She had a sore grief of her own,
A haunting in her brain.

And oft she said, I'm not grown thin!
And then her wrist she spann'd;
And once when Mary was down-cast,
She took her by the hand,
And gazed upon her, and at first
She gently press'd her hand;

Then harder, till her grasp at length
Did gripe like a convulsion!
"Alas!" said she, "we ne'er can be
Made happy by compulsion!"

And once her both arms suddenly
Round Mary's neck she flung,
And her heart panted, and she felt
The words upon her tongue.

She felt them coming, but no power
Had she the words to smother;

And with a kind of shriek she cried,
"Oh Christ! you're like your mother!"

So gentle Ellen now no more

Could make this sad house cheery;

And Mary's melancholy ways

Drove Edward wild and weary.

Lingering he raised his latch at eve,

Though tired in heart and limb:

He loved no other place, and yet
Home was no home to him.

One evening he took up a book,
And nothing in it read;

Then flung it down, and groaning cried, "O! Heaven! that I were dead."

Mary look'd up into his face,
And nothing to him said;
She tried to smile, and on his arm
Mournfully lean'd her head.

And he burst into tears, and fell
Upon his knees in prayer :

"Her heart is broke! O God! my grief, It is too great to bear!"

'Twas such a foggy time as makes

Old sextons, sir! like me,

Rest on their spades to cough; the spring Was late uncommonly.

And then the hot days, all at once,
They came, we knew not how :

You look'd about for shade, when scarce
A leaf was on a bough.

It happen'd then ('twas in the bower,
A furlong up the wood:

Perhaps you know the place, and yet

I scarce know how you should,—)

No path leads thither, 'tis not nigh

To any pasture-plot;

But cluster'd near the chattering brook,
Lone hollies mark'd the spot. *

Those hollies of themselves a shape
As of an arbour took,

A close, round arbour; and it stands
Not three strides from a brook.†

Within this arbour, which was still
With scarlet berries hung,

Were these three friends, one Sunday morn,
Just as the first bell rung.

'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet

To hear the Sabbath-bell,

'Tis sweet to hear them both at once

Deep in a woody dell.

His limbs along the moss, his head
Upon a mossy heap,

With shut-up senses, Edward lay:
That brook e'en on a working day
Might chatter one to sleep.

And he had pass'd a restless night,
And was not well in health;

* Some hollies mark the spot.-1809. + From the brook.-lb.

The women sat down by his side,
And talk'd as 'twere by stealth.

"The Sun peeps through the close thick leaves,

See, dearest Ellen ! see!

"Tis in the leaves, a little sun,

No bigger than your ee;

"A tiny sun, and it has got A perfect glory too;

Ten thousand threads and hairs of light,

Make up a glory gay and bright

Round that small orb so blue."

And then they argued of those rays,
What colour they might be ;

Says this, "They're mostly green;" says that, "They're amber-like to me."

So they sat chatting, while bad thoughts
Were troubling Edward's rest;

But soon they heard his hard quick pants,
And the thumping in his breast.

"A mother too!" these self-same words
Did Edward mutter plain ;

His face was drawn back on itself,
With horror and huge pain.

Both groan'd at once, for both knew well
What thoughts were in his mind;

When he waked up, and stared like one
That hath been just struck blind.

He sat upright; and ere the dream
Had had time to depart,

66

"O God, forgive me !" (he exclaim'd)
"I have torn out her heart."

Then Ellen shriek'd, and forthwith burst
Into ungentle laughter;

And Mary shiver'd, where she sat,

And never she smiled after.

Carmen reliquum in futurum tempus relegatum.
To-morrow! and To-morrow! and To-morrow!-

THE NIGHT-SCENE.

A DRAMATIC FRAGMENT.

SANDOVAL. You loved the daughter of Don

Manrique ?

Earl Henry.

Loved?

Sandoval. Did you not say you woo'd her?

Not loving Oropeza. True, I woo'd her,
Hoping to heal a deeper wound; but she

Oh! I were most base,