Her playmate from her birth, and her first love.
Just as she looks there in her bridal dress,
She was all gentleness, all gaiety,

Her pranks the favourite theme of every tongue.
But now the day was come, the day, the hour;
Now frowning, smiling, for the hundredth time,
The nurse, that ancient lady, preached decorum ;
And in the lustre of her youth, she gave
Her hand, with her heart in it, to Francesco.

Great was the joy; but at the bridal feast,
When all sat down, the bride was wanting there.
Nor was she to be found. Her father cried,
"Tis but to make a trial of our love!'

And filled his glass to all; but his hand shook,
And soon from guest to guest the panic spread.
'Twas but that instant she had left Francesco,
Laughing and looking back, and flying still,
Her ivory tooth imprinted on his finger.
But now, alas! she was not to be found;
Nor from that hour could anything be guessed,
But that she was not!

Weary of his life,

Francesco fled to Venice, and forthwith
Flung it away in battle with the Turks.
Orsini lived; and long might you have seen
An old man wandering as in quest of something,
Something he could not find-he knew not what.
When he was gone, the house remained awhile
Silent and tenantless, then went to strangers.

Full fifty years were past, and all forgot, When, on an idle day, a day of search 'Mid the old lumber in the gallery,

That mouldering chest was noticed; and 'twas said

By one as young, as thoughtless as Ginevra,
'Why not remove it from its lurking-place?'
'Twas done as soon as said; but on the way
It burst, it fell; and lo! a skeleton,

With here and there a pearl, an emerald stone,
A golden clasp, clasping a shred of gold.
All else had perished, save a nuptial ring,
And a small seal, her mother's legacy,
Engraven with a name, the name of both,
'GINEVRA.'

There, then, had she found a grave! Within that chest had she concealed herself, Fluttering with joy, the happiest of the happy; When a spring-lock, that lay in ambush there, Fastened her down for ever!

SAMUEL ROgers.

LESSON 12.

THE GREAT FIRE OF LONDON.1

calcined, reduced to a pow-ignited, set on fire

impetuous, rushing with

1666. Sept. 2d. This fatal night about ten began that deplorable fire near Fish Street in London.

1 This extract is taken from Evelyn's Diary, and is given as a specimen of the style of writing in the 17th century. The author lived from 1620 to 1706.

Sept. 3d. The fire continuing after dinner, I took coach with my wife and son, and went to the Bankside in Southwark, where we beheld that dismal spectacle, the whole city in dreadful flames near the water-side; all the houses from the bridge, all Thames Street, and upwards towards Cheapside down to the Three Cranes were now consumed.

The fire having continued all this night (if I may call that night which was as light as day for ten miles round about, after a dreadful manner), when conspiring with a fierce eastern wind in a very dry season, I went on foot to the same place, and saw the whole south part of the city burning from Cheapside to the Thames, and all along Cornhill (for it kindled back against the wind as well as forward), Tower Street, Fenchurch Street, Gracechurch Street, and so along Bainard's Castle, and was now taking hold of St. Paul's Church, to which the scaffolds contributed exceedingly. The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonished, that from the beginning I know not by what despondency or fate they hardly stirred to quench it, so that there was nothing heard or seen but crying out and lamentation, running about like distracted creatures, without at all attempting to save even their goods; such a strange consternation there was upon them, so as it burned both in breadth and length the churches, public halls, exchange, hospitals, monuments, and ornaments, leaping after a prodigious manner from house to house and street to street, at great distances one from the other; for the heat, with a long set of fair and warm weather, had even ignited the air and prepared the materials to con→ ceive the fire, which devoured after an incredible manner houses, furniture, and everything. Here we saw the Thames covered with goods floating, all

the barges and boats laden with what some had time and courage to save, as, on the other, the carts etc., carrying out to the fields, which for many miles were strewed with moveables of all sorts, and tents erecting to shelter both people and what goods they could get away. Oh the miserable and calamitous. spectacle, such as haply the world had not seen the like since the foundation of it, nor be outdone till the universal conflagration!

All the sky was of a fiery aspect, like the top of a burning oven; the light seen above forty miles round about for many nights. God grant my eyes may never behold the like, now seeing above 10,000 houses all in one flame! The noise and cracking and thunder of the impetuous flames, the shrieking of women and children, the hurry of people, the fall of towers, houses, and churches, was like a hideous storm; and the air all about so hot and inflamed, that at last one was not able to approach it, so that they were forced to stand still and let the flames burn on, which they did for near two miles in length and one in breadth. The clouds of smoke were dismal, and reached upon computation near fifty miles in length. Thus I left it this afternoon burning, a resemblance of Sodom or the last day. London was, but is no more!

Sept. 4th. The burning still rages, and it has now gotten as far as the Inner Temple, all Fleet Street, the Old Bailey, Ludgate Hill, Warwick Lane, Newgate, Paul's Chain, Watling Street, now flaming, and most of it reduced to ashes. The stone of St. Paul's flew like granados,' the melting lead run

Or grenades, hollow balls of metal filled with powder, generally thrown from the hand among an enemy after being lit by means of a fuse; the grenadiers were so called from being employed to throw these hand-grenades.

ning down the streets in a stream, and the very pavements glowing with fiery redness, so as no horse nor man

was able to tread

on them, and the demolition had stopped all the passages, so that no help could be applied. The eastern wind still more impetuously drove the

flames forward. Nothing but the almighty power of God was able to stop them, for vain was the help of man.

Sept. 5th. It crossed Whitehall; oh the confusion there was

possible that part

THE MONUMENT.

of Holborn, whilst the rest of the gentlemen took: their several posts (for now they began to be-.