True it is, we have seen better days,

And have with holy bell been knoll'd to church,
And sat at good men's feasts, and wip'd our eyes
Of drops that sacred pity hath engender'd:
And therefore sit you down in gentleness,
And take upon command what help we have,
That to your wanting may be minister'd.

SHAKSPEARE.

THE sun had not yet broken through the dense vapours that every night enshrouded the water-girt castle of Haelbeck, when Jocelyn was awakened by a faint wailing cry, followed by the plashing of some substance in the waves below. At first he imagined that a dream, engendered by the melancholy change of his residence, had deceived his senses; for although Winky Boss had most gravely assured him that the castle was haunted, he was little disposed at any time to superstitious fears, and had too good an opinion of ghostly taste to believe that any of the tribe would take up their abode in that aguish swamp, when they could obtain

so much better quarters upon dry land. The sounds, however, being distinctly repeated, he arose and opened the window, when something again fell plashing in the water beneath; and looking up, he beheld the stork scratching and loosening the mortar on the top of a ruined tower immediately above him. At the noise he made, the solitary bird, again uttering a plaintive cry, flew off, and it was soon lost in the watery exhalations, although the flapping of its wings was heard long after it was out of sight. Not feeling any further disposition to sleep, he dressed himself, and descended into the apartment where prayers had been read the night before. The Bible remained on the table; and having the curiosity to examine the books beside it, he found them to be the controversial and political works of Milton, in Latin, with copious marginal annotations in a female handwriting, which he subsequently ascertained to be that of Mrs. Strickland.

He had been for some time engaged in looking over one of the volumes, when the door opened and Julia entered.

"You have understood us literally indeed," she exclaimed, with a winning smile. "When we told you that we kept the hours of the anchorite, we meant not to impose upon you such matin vigils.” "To me they are no penance,” replied Jocelyn, "for I have been accustomed to rise with the sun.” 22*

VOL. II.

"You must depart from that custom here," replied Julia, "or you will be a sluggard indeed; for the god of day forfeits his name in this paradise of the frogs; being often so completely lost in the mist, as to be unable to find his way to Haelbeck till the afternoon."

Jocelyn explained the circumstance that had disturbed him, and occasioned his early rising.

"I warn you beforehand," resumed Julia, "not to be alarmed at any strange noises you may hear in the night-time, for the old castle seems sometimes to be bemoaning its own crazy state, and sends forth groans at midnight that attest a deeper feeling than you would expect from its heart of stone. Besides," she continued, with a more serious air, "my poor father occasionally wanders about it all night long,--a circumstance which it grieves me to state, but of which it is right that you should be apprised. But how comes it that neither you nor your servant brought me any letter from my dear Constantia ?"

"The suddenness of my departure rendered it impossible," replied our hero; "but she specially charged me with all kind and cordial remembrances, and never mentioned her friend at Haelbeck but with expressions of the tenderest attachment." “I am proud that she considers me worthy of her friendship," said Julia. "Is she not good, a noble, a fascinating creature ?"

"Perhaps too noble, too exalted, or at all events, too serious and enthusiastic," replied Jocelyn, "to meet my notions of a fascinating creature."

"And I shall be, of course, as much too giddy and volatile to please you," cried Julia, "as my friend is too sedate and contemplative. You must have a creature made on purpose for you; one that shall unite the gravity of Melpomene to the playfulness of Thalia; a tragi-comic monster of conflicting excellencies. You will have much more reason to wonder at my sprightliness, perhaps I should say my levity, than at Constantia's staid and grave deportment. I will not assert with the giddy girl in the play, that I could as soon be immortal as be serious;' but I am blessed with constitutional high spirits; and you will please to recollect, that I have to enact all the cheerfulness that is to be performed in the dolorous castle of Haelbeck." "Which certainly requires an abundant supply of that moral sunshine to dissipate its gloom,' "observed Jocelyn.

“I am vain enough to believe," resumed Julia, "that my silly gaiety sometimes fortifies my mother's courage, and cheers the deep despondency of my father; and as to the dismalness of this swampy prison, it affects not me. There is a Spanish proverb which says, 'Heaven sends the cold according to the clothes;' and the same benignant Providence, providing for the comfort of the mind as well as of the body, seems to dispense cheerful

ness according to the urgency of the need. The bird sings loudest in a cage, the negro dances with unbounded glee in the midst of his servitude, the galley-slave serenades the oar to which he is chained, and the giddy-pated Julia Strickland plays the part of Democritus in petticoats, in the very abode which would have been chosen for its melancholy by the weeping philosopher of Ephesus. Oh, how I would cry if a tear could get one out! but since it cannot, I am determined to defeat the malice of Fortune, by returning her a smile for every frown she flings at me."

"Yours is, indeed, the pleasantest and truest philosophy," said Jocelyn; "but it is not on that account the less difficult to practise."

"Difficult!" cried Julia" in what respect? Happiness comes not from without, but from within it is but to borrow a little from imagination, and we may metamorphose ill-omened owls, frogs, and bats, into pleasant ladies and gentlemen, with as much ease as Ovid reversed the process; and thus provide ourselves with pleasant associations instead of those that are revolting. A touch of Fanoy's wand converts the green mantle of the standing pool' into a verdant lawn embroidered with lilies instead of daisies; osiers and alders supply me with arbutus and myrtle; every floundering carp is a sporting lamb or crooked dolphin, according to the taste of the moment; the floating mists are the white sails of the gallant pleasure