Westminster abbey has been pronounced a part of the English constitution. There are, indeed, circumstances which invest this fabric with a greater interest and call forth a deeper reverence for it than can belong to any of our other ecclesiastical buildings. For, besides that it is of the first order of architectural merit, it presents associations of a peculiar kind. It stands in that part of the metropolis which is the seat of government. Within its walls the sovereigns of England have for centuries received their solemn coronation. It contains the monuments, and in many instances the ashes, of the most illustrious men who have done honour to our country. A walk in Westminster abbey is a pictured lesson in British history. The expectation of being enshrined here has urged on our heroes to victory: "A peerage or Westminster abbey," were the words of Nelson previously to the battle of

the Nile.

Prior to the establishment of Christianity in England, it is said that a heathen temple, dedicated to Apollo, occupied the site whereon at present stands Westminster abbey. Aspaganism, however, disappeared before the light of the gospel, the spot where sacrifices had been offered to a demon was destined to be consecrated to the worship of the true God. In or about the year 604, it is supposed that Sebert, king of the East Saxons, a Christian convert, founded a church in Thorney Island, and dedicated it to St. Peter. This island appears to have been of a triangular form, which may even now be traced, and marshy in its character, overgrown with thorns, whence it derived its name. The church erected by Sebert was destroyed in a Danish invasion, and it was not till the reign of Edgar that it was restored. This monarch, at the suggestion of the celebrated Dunstan, and, as it is said, to atone for a crime he had committed, rebuilt the church, and gave it, with valuable endowments, to the order of St. Benedict.

In 1220, Henry III. laid the first stone of a chapel of the Virgin, and in 1245 he began entirely to re-erect the abbey. The sums he expended on the building were enormous: the amount laid out between 1245 and 1261 on the lady chapel alone is stated to have been 29,6057. The abbey was not completed in Henry the Third's reign, and in 1297 it suffered much by fire; it was shortly, however, repaired by the abbot, and in the succeeding century many additions were made. The eastern parts of the nave and the aisles were rebuilt and finished in 1307; and between that time and 1386, when the abbot, under whose direction the works latterly were, died, the cloisters and the principal monastic building were erected. The civil wars

which desolated England during the fifteenth century retarded the completion of Westminster abbey, but by degrees the western parts of the nave and aisles and the west front were built, though it was not till the time of Sir Christopher Wren that the completion of the two western towers was undertaken. They were finished as we now have them in 1735.

Henry VII. commenced his chapel in 1502, on the site of that dedicated by Henry III. to the Virgin; and it was completed by Henry VIII., the total amount expended upon it being 14.0007., equivalent to an enormous sum of our present money. By Henry VIII. the monastery was suppressed, and Westminster erected into a bishop's see: one prelate, how ever, alone sat here. Its revenues at the time of the dissolution were 3,9761. per annum, and it possessed two hundred and sixteen manors, besides other property. The monastery was re-established by queen Mary, and finally dissolved under Elizabeth.

This edifice shared the fate of most of our noblest ecclesiastical buildings in the troubles occasioned by the great rebellion. In 1643 it was converted into barracks for the parliamentary soldiers. Of course the usual outrages were committed: the tombs were mutilated or destroyed, the altar rails were broken down and burnt, the organ was pulled to pieces, while the venerable church itself was the scene of the vilest indecency-the troopers drinking, smoking, and committing worse sacrilege within its walls. Little was done to repair the injuries thus sustained, till the reign of William III. A parliamentary grant was then obtained for its restoration, and Sir Christopher Wren, as already stated, employed. In the year 1809 the beautifying of Henry the Seventh's chapel was commenced under Mr. Wyatt's direction, 42,000l. being on the whole expended upon it. Much has also been done during the present century in restoration and in repair of the parts injured by fire.

At the western end of the abbey rise two lofty towers; but they are not, unfortunately, in accordance with the rest of the building, Sir Christopher Wren having introduced ornaments little in the Gothic style of architecture. The base of the southern tower is hidden by the gable of the Jerusalem chamber. Here a portal, above which is the great western window, gives admission into the nave. But the most imposing entrance is in the northern wing of the transept.

The general form of the abbey is a cross, but the outline is obscured by numerous chapels. At the centre is a very low tower, scarcely rising above the ridge of the roof. It was probably intended to raise this to a greater altitude,

"Beware, dear Florence; I fear this warm attachment must end in disappointment, fully as I can sympathize in its present happiness," was the warning address of Mrs. Leslie to an animated girl, who, on the receipt of a note, and its rapid perusal, had bounded towards her mother with an exclamation of irrepressible joy.

Disappointment, dearest mother? How can that be?" was her eager reply.

"Because friendship, even more than love, demands equality of station. Friends cannot be to each other what they ought to be, if the rank of one party be among the nobles of the land, that of the other lowly as your own."

"And so I told her, dear mother; at least so my manner must have said, for she once called me a silly girl to be so terrified at rank, and asked me if I fancied, because Lady' was prefixed to her name, it raised up an impassable barrier between Ida Villiers and Florence Leslie. I loved her from that moment."

"No doubt," replied her mother, smiling. "Yet, my Florence, I wish the first friendship

your warm heart had formed had been with some other than its present object. You do not know how often I have longed for you to find a friend of your own sex, and nearly of your own age, on

tions you lavish so warmly on me and Minie -” "And my father and Walter, do I not love them?" laughingly interrupted Florence, kneeling down to caress her mother, as she spoke.

66 Nay, if I must enumerate all whom Florence loves, I believe we must add Minie's kitten and Walter's greyhound, and all the mute animals which come to her for protection and care," rejoined Mrs. Leslie in the same tone; "but, nevertheless, I have longed for you to find a friend, because I feel you stand almost alone."

"Alone, mother! with you and Minie? How can you speak so? Have I ever wished or sought

another?"

"No, love; but that is no reason why your mother should not wish it for you. Minie is a pet, a plaything for us all, younger in looks and manner than thirteen years may justify, and no companion for your present pursuits and opening pleasures."

"But are not you -"

hearted girl, or all your fancy pictures me," replied "I cannot be to you all I wish, my warm Mrs. Leslie, with difficulty suppressing emotion; or bed; often incapacitated from the smallest ex"confined as I am, almost continually, to a sofa ertion, even from hearing the gay laughter of my children; my sufferings are aggravated by the painful thought, that now you need female companionship and sympathy more than ever, I cannot give them. A few years ago you were still a child, and your natural light-heartedness bore you home. But within the last year I have observed up against all that might seem melancholy in your that my sufferings have too often infected you with more sadness than they inflict upon me; and continually to watch with me, and to bear with me, and think for me, this is no task for you, my

Florence."

would not resign it for anything that other friends "It is so precious, even in its sorrow, that I two years I have been conscious of all I owe to might offer, dearest mother. It is only the last you, and all you endure, and all the trouble and sadness my wilfulness must often have occasioned serious, it is because I have only now begun to you. And if I have seemed more thoughtful and think and feel."

B