suspicion, when he expected him to seize the sceptre immediately upon the death of Charles convinced, that when he had usurped that sceptre, he was entirely justified in wresting it from the vile faction, which was plunging England into misery and madness; perceiving that he had in all things used his acquired power with wisdom, justice, and moderation, for the present welfare and the future glory of his people,-Ardenne, we say, had rushed perhaps too hastily to the conclusion, that Cromwell had acted in all things, and from the first, on motives purely patriotic. In any case he responded to Cromwell's cheerful mood; and amid pleasant memories of those past evils which it is often pleasurable to contemplate when we are safe and happy, and amid high anticipations for the future, the hours wore onward; and midnight was announced from many a steeple, and yet that friendly conclave thought not of separation.

At that dead hour of the night a guarded step was heard without the door, and an attendant, entering, called out the Lady Cromwell.

After an absence of some small duration she returned, far paler than before, and with the

traces of fresh tears upon her cheek; and whispered Lady Falconbridge, who in turn left the chamber for a while, and coming back again called out her sister.

It was most strange, that although this dumb show continued for so long a time that Ardenne, and even the blind poet, perceived that something must be seriously amiss, Cromwell did not notice it. He was, however, so much reinvigorated—his spirits had so wondrously regained their elasticity—that he talked on, and smiled, and even jested, until so deep a gloom had fallen on his auditors, infected by the evident and hopeless sorrow, engraved in characters so legible upon the wobegone and pallid face of Lady Cromwell, that he could not continue longer in his happy ignorance.

"Ha!—what is this?" he cried, looking around from face to face in blank bewilderment-"What is to do? speak out-I say"-he gasped-his voice, which had but lately been so strong, now scarcely audible-"Ardenne, speak out-you never have deceived me."

And then, before he could receive an answer, had it been possible for Edgar to have answered, as his eye met his wife's "I see," he said

"I see”-in tones resigned, but inexpressibly sad and heart-broken. "Elizabeth is dead! my daughter, oh my daughter!”—

Gradually he sank down from the pillows upon which he had been raised in a half-sitting posture, and though he struggled hard still to maintain his wonted and severe composure, the effort was too great for his enfeebled frame. For a few seconds' space, he was successful; then stretching out his wasted arms, while his teeth chattered in his head, and all his limbs shook as if palsied, and the large scalding tears poured down his hollow cheeks—“ My God,” he cried, " my God, why-why hast thou

forsaken me ?"—

Then pulling the coverlet about his temples, he turned his face to the wall, and burst into an agony of sobs, and groans, and fierce convulsions, that haunted Edgar's ears long after he had quitted the apartment of the bereaved and dying parent.

CHAPTER IV.

Beneath

His fate the moral lurks of destiny;

His day of double victory and death Beheld him win two realms, and (happier !) yield his breath. Childe Harold.

It was the third day of September - the anniversary of Worcester and of Dunbar - the lucky day of Cromwell-the day marked out, as he believed, by planetary influence—the day whereon he never yet had undertaken aught, but he therefrom had reaped a golden harvest ! And it would have appeared indeed, to any who beheld the conflict of the elements that day, that something of great import to the nations was portended;-for, at the earliest dawn, the skies were overspread with a deep lurid crimson, and the sun rose, although there was no mist on the horizon, like a huge ball

of heated metal, dim, rayless, and discoloured; and as he rose, the unchained winds went forth, raving and howling through the skies with such strange fury, as not the oldest men could liken or compare it to aught they had themselves beheld, or heard of from their fathers. The largest trees were uptorn from their earthfast roots, and hurled like straws before the whirlwind; chimneys and turrets toppled and crashed incessantly; cattle were killed in open fields by the mere force of the elements; the seas were strewn with wrecks ; the lands were heaped with ruin.

Nor did these prodigies occur in one realm only, or in one degree of latitude. From north to south, from east to west, the same strange tempest swept over every shore of Europe, and at the selfsame hour, marking its path with desolation. The same blast dashed the vessels of the hardy Norsemen against their steril rocks, and plunged Italian argosies into the vexed depths of the Adriatic-the same blast shivered the pine-tree on the Dofrefells, and the cypress by the blue waves of the Bosphorus !

Thunder, and rain, and hail, and the con