as naturally the timid creatures would run
away at the slightest movement; but being
very fond of animals I wanted to discover
them, and sought under the sofa and
chairs, and in every corner of the room.
All in vain. At last, hoping that if I kept
quiet they might come out again, and
wondering at the music seeming to attract
them, I sat down once more to my waltzes.
In an instant, there they were again, going
round and round with the greatest
regularity; but the moment I stopped playing,
or moved from my place, they were gone.
This happened three or four times, and
the oddest thing was that Fussy, who was
rabid after rats and mice, instead of flying
at these little creatures crept close to me
and crouched trembling by my side. I was
glad of it, for I did not wish to have the
pretty dancers killed, and I had just
recommenced my tune for the fourth time when
the door opened, and my husband entered
and waltzed up the room towards me while
the little creatures kept time with him
perfectly, seeming to follow his steps.

"Dick! Dick!" said I, without stopping
my music; "look there! Did you ever
see anything so curious?"

He paused, looked in the direction
indicated by my eyes, and then in a tone of
utter amazement, exclaimed:

"Feet! by Heaven!"

"What?" cried I, starting up.

He stood as if petrified. Nothing was
to be seen of the strange apparition. I told
him what had happened, and that I
believed them to be white mice that I had
seen.

"Mice!" said he. "As sure as I stand
here, it was a little pair of feet in white
satin shoes! Go back and play."

I did so.

"There they are again, by Heavens!
Come quickly."

I ran to the end of the room, but no
trace of them appeared.

Next morning we started for London in
the full expectation of returning to Manorbere
early in September. But we were
summoned in the beginning of that month
to what proved to be the death-bed of my
dear father, and changes in the family
arrangements consequent upon that event
kept us some weeks away.

During this time an uncle of my
husband's was appointed to the governorship of
a colony, and wrote to offer his nephew the
post of naval aide-de-camp, which he gladly
accepted. Before the year was out, we
had sailed for our new destination. When
we came back to England, the haunted
house had ceased to exist. A railway
company had bought it and run its iron road
clean across the pretty garden. The house
was razed to the ground, the trees were
felled, and corn now grows on the scene
of the ghost's waltz.

For some time Dick and I kept the story
of the ghost's waltz strictly to ourselves;
but the public mind is now so well
prepared for the reception of marvels, that I
have no hesitation in desiring its acceptance
of this authentic little history.
Accustomed as every one is, now-a-days, to
hear—though certainly not to see— how
gentlemen who print their indisputable
experiences can elongate themselves, flatten
themselves, graze themselves against
ceilings, and flit in and out of three-pair-of-
stair windows; how instruments of music
can play for their own amusement in odd
corners out of humanity's reach, or fly about
in the air, while human beings float among
them; how hands, unattached (like retired
colonels), can gather flowers and crown
poets; and how spiritual beings can return
from the grave, to enjoy a game of romps
under a loo-table, or talk more dreary
nonsense than they talked in life, if possible;
there surely can be no difficulty in believing
the simple fact of a poor little pair of feet
in white satin shoes returning to this world,
at the summons of a favourite tune, to finish
a dance unexpectedly cut short by ruthless
Death!

GRETCHEN'S GUEST.

THE great town that to-day is full of
life and stir was at that time not thought of.
Where the sunshine falls now upon the
brilliant shops, upon the gay carriages, upon
the hurrying crowd, it lay then upon sweet
meadow grass, unbroken, save by the
passing clouds, or the shadow of the kine in
the silent fields, or the robber crows that
lived in their stronghold in the ancient
forest hard by, and wheeled in daring foray
above the newly ploughed land.

The grand market-place and the stately
squares, the noble cathedral church, with
its shrines, and carvings, and painted
windows, was then but a city underground,
reposing in quarries and mines, or in the
heart of greenwood trees, awaiting the call
to its new life. For the town, whither on
market-days the peasants' wives rode with
their well-stowed panniers, and whither
the maidens went decked in all their
bravery to mass or fair; the town, with its