science told her all the while that Amy's penetra tive wit and delicate tact must have made her full♥ aware, that in every seemingly innocent speech she was tendering a provocation to his peculiar temper Was this practising that system of adapting herself to her lot in life which she had so lately enunciated and in which Edith so firmly believed? Yet where lay the fault? Edith would not condemn her friend if she could help it; so she fixed her eyes steadily on the undeniable fact that Mr. Dalton was a bore, and then tried to satisfy her sense of right, by saying to herself that no woman of Amy's genius and refinement could be expected to tolerate such a companion, and that, under the circumstances, she behaved wonderfully well.

pressed her like the murmurs of a wounded spirit. | husband was irritable and impatient, but her con Was earth then left desolate like her own heart, and were the glories of autumn to preface forever the death of winter? Was the same dreary allegory to be forever enacted by the seasons, and budding hopes, transient blisses, and bright memories, forever to pass into the chill of disappointment and the darkness of mortality? This lying-in state of the crowned corpse of nature, ere the snow-shroud should enwrap her for her funeral, seemed grievous and strange to Edith. "Will it be always thus ?" thought she, "or will the king appear at length when the festival is made ready, and bid it last forever? If the hands of angels foster these natural beauties, painting the flowers and clouds, and spreading the sunlight on the hill-slopes tenderly, as if stroking the hair of a beloved child, how sorrowfully must they give their darlings into their yearly grave-how cheerless must be the lovely toils of spring when constant experience has taught them to look ever for the destruction of winter!" And a sudden gust shook the stem of a birch-tree which grew beneath her window, and robbed it of its last scanty covering; the severed leaves passed through the air with a sound like a low sigh, and the dismantled branches shivered as though in fear. The tree stood bare in the broad daylight, but its form was still beautiful and graceful. Will it be so with the soul when the shadows that soften it are gone, and the garments that enrobe it are rent away?

"Let us walk together," were Amy's first words; "Mr. Dalton has gone to Hillfield, and we shall have the whole morning to ourselves."

Edith wondered how this had been settled, but did not like to ask. Amy turned her speaking eyes upon her, and, after a pause, added, with a slight laugh, "You must not judge by what you see at first, Edith. Mr. Dalton has a very kind heart, but he has a nervous constitution, and an unfortunately irritable temper. These little scenes often happen; but, on the whole, we jog on very comfortably together."

Edith literally could not answer her. This was her ideal of female perfection speaking of her husband! When she remembered the husband, she could scarcely wonder at the tone; but why did they marry? She settled, in a parenthesis, that it mus have been compulsory, and, leaving quite out of view the improbability of the supposition, suffered herself to give her entire compassion to the victim

Edith leaned her cheek upon her hand. "There is peace here at least," she thought; "and though yesterday I was ready to chide nature because she does not sympathize with man, to-day I could love her for that very reason. What should we do without a refuge from these petty strifes and un-ized wife. They walked together through the worthy troubles? Here before the quiet eyes of park, enjoying quietly the solemn beauty of an earth, her children are ashamed of grief-how much autumnal noon. The silence of a tête-à-tête is more of irritation and bitterness! Why were we sometimes the most eloquent of all conversations. born with hearts which a wasp can sting or a thistle To those who have suffered from the inexorable pierce? How have we the leisure to lament about rule of common society-who know the compulsory little things, or to be angry at trifles? If great sor-effort to talk, or the grievous burden of listeningrow does no more, it at least does this; it lifts us how delicious is that freedom of intercourse in above the details of life, and makes them dwindle in which the soul is suffered to pause in the abundance the distance till we actually forget them, because of its thoughts, and need speak only when the we do not see them. Well is it for those who can thoughts overflow! Such converse is as unlike the return into the midst of them with the temper small talk by which those shallow familiarities engendered by this forced separation; well for her sometimes called friendships are cemented, as the who can pass through the city tumult with so much gush of the mountain brook, now leaping over its as this of the nun-spirit in her heart!" rocky bed, now reposing in some sweet natural The voice of Ainy calling her from the lawn pool, is unlike the regulated outbreaks and trim interrupted this reverie, and Edith obeyed the sum-impetuosity of the water-works at Versailles. mons in a kind of wonder at herself. She was A boy of about eighteen years old, in a groom's beginning to be conscious of a change within her, though she could not define it. She knew that she was miserable; she was beginning to think that she might have been faulty, and this made her more miserable still, as she strove to repel the thought. But the sight of this loveless home, and the visible fruits of a system of self-pleasing, however innocent and lofty may be the tastes which are to be gratified, without self-discipline, weighed upon her spirits, and disturbed her faith in her former opinions. Then came the unanswerable question, why did these two persons marry? Unsuited in everything, they seemed to be living together without the mystery of love to render forbearance easy, or the enforcement of duty to make them practise it when difficult. But since they were married, Edith, spoilt child as she was, could not wholly justify her friend, the gh she tried hard to do so. She told herself that Amy was good-humored, while her

undress livery, met them, and, taking off his cap, smilingly presented Mrs. Dalton with a piece of moss. "It is the very species I wanted!" cried she, examining it with childish pleasure. "How glad I am! Where could Paul have found it?" She smiled, and nodded the warmest approbation, and, holding up the moss before the boy's eyes, seemed to inquire where he had found it. He pointed over the hill without speaking, and made gestures. Edith for the first time perceived that he was dumb. He held up both hands twice in succession, to imply that he had been to a distance of twenty miles to seek for the moss. Mrs. Dalton again thanked him by signs, and directed him to carry it to the house, and to get some refreshmen. there; and with a bright look and a deep inclination he darted away.

"Poor Paul!" said his mistress; "he is the most grateful creature in the world. Mr. Dalton

took notice of him when he was about five years with perfect amiability of manner, and complete old, and has provided for him ever since; he was disregard of his visible annoyance, for it was clearly first educated at a deaf and dumb school, and after- a sore subject. His deportment grew more and wards brought here, where Mr. Dalton has himself more sullen, and the last few couplets were delivtaught him to perform the duties of groom. Every-ered with an uneasy and uniform growl. When he body said it was foolish and hopeless; but Mr. closed the book, he began to defend his method of Dalton said the lad was intelligent, and he was reading, and a bland, but harrowing, contest endetermined to try what could be made of him. So sued, which lasted with a few intervals till they the master was indefatigably patient, and the pupil retired to bed. Edith tried to take interest in it, indefatigably docile, and now he is a most useful and to give her opinion when called for with due servant. Indeed, he has a strange gift for attaching impartiality; but the graceful contempt of the lady animals; and Emir, my husband's favorite Arab, annoyed her even more than the querulous discomwill scarcely let any one else touch him." fiture of the gentleman; and it was with a feeling of utter dismay, which would perhaps have been livelier had she been less unhappy, that she looked forward to the month which she had promised to spend at Beechwood Park.

"It does so," replied Amy; "he loves like a woman with his whole nature. Did you notice Edith could not sleep, and with the first break of that he wore a knot of autumn flowers in his but- morning she rose, dressed herself, and went out into ton-hole? He once told his master, in his quaint the park to cool her fevered cheeks and aching forebroken phrase, such as he learned for the convey-head in the pure dewy air. She was scarcely to be ance of his thoughts, that flower scents were his music.'

pitied for her wakefulness. "No greater grief," says the poet, "than to remember the happy time "Amy," said Edith, pursuing the train of when we are miserable.”—But there is a grief yet thought that to-day seemed to have arisen within greater; it is to dream of the happy time and awake her, "do you not think that the world of spirits to find it gone forever. If dreams, did not renew may be to us what the world of sounds is to him? the past, and resuscitate the dead, they might per-very near-actually present with us, only need-haps avail to refresh the soul as they do the body; ing a change in ourselves to make us conscious of it?"

advanced even than childhood-a perpetual infancy | us-] -his upward look is so bright and steadfast. You both of heart and mind. And then they awakened know it is not impossible that God may open his his reason and his devotional feelings, but these eyes to see them as a compensation for the privamust have acted strangely and separately from each tion of his other senses." other. For no quiet habitual exercise was provided for such beginnings of religious perception as he was capable of experiencing-no actual daily obedience demanded; he was still cut off from all union with others; he was made to understand dimly that he was responsible, and yet he did not find himself living un'er a law."

"Oh, p. y go on," cried Edith, as her compan1on stopped, apparently somewhat ashamed of speaking at so much length, "I do not quite understand. Surely, the moment he was taught to know right from wrong he found himself living under a law." "Yes," returned Alice; "but there always seems to me to be such a difference between a law of that kind which you are taught in theory and which comes into action when temptation assails us, and one which forestalls temptation, and preöccupies the ground by prescribing a round of duties and suggesting a course of thought. Only just think! If we could but keep an angel within the heart, it seems to me that evil spirits would flee away faster and further than if we had only barred the door against them."

"Like filling every corner of ground with flowers, so as to have no room for weeds," said Edith. "Ah, if we could only do so! But suppose the weeds have grown up without our heeding them?" "Then I think there is nothing for us but hard work," answered Alice. "We cannot have a virgin soil twice in our lives, can we?"

"No, no," said Edith bitterly, "and therefore it is useless to try. There are not two mornings to one day, nor two childhoods, nor two springtimes! Once gone, forever gone,' is the inscrip

tion written on each hour of life.'

Her companion looked at her wonderingly, and presently said, blushing very deeply, "I know that is all very true, but still is it not a little severe to say that it is useless to try? I often think that charity must be the most difficult of all duties to those who are not weak, foolish, and faulty as I am; to those whose strength has never, or very seldom, failed them. When one is very, very often wrong, and yet not without hope, one learns to feel that there is no one who may not hope too."

Edith felt almost awe-struck at the simple expression of an habitual faith in that which to her had been the conjecture of a moment of highly-wrought feeling. After an instant's pause, Alice continued: "And now it is beautiful to see how his whole life seems to be made up of love. Gradually he has made acquaintance with all those whom he is in the habit of meeting here, and there is not one to whom he has not endeared himself-not one in whose prayers he has not a special remembrance. He often waits for me in the porch with a nosegay of flowers from his own little garden at Beechwood Park. But his chief intimacy is with three little children who live in a cottage about half a mile off, and come to this church every morning. He takes such care of them; in wet weather he always brings an umbrella and takes them home himself, sheltering them so anxiously; and he stops them in the doorway, as they come in, to see whether their feet are wet, and wraps them up so tenderly when they go out; and they play with him and caress him, as I have seen a kitten play with a great Newfoundland dog, making him understand everything they want to express by their gestures and coaxing looks."

Edith had fallen into thought, so that she scarcely listened to this little history of poor Paul and his friends. Suddenly rousing herself, she said with some abruptness," And now tell me about yourself, Miss Brown-Alice, if I may call you so. I want to know how you are going on.'

The face of Alice was instantly covered with the deepest crimson. Averting it, she answered hurriedly, but very gently, "Thank you, dear Miss Kinnaird-I quite understand what you mean. I am wiser now, I hope, than I was when I last saw you, and you were so kind to me. Oh! how kind you were! I have often thought of it, and wanted to thank you; at every moment of this conversation I have been wishing to tell you how grateful I am-but-you see-it is a subject of which I am ashamed, as I have reason to be, and so I did not like to begin it."

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Pray, pray, do not thank me," said Edith; you have as little reason to thank me as to blame "Oh! my dear Alice!" exclaimed Edith, grasp-yourself. I was very heedless-I am afraid I have ing her hand, "you did not understand me! If I given you pain." exclude anybody, I exclude-but never mind what I really meant. Only remember, that I did not mean what you thought I did. And now let us go on with poor Paul's history. He, it seems, had all this hard work of which you were speaking, for he had to conquer a violent and sullen temper.

"I

No, indeed," replied Alice, again turning her face to her companion, and speaking with animation. Tears were in her eyes and on her cheeks, but the emotion was perfectly quiet, and only a slight quivering was discernible in her voice. am very glad that you spared me the effort of speak"It seemed to be rather displaced than con- ing first. Thank you for feeling an interest about quered," answered Alice; "you know the case of me. I have several pupils to whom I teach music, a creature so unfortunate, would be no rule for work, and-drawing-only the beginning, you know. others. I cannot suppose there was much actual I have not a day unoccupied, and I earn quite enough guilt in his outbreaks of passion. However, they are over now, and he seems quite happy. I think his chief comfort was, that he began to feel, perhaps unconsciously, that there was one sense in "Quite happy!" thought Edith; " and this is how which he was not the isolated, solitary creature he the destruction of the hope of a life may be borne! had always seemed to be. Here," and she looked Felt, too, so keenly at the time-so keenly, even upward to the white spire still visible above the now," she added, as she met her friend's tearful trees, "he felt that he was a member of a body-smile, "and in the midst of poverty and wearisome that he was one with those among whom he worshipped. And I have sometimes almost thought,' she added, dropping her voice, and hesitating a litJe," that he may see the angels worshipping with

for mamma and myself to live upon very comfortably. Is it not delightful that I am able to do so? I ought to be quite happy."

labor!"

"Alice!" she cried, yielding to an irresistible impulse, "I wish from my heart 1 were you!"

Alice looked at her with undisguised astonish

ment.

"I am sure I should be well contented with | very kindly, and the momentary annoyance which the change," said she, playfully. Then, with the she evidently felt at having no better entertainment delicate tact which nothing but keen sympathy can to offer her, passed away almost before it could be give, perceiving that some new and deep sorrow perceived, in her gratification at her daughter's lay at the bottom of so strange a wish, and divining pleasure, whose pleasures were so few. from Edith's sudden embarrassment that it was one "You must put off your pupils for one hour towhich could not be uttered, she began to speak of day, Alice, darling," said she. other things, to describe her manner of life, to tell "Oh no, mamma," was the answer; "Miss of the various shades of character and talent among Kinnaird will, I am sure, excuse me for going as her young pupils, seeking to win Edith's interest soon as we have breakfasted. It would be a great for things so simple and so personally connected indulgence to stay," she added, turning to Edith, with herself, that it seemed like pleading for such" but I must not break an appointment, must I?" a further advance of friendship, as might, ere long, "Don't ask me," said Edith, "if you want to entitle her to confidence. be confirmed in doing an unpleasant duty; I have a very expansive conscience in such matters, and I shall certainly advise you to stay.'

How common a mistake it is for those who feel keenly and are anxious not to betray their feelings, to suppose that the silence, or the unwary word, or the change of subject, or the indifference of tone in him who listens, proves that the secret is still unguessed! How often are all these only the shyness of sincere love which waits for leave ere it will tell how much it knows! How often are they the result of a sympathy so profound and so perfect that it forebodes what it does not know, but with the modesty of true friendship, shrinks from assuming more than the will of the friend has accorded shrinks even from seeming to suggest or to desire what that will has not spontaneously originated! Thus may the very delicacy of affection pass for coldness-but it is a coldness, which, like that of the polar regions, burns like fire if you grasp it unawares. Strange is it, brother mortals, that our hearts are not suffered to touch cach other, so as to reveal the undiscovered harmonies which sleep among their chords! Oh! thou who despairest of life and man, who hast found no sympathy or comfort among thy fellows, and hast taken desolate self-dependence and cold distrustfulness for thy bosom companions, put away from thee this natural bitterness, and think within thyself of that fair morning in Paradise, when many spirits shall gather round thee and say, "I wept for thee-and I remembered thee in my prayers—and I watched thee, and grieved for thee, and knew what thou hadst to suffer and thou knewest it not!" If the open treasons and chilly repulses which we encounter at the hands of our brethren must needs be remembered, let not the unknown sympathies be quite forgotten!

"But your head ached yesterday," interposed Mrs. Brown, looking at her daughter with that indescribable expression of anxiety which indicates a habit, not a mood; and, indeed, you are looking tired. Do stay, Alice-to oblige me, my love."

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"Well, mamma," returned Alice, kissing her, "if you make a personal favor of it, I suppose I must; but I do assure you I am perfectly well; and you know I must be in a strange state of health, indeed, if an hour more or less could make a difference to me."

Mrs. Brown suppressed a sigh as she turned to the breakfast-table, and began to converse with her guest; and Edith's heart felt oppressed by the ideas which this little scene had awakened. Alice did, indeed, look sickly, though not absolutely ill; and she pictured to herself the daily sufferings of the mother who was obliged to see her child daily taxed to the utmost of her strength, perhaps a little beyond it; and whom the despot poverty actually prevented from doing anything to retard the gradual sacrifice.

But Alice seemed to feel that her mother's eyes rested wistfully upon her from time to time, and she answered their silent inquiry by assuming a degree of liveliness unlike her usually shy manner. She talked and laughed, ran from one subject to another, and contrived to lull all suspicion by her unwonted gayety. Edith was struck by the unusual simplicity of character apparent in all she said; her talk was as unlike the ordinary rattle of a girl of nineteen as it was possible to conceive. And this not because it was more intellectual, for there They were now entering the town of Beechwood, was no appearance of talent about her, but rather and a very few minutes more brought them to because it was more childish. Flowers, of which Alice's humble dwelling. With eager, but some- even in that small room, and at that unfavorable what timid hospitality, she conducted Edith up season, she had a goodly show, and books, were stairs, assisted her in removing her bonnet and her principal topics; the former she exhibited to shawl, and, having quickly completed her own sim- Edith with unfeigned delight, expatiating on the ple toilette, ushered her into the one small sitting-past beauty of those which were now withering room, where Mrs. Brown was awaiting them at with as much enthusiasm as could have been the breakfast-table. Alice's mother was very un- demonstrated by the faded belles themselves, had 'like the person that Edith had expected to see. nature gifted them with tongues; the latter she disHer countenance and manners were full of subdued cussed with at least equal animation, speaking of vivacity; and the former was still so exceedingly all the imaginary characters in poem or tale exactly lovely, though more than sixty years had passed as if they had really lived, and she had known them over it, that it contrasted strangely with her daugh- personally. Edith took pains to discover her tastes, ter's, which, as we have before said, was wholly and could scarcely help smiling at the eager sparkle without attraction, except from expression. She of happiness which came into her face when, in had that peculiarity sometimes to be observed in Mrs. Dalton's name, she offered her access to the persons who have suffered many sorrows, but whose library at Beechwood. The hours slipped rapidly temperament is naturally buoyant. Her face in away, and when Edith, having parted from her repose, or in its ordinary expression, was bright new friend with many promises of visiting her and cheerful; but her smile was melancholy itself. again, walked slowly homewards, her thoughts There was in it a flash of exceeding joyousness, so were so fully and so deeply occupied, that she tremulous and so transient, that you involuntarily could scarcely shake off her abstraction sufficiently expected it to end in tears. She welcomed Edith to escape comment from her host and hostess. Nc