ments towards woman when he finds himself daily jostling with her as his rival in the rude struggle for subsistence or in the still ruder conflicts of political ambition. Sentiment survives for a time the relations on which it is founded; but it does not survive long. It is therefore a serious question which

women have to decide; and they have reason to be careful how they allow a few members of their sex, under the influence of abnormal circumstances or inclinations, to compromise, as compromise they will, the position of the whole.

D

II. MARTHA AND HER CLOCK.

URING the last few years of my school life I lodged in a small, old-fashioned house, kept by an elderly unmarried woman : the only one remaining of what had once been a large family. Father, mother, and her two brothers were dead; her sisters had followed their husbands to distant parts, excepting the youngest, who was married to a doctor in the same town. So Martha was left alone in the old house, and managed to eke out a scanty income by letting some of the now unoccupied

rooms.

Yet she considered it no hardship that she could only afford herself a dinner on Sundays, for her wants were few, owing to the habits of strict economy to which her father had trained all his children, on principle, as well as in consideration of his narrow means.

Although in youth she had had but little schooling, yet the reflections of many solitary hours, joined to a quick understanding and the naturally serious tone of her character, combined to render her, at the time I made her acquaintance, a woman of much greater culture than is at all common in her class. I must allow she did not always speak quite gram

matically, although she was a great reader, and that chiefly of biographical and poetical works, on which she could generally give a correct and independent judgment; and, what is even more rare, could always distinguish between what was really good and what was worthless. To her, all the poet's creations were living, thinking beings, whose actions were not dependent on the fancy of the writer; and sometimes she would ponder for hours, scheming by what means so many beloved persons might have been rescued from a cruel fate.

Martha never found life a burden in her solitude, though at times a sense of the aimlessness of her outer existence would sadden her; she felt the want of some one for whom she might have worked and cared. In the absence of all nearer friends, her lodgers had the benefit of this praiseworthy impulse. I, among others, was the recipient of many little kindnesses and attentions at her hands. Flowers were her greatest delight, and it seemed to me symbolical of her contented and resigned mind, that white ones, and of those again the commoner kinds, were her chief favourites. It was to her always the first festival in the year when her sister's children brought her the first snowdrops and crocuses out of their garden; then a little

china basket was taken down from the cupboard, and, under her tender care, the flowers decorated the little chamber for weeks.

Now, as Martha had very few acquaintances, and spent nearly all the long winter evenings alone, she had, by force of her peculiarly lively imagination, endowed all her surroundings with a sort of life or personality. The old pieces of furniture in her room became thus, as it were, a part of herself, and had the faculty of holding converse with her; certainly the intercourse was, for the most part, a silent one, but on this account none the less real and free from risk of misunderstandings. Her spinning-wheel, her carved oak arm-chair, were strange things that often took the oddest whims; but far surpassing all in this respect, was an ancient clock which Martha's father had bought fifty years before at an Amsterdam fair, and even then as an old curiosity. It certainly looked extraordinary enough two mermaids, carved in lead and painted, leaned their faces on either side against the tarnished dial-plate, their scaly fish bodies, still bearing traces of gilding, surrounded the lower part of it and united beneath; its hands seemed to be in the form of scorpions' tails. Probably the works were worn out by long use; for the stroke of the pendulum was harsh and irregular, and the weights would sometimes slip down several inches at a time. This clock was the liveliest of all Martha's companions; she had not a thought in which it did not mix itself up. Sometimes when she fell a brooding over her loneliness, the pendulum would begin, tick, tack, tick, tack: growing louder and louder, and gave her no peace, ever interrupting the train of her thoughts. At last she was forced to rouse herself and look up-and lo! the sunbeams shone warm through the window-panes; the carnations on the little flower-stand smelt so sweet; and without the swallows shot twittering beneath the blue heavens. She could not but be cheerful again, the world around her was all so bright. But the clock had a strong will of its own; it was old and did not pay much attention to the modern time, therefore it often struck six when it should have been twelve; and, again, to make up for it, it would go on striking till Martha was obliged to take the weight off the chain. The strangest thing was that sometimes it was not able to strike at all, however hard it might try; then the machinery

creaked and creaked, but the hammer would not fall. This happened generally during the night, and always awoke Martha; and however bitter the cold, and however dark the winter night might be, she never failed to get up, and did not rest till she had helped the poor old clock out of its difficulties. Then, when she was in bed again, she lay and wondered why the clock had roused her, and asked herself if she had neglected any part of the day's work, and whether she had closed it with good thoughts.

It was near Christmas. A heavy snowstorm having prevented my journey homewards, I was invited to spend Christmas Eve at the house of an intimate friend. The Christmas tree had been lit up, the children had rushed in a joyous troop into the long-closed room; afterwards we had supped on carp and drunk punch according to custom-none of the old usages had been omitted. The following morning I entered Martha's room, to take her, as usual, my good wishes for the season. She sat with her arm resting on the table, her work lay apparently long forgotten.

"Well, how did you spend your Christmas Eve yesterday?" I asked.

She looked down on the floor, and answered, "At home."

"At home? And not with your sister's family?"

"Ah," she said, "since my mother died in that bed, ten years ago yesterday, I have never spent a Christmas Eve out of the house. Although my sister sent for me yesterday, too, and when it began to grow dark I did once think of going to them; but the old clock went on in such a strange way again; it seemed to me to keep on repeating :-'Don't go, don't go; what do you want there? Your Christmas Eve has nothing to do with them!""

And so she had stayed at home, in the small chamber, where she had played as a child, and where, in later years, she had closed the eyes of her parents, and the old clock ticked on the same as ever. Now that it had got its own way, however, and Martha had laid past her best gown in her wardrobe again, it ticked so softly, quite softly, until at length it was scarcely audible. Martha could give herself up undisturbed to the memories of all the Christmas Eves in her life. Her father sat once more in

reads them. The old clock will help her memory; for it, of course, knows about everything.

THE

III. IN THE OLD HALL.

HERE had been a christening in the afternoon, and evening was now closing in. The father and mother of the infant sat with their guests in the large hall. Among them was the father's grandmother. The others, too, were all near relations, young and old; but the grandmother was a whole generation in advance of the eldest of them. The baby was called Barbara, after her; but they had given it a prettier name besides, for Barbara alone, seemed too old-fashioned for the sweet little child. Still, it was to be called by this name -at least, so said the parents-however much the rest of the friends might object to it. But the grandmother did not know that the use of her ancient name had been called in question.

The clergyman, shortly after the discharge of his office, had departed, leaving the family circle to themselves; and then old familiar stories were brought forth, and repeated, not even now for the last time. They all knew each other, the old people had seen the younger ones grow up, and the elder had seen the old grow grey. The most amusing anecdotes were related of the childhood of all present. When no one else remembered them, the grandmother could always tell them. Of her, alone, no one had anything to tell; her early years lay behind the birth-days of all the others—those who could have told stories of her youth must have been old indeed. While engrossed in such discourse the daylight had slowly faded. The hall lay towards the west. A ruddy glow fell through the windows upon the roses in the garlands of plaster-work which adorned the white walls; soon this, too, died away. From afar, in the now growing stillness, was heard a low, monotonous murmur. Several of the guests paused to listen.

"It is the sea," said the young mother.

Then no one spoke again. Without, before the window, a great linden tree stood in the narrow paved court, and they heard the sparrows going to roost among the leaves. The host took his wife's hand, who sat silent by his side; his eyes rested on the old-fashioned ceiling.

"What are you thinking about?" asked the grandmother.

"There is a crack in the ceiling," said he, "and the cornice, too, has given way. The hall is getting old, grandmother; we must rebuild it.”

"The hall is not so old yet," she replied; "I remember well when it was built."

"Built-then what was here before?"

66

'Before?" repeated the grandmother, and for a time she sat silent, looking like a lifeless statue. Her gaze was turned back on a bygone time-her thoughts were with the shadows of things whose being had long passed away. At last she said, "It is eighty years ago; your grandfather and I, we often spoke of it afterwards,-in those days the door of the hall did not lead into another room, but opened on a little flower-garden; but it is not the same door

the other was a glass one-and when you came into the hall by the front door, you could see through it straight down on the garden, into which a short flight of steps, with bright coloured Chinese railings, led. Flower borders, edged with box, lay on either hand, divided down the centre by a broad path strewn with white shells, at the end of which was an arbour of lindens. Between two cherry trees, in front of this, hung a swing, and on both sides of the arbour apricot trees were carefully trained along the high garden wall. Here, in summer, your great-grandfather might be seen regularly at noon, walking up and down, tending his auriculas and tulips, and tying them with strips of matting and little white wands. He was a strict, precise man, with a military bearing, and his black eyebrows with his powdered hair, gave him a striking appearance.

"Thus it was on an August afternoon, when your grandfather came down the steps into the little garden-but in those days he was far from being a grandfather. I see him still with my old eyes, as he approached with his light step to where your great-grandfather stood. Then he took a letter from a neatly-worked pocket