no sinecure, and the latter put up their daily prayers to Heaven for the arrival of the expected tutor.

One evening, the countess, feeling a little better, permitted Leon to remain with her. The general had that morning received a letter from a friend in Paris, respecting the difficulty of finding a proper person who would consent to undertake the charge of training a youth so far from the French capital.

"This gives me great pain," said the count, "for it is a shame to see Leon growing up so wild."

been a source of happiness to individuals, or has insured the peace of the country? It swarms with a set of needy adventurers, too proud of their acquirements to return to the simple mode of life of their fathers, yet often not sufficiently accomplished to strike out any other line for themselves. They overcrowd the cities, embarrass every path of liberal employment, and, because they are themselves discontented and ill at ease in a state of society which affords not sufficient scope to their vanity and ambition, they make others discontented and unhappy, and become dangerous subjects. What the German students are to the German

"If it be one that my means can encompass, Vanda, it is granted before it is asked."

and doubt."

"I am not able to reason with you, Ladislasmy motives are rather of the heart than of the head-but I still think, even if it be a wise policy, it is an unchristian deed to debar the poor

" I do not speak of the cost," said she, "because you have often spent infinitely more to satisfy my most idle caprice."

" I own that you are so mysterious on the subject, that I begin to feel curious. Tell me at once-what is this mighty project?"

"Will you erect, in my honor, a school in your village?"

The count started, and an angry frown gathered on his brow. "I said-I meant anything in reason," exclaimed he, pettishly; "but this is an impossibility."

"The poor villagers desire it," the countess said, with earnestness.

"I dare say they do," was the reply. "Don't they wish a French tutor, and a dancing-master, too? Surely they do not limit their pretensions to so trifling a thing as a school ?”

"Do you think their desire extravagant?-I do not," replied the countess.

"Bah! you speak like a child, Vanda. I do not mean merely with reference to our own interests-though these point pretty clearly to the propriety of keeping our vassals in their present state of subjection, which would not long exist if means of education were afforded them-but do you think it were a blessing to escape from it? They 'd go starve, beg, and steal on their boasted liberty! You see few or no beggars on our estates; for are we not obliged to provide those with a roof, a hearth, and fuel, who want it? Have they not fields to cultivate, on whose produce they can not only feed their families, but, with a little industry, lay up a store for the future? It is true they are bound to the soil; but I do not perceive that the wanderings of the present generation have much improved it. Look at the state of Germany.

ing."

"My dear Vanda, you might as well question our right of taking a knife from a child's hand." "But still there are natural rights," persisted the countess.

"Pshaw!-cant phrase of the day!" exclaimed the count, impatiently. "Natural rights, indeed! Does nature herself respect them? Do we not see youth languish and pine away with the decay of old age? Ask the blind, the deaf and dumb, the infirm of every kind, who are debarred from the joys of youth, why nature robbed them of her sweetest gifts and poisoned for them the dawn of life; ask the bursting heart of the deformed, whose spring has no flowers, whose youth has no love, who sees the cold, averted eye seek with rapture a fairer form; ask that anguished heart if there be torture a tyrant can inflict equal to that caused by this injustice of nature! When genius, when strength, when beauty will lie within our own command, then talk of nature's freedom, nature's rights, and not till then."

Vanda replied not, but a few silent tears stole down her pale cheek.

"I am wrong to argue with you in your present delicate state; but really-really, Vanda, in conscience, I cannot grant your request."

"I do not think it wise to let men remain wild beasts," said Vanda.

"But do you think, dearest, that painters and poets would till the ground?-that a Petrarch's Laura would milk the cows?"

"Oh, I don't mean that; there is a medium in all things," replied Vanda.

"That's a mistake," said the general. "Every single concession is a stepping-stone to the next. There is a trite German saying which is, nevertheless, very true-' He who gives A, must Besides, my dear Vanda, if I wished to deviate from my principles, in this respect, to oblige you, I could not; for we have, at a late meeting of nobles and proprietors, agreed upon an unanimous resistance to all encroachments on the part of our peasantry; and you cannot but feel how impossible it would be to break a plighted word. You see the thing is not to be done. You must discard it from your mind. Anything else-anything unconnected with my duties as a gentleman and a father, I shall be most happy to do for you. Now, pray, Vanda, try to coax your mind to some one of those thousand feminine caprices which men are so charmed to gratify."

Vanda shook her head, and sighed as she said, "Is there never to be progress?"

"And has there been no progress?" said the general impatiently. "Was I not present when my own father took off the head of a gypsy lad with the sword that hung by his side? I can remember the day when each lord made his own laws. Now, our private justice were murder, and you call that no progress! What would you have more ?"

" I would have Seraphinka and my bed-light," said the countess, closing the discussion.

The count was now desirous of removing to Lemberg, where the best medical advice might be procured for his suffering wife, but the countess would not hear of this plan. She dreaded the fatigue of the journey, and was soon soothed by the notion of lingering in her loved home to the last. The count, above all anxious not to distress her, yielded the point at once, the more readily, perhaps, that his ample fortune enabled him to command the frequent visits of the first medical practitioners in that city. The countess found her chief solace in the unremitting attentions of her husband, and in the consolations of her ghostly monitors; one of whom, a stern Jesuitical-looking clergyman of the church of Rome, seldom, of late,

"Must he, too, leave you at this moment?” "Yes, yes, let him leave the room this instant -moments are precious."

The count took Leon by the hand, and gently forced him from the room.

"And now, dearest, that the child is gone, say, what have you on your mind?"

"Oh, a fearful load!" said the countess; "it has weighed and glowed here," pressing her hand tightly on her bosom, "until I thought I could bear it no longer-indeed, it is that, partly, which has worn me so fast."

"Your mind wanders, my poor Vanda. Of what can you-of what can one so pure-ever have been guilty ?"

"A great sin towards you, and a more helpless being. But I feel my strength wearing fast-I must be brief. Leon is not our child!"

The soothing expression of tender pity for an instant gave way to one of unutterable anguish on the general's countenance; but the latter faded away as his first surmises came back to his mind. He had started from his seat by the bedside, and dropped the hand he held-he now resumed his place, and calmly said,

"Go on, my dear Vanda."

"Oh, I see you are incredulous," she said, "and that I am going to make you very unhappy; but my conscience does not permit me to withhold the truth any longer. You see, Ladislas, I was sorely tempted. You remember, when our own blessed Leon was but a few months old, imperative duties called you to Lemberg. You left our child weak and puny; at your return, months later, you found him strong and hearty-but it was not our boy you then gazed upon, it was a changeling!"

The count was mute with contending emotions, among which doubt and surprise were predominant. "When I saw our darling fade away," continued the countess, "day by day, hour by hour.

symptoms of renewed strength. The leaves were rapidly falling, and the count was positive, and the countess began to hope that she would pass through the ensuing winter. The physicians, as usual, confirmed those expectations. But one autumnal morning, as the general paid her his accustomed visit, he perceived at a single glance a rapid alteration

spare myself, but you yet more. The nursepoor old soul, if she were not dead I should have left her the care to reveal this secret, and not have undertaken so painful a task at such a time; let it be my punishment-the nurse had a cousin, a serf on our estate, who had a child of precisely the same age as ours. The woman was in the

ity."

rob me of my only comfort-my only consolation?"

"Because it would have been doubly a sin to deceive you and the world, and allow your honor and wealth to pass to one who had no right to either when fate again left you free to have a lawful heir. I know the wound, how severe soever it may be, will heal again. But I had learned to love the child so well, I should not, perhaps, have had the fortitude to act as duty dictated, had not the woman tormented me as she has done since the death of my poor nurse. But, for the last two years, not content with the pension I made her, which was ample, and the kindness I extended to all her children, she has harassed me beyond the powers of endurance. Latterly, her insistence and her insolence have almost driven me mad; and, unjust as it may be, I felt that I loved the poor child less when so constantly reminded of his odious mother. You see, Ladislas, I leave not one weakness concealed from you; pity and forgive."

"The woman's name?י

"Jakubska, my pensioner in the village yonder. My confessor, with herself and me, are the only persons in possession of this secret. But oh! Ladislas-for justice, for humanity's sake-it is my last prayer-be kind to the poor boy."

"Madam," said the general, starting up, and giving way to an explosion of uncontrollable anger, " if I can find it in my heart to forgive you, it is as much as mortal has a right to demand! Betrayed !-deceived!-fooled, as I have been, for years!-persuaded to foster, with a parent's care, the brat of a vassal! I hardly know what restrains me from washing away all trace of this disgrace in the changeling's blood!" A scream burst from Vanda's lips, and she fell back, to all appearance lifeless, on her pillow. The general was shocked. Though writhing with the excess of his own passion, still he accused himself of having hastened, by his cruelty, the fatal moment. He rung the bell till the rope gave way. Priests, attendants, nurses, all hastened into the room together, who soon discovered that the countess had but swooned. When she came to herself, the general endeavored, by the tenderest expressions, to soothe the wound he had inflicted. The countess was so weak she could scarcely answer; but, with the last effort of expiring nature, raising her head from her husband's bosom, she cried out, "For God's sake, my letter! my letter!"

She spoke no more.

anticipate the depth of the abyss down which he was about to be precipitated.

One morning he was 'woke early by an unusual animation in the court below. He sprang out of bed, and, on looking from his window, perceived that the servants had drawn out his father's travelling carriage, and were busily preparing it for the road. Surprise and joy kept the boy for a moment mute; then turning to Seraphinka, who had just entered his room, he exclaimed

"I am so glad we are going to leave the chateau! We are going back to the hills; or, perhaps to Lemberg. You have been so good to me these last days, and so consoled me in my grief, that I will buy you something fine, Seraphinka."

"Alas! I am afraid you are not going with your papa, for he has given me no orders about packing up things for you, and yet I cannot think he would leave a poor child of your age in this dull, dreary chateau, and not even a tutor to keep you company. But, then, my lord is scarcely himself yet; however, he has had the steward with him making arrangements, as if for a long absence. I began to fear, seeing that the poor late countess brought my lord no dower, as we all know, he might have forgotten her servantsbut all those who have had anything to do with my lady are allowed to retain their apartments in this house, and are to enjoy a pension, proportionate to their wages during her life. As for me, I retain every single advantage, even to the coffee and sugar. May the Virgin bless my lord, and lighten his sorrow! for sure there never was a more affectionate husband or a better lord. I own," added Seraphinka, musingly, "the pension I expected, but the coffee and sugar was a surprise."

Leon, wrapped in the ecstatic notion of departure, and being restored to his father's presence and love, heard not a single word of what Seraphinka was saying. At that moment, the count's valet-de-chambre entered the room.

"Seraphinka," he said, "prepare Count Leon for the journey; he is to be simply and warmly dressed, and ready within the shortest possible time. You had better make all the haste you can," said he, turning to Leon-" my lord has already locked the chambers of the late countess, that no one may disturb them all his orders are giventhe horses are putting to, and he will be in the carriage in an instant."

The eager Leon made such haste, that it was lucky an ample cloak hid the inaccuracies of his toilet.

"Your watch-your watch-you have forgotten your watch and chain," said Seraphinka, running after him, as he turned from his small apartment, without a word of leave-taking with his faithful ally.

According to the custom of her country, the faithful abigail raised his hand to her lips, in token of the submissive devotion which girls of that class entertain towards their superiors. Leon, hastily tearing away his hand, scampered away to join his father. Never had the corridors or flights of stairs seemed to him so long as at this moment of nervous impatience; but, bounding onward like a young fawn, he soon stood at the carriage door. The chasseur lifted him in, banged to the door, and mounted in the rumble behind-the coachman gave the rein to four fiery young horses, and away flew the carriage with our young hero and his misfor

tunes.

The count addressed not a word to the child, though he had not seen him since the moment he had so reluctantly led him from the chamber of death. Leon stole a timid glance at him he was closely muffled in a travelling cloak, and his foraging cap was drawn deeply over his eyes. Little of his face as these precautions permitted to become visible, however, the contrast of his ashy pallor with his deep mourning, and the almost sinister expression of his brow, frightened the boy, and he shrank into his corner of the carriage. But the count, keeping his eyes in a marked manner riveted on his own window, Leon's situation became too painful to be endured, and he attempted to rouse his attention.

"Papa," he began-but he could get no further, for the count cried aloud-" Silence!" in a voice of thunder.

Never in his life had he heard these accents, or, at least, addressed to himself. Terrified, convinced now his mother was gone, that he was become an object of hatred to his father after having been one of love, the poor boy sank back in mute anguish. But Leon had a proud heart, and a keen natural sense of injustice. He could not prevent the boyish tears from coursing one by one down his burning cheek; but he stifled the thick sobs that nearly choked him, lest the count should discover that he was weeping. Perhaps this stubborn pride deprived him of the only opportunity that offered for melting the count's heart; for he was by no means what could be strictly called an unfeeling man, though he was stung to madness by the shock of losing at once his wife and his child-at having to blot from his existence eleven long years of hope and joy. His pride, too, revolted at having fostered in his halls a beggar's brat; and, accustomed to the roughness of the camp, to the authoritativeness of military command, his temper, naturally firm and hasty, had become harsh; and the cringing dread of his serfs, amongst whom he had chiefly lived of late years, had not tended to teach him self-control. Leon had much of the same ingredients in his composition for good or for evil; and, thanks to his training, was as obstinate and wilful as any feudal lord need be.

The day was drizzly and rainy. The roads were heavy. There was nothing in the atmosphere nor the features of the country to attune the mind to a soft mood; and, accordingly, neither of

the travellers was diverted from his inward brooding by external objects. They had hurried along at extraordinary speed for above an hour in this enforced silence, when they came to a bleak, barren common, more desolate than anything they had yet seen. A solitary stone cross, with an effigy of Christ, whose outlines were worn by wind and weather-the only object that appeared above the dreary line of the horizon in any direction-stood at a short distance from the main road, pointing the way, as it were, to the deep rut of a country by-path. At the foot of this cross sat, huddled up, an indistinct human figure which, from its appearance, might have been mistaken for a bundle of rags. The count pulled the checkstring. In a moment the carriage stopped, and he leapt from it, motioning with his hand to the boy to follow; then said to the attentive chasseur -" Let the carriage wait for me beyond the turn of the road, at the old bridge."

Though not a little amazed at the command he received, the well-trained domestic suppressed every outward mark of surprise; and, having transmitted the order to the coachman, resumed his seat in the rumble, without so much as casting one glance of curiosity at the three figures exposed to a pelting rain an a bleak waste, on which not a house, or a tree, or any object whatever, except the stone cross, was within the range of the eye. The count now moved forward, followed by the child, straight up to the cross.

"Jakubska!" he called out. The object cowering at the foot of the stone monument rose hurriedly to her feet. "I need not, I suppose," continued the count, "repeat the conditions I have stipulated with you-I think, for your own sake, you are not likely to forget them. Boy," said he, turning sharply to Leon, "from this day you cease to fill the place you have too long usurped-you are not my child-I restore you to your legitimate parent-you are yet young enough to forget the duty you now think you owe me, and to learn that which is due to her the past is but a dream, suffer it not to linger on your mind."

So saying, he coldly turned from the mother and her son, and moving away with hasty strides reached the bend of the road and his britchka before Leon had recovered from the first stunning effect of his words. The wheels of the retiring carriage first roused him from his stupor. He stared wildly round. The naked plain-the old witch in her dark cloak to whom he had just been delivered over-the carriage rolling in the distance -the solitude, the silence of the place-the rain falling in blinding mist on the delicately-nurtured boy, all confused and bewildered his senses. He felt as if they were leaving him entirely; and, with a cry of pain, he clasped his little hands and pressed them to his burning brow.

Jakubska remained silent. Pity for the grief of her child, mingled with a sort of respect for the station he had but so lately filled, subdued her usual vein of loquacity. The blow had stunned her too. Though prepared for it by a hurried in