own country, and I warrant you that once there, in the midst of glorious scenery and unbounded hospitality, you will soon sing, with the divine Milton:

"Hence, loathed Melancholy,

Of Cerberus and blackest midnight born.” "I never can, never shall surmount this." "Am I mistaken, or have you not a song, rather too popular, in your language, ending in every verse with 'never shall be slaves ?'” "What a comparison !"

I

"I am afraid I cannot say 'with pleasure.' guess what you want."

"I do not see that it is at all a bad one. If you can ride the waves of ocean, why not, too, the storms of misfortune? Come, pluck up heart, and decide. Poor Dr. Harris must be by this time ready to assent to any plan with a glimmering of sense in it-the more joy-cousin's sake and yours, I will." fully, therefore, to one evidently good."

"Yes. I wish you to bear my farewells to Sir Lionel and his lady, and-and-”

"I could not go to Paris, or to your Vienna either."

"Why?"

"I want solitude."

"Just what you should avoid. Only I have no doubt however uncomplimentary this may sound-that you will soon sicken of yourself with nothing but remembrance for company."

"Oh no! I am used to being alone. I love it."

"Do you? Go to Iceland then; I should imagine there would be not much else than solitude in that country."

"No; but I will go to Norway. I have always had a vague hankering after Norway."

"And the salmon fishing? Well go there. And if you do not succeed in curing yourself, write to me, and we will go to Rome together for the winter."

"Will you not come with me now ?” "Truth to tell, I scarcely feel the same devouring anxiety to behold the North. I rather incline to my ancestral halls, which have not seen their owner for nearly four years."

"Enough, Henry. I would rather face a hostile battery alone and unarmed than go up again there to meet, but for your

"Thanks, thanks. And when you return I will be ready.”

"What do you mean to go at once?" "Naturally. Did you expect-” "Oh! nothing. You are quite right; I strongly approve you. But, in that case I shall have to go at once too; shall I ?”

"Pray do. Don't think me unmanly, but I would so like to know how she will take my departure."

"You incorrigible! may relent?"

Still a hope she

"Those flowers, you know!"
"Well ?"

"She said herself she loves some one."

"Who now won't find it out, for you have thrown away the flowers, and ere this the wind will have wafted them to Bohemia. At any rate, I promise you to go immediately, and to return shortly. I imagine we shall not have a very long interview. Meanwhile, cheer up and pack."

Count Rutkay started very slowly; and more than once was on the point of turning back. But his promise! So he kept on. He kept on, too, pulling out a certain sprig of withered flowers which the breeze had

"Travel with me as far as Copenhagen, not removed from the place where they fell in at least." the court-yard in Moritz Strasse. He reached

She who was sitting there, gazing at a portrait-his own, he recognized it 'twas one he had given her when in Englandwas Diana! No word, no whisper escaped from her lips, pressed tightly together-no sound broke the stillness that reigned in that spot. Rutkay saw revealed to him in one glance the secret of years-a secret that else must have remained dead to all.

the villa. Sir Lionel and his lady had not yet returned, the lodge-keeper said. He entered the avenue, but scarcely went ten yards before he dismounted, led back his horse and gave it into the charge of the porter's son, a healthy, blooming German boy. And instead of directing his steps to the house, he half unconsciously wandered towards the arbour. Nearing it, he perceived some one there-some one leaning Without noise, gently, softly, he slipped over the table, looking intently at some- round almost to her feet. He knelt, in his thing small. What was it made Paul Rutkay hand the withered flowers-the sun shot a leave the path so suddenly, and recklessly glittering beam through the waving leaves tread over flowers, behind shrubs, screening-Diana looked up-half rose, and fell into his approach till he gained unnoticed the his outstretched arms. side of the arbour?

At last!

TO MY WIFE.

M

BY HON. JOSEPH HOWE,

Secretary of State for the Provinces.

Y gentle wife, though girlhood's peach-like bloom

Perchance is passing from thy cheek away,

And though the radiance that did erst illume
Thine eye be temper'd by a milder ray;

And though no more youth's airy visions play
Around thy heart or flutter through thy brain,-
Still art thou worthy of the poet's lay,

Still shall my spirit breathe the lover's strain,
And, if approved by thee, not breathed perhaps in vain.

E'en as the Painter's or the Sculptor's eye
Dwells on some matchless vision which combines

All that they deem of Beauty, ere they try

By inspiration's aid, to catch the lines

To deck earth's highest and her holiest shrines,
So did I oft my boyhood's heart beguile
With one fair image,-and the glowing mines
Of Ind would have been freely given the while,
To bid that being live to glad me with her smile.

But when in maiden loveliness you came,

Giving reality to all the fair

And graceful charms that, blent with woman's name,

Had seem'd too rich for earthly forms to wear,

Yet stood beside me in the twilight there—

Then came the agony, to artists known,
The dread that visions so surpassing rare

May fade away, and ne'er become their own,

And leave their hearts to mourn, all desolate and lone.

Thou wert the guiding star whose living beam

Flash'd o'er Youth's troubled thoughts and vague desires ;
Something of thee was blent with ev'ry dream

That fed Ambition's fierce but smother'd fires.

The gentle fancies Poesy inspires

The hopes and fears of Manhood's early dawn,
That lend their witchery to youthful lyres,

Were of thy guileless fascinations born,

And threw their spells around the fount whence they were drawn.

If in my youthful breast one thought arose
That had a trace of Heav'n, it caught its hue
From the instinctive virtue that o'erflows
Each word and act of thine,—and if I threw
Aside those base desires that sometimes drew
My spirit down to earth's unhallow'd bowers,
'Twas when I met, or heard, or thought of thee,
Or roved beside thee, in those ev'ning hours,

Beneath the boughs that waved wide o'er your Island flowers.

Thou canst remember,―can'st thou e'er forget,
While life remains, that placid summer night
When, from the thousand stars in azure set,
Stream'd forth a flood of soft subduing light,
And o'er our heads, in Heaven's topmost height,
The moon moved proudly, like a very Queen,
Claiming all earthly worship as her right,

And hallowing, by her power, the peaceful scene
Spread out beneath her smile, so tranquil and serene.

Then, as you wander'd, trembling, by my side,
Gush'd forth the treasured tenderness of years;
And your young ear drank in the impetuous tide
Of early passion-boyhood's hopes and fears-
Affirm'd with all the energy of tears.

And then Love wove around our hearts a chain
Which ev'ry passing moment more endears—

Mingling our souls, as streams that seek the plain, Through wastes and flowers to pass, but never part again.

Years have gone by since then-and I have seen
Thy budding virtues blossom and expand ;
Still, side by side, amidst life's cares we've been,
And o'er its verdant spots roved hand in hand;
And I have mark'd the easy self-command
That every thought and movement still pervades-
The gen'rous nature and the lib'ral hand—

The glance that gladdens me, but ne'er upbraids, And the confiding soul whose faith faints not nor fades.

Like to the young bard's Harp, whose magic tone
Delights, yet startles, when he strikes the strings,
And stirs his soul with rapture all its own

As an unpractised hand he o'er it flings,

Thy heart was once to me. But now its springs

Of deepest feeling I have known so long,

Its treasured stores of rich and holy things,

Its sweetest chords round which soft accents throng, That life becomes to me like one inspiring song.

Nor think, my love, that time can ever steal
Its sweetness from me. Years may wander by,
And in their course the frolic blood congeal,
Or dim the lustre of that hazel eye.

But, even then, with proud idolatry

On that pale cheek and wasted form I'll gaze, And wander backward to those scenes where I Bent o'er them first, in youth's primeval days Where memory all her wealth of hoarded thought displays.

The lonely beach on which we often roved, And watched the moonbeams flickering on the seaThe ancient trees, whose grateful shade we loved, The grassy mounds where I have sat by theeThe simple strains you warbled, wild and free, The tales I loved to read and you to hear, With every glance of thine so linked shall be, That every passing day and circling year, Shall to my faithful heart my early love endear.

I'll paint you as you bloom'd in that sweet hour,
When friendly faces beamed on every side,
And, drooping like a frail but lovely flower,
'Fore God and man you claimed to be my bride:

Or, as you now, with all a mother's pride,

Fold to your beating breast your darling child;

And thus, though years beneath our steps may glide,

My fancy still, by mem'ry's power beguiled,

Shall whisper: Thus she looked-'twas thus in youth she smiled.

OUR HIGH SCHOOLS.

BY A HEAD MASTER.