earnest ; nor shall we need to look for those opportunities very far from home.

We know that thoughts will wander let us watch them ever so diligently: "but let them ramble," says Mactrair, "if ramble they must, among objects that are useful and holy, "and thus become so purified and spiritualized, that shunning all the contamination of evil, as the feathered tribes are said to shun the noxious atmosphere of the sea which covers the ruins of Sodom and Gomorrah, they may find no resting place save on hallowed ground." Earth is our present dwelling, where each has his or her appointed sphere of usefulness-their mission of love and duty-heaven is our home-and all else but Dreamland!

PRIDE AND JEALOUSY.

(Continued from page 224.)

Constance and Edward sat together once more in the little bower, where erst we had seen them by the margin of the river which was all but noiselessly gliding away at their feet.

And was there no change in their appearance? no question of the reason of the change? Poor Constance how pale and Iwan she looked. The roses which aforetime had bloomed on her maidenly cheek, had fled and left there the whiteness of the lily's hue; and Edward-his lips were pallid and quivering. And how thin he had grown. He might have been feeding upon the poison of asps.

It was the "stilly-night." A delicious calm seemed to be spread over the earth. It was one of those serene and lovely evenings on which a heavenly quietude pervades earth, air and sky, and in which the mind as it looks abroad upon the past or fresh adorns the future, in the same way as the physical eye surveys the landscape now on the one hand and now on the other (lost as it were in the receding view, as twilight gathers over the scene) - becomes wrapt in thoughts and emotions too ethereal for words. On such occasions who has not felt itwho cannot testify to it-that we are in effect transported from the world of pain and care in which our lot is cast-insensible that we have ever shrunk from sorrow, or been wounded by the

shaft of affliction. At such times even in our later years as we thus sit in solitary communion with our secret thoughts, or clasping the hand of affection which so cordially embraced us in our youth's summer, as the tide of memory rushes into the soul as if to fill it with sweet recollections and to pervade it with a glow of happiness which human sound would dissipate, we appear to have a renewed existence. Then regardless of the din of active life which is so perpetually going on around us, and equally unmindful of the disappointments so numerous and so heart-wearing which have chequered our career we do indeed. realize something, at least in feeling, of the day dreams of our childhood.

And thus motionless and voiceless, sat Constance and Edward. And, how beautiful it looked, how savouring of the earlier years of their affection, before doubt or jealousy had entered into their love-you would have thought no thorn had ever wounded their peace. Yes, they were children again, and the head of the sister unconsciously reclined on the bosom of the brother. By a kind of mutual and tacit consent, they had silently agreed that at least they might retain with the memory, the feeling and the love of their tender and infant years. They were now but children of larger growth. We have said that both were silent and still. Their hearts were full of the subduing sense of sadness-too busy were their thoughts for words. Neither questioned the change which each believed the other to have undergone. Their earlier love still existed; their after affection might have been a mistake. Constance doubted not but that Edward had met with some fairer and better being than herself and she strove to feel contented, so that he were but happy; and thus in the silent hours she nourished the pride which was destroying her peace. And he! Edward! could there be a question from all that he had seen and heard that Sir Henry Hargrave was regarded with more favor by Constance than himself. Why then should words of reproach be uttered? Did not each believe the other to be adding to his or her individual happiness?

Both argued thus unconsciously; and who does not know how, when we are lost in reverie, thought almost without volition, works within the brain.

And there silently they sat as if there were nothing in common about which they could converse- they who before that fatal separation had had so much to talk about, so much to enjoy in the expression of their sympathy with each other, with nature, with the spirituality of religion, the liberality of love.

The silence was at length broken by Constance who without moving her head turned her beautiful-and they were really beautiful and expressive eyes upwards as she said.

"And why, Edward, must you leave us so soon; you have scarcely been home a week and we have not seen each other for many months? Why are you so silent-so changed-you who could once find music in the warbling note of every feathered chorister, in every murmur of the brook, in the night wind as it sighed through the trees, who could discourse so sweetly upon all things, and who even in the tender blade of grass as well as in the beautiful flowers, in the flowing river, in the cloudless sky in which every star was a world, found subjects to fill my young mind with wonder and delight, and gave me cause to

She paused.

"To what?" was the rejoinder.

"To-to love you—to love you fondly and sincerely; I am not wrong in saying so now."

"Love me," said Edward abstractedly; his thoughts dwelling upon the expressive "now."

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Why do you repeat my words ?" asked Constance. "Why have you conversed so little with me too since you have been at home." Again after a pause she continued "Oh, am I not still at least your sister. Why have you appeared as I know you have, to shun me—chosing a different path to the one in which you saw me treading, and flying from the one in which you heard me following you, and when I would have spoken to you why have you frowned and turned aside? Tell me if I have offended you?"

"Offended," ejaculated Edward,-" No, not offended me.

But

"No, I knew that was impossible," interposed Constance ; her womanly pride coming in aid of her womanly love. Then starting up as if some new idea had struck her, she threw back her long silken tresses which had strayed wantonly over her fair brow as she rapidly ejaculated-" Oh, Edward, can it be possible that your Constance, who loved you as a child, who loved you as a girl, now that she has become a woman has lost your affection-even as a SISTer. Edward, we were children once, and who shall I speak to? whom shall I love when you are gone? and yet forgive me, I strangely forget myself. My thoughts were wandering back to other times, and in the childishness of my feelings I forgot that it was only in feeling that I was a child now."

Edward's lips moved though inaudibly. But this the current of his thoughts-Loved me as a woman-not loves. It must be so, alas! dissembler-how-beautiful-but how frail a thing. art thou, oh woman!

"What do you say, Edward ?" asked Constance." Oh, let us be children again, and forget all that has intervened between that period of our happy existence and the present."

She was interrupted by Edward, to whom the scene was becoming one intensely painful. In a tone intended to be playful, but which in Constance's ears sounded very much like earnest, he merely observed, " And what need you mind, fair Constance; when I am gone you will still have your new friend left you know."

"My new friend—who ?"

"Sir Henry."

"Sir Henry," ejaculated Constance. And now a tear which had been gathering in her soft blue eyes trembled and fell. "Sir Henry," she again repeated, half thoughtfully, half musingly.

"Yes," was the reply, "Sir Henry Hargrave-your new Lover-may he be as constant, and as true as the old one. Be it as you wish, I will strive to think that we ARE children."

"My new lover," cried Constance, not heeding the latter part of the sentence. Then abruptly changing her style of expression she continued-" Well, well, why should we unnecessarily hurt the hand which has wounded us, that were only to add cruelty to unkindness.

Edward offered Constance his arm, and as they walked towards the house, he continued in reply to another observation_ "Nay, my dear sister, do I not know how he has called upon you day after day? Have I not seen him encircle you in his arm? Stop till I explain all. I have seen you together when you knew nothing of my presence. I have heard your silvery voice blending its music with his. I have seen you hang upon his arm, look up into his proud face and smile, as once you used to do only in mine, and that too when you told me," and his voice sank into a murmur. "You loved me better than all the world-nay, stay till I have done. I have seen him on his knees before you, nor have I reason to doubt that though I saw them not, his rapturous kisses were implanted upon lips which, save only of our foster parent, none should ever after that night have pressed but mine." And now Constance was confounded and abashed. Circumstances which had never

impressed her mind before, now flashed upon her recollection, and in that little moment she saw the cause of all the estrangement, but still she was confounded. Her heart acquitted her, and why should not her lover do so too? Still she felt that she had driven him from her arms into the love of another. And yet his very confession had aroused the bursting pride which mantled in blushes upon her cheek, that the innocent stars might have chid themselves for gazing on. She, therefore, simply remarked-" I do not understand you, Edward." At length she muttered-" unless you mean that you have stooped to play the spy upon my actions, and now condescend to turn informer of your own dishonor. It is true that Sir Henry

"Oh do not attempt to defend yourself my pretty Constance!" said Edward in a tone of bitter irony. "I did not mean to reproach you; surely you may choose for yourselfthe world is large enough for choice for us both. And why should I blame you for preferring a title and a fortune to a poor scholar, with small hope of fortune, no prospect but the grave."

Constance threw herself upon her knees, and looking up into Edward's face, upon which there was a deep glow of anger, or passion, or wounded pride, perhaps a mixture of all. She strove to speak-for although she felt that a separation between them was inevitable, she did not desire that the parting should be in anger, or that all thought of former love and present hope should be pressed out of her young heart.

Edward turned his head, and with a motion of his hand, put the weeping girl as it were aside. He deemed then that he scorned her that he would not listen to her-and now it was Constance's turn to be offended. Her love a moment before, had, at least for that instant, gained the mastery over her pride. Now her pride grew strong again, and her eyes which before had filled with tears, burned scorchingly.

She felt that she was contemned as well as slighted. She rose, and to the full height of her commanding figure, her bosom swelled, her voice lost all of its silvery tone, it was hoarse with emotion.

And Edward, he who should have cherished, not reproved his faithful, fond, but erring girl. He who should have embraced. Oh, no, not repulsed her. How bore he this trial scene ? As he gazed upon Constance every angry feeling passed away, and every muscle of his face, which would otherwise have betrayed the scarcely repressible emotions of his soul, was subdued in its action, only by a resolution stronger