Already she was like a half-blown flower blighted before its opening. In all the world Linda seemed to be the only one to come to her help. Linda had no close ties, no one on earth so near to her as Cyril. Now she worked hard with her needle to support herself in the house of strangers. Was it more than right that Cyril should share his comfortable home with one so near, who had done so much for him? Ever since she had known him, Cyril had told Agnes how much he owed to Linda. Since the birth of little Cyril he had spoken of it often, with the premeditated purpose of softening Agnes' heart toward his cousin to a degree that would make her willing that Linda should come to Lotusmere. Agnes thought every. thing over. As she rocked little Cyril in her arms she would muse on the woman who, as a little child, nursed his father, and her heart would warm toward Linda, till she thought of her "here."

"Here! in this very room," she would say. "Living in this house, - her home as well as mine! That dreadful look which she gave me under the maples of Ulm!" and Agnes shuddered. "If she were ever to look at me like that here in my own home, how could I bear it! I could not bear it!" and Agnes would close her eyes to shut out the very thought of Linda. “It is right and must be done sometime," she would say to herself with a sigh as she banished her. Nevertheless, whenever Cyril mentioned Linda's coming in the form of an actual proposition, a pang struck through Agnes' heart, and a shadow swept over her eyes which made Cyril silent. That strange, deprecating glance of hers made him feel as if she were conscious of how much he was keeping back from her concerning Linda. He was sure that she knew nothing of it. If that too well remembered look of Linda's could make Agnes shrink from the thought of her like this, how much more acute repulsion would she feel could she know the whole truth. She knew that Linda loved Cyril devotedly, as a sister." The thought of this love which she bore him was all that made her endurable to Agnes. Linda was Cyril's sister, his only sister! she was trying to compel herself to think of her and to love her as such. In the beginning Cyril thought it a wrong to Linda to explain the nature of her wild and vehement passion for himself. For the same reason he withheld from Agnes the fact that Linda wrote him, constantly, letters filled with passionate terms of endearment, which Agnes would think no woman on earth had a right to address him save herself. That any woman could do so, even one who claimed to be his sister, had never entered into Agnes upright mind as possible. Cyril knew this, and said, "Why should I make her unhappy, and for no just cause?"

He was used to Linda's letters; had he not received them ever since he was a boy? "He knew just how to take them." Agnes did not, and more, never could learn. He could never teach her single mind to understand them, never; not as he wished them understood, which meant that at a glance she would understand them literally, and altogether too well. "The truth was not always to be spoken; certainly not." Never was there a more utter fallacy.

Acting on this conclusion he took his first step away from his wife, as any man or woman does who makes the most intimate confidences of another life his or her own in secret; hiding that secret from the wedded mate as from one who has neither right

nor interest in the matter. The secret in itself may not be wrong, but its influences all run in the wrong direction. The subterfuges, the deceit, the falsehood, almost sure to grow out of it, build up the barrier, and make the sin and the unhappiness. Cyril did not want Linda's letters, not at first. For one year, at least, they wearied and tormented him. With his continued absence all her old longing just to see his face came back to her. With it malice and pride went under. She asked his forgiveness for all her wicked threats. She was crazed when she uttered them, she said; she did not mean them. Life was empty, desolate, utterly worthless without him. For his sake she could even love his wife. She did not wish to intrude, but her soul yearned for the sight of his face. She would be a servant in his house, if she could but come where he was, and serve him, and see him once more. For the first year of his marriage, nothing could have been more unacceptable to Cyril than his cousin Ethelinda's presence. His life was complete. Any third person would have been an intruder. Now all seemed changed. He felt as if he would welcome anybody who would divide her care, and help to give him back the society of his Agnes. Besides, he began to be conscious of a quality in Linda's letters which gratified and soothed him. He did not know, himself, how infinitely sweet to his soul were the voice of praise and the word of worship. Here was one who had worshipped him ever since he was born. He had neglected and forgotten her, how often, but she had never forgotten him! How often he felt alone and neglected now. Here was one longing, praying to love him and to serve him, whose one object in life would be to minister unto him. The more he thought of this, the more it became a personal wish with him that Linda should

come.

And as soon as he himself wanted Linda, he was ready to pronounce mentally that Agnes' undisguised aversion to his cousin was unreasonable, if not unkind. "She can afford to be more magnanimous," he said. "It is she who took me from Linda, and made me her own. It was Ethelinda who lost me, and I was all that she had, poor girl. In her heart no one could supplant me, not even a child," he added bitterly. "Agnes should remember that she took Ethelinda's all, and forgive her if she did give a look of hatred. Even now could Agnes give a look of love to anybody who could take me from her?"

His own self-pity made him sympathize with Linda. How soon she felt it filtering through his written words. "He was unhappy," she was sure of it. After all he wished her, he needed her! At present this was bliss enough. In every line that she wrote she followed up her advantage to the utmost. He had already reached that place where he and Linda were exchanging weekly letters filled with tenderest sympathy, of which his wife knew nothing, when he made the last proposition to send for Linda to come to their home.

Agnes held in hers the wasted hand of little Cyril. It was scarcely bigger, and as blue as a tiny bird's claw. Could a baby with such shriveled little fingers live! Her silent tears fell upon them, upon the waxen face, and shrunken features, and purple-veined eyelids.

"Do send for her!" she suddenly exclaimed; "what if she does hate me! I can love her if she will save him! Send for Linda, Cyril, send at once."

"You have done right at last, Agnes," said Cyril. "Linda will give you back your baby, and she will give you back to me. It is so long since I have seen my Agnes. I love baby's mother, but I want my Agnes."

He stooped and wiped away the dropping tears, and kissed her on her forehead. She shuddered, not at the kiss, but because as she felt it she saw Linda's face filled with the horrible look which made her shudder under the maples of Ulm. She was weak and over-wrought; it was a natural sequence that she should see visions. This fell upon her like the first chill of a slowly gathering storm, like the cold presence of evil yet to come.

(To be continued.)

FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD.

CHAPTER X. MISTRESS AND MAN.

HALF an hour later Bathsheba, in finished dress, and followed by Liddy, entered the upper end of the old hall to find that her men had all deposited themselves on a long form and a settle at the lower extremity. She sat down at a table and opened the time-book, pen in her hand, and a canvas money-bag beside her. From this she poured a small heap of coin. Liddy took up a position at her elbow and began to sew, sometimes pausing and looking round, or, with the air of a privileged person, taking up one of the half sovereigns lying before her, and admiringly surveying it as a work of art merely, strictly preventing her countenance from expressing any wish to possess it as money. "Now, before I begin, men,' ," said Bathsheba, "I have two matters to speak of. The first is that the bailiff is dismissed for thieving, and that I have formed a resolution to have no bailiff at all, but to manage everything with my own head and hands."

The men breathed an audible breath of amazement. "The next matter is, have you heard anything of Fanny?"

66

Nothing, ma'am."

"Have you done anything?"

"I met Farmer Boldwood," said Jacob Smallbury, "and I went with him and two of his men, and dragged Wood Pond, but we found nothing."

"And the new shepherd have been to Buck's Head, thinking she had gone there, but nobody had sced her," said Laban Tall.

"Hasn't William Smallbury been to Casterbridge?" "Yes, ma'am, but he's not yet come home. He promised to be back by six."

"It wants a quarter of six at present," said Bathsheba, looking at her watch. "I dare say he'll be in directly. Well, now then "- she looked into the book—"Joseph Poorgrass, are you there?"

"Yes, sir ma'am, I mane,'' said the person addressed. "I am the personal name of Poorgrass- a small matter who is nothing in his own eye. Perhaps it is different in the eye of other people - but I don't say it, though public thought will out."

"What do you do on the farm?

"I does carting things all the year, and in seed time I shoots the rooks and sparrows, and helps at pig-killing, sir."

"How much to you?"

"Please nine and ninepence and a good halfpenny where 'twas a bad one, sir-ma'am, I mane."

"Quite correct. Now here are ten shillings in addition as a small present, as I am a new comer."

Bathsheba blusted slightly as she spoke, at the sense of being generous in public, and Henery Fray, who had drawn

ans of it.

up towards her chair, lifted his eyebrows and fingers to express amazement on a small scale. "How much do I owe you that man in the corner what's your name?" continued Bathsheba.

Matthew Moon, ma'am," said a singular framework of clothes with nothing of any consequence inside them, which advanced with the toes in no definite direction forwards, but turned in or out as they chanced to swing.

-

"Matthew Mark, did you say? — speak out I shall not hurt you," inquired the young farmer, kindly.

66

Matthew Moon, mem," said Henery Fray, correctingly from behind her chair, to which point he had edged himself. "Matthew Moon," murmured Bathsheba, turning her bright eyes to the book. "Ten and twopence halfpenny is the sum put down to you, I see?"

"Yes, mis'ess," said Matthew, as the rustle of wind among dead leaves.

"Here it is, and ten shillings. Now the next Andrew Candle, you are a new man, I hear. How came you to leave your last farm?"

"P-p-p-p-p-pl-pl-pl-pl-1-1-1-l-case, ma'am, p-p-p-p-pl-plpl-pl-please, ma'am please'm-please'm "

"'A's a stammering man, mem," said Henery Fray in an undertone," and they turned him away because the only time he ever did speak plain he said his soul was his own, and other iniquities, to the squire. 'A can cuss, mem, as well as you or I, but 'a can't speak a common speech to save his life.”

"Andrew Candle, here's yours-finish thanking me in a day or two. Temperance Miller-oh, here's another, Soberness, both women I suppose?"

"Yes'm. Here we be, 'a b'lieve," was echoed in shrill unison.

"What have you been doing?"

"Tending thrashing-machine, and wimbling haybonds, and saying Hoosh! to the cocks and hens when they go upon your seeds, and planting Early Flourballs and Thompson's Wonderfuls with a dibble."

"Yes I see. Are they satisfactory women?" she inquired softly of Henery Fray.

"Oh, mem don't ask me! Yielding women

-as scar

let a pair as ever was!" groaned Henery under his breath. "Sit down." "Who, mem?"

"Sit down!"

Joseph Poorgrass, in the background, twitched, and his lips became dry with fear of some terrible consequences as he saw Bathsheba summarily speaking, and Henery slinking off to a corner.

Now the next. Laban Tall. You'll stay on working for me?"

"For you or anybody that pays me well, ma'am," replied the young married man.

"True the man must live!" said a woman in the back quarter, who had just entered with clicking pattens. "What woman is that?" Bathsheba asked.

"I be his lawful wife!" continued the voice with greater prominence of manner and tone. This lady called herself five-and-twenty, looked thirty, passed as thirtyfive, and was forty. She was a woman who never, like some newly married, showed conjugal tenderness in public, perhaps because she had none to show.

64

Oh, you are," said Bathsheba. "Well, Laban, will you stay on?"

Yes, he'll stay, ma'am !" said again the shrill tongue of Laban's lawful wife.

"Well, he can speak for himself, I suppose ?" "O Lord, no, ma'am. A simple tool. Well enough, but a poor gawkhammer mortal," the wife replied.

“Heh-heh-heh!" laughed the married man with a hideous effort of appreciation, for he was as irrepressibly goodhumored under ghastly snubs as a parliamentary candidate on the hustings.

The names remaining were called in the same manner. "Now I think I have done with you," said Bathsheba, closing the book and shaking back a stray twine of hair. "Has William Smallbury returned?'"'

Already ma'am."

"The new shepherd will want a man under him," suggested Henery Fray, trying to make himself official again by a sideway approach towards her chair.

"Oh-he will. Who can he have?"

Young Cain Ball is a very good lad," Henery said, "and Shepherd Oak don't mind his youth?" he added, turning with an apologetic smile to the shepherd, who had just appeared on the scene, and was now leaning against the door-post with his arms folded.

"Oh, I don't mind that," said Gabriel.

"How did Cain come by such a name?" asked Bathsheba.

"Oh, you see, mem, his pore mother, not being a Scripture-read woman, made a mistake at his christening, thinking 'twas Abel killed Cain, and called en Cain, meaning Abel all the time. She didn't find it out till 'twas too late, and the chiel was handed back to his godmother. very unfortunate for the boy."

"It is rather unfortunate."

'Tis

"Yes. However, we soften it down as much as we can, and call him Cainy. Ah, pore widow-woman! she cried her heart out about it almost. She was brought up by a very heathen father and mother who never sent her to church or school, and it shows how the sins of the parents are visited upon the children, mem."

Mr. Fray here drew up his features to the mild degree of melancholy required when the persons involved in the given misfortune do not belong to your own family.

"Very well, then, Cainy Ball to be under shepherd. And you quite understand your duties?-you, I mean, Gabriel Oak."

66

Quite well, I thank you, Miss Everdene," said Shepherd Oak from the door-post. "If I don't, I'll inquire." Gabriel was rather staggered by the remarkable coolness of her manner. Certainly nobody without previous information would even have dreamt that Oak and the handsome woman before whom he stood had ever been other than strangers.

But perhaps her air was the inevitable result of the social rise which had advanced her from a cottage to a large house and fields. The case is not unexampled in high places. When, in the writings of the later poets, Jove and his family are found to have moved from their cramped quarters on the peak of Olympus into the wide sky above it, their words show a proportionate increase of arrogance and reserve.

Footsteps were heard in the passage, combining in their character the qualities both of weight and measure, rather at the expense of velocity. (All.) bridge."

"Here's Billy Smallbury come from Caster

"And what's the news?" said Bathsheba, as William, after marching to the middle of the hall, took a handkerchief from his hat and wiped his forehead from its centre to its remoter boundaries."

"I should have been sooner, miss," he said, "if it hadn't been for the weather." He then stamped with each foot severely, and on looking down his boots were perceived to be clogged with snow.

"Come at last, is it ?" said Henery.

"Well, what about Fanny?" said Bathsheba.

"Well, ma'am, in round numbers, she's run away with the soldiers," said William.

"No; not a steady girl like Fanny!

"I'll tell ye all particulars. When I got to Casterbridge Barracks, they said,The 11th Dragoon-Guards be gone away, and new troops have come.' The Eleventh left last week for Melchester. The Route came from Government like a thief in the night, as is his nature to, and afore the Eleventh knew it, almost, they were on the march."

Gabriel had listened with interest. "I saw them go," he said.

"Yes," continued William, "they pranced down the street playing The Girl I left behind me,' so 'tis said, in glorious notes of triumph. Every looker-on's inside shook with the blows of the great drum to his deepest vitals, and

"No; nobody knew it. I believe he was higher in rank than a private."

Gabriel remained musing and said nothing, for he was in doubt.

"Well, we are not likely to know more to-night, at any rate," said Bathsheba. "But one of you had better run across to Farmer Boldwood's and tell him that much."

She then rose; but before retiring, addressed a few words to them with a pretty dignity, to which her mourning dress added a soberness that was hardly to be found in the words themselves.

"Now mind, you have a mistress instead of a master. I don't yet know my powers or my talents in farming; but I shall do my best, and if you serve me well, so shall I serve you. Don't any unfair ones among you (if there are any such, but I hope not) suppose that because I'm a woman I don't understand the difference between bad goings-on and good." (All.)

"No'm!"

(Liddy.) "Excellent well said."

"I shall be up before you are awake; I shall be afield before you are up; and I shall have breakfasted before you are afield. In short, I shall astonish you all.”

(All.) "Yes'm!"

And so, good-night."

(All.) "Good night, ma'am."

Then this small thesmothete stepped from the table, and surged out of the hall, her black silk dress licking up a few straws and dragging them along with a scratching noise upon the floor. Liddy, elevating her feelings to the occasion from a sense of grandeur, floated off behind Bathsheba with a milder dignity not entirely free from travesty, and the door was closed.

(To be continued.)

IN THE LABORATORY WITH AGASSIZ.

BY A FORMER PUPIL.

Ir was more than fifteen years ago that I entered the laboratory of Professor Agassiz, and told him I had enrolled my name in the scientific school as a student of natural history. He asked me a few questions about my object in coming, my antecedents generally, the mode in which I afterwards proposed to use the knowledge I might acquire, and finally, whether I wished to study any special branch. To the latter I replied that while I wished to be well grounded in all departments of zoology, I purposed to devote myself specially to insects.

"When do you wish to begin?" he asked. "Now," I replied.

This seemed to please him, and with an energetic "Very well," he reached from a shelf a huge jar of specimens in yellow alcohol.

"Take this fish," said he, “and look at it; we call it a Hæmulon; by and by I will ask what you have seen."

With that he left me, but in a moment returned with explicit instructions as to the care of the object entrusted

to me.

"No man is fit to be a naturalist," said he, "who does not know how to take care of specimens."

I was to keep the fish before me in a tin tray, and occasionally moisten the surface with alcohol from the jar, always taking care to replace the stopper tightly. Those were not the days of ground glass stoppers, and elegantly shaped exhibition jars; all the old students will recall the

riches them on the one side, ruins them on the other. The spinning-wheel is silenced because the jenny does the work of five hundred of the old wheels in a day; the sewingmachine reduces the sempstresses to one half. The married women are the great losers by this; they cannot, or ought not to leave their children, and yet have some time which they could employ profitably by adding to the general earnings. A few of the old trades still remain, more particularly in France: the lace of Normandy, the gloves of Isère, embroidery and straw-plaiting in Lorraine; and of these a short description will be given in the following paper.

There is no kind of work which is more completely or essentially feminine than that of lace; the produce of the pillow, which is above all price, and yet so poorly paid. Valenciennes has almost ceased to furnish the lace which bears its name. It is a difficult kind of work, requiring a very long apprenticeship, and wholly absorbing to the women engaged in it; whilst the payment is so small, that the industrious population of the north of France find means to occupy themselves more advantageously. It requires many months, sometimes even a year, to weave a piece of three French yards; and as the lace-maker cannot afford to wait for her wages during so long a period, it is customary for the employer to pay when a third is finished, as well as to find the thread: by which arrangement he is sometimes a loser. Thus, there are but three lace-makers left in Valenciennes : one, who makes the old and real kind, earns about a shilling a day, the other two, fabricating the sort of lace which is imitated in Belgium, receive fifteen-pence for a day of twelve hours. Arras is a centre for a large manufacture of common lace, but the women are in general poor and ignorant.

The kind called the Point d'Alençon is made under different arrangements; whilst at Valenciennes the net and the figure are carried on at the same time, the Point d'Alençon is divided into several departments. They distinguish between the tracers, the net-makers, the lacemenders, the ground work-makers, those who work the holes, and the slender cord which surrounds and strengthens the designs. An apprenticeship of three months is sufficient to learn all these varieties; and provided they do not spoil their hands by heavy work, they can attend to all the lighter cares of housekeeping, lay down the pillow and take it up again as if it were knitting. Yet tenpence a day is all they can earn; a very small number may manage to get a shi ling or thirteen-pence; the outlay, however, is small for the apparatus, nothing but the pillow, the bobbins, and the pins being wanted. Sometimes the young girls work alone; sometimes they collect together to talk whilst moving their bobbins; in the evening they economize light by assembling in one workshop. It is a delicate kind of work, which gives a certain kind of elegance to those who are occupied with it, and contributes much to the comfort of the family. Those who transfer and mend old lace form another interesting branch of the needle-women.

Lace is one of the few victories of handicraft over machine work; so far, nothing but a very inferior imitation having been produced. The efforts of the minister Colbert were very great to introduce superior lace making into France, equal to or surpassing that of Venice. He had recourse, according to the custom of the day, to making it into a privilege; he was resisted, and threatened to send a regiment against the lace-women of Alençon; now the Venetians are no longer their rivals, but they have some difficulty in keeping up with the Belgians. All the patterns are designed in Paris; but the skilful workmanship and lower wages give a superiority to Belgium.

Closely connected with lace is the embroidery of muslin and net, which employs numberless hands in France, Switzerland, Scotland, and Ireland. The best designs are drawn in Paris, and the manufacturers in the various towns where the work is done give out the muslin ready. traced to those who live in the villages round about. The goodness of the embroidery depends upon the elegance of the design, the perfection of the work, and the fineness of

the cotton employed. At the Exhibition of 1855 held in Paris, a house at Nancy sent several collars of exactly the same design, but so differently worked, that the cheapest cost three shillings, and the dearest two pounds. The Scotch and Irish work can now compete with the French, and be done more cheaply; the cotton used by the latter is generally too coarse. In Switzerland, the master furnishes the cotton; whilst the Frenchwoman buys her own, and is tempted to do her work in the quickest manner; she never knows her master, and having no interest in him, works without self-respect.

It is very different to this at Saint-Gall, the great centre of Swiss embroidery: the day on which the work is brought in is a festival; early in the morning the young women arrive from all parts in their Sunday attire. After attending service in the church, they collect in a large room round a long table, where each receives a glass of white wine. They begin to sing one of their melodies in parts, whilst the master goes round the table, examines the work, and pays for it. If he refuse any, and declines to take it, the dispute is decided by a syndic, who sits in the next room. When the examination is over, the head of the establishment throws a mass of embroidery patterns on the table; each girl chooses the kind she likes best; it is inscribed in her book, with the price agreed on, and the day when it is to be returned. They are very industrious; and by reason of their great frugality, are contented with very poor remuneration; and by slightly sewing their pieces of work together, can have them washed at half the cost. In Saxony, the wages are so low, that it is wonderful how the women can live upon them; in Scotland, it is said that many of the children receive only a halfpenny a day. A small number in Nancy, who can embroider coats of arms and crests, earn three shillings a day; but from ten to twenty pence is the usual wage. It is a kind of work that endangers the sight; and as fashion reigns supreme, it not unfrequently happens that a style is abandoned before the orders are completed; when the merchant profits by the smallest pretext to refuse the work from the manufacturer; and in this way the loss often falls upon the poor woman, who can scarcely buy bread and clothes.

Speaking of the graceful adornments of women which they owe to their own sex, we must include the preparation of feathers, whether of the ostrich, the marabout, the heron, the bird of Paradise, or the exquisite hummingbirds; and those who try their skill on flowers, whether of paper or muslin. There is something gay and youthful in the name of florist, and nothing can exceed the beautiful productions which come from their hands; they rival those of our gardens in freshness and brilliancy. This is especially a trade of Paris: beautiful women of both hemispheres there procure the flowers with which to wreathe their hair. Italy once held the first rank for artificial flowers, as it did for silks, lace, and mirrors; then Lyons succeeded to Italy; now the Parisian flora are without a rival. Nearly six thousand work women live on this manufacture in that city alone. The most skilful are real artists, who study natural flowers with a love for them, and reproduce them with more fidelity than the best paintTheir wages will amount to half a crown a day ; whilst the inferior ones do not make more than twentypence, even when working eleven hours. A florist may live upon this if she do not indulge in the fancy of wearing her own wreaths and going to balls.

ers.

It is a curious anomaly that the cutting of precious stones should have established itself on the summit of the Jura Mountains, at Septmoncel, where it is very largely shared in by women. Whilst the diamond is cut at Amsterdam by powerful machines, and in large workshops, as suitable to the richest jewel the earth produces, the remainder of our gems, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, aqua-marine, amethysts, opals, and the corals for children, are cut and polished in a desert by honest and indigent mountaineers. They remain faithful to the manners and customs of their forefathers, and all the riches which pass through their hands do not make them discontented with their chilly cottages and hard fare. The women make imitation gems with