appear amongst them. I had no access to the house of the Fisher Blust, nor dared, even in my mysterious disguise, once approach, for fear that my reception might not have been of the pleasantest kind. In the first place, I dreaded the unsophisticated bluntness of the honest Peter, and I was well aware that Claribelle was no stranger to my having more than once approached you in this mysterious disguise. I once visited the dwelling of Shelty, it is certain, with a view of gaining some intelligence of the fisher's family, but he eyed me with an air of suspicion and jealousy; although I had indeed previously learned from the old dame that the grief and consternation occasioned in the house of your protector by your loss had reduced it to a mansion of despair: that the sum of five hundred pounds had been offered by Mr. Blust as a reward to any person who could give him any clue to the outrage that had been committed, or discover the place of your retreat:—but your presence, lady, like the radiant sun, will dispel all gloom on the honest brow of the poor fisher, when you shall again appear at Herring Dale, the acknowledged daughter and heiress of the Duke of Braganza!"

"At the former title how anxiously does my bosom beat!" cried Agatha, " for what child would not wish to be acknowledged by a father? but for the latter I have no vain ambition-except to exalt those to whom I owe eternal gratitude and thanks. Among that number, Paulo Michello, your name will not be forgotten for to you alone am I indebted for deliverance from the snares of my cruel grandmother. Yes, it was necessary that my friends should sustain this heavy trial of their feelings by my supposed loss, and that I

myself should suffer present to avoid future evils. Alas, how unjustly do we accuse Providence for its dispensations towards us, when even misfortunes and calami.ties, (seemingly so) are but blessings in disguise :and how wisely is the book closed that would otherwise reveal this knowledge to our view!"

"And were it open, might mortal eye behold it, Lady-alas, could we read with judgment and understanding what it unfolds ?" cried Paulo; "it is withdrawn for purposes wise and sacred-unsearchable, but always just!"

As night had imperceptibly advanced during this long conference, and Beda had more than once appeared, to remind her mistress of the lateness of the hour, Paulo respectfully retired, and left Agatha to enjoy a repose more sweet and tranquil than she had ever yet known! in which, if the image of Lord Montague Montault once intruded, to what are we to attach blame? -certainly not to the pure and faultless bosom of our lovely heroine, for she was innocent as far as innocence can extend to mortal frailty!

Well then, who was in fault?—perhaps Paulo-but more likely Nature herself, who first implanted this sweetest of all human sensations in the breast, and without which existence would be deprived of the charm which binds us to it!

CHAPTER XXXVI.

-And here was youth and here was beauty,

Nipt like an April flower, that

Opens its leaves to the sunshine,

While the breath of the east prevails."

WHILE balmy slumbers seal the eyes, and the guardian angel that presides over truth and innocence visits the repose of our beauteous heroine, while all is hushed to silence in the mouldering ruins of the old Abbey, save the moping owl, that doth to the moon complain,' we will endeavour to wing our flight somewhat beyond the precincts of this gloomy pile, and, skimming like the fairy elves that sport upon the glassy stream by Luna's silver ray, launch our adventurous bark again upon the bosom of the ocean, that sweeps, in its course, towards the cliffs of Cromer; where in due season we shall enter the habitation of Peter Blust, and inquire what has been passing at Herring Dale since the so deeply-regretted and deplored loss of Agatha Singleton.

Why, gentle readers, I dare say that you are as anxious as I am to come to the elucidation of a tale which has so long remained wrapt up in profound mystery,—and thus, therefore, commanded by the Fates, I unfold it.

On the evening that Agatha quitted the house of

her protector, the benevolent, honest fisher, accompanied by her dear Wolf, she left both Jessy and Olive Blust in the supposition (for who could doubt it) that she was going to visit her illustrious tenant at the Cottage on the Cliff, by whose artful and insidiously contrived note she was led to imagine that matters of serious communication awaited her arrival there.

How Agatha bore the disappointment of her cherished hopes that such might be the case, and how she was disposed of on that eventful evening, you well know; and being marvellously fond of preserving one at least of King Charles's golden rules, namely, of not repeating old grievances-I am not going to tell you of what you have heard before, but beg you to picture to yourself the thousand restless thoughts, tender fears, and dreadful apprehensions, which filled the bosom of the affectionate Jessy, when the passing hours stole on to an unusual length and neither Agatha or the fisher had yet returned.

Jessy and Olive had seated themselves at a little table after the departure of Agatha; Jessy took up her work, Olive took up her lap-dog (little Silvia,) and Alfred took up a book; and the first that broke silence was the impatient Olive, who, tired of caressing even what she most loved, exclaimed in a pettish tone:

"Lord, Jessy, why don't you say something? I protest this is worse than being at a quaker's meeting, for there the spirit moves somebody to speak at last but here we are all mumchance only because Miss Singleton happens to be gone out, as if nobody was worth the talking to but her."

"I was thinking of Miss Singleton at that moment, Olive," cried Jessy, throwing down her work.

"And so was I too, Miss Jessy," said Alfred, flinging down his book.

"And it appears that you have been both studying her airs and her graces :" retorted Olive.

"Would to Heaven that I could acquire half the graces of Agatha Singleton," said Jessy, "the study would be well worth my pains."

"Grace is in all her steps, Heaven in her eye!' I have marked that page down in the book that I have just been reading," exclaimed Alfred, and smiled.

"Grace is in a fiddlestick's end,' as father says," replied Olive, with an envious and malignant sneer; "but to be sure every body must be thinking of Miss Singleton I suppose, and nobody is to think of any one else without being called to account about it; for my part, I am sick of her very name, for one can hear nothing else but Miss Singleton all over the house!— There's father, the first word he says when he comes down stairs of a morning is—' where's Agatha Singleton?' and there's Jessy, as soon as the tea is popt into the pot, 'dear me, where is Miss Singleton?' then there is that prating Wolf, bawling out for her at one door, and Alfred at another, till one is perfectly dinned with their noise, not to say that David and Alice are keeping up the same game in the kitchen, all about Miss Singleton."

To these observations, so unkind and illiberal, Jessy only replied :

"One cannot be too anxious about an object that one loves."

"And who is so worthy of being beloved?" pursued Alfred.

Olive was just about to vent some more of her splenetic humour, had not the ertrance of Claribelle with