and I will venture to add, that the pretended liberality of an ignorant man, is either indifference or folly. No one is more disposed to respect conscientious firmness in others, than he who can give a good reason of the faith which he himself entertains; and for this cause knowledge will always be found accompanied by a truly tolerant Christian spirit-by compassion where error is inveterate, and by forbearance where prejudice and obstinacy shut the ears to conviction." Our readers are not ignorant of the controversy between the Episcopalian and Presbyterian Churches,-it has, in former times, been maintained with great bitterness, where secular interests were more mixed up with it; but of late years concessions have been made by the sounder opponents on both sides, that have greatly narrowed the debateable ground. It will not, for instance, be disputed by Presbyterians, in the face of St Paul's Epistles, and of every thing that we know of the first establishment of the Church, that the apostles held a species of superintendence over all the various churches which they founded; and there is every appearance that such men as Timothy and Titus succeeded them, with similar powers derived from them. This will carry us on to nearly about the close of the first century. It is as little disputed, that in the second century the Episcopal form of government, in which (we use the words of Dr Hill) "the name of Bishops was appropriated to an order of men, who possessed exclusively the right of ordination and jurisdiction, and who were the overseers of those whom they ordained," was universal over the whole Christian world. Here, then, comes the tug of war in this narrow slip of time, in which it has been attempted to be shown, that there was no superintendence resembling either the Apostolical or the Episcopal; and that, therefore, there is no reason to suppose that the latter is the continuation of the former. Dr Campbell battles the point to obtain the rescue of some twenty or thirty years from this ecclesiastical domination, which Dr Russel, we must own, with much better success, is as determined not to grant him; and from the intermediate authorities of Ignatius, Polycarp, and Clement, proves, as it appears to us very distinctly, that there was no interruption of the Episcopal succession. And this, according to his reasoning, is by no means a matter of slight moment. "The distinctive characteristic of Episcopal government," says he," is the exclusive power intrusted to the bishops of ordaining ministers for the service of God's Church. From the day that St Paul authorized and commanded his two spiritual sons, Timothy and Titus, to ordain presbyters in every city, to exhort and to rebuke, this privilege, it is believed, hath appertained to the first order of clergymen, as the successors of the apostles. Even St Jerome, who has been viewed as the advocate of parity in the ministers of the Gospel, acknowledges that the bishops possessed a power which belonged not to the order of presbyters, namely, the power of ordination."-" This," he afterwards adds, "is the ground upon which Episcopal churches differ from those who have extinguished the first order of clergy. It is not the form of worship, nor the dress, nor the music, nor even the keeping of those fasts and festivals which commemorate the past events of our holy religion, that constitute the real difference between Episcopalians and other Christians; for in many parts of the Continent the Presbyterians use a Liturgy as we do; and there, as well as in England, they observe the principal festivals and fasts of the Church as regularly as do the Episcopalians among whom they live. These points then, important as they are, do not form the leading and distinguishing characteristic of Episcopacy, as separated from the other forms of ecclesiastical polity. The essential difference, I say once more, respects the power of conferring orders, a power which we believe to have been originally vested in the bishops, and during 1500 years to have been exercised by them exclusively,--so exclusively, at least, as to imply that no ordination was held valid at which a bishop did not preside and officiate." We think, then, that Dr Russel has fairly made out a case which must entitle his communion to the sympathy and respect of the nation, from the majority of which it has the misfortune to differ in its conception of church government; and it is not to be considered as a chimera of no consequence, to maintain with firmness that model of polity which carries us up to the times of the Apostles, and which has been universally acted upon throughout the Christian church, except in the case of a few of the reformed churches. Attached, as we are, to the Presbyterian establishment of our land, we confess that we are pleased to see a specimen of Episcopacy amongst us, which comes as near the primitive model as can well be imagined, in which the Bishops are raised above their presbyters by no invidious wealth or dignities, but stand to them much more in the relation of fathers to sons, than as lords to vassals. Nor are we at all indisposed to admit that it was the "evil days" into which the church fell, more than any sound or enlightened principle, which occasioned the fearful rent in that coat which was at first "without seam, woven from the top throughout." But the rent has been made, and we see no reason why a liberal Presbyterian should give himself much trouble to make out that he is wronged by Swift, in his humorous representation of the effects which followed from an undue eagerness to tear off the tawdry ornaments with which the simplicity of the original texture was defaced. Dr Campbell might fairly give up his thirty or forty years, and admit Dr Russel all that he asks. What would follow?-That a convulsion has taken place, which it might have been more seemly to have had otherwise managed. But, out of this chaos, a beautiful and well-ordered system has arisen, which is wound round the hearts of an attached people,-which a gracious Providence has protected and fostered, and which, if, in its origin, it has seemed to make "the kingdom of Heaven suffer violence, and to take it by force," has yet, we trust, been not unsuccessful in the invasion, but, by means of an efficient and zealous Priesthood, has long brought, and is now bringing, "many sons and daughters to righteousness.” For it ought to be considered in all this matter, that though there is something extremely venerable and sacred in the continued order of church government from the first times to the present, yet there is no actual command against the infringement of it; and the deviation in this point is by no means to be considered as similar to giving up the sacraments, or any positively divine institution.-It may, perhaps, amuse our readers to be told, that we recollect, some years ago, a worthy lady of the Epis. copal persuasion, on whose brain the absolute necessity of Episcopacy had so wrought, that she at last fell into a species of Quixotism, which consisted in forming plans for its establishment in this country. She was a truly charitably disposed woman withal, and could not think of shuffling off the present establishment, which contained so many good people, and whose clergy were such excellent and distinguished men. So she had contrived a splendid comprehension-scheme, in which she was very impartial in her distributions, and very generous, too, in her provision for the new establishment. We believe Mr Alison was appointed, by her, Bishop of Edinburgh, with a salary of £2000 per annum,-Dr Inglis was made Bishop somewhere else. We do not think Dr A. Thomson was raised to the Episcopate, his dislike to the order being so notorious; yet the good lady would not leave him out, so she made him a Dean. The worst thing in the business was, that she was a little variable in her selections. After she had fixed upon Mr Alison or Dr Walker for the important see of Edinburgh, one day, she would issue a new congé d'elire the next, removing them, and putting Dr Inglis or Dr Lee in their room. We have no expectation of seeing any thing like this beautiful scheme ever brought to bear; nor, indeed, is there any great need for it. "Yet," says St Paul, "show I you a more excellent way." It is to be found in the affec tionate respect which the clergy and laity of different denominations may entertain for each other, and the deep feeling that they are all, according to their peculiar views and apprehensions, carrying on the same glorious plan of Divine Providence, for the present happiness and the future salvation of the world. We believe that these mutual sentiments are very cordially entertained by the Established Church of this country, and its Episcopalian dissenters; and they will not be the less so, when they each come to ap me, but ye're a young traveller, and a far traveller; an' what's yer name, gin ye please, na?' I answered, 'Grabame.'-' Weel,' said my landlady, 'it's a bonny name, weel respeckit, and far kent, and no for ony ill; are ye ony I, I must be content to have my origin from a meaner friend to the Grahames of Leddiescleugh? I fear,' said source.' Whaurfore meaner?' said she; 'isna the wee spring as fresh, and mair sae, than the brown torrent that comes roaring frae the hills?' as "A sicht o' you,' continued my landlady, brings back and joy. I mind weel the day when I first cam frae the to my mind things no to be minded, without baith grief Netherton to the auld brig o' Glasgow, whaur I was feed bairns-maid to the Rev. Mr M Whirter o' Galspindie; I was then a gilpen lassie o' seventeen, and mony a summer and winter 's come and gane since that, and yet, losh me, it seems nae mair than a dream in the darkness of the nicht! I was then young. I'm now auld and grey, and, mair than a' this, I'm a lanely widow.' A tear at this moment I was led to enquire here several things touching the hisstarted into her once bright, but now time-dimmed eye. tory of my landlady, and, among other things, the term of her widowhood. It's noo sax years and mair,' she re preciate fully the grounds on which they differ from each other, and can give and take in their turn. Much was done, we believe, to produce this feeling of respect and kindness throughout the two bodies, by the unassuming and Catholic temper and demeanour of the late Bishop Sandford, and we are fully prepared to subscribe to the few words of eulogium on the present bishop, with which Dr Russel closes his discourse :-" As a member of the diocese over which the new bishop is to preside, I may be permitted to express, in the name of my clerical brethren, the satisfaction with which this event is contemplated, and the unbounded confidence which they re-plied, since David M'Aupie was laid in the Hie Kirkpose in his wisdom, his principles, impartiality, and, above all, in the knowledge which he possesses of his own duty and of theirs, and in his ardent devotedness to that cause, which they are equally disposed and equally bound to maintain. In the step which it was their duty and their privilege to take in electing their diocesan, there was not only unanimity, there was also affection, combined with an earnest desire to mix their individual regard for his person with their professional respect for his office. In this case, too, the choice of the clergy has been amply and universally approved by the suffrages of the laity; by those whose spiritual welfare depends upon the due and rightful ministry of an Apostolic Church." The Athenæum; an Original Literary Miscellany. yaird. Five-and-twenty years David M'Aupie was a meal-dealer in the Briggate, as honest a man as ever walked on the causey o' Glasgow, and weel respeckit. An' I was an honest woman tae, else I had ne'er been made his marrow. posin,' an' it's maybe just as weel.'- How long is it,' I reIt's an altered world now!-but things are no at our ain disWhitsunday,' she answered. During this period I've plied, since you removed here? It's five years come had colleegeners, writers, and offishers, and though I say it mysell, nane e'er gaed aff frae Dobbie's Lawn wi'an ill word o' Widow M'Aupie. The last lodger I had in this same fechter in the wars with the bluidy French. He was a disroom was an auld Hieland offisher, that had been lang a creet man, but unco gien to late hours, drinkin', and galravishin', which was no for me, so we parted. Late hours, Mr Grahame, is neither gude for body nor soul, and as example is better than precept, as the Reverend Mr M WhirEdit- ter used to say, I'se tell ye an anecdote respecting ane wha was a colleegener like yoursell. He was a wee laddie frae the Mearns, no muckle past fourteen. Weel, sir, that wee laddie, unless when the bell rang for the class, would scarcely gang out ower the door-step. Sometimes frae mornin' till nicht he would sit drivin' awa' at the table amang his papers and books, till he grew a complete heremite, and was na mony months till he became as white's a ghaist. I dinna wunder that it was sae. For lang I said naething; till at last I thought it my duty, and told him it wadna last lang, that if he didna exercise himsell mair, he would soon mak' himsell a corp; it was even sae as I jaloused it would be. He began to decline awa' till an awtomy; the blue veins becam mair and mair veesible in his hauns; and his dark een began to glimmer far awa' ben in their sockets. As the session was weel gane, I got him advised to gang hame. It was with great difficulty; for, by gaun hame sae sune, he lost a chance o' a prize, at the thocht o' which he grat lang and sair. Twa lang months passed awa', and during a' this time, I heard naething frae the Mearns about the wee laddie. It struck me he was waur, and though a lanely woman, I resolved to gang out and see. Rising early ae morning in There couldna be a finer day. The sun was shinin' withJune, lang before mid-day I was on the Mearns Muir. out a cloud; the birds were singing in the hedges; the plover was chiming aboon the heather; the laverock was in the lift; while the bumbee was humming in the sunshine. Awa' ower the muir while daunerin' on at my leisure, I foregathered wi' a decent-looking man on the road. far am I, gin ye please, sir,' I said, frae Braehead?''Yonner it's,' said he, 'on the face of the knowe; there's many a sair heart at Braehead this day.' My fears told me at aince what was the cause; but, as if ignorant, Is ony thing wrang?' I enquired. Ane o' their callants, wha was a great scholar and a colleegener,' he said, 'dead last Monday, and this is his burial day. Wae's me! wae's me!' said I; 'it's the wee laddie.' And though he was neither kith nor kin to me, I was a sair-hearted woman: farther I didna gang, but turned my steps hameward; and after I had reached hame, and for many a day after, I couldna get that wee laddie out o' my mind.'-' Such,' said I, 'is the fate of thousands-born in obscurity,-cradled in adversity, and laid in an early grave.-So perish the dewSince writing the above, we have received "The College Al- drops of the moral world; but what withers on earth shall bum," which we shall review next Saturday, AN honourable and praiseworthy ambition has led to the production of this little volume. It contains a variety of contributions, both in prose and verse, calculated to reflect credit upon the youthful writers. The prose, however, is decidedly superior to the verse. Indeed, we are rather disappointed in the latter, for, with the exception of one or two pieces by Mr Atkinson, who is not, and never was, a student at the University of Glasgow, but who, nevertheless, is one of the Editors of the Athenæum, we cannot find any thing in the shape of verse that much delighteth us. We observe that a rival publication, of a similar kind-The College Album-is announced ;-if it contains nothing better in this department, we shall be forced to confess that the gods have not made the present students at the University of Glasgow poetical.* But some of the prose articles redeem the poetry. We have, in particular, read with pleasure "Persian Sketches," the paper on the "Character of Aristotle as a Critic,' ""A Legend of the Covenant," "The Punished Raid," an excellent story, "The Carnival of Venice," a cleverly-told tale, and "The Student, or a Night in my Landlady's." It is from this last sketch, which we think one of the best in the book, that we shall make an extract : A NIGHT IN MY LANDLADY'S. "The evening came, and as the bells were ringing the hour of six, I found myself seated by a blazing fire in Mrs M'Aupie's, Dobbie's Land. I was scarcely seated, when my landlady entered. Ye'll be a colleegener, nae dout?' said Mrs M'Aupie. To this I answered in the affirmative. 'I was jalousing sae,' she replied; and whaur cum ye frae?' she continued. From Kirkmichael,' I answer'A' the way frae Kirkmichael!' she exclaimed: Losh ed. 'How bloom in heaven!'' It's weel that it's sae ordered!' said for the hours of darkness to be gone. And when they were Mrs M'Aupie, and withdrew, leaving me to my own meditations; and such was my first night in my landlady's." We should have had no objections to have seen somewhat more of a classical air about this volume. With the exception of a spirited translation from King Lear, into Greek verse, there is nothing about it that breathes particularly of alma mater. The two Latin mottos on the title-page are commonplace and poor, and the last sentence of the Preface exhibits a positive blunder in the use of a Latin word. The sentence is ;—" We now take our leave of the public, assuring them, that should they smile on our efforts to gain their approbation, we shall not be backward to renew our toils in another session,-lums's door. I knew her husband had been out with the Vale!" It should have been Valete, young gentlemen. The Listener. By Caroline Fry. 2 vols. London. party, and guessed the rest. Where is Jem?' I said to the first who would hear me, 'He will be here presently,' said the man, in a sullen tone. I had no more to ask,every body was talking, and every body was eager to tell the worst they could make of the fearful story. All murdered, all drowned, all prisoners. And soon there was not even need to listen, for my eyes beheld the worst,—the dead looking men, whose downcast looks bespoke that even they felt pity for his fate. And where was my boy? Him the cold waters held, and would not give me so much as his lifeless body. The smugglers had been attacked in endeavouring to remove their cargo; they resisted; some were slain on the spot, and the rest were drowned in attempting THE fair authoress of these volumes deserves to be bet-body of my husband borne upon the shoulders of ruffianlyter known to our readers than, we have reason to believe, she is at present. Education and religion are the subjects which have chiefly employed her pen; and although her views do not always coincide with our own, we have no hesitation in saying, that upon both subjects she has written pleasingly and instructively. We have no wish to place the name of Caroline Fry on the list of our most distinguished female writers, but neither must we confound her with the mediocre spirits of her own sex or of ours, (if we may speak of spirits being of any sex,) whose literary spawn seldom merits the attention of the critic, otherwise than as a nuisance. In all the writings of our authoress, there is much shrewdness of observation, correctness of taste, and soundness of principle. This is no mean praise; and we hope that it will have the effect of directing the attention of such of our readers as can relish a good book, though its author be no Phoenix, to the unpretending volumes before us. The "Listener" is of a decidedly religious cast, but it is written with considerable liveliness and spirit. It is in Numbers, and, if we mistake not, was published as a periodical; and a pleasing little periodical it must have made. We know not a work less exceptionable, as a present for young ladies, than the "Listener." With much instruction, they may derive from it no small portion of amusement. Some of the slight sketches of character are happy; and there are one or two prettily told tales. Of course, a book of this kind, consisting of a great number of short essays upon a variety of subjects, admits of no analysis, but we shall give our readers, what they will probably like much better, a short extract. It is the concluding part of a story told on her death-bed by a wretched woman, who had tempted her husband to engage in what was called, before Mr William Huskisson so judiciously appropriated the term to his own favourite system, the free trade-in other words, smuggling. The husband and his son had gone out one night on a perilous enterprise : to escape. whole book is No. 18," The Two Invitations;" but we Memoirs of the Rev. William Wilson, A.M. Minister of the Gospel at Perth, one of the four brethren-the founders of the Secession Church, &c. With a brief Sketch of the State of Religion in Scotland for fifty years immediately posterior to the Revolution; including a circumstantial Account of the Origin of the Secession. By the Rev. Andrew Ferrier. Glasgow. Robertson and Atkinson. 1830. 8vo. Pp. 388. THAT the Secession Church of Scotland is a numerous, important, and truly respectable body of Christians, the sternest stickler for the unbroken integrity of our venerable establishment will not deny. Beyond the pale of their own communion, however, we suspect that, for the last thirty or forty years, the precise origin and manner of its separation from its elder sister has been lost sight of, as the kindlier feelings of Christian communion gradually superseded the fiery zeal which, before the middle of the last century, and, indeed, throughout the greater part of it, arranged those fond of polemical discussion in two While we are, in one sense, not sorry opposite ranks. that this oblivion has wrapped up, from the present generation, all that was intemperate in the history of the discussions of those days, we yet are well pleased to see a volume like the present appear, holding, as we do, the opinion, that it is a sacred duty to conserve the memory of those pious men who have stood forward in good faith, and with a Christian spirit, in the attitude of reformers of those abuses which, without unceasing vigilance, would soon corrupt the practice of what may, for a time, have been the purest of religious institutions. If charity be one of its elements, we cannot but look with a degree of veneration upon the abstract character of an eccleFrom what we gather of the sub "They went, and surely something in my heart misgave me of what was coming; for I felt I could not go to bed that night. It was already dark when they went away, and many a time I opened the casement to look out upon the night. The wind howled frightfully; I heard the waves thundering upon the rocks, as if they would have rent the firm earth in pieces; and so dark was it, that when in my restlessness I went out to try it, I could not find my way across the road. Not a star was there in all the heavens, nor a bit of moon to light them on their perilous way, -'twas ever such nights as these they chose to do their boldest deeds. Hour after hour I listened, though I knew not for what, for they were miles away. I shuddered at the silence. I started even at the noise I made myself, as from time to time I threw on a log to keep the fire burning, that they might warm and dry them when they came. I saw my neglected Bible on the shelf, and remembered the time when it would have consoled me,-but not now; I remembered when, in times of fear and danger to those I loved, I should have betaken myself to prayer,-but not now. I could but sit and watch the dial-plate, and long, and long|ject of this Memoir, from his biographer, and from his siastical reformer. own diary-deciphered from shorthand with a spirit of unsubdued devotion to a sacred task-William Wilson, one of the four brethren, as the fathers of the Secession Church are endearingly called by their followers, was worthy of being so viewed, and his memory preserved in honourable remembrance. The affectionate and able chronicler of his life-son to one of the most learned and accomplished theologians and men of letters of the time, Dr Ferrier of Paisley-besides participating in these sentiments, had the honourable claim of lineal descent from Mr Wilson, to entitle him to undertake a task which he has judiciously performed; and he has thus given a personal and domestic interest to a volume which has intrinsically a general and intense one to a large section of the Christian public. The Memoir is divided, in the old style, into periods, and proceeds in a lucid manner, only broken by copious and interesting extracts from the correspondence, &c. of its theme. We presume the volume will command a wide circulation. man. giving me little books of pictures, and explaining them to me. The appearance of this patroness of my early youth I have from that day clearly remembered: and it seems to have been impressed upon me in rather a whimsical way. On the lady's cheek was a small spot streaked with those wavy threads of red, to which immoderate sorrow, or indulgence, or natural decay, often attenuates the tints of a florid beauty. A leaf had fallen from one of my little books, and I remember to have asked a scarlet thread from her cheek to sew it again into its proper place. I omit farther record of my boyhood as common and uninteresting, and advance to deeper and more perilous details. One evening, in the eighteenth summer of my age, I was crossing on horseback a river about twenty miles from home, when the animal on which I rode was mastered by the force of the current, which was heavily flooded from previous rains; and horse and rider were rolled down in the strong stream. From the first rush and thunder of waters in my The Portfolio of the Martyr-Student. London. Long-soul, a dim blank was over me till I awoke to a confused man, Lees, Orme, and Co. 1830. 12mo. Pp. 191. sense of what had befallen me, and of my now being WE presume this is the production of a very young To this succeeded a heavy sleep, kindly ministered to. It indicates the possession of a poetical tempera- which must have lasted during the night, for when I ment, and it is not unlikely that, with a little more exnext distinctly awoke, the light of the sun through a perience and study, the author may produce poetry of a green curtain fell with a fine haze upon my face as I superior kind. Some of the minor pieces are pretty, and lay upon an unknown bed, and the song of swallows there is a good deal of vigour in several passages of the from the eaves was as if it were the matin hour." It is longer poem. certainly morning," said I to myself, as I lay still, trying to remember how I had come thither. I was interrupted in my calculation, by the entrance of a good-looking man, apparently a farmer, who, after satisfying himself that I was fairly awake, began to congratulate me on my escape from drowning in the river, and then told me, in answer to my enquiry, that I had been saved by a young niece of his own, who having seen the failure of my horse, MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE. THE APOLOGY. IN THREE PARTS. By Thomas Aird, Author of " Religious Characteristics," watched me as I was rolled down the river, till, on being &c. Speak of me as I am: nothing extenuate, borne near the bank where she was, she rushed in and drew me out at the peril of her own life. "I am sorry to say," he added, "that your horse perished; but this is comparatively nothing since yourself are safe. I must now go for our sweet young surgeon, for, do you know, you have got an ugly gash on your head against some rock in the water, and it is needful now to have it dress Or my parentage I can say nothing: a mystery overhangs my childhood, which I have sought in vain to clear up, and which I now believe must for ever remain darked." to me. There is nothing more common than to hear it remarked, "How short seems our bypast life!" but to me, sir, this moment the days of my boyhood appear so far remote that they seem to belong to some other earlier world. Such are my farthest recollections of a sunny world of yore, and of my being led out into the pleasant fields by some kind playmate, of whom I remember only the little feet that went before me. Would I could forget these early passages altogether, or knew them more distinctly! Sometimes my spirit is so earnest, and, as I think, so near falling into the proper train of pursuing them, that in my anxiety-I may call it my agony-the perspiration stands upon my brow. I see the dim something before me, yet never can overtake or unmask it could not be, for my heart and soul were inalienably de "You might as well Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream." The first point in my childhood which I clearly remember, is, that I was sitting alone plucking the blossoms from a fine bush of budding broom, when a crow alighted near my feet, and carried off a large worm. Then came a woman, whose face I cannot recall, with a little red shoe in her hand, which she put upon one of my feet; and then she took me up. Probably it had fallen off by the way, and I had been set down on the grass till she went back to seek it. The next point, and that to which I can follow back my continuous recollections, is my being in a room with an elderly lady, who took great pains to amuse me in My host retired for a few minutes, and then returned, followed by a fair young creature, with salve and bandages for my head, whom, moreover, he introduced to me as his niece, Emily Bonnington, who had saved my life. After I had fervently thanked my young preserver, I submitted to her farther kindness, and she bound up my head with the most tender care. I was then left alone, under the recommendation of my kind host, that I should try, if possible, to sleep again, as I felt a most violent throbbing in my head, and accordingly I lay back upon my bed, trying to compose myself anew to slumber. What was it that invested my lovely preserver with such an interest to me as I lay for hours, sleeping none, but thinking only of her? Love-sudden love, it voted to another. Nor yet could the strongest gratitude exhaust the mysterious regard which brought that young woman, Emily Bonnington, so near my heart. Had I seen that face of hers before? I could not say that I had; yet it haunted me less in reference to late things, than to a cloud of early reminiscences which came over me, as I lay without passion, without control, my spirit becalmed on a still sea of remembrance. About noon I arose, and joined my host in a short walk through his fields. In the afternoon I had an opportunity of questioning Emily Bonnington a little farther as to my preservation; and the graceful modesty with which she recounted the particulars, bettered the sweet impressions which her beauty was entitled to make on every heart, whether young or old, and left me to wonder how, in her humble sphere of rustic service, she had attained, or could preserve, her simple but true elegance. In accordance with my host's kind entreaties, I agreed to stay with him till the morrow, resolved then to take a seat homeward in the mail, which passed by near his house at an early hour. This night, after I had slept, as I thought, for several hours, I awoke from confused dreams with an over-laboured spirit. My ears had not yet got quite rid of yesterday's watery visitation, and I felt my head heavy and benumbed, whilst my stomach was oppressed with disagreeable nausea. To relieve myself a little, I arose and went to the window, which I opened to taste the pure breath of the night. The moon was shining clearly down from the zenith, and no cloud stained her blue noon. The stars were aloof and fainting from her glorious presence. My attention was, however, soon drawn from the beautiful wilderness of heaven by a low whispering beneath me, and looking down, I saw Emily Bonnington come round in front of the house with a young man. "Fear not, Emily," I heard him say, 66 my heart and love could afford to blazon you before the whole world." "Enough for me," was her low sweet reply, "that I have staked my all on your good opinion,-honour my pledge." The youth now bade her passionately adieu, which she returned evidently with the most confiding affection; and after she had watched him for some time as he hasted away through the green dewy parks, she turned with some low murmuring exclamation, and retired behind the house. Had I not known that young man, an interview like this, which I had undesignedly witnessed, so common betwixt lovers, might not have given me a thought beyond the moment; but I had at once recognised the youth, and what I knew of him made me anxious and unhappy in calculating the probable consequences of such a love to my young and beautiful preserver, He was a young gentleman of the name of Julius Wardrop, the only son of an old squire, who had an estate a few miles from Mountcoin, and another in that part of the country where Emily Bonnington resided with her uncle, the quick recollection of which circumstance made me better assured that I had truly recognised young Wardrop. I knew him to be bold, artful, and unprincipled; and even had it been otherwise, my knowledge of the disparity of their fortunes was entitled to justify my vexation to have found him the lover of Emily, and my fears for my beautiful little preserver, who had assuredly in return given him her heart. In the morning, when I saw her alone for a few minutes before my departure to join the mail, I was almost on the point of being so friendly, or so impertinent, as to warn her against him; but I dreaded so much the latter imputation, that I forbore. I did indeed give one vague | and general caution. When about to go, I took a ring from my finger, and pressed her to keep it as a slight memento that I wished to be grateful. "I will keep it," said she, taking the gem with graceful modesty," and be proud when I look at it to remember that Heaven made me the instrument of saving the life of a worthy young gentleman." "And may it be the ring of an elder brother," said I, willing to insinuate a general caution against Wardrop's possible villainy; " and may the memory which it recalls of thine own noble heroism, fortify thy soul to challenge and defeat the betrayer, should any one, presuming on his wealth or his wiles, ever tempt thy excellent honour!" To this appeal, which living and present apprehension made me utter with much solemnity, young Emily answered only with a keen and half-blushing look, and I bade her adieu. After finishing my medical studies at the University of Edinburgh, the liberality of my patroness, Mrs Hastings, who had been left with a handsome jointure by an old antiquary, allowed me to visit the medical schools of Dublin and London, where I spent a year in the farther advancement of my professional knowledge. On my way home from the latter city, the mail left me at an inn about ten miles from Mountcoin, where I resolved to stay all night, purposing to walk home early on the morrow. After I had rested awhile from the dizzy fatigue of travel.. ling, I walked out on a balcony from one of the windows of the inn, to enjoy the beautiful summer evening, which had been freshened by a thick shower. The glittering blades of the green wheaten uplands owned the dropping fatness of heaven; and as the fluttering breeze awoke, a dewy fragrance was shaken from the budded spray of some sweetly-breathed birches that twinkled before me. Away towards the watery east, the rainbow was falling with yellow glory down on the green faces of the woods. The little boy crept from the dropping shelter of the hedge, and renewed his rattle to frighten the birds from the yellow plots of seeded turnips up in the sunny crofts; while back, to cheer his bondage, came the village children, bareheaded, rejoicing beneath the skirts of the summer-shower, winking to the dewy sheen, and oft stretching their arms to the lovely rainbow. Such was the glad scene before me, which within a brief quarter of an hour was, though still fair as before in itself, to grow dark and unheeded from a change which came over my heart-for such indeed is the relative constitution of this world's beauty. As I stood before the window, I saw a carriage advancing along the highway with great rapidity, the harness glittering in the sun, and the glimmering wheels raising a mist which was left behind in a long trail. Onward the carriage came, and having been drawn up before the door of the inn, my antagonist Wardrop stepped from it, and turning, handed out a young lady, in whom, to my infinite surprise and horror, I recognised my own beloved Catherine Sinton. I say horror, for the air of necessary gallantry with which Wardrop did his de voir,—the confiding tenderness with which the lady leaned on his arm, and that peculiar softened and mellowed halo of beauty, of which the saffron robe is the emblem, and which, shadowing the warm and blushing brow, weighing the eyelid, and heightening the blooming honours of the cheek, leaves us never to mistake a young bride, carried to my heart, as with a stroke of lightning, that the lady was lost to me for ever, and was become the wife of another. No sooner were Wardrop and his young-(well, it must be so)-his young wife fairly into the inn, than I hurried down stairs to take my departure, not having magnanimity enough to stay an hour near so fearfullyinteresting a party. A single question to the coachman as I passed through the court-yard, brought down upon me an answer confirmatory of my suspicions, and without another moment's delay, I took my homeward road adown the river side, my crowding thoughts unable to arrange themselves, and my whole heart swallowed up in the overwhelming conviction that I had indeed lost all claim to my Catherine. She was the daughter of a gentleman in this neighbourhood, and I had loved her for many years with a growing passion, which, however, I never revealed to her; but this I had determined to do without further delay, and my departure from London was hastened even for this very purpose, as I could endure my absence from her no longer. So then I was too late! So then Catherine was lost to me for ever! With the burden of these bitter thoughts upon me, I wandered homewards, I know not how. I was not, however, so selfish in my own loss as altogether to forget Miss Bonnington, and my heart boiled with double indignation against Wardrop, as I could not but think that he must have deceived and forsaken poor Emily. Were we to refine and enquire curiously for motives, the emphasis which I laid on this part of his misconduct, might perhaps argue that my heart, on account of its own private feelings, was eager to find a just cause of anger against him. The very next day, by chance I met Emily's uncle, as he was on his way to a distant fair, and, on my enquiring for |
