After remaining for some time in this musing attitude, Auriol opened the old tome before him, and began to turn over its leaves. It was full of magical disquisitions and mysterious characters, and he found inscribed on one of its earlier pages a name which instantly riveted his attention. Having vainly sought some explanation of this name in the after contents of the book,he laid it aside and became lost in meditation. His reverie ended, he heaved a deep sigh, and turned again to the open volume lying before him, and in doing so his eye rested for the first time on his habiliments. On beholding them he started, and held out his arm to examine his sleeve more narrowly. Satisfied that he was not deceived, he arose and examined himself from head to foot. He found himself, as has been stated, attired in the garb of a gentleman of Elizabeth's time. "What can this mean?" he cried. "Have I endured a long and troubled dream, during which I have fancied myself living through more than two centuries? Oh, Heaven, that it may be so! Oh, that the fearful crimes I suppose I have committed, have only been enacted in a dream! Oh, that my victims are imaginary! Oh, that Ebba should only prove a lovely phantom of the night! And yet, I could almost wish the rest were real-so that she might exist. I cannot bear to think that she is nothing more than a vision. But it must be so-I have been dreaming --and what a dream it has been-what strange glimpses it has afforded me into futurity! Methought I lived in the reigns of many sovereigns -beheld one of them carried to the block-saw revolutions convulse the kingdom-old dynasties shaken down-and new ones spring up. Fashions seemed to me to have so changed, that I had clean forgotten the old ones; while my fellow men scarcely appeared the same as heretofore. Can I be the same myself? Is this the dress once wore. Let me seek for

some proof."

And thrusting his hand into his doublet, he drew forth some tablets, and hastily examined them. They bore his name, and contained some writing, and he exclaimed aloud with joy, "This is proof enough-I have been dreaming all this while."

"The scheme works to a miracle," muttered a personage stationed at the foot of the steps, springing from the doorway, and who, though concealed from view himself, was watching the prisoner with a malignant and exulting gaze.

"And yet why am I here?" pursued Auriol, looking around. “Ah! I see how it is," he added, with a shudder, "I have been mad--perhaps am mad still. That will account for the strange delusion under which I have laboured."

"I will act upon that hint," muttered the listener.

"Of what use is memory," continued Auriol, musingly, "if things that are not, seem as if they were? If joys and sorrows which we have never endured are stamped upon the brain-if visions of scenes, and faces, and events which we have never witnessed, never known, haunt us, as if they had once been familiar? But I am mad-mad." The listener laughed to himself.

"How else, if I were not mad, could I have believed that I had swallowed the fabled elixir vitæ ? And yet is it a fable, for I am puzzled still? Methinks I am old-old-old-though I feel and look young, young. All this is madness. Yet how clear and distinct it seems. I can call to mind events in Charles the Second's time. Ha!-who told me of Charles the Second? How know I there was such a king? The reign

ing sovereign should be James, and yet I fancy it is George the Fourth. Oh! I am mad-clean mad."

There was another pause, during which the listener indulged in a suppressed fit of laughter.

"Would I could look forth from this dungeon," pursued Auriol, again breaking silence," and satisfy myself of the truth or falsehood of my doubts by a view of the external world, for I am so perplexed in mind, that if I were not distracted already, they would be enough to drive me so. What dismal, terrible fancies have possessed me, and weigh upon me still-the compact with Rougemont-ha!"

"Now it comes," cried the listener.

"Oh that I could shake off the conviction that this were not so-that my soul, though heavily laden, might still be saved. Oh that I dared to hope this!"

"I must interrupt him if he pursues this strain," said the listener.

"Whether my crimes are real or imaginary-whether I snatched the cup of immortality from my grandsire's dying lips-whether I signed a compact with the fiend, and delivered him a victim on each tenth year -I cannot now know-but if it is so-I deeply, bitterly regret them, and would expiate my offences by a life of penance."

At this moment Rougemont, attired in a dress similar to that of the prisoner, marched up the steps, and cried, "What ho, Auriol!-Auriol Darcy!"

"Ah! is it you, fiend?"

"Who speaks ?" demanded Auriol. "What, you are still in your old fancies," rejoined Rougemont. "I thought the draught I gave you last night would have amended you." "Tell me who and what I am," cried Auriol, stupified with astonishment; "in what age I am living; and whether I am in my right mind or not?"

"For the first, you are called Auriol Darcy," replied Rougemont; "for the second, you are living in the reign of his most Catholic majesty, James I., of England, and Sixth of Scotland; and for the third, I trust you will soon recover your reason."

"Amazement!" cried Auriol, striking his brow with his clenched hand. "Then I am mad."

"It's plain your reason is returning, since you are conscious of your condition," replied Rougement, "but calm yourself, you have been subject to raging frenzies."

"And I have been shut up here for safety?" demanded Auriol. Precisely," observed the other.

And

you are

"Your keeper," replied Rougemont.

"My God! what a brain mine must be!" cried Auriol.

"Answer me

one question-Is there such a person as Ebba Thorneycroft?" "You have often raved about her," replied Rougemont.

a mere creature of the imagination.”

Auriol groaned, and sank against the wall.

"But she is

"Since you have become so reasonable, you shall again go forth into the world," said Rougemont ; "but the first essay must be made at night for fear of attracting observation. I will come to you again a few hours hence. Farewell, for the present!"

And casting a sinister glance at his captive, he turned upon his heel, descended the steps, and quitted the cell.

BOB ROBINSON'S FIRST LOVE.

BY LANCELOT WAGSTAFF, ESQ.

CLERGYMEN who take private pupils upon small livings in the West of England, and prepare young gentlemen for the universities or for public life, ought to be obliged by law to destroy their female offspring as certain Indian people do—or at least there should be convents or hospitals for the daughters of the tutorising clergy, where, until their papas had left off "coaching" (as the Oxford phrase was-it is perhaps changed since our time), these virgins should be carefully immured.

For it is next to impossible that lads of eighteen years of age should be put in the daily presence of a rosy-fingered young creature, who makes breakfast every morning in a pink frock; who trips across the common with good things in her basket for the suffering poor people of papa's parish; and who plays the most ravishing tunes on the piano in the evening after tea, when mathematics and the Greek plays are no longer thought of, when papa solaces himself with the St. James' Chronicle; when Smith and Jones amuse themselves at chess; and Robinson, who is musically inclined, accompanies Eliza on the flute:-it is next, I say, to impossible that something should not happen from the presence of such a young woman in a tutor's family-something delightful at its commencement, but often productive of woe, perplexity, and family annoyance ere its conclusion. Dear madam or miss! I will not insult you by naming it—you have often inspired that something, and many a manly heart has suffered because you were inevitably fair!

So, too, was Miss Griggs, daughter of the clergyman under whose charge several of us completed our education. He took a limited number of young men of distinguished family to prepare for the universities. He had a son at Cambridge, whose extravagance he would hint was the cause of his taking pupils, and his lovely daughter, Eliza, kept his house. When parents and guardians would remark on the comeliness of the young woman, and hint that her presence might be dangerous to the peace of mind of the pupils, old Griggs would fling his eyes up to Heaven and say, "I consider that dear girl, sir, to be married. She is engaged to her cousin, the Reverend Samuel Butts, fellow and tutor of Maudlin; and when the first living falls vacant-alas! my Eliza will leave me. Would you have me part with her now? And yet, were she not engaged, she should not live under my roof, but reside, as she used to do previous to her engagement, with her angel mother's family." Here old Griggs' white handkerchief would come out, and as with a trembling voice he uttered these words, his bald forehead, white head, hook nose, and white neckcloth, never failed to impose respect upon his hearers; and parents thought their children lucky under the care of such a man.

But Butts was absent: we saw nothing of him save occasionally in vacation time, when he made his appearance in the shape of a dumpy little flaccid-faced man, who wore high-lows, and no straps to his trousers. He made but a poor figure by the side of the brilliant young bucks at Griggs's, who dressed for dinner, had their clothes from Cliffordstreet, and wore yellow kid gloves at church on Sundays. I think Miss G. (we did not like to call her Miss Griggs somehow) must have seen the disadvantage under which her Samuel laboured in the company of young men of the world. But he was an honest man, great at the digamma, and Miss G. had been engaged to him years ago; before her Aug.-VOL. LXXIV. NO. CCXCVI.

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brother's extravagance at college had compelled pa to take pupils. She wore a lock of his sandy hair in a seven-shilling brooch round her neck; and there was a sticking-plaster full length of him in his cap and gown, done by the fellow from Brighton, who had hit off to a nicety his little bunch of a nose, and his dumpy, pudgy figure and high-lows, hanging up in the dining-room. Robinson (he who played the flute) used to look at that black figure with violent rage and disgust, shake his fist at it, utter tremendous comminations against Butts as a snob, and wish that either one were dead or the other had never been born, for his soul was consumed with passion for Eliza Griggs, and his heart was scorched with the flames of a first love.

Do not be alarmed for the consequences, madam; don't expect any harrowing romance-wir haben auch geliebt und gelebet—we have endured and survived it as other people do. It is like the small-pox, diminished in virulence, and doesn't carry off half so many people as it used according to old accounts.

They have been engaged for seven years," Robinson used to say, making us confidants of his love, and howling and raging about it as young men of his ardent temperament will do; " but she can't care about him; I know she can't; look how the brute squints; and see him eat peas with his knife-I could thwottle him."

It was quite true: Butts had that obliquity, and consumed his vegetables with the aid of the implement in question. Another day he would come out with," She was a child when the engagement was made. He is a brute to hold her to it. He might have married her years ago, but he is waiting for the 12001. a year great living, which may never fall in. The selfish scoundrel ought to release her from her engagement. But he didn't. The promise was there. The locket hung round her neck. I confide these things to you as a friend-a brother-Eliza would say. But let me submit to my destiny. What are you men but selfish? all, all selfish? Unfortunate Eliza !"

Don't imagine I am going to say any thing disrespectful of her-don't fancy I would hint that she was unfaithful to her Butts-in love matters women are never in fault. I never heard of a coquette in my life—nor of a woman playing with a man's affections and heartlessly flinging him off -nor of a woman marrying for money-nor of a sly mother who coaxed and wheedled a young fellow, until somehow Jemima was off her hands. No, no, the women are always right, and the author of "Mrs. Caudle's Lectures" ought to be pulled to pieces like Orpheus for vilifying the sex. Eliza then did not give the least encouragement to young Robinson, though somehow they were always together. You couldn't go into the garden and see the pink frock among the gooseberry-bushes, but Robinson's green shooting-jacket was seen sauntering by-in the evening their flute and piano were always tweedledeedling in concert-and they never stopped until they had driven us out of their room with the music, when unaccountably the duet would cease; how was it that when miss was on the landing-place, Robinson was always coming upstairs? So it was though. They were talking about Mr. Butts probably. What was that lock of hair Robinson kept in his desk? It may have been his sister's, his grandmother's. Were there not many people with black hair besides Eliza? And yet the ill-natured might have fancied that some mercenary motives influenced the pure heart of Miss Eliza. Robinson, though eight years younger than herself, was perhaps a catch in a pecu

By us

niary point of view. He was the son of the famous banking-house of Hobbs, Dobbs, and Robinson; and when arrived at five-and-twenty (for as for Hobbs and Dobbs they were mere myths like Child, Coutts, and others), would take his seat as head-partner of the house. His widowed mother was a Miss Rolfe, daughter of Admiral Rolfe, and sister of General Sir Hugh Rolfe, K.C.B. Mr. Rolfe Robinson our young friend was called, being not a little proud of his double-barrelled name. he was denominated Rich Robinson, Kid Robinson, or Band-box Robinson, alluding to the wealth to which he was heir, and the splendour of his person—or finally, in compliment to a hesitation in his speech which he possessed-Staggering Bob. He was, between ourselves, a weak, fairhaired, vapid, good-natured fellow: at Eton he was called Miss Robinson. Every one of his nicknames justly characterised some peculiarity about the honest fellow.

Huffle (belonging to the firm), Rolfe, his uncle, and his mother, were joint guardians of this interesting heir. His lady mother spent her jointure in a stately way, occupying a great house in Portman-square, and giving grand parties in the season, whereof the Morning Post made mention. Royal dukes, ambassadors, never less than three marquises; Griggs, our tutor, never failed to read the names of these guests, to talk about them at dinner-and I think felt proud at having Mrs. Robinson's son in his house, who entertained such exalted company. He always helped Bob first in consequence, and gave him the wings of the fowls, and the outside of the fillet of veal.

However, Mrs. Robinson had many daughters older than Bob; and though she lived so splendidly, and though Bob was to be chief of the banking-house, the young man himself was not very well supplied with cash by his mother. But he did not want for friends elsewhere; and there was a certain old clerk in the bank who furnished his young master with any sums that he required-" out of regard for his dear father" the before-mentioned clerk used to say-of course never expecting to be paid back again, or to curry favour with his young principal so soon as he took the direction of affairs. From this man Robinson used to get down chests of cigars and cases of liquors and champagne which he consumed in secret, at a certain cottage in the village. Nokes it was who provided surreptitious funds for the hiring of tandems, which, in our youthful days, we delighted to drive. Many a man at Griggs's, who had only his own father's purse to draw envied Robinson such an invaluable friend as Nokes. Well, this youth was in love with Miss Eliza Griggs. Her father was quite ignorant of the passion of course-never dreamed of such a thing. Fathers are so proverbially blind!

upon,

Young Griggs, the Cambridge man, seldom came down among us, except to bleed the governor. A wild and impetuous young man he was; not respectable, and of a bad set-but we lads respected him because he was a man, and had rooms of his own, and told us stories about Proctors and Newmarket; and had a cutaway green coat and large whiskers-to all of which honours we one day hoped to come.

One Easter vacation when young Griggs came down however, we observed he watched his sister and Robinson very keenly; spoke harshly to the former, at which the latter would grow very angry; and finally, one day after dinner, when as usual after the second glass of port, Griggs had given the signal for retiring, touched Robinson on the shoulder as we were quitting the dining-room, and said, " Mr. Robinson, I would