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HOMES OF AMERICAN AUTHORS.

Miles Coverinto the streets. Here, in the early days of spring, | encouragement upon all parties. But the conversa the timid crocus and snowdrop peep from the soil tion became more and more staccato. long before the iron hand of winter has been lifted dale, a statue of night and silence, sat, a little refrom the rest of the city. Besides the near attraction moved, under a portrait of Dante, gazing impertur of the Common, which is beautiful in all seasons, this bably upon the group; and as he sat in the shadow, part of Boston, from its elevated position, commands his dark hair and eyes and suit of sables made him, a fine view of the western horizon, including a range in that society, the black thread of mystery which he of graceful and thickly-peopled hills in Brookline and weaves into his stories, while the shifting presence of I recall little else but a grave eating of Roxbury. Our brilliant winter sunsets are seen here the Brook Farmer played like heat-lightning around to the greatest advantage. The whole western sky the room. burns with rich metallic lights of orange, yellow, and russet apples by the erect philosophers, and a solemn yellow-green; the outlines of the hills in the clear, disappearance into night. The club struggled through frosty air, are sharply cut against this glowing back-three Monday evenings. Plato was perpetually putground; the wind-harps of the leafless trees send ting apples of gold in pictures of silver, for such was forth a melancholy music, and the faint stars steal the rich ore of his thoughts, coined by the deep melout one by one as the shrouding veil of daylight is ody of his voice. Orson charmed us with the secrets slowly withdrawn. A walk at this hour along the won from his interviews with Pan in the Walden western side of the Common offers a larger amount woods-while Emerson, with the zeal of an engineer of the soothing and elevating influences of nature than trying to dam wild waters, sought to bind the wildflying embroidery of discourse into a web of clear, The oracular sayBut still in vain. most dwellers in cities can command. ings were the unalloyed saccharine element; and every chemist knows how much else goes to pratical food-how much coarse, rough, woody fibre is essential. The club struggled on valiantly, discoursing celestially, eating apples, and disappearing in the But I have since known clubs of fifty times that numdark, until the third evening it vanished altogether. ber, whose collective genius was not more than that of either one of the Dii Majores of our Concord coterie. The fault was its too great concentration. It was not relaxation as a club should be, but tension. It is the easy grace of undress; not an intellectual Society is a play, a game, a tournament; not a battle. full-dress parade.

Those who wish to call on Miss Sedgwick, and Mr. Everett and to acquaint themselves with the furniture of the late Mr. Cooper's laboratory of romance-will find means of doing so in this volume. Mazy and hazy persons, moreover, will receive comfort, aliment, and (probably they will fancy, ideas also), from the mazy and hazy pages devoted to Mr. Emerson-his habits and reception. The following is curiously transatlantic and transcendental in its humor :

It was in the year 1845, that a circle of persons of various ages, and differing very much in everything but sympathy, found themselves in Concord. Towards the end of the autumn Mr. Emerson sug

through the winter in his library.

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sweet sense.

We have been beguiled on from house to house gested that they should meet every Monday evening-forgetting how late in the year it is—and how pine,' "Miles Coverdale," and other phantoms, since many calls are to be paid (literally and figuragenerally known as Nathaniel Hawthorne, who then tively) on our own historians, novelists, poets, occupied the Old Manse-the inflexible Henry Tho-playwrights, and punsters, ere the New Year reau, a scholastic and pastoral Orson, then living comes in. One more threshold, however, we must among the blackberry pastures of Walden pond-cross-that of Mr. Hawthorne. The justice of Plato Skimpole, then sublimely meditating impossible time, that fails no deserving man, has at last set summer-houses in a little house upon the Boston road him in his due place as among the most individthe enthusiastic agriculturist and Brook Farmer ual and distinguished of contemporary novelists. already mentioned, then an inmate of Mr. Emerson's But, for a long period, the author of "The Scarlet house, who added the genial cultivation of a scholar Letter" seems to have been little more than a to the amenities of the natural gentleman-a sturdy shadow and a myth in his own country :— farmer neighbor, who had bravely fought his weary way through inherited embarrassments to the small success of a New England husbandman, and whose faithful wife had seven times merited well of her country-two city youths, ready for the fragments from the feast of wit and wisdom--and the host himself, composed this club. Ellery Channing, who had that winter harnessed his Pegasus to the New York Tribune, was a kind of corresponding member. The news of this world was to be transmitted through his eminently practical genius, as the club deemed Itself competent to take charge of tidings from all other spheres. I went, the first Monday evening, very much as Ixion may have gone to his banquet. The philosophers sat dignified and erect. There was a constrained, but very amiable silence, which had the impertinence of a tacit inquiry, seeming to ask, "Who will now proceed to say the finest thing that has ever been said?" It was quite involuntary and unavoidable, for the members lacked that fluent, social genius without which a club is impossible. It was a congress of oracles on the one hand, and of ourious listeners on the other. I vaguely remember that the Orphic Alcott invaded the Sahara of silence with a solemn "saying," to which, after due pause, the honorable member for blackberry pastures responded by some keen and graphic observation, while the Olympian host, anxious that so much good material should be spun into something, beamed smiling

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To the inhabitants of Concord, however, our author was as much a phantom and a fable as the old parson of the parish, dead half a century before, whose faded The portrait in the attic was gradually rejoining its original in native dust. The gate, fallen from its hinges in a remote antiquity, was never re-hung. No bold villager ever invaded wheel-track leading to the door, remained still overgrown with grass. the sleep of the "glimmering shadows" in the aveAt evening no lights gleamed in the windows. nue. Scarce once in many months did the single old nobbySometimes, in the afternoon, faced coachman at the railroad bring a fare to Mr. Hawthorne's. a darkly-clad figure was seen in the little garden-plot putting in corn or melon seed, and gravely hoeing. It was a brief apparition. The farmer passing towards town and seeing the solitary cultivator, lost his faith in the fact and believed he had dreamed, when, upon returning, he saw no sign of life, except, possibly, upon some Monday, the ghostly skirt of a shirt flapping spectrally in the distant orchard. Day dawned and darkened over the lonely house. Summer with "buds and bird-voices" came singing in from the south, and clad the old ash-trees in deeper green, the Old Manse in profounder mystery. Gorgeous autumn came to visit the story-teller in his little western study, and, departing, wept rainbows among his trees. Winter impatiently swept down the

hill opposite, rifling the trees of each last clinging bit of summer, as if thrusting aside opposing barriers and determined to reach the mystery. But his white robes floated around the Old Manse, ghostly as the decaying surplice of the old pastor's portrait, and in the snowy seclusion of winter the mystery was as mysterious as ever. Occasionally Emerson, or Ellery Channing, or Henry Thoreau-some poet, as once Whittier, journeying to the Merrimac, or an old Brook Farmer who remembered Miles Coverdale with Arcadian sympathy-went down the avenue, and disappeared in the house. Sometimes a close observer, had he been ambushed among the long grasses of the orchard, might have seen the host and one of his guests emerging at the back door and sauntering to the river-side, step into the boat, and float off until they faded in the shadow.

The inhabitant of this Castle of Dreams appears to be admirably suited to such a tenement:

During Hawthorne's first year's residence in Concord, I had driven up with some friends to an esthetic tea at Mr. Emerson's. It was in the winter, and a great wood fire blazed on the hospitable hearth. There were various men and women of note assembled, and

was his favorite habit to bathe every evening in the river, after nightfall, and in that part of it over which the old bridge stood, at which the battle was fought. Sometimes, but rarely, his boat accompanied another up the stream, and I recall the silent and preternatural vigor with which, on one occasion, he wielded his paddle to counteract the bad rowing of a friend who conscientiously considered it his duty to do something and not let Hawthorne work alone; but who, with every stroke, neutralized all Hawthorne's efforts. I suppose he would have struggled until he fell senseless, rather than ask his friend to desist. His principle seemed to be, if a man cannot understand without talking to him, it is quite useless to talk, because it is immaterial whether such a man understands or not. His own sympathy was so broad and sure, that although nothing had been said for hours, his comnor had a single pulse of beauty in the day, or scene, panion knew that not a thing had escaped his eye, or society, failed to thrill his heart. In this way his silence was most social. Everything seemed to have been said. It was a Barmecide feast of discourse, from which a greater satisfaction resulted than from an actual banquet.

from the depths of Russia announces that, attracted by the notice in the Athenæum, a Russian literary man, of much taste and accomplishment, has completed a translation into Russian of "The House of the Seven Gables," and published the same in a Muscovite journal! This is something like fame.

mirers on both sides of the Atlantic. A letter

I, who listened attentively to all the fine things that real treasure; only to be equalled perhaps in the A compliment like the above is, of its kind, a were said, was for some time scarcely aware of a man who sat upon the edge of the circle, a little with- meaning of its no-meaning by the adagio movedrawn, his head slightly thrown forward upon his ment of Spohr's symphony, "The Power of breast, and his bright eyes clearly burning under his Sound," which is devoted to the description of black brow. As I drifted down the stream of talk, Silence! We can fancy no one made more quietly this person, who sat silent as a shadow, looked to me, merry by such a fine paragraph than the author as Webster might have looked, had he been a poet-a of "Mr. Higginbotham's Catastrophe." Ere kind of poetic Webster. He rose and walked to the parting from him-and, with him, from this window, and stood quietly there for a long time, handsome gift-book, also-we cannot resist falling watching the dead, white landscape. No appeal was into the American humor of gossipping concerning made to him, nobody looked after him, the conversa-public men and matters from private communication flowed steadily on as if every one understood that tions. Perhaps the following may be news to the his silence was to be respected. It was the same author of "The Scarlet Letter" and to his adthing at table. In vain the silent man imbibed esthetic tea. Whatever fancies it inspired did not flower at his lips. But there was a light in his eye which assured me that nothing was lost. So supreme was his silence that it presently engrossed me to the exclusion of everything else. There was very brilliant discourse, but this silence was much more poetic and fascinating. Fine things were said by the philosophers, but much finer things were implied by the dumbness of this gentleman with heavy brows and black hair. When he presently rose and went, Emerson with the "slow, wise smile" that breaks over his face, like day over the sky, said: "Hawthorne rides well his horse of the night."-Thus he remained in my memory, a shadow, a phantom, until more than a year afterward. Then I came to live in Concord. Every day I passed his house, but when the villagers, thinking that perhaps I had some clue to the mystery, said "Do you know this Mr. Hawthorne ?" I said "No," and trusted to time. Time justified my confidence, and one day I, too, went down the avenue, and disappeared in the house. I mounted those mysterious stairs to that apocryphal study. I saw the cheerful coat of paint, and golden-tinted paper-hangings, lighting up the small apartment; while the shadow of a willow tree, that swept against the overhanging eaves, attempered the cheery western sunshine. I looked from the little northern window whence the old pastor watched the battle, and in the small diuing-room beneath it, upon the first floor, there were

Dainty chicken, snow-white bread, and the golden juices of Italian vineyards, which still feast insatiable memory. Our author occupied the Old Manse for three years. During that time he was not seen, probably, by more than a dozen of the villagers. His walks could easily avoid the town, and upon the river he was always sure of solitude. It

CELESTIAL TACTICS.-Among the Chinese in our city, many amusing scenes occur in their attempts to adapt themselves to our manners and way of doing things. There is no better fun than to see a Celestial on horseback, especially if the animal is any way vicious or refractory. Upon two or three occasions we have noticed them in that particular fix, though it was impossible not to sympathize with them in their terrible and unpleasant situation. Now and then one, in taking a morning ride, or turning out upon a public occasion, mounts a spirited animal, and never for a moment thinks of navigating by the reins. They take a death-grip with both hands on the pommel of the saddle, and sit and shout aloud in an unknown tongue, while the animal uses his own pleasure as to his speed and the direction of travel. A few evenings since, a large crowd had collected on Montgomery street, to witness the tactics of some Celestials, who were endeavoring to manage a horse attached to a loaded dray. The horse was gentle and submissive, and would move right along, but every now and then some one of the party would sing out some awful word, which would cause the animal to back until the dray touched the side-walk. This was repeated for an hour, till at length one of the bystanders took pity on the Celestials, and drove the animal according to established Jehu principles.--Alta California.

From the Spectator.

The Songs of Scotland, without Words; for the
Pianoforte.

The Dance Music of Scotland; a Collection of all
the best Reels and Strathspeys both of the High-
lands and Lowlands, for the Pianoforte. Ar-
ranged and edited by J. T. SURENNE.

THESE volumes are suplementary to the work recently published at Edinburgh under the title of "Wood's Songs of Scotland;" a work which we have already designated as being one of the most valuable collections extant of the indigenous vocal melody and ballad-poetry of Scotland. It is ample, as well as select, containing all the gems of Caledonian song, unmixed with the inferior matter with which most of the large collections are encumbered. The melodies are uniformly given in their best and purest forms; and the accompaniments are skilful and musician-like -elegant and varied, without departing from the characteristic simplicity of the airs. The value of the work is much enhanced by the admirable literary matter contributed by its editor, Mr. G. F. Graham, whose introductory dissertations and copious notes on the songs are full of interest, and have thrown many new lights on Scottish song.

The supplementary works, whose titles are given above, are edited by Mr. Surenne, a professor of music in Edinburgh, one of the gentlemen by whom, under the general supervision of Mr. Graham, the pianoforte arrangements of the songs in the original collection were written. But Mr. Graham has added to the value of both, by furnishing to each of them an introduction, in which his taste, learning, and research are conspicuous, and which contain much curious matter not contained in his previous contributions.

Mr. Graham is of opinion that it is impossible to conclude that national melodies of attractive beauty and marked character, such as the Scottish, sprang from the mere untutored singing or instrumental playing of a rude and ignorant peasantry, and had no foundation in a musical system of remoter antiquity and of more artificial structure. It seems evident, he conceives, that the best and oldest Scottish airs, as well as Irish and Welsh, were founded on such a system, modified by national character and circumstances of the people. He inclines to the belief, though without positively adopting it, that the melodies of Scotland owe some of their peculiarities to the chants of the Romish Church.

"However that question," he says, "may be ultimately settled, certain it is, that in the modes or scales of the Romish plain-chant may be found the elements of the most ancient Scottish airs, not only in the intervals employed, but in the sounds most prominently dwelt upon in chanting, at the beginning, or in the middle, or at the close of the chant."

He put this opinion to an experimental test. "Many years ago, we took a number of these old Romish chants, and, by reducing them to regular rhythmical form, in notes of various lengths, we produced melodies that were decidedly Scottish in their character, as was acknowledged by both professional musicians and amateurs among our countrymen. It must be observed that this fact detracts nothing from the intrinsic beauty or merits of our ancient Scottish airs, such as they

exist; since every melody must be composed in some scale or other, and since the difficulty consists in arranging the sounds of this or that scale so as to produce from them pleasing and popular melodies. In this consists the whole art of such melodic musical composition."

The circumstance that numbers of foreign musicians from France and Italy were anciently entertained at the court of Scotland, is reasonably believed to have had a considerable influence on the popular music of the Lowlands, which (as is well known), differs essentially in its character from the Celtic music of the Northern Highlands. The accounts of the lords high treasurers of Scotland, still preserved in the General Register House, show that many professional musicians, chiefly Frenchmen and Italians, were maintained at the Scottish court, in the times of James the Third, James the Fourth, James the Fifth, and Mary; and it appears, from the same accounts, that native musicians were sent abroad from the court to study their art more thoroughly. All this must have had some effect on the popular music of the country, though it gives no countenance to the belief that any of our existing Scottish music was composed by Queen Mary's unfortunate favorite, David Rizzio; a story which Mr. Graham treats with absolute incredulity. He deals in the same manner with the oft-repeated assertion that the celebrated Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa, imitated in his compositions the Scottish style of melody. This assertion Mr. Graham has fully discussed and confuted in several of his notes in the "Songs of Scotland," and he now brings forward further proofs of its fallacy, showing, from the Prince of Venosa's history, and the character of his compositions, that the notion of his having in any degree imitated the national melody of Scotland is a mere absurdity.

The ancient intercourse between the Scandinavian nations and Scotland must have had an influence on the character of the Scottish music. In reference to this subject, Mr. Graham gives a number of old Danish and Norwegian airs, undoubtedly genuine, and possessed of a wild and rude beauty, but much less regularly and artificially constructed than the melodies of Scotland generally are.

The importation into England of a Scotch king and a Scotch court was followed, of course, by an importation of Scotch music. Before the end of the seventeenth century the Northern melodies had become popular, and their peculiarities were imitated by English composers, even by Purcell himself. So-called Scotch songs were sung by the favorite singers of the day at Vauxhall and other public places; and some of these Cockney ditties-" Deil take the wars,' "T was within a mile of Edinborough town," &c.-have come to pass current even in Scotland, and are admitted into every collection.

In regard to the Highland music, it is essentially different from that of the Lowlands, and apparently of a more primitive character. "From their local position and peculiar habits," says Mr. Graham, "the Celtic population of the Highlands of Scotland were less liable than the Lowlanders to the influences of the Romish church-music, or of the secular music brought into our country by foreign musicians; and thus it is reasonable to suppose that the vocal and instrumental music of the Scottish Highlanders, though none of it seems to have been written down till the seventeenth

century, may have preserved some of its antique | traditions, and directed her well-deserved influence features unchanged. to the establishment of schools and other institutions Mr. Graham's introduction to the "Dance for the education of the working-classes. The funeral Music of Scotland " is also curious and pleasant. of the late baronet was attended by an immense conThe reel and strathspey, as he tells us, are really course of people-as many as 20,000 persons being, it the only national dances of Scotland; and accord-is said, assembled in Dowlais. All business and work ingly it is of reels and strathspeys that the col-was suspended for the day throughout the district. This slight record of his life is due to the memory of a lection of dance music entirely consists. "Fifty man who was one of that class to which this country years ago," says Mr. Graham, "the fashionable owes so much of her wealth and prosperity.-Times. dances taught in Edinburgh and other large towns in Scotland were minuets, cotillions, reels, and SAFE RAILWAY COLLISION.-The manifest danger strathspeys, and country dances. Now, with the of railway collisions has frequently and naturally sugexception of the reels and strathspeys, all these gested the inquiry, whether there is no method by dances have disappeared, and made way for the which they may, as regards passengers and carriages, waltz, the polka, &c., which last will in turn be rendered innoxious; and this important query yield their places to some other saltatory novel- leads to a consideration of the means by which vessels ties. But the reels and strathspeys have held on the river, coming into contact with each other, their ground, manfully and womanfully, in both are, to a limited extent, protected, by using an article Scotland and England, to this day; and we are which is termed a fender, upon which a portion of the not sure that they have not of late years found force of the collision is expended. Whilst, in the their way even to France, that soil of all soils the opinion of some practical men, an invention of that most bedanced by merry lads and lasses." This, description would not have a sufficiently resisting in truth, is the case. Our queen is fond of Scot-power to render it useful as for railway purposes, i tish dances since she has become the Lady of Bal-would nevertheless appear that it is not impossible to moral; and they find favor at the Tuileries and absorb any force that might be directed against it. construct a fender of adequate resisting capabilities to in the Chaussée d'Antin, as well as at Bucking-This opinion is formed after an inspection of the work ham Palace and in Belgravia. ing model of a fender recently patented by Mr. A. T. Mr. Graham has given a catalogue of printed Forder, of Leamington; where it was exhibited on collections of Scottish Melodies, from Playford's Saturday last to a select number of gentlemen, inDancing Master, published in the year 1657, down cluding the local magistracy. Before describing this to the present time. They amount to no fewer invention, and to enable the reader clearly to under than ninety-seven, many of them being of consider-stand the principle of its construction, we will observe able size, and some very large and costly. They that the mode in which a fender wards off the danger form an uninterrupted series, but appearing grad- of a blow is by gradually absorbing its force; or, in ually in greater numbers, and showing the great other words, by possessing a resisting power exercised. and growing popularity of the Scottish national by degrees, and which should be equal to that of the music and song during the whole of this period.sists of two parts, one called the striker, and the other The improved fender con

blow which it encounters.

the receiver. The striker is formed of a plate of metal, THE LATE SIR J. J. GUEST.-On the 26th of Novem- into which a number of strong bars of steel of different ber last, died, at Dowlais, near Merthyr Tydvil, in lengths are fastened. The receiver is a similar plate the 68th year of his age, Sir J. J. Guest, member for with apertures, over which are placed pieces of springthat borough, and one of the largest iron-masters in steel, the centres of which correspond with those of the world. Like the Arkwrights and the Peels, the the bars in the striker. The two bars are fixed tolate baronet, by his own skill and industry, had raised gether, so that the latter may slide towards the reto the greatest prosperity a most important branch of ceiver, and each bar of the striker be exactly opposite British trade, and had accumulated a colossal fortune. the centre of its antagonistic steel plate. One fender His grandfather, Mr. John Guest, the son of a small is intended to be fastened to each end of every car freeholder at Broseley, in Shropshire, accompanied, riage. As the striking bars are of different lengths, in the middle of the last century, to South Wales, a and project accordingly from the plate, it is manifest well-known cannon-founder named Wilkinson, and that upon the centre part of the plate being struck the first furnace was raised, under their joint super- the bars will successively bend and break its opposing intendence, at Dowlais. The works were sold at his spring plate; and if there are a sufficient number of death to a firm, of which his son, the father of the them, the fender will absorb the whole of the impelling late baronet, was the manager. In 1806 they only force, and, in case of a rail collision, stop the train produced yearly about 5000 tons of iron, and were, without injury to passengers or carriages, inasmuch on the death of the proprietors, in considerable pecu-as the whole of the blow will have been expended in niary embarrassment. The entire management then breaking the plates. The force of the collision condevolved upon Sir J. J. Guest, who, by his extraor-veyed to the carriages will be equal to a succession of dinary capacity for business, his mechanical ingenuity slight blows, each of itself insufficient to injure the (to which many of the most important improvements train. The working model exhibited on Saturday con in the working of iron are to be attributed), and by a sisted of a railway five feet high at one end and three judgment in mercantile transactions rarely equalled, inches at the other, being thirty feet in length, and not only cleared the firm from debt, but raised the forming an inclined plane or fall of one in six. Upon produce of the mines in a few years to no less than the highest position of the rails were placed two car68,000 tons. In 1849 the entire property in the Dow-riages fitted up with glass windows, and in all respects lais works became vested in him. He was returned similar to first and second class railway conveyances; for the newly created borough of Merthyr after the at the end of each was appended a model fender of passing of the Reform Bill, and has represented that the above description; and upon a given signal, the place ever since. He was made a baronet in 1838; train, each carriage of which weighed about sixty and married in 1833 (being then a widower), the pounds, ran down the rails against a block placed at Lady Charlotte Bertie, only daughter of the late Earl the bottom. The result of the collision or blow was of Lindsay-a lady to whom is owing much of the that the plates in the fender were nearly all broken, moral and social improvement that has taken place whilst the carriages remained perfectly uninjured. in the population connected with the Dowlais works. There was no visible recoil, and the train was brought Identifying herself with the people, she acquired their to a dead stand in an instant.-Aris' Birmingham language, translated and published their national | Gazette.

KATIE STEWART.

PART IV.-CHAPTER XX.

THE mild spring night has darkened, but it is her downcast face; and the manly young sailor still early, and the moon is not yet up. The wor-answers, "Nae fear." ship is over in John Stewart's decent house, and "Nae fear!" But without, the stealthy steps all is still within, though the miller and his wife come nearer; and if you draw far enough away still sit by the "gathered" fire, and talk in half from the open door to lose the merry voices, and whispers about the events of the day, and the have your eyes no longer dazzled with the light, prospects of "the bairns." It is scarcely nine you will see dim figures creeping through the yet, but it is the reverent usage of the family to darkness, and feel that the air is heavy with the shut out the world earlier than usual on the Sab-breath of men. But few people care to use that bath; and Katie, in consideration of her fatigue, has been dismissed to her little chamber in the roof. She has gone away not unwillingly, for, just before, the miller had closed the door on the slow, reluctant, departing steps of Willie Morison, and Katie is fain to be alone.

dark road between the manse and the churchyard at night, so no one challenges the advancing party, or gives the alarm.

Lizzie Tosh has stolen to the door; it is to see if the moon is up, and if Robert will have light on his homeward walk to Pittenween; but immediVery small is this chamber in the roof of the ately she rushes in again, with a face as pale as it Milton, which Janet and Katie used to share. She had before been blooming, and alarms the assembly: has set down her candle on the little table before" A band of the cutter's men; an officer, with a that small glass in the dark carved frame, and her- sword at his side. Rin, lads, rin, afore they reach self stands by the window, which she has opened, the door." looking out. The rush of the burn fills the soft air with sound, into which penetrates a far-off voice, which proclaims the little town still awake and stirring; but save the light from Robert Moulter's uncurtained window-revealing a dark gleaming link of the burn, before the cot-house door-and the reddened sky yonder, reflecting that fierce torch on the May, there is nothing visible but the dark line of fields, and a few faint stars in the clouded sky.

But

But there is a keen, eager face, with a cocked hat surmounting it, already looking in at the window. The assembled sailors make a wild plunge at the door; and while a few escape under cover of the darkness, the cutter's men have secured, after a desperate resistance, three or four of the foremost. Poor fellows! You see them stand without, young Robert Davidson in the front, his broad bronzed forehead bleeding from a cut he has received in the scuffle, and one of his But the houses in Anster are not yet closed or captors, still more visibly wounded, looking on him silent. In the street which leads past the town- with evil, revengeful eyes; his own eye, poor lad, house and church of West Anster to the shore, is flaming with fierce indignation and rage, and you can see a ruddy light streaming out from the his broad breast heaves almost convulsively. window upon the causeway, the dark churchyard now he catches a glimpse of the weeping Lizzie, wall, and overhanging trees. At the fire stands a and fiery tears, which scorch his eyelids, blind comely young woman, lifting "a kettle of pota-him for a moment, and his heart swells as if it toes" from the crook. The "kettle" is a capacious pot on three feet, formed not like the ordinary kail-pat," but like a little tub of iron; and now, as it is set down before the ruddy fire, you see it is full of laughing potatoes, disclosing them- A few of the gang entered the house. It is selves, snow-white and mealy, through the cracks only "a but and a ben;" and Lizzie stands with in their clear dark coats. The mother of the her back against the door of the inner apartment, household sits by the fireside, with a volume of while her streaming eyes now and then cast a sick, sermons in her hand; but she is paying but little yearning glance towards the prisoners at the door attention to the book, for the kitchen is full of-for her brother stands there as well as her young sailors, eagerly discussing the events of the day, and through the hospitable open door others are entering and departing, with friendly salutations. Another such animated company fills the house of the widow Morison, "aest the town," for still the afternoon's excitement has not subsided.

66

But up this dark leaf-shadowed street, in which we stand, there comes a muffled tramp, as of stealthy footsteps. They hear nothing of it in that bright warin kitchen-fear nothing, as they gather round the fire, and sometimes rise so loud in their conversation that the housemother lifts her hand, and shakes her head, with an admonitory, "Whisht, bairns; mind, it's the Sabbathday."

Behind backs, leaning against the sparkling panes of the window, young Robert Davidson speaks aside to Lizzie Tosh, the daughter of the house. They were "cried" to-day in West Anster kirk, and soon will have a blithe bridal"If naething comes in the way," says Lizzie, with VOL. XXXVI. 14

CCCCLIV.

LIVING AGE.

would burst. But it does not burst, poor desperate heart! until the appointed bullet shall come, a year or two hence, to make its pulses quiet forever.

betrothed.

"What for would ye seek in there?" asked the mother, lifting up her trembling hands. "What would ye despoil my chaumer for, after ye 've made my hearthstane desolate? If ye 've a license to steal men, ye 've nane to steal gear. Ye've dune your warst; gang out o' my house, ye thieves, ye locusts,

ye

"We'll see about that, old lady," said the leader;-"put the girl away from that door. Tom, bring the lantern."

The little humble room within was neatly arranged. It was their best, and they had not spared upon it what ornament they could attain. Shells far travelled, precious for the giver's sake, and many other heterogeneous trifles, such as sailors pick up in foreign parts, were arranged upon the little mantelpiece and grate. There was no nook or corner in it which could possibly be used for a hiding-place; but the experienced eye of the foremost man saw the homely counterpane disordered on the bed; and there indeed the

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