"So I do. But I have never written anything that I can read with the slightest pleasure; my own ideal has never been worked out; it looms up before me a solid, unyielding block of marble, before which I stand, with chisel in hand, utterly despairing of ever bringing out to life the group that I know is sleeping there. Thus I wrote to a friend who said to me, 'Do not let your pen be idle; I find it very easy to read all that you write.' Ah, he little knows how unsatisfied my own mind wanders through the scenes of its creation! The unattained beckons me on; I strive, I yearn to reach it, but there it stands ever the distant goal-the star highest up in the heavens."

"Why, then, do you write?" "Because I must write. I cannot help writing any more than you can help'

Loving," said Mr. Milford, quietly.
Loving that was not what I was going to

say."

Perhaps not; but I finished your sentence much more truthfully than you could possibly have done yourself. But to return to our subject. I think the great mistake that women make in writing is, that they do not come out sufficiently from self; instead of erecting a platform without, from whose plain they can survey the wide field of humanity, they erect one within. Sappho sings, but her songs are the cries of her own wildly beating heart; they are not the echoes of mine. The writer should know no selfish limit; his should be a

'Sympathy that folds all characters,

All ranks, all passions, and all life almost
In its wide circle.'

Then, your men, too, are generally failures;
they are not what men really are, but what you
wish them to be. Women, it seems to me,
write only from a passionate impulse of their
own hearts; they-but a truce to fault-finding.
Upon the whole, I have read some very read-
able books by women, very well written"-
"For women. Oh, manly praise!
Mrs. Browning on that subject-

Hear

'Oh, excellent!

What grace! what facile turns! what fluent sweeps!
What delicate discernment, almost thought!
The book does honor to the sex, we hold.
Among our female authors we make room
For this fair writer, and congratulate
The country that produces in these times
Such women, competent to-spell.''

Mr. Milford laughed. "I do not think that you will ever write a book, Amy:"

"Indeed, you are mistaken. To-day, Mr. Milford, I began the first pages of a woman's book. I intend to pour my whole soul into the task; this shall be the mission of my life, to write a book, not distinguished only for its good grammar, and gracefully turned sentences, but a book that will touch an answering chord in the deep heart of humanity."

"What an ambition! But I look at you more in sorrow than in anger."

"Thank you for sparing me your severity, and bestowing on me your gentle pity."

"I never for the life of me could see, Amy, why women should pester themselves about writing books, unless they wrote them for money, wrote or starved."

"There are other motives than money that induce people to write books."

"So there are, and better motives. But the writing of a book involves so much, and the publishing of it so much more, that I am amazed any woman is willing to sacrifice so much to obtain so very little. Amy, be warned in time, and abandon your book with the ink still wet on the first page."

"Grand merci!' but when a woman has made up her mind to an act she is pretty sure to accomplish it, and I have made up my mind to write a book."

"There is no turning a woman from her will, then?"

"Not this woman."

The servant came in and lit the chandelier over the dining-table. Mr. Lindley, as is the wont of many old gentlemen after dinner, had fallen into a profound sleep. The discussion had not been of sufficient interest to keep the drowsy god at bay. Amy arose from the table, and taking a book seated herself in the rockingchair. Mr. Milford watched her for some time in silence; he noted the expansive brow; the soft chestnut hair lying in shining folds over it; the deep blue eye so full of tenderness and truth, and he thought the world would scarcely call her pretty, and yet she attracts powerfully. She is a lovely woman, lovely to look at, though without beauty. What a pity it is that she should waste her days in the folly of writing

books; she would be much happier married. He approached her

"I was just wondering which would become you the most, a laurel crown, or a bridal wreath."

"Well, and to what conclusion have you come?"

"The veil I have decided in favor of; you must get married."

"Get married! to whom? Anybody, I suppose, so that I do get married, and thus avoid the disgrace of a single life. Marry, as Bertha Lindley has done, a profligate man, who, having spent all his own money, deigned to accept hers to carry on his sinful pleasures with. She has passed from this elegant mansion, where she reigned a queen, to the unloved and desolate condition of a neglected wife. What has she gained? Only a name which she thinks more aristocratic than her own; and now Bertha Van Courtland would give worlds to be once more Bertha Lindley. Or get married as Kate Dumont, to bury youth and spirits in the sepulchre of old age. She lives in regal splendor, and glitters in gems, but her young heart dwells in a solitude more horrible than ever Selkirk did, and she pines for her happy country home, and her sweet eyes fill with tears when she thinks of the cottage beyond the blue hills, where the graces of refinement hid all its poverty; that home where, though she was not rich, she was, at least, happy. When young Samuel Haven approaches her, the blush deepens on her beautiful cheek, and the soft light fills her eyes, as they stand side by side, as if God had intended them to stand ever thus, while the old husband looks on with eyes of fearful jealousy. Heaven help them they are young, passionate, and, alas, loving! What will the end be? If that old man possessed his wife's love, that young one would not have sued for it and got it. Or, marry as Helen Hamilton did, for a support, not independent enough, and too proud (0 pitiable pride!) to support herself. That man never has struck one electric spark from that girl's heart; he never can; but he clothes her, and he feeds her, and he puts a roof over her head, and this we call marriage. Is that what God meant when he gave Eve to Adam? Did he intend us to pattern by this first marriage in Eden, or to invent these awful monstrosities and call them marriages, then say, 'this is a divine institution, a holy pale' that we are entering? I know there are men who think that a woman's life is a sad failure unless she marries; that God put her here for that express purpose;

that the mismated is a far more respectable woman than the woman who is not mated at all. I think differently; marriage is not the great end of a woman's life. There is no need for me to marry; I am strong enough to do without man's love."

"You have not tested that yet," said Mr. Milford.

"Have I not? I am twenty-five. Art shall be my husband.”

"Art cannot satisfy a woman's warm heart. I never knew that woman yet whose passionate yearnings were stilled by art, however intense her devotion to it. There is ever a cry, though she may refuse to hearken to it, for love, love."

"It would grieve me to think so, Mr. Milford, for the light would strike on many a woman in heaven who when on earth missed her heart's most passionate desire. If love is woman's great need in life, and her great good, why, then, does not God give it to all women? Why do so many walk this earth never having once sung the beautiful song of love? Why are there so many hearts that have never known the passionate throbs of satisfied love? God is not unjust, and he surely would not deprive us of that which we could not possibly live happily without. Men are prone to some disagreeable, dangerous, and hurtful fallacies. Women, they say, must have their love or they die; or if they do not die, they droop, they languish, they go about utterly bereft, with a sort of sublime despair in their eyes, because they have missed the summum bonum of life, the topmost sparkle of the wave. But I have done; you need not yawn in that disagreeable way. I am going in the music-room to sing. You may follow me if you please; or, if you prefer, you can stay where you are, and read Mrs. Browning's 'Aurora Leigh.' Here it is. You will find some thoughts in it most refreshingly-manly. you can sit in the fellow chair to the one uncle is in, and have a duet of dozing; or you can write out those profound views of yours on marriage and love; you will find a mother-of-pearl inkstand, a goose quill, and foolscap paper lying on the table in the library. Au revoir." She opened the door, and was gone.

Or

Mr. Milford laughed, and settled himself to read "Aurora Leigh."

Amy passed into the regal drawing-rooms, and, throwing herself on the satin rosewood couch, sighed. What was there to make her sigh in all the splendor that surrounded her? The richly carved rosewood sofas and chairs covered with white satin embroidered with gold; the rich window-curtains to match; the drapery

of the same material, that covered the walls; the richly gilt looking-glasses, that touched ceiling and floor; the superb centre-tables, composed of specimens of marble; the enamelled vases; the pearl-shell odeur caskets; the beautiful statues, and the Bohemian chandelier, that threw a flood of light upon the gorgeous and fairy-like scene. This was a New York palace; New York, that city of extremes, with the hovels of Five Points at one end, and the palaces of Fifth Avenue at the other. The eye soon gets accustomed to splendor, and the heart soon wearies of it.

When Amy Dale, upon the death of her surviving parent, left her simple country home for a residence with her uncle in the city, she was dazzled by the splendor that surrounded her; but one year had accustomed her to the gorgeous novelty, and she felt that it takes something more than even a New York palace to satisfy the cravings of a woman's heart. There was a sad want, even amid all this pleasure; but she looked to her book to satisfy it. Women are so differently constituted; put a well-filled purse in the hands of some, and send them into Broadway on a shopping excursion, and they find themselves at once in a heaven of real delight, whilst others groan over it as a positive infliction. One revels in housekeeping, another in novel-reading, and another has her chief delight in fashionable display. The studious sister loves her books, the pious sister sees no good in anything but her church; happy are they all if in the midst of their several pursuits they feel no aching void. In her life Amy Dale felt this void. What was it that she wanted? Love? No; she was going to live without that; she was so self-sustained that she did not require it; if she ever did love, it would be from the fulness of her nature, not its poverty. Let us see the end of this piece of wisdom.

She arose, and, putting aside the rich drapery, entered the music-room. The song of "Ariadne à Naxos" arose on the air in sweet, clear notes; it sounded like the wail of a broken heart, that passionate entreaty to return. The song ceased; a shadow darkened the doorway.

"Is that you, Everard? Come in."

A very young man, scarcely twenty, stood in the doorway, holding back the curtain that draped the entrance. He was rather under sized, and delicately formed; his head was small and compact, covered with a profusion of slightly waved hair of a rich chestnut hue; his features were delicate, and his eye keen, earnest, penetrating. Some faces are a clear

index to the thought and feeling within; this face told of a mind of poetic sensibility, a heart of noble impulses, full of passion and firm resolve, yet impatient of restraint and opposition; a nature ardent, yet too apt to lean to extremes, that knew nothing of the safe via media. His aspirations were high and noble ; but it remained yet to be seen if his stormy passions would not overmaster the good that was in him, and chain him in lowly baseness at their feet. He had a battle before him; if he conquered the tempting demons of his nature, the world would see in him a true poet to reverence and to love; if not, poetry chained to passion would have a twofold power to sink him into a dismal abyss of shame and wretchedness.

One such poet we are thinking of now; with lofty imagination, glorious intellect, and face like a very seraph's for glowing beauty. Through his whole life his good and his bad angel wrestled in mighty conflict; evil conquered, and good lay crushed and bleeding, and a life of woe, crowned by a death of misery, completed the sad story. The world, that world which bends in reverence to godlike genius, sends up a perpetual wail over what this man was and what he might have been; and the yew-tree seems to wave in double sadness over the lowly grave where lies hid a moral wreck. How will it be with this young poet? Will he conquer, or will he fall? Let us see.

"I was wondering," said Everard Lee, "which of your lovers you were imploring to

return!"

"None; if I am once left, I make no sign that I ever know it."

"That's not kind; one word, one look might bring the truant back to your feet, repentant and loving."

"Ah, no! the man that once plays truant to the woman he has professed to love is scarcely worth the trouble of a recall."

"He may make a very good husband, once fairly brought back, for all that."

"Who on earth is talking about husbands? and, dear young child, who taught you all this wisdom?"

"I learned by intuition. But why will you persist, Miss Dale, in calling me a child? I am no child."

"Well, do not, pray, cry about it, Mr. Lee." "Mr. Lee" bit his lip, and looked angry. "It is a pet word of mine; does that satisfy you ?''

dislike being called a child, even in jest, and yet you behave like one."

"I am not angry," came out in low, mournful tones.

"Ah, Everard, one must love you poets very much to get along with you!"

The words were scarcely said than repented of. The young man flushed to his brow, and said, petulantly

"I know that you do not love me; I know that you despise me; but you need not tell me so again."

"Who says that I despise you?''

"You despise my love; you will not accept it. You say: 'A boy's love! to what use can I put the pretty bauble?' You tell me, 'Why, how absurd you are! I am a woman of twentyfive, you a boy of twenty. The greatest of poets says, the man must be older than the woman. Poor boy! I like you with a tenderness that is almost love, yet it is very far from being love itself. With my love I intend to dower a full grown man; but there is Rose, with her golden curls and childish ways; she is just twelve. My pretty children, love each other; it will be charming for me, in the mature experience of twenty-five years, to witness your playful gambols, your innocent young loves.'"

"That men made a sad mistake when they loved a woman older than themselves; sadder still when they married her."

"Yes, I told you that."

"Every one else is free to love you; but my love is ostracized, despised, cast out beyond the outer gate."

"Everard, listen to truth and common sense. You know full well that I like you very much; there is a strong chain of mutual sympathy that binds us; our pursuits, our likings are the same. We admire each other's qualities, we sympathize in each other's ways. I would infinitely rather talk to you than to many of your superiors in age. I have a feeling of the tenderest regard for you, an honest pride in all that you do well, such as a sister feels for a gifted young brother. If you were sick, I would nurse you with the devotion of a mother; if you were sorrowing and came to me, I would sit patiently and sympathizingly to listen to your woes. But this is not love-not the sort of love I must feel for the man I marry. You are not necessary to my happiness, any more

than I am to yours; your love for me is only a boy's whim-a whim that, some of these days, will make you very much ashamed."

"Oh, age has not placed so wide a gulf between us as you would have me believe. I will not listen to such words; boys have dreams, but manhood realizes them; and this dream of my boyhood shall be accomplished, it shall not be dreamed in vain. I will serve you like a very slave, but I will win you at last. You may despise my love and laugh at it as a boyish freak, but I will love you all the more, and prove to you that boys can love as well as

66

"Everard," said Amy, sadly, as she looked at the flushed cheek and flashing eye of the speaker, some women might delight to listen to a confession like this, but me it only grieves. I am not the wife that your nature demands; I am too old in years and in feeling."

"I want a rest for my restless heart; I find it in you."

"You only think so; between man and wife there must be complete harmony of being, or it is no union at all. Now, interested as I am in you, there is surely not this perfect oneness between us."

"I cannot harmonize with the false, frivolous girls around me; you live out the true life. Oh, why cannot you take pity on me and love me?"

His voice trembled; feeling swayed him like a mighty tempest sweeping over him; passion was at its height. He threw himself at her feet; he clasped her knees with a gesture of passionate grief and love; he sobbed with a fearful intensity of disappointed hopes and crushing woe. Amy bent over him; her tears fell like rain upon the bowed head; she was almost as grief-stricken as he was. It is never easy for a woman of feeling to inflict a sorrow like this, and particularly hard is it when she has a strong regard for the sufferer. We know that some women laugh off all feeling on the subject, and say, "Oh, men care so little about these things; one woman refuses to marry them this week, and the next they lead a blushing bride to the altar, and are ecstatic with bliss-quite as happy as if it had been their first love." Not quite; there is a feeling that belongs to the past that the future cannot give again; a low sigh of regret breathes through the nuptial song; the first, fresh fragrance has gone from the rose, though the flower itself remains as beautiful as ever. Men are not quite as destitute of feeling about these things as even they themselves would sometimes try to

make us believe. "See that lady," said an old gray-headed grandfather; "I feel to this day the pang she inflicted on me when she refused to marry me; and it is now fifty years since that event."

"But you recovered from the blow sufficiently to marry twice."

"Yes, and was very happy both times; I loved my wives exceedingly."

"Well, it is fortunate that the human heart has such vitality."

"It is fortunate; though I see that my three loves have shocked your feelings of romance." "No; I was only wondering if you really felt the first shock,"

"It vibrated through my whole being, until I feel the tingling now."

"Ridiculous, grandpa !" ejaculated a very young man, standing by. "We men are made of sterner stuff; last week the most beautiful girl in this room discarded me; but I do not care one straw; I have enjoyed my dinners just as much since the event as I did before, and sleep just as soundly. There are as good fish in the sea, etc." And the don't care discarded one commenced to hum an opera tune.

"You are an unfeeling fellow, sir," responded the old gentleman, indignantly. "The woman that is worth marrying is worth grieving for."

There was a rustle of brocade, and a lovely vision passed that way. The young braggart turned pale, and a deep sigh came heaving up from the very depths of his heart. A pang of intense regret, a long look of sorrowful love, a rapid movement forward, as if to speak to her, then a sudden halt, and he threw himself into a chair with a groan of desperate misery.

"Ah! you said you did not care, sir," ejaculated the old gentleman. "What am I to understand by those signs of sorrow?"

"That I am very miserable, sir."

"Yes, and nature, like murder, will out; it is folly for any man to say 'I don't care,' ' when the woman he loves refuses to marry him; he does care, and he ought to care; and every woman should know that she possesses the power to inflict a wound, and let her be careful how she uses her power. I do not say the wound can never heal, but I do say the mark always remains."

But Everard Lee made no boasting display of not feeling, and Amy felt that she was inflicting sorrow, as, driving back her tears, she saidArise, Everard; you only make me unhappy."

The curtain was pushed aside, and Mr. Milford stood and gazed upon the scene; but they saw him not.

Again the low tones of entreaty broke on Amy's ear. "Only say that some of these days I may hope to win your love."

She hesitated. Poor boy! who among his superiors in age would ever love her with devotion like his? Do not mature men love more with thought of self? and young ones more as women-unselfishly, giving greater love than they ask in return?"

"What a touching tableau !" And Mr. Milford walked into the room.

Everard sprang to his feet, and without even a good-by, passed out of the door and disappeared.

Five minutes afterwards the servant placed a hurried scrawl in Amy's hands; she smiled somewhat sadly as, looking over it, she read"I hate that man, for I know that you will marry him."

(Conclusion next month.)

TO MY MOTHER.

BY E. CONWELL SMITH.

I KNELT beside your grave, mother,
At sundown yester eve,
What time the lovely minstrel birds
Their good-night carols weave.
The winds of March were echoing

Above your silent breast;

"Twas strange, I trembled, lest they should Disturb your quiet rest.

The day had gone to sleep, mother,
I saw its waning light;
The pensive eve was stealing by,

And came the weird-like night;
Yet still I knelt me by your grave,
For oh, it seemed so cold
To leave you all alone, mother,
No cov'ring but the mould.

Not yet upon your grave, mother,

Have flowers dropped their bloom;
Not yet, sweet spring her sunny smiles
Hath showered on your tomb:
For in the sad November-time,

We gave you to your rest;
And winter's snowy sheet, alone,
Has folded on your breast.

But spring is coming now, mother,
And violets will weep

Their dewy tears upon the couch
Where hushed and still you sleep:
And when the summer-time, mother,
Comes stealing o'er your bed,
I'll wreathe its purest offerings

In garlands for your head.