look at, except two cross faces in a looking- Discontentedly enough, though from very glass." different causes, the Johnsons left the gay

"Oh, of course not! and nothing particu- scene; which, whatever it might have been lar in the glass, I dare say?"

"No, except that it's very smart-too smart for a wise man's pocket, I should think."

"Well, really! But it is just what one might have expected, though it's very hurtful to one's feelings, for all that."

to others, had been to them one of unmitigated annoyance and vexation; and Mr. Matthews, returning to the supper-room after handing Mrs. Johnson to her seat in the fly, uttered an exclamation of most heartfelt relief.

"What's hurtful, Madge? and what's just All the evening through the presence of what might have been expected? If any- the whole family had oppressed him like an thing's wrong, why the deuce dont you speak incubus; and now that they were fairly out, and not keep on beating about the bush gone, he breathed freely, as if relieved from in this way? You've gone on enough to- an intolerable weight. night to make a man say what he should'nt." "Have I?"

"Yes; but now do let's have an end of it, and speak straight out. What's the matter?" "Oh, nothing, if you don't think so." "Very well; then there's no occasion to hear any more about it; there's been enough said about nothing, in all conscience."

The next morning Robert Ingram, who had observed the night before that something was wrong with his papa and mama-in-law elect, but without, of course, having the faintest idea of what it was, called upon them to make all dutiful inquiries. By the gentleman he was received more briefly than courteously; for he and his wife had been tormenting each other all the morning with

"I dare say you think so," replied the angry lady; "but I don't suppose Mary a most unamiable perseverance; and two or

will."

"Only that your friend, Mr. Matthews,

three hours' incessant recrimination seldom

operates pacifically upon the blandest tem

per.

"And so you stayed after we came away, has bought the looking-glass you promised I suppose, muttered Mr. Johnson to his her, and she has lost it-that's all."

visitor.

"How do you know?-'tis n't likely.- sham!" Fifty-five pounds! The man would never be such an idiot!"

"You hadn't had enough of the

"Oh there was some capital fun after you left, and some desperate mischief too. About "Idiot? A very lucky one, I think. Why a dozen fellows got speechifying in that the shopman told me himself there was not such card-room; and in the very thick of it, old another glass in London; and to think of Benson-you know 'Bachelor Ben', that rich poor Mary losing it, all because you would'nt let me buy it at once? I declare I could cry with vexation."

old screw in Cornhill?-went in to fetch his nephew, who was kicking up a furious row, when, somehow or other, he pushed his way "Don't you be an idiot, too, Mrs. Johnson, rather too authoritatively through the crowd, like this hand-over-head fellow here. If that who, in return, gently turned him round glass is gone, there are plenty more as good and round like a teetotum, until, unluckily, to be had in London for the paying for. And he or they made one twist too many, and if there are not, folks who haven't their turned him through the looking-glass at the pockets always running over with money end of the room.

must look for disappointments sometimes. "No! What, through that spicy fifty-five Fifty-five pounds for a glass! muttered the pound glass!" exclaimed Mr. Johnson, now old man to himself; "and the spoons and thoroughly restored to good humour by the gimcracks at supper plated! The man's news. a fool! A 'dash' indeed-he shan't dash with my money though, after this account is closed, I can tell him."

"Yes; and a thorough smash they made of it. It was a desperately provoking thing for Matthews, I must say; for I don't suppose

any of the men who helped in the row could hold it over for that time, or renew it in due afford to pay for the damage; and Benson form? With best compliments to the belles made it pretty well understood that he of last night, believe me, Dear Sir, Yours very truly,

wouldn't."

“I don't think he will even if he could, which I am not quite so certain about." "Why! Is he to be at the loss of other people's rioting?"

"W. MATTHEWS." The writer of this very nonchalent epistle was out when his creditor arrived to answer

it in person; but returned earlier than he had perhaps intended, since the first glimpse of that gentleman's countenance assured the debtor that the present was anything but one of Mr. Johnson's "soft moments."

subject of his letter, overpowering his visitor with inquiries and compliments; but at last, finding his creditor sullen and impracticable, he dashed boldly into the matter, saying, with an air of candour

For a long time the young man persisted "I don't know, unless he's under any in talking on matters unconnected with the obligation to the old fellow; and a few words that were said in the clamour sounded very much like it. At any rate, Matthews was wonderfully careful to assure him how perfectly he exonerated him from all blame." "Hum!" said the grocer suspiciously; "when you have done talking to the ladies, Ingram, I want a word with you in the counting-house."

Half an hour after, while passing the door of the sanctum, which happened to stand ajar, the sandal of Mrs. Johnson's shoe fell down; and, while retying it, she heard the following scraps of a conversation between her husband and his visitor.

"Well, that's all right; and now, perhaps, you won't mind telling me if Matthews took up his acceptance regularly?"

"No, not exactly. He paid the odd fifty, and talked over the Governor into renewing

for the rest at six weeks."

There was a gloomy look upon Mr. Johnson's countenance the whole of that afternoon; and when, towards the evening, a messenger brought him a letter, which he read with every mark of displeasure, his wife was not surprised to hear from the foreman that his master was gone out on business, and that she was not to wait tea for him.

Glancing over the letter which thus cost Mr. Johnson his favourite meal, we read, as well as the jolting of the omnibus will allow, the following words :

"MY DEAR SIR,

"I'm afraid you're very angry with me about this business, Johnson; though 'pon my life you can't be half so much annoyed as I am. But there's no foreseeing everything, you know. Yesterday I was as sure of meeting the bill as I am sure of being alive at this moment; and now to-day—”

"Well, and what to-day?" said Mr. Johnson coldly, seeing that he paused. "You know I told you when I received the bill that I never took up any man's acceptance; and

I- ""

"Yes, yes," interrupted Mr. Matthews, hastily; "that's all right; I know that; but circumstances alter cases sometimes. And this affair last night-I suppose you heard of it? Infernally provoking-was it not ?" "What, the party?”

Oh, no, no; not that, my dear Johnson. How could you think of such a thing? I was delighted to see my friends. Society is my delight-my existence."

"And a pretty expensive one you must find it, if you always exist at such a rate as you did yesterday.

"Yes; it does cost one something certainly; but then, besides the pleasure, there's the advantage to one's connexion. It's quite necessary, in these go-a-head times, to keep

"I regret to say that a sudden and up appearances like one's neighbours." most unexpected loss will prevent my taking

up my bill to-morrow, as I had fully expect-But keeping up appearances isn't mine. "Hum! Well, every man to his taste. ed to do. I shall, however, be prepared to

meet it in three weeks or a month. Will Yet this has not much to do with my business, you, therefore, oblige me so far as either to I suppose; for as you're not a ready-money

customer, I find, I don't suppose yesterday seem to me that I shall get on very well with touched your pocket much. That's a delight those who do, I think the sooner you and I to come." close this bill affair the better. I paid your "Ha! ha! you're a wit, Johnson. But acceptance away more than a fortnight ago didn't you hear of the accident which hap- to Mr. Edward Benson, tea-broker, of Cornpened after you and the steady-going folks took hill; and he will, of course, present it at their departure?" Masterman's to-morrow. If they're obliged

"What, the looking-glass smash !"

to answer, 'no effects,' you know the conse"Yes: : a pretty thing wasn't it? A hun-quence. I'm sorry for it; but I can't help dred-guinea mirror broken by a set of fellows you." that I can't ask to pay a farthing."

"A hundred guineas! Why it was but fifty-five three weeks ago; and dear enough| I thought it then. But prices rise wonderfully sometimes."

And taking up his hat without further parley, Mr. Johnson walked out of the west end counting house.

Three months after there might have been seen in the London Gazette, amongst the "Fifty-five, was it? Well, perhaps so; bankrupts, the following lines:“ William all the better for me," replied Matthews, Matthews, grocer and tea-dealer, South Audsomewhat disconcerted by the speech, ley Street," &c., &c.

"though that's bad enough."

On tracing back events to their source, it 'Quite. Well, you must do without a was easily found that the broken mirror, inglass for the future. Look enough at your volving, as it did, the dishonouring of Mr. face up stairs in the morning to last all day." Johnson's bill, and consequent exposure of "Ha, ha, so I must, so I must. Indeed I Matthews' affairs to the holder (a very large do not think, all things considered, that I creditor), had been the active, if not actually should have kept the mirror after all. It the primary, cause of his ruin. His favorite maxim of "keeping up appearances wasn't quite to my taste, handsome as it was. The frame was rather too wide; and I didn't cost him credit, business, and reputation. altogether like that cupid at the top-rather out of proportion, I fancy-but it did very well for the occasion."

"Very. And as you don't mean to have another, I can't see what the breakage has to do with my bill."

"But it has everything. I shall be obliged to pay for the glass to-morrow; for the man said he had a customer, and

"A customer for your glass?" "It wasn't exactly mine; at least I hadn't bought it out and out. only hired it for the evening."

"Hired it! Why man, is this the way you spend your money? No wonder you can't meet your bills, and want 'em renewed. This is keeping up appearances, with a vengeance."

66

But, my dear sir, you look at the matter in a wrong light. Everybody who lives in the world is compelled to do things in a certain way—to have recourse occasionally to such means of ""

"Humbugging. Well, thank goodness! I don't live in the world. And as it don't

" had

The last time Matthews was heard of he was keeping a handy-store at the “ "Diggins;" and, judging from appearances, not thriving much better than in England.

ANNIE LIVINGSTONE.

Nor far from the straggling village of Nethan Foot, in Clydesdale, stood, many years ago, a small cottage inhabited by a widow and her two daughters. Their poverty and misfortunes secured for them a certain degree of interest among their neighbours: but the peculiarities of the widow prevented much intercourse between the family and the inhabitants of the district.

In her youth "daft Jeanie," as she was style in the village, had been the belle of Nethan Foot; but by her coquetry and love of admiration, she had excited great jealousy among the girls of the country side; and her success in securing the handsomest lad in the place as her husband had not tended to

increase her popularity. Those days, how-to dread from "daft Jeanie." The peculiar ever, had long passed away. A terrible temper and disposition of her girlhood subcalamity had befallen her; and one single night had deprived her at once of home and husband. A sudden flood, or "spate," of the river had inundated their cottage; and, in their endeavours to save the wreck of their furniture from destruction, her husband had lost his life, and her eldest daughter received such injuries as to leave her a helpless cripple for the rest of her days.

Jeanie, never very strong-minded, broke down completely under these accumulated misfortunes; and though her bodily health was restored after the fever which followed, she rose up from her sick-bed an idiot, or rather what is called in Scotland "daft" that peculiar state of mind between idiocy and mania.

The charity of a neighboring proprietor gave her a cottage rent free, and the Nethan Foot people gave what help they could in furnishing it, but they were themselves too poor to do more, so that the whole support of her helpless mother and sister devolved on Annie Livingstone, the younger daughter, a handsome girl of fifteen years of age.

sisted still, and no longer kept in check by intellect, displayed themselves in a thousand vagaries, which rendered her the laughingstock of the village, and caused bitter mortification to her daughters. Once or twice Annie had ventured to interfere with her mother's modes of proceeding; but instead of doing good by her endeavours, she not only brought upon herself reproaches, curses, even blows, but by exciting the revengeful cunning of madness, occasioned the perpetration of malicious tricks, which greatly added to her previous annoyances.

It was wonderful that in such circumstances the young girl contrived to keep her temper and good spirits; but she was wellprincipled and strong-minded, and, as she sometimes said when the neighbours pitied her for what she had to bear—“Eh, woman! but the back is made for the burden; and He that has seen fit to gie me heavy trials has gi'en me also a stout heart and braid shouthers to bear them. And better than all, He has given me my ain dear Mair'n to be a help in all my difficulties."

"A help, lassie? A hindrance you mean." "No, woman, a help. Gude kens my spirit would fail me out and out if I had na Mair'n to keep me up-to read to me out of the Lord's book-for you ken I am no a great scollard mysel'-and to learn me bonnie psalms and hymns to sing when I am dowie (disheartened)."

It is only by living among the peasantry of Scotland that we learn fully to appreciate the warm heart and heroic self-sacrifices which are often concealed under their calm exterior and apparent coldness of manner; and no one acquainted with her previous history could have guessed that Annie Livingstone, the blythest hay-maker, the The picture displayed by these simple best reaper, the hardest worker in the field words was a touching one; but much more or house, the most smiling, cheerful, and touching was the reality of Annie's devotion best conducted-girl in the valley of the to Marian. When her day's labour was Nethan, had home sorrows which fell over, she hurried back to her povertyto the lot of few in this world. Day stricken home; and having swept out and after day she had to leave her bed- dusted the kitchen, and set on the kettle for ridden sister alone and unattended to seek a tea-an indulgence which she laboured hard scanty means of subsistence for the family to afford the invalid-she would creep up in out-of-doors labour; while more than the ladder-like stair to the loft, which was half of her hours of rest and refreshment her sister's sleeping chamber, and, wrapwere occupied in running down to the cot-ping her in an old shawl, would carry her tage to see that Marian required nothing, carefully down stairs, place her in her own that her mother had remembered to make peculiar chair, and wait upon her with the the porridge, or having done so, had given tenderness of a sister and the watchfulness Marian her share instead of devouring it all of a slave. herself. But a want of care of her helpless daughter was not the only thing Annie had

When tea was over, the open Bible was laid on the table; a splinter of the clear

That

cannel coal of the country, which the very But a time came when what had hit
poor of the district frequently use instead been Annie's greatest pleasure, was put
of candles, was set on the upper bar of the competition with one far greater; when the
grate; and by its flickering light the two heart that had lavished so much affection on
sisters would spend the evening together, her crippled sister, and had stood steady
the younger employed in darning and in filial duty to a selfish and lunatic mother,
patching their well-worn garments, the elder was subjected to a trying ordeal.

Marian

in reading to her from the holy volume. One eventful year, when an early spring
Meanwhile "daft Jeanie" would wander in and intensely hot summer had caused the
and out, backwards and forwards, sometimes corn-fields of Blinkbonnie to ripen with such
amusing herself with playing spiteful tricks unheard of rapidity, that the Irish reapers
on Annie-to whom as years went by she had not yet made their appearance in the
seemed to take a strange antipathy-some- neighbourhood, it was announced through-
times sitting cowered up on the hearth, out the vale of the Nethan, that if every man,
maundering and moaning, and, in spite of woman, and child in the district, did not aid
their efforts to the contrary, producing the in getting in the harvest, half the crop
most depressing effect upon her daughters' would be lost. Now, as David Caldwell, the
spirits. At such times it was useless to try tenant of Blink bonnie farm, was
to induce her to go to bed; her natural per- favourite in the neighbourhood, everybody
a great
versity seemed to find pleasure in refusing to who could handle a sickle responded to his
do so, till Annie, worn out by her day's appeal, and made quite a "ploy" (féte) of
work, was ready to fall asleep in her chair, going to shear at Blinkbonnie.
and was yet unable to go to bed till she had Livingstone had been so great a sufferer
seen her mother safely in her's.
that season, that Annie had given up farm-
In spite of these disadvantages, however, labour for "sewing-work," as she called
Annie grew up a handsome, cheerful girl, re- embroidery, that she might be more at home
spected by all who knew her, and dearly loved with her sister, and secure a larger income;
by those who were intimate with her. But but sedentary employments were so repug-
she had very few intimates. She had no nant to her naturally active habits, that she
leisure to waste in idle gossip; she could rejoiced at the necessity which forced her to
not spend an evening hour in rambling by join the reapers, for David Caldwell himself
the sparkling Nethan water, or by the banks had asked her to come, and he and his
of the stately Clyde; no one ever found her family had been too steadily kind to Marian
loitering in the hay-field after the sun went for her to refuse such a request, even had
down; no one ever met her at a kirn (har- she wished it. But she did not wish it;
vest-home) or other rural gaiety: and even and she was among the first of the reapers
"Saturday at e'en" she would hurry who appeared at the farm.

on

home to Marian rather than join the group Blinkbonnie was, as its name suggests, a
of merry lads and lassies gathered round very pretty place. Situated on a slope of a
the village well. Marian was her one en- gentle hill that faced the south, it was the
grossing thought-to be with her, was her earliest farm in that part of Clydesdale; and
greatest happiness; and no holiday pleasure as the. winding river bathed the foot of the
could in her eyes equal the delight she felt hill, and the woods of Craignethan clothed
when on a summer Sabbath afternoon, she the opposite bank, it was also a favourite re-
carried her helpless charge in her arms to sort of the young people of the neighbour-
the top of Dykiebutt's field, and let her look hood, who found a drink of May Caldwell's
at the trees, the skies, and the rushing water, buttermilk, or a bite of her peas-meal scones
listen to the song of the lark as it fluttered a very pleasant conclusion to their evening,
in the blue ether above them, or to the strolls. In short, Blinkbonnie was as popular
mavis singing in the old apple tree that a place as the Caldwells were popular people,
hung its branches so temptingly over the and everybody did their utmost to get in
orchard wall.
the corn quickly. As we have said, Annie

ILLIAR

RADY