful character. He was engaged in various diplomatic missions, and esteemed for his urbanity and excellent business management. Though not relinquishing his original political bias, he declined to take any part in the insurrection of 1745. Perhaps he was aware, from what he knew, and what he saw behind the scenes in France, that the affair was hopeless; and it proved so. Like his brother, attaching himself to Frederick the Great, he was employed by him as ambassador to the court of France, and afterwards appointed governor of the canton of Neuchatel in Switzerland. Settling down in a rural mansion at Columbier

still shewn to English tourists-he became acquainted with Rousseau, who was pleased with his sedate and simple manners; and a friendship sprung up between the two, of which some notice appears in Rousseau's Confessions. Relinquishing his governorship, Earl Marischal was appointed ambassador to Spain. While in that country, he had an opportunity of doing a piece of useful diplomatic service for England, which secured him the favour of the Earl of Chatham, through whose influence the act of attainder against him was reversed, 25th May 1759, and he could now return with safety to his native country. Recalled at his own request from Spain, he visited England, and was graciously received by George II., who gave him the right to draw the sum of three thousand six hundred and eighteen pounds, which was yet unpaid by the purchasers of his estates.

6

Her

Here was an entire change of circumstances. The Earl Marischal had it now in his power to purchase back some of the properties of which his family had been bereft. He made excursions into Scotland, was received everywhere with tokens of respect and affection, and he actually bought some of the heritages that had belonged to his family. But after so long an absence from his original haunts, he felt himself as a visitor to a strange land. His mother, the songtress of the ballad, had passed away, without seeing a restoration of the family honours. anticipations that the king would come ower the water,' and restore matters to their old condition, had lamentably failed. The sight of one of his castles in ruins affected him to tears. He could not make for himself a home even in the district where he was held in the highest esteem. The king of Prussia pressed him in eager terms to return.Come,' said he, to ease, to friendship, and philosophy; these are what, after the battle of life, we must all have recourse to.' He obeyed the summons; and to be near His Majesty, he was given a house adjoining the gardens of Sans Souci. At this charming spot, Earl Marischal Keith