F., I don't recollect that name among the accounts here.' 'I daresay not,' says the governor, but no doubt I shall persuade Captain Studley to bank here henceforward. However, I shall be going away at the end of the week,' he says, 'and shall be away about a fortnight, and you will have to take charge."

"That is a go," said Mr. Smowle. "Well, one comfort is, one can do pretty much as one likes when Froddy's in charge. Fancy this one getting spliced, though. He don't look the figure for the part. I shouldn't care about playing Joan to his Darby, on a dull evening in October, in a back parlour in Camden Town, before the gas was lit. I've seen old Studleymilitary looking, swaggering old buck-he has been here to see Hampstead once or twice, and I pointed him out to Bentle at Tattersall's one Sunday afternoon. Well, that's one pound sterling out of my pocket."

villagers, moreover, whose only permanent visitors were an occasional artist or two, who would put up at the tavern during the summer months and carry away a sheaf of valuable sketches for completion at home, were very proud of counting a man of such distinguished manners and appearance as the captain as one of themselves. Their absolute ignorance of his resources and occupation, of the purpose for which he would suddenly quit the cottage and of his destination, which he himself only vaguely alluded to as "on the Continent," all served to enhance his position in the opinion of the gaping rustics. Nothing, indeed, was personally known of Anne; but that was no reason why the worthy people of Loddonford should not take an interest in her. It was not Dr. Blatherwick's fault if they did not, for she served him as the staple subject of conversation for many a long day. Her extraordinary illness, the cause of which he had defined directly he saw her— directly he saw her, my dear madam. had been young himself, and had not forgotten all he had undergone in those days, but it was not for him to speak; all he had to do was to watch the case from a professional point of view, and, when he had carried it through successfully-and he might venture to remark, in confidence to you, that, at one time, it had caused him a certain amount of anxiety-the father, Captain Studley; rather a remark"I suppose there won't be anything of able man, my dear madam, with a short, the nature of a spread?" said the porter, in prompt way about him, like those used to a grumbling tone. "No, the governor ain't command; had confessed that this illness one of that sort. It is enough to bring had sprung from a love quarrel; but the tears into your eyes, when you have matters had been put right, and the gentaken the trouble to get him a streaky tleman had been brought to book, as anyloin chop, as is a perfect picture both one who knew the captain could very well before and after it goes on the grid-imagine, and the marriage was to take iron, to find it don't give him no more satisfaction than if it had been bought off a stall in Clare Market on Saturday night."

"What do you mean by that, Mr. S. ?" said the porter, looking up at him.

"Why there will be a subscription got up to present him with a neat and appropriate offering on the occasion of his marriage," said Mr. Smowle: "of course-a pickle trophy, or a wine cooler, or a gentle cow on the top of a butter-dish, with a suitable inscription, which old Froddy will prepare, with the assistance of the secretary of the Mechanics' Institute at Peckham."

The news which was thus commented upon by Mr. Smowle and his associates of the bank created some little excitement in the village of Loddonford, where it was sedulously spread by Dr. Blatherwick directly he became acquainted with it. Captain Studley, though frequently away from home, and, even when in residence at the cottage, mixing but little with the inhabitants of the place had, as has been said, made himself popular by the gracious manner in which he had joined the penny readings during the previous winter. The

He

How

place directly; so soon, at least, as he,
Dr. Blatherwick, could guarantee that his
patient was sufficiently recovered.
was she getting on? Well, she was
making sure, but not rapid, progress.
Pretty? Well, it was impossible to say;
there are so many different opinions about
beauty, but he should say interesting
rather than pretty, and, between our-
selves, my dear madam, rather dull, and
lacks the vivacity which distinguishes
the father, and is singularly silent and
uncommunicative. The gentleman? Oh,
yes, the doctor had seen him but once,
and then only for a minute-tall, dark,
good-looking man; manager at Middle-
ham's Bank-you recollect, my dear

If it had not been for Dr. Blatherwick's prattling, the outside public would not have known even thus much of what went on within the walls of the cottage; for the nurse, who came away when all the supposed danger was over, yielding up her place again to her daughter, had nothing to report. The young lady had been ill, and had got well again, that was all that could be said, except that her father, the "Capting," was devoted to her, and had sat up with her o'nights, and given her her medicines as regular as regular. As to the love affair and the marriage, that was all new to her; she hadn't heard talk of any young man, but her Emma knew the name of Heath, and had often seen the gentleman at the cottage before Miss Studley came down there, which no doubt he was making it all right with her pa. So the villagers were compelled to put up with this meagre amount of information, and to await the wedding-day with patience.

madam, Mr. Middleham, who was mur- Came, as all things will come if duly dered-and who had, I should say, a very waited for, the wedding-day, soft and excellent position. warm and bright with radiant sunshine, as though it had become detached from July, and wandering in outer darkness ever since, had only just found its way again into the world. The hanging woods clothing the upland and fencing off the keen east wind from the stately manorhouse, woods which had hitherto been dull and sombre masses, now, in the genial light, displayed their various autumnal tints of russet-brown, and fiery-red, and pale diaphanous yellow; the gorged and swollen river, so long opaque, save in its crested wavelets, danced and glittered in the brilliant sunlit rays, as though remembering its bygone summer sheen; the very birds were cheated into a belief that winter must have somehow slipped by unobserved and spring had come again, and strained their throats to give it welcome. In the churchyard-bordered by the peaceful backwater, the haunt in the summer time of boys in search of the islands of lovely lilies, then floating on its surface, but now abandoned to the Meanwhile, all that the captain had water-rats, by which its banks are honeypromised in the last important interview combed-in the churchyard, with its with his daughter, he had strictly per- billowy graves sleeping in the shadow of formed. She had been left to herself, and the square, old, gray church tower, the though he had remained constantly at villagers are assembled, waiting the arrival home; knowing it to be necessary for him of the bridal party. In the church itself, to be on the spot, in case Sergeant Francis dotted here and there among the high might take it into his head to pay another oaken pews-relics of a barbarous age, visit to the cottage; he never attempted to eyesores which the vicar has hitherto been intrude on Anne's privacy, and beyond a unable to rid himself of-are the élite of duty-visit to her room in the morning and the inhabitants. There are the parson's evening, he saw but little of her. The fact daughters, with the summer bronze still was that the captain was only too glad of on their healthy cheeks, ready to form an an excuse, to remain as long as possible amateur body of bridesmaids in case out of his daughter's presence. The fearful assistance is required; and there is their secret which was in their joint possession mother, a hatchet-faced little woman, could neither be ignored nor alluded to, whose whole existence is soaked in soup and, though the captain took particular and bound up in flannel, and whose one care never to refer to it, the knowledge of available reminiscence is of having had its existence created a gloom, which even the bishop of the diocese to breakfast on his jaunty self-complacency, which had the occasion of a confirmation. There is returned to him in fullest force when he Dr. Blatherwick, with his professional saw his safety assured, was unable to suit of sable, relieved by a very bright pierce. On more than one occasion he blue silk scarf in which glistens a fat tried to interest Anne in a subject which carbuncle pin, and with a large white he imagined must appeal to every female favour pinned on to his breast, looking like heart, and asked her what arrangement a prize turkey at Christmas time. There, she intended making in regard to her too, are three or four of the leading wedding-dress; but the answers which he farmers' wives, and old Mrs. McMoffat, received were so short and vague, so who has the riverside place next to Mr. utterly hopeless and uncaring, that he saw Middleham's, and makes an income by it would be necessary for him to give the letting it during the summer months. | Major Gylkes, of the Manor House-who

requisite orders in the matter.

The speaker, a short man with closeclipped, coarse black hair like a blackingbrush, bows himself from the room and leaves the travellers alone. Then Captain Studley turns to his daughter, and with an air of self-importance, says, "The promise which I made to you, Anne, has been kept, has it not? You have had no annoyance from that man, who has now his own way, and you are here under gone the protection of your father."

She says "Yes," faintly, and without sufficient sense of gratitude to please the captain; but she is evidently weak and tired, and he bids her "Good-night," promising to disclose his plans on the morrow, and comforting himself, before retiring to rest, on reaching his own bedroom, with a cigar, a glass of cold brandyand-water, and a happy retrospect of the day's proceedings.

This retrospect is with him when he wakes the next morning, pleases him as he dresses, and sends him, well-disposed towards everybody, walking jauntily down-stairs to the salon and humming a tune.

The door leading from the salon to mademoiselle's chamber is closed, and the captain raps lightly thereat. Getting no answer, he raps again, more loudly, and on turning round finds himself accosted by the femme-de-chambre, of whom he had had a glimpse last night, and who tells him that mademoiselle has gone out.

"Gone out!" repeats the captain in

astonishment.

"But certainly," says the woman. "Mademoiselle went out at seven o'clock this morning-without saying where she was going, or when she would return."

END OF BOOK I.

DEAD LETTERS.

THE fourth report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, which has recently appeared, contains a vast quantity of documents of great value and importance for the purposes of history, both national and local, and, in addition to these, numerous and interesting papers in the shape of letters, &c., which throw considerable light on manners and customs, chiefly in the seventeenth century. To this latter class, as being of more general interest than the documents relating more particularly to public affairs, we desire to call our readers' attention; and, in so doing, we would state that, so far as we

are aware, none of the documents cited have ever been made public before, and that, in dealing with the enormous mass of materials before us, we have thought it better to observe, as nearly as possible, the order in which they appear in the appendix to the report of the commission, without attempting a more exact chronological arrangement.

The first letter we cite is in the possession of Lord Bagot, at Blithefield, in Staffordshire, and is from R. Adderley to W. Bagot, is dated June 9th, 1600, and gives a short account, by an eye-witness, of the trial of Robert, Earl of Essex, and notices the queen's indignation against Raleigh. It runs thus:

"SIR, of Thursday last my lord of Essex was at York House before the Lords of the Council and other lords, the Queen's Attorney, and Bacon; who shewed himself a pretty fellow, and answered them all well without any touch, but only in some disloyalty towards Her Majesty. She would have had him to have confessed these articles, which were agravated against him in the Star Chamber. But my Lord yielded to nothing, but only submitted himself to Her Majesty. It is doubtful he shall lose his offices, some of them, but she would have all, and yet stand at Her Majesty's pleasure, and he is at his own house as he was before. There were some that said they would move Her Majesty for my Lord's liberty; and that was Mr. Secretary, and he said he did not doubt but to bring a discharge before it were long; which God grant it may be. I doute he spake not as he meant. My lord is merry and in helth, thanks be to God; he was at York House from eight of the clock in the morning until almost nine at night without either meat or drink; he kneeled two hours by the clock. They would have had him to have stood, but he would not so long as the matter was a talk betwixt Her Majesty and him. . . Rawlegh is gone into the country with bag and bagage on his wife and children, and Her Majesty caled him worse than cat and dog."

1568, July 8th, George Saunders writes to his brother-in-law, Richard Bagot, and sends to his sister a sugar-loaf; to his cousin Margaret he sends, inclosed in a pare [probably a box shaped like a pear] a skene of thrydd and a dossin of Spanish nedyls; and he concludes by giving some news from Flanders, notably the death of the Duke of Alva.