"And happy?"

"No great life is an unbroken calm; but
he seems content."

"And is he still—"

"Unmarried?" One woman can of course
guess another's question. "Yes, still unmarried,
he has never forgotten some youthful
ideal, who, from all that I have heard, little
deserved such preference. It comes from the
romance of the artist's temperament, I
suppose, that, spite of proof, he clings to his
illusion still."

She linked her arm into mine, and there
was a pause. At last she said, "Women
must judge women gently."

"True; but in this case," I urged, "where
they had been boy and girl together, played
the same games, shared the same innocent
joys and griefs, the wrong was no common
one. To renounce for interest the affection
that had dawned so early, was a treason not
only to love but to childhood. Well, such
wrongs carry their own retribution. The
woman's heart must either harden into
worldliness, or, if not, how must she feel as
she recals the past—stands, perhaps, in the
old spot, views the old scenes, hears in fancy
the accents of love and trust which, except in
fancy, she can hear no more,—knows that
she has embittered for ever one noble life, and
that a gulf divides her from all that was
purest in her own!"

I spoke with passionate earnestness. We
had left the walk. There was no shrub or
flower to tend now; but she bent over the
moss-grown dial by the grass-plot, and traced
its circle with her finger. "You are severe,"
she said. Then I saw slow heavy tears fall
upon the dial.

"I have pained you?"

She looked at me frankly. "Not by your
censure. I was touched to think that—that
he could still trust her."

She said this so falteringly that I could
bear no more. "Forgive me," I cried, "I
meant not to be cruel; but for his sake I was
forced to learn all. Amelia, is there hope
for him? I am Lucy, his sister!"

She threw herself on my bosom, and we
wept together. Then fondly, wonderingly, as
if she were half-sister, half-child—some Perdita
recovered from the elements—I kissed
her repeatedly, and, her dear head leaning on
my arm, guided her again into the walk. I
asked her no question. I did not need. Who
could doubt those eyes and that pressure of
the hand?

When we wound back through the alley, I
saw a tall figure slowly descending the
garden-steps.

"Amy," I whispered, "there is some one
coming—my companion in this journey, can
you meet him?"

She looked at me keenly, then down the
path, and gave me an assuring grasp. I
walked before her, and met my brother
advancing.

"Cyril," I cried, "prepare yourself! Here
is a friend—a dear friend!" Before I could
say Amelia Latham, he had read it in my
face. A feeling leaped to his own so intense,
that it might either have been bliss or
anguish. But O! the calm that succeeded,
the soft transfiguring smile in which more
than the lustre of his youth re-dawned. She
had followed me with extended hands. He
took them without a word, and led her on.

I knew my part well enough to linger
behind. Their silence was soon broken. Then
Cyril learned how his letters to Amelia, and
hers to him—though she was long ignorant
that he had written—had been intercepted
by her father; how the report of her
betrothal to the vicar had arisen from his
frequent visits at Mr. Latham's, and from
the known wishes of the latter for a match
which Amelia had always resisted; how
Mr. Latham himself, before his death, had
revealed to her, with deep penitence, the
stratagem which had wrecked her hopes.
She, too, had been faithful to the memory of
childhood. In a few days my father was
summoned to Winborough. We were four—
all members of one family—when we left the
town; and Cyril's sister felt, but felt happily,
that she had resigned to its lawful claimant
a woman's chief place in his heart.

DRIP, DRIP, O RAIN!

DRIP, drip, O Rain!
   From the sky's beclouded eaves;
Wail, wail, O Wind,
   That sweepest the wither'd leaves.

Moan, moan, O Sea!
   In the depths of thy secret caves;
Utter thine agony,
  With the roar of thy striving waves!

Sigh, sigh, O Heart!
   That vainly seekest rest;
Moan, moan, O Heart!
   By grief and care opprest.

For the drip of the falling rain
   And the wail of the wind shall cease;
The roar and strife of the waves
    Ere long shall be at peace.

Then fear not, O sad Heart!
   To let thy grief have way;
For the grief that hideth not
   Shall the sooner pass away.

THE NEW JERUSALEM.

EVERYBODY has heard of Swedenborg and
the Swedenborgians; but few know that the
New Jerusalem Church (as this sect call
themselves) although based on revelations,
claiming to be divine, almost as improbable
as those of Mahomet himself, is now, at the
end of a hundred years, growing and spreading
not only among ourselves and in our
colonies, but in many parts of Europe and