therefore all at second hand, but I shall repeat to you what I think is not love, and what is."-And she repeated these pretty and well known lines :

CARELESS AND FAITHFUL LOVE.

To sigh-yet feel no pain

To weep-yet scarce know why,

To sport an hour with beauty's chain,

Then throw it idly by:

To kneel at many a shrine,

Yet lay the heart on none;

To think all other charms divine,
But those we just have won :-
This is love-careless love—
Such as kindleth hearts that rove.

To keep one sacred flame

Through life, unchill'd, unmov'd;
To love in wint'ry age the same
That first in youth we loved :

To feel that we adore

With such refined excess,

That though the heart would break with more,

We could not love with less.

This is love-faithful love,

Such as saints might feel above.

"And such as I do feel, and will always feel, for my Edward," said Lady Emily"But there is the dressing bell!" And she flew off, singing,

"To keep one sacred flame, &c.

CHAPTER HI

"Some, when they write to their friends, are all affection; some are wise and sententious; some strain their powers for efforts of gaiety; some write news, and some write secrets-but to make a letter without affection, without wisdom, without gaiety, without news, and without a secret, is doubtless the great epistolic art." Dr. JOHNSON.

An unusual length of time had elapsed since Mary had heard from Glenfern, and she was beginning to feel some anxiety on account of her friends there, when her apprehensions were dispelled by the arrival of a large packet, containing letters from Mrs. Douglas and aunt Jacky. The for

mer, although the one that conveyed the greatest degree of pleasure, was perhaps not the one that would be most acceptable to the reader. Indeed, it is generally admitted, that the letters of single ladies are infinitely more lively and entertaining than those of married ones-a fact which can neither be denied nor accounted for. The following is a faithful transcript from the original letter in question.

"Glenfern Castle,

"MY DEAR MARY,

-shire, N.B.

Feb. 19th, 18-.

YOURS was received with much pleasure, as it is always a satisfaction to your friends here to know that you are well and doing well. We all take the most sincere interest in your health, and also in your improvements in other respects. But I am sorry to say they do not quite keep pace with our expectations. I must therefore take this opportunity of mentioning to you a fault of yours, which

though a very great one in itself, is one that a very slight degree of attention on your part, will, I have no doubt, enable you to get entirely the better of. It is fortunate for you, my dear Mary, that you have friends who are always ready to point out your errors to you. For want of that most invaluable blessing, viz. a sincere friend, many a one has gone out of the world, no wiser in many respects, than when they came into it. But that, I flatter myself, will not be your case, as you cannot but be sensible of the great pains my sister and I have taken to point out your faults to you from the hour of your birth. The one to which I particularly allude at present is, the constant omission of proper dates to your letters, by which means we are all of us very often brought into most unpleasant situations. As an instance of it, our worthy minister, Mr. M'Drone, happened to be calling here the very day we received your last letter. After hearing it read, he most naturally inquired