I knew thy meaning—thou didst praisc Come, talk of Europe's maids with me, Whose necks and cheeks, they tell, Outshine the beauty of the sea, White foam and crimson shell. I'll shape like theirs my simple dress, And bind like them each jetty tress, A sight to please thee well; And for my dusky brow ill braid A bonnet like an English maid. We lose the pleasant hours ; That seat among the flowers. A lot as blest as ours- THE MERCHANT. CHAP. I. of motion at once graceful and exhilarating to behold. We might discover an interesting chapter of human No young adventurer ever set out with a more sanguine life, well filled with curious facts, could we board that spirit than did Edmund Neville; and now he return: with feelings of loneliness and depression even far noble East Indiaman just entering the Plymouth docks, beyond those usually entertained by the exiles of many and read the hearts and the lives, as well as scan the years. He had quitted England an orphan, but not features, of the anxious crowd who, gathered together on therefore, without leaving fond hearts to mourn at his her deck, appear all impatient to land. Seldom could departure. Destitute of fortune-loving passionatels we find more variety of character and circumstance. the beautiful sister of a friend, by whom he was in turi We must, of necessity, mingle with that group, for beloved, and who was as portionless as himself—b turned with the ardour of youth, and of a sanguine and from among it have we to single out the chief subject energetic temperament, to bright prospects which of our tale. Ah! now you cast a curious eye around. opened to him in the East, promising to return in It is not that young dragoon, with twisted moustache, few, a very few years, to claim Juliet Markham as his and sallow skin, who, on account of ill-hcaltb. is return bride, and again to seek with her a golden land. 1; ing to join the depôt of his regiment; nor is it that very was twenty years ago that he gave that promise, –an! lovely delicate-looking woman, who, for the same cause, it is yet unfulfilled. The most indefatigable applica has been sent by a husband, far more advanced in years, for whom all his efforts were made, meanwhile sickene: tion was rewarded by gradual advancement; but sh to reside for a wbile with his family in England, on whom the young soldier we have just mentioned is be- and died, while he laboured for her in a distant lat. stowing many little attentions, of the same class as and did not learn, for months after the event, that she those by which he has striven to alleviate the dulness who animated all his endeavours had passed into th: of the long voyage to her. It is not that veteran hero state in which all he could bestow could profit bis who has fought on so many bloody fields; not that im nothing Still he did not abandon his avocations; to perious judge, whose arbitrary behests are obeyed by his was far too wretched to be idle. In vast and splendii servants with trembling haste; nor is it that pale wealth. At length he wearied of his labours; he felt attempts he ran bold risks, and amassed prinal sickly widow, who presses her young child to her breast, and anxiously reflects on what welcome will await her yearning for his native land, and yielded to the impulse and her orphan at the family hearth of him who was though to do so at that moment asked the sacrifice o her protector and support. It is none of these (though moment he reached her shores, to seek the deare thousands. He set sail for England, and proposed, thn each may have a tale to tell) that I am seeking friend he possessed in her, the brother of his betrothel earnestly. But I discover him now; and though you did not fix on him for a hero, and exclaim triumphantly; wanted, but slenderly furnished with the riches wit ---a man happy in those domestic ties which Neville “ This is he !" yet, when you mark him closer, you shall acknowledge that perhaps I have chosen well, or at which he was so amply supplied. least, that twenty years ago he must have been admirably qualified to sustain the character. Nay, reader, Mr. Marciam, holding in his hand an open letter when you are as well acquainted with him as I intend which conveyed the welcome promise of Nerilli to make you, you shall confess that (strange as it seems arrival that very evening at the Grange, was standin: to talk of romance at forty !) he yet retains most of the with his wife before a picture representing a vers necessary ingredients of a hero. You hinted at twenty beautiful girl in the costume worn twenty years before years ago. Well, it is exactly twenty years since Both gazed on it with mournful reflections. At leng:Edmund Neville quitted his native land, never to set Mr. Markham said, “Shall we remove this picture, or foot on her shores till this very day; and at his de- shall we leave it here, Maria? Do you think that parture he was all that you may suppose him to have Edmund Neville will perceive Juliet's strong resenje been, from what you Those locks, now blance to it? Do you think the sight of it will distru whitened by a fiery sun, by arduous toil, by grief of him ?" heart, were then of a glossy chestnut; those lips, now " I know not what to advise," replied Mrs. Markhapa habitually compressed, wore then a smile of uncommon "he cannot come here without being reminded of his sweetness, into which they can still occasionally relax ; youth ; he must be aware of that, and yet, you see, ha those thoughtful, mournful eves, then sparkled with If he must see Juliet, he may as well see 114 hope ; that well-proportioned figure, that wears an air picture ; it is one and the same thing. of becoming dignity, had then an elasticity and freedom “She is so exactly in age and person what my sis CHAP. II. see now. comes. 66 was when he parted from her,” said Mr. Markham, , that she has drunk the first draught of the bitter thoughtfully and sadly,—" so exactly what he may waters of Marah-the waters of disappointment? And imagine her to have been when grieving over his before she tasted of them she fancied herself in the absence. Poor Juliet ! had he come a few months garden of Eden, so happy and rejoicing was she ; but ago, when she was gay and happy, he would not have now it seems to her that she has suddenly discovered found a resemblance so distressing !" herself to be a wanderer and an outcast in the waste “ Does he ever mention his betrothed to you in his howling wilderness. Now may she, with George Herbert, letters !" say, not repiningly, but with a grateful, though a broken, “Never. He is one of those who never speak or spirit :write on subjects on which they feel acutely, unless duty calls for the exertion." “At first thou gav'st me milk and sweetnesse I had my wish and way; At this moment a pretty child ran into the room. My days were strew'd with flowers and happinesse“ Tell me, dear papa,” she said, “is the great ‘Indian There was no moneth but May; Nabob' really coming to see us?" But with my yeares sorrow did twist and grow, By this name the wealthy merchant often went in And made a party, unawares, for wo.” his friend's family, and it conveyed very mysterious ideas of him to the younger members of it. He was Juliet, languid as she was, shared the eager wish for half identified in their minds with the strange idols the arrival of her father's noble-hearted merchant friend. which once arrived in one of the boxes of rich Indian She knew well the history of his early love and grief, curiosities which had often found their way to the and could trace in memory a fair vision of her aunt, Grange. Little Marion, having procured an answer to which she cherished with the utmost tenderness. her first question, had still an important one to pro- minds of those who had known and loved her, and in Everything that remained of her, in the hearts and pound. Papa,” she said, “we all very well know how beau- the memorials which she had left behind, conveyed tiful and good Juliet is, and that she deserves much the impression of so much tenderness and truth, such more than any of us; but how did Mr. Neville guess meekness and devotion of spirit, such touching resignathis, that he should always mark all his prettiest gifts tion, that Juliet could not but believe that she had been with her name?" a being rarely equalled, and never to be forgotten. She Her father patted her cheek, amused by her earnest felt that she could conceive and sympathize with the curiosity, and replied with a smile, “ Probably the be- feelings of him who was now about to return to her nevolent fairy who presided at her christening, and home, and would find her not. She contrasted their gave her all her good gifts, floated across the ocean to fates with her own; and, though she wept for them, the whisper this in the ears of the Nabob, Marion ; what They had loved with unbroken constancy and unshaken tears which she shed for herself were far more bitter. do you think?" Why, I really think that is very likely, papa," cried trust. Juliet sickened as she remembered the beautiful Marion, who loved the marvellous, and in her merry image which had once been enshrined in her heart, mood always feigned to credit the wildest fancies with and then looked on it disfigured and dethroned, lying which her favourite books abounded; and those favourite in shame and degradation in the dust; and, first to love, books, I almost fear to confess it, were no other than and then to despise,-Juliet thought that no dart from the Arabian Nights and other tales, with which I and the quiver of Death could infiict a wound like this. those of my generation were allowed to delight our. selves; and which Mr. Markham, remembering the exquisite pleasure which he had enjoyed, had the good At length evening came, and with it came Mr. Nenature, if I may not say the good sense, to let his ville, and the merchant was quite unlike what any one children enjoy also. And now Juliet entered ; and you, of the expecting group had supposed that he would my reader, seeing her th for the first time, will prove. Mr. Markham, who had parted from a fiery enwonder why Marion talked such nonsense as to call thusiastic youth, was scarcely prepared for the calm dig. her beautiful, and why Mr. Markham appeared to hold nity of his manhood. The children, who regarded him the same opinion. Why should this pale girl, with her from a distance with something of the awe and curiosity sad and serious countenance, and her listless step, be which a Bengal tiger might inspire, were amazed by termed beautiful ? Wait a little; perhaps she will the sweetness and gentleness of his voice and manner. raise those drooping eye-lids, fringed with their long Juliet had not thought that he would look so old, but, black eye-lashes; then shall you behold eyes of a in spite of his whitened hair and bronzed skin, the unwondrous lustre-large, liquid, grey eyes – that beam quenched fire of his dark eye, the whiteness of his teeth, with intellect and with feeling. Perhaps she will speak, and the freedom of his movements, quickly removed the and you will see a brilliant glow mount up on her cheek, impression of advanced age. Mrs. Markham was surand fade away again as quickly; you will see two rows prised to find him so young. of pearly teeth ; and, if Marion can make her smile, you After the first warm greeting of the friends was over, will see a hundred dimples play around her mouth. and the feelings excited by it had partly subsided, Mr. NeAh! if you had beheld her a few months since, I need ville showed how desirous he was to make acquaintance not have written all this to convince you that she with each member of the little group. Juliet was quite is lovely. in the background, and her little brothers and sisters Juliet has not yet seen her nineteenth birth-day. crowded round her, and completely shut her out from What can have worked so great a change in one so view. Her father put them aside, and called her to him. young? Nay, reader, why ask the question? Sure I She well knew the tide of painful associations which am that every one who reads this passage can answer must fill the stranger's breast on hearing her name, and it. It is true that the heart of youth is not easily cast on beholding her for the first time. She advanced with down; it triumphs over dangers, difficulties, hardships, head and eyes inclined downwards; her raven hair was sufferings, poverty; it recovers the loss of friends, the drawn back from her classic brow; the colour mounted defeat of projects; it can hope on, and continue to visibly on her cheek, then rushed back, leaving her pursue the happiness which has a thousand times colourless as marble. She breathed quickly with agieluded its grasp ; it can do all this, but there are pangstation. Her father glanced at bis friend as she apat which older hearts mock, and at which it will proached. He saw him start, and briefly, but tenderly, mock too, in its turn - pangs which, to the young, fresh, he said :ardent heart, are as the severing of soul and body, in- This is my eldest child, my Juliet." expressibly agonizing. Taking her hand, he placed it in that of Neville, and And Juliet, this beautiful young girl, what is it but | by a kind pressure spoke his acquaintance and sym CHAP. III. pathy with all that was passing in his breast. Neville | her as soon as she appeared. Her cheek was glowing, Was as in a dream ;---one of those heart-sickening dreams and her eyes were sparkling, with the exercise she had in which we act over again the happy scenes of youth. taken; but he watched all this brilliancy fade away, “Oh, miserable power to dreams allowed !” and an expression of mournful resignation overspread her countenance. “She does not look happy,” he thought; None of the supernatural horrors, the terrific perils, and throughout the day he could not banish from his which we often encounter in sleep, cause half the pain mind this distressing supposition. which we experience in retracing reality step by step ! The time past chiefly in familiar conversation between Juliet felt Neville's hand tremble; the moment that the two friends; by which, in a few hours, they realised she could withdraw hers, she fell back, and a few hot the existing circumstances of each other more than they tears rolled down her cheek unperceived. had done in the correspondence of years. Neville found Neville grew absent in his replies, and declined all that Markham enjoyed few of the superfluities of life. His refreshment, though he had travelled far. His friend children were frugally reared, and simply attired, which interpreted these signs as weariness, and conducted him added vigour to their health, and charms to their to the chamber prepared for him. When alone together, beauty. His sons were carefully educated, and were they could not abstain from retrospections of the past. already fitted for introduction into the world; to adAt length Neville himself alluded to the perfect resem- vance their fortunes Neville resolved should be his blance which Juliet bore to her whom he had left as earliest care. Juliet owed chiefly to her aunt and godfresh a flower, blooming in the same soil. As he spoke mother a cultivation of mind and taste which might be his countenance changed, bis manly voice faltered. a solid basis for further acquirements. Nature had gifted Emotion banished self-possession. He resolved that her with talents for the arts which she had formerly exthis comment should be made for the first and last time. ercised with great delight, though with little knowledge; He would never again venture to approach this subject. but that delight did not now exist. Her most pleasing When Neville was left to himself, he found it impos- occupation now was the instruction of her little sister in sible to obtain rest. Old recollections haunted and such rudiments as she could impart; and she was no agonized him. Visions of an hour's birth flitted before unskilful teacher, as the progress of the lively, intellihim. In vain did he attempt to separate the Juliet who gent little Marion evinced. Neville saw, with vexation, was not, and the Juliet who was. He trembled on the that while Juliet welcomed him with all the cordialits brink of a discovery, that to him they must henceforth due to her father's friend, yet, as much as possible, she be the same. He passed a night of restless pain, shamed withdrew from the conversation generally held, and her and harassed by this strange intermixture of the past silence was less that of timidity than of abstraction. with the present. He rose with the dawn, and threw Clearly to ascertain whether the grief which he susopen the window of his chamber to breathe the morning pected did or did not exist, --if it did, to proceed to the air, which seldom fails to refresh the sickest head or discovery of its cause, and finally to relieve it, - became, heart. He gazed forth on a scene once so familiar to ere evening, Neville's prevailing wish and design. But him, and retraced with little difficulty every feature of he was resolved that the impression made on him should it. While thus employed, he forgot the lapse of time. receive corroboration solely from his own observation, Suddenly the sound of the church-bell struck his ear. and, actuated by delicacy, he abstained from commun:What village ceremony is about to take place ? He felt cating his doubts, by the slightest hint, to the parents a superstitious desire that no funeral train should meet of Juliet. his eye, as the omen attending his first return to the The following morning found him walking at her Grange. He was diverted from his fears by beholding side towards the village church. She conversed with his bost issue from the house with his family, and, quit- intelligence and animation until her father overtook ting the garden, take the winding path over the rising them. Then she immediately fell back, and walked common, which he so well knew led immediately to the and talked with Marion, evidently with more real sats. church porch. He quickly descried among the group faction. But in the church they were again side ly the slight form of Juliet. He saw, too, how the younger side, and Neville could not but be sensible, that while children hung about her with fondness, and her they joined in the most impressive prayers which man father drew her tenderly to his side. Neville's eyes were ever framed wherewith to address his Maker, Julia fixed upon her till she disappeared among the trees wept-silently,-as secretly as might be,-but, calm : which bounded the common. Then he covered his face she ordinarily was, she could not here wholly restrain with his hands, and in his loneliness he wept. It was the emotion which betrayed a heart full to overflowing. as if he had returned to find Juliet in unimpaired youth Neville's first inquiry was answered. and beauty, while, in himself, all freshness of feeling, (To be continued.) all liveliness of hope, all elasticity of spirit, had been numbed by the touch of time. The contrast was bitter. HISTORY OF THE COTTON MANUFACTURE. NEVILLE was roused from his deep reverie by the It has long been acknowledged, that from the simplest merry shouts of the children as they came bounding matters the most important results may flow. Nor is over the common on their return. The merchant pre- this true in one province of human affairs only, but conpared to join his friend, and, after their first greeting, tinually excmplified in the great departments of morals, asked an explanation of the proceeding he had wit- politics, arts, and science. Some remark uttered carenessed. " Was it not uncommon?” lessly, some thought lighting upon the mind in 2 mo “ No, not uncommon,” replied Mr. Markham; " for ment of reverie, may produce changes in the laws and it is of daily occurrence. At this hour Mr. Villiers, the excellent clergyman whom we have now possessed more constitutions of empires, affecting the condition for than six months, performs the Morning Service, and good or evil of myriads of men through a long course of many, with little detriment to their necessary avoca ages. Thus in human society we see great things rise tions,—though few, I believe, without some slight self- from little. And this is clearly the law in the material sacrifice,--are able to attend. We find it the most be- world; the Nile springs from a brooklet, over which the neficial, the most pleasurable mode of commencing the Abyssinian boy can leap, and Egypt herself has risei day that we can follow." To-morrow I will so commence it with you,” replied from the muddy deposits of a stream ; whilst an insect, Neville, readily; and Juliet, who had just reached the silently working in the deep sea, creates a wlivie spot where they stood, was pleased with the cheerful polynesia, and covers the ocean with a thousand coral alacrity of his voice. Neville's eye rested attentively on | isles. A similar exemplification of the law of growth CHAP. IV. 1 appears in the history of all human works; the first ready for the first stages of the spinning process. This untutored man who launched a hollow tree on the was originally performed by carils, in which were inwaters for a canoe, was a naval architect certainly, and serted wire teeth, when, the cotton being laid upon the stands in the same class with Sir Robert Seppings ; lower card, and the teeth of the upper drawn like a but how numerous were the steps between this rude comb across the entangled mass, the different fibres are vessel and our modern war-ships ! Nowhere, however, drawn in the direction towards which the card is moved. is the progress from the first rude step to the magnifi- Carding was formerly performed by the hand; but a cent development more remarkable than in the cotton machine was subsequently invented, in which the loose manufacture. Startling is the contrast between the old cotton, being laid upon a revolving toothed cylinder, woman working at her distaff, and the mighty machine and pressed against a card fitted with wire teeth, is turning its 2,000 spindles, and forming, with magical gradually placed all one way. A small roller covered celerity, more than 160 miles of thread from a single with teeth snatches off the carded cotton from the pound of cotton. The concentration of power upon one large revolving cylinder, and conducts the soft fleecy object, the many applications of a single machine to band between two rollers which compress it into a closer numerous purposes, and the perfect command exercised substance. In this state the cotton, called a roving, or over the thousand movements, combine to excite the sliver, falls into a vessel placed beneath the roller, admiration of all who walk through a cotton factory. ready for the application of the spinning machines. The All classes have an interest in this branch of British slivers taken from the old hand cards were only a few manufacture, from the peasant boy, or servant girl, inches long ; but those produced by the modern carding whose comforts are advanced by its soft, white produc- machine extend hundreds of yards in length, and a tion, to the statesman who recognises a powerful constant supply of cotton is furnished by means of a element of national prosperity in the imports and ex- revolving cloth called the feeder. This brings the ports dependent upon the cotton loom. Nor will the beaten cotton from the scutching machine to the toothed patriot and the Christian be inattentive to the great cylinder. The next operation is called drawing, and social changes resulting from a manufacture which has consists in combining several slivers, and then druwing caused populous towns to rise in the midst of once silent out these conjoined threads, so that the whole sliver valleys, and thereby drawn into vast masses the once shall not exceed the thickness of the original separate scattered population of a district, -disorganizing old pieces. Thus, several slivers being drawn through modes of life, creating a necessity for new means of rollers, and so reduced to a greater fineness, are united education, and supplying fresh powers for good or evil by passing through a funnel, by which the line is into the nation. Let us then trace the history of the creased in thickness and strength. The cotton next cotton manufacture through its more remarķable stages undergoes the operation called roving, in which several of transition, to the fully developed condition now pre- slivers are joined together as by the drawing process, sented by this branch of human industry. but the roving machine gives a slight twist, this being What is the first state of cotton, and what does it the first step in the spinning. To describe all the pecuresemble before making its appearance in our country? liar details of roving, without reference to working The soft substance which we call cotton, is taken from models, is impossible. But the principle combines the the pods of a tall shrub, classed by botanists in the three acts of uniting several slivers, drawing out the genus Gossypium, in which are found nine or ten species thread thus formed, and giving a slight twist to the of this plant. Those who have studied the botanical loose material. Suppose four slivers are joined in one, system of Linnæus, would place it in the class Monadel. and then drawn out to four times the length of this one, phia, and the order Polyandria. The seeds are taken it is evident that the single resulting sliver will equal from the pods, and dropped into holes, where the plants the lengths of the four from which it is formed. Again, soon appear, and in about eight months produce their let four of such compound slivers be combined, and first crop of that soft material, for the safe transport of stretched to four times the length, it is clear that the which many a ship is employed, and on its arrival so combined thread has no less than sixteen distinct many hundreds of thousands depend for subsistance. slivers in it. These successive combinations and drawThe cotton is, in reality, nothing more than the seedings are important, as they secure an equable thickwrapper; its soft substance surrounding the ripe grains, ness throughout the whole length of the thread. So from which it is separated by an instrument after re- numerous are the operations necessary, even before moval from the pods. These pods are about the size of commencing the work of spinning. These scutchings, a filbert, and burst when ripe, disclosing the cotton, cardings, drawings and rovings involve an amount of which is gathered and prepared for packing. A further labour and skill, of which few who use daily the cotton notice of the plant itself would seem superfluous : let us thread have any conception, therefore leave the whole process of packing and ship- Before proceeding to the various machines employed ping to those whom it may concern, waiting the arrival of in cotton spinning, we must pause to notice the carly the cargo at Liverpool, and the removal of the bales to state of the cotton manufacture, and contrast this with the factories of Lancashire and Yorkshire. the present amount of its production in England; we It is evident, that the newly arrived vegetable down shall then be able to appreciate the powers and the needs considerable preparation before it can be delivered value of the inventions which have effected the change. to the care of the spinner, for, having been closely It is scarcely necessary to remind our readers that the packed in tight bales a long time, the whole is matted cotton manufacture is of modern date; for, though together in one dense mass. It is therefore subjected forming a branch of trade many centuries ago, it is to the operation of a machine fitted to tear open only in later days that it has developed its powers, and the tangled cotton, and free it from the dirt which created for itself a kingdom in the world of art. may have become mingled with it. Having undergone The former state of this manufacture may be most this preliminary loosening and shaking, the cotton is forcibly contrasted with the present by a simple line of prepared for the “scutehing machine,” by which it is figures ; for though these strict unbending little signs still more disentangled and cleansed, being beaten by may not have much poetry in them, they deal in the flat pieces of metal, which move with the rapidity of most convincing of all logic, and utter the most power1,200 revolutions a minute. When the cotton is thus ful of all statements; nor is deep poetry, even the most thoroughly opened and expanded by the “spreading solemn and significant, far from those figures which machine,” it becomes ready for the important operations so often hint with sublime brevity a nation's history. upon which its utility and beauty depend. One of these, Sixty or seventy years ago, a period within the recoland a necessary preliminary to spinning, is carding, lection of some now living, the cotton manufacture conwhich consists in spreading out all the cotton fibres in sumed annually 3,000,000 lbs. of raw cotton; and this, one direction, that the woolly mass may be smooth and no doubt, seemed a vast amount to many at that time. |