sic was dissonance; poetry, tasteless; the long long days succeeded to each other in dread monotony; their sum was computed only by the few brief moments when I beheld him; and these moments I notched on a willow bough, which I kept for that purpose; it was at once my calendar and my emblem-a broken sapless branch, torn from its native stem, marked with love's destructive seal, a worthless, useless, melancholy thing.

"When Lord Mowbray quitted his castle, he went to Montgomery Hall, and I still followed. The report of the transcendent beauty of the Lady Lorimers reached even me, and the prescience of passion told me, that one of them was destined to become his bride. I cannot say why this belief should have added much to my wretchedness, for I had long before resigned every hope; yet at this conviction, the fever that was consuming me, burst with fresh fury in my veins, and I knew that death would, ere long, end my sufferings. I became more impatient than ever to see Lord Mowbray as fre

quently as possible; yet to do so, was infinitely more difficult than it had been at Mowbray Castle, as he seldom left the precincts of the Park; and without being recognised I could not easily indulge my longing eyes with the only sight they wished to see.

"One day, as I was sauntering about in a lane, and devising means to gratify the desire I felt only to behold him at a distance, I met some gipsies, whom I immediately recognised as such from their resemblance to some of their caste whom I had seen in my own country. One girl of the name of Lushee particularly attracted me, for she read my fortune in my face, and told me I should die for love. I was grateful for the prophecy, and in return I gave her money. She asked me if there was any thing she could do for me. I told her she could serve me materially, by letting me disguise myself as one of her tribe, and take me to the Hall, so that I could see the persons living there without being seen. Lushee cast her glittering eyes about, as if in search of the

means to comply with my request, and then promised to come to the cottage where I lived, and give me an answer.

"One night, she told me she could fulfil my bidding, and I had only to follow her in silence. I did so. We reached the park of Montgomery Hall. Lushee applied a key to one of the gates; it opened, and admitted us; and she led me to the walls of the house. The shutters of the windows of one of the apartments were open. Lushee jumped upon a ledge that jutted out a few feet from the ground, and, looking in at that window, beckoned to me to do the same. I did so, and beheld Lord Mowbray and another gentleman:-for near an hour, I gazed at him. I could see the varying expression of his countenance, and every now and then I could catch the meaning of what his companion was saying to him. I sat absorbed in the contemplation of that countenance whose every turn and expression I had so often watched, and I fancied I could trace a feeling depicted on his features similar to that which I had seen when we met at Naples for the last

time. A pang of self-reproach contracted his brow, and the melancholy half smile that played around his lips, seemed to imply that even in his mirth there was sadness. It was thus, at least, I interpreted the meaning of his look; when suddenly the violent ejaculation of the gentleman who was talking to him, startled Lushee, and she uttered a slight shriek; at the same instant he turned round, and, seizing one of the candlesticks, hurled it furiously at the window at which we were placed. Lushee dropped down to the ground with the quickness of lightning, and evaded the broken glass; and as the room was now in obscurity, she turned a lantern she held full upon them, and beheld the gentleman, who had just committed the violence, flinging about the furniture in a furious manner, right and left, which seemed to her so ridiculous that she laughed heartily, and the more she laughed, the more enraged he became. I entreated her to cease; and, to avoid detection, I took her by the arm, and we ran as fast as we could away.

"Often and often did I repeat these nocturnal

visits; but afterwards I went alone, for I dared not trust the mirthful and mischievous Lushee. One other time, however, I had recourse to her for assistance. As I had learnt from her that Lord Mowbray was positively to marry one of the Lady Lorimers, I had an invincible longing to behold them; and Lushee, ever delighted to have an opportunity of exercising her ingenuity, soon gave me notice that she had obtained means, through the servants, to effect this. It was a weak curiosity, I confess it was a restless desire to identify myself with all that interested him even in the most painful and perhaps humiliating of all circumstances, that of forming an interest in and for the person from whose heart I was for ever to be banished.

"O! you-and all such as you, Mrs. Altamont, who, in the blessed bands of mutual and honourable love, see your duties and your affections walking on in the same undivided path, pity the wretched of your sex, who devote themselves to a man without the hope of a return of love; who voluntarily sacrifice themselves to a shrine, whose votive offerings are tears and pangs