Why,' responded Horace, from the serene height of a protracted acquaintance with human nature, 'it's my experience that murderers look very much like other people. We raise an imaginative barrier between the murderer and the rest of the race. But, in truth, there is no brand upon his forehead; and I am not sure that the man who takes his neighbour's life is necessarily worse than the man who takes his neighbour's character. But there is one point in your narrative,' Horace continued, turning to the Commodore, which I do not quite follow. Was it possible that the girl could have heard the cry which we may suppose her lover uttered when he was precipitated from the cradle?' 'Well, I don't know: the cradle was not more than a mile and a half, or two miles, from the cottage, and the night was uncommin' quiet. It is barely possible that she may have heard his cry: but I think not. The cry, at least, could not have wakened her. It was another cry, I suspect, audible to the inner ear only,— though connected, perhaps, by some fine law of sympathy-some mysterious and invisible train of association-with the actual peril of her lover.' Thus the Commodore, not knowing that our latest poet had written, or was to write Star to star vibrates light; may soul to soul Strike through a finer element of her own? 347 L' XIV. WHAT WE ALL MADE OF IT. IKE causes produce unlike effects,—a philosophical proposition to be deduced, inter alia, from the well-worn epigram on the convivial habits of two illustrious statesmen : Pitt. I cannot see the Speaker, Hal-can you?' Many men, I believe, work best in winter; but for me the summer time is the time for work. The frost nips the imagination. It is impossible to write with freedom when the mind is torpid, and the frost-bitten fingers refuse to guide the pen. The polar bear sleeps through the dark months; and I think we might do worse than follow the example he sets us. He awakes in spring, fierce, energetic, lively, amorous, and ready for any quantity of blubber. The idyll must be sung, the essay must be finished, ere the leaves begin to brown; in December, after a sharp walk in search of wild duck and woodcock during the brief daylight, we will doze indolently over the blazing logs, and dream of Capri. These early days of winter, however, are not unpleasant. This, indeed, was a charming morning,—the grass was crisp with frost; the sun shone brilliantly ; and when I looked out from the window of my bedroom (which is at the very top of the house), I saw that the distant sea was smooth as a mirror, and that the fishers were busy at their work. So (as I had promised Dr. Diamond to make some notes from an old manuscript before the snow kept us permanently within doors) I determined to walk across the sands to the Castle.' She Letty had told me that she wanted to sketch the Hawk-head; and when she heard at breakfast where I was going, she undertook to be my companion. would sketch the rock as I was making my notes, and we should return together in the early twilight. A brief hour's walk through yellow stubbles and woods from which the brown frosted leaves were falling incessantly, brought us to the sea-shore. I left Letty (who had grown very silent and pale for some days past,-where, by the way, was Horace? and was the Hawk-head meant to effect a diversion?) in view of the fantastic cliff which she had come to sketch,-the old Newfoundland-after a vain pursuit of a string of wild-fowl, which rose unexpectedly among the rushes— stretched himself out at her feet. It was a pretty picture, I thought, as I looked back,-one which I should like Mr. Dante Rossetti to paint for me, when he comes to Hazeldean. The fair delicate face, the blue-brown eyes, the pure brow, the composed lips with their faint smile, the wealth of yellow hair, is one which he alone of all our artists is able to interpret on canvas. Let him place her beside the grey northern sea, or, like his own matchless Aphrodite, amid a thicket of roses and honeysuckle; either will suit that fitful, shifting, Aprillike loveliness. Her smile brightens the wintriest sky; and the glory of honeysuckle and roses faints before the bloom of life. The Castle is a sea-girt keep-an imposing and massive pile. The sea washes the windows; the sea buffets the walls; at night, the sea mingles with your dreams. It is the sort of place where you might fall madly in love with the sea, and the sea-creatures; for, in the moonlight, the Mermaid sings her deceitful song, and combs her yellow curls, and you can leap from your bedroom window into her arms, or into the shadowless water at her feet, for at such seasons you do not credit the cold-blooded calumny about her tail. The nobles who own the keep have mingled their blood with that of their country since the days when the Danes first landed on our island; and in hall and corridor, comely and gallant faces by Gainsborough, and Sir Joshua, and Sir Peter, and Jamieson, and older masters, illustrate the annals of the House. A Royalist house, you may be sure; and ever foremost in battle and council,-whether for a Mary or a Charles,—to vindicate its constant loyalty. This thick folio-the Kilmarnock Papers, it -contains one of these loyal episodes; and, as th sun still keeps its place in the heaven, we may linger for a little over a sorrowful record of the violent and unhappy past. The Kilmarnock Papers form a most interesting collection. They introduce us to the inner life of a troubled society, bringing us face to face, as it were, with the men of the '45.* เ From the series of contemporary prints alone, a sketch of the time might be constructed. There is the Royal Palace of St. Germain-en-Laye, with its straight walks, its fountains, and its trim holly hedges, among which the exiles plotted, and from which is dated (June 29, 1706) the letter which occupies the following page, wherein James R.' thanks Lord Erroll for his 'constant and singular fidelity,' and assures him of his kindness, and of the desire I have to be in a condition of rewarding you for all your services,'-a desire not to be gratified. There are portraits of those who were engaged in the '15-George Collingwood, Richard Gascoyne, Lord Viscount Kenmure, the Earl of Derwentwater. There are several portraits of Prince Charles Edward-one painted at Rome by Domenico Dupra, with these lines inscribed below: 6 Édouard, presque seul, vole vers ses États," Sa fortune et ses droits accompagnent ses pas. Another-a lovely boyish face in a highland bonnetgraces a Dutch print of 'Perkins's Triumph.' William, * Lord Erroll has kindly allowed me to use these papers. |