like the comfort of Job's friends; and that he would help me if he could, but feared I had not heroism enough to conquer the difficulty.

I asked what heroism he meant.

"To lay the axe to the root of the tree, and cut the whole down in forgetfulness; which, after all," said he, "is not so impossible.”

I shook my head.

"Why, you do not say that you ever told your love, much less what encouragement, if any, you have received from her. Has she ever

"Oh! no! no! no!" said I, interrupting him with anxiety; "she was good, gracious, and condescending, but not more to me than all others-and when I think of her bright radiance,

'It were all one

That I should love a bright particular star,

And think to wed it, she is so above me.'

I said this with so much emotion, faltering in my speech as it escaped, that the good Fothergill was affected; his rough exterior gave way; he took my hand, and his hard features softened into more than common fellow-feeling; but he told me that nothing but a total and complete banishment of the very name, and of course all that bore it, from my memory, could work any cure. "Were you like her brother himself," said he, "and could you, like him, fly from flower to flower, and amuse yourself with 'beautés de garnison,' or seek the thousand diversions of thought which the ambition of being a "renowner" occasions, I might have some hopes for you; but you are jeune homme à parfait amour; you walk gardens and court cloisters, rather than the High Street or the cricket-ground; you prefer sighing to merriment; you are like Jacques, you do love melancholy better than laughing,' and

the hold the brother has upou you is cherished a thousand times more fondly, because in the brother is cherished the thought of the sister."

Though I felt every word of this to be true, and mourned that it should be so, yet I could not help wondering where my tutor had got this penetration, on a subject to which, from his habits, manners, and appearance, it should seem he must have been a stranger. But at any rate, the reasoning was good, and the power only, not the will, was wanting. For I found myself unequal to the promise he demanded of me, to use all means and appliances to drive the whole family from my memory.

"It will smooth your path here," said he, "as well as there; for this unhappy accident (as I may call it), which has so lifted you above yourself, has placed you every way in a false position, and your intimacy with Mr. Hastings, even if renewed, which is doubtful, will only be pregnant with mortification; while to cherish your feelings for this young lady must plunge you in despair."

"There is not a word you have said," I answered, "to which I do not defer. And yet

"What ?"

"The despair would be welcome, in preference to oblivion; and I would rather be hopeless in my love, than not love Bertha."

"I give you up," said Fothergill, somewhat ruffled, and he walked away.

This troubled me: and not the less because he was right. Then, again, though he was my cousin, and had shown himself my real friend, he was also my tutor, and a high college official. But I was a real lover, and to a real lover, even without hope, and though his mistress may even be ignorant of his

passion, the dream of that mistress is often sweeter than liberty itself.

Fothergill, however, had been too abrupt. He was perhaps himself invulnerable, and therefore hard to others. I sulked also, and walked away to "commune with my own heart, in my chamber," though not to be still; rather indeed the reverse; for in my chamber I did not stay ten minutes, but sallied forth into the town, unknowing where to go.

My steps, however, were soon directed, for I met my friend's French valet, who, accosting me with the consequential national politeness of a French valet of fashion, said he had brought me " von letter from his master, le jeune Seigneur Hastings, who vas a leetel indispose, and wish mosh for de company of monsieur, for one petit quart d'heure.”

Recollecting the preceding evening's conversation, my heart leaped up at this, as it looked like an alteration of sentiment."

"I am sorry he is ill," said I.

"Not ver ill,” replied the valet, "mais il veut bien se fortifier contre l'ennui, avec monsieur."

"Has he not his friend, Lord Albany, with him ?” asked I.

"Mi lor,” replied La Fleur (for so, as I have said, his master had christened him), 66 was gone to Blenheim, with a party of jeunes dames, to visit the château of le grand Malbrook, and jeune Monsieur Hastings was au désespoir that he no go too, pour

Here La Fleur shook his head almost as significantly as Lord Burleigh.

"And what cause ?" asked I, with curiosity.

"Von leetel (how you call it?) imposition," replied the valet," for which he is aux arrêts, and can

no stir; but monsieur will open his billet and will see all about dat, sans doute."

It was time I should; but meanwhile I dismissed the valet with my compliments, and I would come directly.

I then opened the note, and read as follows:

"MY DEAR ORESTES.

"Our ruler has had the audacity to confine me, because I refused to obey a nonsensical order, that none of us should attend the race ball last night. What makes it worse, all my friends have flown off in different directions. Pray, therefore, come, if only for half-an-hour. A sober Queen's man for an associate and counsellor may perhaps redeem me with the tyrant, who has been most pragmatical in this matter. "Yours,

"PYLADES."

This allusion to our school nicknames by no means displeased me. It is impossible, I said, to myself, that he wishes to forget old friendship; Fothergill is wrong:-and I quickened my pace to Christ Church.

CHAPTER XI.

I TELL MY MIND TO FOLJAMBE.—THE CONSEQUENCES OF IT.

That you have wrong'd me doth appear in this.

Under your testy humour? By the gods,
You shall digest the venom of your spleen!
Though it split you.

SHAKSPEARE.-Julius Cæsar.

My old friend the porter received me at the gate with still improved obsequiousness (another barometer of the surrounding atmosphere); for La Fleur, with whom he had struck up an alliance (I suppose not unequal, and therefore likely to last), had informed him of the message to me, as he did of every thing else concerning his master, and this made the shrewd janitor suppose that I could be no common person. He treated me accordingly.

For my own part, I no longer played the meek freshman of Queen's, but received his salutation as my mere due, and passed on with a sort of calm dignity (at least what was intended for such), which I took no pains to repress, and it lasted all the way into Hastings's presence, of whom I felt, or thought I did, less and less afraid. I at any rate resolved to probe both his heart and character to the bottom. If he really loves, and does not disdain me, thought I, I will make him disclose himself unequivocally; if he is