again when you are gone. Go, and forget her. May He whom we both worship, shield you in the day of battle! and may you return to your own land, and make happy one more worthy of you than I am! But even then, Norman, think kindly of me. When your blue-eyed bride smiles upon you, even then spare one thought for Theresa, not of love-for that will be hers,-but of pity. For me, my resolution is formed; I renounce the world for ever." "Theresa, Theresa," cried Norman passionately, "this is too much; I had determined not to speak of love, at least at present, till your country should be delivered from her enemies, and I could return to claim you as my bride; but hear me now. I swear by every thing that is sacred in this world and in the next-by thine own pure self I swear-that I have never loved, and never can love, but thee. I knew not the sensation till we met; I shall never know it for another. Why shake thy head, dearest Theresa," continued he, as the maiden's look became more sorrowful than ever; "dost thou not love me ?-do I not love thee?—and when the war has come to an end, may I not return to woo thee?" "Love thee, Norman! I love thee not as women usually love; but as the martyr loves his religion-the saint his Saviour-even so do I love thee. But what avails it? Our faiths are not the same, Norman; and I cannot wed a heretic." "Oh talk not of differences in faith. Do we not worship the same God and the same Redeemer? and what are minor distinctions to us? I will never disturb thee in the exercises of thy religion, and among my own kindred are many who will join thee in them; let not that divide us. Say, dearest Theresa, that when peace is proclaimed, I may come for thee; and that thou wilt cross the sea with me, and dwell among the glens and hills of my romantic country." The conversation had proceeded thus far; and Norman, unconsciously throwing his arm around the maiden's waist, had pressed her to his bosom, anxious and yet apprehensive of her reply; when their attention was suddenly called off to other subjects, by the report of a musket; a second and a third took place, then a volley from one of the outpiquets. Instantly the bugles sounded. "It is the enemy," cried Norman; "fly, Theresa, fly to the house; there you will be safe; we will defend it to the last." The lovers ran towards the chateau as fast as they were able. The troops were already under arms, and Norman's horse, always upon duty, was at the door in an instant. He sprang into the saddle, and, leaving another officer to take charge of the reserve, he galloped towards the front. One of the out-posts was already forced; a column of fifteen hundred French infantry were advancing. Norman formed such of his men as were up, to the best advantage among the woods; and, despatching a messenger with orders for the companies in the rear to throw an abattis across the avenue, and to occupy the cottages on each side, he awaited the approach of the enemy. They came on, as French soldiers always come on, with the most determined resolution. The Caçadores, animated by the example of their colonel, bravely met them; but their numbers were inadequate to successful resistance, at least for any length of time; they gradually gave ground. The French imagining that the whole body was engaged, concluded of course, that all opposition was overthrown; they pursued in considerable disorder. This accorded well with Norman's plan; they were already at the head of the avenue, when the troops from behind the abattis, with those in the cottages, opened a tremendous fire; the enemy were thoroughly confounded. Norman had still about three hundred men with himself, whilst two hundred defended the approach to the chateau. He formed this body into line, and advanced to the charge. The French, by no means expecting an attack, lost all confidence, and fled. But at this moment, when the victory was secured, and the assailants were escaping, as they best could, into the thickets, a shot from one of their skirmishers struck Norman in the side. He fell from his horse; and having uttered but these words-"Oh! my mother!"-instantly expired. The family in the chateau were, as may readily be imagined, overcome with alarm at the suddenness of the attack; but Don Fernando retained too much of the spirit of an ancient Spaniard to seek his safety in flight. Having deposited in an inner chamber the priest, the duenna, and his daughters, all except Theresa, whom no entreaties could prevail upon to quit the window, he barricadoed the door, and planted himself and his two aged domestics, each armed with a rifle, in such a situation as would enable them to fire upon the enemy, in case the guard at the abattis should be forced. They were standing thus, listening with anxiety, not unmixed with triumph, to the receding sound of musketry, when a party of soldiers made their appearance, bearing a body, wrapped up in one of the blankets, down the avenue. Theresa's palpitating heart instantly whispered to her the truth. It is he!" she exclaimed, starting back, and rushing towards the door; "it is Norman! he has fallen, and fallen defending us." Her father vainly endeavoured to oppose her progress; she rushed down stairs, and, drawing aside the bars and bolts, met the party just as they had reached the lawn. The men were in tears, and her apprehensions received an immediate confirmation. She did not even look upon him; for, before the bearers had time to lay him down, or withdraw the covering from about him, her heart brokeand she was a corpse! The lovers were laid side by side, in a little mausoleum attached to the chateau of Alanjuez-the prejudices of Catholics giving way to personal regard. Theresa was long and deeply lamented by her relatives; and Norman's name received the applause which could no longer reach his own ears, but which, in no slight degree, served to alleviate the sorrow of his desolate parent. THE SLIGHTED ONE. "Man was made to mourn." THE sentiment at the head of this sketch appears to meet the approbation of many persons. Indeed, some authors take pleasure in repeating the very words. Why this should be the case is the question. Do not such persons know that they assert a palpable falsehood? It is true that some persons do mourn, and that some have a great share of suffering in this world-sufficient indeed, to afford them an excuse for mourning. But, to assert roundly that "man was made to mourn," is to assume a position which cannot be sustained by a course of just reasoning. When you look upon a chair, you at once conclude that it was made to sit upon. When you see a coach, you know that it was made to ride in; and when you see a watch, you are certain that it was made to keep time. The fact is palpable upon the face of it. But suppose you see somebody break up a chair and use it for firewood, would you then be justified in saying that chairs were made to boil the tea-kettle with? So if you saw a tin kettle tied to a dog's tail, would you assert that dogs' tails were made on purpose to support tin kettles, and that the latter articles were intended as ornaments to be suspended from the tail of a dog? Again, if you saw a man on the scaffold with a rope about his neck, would you declare that such was the end of man's creation ?-On the contrary, we can produce good authority to show, that the very worst use which you can make of a man is to hang him. Let us then examine the creature man, and see if we can discover those infallible marks of design that would warrant us in proclaiming that he was made to mourn. Firstly, man is said to be the only laughing animal in existence, for we cannot call the noise of the hyæna a laugh. With much more propriety could we then say that man was made to laugh. Other animals can mourn. The cow utters loud complaints at the loss of her calf; the dog whines and howls; and the crocodile weeps. But man only can laugh. There are many things which man can do, and he possesses both the organs for accomplishing them. He can do many things much better than he can mourn.-If man was made to mourn, all creation would be hung in black. It is a fact almost self-evident, that man was not made to mourn. Those, therefore, who give themselves up wholly to grief, act an unnatural part. They do not subserve the purposes of their creation, they deny themselves the only consolation, apart from the brutes, which belongs to their physical nature. But such an individual will plead in extenuation of his monstrous and continued sorrow, that he has been visited by some peculiar misfortune." That is no valid excuse. They cut off heads in France, and where is there a more merry and careless people? A Frenchman invited to a ball, though beheaded in the afternoon, would take his head under his arm and go to the ball in the evening. Every misfortune is peculiar. Every source of unhappiness sends up bitter waters; otherwise it would not be unhappiness. But why permit grief to overcome you? You thus chase from you those resources which are calculated to alleviate your grief; for it remains to be as true now, as in the days of Collins, that "pale melancholy" sits retired. Nobody cares to meddle with her. The eye aches when it is fixed on impenetrable blackness, and turns for relief to the soft green of the soil--to those cheerful hillocks on which the sun-beams rest as they glance through the foliage of leaves and blossoms. The world shrinks from those who can impart no pleasure. Many a fair one has given herself up to all-devouring grief on account of a disappointment in love. "She has been disappointed," is supposed to be a sufficient reply, when the sad and downcast eye, the trembling lip, and pallid visage have drawn the attention of a stranger to some neglected forlorn maiden, who shrinks from the gaze of others, and sits in a distant part of the room, wrapped in speechless sorrow, "like patience on a monument." -true love crossed, and a real and loving heart betrayed! The sickly pall of grief fell over her visage. Her bright eye became dim and wandering. Her head drooped, and she scarcely seemed sensible of the presence of others. Her response to their words was faint and low. She was like a fading flower whose stem was bruised. The case was a desperate one; for who can administer to a mind diseased, and least of all, diseased by hopeless love? She loved to sit for an hour together, by the side of a running brook, with her eyes fixed upon the stream; and if a cloud came over the sky, and the drops of rain began to fall, it was slowly and carelessly that she moved off to a retreat in the very heart of the grove, where the thicket was blackest and securest. There she would sit and weep. She would repeat the name of him who had deserted her, as if there were not other names more musical-she would bring before her mind's eye his features, as if there were not other features more comelyand would ponder upon the fine things he had said to her, as if more ingenious and pleasing things did not remain to be said. Thus for eighteen months she lingered on, refusing to be comforted; and whenever a word was drawn from her, it breathed only of the hopelessness of her lot, and the weariness of blighted existence. Remarkable as the fact may seem, her runaway lover, having visited distant lands, and become cloyed by the vanities of this gay world, did, most unexpectedly, return to the town where the melancholy dove abided; presented himself to her, and repeated his vows in truth and in sincerity. In this event, there was more truth than poetry, and this may also be said of the substantial puddings and tarts which graced the board on their wedding day. Now seven long years have passed, and our plaintive, desolate heroine, counts four bouncing boys when she ranges the dishes on the table. She is a notable housekeeper; and if her husband intrudes too carelessly on a washing day, or is guilty of any other inadvertency which seems to invade her province, her voice is lifted up against him with no uncertain sound. For his part, he is a valiant trencher man, and an enterprising grocer. His wife is careful of the pence, and sees that nothing goes out of the family in a profitless manner. She likes her husband for just what he is worth; she thinks him a "good pro vider," and a decent sort of a body, but she wishes him to keep on his side of the house, and she will manage her own affairs. She wonders that she ever pined and wept at his desertion, for she is sure that since her marriage, she has seen fifty men as good as he-when she is particularly angry, she says better. Sad, sorrowful, pining, and melancholy maids, if you cannot get husbands, you are free from many cares and anxieties-rejoice. Have you been deserted by a lover? -mourn not, but arouse and seek some other source of enjoyment; for the sorrow you feel is the grief of inexperience. Had you married him, a few years would have shown you that your fine fancies were but the dreams of ignorance, and that he for whom you now mourn, was worth just so much and no more. We knew a light-hearted damsel once, who had the misfortune to fall in love. She fancied one who was, in most respects, her inferior-and certainly so in point of sincerity. She gave him her heart embalmed in sighs, and its incense went up to him like the perfume of a holocaust from the plains of Israel. In return he gave her fair words. He was without feeling, but he could discourse; he had no heart, for nature had worked it all up into tongue, and like the tongue of the serpent it wrought only venom on those who placed dependence on the words which flowed from it. The maiden became attached to him. She supposed that his admiration was equal to hers. It was not his intention to dishonour her, for that would have involved the possession of some feeling on his part. He had none. His vanity was gratified by her love, and he permitted her to love on. Why she did love him it was difficult to tell. An ordinary person, set HARRY piques himself upon being a writer of epigrams, off by a fashionable dress, was all he could boast of.-In and we should be inclined to allow him the merit which the course of a few months he left her, and sought another he claims, could an epigram exist without a point. We dupe. beg pardon our friend does occasionally employ a point, Here was food for sorrow. Here was a maid forsaken | but it is the full stop at the close of a sentence. STRAY THOUGHTS.-No. II. BY E. J. HYTCHE. A great grumbler grumbles at every person, save one, and him that one who most deserves it-himself. If the best man saw his soul in its unveiled nakedness, how he would recoil from the hideous spectacle which would be thereby presented! "Man was made to mourn"-yes, over his sins. By the methods we employ to ward off trouble, we generally occasion ourselves most trouble. We place the immoral authors of antiquity in the hands of our children-we saturate them with the detailed lives of gods and goddesses, whose thoughts are depraved, and whose every action criminal,-and then, forsooth, we express our surprise that they have copied the examples set before them; whereas surprise could alone be justly excited did they not imitate the prescribed models. Ill-regulated charity is no charity; for not only does it not destroy mendicancy, but it increases the number of beggars by generating a mendicant feeling. Poor 'we ne'er shall look upon his like again," and we can truly Say-we hope not. Every lover of literature has some author for whom he feels a brotherly attachment; and there are also authors towards whom the first perusal makes you feel as an old friend-such are Charles Lamb and Leigh Hunt. The blush on the cheek of modesty remains until effaced by contact with the world; so when the bloom escapes from the peach, we have a sign that the fruit is withering. The gross language of libertines often occasions surprise; but we confess that we do not participate in such a feeling; for when we see a sow wallowing in mire, we merely think that thereby its native instincts are gratified. Is there any thing so miserable as to see a host of rouged dowagers at a card-table? Yes, to hear their conversation. When the poet wrote-" What great events from little causes spring!" he must have had parish politics in view. We have known a parish to be agitated for years upon the propriety of re-gilding the church vane, or of supplying the paupers with an extra pound of plum-pudding at Christmas! How childish are the pursuits of men, ay, of men who acquire the esteem of society; for we have known men to roast their livers beneath the sultry clime of India, not in order that they might instil the precepts of Christianity into their Hindoo brethren, but in order that the word "Sir" might be prefixed to their names on the superscription of their letters. To fill the blank pages of the diary of most persons, the employment of three words is alone requisite-eating, drinking, and sleeping. There are many great men in the world of whom it would be impossible to predicate any thing, save that they have accompanied Green in a balloon, or explored the Thames in a diving-bell. Every parish, indeed, has its great man-fat is he and short, and his brain much fatter than his body; but yet even the beadle regards him with marbles, smooth their close-cropped hair, and look the very pictures of innocence and gravity. A great book is not a necessary sign of great wisdom-awe; and the charity boys, when he approaches, hide their a maxim has contained volumes of suggestive thought. The best medicine for a disquieted mind is a country walk. If it resist the soothing influence of gushing streams, the pleasant flower-odours, the love-song of birds, and the genial southern breeze, hopeless indeed is the case. School-flogging generally indicates that the teacher has no natural qualification for the task allotted him. It implies that he does not know how to teach, and hence he will try if the cane possesses that power. Man has a strange method of condoling over affliction that is, other people's. For instance, a boy has just had his legs fixed in the railings of an area, whereby they are much grazed, and streaming with blood. The poor boy sobs loudly, but he is kindly told not to mind the accident, for the consequences might have been worse, and he should not forget that the accident was occasioned by his own carelessness. The greatest censure which a man could pass upon himself, would be to employ appropriate words to describe his own actions. It is said that "truth is stranger than fiction," and rightly-for truth is seldom heard. Some persons appear to imagine that, because they possess a superfluity of money, they are justified in spending it mischievously. If this were not the case, can we account for the opera house being filled, and the racecourse thronged? We detest those writers who intermingle foreign phrases with English idioms-like an ill-joined mosaic pavement, it merely makes us stumble. There is a fashionable novelist, who cannot write fifty words without employing twenty French, Italian, German, or-hear it, shade of Porson, with grim smile!-Greek words. Perchance the writer thinks it displays excessive reading, whereas it merely indicates an acquaintance with the "Dictionary of Quotations." "My friend, do not rest contented with bemoaning your misfortunes, but strive to remove them." "I feel grateful for your advice, but I cannot overcome the evil influence of external circumstances." "You say that you cannothave you tried?" AMERICAN VARIETIES.-No. XIV. THE Harrisburg Gazette tells of a soldier, who, about 150 years ago, was frozen in Siberia. The last expression he made was, "It is ex-." He then froze as stiff as marble. In the summer of 1840, some French physicians found him, after having laid frozen 150 years. They gradually thawed him; and upon animation being restored, he concluded his sentence with "ceedingly cold." "Mrs. Grimes, lend me your tub." "Can't do it-all the hoops are off-it's full of suds; besides, I never had one-I washes in a barrel." "Recollect, sir," said a tavern keeper to a gentleman who was about leaving his house without paying the "reckoning,' "recollect, sir, if you lose your purse, you didn't pull it out here." A man who can diddle a tailor out of a new suit is a gentleman. If you cannot avoid a quarrel with a scamp, let your lawyer manage it rather than yourself. No man sweeps his own chimney, but employs a chimney-sweeper, who has no objection to dirty work, because it is his trade. It would be better if young ladies would encourage young men more on account of their good characters than their good clothes. A good reputation is better capital than a fine coat in almost any kind of business, except wooing a fashionable lady. A Leghorn hat loaded with flowers, will not cure the head-ache, nor will a gold watch prevent consumption. "The Cincinnati Sun" intimates that our friend of the "Boston Times" keeps a very suspicious-looking inkbottle by his side, since the fifteen-gallon law went into operation. If it be so, the Boston man says there is more than one editor who would like to replenish his inkstand from it. ORIGINAL POETRY. THE HOUSELESS ONE. "On, hush my baby! hush and sleep," I heard a mother say; With anguish'd feeling pure and deep, She trod her weary way. The moonbeams fell upon her form, And meanly was she clad, Whilst through the silent streets forlorn, She roam'd with visage sad. "Oh, do not weep, my baby dear," That mother gently said, The night was cold-the blast was keen, Came stealing o'er her soul, Like days for thee again. As o'er her child she hung. She wander'd on-she knew not where- Till o'er her heart a bleak despair MINUTE WRITING.-About a century ago, minute writing was a fashionable curiosity. A drawing of a head of Charles the First is in St. John's library, Oxford. It is wholly composed of minutely written characters, which at a small distance resemble lines of engraving. The head and ruff contain the book of Psalms, the Creed, and the Lord's Prayer. It is said that in ancient times, the whole of the Iliad was transcribed in such small compass, it could be put into a nut-shell.-Poetry and Poets.-R. Ryan. Some one stole Lord Chatham's large gouty shoes; his servant not finding them, began to curse the thief." Never mind," said his Lordship, "all the harm I wish the rogue, is, that the shoes may fit him!" HEALTHY HABITATIONS.-It would be well if architects were to make themselves acquainted with the circumstances which contribute most essentially to the salubrity of habitations, as regards the site, the exposure, the drainage, and the size and disposition of the rooms. In many houses, in other respects well proportioned and arranged, the want of height in the bed-rooms is, I am persuaded, the cause of much illhealth. In our small country-houses this fault is very conspicuous; and the country-houses of our gentry are in many instances rendered unhealthy for one half of the year by the nature of the situation in which they are built; and this is frequently the case, too, when unexceptionable sites are to be found in the immediate vicinity. Numerous elegant buildings around this metropolis are more unhealthy than the central parts of the city. The evil consequences of inattention to these circumstances are experienced in all classes of habita tions from the palace to the cottage.-Sir James Clark on Consumption. ST. PAUL'S MARTYRDOM AND GRAVE.-There seems no reason for distrusting the main features of the legend as to St. Paul's martyrdom and his grave, the localities of which are in themselves likely enough, and even derive some addi. tional probability from the way in which the tradition connects these incidents with the death of St. Peter. About three miles from the gate of St. Paul, on the heights which swell gradually from the left bank of the Tiber, in a solitary hollow among green hills, lies the spot anciently called Ad Aquas Salvias, which is said to have been the scene of the holy man's suffering. The beautiful seclusion of the region, surrounded in every quarter by the bare hilly downs, which are excavated in many spots into "dens and caves of the earth," similar to those in which the early Christians so often took refuge, inspires a feeling that is pleasingly consonant to the event, and is scarcely disturbed by even the tradition pointing to three fountains, as miraculously struck out by the saint's head when it fell under the sword. These springs give to the three churches erected on the spot their modern name of the Abbey of the Three Fountains. All the three wells are enclosed in one of the churches, and beside the first of them stands a marble column, to which we are told the apostle was bound when he was beheaded. From the second church, we enter the burying-ground named after the third, which is that of the Saints Zeno and Anastasius, where, says the legend, lie the bodies of the 10,000 martyrs slain in this valley, after they had assisted in erecting the baths of Diocletian. Descending the heights till we reach the brink of the Tiber, we arrive at the ruins of the basilica of St. Paul, which we are told, contains the apostle's body, removed by the pious ma. tron St. Lucina, from its first place of interment in the catacombs, to this spot on her own grounds. The proximity of this church to the road leading towards Ostia, does little to remove that appearance of seclusion which it shares with the place of martyrdom. CARR'S COUSIN.-I was very silly to alarm you so! but the wisest of us, from Solomon to old Carr's cousin, are poor souls. Maybe you don't know anything of Carr's cousin? Why then, Carr's cousin was-I don't know who-but Carr was very ill, and had a cousin, as I might be, to sit up with her. Carr had not slept for many nights; at last she dozed. Her cousin, whereupon, immediately jogged her, "Cousin, cousin! " "Well," said Carr, "what would you have?" "Only, cousin, if you die, where would you be buried?"Walpole's Letters. Vol. I. of the New and Pictorial Series of the LONDON SATURDAY JOURNAL, price 6s. 6d. handsomely bound in cloth, is now ready, and may be had of all Booksellers. LONDON: W. BRITTAIN, PATERNOSTER ROW. Edinburgh: JOHN MENZIES. Glasgow: D. BRYCE. Dublin: CURRY & Co. Printed by J. Rider, 14, Bartholomew Close, London. |