To-day we are tired of living;
Brain-worn and heart-worn am I;
If forgiven as I am forgiving,
Then peace were mine, and I would die.
       Brook, bough, breeze and bird, now adieu!
       Winter's snows weave a shroud, too, for you,

O, then, we shall tire no longer,
Where the soul shall truly be;
Then the weak shall be as the stronger,
All helping in one harmony.
       Now bird and now breeze are in tune,
       And the leaves are most merry in June.

THE DEAD SECRET.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIFTH. THE STORY OF
THE PAST.

THE afternoon wore away, and the evening
came, and still there were no signs of Uncle
Joseph's return. Towards seven o'clock,
Rosamond was summoned by the nurse, who
reported that the child was awake and fretful.
After soothing and quieting him, she
took him back with her to the sitting-room;
having first, with her usual consideration for
the comfort of any servant whom she
employed, sent the nurse down-stairs, with a
leisure hour at her own disposal, after the
duties of the day. " I don't like to be away
from you, Lenny, at this anxious time," she
said, when she rejoined her husband; " so I
have brought the child in here. He is not
likely to be troublesome again; and the
having him to take care of is really a relief
to me in our present state of suspense."

The clock on the mantel-piece chimed the
half-hour past seven. The carriages in the
street were following one another more and
more rapidly, filled with people in full dress,
on their way to dinner, or on their way to
the opera. The hawkers were shouting
proclamations of news in the neighbouring
square, with the second editions of the
evening papers under their arms. People
who had been serving behind the counter all
day were standing at the shop doors to get a
breath of fresh air. Working men were
trooping homeward, now singly, now together
in weary, shambling groups. Idlers, who had
come out after dinner, were lighting cigars at
corners of streets, and looking about them,
uncertain which way they should turn their
steps next. It was just that transitional
period of the evening at which the street-life
of the day is almost over, and the street-life
of the night has not quite begun—just the
time, also, at which Rosamond, after vainly
trying to find relief from the weariness of
waiting by looking out of window, was
becoming more and more deeply absorbed in
her own anxious thoughts, when her attention
was abruptly recalled to events in the little
world about her by the opening of the room
door. She looked up immediately from the
child lying asleep on her lap, and saw that
Uncle Joseph had returned at last.

The old man came in silently, with the
form of declaration which he had taken away
with him by Mr. Frankland's desire, open in
his hand. As he approached nearer to the
window, Rosamond noticed that his face
looked as if it had grown strangely older
during the few hours of his absence. He
came close up to her, and still not saying a
word, laid his trembling forefinger low down
on the open paper, and held it before her so
that she could look at the place thus
indicated without rising from her chair.

His silence and the change in his face
struck her with a sudden dread which made
her hesitate before she spoke to him. "Have
you told her all?" she asked, after a moment's
delay, putting the question in low, whispering
tones, and not heeding the paper.

"This answers that I have," he said, still
pointing to the declaration. " See! here is
the name, signed in the place that was left
tor it—signed by her own hand."

Rosamond glanced at the paper. There
indeed was the signature, " S. Jazeph; " and
underneath it were added, in faintly traced
lines of parenthesis, these explanatory words:
"Formerly, Sarah Leeson."

"Why don't you speak? " exclaimed
Rosamond, looking at him in growing alarm.
"Why don't you tell us how she bore it?"

"Ah! don't ask me, don't ask me! " he
answered, shrinking back from her hand, as
she tried in her eagerness to lay it on his
arm. " I forgot nothing. I said the words
as you taught me to say them. I went the
roundabout way to the truth with my tongue;
but my face took the short cut, and got to the
end first. Pray, of your goodness to me, ask
nothing about it! Be satisfied, if you please,
with knowing that she is better, and quieter,
and happier now. The bad is over and past,
and the good is all to come. If I tell you
how she looked, if I tell you what she said,
if I tell you all that happened when first she
knew the truth, the fright will catch me
round the heart again, and all the sobbing
and crying that I have swallowed down will
rise once more and choke me. I must keep
my head clear, and my eyes dry—or, how
shall I say to you all the things that I have
promised Sarah, as I love my own soul and
hers, to tell, before I lay myself down to rest
to-night? " He stopped, took out a coarse
little cotton pocket handkerchief, with a
flaring white pattern on a dull blue ground,
and dried a few tears that had risen in his
eyes while he was speaking. "My life has
had so much happiness in it," he said,
self-reproachfully, looking at Rosamond, " that
my courage, when it is wanted for the time
of trouble, is not easy to find. And yet,
I am German! all my nation are
philosophers—why is it that I alone am as soft in
my brains, and as weak in my heart, as the
pretty little baby, there, that is lying asleep
in your lap?"

"Don't speak again; don't tell us
anything till you feel more composed," said
Rosamond. " We are relieved from our