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"Poh, poh!" exelaimed the priest, "you're all well shrived, and he is in his grave; remember he was but a heretic, and a minion of the prince of heretics. But come, turn up the black-jack, for there dwells good fellowship, resolution, and manhood-here, pledge me, boys. And now, good hostess, bring forward this said spolia optima, that I may divide it according to the laws of Corinth."

The landlady having brought a large green pack, bound round with black leather straps, it was burst open, and its contents, consisting of silks, English broad cloths, trinkets, &c. were spread upon the board.

“Here, dame, here is as much parde soi as will make thee a hood and kirtle. Marry come up! two golden crosses and an Agnes Dei !—O, imp! these were doomed to the crucible-this belongs to the Church, my children," putting them into a scrip that lay on the table before him : "There, Sawney Bean, there's as much Lincoln green as will make thee a jerkin and trews, as fine as thy old friend, Gilderoy; and here's for thee, blushing Jess, the silver bodkin for thy hair, and the gold brooch for thy kerchief. But what have we here?—a roleau of gold Jacobuses: well, children, the tythe of a hundred is ten-stand thou there," slipping his hand into the scrip: "the arrears of shrive, ten more," making another errand in the same direction: "I have a long and a perilous journey before me, children," continued the holy father, 66 so I will borrow other ten; and there remains ten for each of you. But what have we next," taking up a book with silver clasps; "Holy St. Mary! a Bible in the vulgar tongue-this has been the Church's undoing-this has wrought our overthrow, and the downfal of the holy Catholic faith in these parts; what!" continued he, observing a written inscription on a blank leaf, "the holograph of two of the subtlest of our enemies-this would have been worth two steps of preferment ten years ago, but now it is only worthy of the flame- A present from John Knox and Andrew Melville to Simon Fraser, for his fidelity, secresy, and

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zeal, in conveying intelligence to the friends of reformation in the days of the faggot and torture. Edinburgh, July 14, JN. KNOX. AND. MELVILLE.' Then to the flames I commit thee;" throwing the Bible into the fire, which speedily sent up a blaze that illuminated the farthest recess of the apartment, and showed the horrified pedlar an opening in one of the most distant angles of the roof.

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Ay, there," exclaimed one of the wretches, thrusting the Bible farther into the flames with his rapier. "Would that this was the heart of every heretic in Scotland.”

During this scene of wickedness, the feelings of young Fraser were wrought into a state of frenzied horror. He had heard the murder of his father confirmed-had witnessed his property divided among a band of ruffians, and still he looked on in breathless silence. But when he saw the holy Word of God committed to the flames, he lost all recollection, and loudly vociferated—

"Murderers! fiends! blasphemers of the true God! stay your sacrilegious hands!"

At this instant, a dreadful peal of thunder shook the hostelry to its foundation.

"Fire, fury, and faggot!-betrayed, betrayed!" shouted the whole party, tumbling over one another in their way to the door.

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'Ha, ha, ha!" exclaimed the hostess, discovering the pedlar; "what! scared by a bantam-cock on yonder bawk? Now, Allister Gunn and Sawney Bean, there's wark for the rapier; yonder's the key tied to the ram'shorn. I dreamed of this, and so made sure work of it. Go, go; the dead tell no tales!"

A momentary thought rushed across the mind of the youth-he sprang towards the opening in the roof; first one ball, then another, whistled close past him as he pushed his way through the thatch, and rolled to the ground. He fell unhurt at the back of the house, and instantly fled into a neighbouring thicket.

He heard footsteps close behind him, and he scrambled up on a large bush a few paces off the path. The two ruffians passed him, urging one another on with curses and blasphemy. Their search proved ineffectual, and in a short time they returned.-They halted near the place of Fraser's concealment, to recruit themselves after their race, when he overheard the following conversation :— "This part of Scotland will be too hot for us if he escapes."

"Then to France we must go; our old Captain, Gilderoy, will give us a hearty welcome."

They now passed on towards the hostelry, and were soon out of hearing. Fraser descended from his hidingplace, and hurried to the next village. The inhabitants were soon roused from their peaceful slumbers by the pedlar's tale of horror; and arming themselves with utensils of rustic labour, made all speed to the hostelry, which they found deserted and in darkness.

Morning was beginning to dawn. A small brigantine was seen at no great distance from the shore, labouring in a tremendous sea; at one moment engulphed in the valley of two mountainous waves, and anon suspended on the summit of the heaving billow. She was fast drifting towards a reef of rocks not a hundred yards from the beach, which was now covered by the villagers, led thither by the pedlar. As the vessel rode onward to her certain destruction, an awful sea struck her amidships, carrying away one of the masts, and sweeping almost every article overboard. The screams of the people on board were now distinctly heard on the shore; they had got the small boat overboard, and five or six men were seen leaving the ship in it. A female figure was observed running to and fro on the deck, and shrieking in wild despair. The boat was making fast towards the shore, when the woman once more rushed to the side next the boat, holding an object in her arms that appeared bright and shining as the purest of silver.

"See, see the boat makes back to the wreck! What madness is this? It is tempting of Providence!" exclaimed an old fisherman.

The woman stretched out her arms, handing into the boat the object that had attracted their notice. At that moment an overwhelming waye smote the boat, and dashed her in a thousand pieces against the side of the brigantine!

Every individual on board were in an instant swept to destruction by the impetuous surge; and in a short time the beach was covered with fragments of the wreck, and the mangled bodies of the murderers. A strange fatality marked the fate of the priest. The silver image, the cause of his journey to Scotland, was found clasped in his arms when his body was thrown ashore. Towards noon the hull of the brigantine broke up, when part of her stern was drifted on the beach, discovering her to be the "SAINT NICHOLAS OF DUNKIRK;" which gave name to the reef of rocks on which she was lost.

Thus the winds of heaven, and the waves of the ocean, are instruments in the hands of Providence in punishing the wickedness of the children of the earth.

THE COURIER DOVE.

"Va, porte cet ecrit a l'objet de mon cœur!"

OUTSTRIP the winds, my courier dove!

On pinions fleet and free,
And bear this letter to my love
Who's far away from me.

It bids him mark thy plume whereon
Thy changing colours range;
But warns him that my peace is gone,
If he should also change.

It tells him thou return'st again
To her who sets thee free;

And O! it asks the truant, when
He'll thus resemble thee?

MRS. COLONEL HUTCHISON'S CHARACTER

OF HER HUSBAND.

"HE governed by persuasion, which he never employed but to things honourable and profitable for herself; he loved her soul and her honour more than her outside, and yet he had ever for her person a constant indulgence, exceeding the common temporary passions of the most uxorious fools: if he esteemed her at a higher rate than she in herself could have deserved, he was the author of that virtue he doted on, while she only reflected his own glories upon him, while he was there, and all that she is now is at best his pale shade.”

OLD ENGLISH POETRY. No. I.

OF CORINNA'S SINGING.

By THOMAS CAMPION.

WHEN to her lute Corinna sings,
Her voice revives the leaden strings,
And doth in highest notes appear,
As any challenged echo clear:

But when she doth of mourning speak,
E'en with her sighs the strings do break.

And as her lute doth live or die,
Led by her passions, so must I;
For when of pleasure she doth sing,
My thoughts enjoy a sudden spring;
But if she do of sorrow speak,

E'en from my heart the strings do break.

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