loving hearted woman, who bore his illhumours with a meekness and goodness that was worthy of the shining crown of Virtue. They had a daughter named Mary, who was the pride of the country around, and as she, gentle reader, is the heroine of my narrative, a few words, respecting her, will not, it is to be hoped, be like a discharged servant, "out of place!" (Shades of Sheridan, of Swift, and of Joe Miller, forgive me this!) At the time of which I write she could scarcely have numbered eighteen years; and those who know how much loveliness eighteen summers reflect on a face that is in the primary instance gifted by nature with grace and beauty, can well comprehend how many hidden spells, what countless concealed charins are in the very words. Her father, by his superior means, had been enabled to give her a sound, and in many respects an elegant education, and being naturally possessed of great qualifications, she had so excellently employed her opportunity, that she was mistress of many accomplishments that were not included in the category of studies for which her father had to pay. It must be owned that this education did not tend to make her feel satisfied with her home; not that Mary loved her parents less; but there was a certain rudeness, a gaucherie, and vulgarity of manner, that she soon became keenly alive to; and though this did not in any measure change the current of her natural affection, yet it caused an unquiet feeling in her bosom, which, though it partook neither of pride nor of shame, yet at last became a cause of considerable uneasiness to her. She endeavoured, without exciting observation, to soften and refine the manners of her father and mother. Woman is generally of that gentle disposition which is ready to follow and obey; and Mary found her mother extremely ductile in this point, and soon had the satisfaction of perceiving a visible difference. But it was not so with her father; he was of an acute disposition, and soon discovered what Mary was aiming at, and put an end to all her hopes by violently accusing her of creating what he was pleased to term newfangled notions" in her mother's brain, and of being "too proud and high-minded for her station" and he wound up his invectives by withdrawing her from school. This was when she was about seventeen, a time when Mary, girl like, began to think she had been labouring at scholastic duties quite long enough: so that this punishment, as her father thought it, echoed precisely to her most ardent wish. The gentleman who owned the estate of which I said Mary's father was land-steward, and which estate had descended from father to son uninterruptedly for five or six generations, was named Hamilton. He had entered young into the service of the East India Company, and had only returned on his father's death to take pos session of his inheritance. His character was a strange compound of frigidity and fire; a temperament at one time partaking of the cold phlegmatic atmosphere of his native land, at another of the fiery warmth of the burning countries on which his youth and manhood had been passed; now bitingly sarcastic, and then proudly tyrannical. The instinctive impulses of his nature, however, were good and generous, but he had been so used to have his every wish obeyed on the instant, to express a desire but to ensure its immediate fulfilment, that it is no wonder he sunk into a self-willed, and in most respects a selfish, nabob. A considerable share of acerbity of temper exhibited itself occasionally in his language, which was attributed to disappointment that he had only attained the rank of major, and had witnessed the elevation of men younger and of inferior qualifications, over himself. The real fact was, that notwithstanding his constitutional bravery, which could not be denied, he had commanded in several expeditions that had turned out so unfortunately, that they had entailed some slight censure on him from head quarters on one occasion. This so rankled in his heart, that be became restless and peevish, estranging himself from all society, save that of his wife and children, a son and daughter (for he had married the sister of one of his brother officers). He at length seemed to form a sudden resolution, and soon effected a sale of his commission. Determined to return to his father-country, he bade adieu to the scene of his disappointment, and it was on the voyage to England that the vessel he sailed in was spoken to by another proceeding to the East Indies, and he learned from an acquaintance on board the news of his father's death, and that letters informing him of that fact were among the government despatches, though he could not, of course, obtain possession of them. At the time he arrived in England, and settled on his own property at Mitcham, his son Henry and his daughter Clara were of the respective ages of seventeen and fourteen. At the period of my story Harry was about one-and-twenty, his own master," as he would frequently tell his father, when he seemed rather inclined to draw the girths (rhetorically speaking) of parental authority too tightly, and not in the eye of the law! He had passed the ingeneral allotted terms at college, where in fact he would have shone, had not the Major with drawn him at a time when his bent was decidedly directed towards "les belles lettres." But his father had a devout and indignant horror of the profession of the pen; for he enter tained no better idea of a man of letters than that of the poor slave to a bookseller, who rose no higher in the world than a garret, mainly for the reason that such was the extreme altitude to which he could attain; and the fiery and im petuous soldier was so changeable of disposition, and so vacillating in temper, that, though at one time he was eager to obtain Harry a commission, at another he would exclaim violently against the profession of arms, and though himself as “untired of war's alarms" as the most ardent spirit as yet untried could be, he would fairly renounce the idea, and profess his intention to "keep his only son at home." Thus was Harry like a ball, constantly evolving, an infant" at one moment enraptured with the thought of becoming a soldier, at another fretting, like an impatient charger, at his life of inactivity and dependence. Harry was of a gay and amiable disposition, rarely despondent, but frequently brooding over the bitterness of his uncertain position. He was a fine, handsome, open-hearted young man, with bright, laughing blue eyes, and curling hair, of a colour somewhat darker than auburn, yet scarcely of so deep a hue as chesnut; and it could be at once perceived that the suns of Ind had imparted a richer and deeper tinge to the clear, ruddy complexion of his cheek, though his forehead was high, and very white. His sister, on the contrary, was dark; her complexion surpassingly fair for a brunette, and her long ringlets rivalled in texture the fineness of the gossamer's wing, and in hue the glossy sable of the raven. Her eyes were a deep violet, and her figure, though above the medium height, did not in the slightest degree detract from her elegance of carriage-so important, so vital an attribute among the gifts of woman. If my readers (as they doubtless are) be mental arithmeticians, they will have a priori, or, from certain numerical data given in the course of my narration, long since calculated that, at this time, her brother being twenty-one, Clara was eighteen years of age, or thereabouts. We may dismiss Mrs. Hamilton in a few words, She was of a very delicate constitution and appearance, always ailing, and frequently, it must be owned, complaining, but her complaints were ever gentle and unallied to repining. She was gifted with one of the best hearts in the world, always seeking out objects on whom to lavish her goodness, and with whom to share the riches which heaven had so bounteously bestowed on her. Alas! that there are so few such in this work-a-day world! How radiantly might it be brightened, like the floor of heaven, by angel-guests. When Mary Grayson so suddenly returned from school-at which time, as I said before, she was, notwithstanding her humble origin, an elegant, and far from unaccomplished womanshe was taken considerable notice of by Mrs. Hamilton, and at length invited to make a visit at the Grange. This was an honour which Grayson thought equivalent to a command, and notwithstanding he entertained the impression that it would not only considerably increase Mary's pride and discontent for home, but make the barrier between her and himself still greater, yet he was too sagacious to withhold his consent, and Mary accordingly accepted the invitation. In truth, Mary was of so engaging a disposition that she was secure of gaining friends wherever she went, and of winning kindness from all. It was nothing more than natural that Clara and she should be mutually delighted with each other. The former possessed not a spark of that contemptible pride of birth and station that casts a hauteur over such a preference as that which she soon evinced for Mary; but throwing aside the scarlet robe of arrogance, she stood revealed in all the endearing qualities that constitute a true-souled, noble-hearted woman. Despising the conventionalities, as well as the tongue, of the so-called "world;" firm, because conscious of self-approval, in her beautiful sentiment, she yielded to Mary the love of a sister and of an equal-and sought from her in return nothing else than an undisguised affection in which should exist no disparity of birth, of earthly gifts, or of position. And in time she gained her wish; for though the simplicity, if I may so call it, of Mary Grayson's nature at first opposed an obstacle in the shape of reverence, or that peculiar feeling of inferiority of birth which not even education can entirely eradicate, yet this imperceptibly wore off before the uniform kindness and openness of Clara's manner, and at last faded away entirely. Mary's gentleness and unvarying goodness of heart, even won the most respectful obedience from the Major's servants-for gentlemen and ladies of this class are not apt to pay too much deference to those whom they are not wont to consider as "well born," or in their own vernacular, "gentlefolk;" for the theory of these persons is limited to a very narrow sphere, and the equator of their distinction is so minute that the eye might sometimes in vain search for its "locus in quo." The Major himself treated her kindly, and scarcely knew himself how favourable was the impression she had made on him, and seldom or never thought how many comforts he was indebted to her for. Attentive to his every want, which was attended to almost as his looks had implied it. Mary was, par consequence, a frequent guest at the Grange, but had not beheld Harry until a few months prior to the date of my narrative, and after his return from college. To say that Harry was struck with a violent emotion at first sight would be untrue; and although this point seems so dear to orthodox Romancists, I am constrained to deny that such was the case in the present instance, even though it may utterly dispel the interest some of my readers may feel in so romantic, so poetical an occurrence. the contrary, Harry was at first inclined to think her a silent, stupid girl, with more pretensions to beauty than so humble a person deserved. To be sure she had beautiful eyes, but she turned them away so soon; and had a passably clear complexion, though she never improved its attraction by rouge. Altogether, he looked upon her as an inanimate creature, who did not "make up so showily as she might have done," and did not think, when he bade her the usual matutinal or nocturnal salutations, that because he held her hand without pressing it he was necessarily like a MUFF-for were it with a different person, he knew, he felt he should have been a little tender. But Mary oh! she froze him-and his vanity whispered, did not sufficiently value him. These were the results, dear reader, of his college education, destined to give place to more natural, that is, higher, nobler, and more manly emotions. In short, it must not be denied, that being constantly thrown in Mary's society, unconsciously a close observant of her unchanging and amiable On traits, a witness of her enduring patience, her care, and the sweet amity she evinced for his sister, Harry unknowingly-fell in love-ay, dear reader, "Over his head, and over his ears, Brimful of passionate sighs and tears;" pressed." But perhaps for that very reason Clara had hurried away. "Mary!" he continued breathlessly and earnestly, drawing still nigher to her, while his eye glittered with a peculiar lustre, and his cheek became still more deepened with the warm blood; "Mary! can it have escaped your observation, during some days past-for in truth my passion has made me forgetful of concealing it-that I love you; deeply, passionately, adore you! Could I behold your exquisite gentleness, your tender care of my father, your affectionate and endearing friendship for my sister, without ex noble are your qualities and desert, and that he who gains the first warm response from a heart like yours would be indeed the happiest of men!" and even as the Spirit of Eros shed its refining influence over his heart, he became greatly changed-his character ennobled, his manners assumed a more subdued and refined tone, his flippancy vanished, and in time of his once overweening self-esteem, not a vestige remained.periencing the emotion that tells me how Oh, Love! how closely art thou allied to every noble, every right quality of our nature! Thou callest forth like the stroke of the Enchanter's wand, the hidden Virtues of Mortality, and biddest them bloom like the star-eyed flowers, a life of beauty; and though, when the body lies shrouded in the dark, unfathomable mystery that attends Humanity, and when the Invisible and Immaterial Essence seems no longer to exist, they perish in outward semblance, they remain still fragrant, still sweet to the sense, even amid decay, and vacancy, and death! The duration of Mary's visit had not been arranged; but at the expiration of a month she proposed returning home to Mrs. Hamilton; they being together in the drawing-room at the time. That lady, although she had imbibed a very strong interest in Mary, was of too passive a disposition to raise any objections; for though she would have willingly entreated Mary to extend her visit, yet she offered no very pressing or urgent entreaty. So that when Clara and her brother returned from a morning's visit they had paid to some friend in the vicinity, she said quietly, and as if with an effort, " Clara, my love! pray use your influence to gain Mary's consent to prolong her stay with us, for she has mined on departing this very day.” As she spoke thus, she rose up and left the room with a suffering air, as if the effort had caused her pain. Mary had gazed on him with looks of terror and alarm, her neck and brow at first becoming flushed with crimson; but as he proceeded her face became deadly pale, though her respiration was as difficult and the pulses of her heart beat as violently as before. When Harry had concluded, and stood watching her with the most eager interest, as if his very salvation depended on her reply, she rose up with an effort, and placing her hand tightly on her bosom, as if to still its motion, she said "This must not be, Mr. Hamilton. I must not-dare not listen to such language; it is unbecoming-it is criminal. You cannot mean what you utter; or, if you do, forget it! Forget me; I am unworthy of your regard. I, the daughter of one of your father's tenants-nay, of one of his servants." "No, no!" Harry passionately exclaimed; "that expression of humility is but one of pride!" the Mary answered his outburst with a saddened look." Hear me," continued she; "you have deter-pained me, acutely pained me, by avowing the secret feeling you entertain towards me; for it can never meet a return. Our position-I am arguing perhaps coldly, Mr. Hamilton; perhaps unkindly; but I do it in order to save you pangs of future regret-our position, as I said, and the difference, the vast abyss that lies between our relative stations, should have induced you to ponder ere you so openly expressed yourself as you have done. Believe me I am not ungrateful for your good opinion; but for your sake, for that of your family, and for that of my own, I can never hearken to such language again -never!" "Why what means this sudden determination, my dear Mary?" exclaimed Clara; "what unkind spirit has been whispering in your ears to leave us so soon?" "So soon!" echoed Mary, "so soon! Do you not forget I have been here upwards of a month ?" Impossible, ma chere, 'tis only a long week. Harry," she continued, turning to that personage, who had been silent all this time; "Harry! Why, Harry! do you not hear me? Oh, look at him! why he is the very incarnation of the Great Unmoved. Oh, Mary! disenchant himfor you only can!" But the silent Harry so far recovered from his spell-bound attitude as to gaze fixedly on Mary for a few seconds, and then, drawing his hand across his forehead, with an impatient and hurried gesture he approached her. "Do not leave us, Clara!" he said to his sister, "for unto you I have confided the secret which must, which shall, no longer be sup "But hear me, Mary!" cried Harry; “I have confessed my love. Oh, believe it is no idle dream-no intangible fancy of the passing hour; but a feeling that is blended with every moment, every impulse of my existence; that will live on unfadingly, unchangingly, till my latest breath. You remind me of the disparity of our positions: love-such a love as minelevels all petty distinctions like that; it may be that worldly, that selfish affection, or the cold hearts of those whose bosoms beat no longer at the divine name, may raise up this wizard phantom, which swells before their eyes in spectral gigantitude; but the true heart overcomes such callous laws, nor thinks for an instant on an inequality which it would only remember but to condemn." "It can never be !" Mary uttered with a deep sigh-"your father!" "My father!" interrupted Harry, though at the same time a shade of seriousness might have been observed to pass over his face as he spoke, "what of him? He would, I feel assured, so far value my future happiness as to smile on our affection. But tell me, Mary, tell me that what I have dared to hope is true-tell me that I have read your looks aright-that I have inspired you with a kindly feeling towards me! Clara," he added, appealing to his sister, who had returned, "aid me;" and then forgetting this entreaty, as if he had never uttered it, and addressing Mary again with concentrated tenderness-" answer me: I intreat, I implore!" Mary was silent for a few minutes, during which Clara sat herself by her side, and embraced her. The former then addressed Harry, though a deep hue overspread her face, and more than one tear-drop fell slowly down her cheek. thither. Clara, will you accompany your visitor, and assist her in her preparations?' They rose up, Mary despondingly and mechanically concealing her face; while Clara, with her arm round her waist, guided her across the room, for Mary was so blinded by her tears, that she was incapable of proceeding to her own chamber unassisted. They were stopped midway by the Major, who, taking Mary's hand kindly between his own, pressed it warmly, while he said in a tone that bespoke its sincerity-for the old soldier was not devoid of all feeling, though it had, to be sure, been sadly lessened by the early chagrin and disappointment he had experienced, and by the fictitious and overweening pride he had inherited from ancestry, whose chief boast had been their unmixed descent-" I appreciate your motive, my poor girl, at the same time that I pity you if my graceless son should have inspired you with a sentiment warmer than than friendship: return home now; a few weeks will quickly pass away; and absence, which soothes regrets the most poignant, will soften the memory of this scene. In the mean time, however," he whispered, "accept this as a token of my regard and protection." He let go the "I will not deny, Mr. Hamilton, that, had for- passive hand of poor Mary, but the purse which tune placed me in a position not inferior to he had intended she should retain fell to the yours I might have listened to your declara-ground, while Mary stood immovable and untion with pleasure, and-and-" (Harry made a gesture expressive at once of joy and hope) "reciprocated it; but," she continued, her colour fading as she spoke, "as Fate has ordained it otherwise, I must strive to forget this conversation: it must be to me only as one of those sweet dreams which occasionally visit us, and serve by their remembrance to gild many of life's sad moments!" "I will speak to my father," exclaimed Harry; "he will, I am convinced -' "Name him not!" interrupted Mary. "Were he, even he, to look favourably on your suit, I should still refuse!" "Obdurate girl!" returned Harry, passionately: "you do not value the peace of him who lives but for you alone: you cannot do so, or you would bestow some little hope, instead of adding still further to my dejection: but I will at once to my father; I will appeal to him: he will approve he will—” 66 "NOT!" shouted the old Major impetuously, at the same time advancing from the half-shut door towards them. Clara gave a slight scream, while Mary hid her face in her bosom. Harry stood petrified with surprise. "He will not, you undutiful scoundrel! he will not approve of so unheard-of an alliance. Shall the blood of a Hamilton be mixed with that of―" "Oh, sir! remember, for Mercy's sake, that she, she whom I love is present," said his son, in a hoarse whisper. "I do remember! I-I-but she has behaved like a fine-spirited girl, and I will spare her. Miss Grayson," he continued, addressing Mary, "I have heard that you wished to return to your home, and have therefore ordered the carriage to be ready in half-an-hour to convey you conscious as before. Harry rushed to her. “One word-one look before you go," he uttered wildly; "but one kind look-but one simple tone, that Memory may store them up in her dearest, her most secret shrine, to be recalled in after years, and to soothe the bitterness, the anguish of this hour. I leave you perhaps for ever! Oh, let me depart with the blissful consciousness that though the pride of a father places an insuperable bar between us, and though that pride should wreck a son's earthly happiness, I hold a place in your heart, to win which I would encounter every peril-every hardship." They had reached the door as he spoke, and Mary, after struggling with her resolution, at last extended her hand, and merely said, Forget me! it is better for us both; or, if you will remember me, let it be only as one who will be your most sincere friend while she lives!". Harry pressed her hand passionately to his lips, and then suffered her to depart. He buried his face in his hands and wept. (To be continued.) PITY. BY MRS. A. TURNER. Soft like the dew fall tears from Pity's eye, There is something refreshing even in the mention of Robert Bloomfield. It brings back to us memories of green meadows, and lowing cows, and golden corn-fields, and the delights of seed-time and harvest in England's country homes;-all these exalted into poetry, by a mind not ideal, it is true, but full of that keen appreciation of the beautiful which is the ornament of life. The English Robert is no wonderful genius, like his Scottish namesake. Reading Bloomfield's poems is like taking a ramble among green fields, where there is no sublime scenery, no dazzlingly lovely spots; but that is all calm, and home-like, and beautiful. His life, too, is an illustration of the independence of a poet's soul: how superior it is to the chances of destiny and abode, and how the stream of poesy will flow on, despite all hindrances. Robert Burns poured forth his songs amidst the scenes he was celebrating, face to face, as it were, with nature but Robert Bloomfield composed his in a shoemaker's stall, in the midst of noisy Lon-insert the first two verses: don. Thinking of this, his poetry acquires a new charm. valued a mother's blessing, to watch over him, to set good examples for him, and never to forget that he had lost his father." In return for instruction in shoemaking, Robert was to his brother and his fellow-workmen-to use a line of his own Robert Bloomfield was the son of a tailor. He was born at Honington, a village in Suffolk, in 1766. George Bloomfield, the father, died before Robert was a year old, and the boy was thrown entirely upon his mother for support and instruction. From her the future poet derived all the education he ever had. In her school, where the poor widow taught the village-children to support her own large family, Robert learned reading and writing until he was seven years old. Mrs. Bloomfield then married again, and the boy's education ended. At eleven a charitable uncle-one Mr. Austin, who was a farmer-took Robert to live with him as a labourer. In this life the boy delighted: it lasted for some time, and his feelings and experience then were doubtless the origin of the "Farmer's Boy." Robert was a slender and weakly lad, unfitted for hard labour; and the good Mr. Austin, after some time, informed the mother of this. She wrote to her two elder sons, who were shoemakers in London, and the result was that they proposed to take Robert and teach him their trade. So the country boy left his happy rural life and came to London. What a change, from the open sunny fields of Suffolk, to a close alley leading out of Coleman-street, City! Yet perhaps it was necessary to kindle poetry in his spirit, by the memory of the delights he had left. There, while learning the trade, young Robert Bloomfield lived with his elder brother George, to whose care their good mother had earnestly confided him. "She charged me," said George, many years after, in a letter to Capel Lofft, "as I A Gibeonite, that served them all by turns. It was he who fetched their dinner, and read the newspaper aloud while they worked. This stirred up his mind to learn: he bought an old dietionary to help in the hard words; studied the speeches of Burke, Fox, and North in the paper, went to hear the best preachers, and now and then to the theatre. At sixteen he began to compose poetry. His first song-which his brother persuaded him to send to a sixpenny magazine, in whose "Poet's Corner" it appeared-was a milkmaid's carol on May-day. It has no high merit, but has a fresh heart-bursting gladness, which makes its liquid rhymes pleasing. We Hail, May! lovely May! how replenished my pails! The young dawn overspreads the east streaked with gold; My glad heart beats time to the laugh of the vales, The wood to the mountain submissively bends, sun; See thence a gay troop to the wild rill descends, Robert now found a friend in a ScotsmanJames Kay, of Dundee-who lent him various books, including "Paradise Lost" and "Thomson's Seasons." The latter was his great delight. Soon after, from some legal disputes connected with the trade, Bloomfield left London, and for two months retrod his old Suffolk haunts, with his newly-acquired perceptions of beauty. A few years after his return to London he married, and after a long struggle with poverty, succeeded in becoming possessor of one room and a garret. In this garret, among several workmen, he wrote the "Farmer's Boy." Capel Lofft, a patron of literature, was charmed with the poem, edited and published it. And now came the trial of the poet's life. The praise and patronage of his great friends induced the simple-minded country bard to relinquish his trade, for the precarious life of an author. He wrote in succession, “Rural Tales,” “Good Tidings, or News from the Farm," and many other poems. But the fluctuating patronage of |