hold whence to jeer at all assailants; whence to crush the powerless-the climbing!

"With regard to my second trial, can it be wondered at, that a nature so sensitive, so susceptible of almost every emotion, as mine, should give ready admittance to the all-pervading influence of love? and yet how peculiar was my adoration-some might allege, how uncertain, how little to be trusted; for I was personally unacquainted with its object. I had seen one who appeared to realize my dreams of woman; that was sufficient for me; I did not ask for a word, for a look; I dreaded an introduction, but I felt that I loved. Naturally enough this sentiment was born in the days of my youth, before I had ever left Europe; I had first seen the beautiful Mary Manville, no matter where; but the first glance was enough; I ascertained who she was; her name, position in society, residence. This achieved, I loved to watch her, unseen, unknown; to worship in the distance an idol, the charm of which, I feared, might deteriorate from proximity; to love where I felt I could love, and to prolong the sentiment as we would prolong a happy vision in the night; and I quitted England without even making one effort to know the object of my affections. Perhaps the poverty I have adverted to was, after all, the great cause of restraint; for those fascinations of feature, that form of elegance and grace, were owned by one wealthy and allied to the aristocracy of the land: she might have proved for me as the Peri with Hafiz

666

"I turn'd my face towards her path, but ne'er look'd she on me.'

On my return I saw her again; she was still unmarried. I felt the passion return, intense, undefined as of old. I was now in a position to become acquainted with her. I would obtain an introduction; but from whom? I knew twenty who could effect this for me, but could not ask one; the subject seemed too sacred for the tattle of my friends, and I entertained a conviction that they would see through my object at once, without the necessity of disclosure on my part. And yet, notwithstanding that I had been her devoted admirer for years; notwithstanding that her image had been paramount in my thoughts whenever and wherever the charms of the fair sex led me to reflection on the tender sentiment, she became, in course of time, lost to me for ever, as the bride of a happier man. I was in the church at the wedding; and fancied a smile of mingled pity and contempt on her features, as she saw me watching the ceremony; well, soon after, I left England again."

"Are you sure that she knew of your attachment, or had ever noticed you, to know who you were?" innocently asked Amble, who could not refrain from the interruption. April, 1847.-VOL. XLVIII.—NO. CXCII.

E E

"Oh, she could not avoid knowing me; impossible: as for proofs, I have none; but-but-in fact, the whole chain of circumstances; the-no matter-it is over now."

Amble asked nothing further, but fancied it probable that the fair lady knew as little of the love of her silent follower as the minister of his letter; for a beauty, and a pair of eyes which gaze constantly on her, may be as void of a sympathetic link as the man in office and one of the hangers on in his hall; in short, to use an Irishism, the reciprocity would be all on one side. Wrayle continued:

"On my again setting foot in India, a new Government had been established in the Presidency to which I belonged. A few of its members were my intimates, and those few seemed little disposed to serve me; at all events, I would ask for nothing; promotion had attained me, however, and I joined my regiment as captain; but I could not apply myself to study as before; the home trip had completely unsettled me; I sighed after London and Paris, and the amusements of a life in cities. Some few years ago, we met-I had then fallen sick, and was returning homeward. One year subsequent to this, I took a moiety of the pay of my rank, and retired from the service altogether.

"And what, think you, is the profession which I have now adopted? Why, the first love of my boyhood-literature! by which I have expected to attain wealth and palaces; by which I have gained nothing but bitter experience. My stock of money expended, I would have sooner starved than become dependent on my connexions: if they wished to see me, they could have written long since; but it was plain, they cared not what became of me. I would be indebted for maintenance to my own exertions only. Alas! how vain was the dream cherished! I set up a battery of lines in albums, voluntary and unpaid contributions to magazines, poems for a circle of friends, charades, and so forth, by which I had once earned éclat; against the strong walls of reputations protected by the public at large; and my child's work was soon reduced to a pitiable state indeed. Occasionally, I have obtained a few pieces of gold; occasionally, a trifle in silver. I am now too old to look forward to the moral recompense of my labour: the joy or grief-throbs are not so easily wakened as of old; they become more deadened every day: this very morning-" and a wild expression came over the speaker's countenance as he said this, which Amble could not fail to remark.

"I had been trying, before you came in, to complete a tale, for which I was promised a small sum. I believe I worked at its commencement under the influence of the old unfailing stimulant-the mental aspiration; and this enabled me to progress, as I thought, well; but in the course of the undertaking my

ideas grew confused, all trace of pleasurable labour disappeared; the healthy pastime of love became a loathsome toil for money. I sank under it last night; rose from a restless couch with the same feelings, and-but you saw me, and can judge of the effect produced by this miserable consciousness of decline."

A thousand vague thoughts came into the mind of the young East Indian, as he scanned the care-worn features and earnestness of manner of his friend, who thus concluded his narrative:—

"I told you that my story would suit you, inasmuch as you had neglected to make an idol of some worldly Juggurnauth. I have shown you, at least, the ill effects of a slavish regard of the opinion of mankind, which you should strenuously avoid, if you do not desire to do as I have done-sacrifice the best of all your abilities and energies in pursuit of fifty bubbles of reputation, and obtain, for your pains, the reward of a vacant yearning for better days-despondency-wretchedness-perhaps, a wish for death!"

Here was a sad case of a man who, in prosperous circumstances, would have grown into a philanthropist; but, from having to contend against fortune-from being baffled and disappointed in his every intercourse with the world-had become morose, sensitive, restless. And he had himself supplied the weapons, if not the very enemies, whereby he had been defeated! Here was a man of naturally great and commanding abilities— calculated to lead him to honours in almost any path he chose to select-but, who, in default of a few concluding years, almost months, of education, had been unprepared to fix with confidence upon any; who had, however, come within sight of so much of the fairy lands in which the more fortunate are permitted to tread, that the brain became affected with the constant vain desire of crossing the gulph which divided him from them. Alas, that the bridge was wanting, and but few mortals are gifted with wings, to become independent of such substantial earthly aids! Here was a man, who, without being selfish, lived in his own ideal world, the sombre atmosphere of which caused its inhabitants to wear any but a becoming garb or aspect. He may be said to have known no man. It was only with sentiments that he seemed to seek acquaintance; and, although the average adventure of his life was perhaps fully as romantic and interesting as that of his fellows, he neglected to record almost one particular, and contented himself with writing vividly on the tablets of his memory the inward events of his carcer only.

Poor Stephen Wrayle! we may speak of you as we know you, though the sketch may seem unnatural and disproportionate; and we cannot help confessing admiration, if mingled even with regret, at a man, who, on his stage of life, preferred, under any circumstances, the applause, to the money of his audience-and

to whom success in his intellectual vocation was far more acceptable than would have been a baronetcy, a fortune, or a coronet! The narrative that you have given us of your " mind" adventures, (if we may so designate them), shows what advantage the illiterate, matter-of-fact 'Squire Bantum has over you. To him, these would have been unheeded as very nothings. He eats, drinks, sleeps, and enjoys himself in a spirited out-door and noisy in-door life. His malt is his Pierian spring, and his grog tumbler his fountain of inspiration. He got a very decent wife by the asking for; and, in time, a good berth for his son, by constantly working the hinges of the doors at the Foreign Office, and worrying a minister's private secretary. Why did you not follow his example?

Amble was not a sufficiently thoughtful character to weigh all these matters in his mind, but he acknowledged a strange suspicion, from the last words of Stephen Wrayle, that he might have come in, on that very morning, to save him from the commission of a fearful crime-and that the sound he had heard, on entering the room, was that of a pistol hurriedly turned from its intended use.

Yet, was it possible that such a course as that described, could be one affecting life itself? Certes, much of apparent madness may work under the influence of the "malignant star."

(To be continued.)

CLASSIC HAUNTS AND RUINS.

66

BY NICHOLAS MICHELL, AUTHOR OF THE TRADUCED," ETC.

NO. XIII.

PARNASSUS.

Bur westward journeying still by mount and stream,
Where nameless ruins 'mid green foliage gleam;
Treading famed battle-fields where wild-flowers wave,
And trees of ages shade the hero's grave;

We reach a grander scene, a holier spot,
Than mouldering town, or Heliconian grot.

Mountain! where ruin sits, yet sits to twine

Her haggard brow with flowers, and gadding vine,
For ne'er she looked so fair, so full of pride,
As, glorious Mount! upon thy living side:

What though, Parnassus! sorrowing thou look'st down
On mud-walled huts for Delphi's sacred town ;*
Though stands no pillar now of Phoebus' fane,
And each bright haunt hath long in darkness lain;
Though dreary silence, save" when thunders swell,
For ever hushes Pythia's awful cell;

Yet grandly beautiful thou towerest still
O'er Time's dim wreck, defying change and ill.
The green pines bending o'er thy giant rocks,
The fearful hollows cleft by earthquake-shocks;
Torrents that leap and gush through laurel bowers,
Or fall from crag to crag in diamond showers;
Groves half-way up to laughing Bacchus given,
Where the rich clusters hang 'tween earth and heaven;
Thy peak of snow so purely, softly bright,
To gain whose summit tasks the eagle's flight,
Where he may sit, his weary journey done,
Behold half Greece, and gaze upon the sun-
Oh! these, Parnassus! know no dark decay,
These, Nature's glories, have not passed away!

Famed Mount! that bards have hailed in every age,
And millions sought in hopeful pilgrimage!
Bright seat of Inspiration! whose grey caves
Sent forth those oracles o'er land and waves,

Which made Kings tremble, empires rise or fall,
So fearful Superstition's iron thrall;

Dear art thou to youth's dreams, a haunted scene,
In beauty wild, in majesty serene!

Warm with romance, how classic fancies cling
To thy dark waving wood, and murmuring spring!
And some few relics still of glory's hour

Live on thy side, and gleam in grot and bower.
But fraught with mystic interest ne'er to die,
Charm of the scene, Castalia's fount draw nigh;
Yes, that small spring, which years nor crush nor dim,
Still bubbling forth, o'erflows its basin's rim:
The temple falls, the gods forsake their cave,
Creeds pass away, but lo! that gushing wave!
Peace-breathing scene! the tall rocks frown above,
A fig-tree bends close by, as if in love,

Chequering with shade the fountain's silver face,
Where the blue skies and jutting crags ye trace,
While flowers that hang their petals 'mid the calm,
Rise banked in moss, and fill the air with balm.
Drop-drop-30ft gurgling, forth the crystal flows,
Lulling the sense, inviting to repose,

• The little village of Castri now occupies a part of the site of ancient Delphi. + Parnassus, called in the present day Liakura, is the most celelebrated of all the mountains of the classic world. It is situated in Phocis, north-west of Helicon, and south-east of Mount Pindus.