"come and tell me the result  when it is
over."

We found Olive lying on the sofa, moaning,
and shivering like one stricken with fever.

"My dear," said the doctor addressing her,
"we want you to give us, as concisely and
clearly as possible, a full account of all that
passed between the late Mr. Philip Delmer
and yourself, from the time you met him this
evening till the moment he was so barbarously
murdered."

"O papa!" she exclaimed, sobbing out
afresh. "I cannot bear to speak of it. I can
only think about it at present. Do please
spare me!"

"It is necessary for several important
reasons," said the doctor very gravely, "that
you should do as I ask you. So summon all
your firmness to your aid for a few minutes,
and relate to us, as closely as you can
remember, everything that passed between
you."

Thus adjured, Olive was obliged to comply,
and with many sobs and tears she began
as follows:

"Philip wrote me a short note yesterday,
asking me to meet him this evening on the
other side of the bridge, as he wished to
see me before going home, having something
of importance to relate to me. I met him as
he had requested, and it was nearly dark.
We went walking gently up and down the
meadows for about two hours, talking cheerfully
to each other. I never saw him in
better spirits."

"What was the matter of importance he
had to relate to you?"

"He told me that he should be obliged to
return to London the following evening, and
that he had written to me to meet him before
he went home, because it was his intention to
ask the consent of Mr. Redfern and yourself
—to-morrow morning—to our marriage; and
he wanted to tell me beforehand."

"What was he saying and doing at the
moment you heard the pistol fired ? Had you
hold of his arm at the time ?"

"O papa, spare me!" she exclaimed, hiding
her head in the pillows of the sofa.

"My child, there are none but friends here,
and it is of the greatest importance that you
should be explicit. Speak the truth without
shame or fear."

"I had hold of his arm," she went on.
"He had just said, 'Olive, this day six
months we shall be man and wife,' and
stooped down to kiss me as he said it. As he
was raising his head again, there came a
sudden flash and explosion. He flung up his
arms  exclaiming, 'O my God!' and then fell
to the earth. He only spoke once more,
saying, 'Olive, tell my aunt '—but could not
finish. Then a great shiver ran through his
body, and I knew that he was dead."

"Did you see any one near or at a
distance, while you were in the meadows, either
before or after the shot was fired?"

"I did not see any one."

"There are a clump of willows close to
where the murder took place. Could any one
be concealed there, and you not see him,
when you went past it?"

"Certainly; especially after nightfall."

"Did you see any one step out of the
willows at the moment the shot was fired ?"

"I seemed to see a great black shadow
start up with outstretched arm; but the
flash blinded my eyes, so that I could be
certain of nothing."

"Are you acquainted with any one who, in
your judgment, had any cause or reason to
commit such a deed?"

To this question, after some hesitation, she
answered, "I am not."

My father only sighed when I told him;
then beckoning me to follow him, he led the
way into his study, and going up to his
bureau—an old and massive piece, of furniture
—touched a secret spring, which opening
a pigeon-hole, revealed to me the place where
he had concealed the pistol.

"Only you and I, Caleb, know of this. It
may be wanted some day after I am gone. If
so, you know where to find it."

LORD W. TYLER.

Once upon a time—on a day in the remote
past, when there were inhabitants in London,
and a parliament was sitting, and the shrimps
had Margate to themselves, and the Pharaohs
were alive, and the Chaldeans were looking
out of their telescopes upon the plains of
Waterloo to watch the rising of Arcturus
over a world inhabited only by plesiosauruses
—there was a member of the British House
of Commons who informed a despotic British
Minister that he had better not attempt to
play Wat Tyler with the British nation. Old
as I am, I can remember little of what
happened at so remote an age in the world's
history, but the fact dwells in my memory, as
I sit here with Canute by the seashore, saying
to my shrimpwoman, who over-rates the
market value of those centipedes, thus far
will I go and no farther. As Judith hit the
nail upon the head of the tyrant Holothuria,
who hung Jupiter Ammon high upon a gibbet
after invading—Judas-like—the castle of his
house, so the member for Finsbury, helped
by the member for the Tower Hamlets and
some other revered metropolitans, drove the
nail home into the bill of that Strafford of
the ninetieth century, her Majesty's Prime
Minister, Lord W. Tyler.

Some persons are easily confused by that
which is confusing. Thus it happens that to
me when I think of Mr. Cox, M.P. for the
borough of Finsbury, in connexion with the
History of England, all history becomes a
chaos, trains of ideas come into collision or
slip off the line, old associations come to
loggerheads in all their sections, black is
white, and white is crooked. There is nothing