ing me several good-natured civilities, spite of the gruff manner in which I frequently received them; for although I had also learned to like him very much, and to admit him daily with Barbara into my own drawing-room, still the idea that I had been privately interfering in his concerns (although Goodness knows with what a good motive) made me feel myself such a hypocrite that I often revenged on him my discontent with my own conduct. I never made him angry; though, as he usually remained silent under my cross speeches, or turned them off with a merry word, it is miraculous to me, now, how well I kept my secret; nor can I see what great necessity there was for my making a secret of it at all, when I muse over it: but there is a difference between thinking calmly and being bewildered by Mrs. T- -'s entreaties and hints, and my own fear of exciting Barbara's easily-aroused feelings; so I let things take their course-rather unfortunately. As time passed on, the marriage was spoken of openly. Mr. T had come home, and, on being told of the engagement, made arrangements not to leave again until after the wedding, which he highly approved of, saying it was "the best thing of all, under the circumstances" (whatever those were I did not ask); declared that Martyn was "an honest, honourable fellow," whom he had no doubt would "make Bab happy;" laughed at what he called his wife's nonsense about age; and hoped, as he tossed the delighted Lizzie in his arms, that she would, when her time came, get as good a husband; the only thing puzzling him in the whole affair being that their marriage did not "come off at once, instead of dawdling over it" as they did. Barbara's resolution was sorely shaken by his words, as well as by Martyn's renewed entreaties; and I think she would have yielded but for the half-sneers of her stepmother, and I suppose I must confess a little sly advice from me, to keep to the time fixed on originally. Listening to the conversations between the betrothed pair, as the weeks passed on, I grew every day more sanguine for their future content in each other's society (to use a sober word, although I should be perfectly justified in using a far more genial form of expression). Even when at the other end of the world, it would seem that Barbara had been to her lover-cousin the embodiment of home, as she ever was his standard of kindness and truthfulness; and, viewing her through his love-tinted imagination, he even still thought her far fairer than she could really have ever been. He was prejudiced in favour of her very dress; for when I foolishly proposed to have it modernized a little, he said No, to make it otherwise than it was would be to take his own Bab in some degree from him; and as they intended, on their marriage, to go back to their aunt's old farm, they would have no one's taste to please but their own, and her present mode of adorning herself was his. So the wedding-garments were all made in the old style-aye, and brought home and packed in her travelling-trunks; for it wanted but a few days of the time, and Mrs. T― was making fidgetty preparations for the quiet feast which was to celebrate their union, and, under pretence of consulting me about its details, darting unexpectedly into my room several times in the day to wring her hands and assure me that she knew something dreadful was going to occur, or to ask me could I discover when the mail was to be in; or to pity Barbara at one time, and at another to declare she hated her as the destroyer of her child's prospects. At last I was obliged, for my own health sake, to forbid her speaking to me at all; as she had so upset my nerves by her way of "taking on" that I caught myself more than once moving stealthily (although quite alone) towards the looking-glass to see if I was really myself, or whether I was not rather Portia waiting for news of Brutus from the Capitol. Then Martyn confided to me that he "could not make her out, somehow." Now she was very cordial, and again she scarcely spoke to him; then he had surprised her weeping wildly over Lizzy, to the little one's evident terror, when she either would not or could not give any explanation of her emotion, and, on the whole, he was glad they were to be off so soon, as he rather feared she was going mad. I, who knew better, but was hopelessly involved in my "good-natured villany," feared to speak, only forcing a smile as I listened, and mentally resolved, over and over, never again, for any consideration whatsoever, to engage in any underhand business of any kind if I could only once get well out of this disagreeable situation in which I had placed myself. How auxiously I watched the papers, to learn when the Australian letters were expected, while Martyn and Barbara both laughed at me: the latter very gay and happy now, all her doubts were charmed to rest, and told me I should soon be as great a politician as Hogarth's; bidding me take care and not burn the border of my cap. And yet I was not longing for the arrival of news from any misgiving of Martyn-that was all over and gone: it was impossible for anyone to live in daily intercourse with him, and doubt his thorough good faith; only that, teased as I was by Mrs. T, Í had a vague wish that the letter should arrive before the marriage took place, and the intervening days to it had dwindled down to five, when at length, immediately after my ears had been warned by the usual sharp notice which announces the arrival of that important personage the postman, Barbara herself put the longlooked-for missive in my hand, which unknowingly to her, had so much to do with her future propects. On her leaving me (which she did immediately, that her presence might not interrupt my reading), I, according to a habit old as letter-writing itself a custom which has been commented on myriads of times-sat turning the letter over and over in my hand, speculating on its contents instead of opening it and satisfying myself at once concerning them. However, at length the envelope lay on my lap, and the thin foreign paper was crackling in my hand. It was a very long letter, full of the-to meinteresting details which my dear friend always sent me of herself and her young family's pains and pleasures; but for once my eyes glanced over the pages without resting on them, searching for the name of him of whom I had requested her to send me information; and at length I found it on a half-sheet written after the letter was finished and put loosely in, running as follows: Poor "I was near forgetting telling you about Martyn Smythe, after all your charges. How you have come to know him I cannot guess, but the last I heard of him was at the Ballarat diggings, where Richard her husband met him last season, when there on business. He did live in our neighbourhood before that with a friend of ours, Mr. R, a wealthy bush-farmer, who was forced to part with him (although he was an excellent land-steward) in consequence of his reckless disposition, and, I have heard it said, not very strict honesty. It was generally believed here that he was married; but when, or to whom I cannot say. creature! Whoever she is, she is much to be pitied; as his total want of principle makes it but too probable that, as you say he is in England, he has now altogether deserted her. I liked him very much when I knew him first. He is so plausible, and it was only after repeated proofs of his delinquencies that I could be made to believe in them; however, they became too plain at length, and I was forced to yield. I do not know how you made his very undesirable acquaintance; but shake him off again as quickly as you can, as it is best you should have nothing to do with such a person." I was completely confounded by this intelligence. To doubt the veracity of my dear correspondent would be to doubt my own very existence: nay, his story must be very very bad indeed, or she, who was Kindness itself, would never write so harshly. Yet how could I doubt him either, whose every word and act seemed open as day, with the one exception of his confusion when I mentioned Victoria and the G's, for which the letter before me showed there was such unhappy cause. But for that circumstance I should say its writer had mistaken him for another, but now I could not do so. Never was an old lady, having a strong desire to avoid assuming the responsibility of other people's difficulties, so puzzled before. How was I to show this communication? or to whom? I shrank from wounding poor Barbara with its contents. The young man himself I would never again meet, if possible; while I disliked very much giving the stepmother the triumph I knew she would enjoy so keenly; yet as I was not very intimate with the father, there was no help for it but to tell her. surprise (as she always lately watched me closely So, with a heavy heart, I descended the stairs, that I might see her in her own parlour, and take her into my confidence, when she could afterwards act as she thought fit. But on going down, to my disappointment and a little to my "Not long, ma'am," was the answer; "just as the post came. She took the letter, as she was at the door, and gave it to Miss Bab, who was in the hall, to take up; so I suppose she won't be back just yet." She was wrong, however, in her surmise; for she came almost on the instant, admitting herself with a latch-key, and gave one of her exceedingly uncomfortable nervous starts on seeing me seated in her own domain before her. her shawl or bonnet or veil, which was down, She took a chair near me, without removing and asked, without raising it, and in a firm tone, "Did you want me, Miss Wilson?" 66 "Want you?" I repeated. Yes, I want you-and it is only wonderful that you have not wanted me before this, when you must have known that the long-expected letter had arrived." "I had it scarcely a moment in my hand," she said, hastily; "I gave it to Barbara, without delay." 66 Poor Barbara !" I said, in my distress, not noticing the strangeness of her manner; "it contains sad news for her." he-is he--already married?" "is shortly. "Here, read it for yourself." She took the portion of the letter I handed her, but without eagerness, and commenced reading it through her veil. When she had got through its contents, however, she threw the thickly-worked lace up, and, with flushed cheeks and a strange glitter in her eyes, said, "Bab must be told at once. I must send for her father to the warehouse. I knew she was about to be very foolish. Will you tell her-or shall I ?" All her nervousness had vanished now, and the same look of determination I had noticed when she first spoke to me of her step-daughter was in her face. I declined the unpleasant task, telling her I thought it was her office, not mine, and went upstairs that I might not be present even at what I felt would be the terrible scene which would too surely follow. Yet I was not destined to escape it, after all. I never knew how the news was broken to her; but I had scarcely seated myself, trembling all over, (although I am not easily alarmed) in my own room, when the door was flung violently open, and Barbara herself stood before me, a perfect sight to see. Her face was white to the lips, and the features already drawn like those of a corpse, while the blue veins in her forehead stood out relieved from its smooth surface like cords, the fingers of one clenched hand closing convulsively over the scrap of paper they held, as, with the other leaning on the table before her, she panted out: "It is a lie, a base foul invention. Who is this woman you, was totally insensible. On calling for her step call your friend who thinks to separate Martyn from me?" The first thought that struck me was that she would fall at my feet, and in my fright I was about to call aloud for assistance; when Martyn himself, who had followed her up-stairs, was quickly beside her, with his kind restraining hand on her shoulder, and his calm words sounding in her ear: 66 You must leave this to me, Barbara; it is a thing to inquire into, not to quarrel about." "But they shall not part us, Martyn-they shall not part us," she exclaimed: that seemed to be the point upon which all her terror turned -that they should be parted. "At worst but for a time," he replied; while unconsciously, as I believe, quoting the words of the Gospel, he added, "some enemy hath done this; and until the charge is disproved nothing can induce me to become your husband even if your father permitted it, which of course he will very properly decline to do." "What is my father to me?" she exclaimed impetuously: "he is almost a stranger to me, you I have loved for years. Do you think I would weigh his word-the word of the whole world-against yours? You will hasten our marriage, Martyn: they must not part us." "My dear love," he replied, with manly tenderness, as, perceiving her tremble violently, he placed her in a chair beside him, "we will speak of this by-and-bye; at present I want to ask Miss Wilson a few questions. Give me the paper you hold." "No," she cried, "I will tear it to atoms: no eye shall again rest upon those written lies." Excited as she was, and busybody as I felt myself to be, I could not hear her a second time accuse my friend of falsehood without contradicting her. So I said: "The lady who wrote that letter is incapable of misrepresenting any one, even if she had a motive in doing so, which, in this instance, she cannot possibly have had. If your cousin knows her at all, he must know something of her worth." "I do know her well," said Martyn frankly, "and that is why the whole thing is so utterly incomprehensible to me." "Perhaps she loves you herself, and would wish-" commenced Barbara, when she was interrupted by her lover, who said, authoritatively, "Hush, Bab; Mrs. G- is the good mother of a large nearly grown-up family." "But," I questioned, after a moment's silence, during which we all seemed equally perplexed, "might I ask why you became so confused, on the evening I first made your acquaintance, at the mention of Victoria, and the G "A silly piece of Celtic pride of mine," he replied, "which I explained to Barbara that very night, as she can testify;" but, on turning towards her, we both perceived she was just then incapable of testifying to anything, as the excitement had proved too much for her slight frame, and lying back in her chair, with her head resting against his arm, the poor thing mother, which I immediately did, to assist in restoring her, I learned she had gone out again. Strange how fond she was of being out to-dayshe who so seldom left the house at all! However, her absence on this occasion was soon explained by her arrival with her husband, a little time after Barbara had recovered from her swoon. "What is all this my wife tells me?" exclaimed Mr. T, in his loud good-humoured tones, "something about your being already married, Martyn! But your friend must forgive me for doubting her, Miss Wilson: she probably mistakes my nephew for some one else." Bab's pale face brightened, and she was about to say something eagerly, when Martyn extended his hand, and said, clasping that of Mr. T, "Thank you, sir, for your trust in me; but whatever is Mrs. G- 's motive for writing as she has done, she could not have mistaken me for another; as I lived with her husband as shepherd for seven months at a time, when I was very poorly off indeed, although I afterwards pulled up a little at the gold-fields. It was an absurd dislike to its being known here that I had served in such a capacity (though my betters have there done so) which first excited Miss Wilson's suspicions, and caused her to make the inquiries concerning me, which have been replied to so strangely. I may add I know no such person as Mr. R- nor do I believe a man of that name lives anywhere in Mrs. G's neighbourhood. "Not so," I hastened to say in self-defence; "at all events I must declare it was Mrs. T— who first requested me to write about you to my friend, otherwise I should not have dreamed of doing so." "The thing commenced with you then, I am to understand," said her husband, looking curiously at her. "Where is the epistle itself? I have not seen it yet." "Where It was immediately handed to him by Martyn, who, during Bab's faintness, had taken it from her; and we all remained silent while Mr. T, with a face which became graver and graver as he read, got through its contents. is the envelope this came in? he asked at length I quickly produced it from my pocket, when he examined it minutely, looking closely at the different postmarks, and glancing still in what seemed to me a suspicious manner at his wife, who had lost the determined expression from her face, and seemed rapidly relapsing into nervousness. Tearing a piece of paper on the table before her into fragments as she spoke, she said in a sharp quick tone: "I gave it direct to Barbara, when I got it from the postman; no one could have meddled with it in so short a time." "Certainly not in the space of time necessary to bring it up-stairs," he replied, with a sort of forced calmness, and speaking through his set teeth. "However, as the Australian mail was delivered at our office last night, there would have been ample time for me to tamper with any one or even all of the letters before this morning, were I base enough to do so. But no one has spoken of meddling with this one but yourself how came you to think of it?" could only gain time!" She replied that she forgot having done so; but of course she only meant, that if she succeeded in separating them for a time she could find some means of breaking their engagement. God grant she meant nothing more. Well, men are more large-minded and ge nerous than women, after all! For, although I have since then paid more than one summer visit to Barbara in her Welsh home, and seen a couple of her children tumbling with their young Aunt Lizzie in the new-mown hay, her father and stepmother looking on, I am convinced that, long after her husband had forgiven, and almost forgotten, my share in his My heart beat violently, and my breath came quick I had a feeling that all was about to be made clear, and rose from my seat, as did Martyn and Barbara, just as Mr. T springing up from his, in a voice, the tones of which rang through not even the room, but the house, demanded of the miserable woman, who had already sank upon the carpet, clinging round his knees, "Where is the real page of the letter? or if you have destroyed it, what were its contents? speak!" But that she could not do; for, though her blood-brief trouble, she, spite of her affectionate attenless lips moved in her effort to obey him, no sound came from them, such was the extremity of her terror, and she remained there gazing helplessly upwards at her husband, as if, while expecting each moment he would kill her, she had no power to avoid her doom. But after a minute or two the broken words came, and in a whisper-" For Lizzie! Barbara unmarried! Leave her all!" "Fool!" exclaimed Mr. T, as he shook her off; while Martyn, in pity of her abject distress, assisted her to rise. "Fool, as well as criminal, did you not know, that, even if your weak, shallow plot remained undiscoveredwhich it was impossible it could, against the plain, common-sense inquiry which would, as a matter of course, be made into it-did you not know, I repeat, that you would have destroyed my daughter's happiness for nothing? as, did she die unmarried, she would have no power to make a will. By that of her aunt the money you covet so much would go to the charities of her native town.” And so was Mrs. T.'s feeble wickedness, in taking a share in which she had so cunningly beguiled me, defeated. In my first resentment at being made the unwitting instrument of her unprincipled scheme, I was for quitting the house at once, but was half-coaxed, half-quizzed into staying until after the wedding, by the two men, Martyn assuring me I should always figure in his memory as a flighty "young lady of three-score and ten!" if I took such a sudden departure; instead of the sensible, good-natured friend he had always taken me for. "But which," I added, although he would not stay to listen, "I had not exactly proved to be." Mrs. T- confessed afterwards that she had really, as her husband said, received the letter the evening before, when, opening the envelope (a gummed one unsealed), she succeeded in imitating my friend's writing so well, as even to deceive me, who was in the habit of seeing it frequently. The original page she destroyed. (it was really put in loosely after the letter, which aided her plan amazingly), and was a most cordial testimony to Martyn's high character, when, as has been already stated, the rest was easily managed. I asked her what she meant the night she muttered to herself, "Time—if I tion to my comforts, continued to think of me aye, and does still occasionally-as the meddling old woman, who had once assisted in nearly separating her from Martyn! "I SHALL BE SATISFIED." BY MYSTIC. I gathered daisies and the honied clover; And in deep woods sought where the greenest mosses And feath'ry lichens cling. I learned the song of robin and of swallow, The years crept by; and as they passed me slowly, And mystic lore I conned from morn till even, Until the trembling stars grew pale in heaven, Nor yet content, I builded dreams of glory, When all the dew was gone? That when I caught a ray of sunshine dying, I smiled, and called it day; Not yet content, from out the gloom I borrow The boon to-day denied- In My I shall be satisfied. years go on, but now I softly listen ONCE ROUND THE CLOCK AT OXFORD. It has become mighty fashionable now, when a man wishes to declare his ideas concerning places, to write those ideas on paper, and forthwith despatch them to the magazine or review which his genius illumines. One can scarcely open a number now of any current magazine without seeing "A Summer Day at Birmingham" (such summers as they have there, poor dwellers in the country of toil), or "An Autumn Day at Brighton," or "A Rainy Day at Little Pedlington" (a paper in which you may be sure the scenery is blamed because it is insignificant, the hotel is anathematized because it is dear, and the landlord abused because the chops were burnt; the hapless author, mean. while, being wofully obtuse to the fact that people are laughing at him for a discontented grumbler). Then if these litterateurs go from home-if they "peregrinate," as good schoolmaster Holofernes calls it, they generally limit their stay to a fortnight, and then are we startled by seeing "A Fortnight's Run through Carpathia," or "Fourteen Days among the Ural Mountains," not to mention the cut-and-dried tour through all seeable Europe, fast as a rocket or Mazeppa's steed, which all Englishmen do religiously incline to perform, and as religiously endeavour to write a book about afterwards: the style of which book is either intensely funny, or morosely savage, in proportion as the traveller has been pleased or fleeced. Now I flatter myself that the subject which, in imitation of these popular writers, I have taken up for description Oxford, its varying scenes from morn until evening-will not be such as will bore you; always allowing that your mind, dear reader, be properly constituted. Should I be fortunate enough to have old University men among the perusers of this scribble, I know that I am on safe ground; for, spite of all the troubles and cares and carking sorrows of life, the old Oxford man will look back to the halcyon days when he rowed "six" in his boat, played a good hour's innings for his Eleven, and did his "First" quietly and scientifically as a scholar should. Sure am I that at the mere mention of the dearly-beloved place he will prick up his ears and listen, as an alien on a foreign shore when he hears from strange lips the word "home." Sure am I that in fancy he will be back in the crowded, picturesque "High," with its ever-changing colours; or will throw himself once more prone on the sward of John's garden, and drink in the glori ous perfume of the chesnuts, and glance with critical eye at the fairy figures which are promenading there; or will be down among the barges once more, with his foot to the stretcher, his hand to the oar, and his eye on the coxswain, while the even sweep of the oars and the clicking of the rowlocks make glorious music in his ear. Happy times, Messires! Alas, that, in after-days they should come but as a bright vision, or the last echoes of well-loved music, when hand and heart are strung to face misery and want and wickedness in the "Master's business!" And, as regards the people who have never enjoyed these advantages, I feel sure that they will like to see a picture, however imperfectly limned, of the way in which the "rosy hours" are spent in Oxford-that they will feel interested in these pages when they reflect that within the grey walls of the colleges are being trained the future statesmen and men of letters who shall guide the common weal. And now, "to make a beginning," as they say on the Turf, we will commence devotionally at any rate, as perhaps in the course of the day and night the reader will be led into scenes which will not strike him as being of a very devotional character. Past seven of the clock, a.m.-This is the hour at which the serious business of the day in college commences; then does every undergraduate hear at his bedroom door a tap, and the following words from his scout-"Half-past seven, sir; breakfast in your room, sir?" And the undergraduate turns himself round in bed, yawns in a careworn manner, and mutters in a sleepy undertone, "All right," and then turns round-to sleep again, think the uninitiated. Ah, no! there are other words, which to the freshman the scout adds, "Chapel at eight, sir;" and at these words all further ideas of rest are banished, and the sleeper sighs a sigh of deep import, then casts despairing glances at his washing-tub, and with a mighty effort is up and dressing. How differently do these words strike on different ears! One man awakes in the morning with his head seeming to weigh a ton, his mouth parched and burning, his eye glazed, and as he turns to the scout, murmurs, "Get me some soda-water, Harry, for God's sake!" This gentleman is in what is vulgarly called a state of "coppers." The festive wine and noisy supper of the past night have joined to produce this pleasurable feeling, and the wild freshman is disagreeably reminded that "The song was on his lip, Let us leave this repentant gentleman, and intrude into the room where dwelleth the very |