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a fresh bevy of intruders armed with camp-stools and sketch-books having at that moment made their way across

the flower-beds to get a view of a waterfall that tumbled over the cliff.

CHAPTER II.

Charles Martin sat for some time immersed in the brown study from which Mr Wallop's fiery speeches had only half succeeded in awakening him. The subject for his meditation was an interesting one. Entirely dependent on his uncle, who, in every sense of the word, had supplied a father's place to him, he felt that it was his duty, no less than his interest, to gratify the old gentleman in as far as lay in his power. And as, in spite of the hot temper and occasional odd notions of the senior, the inclinations and sentiments of the uncle and nephew were generally in accord, Charles found it less difficult than might have been supposed to exhibit himself as a pattern to all persons similarly situated, of duty and obedience. In nothing did the two gentlemen scem more in unison than in the admiration they both entertained of the fair and fascinating Jane Lorimer, alluded to in the preceding chap

ter.

The sole daughter of a widow, whose property-beautiful, though small-lay next that of Mr Wallop intimate with each other from childhood, with the intimacy that is unknown to the nearest neighbours in towns and cities, but which only flourishes, like other plants divine, in the ⚫ open air and under the clear eye of heaven, Jane and Charles, like the hero and heroine of some novel, had only made the discovery that they were all the world to each other, when the young gentleman, about two years before this time, had taken leave of her to finish his education by making the grand tour. The first winter in Germany, the second in Rome, had produced no diminution in Charles's attachment the names both of mother and daughter were mentioned as affectionately as ever in his uncle's letters -and it seemed so natural a thing to Charles that Jane Lorimer should be his wife, that it never entered into his calculations that any one-and especially his uncle, who knew her so well --could be of a different opinion. We are not prepared to deny that the party at Elmhurst, as Mrs Lorimer's estate was called, had somewhat similar no

tions of the reasonableness of such an alliance; and as Jane, though quite as beautiful and accomplished as even the prejudices of her lover could represent her, had a stock of good sense not often found in combination with such advantages, she and her mother looked upon the tide of population that overflowed their property with very different feelings from those that agitated the bosom of the romantic Mr Wallop. An income, doubled in a short time, with every prospect of its doubling itself each year, if the rage for dotting all the dells and dingles of Elmhurst with invalidtempting cottages continued as powerfully as it had begun, compensated for the absence of that blest retirement which we have seen the old gentleman valued so highly. Mrs Lorimer had even given up her own cottage, at an enormous rent, to a Londoner of great wealth, till a mansion, which he was building on the estate, should be ready for his reception, and had botaken herself, about three miles down the coast, to a romantic cottage she possessed in a small inlet, to which the housebuilding mania had not yet found its way. This completed the measure of Old Wallop's indignation. A huge tower, which Alderman Swipes had commenced on a hillock near his ra pidly rising house, commanding a view of Mr Wallop's lawn, had lowered the Lorimers to the lowest pitch in his regards; but the fact of their having let their own old mansion to the very Goth who was perpetrating that perpetual trespass on his premises was too bad. He tore both mother and daughter from his heart, and succeeded in persuading himself that he hated them with all his soul. Some sort of suspicion lurked in his mind that there was some matrimonial compact-expressed or understood, between the young people-and out of sheer spite, and to punish the poor girl because a London Alderman had built a gazelio on her laud, he resolved to marry his nephew, without a moment's warning, to somebody else. He had accordingly entered into the agreement he

fashion? Why, they've doubled the look-out; and who can tell but some of these fine quality may be the collector or supervisor himself, you know?" "Whew!"-whistled Charles"that's the trade you meant?"

John Bammel winked very knowingly." There's a tub or two to be had yet, and if you ever wants a little of any thing, and will only”---

"Nonsense, John. I was in hopes you were improved by the lessons you've had before."

alluded to in the conversation we have recorded, with his old friend Mr Fuz by, who was in nearly similar circumstances with regard to his niece; and Old Wallop, in the joy of his heart at so excellent an arrangement, had summoned Charles home, giving him no more particular intimation of his object than that he must be married on his arrival. Who could the partie be except Jane Lorimer? What other girl did he know that his uncle could have engaged him to? The whole thing was as clear as a sign-post, and without a moment's hesitation, he wrote off to say he highly approved of all his uncle had done, and hurried home, from the midst of the Carnival at Venice, to show his submission to his request. We shall not attempt to describe his feelings on hearing how the matter really stood. The first night of his arrival had been spent in mute wonder and despair, and the figure he cut next morning at breakfast we have already seen.

He again took out the letter that had made him so neglectful of his coffee, and read it over from begin ning to end.

"And who the deuce can this free and easy fellow, Mr Slap, be? He writes as if we had been intimate for a century. And who the deuce is John Company? Ha! my good old friend, John Bammel, how are you?" -he continued, stuffing the letter into his pocket, and holding out his hand, "how goes it, old fellow, eh?” "Thank your honour," replied the old man thus addressed, who was habited in the short blue jacket, and high oil-skin boots that form the dress of the half-amphibious natives of that coast. "Hope your honour's well after this long time from home. I've brought you some prawns and lobsters, your honour."

"Why, John," said Charles, "you've turned mighty distant and respectful."

Distant! no, Master Charles, it's you as went to such a distance; and as to my being respectable, it's what I tries to be with all my might; but it are a mighty tough job-jigged if it ain't, though. Trade ain't what it was afore all this company came."

"No! I should have thought it would have been better."

"Lord, Master Charles, how can you shake the wind out o' your sheet in that

"Why, yes, Master Charles, I can't say but it improved me summat for the first six months I had in the big house at Winchester, ye see, I learned shoemaking; 'twas so woundy dull; but that there mill they've got now ain't no go; I had rather take another five years of sea."

"But don't you find serving the quality a better employment, John, than cheating the Queen?"

"Cheating the Queen, bless her little heart! Wouldn't cheat her of a mackerel tail. No, no, there's cheating enough going on in one little place without my taking to it in my old age; jigged if there aint, though."

"Fleecing the visiters-skinning them, eh?"

"Some be main tough in the hide," replied John; "jigged if they ain't, though. A good many lawyers comes down now, ye see, to find bathing, and all that, for their families; so a poor man has no chance of any thing; jigged if them 'tornies, and such like, don't carry off every thing as clean as a whistle."

"So the new comers don't make up for the loss of the old-eh, John?"

John sniggered and laughed. “No, no, sig. Lord! what fun it used to be, to be sure, when you and I and Miss Jane used to go pouting off the High Ledge! Them was days, wasn't 'em, sir?What a hand she had for a nibble!"

Charles looked as unmoved as a Stoic. "You've got the old boat, still?”

"O yes, sir, there she is, sound as ever. I'm going down at high-tide to Shepherd's Cove-promised to carry the ladies some lobsters. Should you like to see if she's much altered, sir?"

"Much altered-Good God!" exclaimed Charles-" is she indeed much changed?"

Improved, if any thing, I thinks, sir," replied John, somewhat surprised

at the deep interest his old play fellow seemed to take in his boat. "She's half a foot widened in the waist, and a good deal spread out at the stern since you saw her. Them big round sterns is certainly the best, after all." "You scoundrel!" burst out Charles, "how dare you--Oh! you mean the boat, do you?-Much improved, is she?—I should like to try her."

"I'm going off in an hour, sir," said John, no little amazed at the change two years had made in young master's manners, but convinced, in spite of all Charles's affected indifference, that the sail to Shepherd's Cove was the pleasantest excursion that could be offered him.

"Captain Slap, sir," said the servant at the door, announcing a stranger, who nearly knocked over the old fisherman as he rushed into the room.

"Got my note, eh?-thought it best to be explicit-get out of the room old Bammel, remember our agreement, and you've another five pound tip."

"I received a letter this morning signed William Slap, and"

"All right; that's me, Bill Slap of John Company's Snapdragons; and the contents of my epistle?"

"I didn't understand a word of it." "Well, there's no great loss in that; for I can explain it all in the filling of a hookah. Here they are, all arrived last night."

"Who?"

"Miss Haggersbagge, Dr Bubb, two waggon-loads of stones, three parrots, a waiting-maid, and a collection of spades and hammers."

"Indeed!" said Charles, looking at his visiter at the same time for some further explanation. That gentle man's visage, which seemed exactly copied, both in colour and shape, from a new copper halfpenny, was illumined with a smile of such prodigious good-humour, and contained such a mixture of open-heartedness along with its impudence, that Charles found it impossible to take offence at the freedom of his address.

"Indeed?" echoed the visiter, "to be sure; but I've set them on their way already."

"They've gone, then? Thank Hea ven!" he added, but not so inaudibly as to escape Captain Slap.

"Give me your hand," exclaimed that gallant gentleman," I see from

your thanking Heaven so religiously that you ought to be delivered from your woes. Here am I-heart and soul in the cause-old Fuzby has told me the whole concern, and the moment I heard of it I sent for old Doughty, of the Swagdenapoonah hussars, who is providentially home in a dying state, and determined to shoot you without delay."

"Oh, you did?" enquired Charles; "really, Captain Slap, you are very"

"Polite. I know it; but you know, in affairs of that kind, ceremony is out of the question. Miss Haggersbagge must be Mrs Slap, or "

"Ah, now I see," cried Charles, and joyfully took the long bony hand that was still held out to him; 66 ; an affair of the heart, eh?"

"By no means," replied the Cap. tain an affair of the liver entirely. You see India doesn't agree with me -hot climate, cold grog, tiffins, labobs, and all that sort of thing- get on the sick list continually, and stop all sorts of promotion. Now, this Phronsay Haggers is a very nice girl-knew her well, and liked her a great deal better, before old Bagge the attorney died and left her his name and fortune. And also, my leave is out in three months, and about an inch of liver left; so you see it is absolutely necessary that I marry her without delay." "But how?"

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"Oh, the usual way. I hate elopements; it's not respectable for a country gentleman; and as she has a very good estate in Warwickshire, I consider myself a landed proprietor of some consequence, and conduct myself with dignity and decorum accordingly. No-we shall trouble old mother church, by way of setting a good example to our numerous offspring."

Then am I to consider it quite settled that you are engaged to this young lady?"

"As far as human perseverance can insure any thing-I am a capital shot, and "

"But have you the lady's consent?" "How can I, my dear fellow, when I tell you old Fuzby says she has given her consent to you, or rather to your uncle on your behalf?"

Charles looked somewhat puzzled at these contradictory pieces of information" Then, in Heaven's name," he said, "what do you mean to do?"

"Oh leave that to me,-another voyage in prospect is a mighty sharpener of the wits. Before three days are over your uncle will be very happy, I've a notion, to get quit of his bargain, and Frouny, poor dear; what a nice girl she used to be last time I was home on sick leave, before she had got her fortune, or had her head turned by Dr Bubb!-How we danced at all the balls!"

"Has she taken a serious turn? Is she religious? Those Cantwells at Cheltenham

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"Religious!-I wish she were!— No, this fellow, Dr Bubb, is our great lecturer at Institutes and scientific associations. He explains every thing in the most lucid manner possible— was present at the creation, and recollects every stone exactly as it was made. Then he writes many articles in philosophical publications, and is the author of the paper "On the intellectual faculties of the Midge Tribe, with an Enquiry into the Conscientionsness of Fleas" in the halfpenny

Cyclopædia. He is now engaged on the words "stratum" and "shell" for the same compilation, and has made poor Frouny as ludicrous as himself-that accounts for the cart-load of spades and pickaxes they carry about with them."

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"And how do you manage to con verse with such learned personages?" "No need of conversation; they won't let one speak. I make a point of always agreeing with the lady, and hugging some words like tertiary,' 'granitic,' or 'stalactitic,' into whatever I say. It makes very pretty mosaic work of my plain prose, and I think it pleases very much. But as I see you're fidgety, I'll tell you our plans in a single moment. In the first place we will" But as no man

is worth a farthing who can't keep a secret, we intend to have more discretion than the gallant captain, and pass on to the next chapter without telling the reader any more of their conver

sation.

CHAPTER III.

Poor Mr Wallop, with his mouth stuffed with ham, and his waistcoat copiously bedewed with an oblation of coffee which he had offered to the infernal deities on perceiving the second regiment of sight-seers effect an entrance into his grounds, rushed from one secluded nook of his beautiful domain to another, but found them all peopled. Parasols were as plentiful as leaves, and spread a shade over the whole dell, giving more umbrage to the proprietor of the soil than the maker of the foresaid parasols had con⚫tracted for. But a fiery old gentleman, growling horrible imprecations from amid the mass of ham and muffin which he had yet had no time to swallow, dispelled in a great measure the romance of the scene; and one after another the groups folded up their books and pencils and retired to some other portion of the property, wondering at the insolence of the ill-natured individual who denied to the universe at large free access to every square yard of his estate. The Hermit's Grotto was emptied of the giggling young gentlemen and misses who had been carving their initials on the stonetable and crucifix,-the Naiad's Well,

into which a pure spring rushed down from a cleft in the rock, had been deJivered from the pic-nic party who had already taken the precaution of depositing sundry bottles in the water,— obscure giggles were heard in all directions as the various retreating intruders expressed their indignation or surprise, or amusement, as the case might be, at the behaviour of Mr Wallop; and that worthy gentleman having at last emptied his mouth, was beginning to fancy he had cleared the premises of all interlopers, when-oh earth, oh sky! what do his eyes be

hold?

In the very heart of the little flowergarden at the foot of the cliff, whose little bed, shaped in all sorts of ways, had been so carefully filled with the choicest plants and flowers by his former favourite, Jane Lorimer, where he and Charles and Jane had with their own hands reared, on a pedestal of turf, an exact copy of the Warwick Vase, which, with equal taste and ingenuity, they had taught a vine to clamber round the sides of, and shake its real clusters just over the brim,— there, in that hallowed spot, we say, which was dear to the old man's heart,

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as it had reminded him of his nephew all the time he was from home, and recalled the days when Jane was "the fair spirit for his minister," which only the demon of lime and mortar, groundrents, and front elevations, had had power to expel;-there, we again repeat-in the fairy land of his heart, which his soul had consecrated for a temple to memory and romance-he perceived a gigantic cart-wheel fixed on a wooden stage, and zealously turn ed round and round by a little plump gentleman with very bandy legs, while its gyrations were carefully watched by a lady in a bright green pelisse, who was standing in the very midst of a bed of lily of the valley. The plump little gentleman, who was dressed in a suit of sober black, had laid aside his hat; and by way of keeping it from the ground, had hung it, as on a peg, on the beautiful handle of the Warwick Vase-his face reddened to a preternatural depth of scarlet by his exertion, and his spectacles fallen forward on the very point of his flat broad nose, he could find no time to answer the harangue of Mr Wallop, but kept on twisting the great wheel with the same impetuosity as before.

"Hallo!-stop, you infernal villain -who sent you here-what the devil are you doing?"

"Sir," said the young lady, in reply to these thundering exclamations66 you are interrupting a philosophical experiment of the highest value; go on, dear Dr Bubb-what stratum are you in now?"

"Not yet come to the chalk formation, miss, simple alluvial-three feet four."

The lady wrote with her pencil in a little green bound book-" alluvial, three feet four."

"Do you hear, sir?" again exclaimed Mr Wallop, "who sent you here? I'll prosecute you for a trespass."

But the doctor and the young lady were too deep in the operation before them to take notice of what was said. A great cart-rope was twisted round the wheel, and kept in place on the iron by a ledge of wood nailed all round, and at the end of the rope was a huge iron bar which the philosopher raised up by the turning of the wheel, and then let it fall with the whole impetus of the height, by letting the wheel go. This operation, constantly repeated,

succeeded in boring a great hole; and as the weight was increased every time by the additional depth the bar had to fall to, the progress became more rapid as the operation went on. In the mean time, Mr Wallop looked round in search of the gardener, the groom, or any of the domestics; what would he not have given for Charles in this moment of anger to have assisted in burying the experimenter in the hole he had made in the prettiest flower-bed in the garden!

"And pray, madam," he cried, going up to the young lady, "what possible right have you to commit this devastation?"

"Don't trouble yourself, dear sir, about it,-I know very well by whose authority we act. Where now, Dr Bubb?" she added, turning to her friend.

"Marle, and imperfectly consolidated limestone-but it seems a very irregular formation; we shall come to the chalk in two or three more turns."

"There, sir, you hear what the doctor says he seems a little tired with his exertions; you will perhaps relieve him at the wheel."

“No, madam, not at the stake !— What the deuce! would you have me help the ruffian to destroy my own ground?"

The philosopher now paused in his labour, and, adjusting his spectacles and coughing to clear his throat, said,

"All objections to the march of science proceed from ignorance and prejudice. I will therefore, in few words, explain to this old gentleman the order of formation, so far as the beds are already ascertained, and he will, I feel certain, no longer refuse us his assistance till the return of our friend and fellow-labourer, Captain Slap. You know what a stratum is?"

"I neither care for straitum nor crookum," replied Mr Wallop; "what business have you here?"

"I conclude you are Mr Wallop?" enquired the Doctor.

"I am-but that's no business of yours; but who told you you might bring all those concerns here? eh?"

It is indeed as we were told," said the philosopher to his fair companion, aside; "we must soothe him till the Captain comes. You will be pleased to observe, sir, the progress we have already made. This simple process is borowed from the system em

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