rank did not present itself to her mind, nor did Clara's open and ingenuous disposition admit of the painful consciousness of inferiority, that often accompanies unequal friendship. Indeed it was Lady Ellesmere's system in selecting a governess to choose only one who was in every respect a fit person to be a friend of her daughters, and then to treat and consider her as such.

With respect to Harry, he had hung up his sword in the mean time, without any very immediate idea of taking it down again. Having got tired of the army, he began to consider whether the temptations of that profession, either at the present time or at any future period, were sufficient to counterbalance its discomforts. Upon consulting Major Marsden on the subject, he received from that experienced officer, the following Memorandum.

You will probably become a Lieutenant-Colonel at the age of fifty, your position will then be as follows:

Emolument.

Pay 17s a day, and allowance 3s-£1. a day per Ann. £365.

Deductions.

Interest of money, commonly about £5000.-£250. Difference between the sum allowed for a horse and real cost, and also a deduction of 3s a day, command money when you are on leave, say together about £40. a year,

Net emoluments of British Lieut.-Colonel after service, of from thirty to fifty years

£40. £290.

About twenty or five and twenty years after this, you may be appointed a Major-general, in which case the usual routine is, that you should half ruin yourself by accepting a government or situation on the staff, whose outgoings very considerably exceed its incomings; in order to acquire a claim to the Colonelcy of a regiment, with which the few remaining years of your life between the colonies and the grave, are patched up; by this time you are pretty well used up, and soon afterwards are decently interred, having seen every tradesman you ever employed become a rich man in time to enjoy his competence, earned certainly, but not fought and wrestled for, by land and sea, with sword, fire, storm, land crabs, rotten transports, enforced idleness, night exposure, tropical climates, exile, and every illness that the sun

shines on."

This sketch of the prospects of a British officer, seemed to Harry to be rather a favourable one, it was certainly more favourable than Major Marsden's own personal experience warranted, for he was past fifty and was still a Major, so our hero not liking to give up his profession irrevocably at one plunge, resolved upon trying how he liked being his own master, and retired upon half pay. He proceeded in the first instance to Falconscrag, with a view of turning country gentleman for a time, setting his house and lands in order, and then setting out on a tour in Europe,-and for a fortnight enacted Cincinnatus with great success, that is to say he wore thick hobnailed shoes and gaiters, drank an amazing quantity of strong beer, pinched the back of every

beast he could get within reach of, and perambulated his estate with a very singular and surgical looking instrument in his hand, which some people affirmed was intended for marking, pruning, or otherwise molesting trees. There is no saying what mischief this weapon might have done, but for the circumstance that there were no trees for it to operate upon; but in the course of May, an invitation from Lord de Creci, to join him in his cruise in the Mediterranean on board the Arab, altered all the plans he had formed, and he gladly embraced the offer, The yacht was still fitting out at Gosport, and was to sail early in August. Lord de Creci was there hurrying on the preparations, but the end of July found Harry at Ellesmere, where also was Mr. Montague Marsden, who had led somewhat an unsettled life of late (in reality since his failure in settling himself,) for the ridicule attendant upon his last unsuccessful attempt on Mrs. Hastings' hand, had fairly driven him out of Somerton. He had spent the summer in an unhappy wandering, from chophouse to chophouse, in London, and was now at Ellesmere, where also was expected Sir Thomas Horton, and Lord Chorley. The arrival of the former of these gentlemen was looked forward to with evident anxiety by the inmates of the castle; indeed wherever he went he seemed to create some sort of sensation, commonly a disagreeable one; and the night before his arrival, he was the subject of a long and anxious conversation between Mr. Marsden and Lord Ellesmere, upon the occasion of that gentleman giving the Marquis an account of the loss of the Mary Anne, and the finding of Sir Thomas, which Mr. Marsden seemed to consider by no means a case of treasure trove. Indeed it required no superhuman acuteness to discover that, although the presence of his Lordship, who was evidently determined to befriend Sir Thomas under all circumstances, prevented the express declaration of his opinion, still, in Mr. Marsden's inmost heart there was a sort of glimmering idea, that as the ship was wrecked and so many people were drowned, there might just as well have been one more; it would have saved him some trouble, some more perplexity, and the scene with Mrs. Hastings; and Sir Thomas would have slept peaceably, which probably would have been an agreeable novelty to him, for he invariably complained of not being able to sleep. Such were Mr. Marsden's secret opinions, for as far as the heart is concerned there is little difference between the hardheartedness of uncontrolled passions, and the callousness of selfish indolence; they are chips of the same block, and an uncommonly hard block it is however, he said nothing about this to Lord Ellesmere, contenting himself with remarking how fortunate Sir Thomas was in being saved at all.

"Yes," said the Marquis, "that is very true, but that shipwreck was most unfortunate. If he had once got out to the East, there is no saying how long he might have remained there: from what I know of his character, I should say, that if he would have plunged at once into investigations there, that would have kept his hands full for the rest of his life. In those countries, the past, the present, and the future are alike abs orbing, alike dreamy, colossal and obscure."

"That is precisely his feeling," said Mr. Marsden, "I recollect his using the phrase,Take India from whatever point of view you please, she always looms large in the haze.'

66

Well," said Lord Ellesmere, "knowing that he had that feeling, we might have depended upon its keeping him in India some years at a time, when, for several reasons, it is of the greatest consequence that he should be kept out of this country.--Indeed" (here his Lordship smiled slightly) "it is probable that the search he proposes undertaking on the banks of the Irawaddy may detain him some considerable time."

"He grows more unmanageable and headstrong every day," said Mr. Marsden, with something of a grin, nevertheless," upon my conscience I do not know what is to be done with him: and, what is worse, I am told he has quarrelled with the Admiralty, because they would not give him a ship, and that they have threatened never to employ him again." "Hem," said the Marquis, "I dare say this Admiralty will not but I do not think those gentlemen likely to remain any very enormous time in office; neither man nor beast can long hunt with the hounds and run with the hare as they seem to me to propose doing."

"I thought he would have killed me when he was at Waterproof Lodge for refusing to tell him who his father was."

"His father, poor fellow," said Lord Ellesmere, with a sigh, "sleeps sound enough now; it is the mother that really gives me uneasiness: any explosion or discovery during her life-time is what I dread; and every time that he makes himself conspicuous there is danger of some of those that know half the story getting a clue to the other half."

"Very true, my Lord," returned Mr. Marsden, "the rank of the parties complicate these affairs amazingly; if she had been a milk-maid there need have been little trouble about it."

"None whatever," answered the peer. "Did she see him when he was in London ?"

"She did, and was taken ill, and obliged to be carried out of the room; but nobody knew the cause."

"Do you know what he did with himself during those few months?" "He has got a most singular hobby now, my Lord, he spent his time visiting all the mad-houses he could get access to; he has singular idea that all madness arises from the constant recurrence of one idea, and that, consequently, the constant study of an encyclopædia would cure most cases by suggesting a succession of fresh ideas: this he calls 'the rotation system; or, cyclopean order of successive ideas :' and he says that the world never saw a madman who had read the Encyclopædia Britannica from end to end, which I think is very likely."

"I suppose not, or a sane man neither; but as to that fancy for examining mad-houses, that is the very last thing in the world I should have thought of his doing," said Lord Ellesmere, with uncontrolled astonishment. "You know, I suppose, that expect him here to-morrow?”

"I do," answered Mr. Marsden, shrugging up his shoulders, as much as to say 'it is not for my pleasure he is coming here,' and Lord Ellesmere, not being aware of the trick that, in the exuberance of his some

what erratic fancy, Sir Thomas had played Mr. Marsden on the subject of his projected matrimonial alliance with Mrs. Hastings, dismissed the wayward sailor from his mind for the present.

"By-the-bye," said he, "I take it for granted Lady Ellesmere has thanked you for the treasure you found for us in Miss Hastings; my young people are charmed with her, and, indeed, so is their mother."

Mr. Marsden made a sort of inarticulate, unintelligible acknowledgment of this, and fidgetted a little in his chair, for the mention of Clara recalled to his mind the unsuccessful issue of the plot by which he expected to gain the mother, by separating her from the daughter; and it also suggested to him, and that most painfully, that the circumstances attending his last rejection left him entirely at the mercy of Sir Thomas Horton, during that gentleman's stay at Ellesmere, inasmuch as he could at any moment, by telling the story overwhelm him with ridicule; and he also knew that the gallant knight was just as likely to do so as not, and that, if he did, he would probably choose the place and the audience that suited him best, and certainly garnish the tale with such additions as he might think ornamental. How to treat him on his arrival puzzled him exceedingly. He by no means liked the idea of a quarrel with him, and indeed had he been so inclined, that would now be out of the question, so much time had elapsed since the original offence; he would have been very glad to have sunk the whole matter, and said nothing about it, could he have been certain that the other party would have also observed a strict neutrality, but for that he had no security whatever. He thought of a plan much in use, and often very effective: viz. stoutly and gallantly denying the truth of the whole story; but that was too strong a measure for Mr. Marsden, if indeed it did not infringe upon the privileges of Parliament, and finally, seeing nothing else to be done, he resolved upon taking the initiative; a resolution which nothing but the most intense perception of its necessity could have forced upon him, upon receiving Sir Thomas, upon his arrival, with the utmost cordiality, and treating the whole matter as one of the very best practical jokes that ever was played. This prudent resolution he put in practice the next day with remarkable success; a success which was indeed, to him, an unexpected God-send; for, very much to his astonishment, Sir Thomas seemed to have forgotten the whole story: he neither by look, word, or gesture, ever once alluded to it; and so completely did he seem unconscious of such a hoax ever having been played, that Mr. Marsden occasionally even doubted whether the whole affair was not the creation of his own imagination, so that he might almost have said with the immortal, or, perhaps more properly, everlasting, author of that singularly authentic work entitled Ireland and the Irish:

-

ALL THESE things APPEAR like a hideous dream. They would be utterly INCREDIBLE ONLY THAT they are QUITE CERTAIN.* All this Mr. Marsden might have said, but being as he formerly very justly remarked, no orator, he contented himself with grovelling in the realm of common sense, his idea of antithesis being goose and apple sauce, venison and currant jelly, veal and ham sandwiches; and, as the cook was good, and the wine better, he became himself an optimist, and made the best he could of everything.

*

The write

riter of this book is a

Courfounded foot !!

With our hero, however, it was otherwise; he was somewhat hotter in the head, and somewhat warmer in the heart than the sedate Montague, and was by no means content with having been six days in the same house with Clara without seeing her. He had made such efforts to accomplish that object as he could, but hitherto without success. In so large a house as Ellesmere, those whose apartments were distant never met by accident, numerous staircases and passages led, without interfering with one another, from one part of the house to another; and as, in point of fact, Harry never passed along any but those which conducted him from his own room to the hall, and Miss Hastings never came near that part of the house at all, they might have been in the same house for a twelvemonth without ever meeting,-for it is to be remembered that going to church by no means formed an integral part of Harry's Sunday, so that that opportunity was thrown away upon him. He had a sort of an idea that if he had any luck he might meet her out walking with her charge, and made a good number of casts in different directions among the shrubberies with this view, but in vain; he tried the garden also, but drew blank; he did not know at what hour of the day she went out, or whether it was on foot or in a carriage. Once or twice he thought of writing to her, but his good feeling revolted at this, though he would have been puzzled to tell why; sometimes he thought of taking Lady Madelaine into his confidence on the subject, as it certainly appeared that Clara had done already; but this course also seemed to him to be liable to some objections, for he thought, not unnaturally, that failure was bad enough in itself without the additional aggravation of more witnesses than could be helped; and in the meantime time was slipping away, as Brother Jonathan would figuratively express it, like greased lightning,-the last day of July had dived into the last night, and the two had gone off together to keep company with the years beyond the flood-he was to embark early in August on board the "Arab," whose equipment and preparations for her voyage were proceeding as rapidly as a very impatient Earl, with an immensity of money and no objection to spending it, could keep them moving, and still he had not seen Clara; he saw no reasonable chance of seeing" her, but still could not reconcile himself to the idea of leaving the country without making one more effort to overcome the objection that he knew was the only bar to his union with her.

With respect to Clara herself, it may appear strange that neither the friendship that existed from early youth before the appearance of a tenderer feeling, nor her gratitude for the service he had rendered her at the burning of Avonmore, nor even the circumstance of his having so recently seen her mother, should have induced her to depart from the resolution she had expressed before his arrival to Lady Madelaine, not to see him at all. The fact was, she dared not.

"I know," she said to Lady Madelaine, "that in refusing him I acted rightly, though the so acting was very bitter, but now the bitterness, at least the first bitterness is partly passed, firmness is what is required of me, and heaven knows it is a hard task, with that dreadful night at Avonmore before my eyes, to be firm; but it would be weakness, culpable weakness in me to risk an interview that would certainly