rustle seem the rhythm of a poem; a fourth will see in it, as Cowper in Yardley Oak, its entire history from the acorn to the axe, or perchance from the germ to the final conflagration; and a fifth will look on it as a mouth and mirror of the Infinite-a slip of Igdrasil. Or is the object the ocean-one will describe it as vast or serene, or tremendous, epithets which burden the air but do not exhaust the ocean; another will regard it as a boundless solution of salt; a third will be fascinated by its terrible beauty, as of a chained tiger; a fourth, with a far look into the dim records of its experience, will call it (how different from the foregoing appellations!) the melancholy main;' and a fifth will see in it the reflector of man's historythe shadow and mad sister of earth-the type of eternity! These last three orders, if not one, at least slide often into each other, and Dr Croly appears to us a combination of the third and the fourth. His descriptions are rather those of the poet than of the seer. They are rapid, but always clear, and vivid, and strong, and eloquent, and over each movement of his pen, an invisible pencil seems to hang and to keep time. volution seems more a ray from hell, shooting athwart Searching somewhat more accurately for a classification of minds, they seem to us to include five orders-the prophet, the artist, the analyst, the copiast, and the combi-God hath made of one blood all nations who dwell upon nation in part of all the four. There is, first, the prophet, who receives immediately and gives out unresistingly the torrent of the breath and power of his own soul, which has become touched by a high and holy influence from behind him. This is no MECHANICAL office; the fact that he is chosen to be such an instrument, itself proclaims his breadth, elevation, power, and patency. There is next the artist, who receives the same influence in a less measure, and who, instead of implicitly obeying the current, tries to adjust, control, and get it to move in certain bounded and modulated streams. There is, thirdly, the analyst, who, in proportion to the faintness in which the breath of inspiration reaches him, is the more desirous to turn round upon it, to reduce it to its elements, and to trace it to its source. There is, fourthly, the copiast-we coin a term, as he would like to coin the far-off sigh of the aboriginal thought, which alone reaches him, into a new and powerful spoken word -but in vain. And there is, lastly, the combination of the whole four-the clever, nay, gifted mimic, whose light energy enables him to circulate between, and to be sometimes mistaken for, them all together. It is of Dr Croly as a prose writer principally that we mean to speak. His poetry, though distinguished, and nearly to the same extent by the qualities of his prose, has failed in making the same impression. The causes of this are various. In the first place, it appeared at a time when the age was teeming to very riot with poetry. Scott, indeed, had betaken himself to prose novels; Southey to histories and articles; Coleridge to metaphysics; Lamb to Elia;' and Wordsworth to his 'Recluse, like the alche mist to his secret furnace. But still, with each new wound in Byron's heart, a new gush of poetry was flowing, and all eyes were watching this martyr of the many sorrows, with the interest of those who are waiting silent or weer ing for a last breath; and at the same time a perfect crowd of true poets were finding audience 'fit though few.' Wil son, Barry Cornwall, Hogg, Hood, Clare, Cunninghame, Milman, Maturin, Bowles, Crabbe, Montgomery, are some Dr Croly's intellectual distinction is less philosophic sub- of the now familiar names which were then identified altlety than strong, nervous, and manly sense. This, be- most entirely with poetical aspirations. Amid such com lieved with perfect assurance, inflamed with passion, sur-petitors Dr Croly first raised his voice, and only shared rounded with the rays of imagination, and pronounced with a dogmatic force and dignity peculiarly his own, constitutes the circle of his literary character-a circle which also includes large and liberal knowledge, but which has been somewhat narrowed by the influence of views, in our judgment, far too close and conservative. Especially, as we have elsewhere said, whenever he nears the French Revolution he loses temper, and speaks of it in a tone of truculence as if it were a virulent ulcer and not a salutary blood-letting to the social system-the stir of a dunghill and not the explosion of a volcano-a few earthworms crawling out of their lair, and producing a transient agitation in their native mud, and not a vast Vesuvius moved by internal torments to cast out the central demon and with open mouth to appeal to heaven. To Croly this re Dr Croly is the artist, and in general an accomplished and powerful artist he is. There is sometimes a little of the slapdash in his manner, as of one who is in haste to be done with his subject. His style sometimes sounds like the horse-shoes of the belated traveller, spurring apace to gain the timely inn.' He generally, indeed, goes off at the gallop, and continues at this generous, breakneck pace to the close. He consequently has too few pauses and rests. He and you rush up panting, and arrive breathless at the summit. And yet there is never anything erratic or ungraceful about the motion of the thought or style. If there be not classical repose there is classical rapture. It is no vulgar intoxication-it is a debauch of nectar; it is not a Newmarket, but a Nemean race. with many of them the fate of being much praised, considerably abused, and little read. Secondly, more than most of his contemporaries, he was subjected to the dis advantage, which in a measure pressed on all. All were stars seeking to shine ere yet the sun (that woful bloodspattered sun of Childe Harold') had fairly set. Dr Croly suffered more from this than others, just because he bore in some points a striking resemblance to Byron, a resemblance which drew forth, both for him and Milman, a coarse and witless assault in Don Juan. And, thirdly, Dr Croly's poems were chargeable, more than his prose writings, with the want of continuous interest. They consisted of splendid passages, which rather stood for themselves than combined to form a whole. The rich bugle blooms' were trailed rather than trained about a stick, scarce worthy of supporting them, and this, with the monotony inevitable to rhyme, rendered it a somewhat tedious task to climb to the reward which never failed to be met with at last. Catiline,' we think, is the most powerful those productions, and copes worthily, particularly in the closing scene of the play, with the character of the gigantic conspirator, whose name even yet rings terribly, as it sounds down from the dark concave of the past. David felt of old toward the sword of Goliath, when he visited the high priest, and said, 'There is none like that, give it me.' So writers of true taste and sympathies feel on great occasions, when they have certain thoughts and feelings to express, a yearning after that sharp two-edged sword, and an irresistible inclination to say, 'None like that, give it us; this right Damascus blade alone can cut the way of our thought into full utterance and victory.' His prose writings may be divided into three classes; But Croly does more than snatch live coals from off the his fictions, his articles in periodicals, and his theological altar' to strew upon his style; his spirit as well as his lanworks. We have not read his Tales of the Great St Ber- guage is oriental. You feel yourselves in Palestine, the rard,' but understand them to be powerful though unequal. air is that through which the words of prophets have viIs Colonna, the Painter,' appeared in 'Blackwood,' and, brated and the wings of angels descended-the ground is is a tale shadowed by the deadly lustre of revenge, yet scarcely yet calm from the earthquake of the crucifixion-shining in the beauty of Italian light and landscape, may the awe of the world's sacrifice, and of the prodigies which be called an unrhymed Lara.' His Marston, or Memoirs attended it, still lowers over the land-still gapes unof a Statesman,' is chiefly remarkable for the sketches of mended the ghastly rent in the veil-and still are crowds stinguished characters, here and in France, which are daily convening to examine the fissure in the rocks, when -prinkled through it, somewhat in the manner of Bulwer's one lonely man, separated by his proper crime to his proDevereux,' but drawn with a stronger pencil and in a per and unending woe, is seen speeding, as if on the wings Jess capricious light. To Danton, alone, we think he has of frenzy, toward the mountains of Naphtali. It is Salanot done justice. On the principle of ex pede Herculem, thiel, the hero of this story-the Wandering Jew-the heir from the power and savage truth of those colossal splinters of the curse of a dying Saviour, Tarry thou till I come.' of expression, which are all his remains, we had many As an artistic conception, we cannot profess much to adyears ago formed our unalterable opinion, that he was the mire what the Germans call the Everlasting Jew.' The greatest, and by no means the worst man, who mingled in interest is exhausted to some extent by the very title. The the melée of the Revolution-the Satan, if Dr Croly will, subject predicts an eternity of sameness, from which we and not the Moloch of the Paris Pandemonium-than shrink, and are tempted to call him an everlasting bore. Robespierre abler-than Marat, that squalid, screeching, Besides, we cannot well realise the condition of the wanout-of-elbows demon, more merciful-than the Girondin derer as very melancholy, after all. What a fine oppor champions more energetic-than even Mirabeau stronger tunity must the fellow have of seeing the world, and the and less convulsive; and are glad to find that Lord Brougham glory, and the great men thereof! Could one but get up has recently been led, by personal examination, to the same behind him, what pencillings' could one perpetrate by opinion. The Danton of Dr Croly is a hideous compound the way!' What a triumph, too, has he over the baffled of dandrism, diabolism, and power-a kind of coxcomb skeleton, death! What a new fortune each century, by sellbutcher, who with equal coolness arranges his moustaches ing to advantage his rich reminiscences!' What a short and his murders, and who, when bearded in the Jacobin period at most to wander-a few thousand years, while Club, proves himself a bully and a coward. The real yonder, the true wanderers, the stars, can hope for no rest? Danton, so broad and calm in repose, so dilated and Titanic And what a jubilee dinner might he not expect, ere the close, in excitement, who, rising to the exigency of the hour, as the oldest inhabitant,' with perhaps Christopher North seemed like Satan, starting from Ithuriel's spear, to grow in the chair, and De Quincey (whom some people suspect, into armour, into power and the weapons of power-now however, of being the said personage himself) acting as attering words which were half battles,' and now walk- croupier! Altogether, we can hardly, without ludicrous ng silent, and unconscious alike of his vast energies and emotions, conceive of such a character, and are astonished oming doom, by the banks of his native stream-now at the grave face which Shelley, Wordsworth, Mrs Norton elting his judges with paper bullets, and now laying his (whose Undying One,' by the way, is dead long ago, in head on the block proudly, as if that head were the globe- | spite of a puff, also dead, in the Edinburgh'), Captain was long since pointed out by Scott as one of the fittest Medwyn (would he too had died ere he murdered the mebjects for artistic treatment, either in fiction or the mory of poor Alastor!), Lord John Russell (who, in his irama, 'worthy,' says he,' of Schiller or Shakspeare them-Essays by a Gentleman who had left his lodgings,' has selves.' taken a very, very faint sketch of the unfortunate Ahasuerus), and Dr Croly put on while they talk of his adventures. 6 Dr Croly's highest effort in fiction is unquestionably Salathiel.' And it is verily a disgrace to an age, which devours with avidity whatever silly or putrid trash popular The interest of Salathiel,' beyond the first splendid anthors may be pleased to issue-such inane common- burst of immortal anguish with which it opens, is almost place as Now and Then,' where the only refreshing things entirely irrespective of the character of the Wandering are the glasses of wine' which are poured out at the close Jew. It is chiefly valuable for its pictures of Oriental every third page to the actors (alas, why not to the scenery, for the glimpses it gives of the cradled Hercules readers), naturally thirsty amid such dry work, or the of Christianity, and for the gorgeous imagery and unmitiCoarse greasy horrors which abound in the all-detestable gated vigour of its writing. Plot necessarily there is Lucretia-that Salathiel' has not yet, we fear, even none; the characters, though vividly depicted, hurry past, reached a second edition. It has not, however, gone with- like the rocks in the Walpurgis Night'- -are seen intensely out its reward. By the ordinary fry of circulating library for a moment, and then drop into darkness; and the readers neglected, it was read by a better class, and by crowding adventures, while all interesting individually, do none of those who read it forgotten. None but a literary not gather a deepening interest as they grow to a climax. vine' could have written it. Its style is steeped in Scrip- It is a book which you cannot read rapidly, or with equal And what a magic this adds to writing, let those gusto at all times, but which, like Thomson's Seasons,' tell who have read Bunyan, Southey, Foster, even Mac-Young's Night Thoughts,' and other works of rich masanley, yea, and Byron, all of whom have sown their pages with this orient pearl,' and brought thus a reflection from Divine inspiration to add to the momentum of their own. Scripture extracts always vindicate their divine origin. They nerve what else in the sentences in which they occur is pointless; they clear a space for themselves, and cast a wide glory around the page where they are found. They are taken from the classics of the heart, and all hearts vibrate more or less strongly to their voice. It is even as tire. siveness, yield intense pleasure, when read at intervals, and in moments of poetic enthusiasm. We have been, as a friend in the INSTRUCTOR has already told its readers, for some time past preparing materials for a work on the Hebrew Poets,' and propose reading 'Salathiel' over again, for a fourth or fifth time, to get ourselves into the proper key for beginning the high theme, since in no modern work do we find the spirit of Hebrew song in finer preservation. Dr Croly's contributions to periodicals are, as might on each of these periods, and the idea of each, has appeared, as we trust it speedily shall. have been expected, of various merit. We recollect most vividly his papers on Burke (since collected into a volume), on Pitt, and a most masterly and eloquent outline of the We depicted, some time since, in the INSTRUCTOR, our career of Napoleon. This is as rapid, as brief almost and visit to Dr Croly's chapel, and the impression made by his eloquent, as one of Bonaparte's own bulletins, and much appearance, and the part of his discourse we heard. It more true. It constitutes a rough, red, vigorous chart of seemed to us a shame to see the most accomplished clergy. his fiery career, without professing to complete philosophi- man in London preaching to so thin an audience; but cally the analysis of his character. This task Emerson perhaps it is accounted for partly by the strictness of his lately, in our hearing, accomplished with much ingenuity. Conservative principles, and partly by the stupid prejuHis lecture was the portable essence of Napoleon. He in- dice which exists against all literary divines. dicated his points with the ease and precision of a lion- We are sorry we cannot, ere we conclude, supply any showman. Napoleon, to Emerson, apart from his splendid particulars about his history. Of its details we are altogenius, is the representative of the faults and the virtues of gether ignorant. In conversation, he is described as the middle class of the age. We heard some of his audi- powerful and commanding. Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, tors contend that he had drawn two portraits instead of we remember, describes him as rather disposed to take the one; but in fact Napoleon was two, if not more men. In- lead, but so exceedingly intelligent that you entirely fordeed, if you draw first the bright and then the black side give him. He has been, as a literary man, rather solitary of any character, you have two beings, which the skin and and self-asserting-has never properly belonged to any brain of the one actual man can alone fully reconcile. The clique or coterie-and seems to possess an austere and experience of every one demonstrates at the least a dualism, somewhat exclusive standard of taste. and who might not almost any day sit down and write a letter, objurgatory, or condoling, or congratulatory, to my dear yesterday's self?' Each man, as well as Napoleon, forms a sort of Siamese twins-although, in his case, it was matter of thankfulness that the cord could not be cut. Two Napoleons at large had been too much. Of Dr Croly's book on the 'Revelation' we have spoken formerly. Under the shadow of that inscrutable pyramid it stands, one of the loftiest attempts to scale its summit, and explain its construction; but to us all such seem as yet ineffectual. A more favourable specimen of his theological writing is to be found in his volume of 'Sermons' recently published. The public has reason to congratulate itself on the little squabble which led to their publication. Some conceited persons, it seems, had thought proper to accuse Dr Croly of preaching sermons above the heads of his audience, and suggested greater simplicity; and, after a careful perusal of them, we would suggest, even without a public phrenological examination of those auditors' heads, that, whatever be their situations in life, they are, if unable to understand these discourses, incapable of their duties, are endangering the public, and should be remanded to school. Clearer, more nervous, and, in the true sense of the term, simpler discourses, have not appeared for many years. Their style is in general pure Saxontheir matter strong, manly, and his own-their figures always forcible, and never forced-their theology sound and scriptural and would to God such sermons were being preached in every church and chapel throughout Britain! They might recall the many wanderers, who, with weary heart and foot, are seeking rest elsewhere in vain, and might counteract that current which is drawing away from the sanctuaries so much of the talent, the virtue, and the honesty of the land. Dr Croly, as a preacher, in his best manner, is faithfully represented in those discourses, particularly in his sermons on Stephen,' the Theory of Martyrdom,' and the Productiveness of the Globe.' We admire, in contrast with some modern and ancient monstrous absurdities to the contrary, his idea of God's purpose in making his universe-not merely to display his own glory, which, when interpreted, means just, like Cæsar, to extend his own name, but to circulate his essence and image-to proclaim himself merciful, even through punishment-and even in hell-flames to write himself down Love, is surely, as Dr Croly proclaims it, 'the chief end of God!' His sermon on Stephen is a noble picture-we had almost said a daguerreotype of that first martyrdom. His 'Productiveness of the Globe' is richer than it is original. His Theory of Religion' is new, and strikingly illustrated. His notion is, that God, in three different dispensations-the Patriarchal, the Mosaic, and the Christian-has developed three grand thoughts: first, the being of God; secondly, in shadow, the doctrine of atonement; and thirdly, that of immortality. With this arrangement we are not entirely satisfied, but reserve our objections till the conclusion of the whole matter,' in the shape of three successive volumes It is to us, and must be to the Christian world, a delightful thought, to find such a man devoting the maturity of his mind to labours peculiarly professional; and every one who has the cause of religion at heart, must wish him God speed in his present researches. Religion has in its abyss treasures yet unsounded and unsunned, though strong must be the hand, and true the eye, and retentive the breath, and daring yet reverent the spirit of their successful explorer-and such we believe to be qualities possessed by Dr Croly. FLOATING GARDENS OF CASHMERE. THERE are floating gardens, independent of the absurdities which ancient travellers wrote down in their books for truths. There is, we wot, no Eldorado, with its perpetual beauty, its golden sands, its diamond lakes and streams, which, to drink of was to renew youth, and to perpetuate life; there is no Laputa floating in the atmosphere, with its hosts of wise and misty-minded savants; no Kraken skimming over the sea with its groves and shrub clumps all in leaf. Lemuel Gulliver, and that equally veracious mariner Sinbad, might see these although nobody else could; but there are floating gardens, independent of them, which are seen every day. Everybody who has travelled by book or map, or who has studied the nativity of shawls, must have heard of Cashmere-the beautiful valley around which towers the hills of goats,' and in which the flowers and fruits, the trees and other plants, with lakes and flashing rivers, revive thoughts of beautiful Eden, and which also claims to itself the name of the Indian Paradise.' In this valley the roar of the tiger is never heard, neither the howl of the jackal; the mountain-goat, with its silken wool, browses unmolested in the little grassy glens, and the cattle low on the plains, without fear of beasts of prey. One hundred thousand beautiful villages stand on the bosom of this magnificent natural amphitheatre, and these are peopled by men and women who are ingenious, and are said to resemble Europeans more than any other Asiatic nation. The capital of the province of Cashmere is also called by the same name. This city is situated in the midst of numerous lakes, which are connected with each other, and with the river Vedusta, by numerous little canalswhich canals, again, are only divided from each other by narrow stripes and insular pieces of ground. These lakes are not allowed to lie in passive beauty for poets only to sing about, and for the sun to exhale; upon their surface are floating gardens, and in these gardens melons and cu cumbers thrive like mushrooms in a hundred years' old pasture-field. Cashmere is frequently inundated during the rainy season; and this frequency of inundation had considerably increased of late years in consequence of the lakes becoming more shallow and superficially extensive. The spread of the water, by diminishing the arable land, set the wits of agriculturists to work, and necessity, that mother of invention, developed a plan of floating gardens. Numerous aquatic plants spring from the bottoms of the lakes, and cover their surface with a mantle of green; the boats traversing the lakes keep on tracks, and thus the yearly growth of sedges and other plants is allowed to come up and mingle with the old growths undisturbed. The gardener then cuts the plants about two feet below the lake's surface, and thus completely separating them from their roots in the bottom of the lake, he erects on them his melon-floats. When the plants are separated from their roots, they are closely pressed together. The heads of the sedges and reeds are next cut off and laid on the top of the floating beds; and above this again is laid a thin coat of mud, which gradually sinks into the mass of matted stalks. These floating beds, perhaps two yards in breadth, are retained in their positions by willow-stakes, which, being thrust through the floating beds into the mud of the lake, admit of the gardens rising and falling, according to the ebb or fullness of the waters. The gardeners then go out to the lakes in boats, and thrusting long poles in amongst the reeds at the bottom, they twist them round several times, and when the plants become sufficiently attached, they drag them from the lake and carry them to the melon-beds. These reeds are then formed into cones about two feet in diameter at the base, and, rising to about the same height, they terminate at the top in a hollow, which is filled with fresh soft mud, and sometimes wood-ashes. These cones run in double rows down each side of the float, and are distant from each other about four feet. Previous to this preparation of the beds, the farmer has raised cucumber and melon plants under mats, and when they have struck four leaves he places three plants in each cone, and then his labour, except in gathering the fruits, is completed. The general depth of the floating gardens is about two feet, and in breadth they average from six to seven feet. The season for cultivating these terraquatic gardens begins in June and ends about the middle of September. The plants thrive most luxuriantly, few ever dying, and the fruits are most abundant; for eight days, which may be termed the extent of the melon harvest, perhaps thirty fruit from each plant, or from ninety to a hundred in all may be seen clinging round a cone. The melon-seeds are obtained from Baltistan, and the first year yield fruits of from four to ten pounds weight. If the seed of the fruit grown at Cashmere is sown, the quality of the melon is finer, but the fruit seldom exceeds three pounds each in weight. The melon is a most healthful article of food, and it is remarked of those in Cashmere who do not indulge in it to excess, that they become fat during the fruit season, and horses exhibit the very same appearance. There are about fifty acres of these fruits cultivated in Cashmere; and early in the season full-sized cucumbers sell at about three for a coin valued at about a halfpenny, but as the weather becomes hotter and ripens them very quickly, even twenty may be obtained for this sum. It is calculated that every cone yields a money return of about eighteenpence. Now if we suppose that labour, seed, and the impost amount to about sixpence per cone, these floating beds, it will be perceived, are not unprofitable objects of culture. SAVE THE ERRING. THERE was bustle in the little dressing-room of young Ella Lane; a dodging about of lights, a constant tramping of a fat, good-natured serving-maid, a flitting of curius, smiling little girls, and a disarranging of drapery and furniture, not very often occurring in this quiet, tasteful corner. An arch-looking miss of twelve was standing before a basket of flowers, selecting the choicest, and studying carefully their arrangement, with parted lips and eyes demurely downcast, as though thinking of the time when the little fairy watching so intently by her side would perform the same service for her. On the bed lay a light, fleecy dress of white, with silver cords and clusters of silver leaves, and sashes of a pale blue, and others of a still paler pink, and here and there a little wreath of flowers, or a small bunch of marabouts—in short, ornaments enough to crush one person, had their weight been at all proportioned to their bulk. Immediately opposite a small pier-glass, sat a girl of seventeen, in half undress, her full, round arms shaded only by a fold of linen at the shoulder, and her eye resting very complacently on the little foot placed somewhat ostentatiously upon an ottoman before her; and, indeed, that foot was a very daintylooking thing, in its close-fitting slipper, altogether unequalled by anything but the finely curved and tapered ankle so fully revealed above it. Immediately behind the chair of the young lady, stood a fair, mild-looking matron, her slender fingers carefully thridding the masses of hair mantling the ivory neck and shoulders of her eldest daughter, preparatory to plaiting it into those long braids so well calculated to display the contour of a fine head. There was a smile upon the mother's lip, not like that dimpling at the corners of the mouth of the little bouquetmaker, but a pleased, gratified smile, and yet half-shadowed over by a strange anxiety, that she seemed striving to conceal from her happy children. Sometimes her fingers paused in their graceful employment, and her eye rested vacantly wherever it chanced to fall; and then, with an effort, the listlessness passed, and the smile came back, though manifestly tempered by some heaviness clinging to the heart. At last the young girl was arrayed; each braid in its place, and a wreath of purple buds falling behind the ear; her simple dress floating about her slight figure like an airy cloud, every fold arranged by a mother's careful fingers; her white kid gloves drawn upon her hands, and fan, bonquet, and kerchief, all in readiness. The large, warm shawl had been carefully laid upon her shoulders, the mother's kiss was on her bright cheek, and a 'don't stay late, dear,' in her ear; she had shaken her fan at the saucy Nelly, and pinched the cheek of Rosa, and was now toying with little Susy's fingers, when the head of the serving-maid was again thrust in at the door, to hasten the arrangements. Ella tripped gaily down stairs, but when she reached the bottom, she paused. 'I am sorry to go without you, mamma.' 'I am sorry that you must, dear; but I hope you will find it very pleasant.' 'It will be pleasant, I have no doubt; but, mamma, I am afraid that you are not quite well, or perhaps,' she whispered, 'you have something to trouble you; if so, I should like very much to stay with you.' 'No, dear; I am well, quite well, and-' Mrs Lane did not say happy, for the falsehood died on her lip; but she smiled so cheerily, and her eye looked so clear and bright as it met her daughter's, that Ella took it for a negative. 'Ah! I see how it is, mamma; you are afraid my new frock is prettier than any of yours; and you don't mean to be outshone by little people. Do you know, I shall tell Mrs Witman all about it? 'I will let you tell anything that you choose, so that you do not show too much vanity; but don't stay late. Good night, darling.' 'Good-night, till sleeping-time, mamma.' And, with a light laugh, Ella Lane left her mother's side and sprang into the carriage. When Mrs Lane turned from the door, the smile had entirely disappeared, and an expression of anxious solicitude occupied its place. While the joyous children went bounding on before her, she paused beneath the hall-lamp, and pulling a scrap of paper from her bosom, read-' Do not go out to-night, dear mother; I must see you. He will not come in before eleven-I will be with you at ten.' It was written in a hurried, irregular hand, and was without signature; but it needed none. 'My poor, poor boy;' murmured the now almost weeping mother, as she crushed the paper in her hand and laid it back upon her heart. It may be wrong to deceive him so; but how can a mother refuse to see the son she has carried in her arms and nursed upon her bosom ? Poor Robert!" Ay, poor Robert, indeed! the only son of one of the proudest and wealthiest citizens of New York, and yet without a shelter for his head! Mr Lane had lived a bachelor until the age of forty-two, when he married a beautiful girl of eighteen-the mother whom we have already introduced to our readers. She was gentle and complying; hence, the rigid sternness of his character, which so many years of loneliness had by no means tended to soften, seldom had an opportunity to exhibit itself. But the iron was all there, though buried for a time in the flowers which love had nursed into bloom above it. The eldest of their children was a boy; a frank, heartsome, merry fellow--a lamb to those who would condescend to lead him by love; but exhibiting, even in infancy, an indomitable will, that occasioned the young mother many an anxious foreboding. But as the boy grew toward manhood, a new and deeper cause for anxiety began to appear. To Robert's gaiety were added other qualities that made him a fascinating companion; his society was constantly sought, first by the families in which his parents were on terms of intimacy, and then by others, and still others, till Mrs Lane began to tremble lest among her son's associates might be found some of exceptionable character. By degrees he spent fewer evenings at home, went out with her less frequently, and accounted for his absence less satisfactorily. Then she spoke to him upon the subject, and received his assurance that all was well, that she need not be troubled about his falling into bad company. But she was troubled. There was at evening a wild sparkle in the boy's eye, and an unnatural glow upon his cheek, that told of unhealthy excitement; but in the morning it was all gone, and his gaiety, sometimes his cheerfulness, fled with it. Oh! what sickness of heart can compare with that indefinable fear, that foreshadowing of evil, which will sometimes creep in between our trust and our love; while we dare not show to the object of, much less to others, anything but a smiling lip and a serene brow. Mrs Lane was anxious, but she confined her anxiety to her own bosom; not even whispering it to her husband, lest he should ridicule it on the one hand, or, on the other, exercise a severity which should lead to a collision. But matters grew worse and worse constantly; Robert was now seldom home till late at night, and then he came heated and flurried, and hastened away to bed, as though his mother's loving eye were a monitor he could not meet. She sought opportunities to warn him, as she had formerly done, but he feared and evaded them; and so several more weeks passed by-weeks of more importance than many a life-time. Finally Mrs Lane became seriously alarmed, and consulted her husband. 'I have business with you to-night, Robert,' said Mr Lane, pointedly, as the boy was going out after dinner, and will see you in the library at nine o'clock.' 'I-I-have-an engagement, sir. If some other hour 'No other hour will do. You have no engagement that will be allowed to interfere with those I make for you.' Robert was about to answer-perhaps angrily-when he caught a glimpse of his mother. Her face was of an ashy hue, and a large tear was trembling in her eye. He turned hastily away and hurried along the hall; but before he had reached the street door, her hand was upon his arm, and she whispered in his ear, 'Meet your father at nine, as he has bidden you, Robert; and do not-for my sake, for your mother's sake, dear Robert-do not say anything to exasperate him.' 'Do not fear, mother,' he answered, in a subdued tone; then, as the door closed behind him, he muttered, he will be exasperated enough with little saying, if his business is what I suspect. What a fool I have been-mad -mad! I wish I had told him at first, without waiting to be driven to it; but now-well, I will make one more attempt-desperate it must be-and then, if the worst comes, he will only punish me; that I can bear patiently, for I deserve it; but it would kill my poor mother-oh! he must not tell her!' Mrs Lane started nervously at every ring of the doorbell that evening; and when at nine she heard it, she could not forbear stepping into the hall to see who was admitted. It was her husband; and only waiting to inquire of the girl if Mr Robert had yet come in, he passed on to the library. Mrs Lane found it more difficult than ever to sustain conversation; she became abstracted, nervous; and when at last her few evening visiters departed, she was so manifestly relieved, that Ella inquired, in surprise, if anything had been said or done to annoy her. It was past ten, and Robert had not yet appeared. Finally the bell was pulled violently, and she hastened to the door herself. With livid lip and bloodshot eye, her son stepped to the threshold; and, starting at sight of her, he hurried away to the library, without giving her another glance. How slowly passed the moments to the waiting mother! How she longed to catch but a tone of those voices, both so loved, that she might know whether they sounded in confidence or anger! What Robert's course had been she could not guess; but she knew that he would be required to give a strict account of himself; and she dreaded the effect of her husband's well-known | severity. A few minutes passed (they seemed an age to her), and then she heard the door of the library thrown open; and, a moment after, a quick, light step sounded upon the stairs. It was Robert's. I 'You are not going out again, my son?' she inquired. 'Father will tell you why I go, dear mother,' said the boy, pausing, and pressing her hand affectionately. must not wait to answer questions now.' He passed on till he reached the door, then turning back, whispered, Be at Mrs Hinman's to-morrow evening, mother,' and before she had time to ask a question or utter an exclamation of surprise, he had disappeared up the street. But poor Mrs Lane was soon made acquainted with the truth. Mr Lane was somewhat vexed with himself for not perceiving his son's tendency to error before; and, like many others, he seemed resolved to make up in decision what he had lost by blindness. It was this which had occasioned his sharpness when he made the appointment, and he considered his dignity compromised when nine o'clock passed and his son seemed resolved on acting in open disobedience to his command. An hour's ruminating on the subject did not tend to soften his feelings; and when at last the culprit appeared, he was in a mood for anything but mercy. He demanded peremptorily a full confession; and Robert gave it. He did not colour, soften, nor extenuate; but boldly-too boldly, perhaps declaring that he scorned falsehood, he told the whole. He had fallen into gay society, then into vicious; and he was not the one to occupy a minor position anywhere. Wit and wine seduced him; and in an evil hour he sat down to the gaming-table. He had played at first for a trivial stake, then more deeply, and to-night, in the hope of retrieving his bad fortune, he had plunged in almost past extrication. At any time Mr Lane would have been shocked; now he was exasperated, and spoke bitterly. At first Robert did not retort, for he had come in resolved on confession and reformation; but finally repentance was drowned in anger, and he answered as a son, particularly an erring son, should not. Then a few more words ensued, unreasonable on both sides; Mr Lane asserting that debts so contracted were dishonest ones, and should not be paid; and Robert declaring that they should be paid, if he gamed his lifelong to win the money; till, finally, the old man's rage became uncontrollable. It was in obedience to his father's command that Robert left his home that night, with the order never to cross the threshold again. For two or three weeks, Mrs Lane, now and then, of an evening, met her son at the houses of her friends; and then he disappeared almost entirely. While she could meet him, and speak a few words, even in a gay party, and perceive that he regarded her with as much affection as ever, she continued strong in the hope of final reformation and reconciliation; but when, evening after evening, she carried a hoping heart abroad, and dragged home |