"Mary, forgive me; I have done you injustice." He smiled sadly, then added, "Florence may pine in this grim old castle, for lack of genial society, but in a choice of evils we must choose the least. Better far that she should bloom unseen, and fade unknown, than flourish for a passing hour as the heroine of a romantic episode in the life of some errant adventurer. The moment we excite the curiosity of strangers, our respectability is gone. Hush! I hear her voice; her song points a moral to my speech."

Soft and sweet were the tones which breathed forth the plaintive lay of Tommy Moore :-

"Oh, weep for the hour

When to Eveleen's bower

The Lord of the Valley with false vows came;

The moon hid her light

From the heavens that night,

And wept behind the clouds for the maiden's shame.

The clouds passed soon
From the chaste, cold moon,

And Heaven smiled again with her vestal flame;
But none will see the day

When the clouds shall pass away,

Which that dark hour left upon Eveleen's fame."

There was a pause, as if the singer was trying to recall the concluding stanzas of the ballad. Clear and flute-like rose the strain :—

"The white snow lay

On the narrow pathway,

When the Lord of the Valley cross'd over the moor;
And many a deep print

On the white snow's tint,

Show'd the track of his footstep to Eveleen's door.

The next sun's ray

Soon melted away

Every trace on the path where the false Lord came;
But there's a light above,

Which alone can remove

That stain upon the snow of fair Eveleen's fame.""

The voice died away in a plaintive murmur, soon to

rise again in a blither strain; but Mr. Dudley heard it not. He was never merry when he heard sweet music, and so sweet was the piteous lay, that he sank involuntarily into a melancholy reverie.

What would become of Florence if he were called away? Must that dainty creature go forth into the rude world, to be buffeted by the keen blast of unkindness, chilled by the freezing breath of indifference, or worse, far worse, would her beauty expose her to the idle pursuit, the supercilious advances, of the man of fashion? Ah, Mr. Dudley, you are not wise! Why indulge in morbid fancies, the creation of a diseased mind, which may never find their fulfilment in reality? Why does your haughty spirit chafe at the equivocal nature of your position? Remember you have found a haven of rest; remember the labour of your brain (you own it with deep thankfulness) has been successful beyond your fondest hope. Why doom poor Florence to a life of conventual seclusion, lest she should excite a passing tribute of admiration-it would be no more-the days of chivalry are over and gone.

"Every door is barr'd with gold, and opens but to golden keys."

Why chain the spirits of youth down to a life of unvarying monotony ? remember

"Quiet to quick spirits is a hell."

But Mr. Dudley, like the best of us, deceived himself with perfect good faith; he would have persevered in his resolution of keeping Florence in the shade through the spring-time of youth and hope, had not circumstances militated against it.

Before we turn to a brighter page in the life of our little heroine, we will insert a letter which Mr. Dudley received about this time from Dr. Leicester.

"I doubt not, my dear Dudley," the letter ran, "that your thoughts sometimes flit to the Wilderness. My visits there are few and far between; alas! they are unprofitable to all. I will not deny, that, when the spasm

which contracted my heart of hearts-ahem!-the first time I set foot in the Manor, after your departure, had fairly exhausted its fury, my attention was riveted upon the bride, Lady Pembroke, with an intensity which excluded reminiscences of my well-loved friends. It is said that her ladyship was forced into the marriage by her guardian. God grant her affections are not placed elsewhere, but it is whispered that were a certain captain to appear on the tapis, he would not plead in vain. The Lady of the Wilderness is beautiful as its former mistress, but with a difference.' The restless glance, the bitter sneer, betray a mind diseased. Sir Harry, gay, insouciant, hangs over his wife, and sees not the looks of unequivocal contempt, the supercilious disdain, with which she regards him. Lady Pembroke has honoured me with her confidence-to a certain point. She con

fesses that she is not happy in her marriage, that she is weary of the bitter farce of existence. Sir Harry hunts, drinks, and, in his way, loves his wife; he dreams not of the sick loathing with which she shrinks from him. What will be the result? Lady Pembroke may be

"Content to dwell in decencies for ever.'

but she will never rise to the spirit of her duties. She leans on that broken reed-the world-for consolation, but in the hour of temptation, the reed may break and pierce her hand.

"I tremble for her, but I warn, I appeal to her better feelings in vain. Alas! where religion is rejected, who

can

"Minister to a mind diseased:

Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow;

Raze out the written troubles of the brain;
And, with some sweet oblivious antidote,
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff,
Which weighs upon the heart?

Six months after the date of this letter, Lady Pembroke fled from her husband's house. Sir Harry pursued the fugitives, for she did not fly alone. A duel was

fought; the favoured lover was shot through the heart by the furious husband. Sir Harry, struck with remorse, like the accursed one of old, wandered up and down, a fugitive and a vagabond upon the face of the earth.

The voice of his brother's blood cried unto him from the ground, and many years rolled away ere, a wiser and a better man, he once more set foot on English ground. The Wilderness was deserted.

87

CHAPTER X.

TRUE is it that we have seen better days;

And have with holy bell been knoll'd to church;
And sat at good men's feasts.

As You Like It.

SEVEN years have rolled away since Mr. Dudley and his daughter first took up their abode at Emrys Castle. Seven long years!-marked by few changes save those which track the relentless footsteps of time.

Flo

Mr. Dudley is little altered; a few grey hairs silver his raven locks, but he is firm and erect as ever. rence, no longer the fairy child, is sprung up into as blooming a maiden as ever ran on the greensward, while Mary is feebler than of yore. Puck, "sweet Puck," his graceful antics over, sleeps beneath a green sod in the only sunny nook among the ruins. The flower associated with his immortal namesake ("the pretty Paunce") marks his grave

"A little western flower,

Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound;
And maidens call it Love-in-idleness.*'

Puck's place is filled, more than filled, by Madoc, a son of Mr. Dudley's preserver, Madoc the First. But the noble animal is not so dear to Florence as her lost favourite, her "gentle Puck."

We take up the thread of our narrative one sunny morning in June, when an air of unprecedented fes

* An old name for the Heartsease.