so lately only a paid clerk to his superior. There
was a sense of something wrong in the Ford
Bank household for many weeks about this time.
Mr. Wilkins was not like himself, and his
cheerful ways and careless genial speeches were
missed, even on the days when he was not
irritable, and evidently uneasy with himself and all
about him. The spring was late in coming, and
cold rain and sleet made any kind of out-of-door
exercise a trouble and discomfort rather than a
bright natural event in the course of the day.
All sound of winter gaieties, of assemblies and
meets, and jovial dinners, had died away, and
the summer pleasures were as yet unthought of.
Still Ellinor had a secret perennial spring of
sunshine in her heart; whenever she thought of
Ralph she could not feel much oppression from
the present unspoken and indistinct gloom. He
loved her; and oh, how she loved him! and
perhaps this very next autumn—- but that
depended on his own success in his profession.
After all, if it was not this autumn it would be
the next; and with the letters that she received
weekly, and the occasional visits that her lover
ran down to Hamley to pay Mr. Ness, Ellinor
felt as if she would almost prefer the delay of
the time when she must leave her father's for a
husband's roof.

SMALL-BEER CHRONICLES.

THE power of prophesying after the event, is
one possessed by a large class of persons, and it
will doubtless be very easy for future ages to
show with great correctness and lucidity how
certain characteristics of these present times
plainly foreshadowed the events and changes
which were to follow them. The task of those
prophets who have to deal with matters over
which the veil of futurity is yet drawn, is more
difficult, and though they may note the events
of the day, and speak of them knowingly as
"signs of the times," it is not anything like so
easy for them to say with precision what sort of
"times" these same events are " signs of."

Therefore it is that when, as is sometimes
inevitable, I pass from the chronicling of those
changes in our manners of which we are taking
note, to certain inferences apparently deducible
from them, I ask, even more than at other times,
for great indulgence.

How is it faring, in this age, with what we
ordinarily call " the Picturesque?" How is it
faring with " the Poetical?" According to all
our received, notions, it is faring ill with both the
one and the other.

Is there any one invention of modern times
which has added anything to the picturesqueness
of the age? Nay, is there one which has
not rather detracted from it?

The same questions may be asked as to the
influence of all recent changes on the Poetical
element. In both cases, according to our
received notions, I think it must be answered
that what are popularly called " modern institutions"
have been unfriendly alike to the
Picturesque and to the Poetical.

"According to our received notions." That
there may be even now, and that there will be
hereafter, inherent in these same institutions a
Picturesqueness and a Poetry of their own, I
am far i'rom denying; but it is separate from
what we have hitherto delighted in, and we
must, before we can see or appreciate it, part
with many cherished associations, and with
many beloved prejudices which we have been
used to hug to our hearts.

The Poetical and the Picturesque are so
nearly related to each other, that, in examining
into their present position and future prospects,
we may legitimately treat of them for the most
part together.

The other day, the following paragraph
appeared in the newspaper: " In consequence of
the great destruction by wolves of sheep grazing
on the mountains of Ax, in the neighbourhood
of Toulouse, the mayor of Savignac, after several
ineffectual attempts to hunt them down with
packs of hounds, determined to try strychnine,
in order to rid the country of these voracious
animals. Two wolves were found dead the first
night after the poison was laid. Seven foxes
were the next victims; and subsequently two
large wolves. Encouraged by this success, the
mayors of the neighbouring communes determined
to try strychnine, and by the end of
the year the sheep in the mountains were
suffered to graze without being molested." Now,
how like this announcement is to the age
we live in. What a romantic thing was the
old wolf-hunt! How picturesque was everything
connected with it! There was a spice
of danger about it too, to make it more attractive.
Practically, however, it did not answer,
and so away with it, and let us treat the wolves
upon the mountain-side as we do the black-
beetles in the kitchen. Oh, Schneyders, it was
well for you to die when you did! Your occupation's
gone, and the grocer steps in with his
"Celebrated Paste for Poisoning Wolves," and
the advertisement comes out, " Why Keep Wolf-
hounds?" Why indeed? The object is attained
more easily, more economically, more completely,
upon the black-beetle system. We think now—
for we are sensible people— of the object to be
attained, not of the process of attaining it.
When we shoot, for instance, our object is to
kill game, and that is sooner gained by employing
beaters than by hunting with pointers;
when we travel, we only wish to be conveyed
from one spot on the earth's surface to another as
quickly as possible, and the pleasures of the
actual transit are over for us. I wonder if we
shall ever fight our battles with strychnine, or
discharge a volley of poison-vapour into the
columns of the enemy " with terrific effect"?

How long ago was it that the great Naval
Review took place at Portsmouth? Fifteen,
eighteen, twenty years, perhaps. We talk of
signs of the times. What a sign of the times
that was! The great sham fight took place
well out at sea, and we on shore could see