But although the festivities with which our ancestors hailed the opening of this month have sunk into neglect, Nature has not forsaken her festivities. She still scatters flowers, and revels in dews; she still loves her leafy garniture, and the burst of unoppressive sunshine; for, though we moderns may abandon the customs of our forefathers, and may even deny to May those joyous at tributes with which they delighted to invest her; though we complain of cold winds, dull days, and frosty nights, cutting down flower and leaf, and have them too, yet is May a gladsome month withal. Vegetation has made a proud progress; it has become deep, lavish, luxuriating, and nothing can be more delightful than the tender green of the young leaves. Primroses still scatter their millions of pale stars over shady banks, and And there, too, in a subsequent stage among the mossy roots of hazels;. of the pageant, were— "The archer-men in green, with belt and bow, Feasting on pheasant, river-fowl, and swan, With Robin at their head and Marian." One "evil May-day," however, occurred, and never again did Maymorning come wreathed to the citizens in its usual smiles. In consequence of an insurrection that broke out in London on May-eve, 1517, the sports of May-day were long suspended; nor were they ever after more than partially resumed. The (6 great shaft of Cornhill" was not once erected after that event; and thirty-two years later was broken in pieces, at the instigation of a fanatic priest, who insisted that the inhabitants had made an idol of it, by sainting it along with the church. Without being bigoted admirers of the rough and riotous sports of antiquity, one cannot help regretting that the innocent and fanciful festival of May-day has fallen into disuse. In Scotland, Wales, Ireland, and, indeed, most countries, some traces of Mayday customs still prevail; but as to Jack in the Green, it is too great a burlesque of the old pageant to be here tolerated. and, once more, amid the thicklyspringing verdure of the meadow, we hail the spotted and golden cowslips. sur Towards the close of the month, the mind, which has been continually led onwards by the expansion of days, leaves, and flowers, seems to repose on the fulness of nature. Every thing is clothed. The Spring actually seems past. We are rounded by all that beauty, sunshine, and melody, which mingle in our ideas of summer. Butterflies take their wavering flight from flower to flower, and dragonflies on the banks of rivers. Cattle, fed to satiety, repose in meadows golden with crowfoot; and sheep-washing is begun in many places. The mowing-grass presents a mosaic of the most gorgeous and inimitable hues, or is white with waving umbels. A passing gale awakens a scene of lively animation. The massy foliage of trees swings heavily; the boughs of the hawthorn wave with all their loads of fragrant bloom, and the snowy, umbelliferous plants toss on the lea like foam on a stormy ocean. Cottage gardens are now perfect paradises; and, after gazing on their sunny quietude, their lilacs, peonies, wall-flowers, tulips, and crocuses, with their yellow tufts of flowers, now becoming as common at the doors of village cots as the rosemary and rue once were, one cannot help regretting that more of our labouring classes do not enjoy the freshness of earth, and the pure breeze of heaven, in these little rural retreats, instead of being buried in close sombre alleys. A man who can, in addition to tolerable remuneration for the labour of his hands, enjoy a clean cottage and a garden amidst the common but precious offerings of Nature, the grateful shade of trees and flow of waters, a pure atmosphere and a riant sky, can scarcely be called poor. If Burns had been asked what was the greatest luxury of May, we suppose he would have quoted from his Cotter's Saturday Night," "If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare, One cordial in this melancholy vale, "Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair In others' arms breathe out the tender tale, Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale." TO THE FIRST OF MAY "Hard his herte that loveth nought In May, when al this mirth is wrought."-CHAUCER. HAIL, thou rosy May! with thy merry-dancing hours, To life's young hour of feeling, the gales of Araby, Let Summer wear her flaunting garb and shoot her parching ray, Thy pearls are flashing on the bough, the land is giving life, The waters sparkle with delight, a buz is in the air, The low wind scarcely moves the wood, or sighs the leaves between, Thou kindliest month of all the year, pass not too fast away, Thou 'rt come, bright May! with passion's glance to flush the virgin's cheek, The sadness of affection's dawn is over her soft heart, She sighs amid her solitude, and tears unbidden start She hears the mated bird's first song, when love is all the theme,— Of thee, thou month of love, inquires, why she is not the same; No songster comes to sing to her, and wile her hours away, Cheering her wishing solitude with his congenial lay. Welcome, thou rosy May! with thy merry-dancing hours, ANDREW CLEAVES.* MATTERS went on smoothly on the whole, till Joey had been full two years at school, and his third summer holidays were approaching. They were no longer anticipated with the same impatient longing which had drawn his heart towards home in his earlier school-days; but still there were home pleasures, and home indulgences, not attainable at school, and foremost of those ranked the privilege of being master of his own time, and of the grey colt, now become a well-disciplined, yet spirited steed, and destined to succeed to the functions of blind Dobbin, whose faithful career was fast drawing to a close. In the meantime, Joey was permitted to call young Greybeard his horse, and was indulged in the pride and happiness of driving it himself the first time its services were put in requisition to fetch him home for the Christmas holidays. But when the summer vacation arrived, Joey's return was ordained to be in far other and less triumphant order. It so chanced, that on the very day of breaking up, a great annual fair was held at C, which was looked forward to as a grand festival by the boys whose parents and friends were resident there. These youngsters had vaunted its delights to Joey, and one especial friend and crony had invited his schoolfellow to go with him Ito his own house, and stay the two days of the fair. Now it unluckily fell out that these identical two days occurred at a season most important to Andrew-just as his hay-harvest was getting in, and there was reason to expect the breaking up of a long spell of dry weather. So when Joey returned to school on the Monday, he was enjoined to tell his master (with whom Andrew had no time for parlance,) that it would not be con venient for his father to fetch him home the ensuing Thursday, or indeed (on the account before mentioned) till the Saturday evening. Andrew, engrossed by his rural concerns, had not thought of the fair, of which Joey took especial care not to remind him, as he well knew, that were be to give the least hint of his schoolfellow's invitation, and his own vehement longing to accept it, his father would fetch him away at the risk of sacrificing his whole hay crop, rather than leave him exposed to the danger of mixing in such a scene of abomination. Master Joey, whose genius was of a very inventive nature, soon arranged in his own mind a neat little scheme, which would enable him to partake the prohibited delights, unsuspected by his father or the Rev. Mr. Jerk; so trimming up to his own purpose his father's message to that gentleman, he ingeniously substituted for the request that he might be allowed to stay at school till Saturday, an intimation that he had obtained parental permission to accept his schoolfellow's invitation for the fair days, and that a neighbour's cart would take him home on Friday evening from the house of his friend's parents. Joey had his own plans for getting home too when the fun was over, and of managing matters so dexterously, that the truth should never transpire either to his father or master. The latter was easily imposed on by the boy's specious story; and when Thursday arrived, Joey, taking with him his little bundle of Sunday clothes, and his whole hoard of pence and sixpences, left school in high spirits with a party of his playmates. Andrew Cleaves, meantime, got in his crops prosperously, and, exhausted as he was by a hard day's labour, set out on Saturday evening * Continued from page 59. to fetch home the expecting boy. Poor Greybeard was tired also, for he too had worked hard all day; but he was a spirited and willing creature, and went off freely, as if he knew his errand, and rejoiced at the thought of bringing home his young master. So the farmer and his vehicle arrived in good time at the door of the Academy, but Andrew looked towards it in vain, and at the upper and lower windows, for the happy little face that had been wont to look out for him on such occasions. The servant girl who opened the door looked surprised when Andrew inquired for his son; and still greater astonishment appeared in Mr. Jerk's countenance, when he stepped forward and heard the reiterated inquiry. A brief and mutual explanation ensued a grievous one to the agitated father, whose feelings may be well imagined-irritated as well as anxious feelings, for on hearing the master's story, little doubt remained in his mind, but that the truant was still harboured at the house of his favourite schoolfellow. But the intelligence promptly obtained there, was of a nature to create the most serious alarm. The parents of Josiah's friend informed Andrew, that his boy had accompanied their son home when the school broke up on Thursday morning-they having willingly granted the request of the latter, that his playfellow might be allowed to stay with him till an opportunity occurred (of which he was in expectation) of his returning to his father's the next evening. That after dinner the two boys had sallied out into the fair together, from which their son returned about dark without his companion, with the account that they had been separated the latter part of the day, but that just as he began to tire of looking about for his schoolfellow, Josiah had touched him hastily on the shoulder, saying a neighbour of his father's, who guessed he was playing truant, insisted on taking him home in his own cart, and that he must go that moment. This was all the boy had to tell-and that Josiah vanished in the crowd so suddenly, he could not see who was with him. Vain were all possible inquiries in all directions. The distracted father could only learn further, that his child had been seen by many persons standing with his friend at many booths and stalls, and, at last, quite alone in a show-booth, belonging to a set of tight-rope and wire dancers, and of equestrian performers-with some of these he seemed to have made acquaintance, and among them he was last observed. That troop had quitted C― the same night, and having fine horses and a light caravan, must have travelled expeditiously, and were probably already at a considerable distance; nor could the route they ad taken be easily ascertained after they had passed through the turnpike, which had been about ten o'clock at night. Now it was that Andrew Cleaves, in the agony of his distress, would have given half his worldly substance to have obtained tidingsbut the least favourable tidings of his lost child-for dreadful thoughts, and fearful imaginings, suggested themselves, aggravating the horrors of uncertainty. There was no positive reason for belief that the boy had left C― with the itinerant troop. A rapid river ran by the town-there was a deep canal also-and thenthe wharf-crowded with bargesbetween which-But Andrew was not one to brood over imaginary horrors in hopeless inaction, and the opinion of others encouraged him to hope that his son had only been lured away by the equestrian mountebanks. With the earliest dawn, therefore, mounted on the young powerful grey, he was away from C, and (according to the clue at last obtained) in the track of the itinerants. But they were far in advance, and soon after passing through the turnpike, had struck into cross country-roads and by-ways, so that the pursuit was necessarily tedious and difficult; and Andrew was unused to travelling, having never before adventured twenty miles be ed and spake thus earnestly-" Have ye, have ye found him?-have ye found my boy ?" was all he could stammer out. "You are a stranger to me; but God bless you, if you can give me back my boy!" "I am not a stranger to you, An yond his native place. No wonder that he was sorely jaded in body and mind, when he put up for the night at a small town about thirty miles from C, through which he ascertained, however, that the caravan, with its escort, had passed early in the morning of the preceding day-drew Cleaves; and I can give you that the troop, while stopping to bait, had talked of Carlisle as their next place of exhibition; and had, in fact, struck into the great north road when they proceeded on their way. Andrew could gain no intelligence whether a boy, such as he described, accompanied the party. It having been very early morning when they baited their horses at the females of the band and children (if there were any) were still asleep within the closed caravan. So Andrew proceeded with a heavy heart, but a spirit of determined perseverance-and his pursuit (now that he was fairly on the track of its object) was comparatively easy. About mid-day, in mercy to his beast, as well as to recruit his own strength, he halted at a hedge alehouse, when, having unsaddled Greybeard, and seen that he was taken care of, he entered the kitchen and called for refreshment. There were many persons drinking and talking in the place, and Andrew failed not to make his customary inquiries, which awakened an immediate clamour of tongues-every one being ready with some information relating to the troop Andrew was in pursuit of. Such was the confusion of voices, however, that he was kept for a moment in painful suspense, when a decent looking woman, (apparently a traveller,) who was taking her quiet meal in one corner of the kitchen, came hastily forward, and laying her hand on Andrew's arm, and looking earnestly in his face, exclaimed," After what are ye asking, master? Is it for a stray lamb ye're seeking-and hav'nt I seen your face before?" Andrew shook like a leaf. The man of stern temper and iron nerves, shook like an aspen leaf, while the woman look back your boy; and the Lord bless him for your sake, for you saved me and mine, and took us in, and gave us meat and drink when we were ready to perish. Come your ways with me, Andrew Cleaves; but soft and quiet, for the laddy's in a precious sleep. He has come to hurt, but the Merciful watched over him." So she led him softly and silently through a little back kitchen, and up a steep dark stair, into a small upper chamber, before the casement of which a checked apron was pinned up, to exclude the full glow of light from the uncurtained bed. Softly and silently, with finger on her lip, she drew him on to the side of that humble bed, and there, indeed, fast locked in sleep, in sweet untroubled sleep, lay the little thoughtless one, whose disappearance had inflicted such cruel anxiety and distress. The boy was sleeping sweetly, but his cheeks and lips were almost colourless; a thick linen bandage was bound round his head; and over one temple, a soft fair curl, that had escaped from the fillet, was dyed and stuck together with clotted blood. Andrew shuddered at the sight; but the woman repeated her whispered assurance, that there was no serious injury. Then the father knelt softly down beside his recovered darling, his head bent low over the little tremulous hand that lay upon the patchwork-counterpane. Almost involuntarily his lips approached it; but he refrained himself by a strong effort, and, throwing back his head, lifted his eyes to Heaven, in an ecstacy of silent gratitude; and, one after another, large tears rolled down over the rough, hard-featured face, every muscle of which quivered with powerful emotion. Yes, for the first time in his life, Andrew Cleaves |