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"There is but one way. Matters have changed since we spoke of it first."

"I would like to know how far they have changed," said Lauderdale. "Colin, take heed to what I say; if it's love I'll no speak a word; I may disapprove a' the circumstances, and find fault with every step ye take; but if it's love——'

"Hush!" said Colin, standing upright, and meeting his friend's eye; "if it should happen to be my future wife we are speaking of, my feelings towards her are not to be discussed with any man in the world." They looked at each other thus for a moment, the one anxious and scrutinizing, the other facing him with blank brightness, and a smile which afforded no information. Perhaps Lauderdale Perhaps Lauderdale understood all that was implied in that blank; at all events, his own delicate sense of honour could not refuse to admit Colin's plea. He turned away, shaking his head, and groaning privately under his breath; while Colin, struck with compunction, having shut himself up for an instant, unfolded again, that crisis being over, with all the happy grace of apology natural to his disposition. "You are not any man in the world,'" he said with a short laugh, which implied emotion. "Forgive me, Lauderdale; and now you know very well what I am going to do."

"Oh ay, I ken what you are going to do; I kent three months ago, for that matter," said the philosopher. "A man acts no from circumstances, as is generally supposed, but from his ain nature." When he had given forth this oracular utterance, Lauderdale went straight off to his room without exchanging another word with Colin. He was satisfied in a way with this mate for his charge, and belonged to too lowly a level of society to give profound importance to the inexpediency of early marriages-and he was fond of Alice, and admired her sweet looks and sweet ways, and respected her self-command and patience; nevertheless, he too sighed, and recognised the departure of the ideal woman, who to him as little as to Colin resembled Alice -and thus it was understood between

To

All this, it may be imagined, was little compatible with that reverential regard for womankind in general which both the friends entertained, and evidenced a security in respect to Alice's inclinations which was not altogether complimentary to her. And yet it was highly complimentary in a sense; for this security arose from their appreciation of the spotless unawakened heart with which they had to deal. If Colin entertained little doubt of being accepted when he made his proposition, it was not because he had an overweening idea of himself, or imagined Alice "in love" with him according to the vulgar expression. A certain chivalrous, primitive sense of righteous and natural necessity was in his confidence. The forlorn maiden, knowing the knight to be honest and true, would accept his protection loyally and simply, without bewildering herself with dreams of choice where no choice was, and having accepted would love and cleave as was her nature. be sure there were types of woman less acquiescent; and we have already said that Alice did not bear the features of the ideal of which Colin had dreamed; but such was the explanation of his confidence. Alice showed little distress when she saw her stepmother's letter except for her father's illness, though even that seemed rather consolatory to her than otherwise, as a proof of his love for Arthur. As for Mrs. Meredith's refusal to interfere on her behalf, she was clearly relieved by the intimation; and things went on as before for another week or two, until Sora Antonia, who had now other tenants arriving and many occupations in hand, began to murmur a little over the watch which she would not relinquish. "Is it thus young ladies are left in England," she asked with a little indignation, "without any one to take care of them except the Signori, who, though amiable and excellent, are only men? or when may Madama be expected from England who is to take charge of the Signorina ?” It was

after this question had been put to

that Colin proposed to Alice, who was beginning to lift her head again like a flower after a storm, and to show symptoms of awakening from the first heaviness of grief, to go out with him and visit those ilex avenues, which had now so many associations for the strangers. She went with a faint sense of pleasure in her heart through the afternoon sunshine, looking wistfully through her black veil at the many cheerful groups on the way, and clinging to Colin's arm when a kind neighbour spoke to her in pity and condolence. She put up her veil when they came to the favourite avenue, where Lauderdale and Colin walked so often. Nothing could be more silent, more cool and secluded than this verdant cloister, where, with the sunshine still blazing everywhere around, the shade and the quiet were equally profound and unbroken. They walked once or twice up and down, remarking now and then upon the curious network of the branches, which, out of reach of the sun, were all bare and stripped of their foliage, and upon the blue blaze of daylight at either opening, where the low arch of dark verdure framed in a space of brilliant Italian sky. Then they both became silent, and grew conscious of it; and it was then, just as Alice for the first time began to remember the privileges and penalties of her womanhood, that Colin spoke,

"I brought you here to speak to you," he said. "I have a great deal to say. That letter that Lauderdale showed you did not vex you, did it? Will you tell me? Arthur made me one of your guardians, and, whatever you may decide upon, that is a sacred bond."

"Yes, oh yes," said Alice, with tears, "I know how kind you both are. No, it did not vex me, except about papa. I was rather glad, if I may say so, that she did not send for me home. It is not -a-home-like what it used to be," said Alice; and then, perhaps because something in Colin's looks had advertised her of what was coming; perhaps because the awakening sense sprung up

change came upon her face.

"I have given you a great deal of trouble," she said; "I am like somebody who has had a terrible fall-as soon as I come to myself I shall go away. It is very wrong of me to detain you here."

"You are not detaining us," said Colin, who, notwithstanding, was a little startled and alarmed; "and you must not talk of going away. Where would you go? Are not we your friendsthe friends you know best in Italy? You must not think of going away."

But even these very words thus repeated acted like an awakening spell upon Alice. "I cannot tell what I have been thinking of," she said. "I suppose it is staying indoors and forgetting everything. I do not seem to know even how long it is. Oh yes, you are my kindest friends. Nobody ever was so good to me; but, then, you are onlygentlemen," said Alice, suddenly withdrawing her hand from Colin's arm, and blushing over all her pallid face. "Ah! I see now how stupid I have been to put off so long. And I am sure I must have detained you here."

"No," said Colin, " do not say so ; but I have something more to say to you. You are too young and too delicate to face the world alone, and your people at home are not going to claim you. I am a poor man now, and I never can be rich, but I would protect you and support you if you would have me. Will you trust me to take care of you, Alice, not for this moment, but always? I think it would be the best thing for us both."

"Mr. Campbell, I don't understand you," said Alice, trembling and casting a glance up at him of wistful surprise and uncertainty. There was an eager, timid inquiry in her eyes besides the bewilderment. She seemed to say, "What is it you mean?" "Is that what you mean?" and Colin answered by taking her hand again and drawing it through his arm.

"Whether you will have me or not," he said, "there is always the bond between us which Arthur has made

same. I think you will see what I mean if you consider it. There is only one way that I can be your true protector and guardian, and that is if you will consent to marry me, Alice. Will you? You know I have nothing to offer you; but I can work for you, and take care of you, and with me you would not be alone."

It was a strange way of putting it, certainly-very different from what Colin had intended to say, strangely different from the love-tale that had glided through his imagination by times since he became a man; but he was very earnest and sincere in what he said, and the innocent girl beside him was no critic in such matters. She trembled more and more, but she leaned upon him and heard him out with anxious attention. When he had ended, there was a pause, during which Colin, who had not hitherto been doubtful, began himself to feel anxious; and then Alice once more gave a wistful, inquiring look at his face.

"Don't be angry with me," she said; "it is so hard to know what to say. If you would tell me one thing quite truly and frankly-Would it not do you a great deal of harm if this was to happen as you say?

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"No," said Colin. When he said the word he could not help remembering, in spite of himself, the change it would make in his young prospects, but the result was only that he repeated his negative with more warmth.

"It can do me only good," said Colin, yielding to the natural temptations of the moment, " and I think I might do something for your happiness too. It is for you to decide do not decide against me, Alice," said the young man; "I cannot part with you now."

"Ah! " said Alice with a long breath. "If it only would not do you any harm," she added a moment after, once more with that inquiring look. The inquiry was one which could be answered but in one way, and Colin was not a man to remain unmoved by the wistful, sweet eyes thus raised

to him, and by the tender dependence of the clinging arm. He set her doubts at rest almost as eloquently, and quite as warmly, as if she had indeed been that woman who had disappeared among the clouds for ever, and led her home to Sora Antonia with a fond care, which was very sweet to the forlorn little maiden, and not irksome by any means to the magnanimous knight. Thus the decisive step was taken in obedience to the necessities of the position, and the arrangements (as Colin had decided upon them) of Providence. When he met Lauderdale and informed him of the new event, the young man looked flushed and happy, as was natural in the circumstances, and disposed of all the objections of prudence with great facility and satisfaction. It was a moonlight night, and Colin and his friend went out to the loggia on the roof of the house, and plunged into a sea of discussion, through which the young lover steered triumphantly the frailest bark of argument that ever held water. But, when the talk was over, and Colin, before he followed Lauderdale downstairs, turned round to take a parting look at the Campagna, which lay under them like a great map in the moonlight, the old apparition looked out once more from the clouds, pale and distant, and again seemed to wave to him a shadowy farewell. "Farewell! farewell! in heaven nor in earth will you ever find me," sighed the woman of Colin's imagi nation, dispersing into thin white mists and specks of clouds; and the young man went to rest with a vague sense of loss in his heart. The sleep of Alice was sweeter than that of Colin on this first night of their betrothal; but at that one period of existence, it often happens that the woman, for once in her life, has the advantage. And thus it was that the event, foreseen by Lauderdale on board the steamer at the beginning of their acquaintance, actually came to pass.

To be continued.

THE CAMBRIDGE "APOSTLES."

BY W. D. CHRISTIE.

A WRITER in the July number of Fraser's Magazine, who has described most of the living Judges of England, has, under a mistake about one of them, introduced an allusion to a Cambridge Society to which, not by itself, the name of "Apostles" has been given. He says of Mr. Justice Blackburn that "he was educated at Eton and Trinity College, where he took a creditable degree in mathematics. His friends thought highly of him, and he was enrolled a member of the club or society called "The Apostles,' which boasts of having worked wonders in the domains of thought and imagination. It may lay claim to a man of genius or two, and several men of talent, as having belonged to the fraternity; but, as regards national thought or progress, its annals might be cut out of the intellectual history of England without being missed."

Mr. Justice Blackburn was eighth wrangler in 1834, and was not a member of the Society to which his name has served as a pretext for this allusion. His abilities are accredited to the world by something stronger than his college honours or the opinion of friends, for there is probably no more remarkable instance of a high appointment given entirely from disinterested conviction of ability and learning than the selection by Lord Campbell, when Lord Chancellor, for the first judgeship he had to give, of Mr. Blackburn, a political opponent, known to him only as member of the bar, and not suggested for promotion by precedence, for he was not a Queen's Counsel, or by popular opinion, for to the general public he was unknown. It so happens, however, that the learned Judge did not belong to the fraternity which, according to this writer, "boasts of having worked

a

imagination," and whose annals, strange to say, though the writer asserts that it has comprised one or two men of genius and several of talent, might yet, he thinks, be "cut out of the intellectual history of England without being missed." The mistake has perhaps originated in a confusion with a younger brother of the Judge, the Professor of Mathematics at Glasgow, who was a member of the Society.

This Society has existed for forty-four years in the University of Cambridge. Its own name is Conversazione Society. It is limited in number to twelve actual members in residence, undergraduates or bachelors of arts. Hence the name of "Apostles," given at first in derision. Thirty years ago, the fame, then already considerable, of one, of whom few would now say that his works, if lost, would not be missed, or that he had not done wonders in the domains of thought and imagination, the fame of Alfred Tennyson, and a band of his friends and contemporaries, all members of the Society, among whom may be named Arthur Hallam, Milnes, Trench, and Alford, had made for the Society in Cambridge a name which has never since departed from it. Poetry was not its sole or special pursuit. In 1834, the actual members had the advantage of the continued presence in Cambridge, and friendly counsel, and familiar companionship, of a large number of college tutors and lecturers, who had taken high University honours, and had already, according to the rules of the Society, become honorary members. Among these were W. H. Thompson, the present Regius Professor of Greek, Blakesley, now a Canon of Canterbury, Charles Merivale, the historian of Rome, G. S. Venables, and Edmund Lushington, the Professor of Greek at Glasgow.

controversy having arisen about the admission of Dissenters to degrees in the Universities, and great fears having been expressed by Mr. Goulburn in the House of Commons, and by Dr. Turton, then Regius Professor of Divinity, in a pamphlet, of mischievous theological controversies among undergraduates, that giant in learning and intellect, Connop Thirlwall-then an assistanttutor of Trinity, soon after made Bishop of St. David's-scouted the alarm with a reference and a tribute to this Society. Addressing Dr. Turton, Mr. Thirlwall said, "If you are not acquainted with the fact, you may be alarmed when I inform you that there has long existed in this place a society of young men, limited indeed in number, but continually receiving new members to supply its vacancies, and selecting them by preference among the youngest, in which all subjects of the highest interest, without any exclusion of those connected with religion, are discussed with the most perfect freedom. But, if this fact is new to you, let me instantly dispel any apprehension it may excite, by assuring you that the members of this Society, for the most part, have been and are among the choicest ornaments of the University, that some are now among the ornaments of the Church, and that, so far from having had their affections embittered, their friendships torn and lacerated, their union has been one rather of brothers than of friends."

Names have been mentioned which may already suggest that this Society might have been spared the remarks by which an anonymous writer, led to mention it by mistake, has accompanied his admissions of praise. "It may lay claim to a man of genius or two, and several men of talent, but, as regards national thought or progress, its annals might be cut out of the intellectual history of England without being missed." Well, genius does not grow on hedgerows, and rare always have been the spirits which are, in Tennyson's words, "full-welling fountain-heads of change," governing national thought and progress.

Among those who, in academic youth,

were members of this Society, are three distinguished living ornaments of the House of Commons, to two of whom it has been given to be members of the Cabinet, or again as Tennyson says,

"To mould a mighty state's decrees

And shape the whisper of the throne,"

and the other of whom is one of our ablest parliamentary orators. The three are Mr. Walpole, Lord Stanley, and Mr. Horsman.

Of a fourth who attained eminence in public life I will speak more at large, for death has closed his distinguished career, and in his last years I had peculiar opportunities of knowing him. The name of Charles Buller, by several resemblances by his wit, by his death at a moment when his fame was culminating and higher political honours had begun to come to him, by many qualities described in Burke's famous eulogy on Charles Townshend-involuntarily recalls to mind that more eminent but less estimable politician. For of Charles Buller it might have been as truly said in the House of Commons, when he had ceased to adorn it, as it was said by Burke of Charles Townshend: "In truth, he was the delight and ornament of this House, and the charm of every private society which he honoured with his presence. Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in any country, a man of a more pointed and finished wit, and of a more refined, exquisite, and penetrating judgment. he had not so great a stock as some have had, who flourished formerly, of knowledge long treasured up, he knew better by far than any man I ever acquainted with, how to bring together within a short time all that was necessary to establish, to illustrate, and to decorate that side of the question he supported. He stated his matter skilfully and powerfully. He particularly excelled in a most luminous explanation and display of his subject. His style of argument was neither trite and vulgar, nor subtle and abstruse. He hit the House just between wind and water." Burke qualified his praise of Towns

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