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t'were, and I couldn't stir to go nigh 'um, | but just waited upo' the door-sill, like as my very soul were dead, for to know which it would be-husband, or son, or any of the brothers; and it seemed so cruel for to pray as it might be some other woman as was to have her heart broke; and then to see it were my own lad as were brought in with his feet foremost into his home. Eh, child, them words in that Scriptur, and he was the only son of his mother,' has more heartbreak in 'um nor any one can speak. But ye know," added the poor woman with a quivering sigh, "I ought to be thanking God A'mighty as the rest of the verse ain't true for me, and she were a widder.' And such a mercy, too, you know, as he weren't lost."*

6

"Lost ? " repeated Lettice, somewhat puzzled.

Yes, as his body were brought ashore, ye know; and now he lies dry and comf'able in the grave-yard at Denehead, where Jesse and I shall come alongside of him, please God, some time."

"How old were he?" said Lettice, after a long pause.

66

Just about same as ye said ye were, And Caleb he were so kind and feelin' for me, just one as if I'd a been his own mother, for all he makes jokes like that; and were like a son to Jesse, he's so much younger, ye see; he's part owner wi' one of the other brothers in a fishing-boat, but he goes wi' Jesse a deal of his time. Tis strange too," said Mrs. Jesse, after a pause, apologising to herself for her sudden confidence in the girl, "how you and me sits cosing on here as if I'd a know'd you all my life. I can't tell how 'tis, but with some folk one comes together so nateral as if it had been allays so; and there's other some as you may live cheek by jowl wi' for years, and never a bit nearer. To-morrow's the Sabbath day you come down, child, and go to chapel with me, sure they can spare ye, -and then ye can have yer dinner wi' me and David. Jesse won't be back this ever so long," she ended, as Tony summoned the girl and the pail loudly from the foot of the steps.

CHAPTER XI.

TROUBLES AND SYMPATHY.

THERE was no objection made by any one at the Puckspiece on the following morning to

There is a curious horror at the corpse being lost. The extreme care for the preservation of the body seems common to all early faiths. Probably, the soul could not find its own again at the last if the members were dispersed by the ocean.

Lettice going to join Mary; indeed, Norton, when he heard of it, observed to his crony Tony, as, with his hands, in his pockets, he watched her setting off from the Puckspiece

religion's a fine thing for the women: keeps "I'm main glad she've a took that way;. 'um out of mischief rarely."

like Edney's Chine there was hardly any reIn outlying hamlets and secluded places ligious instruction possible in those days, except through the Methodists; the Church did not even attempt to reach them, and there would scarcely in some parts have. been a semblance of Christianity without their help. The square red little Bethel stood at the head of the glen, hideous in its outward form and presentment, and in the worship within; but the self-sacrifice which vehement gesticulation and ranting of the desire after a nearer communion with God had been required to build it, the earnest which it represented, were as holy and beautiful as that which had raised the magnificent minster in the cathedral town of the covering under which they were worthe county, if only we could see through and ability. But we are slaves to beauty of shipping God to the best of their knowledge form: it is a good deal of trouble to find out the substance underneath, and we don't like trouble.

orderly and educated style of worship, and Lettice had been used to rather a more Mary saw it in her face though she had not spoken.

there," said she, almost apologetically. ""Taint nothing like when Jesse isn't "He most time preaches when he's at home. La, Russell ain't nothing to him; but our prayers goes up to God A'mighty and He hears 'um howsoever they be said: 'tain't the words as he looks to, and ourn be but stammerin' lips at the best on 'um," she went on, as they passed along a winding path through the holly and dwarf oak which clothed the banks of the little chine. rough slatternly woman standing at the door of her cottage on the other side the river called out some loud unintelligible greeting as they passed.

A

"She and I had had words once before
that time," said Mrs. Jesse, musing as she
went. 66
She ballaragged me sorely, but
she sent up a bit o' lad's-love (southern-
wood) and some fair-maids' (snowdrops)
forgot it to her," she ended, with a sigh.
for to lay upon his coffin, and I've never

her preparations for dinner. As the heavy
They reached the house and she began
lump of suet-dumpling with a few plums
stuck in it came tumbling out of the pot,

"Figged pudding!" cried David, with

Now, David, I won't have you so taffety" (dainty). "You don't see Lettie squealin' and squallin' after her vittles like that."

66

Nay, but she ain't so nippy as I be," answered the incorrigible David.

As long as that worthy was present he monopolized conversation; but after dinner he was safely disposed of in a sandy hole near the house, with a new puppy which Caleb had given him, and which led a hard life of it.

"He worships (fondles) him so as he'll half kill the little beast," said Mrs. Jesse, as she followed Lettice out on the little terrace in front of the house. The girl was sitting on the low bench looking listlessly out on the blue sea and the bright cliffs of the Island; everything was still the "Sabbath" stillness and lovely with the peculiar beauty of an autumn day- as if it could not be, as if it had not been”. which Shelley describes. The tiny waves which rippled to the shore and left no foam seemed only to make the quiet more sensible.

66

"What are ye thinking on, child?" said Mrs. Jesse, coming up to her, and laying her hand on her shoulder. Lettice looked up at the grave motherly face with its kind eyes, and her own filled with tears. She took hold of the woman's gown and hid her face in its folds as if she had been a child. Mrs. Jesse stroked the bright golden hair and was silent. "Is it aught that I can help, dearie?" said she at last.

"But I don't want to forget, nor more than for he to do't,"

"No, not to forget; it weren't not sent us to forget, but to use like. Sorrow's like yeast, I sometimes thinks," went on Mrs. Jesse. "If ye works it well in wi' your life it raises the bread, and sweetens the taste on it but if ye just leave it there to ferment, it turns all things bitter, and the dough's altogether sad, and that batch is spiled anyhow."

"And I've got nought to do like."

Who sweeps a room as in His sight, makes that and the action fine," Mary would have said; but she had never heard of old Herbert, so her answer was more homely. "We can't only do the work as God has given us: if there's sweepin' to do, 'tis like as he means thee for to sweep; but there's lots o' sick and sorry folk, child, round every place. They're not wantin' nowhere, poor bodies."

"I wonder ought one to be comforted by other folk's griefs?" said Lettice, consideringly. "After you telled me yesterday o' yourn, I just went home and could ha' cried a' the way, it seemed as if mine weren't nought to what you'd a gone through, and as though I were so took up wi' myself as 'twere wicked; but it wouldn't do. My ache's my own, and nobody can't "I care for somebody, and he cared for feel it but just me in my own heart, and me," she said, amidst her tears; "and no-nobody can't mend nor make there. Nobody isn't agreeable: his father and uncle body knows the spirit o' man but the heart Amyas and my grandmother: and my father o' man that is in him.". don't mind much either way, but I know he'd be agin it. I've heard nought sin' I came here, and I don't know whether he' won't forget a' about it. Why shouldn't he? He don't even know where I am. And I'm so poor a thing, and life's so long; how ever shall I live through all them years till I'm old?" cried the poor child passionately. "Here's every day seems like a year-I I wish I were dead."

Mrs. Edney sighed. "Grief don't kill the body, dearie, only just the heart out on ye, if thou doesn't mind. Thou'st but at beginning o' thy road, when the sun's low and casts great shadders, and everything looks so big: morning and evening's both alike for that; but there's a long day afore thee, please God; and at noonday one's too throng to heed as much."

66

66

Mrs. Jesse was more used to act philosophy than to talk it, and she was silent. No," she said at last, I don't see as it ought to comfort we for to know, barelike, as other folks is in sore straits as well as we; but I think 'tis God A'mighty's will, if ye can succour them as wants it, that somehow it eases yer own smart. I dunno what would ha' come to me that time I telled ye of the sorrow struck, but David's mother she were down in the faver after he were born, and nobody wouldn't a come nigh her; and only a little girl to tend her as died, and her own man out at sea for to get 'um a living; and I bided with her by night and by day, just coming home for an hour or two to find for Jesse. He were a right down good man for to let me go, he were. He might ha' catched the faver

telled me after, as he thowt the work kep' me alive, and were thankful for it. And after she died, he let me take the babby, that's David. It were a tewly thing, and sore trouble at night for to bring up, and Jesse were so patient when it mourned as never were. She paused, and looked out at the sea, as if she were trying to see

him.

66

but he nection between the ideas of cultivation and reading and writing; it is now only the ignorant and stupid who cannot do hoth, and certain thoughts are never attained without those arts; but fifty years ago, books, except in the highest education, were the exception, and very clever men and women thought out their own thoughts and fancies with extraordinarily little assistance from anything beyond the Testament. Even in the upper classses reading was not very common among women. "My grandmother could hardly spell when she wrote, and she read nothing but her livre d'heures," said a Frenchman, who was well able to judge; "but she was far more witty and wise than women are now." There are other volumes in the world than written ones to be read; life is a book which may well last one's whole time, but it requires a great deal of intelligence to understand its difficult pages.

There's a tale as Jesse tells he's full o' his yarns is Jesse (I can't tell it not as he do)-o' the building o' the minster at Mapleford. They wanted to have it at the top o' the hill where the people didn't dwell; and whatsumdever were put up in the day the angels pulled it down by night; and the beams was too short, and the corner-stones wouldn't fit, till they give in and built it where 'tis now; and when it came to evening there were ever one workman more as worked in the day and niver came up to paytime, which were Jesus Christ our Lord. And Jesse always said where we'd work to do accordin' to his word, there we'd find our Lord to give a hand to't, a-working with us both to will and to do. And it seemed to me ever as I went and come them nights as my beautiful Saviour were a-walking alongside of me up and down, and as He said, Peace, be still to the raging of my grief. And he'll do it to thee, too, Lettie, an thee astes it of Him."

Lettice did not answer. Resignation is not a plant that thrives in young soils; making the best of what is seems more the virtue of the old, struggling to cure the evil the work of the young. "To suffer and be still" is the fruit of experience in pain to do, to act, to try and throw off its sorrow by winning the goal is the instinct of the young; and perhaps Providence may know best, after all, as it is He that has made them so, or the world would stand comparatively still and become, an abode of quietists.

It was the first time that Lettice had ever had a woman friend. She could have no confidences with her grandmother, and in spite of her affection for her uncle, they were both too shy to come near a number of her perplexities; while Mrs. Jesse seemed to have time and sympathy for everybody, and her work, of which she had plenty, to be always done quietly and quickly, so as to leave her at liberty for others, instead of the way in which Mrs. Wynyate was miserable if she herself and every one under her were not continually on the stir.

In our days there is an indissoluble con

CHAPTER XII.

TEASING AND QUIBBLING. LETTICE clung to her new friend with a passionate affection. It was one of those earnest friendships which are so beautiful between women of different ages, where the young one contributes the interest of the future, with a very refreshing mixture of reverence and love, and the older one the living experience (which is not to be found except in the heart of man), and both are the happier and the better for the communion.

Mrs. Jesse had a great deal of work of different kinds for her own and other households, and Lettice was only too happy to help, and came down whenever she could be spared from the Puckspiece, which was pretty nearly every afternoon. She did not see much of either of the men. Jessie was generally out with the pilot-vessel, and Caleb, who oscillated between it and his own fishing-boat, was not often at home for many hours together. Lettice did not like him, and kept out of his way as much as possible. One day when she thought she had watched hiur safely out of the house, she found Mrs. Jesse with a great heap of clothes before her, which he had just brought in.

"I washes and mends for him, ye know, said she. "I telled him t'other day as t'were time to get him a wife, if so be he ever meant to; but he laughs and says, 'I never could see no sense in giving away half my vittles for to get the t'other half cooked;' and then he turns on me, grave like, and says, Sure, ain't you like a mother to me,

.

Mary? and isn't that better nor ten "Will you put this letter for Lettie in wives?' 'Yes,' says I, 'lad, but not better somewhere when you're out wi' the boat, as nor one.? And with that he laughs again it isn't Seaford? and goes off a-calling out, 'Let be, I'm satisfied wi' mine ye see as 'tis.""

"Come out, aunt Mary, and look at me'; come out, Lettice, I say," shouted the young tyrant as he picked the grapes from the vine which trailed all over the roof of the cottage, and flung them at the girl, who' That's where uncle Ned is with the was standing in the open doorway looking Revenue officers," replied the girl thought-up at him, and knitting diligently at a pair fully, (and most like Everhard too; I of socks for his troublesome little feet. wonder what ever he's a-doin' of all these days," she added to herself.)

66

"Jography!" cried Caleb. "Why, he teasin' and stirrin' of me up when he's knows a deal more nor Lettie now! here." What's that o' the four quarters o' the world as the little sailor wi' the long nose in the collier's brig teached ye, David, that day I took ye to Seaford wi' me?"

TOBACCO SMOKING. -The Lancet, discussing Mr. Lewes's paper on tobacco published in the Cornhill, and our comments thereon, says the Spectator, gives it as its opinion that tobacco poison cannot create a permanent susceptibility to the action of the drug. Every smoker is poisoned once, namely, when he begins, but very few show the susceptibility. That would be final, if there were proof that the nausea, &c., which follow the first cigar were symptoms of

poisoning, but that is not yet proved. People may suffer from mercury without being salivated, yet it is certain that if salivated they retain a permanent susceptibility to the action of the drug. The argument that many persons injured by tobacco do so entirely recover as to be able to smoke again in moderation is a much stronger one, but there are many cases of a different kind on record. The Lancet distinctly admits the existence of persons to whom any dose of tobacco is seriously injurious, and the point we suggest for investigation is whether such a peculiarity of constitution cannot be superinduced by over

doses.

'He's a bit spiled is Caleb. I don't say no," answered Mary; "he've nobody to pleasure but just hisself; and the bit o' land's hissen as Edwin hires, and gives him house-room when he pleases, and a share in the fishing-boat belongs to he. (I hope they ain't a-leading him into mischief wi' all them trips nobody knows where, up and down the coast as they goes.) And then he knows he's as welcome as the day here anytime, Jesse's so glad to have him, and me too, to bide here; but he sims more freelike to have his liberty at the t'other house p'r'aps. For all that Jesse don't say naught about it, Caleb knows pretty much what he thinks of such goings on; and, after all's said and done, his own way's what a young man loves better nor house and land. But he's a good 'un is Caleb for all. that; he saved a man as was nigh drownded at Seaford no longer nor two months back. It tore his best shirt almost to ribbins; and there he never brought it me but now! See you here what rents there be!"

"How can he get wisdom that holdeth the Plough, and that glorieth in the goad, that drivwhose talk is of bullocks? He giveth his mind eth oxen, and is occupied in their labours, and to make furrows; and is diligent to give the kine fodder. He shall not be sought for in public counsel, nor sit high in the congregation: he shall not sit in the judge's seat, nor understand the sentence of judgment; he cannot declare justice and judgment, and shall not be found where parables are spoken."- Ecclesiasticus

XXXVIII.-25-33.

In reply Mr. M'Combie's supporters issued the following handbill "not from the Apocrypha":—

"Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.'-Prov. xii. 29. Blessed MESSRS. HURST & BLACKETT will shortly pub- shall be the fruit of thy cattle. The Lord shall lish a work entitled "Chaucer's England," by cause thine enemies that rise up against thee to Matthew Browne, which promises to be of excep- be smitten before thy face: they shall come out tional interest. It will consist partly of sketches against thee one way, and shall flee before thee of English character and manners in the four-seven ways.'-Deut. xxviii. 7.” teenth century, founded on the "Canterbury Tales," and partly of criticisms of the facts in It will be seen that the issue of the election upmedieval life. The work will be in two volumes, held the authority of the Canonical Books. illustrated.

London Review.