was actually tied-have in the bitterness of their hearts a thousand times preferred the pennyless, nay even prospect-less, Frank Lygon! ever. When Frank heard this, and it met him in the public prints on the very threshold of his countryhis first impulse was to re-embark, and abjure it for But a second and manlier feeling determined him to complete the sacrifice he had already made to duty, by a painful but necessary visit to Cheveley; from whence-from that very library where he first gave, by an act of heroic sincerity, the death-blow to his youthful dreams of happiness-he dated their final renunciation in a few cold lines to his once Emma," inclosing all the letters thus subscribed by a hand, since profaned by coquetry, and about to ratify its own eternal degradation. This done, he returned with a saddened, yet relieved heart, to Lausanne; and, after watching for another year the gentle and almost simultaneous extinction of his brother's malady and life he landed with his remains in England, about the very period which made Emma Grosvenor twenty one. ❝ own It was on the day when-with a bridegroom whom a year of wedded life had sufficed already to unmaskthe heiress went down to take possession of estates, of which she already found herself a mere burdensome appendage, that the long funeral train bound for Cheveley, crossed, by a strange coincidence, the bridal pageant from Grosvenor Hall. The bridegroom bit his lips, the bride sunk back in the carriage. What she felt through a few short years of wedded martyrdom, few can tell,—but she died young; and amidst the horrors of a decline, which opium was said to have soothed but to accelerate-held sad and disjointed converse with the absent, but never forgotten, Frank Lygon! SONNET. MILTON VISITING GALILEO IN PRISON. ART thou the mighty reader of the skies, The maze of heaven's star-ciphered mysteries? A soul of those enormous energies That heaven's eternal hollow could not hold? Look up, look up, great Prophet, and rejoice,- Possessed an ampler state; not Sovran Jove To chill an impious age with sudden fear, THE EARLY-LOVED. BY WILLIAM HOWITT. What moving incidents occur in the most quiet and uneventful lives! Did we but know upon what ground we tread in our youthful gaiety, methinks it would arrest our thoughtless merriment. I have met with an early friend !-but it was at her grave.-PRIVATE DIARY. I. AWAY! away!-release me !— I thought there had not been The spirit of this scene! II. And have you, have you truly Here made the bed of rest 'Mid the opening leaves, the budding trees, I lift my eyes, and round me What an old, familiar spot! In a moment-years have passed away, And the present time is not. IV. That house-these pleasant gardens Walls-walks beloved so well 'T was thus they looked in the buried years! 'T was thus the sunshine fell! V.. And here, 'mid friends and fortune, In life's first, faëry truth, Dwelt the daughter of a house beloved, In the brightness of her youth. VI. Yes! yes! and in that season, When the soul was full of glee, I have stood with her on this very spot, And laughed right merrily. VII. Behold! behold!-you have brought her Back to her native ground; And her grave is open at our feet, With her children gathered round: VIII. With her weeping, trembling children ;— Fill up fill up !-let us turn away! For the soul can brook it not. -- IX. For me, I have tasked my spirit In a quest severe and high; And have gazed perhaps too much on life, As a pageant fleeting by. X. Yet in my home's seclusion Are numbered things of mine, It were hard, even at the gates of heaven, For its glories to resign. XI. And I turn back to life's morning With a fond and lingering gaze, And fain would stem the stream of time, And regain the perished days. XII. Yet wherefore?-for all objects That round about appear, Cry-" follow!" for the souls beloved Are risen-" they are not here!" XIII. Then onward!-spread the canvas In the wide, eternal seas. |