unbounded and unrestricted friendship as theirs was, this reserve could be maintained, or this silence persisted in, must be mistaken. Accordingly after a time, and certain good and cogent arguments on the part of Emma why Jane should trust her, or rather why she should not withdraw from her a confidence which had existed for years, and never yet had been violated, Miss Bruff detailed all that had passed between her and her father during their morning walk, as far as she could recollect.

The effect the disclosure produced upon Emma was not exactly what Jane expected. Her own views and feelings of the case were, that no such person as this exceedingly pretty naïve half English, half Frenchwoman existed, except in the fertile imagination of the diary-keeping tourist; and if Colonel Bruff had taken the line of inquiring whether any such person did exist, Mrs. Amersham, "knowing her friend," as she said the night before, would have been perfectly prepared to believe him, but the moment she heard that the Behemoth admitted the existence of such a person, that moment did Emma believe there was something more in it than yet had met their ears.

"Was I then so exceedingly wrong," said Jane, "in expressing my anxiety to know something more upon the subject, when I spoke to you yesterday evening as we were going to supper?"

"Why," said Emma, " it turns out, my dear love, that you were not; but to those who know our fat and fair guest, any statement of hers is considered proof positive against a fact; but as you say your father allows that there is a Mrs. Grindle in Paris, as I have already said, the affair takes another aspect. I don't know, but from all I have seen-not much to be sure of Frank Grindle, for Amersham calls him Frank, and so do I-I don't believe one syllable of the history.'

"Then what does it mean, Emma?" said Jane.

"What did that amiable person, Mrs. Smylar, say to you," asked Emma, "with regard to this particular subject, which struck you so forcibly at the time, and which has retained its impression on your mind ever since?"

"I forget the words," said Jane, "but they conveyed to me the idea that Mr. George Grindle had formed some sort of attachment, and-"

-"I see, I see, dear child," said Emma, "and all that is exceedingly probable; but let us think a moment; if that should be the case, as your father has explained away the history of the Versailles beauty, that can have nothing to do with this history. What I do not believe is, that the younger brother is married, or that he has any tie of any sort likely to attach him to any woman on earth-except, perhaps, one."

"Indeed," said Jane, utterly unconscious of the full extent of the meaning of Mrs. Amersham, who being the wife of the Mr. Amersham who had visited Frank Grindle the day before, had, of course, (as married men of kind hearts and communicative dispositions, blessed with exceedingly pretty wives, with amiable characters, will no doubt readily believe,) been duly apprised of all that had happened during that visit, followed up by the expression of Amersham's own belief, that Frank in spite of all that had actually passed between them during his stay with him, was very much stricken with Jane Bruff. This we know,

from our power of peeping into the history as it progresses; but Jane with her sweetness of disposition and modesty of mind, scarcely felt conscious of her powers of captivation, or would ever perhaps have known how much, how truly, and how deeply she was loved.

We have lightly touched upon the beautiful sympathy and the charming communicativeness which exist between men and their wives, when that blessed confidence is once established, without which marriage must be a curse; and having in the most delicate manner insinuated that Amersham, after retiring from the turmoils of the world, gentle as they were under his own roof, had told Emma all that had happened at Frank Grindle's during his visit,-who were there,-what he considered his views to be, and his high opinion of the honour and feeling which he so admirably and chivalrously displayed, it perhaps would not be asking the reader too much to imagine that on the evening of the day of Colonel Bruff's departure, in which Jane told Emma all that had passed between that distinguished officer and herself, when Mr. and Mrs. Amersham were again restored to the paradisaical occupation of that apartment which in less well-regulated houses is said to be set apart for the delivery of curtain lectures, that Mrs. Amersham, actuated by an equally friendly and affectionate feeling towards Jane, with that which she knew animated her husband as regarded Frank Grindle, might have-in strict confidence-imparted all that Jane communicated touching the lady at Versailles.

Whether this fancy may be well founded or not, it is impossible to say-Amersham's house was the quietest of villas-it was all carpeted, and matted, and curtained, and squabbed, and not a sound was to be heard through the double cloth-doors with which all its bed-rooms were guarded from wind and noise; but certain it is that upon this special occasion, about an hour after its master and mistress were supposed to be asleep, these words were heard,

"Emma, love, that's an infernal

What the concluding monosyllable-for monosyllable we know it was-might have been, we set not down here, for it has not rightly been communicated to us; but this we know, that the exclamation applied to the statement of the big Colonel Bruff as to the French lady and Frank Grindle.

"My love," said Mrs. Amersham, "don't agitate yourself-I quite agree with you."

"I wish it were morning," answered the agitated husband; "I will not suffer this to rest. The first thing, dearest Emma, I will do after breakfast is to inquire a little more into the business of the crack-brained woman we have here, of whose story, as you say, I should have thought nothing, if old Bruff" (and here, hear it not, ye good and pious; or if ye do, make allowance for excitement produced by right feeling and an earnest desire to do justice, Mr. Amersham apostrophized him in terms too strong to be written) "had at once denied the fact; but this shuffling and shifting-no, I care nothing for what happens, this shall be hunted out."

And so he went on declaring and resolving until at last he fell asleep, an example which we hope for the sake of her health and comfort was speedily followed by his excellent wife.

In the morning our host was up early, and the hours seemed to crawl till his large and intelligent guest was gotten out of bed by her

maid. Seraphine was earlier in the field, but Seraphine was too quiet, too unpresuming, and too little inquisitive in herself to be able to answer Amersham's questions concerning the pretty Mrs. Grindle of Versailles. So Amersham talked to her of buds and flowers, and even of the fishes which they had seen in their yesterday's excursion; and Seraphine enjoyed this little morning tête-à-tête.

But it was not till after breakfast that Amersham brought Lady Cramly into play-then when she made her first appearance for the day as much be-turbaned, and be-beaded, and be-bustled, as if she were prepared for a country assembly, then it was that he rolled her as it were out into the grounds-(who is the old joker who compares such a woman to a fillet of veal upon castors?)—and began by degrees, not to assail her too decidedly upon the subject, to touch upon Versailles and its accessories, and thence leading her back again to Paris, contrived to lodge her in the shoe-shop in the Rue Richelieu.

The siege was well conducted, but the failure was signal; the tourist with the diary had totally forgotten all about the matter; she might have heard of, perhaps did see a Mrs. Grindle, and she thought she had, and it was somehow connected with a shoe-shop; but wanting the curaçoa, and other generous stomachics, by which her ladyship was in the habit of supporting her mental energies in the evenings, the varnish of the picture being absent, she could give no very distinct account of the princes or the dukes of whom she had so flippantly discoursed the preceding night; but she still held out a hope to Amersham, by telling him that she thought it extremely probable that in the course of the afternoon she should recollect all about it; the fact being that her mind was completely occupied during the day in arranging her papers, which she certainly should not have taken the trouble of doing, but her dear "Mett" (as she called somebody) insisted upon her not permitting herself to quit the world without leaving it a treasure in the shape of her" Loose Thoughts upon the Governments of Europe," illustrated by Cruickshank. This was the work upon which she was engaged, only Mr. Amersham was bound in honour not to mention it.

"Emma," said Amersham, after having had some conversation with the agreeable romancier, "this woman's account of the meeting is exceedingly confused. I cannot make out what it means-I wasn't here last night when she talked of it, and this morning she seems not to recollect any thing about it: rely upon it the whole history, to use a brief, and by no means genteel expression-rely upon it, it is all fudge."

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My dear Amersham," said Emma, "I should think so too; but if Lady Cramly has forgotten what she said last night about it, you seem to have forgotten what I said last night to you-if there is no ground for the story, why does old Bruff admit its truth?"

"Ah!" said Amersham, recollecting that he had, perhaps, not paid sufficient attention to all the details, "there you have it-I suppose poor dear Jane is worried about it?"

"Why," said Emma, "I have told her, it is no business of hers."

"Nor is it a business of Frank Grindle's," said Amersham; "rely upon it, here is something more to be discovered than first strikes us. I would this instant start off to follow Frank Grindle, whose heart is all truth, and whose mind is all candour; I would ask him, and be sure of an answer: but he is gone-he is at this moment in France."

"And if he were not," said Emma, "what possible right, my dear, good Amersham, have you to ask any such question? What claim can you have upon him, or even if you had, what interest have you in his proceedings to inquire into his family circumstances or connexions?"

"But, my dear Emma," said Amersham, "after our yesterday's interview, I have a right, for my own sake, and as vindicating myself from an imputation of being trifled with and imposed upon-by Heaven, I say I have a right to know from him whether the reasons he so generously-at least to all appearance and so cordially gave me for not fulfilling his promise to visit us, are genuine and true, and after hearing what I have heard this morning, I must say that he seems to have been trifling with me-"

"Now, my dear Amersham," said Emma, "do not needlessly run yourself into a personal quarrel, which I see will be the end of all this, about nothing. Supposing all that Lady Cramly says is true, and he is married, why need he have opened his heart to you about it; he might have given you his reasons for not coming here while Jane was with us, with just as much reason and justice as any other people you invite to your house plead illness, or as they call it, "a prior engagement," because they wish to decline coming. As the matter has nothing to do with Jane, who is not going to be married to him, and as it can make very little difference to you whom he marries, leave the matter where it is."

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No," said Amersham, "I cannot consent to that, because I suspect there is some juggle in it and you yourself say, that Jane thinks her father is not quite so steady in his statements as usual; and I am sure, my dear girl, you agree with me that we ought to do anything rather than suffer that poor dear child's comfort and peace of mind to be endangered. No; I will put off writing to Frank till to-morrow's post, because it will give me the opportunity of again talking to the Tourist at a period when as it seems even her poor good-natured daughter admits she is most communicative-after I get what I can pick up from her, I certainly will write, and I can, I am sure, confide in Frank for a true and ingenuous answer."

This dialogue, although it had not been stormy, had been animated. Amersham was easily excited, Emma was excited too in endeavouring to calm him; and when this conflict of words, which had been carried on rapidly, ceased, Emma got up from the sofa and was leaving the room-Amersham remained, with his brows contracted, and his lips compressed.

Just as Emma got to the door, she suddenly paused, and after a moment's reflection, returning to her husband, said,

"My dear love, it just strikes me.-If you really are so anxious to know more about this business, why not write to Miles Blackmore? he is either in, or near Paris, with nothing on earth to do—he would be delighted with the mission."

"Emma," said Amersham, darling girl, you have hit it; wisest thing on earth to do.

I

starting up in an ecstasy, "Emma, my what was I thinking of-to be sure-the will write to him this very night."

BEETHOVEN.

BY GEORGE HOGARTH, ESQ.

No poet, probably, has ever existed (for the musician and the painter are poets in the genuine sense of the word), whose mind is more completely reflected in his works, than Beethoven. Every quality which he possessed as an artist-his grandeur, his beauty, his boldness and freedom of thought, his wildness, his obscurity, his extravagance-all had their counterparts in his character as a man. His compositions are pictures of the ever-changing moods of his mind. Was he happy in love and friendship? Did his heart bound with confidence and hope? Did the shadows of suspicion and jealousy settle on his darkened spirit? Did he taste the bitterness of neglect and poverty? Did he gaze into futurity with anxious and gloomy forebodings?—

"Still his speech was song:"

song as various as the feelings that called it forth. Isolated and solitary; excluded from social intercourse by the most cruel calamity which could befall a musician; bestowing his friendship on few, and his confidence on none; his hidden thoughts and suppressed emotions attended him in his flights into the realms of imagination, and gave birth to that "most eloquent music" which will make his name immortal.

The circumstances, therefore, of Beethoven's life, and the peculiarities of his mind, furnish the master-key to his genius as an artist. We will venture to say, that there is hardly any one of his greater works which does not bear the impress of some particular period of his career, and of the situation in which it was produced. It was in the morning and the noon of his short and troubled life that his music displayed the clear and cheerful light of day, and the warm hues of sunshine. As the evening closed around him, his colours grew darker and darker, often illuminated by bright and fitful gleams, but as often deepening into impenetrable gloom. No one who looks at Beethoven's writings in connexion with his life, can fail to observe how much this is the case; and the more minutely this examination is entered into, the more interesting and instructive, we are convinced, will be its results.

Beethoven's biography, in itself, is deeply affecting. It presents one of the noblest objects of contemplation-a great man striving with adversity. But its value is greatly enhanced by the above considerations: and, ever since his death, the desire to know the history of so remarkable a life has kept pace with the growing love and admiration of his works. This desire, till lately, has been very imperfectly gratified. The public curiosity indeed gave rise to many memoirs, anecdotes, &c., of him; but they were generally full of stories and descriptions so evidently idle and exaggerated, that no trust could be placed in them. The first authentic sketch of Beethoven is by the Chevalier Seyfried, prefixed to the posthumous publication of Beethoven's juvenile "Studies in Thoroughbass," when he was the pupil of the celebrated Albrechtsberger. The still later publication of Wegeler and Ries (both of them June.-VOL. LXII. NO. CCXLVI.

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