"No other bliss below —above—
No other hope be given!
Life were not life without his love,
And, with it, earth were heaven!"

The Angel to the younger spake:
"What, maiden, wilt thou do
Or suffer, for thy loved one's sake,
To prove thy love is true?"

"I love him well," the maid replied,
"And much would I resign,
To be for ever at his side,
And know his heart was mine.

"My father's creed is dearer yet,—
Mine ancient race and name:
Then break, my heart! ere I forget
The Israel, whence I came.

"Yet, though my vows I may not break
To share his happier fate,
To deeds of love, for his loved sake,
My days I consecrate.

"No other love this heart shall share,
To his for aye consign'd,—
No thought of evil enter where
His image is enshrined!

"But I the sick and poor will tend,
My life an offering make
In trust— that Heaven on him may send
A blessing for my sake!"

The Angel smiled: "The rose is thine;
Such love is love indeed:
So love—so live; and love divine,
Eternal be thy meed!"

MOTHER SHIPTON.

THERE are some names which attain a
national celebrity without posterity knowing
exactly why or wherefore. That of Mother
Shipton is one of the most noted in the
traditionary annals of this country. Her fame
as a prophetess has extended throughout the
land; and her sayings have become, in the
remotest corners, literally Household Words.

Undoubtedly there have been witches—for
in that category must Mother Shipton be
classed—who have played the oracle as well
as she; but, as generally happens, the multitude
are lost sight of in the course of time,
and the wisdom of the many is eventually
ascribed to one. Homer, Æsop, Solomon— to
say nothing of that friend of the destitute,
Joe Miller —are amongst a thousand instances
of concentrated reputation. Every hour's
experience, indeed, affords example of this
tendency to special attribution; and there
are very few of us, perhaps, who have not, at
one time or other, contributed our mite to
set up the popular sect of the day.

During a recent excursion in one of the
midland counties, the consideration of this
question was forced upon me by a local legend
of which Mother Shipton was the heroine,
although nothing exists to show that she ever
set her foot on the spot, and more than three
hundred years have elapsed since her death.
But, before I add the stone I have gathered,
to the general heap, it may not be out of
place to relate the history and prophecies of
this remarkable woman, as I have found them
recorded in pamphlets now somewhat scarce.

Ursula Shipton, whose maiden name was
Southiel, was born near Knaresborough, in
Yorkshire, on the sixth of July, fourteen
hundred and eighty-eight: three years after
the accession of Henry of Richmond to the
throne of England. She was baptised by
the Abbot of Beverley, and probably an
uglier child was never held at the font— a
contemporaneous account stating that "her
stature was much larger than common, her
body crooked, and her face frightful." But, as
a set-off to her personal deformity, her
understanding is spoken of as having been
extraordinary; and it was probably for this reason
—certainly not because of her beauty—that
Ursula's hand was sought in marriage when
she had reached the age of twenty-four. Her
suitor, a bold fellow to venture on such a
strong-minded woman, was one Toby Shipton,
of the village of Skipton, not far from
York. He was, by profession, a builder,
though whether he added anything to the
architectural glories of the Minster, or
acquired a Pecksniffian celebrity for edifices
which he never helped to raise, is a point on
which no information has been obtained.
His fame rests entirely on the fact of
his having bestowed his name on the
bewitching Ursula; for, with that exception,
we hear nothing at all about him. Of two
things, one, as the French say. Toby Shipton
either crawled through life the most hen-
pecked of husbands, or shuffled off his mortal
coil after a very brief season of conjugal
felicity. The last hypothesis is the more
likely.

I am ignorant at what period of her life
the gift of prophecy descended upon Mother
Shipton, but, hazarding a conjecture, I should
say it was as soon as she discovered the
mastery she had acquired over the minds of
those around her. Her first prophetic essays
were probably a few ambiguous words based
on shrewd observation, the results of which
naturally came to pass. Her speeches then
assumed a darker meaning, chance proving
the issue, or the obscurity in which they
were couched leaving the event only doubtful.
One lucky hit in matters of prognostication
is always better remembered than a
hundred failures. It is a common thing to
make mistakes; a rare one to be right.
Mother Shipton seems to have been a most
successful soothsayer, and with the
accomplishment of those predictions which
concerned her own neighbourhood her reputation
spread, until, it is said, it tilled the whole
land; and even bluff King Harry quaked
with dread when he heard the words of
Ursula. The most striking story that is told
of her vaticinations has reference to the fate
of his great minister, Wolsey, and that of
those of the monarch's most distinguished