to a distance of twenty miles to seek for the moss. | voice, and on these five he swung to and fro with a Mrs. Dalton again thanked him by signs, and directed him to carry it to the house, and to get some refreshment there; and with a bright look and a deep inclination he darted away. "Poor Paul!" said his mistress; "he is the most grateful creature in the world. Mr. Dalton took notice of him when he was about five years old, and has provided for him ever since; he was first educated at a deaf and dumb school, and afterwards brought here, where Mr. Dalton has himself taught him to perform the duties of groom. Everybody said it was foolish and hopeless; but Mr. Dalton said the lad was intelligent, and he was determined to try what could be made of him. So the master was indefatigably patient and the pupil indefatigably docile, and now he is a most useful servant. Indeed, he has a strange gift for attaching animals; and Emir, my husband's favourite Arab, will scarcely let any one else touch him." "What a strange life it must be," said Edith, "to live without language, which seems the natural weapon of the soul, and music, its natural food! How very strongly and clearly Love must burn in an air so unnaturally purified!" "It does so," replied Amy; "he loves like a woman, with his whole nature. Did you notice that he wore a knot of autumn flowers in his button-hole? He once told his master, in his quaint broken phrase, such as he learned for the conveyance of his thoughts, that flower-scents were his music.' 66 ruthless precision-now up, now down, as their turn came, regardless of the words which were crushed by his bass or tortured by his treble. Edith endured in silence; Mrs. Dalton interrupted him every two minutes, to question the accentuation of a line. This she did with perfect amiability of manner, and complete disregard of his visible annoyance, for it was clearly a sore subject. His deportment grew more and more sullen, and the last few couplets were delivered with an uneasy and uniform growl. When he closed the book, he began to defend his method of reading, and a bland, but harrowing, contest ensued, which lasted with a few intervals till they retired to bed. Edith tried to take interest in it, and to give her opinion when called for with due impartiality; but the graceful contempt of the lady annoyed her even more than the querulous discomfiture of the gentleman; and it was with a feeling of utter dismay, which would perhaps have been livelier had she been less unhappy, that she looked forward to the month which she had promised to spend at Beechwood Park. THE SLEEP OF PLANTS IN WINTER. "WHEN do plants sleep?" the reader may exclaim with a sceptical frown upon reading the above title. The answer is, "Not in the night, when most animals take their rest, but during that season when Amy," said Edith, pursuing the train of thought tempests are active, and storms traverse the earth." that to-day seemed to have arisen within her, "do The term sleep may appear to some far-fetched when you not think that the world of spirits may be to us applied to plants; but compare their winter state what the world of sounds is to him?-very near-with the repose of animals during night, and we actually present with us, only needing a change in ourselves to make us conscious of it?" A singular emotion was visible in Amy's face, like the rekindling of a quenched memory, and she made no answer. "How sweet and how fearful," continued Edith, "would be the visible presence of an angel! Could we ever do wrong then? could we even be unhappy? Oh, Amy," she added suddenly, her voice faltering. "if human love only did not fail, would it not do all this for us, and more? Should we not be always strong, always happy?" Amy passed her arm round her waist: "But human love does fail," said she, " and we must learn to live without it. Do not talk of it any more, Edith; some day you shall tell me all, if you will. But you have reminded me of a time-many years ago-a time when these thoughts, or thoughts like them, were first put into my mind. I was very different then. I was a very foolish, happy child; I believed just what I was taught, because it was taught me; and I had a friend then, who loved me, and whose love failed-do you understand?-or mine failed him; it is all the same." She spoke very hurriedly, and broke off with a forced sudden laugh, painful to hear. Soon afterwards she began to talk on indifferent subjects, and Edith followed her lead as best she could. Strange seemed it to Edith that the evening which closed this day should pass as it did. Mr. Dalton volunteered to read aloud Tennyson's "Locksley Hall," which he delivered with a pompous trepidation very fatal to the flow of the metre, to say nothing of the sentiment. You might have kept time to his declamation with a metronome, and counted his accents by beat of drum. Five notes had he in his natural shall then discern a number of resemblances between the two. The sleep of animals occurs after stated intervals, so does that of plants; the former rest after the labours of each day, the latter after the incessant activities of a summer. In the sleep of animated creatures we have the external aspect of death, joined with the activities of the invisible life. So, in the repose of plants during winter, the form of death does but conceal the vital energies which lie buried beneath the frozen soil. Both rise to their former life after a fixed time, and resume their original agencies on land and water. It may also be said that the sleep of animals is almost as involuntary as the winter state of plants, no creature being able to resist the tendency to sleep, after fatigue has reached a certain point. Such resemblances may justify the application of the word " sleep" to the annual torpidity of vegetation. But there are also some singular diversities between the botanical and the animal sleep, as indeed all must feel who observe a sleeping bird and a reposing plant. In the sleep of the former, the visible form is not altered; the chief change being the substitution of quietude for energy, and the hush of the sensations for the activity of consciousness; but all is ready for action the moment sleep is over; while in the awakening of vegetables in spring, a fresh creation seems necessary ere the newly vivified plants can develope their powers; the leaves, those lungs of vegetables, must be waited for; in many cases a trunk is to be produced, and in all a series of the most important changes must precede the full exercise of the plant's life. Thus the repose of the tree during winter suggests notions of death rather than of sleep, and the renewed life of spring bears a closer resemblance to a resurrection, than to a waking from rest. And yet, | to call this rest a botanical death would be singularly inappropriate; for the life of the meanest weed has not departed-it has only changed its locality, and instead of being fixed in the stem, branches, or leaves, has retired into the seed or roots, where it remains in a torpid state. Look at some oak-tree in winter, and ask for the abode of that strange living principle, which covered every ancient branch with massy foliage last summer. Life has not gone from the tree; it has but fled for safety to the deep recesses of the roots, the heart of the tree, where, sheltered by the loving earth, it scarcely feels the keen frost above, or the tempest which rocks the stately trunk. Or should we ask where is the life of those delicate flowers which gave such a rich beauty to our gardens, we find it quietly secreted within the fortified strongholds of bulbous roots, whence the first flush of spring will summon it with a timid look to gaze upon its former scene of summer life. Other plants may have totally disappeared, not even a single fibre of the root remains; but a part of the old plant is still in existence. In the seeds, and in the most sheltered cells, curiously protected by roofs and walls of cold-resisting matter, the vital principle rests. Thus the repose of Nature in winter is not death, but a species of torpidity thrown for a season over the homes of vegetable life. This period of repose is not one of absolute inactivity; certain operations proceed in many plants, and changes are produced, essential to the future health of the vegetable. The woody part of trees is hardened in winter, and becomes more capable of supporting the growth of the following season, whilst other vegetables begin to exercise their powers long before the human eye can detect their hidden operations. This resembles in some degree the activity of digestion, and the action of other functions, in animals during sleep. The length of winter is beautifully adapted to the duration of the sleep required by plants: another illustration this of the operations of infinite wisdom around us. Most vegetables in this climate are so organized as to require a winter of the present average duration; and if it were shorter the sap machinery would not be ready for the spring, whilst if longer, the vegetables would begin to work before the warmth of the sun had duly prepared the atmosphere. In either case, a great destruction would fall upon the kingdom of plants. But this precise duration of our winter depends on the distance of the earth from the sun, and therefore the prosperity of the whole botanical kingdom is closely dependent upon our being neither more nor less than ninety millions of miles from the solar centre. Thus we see an intimate connexion between the opening of a little flower-bud and the arrangement of the planetary orbits; so closely are the greatest things in the universe linked with the smallest, all forming one harmonious system. Few gardeners probably consider this connexion between the flower they train along some verandah, and the constitution of the planetary system. Whewell has well remarked in his "Bridgewater Treatise," that our earth might have been placed where Venus or Mars now moves; in either case, the present flowers and fruits would be unsuited to live upon the globe; for upon one supposition, the average length of the winter would be too short, and in the other too long; results which would produce a total disorganization in all botanical arrangements. But we find that the duration of our winter is exactly suited to the various functions of vegetable life, and for securing the repose needful for trees, fruits, and flowers, by which we live in the midst of order and beauty, instead of confusion and ruin. If we consider each plant as a machine, then we find a number of delicately constructed mechanisms, full of the finest wheels and springs, so beautifully adjusted to another great machine, viz. the solar system, that all move as if acted upon by one spring. Hence the average return of our winter affords the same opportunities of repose for plants, as the stated recurrence of night does to the bodies of animals. Some of our readers may feel that many vegetables cannot be said to sleep at all, their summer life being followed by as complete a death as can befall any animal. This seems the case with all the annuals, which in December do not retain a sprig of their June foliage, but are dissolved into undistinguishable dust. We will not say that such plants exist in their seeds, for this would be to substitute a figure of speech for fact. The father may be represented by the son, but the life of the latter is not the life of the former; so neither can the seed be considered as the actual living plant. Let it therefore be admitted, that some species of plants die each winter; this, however, is not the case with all. What shall be said of the oak in winter? that sturdy trunk is not dead; deep within well-guarded recesses sleeps the life of the forest giant, and when the violet looks on the blue of heaven, that very tree shall again rustle with its ten thousand leaves in the wind. So is it with all our forest trees, and thousands of our most delicate blossoms. How wonderful is the sleep of such flowers as the dahlia, or the tulip, the life of which is carried about in their unattractive roots from place to place! This may be called vegetable torpidity; but what is this but another name for the winter sleep? the torpidity of the reptile, the bird, or the insect, finds its parallel in the wide kingdom of plants. All material nature, indeed, exhibits the law of repose; for where is the organized existence which does not require sleep? The whole circle of animated nature demands it, and the kingdom of plants is not exempt from the operation of this universal law. Thus the sleep of plants may direct our attention to the uniformity of the laws which reign supreme in all portions of Nature's glorious realm. Now we are surrounded by myriads of leafless trees, for the brown leaves have fallen in a thousand forests, covering the silent valleys with their dying forms;— but let us not liken the earth to a burial-place: the fair children of summer are but sleeping till the storm has passed and bright spring-tide comes again. Of plants and trees it may justly be said, they will awake in the morning light of summer. W.D. MIDNIGHT AT THE LOUVRE. DURING the last annual exhibition of paintings at the Louvre, one in particular attracted universal attention. It was of immense size, and was placed at the farthest end of the gallery, near the colossal curtain, which, during the period of the exhibition, conceals the noble productions of the ancient masters. A crowd was daily assembled before it, and to judge by the sensation it created, one might have supposed it to be a proud and living canvass, signed by Delacroix, Verdier, or Müller. Admiration, however, was not the feeling which animated the circle of spectators. On the contrary, it was mingled astonishment, ridicule, and contempt; for the picture was undoubtedly the vilest production that had ever disgraced the walls of a gallery. It represented the Pont des Arts at night; such at least was apparently the whole subject up to this period; but the part of the Louvre which fronts the end of the bridge, the Palais Mazarine, which rises at the opposite side, the bridge itself, the river, the night (since the catalogue called it night), were all so odiously bedaubed, that the universal amazement and hilarity were fully accounted for. How such a production could have found its way into the Louvre was a puzzle to all. Some pronounced it to be the result of a wager, others that it was a snare which had been laid for the jury; various were the conjectures formed, but the general curiosity seemed destined to remain unsatisfied. At length, one afternoon when the crowd was gayer and more dense, if possible, than the preceding days, a man rapidly forced his way through the group of satirists till he stood in front of the picture, which he began to examine, first with anxiety, then emotion, and at last with extraordinary excitement. "It is that, indeed!" he cried, without perceiving he was listened to and observed. "Oh! yes, how could I doubt it? The bridge! the night! winter's night! And then this picture placed against the rails-and-——” Here his utterance seemed choked by emotion, and leaning on the frame of the picture for support, he sunk upon the bench beneath it. After a few moments he slowly raised his head, and exhibited a countenance on which the strongest agitation was depicted. She then directed her steps towards the painting, and for some moments her attention appeared divided between it and the man who stood gazing upon it. Youth had not entirely left the features of this unfortunate being. It was evident that they had been very handsome, and the expression of his countenance was still noble and benignant. His complexion was fair, and the grey hairs mingling with the rest shaded the whole with varied tints of silver. His soft blue eyes were expressive and tender. One might have said that his appearance was angelic. Eager and adroit in her two-fold curiosity, the young lady rose for an instant on tip-toe, and bent forward to inspect more closely a portion of the subjeet. This movement disturbed the attention of her singular neighbour, and obliged him to notice her. He yielded the more readily to the first impulse, since it was apparent at a glance that she who caused it belonged to the Indian race, among whom he had passed many years. She was one of those dark and The spectators were at first astonished, but this slender daughters of Bramah, who have the tiger's feeling soon gave way to pity, for they had no doubt melancholy eyes and the panther's suppleness of but that the unfortunate man was mad. How, other- form; and to these, her active charms, was added an wise, could he be thus affected at the sight of a pic-air of exquisite refinement, which spoke of the poture which in others excited only laughter and derision? With this idea, they amused themselves by jests upon his behaviour, and even rallied him upon his preference for this picture and his indifference to others more worthy of attention. But the object of | their pleasantries appeared totally unmoved by them. When sufficiently recovered he arose, and recommenced examining the picture, the first sight of which had so greatly discomposed him, and continued his inspection until warned that it was the hour to depart. This occurrence would probably have been forgotten, and attention again directed to the picture only, had it not been found that the man returned the next day, and the next, and the next, to enact nearly the same scene. Curiosity was now really aroused by this singular affair, and even the papers added to the celebrity of the man of the picture. April, however, is a fickle friend, and one day the visitors of the Louvre found the weather an obstacle to the indulgence of their curiosity. After eight days of intense heat, came one of rain, lightning, and thunder. In such weather the Parisian remains at home, and spares the Roman mosaics of the ancient Louvre the honour of his muddy shoes. The Louvre received only some English, Danish, and Russian visitors come to enjoy the beautiful sky of France. At two o'clock the galleries were almost deserted, one figure alone was to be seen-it was the man of the picture, who stood as usual contemplating his favourite painting. He was not destined to remain long undisturbed. From the place where he stood, the extreme end of lished circles of the French capital. Even her dressthe light Parisian bonnet, and the cachemire shawl, seemed to indicate this union of graces. After gazing at the picture for some moments, her small, delicate hand pointed out a minute detail in the scene, represented by the artist with less of talent, alas! than good-will. We allude to the painting which he had wished to represent as leaning against the rails of the Pont des Arts, in a thought much too subtle to allow itself to be readily divined. When the madman (he at least whom they called the madman) perceived this movement, he shuddered from head to foot, and fixed his gaze upon the young Indian's olive-tinted hand, and only turned it away to glance over himself with an air of pity, as if to say, "Is it likely that she can have anything to say to me?" But almost at the same moment he uttered a cry of astonishment, as he saw the finger, whose first movement had surprised him, leave its place, and point out where under the mass of shadow stood a group composed of two persons, which no one, not even one of those who had so frequently ridiculed the painting, had hitherto observed. "Oh! Mademoiselle," he exclaimed, "who told you? how was it that you noticed that? Do you know the painter? Oh! answer me, do you know him?" The young Indian smiled. Misfortune is full of illusions. moiselle." thought you might know him, but it cannot be. | time, here is our picture." As she spoke she pulled Pardon me, Made- a silken cord, and thus drew aside a pair of crimson velvet curtains, embroidered with gold, and M. Jouvenal No, I do not know him, Sir," replied the young beheld the painting of the Pont des Arts. So much lady, with emotion, but if you desire it I will tell honour paid to this miserable daub! you the cause of my curiosity in examining this painting-I have purchased it." 66 "You have purchased it! is it possible? but then you surely know the artist?" "I have already told you, Sir, that I am unacquainted with him," replied the young Indian. "You see as I do that this picture is of unexampled inferiority." "I see, Mademoiselle, that it is a piece of canvass, which to every one but me has lost all value since it was painted." "Nevertheless, I have purchased it at the price of forty thousand francs, and to-morrow it will be removed to my house." "Removed! purchased for forty thousand francs! Mademoiselle, you are granting many favours in one; if I dared I would ask one of you, and that is, your reason for paying so dear for a picture which can have no value but for me, and of which you are pitilessly going to deprive me." "Ideprive you of it, Sir? that is far from my wish; you shall see it at my house as often as you desire. You are a painter?" "I am not," replied the stranger, with a heavy sigh. You are not?" No, Mademoiselle." The young Indian looked at him with incredulity and surprise. "You have asked me," said she, after | a moment's silence," my true reason for purchasing at the price of forty thousand francs a picture which is not worth a hundred. I will tell you, but on one condition." our scene. A vague, but powerful and almost irresistible impulse impelled M. Jouvenal (for that was the name which our original had left in exchange in the hand of the Princess) to be punctual in his appointment with her. At this period of his life, M. Jouvenal was very poor, and to complete his ill fortune he had no profession by which to gain a subsistence. It may be supposed that the sense of his humiliating position was made more painfully acute, when he found himself entering, as a visitor, the Princess's magnificent hotel. "The Princess, my aunt, is not yet returned from the country," said the young Indian, as in her lofty and sumptuous apartment she advanced to receive him; "but that shall not interrupt our interview. To-morrow I will present you to her. In the mean Oh! Mademoiselle, when you know my history, since you desire to know it, you will see that the generous pleasure which you feel in looking at this picture, for which you have paid forty thousand francs, (for I know that you have thus saved a poor artist from want,) cannot be compared to the pain which I suffer in gazing upon it. And yet, there is a joy in the depth of this pain, a happiness beneath the misery-the happiness of self-approval. "But here is my story." (To be continued.) Poetry. [In Original Poetry, the Name, real or assumed, of the Author is printed in Small Capitals, under the title; in Selections it is printed in Italics at the end.] waters, THE ARMADA. BY ENNA. "THE Armada!-the Armada !" and the fearful tidings fly « Sit down, sit down, thou aged man, a moment rest thee here, the land. "And foremost there, with sword in hand, I saw the gallant Howard, And blessings on his noble head by old and young were shower'd. Poictiers,- I raised my bonnet from my brow, Huzza for England's might! Now who shall stand before the men who combat for the right ?' "The shout went pealing up to heaven, like the pent ocean's swell, Then suddenly o'er all the host a deep hushed silence fell; "Each word that kingly woman spoke was like a trumpet call, Till hope and fear in that stern calm alternate died away: Then rose the shout, 'Look seaward, ho!' and proudly o'er the main The crescent squadron swept along the vaunted host of Spain. "Now haste ye, haste ye to your ships,' impatient Raleigh cried, And Cecil came, and Vavasour, and thousands at their side; The glad sea bore their bounding barks as eager for the fray; How sighed they for their native land, the quailing foe that day. "In vain their floating fortresses tower'd high above the water, The island warriors scale their sides, their decks are red with slaughter; The thunder-clouds of battle rolled thickly o'er the fight, And hid the useless, shattered sails, the tottering masts from sight; And when that fiery tempest's rage had hushed itself to sleep, Joy, England! 'twas Jehovah's arm which won the victory! Though strewed with flowers the sportive hours With Fanny that flew by, I could not stay another day, The bird that hath not built its nest, My pathway lies through sparkling eyes, THE SPIRIT OF NATURE. IN the green laughing earth, and the sea, and the air, But all would be nought if it wanted but love. Miscellaneous. "I have here made only a nosegay of culled flowers, and have brought nothing of my own, but the string that ties them."-Montaigne. CHARLES I. A PRISONER IN THE ISLE OF WIGHT. SOME few things I remember he said, which showed those eminent Christian virtues in him which were rarely to be found among any sort of men, scarce ever among princes. For about the latter end of the treaty, finding it was like to be ineffectual, "I wish," says he, "I had consulted nobody but my own self; for then, where in honour or conscience I could not have complied, I could have early been positive; for, with Job, I would willinglier have chosen misery than sin." I never saw him shed tears but once, and he turned presently his head away, for he was then dictating to me somewhat in a window, and he was loth to be discerned, and the lords and gentlemen were then in the room, though his back was towards them; but I can safely take my oath they were the biggest drops I ever saw fall from an eye, but he recollected himself, and soon stifled them.-See Philip Warwick's Memoirs of Charles I. PRICE THREE HALF-PENCE. |