acter, the reader is prepared to understand the decision of her present proceeding. She had no time to lose; the twilight favored her; but she must get under hiding before pursuit commenced. Consequently she lost not one of her forty-five minutes in picking and choosing. No shilly shally in Kate. She saw with the eyeball of an eagle what was indispensable: some little money perhaps, to pay the first toll bar of life. So, out of four shillings in aunty's purse, she took one. that was exorbitant.

You can't say

Now she was ready - ready to cast off St. Sebastian's towing rope ready to cut and run for port any where. The finishing touch of her preparations was to pick out the proper keys. Even there she showed the same discretion. She did do no gratuitous mischief. She did not take the wine celler key, which would have irritated the good father confessor; she took those keys only that belonged to her, if ever keys did; for they were the keys that locked her out from her natural birthright of liberty. "Show me," says the Romish casuist, "her right in law to let herself out of that nunnery." "Show us," we reply, "your right to lock her in." Right or wrong, however, in strict casuistry, Kate was resolved to let herself out, and did so; and, for fear any man should creep in whilst vespers lasted and steal the kitchen grate, she locked her old friends in. Then she sought a shelter. The air was not cold. She hurried into a chestnut wood, and upon withered leaves slept till dawn. Spanish diet and youth leave the digestion undisordered and the slumbers light. When the lark rose, up rose Catalina. No time to lose; for she was still in the dress of a nun, and liable to be arrested by

any man in Spain. With her armed finger (ay; by the way, I forgot the thimble; but Kate did not) she set to work upon her amply-embroidered petticoat. She turned it wrong side out; and, with the magic that only female hands possess, she had soon sketched and finished a dashing pair of Wellington trousers. All other changes were made according to the materials she possessed, and quite sufficiently to disguise the two main perils - her sex and her monastic dedication. What was she to do next? Speaking of Wellington trousers would remind us, but could hardly remind her, of Vittoria, where she dimly had heard of some maternal relative. To Vittoria, therefore, she bent her course; and, like the Duke of Wellington, but arriving more than two centuries earlier, (though he, too, is an early riser,) she gained a great victory at that place. She had made a two days' march, baggage far in the rear, and no provisions but wild berries. She depended for any thing better, as lightheartedly as the duke, upon attacking, sword in hand, storming, her dear friend's intrenchments, and effecting a lodgment in his breakfast room, should he happen to have one. This amiable relative, an elderly man, had but one foible, or perhaps one virtue, in this world; but that he had in perfection: it was pedantry. On that hint Catalina spoke. She knew by heart, from the services of the convent, a few Latin phrases. Latin ! — 0, but that was charming; and in one so young! The grave don owned the soft impeachment, relented at once, and clasped the hopeful young gentleman in the Wellington trousers to his uncular and rather angular breast. In this house the yarn of life was of a mingled quality. The table was good; but that was exactly what

Kate cared little about. The amusement was of the worst kind. It consisted chiefly in conjugating Latin verbs, especially such as were obstinately irregular. To show him a withered, frostbitten verb that wanted its preterite, wanted its supines, wanted, in fact, every thing in this world, fruits or blossoms, that make a verb desirable, was to earn the don's gratitude for life. All day long he was marching and countermarching his favorite brigades of verbs — verbs frequentative, verbs inceptive, verbs desiderative - horse, foot, and artillery; changing front, advancing from the rear, throwing out skirmishing parties; until Kate, not given to faint, must have thought of such a resource as once in her life she had thought so seasonably of a vesper headache. This was really worse than St. Sebastian's. Now, you know, when the time comes that nous nous ennuyons, the best course is to part. Kate saw that; and she walked off from the don's, (of whose amorous passion for defective verbs one would have wished to know the catastrophe,) and took from his mantel piece rather more silver than she had levied on her aunt. But the don, also, was a relative; and really he owed her a small check on his banker for turning out on his field days. A man, if he is a kinsman, has no right to bore one gratis.

From Vittoria, Kate was guided by a carrier to Valladolid. Luckily, as it seemed at first, - but it made little difference in the end, here, at Valladolid, were the king and his court; consequently there was plenty of regiments and plenty of regimental bands. Attracted by one of these, Catalina was quietly listening to the music, when some street ruffians, in derision of the gay

colors and the form of her forest-made costume, (rascals! one would like to have seen what sort of trousers they would have made with no better scissors,) began to pelt her with stones. Ah, my friends of the genus blackguard, you little know who it is that you are selecting for experiments. This is the one creature of fifteen in all Spain, be the other male or female, whom nature, and temper, and provocation have qualified for taking the conceit out of you. This she very soon did, laying open a head or two with a sharp stone, and letting out rather too little than too much of bad Valladolid blood. But mark the constant villany of this world. Certain alguazils, very like some other alguazils that I know nearer home, having stood by quietly to see the friendless stranger insulted and assaulted, now felt it their duty to apprehend the poor nun for murderous violence; and, had there been such a thing as a treadmill in Valladolid, Kate was booked for a place on it without further inquiry. Luckily, injustice does not always prosper. A gallant young cavalier, who had witnessed from his windows the whole affair, had seen the provocation, and admired Catalina's behavior, equally patient at first, and bold at last, hastened into the street, pursued the officers, forced them to release their prisoner upon stating the circumstances of the case, and instantly offered Catalina a situation amongst his retinue. He was a man of birth and fortune; and the place offered, that of an honorary page, not being at all degrading even to a "daughter of somebody," was cheerfully accepted. Here Catalina spent a happy month. She was now splendidly dressed, in dark-blue velvet, by a tailor that did not work within the gloom of a chestnut forest. She

and the young cavalier, Don Francisco de Cardenas, were mutually pleased and had mutual confidence. All went well; when one evening, but, luckily, not until the sun had been set so long as to make all things indistinct, who should march into the antechamber of the cavalier but that sublime of crocodiles, papa, that we lost sight of fifteen years ago, and shall never see again after this night! He had his crocodile tears all ready for use, in working order, like a good industrious fire engine. It was absolutely to Catalina herself that he advanced; whom, for many reasons, he could not be supposed to recognize : lapse of years, male attire, twilight, were all against him. Still she might have the family countenance; and Kate thought he looked with a suspicious scrutiny into her face as he inquired for the young don. To avert her own face, to announce him to Don Francisco, to wish him on the shores of that ancient river for crocodiles, the Nile, furnished but one moment's work to the active Catalina. She lingered, however, as her place entitled her to do, at the door of the audience chamber. She guessed already, but in a moment she heard from papa's lips, what was the nature of his errand. His daughter Catharine, he informed the don, had eloped from the convent of St. Sebastian — a place rich in delight. Then he laid open the unparalleled ingratitude of such a step. O the unseen treasure that had been spent upon that girl! O the untold sums of money that he had sunk in that unhappy speculation! the nights of sleeplessness suffered during her infancy! the fifteen years of solicitude thrown away in schemes for her improvement! It would have moved the heart of a stone. The hidalgo wept copiously at his own pathos. And