THE GLOWWORM.

How pleasant is the greenwood's deep-matted shade,
On a midsummer's eve, when the fresh rain is o'er;
When the yellow beams slope, and sparkle through the glade,
And swiftly in the thin air the light swallows soar !

But sweeter, sweeter still, when the sun sinks to rest,
And twilight comes on, with the fairies so gay,
Tripping through the forest-walk, where flowers, unpress'd,
Bow not their tall heads beneath their frolic play.

To music's softest sounds they dance away the hour,

Till moonlight steals down among the trembling leaves,
And checkers all the ground, and guides them to the bower,
The long-haunted bower, where the nightingale grieves.
Then no more they dance, till her sad song is done,
But silent as the night, to her mourning attend;
And often as her dying notes their pity have won,
They vow all her sacred haunts from mortals to defend.

When, down among the mountains, sinks the evening star,
And the changing moon forsakes this shadowy sphere,
How cheerless would they be, though they fairies are,
If I, with my pale light, came not near!

Yet cheerless though they'd be, they're ungrateful to my love:
For often, when the traveller's benighted on his way,

And I glimmer in his path, and would guide him through the grove,

They bind me in their magic spell to lead him far astray,

And in the mire to leave him, till the stars are all burnt out;
While, in strange-looking shapes, they frisk about the ground,

And, afar in the woods, they raise a dismal shout,

Till I shrink into my cell again for terror of the sound!

But, see where all the tiny elves come dancing in a ring,
With the merry, merry pipe, and the tabor, and the horn,
And the timbrel so clear, and the lute with dulcet string:
Then round about the oak they go till peeping of the morn.

Down yonder glade two lovers steal, to shun the fairy queen,
Who frowns upon their plighted vows, and jealous is of me,
That yestereve I lighted them along the dewy green,
To seek the purple flower, whose juice from all her spells can free.

And now, to punish me, she keeps afar her jocund band,
With the merry, merry pipe, and the tabor and the lute;
If I creep near yonder oak, she will wave her fairy wand,
And to me the dance will cease, and the music all be mute.

Oh! had I but that purple flower whose leaf her charms can foil,
And knew like fays to draw the juice, and throw it on the wind,

I'd be her slave no longer, nor the traveller beguile,

And help all faithful lovers, nor fear the fairy kind!

But soon the vapor of the woods will wander afar,

And the fickle moon will fade, and the stars disappear;
Then cheerless will they be, though they fairies are,
If I, with my pale light, come not near!

Whatever St. Aubert might think of the stanzas, he would not deny is daughter the pleasure of believing that he approved them; and, having given his commendation, he sank into a reverie, and they walked on in silence.

"A faint erroneous ray,

Glanced from th' imperfect surfaces of things,

Flung half an image on the straining eye;
While waving woods, and villages, and streams,
And rocks, and mountain tops, that long retain
The ascending gleam, are all one swimining sceno,
Uncertain if beheld."-THOMSON,

St. Aubert continued silent till he reached the chateau, where his wife had retired to her chamber. The languor and dejection that had lately oppressed her, and which the exertion called forth by the arrival of her guests had suspended, now returned with increased effect. On the fol lowing day symptoms of fever appeared; and St. Aubert, having sent for medical advice, learned that her disorder was a fever, of the same nature as that from which he had lately recovered. She had, indeed, taken the infection during her attendance upon him; and her constitution being too weak to throw out the disease immediately, it had lurked in her veins, and occasioned the heavy languor of which she had complained. St. Aubert, whose anxiety for his wife overcame every other consideration, detained the physician in his house. He remembered the feelings and the reflections that had called a momentary gloom upon his mind, on the day when he had last visited the fishing-house in company with Madame St. Aubert, and he now admitted a presentiment that this illness would be a fatal one. But he effectually concealed this from her, and from his daughter, whom he endeavored to reanimate with hopes that her constant assiduities would not be unavailing. The physician, when asked by St. Aubert for his opinion of the disorder, replied, that the event of it depended upon circumstances which he could not ascertain. Madame St. Aubert seemed to have formed a more decided one; but her eyes only gave hints of this. She frequently fixed them upon her anxious friends with an expression of pity and of tenderness, as if she anticipated the sorrow that awaited them, and that seemed to say, it was for their sakes only, for their suffering, that she regretted life. On the seventh day the disorder was at its crisis. The physician assumed a graver manner, which she observed, and took occasion, when her family had once quitted the chamber, to tell him that she perceived her death was approaching. Do not attempt to deceive me, said she; I feel that I cannot long survive: I am prepared for the event-I have long, I hope, been preparing for it. Since I have not long to live, do not suffer a mistaken compassion to induce you to flatter my family with false hopes. If you do, their affliction will only be the heavier when it arrives. I will endeavor to teach them resignation by my example.

The physician was affected; he promised to obey her, and told St. Aubert, somewhat abruptly, that there was nothing to expect. The latter was not philosopher enough to restrain his feelings when he received this information; but a consideration of the increased affliction which the observance of his grief would occasion his wife, enabled him, after some time, to command himself in her presence. Emily was at first overwhelmed with the intelligence; then, deluded by the strength of her wishes, a hope sprung up in her mind that her mother would yet recover, and to this she pertinaciously adhered almost to the last hour.

The progress of this disorder was marked, on the side of Madame St. Aubert, by patient suffering, and subjected wishes. The composure with which she awaited her death, could be derived only from the retrospect of a life governed, as far as human frality permits, by a consciousness of being always in the presence of the Deity, and by the hope of a higher world. But her piety could not entirely subdue the grief of parting from those whom she so dearly loved. During these her last hours, she conversed much with St. Aubert and Emily, on the prospect of futurity, and other religious topics. The resignation she expressed, with the firm hope of meeting in a future world, the friends she left in this, and the effort which sometimes appeared to conceal her sorrow at this temporary separation, frequently affected St. Aubert so much as to oblige him to leave the room. Having indulged his tears awhile, he would dry them and return to the chamber with a countenance composed by an endeavor which did but increase his grief.

Never had Emily felt the importance of the lessons which had taught her to restrain her sensibility, so much as in these moments, and never had she practised them with a triumph so complete. But when the last was over, she sunk at once under the pressure of her sorrow, and then perceived that it was hope, as well as fortitude, which had hitherto supported her. St. Aubert was for a time too devoid of comfort himself to bestow any on his daughter.

CHAPTER II.

"I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word
Would harrow up thy soul."-SHAKSPEARE,

MADAME ST. AUBERT was interred in the neighboring village church: her husband and daughter attended her to the grave, followed by a long train of the peasantry, who were sincere mourners of this excellent

woman.

On his return from the funeral, St. Aubert shut himself in his chamber. When he came forth, it was with a serene countenance, though pale in sorrow. He gave orders that his family should attend him. Emily only was absent; who, overcome with the scene she had just witnessed, had retired to her closet to weep alone. St. Aubert followed her thither; he took her hand in silence, while she continued to weep; and it was some moments before he could so far command his voice as to speak. It trembled while he said, My Emily, I am going to prayers with my family; you will join us. We must ask support from above.--Where else ought we to seek it-where else can we find it?

Emily checked her tears, and followed her father to the parlor, where the servants being assembled, St. Aubert read, in a low and solemn voice, the evening service, and added a prayer for the soul of the departed. During this, his voice often faltered, his tears fell upon the book, and at length he paused. But the sublime emotions of pure devotion gradually

elevated his views above this world, and finally brought comfort to bis heart.

When the service was ended, and the servants were withdrawn, he tenderly kissed Emily, and said, I have endeavored to teach you, from your earliest youth, the duty of self-command; I have pointed out to you the great importance of it through life, not only as it preserves us in the various and dangerous temptations that call us from rectitude and virtue, but as it limits the indulgences which are termed virtuous, yet which, extended beyond a certain boundary, are vicious, for their consequence is evil. All excess is vicious; even that sorrow which is amiable in its origin, becomes a selfish and unjust passion, if indulged at the expense of our duties: by our duties I mean what we owe to ourselves, as well as to others. The indulgence of excessive grief enervates the mind, and almost incapacitates it for again partaking of those various innocent enjoyments, which a benevolent God designed to be the sunshine of our lives. My dear Emily, recollect and practise the precepts I have so often given you, and which your own experience has so often shown to

be wise.

Your sorrow is useless. Do not receive this as merely a commonplace remark, but let reason therefore restrain sorrow. I would not annihilate your feelings, my child, I would only teach you to command them; for whatever may be the evils resulting from a too susceptible heart, nothing can be hoped from an insensible one; that, on the other hand, is all vice-vice, of which the deformity is not softened, or the effect consoled for, by any semblance or possibility of good. You know my sufferings, and are, therefore, convinced that mine are not the light words which, on these occasions, are so often repeated to destroy even the sources of honest emotion, or which merely display the selfish ostentation of false philosophy. I will show my Emily that I can practise what I advise. I have said thus much, because I cannot bear to see you wasting in useless sorrow, for want of that resistance which is due from mind; and I have not said it till now, because there is a period when all reasoning must yield to nature-that is past; and another, when excessive indulgence, having sunk into habit, weighs down the elasticity of the spirits so as to render conquest nearly impossible—that is to come. You, my Emily, will show that you are willing to avoid it. Emily smiled through her tears, upon her father: Dear sir, said she, and her voice trembled; she would have added, I will show myself worthy of being your daughter; but a mingled emotion of gratitude, affection, and grief, overcame her. St. Aubert suffered her to weep without interruption, and then began to talk on common topics.

The first person who came to condole with St. Aubert was a M. Barreaux, an austere and seemingly unfeeling man. A taste for botany had introduced them to each other, for they had frequently met in their wanderings among the mountains. M. Barreaux had retired from the world, and almost from society, to live in a pleasant chateau, on the skirts of the woods, near La Vallee. He also had been disappointed in his opinion of mankind; but he did not, like St. Aubert, pity and mourn for them; he felt more indignation at their vices, than compassion for their weaknesses.

St. Aubert was somewhat surprised to see him; for, though he had often pressed him to come to the chateau, he had never till now accepted the invitation; and now he came without ceremony or reserve, entering the parlor as an old friend. The claims of misfortune appeared to have softened down all the ruggedness and prejudices of his heart. St. Aubert unhappy, seemed to be the sole idea that occupied his mind. It was in manners, more than in words, that he appeared to sympathize with his friends; he spoke little on the subject of their grief; but the minute attention he gave them, and the modulated voice and softened look that accompanied it, came from his heart, and spoke to theirs.

At this melancholy period, St. Aubert was likewise visited by Madame Cheron, his only surviving sister, who had been some years a widow, and now resided on her own estate near Toulouse. The intercourse between them had not been very frequent. In her condolements, words were fot wanting; she understood not the magic of the look that speaks at once to the soul, or the voice that sinks like balm to the heart; but she assured St. Aubert, that she sincerely sympathized with him; praised the virtues of his late wife, and then offered what she considered to be consolation. Emily wept unceasingly while she spoke; St. Aubert was tranquil, listened to what she said in silence, and then turned the discourse upon another subject.

At parting, she pressed him and her niece to make her an early visit. Change of place will amuse you, said she; and it is wrong to give way to grief. St. Aubert acknowledged the truth of these words of course; but, at the same time felt more reluctant than ever to quit the spot which his past happiness had consecrated. The presence of his wife had sanctified every surrounding scene; and each day, as it gradually softened the acuteness of his suffering, assisted the tender enchantment that bound him to home.

But there are calls which must be complied with, and of this kind was the visit he paid to his brother-in-law, M. Quesnel. An affair of an interesting nature made it necessary that he should delay this visit no longer; and, wishing to rouse Emily from her dejection, he took her with him to Epourville.

As the carriage entered upon the forest that adjoined his paternal domain, his eyes once more caught, between the chestnut avenue, the turreted corners of the chateau. He sighed to think of what had passed since he was last there, and that it was now the property of a man who neither revered nor valued it. At length he entered the avenue, whose lofty trees had so often delighted him when a boy, and whose melancholy shade was now so congenial with the tone of his spirits. Every feature of the edifice, distinguished by an air of heavy grandeur, appeared successively between the branches of the trees-the broad turret, the arched gateway that led into the courts, the drawbridge, and the dry fosse which surrounded the whole.

The sound of the carriage wheels brought a troop of servants to the great gate, where St. Aubert alighted, and from which he led Emily into the Gothic hall, now no longer hung with the arms and ancient banners of the family. These were displaced, and the old wainscoting, and beams that crossed the roof, were painted white. The large table.