"Mistake you for your sister! Propose to Jane! incredible! impossible! You are jesting." "Then he mistook Jane for me, last night;-and he is no deceiver!" thought Patty to herself, as with smiles beaming brightly through her tears she turned round at his reiterated prayers, and "He mistook her for yielded the hand he sought to his pressure. me! He that defied us to perplex him!" And so it was, an unconscious and unobserved change of place, as either sister resumed her station beside little Betty, who had scampered away after a glow worm, added to the deepening twilight, and the lover's natural embarrassment, had produced the confusion which gave poor Patty a night's misery, to be compensated by a lifetime of happiness. Jane was almost as glad to lose a lover as her sister was to regain one: Charles is gone home to his father's to make preparations for his bride; Archibald has taken a great nursery garden, and there is some talk in Aberleigh that the marriage of the two sisters is to be celebrated on the same day. THE HOURS.* Hours-minutes-moments are the smaller coin NAY, Pallet, paint not thus the hours, Young urchins, weaving wreaths of flowers; Hiding in the buds of roses, Where the folding pink-leaf closes Peeping from the sunflower's stem No!-rather Limner, make them lurk, From "The Chameleon." By Thomas Atkinson. Glasgow, 1832, JULIAN THE APOSTATE. [Many of the facts stated or referred to in this Sketch, may be found in Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. On the night before the Emperor Julian fought his last battle, he had the dream which 1 have detailed in the first Scene of this Sketch; and it is recorded that on the night of his death he addressed his soldiers, distributed rewards amongst them, and conversed with the sophists around him, respecting the immortality of the Soul. The names of Anatolius, Nevitta, &c. are taken from history.] SCENE I. The Tent of the Emperor Julian. Night-near day-break. (Julian-alone.) To-morrow?-aye, to-morrow. The bright Sun Of my life will set in blood. Dark, heavy clouds Are rolling round about me, yet my eye Can reach into the dim eternity, And in its bosom is-my grave. Oh! then, Valour and War, farewell! Soldiers and friends, Who in tempest of the battle, once, With your loves girded me like triple steel, I must be gone. Morning and Night farewell! And thou, fair Air! who music art and perfume, Now nursest with cold dews the sleeping flower, I may array my thoughts and vanquish Death? For ages and for ages, and there be A Spirit, filled with human thoughts and pains, My father, and my god, I perish here For want of succour. Fate and Death, at hand, And the grave opens, with a sickly smile, Away-this must not be. Imperial Rome Anat. My emperor! You are- (Anatolius enters.) Julian. 'Tis nothing-nothing. I am well. To-morrow I-pshaw ! that's for after thought. Anat. It is the same as ever. Julian. My good soldier. Anat. Let us but once meet Sapor face to face: Julian. Forget this. 'Tis true, indeed, we take less time for breathing, Now that we march for Rome, than when we came Intent to see the Persian on his throne: And in our trumpets now the wailing notes Sound lingering and prolonged. Well! 'twas not so Anat. Aye, when we shook Down to the dust their sixteen towers of brick Julian. Good Anatolius, you Have been my friend and fellow soldier long; From my youth upwards. We have fought together In Germany and Gaul, and on the banks Of the black Danube, when its waters lay 'Tween us and Hope. Anat. Like a dark rolling Hell. Oh! I remember it. Julian. My spirit never Quail'd in those times of peril, yet Anat. My lord! Julian. Nor doth it now: but there is on my soul A solemn foreboding that to-morrow's light -To day's for even now the clouds begin To break about the east, and dawn is here Before the stars have left us: Be it so. Anat. Oh! you hurt me. By the great Jove you tear my heart away. Julian. My dear soldier, this Is the last day of Julian. Mourn it not. Seen many things that age but seldom looks on, In which he thought he erred, for one more bright. Will it forget to say that I-(I hope not) Anat. I cannot stay. I shall be angry with you-Oh! is it thus I must say something, Anatolius; And you must listen, for 'twill ease my soul. And, in the van, my plume. I have a leaf From the green crown of Victory. You shall see How soon we'll tame the Persian spirits down. Anat. Aye, now you speak like Julian. Oh! we'll beat These brown barbarians to their silken tents, As we were wont. Let's talk of better times, (If we must talk)-of the old Roman times, When our rich veins fed Conquest with their blood, And fear was stifled in our hearts. Away We'll fight as bravely as great Julius did, And feast to-day with Sapor. Julian. You shall do it. And now but listen to me.-I have had A solemn dream. Methought there did appear Without a word-one word, he floated out, And left me in my tent, alone. Anat. Go on, Go on. Julian. I 'woke and started from my bed, But there was nothing,-nought: So, I went forth, Of divination, and can read the stars- Julian. No; by my father's spirit. Until now Have heard at Thebes the lonely marble voice Which better thrive in darkness than in light. Julian. And now, I can divine my fate. ('Tis Mars) rolling in the blue firmament, Usurping all one quarter of the sky; At last he seem'd to shake, and left his orb, Streaming athwart the heavens. Methought he went To meet the morn and died. By Serapis ! I saw him vanish in the east. Anat. Away; And what of this? 'tis nothing. Julian. I am now Deserted by my planetary God. Ah!--the sun comes: then I must haste to speak. Anat. And a child. Julian. 'Twas so. Eusebia was-ev'n while Constantius' wife, Gracious to me. In boyhood, when I was She stood my friend. Beneath her warning smile |