Diary and Chronology. Tuesday, August 30. St. Pammachius, Conf. A.D. 410. Moon's Last Quar. 48m after 10 Morn. The Harvest.--The end of August is generally the usual time of Harvest, and hence the beginning of sporting has, from time immemorial, been fixed for September. In fine weather the Harvest Home, as it is called, is a scene of great cheerfulness, and it is peculiarly pleasing to see the wheat carried, accompanied by the cheerful sounds of the Harvest-horn, an emblem of the horn of Plenty. But the many rustic ceremonies formerly belonging to the carrying of the Harvest, are fast going out of use. Brand observes, that the Harvest Home is call. ed Mell Supper, Kern, Churn Supper, or Feast of In-gathering; and quotes Macrobius, who tells us that, among the Heathens, the masters of families, when they had got in their Harvest, were wont to feast with their servants, who had laboured for them in tilling the ground. In exact conformity to this it is common among us, when the fruits of the earth are gathered in and laid in their proper repositories, to provide a plentiful supper for the harvest-men and the servants of the family. At this entertainment, all are, in the modern revolutionary idea of the word, perfectly equal. Here is no distinction of persons, but master and servant sit at the same table, converse freely together, and spend the remainder of the night in dancing, and singing, in the most easy familiarity. Bourne thinks the original of both these customs is Jewish, and cites Hospinian, who tells us that the Heathens copied after this custom of the Jews, and at the end of their Harvest, offered up their first fruits to the Gods. For the Jews rejoiced and feasted at the gett ng-in of the harvest. Wednesday, August 31. St. Cuthburge, Queen, Vir. & Abbess, &ch Cent. High Water 25m after 7 Morn—57m after 7 Aftern. August 31, 1422.-Expired at or near Rouen, in Frauce, ET. 34, Henry V. the celebrated conqueror of France. His remains were conveyed to England, and interred in Westminster Abbey.Henry was a native of Monmouth, which at that period belonged to Wales; a country which also gave birth to two other Kings of England, namely, Edward II. and Henry VII. The former was born at Caernarvon; the latter at Pembroke. Thursday, Sept. 1. St. Giles, Abbot, 1st Century. Sun rises 13m after 5-sets 46m after 6. Sept. 1, 1503.-Return of Vasco de Gama to Lisbon. Vasco de Gama immortalized himself by a discovery of a passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope. Don Emanuel, King of Portugal, sent him to India in the year 1493, upon a voyage of discovery. He first ran down the eastern coast of Africa, and landed in various parts, with intention to make treaties with the chiefs. He also sailed upon the eastern coast of India. On his return, he was made Admiral of the Indian, Persian, and Arabian seas, a title which his descendants preserved to the latest period. Gama sailed on a second voyage on the 10th of February, 1502, and, after having revenged the insults he had received in his first voyage, by destroying the vessels of several barbarous princes, he returned with thirteen ships, richly laden. To distinguish this happy expedition, Don Emanuel built the fort of Bellemo, honoured Gama with the title of Don for himself and his posterity, and created him a Grandee of Portugal. Friday, Sept. 2. St. William, Bishop of Roschild. A.D. 1067. High Water 1m aft 10 Morn-46m after 10 Aftern. Sept. 2, 1666.- Fire of London.-There is a description of this tremendous fire in a rare tract, published in the year 1667, entitled, "Vincent's God's Terrible Voice in the City," which begins as follows: "It was the 2nd of September, 1666, that the anger of the Lord was kindled against London, and the fire began: it began in a baker's house, in Pudding Lane, by Fish Street Hill; and now the Lord is making London like a fiery oven in the time of his anger, and in his wrath doth devour It was in the and swallow up our habitations. depth and dead of the night, when most doors and fences were locked up in the city, that the fire did break forth, and appear abroad like a mighty giant refreshed with wine." Saturday, Sept. 3. St. Vepe, in Cornwall. Sun rises 16m after 5-Sets 43m after 6. Charles Lamb, in his Mirror of the Months, says, "The apple-harvest of the cider counties, takes place this month, and though I must not represent it as very fertile in the elegant and picturesque, let me not neglect to do justice to its produce, as the only one deserving the name of British wines; all other liquors so called being, the reader may rest assured, worse than poisons, in the exact proportion that specious hypocrites are worse than open, bold-faced villains." Sunday, Sept. 4. FOURTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY. Lessons for the Day.-Jeremiah, 5 chapter Morn. Jeremiah, 22 ch. Evening. The first week in September is more often calın on an average than the last of August: hence the well-known proverb "September blows soft till the fruit's in the loft." In an early volume of Black wood's Magazine, we find the following beautiful sonnet, entitledAutumnal Twilight. I stood at sunset on a little hill, O'erhung and garlanded with tall beech trees, The west was clothed in gold and not a breeze Disturbed the scene-all was unearthly still; And pleasant was the air, though somewhat chill, As wont upon a clear September eve. Methought 'twas theu impossible to grieve, For placid thought o'ercame the sense of ill, And a deep Lethe o'er the senses brought. I gazed upon the waters-on the flowersThe sky-the stirless woods-the silent leaves, Flashed back departed boyhood on my thought, And all the joys that theu, loved friend, were ours. Monday, Sept. 5. St. Laurance Justinian, Pat. of Venice, A.D. 455. High Water 7m aft 1 Mor-32m aft 1 After. Sept. 5, 1638.--Born at St. Germain-en-Laye, Louis XIV. King of France, surnamed Dieudonne. A modern historian says that this monarch "Had all common virtues and talents in perfection, without any of those striking and salient attributes which constitute the hero, or in history's eye, the great. There are few mortals to whom a more glorious epitaph might be inscribed; but his career was neither of that astonishing or interest. ing class which claims and wins apotheosis." This day is published, Part 48, with Six Fine Engravings. Also No. 5, of the Scrap Book Illustrations, containing a Series of Splendid Designs to illustrate Sir Walter Scott's St. Valentine's Day and Anne of Geierstein. Illustrated Article. THE FORCE OF CONSCIENCE. AN EPISODE OF REAL LIFE. Jul.-As little by such toys as may be sible, pos But sing it to the tune of light o' love. I am sure, Cleveland, you have been astonished at my silence, and I cannot say that either amusement or occupation has withheld me from performing the chief duty and pleasure of my existence. One entire and absorbing interest has lately taken possession of my whole soul, and drawn, as it were, all my powers into itself. It has been said that love is the business of woman's life-but only an EPISODE in that of man. Though my youth has sobered into manhood, and manhood is gliding imperceptibly into old age, yet one "episode" of my early days has been treasured up with but too faithful a remembrance. Judge then, my chosen VOL. VIII. H See page 117 friend, ny second self in all, except the weakness of my nature, what my feelings must have been some weeks ago, when in a ghastly and attenuated being, who leaned his head languidly on the velvet lining of a splendid landau, as it crept along Pall-mall, I recognized the once handsome and animated BAn uncontrollable impulse led me to remain near the door of the United Service Club, which he was about to enter. His trembling frame was supported at either side, by two footmen as he ascended the steps,-Good God! how painfully altered he appeared!-his cheeks yellow and wrinkled-his teeth were broken and decayed-his eyes, once so brilliant, black and penetrating, darting and catching light, now were sunken and changed both in colour and size, and unmeaningly strayed from object to object. It was only when their dullness rested upon me, that any thing like a feeling of life passed over his countenance-then he paused, pressed the servants' arms with his gloved hands, and raised himself to his full 204 height as he peered into my face, with a wandering, undefined expression of dread and uncertainty. This was the action of a moment, his grasp relaxed, and he proceeded up the staircase, with the same restless and bewildered air. My heart ached within me, at the full tide of recollections that rushed upon it; I literally gasped for breath, and involuntarily hastened towards the Park, eager to escape from the vision that you will readily believe my imagination conjured up at this strange meeting. I walked rapidly onward, as if memory could be obliterated by violence of motion. I had scarcely turned the corner of St. James's, when a powdered menial arrested my steps and politely inquired if my name were not Leyden. I replied in the affirmative, and he requested that I would accompany him back to the United Service Club, as his master wished particularly to see me. I retraced my path, and was shown into a private room, at the upper end of which B- sat, or rather reclined, upon a sofa. On entering I felt a chilliness steal over my frame, as if the atmosphere I breathed was tainted. As I approached, he endeavoured to stand up, but the effort was unavailing, and while extending his hand he buried his face in the cushions that supported him. For many minutes we were both silent, but when he did speak, his delivery was slow and broken, yet he was the first who acquired self-possession enough to articulate. "Years have passed, Mr. Leyden," he commenced, "since we have looked upon each other.-Years, sir, yes, years have passed-years of worldly prosperity of mental anguish-anguish anguish," he repeated, in a low and monotonous voice that sounded like a death wail; "anguish-more than that -years of feelings, that have rendered this bosom," and he struck it with his clenched hand, “a living, an eternal hell!" What could I say, Cleveland? had you seen him at that moment, as I did, you would have forgotten the injuries he heaped upon your friend, in witnessing the misery he endured. You could not have looked upon, and not have pitied him. "Tell me," he continued, reading, doubtless, the softened expression of my countenance, for you must remember how fatally skilled he was in every movement of the human face, as well as in every winding of the human heart, -"tell me, where they have buried her?" Little as I had anticipated such a question, I felt it was one that he ought to ask, and without faltering, replied :— "A small black marble urn, supported on a slight pedestal, in the south corner of Old Windsor church-yard, marks the spot; it is near the vault of her ancestors." "Who," he inquired, “ who raised the tablet ?" "I did." He gazed, Cleveland, as if into my very soul, and then muttered in an under tone, "Black, why made you it of black marble? She was pure as God's own light; I ought to know it best, and I say it; and why did they exclude her from the vault was her flesh less fair than theirs?" After one of those distressing pauses, which come when the mind is too full for utterance, he continued :-" Leyden, you are not changed as I expected; your brow is smoother than mine, though you are an older man, and there is a look of peace inward peace-about you. Strange that, after an absence of twenty years, you were the first of my old acquaintances to meet me,-you, whom I would have most avoided, and yet most wished to see:-there is only one other "There is no other," I interrupted; "her father died broken-hearted within a year after her fatal act was known." Cleveland, I cannot describe to you the shudder that passed through his frame, as I uttered these words; it was a positive convulsion, and, sensible of the hideous effect it produced, he covered his face with his hands, while his limbs quivered as if in mortal agony; when the paroxysm had subsided, I collected myself sufficiently to say, that having communicated the information he seemed so anxious to obtain I would now leave him, sincerely hoping that he might experience a return of the tranquillity he had lost; he raised his eyes to mine, and though they instantly sank to the earth, in that one look there was more of despair, more of hopelessness, than I ever beheld conveyed by human expression; there is something like it in a fine picture I once saw, but cannot remember where, that represented with fearful reality the betrayer of his Saviour flinging back to its purchasers the price of his Master's blood. He then rang the bell, and with forced composure inquired my address; I presented my card, and he bowed with somewhat of his once courtly air, as the servant conducted me to the door. During the remainder of that day, London was to me as a peopled solitude; Full of those feelings, I took my way in solitude and silence to the churchyard, so retired, and, as I have sometimes thought, so picturesque. I stood for a moment by the little white turnstile, looking down that solemn avenue of stately trees, the Thames gliding "At its own sweet will," a broad and polished mirror, reflecting every passing cloud, and numbering the stars as they betokened the coming night. All was deeply, beautifully still; for the occasional shout of noisy children, brought upon the breeze from the sweet village of Datchet, accompanied, at intervals, by the deep bark, or querulous yelping of the household dogs, rendered more intense the silence that succeeded. It was an hour and a place fitted for deep meditation-for self-examination; and (dare I confess it, even to you?) for communion with the invisible spirits that draw nearer to our world, when the bustle and business of life yield to that repose which the soul delights in. I lingered where I had first stayed, until the beams of the early moon silvered the clustering ivy that climbs the church-yard wall: this partial light, while it deepened the dark ness of the avenue, warned me that the night was come, A single beam, like a thread of silver, rested on the urn when I knelt upon her grave. I could hardly distinguish the flowers from the grass; but all was soft and green; and I confess that it afforded me a melancholy pleasure to think that no rank weeds violated the little mound which -But I weary my friend with the recital of feelings, that, if the world knew, they would scoff at, in a man whose hair is grey. I thought I heard an approaching footstep; the little ray vanished; and, looking up, I beheld B- himself, resting against the monument, while his eyes were fixed upon me with an expression I cannot attempt to describe. I started from the grave; but he seized my hand with a strong grasp, and, throwing himself upon the spot I had just quitted, almost dragged me to the earth. "The time is fitting-the place is fitting," he murmured; "bear with me for a little, and you shall know allmore, ay, much more than you anticipate." After the first or second sentence, his manner was calm and collected; but then, his mind was so evidently wound up for the exertion, that a fearful reaction might well have been looked for. "Strange I should meet you here, Leyden; but there is a fate in all things, and a cruel one has been mine! There are those, I know, who disbelieve this; but you shall hear. I need not ask if you remember her, or the anxiety with which I strove to win affections that, at the very time, were comparatively worthless in my eyes. You seem astonished; but so it was. I was not half as eager to possess her, as I was to rival you. You had boasted of your security; you had openly defied me; you had baffled me, in more ways than one; you had preserved your temper, your equanimity in all our differences. In all essential things you were more than my superior; but the peculiar tact that can call forth all the fascinating littlenesses of everyday existence, and mould them to the best advantage, was fatally awarded to me. To mortify you, and show forth my own power as best I might, I resolved to try my success with the innocent Cicely. At first, I trifled in mere, but wicked wantonness, as I had done with others; but gradually I felt her acquiring a powerful ascendancy. Her innocence, her purity, her full and perfect simplicity, and the celestial character of her beauty, which gained instead of losing by more intimate acquaintance, overpowered me. I might well be compared to a second Satan, tempting a second Eve, who dwelt in the paradise of pure and holy imaginings. For a length of time the untaught girl of eighteen baffled the practised libertine of five-and-twenty. But, in the end, a secret marriage, as I called it, gratified my passion, and gave me nothing more to woo for. The rifled flower withered at my touch. Cicely was too holy, too refined, to enchain a wandering profligate. Her silent but visible virtues rose up in judgment against me. Fresh beauties led captive a heart laden with divers lusts; and the being that, but a little month before, I had strained to my throbbing bosom, as if to make it her everlasting restingplace, I now loathed-Yes, Leyden, loathed as if she had been a poisonous serpent! Her voice-Leyden, you remember her voice-its very tones gave me positive pain; her small white hand, when resting on my bosom, felt heavy and cold as lead; and all those little offices of kindness, which woman only can bestow, became absolutely disgusting to me. When, with blushes and many tears, she told me that she must, in time, become a mother, and begged me, for my infant's sake, to confess our marriage, I thrust her from me so rudely, that she fell even at my feet! When again we met, she did not curse, but blessed me! I urged my uncle to procure for me the situation in India, I had once offended him by refusing to accept. He seemed pleased, as he expressed it, 'at my recovering my senses;' and, much sooner than I anticipated, I was informed that my departure was immediately required. I wrote to Cicely, whom, under various pretexts, I had declined to see from time to time, and whom I now sought most particularly to avoid; for, as I said to one of my companions in iniquity, 'I hated scenes.' I enclosed her a sum of money, scathed with the intelligence that she was not my wife; but (wretch that I was !) containing the cold assurance of my friendship and good wishes. This I sent from ship-board, where we were under sailing orders, waiting only for a fair wind. While I was lounging the next evening on deck, and longing for the moment when the sails should fill, and we should go rejoicing over the clear blue waves, a note was presented to me from Cicely, returning my money, containing no word of reproach, but adjuring me, in the most solemn manner, to meet her for five minutes, for the last time. The simple appeal concluded by naming a little creek, where, she said, she waited for me. My spirit revolted at seeing that the note was signed C. B.' I felt irritated that she should presume to use a name to which I had said she was unentitled. You cannot conceive how that small circumstance rankled in my bosom. I had caroused, more than usual, with my shipmates-my brain was fevered and confused-my resolves bewildered and changing. From the deck I could discern the trysting-place, and distinguish the fluttering of a white robe. I determined, at last, not to shrink from a meeting with a woman, and asked the captain if he would lend me a boat, adding, with a bravo's tone, and a bravo's feeling, that an affair of gallantry called me on shore for about an hour. As I rowed towards the creek, the spire of Milton Church stood coldly, and I thought reproachfully, out against the sky, there was nothing else which indicated the proximity of human habitation; for the little town of Gravesend, then only a straggling village, was concealed by a sudden winding of the river. Amid this solitude the fiend was busy with me, and whispered devilish suggestions in my ear. Cicely seemed resolved to retain my name. I felt that she would be an everlasting barrier to my advancement, as I called it: and the affair, if bruited abroad, was almost too serious to receive the applause even of my gayest friends. I believe I was coward enough to dread the resentment of her grey-headed father. I trembled at my own imaginings, and passed my hand across my burning brow, as if to dissipate ideas, which, congregating there, became too strong for my enfeebled brain. My boat touched the strand, and Cicely sprang upon my bosom. God! how I hated her, even when her arms were clasped, with all the intensity of woman's love, around my neck! when, unmindful of the injuries I had heaped upon her innocent head, she covered my hands with kisses, and, crouching at my feet, implored me not to desert her-not to leave her to shame and misery-to the scorn of the scorner-to the bitterness of self-reproach. Her long dark hair clustered over her figure, and her soft eyes were turned upon me-as the dove turns, in its agony, its last gaze upon the vulture that destroys its most sweet life-yet, in that hour, Leyden, I hated with a deadly hatred As he pronounced the last words, my blood run cold. I could neither speak nor move-every power of vitality was paralyzed; and when he recommenced, I listened with swollen veins and straining eye-balls : "I am sure she read my purpose; for she implored that, for the sake of the unborn, I would spare her life. I flung her from me with violence ;-she shuddered; and, exhausted by exertion, fainted at my feet. I gazed upon her pale and beautiful features, which grief had touched, but not destroyed. 'Why,' whispered the ready demon that dwells within the bosom of the wicked, and impels him to destruction -'why should she awaken to the shame and disgrace that must await her? Why should she awaken to mar your fortunes? What |