"Ah, now we come to the original matter," returned Coleman, "and very original it seems.

-It does not seem to have been one of those moments with you just then," continued Freddy, "for the poem comes to an abrupt and untimely conclusion, unless three blots, and something that looks like a horse's head, may be a hieroglyphic mode of recording your inspirations, which I'm not learned enough to decipher."

"Eh! no; I broke down there," replied Lawless; "the muse deserted me, and went off in a canter for―where was it those young women used to hang out?-the' Gradus ad' place, you know?" "The tuneful Nine, whom you barbarously designate young women," returned Coleman, " are popularly supposed to have resided on Mount Parnassus, which acclivity I have always imagined of a triangular or sugar-loaf form, with Apollo seated on the apex or extreme point, his attention divided between preserving his equilibrium and keeping up his playing, which latter necessity he provided for by executing difficult passages on a golden (or, more probably, silver-gilt) lyre.”

"Eh! nonsense," rejoined Lawless; "now, do be serious for five minutes, and go ahead with this letter, there's a good fellow, for, 'pon my word, I'm in a wretched state of mind,-I am indeed. It's a fact, I'm nearly half a stone lighter than I was when I came here; I know I am, for there was an old fellow weighing a defunct pig down at the farm yesterday, and I made him let me get into the scales when he took piggy out. I tell you what, if I'm not married soon I shall make a job for the sexton; such incessant wear and tear of the sensibilities is enough to kill a prize-fighter in full training, let alone a man that has been leading such a molly-coddle life as I have of late, lounging about drawing-rooms like a lapdog."

"Well, then, let us begin at once," said Freddy, seizing a pen; "now, what am I to say?"

"Eh! why, you don't expect me to know, do you?" exclaimed Lawless, aghast; "I might just

"I have given up hunting,'" resumed Lawless, 'which no longer possesses any interest in my eyes, though I think you'd have said, if you had been with us the last time we were out, that you never saw a prettier run in your life; the meet was at Chorley Bottom, and we got away in less than ten minutes after the hounds had been in cover, with as plucky a fox as ever puzzled a pack——””

"Hold hard there!" interrupted Coleman. "I can't put all that in; nobody ever wrote an account of a fox-hunt in a love-letter,-no, 'You've given up hunting, which no longer possesses any interest in your eyes;' now go on."

"My eyes," repeated Lawless, reflectively: "yes; 'I am become indifferent to everything; I take no pleasure in the new dog-cart King in Long Acre is building for me, with cane sides, the wheels larger, and the seat, if possible, still higher than the last, and which, if I am not very much out in my reckoning, will follow so light"

"I can't write all that trash about a dog-cart,” interrupted Freddy, crossly; "that's worse than the fox-hunting; stick to your feelings, man, can't you?"

"Ah, you little know the effect such feelings produce," sighed Lawless.

"That's the style," resumed Coleman, with delight; "that will come in beautifully ;- such feelings produce now, go on."

"At night my slumbers are rendered distracting, by visions of you as-as

"The bride of another,'" suggested Coleman. "Exactly," resumed Lawless; "or, 'sleep refusing to visit my""

Aching eye-balls,' put in Freddy. "I lie tossing restlessly from side to side, as if bitten by-

"The gnawing tooth of Remorse ;'-that will do famously," added his scribe; "now tell her that she is the cause of it."

And found her fairer than the bramble flower
That unbeholden bears the wilding rose,
Fresh as a first spring dawn that, cre it close,
Leaves the world wealthier for the violet ;
For ere they parted (howsoe'er they met,
A sweetness, like the scent from some unseen
And new-born flower that makes the mild month
green,

Lingering along the thoughts of each, made known
That the first violet of the heart was blown --
Love, the beginning and the end of youth !
Sweet Rosamunda, maid o' the rosy mouth,
Did the deep skies assume more blissful blue,
Saw ye faint fairy footsteps in the dew,
That eve, when Love's pale planet made aware
Of Love's faint advent all the holy air
About the ivy-twine and eglatere
Bowering the balmy casement, where shy fear
Of thine own young heart leaping into life
Against its fragrant girdle, wrought sweet strife
Among thy maiden musings? None shall tell
The secret of that hour, and this is well.
No old worm-eaten page with flowery marge,
And faded letters, once made fair and large
To suit the sight of some lascivious king,
Remaineth now to babble anything
To prying pedants of thine mmost heart ;
But, in unfading Fable land, thou art
(Among green England's greenest memories)
A flower kept fresh by tears from poets' eyes.
Albeit, fond fancies sue me to conceive
How many a gleaming morn and glimmering eve
Beheld the stranger, that sweet trespass made
A welcome guest, in Clifford's hall. I said
"The Stranger:" but not nameless, sure, he came.
The Count Plantagenet had such a name
Might win him welcome when the love of sport
Lured him that way; the manners of the Court,
Moreover, mingling with a debonaire
Frank nature, made his comely presence there
A secret pleasure in the pride of all
The homely i mates of Lord Clifford's hall.
His stout voice cheer'd the fifty squires that bowl'd
The daylight down in alleys green and cold:
His brave lips blew so shrill a blast among
The echoing glades that, when the high wood rung
To his blithe bugle, every huntsman knew
That note, and merrily his response blew.
Nor less, when oft to snare the sliding fish,
Among the low-bridged moats, with silken mesh,
Fair Rosamunda and her maids would lean,
The courtly guest soft songs could breathe
between

The rippled silver of most sweet lute-strings,
Musical with great loves of mighty kings
For queens of old, and every fair romance

By well-skill'd minstrels sung through sunny
France;

Till, as a Naiad being slowly Lorn,

That rises up a forest fount forlorn,

The maiden's misty sense of her own love,
Borne on the mounting music, seem'd to move
Up every virgin pulse to palpable

And passionate consciousness. He touched so well
The tingling source of tender thoughts!

Half child,

Half giant, there was in him, undefil'd,
The fresh fount of an overilowing heart,
And that strong sense that grasps the sovranest
part

Of life, and makes it pregnant. See him stand,
His grey goshawk upon his ungloved hand!
Singulfus shows ye how he yet appears
Athwart the ravage of those ruthless years
That make men names, or nothing. I, meanwhile,
Follow these fancies, meaning to beguile
Dull days, unlike the days whereof I sing,
Blown blossoms from the May of the world'

spring.

Yet were their goings, comings, mysteries,
Wild intervals of absence, vague surmise.
Oft, in the midst of tenderest talk, he sat
Suddenly silent, gazing sternly at

The faint blue upland objects leagues away;
As tho', for him, beyond the hills there lay
A fiercer world than that 'mid those soft bowers
Visited only by the silver showers,

And then the woman-instinct in her heart
Dimly divined her presence claim'd no part
Among those fitful moods: and if her glance
Stole up the silence to his countenance
Timidly, she beheld upon his brow
Deep furrows folding, and a shadow grow
Into his face, as when in open lands
The shadow of a hawk sweeps o'er still sands.
So that her love was like a summer cloud
Breathless above some brooding garden bow`d,
Where all the watchful roses seem aware
Of the uncertain spirit in the air,
And even the brightest minutes of that love
Were but as rays of light that rest above
Such clouds as, girt with thunder at the base,
Have yet sweet sunlight sleeping on their face.
At last doubt broke to passionate appeal
That drew such response as did less reveal
Than hint deep cause for these disturbed moods :
Court complots growing from domestic feuds :
A spleenful parent, powerful friends to be
Humour'd, and some persistent enemy.
An easy tale Lord Clifford's faith beguil'd,
Who loved the comely guest that loved his child.
They wed, by night, in secret. A strange friar
Join'd them. And when, too late, the stricken
sire

Learn'd all: the falsehood con ummate that night

The mockery of the midnight marriage rite