glow of the retreating day. The rippling of the stream, a wooded bank, a thousand flowers, a thousand birds—all seemed to speak to the heart.

Tremaine was alone he had left his carriage and servants at Limoges, in the Limousin; and in a fit of musing, but not of moping melancholy—and, it may be added, in a fit of exertion not over common with him-he had resolved to explore this part of France on horseback,-where, however, the landscapes were much more beautiful than the roads were good.

He took with him only a French guide for a servant. His loneliness soothed but did not oppress him; for he had lately been plunged in the very depths of French dissipation; and a solitary walk in such a scene seemed at this moment the most suited to his taste of any thing in the world. His heart expanded to the touch of nature; but yet there was a void in it.

"Is it not strange," said he to himself as he surveyed the landscape, "that I should always be viewing these scenes by myself, and that, at eight and twenty, the loveliest part of the creation should to me still be as nothing?"

He thought over all the fair beings to whom he had ever felt inclined, regretted none of them, and began to think (to him a strange speculation) that in the upper ranks, though there was more elegance of manner, there was less of that real feeling

which constitutes the love he sighed to meet with. He seemed even to think there might be more probability of finding it in the middling, perhaps even in the lower classes of society. "What signifies it," continued he, "where I meet with it? Will not my own rank elevate and illustrate whomsoever I please ?"

The murmur of the water had now subsided a few minutes, when from the other side of an hedge of sweet shrubs, which enclosed a small garden, his ear was struck with sounds which in that place absolutely astonished him.

It was the voice of a young female reading Milton in English, with a tone and feeling which, even in England, would have been charming. Another voice now and then interposing, shewed that the reader was not alone; and the few sentences that passed, proved the persons to be mother and daughter.

The passage which Tremaine last heard, was that so well known, beginning with,

"Sweet is the breath of morn," &c.

The young unknown read it with a tenderness which did not fail to strike on the heart of the hearer, any more than the observation that followed. "Oh! my dear mother, what happiness is here described; and how does my heart swell whenever

7

I think of such conjugal tenderness! If ever I have a husband, oh! how I shall love him!"

"'Tis well, my dear," replied the mother, "that we are alone: else such a speech, though the most natural in the world, might subject you to ill-natured interpretations. You are so naïve and so young, that people who did not know, might not understand you. But Heaven forbid, my dear Eugenia, that you should not express your feelings before your mother."

"Ah!" replied Eugenia with a sigh, "how can it be wrong to express one's feelings before any one?"

Deeply did these words impress themselves on Mr. Tremaine, and willingly would he have heard more; but while a vague thought struck upon his 'mind, that here was a pure unsophisticated being, such as his fancy had coveted, he felt himself in the situation of a listener; and therefore, merely with a view to shew that some one was nigh, he began to call aloud in English to a spaniel he had with him.

His voice alarmed the two recluses, who immediately left their seats; yet, struck with curiosity to know how a countryman could be so near them in such a part of the world.

The curiosity was at the very least partaken; and no wonder, therefore, as the ladies had to cross the road from the garden to their house, that no

a bachelor, though approaching the middle of lifethat he should even have seemed to take his leave of the sex-is not at all inconsistent. His fastidiousness, though always allied to integrity and feeling, coloured, indeed, all his pursuits; his earlier conduct scarcely more than his subsequent fate.

Finding, therefore, many of his tastes promoted by the pursuit of the ecclesiastical profession, and none of them thwarted, he listened to the advice given him by his friends, and the advantage held out by the head of his family, in the promise of the living before-mentioned.

Tremaine's first impressions in Divinity delighted him. A great first cause, with all its million of consequences;-a deep research into antiquity, tradition, criticism, and even poetry;-these held possession of his soul for a time. But at length metaphysics came; and what was worse, metaphysical jargon. His mind was appalled, more perhaps through his taste than his understanding; and having left his landmarks, he betook himself to Bolingbroke and Voltaire, instead of proceeding with the Bible. In short, he dabbled with, instead of studying "Providence, Foreknowledge, Will, and Fate;" till, like the devils who had dabbled before him, he

"Found no end, in wandering mazes lost."

He embraced, indeed, a kind of Epicurean notion

of the Deity; which, while it confessed his existence, by denying every thing else, rendered it of little consequence whether he existed or not. And after trying a little, and but a little, to unravel the difficulties in which he had enwrapped himself, and which task the subtlety of his own mind only rendered a more hopeless one, he thought it right to refuse the living, and renounce the church.

Had he been contented with this, he might have been rewarded by the approbation which at least his disinterestedness and principle deserved. But unfortunately for himself, he was not sufficiently decided against the tenets he had rejected, to render his satisfaction perfect in the sacrifice he had made. An amiable and sincere clergyman, apparently happy in the performance of his duties, always made him doubtful; and he was disposed to seek refuge, at last, in an opinion which he took pains (though here also without success) to render as fixed as he could, that all church ceremonies were useless, and almost all churchmen insincere.

He was indeed too naturally just not to feel uneasy at this; for he had a disposition, particularly in his youth, to feel

"All various Nature pressing on the heart;"

and he was always happiest when most under that influence. At the same time, a listless temper,