between them, when chance had brought them as closely together as "twin cherries on one stalk.”

We quite agree with her. Silly man! what could have possessed him? the room to themselves, both of her hands in his, and yet he not have the courage even to ask for one of them; although she was actually begging the question, by asking by what means she could possibly repay all his kindness? Well, it must be that my grandmother was right, and that we men, clever as we think ourselves, never do take advantage of the right moment when women are in the YES humour, but generally obtrude our propositions at the wrong time and place, when they are in the No frame of mind; and my grandmother, having, besides being a very shrewd, clever woman, also been a celebrated beauty, must have been a good authority upon this particular branch of epicene Ethics, for there was a great deal of love, and love making, going on in her dayindeed, there is a great deal too much love making going on in our day;-but little, or no LOVE, if we except that ugly changeling SELFLOVE. And this fait accompli, at once reminds me, and confirms, another observation of my grandmother's upon this "still beginning, never ending" subject. She used to say, after inquiring if it was possible that I should have reached the age of nine-and-twenty without having looked

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out for a convert-that is, for a lady to convert into Mrs. Gordon Scott;-and when she found that I rather winced, and waived the subject, she would add, "Ah! George, in my time L, stood for love, S, for sincerity, and D, for devotion; but now-a-days £ s. d. never means anything but pounds, shillings, and pence,—and men's devotion to the modern signification of these three mystic letters, is so equally divided between them and themselves, that they have none left for us women. Indeed, their devotion to the £ s. d. is so all engrossing, and so undeviatingly constant, that they are often false to themselves rather than forsake the former." Very true, my dear grandmother, so far as the mere bare, hideous, and undeniable fact goes; but whatever our posterity may do, certainly our forefathers have not discovered the meaning, or the mystery, of that seething, surging maëlstrom of human passions, which, for want of a wider, broader, deeper, and truer definition, we call LIFE. Speaking of the sea, or, rather, of navigation, Victor Hugo says, in his last work "L'Homme qui Rit"-and says it in his own inimitable and profound manner"Quand on naviguera sur de l'instabilité étudiée, quand le capitaine sera un météorologue, quand le pilote sera un chimiste, alors bien de catastrophes seront evités. La mer est magnétique, autant que qu' aquatique; un ocean de force flotte

inconnu, dans l'ocean des flots; à vau-lau pourrait on dire. Ne voir dans la mer qu'une masse d'eau, c'est ne pas voir la mer; la mer est un Va-et-Vient de fluide, autant qu'un flux et reflux de liquide; les attractions, la compliquent, plus encore peut-être que les ouragans.'

Now this, slightly paraphrased, would hold good with regard to that still deeper, more uncertain, and more unfathomable sea-human nature-till we learn how to steer through it scientifically, instead of merely mechanically, as we now do ;—that is, till we learn to sound its depths, and know the causes, whence come the dangers, and the drifts, of its ceaseless changes; instead of as now, merely seeking to utilise, or to foil them with a selfish and superficial expediencywe can never, effectually—that is, to a certainty, and on fixed principles-really avoid the shoals, and quicksands, sunken rocks, or storms, and calms of either sea. Above all, till we recognise the truth in the moral world-of what Victor Hugo says of the ocean-that "its attractions perhaps complicate its mysteries more than its antagonistic storms;" till, in short-instead of contemplating the fates and lives of our fellowcreatures as a mere chain of events and circumstances,—we can acquire the art of knowing what has gone before, and what follows after, each individual's packet of events and circumstances ;

we must continue, as we do now, always to judge at the wrong end-that of effects, instead of causes. But as the little span that we call "life" is, no doubt, as mere a germ and first stage to our real existence, and complete development in Eternity—as the fragile blossom is to the rich, ripe, perfect fruit-we are not likely ever to attain to this scientific and accurate knowledge of ourselves, or of our common nature;—still the greatest, and darkest, mystery to us of the many mysteries of God's creation. Who can war against the inevitable?—contend against it they may, but conquer it NEVER;—and it is because there is an inevitable for each and all, that we are especially commanded to "Judge not, lest we be judged."

CHAPTER VIII.

"IT'S ILL WAITING FOR DEAD MEN'S SHOES

ever.

OR FOR DEAD KINGS' CROWNS, AS THE CASE MAY BE.'

VER since the July excursion to Hampton Court poor Lady Castlemaine had been sent to Coventry, without quitting London or even her magnificent

quarters in Whitehall Gardens. It was to her own and every one else's astonishment, the very longest time she had ever been banished to that over-populated penal county. Mais à mauvaise fortune, faire bonne face, being the philosophical maxim on which she acted, her nightly receptions were more brilliant and more crowded than And the Duchess of York, to show that she wished, with her newly-acquired royalty, to shuffle off all the bourgeois vulgarities of mere private station, and not enter into family quarrels, while at the same time she had no idea of worshipping a mere sun that had risen, and so in the natural course of things must set, and therefore treated "his most excellent majesty Charles the Second" strictly as a brother-in-law, and not the least as a king. To the Queen, she was a