ing, and oblige him to save souls through the medium of read sermons.

She was engaged in a dance, when the dispute between her cousin and Paul caught her notice; she saw their angry eyes and their darkening looks, and with a throbbing heart beheld their departure from the hall. She thought the dance would never be done; the young men leaned round her in a ring, and admired every motion of her foot: all that beauty does is graceful and becoming. When the dance ceased she shot through the porch like a beam of light, threaded the woodland, and stood breathless on the sea-shore. All was still; she laid her ear to the ground, and heard only the murmur of the tide. The road to the Mermaidbay was rough and difficult; but to that place she resolved to go, and as she wound her way through the thickets, her dress of satin, starred round the neck with diamonds, and studded with pearls and gold from the knee to the lowest hem, suffered sorely in her progress.

She had climbed to the summit of a little knoll, which stood like a wart on a tongue of land that protected the Mermaid-bay from the violence of the returning tide. She saw the whole line of coast for a mile on either hand,-she saw the cormorants roosting in pairs among the cliffs,-the wood-doves seated on the pine-tree tops,-and, as her eye sought the bosom of the bay, she heard words of anger, and then clashing of swords,—the

combatants were concealed from her by the luxuriant wood which lined the shore down to the water's edge. With locks disordered, and partly escaped from the virgin fillet which enclosed them, -and a dress which betokened the rudeness of the roads, and looks which witnessed the anxiety of her bosom,-Lady Phemie started in between them, pushed them asunder with her hands, while her heart heaved as if it would have leaped through its silken bondage. She had not come a moment too soon,-they had renewed their combat with a fury and a spite which was blinding their judgments and undoing their tempers, and one or both must have fallen.

She

They started back when she descended like a winged creature between them; they both bowed, dropt their sword-points, and stood silent. snatched their swords from their hands, dashed them into the tide, and, looking on them in sorrow and in scorn, said,-" You are both mad, and wholesome words are thrown away upon you; to counsel two such fiery fools is to sow corn on that sea with the hopes of harvest. From you, my cousin, the last of an old and noble line, with your natural pride embittered by the fallen fortunes of your family, an unfulfilled curse hanging over your name, and with many a folly of your own to answer for,-from you I looked for wiser and better things. And you too, John Paul, are you become a brawler and a challenger? I know your nature is open

and generous, see what the world is making of you. Fierce, vain, and uncompromising, you scorn all control, you hate rank and station, and despise all dignity of birth and precedence of blood. You have drank of the world's poisoned cup. Religion will die within you, love of country will pass from among your virtues, and, born to be your nation's glory, you will become her shame and her scourge." As she uttered this, her lips quivered, the light trembled in her eyes,— her looks changed from the hue of the rose to that of the lily, and she burst into tears.

"A prophecy! a prophecy !" exclaimed Lord Dalveen," why, my pretty Phemie, I never knew that you had a gift of preaching before. You have got indeed a capital text; for poor Paul is, as you say, of a vain and generous nature; but, alas! undevoutly inclined, and, as you hint, a citizen of the world, an universal philanthropist ; which means, that he loves mankind collectively, and could cut their throats individually. As for me, alas! you know not the milkiness of my nature,— men call me proud and women call me vain,—they know me not,—they know me not. I am but as milk; now listen; you are of a pastoral turn, and this is a most elaborate simile,-I am but as new milk under the hands of one of thy dairy-maidens, from which rich butter may be extracted, sweet cheese taken, and curds for the lips of some sweet smiler like my pretty cousin."

Lady Phemie laughed: she said," Come along with me, you two master spirits of the earth,-I shall fish up your swords when the tide recedes, and make you swear that they shall never be drawn in anger again. Come home; you know not the sorrow you have created by your absence. The musicians imagine they will have no money for the mirth they have made,-maidens think you are lost, and wonder whether you will be mourned for in crape or bombazeen,-and men calculate how many cups of brandy will fall to their share at your lyke-wake,—while here you are with your souls still most ungenerously in your bodies, moving as slowly home as a child going to school with the fear of a whipping upon him,— come." And she shed back her luxuriant locks in tresses of glistering and golden brown, restrained them under a fillet of pearls, gathered the leaves of the bushes from the plaits and ornaments of her dress, and with a face bathed in gladness proceeded towards the castle.

Paul had not yet spoken, he had submitted without a murmur to the wishes of the young lady, and now walked near her with a look which denoted internal commotion: on the other hand, Lord Dalveen went gayly along with a pleasant face, and an eye that seemed to be in quest of joy. He shed back the boughs of the trees from his cousin's face,-chanted a verse of an old border song,-varied it with a fragment of an ancient

Galwegian ditty; and, had not his courage been well known, his transports might have been ascribed to joy at escaping from Paul's sword.

"I know not what to think of you," observed the young lady," I like the merriment of the one as ill as I do the silence of the other. Both mean mischief, for so I interpret from your natures. Here am I, a poor bird that dropt accidentally between two wild hawks rending one another, yet escaped with a fright and ruffled plumage. But smooth your looks. Here are the castle torches glimmering along the grass, and you are to stand at the tribunal of certain district sages. See that the one cast away his ludicrous gravity, and the other his idle folly; they will not pass for the virtues they represent before the Lady Emeline."

"Lady Phemie Dalzell," answered Paul, admire your courage and the nobleness of your heart,-few save yourself would have braved the swords of two incensed men. You say I am changed from what you formerly knew me,—I am changed, but it is that change which springs from knowledge, which gives man a sense of the dignity of his nature, and makes intellectual worth the standard of rank. I am changed, lady, because I no longer endure the insolence of those whom the caprice of fortune has placed above me. I am changed, because I have a heart to feel I am free and a hand to vindicate it. I am changed, lady, because, while I would bow to worth, whether titled