dure of the turf above, whilst plants of a ranker growth, nettles, docks, and fumatory, sprang up beneath, adding to the wildness and desolation of the scene. The road that led by the pit was little frequented. The place had an evil name; none cared to pass it even in the glare of the noon-day sun; and the villagers would rather go a mile about, than catch a glimpse of it when the pale moonlight brought into full relief those cavernous white walls, and the dark briars and ivy waved fitfully in the night wind. It was a vague and shuddering feeling. None knew why he feared, or what; but the awe and the avoidance were general, and the owls and the bats remained in undisturbed possession of Lanton Chalk-pit. One October day, the lively work of ploughing, and wheat-sowing, and harrowing, was going on all at once in a great field just beyond the dreaded spot: a pretty and an interesting scene, especially on sloping ground, and under a gleaming sun throwing an ever-shifting play of light and shadow over the landscape. Toward noon, however, the clouds began to gather, and one of the tremendous pelting showers, peculiar to the coast, came suddenly on. Seedsmen, ploughmen, and carters, hastened home with their teams, leaving the boys to follow; and they, five in number, set out at their fullest speed. The storm increased apace; and it was evident that their thin jackets and old smock-frocks would be drenched through and through long before they could reach Lanton Great Farm. --In this dilemma, James Goddard, a stout lad of fifteen, the biggest and boldest of the party, proposed to take shelter in the Chalk-pit. Boys are naturally thoughtless and fearless; the real inconvenience was more than enough to counterbalance the imaginary danger, and they all willingly adopted the plan, except one timid child of eight years old, who shrank and hung back. Harry Lee was a widow's son. His father, a fisherman, had perished at sea, a few months after the birth of this only child; and his mother, a fond and delicate woman, had reared him delicately and fondly, beyond her apparent means. Night and day had she laboured for her poor Harry; and nothing but a long illness and the known kindness of the farmer in whose service he was placed, had induced her to part with him at so early an age. Harry was, indeed, a sweet and gracious boy, noticed by every stranger for his gentleness and beauty. He had a fair, blooming, open countenance; large, mild, blue eyes, which seemed to ask kindness in every glance; and a quantity of shining, light hair, curling in ringlets round his neck. He was the best reader in Mrs. Mansfield's Sunday-School; and only the day before, Miss Clara had given him a dinner to carry home to his mother, in reward of his proficiency: indeed, although they tried to conceal it, Harry was the decided favourite of both the young ladies. James Goddard, under whom he worked, and to whose care he had been tearfully committed by the widow Lee, was equally fond of him, in a rougher way; and in the present instance, seeing the delicate boy shivering between cold and fear at the outside of the pit, (for the same constitutional timidity which prevented his entering, hindered him from going home by himself,) he caught him up in his arms, brought him in, and deposited him in the snuggest recess, on a heap of dry chalk. "Well, Harry, is not this better than standing in the wet?" said he, kindly, sitting down by his protegé, and sharing with him a huge luncheon of bread and cheese; and the poor child smiled in his face, thanked him, and kissed him as he had been used to kiss his mother. Half an hour wore away in boyish talk, and still the storm continued. At last James Goddard thought that he heard a strange and unaccustomed sound, as of bursting or cracking-an awful and indescribable sound-low, and yet distinctly audible, although the wind and rain were raging, and the boys loud in mirth and laughter. He seemed to feel the sound, as he said afterwards; and was just about to question his companions if they too heard that unearthly noise, when a horseman passed along the road, making signs to them and shouting. His words were drowned in the tempest; James rushed out to inquire his meaning; and in that moment the side of the Chalk-pit fell in! He heard a crash and a scream-the death scream!-felt his back grazed by the descending mass; and, turning round, saw the hill rent, as by an earthquake, and the excavation which had sheltered them filled, piled, heaped up, by the still quivering and gigantic fragments-no vestige left to tell where it was, or where his wretched companions lay buried! "Harry! Harry! the child! the child!" was his first 66 thought and his first exclamation. Help! instant help!" was the next; and, assisted by the stranger horseman, whose speed had been stayed by the awful catastrophe, the village of Lanton was quickly alarmed, and its inhabitants assembled on the spot. Who may describe that scene? Fathers, brothers, kinsmen, friends, digging literally for life! Every nerve quivering with exertion, and yet all exertion felt to be unavailing. Mothers and sisters looking on in agony; and the poor widow Lee, and poor, poor James Goddard, the self-accuser! A thousand and a thousand times did he crave pardon of that distracted mother, for the perilthe death of her son; for James felt that there could be no hope for the helpless child, and tears such as no personal calamity could have drawn from the strong-hearted lad, fell fast for his fate. Hour after hour the men of Lanton laboured, and all was in vain. The mass seemed impenetrable, inexhaustible. Toward sunset one boy appeared, crushed and dead; another, who showed some slight signs of life, and who still lives, a cripple; a third dead; and then, last of all, Harry Lee. Alas! only by his raiment could that fond mother know her child! His death must have been instantaneous. She did not linger long. The three boys were interred together in Lanton church-yard on the succeeding Sabbath; and before the end of the year, the widow Lee was laid by her son. A COLLOQUY WITH MYSELF. BY BERNARD BARTON. As I walked by myself, I talked to myself, And the questions myself then put to myself, Put them home to thyself, and if unto thyself Their responses the same should be, O look well to thyself, and beware of thyself, Or so much the worse for thee. What are Riches? Hoarded treasures Yet, like earth's most fleeting pleasures, |