haste, and repent at leisure," was, however, another of Andrew's favourite sayings, so he took another year or two to consider the matter in all its bearings; but as all things earthly come to an end, so at last did Andrew Cleave's ponderings; and as his actual wooing was by no means so tedious an affair, and as the discreet Dinah had had ample time for deliberation while the important question was pending, the favoured suitor was not kept long on the rack of uncertainty, and the third Sunday, which completed the bans, saw Mrs Dinah " endow ed," by Andrew Cleave, with " all his worldly goods," and installed Lady and Mistress of his hitherto lonely dwelling.

He had no reason to repent his choice. For once Dame Fortune (so often reviled for her strange blunders in matchmaking-so often accused of "joining the gentle with the rude,") had hooked together two kindred souls; and it seemed indeed as if Andrew had only reunited to himself a sometime divided portion of his own nature, so marvellously did he and his prudent Dinah sympathise in their views, habits, and principles. Thrift-thriftthrift and the accumulation of worldly substance, was the end and aim of all their thoughts, dreams, and undertakings; yet were they rigidly just and honest in all their dealings, even beyond the strict letter of the law, of which they scorned to take advantage in a doubtful matter; and Andrew Cleave had been known more than once to come forward to the assistance of distressed neighbours (on good security indeed), but on more liberal terms than could have been expected from one of his parsimonious habits, or than were offered by persons of more reputed generosity.

Moreover, he was accounted-and he surely accounted himself-a very religious man, and a very pious Christian," a serious Christian," he denominated himself; and such a one he was in good truth, if a sad and grave aspect-solemn speech, much abounding in scriptural phrases--slow delivery-erect deportment, and unsocial reserve, constitute fair claims to this distinction. Moreover, he was a regular church-goer-an indefatigable reader of his Bible (of the Old Testament and the Epistles in particular), VOL. XXIII.

fasted rigidly on all days appointed by the church-broke the heads of all the little boys who whistled, within his hearing, on Sabbaths and Saints' days

said immoderate long graces before and after meals, and sang hymns by the hour, though he had no more voice than a cracked pitcher, and not ear enough to distinguish between the tunes of the 100th Psalm, and "Molly, put the kettle on."

Besides all this, he had been a dutiful, if not an affectionate son-was a good, if not a tender husband-a neighbour of whose integrity no one doubted-a most respectable parishioner; and, yet, with all this, Andrew Cleave's was not vital religion, for it partook not of that blessed spirit of love, meekness, and charity, which vaunteth not itself-is not puffed up

thinketh no evil of its neighbour neither maketh broad its phylacteries, nor prayeth in the corners of marketplaces, to be seen of men. He was neither extortionate nor a drunkard. He gave tithes of all that he possessed. He did not give half his goods to the poor; but, nevertheless, contrived to make out such a catalogue of claims on the peculiar favour of Heaven, as very comfortably satisfied his own conscience, and left him quite at lei. sure to despise others."

It had been the misfortune of Andrew Cleave to have imbibed from his parents those narrow views of Christianity, and their early death had left him an unsociable being, unloving, unloved, and unconnected, till he changed his single for a married state.

"Habits are stubborn things; And by the time a man is turned of forty, His ruling passions grow so haughty,

There is no clipping of his wings.'

Now, Andrew was full forty-three when he entered the pale of matrimony, and the said Dinah, three good years his senior, had no wish to clip them, being, as we have demonstrated, his very counterpart, his "mutual head" in all essential points; so, without a spark of what silly swains and simple maidens call love, and some wedded folks" tender friendship," our serious couple jogged on together in a perfect matrimonial rail-road of monotonous conformity, and Andrew Cleave might have gone down to his grave unconscious that hearts were

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made for any other purpose than to circulate the blood, if the birth of a son, in the second year of his union, had not opened up in his bosom such a fountain of love and tenderness, as gushed out like water from the flinty rock; and became thenceforth the master passion, the humanizing feeling of his stern and powerful character. The mother's fondness, and she was a fond mother, was nothing compared with that with which the father doated on his babe; and he would rock its cradle, or hush it in his arms, or sing to it by the hour, though the lullaby seldom varied from the 100th Psalm, and, as he danced it to the same exhilarating tune, it was a wonder that the little Josiah clapped his hands, and crowed with antic mirth, instead of comporting himself with the solemnity of a parish clerk in swaddling clothes.

It was strange and pleasant to observe, how the new and holy feeling of parental love penetrated, like a fertilizing dew, the hitherto hard, insensible nature of Andrew Cleave; how it extended its sweet influence beyond the exciting object, the infant darling, to his fellow-creatures in general, disposing his heart to kindliness and pity, and almost to sociability. In the latter virtue, he made so great progress as to invite a few neighbours to the christening feast, charging his dame to treat them handsomely to the best of everything, and he himself, for the first time in his life, "on hospitable thoughts intent," pressed and smiled, and played the courteous host to a miracle.

And sometimes, on his way home of an evening, he would stop and exchange a few words with an acquaintance, at his cottage door, attracted by the sight of some chubby boy, with whose short limbs and infant vigour he would compare, in his mind's eye, the healthful beauty of his own urchin. But great, indeed, was the amazement of Dame Cleave, when Andrew, who had always "set his face like a flint" against the whole tribe of idle mendicants, making it a rule, not only to chase them from his own door, but to consign them, if possible, to the wholesome coercion of the parish stocks, actually went the length of bestowing a comfortable meal, a night's shelter in an outhouse, and a bed of clean straw, on a soldier's widow, who was

travelling, with her babe in her arms, towards the far distant home of its dead father.

Dame Cleave stared in strange perplexity, and said something about "charity beginning at home," and "coming to want," and "harbouring idle husseys and their brats." But Andrew was peremptory, for his eye had glanced from the poor soldier's fatherless babe to the cherished creature at that time nestling in his own bosom. So the widow was "warmed and fed," and left a blessing on her benefactor, who, on his part, failed not to accompany his parting "God speed you," and the small piece of money which accompanied it, with an impressive lecture on the sinfulness of want and pauperism, and a comfortable assurance, that they were always deserved manifestations of Divine displeasure.

Just as the little Josiah had attained his second year, Andrew Cleave was called on to resign the wife of his bosom, who went the way of all flesh, after a short but sharp illness. She had so fully realized all the calculations that had decided Andrew to choose her for his mate, that he regretted her loss very sincerely; but resignation, he justly observed, was the duty of a Christian, and Andrew was wonderfully resigned and composed, even in the early days of his bereavement, throwing out many edifying comments on the folly and sinfulness of immoderate grief, together with sundry apposite remarks, well befitting his own circumstances, and a few proverbial illustrations and observations, such as "misfortunes never come alone, for his poor dame was taken at night, and the old gander was found dead in the morning." Moreover, he failed not to sum up, as sources of rational consolation, "that it had pleased the Lord to spare her till the boy ran alone, and Daisey's calf was weaned, and all the bacon cured; and he himself had become fully competent to supply her place in the manufacturing of cheeses." So Andrew buried his wife, and was comforted.

And, from the night of her death, he took his little son to his own bed, and laid him in his mother's place; and long and fervent were the prayers he ejaculated before he went to rest, kneeling beside his sleeping child; and cautious and tender as a mother's kiss

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was that he imprinted on its innocent brow before he turned himself to slumber. Early in the morning an elderly widow, who had been used to cook his victuals, and set the cottage to rights before his marriage, came to take up and tend the boy, and get breakfast for him and his father, and she was now detained through the day, in the care of household concerns, and of the motherless little one. was a good and tender foster-mother, and a careful manager withal, falling readily into Andrew's ways and likings; a woman of few words, and content with little more than her victuals and drink-and (inoffensive and taciturn as she was) he had a feeling of snug satisfaction in locking her out every evening when she betook herself to sleep at her own cottage. Then was Andrew wont to turn back to his own solitary hearth, with a feeling of self-gratulation, not evincing much taste for social enjoyment, or any disposition again to barter his secure state of single blessedness for a chance in the matrimonial lottery-from which, having drawn a first-rate prize, it would have been presumptuous to expect a second.

What with old Jenny's help, and his own notability (he had not lived so long a bachelor without having acquired some skill in housewifery), he got on very comfortably; and for a living object to care for, and to love, the little Josiah was to him wife, child, companion-everything! So Andrew continued faithful as a widowed turtle to the memory of his deceased Dinah; and the motherless boy throve as lustily as if he had continued to nestle under the maternal wing. He was, in truth, a fine sturdy little fellow, full of life and glee, and "quips and cranks, and mirthful smiles," and yet as like Andrew as "two peas." "The very moral of the father," said old Jenny, “only not so solemn like." He had Andrew's jetty eyebrows, and black lustrous eyes, deep set under the broad projecting brow; but they looked out with roguish mirth from their shadowy cells, and the raven hair, that, like his father's, almost touched his straight eyebrows, clung clustering over them, and round his little fat poll, in a luxuriance of rich, close, glossy curls. His mouth was shaped like his father's, too; but Andrew's could never, even

in childhood, have relaxed into such an expression of dimpled mirth, as the joyous laugh burst out-that sound of infectious gladness, which rings to one's heart's core like a peal of merry bells. He was a fine little fellow ! and, at five years old, the joy and pride of the doating father, not only for his vigorous beauty, but for his quick parts, and wonderful forwardness in learning; for Andrew was a scholar, and had early taken in hand his son's education; so that, at the age above mentioned, he could spell out passages in any printed book, could say the Lord's Prayer and the Belief, and great part of the Ten Commandments, though he stuck fast at the 39 Articles, and the Athanasian Creed, which his father had thought it expedient to include among his theological studies. It was the proudest day of Andrew Cleave's whole life, when, for the first time, he led his little son by the hand up the aisle of his parish church, into his own pew, and lifted up the boy upon the seat beside him, where (so well he had been tutored, and so profound was his childish awe,) he stood stock still, with his new red prayer-book held open in his two little chubby hands, and his eyes immoveably fixed, "not on the book, but" on his father's face. All eyes were fixed upon the boy, for, verily, a comical little figure did the young Josiah exhibit that Sabbath-day. Andrew Cleave had a sovereign contempt for petticoats (though, of course, he had never hinted as much in his late spouse's hearing,) and could ill brook that his son and heir, a future lord of creation, should be ignominiously trammelled even in swaddling clothes. So soon, therefore, as a change was feasible-far sooner than old Jenny allowed it to be so-the boy was emancipated from his effeminate habiliments, and made a man of a little man complete, in coat, waistcoat, and breeches, made after the precise fashion of his father's, who had set the tailor to work in his own kitchen, under his own eye, and on a half-worn suit of his own clothes, out of which enough remained in excellent preservation to furnish a complete equipment for the man in miniature. So little Josiah's Sunday-going suit consisted of a long-tailed coat of dark blue broad cloth, lapelled back with two rows of large gilt basket-work buttons; a

red plush waistcoat (the month being July), brown corduroy breeches with knee buckles, grey worsted hose, and large new square-toed shoes, with a pair of heavy silver buckles, once belonging to his mother, that, covering his little feet quite across, like a couple of pack-saddles, touched the ground, as he walked, on either side of them. Add to this, a stiff broad-brimmed beaver (padded within all round, to fit his tiny pate), under the shadow of which the baby-face was scarce discoverable, and the whole diminutive person moved like a walking mushroom.

Proud was the boy of his first appearance, so equipped, before the assembled congregation; and very proud was Andrew Cleave, who felt as if now, indeed, he might assume unto himself, before the elders of his people, the honour of being father to a man-child.

From that day forth little Josiah, led in his father's hand, came regularly to church every Sabbath-day; but, alas! his after demeanour, during service, by no means realized the promise of that solemn propriety wherewith he comported himself on his first memorable appearance; and it soon required Andrew's utmost vigilance to rebuke and check his son's restless and mischievous propensities. Great was the father's horror and consternation, on detecting him in the very act of making faces at the Vicar himself, whose unfortunate obliquity of vision had excited the boy's monkey talent of mimicry; and, at last, the young rebel was suddenly and for ever deposed from his lofty station on the seat beside his father, for having taken a sly opportunity of pinning the hind bow of an old lady's bonnet to the back of her pew, whereby her bald pate was cruelly exposed to the eyes of the congregation, as she rose up, with unsuspecting innocence, at the Gloria Patri.

At home, too, Andrew soon discovered that his parental cares were like ly to multiply in full proportion to his parental pleasures. Little Josiah was quick at learning, but of so volatile a spirit, that in the midst of one of his father's finest moral declamations, or most elaborate expoundings, he would dart off after a butterfly, or mount astride on the old sheep-dog; and at last, when sharply rebuked for his ir

reverent antics, look up piteously in his father's face, and yawn so disconsolately, that Andrew's iron jaws were fain to sympathize with the infectious grimace, to their owner's infinite annoyance. At meal times, it was wellnigh impossible to keep his little hands from the platter, while his father pronounced a long and comprehensive grace, with an especial supplication for the virtues of abstinence and forbearance; and so far from continuing to take pride in the manly dignity of his raiment, it became necessary to dock his waistcoat flaps, and the long skirts of his week-day coat, the pockets of the former being invariably crammed with pebbles, munched apples, worms, brown-sugar, snails, cockchafers, and all manner of abominations; and on the latter it was not only his laudable custom to squat himself in the mud and mire, but being of an imitative and inventive genius, and having somewhere read a history of the beavers, he forthwith began to practise their ingenious mode of landcarriage, by dragging loads of rubbish behind him on the aforesaid coat-tails, as he slid along in a sitting posture.

Greatly did Andrew Cleave marvel that a son of his should evince such unseemly propensities, having perpetually before his eyes an example of sober seriousness and strict propriety. But, nevertheless, he doated on the boy with unabated fondness-toiled for him-schemed for him-waked for him-dreamt of him-lived in him-idolized him!-Yes!--Andrew Cleave, who had been wont to hold forth so powerfully on the sin and folly of idol worship, he set up in his heart an earthly image, and unconsciously exalted it above his Maker.

Andrew's cottage was situated on the extreme verge of a large and lonely common, which separated it from the village of Redburn, and it was also at a considerable distance from any other habitation. He had taken upon himself his son's early instruction, and it was consequently easy enough to maintain a point which he had much at heart, that of keeping the boy aloof from all intercourse with the village children, or indeed with any persons save himself and old Jenny, except in his company. This system, to which he rigidly adhered, had a very unfavourable effect on his own character, repressing in it all those kindlier and

more social feelings, which had almost struggled into preponderance, when the hard surface was partially thawed by the new sense of parental tenderness, and while his son was yet a cradled babe, and he had nothing to apprehend for him on the score of evil communications. But now he guarded him, as misers guard their gold. As he himself, alas! hoarded the Mammon of unrighteousness (his secondary object) but "solely for his darling's sake." So Andrew compromised the matter with his conscience; and so he would have answered to any inquiring Christian.

The boy, though thus debarred from all communication save with his father and old Jenny, was nevertheless as happy as any child of the same age. He had never known the pleasures of association with youthful playmates he was full of animal spirits and invention, particularly in the science of mischief-he completely ruled over Jenny in the absence of his father, and (except at lesson times, and on Sabbaths) had acquired more ascendancy over that stern father himself, than Andrew anyway suspected.

The interval between the boy's fourth and seventh year was, perhaps, the happiest in the whole lives of father and son ; but that state of things could not continue. Andrew Cleave had aspiring views for his young Josiah-and it had always been his intention to give him "the best of learning;" in furtherance of which purpose, he had looked about him almost from the hour of the boy's birth, for some respectable school wherein to place him, when his own stock of information became incompetent to the task of teaching. He had at last pitched upon a grammar school in the county town, about five miles from his own habitation, where the sons of respectable tradesmen and farmers were boarded and taught upon moderate terms; though, to do Andrew justice, saving considerations were not paramount with him, when his son's welfare was concerned, and he was far more anxious to ascertain that his morals, as well as his learning, would be strictly attended to. On that head, he, of course, received the most satisfactory assurances from the master of the "academy for young gentlemen," and having likewise ascertained that the boy would have an ample allow

ance of wholesome food, it is not wonderful that Andrew Cleave threw the "moderate terms" as the third weight into the scale of determination.

The greater number of the boys,— those whose parents were dwellers in the town of C-, were only dayboarders; but some, whose families lived at a greater distance, went home on Saturdays only, to spend the Sabbath-day; and it was Andrew's private solace, to think that the separation from his child would be rendered less painful by that weekly meeting. It had taken him full six months, and sundry journeyings to and fro, to make all his arrangements with the master. But at last they were completed, and nothing remained but the trial-the hard, hard trial-of parting with that creature who constituted his all of earthly happiness. Andrew was a hard man, little susceptible of tender weakness in his own nature, and ever prone to contemn and censure in others the indulgence of any feeling incompatible (in his opinion) with the dignity of a man, and the duty of a Christian.

His God was not a God of love; and when he rebuked the natural tears of the afflicted, the submissive sorrows of the stricken heart,-it was in blind forgetfulness of him who wept over the grave of his friend Lazarus. He had honoured his parents during their lifetime, and buried them with all decent observance; but with no other outward demonstration of woe, than a more sombre shade on his always severe countenance. "The desire of his eyes" was taken from him, and he had shown himself a pattern of pious resignation. And now he was to part with his son for a season, and who could doubt that the temporary sacrifice would be made with stoical firmness? And so it should verily, was Andrew's purpose ;-upon the strength of which he proceeded, with old Jenny's advice and assistance, to make requisite preparation for the boy's equipment. Nay, he was so far master of himself, as to rebuke the old woman's foolish fondness, when she remarked "how lonesome the cottage would seem when the dear child was gone;" and he expressed himself the more wrathfully, from the consciousness of a certain unwonted rising in his throat, which half choked him as he went "maundering on."

To the child himself, he had not yet