a farewell sermon to his former hearers; even in the pulpit he could not restrain his joy: "How long," he exclaimed, "how long have we heretofore expected preferment, and missed it; but now, God be praised, we have it." He did not know that the gift conferred on him was so poor and encumbered as to be rather a punishment than a reward. "The Bishopric of Ferns," wrote Wentworth to Laud, “is already so saddle-girted and so spear-galled, as if the devil himself were the rider, he could not make worse of it than it is already. He is a good child and kisseth the rod; so you see it was not a connection ill-bestowed on him."

On the 12th of April the Parliament was dissolved. The Deputy would have preferred a prorogation; but the royal mandate left him no choice. He consoled himself with the thought that, "for the King's service and public settlement of the State, it was the happiest Parliament that ever was in Ireland, and that his Majesty had now made himself more absolute master of the kingdom by his wisdom than any of his progenitors were able to do by their swords. There being good reason for his Majesty to be pleased, he was well contented to give other men leave to censure as they list, fully delighted in his obedience and faith to his master, which would preserve him inviolably against any calumny and foulness of tongues." He now had leisure to enter on the inquiry into Defective Titles, a business he had long at heart; by it he hoped to enrich the Crown still more. The history of this, the most tyrannical act of his cruel government, we must, for want of space, defer to our next issue.

(To be continued.)

D. M.

B

YEARNINGS.

BY ALICE ESMONDE.

EYOND, where the branching trees divide,
In the trembling light of the dying day,
See the Suir's gold track, where the wavelets glide
Through the circling arch 'mid a shower of spray;
Hear the music sweet of that old, sad song
It brings in its heart from the lone hills down,
And the cadence deep that it bears along,
As it streams away 'neath the shadows brown.

There's the convent gray and the spire above,
With its background clear of the deep blue skies-
I can see every spot in that place I love,
As I stand here now and I close my eyes—

* Laud's Letter to the Deputy, I. 380.

Ah! 'twas never half in my youth so dear,
Nor drew my thoughts to itself away,
Not one-half as fair as I see it here,
A picture framed in my heart to-day.

I know every stone in those ivied walls,
From the shaded walk to the terrace high;
I know where the green of the spring first falls,
Where the roses latest in summer die;

And I listen still as the Suir flows on

And it wrings my heart with a thrill of pain,
For it sings of years and of old friends gone,
Of voices I'll hear not on earth again.

On its margins green all the wild flowers grow,
And they seem not to me so sweet elsewhere,
And its waters linger, as loath to go

Through the blossomed reeds and the rushes there,
The forget-me-nots, and the woodruff tall,

The strawberry blossoms that grow in the dells-
And the fairest flower still of them all,
The tender, trembling white sorrel-bells.

The fair white bells on the banks that lie,

On their thick-strewn leaves of a beauteous green,
On that soft pavilion laid out to die,

With the purple streaks 'mid their pallid sheen;
Too fair and white on the earth to stay,
In no common mould will they seek a grave,
They'll droop and pine on their thrones away,
Ere the parching sun shines out on the wave.

And they speak to me of a friend in pain,
And the waters murmur as past they roll,
With the cadence deep of that strange, weird strain,
Like an echo caught from a human soul-
That the best must die and the fairest fade,

And the truest heart still the deep wound meet,

But that Time can heal every scar it made,

And from hours most sad weave a memory sweet.

Oh! for ever still on the Calvary height,
Doth a darkness stay that will not depart;
Only Life-sick eyes 'neath the Cross find sight,
Christ's wounds but show through a broken heart;
He will draw tired souls to those heights above,
And the sad ones fill with his special grace,
He will shape hard ways with a jealous love;
Through the heart's deep rent He will show his face.

You were more unto me than words may tell,
Since you took my hand on a distant day,
And to one, since dead, said you'd guard me well
And hold her place and her gentle sway-
And ah! shall I speak of that other hour,
When your voice stole out 'mid a life all pain?

Shall I speak of the words, and the old, sweet power?—
Forgive me! Not here could I that explain.

But the sun is gone and the golden track-
Though I hear the Suir as it streams away,
And it sings of years that will not come back,
And it sings to me in the dying day:
That the best must go and the fairest fade,
And the truest heart still the deep wound meet,
But that time can heal every scar it made,
And of sad To-day make a memory sweet.

THE CHANCES OF WAR.

BY A. WHITELOCK.

CHAPTER XXVI.

SPREADING THE TOILS.

"Cauto guerrier pugnando
Già vincitor si vede;
Ma non depone il brando,
Ma non si fida ancor :
Chè, le nemiche prede
Se spensierato aduna,
Cambia talor fortuna
Col vinto il vincitor."

Metastasio.

THERE is an indescribable buoyancy in the joy of newly-recovered liberty. Freedom, according to the universal theory of poets and philosophers, is a priceless blessing; like all other blessings it is doubly prized when it is recovered after a temporary loss. For Derry. His captivity had been lightened by the kindness of his

captors, but had been irksome all the while. From the ramparts, where he was wont to walk for hours musing and alone, he had seen the hills of Donegal whiten with snow and then throw off their icy tude his mind had been busy with bootless self-questionings. He had mantle and clothe themselves again in green and purple. In his solioccupied himself in divining what had been the further fortunes of his fared with the gentle, heroic girl he had left alone in the power of companions in arms, and oftener still, in conjecturing how it had

her enemies.

With the end of spring there had come a season of tumult and excitement in the town. It was held by Sir Charles Coote for the Parliament of England. It was an important fortress, and was attacked early in the campaign organised by Ormonde in the name of the King. In the result of the siege MacDermott was but little interested; it was a matter of small moment to him whether he was detained prisoner in the name of the King or the Parliament. The operations of the besiegers were conducted without much energy, the blockade in no way increased the inconveniences of the prisoner's position. It rather relieved the monotony of his many unoccupied hours to observe the tactics of the garrison and their rivals. The game was rather spiritless, but it was better than nothing; he watched it from his solitary walk on the walls, and occasionally he descended into the narrow streets of the old town to hear the events of the hour discussed by the excited burgesses, who scowled at him as he went by-they were rebels themselves, but he was a "Papist" rebel, and, as they thought, one of the "Irishry." One day as he descended into the town on one of these excursions, he noticed that the faces of the cooped-up citizens had put off their gloom and wore a holiday look of pleasure. There was laughter, loud and boisterous, and eager congratulations, and a hearty interchange of pleasant greetings, in the groups where hitherto the speakers had muttered their fears and forebodings in half audible whispers, and with much significant shaking of the head, and rueful upturning of the eyes. Even his own appearance among them was not greeted with the usual marks of unfriendliness. Stout burgesses nodded to him good-humouredly; and fair eyes, that before had only gazed from behind the windowcurtain at the godless rebel as he passed, now beamed their salutation from the open windows.

"Friend," he inquired of a Puritanical-looking townsman, whom he encountered in a lonely street, "may I inquire the reason of the general joy ?"

"Odds, man," answered the citizen, "hast thou not yet heard that the siege is nearly over? The Lord, who draweth good out of evil, maketh use of the rebel, O'Neill, to deliver us from them that lie in wait outside our gates. The Irishry have covenanted with the worthy Sir Charles Coote to come up unto the deliverance of the city, and will be here anon."

The words sent a wild thrill of hope through the breast of the prisoner, and he hurried away in search of reliable information. "It is even so," said Montgomery, whom he found on duty at a remote point of the city wall. "Sir Charles has been obliged to call in the aid of your former commander, to rid us of the persistent attentions of our loyal friends yonder. O'Neill is already on his way hither. We are in hourly expectation of seeing Sir Robert and Colonel Audley pack up their baggage, and bid us a reluctant fare

well."

"Which adieu, I trust, will be speedily followed by mine."

* Sir Robert Stewart and Colonel Audley Mervin.

"Doubt it not; all our standing accounts with O'Neill will be closed."

"Thou hast still been the father of good news," remarked MacDermott, with a smile.

"Learned! right learned! my worthy bookworm," returned the lancer, encouragingly. "But thou hast not outstripped me yet. I, too, have employed some of my prison hours to form the acquaintance of honest Will Shakspeare. Methought, however, the fervid speeches of the sighing Romeo would have fixed themselves in thy brain rather than the witless sayings of that dull fool, Claudius. Nay, never blush, man," continued the gay soldier, laughing at his own banter, and making his horse prance playfully round his victim. "Thou hast, I trow, stored up in thy memory a goodly supply of the graceful sayings of the young Montague, and wilt now be able to swear thy vows in pretty language to the mermaid of Lough Ree. Forget not when thou hastenest thither to expend a little of thy choice eloquence in tendering my most ardent homage. Lucky thou, that the necessities of the service retain me at this extremity of the Island! Thus art thou delivered from a dangerous rival. But stay not now to tempt me longer from my duty. Be early at the mess-table to-night; it will cheer thy melancholy soul to see us drain bumpers to the success of O'Neill."

Things had happened as Montgomery anticipated. The besiegers, as soon as they learned that O'Neill was marching to the relief of the town, withdrew from before it, and left Coote and his new ally to celebrate their reconciliation undisturbed. In return for the service done him, Sir Charles contributed a thousand beeves to the exhausted commissariat of the Ulster army, and thirty barrels of gunpowder to its scanty ammunition stores. O'Neill encamped outside the walls, and for a time, a friendly intercourse was maintained between the army of the Church and the army of the Covenant.

The civilities interchanged between the new allies were not limited to substantial favours given and received. There were not wanting gay festivities to celebrate the event. The streets of the old town echoed by day to the tread of daintily-clad gallants, and the tramp of richly-housed steeds; and at night they were flooded with light streaming from the windows of banquet-hall or ball-room, and the sound of music and gay laughter kept the staid burghers awake until the dawn. The garrison, though professing unbounded attachment to the political principles of the Covenant, liked not over well the rigidity of Puritan asceticism, and in the matter of morals inclined rather to the gaiety of the Cavaliers than to the gloomy piety of the Roundheads. Their Irish allies sympathised heartily with these tendencies, and thus in the pleasant merry-makings which followed the relief of Derry, Ulsterman and Parliamentarian met as if they had never fired pistols at each other's heads, or directed pikeheads against each other's hearts.

O'Neill cared little for the pleasures of the ball-room, but he was an ardent lover of the chase; in fact, his love of this sport had more than once brought his life into peril. His entertainer, the commander