Ezra was really unnoticed by Ruth, and indeed there was little about him that was noticeable. "A common, decent farmer" Mrs. Bowen would have called him, if she had spoken of him at all.

He was unlike his mother, but favored his father, as she often said with an odd sigh; he was tall and angular, fair-haired, grayeyed, and had a Roman nose. If Ruth had ever taken pains to examine his face she would have seen there a resemblance to herself. She was tall and angular also, and had fair hair; but her features were delicate and trained, as in fact was her whole self, while Ezra, as yet, was but a man in the rough. Mrs. Clark penetrated Ezra's secret about the time he learned it himself. She thought him a green, foolish boy, but did not say so; she depicted the horrors of gentility to him in her cunning way; exposed the shifts and expedients to be resorted to where there was no real basis for it, but she only made Ezra laugh. The truth was, that it was Ruth's elegant precision that had fascinated him. He had suffered his long life, without knowing it, from the disorder and confusion at home, and his mother, without his knowing this too, would have been the last model he would have chosen from. are ignorant also. After worshiping Ruth for several years in church he suddenly took the initiatory step toward making her acquaintance, and went up to Repton to spend his evenings. This was late in the spring, at the time the young people were beginning their excursions to the woods and fields. He was acquainted with the Repton men, but had made no visits to their houses. His point of attack was a call at the minister's, where it was lawful for all to go, with a bundle of rhubarb stalks, which he presented to the minister's wife, with the hope that they would not use up too much of her sugar; and chance, who loves parochial gifts, favored him. One of his friends, Joel Barnes, was there on a parish errand.

Mrs. Clark would have lived had he left her, | recognized by them; perhaps they never saw it. for she loved life and the world. She was some- Some people never discover genius even, when what eccentric-the "Widow Nabby," pious by it is born in the same town with themselves. I rule, and skeptical by nature, artful, kind-heart- am told that one of our noted authoresses is coned, bright, and simple, and withal a remarkably sidered a miserable housekeeper in her town, handsome woman. Her features were as regu- and that Mr. Tennyson is called a cross man in lar as a Greek's. She had full black eyes, and his. If the world discovers a man of genius a mop of black curly hair; her feet and hands these people cry: "It can't be; he was born were beautiful, her form perfect, and yet she here; we have known him always!" was born on the opposite side of the swamp, where she lived till she married Ezra's father, and moved on the side where she now was. She was an awful dowdy, however, being perfectly indifferent to dress and her personal appearance. Her shoes were always down at the heel; she preferred wearing them so-there was no trouble about tying them. She hated strings, buttons, and hooks and eyes, and pins scratched her; her cap was two-thirds off her head generally, which she said was owing to the obstinate curl of her hair-it would rise up wave-like. Her gowns were made of a material that never required washing, and never came to mending, but fell all away at once. Her house was arranged correspondingly, and her way of doing housework was slip-shod of course. What was the use of making her bed every morning when it was tumbled every night—she reasoned with old Sally Lane, her ancient "help," who made it up notwithstanding. If the furniture dropped apart it remained so, unless Ezra saw it, and had it mended. Occasionally she had a fit of moving what she called "Lumber" into the unused rooms, and compelling Sally and Ezra to enjoy bare floors and walls a while. She swept and dusted, she said, when the Lord willed, which was not often. Her duty was done, however, in the line of milk-pans; their "shining morning faces," when she put them out of doors on a board, propitiated the demon of cleanliness, and was the saving clause put in by her friends when they otherwise called her a "Slut." She made a sincere effort on Sundays to look something like the Repton people whom she met at the Presbyterian church; and, with the help of Sally, succeeded, though before she returned her bonnet, shawl, and collar went astray over her shoulders; and she lost so many gloves and handkerchiefs that she gave up wearing them at last, and flourished a leaf of tansy, a rose, or a dry stalk of caraway seed instead. It was at church that Ezra began to observe Ruth, to admire, and then fall in love with her. His pew was behind the one Mrs. Bowen hired seats in, which gave him the advantage of seeing Ruth enter it, and of looking boldly at the back of her bonnet. Sometimes her silk dress rustled against him, and he smelt the Cologne water her handkerchief was perfumed with. Mrs. Bowen and Mrs. Clark were members of the church, and the symbolic cup was handed by one to the other often; but they never exchanged more than a bow outside of the church. The. "Widow Nabby" and her wardrobe was a jesting theme between Mrs. Bowen and Ruth; but her wonderful old woman's beauty was never VOL. XXXI.-No. 186.-3 C

Poor mothers! But they

"There's a party of us," he said, "going up your way in a few minutes, Ezra. Join it, will you? We are going to Grape Dell."

"Who's going?" Ezra asked, confidently. "I hardly know; I asked Ruth Bowen to go, for one."

"I am not acquainted with her."

"I'll introduce you. Come, you have kept out of company long enough. I never saw you in the minister's house before."

"It is Mr. Clark's fault," remarked the minister's wife, kindly.

"I know it," answered Ezra; "but, marm, the farm is on my hands; it takes all there is of

"Perhaps he wants a wife-where else could for the world. But what can we expect of that he look for one?"

"He appeared to be flabbergasted by you," Mrs. Clark is a good, clever woman for all that; said Joel, mischievously.

"The wind is that way, is it? Ask 'em right gently. up, 'Ezry; they'll sing hymns, maybe." "Hymns be darned."

Being fully recovered, she shook out her hand- | that I never gave any body the least encouragekerchief, raised her eyebrows, and answered, "Indeed!"

"How do you think that glass of cider tasted erated; that he had been invited to the sociato Ruth Bowen, Ezry?"

"I do; it was as bitter as the waters of proposed withdrawing from them, should she Marah."

"Oh, mother," said Ruth, with heat, "I think and the afternoon service in the church. As the donkey is in love with me."

"Don't drive me quite crazy. You know heart.

"I wonder your son is not at his post watching," she said. "I miss him."

"I am sorry to disappoint you, marm," Mrs. Clark answered; "but he ain't coming. Where's your Ruth ?"

cluded not to drive home his loaded wagon, but sent his man on with it in advance. Ruth still walked forward without seeing him. He leaned his elbows on the wall which bordered the road, and wondered if she knew where she was go

"She has been obliged to make herself a pris- ing, and if she would come much nearer. oner."

""Tain't on bread and water, I hope."

She

stopped a moment as if she were reflecting, which made him feel sorry and apprehensive,

"If it was it would be preferable to what she and started on again; her eyes fell on his head is forced to have when she goes out."

What's that, marm ?"

"The attentions of your son. Can't you teach him how to keep in the place where he belongs?"

"If your Ruth's disposition and behavior won't drive him away nothing will; we must let him go to the end of his rope. I am really sorry for you, because I see you have not got over it, as I have; I gave Ezry up some time ago. Now, marm, let us go right in and hear the gospel preached."

Ezra from this time deserted Repton. Ruth emerged from her seclusion and went about as in former times; but she missed something— her persecution. A sting, an expectation, a flavor was gone; dullness took their place, especially after Joel Barnes became engaged to a girl entirely out of their set.

"The good times are over," was the cry. "We are going to break up; what are we to do for young men ?"

But Ruth had little time either for amusement or reflection. Mrs. Bowen was taken ill;

above the wall, she made up her mind instinctively to go by as if she did not see him; but when she came opposite him she said, in a trembling voice,

He was over the wall in an instant and beside her; for a moment both were agitated. "Do you feel any different?" he asked at length.

She meant to say "No," and that she "never should ;" but all at once she felt how lonely the road was; how lonely the world might be, and how deep the "gloaming" which would surround her.

She gave a little gasp and looked up at him. His arm was round her waist like lightning. His shirt-sleeves were rolled up, and barley straws were sticking in his hat, but she returned his kiss.

They were married, but it was a very unequal match, and nobody knew it so well as Mrs. Clark and Mrs. Bowen, though they had entirely different reasons for thinking so.

VASS.

HEPHERDS of people," says Lord Bacon,

SHE

their work got behindhand, and Ruth obtained THE GREAT WESTMINSTER CANan insight into the pains and penalties of living. When her mother recovered they were obliged to make up by extra industry for the lost time, and " so the weeks rolled on even up to the night on which Ruth walked out in sight of Ezra's chimneys. She did not on that occasion define all the cause of her exasperation. The roots of human nature are everlastingly the same; and yet every body is surprised at the foliage and fruit they bear. No one would have been more surprised than Ruth if she had been told that she wanted Ezra to come back. Bedquilts ran in her mind the whole of the following day; dreams of their disposal by Ezra's wife confused and afflicted her; fancies of a well-regulated house for him flitted through her mind. How much might she accomplish with her ability, industry, and neatness toward making him a prosperous man she could not help reckoning. And what would he not do for her-how indulgent, generous, and faithful she was sure she should find him! She and her mother could turn him round their little fingers if they chose. The day ended with her hating the supposititious wife and her bedquilts, and going out to walk on the same road she had walked over the night before. She sauntered nearer and nearer the chimneys, which seemed to ride down the horizon as she approached. It was the barley harvest, and it chanced that Ezra and his man were out late in a field on the border of his farm. He descried Ruth's tall figure in the "gloaming," and con

"have need to know the calendars of tempests of state, which commonly occur when things grow to equality, as, in the natural world, storms appear about the equinoctia." The political quiet which has endured under the long Palmerston Parliament just closed was felt by the weatherwise of all parties to be a temporary lull. Lord Russell's naïve appeal to England to "rest and be thankful" had naturally become a standing jest to the people and politicians who saw with sharpened vision, or forefelt in rheumatic twinges, the storm that must come. Five millions of unenfranchised workingmen, a people taxed to support a Church in which half of them believe not, a nation supporting universities in which not one of its leading thinkers can enter without sacrificing truth on their thresholds; these were scarcely the elements to which rest and thankfulness could be effectively preached for any great length of time. The conservative and the progressive forces of England both felt this, and, under the five years' quiet, have been furbishing their arms and measuring their strength for the inevitable conflict. found, as already intimated, that they were very nearly equal, all things considered; for in a country where it is not the man but the tenpound rental that votes, equality of power can not be estimated by counting numbers. The

It was

beyond the trenches of party. There was good reason for this A salient or novel point will at once be seized upon by an antagonist, and made the basis of misrepresentation which he knows can not be fully met before the yelling crowd on the hustings. No shrewd candidate will encumber himself with any thing that requires explanation, for explanation is precisely the one impossible thing during elections. Lord Palmerston was so averse to saying any thing material in his address to Tiverton, that after announcing himself a candidate he filled out the paper by reminding his constituents that under the prosperous administration of which he had been the head no fewer than two new princes had been born in the Royal Household. But presently the wars of the canvassers began in good earnest, and the fortresses of platitude became smoking ruins. The candidate must stand under hurtling volleys of questions; and woe to

of iron or of brass-from which each one will rebound in the shape of a sufficient answer.

The elections just closed have shown that the England of to-day includes every age of humanity, from the savage worshiping his fetich, or tomahawking his foe, up to the idealist, as Chimborazo stretches from tropic to arctic, and is traced with the growths of every latitude between them. It is idle to speak of England as doing this or that: which England? There is one represented by the constituents which demanded of their candidate, 1. Whether he believed in the Book of Genesis; and, 2. When he last partook of the communion. There is another which defends John Stuart Mill's finest relig

Tory party, owning, substantially, the House of Lords, and wielding a large minority in the Commons, was at least able to keep the Government perpetually on the defensive, and to prevent any real movement. Lord Palmerston, who seems to have a political as well as a physical gouty leg, sensitive to all changes of the atmosphere, probably fearing the "Conservative reaction" which the Tories confidently predicted, and knowing certainly that a storm would follow the dissolution of Parliament, shrank from it until so late in the season that Mr. Punch wiped his forehead and said, "Pam, if you don't dissolve I shall!" The evil day could not, however, be put off forever, and the Parliament reached at length its constitutional term of existence. The real predominance of Liberalism in the country might be at once seen in the swarms of Liberal candidates, which indeed constituted the danger of that party. Wherever there was a contestable seat, there was a pre-him if he have not on a coat of mail-wrought liminary contest among possible (Liberal) candidates as to who should stand for it, too often ending in the seat itself being endangered by internal dissension, whereas the Tories generally managed to have their forces united upon one man, or two if the borough or county offered any chances of success. This is indeed the usual Tory tactics, and that it is so is due to the fact that the educated young men who aspire to political life and influence in England are rarely Tories. It is probable that every superior and cultivated man in England desires to have a seat in Parliament; the Laureate himself is reported to have declared that he would regard that as the most tempting earthly honor that could be made to him. When lately the candi-ious and social radicalism, and elects him theredatures were arranged it was found that the on. And between these what worlds roll on struggle was to be unusually interesting, apart side by side, in these little islands, each with its from the great questions involved, by reason of own interests! It would require volumes to the large numbers of young and independent give the proofs furnished by the recent elections thinkers and radicals who had entered the lists. that England is an epitome of the Eastern hemThe addresses to the various constituencies which isphere, and of ages past and present, dark and were put forth did not break the truce of the luminous; but there was one contest which may Parliament; the reticence and the spirit of post- be regarded as supplying a fair epitome of Enponement which had marked the dealings with gland; and of that I propose to give some acvital questions in Westminster Hall were re- count, chiefly from personal observation, beproduced in the long columns of generalities fore passing to any considerations concerning and platitudes which appeared in the Times. the political significance of the elections genThe Whigs took their stand on the general pros-erally. perity of the country and the financial successes The nomination of John Stuart Mill for Westof Mr. Gladstone. The Tories deplored the minster is the most practical reply which this spirit of innovation characterizing the Govern- English generation has given to Burke's famous ment, but declared that they would not oppose declaration that the age of chivalry is past. The any "judicious and well-considered measure of City of Westminster is nearly all of the west reform." The infra-gangway supporters of the portion of London, has a population about oncGovernment believed that the time had now third in number to that of New York City, and come when, in the words of the Chancellor of sends two members to the House of Commonsthe Exchequer, every Englishman not incapaci- the same number, it may be remarked, in passtated by some consideration of personal unfit-ing, as are sent by dozens of places which have ness or of political danger should be admitted to not a fiftieth of its population. In this ancient a share of political power." The enterprising reader who journeyed over these deserts of commonplace was indeed rewarded now and then with an oasis of wit and individuality, but as a general thing the candidates did not venture

city is represented every degree of wealth and of poverty. One may start from that region of hovels and filth from which the towers of the new Houses of Parliament and of Westminster Abbey rise and pass by Whitehall, with its offi