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was necessary. They went to the unhappy performer privately, and in succession, in vain striving to stimulate him. The difficulty was to convey the reproof delicately to Wilkie, whose well-known testy disposition might resent such treatment. But nothing would do. In the room the dancers were all leaning forward in an attitude of attention, trying to catch the sound; some, fancying they had caught it, starting long in advance of the others. From experience, I can say myself that the effect was very odd and grotesque, the combined sound of the orchestra having a muffled effect, something like a musicalbox, that was most exasperating. Experiments were tried, moving the instrument and chair right across the door, while the performer sat exactly in the doorway, with his back to the dancers. This answered to a certain extent, though it amounted to complete imprisonment, and shut Mr. Wilkie off from his "jinglejangles" and his companion. However, the vigour of the performance never seemed to abate. The cheeks of the rustic young ladies blazed with a fiery heat, for the carpet had not been removed, and a gritlike dust was mounting in fine clouds, and getting into our throats. To the unsophisticated, however, this seemed enjoyable, and an element only common to all balls. They were happy in their delusion. At one, supper was served, our hostess being awfully exercised during the preceding half-hour, during which the maids had been rushing wildly up and down the stairs. There was none of that misplaced delicacy through which the genteeler host pretends to know nothing of what is going on. I will not even venture to deny that she had been in the kitchen herself, putting a few finishing touches. However, there it was, a banquet in itself: a great many glasses filled with pink and yellow liquid, glasses filled with a jagged yellow formation which we knew to be the jellies, glasses filled with cream; in fact, on analysis, the whole seemed to be contained in glasses; save, of course, the sandwiches. However, it was wonderful for her, a widow lady of moderate means, and we all felt obliged to her. After the meal, Mr. Wilkie, much refreshed, found himself once more in the doorway, and asserting his right to his faithful musical accompaniment, succeeded in getting the "jingle-jangles" within masterly reach, and played away till dawn.

I recal another party with which, however, the higher grotesque is associated.

There was a mild retiring gentleman residing with his family between Richmond and Twickenham. I think he had to do with stock-broking; at least he went into London every day, and I always, on no evidence, set down the Stock Exchange as his destination. They had not been long among us, but his wife and two pretty girls, though shy, inspired an interest. The latter, we saw, enjoyed dancing; they were asked to all the little revels in the district. These compliments entailed obligations, which every one could see were resting on them uneasily. Soon, instigated by these prickings of conscience, and the restless pressure of the malicious, they were beguiled into issuing invitations to a sort of hybrid programme, half musical, half terpsichorean. From that hour a perceptible change was noticed in the hitherto smiling air of the family. They became wan and haggard, and borne down by an open weight of care. Mr. Cooke, such was his name, gave the idea of having some dark and fraudulent stock-broking transaction on his soul. But it was all the ball; they were overwhelmed and crushed by the sense of responsibility. Every refusal was a stab, and would be a disgrace to them. Yet owing to the labours of some interested friends all was going well, and all promised well. Still the forebodings of these unhappy people were to be realised.

Has it been remarked how often a contretemps is so nicely selected, as to fall on the weakest part of the victims, thus adding a special piquancy to the visitation? Thus, if the person dreading misfortune is peculiarly sensitive to ridicule, it is pitched so as to fall in this very direction. There is something almost demoniac in this. Now, as the Cooke family were a shy, sensitive party, shrinking away from rude jests, or even from light persiflage, they were to be selected for a visitation of a peculiarly grotesque and ridiculous kind, from which even robust natures would have shrunk.

The entertainment was about beginning, and so far was full of promise. The girls looked charming, and their spirits fast rising. Mrs. Cooke had already lost that shrinking away or "dodging" air, which always gave the idea that she was avoiding a blow. The embezzlement expression was fast passing away from her husband's face. The company was pouring in. They were being congratulated: "so successful," "quite a feature of the season," "so charming," when a little commotion arose at the other end of the room, where Mrs. Rounders, the curate's lady, was sitting.

Now, it has been mentioned that the whole parish felt a good-natured interest in the Cookes and their little undertaking. One result of this feeling was that Mrs. Rounders, a portly lady, with a large and regularly increasing family, though she had not been very well lately, resolved "that on no account would she disappoint her own girls, Harriet and Charlotte." She would take them herself, and she did So. She was now, or up to that moment had been, looking on with a smiling complacency and interest.

of a detachment of young officers just arriving, in their light manner, and encountering this procession on the stairs. They must have thought it was some rite of inauguration peculiar to the district.

After that it may be imagined with what heart the ball proceeded. On every face during waltz and galop was a sly twinkle. Even the musicians grinned as they fiddled. Meanwhile the stairs became a sort of thoroughfare. At one, arrived Doctor Gunter, the eminent practitioner in that line, who had been sent for from Kew, and had been called out of bed; he tramped upstairs, jostling the dancers who were passing down, and causing wonder and amazement. Women in large bonnets began to be seen. By two it was known through the mansion that everything had gone happily, and at a little after that hour, the curate himself, a red-faced gentleman, and Doctor Gunter, peremptorily called on the host to dismiss the guests, the latter saying "he would not answer for it" if this step were not taken. It had to be done. In three weeks we lost this amiable family, who never held up their heads again, and, indeed, could not bear to look any of us in the face. Mrs. Rounders, on the contrary, took all the airs of a heroine, and always maintained that "the Cookes had behaved with gross inhumanity;" Mr. Rounders even going so far as to say that "he'd like to have seen how they'd have looked if any. thing had gone wrong."

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The phrase was used "regularly and increasing" family, and, indeed, no astronomer could count more accurately on the return of some planet than could the curate on that annual contribution to his household. But there was a disturbing element which no one had reckoned upon-the agitation and excitement. At the end of the room suddenly came a flutter, of which Mrs. Rounders seemed to be the centre. Faces looked anxiously towards the door, and a matron, in quality of aide-de-camp, came spurring to Mrs. Cooke. A hurried whisper, and a spasm of agony shot across the unhappy hostess's face. She flew to her husband, and his face seemed as though the embezzlement had really been discovered, and the officers of justice were waiting below. Horror was, indeed, on all faces, joined with helplessness. They could do nothing, and did nothing. From a distance it seemed as though friendly advisers, experienced, too, in these delicate I recal a large public ball where, in the matters, were pressing prompt retirement middle of a crowded waltz a sudden crash on the suffering lady, which was sternly was heard, and a tall and elderly major in and haughtily resisted. That sort of pride, full regimentals was seen to fall. His partwhich Charles Lamb was perhaps the first ner rose at once, but the major lay so helpto point out, as always associated with less, that the zealous stewards assumed the situation, was present. Her only terms that he was intoxicated, and collected round were, that she should be carried from the him with a view to removing him. Two atroom with the seat on which she reposed. tempted to raise him, laying aside their The situation was so critical, that some wands for the purpose; but an angry roar resolute friends of the house, who, in the from the major, accompanied by an oath, helplessness of the family, took all on on made them desist, though it confirmed themselves, at once agreed to it, and, them in their original view. It was prewith great promptness, brought up the sently found that the elderly major's hip two hired waiters, who seemed not a little was broken-a heavy penalty to pay for perplexed at the service required of them, a waltz. The scene then became an odd which was certainly not within the duties one; dancing was suspended, a vast crowd they had covenanted for. These men, how-gathered round a prostrate gentleman in ever, are in the habit of seeing a good deal of life, and are perhaps astonished at nothing. But the amazed guests, who had no idea of what had happened, or was going to happen, were confounded at the spectacle of a portly lady, in ball-dress, flowers, &c., chaired through the rooms on the shoulders of waiters! I never shall forget the faces

regimentals, who was lying perfectly flat, his eyes staring at the chandelier, the stewards gazing down on him as if on guard. The embarrassment was how to remove him. At the slightest touch he shrieked. A shutter, a door, were suggested. Finally, a squeaking sound was heard in the distance, and a party of

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How exciting at the county ball the whispers after supper, when it becomes known that an altercation had taken place below stairs between Mr. Gunn and Captain Horser. Every gentleman witnessed it, and told his version of the story to every lady. Horser had driven home, it was said, either to procure a horsewhip or a friend, though both articles, it may reasonably be supposed, were close at hand. "High words had passed," including that higher one, Puppy. Gunn had behaved with great spirit and temper, and showed himself on the ground for the rest of the night. In the morning, as a matter of course, handsome, in fact the handsomest, apologies were made on all sides, and Gunn and Horser became sworn brothers.

How pleasant the genuine county ball, where the young girls come from twenty miles round, hungry with perhaps a year's fasting from the dance, and fling themselves into it like famished mariners taken off an island; how the festival goes on until bright morning is shining in at the windows; and how curious the feeling of standing out on the steps in the fresh air, the lights still in the windows, the grass, the flowers, the inspiring breeze, all precisely as things would look about ten o'clock, after breakfast. More curious still the bare shoulders, the wreaths, and the faded eyes.

Sometimes, after a hard night's work, a craving hunger supervenes, intensified by the longed-for supper being delayed. This feeling is rare, for we but too often bring to the banquet a cloyed appetite. I can recal a kind of entertainment given by a pair who lived down at an old-fashioned mansion, and who, by a sort of mysterious épanchement, became of a sudden liberal and open-handed, and invited all their friends to a sort of al fresco entertainment, combining garden-walking and dancing. We were bidden for six, and most had arrived by seven. A long and weary night followed. It was announced that a supper would be served in the great hall at ten precisely; and this prospect served to detain many who would else have departed, and whose appetites the long drive

and keen country air had whetted. For the sense of expectancy, of a wish always on the eve of being gratified, yet always disappointed, is a stimulant. The appointed hour passed by; half-past ten, eleven came round. Like Justice Greedy in the play, there "was a clapper in every one's stomach," signalling dinner-time; the laws of politeness were forgotten, and host and hostess were bluntly plied with the question, "What time would supper begin?" It then transpired that there was a certain Lord L. who had promised to assist, and these ancient toadies, who dearly loved an aristocrat, were determined to wait until he arrived. They were obstinate, rooted, mulish in this determination. No power on earth could get them to allow knife to be plunged into roasted bird before the august visitor should see the grand coup d'oeil of the smoking board. Delicious savours, as of game well browned and savoury, came floating to us from the kitchen. This inflamed us the more, and at half-past eleven old Bolton, a rough customer, went to the host and stated, in a loud voice, that he could not let his health suffer from this fast, and that he must really ask for something to eat at once. On this bold demand, a number of cries broke from the crowd. "My dear sir, you surely don't want to starve us. goodness sake open your rooms. Mrs. Blank is really delicate, and complains of faintness." Nothing would do. The host indeed said he would go and see, and did go and see, actually followed by the whole herd of the hungry, who kept their eyes on him. Presently appeared a servant or two bearing some bottles of sherry and a plate of biscuits. This was received almost with a cry of disgust and rage; not so much from the character of the food as from the certainty it offered of further delay. What would have followed in the state of public exasperation I know not; for Mr. Bolton and some of the more weighty public men were holding a sort of caucus, when Lord L. was at last announced. Almost at once a rush was made to the supper-room door, where numbers had already taken up their places, like pittites waiting" the opening of the doors." When they were at last opened, the lord, who was leading the hostess, was swept away in the unseemly tumult. All decency was forgotten, places were scrambled for, and I actually saw Mr. Bolton carrying away a dish of roast wild-duck to his own part of the room. But the worst was to come. It was to be a good old-fashioned sitting-down supper, and the room

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only equal to containing scarce half the assembled guests. Every place was filled, to the rage and disappointment of those who found themselves shut out, a famished look in their eyes as they crowded restlessly behind the chairs of those who were busily engaged cutting up the roasted birds, and indecently gobbling. These last showed no signs of hurry, but bestowed them selves as for a protracted occupation. Gradually, on repeated helpings, limbs, breasts disappeared, then side - bones; husbands pressing their wives (whom they had taken in with them, but the crisis made everything exceptional), until those standing up were inflamed to madness. At the end there was, in fact, nothing left for them but some meagre fag-ends of cream or jelly—a sponge cake or two-an insult to offer to a hungry man.

PLEADING.

GIVE me thy faith, that looking down
The misty vale of years,

I, too, may see our dear life's crown
Repaying present tears.

Give me thy faith so firm and strong,
Thy trust so large and free,
To feel the years that roll along,
But bring me nearer thee.

Give me thy hope to charm away
My life's untold regret,
And whisper to my heart it may

Know love's own gladness yet. Give me thy hope, so warm, so dear, So sunny and so sweet,

To teach my heart with olden cheer,
And new-born life to beat.

Give me thy patience, dear, to wait,
Till from time's hand hath flown
The crowning hour designed by fate,
To blend our lives in one.
Give me thy patience, hope, and faith,
I need them, thou art strong;
But I am weary unto death:
This waiting is so long!

CHRONICLES OF LONDON STREETS.

CHARING CROSS.

THERE is a tradition that Charing was so named by Edward the First in memory of his "chère reine," his dear Queen Eleanor, whose corpse rested here for the night on its way from Lincoln to Westminster. The real derivation is cerre, Anglo-Saxon for bend; and ing, Anglo-Saxon for meadow. Charing is, therefore, the meadow at the bend of the river, for just there the river makes a great turn southward. In 1260, a chronicler talks of " the village of Charing."

There were ten Eleanor crosses in England; of these three only now remain.

That at Charing is supposed to have been the most costly. It was octagonal, built of the fine-grained Caen stone, with Purbeck marble steps, and eight gilt metal figures, and rising, with pinnacle above pinnacle, like a petrified fountain. It was long supposed that Pietro Cavallini, a contemporary and assistant of Giotto, designed the cross, but it is now known to have been the work of Masters Richard and Roger de Crundale, who received for their labour some five hundred and ninety pounds seven shillings and fivepence. William Torel, a London goldsmith, modelled the figures, which were carved by one Alexander, of Abingdon. On Queen Eleanor's tomb in Westminster Abbey, executed by the aforenamed Torel, seventeen hundred pounds were expended. The cross now in the court-yard of the Charing-cross Station was the work of Mr. E. M. Barry, A.R.A., who put together the details with care from the three rude drawings which are the only extant records of the old memorial. It is, however, spoiled and dwarfed by being placed so near a lofty and huge building. The old cross was pulled down by the Puritans in 1647, and it took the Roundheads three months to destroy. Some of the stones went to form a pavement before Whitehall, while others were sold to antiquaries to make knife-handles. The site remained vacant thirty-one years.

The spot left bare by Puritan bigotry became a slaughter-yard at the Restoration. Hugh Peters, Cromwell's chaplain, Major-General Harrison, Colonel Jones, and Colonel Scrope, were executed here. They died like brave, pious, and sincere men. Harrison-the son of a Staffordshire farmer had been a lawyer's clerk in Clifford's Inn, till he was called to lay down pen and take up sword. He died repenting nothing, disavowing nothing. When some brutal fellow in the crowd shouted, "Where is your good old cause now?" he replied, smiling, and clapping his hand on his breast, "Here it is; and l am going to seal it with my blood!"

When he caught sight of the gallows he was transported with joy, and said to one who asked him how he did, "Never better in my life."

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poor man, thou doest it ignorantly; the Lord grant that this sin be not laid to thy charge."

Then he gave the man all the money in his pocket, embraced his servant, and went up the ladder with a calm and undaunted

countenance,

The cruel rabble, seeing his knees shake, called out with curses that the regicide rogue was shaking with fear.

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Gentlemen," cried this old lion, "by reason of some scoffing that I hear, I judge that some do think that I am afraid to die, by the shaking I have in my hands and knees. I tell you No, but it is by reason of much blood I have lost in the wars, and many wounds I have received in my body, which causeth this shaking and weakness my nerves. I have had it this twelve years. I speak this to the praise and glory of God. He hath carried me above the fear of death. And, gentlemen, take notice, that for being an instrument in that cause which hath been pleaded against us, and which God hath witnessed to by many appeals and wonderful victories, I am brought to this place to suffer death this day, and if I had ten thousand lives I could freely and cheerfully lay them all down to witness to this matter."

Immediately after he was hung, they cut down the old soldier's body, and slashed it open. The moment the hangman's knife touched the flesh, the great heart is said to have made one beat more, and they declare that, in his agony, Harrison arose and struck the executioner a stalwart blow on the face.

They all died in this spirit. When Cooke, another brave Puritan, parted from his wife, as he entered the sledge, he said: "I am going to be married in glory this day. Why weepest thou? Let them weep who part and shall never meet again."

The last words of Scott, another of these Cromwellians, were: "God engaged me in a cause not to be repented of-I say in a cause not to be repented of.”

Colonel Jones said to the weeping child of a fellow-sufferer: "Suppose your father were to-morrow to be King of France, and you had to tarry a little till you could join him, would you weep so? Well, he is going to reign with the King of Kings."

When he saw the sledge, he said: "It is like Elijah's fiery chariot, only this goeth through Fleet-street."

And as he embraced a friend at the door of Newgate, he exclaimed: "Farewell! I could wish thee in the same condition as myself, that our souls might mount

up to heaven together, and share in eternal joys."

Hugh Peters was treated with great cruelty. The Cavaliers made him sit on the scaffold and see a friend hung and quartered, while some came and upbraided Peters with the king's death. He replied calmly: "Friend, you do not well to trample on a dying man; you are greatly mistaken. I had nothing to do in the death of the king."

The hangman then came up rubbing his crimson hands, and said, sneeringly: "Come, how do you like this? How do you like this work ?"

Peters replied calmly: "I am not, I thank God, terrified at it. You can do your worst."

His last words were: "Oh, this is a good day. He is come that I have long looked for, and I shall soon be with Him in glory." And he smiled as he passed away.

The statue of Charles the First, at Charing-cross, was erected in 1674, fourteen years after the Restoration. The statue, cast by Le Soeur as early as 1633, had suffered as many vicissitudes as the exiled monarch who raised it as a memorial of the father whom he disgraced. From a document in the State Paper Office, it has been discovered that it was originally ordered by Lord Treasurer Weston, afterwards Earl of Portland, a proud and mean courtier, of whom Clarendon has left a dark-tinted portrait, for his gardens at Roehampton. But no flowers were to bud and bloom around that pedestal, and in no quiet bocage of rose and honeysuckle was it to sun itself. Instead of standing in the quiet garden where the only sounds were the splash of fountain and the song of bird, the statue was to be the centre of the rush and roar of a great city, and after being buried by crafty Royalists for many years, came to Charing-cross, to stare steadfastly for centuries at that fatal window of the Whitehall banqueting-house.

There is an old legend about the statue, that the sculptor forgot to carve a girth, and, chagrined at his carelessness, destroyed himself when told of the omission. But whatever death Le Soeur died, that could not have been the cause, for there is a girth passing over a very strong rein on the right. Still, Time does gnaw at the statue, for in 1810 the sword, buckles, and straps dropped off, and about the time of the coronation of Queen Victoria, 1838, the sword (a real rapier of the Carolan period) was stolen. A hole in the metal also indicates where

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