persuaded of the fact, and the little cavalcade which had left Aix so joyously in the morning re-entered it at sunset, mute and mournful, as a funeral procession-a corpse silent and cold in one carriage, and a queen weeping sadly in the other.

Years after the event I have just described, Napoleon III., the glories of the imperial crown fresh upon his brow, and his fair young bride beside him, paid a visit to Grezy, and looked down into the chasm where his mother's friend had perished. The "once brave boy in blouse," then a garrulous old man of eighty, and the sole surviving witness of the disaster, had been summoned to the imperial presence, and from his lips the emperor learned all, down even to the minutest particulars connected with the scene. Probably he had heard something already from Hortense of the untimely fate of her beloved Dame du Palais, and he may even have had himself a dim childish recollection of the fair young girl in widow's weeds (for Madame de Broc had lost her husband soon after her marriage), who moved like a shadow through his mother's palace, and contrived to lead a life of charity and devotion in the midst of its gay surroundings.

At all events, he showed great and real emotion as he listened to the story, and the empress shared the feeling; for no sooner had the old man ceased to speak, than, moved by one of those warm impulses so graceful in every woman, so gracious as well as graceful in a woman like Eugenie, young, beautiful, and of high rank, she took a splendid chain of gold from her own neck and flung it over his. Neither was the emperor slow in the expression of his feelings. He had listened to the tale with that peculiar expression of bonhommie which never failed to win the hearts of those upon whom it was exerted, and he closed the interview (English fashion) by a good shake of the hand and a bountiful supply of gold, fresh and bright from the imperial mint.

In simple justice, however, to the "brave blouse boy," I feel bound to add that when he described to me this interview with royalty, he dwelt far more enthusiastically on the sweet smile of the empress and the emperor's offered hand than upon the gold which filled the latter, and which came to him just in time to make his old age comfortable and free from care.

I

POVERTY.

A SONNET.

HAD a dream of poverty by night,

And saw the holy palmer wending by
With pensive face and radiant upturned eye,
Drinking the tender moon's approving light.
I saw her take the hills and climb the height,
While broad below the city murmured nigh,
Spangling the dusk with lamps of revelry
That made the mellow planets pale to sight.
Yet kept my love her face toward the stars
Till broke the dawn against the mountain ridge,
And angels met her on the misty way.

Then heaven looked forth on her through golden bars,
Then gleamed her feet along a rosy bridge,

Then passed she noiseless into eternal day.

R. M.

A NAMESAKE.

H grand the music of that martyr-fame,

Which peals from where Catana's blue waves fleet, Through sixteen centuries, clear, and strong, and sweet, In power of fresh attraction still the same.

With thoughts of thy young glorious death I came,

Of Peter's love for such fair soul so meet,

And of one heart as kind as ever beat

One dear and valued friend that bears thy name,

A gifted nature, noble, rich, and deep,

That can with wealth of generous love repay.

Then guard her well, sweet saint, her life still keep
Safe in Perfection's narrow path each day,
Spare her in pain as may be without loss,

And teach thy patience when Christ sends his cross.

A. E.

THE CHANCES OF WAR.

CHAPTER XXXV.

A LAST INJUNCTION.

"The walls grew weak; and fast and hot
Against them poured the ceaseless shot,
With unabating fury sent

From battery to battlement;

And thunder-like the pealing din

Rose from each heated culverin. "

The Siege of Corinth.

WITH the return of night all Kathleen's visions of green fields and bright waters disappeared. The gloom of the city sank down upon her more heavily than it had ever done before. The sluggish atmosphere was more suffocating than usual, and the hot vapours of the narrow street more oppressive. In her attempt to play the convalescent she had exhausted the little strength her long illness had spared. Feverish and restless she lay awake all the night through, listening to the occasional sounds that broke upon its stillness. The listless step of the homeless outcast, the quick, impatient tread of the public messenger on his important errand, the measured tramp of the patrol, each came in turn to give a new turn to her wandering thoughts, and a new course to her weary speculations. The window of her room looked down into the street that led from King John's Castle to the bridge uniting the English with the Irish town. Several detachments of infantry passed under the window in the direction of the bridge, and once a body of cavalry went by. She strained her ears to catch the sound of a voice from some of the riders, but without success. There was nothing to be heard but a jingling of bits, a rattling of coats of mail, and the ring of many hoofs upon the pavement; and all these sounds died away soon, and left the night lonely and dismal as before. Its dreary hours dragged slowly on; it seemed as if the dawn would never come.

But it came at last. Its rays found their way into the dingy street, and then into the gloomy chamber where Kathleen lay. They crept in through chinks and crevices, and found out hidden passages among the folds of the curtains, through which they entered mysteriously; and they danced merrily about the room, as if glad to see it again after their long journey round the earth, and tried, in their own way, to cheer the sick child. But their fantastic pranks were unheeded. The child's face was flushed with a scarlet bright as the colouring of the morning clouds through which they had forced their way. A strange, unsteady light flickered in her eyes, her breath came long-drawn and very slow, and her breast rose and fell spasmodically with every respiration. These were alarming symptoms, but

there was no one near to be alarmed by them. The bright beams continued to pour into the room; for hours after they had come, they alone saw what the child suffered.

Later on Mary came to pay her morning visit to the invalid. She was terrified at the change the night had brought.

"I feel very weak and very tired, Mary," said Kathleen, in answer to her inquiries. "I have not slept. The air seems thick and slimy. I am hot and thirsty too."

Mary moistened the thin parched lips of her sister, and seated herself by the bedside.

"Mary," asked the child, after a long pause, must every one who dies in Limerick be buried amongst the tombstones that stand round the old church ?"

"I cannot tell, Kathleen; why do you ask?"

"I should not like to lie there if I were dead, Mary. It must be very chill and damp in those musty corners; nothing grows there but long grasses and weeds. If I died I should like to be laid near father, the flowers grow so very beautiful there, and the water goes by with such a nice soft gurgling sound that it could never be lonely."

"What strange thoughts you have to-day, Kathleen! Where have they all come from?"

"I do not know," answered the child, "they have filled my head all the morning. Perhaps I am going to die. I should not like it, Mary."

"You would meet father and mother, and would be happier with them than you have ever been here, Kathleen dearest," said her sister, sadly. She felt there was something more than fancy in these dark presentiments.

"But you would be left alone. What would become of you, Mary ?"

"I should be lonely, but it would only be for a short time. We should all soon meet again in heaven."

"How I wish we could go there together! I am sure it would make me sad even there, to think of you left on earth without a friend."

66

Stay with me then, Kathleen, and do not think any more of dying. We are to be delivered soon out of this miserable town. Bear up until we reach the green fields and the pure air beyond the hills, and you will be strong again."

A bright look lit up the face of the sick child at the mention of these pleasures so near at hand.

'How long have we yet to wait ?" she asked.

Before her question could be answered, the report of a gun, fired from some battery beyond the river, broke on the air. Another followed, and then another, and in a few minutes a heavy cannonade resounded along the eastern wall of the "Irish Town." The sisters were not unused to the tumult of siege operations, but they had never heard them plied with such violence before. The furies of war seemed to have broken the bonds which had hitherto restrained them.

The smaller pieces of artillery maintained an almost continuous roar. Now and then their voices were drowned in the prolonged boom of the heavy siege guns, but when this sullen thunder died away the lesser engines roared out again as lustily as before.

It is exciting to witness the angry efforts man makes to wreck the stronghold in which his enemy has taken refuge-to watch the flash of the sulphurous flame-the rolling of the clouds of sulphurous smoke, to hear the roar, the hiss, the exploding crash of the iron missiles, and all the glorious din which accompanies the work of destruction. And then the pent-up enemy replies in the same tumultuous manner. His messengers pass in mid air the deadly envoys bound for the city, and, in their turn, burst and roar about the ears of the besiegers; and so the noisy game briskly goes on, and the "pomp of glorious war" is duly maintained. What recks it that behind those falling walls mangled wretches are writhing on the bloodstained pavements, dismembered by the iron fragments that fly through the air, or that under the shadow of these thundering batteries mutilated creatures are breathing forth their souls in curses or in prayer? It matters nothing. If they have fallen there are others left who will exult in the victory they have died for. "On with the game!" cries the yet unscathed enthusiast, deaf to the groans of the maimed and dying.

But the tumult of battle-strife loses its inspiriting effect when heard from a dull, dark chamber where disease has taken up his abode, and imprisoned one of his captives. It cannot kindle enthusiasm in the breast in which life is struggling to maintain itself, nor string the nerves that long illness has paralysed. Poor Kathleen listened all the morning to the sounds of the angry contest. Her brain, which had been throbbing through the night with the fever heat within it, was dazed by the incessant din. The windows shook in their frames as the savage voices of the huge guns threatened the stubborn walls. The crash of bursting shells, the noise of falling houses, and the despairing cries of children and women, came from the crowded streets along the river. The clatter of musketry, the distant note of drum or trumpet, and the nearer tramp of feet hurrying to or from the scene of combat, all broke together upon the tired brain of the weary sufferer in painful confusion, and it throbbed wilder and faster than ever.

The day advanced, but the furious cannonade abated nothing of its vigour, nor did the fever in Kathleen's veins relax anything of its wasting energy. Unable to relieve her sufferings, Mary watched in helpless agony the varying phases of her illness, smoothed the pillow which supported her head, and moistened from time to time her burning lips. The thunder of the guns had for her a significance which, fortunately, it had not for the invalid; she knew that the fate of the city was being decided, and she knew what would follow if the old walls gave way under the iron hail that was beating upon them. Often, when her sister's eyes were closed, she knelt by the bedside, and prayed that God would sustain the sadly-thinned ranks that manned the battered defences of the city. And in her prayers she