the shore; and yet there stood, leaning against the railing of the esplanade, a Hindoo, clad in the graceful and picturesque, but very insufficient garb of his native land. He was a slight delicate-looking man of good caste, judging by his complexion and features; his eyes were fixed with a mild thoughtful expression on the sea, and he held a few tracts in his hand. His presence reminded us forcibly of the brilliant east, towards which our thoughts had turned with vain regret several times that morning; and approaching him, we asked if he did not miss the sunshine.' He replied: 'Sun shine here too sometimes, Ma'am Sahib, and to-day clouds very pretty!' The reply struck us. We entered into conversation with the dark-browed Asiatic, and found that he was called John, having received baptism from a Christian missionary. He had accompanied an English master to his native land, and married a very young and pretty English girl; but unhappily, shortly afterwards, the gentleman died: his family, if he had any connections, did not care for or trouble themselves about his Hindoo attendant, and the poor fellow, when his last paid wages were gone, found himself wholly dependent on his wife's labour for support; but she was burdened with the care of a child, and in very delicate health, so he had resolved on trying to get something himself by selling little books. People very kind,' he added; they buy books, and I get bread and meat for the wife and baby, and rice for me.' 'But you must be so cold.' 'No, not very; and then when the sun shine, he great deal prettier, because he hide his face before.' We grew in a few days quite an intimate acquaintance of John Commo; he confided to us all his little successes, but never troubled us with complaints of his privations. One theme on which he loved to descant was the beauty of his young child. Its image appeared to haunt his path, and, doubtless, thoughts of it beguiled the weary hours during which he stood patiently waiting the charity of the passers-by, for he never begged of any one. Suddenly we lost sight of him, and we fancied he had left the place, his old station remained so long unoccupied; but at the end of about three weeks or a month, we saw him again standing one Sunday near the church door. We went up and spoke to him immediately. He looked ill, and his bright sunshiny smile was gone. We asked him how he was. 'Very well,' was the reply. And the baby?' His dark eyes filled for a moment, and then he gave his own smile again, as he answered: 'Poor baby! gone where sun shines always.'

He had been ill, and had been obliged to go into the Union with his wife and child. The little family were separated, and he never saw his boy again. 'But,' he added, 'not all bad even there.' The chaplain of the house had been a missionary in the east; could speak his language; had grown interested in him; and had promised to get him sent back to his native land by the Missionary Society; and till that hoped-for time arrived, he resumed his former mode of life; looking, in the gloomiest and coldest weather that visits us during our chilly spring, as if he always saw the sun behind the cloud. One morning he stopped us his face wearing an expression of more than ordinary pleasure-to offer a little gift as a token of his gratitude for the small services we had rendered him. It was a wafer-stamp, manufactured from a bone he had picked up in the road! but carved with great skill, and quite an elegant little affair, considering the coarseness of the material and tools used in its formation. It was a parting souvenir, as he was about to be sent to his own land again. We bade him call on us at the house of our friend, in order to receive some trifles in the way of clothing for his wife and her infant-another child born since he left the Union. He came, and we introduced our happy vagrant to the notice of one of the most beneficent

men we know; he was loaded with gifts of all kinds; hospitably entertained in the servants' hall, and finally bade us farewell for ever, with the deepest shadow on his merry face that we had yet seen, leaving us with the conviction, that wherever the remainder of his pilgrimage might be cast, it would be cheered by a contented spirit.

6

But we must not close our sketch without giving a little instance of counting the sunny hours' in one of our own nation; albeit, our slow Anglo-Saxon spirits are, we are bound to acknowledge, more prone to mark the shadow than the sunshine.

There stood, in our village, an old-fashioned cottage, the property of a maiden lady named Markham, who was, however, universally called, by all who knew her, 'Miss Sally'a certain proof of her popularity with her neighbours. We are of those who think that there is a physiognomy in houses, and that the general effect of their appearance helps the observer to some knowledge of their occupants' characters. Now, Miss Sally's cottage was precisely the sort of dwelling that, if it had belonged to a miser or a 'dull fellow,' would have been a very temple of gloom. The rooms were low, with heavy beams across the ceilings; the windows had deep seats, and being long and narrow, gave but little light; tall prim poplars shaded the front of the house, and there had been, in former days of superstition, a ghost-legend attached to it; nevertheless, Miss Sally Markham managed to render it a cheerful home. Her old-fashioned furniture was always arranged to the best advantage, and with a certain degree of taste; in winter, a blazing fire; in summer, a profusion of the gayest flowers enlivened her sombre parlour; and no ghost, we are quite certain-unless it were an uncommonly happy sociable one-could have resisted the exorcism of her merry musical laugh: anything evil or unhallowed must have fled from it. though she lived alone with only one old servant, and had but a very limited income, Miss Sally was much sought after and even courted. There was not a house with children in it where her appearance was not hailed with glee; they understood and loved her, and she was 'aunt' by adoption to half the parish. She never appeared to grow older-her blithe nature retaining, far beyond the period of youth, its freshness of enjoyment and perception; and yet village rumour said that she had had her cares-nay, had even been crossed in love! but, if the latter tale were true, she had borne it much better and more wisely than Viola's imaginary sister, for it had evidently not proved detrimental either to her health or her complexion.

And

About the time we first became acquainted with Miss Markham, a new arrival had recently taken place in the village; the great house, par excellence, had been taken by a wealthy manufacturer, who proved to be * a bachelor. It was astonishing what a sensation he created in the place! How the young ladies bought new bonnets, and how the mammas, as soon as they knew he was wifeless, ceased bewailing the extinction of the 'good old family' of the ancient squire! The parish-church was as gay as a parterre of tulips the first time Mr Spicer occupied his new pew. Alinost the only lady who had not grown smarter was Miss Sally Markham, who still wore the same straw-bonnet and quiet shawl, and, moreover, the same sweet smile, she was ever wont to have on her happy face.

The next week, people called at the manor, and gave parties to its new lord. The little place became quite gay, and Miss Markham was invited everywhere; for she was of great use in making a party go off well, her spirits being generally a strong stimulant to those of others moreover, she was not considered likely to become a dangerous rival to the fair aspirants to the vacant place at the manor. People were pleased that she amused Mr Spicer, and that she rendered themselves more amusing also, and they rather over

calculated the counter-charm of her plainness and her poverty.

One morning, some three months afterwards, an astounding announcement electrified the village gossips: Mr Spicer was going to be married! and-alas for the matchmakers-to Miss Sally Markham! The report was at first too much for their faith; but time fully confirmed it: very shortly, the church-bells were ringing merry peals in honour of the marriage of the lonely little lady of the cottage; and the vicar related how Mr Spicer had told him, that from the first, he had resolved on proposing to Miss Sally; requiring, to cheer his retirement from the excitement and toil of the world, not a young lady who dressed well and sang Italian bravuras, but an amusing companion, who looked on the bright side of things, and would help him to count the sunny hours, and to forget the shadows.

HINDOO EMIGRANTS. THE writer was one of twenty Englishmen engaged in conveying from east to west 260 natives of the Carnatic. Forty of these were women; and thirty, children under ten years of age; the remainder, youths or adult men. Most of the males were strictly coolies or labourers, chiefly agricultural; but some had exercised specific arts or callings, as metal-workers, bricklayers, painters, basket-makers, cloth-weavers, confectioners, barbers, milkmen, washermen, shoemakers. One had been employed in making garlands for native festivals and funerals. Many had been gardeners, drawers of toddy from the palmyra trees, bullock or bandy drivers, and a number had worked in the paddy-fields. Several had been 'boys' or palanquin-bearers, some peons, policemen, or messengers; others, domestic servants, cooks, or horsekeepers. One had been a sepoy. Two had been schoolmasters, of whom one could read and write English imperfectly. About a dozen had been to the Mauritius as free emigrants, and had there acquired some knowledge of French. Fifteen of the party were Mussulmans, six or eight, Roman Catholics, and of the remaining, about fifty were Pariahs. Their ages varied, but by far the greater number were in the prime of early

manhood.

Their complexions were of all shades, from light bronze or yellow, through rich chestnut brown, to dark olive, bordering on black. The children were the fairest, but among adults there was a wide range. The younger men were especially handsome, with open oval countenances, fine eyes and teeth, smooth soft skins, and well-proportioned forms. Some were, of course, of less graceful mould, but scarcely any were misshapen, and a few were of peculiarly attractive aspect. The women were inferior to the men in personal appearance. Though amply supplied with clothing by the government emigration authorities at Madras, they made little use of it on board, and dressed as they were accustomed to do on shore. The men contented themselves with a cloth round the loins; the garment of the women was a long cotton cloth, wrapped and folded so as to conceal the trunk, and descending to the knees, or a little below them. Simple as were the materials, there was much scope for elegance and taste in the way in which this female drapery was worn. They invariably left the head uncovered; the men sometimes did the same; but at other times investing it with a turban or cap. In both sexes, the feet and legs were bare. Young children were quite nude, but had a string round the middle, to which the forecloth would afterwards be attached.

Unpretending, however, as was their costume, these coolies were as profuse in ornaments as their means would allow. The women, if unable to procure

bracelets of the precious metals, wear rings of glass upon their wrists, and the greater the number of these rings, the better are they pleased. As they are necessarily drawn on over the hands, they fit loosely upon the arms, and clank one on the other as the wearer moves. Rings of silver, pewter, or brass, in lieu of more costly fabrics, are worn upon the fingers and toes, and rings or jewels hang from the tip and sides of the nose. The neck is encircled with strings of beads, or decorated with tassels and trinkets of various devices, suspended from a cord. The lobe of the ear is perforated, and through the aperture is introduced a coil of painted paper or palm leaf, wound on itself like a watch-spring. By contrivances such as these, the lobe is sometimes much elongated, and converted into an open circle, larger in circumference than the whole remaining portion of the ear. Little children are decked with necklaces, bracelets, and rings, before they assume a particle of clothing. Among men, earjewels are frequent, and in a few may be observed the pendent lobe. Some also wear finger and toe rings.

In the arrangement of their hair, these emigrants exhibited a great diversity of taste, with much of what some might call an absence of all taste. It was frequent with the men to shave the head, except a tuft on the crown and at the sides. The hair of the vertex is never cut, and is sometimes long enough to reach the waist. It is either plaited into a queue or tied into a knot, or suffered to hang dishevelled. The hair is occasionally cut in the most fantastic shapes and patterns, and at other times permitted to preserve its natural growth and appearance. The women leave it as nature formed it, and in them it is often luxuriant and beautiful. It is generally lank and soft-in a few instances, thick and curling. In young children, it may be brown; in adults, always black, but soon whitens with age. Most of the women had their arms tattooed in blue, but there was nothing remarkable in the devices. The other prevalent adornments, if such they may be called, were the usual idolatrous symbols. The Vishnuvites paint three yellow lines, diverging upwards from the root of the nose; the Sivaites present three parallel horizontal white lines across the forehead, breast, and upper arms; and it is common with them to have a vertical blue line down the centre of the forehead. It was the absence of these marks that chiefly distinguished from the rest the Mohammedans and Roman Catholics.

Both sexes were sadly inattentive to personal cleanliness. Every morning, however, they might have been seen in rows along the deck, washing their mouths, and rubbing their teeth with pieces of stick, kept for the purpose. This was not neglected, even if it included the whole ceremony of ablution. They were also in the habit of frequently pouring water on their feet. The principal occupation of the women was that of destroying the vermin with which they were infested.

Their food was according to a dietary scale prescribed by government, and was more liberal than their necessities or inclinations required. Rice was the staple article, to which the other ingredients, the dholl-a species of pulse-the salt fish, the ghee or clarified butter, the tamarinds, and savoury herbs, were rather regarded as accessories. Each day's first duty was to serve out in one mass the requisite amount of provisions for the whole. The subsequent appropriation and preparation of this food were left to the emigrants themselves. It was for the most part conducted by a certain few, who possessed more activity than their neighbours, and sufficed to occupy them all the morning. The rest were perfectly willing to be exempt from any trouble but that of eating. The proper quantity of rice they estimated by a measure brought with them, which allotted to each about twenty-four ounces a day; and having been

'It is a fine day,' observes Piscator, when I salute him in the morning-a very fine day-a very fine day, indeed, Bob,' as though there was somebody contradicting that assertion. And your mother is well, is she, Bob? Your mother is well? Good, Bob, good-very good.' I think they have some idea that this makes an ordinary sentence remarkable, and they wish, perhaps, to give you an opportunity or two of setting it down in your note-book.

'What is this huge black and white fly, uncle,' I inquire, like an excellent imitation of a death's-head moth?'

'Death's-head fiddlestick!' cries Piscator, in a fury; "it's nothing of the kind, Bob-nothing of the kind. I call it the Popular Preacher, and it also is a good bait for the female-the serious female, that is. I have killed a number of chub with that fly, sir-a number of stout chub.'

There is a sort of box, also, attached to Piscator's book which contains even still more wonderful effigies; spinning minnows, twice as large as any in real life, and furnished with Archimedean screws; mice with machinery inside instead of intestines, and composite animals-half toad, half gergoyle-of which pike are supposed to become readily enamoured.

What a glorious amusement must indeed be that of the fly-fisher, climbing up in his huge waterproof boots the bed of some rock-strewn stream, amid the music of a hundred falls, and under the branching shelter of the oak and mountain ash, through which the sunbeams weave such fairy patterns upon his watery path! I never could throw a fly myself by reason of these same branches; I left my uncle's favourite killer-brown, with a yellow stripe-at the top of an inaccessible alder, on our very last expedition together, just after we had taken a great deal of trouble, too, in its extrication from the right calf of Piscator, where I had inadvertently hitched it. I am too clumsy and near-sighted, and indeed much too impatient for the higher flights of fishing. Piscator starts in the dusk, in order to be up at some mountain tarn by daylight, and comes back in the evening with half-a-dozen fine trout, well satisfied; now I would much rather have half-an-hour's good fishing for bleak in a ditch with a landing-net. However, I do rise to gudgeon-fishing. I know no pleasanter and more dream-like enjoy ment than that I have often experienced on the bank of some ait (which some ingenious persons still spell 'eyot') in the bosom of old Father Thames; or, better still, on an arm-chair in a punt pitched in one of his back-waters. Let a little beer be in the boat and some tobacco, with perhaps a sympathising friend; then what a scene it is! Before us, the great roomy eelpots are hanging idle over the foamy lasher, in waiting for the night; their withy bands seem dry and rotten enough in the sunshine, but they are good for many a summer yet; beyond them lies the round island where the bending osiers dip their green heads into the flood till they be needed; in its centre, is the large leafless nest of her, born to be the only graceful shape of scorn,' the river swan; and around it grow those 'starry river buds,' the lilies; on the right hand, stately woods slope up from the very bank to the horizon; on the left is the miller's garden, upon an island likewise, with the high broad mill-stream running swiftly on its eastern shore, almost upon a level with the flowers; clack, clack, goes the great clumsy wheel, whose shining paddles we see disappear, one after one, under the low dark archway; and whir, whir, go half a score of little wheels within the bowels of the quaint old wooden house; along the main stream, beyond the mill-race, and separated from it by another island, ply the heavy-laden barges with half-a-dozen horses apiece, on one of which the lazy driver sits, like a lady, sideways, with his red woollen cap drooping upon one side, and his pipe scarcely kept alight;

market-people are going and returning along the towing-path, too, to Camelot, or, as it is called at this particular time and place, to Cookham; pleasureboats pass in the distance, filled with ladies, with brass bands, with racing crews; the locksman sees them from his lofty post, and the huge gates slowly part to let them through: all this we watch afar off, and have no part with the great stream of existence regarded from its calmest of back-waters. As for the fishing itself, that is very pleasant; I always look away when the man puts on the gentle; and my friend and I have shilling bets upon which catches the next fish. We did bet at least at one time, until I detected him in the ingenious but fraudulent manœuvre of pulling the same perch up again and again, by which he not only won half a sovereign of me, but gloried in his shame. I love the very dropping of the boat from 'pitch' to 'pitch;' the careful fixing of it between its two bare poles; the measuring with the plummet for length of line; the chucking the bread and meal in for the gratuitous entertainment of the fish; the grating of the iron rake in the pebbly bottom; and all the machinery which is set in motion to persuade me that I am doing something and not nothing.

Better than all, perhaps, is the after-entertainment at the old-fashioned river inn, where jack is stuffed in some peculiarly fragrant manner, or there is an especial patent for frying trout; where awful specimens of both those fish, with particularly protuberant eyes, are suspended in the low-roofed cosy diningroom, along with the portrait of some famous fisherman, and the rules of the local angling club. The heroes of these places are not insolent and puffed up with knowledge, as hunters and shooters for the most part are, but freely and graciously impart intelligence to the unlearned. I confess at once that I have caught but two perch all day; my friend, three perch; and Jones, the man, about eight dozen. 'Ay, ay, and very well too,' observes the landlord; 'Jones is a good rod; you should have tried Miller's Hole with the minnow;' and so on. I have fished for bigger fish than perch. I once went out-went in, I should say― to spear barbel: that is a very splendid and almost warlike amusement. You see the leviathan reposing upon the pebbles beneath; silently, softly, you seize a long barbed spear, and measure the distance between you and your prey exactly; you think it to be about four feet, whereas the real depth of water is six feet at the very least. Striking, under this impression, with all your force, you throw yourself into the river, arrive upon the very spot which the barbel recently occupied, and are lucky if you can swim as well as he. Whenever I attempt anything above my perch, indeed, I fail miserably; 'the party' who occupied my seat in the punt on the previous day has caught so many trout, he could not carry half of them away with him; and the party' who comes the day afterwards, again, is equally successful; but, for me, I might just as well have baited my hook with a pack of cards. However, at the end of this last summer, I had one really good day's fishing, killing with my single rod carp and trout, of such magnitude and number as Piscator himself would have been proud to tell of; and it came to pass in this way.

.

The Marquis of B-, whom I call 'B.' in conversation with strangers, is a good friend of mine, who has known me for many years. If he met me in the market-place of our borough, his lordship would, I am sure, say: How d'ye do?' or, 'How are you?' and thank me, perhaps, for the pains I took about the return of his second son. I have dined more than once at the Hall, during election-time, and his lordship has not failed to observe to me: 'A glass of wine with you?' or, Will you join us, my dear sir?' quite confidentially upon each occasion; the words may be nothing indeed, but his lordship's manner is such that