Though it must flow for ever: not unseen Before the spirit-sighted countenance Of Milton didst thou pass, from the sad scene Beyond whose night he saw, with a dejected mien. The eager hours and unreluctant years As on a dawn-illumined mountain stood, Trampling to silence their loud hopes and fears, Darkening each other with their multitude, And cried aloud, Liberty! Indignation Answered Pity from her cave: Death grew pale within the grave, And Desolation howled to the destroyer, Save! Thou heaven of earth! what spells could pall thee then, Dyed all thy liquid light with blood and tears, Round France, the ghastly vintage, stood Destruction's sceptred slaves, and Folly's mitred brood! When one, like them, but mightier far than they, The Anarch of thine own bewildered powers, Rose: armies mingled in obscure array, Like clouds with clouds, darkening the sacred Of serene heaven. He, by the past pursued, He who taught man to vanquish whatsoever He has enthroned the oppression and the oppressor. Amplest millions at their need, Driving on fiery wings to Nature's throne, New wants, and Wealth from those who toil and groan Rend of thy gifts and hers a thousand fold for one? Come Thou, but lead out of the inmost cave Wisdom. I hear the pennons of her car To judge, with solemn truth, life's ill-apportioned lot? Blind Love, and equal Justice, and the Fame Of what has been, the Hope of what will be? O, Liberty! if such could be thy name Wert thou disjoined from these, or they from thee: If thine or theirs were treasures to be bought By blood or tears, have not the wise and free Wept tears, and blood-like tears? The solemn harmony Paused, and the spirit of that mighty singing As a brief insect dies with dying day, THE DOCTOR'S WOOING. BY MRS. OLIPHANT. [Mrs. Margaret Oliphant is one of the most successful as well as one of the most prolific of our lady novelista. Her literary career commenced with the publication of "Katie Stewart, a True Story," in Blackwood's Magazine, 1853-54. Since that date she has produced in rapid succession more than a dozen novels, besides other works, of which the most notable is the Historical Sketches of the Reign of George II. Her fame and popularity, however, rest in a great measure on The Chronicles of Carlingford, a series of domestic stories descriptive of life in a quiet country town. The series includes: The Rector, The Doctor's Family, Salem Chapel, The Perpetual Curate, and Miss Marjoribanks.1 Our extract is from The Doctor's Family, and that the situation may be properly understood it is necessary to mention that Edward Rider is a young doctor struggling hard to gain a practice in Carlingford. His brother, Fred -a lazy, good-for-nothing fellow-has been drowned. He has left a widow and three children dependent, as they had been all along, on the widow's sister, Nettie Underwood. The sisters are of Australian birth and of widely different characters. Susan (Mrs. Fred) is weak and selfish, and obtains her own way in everything by persistently crying for it. Nettie is a shrewd, energetic, self-denying creature, who sacrifices her heart and life to provide for her sister and the children. She has stubbornly refused Dr. Rider's hand for their sakes, and she sees little in the future for herself but hard work for others who repay her with little gratitude. The widow wishes to return to Australia, and she gains her object in the usual way, aided by the appearance of a colonial friend, Mr. Chatham. This stalwart bushman is supposed to be paying his addresses to Nettie, to the bitter annoyance of the doctor.] When tea was over, Nettie sent her children out of the way with peremptory distinctness, and stayed behind them to make her communication. If she noticed vaguely a certain confused impatience and desire to get rid of her in the looks of her sister and the Australian, she attached no distinct meaning to it, but spoke out with all the simplicity of an independent power, knowing all authority and exe cutive force to lie in her own hands alone. and, not without a little consternation, turned her eyes towards her friend before answering her sister. "It is just Nettie's way," cried Susan "just how she always does-holds out against you to the very last, and then turns round and darts off before you can draw your breath. The 24th! and this is the 19th! Of I shall want course we can't do it, Nettie. quantities of things, and Mr. Chatham, you know, is not used to your ways, and can't be whisked off in a moment whenever you please." "I daresay it's very kind of Mr. Chatham," said Nettie; "but I can take you out very well by myself-just as well as I brought you here. And I can't afford to get you quantities of things, Susan. So please to understand I am going off to pack up, and on the 24th we shall go." Once more, under Nettie's impatient eyes, a look and a smile passed between her sister and the Australian. Never very patient at any time, the girl was entirely aggravated out of all toleration now. "I can't tell what you may have to smile to "It is no each other about," said Nettie. But since I am very smiling business to me. driven to it, I shall go at once or not at all. And so that you understand me, that is all I want to say." With which words she disappeared suddenly to the multitudinous work that lay before her, thinking as little of Susan's opposition as of the clamour raised by the children, when the hard sentence of going half an hour earlier Nettie's to bed was pronounced upon them. haste and peremptoriness were mixed, if it must be told, with a little resentment against the world in general. She had ceased being sad --she was roused and indignant. By the time she had subdued the refractory children, and disposed of them for the night, those vast Australian boxes, which they had brought with them across the seas, were placed in the little hall, under the pale light of the lamp, ready for the process of packing, into which Nettie plunged without a moment's interval. Nettie did not hear the footstep which she might have recognized ringing rapidly down about with perpetual motion, folding and rethe frosty road. She was too busy rustling folding, and smoothing into miraculous compactness all the heterogeneous elements of that mass. When a sudden knock came to the door she started, struck with alarm, then paused a moment, looking round her, and perceiving at one hasty glance that nobody could without even giving me just warning-without a word, without a sign; and you think I will permit it, Nettie? Never-by heaven!" "Dr. Edward," said Nettie, trembling, half with terror, half with resolution, "you have no authority over me. We are two peoplewe are not one. I should not have gone away without a word or a sign. I should have said good-bye to you, whatever had happened; but that is different from permitting or forbidding. Let us say good-bye now and get it over, if that will please you better," she cried, drawing her hands from his grasp; "but I do not interfere with your business, and I must do mine my own way." He possibly enter without seeing both herself and her occupation, made one prompt step to the door, which nobody appeared to open. It was Mrs. Smith, no doubt; but the sudden breathless flutter which came upon Nettie cast doubts upon that rapid conclusion. She opened it quickly, with a certain breathless, sudden promptitude, and looked out pale and daunt less, understanding by instinct that some new trial to her fortitude was there. On the other hand, Edward Rider pressed in suddenly, almost without perceiving it was Nettie. They were both standing in the hall together, before they fully recognized each other. Then the doctor, gazing round him at the unusual confusion, gave an involuntary groan out of the The doctor was in no mood to argue. depths of his heart. "Then it is true!" said thrust the big box she had packed away into Dr. Rider. He stood among the chaos, and a corner, and closed it with a vindictive clang. saw all his own dreams broken up and shattered It gave him a little room to move in that little in pieces. Even passion failed him in that commonplace hall, with its dim lamp, which first bitterness of conviction. Nettie stood had witnessed so many of the most memorable opposite, with the sleeves of her black dress scenes of his life. "Look here," cried Dr. turned up from her little white nimble wrists, Rider; "authority has little to do with it. If her hair pushed back from her cheeks, pushed you had been my wife, Nettie, to be sure you quite behind one delicate ear, her eyes shining could not have deserted me. It is as great a with all those lights of energy and purpose cruelty-it is as hard upon me, this you are which came to them as soon as she took up her trying to do. I have submitted hitherto, and own character again. She met his eye with a Heaven knows it has been bitter enough; and little air of defiance, involuntary, and almost you scorn me for my submission," said the unconscious. "It is quite true," said Nettie, doctor, making the discovery by instinct. bursting forth in sudden self-justification; "I"When a fellow obeys you, it is only contempt have my work to do, and I must do it as best you feel for him; but I tell you, Nettie, I will I can. I cannot keep considering you all, and bear it no longer. You shall not go away. losing my life. I must do what God has given This is not to be. I will neither say good-bye, me to do, or I must die." nor think of it. What is your business is my business; and I declare to you, you shall not go unless I go too. Ah-I forgot. They tell me there is a fellow, an Australian, who ventures to pretend-I don't mean to say I believe it. You think he will not object to your burdens! Nettie! Don't let us kill each other. Let us take all the world on our shoulders," cried the doctor, drawing near again, with passionate looks, "rather than part!" Never had Nettie been so near breaking down, and falling into sudden womanish tears and despair. She would not yield to the overpowering momentary passion. She clutched at the bundle of frocks again, and made room for them spasmodically in the box which she had already packed. Edward Rider stood silent, gazing at her as in her sudden anguish Nettie pulled down and reconstructed that curious honey-comb. But he had not come here merely to gaze, while the catastrophe was preparing. He went up and seized her busy hands, raised her up in spite of her resistance, and thrust away, with an exclamation of disgust, that great box in which all his hopes were being packed away. "There is first a question to settle between you and me," cried the doctor: you shall not do it. No; I forbid it. Nettie. Because you are wilful," cried Edward Rider, hoarse and violent, grasping the hands tighter, with a strain in which other passions than love mingled, "am I to give up all the rights of a man? You are going away There was a pause-neither of them could speak at that moment. Nettie, who felt her resolution going, her heart melting, yet knew she dared not give way, clasped her hands tight in each other and stood trembling, yet refusing to tremble; collecting her voice and thoughts. The doctor occupied that moment of suspense in a way which might have looked ludicrous in other circumstances, but was a relief to the passion that possessed him. He dragged the other vast Australian box to the same corner where he had set the first, and piled them one above the other. Then he collected with awkward care all the heaps of garments which lay about, and carried them off in the other direc- | with eyes intent as if she might suddenly distion to the stairs, where he laid them carefully with a clumsy tenderness. When he had swept away all these encumbrances, as by a sudden gust of wind, he came back to Nettie, and once more clasped the firm hands which held each other fast. She broke away from him with a sudden cry— "You acknowledged it was impossible!" cried Nettie. "It is not my doing, or anybody's; no one shall take the world on his shoulders for my sake-I ask nobody to bear my burdens. Thank you for not believing it—that is a comfort at least. Never, surely, any one else and not you, not you! Dr. Edward, let us make an end of it. I will never consent to put my yoke upon your shoulders, but I-I will never forget you or blame you-any more. It is all hard, but we cannot help it. Goodbye-don't make it harder, you, who are the only one that- -; good-bye,- -no more-don't say any more. At this moment the parlour door opened suddenly; Nettie's trembling mouth and frame, and the wild protest and contradiction which were bursting from the lips of the doctor, were lost upon the spectator, absorbed in her own affairs, and full of excitement on her own account, who looked out. "Perhaps Mr. Edward will walk in," said Mrs. Fred. Now he is here to witness what I mean, I should like to speak to you, please, Nettie. I did not think I should ever appeal to you, Mr. Edward, against Nettie's wilfulness-but, really now, we, none of us can put up with it any longer. Please to walk in and hear what I've got to say." The big Bushman stood before the little fire in the parlour, extinguishing its tiny glow with his vast shadow. The lamp burned dimly upon the table. A certain air of confusion was in the room. Perhaps it was because Nettie had already swept her own particular belongings out of that apartment, which once, to the doctor's eyes, had breathed of her presence in every corner-but it did not look like Nettie's parlour to-night. Mrs. Fred, with the broad white bands of her cap streaming over her black dress, had just assumed her place on the sofa, which was her domestic throne. Nettie, much startled and taken by surprise, stood by the table, waiting with a certain air of wondering impatience what was to be said to her-with still the sleeves turned up from her tiny wrists, and her fingers unconsciously busy expressing her restless intolerance of this delay by a hundred involuntary tricks and movements. The doctor stood close by her, looking only at Nettie, watching her appear from under his very gaze. As for the Australian, he stood uneasy under Nettie's rapid investigating glance, and the slower survey which Dr. Rider made on entering. He | plucked at his big beard, and spread out his large person with a confusion and embarrassment rather more than merely belonged to the stranger in a family party; while Mrs. Fred, upon her sofa, took up her handkerchief and once more began to fan her pink cheeks. What was coming? After a moment's pause, upon which Nettie could scarcely keep herself from breaking, Susan spoke. "Nettie has always had the upper hand so much that she thinks I am always to do exactly as she pleases," burst forth Mrs. Fred; "and I don't doubt poor Fred encouraged her in it, because he felt he was obliged to my family, and always gave in to her; but now I have somebody to stand by me," added Susan, fanning still more violently, and with a sound in her voice which betrayed a possibility of tears"now I have somebody to stand by me--I tell you once for all, Nettie, I will not go on the 24th." Nettie gazed at her sister in silence without attempting to say anything. Then she lifted her eyes inquiringly to the Australian, in his uneasy spectator position before the e. She was not much discomposed, evidently, by that sudden assertion of will-possibly Nettie was used to it—but she looked curious and roused, and rather eager to know what was it now? "I will not go on the 24th," cried Mrs. Fred, with a hysterical toss of her head. "I will not be treated like a child, and told to get ready whenever Nettie pleases. She pretends it is all for our sake, but it is for the sake of having her own will, and because she has taken a sudden disgust at something. I asked you in, Mr. Edward, because you are her friend, and because you are the children's uncle, and ought to know how they are provided for. Mr. Chatham and I," said Susan, overcome by her feelings, and agitating the handkerchief violently, "have settled-to be-married first before we set out." If a shell had fallen in the peaceful apartment, the effect could not have been more startling. The two who had been called in to receive that intimation, and who up to this moment had been standing together listening languidly enough, too much absorbed in the matter between themselves to be very deeply concerned about anything Mrs. Fred could say or do, fell suddenly apart with the wildest amazement in their looks. "Susan, you are mad!" cried Nettie, gazing aghast at her sister, | doctor as he stood watching her. The work she with an air of mingled astonishment and in- had meant to do was over. Nettie's occupation credulity. The doctor, too much excited to was gone. With the next act of the domestic receive with ordinary decorum information so drama she had nothing to do. For the first important, made a sudden step up to the big time in her life utterly vanquished, with silent embarrassed Australian, who stood before the promptitude she abdicated on the instant. She fire gazing into vacancy, and looking the very seemed unable to strike a blow for the leaderembodiment of conscious awkwardness. Dr. ship thus snatched from her hands. With Rider stretched out both his hands and grasped proud surprise and magnanimity she withdrew, the gigantic fist of the Bushman with an effusion forbearing even the useless reproaches of which which took that worthy altogether by surprise. she had impatiently asked, "What was the "My dear fellow, I wish you joy-I wish you good?" Never abdicated emperor laid aside joy. Anything I can be of use to you in, com- his robes with more ominous significance, than mand me!" cried the doctor, with a suppressed Nettie, with fingers trembling between haste shout of half-incredulous triumph. Then he and agitation, smoothed down round her shapely returned restlessly towards Nettie-they all wrists those turned-up sleeves. turned to her with instinctive curiosity. Never in all her troubles had Nettie been so pale; she looked in her sister's face with a kind of despair. "Is this true, Susan?" she said, with a sorrowful wonder as different as possible from the doctor's joyful surprise-"not something said to vex us really true? And this has been going on, and I knew nothing of it; and all this time you have been urging me to go back to the colony-me-as if you had no other thoughts. If you had made up your mind to this, what was the use of driving me desperate?" cried Nettie, in a sudden outburst of that incomprehension which aches in generous hearts. Then she stopped suddenly and looked from her sister, uttering suppressed sobs, and hiding her face in her handkerchief on the sofa, to the Australian before the fire. "What is the good of talking?" said Nettie, with a certain indig nant impatient indulgence, coming to an abrupt conclusion. Nobody knew so well as she did how utterly useless it was to remonstrate or complain. She dropped into the nearest chair, and began with hasty tremulous hands to smooth down the cuffs of her black sleeves. In the bitterness of the moment it was not the sudden deliverance, but the heartlessness and domestic treachery that struck Nettie. She, the champion and defender of this helpless family for years who had given them bread, and served it to them with her own cheerful unwearied hands-who had protected as well as provided for them in her dauntless innocence and youth. When she was thus cast off on the brink of the costliest sacrifice of all, it was not the delightful sensation of freedom which occurred to Nettie. She fell back with a silent pang of injury swelling in her heart, and, all tremulous and hasty, gave her agitated attention to the simple act of smoothing down her sleeves a simple but symbolical act, which conveyed a world of meaning to the mind of the The doctor's better genius saved him from driving the indignant Titania desperate at that critical moment by any ill-advised rejoicings; and the sight of Nettie's agitation so far calmed Dr. Rider that he made the most sober and decorous congratulations to the sister-in-law, whom for the first time he felt grateful to Perhaps, had he been less absorbed in his own affairs, he could scarcely have failed to remember how, not yet a year ago, the shabby form of Fred lay on that same sofa from which Susan had announced her new prospects; but in this unexampled revolution of affairs no thought of Fred disturbed his brother, whose mind was thoroughly occupied with the sudden tumult of his own hopes. "Oh yes, I hope I shall be happy at last. After all my troubles, I have to look to myself, Mr. Edward; and your poor brother would have been the last to blame me," sobbed Mrs. Fred, with involuntary self-vindication. Then followed a pause. The change was too sudden and extraordinary, and involved results too deeply important to every individual present, to make words possible. Mrs. Fred, with her face buried in her handkerchief, and Nettie, her whole frame thrilling with mortification and failure, tremulously trying to button her sleeves, and bestowing her whole mind upon that operation, were discouraging interlocutors; and after the doctor and the Bushman had shaken hands, their powers of communication were exhausted. The silence was at length broken by the Australian, who, clearing his voice between every three words, delivered his embarrassed sentiments as follow: "I trust, Miss Nettie, you'll not think you've been unfairly dealt by, or that any change is necessary so far as you are concerned. Of course," said Mr. Chatham, growing red, and plucking at his beard, "neither your sister nor I found out-till quite lately-how things were going to be; and as for you making any |