"Not he. Hang Lunnon! Why did he go to Lunnon at all? Why could not he stop at Rutherford like his father and his father's father, and see to the farm? What business had he in a great shop?-a man-mercer's they call it. What call had he to Lunnon, I say? Tell me that, Miss Susan."

66

Why, dear father, you know very well that when Master George Arnot was so unluckily obstinate about the affair of the watercourse, and would go to law with you, and swore that instead of marrying William, poor Mary should be married to the rich maltster old Jacob Giles-William, who had loved Mary ever since they were children together, could not bear to stay in the country, and went off to my uncle, forbidding me ever to mention her name in a letter; and so

"Well! well!" rejoined the father, somewhat softened; "but he need not have turned puppy and coxcomb because he was crossed in love. Pshaw!" added the good farmer, giving a mighty tug with his paddle at a tough mullein which happened to stand in his way; "I was crossed in love myself, in my young days, but I did not run off and turn tailor. I made up plump to another wenchyour poor mother, Susan, that's dead and gone and carried her off like a man; married her in a month, girl; and that's what Will should have done. I'm afear'd we shall find him a sad jackanapes. Jem Hathaway, the gauger, told me last market-day that he saw him one Sunday in the what-d'ye-call't -the Park there, covered with rings, and gold chains, and fine velvets-all green and gold, like our great peacock. Well! we shall soon see. He comes to-night, you say? "Tis not above six o'clock by the sun, and the Wantage coach don't come in till seven. Even if they lend him a horse and cart at the Nag's Head, he can't be here these two hours. So I shall just see the ten-acre field cleared, and be home time enough to shake him by the hand if he comes like a man, or to kick him out of doors if he looks like a dandy." And off strode the stout yeoman in his clouted shoes, his leather gaiters, and smock frock, and a beard (it was Friday) of six days' growth; looking altogether pro

Susan, on her part, continued to thread the narrow winding lanes that led towards Wantage; walking leisurely along, and forming, as she went, half unconsciously, a nosegay of the wild-flowers of the season; the delicate hare-bell, the lingering wood-vetch, the blue scabious, the heaths which clustered on the bank, the tall graceful lilac campanula, the snowy bells of the bindweed, the latest briarrose, and that species of clematis, which, perhaps because it generally indicates the neighbourhood of houses, has won for itself the pretty name of the traveller's joy, whilst that loveliest of wild-flowers, whose name is now sentimentalized out of prettiness, the intensely blue forget-me-not, was there in rich profusion.

Susan herself was not unlike her posy; sweet and delicate, and full of a certain pastoral grace. Her light and airy figure suited well with a fair mild countenance, breaking into blushes and smiles when she spoke, and set off by bright ringlets of golden hair, parted on her white forehead, and hanging in long curls on her finely-rounded cheeks. Always neat but never fine,-gentle, cheerful, and modest, it would be difficult to find a prettier specimen of an English farmer's daughter than Susan Howe. But just now the little damsel wore a look of care not usual to her fair and tranquil features; she seemed, as she was, full of trouble.

"Poor William!" so ran her thoughts, "my father would not even listen to his last letter because it poisoned him with musk. I wonder that William can like that disagreeable smell! and he expects him to come down on the top of the coach, instead of which, he says that he means to purchase a—a— (even in her thoughts poor Susan could not master the word, and was obliged to have recourse to the musk-scented billet) britschka-ay, that's it! or a droschky; I wonder what sort of things they are-and that he only visits us en passant in a tour, for which, town being so empty, and business slack, his employer has given him leave, and in which he is to be accompanied by his friend Monsieur VictorVictor-I can't make out his other name-an eminent perfumer who lives next door. To think of bringing a Frenchman here, remembering how my father hates the whole nation! Oh dear, dear! And yet I know William. I know why he went, and I do believe, in spite of a little finery and foolishness, and of all the britschkas, and droschkies, and Victors, into the bargain, that he'll be glad to get home again. No place like home! Even in these silly notes, that feeling is always at the bottom. Did not I hear a carriage before me? Yes!-no!-I can't tell. One takes everything for the sound of wheels when one is expecting a dear friend! And if we can but

get him to look as he used to look, and to be what he used to be, he won't leave us again for all the fine shops in Regent Street, or all the britschkas and droschkies in Christendom. My father is getting old now, and William ought to stay at home," thought the affectionate sister;" and I firmly believe that what he ought to do, he will do. Besides which surely there is a carriage now."

Just as Susan arrived at this point of her cogitations, that sound which had haunted her imagination all the afternoon, the sound of wheels rapidly advancing, became more and more audible, and was suddenly succeeded by a tremendous crash, mixed with men's voices -one of them her brother's-venting in two languages (for Monsieur Victor, whatever might be his proficiency in English, had recourse in this emergency to his native tongue) the different ejaculations of anger and astonishment which are pretty sure to accompany an overset; and on turning a corner of the lane, Susan caught her first sight of the britschka or droschky, whichever it might be, that had so much puzzled her simple apprehension, in the shape of a heavy-looking open carriage garnished with head and apron, lying prostrate against a gate-post, of which the wheels had fallen foul. Her brother was fully occupied in disengaging the horses from the traces, in reprimanding his companion for his bad driving, which he declared had occasioned the accident, and in directing him to go for assistance to a cottage half a mile back on the road to Wantage, whilst he himself intimated his intention of proceeding for more help to the Farm; and the obedient Frenchman who, notwithstanding the derangement which his coiffure might naturally be expected to have experienced in his tumble, looked, Susan thought, as if his hair were put in paper every night and pomatumed every morning, and as if his whole dapper person were saturated with his own finest essences, a sort of travelling perfumer's shop, a peripatetic pouncet-box-walked off in the direction indicated, with an air of habitual submission, which showed pretty plainly that, whether as proprietor of the unlucky britschka, or from his own force of character, William was considered as the principal director of the present expedition.

Having sent his comrade off, William Howe, leaving his steeds quietly browsing by the way-side, bent his steps towards home. Susan advanced rapidly to meet him; and in a few seconds the brother and sister were in each other's arms; and, after most affectionate greetings, they sat down by mutual consent upon a piece of felled timber which lay upon the bank-the lane on one side being bounded by an old coppice-and began to ask each other the thousand questions so interesting to the children of one house who have been long parted.

Seldom surely has the rough and rugged bark of an unhewed elm had the honour of supporting so perfect an exquisite. Jem Hathaway, the exciseman, had in nothing exaggerated the magnificence of our young Londoner. From shoes which looked as if they had come from Paris in the ambassador's bag, to the curled head and the whiskered and mustachioed countenance, (for the hat which should have been the crown of the finery was wanting-probably in consequence of the recent overturn,) from top to toe he looked fit for a ball at Almack's, or a fête at Bridgewater House; and, oh! how unsuited to the old-fashioned homestead at Rutherford West! His lower appointments, hose and trousers, were of the finest woven silk; his coat was claret colour, of the latest cut; his waistcoat -talk of the great peacock! he would have seemed dingy and dusky beside such a splendour of colour! - his waistcoat literally dazzled poor Susan's eyes; and his rings, and chains, and studs, and brooches, seemed to the wondering girl almost sufficient to stock a jeweller's shop.

In spite of all this nonsense, it was clear to her, from every look and word, that she was not mistaken in believing William unchanged in mind and disposition, and that there was a warm and a kind heart beating under the finery. Moreover, she felt that if the unseemly magnificence could once be thrown aside, the whiskers and mustachios cleared away, and his fine manly person reinstated in ' the rustic costume in which she had been accustomed to see him, her brother would then appear greatly improved in face and figure,taller, more vigorous, and with an expression of intelligence and frankness delightful to behold. But how to get quit of the finery, and the Frenchman, and the britschka? Or how reconcile her father to iniquities so far surpassing even the smell of musk?

William, on his part, regarded his sister with unqualified admiration. He had left a laughing blooming girl, he found a delicate and lovely young woman, all the more lovely for the tears that mingled with her smiles, true tokens of a most pure affection.

"And you really are glad to see me, Susy? And my father is well? And here is the old place, looking just as it used to do; house, and ricks, and barn-yard, not quite in sight, but one feels that one shall see them at the next turning the great coppice right opposite, looking thicker and greener than ever! how often we have gone nutting in that coppice!— the tall holly at the gate, with the woodbine climbing up, and twisting its sweet garlands round the very topmost spray like a coronet;

many a time and often have I climbed the holly to twine the flaunting wreath round your straw-bonnet, Miss Susy! And here, on the other side of the hedge, is the very field where Hector and Harebell ran their famous

THE WIDOW'S DOG.

ONE of the most beautiful spots in the north of Hampshire-a part of the country which, from its winding green lanes, with the trees meeting overhead like a cradle, its winding roads between coppices, with wide turfy margents on either side, as if left on purpose for the picturesque and frequent gipsy camp, its abundance of hedge-row timber, and its extensive tracts of woodland, seems as if the fields were just dug out of the forest, as might have happened in the days of William Rufus-one of the loveliest scenes in this lovely county is the Great Pond at Ashley End.

Ashley End is itself a romantic and beautiful village, straggling down a steep hill to a clear and narrow running stream, which crosses the road in the bottom, crossed in its turn by a picturesque wooden bridge, and then winding with equal abruptness up the opposite acclivity, so that the scattered cottages, separated from each other by long strips of garden ground, the little country inn, and two or three old-fashioned tenements of somewhat higher pretensions, surrounded by their own mossgrown orchards, seemed to be completely shut out from this bustling world, buried in the sloping meadows so deeply green, and the hanging woods so rich in their various tinting, along which the slender wreaths of smoke from the old clustered chimneys went smiling peacefully in the pleasant autumn air. So profound was the tranquillity, that the slender streamlet which gushed along the valley, following its natural windings, and glittering in the noonday sun like a thread of silver, seemed to the unfrequent visiters of that remote hamlet the only trace of life and motion in the picture.

The source of this pretty brook was undoubtedly the Great Pond, although there was no other road to it than by climbing the steep hill beyond the village, and then turning suddenly to the right, and descending by a deep cart-track, which led between wild banks covered with heath and feathery broom, garlanded with bramble and briar roses, and gay with the purple heath-flower and the delicate harebell, to a scene even more beautiful and more solitary than the hamlet itself.

* One of the pleasantest moments that I have ever known, was that of the introduction of an accomplished young American to the common harebell, upon the very spot which I have attempted to describe. He had never seen that English wild-flower, consecrated by the poetry of our common language, was struck even more than I expected by its delicate beauty, placed it in his button-hole, and repeated with enthusiasm the charming lines of Scott, from the Lady of the Lake:

"For me."--she stooped, and, looking round,
Plucked a blue harebell from the ground,-
"For me, whose memory scarce conveys
An image of more splendid days,

It was a small clear lake almost embosomed in trees, across which an embankment, formed for the purpose of a decoy for the wildfowl with which it abounded, led into a wood which covered the opposite hill; an old forest-like wood, where the noble oaks, whose boughs; almost dipped into the water, were surrounded by their sylvan accompaniments of birch, and holly, and hawthorn, where the tall trees met over the straggling paths, and waved across the grassy dells and turfy brakes with which it was interspersed. One low-browed cottage stood in a little meadow-it might almost be called a little orchard-just at the bottom of the winding road that led to the Great Pond: the cottage of the widow King.

Independently of its beautiful situation, there was much that was at once picturesque and comfortable about the cottage itself, with its irregularity of outline, its gable-ends and jutting-out chimneys, its thatched roof and pent-house windows. A little yard, with a small building which just held an old donkeychaise and an old donkey, a still older cow, and a few pens for geese and chickens, lay on one side of the house; in front, a flower court, surrounded by a mossy paling; a larger plot for vegetables behind; and, stretching down to the Great Pond on the side opposite the yard, was the greenest of all possible meadows, which, as I have before said, two noble walnut and mulberry trees, and a few aged pears and apples, clustered near the dwelling, almost converted into that pleasantest appanage of country life, an orchard.

Notwithstanding, however, the exceeding neatness of the flower-court, and the little garden filled with beds of strawberries, and lavender, and old-fashioned flowers, stocks, carnations, roses, pinks; and in spite of the cot

This little flower, that loves the lea,
May well my simple emblem be;
It drinks heaven's dew as blithe as rose
That in the King's own garden grows,
And when I place it in my hair,
Allan, a bard, is bound to swear
He ne'er saw coronet so fair."

sociations the flower sacred to Milton and Shak

Still greater was the delight with which another American recognised that blossom of a thousand asspeare-the English primrose. He bent his knee to the ground in gathering a bunch, with a reverential expression which I shall not easily forget, as if the by whom it has been consecrated to fame; and he flower were to him an embodiment of the great poets also had the good taste not to be ashamed of his own enthusiasm. I have had the pleasure of exporting, family one of my visiters belongs,) roots and seeds of this spring, to my friend Miss Sedgwick, (to whose these wild flowers, of the common violet, the cowslip, and the ivy, another of our indigenous plants which

Theodore Sedgwick was especially delighted. It will our Transatlantic brethren want, and with which Mr.

be a real distinction to be the introductress of these plants into that Berkshire village of New England, ! where Miss Sedgwick, surrounded by relatives worthy of her in talent and in character, passes her sum

mers.

tage itself being not only always covered with climbing shrubs, woodbine, jessamine, clematis, and musk-roses, and in one southern nook a magnificent tree-like fuchsia, but the old chimney, actually garlanded with delicate creepers, the maurandia, and the lotus spermus, whose pink and purple bells, peeping out from between their elegant foliage, and mingling with the bolder blossoms and darker leaves of the passion-flower, give such a wreathy and airy grace to the humblest building;* in spite of this luxuriance of natural beauty, and of the evident care bestowed upon the cultivation of the beds, and the training of the climbing plants, we yet felt, we could hardly tell why, but yet we instinctively felt, that the mossgrown thatch, the mouldering paling, the hoary apple-trees, in a word, the evidences of decay visible around the place, were but types of the fading fortunes of the inmates.

And such was really the case. The widow King had known better days. Her husband had been the head keeper, her only son head gardener, of the lord of the manor; but both were dead; and she, with an orphan grandchild, a thoughtful boy of eight or nine years old, now gained a scanty subsistence from the produce of their little dairy, their few poultry, their honey, (have I not said that a row of bee-hives held their station on the sunny side of the garden?) and the fruit and flowers which little Tom and the old donkey carried in their season to Belford every market-day.

Besides these, their accustomed sources of income, Mrs. King and Tom neglected no means of earning an honest penny. They stripped the downy spikes of the bulrushes to stuff cushions and pillows, and wove the rushes themselves into mats. Poor Tom was as handy as a girl; and in the long winter evenings he would plait the straw hats in which he went to Belford market, and knit the stockings, which, kept rather for show than for use, were just assumed to go to church on Sundays, and then laid aside for the week. So exact was their economy.

The only extravagance in which Mrs. King indulged herself was keeping a pet spaniel, the descendant of a breed for which her husband had been famous, and which was so great a favourite, that it ranked next to Tom in her affections, and next to his grandmother in Tom's. The first time that I ever saw them, this pretty dog had brought her kind mistress into no small trouble.

We had been taking a drive through these beautiful lanes, never more beautiful than when the richly tinted autumnal foliage contrasts with the deep emerald hue of the autumnal herbage, and were admiring the fine effect of the majestic oaks, whose lower branches almost touched the clear water which reflected so brightly the bright blue sky, when Mrs. King, who was well known to my father, advanced to the gate of her little court, and modestly requested to speak with him.

The group in front of the cottage was one which it was impossible to contemplate without strong interest. The poor widow, in her neat crimped cap, her well-worn mourning gown, her apron and handkerchief, coarse, indeed, and of cheap material, but delicately clean, her grey hair parted on her brow, and her pale intelligent countenance, stood leaning against the doorway, holding in one thin trembling hand a letter newly opened, and in the other her spectacles, which she had been fain to take off, half hoping that they had played her false, and that the ill-omened epistle would not be found to contain what had so grieved her. Tom, a fine rosy boy, stout and manly for his years, sat on the ground with Chloe in his arms, giving vent to a most unmanly fit of crying; and Chloe, a dog worthy of Edwin Landseer's pencil, a large and beautiful spaniel, of the scarce old English breed, brown and white, with shining wavy hair feathering her thighs and legs, and clustering into curls towards her tail and forehead, and upon the long glossy magnificent ears which gave so much richness to her fine expressive countenance, looked at him wistfully, with eyes that expressed the fullest sympathy in his affliction, and stooped to lick his hand, and nestled her head in his bosom, as if trying, as far as her caresses had the power, to soothe and comfort him.

day next, or else my goods will be seized and sold. And I have but just managed to pay