ation for every species of barbarity and injustice. For worldly prosperity, my dear children, it is not always the reward of virtue, or adversity the punishment of vice; for we frequently, in this life, witness the misfortunes of the good, and the success of the wicked. Wealth and power are of no estimation in the sight of God; but a heart free from guile and oppression will assuredly hereafter meet their reward. Punishments in this world, the Scripture tells us are salutary; for as parents correct their children to break them of evil propensities, so does the wisdom of God punish those he loves best, to make them nearer perfection, and more worthy of the happiness he designs them."

Mr. Wilmot paused, and then continued.

"Fortune now appeared to smile upon Henry; he was at the height of power, in peaceable possession of two powerful states, and father of a son his acknowledged heir, and who at eighteen was all

his most sanguine wishes could desire. His daughter Matilda was married to Henry the Fifth, Emperor of Germany, and he doubtless looked forward to increased honours to grace his old age.How fallacious is the wisdom of man! and how feeble is the foundation of worldly happiness! in a moment the breath of God destroys it, and the vacant heart is left to seek a fresh object. On the contrary, in the gloom of a dungeon, surrounded with every mortal evil, the soul that leans on God alone, finds a support that never fails or decays; but looking forward to a better and more permanent state, forgets the present transitory ill, in the expectation of a joyful hereafter."

"I trust, my dear Sir," said Anne, "that poor Robert met with that support in the castle of Cardiff."

"I hope he did, he had time for reflection, and might repent of his former indiscretions-but to proceed-Henry, suspicious from his own former conduct,

and fearing, perhaps, that his son might be supplanted, as he had before supplanted his brother, resolved to have him acknowledged, both in England and Normandy; which ceremony was performed with great pomp in both states.

"In order to render the voyage to Normandy more pompous and agreeable, most of the young nobles of the kingdom were of the party, and the prince having received the homage of the barons, all were returning in triumph. The king and prince were in separate vessels of the fleet; the first had sailed from Harfleur, and was soon out of sight of land. The ship which contained the young prince and his companions was detained by some accident; and the crew, with their captain, named Fitz-stephens, having spent the interval in mirth and drinking, became to disordered that, unable to steer the vessel, she struck upon a rock, and was instantly dashed to pieces. The prince was put into a boat, and might have escaped, had not the cries of

Maud, the king's illegitimate daughter, awakened his humanity. By persuasion he prevailed on the sailors to row back. and attempt to save her; but the boat--no sooner approached the wreck, than numbers who clung to the vessel, inspired with the hope of life, leaped in, and overwhelmed it, so that the whole went to the bottom.

"By this accident an hundred and sixty of the youthful nobility were lost, a butcher of Rouen being the only per son that escaped. The shrieks of these unfortunate sufferers reached the shore, and were heard even in the king's ship, though the cause was unknown. For three days the king entertained hopes that his son had reached some distant part of England, but when assured of the dreadful certainty, he fainted away, and was never seen to smile afterwards.

"Some modern historians have said he died soon after this event, but on examining more ancient records, he appears to have survived it fifteen years;

the immediate cause of his death proceeding from a surfeit occasioned by eating lampreys, a kind of eels. He died at St. Dennis, a little town in Normandy; his bowels were buried at Rouen, but his body was brought to England and deposited in the abbey of Reading, which he had founded.—Henry the First reigned thirty-five years, three months and twenty-nine days; his brother Robert died the year before him."

As Mr. Wilmot ceased, Anne said— "Were it not for Henry's cruelty to his brother, I could sincerely pity him for the death of his son-as it was, I think he was properly punished."

"He was indeed punished where he felt it most severely," replied Mrs. Wilmot-" for all his honours were at once blighted, and the cruelty and craftiness of so many years rendered fruitless by being deprived of his male heir.-I think he bequeathed his possessions to his daughter Matilda, who married the emperor."