nounced this determination to the baronet and his nephew. The latter barely communicated the fact, and pointed out the necessary preparations for joining his regiment. To his brother, Richard was more diffuse and circuitous. He coincided with him in the most flattering manner in the propriety of his son's seeing a little more of the world, and was even humble in expressions of gratitude for his proposed assistance; was, however, deeply concerned that it was now unfortunately, not in Edward's power exactly to comply with the plan which had been chalked out by his best friend and benefactor. He himself had thought with pain on the boy's inactivity, at an age when all his ancestors had borne arms; even royalty itself had deigned to inquire whether young Waverley was not now in Flanders, at an age when his grandfather was already bleeding for his king, in the great civil war. This was accompanied by an offer of a troop of horse. What could he do? There was no time to consult his brother's inclinations, even if he could have conceived there might be objections on his part to his nephew's following the glorious career of his predecessors. And in short, that Edward was now (the intermediate steps of cornet and lieutenant being overleapt with great agility) Captain Waverley, of the

regiment of dragoons, which he must join in their quarters at D— in Scotland, in the course

of a month.

Sir Everard Waverley received this intimation, with a mixture of feelings. At the period of the Hanoverian accession he had withdrawn from parliament, and his conduct in the memorable year 1715, had not been altogether unsuspected. There were reports of private musters of tenants and horses in Waverley Chase by moon-light, and of cases of carbines and pistols purchased in Holland, and addressed to the baronet, but intercepted by the vigilance of a riding officer of the excise, who was afterwards tossed in a blanket on a moonless night, by an association of

stout yeoman, for his officiousness. Nay, it was even said that at the arrest of Sir W—W— the leader of the tory party, a letter from Sir Everard was found in the pocket of his night-gown. But there was no overt act to be founded on, and government, contented with suppressing the insurrection of 1715, felt it neither prudent nor safe to push their vengeance farther than against those who actually took up arms. Nor did Sir Everard's apprehensions of personal consequences seem to correspond with the reports spread among his whig neighbours. It was well known that he supplied with money several of the distressed Northumbrians and Scotchmen, who, after being made prisoners at Preston in Lancashire, were imprisoned in Newgate and the Marshalsea, and it was his solicitor and ordinary counsel who conducted the defence of some of these unfortunate gentlemen at their trial. It was generally supposed, that had ministers possessed any real proof of Sir Everard's accession to the rebellion, he either would not have ventured thus to brave the existing government, or at least would not have done so with impunity. The feelings, however, which then dictated his proceedings, were those of a young man, and at an agitating period. Since that time Sir Everard's jacobitism had been gradually decaying, like a fire which burns out for want of fuel. His tory and highchurch principles were kept up by some occasional exercise at elections and quarter sessions; but these respecting hereditary right were fallen into a sort of abeyance. Yet it jarred severely upon his feelings, that his nephew should go into the army under the Brunswick dynasty; and the more so, as independent of his high and conscientious ideas of paternal authority, it was impossible, or at least highly imprudent, to interfere authoritatively to prevent it. This suppressed vexation gave rise to many poohs and pshaws, which were placed to the account of an incipient fit of gout, until, having sent for the Army List,

the worthy baronet consoled himself with reckoning the descendants of the houses of genuine loyalty, Mordaunts, Granvilles, and Stanleys, whose names were to be found in that military record; and calling up all his feelings of family grandeur and warlike glory, he concluded, with logic something like Falstaff's, that when war was at hand, although it were shame to be on any side but one, it were worse shame to be idle than to be on the worst side, though blacker than rebellion could make it. As for Aunt Rachael, her scheme had not exactly terminated according to her wishes, but she was under the necessity of submitting to circumstances; and her mortification was diverted by the employment she found in fitting her nephew for the campaign, and greatly consoled by the prospect of beholding him blaze in complete uniform.

Edward Waverley himself received with animated and undefined surprise this most unexpected intelligence. It was, as a fine old poem expresses it, "like a fire to heather set," that covers a solitary hill with smoke, and illumines it at the same time with dusky fire. His tutor, or, I should say, Mr. Pembroke, for he scarce assumed the name of tutor, picked up about Edward's room some fragments of irregular verse, which he appeared to have composed under the influence of the agitating feelings occasioned by this sudden page being turned up to him in the book of life. The doctor, who was a believer in all poetry which was composed by his friends, and written out in fair straight lines, with a capital at the beginning of each, communicated this treasure to Aunt Rachael, who, with her spectacles dimmed with tears, transferred them to her common place book, among choice receipts for cookery and medicine, favourite texts and portions from high-church divines, and a few songs, amatory and Jacobitical, which she had carolled in her younger days, from whence they were extracted when the volume itself, with other authentic records of the Waverley family, were exposed

to the inspection of the unworthy editor of this memorable history. If they afford the reader no higher amusement, they will serve at least, better than narrative of any kind, to acquaint him with the wild and irregular spirit of our hero.

Late, when the Autumn evening fell
On Mirkwood-Mere's romantic dell,
The lake return'd in chasten'd gleam,
The purple cloud, the golden beam:
Reflected in the crystal pool,

Headland and bank lay fair and cool;
The weather-tinted rock and tower,
Each drooping tree, each fairy flower,
So true, so soft, the mirror gave
As if there lay beneath the wave,
Secure from trouble, toil, and care,
A world than earthly world more fair.
But distant winds began to wake,
And rous'd the genius of the Lake!
He heard the groaning of the oak,
And donn'd at once his sable cloak,
As warrior at the battle cry,
Invests him with his panoply:
Then as the whirlwind nearer press'd,
He 'gan to shake his foamy crest

O'er furrow'd brow and blacken'd cheek,
And bade his surge in thunder speak.
In wild and broken eddies whirl'd,
Flitted that fond ideal world,

And to the shore in tumult tost,
The realms of fairy bliss were lost.

Yet, with a stern delight and strange,

I saw the spirit-stirring change.

As warr'd the wind with wave and wood,
Upon the ruin'd tower I stood,

And felt my heart more strongly bound,
Responsive to the lofty sound,
While, joying in the mighty roar,
I mourn'd that tranquil scene no more.
So, on the idle dreams of youth,
Breaks the loud trumpet call of truth;
Bids each fair vision pass away,
Like landscape on the lake that lay,
As fair as flitting, and as frail,
As that which fled the autumn gale-
For ever dead to Fancy's eye
Be each gay form that glided by,

While dreams of love and lady's charms
Give place to honour and to arms!

In sober prose, as perhaps these verses intimate less decidedly, the transient idea of Miss Cæcilia Stubbs passed from Captain Waverley's heart amid the turmoils which his new destinies excited. She appeared indeed in full splendour in her father's pew upon the Sunday when he attended service for the last time at the old parish church, upon which occasion, at the request of his uncle and Aunt Rachael, he was induced (nothing loth, if the truth must be told) to present himself in full uniform.

There is no better antidote against entertaining too high an opinion of others, than having an excellent one of ourselves at the very same time. Miss Stubbs had indeed summoned up every assistance which art could afford to beauty; but alas! hoop, patches, frizzled locks, and a new mantua of genuine French silk, were lost upon a young officer of dragoons, who wore for the first time his gold-laced hat, boots, and broadsword. I know not whether, like the champion of an old ballad,

His heart was all on honour bent,
He could not stoop to love;
No lady in the land had power
His frozen heart to move;

or whether the deep and flaming bars of embroidered gold, which now fenced his breast, defied the artillery of Cæcilia's eyes, but every arrow was launched at him in vain.

Yet did I mark where Cupid's shaft did light:
It lighted not on little western flower,
But on a yeoman, flower of all the west,
Hight Jonas Culbertfield, the steward's son.

Craving pardon for my heroics, (which I am unable in certain cases to resist giving way to,) it is a melancholy fact, that my history must here take leave of the fair Cæcilia, who like many a daughter of Eve,