SCARBOROUGH, 1859.

to all men, he found subjects in abundance for his keen sense of humour and his exquisite art, simultaneously replenishing his sketch-book and refreshing his spirits. I was walking with him on the sands, when below the young lady on the plank half-way between the boat and the shore we saw the huge legs of the fisherman, which seemed, the rest of him being hidden by her dress, to belong to the maiden whom he was escorting; and on many other occasions he directed my attention to incongruities and comic tableaux, which never escaped his observation.

During one of our marine excursions I wrote the verses herewith reprinted, which he illustrated with one of the most charming sketches he ever drew, and which we sent for publication to our friend "Sam Lucas," the editor of Once a Week,* and the author of some of the cleverest articles, chiefly reviews of books, which have appeared in the Times. Two of the figures have a strong resemblance to himself and his wife.

SCARBOROUGH, 1859.

I have been here a little child, with a nankeen frock and spade, The darling and the despot of a pretty little maid;

"She niver know'd," I heard her say, as we came up the rocks, "Sich a nawfil boy as Master John for dirtying of his socks."

And here (ah, merry days!), a boy, I learn'd to dive and swim,
And that dear old sailor taught me his little craft to trim,
Or, when the sail flapp'd idly, to "feather" and to scull,
To catch the whiting and to shoot the heavy, harmless gull.

* Reprinted by permission of the proprietors.

Again, I came from Oxford with the newest thing in ties,
The hat, the coat, the whole "get-up," a marvel and surprise;
And I meant to read for honours, as in letters home 'twas said,
But took to flirting on the Spa and playing pool instead.

And here, a man, I lost my heart, and woo'd on wave and strand,

My counterpart, my queen, until I won that soft small hand; And for ever shall I bless that hour, in the grotto by the sea, When we talk'd of all our mutual love and sighed in ecstasy.

For now once more with her I come, and though the children say That they find hairs in my whiskers of a most decided grey, And though my Kate, the "counterpart," must weigh nigh thirteen stone,

We're happier now than ever-say, are we not, my own?

A child runs to us o'er the sand, and his curls are dank with brine;

My childhood lives again in his, for that little boy is mine;
And yonder on the Spa I see a mirthful, handsome swell,
Our eldest born, our Frank, the slave of every winsome belle.

God bless them, child and boy, and may He grant to them, my Kate,

When manhood comes to these our sons their father's happy fate

Such a wife, my own true darling, as thou hast been to me, According to thy promise in the grotto by the sea.

The science of locomotion by means of carriages and horses seemed to have attained perfection: the roads. were in excellent order, the rate of progress was ten miles an hour, the drivers were skilful, and the accidents were rare, when a bolt fell from the blue, there was thunder in the time of harvest. A single word

proclaimed a revolution, and that word was Steam. I was ten years old before a railway for passengers was opened in England, and now the country is barred like a gridiron, and the inhabitants hurry to and fro, like the ants disturbed in their hill or like shoals of fish in a stream. Railways everywhere-up, down, and through Alpine mountains, over and under great rivers; over the Tyne at Newcastle, over the Tweed at Berwick, over the Straits of Mexico, over the St. Lawrence at Montreal-these only the first pioneers of a great army of right royal engineers who have marched in triumph through the civilised world. And who were the first to organise and to lead this glorious expedition, to leave surmise for certainty, theory for practice, failure for success? Two men who began life, "alike to fortune and to fame unknown," in toil and poverty, as firemen in a northern colliery, and who by their genius and energy achieved that new and wonderful method of transport and locomotion by steam power which not only won for them riches and honours, but the gratitude and admiration of the world. No two men have accomplished such extensive and important results by their endeavours as George and Robert Stephenson, father and son.

Ambitious boys will be encouraged to read that George Stephenson received twopence a day for what we call in the Midlands " tenting be-asts"-keeping cows within the boundaries of their pasture-and that subsequently he doubled his income, receiving fourpence a day for hoeing turnips, before he became a

fireman.