the night, that husband and wife may see one another again; come to me in the third watch; let me renew the illusions of the past. In the second moon, at the birth of the spring, the sun shines longer in the sky, and each family washes its robes and linen in pure water. Husbands who have still their wives, love to adorn them with new clothes; but I, who have lost mine, I am a prey to a grief that wastes my life away. I have removed from my sight the little shoes that enclosed her pretty feet. Sometimes I have thought of taking another companion; but where should I find another so beautiful, so witty, and so kind! In the third moon, at the epoch called Tsing-ming, the peach-tree opens its rose-coloured blossoms, and the willow begins to display its green tresses. Husbands who have still their wives, go with them to visit the graves of their relations. But I, who have lost mine, I go alone to visit her grave. When I see the spot where her ashes repose, burning tears stream down my cheeks. I present to her funeral-offerings; I burn for her images of gilded paper. "Tender wife!' I exclaim, with a tearful voice, where art thou? Tender wife! where art thou?' But, alas, she is deaf to my cries! I see a solitary tomb, but I cannot see my wife. * * In the sixth moon, at the epoch called San-fo, it is difficult to support the burning heat of the day. The rich and poor then spread their clothes to air. I will expose a silken robe to the sun's hot rays. Look, here is the robe she wore on festival days!-here are the elegant shoes that enclosed her pretty feet! But where is my wife? Oh, where is the mother of my children? I feel as if a cold steel-blade were dividing my heart. * * * The fifteenth day of the eighth moon, when her disc shines with its greatest splendour, men and women offer to the gods melons and cakes, which have a rounded form like that of the orb of night.* Husbands and wives go two and two to walk in the country, and enjoy the sweet moonlight; but the round disc of the moon can only remind me of the wife I have lost. At times, to relieve my wo, I pour for myself a cup of generous wine; at times I take my guitar, but scarcely can my trembling hand draw forth a sound. My relations and friends come, turn by turn, to invite me; but my heart, full of bitterness, refuses to share their pleasures. In the ninth moon, at the epoch called Tehong-yang, the chrysanthemums open their golden cups, and every garden exhales a balmy odour. I would gather a bunch of newly blown flowers, if I had still a wife whose hair they could adorn. My eyes are wet with tears, my hands are contracted by grief, and beat my fleshless breast. I enter into the elegant chamber that was once my wife's; my two children follow me, and come sadly to embrace my knees. Each one takes me by the hand, and calls me with a choking voice. By their tears, their sobs, their gestures, they ask me for their mother. The first day of the tenth moon, both rich and poor present winter-clothes to their wives. But I who have no wife, to whom shall I offer winter-clothes? When I think of her who shared my bed, who rested on the same pillow, I burn for her images of gilded paper, and my tears flow fast. I send these offerings to her who now dwells beside the Yellow Fountain. I know not whether these funeral gifts will be of use to the shade of her who is no more, but at least her husband will have paid her a tribute of love and regret. In the eleventh moon, when I have saluted winter, I call my beautiful wife. In my cold bed, I double up my body, I dare not stretch out my legs, and half of the silken counterpane covers an empty place. I sigh and invoke heaven; pray for pity on a husband who passes solitary nights. At the third watch, I rise without having slept, and I weep until the dawn. In the twelfth moon, in the midst of winter's cold, I called my tender wife. Where art thou?' I said. 'I think of thee all day, yet I cannot see thy face.' The last night of the year, she appeared to me in a dream: she pressed my hand in hers; she smiled on me with tearful eyes; she The full moon presides over happy marriages. Every one must have observed the destructive combination of lead and iron from railings being fixed in stone with the former metal, and the oxygen of the atmosphere keeping up the galvanic action between the two metals. This waste might be prevented by substituting zinc for lead, in which case the galvanic influence would be inverted: the whole of its action would fall on the zinc, and the iron would be preserved; and as zinc is oxidated with difficulty, it would, at the same time, be scarcely acted on; the one formed of the oxide of zinc, for the same reason, preremaining uninjured, and the other nearly so. serves iron exposed to the atmosphere infinitely better than the ordinary paint, which is composed of oxide of lead.-Timbs's Popular Errors. Paint Printed and Published by W. and R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH. Also sold by WILLIAM ROBERTSON, 23 Upper Sackville Street, Dublin, and all Booksellers. POPULAR LITERATURE Science and Arts. CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS. No. 206. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1857. PRICE 1d. elsewhere their haggard looks and aching heads. Some set out for Paris, some for London, some for Vienna, some for Berlin, some for St Petersburg, some for America; a good many lose themselves by the way, and sinking into some obscure pitfall, never turn up again till the following spring; not a few, on getting home, shut themselves up in their room to examine the pin-holed cards they have brought away, containing the history of the campaign, and invent from these data an absolutely infallible system of play by which to lose their money next year; while of those who reach London, a fair proportion forget the way to their clubs and their old landladies, and are fain to swell the competition for cabmen's boxes. But the bankers? What becomes of them? How have they fared in the conflict? The answer to these questions is curious; and it so happens that we are able to throw some light upon a subject hitherto shrouded in mystery. We shall take the principal temples of play seriatim, as we have catalogued them above. RECKONING THE WINNINGS. In England, the grand epochs of the year are connected with the fate of grouse and partridges: on the continent, with a thing of far more general and absorbing interest. The great resorts of fashion there, where people crowd to drink nasty water and enjoy, or pretend to enjoy, fine scenery, have a third attraction much more powerful-public and licensed Gaming; and to many, of course, the opening and closing days of the tables are the most memorable dates in the calendar. Paris, although more abounding in eau de vie than in mineral springs, and in monts de pieté than in picturesque hills, was formerly the most distinguished of the temples of play, paying two million francs a year to the government for its licence; but it has now lost this dignity by the interference of the legislature, and its great salons de jeu have retired into the dangerous obscurity of the hells of London. One or two other places have likewise been erased from the list, which now chiefly consists of Baden-Baden, Wiesbaden, Homburg, Ems, Spa, Geneva, and Monaco. The gaming season begins in spring, when the leaves come out green and glittering in the sun, and closes in most places on the 1st of November, when they drop sear and withered from the trees. The 1st of November has more general excitement than the opening date, for on that day there comes into play a new element of interest; a new class, hitherto rigidly excluded, being then for the first and only time in the season, permitted to approach them. Many a wistful glance have these latter been accustomed, for months past, to throw at the shut doors; many an investigating look have they fixed upon the pale or flushed faces, the dead or burning eyes, of the privileged classes emerging from them; but now at length their turn comes, they are permitted to enter within the sacred precincts, and to feel in their own experience the glorious excitement of play. The time allowed them, it is true, is short-only a single day; but that suffices for the purpose: a few francs or florins don't take long, and luckily they have no fund to fall back upon when these are swept up by the good-natured bankers. In, therefore, they flock-gentlemen's servants, waiters, hotel commissionaires, petty trades-people of the town, shopmen, neighbouring villagers, agricultural labourers, farm-servants, with the wives of all who have wives to bring, and boys and girls from their first teen to their last-all are welcome to the honour of risking their year's savings upon the identical table which yesterday—namely, one for rouge et noir and two for roulette. ingulfed the inheritance of princes. In the meantime, the members of the other class, for whom the season is already at an end, prepare to carry Baden-Baden pays an annual licence of 300,000 francs. The present lease is for seventeen years from 1854, a period of eight years being fixed, and the remainder renewable, either on the same terms or at an advanced ratio. In four years, therefore, the bankers will have the option either of giving up their lease or submitting to a perhaps considerable augmentation of the licence. This large sum does not go into the pockets of the Baden government. It is laid out, through a special commissioner of the Baths, in embellishing the place-in gilding refined gold and painting the lily, for the whole locality is a paradise of beauty as it is. The seven less important baths receive only 50,000 francs among them, that of BadenBaden taking the lion's share. In addition to the licence, the expenses are of course heavy, making up the aggregate costs to not less than 700,000 francs; but notwithstanding this, the net profit of the last season amounted to above two millions! Nor is there any chance of a reduction of this large sum in future years, so long as the place retains the prestige of fashion; for a curious clause in the treaty defends Baden-Baden even against the effects of its own justice or generosity by forbidding it to renounce either of its two zeros with which the game of roulette is played, or the refait, as it is termed, of rouge et noir. On the other hand, it is not permitted to be too greedy of business; its tables being limited to the present three The above is the speculation of a private individual, but the tables of Wiesbaden and Ems belong to a joint-stock company. They pay for the double licence its bank. In anticipation of this, the manager, in imitation of the autocrats of the Opera, has been recently on a tour among the other gaming temples to recruit his staff, and has already at a fabulous sum engaged the services of one of the best croupiers of Homburg. 115,000 florins; but are prepared, it is rumoured, to offer 100,000 florins more for permission to keep their play-rooms open during the winter months. The expenses of this company for the season are estimated at 750,000 francs; yet at the last division of profits, a dividend was declared which entitled each of the 25,000 shares to 49.30 francs. This exhibits a net At Monaco, the society gives the prince one-fourth profit for the season of 1,232,500 francs! Baron de of the profits, guaranteeing to him 25,000 francs as the Wellens, the gérant or manager of the society, receives minimum. This year its receipts (about 80,000 francs) in lieu of salary, for what is reckoned his able services, are said to have fallen short of its expenses; but 5 per cent. on these profits-an allowance which makes notwithstanding this, as well as the unfavourable eye up the very respectable income of 61,625 francs or with which it is regarded by Sardinia, the prospects of L.2465. As this sum, for six months' work, is more Monaco are good, as by and by a ramification of than equal to the salaries of all the Grand Duke of railways will encircle it like the net of a spider. This Nassau's ministers for a year, it has excited some is believed to be the only instance in which the reignremark; and at the last meeting of the society to hearing prince is a personally interested director of the the Report, one shareholder, astonished and alarmed at the announcement of so large a recompense, declared that it was absolutely 'scandalous.' 'Well, gentlemen,' said the baron with his usual serene courtesy, 'I admit that the sum which produces this amount at five per cent., and pays you so handsome a dividend, is a large one. I am sorry you are dissatisfied with it: but another year the misfortune might be remedied; and I am sure if I could do anything that would give you satisfaction'- But here he was interrupted by a general laugh, and the Report was received with acclamation. At Wiesbaden there are two tables for roulette, and two for rouge et noir; at Ems one for roulette and one for rouge et noir. Homburg pays a licence of 50,000 florins, for which it is at liberty to keep the tables open throughout the entire year. The lease is for fifty-five years, of which sixteen have expired; the cost of all buildings, embellishments, and improvements to be defrayed by the society. The capital is divided into 10,000 shares; which received for last season (summer only) a dividend of 53 francs per share, giving a total profit of more than half a million. The owner of more than half these shares is a single individual, M. Blanc, the manager. There are five tables, three for roulette and two for rouge et noir; and they have this remarkable distinction, that the play is with only one zero. This does not affect stakes of less than 500 florins, but still it tends so far towards equalising the chances between the gamesters and the bank, that in April next the second zero, customary at all the other tables, is to be added. Spa, since the suppression of the tables at Aix-laChapelle, has become a flourishing concern. The Company set apart 150,000 francs for the general expenses of embellishment, &c., and then divide the spoil with the state. This year's profits have exceeded a million francs. There is only one table for roulette, and one for rouge et noir. Geneva, like Spa, pays no licence; but, unlike Spa, it has no connection with the government. Although it has enemies in the state council, however, the company are domiciled in the private mansion of the President of the Council himself, whom it gratifies with a rent of 25,000 francs. The general expenses here are about 125,000 francs, and the net profits 300,000; but this is nothing to its future, if it can only get over the enmity in the council, and be allowed to keep open the tables till the railway from Lyon, expected to be ready shortly, acts as a duct for treasure to pour into Bank. On casting our eye over the foregoing figures, we find that the half-dozen banks we have specified must have gained at play in a single season-putting profits and expenses together-seven million francs. Nor is this extraordinary fact to be taken as something peculiar to the present year: it is probably nothing more than the average annual rate at which the visitors of the places indicated submit to be shorn. And who are these visitors? Our readers may perhaps suppose them to consist of the mass of tourists who throw away here and there, without a thought upon the subject, a handful of five-franc pieces, or a few napoleons; but the fact is, that the most important of the victims are themselves intending victimisers, that the most feathery of the pigeons are the knowing ones, who, after mature study of the doctrine of chances, set forth every year from England, France, Germany, Russia, America, for the avowed purpose-to use their own language-of giving a lesson to M. le Baron de Wellens, of taking the shine out of M. Benazet, and of sewing up M. Blanc ! If these knowing ones, on sitting down to play a game of mere blind chance with a friend, were asked to give him odds, they would laugh at the idea. Odds, they would say, are given only in games of skill, such as billiards, to balance the inequality of the players, but in games of chance there is no inequality to balance. Yet this is precisely what they do with the Banks, which are secured certain odds by their fundamental rules. In playing either with the friend or the bank, however, in this unequal way, it is by no means impossible, despite the odds, that they may win: but with a difference. On finishing the friendly game, they pocket their winnings with a laugh, and determine not to risk them by repeating the frantic play, at which success was a kind of miracle; but success at the rouge et noir table is another matter: their mind is confused by the magnitude and complexness of the whole affair, by the mystery of the bank, the hopeless, fearless, bloodless serenity of the automaton-like croupier; they are incapable of reasoning as they do in the other case; the play, on the same terms, continues from hour to hour, from day to day, from week to week, and if they can hold out so long, from month to month, till they reach the inevitable goal of ruin at last. In the one case, in short, it is possible to win: in the other, impossible. The principle is so clear, that there would be no chance of mistake, were it not that the prestige of the tables is kept up by the spectacle of temporary success, while few or none are present at the final result: except when that is signalised by the report of a pistol, the withdrawal of the effigy whose last stake has been lost, and the scattering of the sawdust upon the floor preventing the company for a few minutes from closing round the table as before, to drink in the absorbing announcement of a new game, Le jeu est fait. Not, however, that such catastrophes are common, although they have happened; people are more considerate now-a-days than to enact such scenes in public: when they do sink under their misfortunes-at least, when we English do so-it is into a chair by the tap-room fire opposite the cab-stand. The reason why the last day of the season is the most popular, may be deduced from the foregoing. The visitors have no second day, or week, or month to insure their ruin: some, therefore, may win; and a single instance of success is worth more to the fame of the tables than a whole village of bankrupts. Only fancy that happy grisette, who, with flushed face, and yet shivering as if from cold, carried to the princely rooms in the morning her whole worldly fortune, which she had hoarded in an old stocking, consisting of two pièces de cent sous, and who could hardly be got out of the doors by force at night. She had won; she was winning-what cruelty to break off her golden dream in the midst! Happy grisette! another deal of the cards, another whirl of the roulette, would in all probability have stripped her of every sou; but kind fortune has turned her out of doors, the mistress of six bright and heavy crowns. It is true; Victoire was one of the great majority who lost; but does not her treasure make up for it, and will not the wedding come off just the same as if nothing had happened? This grisette will always be a benefactress of the Bank, for she will become a traditional heroine of her village; and as each new season approaches, her six pieces will be multiplied by report in at least arithmetical ratio. It is an old notion of ours that if a man will have the folly to throw away his money on so hopeless a speculation, the less he knows of the doctrine of chances, and the less he bothers himself with pricked cards, the more easily he will get off. Many years ago we witnessed a circumstance at Frascati's, in Paris, which quite demolished our faith in the doctrine. The rouge et noir room was well filled with visitors of both sexes, and the playing went on pretty briskly. A new deal took place-le jeu est fait-and the company obeyed the signal. The red wins. Some left their money on the red; some transferred it to the opposite side. The red wins again, and is the favourite. Again -again. The players become suspicious: the doctrine of chances is now dead against the red, and the black is loaded with gold and silver. The red wins. The red wins-again-again. People don't know what to do. They have lost enough on the black; but what knowing one would trust the red? They stand looking on, except a few who persist—but cautiously—with the black, and fewer still who put down a trifle on the red with a smile, as if they did it in jest. The red wins. Again -again. The red wins, in short, to the very end; and a game which, without the intervention of the doctrine of chances, ought to have broken half-a-dozen banks, terminated in comparatively little mischief to either side. Whether a circumstance like this ever happened before or since, we cannot tell; but what we have related, certainly did occur in our own presence, at a time when we visited, from curiosity, all sorts of places as well as gaming-tables. We are not sure that much good has been effected by the numerous moral treatises against gaming, or the equally numerous stories of ruin and misery the habit has occasioned. Gamesters, we fear, don't read moral treatises, and moral examples are looked upon as mere illustrations of the doctrine of chances. But we are more sanguine as to the antidotal power of the revelations of this paper. Seven millions a year against one is an awkward fact to get over. How do you like giving odds under the circumstances? THE PARIAH'S REVENGE. I was once acquainted with a Frenchman who could smoke any two Germans down. He was an artist, and, when I knew him, an exile, having got mixed up in some of the conspiracies against Louis-Philippe ; but he always declared that his uncommon skill in the art of consuming tobacco had been acquired during his residence in British India, where he was employed for years in copying sculptures and inscriptions from the ancient tombs and temples for the Institute of France. Of his other experiences in the land of the Brahmins, he was not inclined to talk much on English ground; but one evening when we sat together, and his long pipe was in full play-my friend was generally most fluent then-our conversation happened to turn on the extent of empire England had obtained in the east. 'A curious study they are,' he said, 'the Hindoo and his ruler. Nature never intended the two races to occupy one country: suppose they were willing, it is an absolute impossibility that they could ever understand each other. The Oriental character and that of the Anglo-Saxon are the opposite poles of mankind; hence the rule of England in India has had no moral result. It has familiarised the natives with European commerce, and, to a certain extent, with European science too, but the Hindoo and the Mussulman remain as far from Britain as their ancestors.' My response was about missions, and schools, and time. 'Well,' said my friend, we would never agree, and it's no matter; but I'll tell you an adventure which rather enlightened me on the subject when I was new in India.' This he did as follows: It was at Agra, the ancient capital, where the sultans of the Persian dynasty reigned and built before the days of the Mogul. The modern city is still of great importance. There are holy places within its walls for Hindoo and Mohammedan, an English garrison, and a considerable trade; but all round stand the witnesses of earlier power and splendour-temples and palaces, and regal tombs-scattered for miles over the country, and interspersed with palm-groves, native hamlets, and the bungalows of the English residents. I had a full twelvemonth's work among them; and among other acquaintances made in my peregrinations, was that of an English family named Jackson. They had what might be termed a strong position in Hindostan. Mr Jackson was a high law-officer for the province; Mrs Jackson's brother was at the head of the Agra custom-house; their son was a captain in one of the regiments of that native army by which England keeps her hold on India; and their daughter was married to one of the Company's judges in Calcutta. With their family interest so well represented, and titled connections in one of the midland counties of England where they were born, you may believe that the Jacksons were rich and important people. They had a house in the city of Agra, chiefly for the transaction of business, and an extensive bungalow in the outskirts, situated on the banks of a rivulet, surrounded by a garden full of Indian flowers, shaded from the southern sun by tall palms, and commanding a glorious prospect of splendid ruins and eastern vegetation. There they lived in a degree of material luxury known only to the Anglo-Indian. Nothing was wanted that wealth could purchase, and they possessed the love for elegance and taste; so the great lawyer and his lady were considered the elite of Agra society, and my acquaintance with them could only be accounted for on the ground that Europeans out of uniform were rather scarce, that life is somewhat dull in the Company's territory, that the Jacksons wanted their portraits, and that I was wanted to paint them. They had resided almost thirty years in India, and believed themselves thoroughly acquainted with it and its people. So they might have been as regarded time and opportunity; but unfortunately the Jacksons had brought the English midland counties with them, and never could get rid of the burthen. They reasoned on the dwellers by the Jumna exactly as they would have done on those beside the Trent, and applied the rules of conduct laid down for Jim and Bill, in all the rigour of their Angloism, to Ali and Ranou. Mr Jackson was an upright, honourable man, with little depth and much narrowness of mind. Of his spouse I will only venture to premise that she did not pretend to be interesting, and the only part of her conversation I recollect is a lament over the inferiority of meat in India, and a wonder that the Hindoos did not leave off worshipping idols when they were told it was wrong. Their son-of whom I saw a good deal, his regiment being then in garrison at Agra-was a handsome young man, with very red whiskers, and a great, though silent, esteem of himself; and of their daughter I know only that she was a young married lady of remarkable propriety, and had two really beautiful children, twin-boys, around whom the whole family's affection, and much of its pride, was gathered. The letters from Calcutta were full of them; their sayings, their doings, and their general progress. They were the theme to which Mrs Jackson returned from the two leading subjects I have mentioned-the topic to which the lawyer came down from his official dignity, and on which the captain condescended to unbend his mind. The twins were now in their fourth year, but the old people had not seen them since their first summer. The distance between Agra and Calcutta made the visit of the judge's lady to her parents rather rare. However, in the third quarter of my acquaintance with the Jacksons, it was publicly announced that Mrs Lester was coming with the dear children, and I was engaged to paint their portraits. Like most families of distinction in British India, the Jacksons kept a considerable retinue. The requisitions of caste, which always limit the Hindoo's labour, and the indolence superinduced by a tropical climate, contribute to augment the number of these household troops. My friends had servants of all sorts and sizes; but among them there was none in more esteem or trust than a native girl, who acted as Mrs Jackson's own maid, and held besides sundry important offices, such as the charge of the household linen and the dealing out of the spices. They called her Zelle; and when her good mistress was in a hurry, it became Sally sometimes, but I believe her proper name was Zelleya. She was a Pariah, at least she did not object to do or touch anything; but her appearance had something of high caste in it, for that peculiar institution of India has the advantage of making the classes known without the help of dress or equipage. Zelle had the tall, slender figure, the features of that fine mould which might be termed the classical of Hindostan―the upright carriage and elastic grace, the long, shining hair and pure olive complexion, which distinguish the Brahmin's daughter. She was young, too-I think not more than seventeen. By the way, that is not counted extreme youth in the east; but there was a cold glitter in her black eye, which, in spite of so much beauty, would not have charmed me. I thought Captain Jackson had come to a different conclusion. The near neighbourhood of his garrison made him almost a resident with his parents, and my frequent visits, in the double capacity of artist and friend to the family, enabled me to observe that Zelle's dress, which was a tasteful compromise between the costumes of Europe and India, was always more studied, and her black hair more carefully braided, when the captain was at home. Of course, it was by accident; but I once espied something very like an assignation in the garden, though, from circumstances too minute to be so long remembered, I believe that the siege did not advance as rapidly as the gallant captain could have wished; and Mrs Jackson had a mighty opinion of her maid. It was not easy to make an impression on the heart of that very respectable lady; but Zelle had achieved it, for the girl was clever and handy. I was told she could mend and clear-starch, mark and cut out as well as any maid from England; that she never had been known to tell a fib, black or white; might be trusted with anybody's wardrobe or jewel-case, and gave no trouble on the score of caste. Mrs Jackson also said that the girl was sincerely attached to her family; and with good reason, for they had been great benefactors to her and all her relations; and the good woman was accustomed to relate how Zelle's life, as well as that of her four sisters, had been saved in their infancy by the attorney-general's interference with that peculiar institution which, in some parts of Hindostan, saves the higher castes the trouble of providing trousseau and wedding-feasts; how her mother had been prevented from becoming a suttee by Mrs Jackson's cousin, then in the Agra mission, though the poor creature was scorned for it by all her heathen people, and somehow fell into the Jumna afterwards;' how her three brothers got advice and assistance from every branch of the Jacksons to take up honest trades, when the Company dispossessed them of some land to which they had no right in law; how, in consequence, one had a place in the custom-house, one had become a soldier in the captain's regiment, and one a small merchant in Agra. Mrs Jackson always wound up that recital of benefits by stating, that Zelle had been three years at the school for native girls; that she could read English as well as Hindostanee; that she never refused a tract, and the missionaries had great hopes of her. Mrs Lester's visit had been expected to take place in that cool and pleasant season of the Indian year, which the English residents persist in calling the winter, because it extends from October to March, and their Christmas dinners come off in the midst of it. Intervening between the time of rain and the fierce heat, it seems the natural season for travelling; but by those many casualties which beset the goings forth of ladies-who will take everything with them, as well as maids and children-the judge's spouse, for he himself, good man, stayed at home in hot Calcutta, found it impossible to set out so early as she had intended; but as she travelled in the most expeditious manner, by boat and palanquin, it was hoped the family would reach Agra before the regular deluge set in. Meantime, my commission to paint the children had widened to a family group. Somebody had suggested that the moment of arrival would be the most striking scene; and as it was necessary to witness the ceremony before transferring it to canvas, I was bound to be at the Jacksons' bungalow in good time on the day the visitors were expected. Having English patrons to deal with, I was punctual. Mrs Lester and company were due early in the afternoon, and the house was on the qui vive for hours; but there was no arrival. Towards evening, the rain, which had fallen in occasional showers for some days, as it does at the beginning of its season, came down in good earnest, with a fag-end of a thunder-storm, which we heard raging far to the southward, and the Jacksons comforted themselves with the hope that the travellers had taken refuge in some tomb or ruin, of which there was no lack on their way, and should come on as soon as |