place to fly but to England or the Pyrenees, the old nurse's native country.

แ

England was too far off, and Zerlina knew not her relations; so they flew, that is, they came in a wagon to Bagnieres, where the good nurse hoped to find her family. She found only an uncle, but he was grown old, and had retired to die in the hamlet where I met Zerlina. 'Twas a beautiful hamlet, as I have told you; and Zerlina, who courted privacy, entreated her nurse to settle there. She had saved some ducats from the wreck of her fortune, and all her mother's jewels: and luckily the Poles are very fond of jewels. Her nurse, too, had a little hoard. So they established themselves humbly but comfortably at St. Elmo. Alas! in twelve months Zerlina lost this faithful old friend, and was glad to be received as a boarder by the respectable old lady in whose cottage I found her."

Here Mr. Rivers stopped, as if doubtful whether he had not told enough, but no one seeming to relax in his disposition to listen, he went on.

"In this sequestered spot she endeavoured to forget herself. She liked the females, and all showed her attention. Too much attention for Jacques-but hang Jacques-he did not succeed and was so unhappy, poor fellow, that one morning he left us, with his Montero cap on his head, a long gun on his shoulder, and a leathern bottle and wallet at his back. He said he would

just go and fetch us an iserre. I shall never forget his blue stockings, and red garters, tied under the knee. A fine figure, Sir, for a picture; and I wish I had taken him. But I never saw him afterwards. He said he would only climb the mountains; but he climbed into Savoy, and never came back while I was in the village."

Here Mr. Rivers concluded, saying, "My tale is done, for as you may suppose, the admiration I had conceived for the beauty of Zerlina, did not diminish by learning her history and character. Such was the esteem kindled by these, that had she been plain, I believe I should have been equally won. As it was

I loved her for the dangers she had past,
And she loved me that I did pity them.'

In short, I married her. Marriage usually puts an end to imagination. But it was not so with mine. What I have been telling you, happened five or six years ago, and I am now about thirty; but, thank Heaven, imagination has not yet failed me. To be sure, I suppose

Zerlina is not so much of a nymph as she used to be. But I cannot find it out, and the knowledge of her virtue, and the recollection of the romance which brought us together, not only point every charm, but are always new to our hearts. I have a boy who already repeats verses; and a girl who is an angel. We still dance in an orchard, and I still play the flute."

-

It was late night when the friends returned to their lodgings from Rivers' supper, and Rivers' story. They were both much impressed by it, and they agreed that what Wentworth in his speculation had despaired to meet with a man full of interests unconnected with the business of life-was here found. They agreed, indeed, that most who were engaged in that business, would laugh at Rivers as a madman, or at best, as a very great fool. But to Wentworth, in his then frame of mind, the man of imagination seemed a person of a higher 'world. "For though," said Wentworth, "he talked a great deal of what many of us would, and not unjustly, call nonsense, yet never man was seemingly more qualified to laugh in his turn at our struggles, or tell a minister of state, I want nothing of you.

"He would at farthest," observed De Vere," tell the minister to stand out of his sunshine, if he were in it. He beats Bolingbroke all to nothing with his philosophy and his inscriptions."

"He is certainly an enviable person," proceeded Wentworth; "and whether we may agree with him or not in the road he has taken to happiness, I never saw more sincerity in the enjoyment of it. He puts us matter-of-fact people to the blush. In imagining all, he possesses all."

"He possesses the woman he loves," remarked De Vere.

A silence of some minutes ensued, each revolving the tale they had heard according to his different no

tions, till they separated for the night, to think of it alone.

They passed a week or two in this country of romance, the tutelary deities of which seemed the enthusiastic Rivers and his touching little wife-both of whom became objects of their close observation. In truth, the friends expected to detect something like vacuity in their enjoyments. But no. The imagination of Rivers gilded every thing with sunshine. He was out of doors whenever the weather did not forbid, and when it did, employed himself in reading to his wife.

The friends were curious to observe the subjects he generally chose, which they concluded would be of the Ariosto school. To their surprise they found them to be history and memoirs, or those writers who have best painted the manners and follies of men. Expressing wonder at it, Rivers told them that it was this that made his liberty so sweet; for if he did not know the world, either through himself or others, he might hanker after it. Hence, in graver moments, Plutarch and Horace were always his favourite authors.

De Vere particularly marked this, and said, if this were madness, there was at least method in it.

De Vere profited, by Rivers' acquaintance with the news of Poland, to extract from him both information and advice, as to the despairing prospect of that illfated country. But Rivers was far more disposed to talk of the chasse de Ramier, or wild pigeons, than of a hopeless cause which he could not remedy; and for this purpose he led them over the mountains to Bagnieres, to see what in fact was a curiosity, and, at that time of the year, proved no unpleasant expedition. In the chasse de Ramier, peasants skilled in the art, (some of them coming a hundred miles for that purpose,) repaired to a high wood of cork trees, over which flocks of these pigeons (thousands in number) regularly passed about this time, in the manner of birds of passage. The wood was lined with nets, extending perhaps three or four hundred yards. In advance, were raised masts, fifty or sixty feet high, on the top of which sat a watchman, provided with machines of light wood, in the

shape of a hawk with spread wings. On the approach of the birds to a proper point, these were launched in the air with great force, and the game, stooping to avoid the supposed destruction, flew into real, by endeavouring to pass through the wood, where they were caught in the nets.

The chasse was periodical, and lasted some days. It always occasioned a sort of a holiday when it occurred; hundreds of idlers, cheerful and uncheerful, flocking from the neighbouring places, (but especially Bagnieres) to behold the sport. These made a sort of fair, or rather encampment, chiefly composed of huts, which were run up in an hour or two, from boughs and branchHere there was a universal pic-nic during the day, and many remained all night with no other bed than dry leaves. The night, however, was seldom entirely devoted to sleep : the watchers, tempted by that fine climate, beguiled the time by roaming about in companies to the sound of the guitar and tambour basque; which produced in the stillness, and especially at a distance, a delightful effect.

es.

All this was so new, and at the same time so pleasing both to Wentworth and De Vere, that, could the former have forgotten he had been a minister, and might be so again, and the latter not only that he had been and was still a lover, but that he meditated a more distant flight from her he loved, both would have been content to have followed Rivers' standard for a much longer time than they did.

As it was, the diversion of gloomy remembrances was much assisted, and the health of Wentworth rapidly restored, by such a way of life.

CHAPTER VII.

REACTION.

Time hath, my lord, a wallet on his back

Wherein he puts alms for oblivion.

A great-sized monster of ingratitude

Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devoured
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon as done.

SHAKSPEARE.

TORRENTS and falls are delightful things to look at in fine weather; but one cannot always have fine weather. It is charming also to paint; but one cannot always be painting. The contemplation of man, indeed, under his various appearances, is delightful to the moral observer; and a new or primitive people is a noble field of interest, until it is got by heart. Hence the charm of pastoral life to a man accustomed to cities; and the sweets of repose, to one jaded by the contests of passion. To youth also, which has all time before it, and all the world to choose in, and which, therefore, can play the prodigal with both time and the world, pleasure seems interminable, because ever seen through the glass of hope. O! its careless uncertainty is delicious! It gilds all prospects, and gives body to wishes; nor can the most successful certainty of after times, not even if it make a prime minister of a clerk, or a commander-in-chief of a private soldier, ever equal, in real happiness, that of the simple stripling who hopes all, and believes what he hopes.

"Where do you live?" said I once to an erect Irish boy of fifteen. "Wherever there are the best potatoes," was the answer. "And where sleep?" "Whereever there is the best hay." Such beings may roam unheeded and unheeding through pathless wilds, nor sleep the less sound because they know not where they

are.

Not so with the veterans of the world, particularly if they have sacrificed to any great passion, and only fled from it as a relief, when its mischiefs pressed too sorely