what he most feared, and how there was once more sparkles in their life-cup, sunlight on its brim, and divine youth in their hearts —are matters best left to be pictured out by each one's fancy and experience.

The truth was a sad one, and sent many a keen pang through their cheeriness and joy. Misfortune, solitude, and as it seemed, self-reproach, had broken the health and spirit of his old master and friend, and the helpless, friendless pair had had to bury their dead out of their sight, in a strange city, amongst strange people, and with gloomy forebodings. But Maggie was not now a laughing, giddy girl, but a cheerful, trustful companion to her mother, and a warm sheltering angel in that dark house of mourning and lamentation. had risen into a higher womanhood, and Giles had climbed into a nobler manhood; and, as they looked out at each other, they measured each other's altitude, and found that even in misfortune God had passed by them, and touched out their lives and characters into a firmer boldness, a steadier lustre, a holier beauty.

She

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CHAPTER VII.

IN PACEM.

THE great joys and sorrows of human life are often side by side-they touch and mingle, as the blue ether and the common earth, in every visible horizon. The angels of life and death cross wings on almost every threshold. As misfortunes brighten into joy, so joy will be hallowed into sadness, and still the feet of the holy ones tread very near our hearths, and the sweep of their wings break the deep silence of our dreams.

Giles was happy, very happy-who will doubt of it? The busy streets of London were often transformed beneath his gaze into fairer pictures and brighter climes. His whole life had suddenly opened into blossom, and sweet odours were wafted out by every tiny breeze that stirred. He moved

about as to softest unsyllabled music, and went through arduous duties as a strain of song winds along dim aisles and woods, leaving a little of its precious freight in every bosky nook and corner. I know not whether he wrote any poetry, but most assuredly it welled up in his heart and gave a charm to his life. Men tell us the world is getting old and poets have lost their use and their power. They belie us, for true love makes the universe fresh and young for ever, and what a thousand can feel where only one can express, will never cease to interest and thrill as long as there are eyes that beam, hearts that feel, tongues that stammer, and lives that blend.

Giles was often at Carlton now, and many talks and rambles were had by all amongst its meadowy pleasantness and its songfal copses. And Maggie told him how she had wanted to write but dare not, how she had suffered, and waited, and trusted, and how her dear father was in his latter days more than half a Puritan, and a thorough admirer of Cromwell. A very little thing, it seemed, would have decided him.

"O, if you had but been there," said Maggie, many, many times, "my father had not

died."

And then Giles was sorrowful.

There were grief shadows amidst this summer-wealth of sunniness and bloom. Life, free, full, and loving, had renewed itself to some, and even others had caught its invisible impulsions, and were renewed and brightened. But in the deep chimney corner, above which hung his dinted armour, with his old Bible on his knee, was the figure of a man who was not long for this world, and who knew it and felt it without fear. It was no sudden change, but a gradual, stealthy, and certain approach. Long ago Nathaniel had seen to the end of the path, "where sat the Shadow feared of man," and went smiling on to meet him in the strength of God and the grace of prayer.

He seemed to be ing for something he

living on and wait

scarcely knew what.

There was, at times, so much energy in his mind and frame that his friends were disposed to chide him for his resignation, but wisely held their peace.

The event was coming. It was bringing with it excitement, debate, and contention. There were hard words, hard hits, and hard arguments. Never before had England seemed so shaken from the deep slumber of a religious and political sloth. Commonest men became heroes, and veriest rogues put to blush the saints of a quieter period. Three years had passed since Naseby fight, and numerous events had brought on the foreseen conclusion. What was to be done with the king? He must be tried. By whom? By commissioners appointed by Parliament.

January 20, 1648, old style, and 1649, new style, was the beginning of the end. On that day the king was brought to trial. The charge was read, "all being bareheaded, but the commissioners and the king who sat in his chayre;' and, when pressed for his answer, the king denied their authority, affirming that he was to give answer to no power but the Supreme Power above.

"The Lord President told him that they sate by the authority of the Commons of England, in Parliament assembled, who had