aid, for a woman without a head!-O father, father! and O mother, mother! it is well you are low to-day!—that you don't see this affliction and disgrace to your daughter that you reared decent and tender. O Larry, you villain, you'll be the death of your lawful wife going after such 0-0—0—”

“Well,” says Larry, putting his hands in his coat-pockets, “least said is soonest mended. Of the young woman I know no more than I do of Moll Flanders; but this I know, that a woman without a head may well be called a Good Woman, because she has no tongue!"

How this remark operated on the matrimonial dispute, history does not inform us. It is however reported that the lady had the last word.

THE RISING OF THE NILE.

RICH is the earth in streams,

O'er the green land unnumbered waters glide;
But brighter than the rest thy current gleams,
Egyptian tide!

'Time throws no shadow on thy silver crown,
O river of renown!

Rich are the ancient shores,

Made fertile by the flow, in piles that stand
To point how far the feeble spirit soars

Above the land:

Thy wave sublime o'ersweeps the marvellous ground,
A marvel more profound.

The Pyramids are there;

Yet once the sunshine fell upon the spot

On which they stand: forth went thy current fair,

And found them not.

Old as the earth they seem, but thou wert old
Ere man conceived their mould.

And when the traveller's eye

Shall find these sculptured glories (as it will)
Crumbled and dim, thy sands shall not be dry,
But sparkle still :

Along thy shores their ancient dust may fall,
But thou shalt flow o'er all.

A hundred times the morn

Hath tinged the living flood; which now rolls back
Leaving rich verdure upon fields forlorn,

And when, where'er its sacred streams were found

That was Egyptian ground!

LAMAN BLANCHARD.

THE LOST FRIEND.*

Oh, known the earliest, and esteemed the most,
Dear to a heart where nought was left so dear!
Though to my hopeless days for ever lost,
In dreams deny me not to see thee here!
And morn in secret shall renew the tear
Of consciousness awaking to her woes,
And Fancy hover o'er thy bloodless bier,
Till my frail frame return to whence it rose,
And mourn'd and mourner lie united in repose.

BYRON.

In my younger days I visited the capital of Ireland, in company with a friend, whom I shall call Walsingham-a youth of rare talents, superior acquirements, and generous disposition. We had been associates from infancy; our parents had been on terms of friendship prior to our birth; the same preceptors had superintended our education; and, to crown all, a similarity of pursuit, in riper years, served to bind us more closely together. For my own part, I cherished for Walsingham a regard nothing short of fraternal-a regard which I calculated on his one day claiming as his right, in consequence of an alliance eagerly sought by him, and anticipated with pleasure by all concerned; and, on his side, it seemed the study of his life to prove the sincerity and strength of his affection for me and mine.

Our motives for visiting Ireland, at the period I allude to, were simply those of curiosity. Both had a passion for roaming, in order to gratify which, we had penetrated into the most retired fastnesses of the Scottish Highlands-had visited the barren rocks of Zetland and Orkney-and, latterly, nearly the whole of the Hebrides, from one of which (Islay) we ran across in a fishing skiff to the Irish shore, and after a due examination of the wonders of the Giant's Causeway, proceeded on to Dublin, with the intention of concluding our protracted excursion by a survey of that metropolis.

Though we carried introductions to several families in Dublin, and, in consequence, had many pressing invitations to throw ourselves on private hospitality, we uniformly declined civilities that threatened to curtail our liberty. We had entered on the excursion, not for the purpose of hunting out good cheer and frivolous amusement, but to store our minds with information regarding the districts we traversed; therefore, any engagements militating against this pursuit were studiously avoided. True it is, that now and then an evening was devoted to a lively party; but the day was invaria* From Tales of a Pilgrim.' By the late Alex. Sutherland.

૨૩

bly spent in rambling round, or in examining objects worthy of observation within the metropolis. It was the indulgence of these prying, inquisitive habits, which eventually occasioned the misfortune I lament, and for ever interrupted my search after knowledge. One day, on our way to the outskirts of the city, it chanced that we had to pass near to a church, remarkable, as we had been previously told, for the extensive vaults beneath it-most of which were appropriated for the reception of some of the noblest families in the realm. The doors of the edifice stood open inviting us to enter; and a short consultation with the sexton, whom we encountered in the porch, induced us to accept the invitation. The entrance into the vaults was at that moment unobstructed, the remains of a person of note being to be laid within them on the ensuing day; and, for a trifling gratuity, the porter of these dreary mansions agreed to let us behold them. Constitutionally gloomy, and looking upon everything in nature with the eye of a moralist and a poet, Walsingham expressed delight at his acquiescence; but the triumph of the grave was to me always a painful sight, and I followed unwillingly, and with a faltering step.

As we had been led to expect, we found the vaults capacious, and, from their branching off into various compartments, more like the catacombs of a great city, than places reserved for the interment of a few families. A cold damp air, sluggish and perceptibly unwholesome, saluted us on our entrance; and, sunk far below the surface of the ground, and remote from noisy streets, no sound disturbed the silence of the vaults, save ever and anon, when the crash of rotten boards and fleshless bones told that the noxious rat had taken up its abode among the coffins of the dead. The rat was a creature I instinctively detested; and the proximity of one of the species was of itself sufficient at any time to unnerve me; it was no ways surprising, therefore, that the pattering of multitudes, on the hollow-sounding shells that doubtless contained the food they subsisted on, created in my mind disgust towards the place. Walsingnam, from feeling none of this intuitive horror, betrayed an evident unwillingness to give way to my entreaties, and depart with his curiosity ungratified; but, accustomed to acquiesce in whatever I proposed, he at length complied, and we speedily regained the world above, and the pure air of heaven. At parting, my companion put some brief question to the sexton; but, exulting in my liberation, I gave no heed to a circumstance so trivial.

During the excursion which this occurrence had induced us for a short space to procrastinate, Walsingham frequently reverted to the subject of the vaults-sometimes jesting with me on my pusillanimity in regard to vermin, at others moralising over what he

had recently beheld, in that sublime and eloquent strain of declamation for which he was remarkable. An accident I met with in

the course of the day, however, changed the current of his thoughts. In scrambling over the rocks on the northern shore of the bay-to which we had directed our steps-I chanced to make an unlucky stumble, and so severely sprained my ancle, as to oblige us to conclude our ramble by a ride back to Dublin in a post chaise.

On the ensuing day, my twisted joint continued to give me acute pain, and the swelling had increased so prodigiously as to preclude all attempts at exertion. A surgeon was called in to examine it;

and inferring from his declaration that I had to calculate on close confinement for at least a week, I entreated Walsingham not to let me draw too largely on his good nature, but to seek out of doors what amusement he listed, and only become my companion when he had nothing more interesting to occupy his time. After some demur, a sudden thought seemed to strike him, and in a cursory way, he mentioned that he would take a short saunter in the course of the morning. In a few minutes he got up, took his hat, and with an assurance that two hours would be the duration of his absence, departed. It was the last time I looked upon him in life.

The two hours passed-dinner was served-long left untasted, and at length eaten with reluctance, and petulant reflections on his want of punctuality. Tea and supper in like manner appeared and vanished without his partaking of either; and finally, towards midnight, I saw myself under the necessity of retiring, without having an opportunity of exchanging the friendly expressions with which we usually separated. Then, and not till then, did my heart misgive me, and a qualm of sickening apprehension pervade my frame. Dublin I knew to be a city noted for ruffian acts, and overrun with desperadoes given to robbery, and the shedding of blood: in his solitary wanderings my friend might have encountered a footpad; that he would endeavour to repel force by force, I could securely calculate on; and of the consequences of such teme. rity I trembled to think. Be this as it might, however, I had no means of relieving my anxiety. My injured limb fettered me to my apartment, and no other procedure was left but to seek my pillow, supported by the hope that some juvenile frolic had tempted him to overstep the boundaries of prudence, and that on the morrow he would meet me at breakfast, ashamed of his indiscretion, but unharmed by either bludgeon or knife. Such was the mode of reasoning by which I sought to cheat an anxious mind, but it failed to secure me sound repose. All night I tossed restlessly on my bed-now racking my brain with vague suppositions, or listening breathless for the peal that was to announce his arrival;