pension upon her at that time, of unprecedented amount in the case of a subaltern officer; and by his desire, because the year 1625 was a year of jubilee, she departed in a few months from Madrid to Rome. She went through Barcelona, there and every where welcomed as the lady whom the king delighted to honor. She travelled to Rome; and all doors flew open to receive her. She was presented to his holiness, with letters from his most Catholic majesty. But letters there needed none. The pope admired her as much as all before had done.

He caused her to recite all her adventures; and what he loved most in her account was the sincere and sorrowing spirit in which she described herself, as neither better nor worse than she had been. Neither proud was Kate, nor sycophantishly and falsely humble. Urban VIII. it was that then filled the chair of St. Peter. He did not neglect to raise his daughter's thoughts from earthly things; he pointed her eyes to the clouds that were above the dome of St. Peter's Cathedral; he told her what the cathedral had told her in the gorgeous clouds of the Andes and the vesper lights, how sweet a thing, how divine a thing, it was, for Christ's sake, to forgive all injuries, and how he trusted that no more she would think of bloodshed.

whether it

never to the

From Rome, Kate returned to Spain. She even went to St. Sebastian's, to the city, but was that her heart failed her or notconvent. She roamed up and down; every where she was welcome, every where an honored guest, but every where restless. The poor and humble never ceased from their admiration of her; and amongst the rich and aristocratic of Spain, with the king at their head,

Kate found especial love from two classes of men. The cardinals and bishops all doted upon her, as their daughter that was returning. The military men all doted upon her, as their sister that was retiring.

You will ask me, What became of Kate? What was her end? Ah, reader! but, if I answer that question, you will say I have not answered it. If I tell you that secret, you will say that the secret is still hidden. Yet, because I have promised, and because you will be angry if I do not, let me do my best; and bad is the best. After ten years of restlessness in Spain, with thoughts always turning back to the Andes, Kate heard. of an expedition on the point of sailing to Spanish America. All soldiers knew her, so that she had information of every thing that stirred in camps. Men of the highest military rank were going out with the expedition; but they all loved Kate as a sister, and were delighted to hear that she would join their mess on board ship. This ship, with others, sailed, whither finally bound I really forget; but, on reaching America, all the expedition touched at Vera Cruz. Thither a great crowd of the military went on shore; the leading officers made a separate party for the same purpose. Their intention was to have a gay, happy dinner, after their long confinement to a ship, at the chief hotel; and happy in perfection it could not be unless Kate would consent to join it. She, that was ever kind to brother soldiers, agreed to do so. She descended into the boat along with them, and in twenty minutes the boat touched the shore. All the bevy of gay, laughing officers, junior and senior, like schoolboys escaping from school, jumped on shore, and walked hastily, as

their time was limited, up to the hotel. Arriving there, all turned round in eagerness, saying, “Where is our dear Kate?" Ah, yes, my dear Kate, at that solemn moment, where, indeed, were you? She had certainly taken her seat in the boat-that was sure. Nobody,

in the general confusion, was certain of having seen her on coming ashore. The sea was searched for her — the forests were ransacked. The sea made no answer the forests gave up no sign. I have a conjecture of my own; but her brother soldiers were lost in sorrow and confusion, and could never arrive even at a conjecture.

That happened two hundred and fourteen years ago. Here is the brief sum of all: This nun sailed from Spain to Peru; and she found no rest for the sole of her foot. This nun sailed back from Peru to Spain; and she found no rest for the agitations of her heart. This nun sailed again from Spain to America; and she found the rest which all of us find. But where it was could never be made known to the father of Spanish camps that sat in Madrid, nor to Kate's spiritual father that sat in Rome. Known it is to the great Father that once whispered to Kate on the Andes; but else it has been a secret for two centuries; and to man it remains a secret forever and ever.

12

THE EASEDALE ROMANCE.

THE little valley of Easedale, which, and the neighborhood of which, were the scenes of these interesting events, is, on its own account, one of the most impressive solitudes amongst the mountains of the lake district; and I must pause to describe it. Easedale is impressive, first, as a solitude; for the depth of the seclusion is brought out and forced more pointedly upon the feelings by the thin scattering of houses over its sides, and the surface of what may be called its floor. These are not above five or six at the most; and one, the remotest of the whole, was untenanted for all the thirty years of my acquaintance with the place. Secondly, it is impressive from the excessive loveliness which adorns its little area. This is broken up into small fields and miniature meadows, separated not-as too often happens, with sad injury to the beauty of the lake country - by stone walls, but sometimes by little hedge-rows, sometimes by little sparkling, pebbly "beck," lustrous to the very bottom, and not too broad for a child's flying leap; and sometimes by wild selfsown woodlands of birch, alder, holly, mountain ash, and hazel, that meander through the valley, intervening the different estates with natural sylvan marches, and giving cheerfulness in winter, by the bright scarlet of their barrier. It is the character of all the northern English valleys, as I have already remarked- and it is a character first noticed by Wordsworth-that they

assume, in their bottom areas, the level floor-like shape, making everywhere a direct angle with the surrounding hills, and definitely marking out the margin of their outlines; whereas the Welsh valleys have too often the glaring imperfection of the basin shape, which allows no sense of any absolute valley surface; the hills are already commencing at the very centre of what is called the level area. The little valley of Easedale is, in this respect, as highly finished as in every other; and in the Westmoreland spring, which may be considered May and the earlier half of June, whilst the grass in the meadows is yet short from the habit of keeping the sheep on it until a much later period than elsewhere, (viz. until the mountains are so far cleared of snow, and the probability of storms, as to make it safe to send them out on their summer migration,) the little fields of Easedale have the most lawny appearance, and from the humidity of the Westmoreland climate, the most verdant that it is possible to imagine; and on a gentle vernal day -when vegetation has been far enough advanced to bring out the leaves, an April sun gleaming coyly through the clouds, and genial April rain gently pencilling the light spray of the wood with tiny pearl drops - I have often thought, whilst looking with silent admiration upon this exquisite composition of landscape, with its miniature fields running up like forest glades into miniature woods; its little columns of smoke, breathing up like incense to the household gods, from the hearths of two or three picturesque cottages abodes of simple primitive manners, and what, from personal knowledge, I will call humble virtue — whilst my eyes rested on this charming combination of lawns and shrubberies, I have thought