Benjamin, no longer "little Ben," as the elder brother called him, was departing for the great town of commerce, to secure a small sum owing to Ned for wages; and with that and a couple of hundred pounds given him by the uncle who had brought up both the young men, he meant to begin life and become all that, it has been said, he aspired to become.

Saddened by the remembrance of his brother's death, he walked slowly down the hill, and in a quarter of an hour stopped at Mr. Aveley's cottage. The door was opened by Harriet Aveley, a charming young person with an ingenuous and sprightly countenance. A youth and maiden about to be separated, but no scene of lover's parting to be depicted-such is the plain matter of fact. Yet under this matter of fact something was hidden. There was only one other being in the world in whom Harrict was more interested than in Benjamin; that was, her father; and there was only one

other being in whom Benjamin was more interested than in Harriet; that was himself. This was evidently not love on either side. But it is a kind of thing which has made many a woman's cheek turn pale during long years of absence; and has brought many a man, wearied with the jostle of life, back to seek in the old home of his youth, the face which looked kindly on him when a boy.

"We thought you would have come sooner," said Harriet. "My father has a book for you-he wished to talk to you about it before you read it."

Now, it is strange, that Benjamin could not have commanded his voice just then, to say a careless thing like that about a book.

Mr. Aveley came forward, took the young man by the hand and led him into his little parlour, signifying to his daughter, by a gesture, that he wished to be alone with him. Not often has a youth on entering the world received counsel so good as that which Hardy

then received-for the book, a parting gift, was forgotten, and the book of life was wisely commented on. A tear was in Hardy's dark eye, and a glow on his brown cheek as he came out from the interview with his friend. He was summoned by the sound of wheels; the stage coach stopped for a minute; there was a hurried "Good bye," to father and daughter, and he was gone.

CHAPTER II.

"In discourse more sweet,

Others aloft,

In thought more elevate, now reasoned high,
Of Providence, fore-knowledge, will and fate;
Fixed fate, free will, fore-knowledge absolute,
And found no end in wandering mazes lost.
Of good and evil much they argued then,
Of happiness and final misery."

MILTON.

HARDY now found himself, for the first time in his life, on the top of a stage-coach. He sat behind the coachman, and was soon roused from the meditative mood, into which Mr. Aveley's discourse had thrown him, by rather severe pressure against the iron rod which formed a safety-rail to his seat. The

cause of this was, that of the two besides himself who occupied that position which afforded the nearest contemplation of the broad shoulders of their driver, one was of very bulky proportions. He was also much engaged in conversation with the gentleman on his left, and, turning his person towards him, he took up more than his just allowance of room. The young man having given, by some wrigglings and twistings of his body, tacit hints about the inconvenience which he suffered, finding them ineffectual, had to request his neighbour, rather loudly, to move over. In consequence of this the bulky personage in the middle sat further back, and his thin supporters, Hardy and a light-eyed, eager-faced man of thirty, drew forward a little, and were thus decidedly more comfortable than they had been. Another result was that the new-comer seemed to become a party in the conversation going on; for, though he scarcely spoke, the quick intelligence of his countenance showed that he