is in the rose-bud; but the withering influence of superstition should be unable to discern-and to feel-the difference between the pure glowing of the heart towards its beneficent creator, and the cold formalities which custom would substitute in its stead. In the day of prosperity, she should be conscious of the uncertainty of earthly happiness; and, with the heart to which she has linked her fate, she should encounter the blasts of adversity, not only without repining, but with cheerfulness. She should be a creature, breathing all the warmth of the most generous devotion-unable to reproach, unwilling to be offended, and cautious to avoid the possibility of giving offence, should be, as woman was meant to be to man, a being allied in spirit to the angels, and feeling the passions of earth only, as it were, to divest them in him of their grossness, and to lead him, insensibly, to the disinterestedness and the purity of her own generous feelings.

"A pretty portrait," exclaims the reader, "but only a belle ideal."

Sayest thou so, most sapient critic? My belle ideal of " the beautiful" is my own nearest relative, and wears a gold ring on what the compilers of the Common Prayer Book call the fourth finger of her left hand! R. JARMAN.

To thee, Romance, I bade a cold adieu,
For thou hadst led me from the world away;
Amidst thy gorgeous pageantries to stray,
And all thy fictious follies to pursue:
But when I hear thy witching voice so wild,
Tell all the strife which shook my native
vale,

And monkish Mowbray fills the warlike tale; With mourning Espec, and his fated child, Clothed in thy rich exuberance of tongue

Monastic splendour and baronial pride, The rich old abbey on the mountain's side; The tow'ring castle and its fortress strong, Then oh, Romance, before thy charms I fall, My valediction and my oath recal

THE

G. Y. H-N.

BABINGTONS.

A TALE OF CHADSTOW,
For the Olio.

Continued from p. 269.

darkening the blue sky with their clamorous squadrons, and the Lake of Chadstow, with its snowy swans, was basking in the golden glitter of morning. The Lady Babington and Barbara sate together in a retired oriel at the further end of the apartment, in deep

converse.

"Talk not to me, Barbara," said the Lady Joscelyne, "the Black Priest will be the downfall of his brother's house; my very heart recoils from him, when I think of his restless, plotting spirit, animated as it is by unextinguishable animosity towards my royal patrons. Then my husband so doteth upon him, that even when Sir Oliver's sword was distinguished in the victories of the House of York, his first solicitude was for his unpriestly brother, who had been battling for the bloody Margaret, and the shame-faced Henry! These thinly-veiled discontents, too, of my fiery lord, what may I not fear from the direction this intriguing monk may give to them! And was ever the honor of an ancient house so compromised as ours by his betrayal of last night?"

"Soft, my lady," said Barbara, whose high and open spirit sometimes entrenched on courtesy, " if my late guardian stands committed in ought, he owes it to his own headstrong impulses, and those I join you in regarding with fearful anticipation. As for the monk's conduct yesternight-reflection makes me deem it the result of honest love towards your house; - doubtless we shall find that urgent danger was to be apprehended!"

-

"What danger?" haughtily interposed Joscelyne," what danger so long as we are loyal and what a method of proving our loyalty, to fly like hares from our hall, when every door should have been flung open-every closet lighted-and every coffer unlocked, to shame the eye of suspicion! By my faith, we deserve that the hare should indeed be the tenant of our roofless chambers and cold hearthstones! At all events," pursued the dame, with rising wrath, "Mistress Barbara Somerville, whatever her prudence, whatever her rank, and however she may presume on her new born independence, to slight her too indulgent guardian, will do well to remember that a few months back she would not have dared to adventure yon imprudent vigil!”

The deep and magnificent oriel where this conversation took place was burnished with beautifully coloured glass, displaying the scriptural emblems of

the twelve tribes, and representations of the seasons, finely painted, and each Occupying a single pane. Barbara laughed, and pointed to the emblem of Ephraim, an ass stooping between two burdens.

"Methinks," she said, "it were hard to expect a poor maiden to sustain a guardian's influence on the one hand, and bags of wealth on the other;-nor can we always," she added with provoking sarcasın, "expect to see the gay and buxom Spring, with her yellow scarf, and wreath of hyacinths, endued with the care and foresight which we reasonably expect from yon fur-mantled Winter, stooping over his brazier of faggots. You, lady, were at the vigil!" Joscelyne coloured deeply, and was about to reply in anger, when the voice of the Dame Dyott, from the other end of the apartment, announced that the dejeuner waited. The sun had climbed high ere its stately ceremony concluded -Barbara was, once or twice, on the point of leaving the room, on some pretext, when to her mingled relief and alarm, an attendant entered, and announced to Lady. Babington that the Sieur Vaucler waited below, and requested an immediate and private interview with his kins woman.

Joscelyne arose, and with solemn excuse to Mistress Dyott, quitted the apartment. Barbary also arose, but with much less decorum; her agitated countenance and fluttered manner would have frightened any other than the good quiet dame; as it was, the hostess was not a little surprised when her guest, with hurried expressions of acknowledgment and apology, stated the necessity of her immediate departure for Whichnover, and darting from the room, left the old lady in the act of upsetting a silver tray of comfits, amidst mingled exclamations of regret, and calls to her servants to attend the Lady Barbara, The damsel, however, hastily assuming her hood and mantle, sped through the court, and was quickly by the lake side, whither the disguised princess had preceded her. The steeds stood ready with two mounted servitors in the livery of Somerville, whom Father Paul had contrived to suminon from Curborough, and the party were soon on their way to Whichnover.

Meanwhile, a prolonged and earnest conference was going on between Sir Gilbert Vaucler and Lady Babington, wherein he anxiously aggravated that lady's fears for her husband, at the same time that he artfully inflamed her dis

like of the Black Priest; disclosing as much as he thought fit of their correspondence with the Earl of Oxford and the Archbishop of York-and the finished traitor added that her son Mark was inseparable from the restless Duke of Clarence, (with whom, indeed, he had been brought up,) and was suspected to be an abettor of his treasonable designs. Without we consider that Lady Babington, though a doting wife and an affectionate mother, was a courtier attached by private friendship to the reigning family, and moreover a woman of an imperious disposition, we can scarcely imagine how warmly she adopted the insidious views of Vaucler, or how bitterly her animosity was increased against her brother-in-law, whom she considered as the future obstacle between her family and the full sun-shine of the court. How far this feeling transported her, our story will unfold.

It was with some surprise, however much engrossed by other feelings, that Lady Babington, on taking leave of her hostess, heard of Barbara's precipitate return to Whichnover; to Vaucler, however, it was in some measure gratifying; his suspicions had already received support from the very means that the worthy priest had employed to baffle them, and it need not be told that Vaucler's keen eyes, if they had not detected the fugitive princess, had at least seen enough to satisfy him he had come on no vain search. This flight confirmed him, and his wily speculations thereon hurried him to the destruction he had richly laboured for others. His own views led him, however, carefully to conceal any hint of his suspicions from Lady Babington, who proceeded to Curborough under his escort.

The emissaries with their troops had returned towards Coventry, expressing. themselves satisfied with the result of their investigation; but Sir Oliver's brow was clouded as he announced to his lady that missives had just arrived requiring her immediate presence at court, as lady in waiting to the queen; and by the same messengers it had been announced that Prince George of Clarence purposed accompanying Mark Babington to partake of the hospitality of Curborough.

At this intelligence Joscelyne's brow caught the clouds that shadowed Sir Oliver's countenance; but ere she departed for Coventry she had another private interview with Vaucler, in which it was resolved he should remain

at Curborough, to watch the movements of Clarence, and, if possible, to detach Mark Babington from his counsels. It may be seen that Sir Gilbert lacked not these motives to induce his acquiescence with Lady Babington's wishes.

The city of Coventry at this period well deserved her proud title, "THE CHAMBER OF PRINCES, AND THE SECRET ARBOUR OF QUEENS." Walls of enormous bulk, bristling up at intervals in huge towers, and embattled gateways, girdled with a graceful circumference of three miles, such an assemblage of stately churches and convents, picturesque mansions, blooming gardens, and clustered orchards, as was rarely to be seen, even in that period of chivalric and monastic ornament. The gorgeous cathedral and convent of the Benedictines, the vast church of St. Michael, with its peerless spire, the church of the Holy Trinity, the solid bulk of St. Mary's Hall, and the buildings of the abbatic and episcopal palaces stood grouped in one splendid area that occupied the platform of a hill, sloping softly to the river Sherborne, and soared to view without the slightest interference of any mean contiguous object, an unrivalled picture of ecclesiastical and civil splendour. The priory surpassed all others in the county for amplitude of revenue and splendour, so that an old chronicler says, "As to its magnificence of embellishment, it was enriched with so much gold and silver, that the walls seemed

too narrow to contain it."*

In this stately city, then, King Edward the Fourth held his court at the period of this tale; and it was on a fine Spring morning that Lady Babington and her train entered the woody domains of Cheylesmore Hall, bordering on the southern walls of Coventry, and distinguished no less by its herds of deer, whose antliers and sur-antliers, crowns, palms, and croches, royals and surroyals, would challenge the gallant Sherwood itself for branchy stateliness -than it was marked by its soft lawns of turf, or the gigantic dimensions of its ancient trees. These were now the precincts of the royal court; and from hence (after assuming her robes of ceremony, and partaking a hasty repast), Lady Babington repaired to the city. After a short pause at the Cheylesmore Gate, she passed on, attended by two waiting-women and four men-at-arms, to the Benedictine Minster, where the court was holding a solemn ceremony.

Gulielm, Malmsbur.

A few days ago, the Feast of St. George had been celebrated by the king with grand solemnities, in the St. Mary's Hall, and to-day the youthful Prince of Wales was to stand god-father to a child of the Mayor, so anxious was Edward to conciliate the affections of the Coventry citizens, whom he had recently punished for their adherence to the Red Rose.

When Lady Babington passed under the great western gateway of the cathedral, the ceremony had commenced. There is a gorgeous and gloomy magnificence distributed over every part of a monkish temple, which we look for in vain among the coldly classic fanes of Athens or of Rome. Omitting the broad elevation of the towers, the canopies, the spires, the pinnacles, the array of royal and saintly images that clothe, like an arabesque pattern, the mighty minster, whose giant mould makes all this elaborate decoration resemble diminutive embroidery, the interior alone is absorbing in its splendour.

To be continued.

WOMAN A MYSTERY.

In the year 1798, when his Majesty's ship Juno was commissioned at Deptford by the late Capt. George Dundas, (brother to the late celebrated serjeantsurgeon to the king,) Lieut. S. P. Humphreys, who had just been appointed one of the lieutenants of that ship, was one day attending a working party on shore at the Dock-yard, when a fine-looking boy asked to be received on board, and if Lieut. H. had not selected any one to be his servant, he should be happy to fill that station. The lieutenant was at the time in want of a servant; the boy in a few days came on board, and was entered on the books amongst volunteers of the third class, and for some months filled the situation with great satisfaction to his master and all on board the Juno. At length an accident occurred to William, which obliged the poor lad to be sent to the hospital-ship at Sheerness; a splinter from the ladder of one of the hatchways had entered one of his ankles, and the wound not promising well, the surgeon deemed the removal necessary to speedy recovery. William got well of this misfortune, and was removed to the convalescent ship, on board of which were some Russian seamen, who had lately recovered from a contagious fever: from these men he caught the disease, and was sent back to the hospital ship, where he died. Ou

The surgeon, who was afterwards removed to the Investigator, came on board the Juno to communicate these particulars; many officers now living can attest the truth of this. Capt. Patrick Campbell was at Sheerness at the time; he now commands the Britannia, and can vouch for the fact here related. Lieut. Humphreys is now an old post-captain of twenty-seven years standing, and declares most solemnly that he never for a moment suspected the circumstance; he was certainly kind to his servant, because the attention and assiduity of the servant merited all the master could do in return of course Lieut. H. never would have permitted the poor girl to go to an hospital-ship amongst men, had she revealed the secret to him.

United Serv. Jour.

CHEROCKEE*:

AN AMERICAN TRADITION. Continued from p. 260.

UPON which, bidding them adieu, Cherockee hastily left them, and disappeared in the thickets of the wood. The settlers had in the mean time returned to their employments, and the settlement again assumed its wonted appearance; but it would be out of the course of things for prosperity to last for ever, and in this case there was no exception; for hardly had the people recovered from their former alarm, when they were again put in commotion by the appearance of an Indian messenger, sent by Cherockee, to inform Noah that a party of French intended to cross the mountains, and would most likely molest them if they arrived in safety. And therefore advised them to make preparations for the worst. The instant Noah received this intelligence, he sent Amidab to inform the governor and other settlers (who were by this time assembled in a crowd before the door of his hut) that the enemy intended to cross the mountains, and begged to know what measures he would adopt on the occasion.

The person to whom this message was sent was a strong-built man, rather past the prime of life, and below the

Fraser's Mag.

common size. He was more feared than respected by the settlers, who would most likely have chosen another had they been consulted; but he was not deficient in personal courage, though he wanted skill to direct it. The present emergency, however, prevented all disunion or expostulation. The orders he gave, to collect all the arms the village afforded, was promptly obeyed, and the people before sunset were busily at work making ramparts with earth and trunks of trees, which the woodsmen do with great fecility. The next morning again smiled on them at work, and before the evening closed the village was well surrounded, and all seemed to be secure; only the cry of the night-hawk, and the whispers of the anxious villagers disturbed the solemnity of the woods. In the morning they resumed their preparations, they felled all the nearest trees, and arranged them in such a manner that the enemy could only approach by one way, at which the best marksmen were stationed. The rest were placed behind the ramparts to fire, if the enemy attempted to mount them. The day, however, was not destined to pass as the former, for towards noon the silent forest was disturbed by the bugles of the French, who soon made their appearance on the open area round the village, which had been made both to strengthen the fort and that the trees might afford no shelter. The leader of the French, however, was not a person to be easily daunted by appearances; he ordered his men to try the villagers' courage by a volley, which produced no other effect than a loud laugh, followed by a discharge in return, which brought down several of the enemy, and obliged them to retire for that time; but about midnight, the sentinel who was nearest the point where the enemy were bivouacing, fancied he heard the rustling of leaves as if moved by the force of a flock of deer, or a body of men coming slowly and with great caution through them. He again listened, and again hearing it, he thought it his duty, as their foes were so near, to alarm the men by the report of his gun, and he was not a moment too soon, for hardly had he drawn the trigger when he found himself wounded by an arrow in the shoulder, which was most likely aimed

at his heart.

The besieged were now all in motion; the wood seemed alive with men, shouts arose from every quarter, but all lesser din was drowned in the noise

of the murderous rifles. The enemy rushed with great daring, close up to the ramparts, which they endeavoured to mount, but were repulsed with great loss by the determined valour of the defendants, among whom Amidab shone conspicuous, but was latterly slightly wounded; he had, however, the satisfaction, as he was being carried away, of seeing the enemy retreat in great disorder. If the conflict was bloody where he was, it was nothing in comparison, of the slaughter which took place at the avenue, which had been made in the trees, where the French captain himself led the assault; thrice was he driven backward, and yet he persevered so resolutely, that the besieged thought he would eventually gain it; but his bravery and the courage of his men were useless, for they were obliged to retire, leaving a high mound of their dead behind them, while the besieged had only seven killed and twelve wounded.

The darkness was now giving way to the rising sun, and as the shades disappeared, it was dreadful to behold the extent of the slaughter. The French,

rejected, as impracticable, and still he could propose nothing better. Now what is your opinion, shall we starve, surrender, or risk the lives of a few men? I offered to take the command, as I did not like to propose a scheme in which I would not risk myself."

"For my part," replied Amidab, “I think the governor should submit the case to a council, composed of the eldest and most experienced of the settlers; at the same time I regard the subject as one which will admit of no consideration whatever. We must not starve, and it is our duty not to surrender; therefore, in spite of my wound, I will go to the commandant, and prove to him the necessity of undertaking what you suggest." This he said with great earnestness and warmth.

"Be you still, and I will try him again," said Noah; and so saying, he quitted the hut, and hastened to the governor, whom he found at his door, sitting on the stomp of a tree, disconsolately reading an old religious book. To be continued.

For the Olio.

THE SKETCH BOOK OF GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.

"What is it that disturbs you? are you likewise hurt?"

"No, Amidab, it is because all this bravery of our men is of no avail, for we must surrender for want of provisions."

"I hope not," replied Amidab, "for I should grudge to have received this wound in vain, or that so many gallant fellows should have lost their lives in vain; besides, I do not expect we shall receive quarter if we do surrender."

"That, too, is my opinion; and if the governor would be ruled by me, he would hold out as long as a man remained, for I think they have got a party of Indians with them, against whose nature it would be to give quarter; on the other hand if we hold out, we have nothing but starvation staring us in the face. I did propose to the commandant to send out a party who should make their way, if possible, through the enemy, and endeavour to obtain some provisions; but which he

SHAKSPEARE.

GREAT were the difficulties, and almost insurmountable the prejudices, with which the writer of the Sketch Book had to contend, before he could bask in the cheerful sunshine of public approbation. As the native of a foreign shore-the rival of a sea-girt land, this candidate for literary laurels was naturally viewed with a somewhat jealous eye: he entered among us a stranger, and wrote of a country with which we should suppose him unacquainted, or rather incompetent to touch on those peculiar customs and manners which he has introduced. The subjects, also, of his selection are trite, common-place, and, on first sight, but little calculated either to interest or amuse. originally appeared at New York, in separate numbers, each containing four essays, and obtained a circulation and celebrity unknown in the literary annals of that great and kindred country. On their republication in England, Blackwood invited attention to this unassuming volume; otherwise it is pro

The work