Mont Blanc in miniature, rising above the highest point of vegetation. It was on this little spot, undefended alike by art and nature, that at this interesting moment a blow descended, such as we must borrow a term from the Sister Island adequately to describe; it was a “whack.”

Sir Guy started upon his feet; Beatrice Grey started upon hers, but a single glance to the rear reversed her position; she fell upon her knees and screamed. The knight, too, wheeled about, and beheld a sight which might have turned a bolder | man to stone. It was she-the all but defunct Rohesia. There she sat bolt upright! Her eyes no longer glazed with the film of impending dissolution, but scintillating, like flint and steel; while in her hand she grasped the bed-staff, a weapon of mickle might, as her husband's bloody coxcomb could now well testify. Words were yet wanting, for the quinsy, which her rage had broken, still impeded her utterance; but the strength and rapidity of her guttural intonations augured well for her future eloquence.

Sir Guy de Montgomeri stood for awhile like a man distraught: this resurrection-for such it seemed had quite overpowered him. "A husband ofttimes makes the best physician," says the proverb: he was a living personification of

its truth. Still, it was whispered, he had been content with Dr. Butts; but his lady was restored to bless him for many years. Heavens, what a

life he led !

Years rolled on. The improvement of Lady Rohesia's temper did not keep pace with that of her health; and one fine morning Sir Guy de Montgomeri was seen to enter the porte-cochère of Durham House, at that time the town residence of Sir Walter Raleigh. Nothing more was ever heard of him; but a boat-full of adventurers was known to have dropped down with the tide that evening to Deptford Hope, where lay the good ship the Darling, commanded by Captain Kemyss, who sailed next morning on the Virginia voyage.

A brass plate, some eighteen inches long, may yet be seen in Denton chancel, let into a broad slab of Bethersden marble: it represents a lady kneeling, in her wimple and hood; her hands are clasped in prayer, and beneath is an inscription in the characters of the age

"Praie for ye sowle of ye Lady Royse,

And for alle Christen sowles."

The date is illegible; but it appears that she survived King Henry VIII., and that the dissolution of monasteries had lost St. Mary Rounceval her thousand marks.

GODIVA, not for countless tomes

Of war's and kingcraft's leaden history, Would I thy charming legend lose, Or view it in the bloodless hues

Of fabled myth or mystery.

Thou tiny pearl of demagogues!

Thou blue-eyed rebel-blushing traitor! Thou sans-culotte, with dimpled tocs, Whose red cap is an opening roseThou trembling agitator!

We must believe in thee. Our ranks

Of champions loom with faces grimy-
Fierce Tylers, from the anvil torn,
Rough-chested Tells, with palms of horn,
Foul Cades, from ditches slimy !

Knit brows, fierce eyes, and sunken checks
Fill up the vista stern and shady;
Our one bright speck we cannot spare,
Our regiment's sole vivandière-
Our little dainty lady!

No, she was true! the story old

As any crumbling Saxon castle,

Firm at its base: she lived, and moved,
And breathed, and all around her loved-
Lord, lackey, hound, and vassal.

She loved Earl Leofric, her lord,

Nor cared with his fierce moods to wrestle, By protest more than eyelids red. Would he but pat her golden head, "Twould in his rude breast nestle. She loved the palfrey, o'er the plain

That galloped to her voice's chirrup; His surly grooms she thought were kind; Noble and true she deemed the hind

Who, cringing, held her stirrup. The peacocks on the lawn she loved

But none the less their homely grey mate. The kennel yelped as near she drew; A crippled, ugly cur or two

Were her especial playmates.

She loved all things beneath the sun.
Into the toad's bright eyes, unstartled,
She laughing gazed. Within the brake
She'd wonder-" Had she hurt the snake
That out upon her dartled?"

Into the peasant's tree-built hut,

With reeking walls and greasy tables, She loved to run for draughts of milk; The children mauled her robe of silk, And pulled to bits her sables.

They made her sad; she loved them allEach lout a friend, each drab a sister. Why praise her beauty-goodness-so? Why, when she left them, bow so low? None of them ever kissed her.

Within the town 'twas worse than all;
Where anvil clanked, and furnace rumbled;

There workmen, starved and trampled, met, Thought, talked, and planned-a churlish set: Embittered-no whit humbled.

They railed at her-their tyrant's bride,

When, like a mouse, she peeped among them; They met her frightened smiles with "Go!" Her bungling proffered love with "No!" What had she done to wrong them?

For wronged they were, she felt it sore

Else, whence such faces wan and gloomy?
In smoke, and filth, and discontent,
Why thousands, thus in alleys pent;
And earth so rich and roomy?

She could not tell. But she would give
Her soul, the people's wrongs to lighten;
Or if she might not, in their smoke,
Would they but let her, with them choke,
Nor off with rude words frighten.

What could she do? Dark rumours came
That 'twas the earl, her lord and master,
Caused all their wrong. Alas! the day;
She loved him, too. What means essay
The double-fold disaster

To turn aside? The moment came;

The town, new taxed, moaned fierce and sadly; "How free them from this tax ?" said she; "Ride naked through the town," laughed he. "I will," she answered, "gladly." And gladly to her bower she fled,

This more than virgin, gaily singing;
And stripped a form, that morn had blushed
All over, by a rude fly brushed,

Her garden-bath o'erwinging.

And gladly on her palfrey sprung,

That quick the echoing stones awaked. "They will be freed," she sang, "and he

Shall know no harm." Rose-red went she, That she was proud, not naked.

She galloped through the glaring street"Tis true as written gospel holy. "Tis also true, thank God! that all— The meanest mean, the smallest smallThe vilest of the lowly,

Kept within doors

. . save one alone. And here, I own, my faith gets weaker. "Tis said, a rascal from behind A shutter peeped, and God struck blind The soulless, prying sneaker.

I would not have a miracle

Bring doubt upon my darling story; God does not thus avenge the true, But leaves their wrongs to me and you, To right them in their glory. Punished the miscreant was, no doubt, Indignantly with pump and gutter; But he who, of enslaved mankind. The martyr pure could mock, was blind Ere he undid the shutter!

HEN what is the matter with young Mr. Blake?

As he walks through the

streets

he meets

He accosts with a sigh, and a sorrowful shake Of the hand, and his heart throbs as if it would break.

"Once on a time,"

as the storybooks say,

Young Mr. Blake was as blithe and as gay,

And as full of his lark,

As any young spark

You'd meet in your walk through a long summer's day.

What is the matter? (The truth I must tell, Though the sex, that's the females, fall on me pellmell.)

Young Mr. Blake had a house full of strife,

And the cause of the rows was the tongue of his wife!

gaging,"

Excepting at times of irruption and raging.

And then it was strange

To witness the change

en

And pour out the curse Upon him whom she'd taken for "better or worse; Whilst strangers would think

Mrs. Blake was the pink

Of politeness, and kindness, and conjugal love,
And as loving and fond as a real turtle dove.
Young Mr. Blake one evening sat,
His feet on the fender, beating rat-tat;
Each hand in his pocket, up to the wrist;
On his visage a serio-comical twist.

We shall presently find

He had made up his mind

No more to be henpecked-no more to submit
To his wife, and do only what she thought was fit.
The thorn in his side was beginning to rankle;
He repented that he

Had espoused Mrs. B.

For her nice little foot, and her neatly-turned ankle. But what was done could not be undone; in despair He determined to try the effect of "The Chair." In "seventeen hundred and eighteen "

Mountjoy was Bristol's mayor;

Then, on the Weir, might have been seen
The city ducking-chair.

Above the waters of the Frome

The awful apparatus

Frowned like a monitor of gloom,
Just by the castle gatehouse:
A high pole, and a transverse beam,

Which turned ten times a minute

Upon its pivot, o'er the stream,

87

And now, to Blake's astonishment,
With voice all meek and quivering,
She promises, that if unhung
She'll ever after "hold her tongue,"
From that month when the year is young,
È'en until dim December.

So to "the house" was she returned-
It was a quiet house, I've learned,

E'er since they chaired the member
(In a parenthesis I truly
Agree with Paul, that 'twas unruly).
And 'tis declared that Mr. B.
Ne'er made one slight objection
To her return, or sent a pe-
Tition showing forth that he
Disputed the election;

And ever after Mistress Blake
Sailed only in her husband's wake.

AN old friend, who was formerly my schoolfellow, came to town last week with his family for the winter, and yesterday morning sent me word his wife expected me to dinner. I am, as it were, at home at that house, and every member of it knows me for their well-wisher. I cannot, indeed, express the pleasure it is to be met by the children with so much joy as I am when I go thither; the boys and girls strive who shall come first when they think it is I that am knocking at the door; and that child which loses the race to me, runs back again to tell the father it is Mr. Bickerstaff. This day I was led in by a pretty girl that we all thought must have forgot me, for the family has been out of town these two years. Her knowing me again was a mighty subject with us, and took up our discourse at the first entrance. With many reflections on little passages which happened long ago, we passed our time during a cheerful and elegant meal.

FAMILY.

See Page 21.]

the company that dined with you to-day again. Do not you think the good woman of the house a little altered since you followed her from the playhouse, to find out who she was for me?" I perceived a tear fall down his cheek as he spoke, which moved me not a little. But to turn the discourse, said I, "She is not indeed quite that creature she was when she returned me the letter I carried from you; and told me, she hoped, as I was a gentleman, I would be employed no more to trouble her who had never offended me, but would be so much the gentleman's friend as to dissuade him from a pursuit which he could never succeed in. You may remember, I thought her in earnest, and you were forced to employ your cousin Will, who made his sister get acquainted with her for you. You cannot expect her to be for ever fifteen." "Fifteen!" replied my good friend: "Ah! you little understand, you that have lived a bachelor, how great, how exquisite, a pleasure there is in being really beloved! It is impossible that the most beauteous face in nature should raise in me such pleasing ideas, as when I look upon that excellent That fading in her countenance is chiefly caused by her watching with me in my fever.

woman.

This was followed by a fit of sickness, which had like to have carried her off last winter. I tell you sincerely, I have so many obligations to her, that I cannot with any sort of moderation think of her present state of health. Ever since her sickness, things that gave me the quickest joy before, turn now to a certain anxiety. As the children play in the next room, I know the poor things by their steps, and am considering what they must do, should they lose their mother in their tender years. The pleasure I used to take in telling my boy stories of the battles, and asking my girl questions about the disposal of her baby, and the gossiping of it, is turned into inward reflection and melancholy."

He would have gone on in this tender way, when the good lady entered, and with an inexpressible sweetness in her countenance, told us she had been searching her closet for something very good, to treat such an old friend as I was. Her husband's eyes sparkled with pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance, and I saw all his fears vanish in an instant. The lady observing something in our looks which showed we had been more serious than ordinary, and seeing her husband received her with great concern under a forced cheerfulness, immediately guessed at what we had been talking of, and applying herself to me, said, with a smile, "Mr. Bickerstaff, don't believe a word of what he tells you, I shall still live to have you for my second, as I have often

promised you, unless he takes more care of himself than he has done since coming to town."

On a sudden, we were alarmed with the noise of a drum, and immediately entered my little godson to give me a point of war. His mother, between laughing and chiding, would have put him out of the room; but I would not part with him so. I found upon conversation with him, that the child had excellent parts, and was a great master of all the learning on t'other side of eight years old. I perceived him a very great historian in Æsop's fables. But he frankly declared to me his mind, that he did not delight in that learning, because he did not believe they were true; for which reason I found he had very much turned his studies for about a twelvemonth past, into the lives and adventures of Don Bellianis of Greece, Guy of Warwick, the Seven Champions, and other historians of that age.

I sat with them till it was very late, sometimes in merry, sometimes in serious discourse, with this particular pleasure, which gives the only true relish to all conversation, a sense that every one of us liked each other. I went home, considering the different conditions of a married life and that of a bachelor; and I must confess that it struck me with a secret concern, to reflect, that whenever I go off, I shall leave no traces behind me. In this pensive mood I returned to my family-that is to say, to my maid, my dog, and my cat, who only can be the better or worse for what happens to me