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"To the Marquis de Secqville." Hey! Why that is the very gentleman of whom Monsieur de Blassemare told us such wicked stories the other day."

"Did he?" she said, with a sigh. "Well, I often feared he was a prodigal; but heaven, I trust, will reclaim him.' "But do you not love him?" "No. I never saw him but once." "And are you happy?"

"Yes, quite happy now; but, dear Lucille, I was very miserable once. You must know that shortly after we were betrothed, when I was placed in the convent at Rouen, there was a nice girl there, of whom I soon grew very fond. Her brother, Henri, used to come almost every day to see her. He was about three years older than I, and so brave and beautiful. did not know that I loved him until his sister went away, and his visits, of course, ceased; and when I could not see him any more, I thought my heart would break."

"Poor little Julie !"

I

"I was afraid of being observed when I wept, but I used to cry to myself all night long, and wish to die, as my mother used to fear long ago I would do before I came to be as old as I am now; and I could not even hear of him, for my friend, his sister, had married, and was living near Caen, and so we were quite separated."

"You were, indeed, very miserable, my poor little friend."

"Yes; but at last, after a whole year, she was passing through Rouen, and so she came to the convent to see me. Oh, when I saw her my heart fluttered so that I thought I should have choked. I don't know why it was, but I was afraid to ask for him; but at last, finding she would not speak of him at all, which I thought was ill-natured, though indeed it was not, I did succeed, and asked her how he was; then all at once she began to cry, for he was dead; and knowing that, I forgot everything I lost sight of everything-they said I fainted. And when I awoke again there were a good many of the sisters and some of the pensioners round me, and my friend still weeping; and the superioress was there, too, but I did not heed them, but only said I would not believe he was dead. Then I was very ill for more than a month, and my uncle came to see me; but I don't think he knew what had made me so; and as soon as

I grew better the superioress was very angry with me, and told me it was very wicked, which it may have been, but indeed I could not help it; and she gave me in charge to sister Eugenie to bring me to a sense of my sinfulness, seeing that I ought not to have loved any one but him to whom I was betrothed."

"Alas! poor Julie, I suppose she was a harsh preceptress also."

"No, indeed; on the contrary, she was very kind and gentle. She was so young-only twenty-three-dear sister Eugenie!-and so pretty, though she was very pale, and oh, so thin; and when we were both alone in her room she used to let me tell her all my story, and she used to draw her hand over her pretty face, and cry so bitterly in return, and kiss me, and shake me by the hands, that I often thought she must once have loved some one also herself, and was weeping because she could never see him again; so I grew to love her very much; but I did not know all that time that sister Eugenie was dying. The day I took leave of her she seemed as if she was going to tell me something about herself, and I think now if I had pressed her she would. I am very sorry I did not, for it would have been pleasant to me as long as I live to have given the dear sister any comfort, and show how truly I loved her. But it was not so, and only four months after we parted she died; but I hope we may meet, where I am sure she is gone, in heaven, and then she will know how much I loved her, and how good, and gentle, and kind I always thought her."

Poor little Julie shed tears at these words.

"Now I do not love the Marquis," she continued, "nor I am sure does he love me. It will be but a match of convenience. I suppose he will continue to follow his amusements and I will live quietly at home; so after all it will make but little change to me, and I will still be as I am now, the widow of poor Henri."

"You are so tranquil, dear Julie, because he is dead. Happy is it for you that he is in his grave. Come, let

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like to be a nun, and to die early, like sister Eugenie."

Lucille looked at her with undisguised astonishment.

"Take the veil!' she exclaimed, "so young, so pretty. Parbleu, I would rather work in the fields or beg my bread on the high-roads. Take the veil-no, no, no. Marguerite told me I had a great aunt who took the veil, and three years after died mad in a convent in Paris. Ah, it is a sad life, Julie, a sad life!"

It was the wish of the Fermier-General that his nuptials should be celebrated with as much privacy as possible. The reader, therefore, will lose nothing by our dismissing the cercmony as rapidly as may be. Let it suffice to say, that it did take place, and to describe the arrangements with which it was immediately succeeded.

Though Monsieur Le Prun had become the purchaser of the Charrebourg estate, he did not choose to live upon it. About eight leagues from Paris he possessed a residence better suited to his tastes and plans. It was said to have once belonged to a scion of royalty, who had contrived it with a view to realising upon earth a sort of Mahomedan paradise. Nothing indeed could have been better devised for luxury as well as seclusion. From some Romish legend attaching to its site, it had acquired the name of the Chateau des Anges, a title which unhappily did not harmonise with the traditions more directly connected with the building itself.

It was a very spacious structure, some of its apartments were even magnificent, and the entire fabric bore overpowering evidences, alike in its costly materials and finish, and in the details of its design, of the prodigal and voluptuous magnificence to which it owed its existence.

It was environed by lordly forests, circle within circle, which were pierced by long straight walks diverging from common centres, and almost losing themselves in the shadowy distance. Studded, too, with a series of interminable fish-ponds, encompassed by hedges of beech, yew, and evergreens of enormous height and impenetrable density, under whose emerald shadows waterfowl of all sorts, from the princely swan down to the humble water-hen, were sailing and gliding this way and that, like rival argosies upon the seas.

The view of the chateau itself, when at last, through those dense and extensive cinctures of sylvan scenery, you had penetrated to its site, was, from almost every point, picturesque and even beautiful.

Successive terraces of almost regal extent, from above whose marble ballustrades and rows of urns the tufted green of rare and rich plants, in a long, gorgeous wreath of foliage, was peeping, ran, tier above tier, conducting the eye, among statues and graceful shrubs, to the gables and chimneys of the quaint but vast chateau itself. The forecourt upon which the great avenue debouched was large enough for the stately muster of a royal levee; and at intervals, upon the balustrade which surrounded it, were planted a long file of stone statues, each originally holding a lamp, which, however, the altered habits of the place had long since dismounted.

If the place had been specially contrived, as it was said to have been, for privacy, it could not have been better planned. It was literally buried in an umbrageous labyrinth of tufted forest. Even the great avenue commanded no view of the chateau, but abutted upon a fountain, backed by a towering screen of foliage, where the approach divided, and led by a double road to the court we have described. In fact, except from the domain itself, the very chimneys of the chateau were invisible for a circuit of miles around, the nearest point from which a glance of its roof could be caught being the heights situated a full league away.

If the truth must be told, then, Monsieur Le Prun was conscious of some disparity in point of years between himself and his beautiful wife; and although he affected the most joyous confidence upon the subject, he was nevertheless as ill at ease as most old fellows under similar circumstances. It soon became, therefore, perfectly plain, that the palace to which the wealthy bridegroom had transported his beautiful wife was, in truth, but one of those enchanted castles in which enamoured genii in fairy legends are described as guarding their captive princesses a gorgeous and luxurious prison, to which there was no access, from which no escape, and where, amidst all the treasures and delights of a sensuous paradise, the captive beauty languished and saddened.

OUR PORTRAIT GALLERY.-NO. LX.

CHARLES KEAN.

THE name of KEAN has a "stirring sound" in association with the annals of the stage. The brilliant career of Edmund Kean, the father, dazzling and eccentric as that of a comet, with its melancholy close, is still vivid in the remembrance of his contemporaries, and by them as vividly conveyed to the present generation. Charles Kean, the son, and subject of the present memoir, inheriting the genius and success of his parent, but avoiding the fatal improvidence by which both were rendered unavailing, has, while yet within the meridian of life, placed himself at the head of a profession for which he was neither trained nor intended, realised a competent independence by his own exertions, and won an honorable estimation in the eyes of all who are acquainted with him. It is not given to many to achieve these multiplied advantages; nor have they been gained in the present instance without trial, privation, and vicissitude. Scenes of exciting interest have been passed through, and many difficulties encountered. A slight detail of these events can scarcely fail to amuse the careless and instruct the reflecting reader.

Charles John Kean is an Irishman. He was born at Waterford, on the 18th of January, 1811. His father at the time formed one of the company attached to the theatre in that city. His mother, Mary Chambers, was also a native of Waterford, descended from the highly respectable family of Cuffe, long settled in that county. Miss Chambers, with a sister, had, from family embarrassments, been induced to attempt the stage as a means of livelihood, and first became acquainted with Edmund Kean, while performing in the Cheltenham theatre, under the management of Mr. Beverley. They were married at Stroud, in Gloucestershire, in 1808, he being under twenty, and several years junior to his wife. They had another and elder son, named Howard, born at Swansea, for whom Charles has sometimes been mistaken. He died of water on the brain, at Dor. chester, in February, 1814, a short time before his father appeared at Drury-lane, not having completed his fifth year; but even at that early age remarkable for his beauty, and promise of theatrical talent, having performed occasionally with his father in infantine characters.

When Charles Kean was born, and for a considerable time after, the fortunes of his parents were at the lowest possible ebb; they had barely a subsistence for the present, and were almost hopeless of the future. His father, toiling with the endless drudgery of an itinerant life, acted every night in play, interlude, and farce-not unfrequently Richard III. and Harlequin on the same evening; and during the day endeavoured to eke out a scanty and doubtful salary of some five-and-twenty shillings a-week, by giving lessons in boxing, fencing, dancing, and riding. Prejudice has sometimes designated the stage as an "idle avocation." Those who think so would do well to try it experimentally for a short period, and thus test the accuracy of their opinion by the soundest of all applications.

At this time none saw in Edmund Kean the undistinguished and somewhat insignificant country actor-the future prop of Drury-lane-the magnet of attrac tion-the star before whose brightness all rival influences were to become pale. The genius was unquestionably there, but the opportunity had not yet arrived. It came at last. In 1814, Kean obtained the long sought for opening in London, and the family entered the metropolis in the most legitimate of Thespian conveyances—a wagon!

Now the scene changed rapidly and effectually. Success, that potent wand of the enchanter, at once established the great tragedian on the pinnacle of fame and the high road to opulence. "Now, Mary," said he to his wife, "you shall ride in your own carriage." The doors of the rich and influential were thrown open to him; he might have chosen his own society; his praises filled

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