And on this first of May, I was also to leave my dwelling in Enkhus Grand, or Widow House Lane, and to remove to the very comfortable lodginghouse, or hotel, of Frue La Croix, in Brunkebergs Torg; one which is surprisingly little known to English travellers, to whom it would possess an additional advantage, since its kind and pleasant owner was born in England, and would speak our language much better than she even now does if the travellers, who suffer so much inconvenience in other quarters in Stockholm, resorted to her hotel.

The snow still lay on the heights of Södor when I took the last view I ever should take of them, from the windows which had been to me, for at least six months, like the face of a friend, to which, even if it change a little at times, we still turn to reap some consolation, some compensation for all the trials and annoyances we meet with from other things. That window was to me as the record, too, of thoughts, feelings, emotions, words, that never might be exactly reproduced, because originating in, and proceeding from, novel circumstances yet which must be indissolubly linked with all that had been, all that should be, to me in life-in death-perhaps in eternity.

VOL. II.

Z

That May-day was the bitterest I ever felt. The sky was iron-grey, and seemed heavy with snow: the keen wind penetrated one's very bones. No sign of a leaf, or sprig, gave intimation of spring; it was like a bitterly cold first of March in England.

The thought of passing it, as I had intended to do, on the rocks of the Djurgord, was given up; and I gladly accepted the invitation of some of the kindest of my many kind Swedish friends, Kammerherre Cederschiold, to spend it at his house, the windows of which afforded a fine view of the procession, and of the throngs of citizens flocking out to the park.

With this "Lord of the Bedchamber," as we should translate the title Kammerherre—and his charming wife, who by Swedish courtesy bears the title of "Female Lord of the Chamber," the evening afforded me greater pleasures than were derived from merely watching a singular medley of persons—some brilliant, some gay, all decent, orderly, and the lower classes grave and respectable-who, in carriages, on horseback, or foot, poured on in a continuous stream, facing cold, wind, and dust, to make an annual promenade in the Djurgord on the evening of the first of May.

Having spent a most agreeable and social evening with friends who had really become dear to me, but whom I was doubtful of seeing again, I was conducted to Brunkebergs Torg, where I was to take up my temporary abode till the water was

open.

My rooms were four trapper upp-that is, up four flights of almost interminably winding stone stairs; and as this was on the high hill called that of Brunke, you may fancy to what an elevation I attained, and how complacently I might, from my new windows, look down on all the rest of the visible world.

Mamzellen, or the mamzell, the housekeeper, or superintendent of the hotel, had told me, when I went out, that if it were shut up at my return for the night, I should clap my hands in the street, outside the door, which would immediately open to admit me. This eastern, and magical mode of action, extremely pleased my fancy; but the solid Englishman who attended me thought I had lost my senses, when he saw me clapping my hands together outside the great strong door of the hotel: and when I convinced him that I was only obeying orders, he clapped his with such a real John Bull determination, that

the door seemed to fly open at the sound of its own accord. I bade him god natt, and went four trapper up by myself.

On entering in the dark the first of my long suite of small rooms, the salong-the honour of possessing which I had now attained to-the view from the three windows at once struck me. It was not only from its great difference to that I had lately so much delighted in, looking over as it did a vast number of windmills, and the redtopped houses of a great part of Stockholm; but from the singularity of the night-scene it showed me, that the effect arose.

The horizon presented a most curious aspect, and being so extensive,-far beyond the limits of the capital,—I had an opportunity of watching the progress of the phenomenon.

Far away, beyond the windmills, whose long arms were flinging about in a strange wild manner, there lay a deep, yet glowing light; a crimson sky. I thought it strange to see the red sunlight rest on the horizon at eleven o'clock on the night of the first of May; and I stood looking at it without recollecting it was not at the west I was looking. But, while I looked, the flame colour brightened and spread, instead of fading and lessening; some

lines of light came shooting athwart the crimson, then a green and orange hue blended with itsuddenly it blazed up, far over the northern sky -dancing, glittering, making a festival in the midnight skies.

This was the Northern Lights, the Aurora Borealis, seen often in the frosty winter season here; but more curious, more delightful to me, when these glorious lights come on the first night of May, to welcome my first entrance into my solitary dwelling, to which I had climbed in the dark, four trapper upp !

"In everything give thanks !" said an apostle; and oh! for all, even of the lesser circumstances that lighten the weight of mortal life, how does the heart respond to the injunction? How many glad, how many brighter thoughts, may just this litttle accident of nature furnish to me in futureperhaps more dreary-times, when no Northern Lights may illume another lonely abode.

And now the twelfth day of May has come. The ice has quite broken up; the water is clear; the sun shines, and the breeze blows strong. My friends are in waiting on the Crown Princess