received remittances from that country, dis-"The candles, the candles!-the matches charged all her debts, and with her two will all be out again soon! Make haste, daughters set off for London: and where, make haste! reach me that candle, Gradus perhaps, they may be even now living, and I come, Hic-hæc-hoc-and you, you little may have passed them in the streets and fool, you, (to A-B-C,) make yourself useful, looked upon their faces as those of strangers. and don't blow away the tinder again!" But the greater probability is, that the poor "Here! here! here!" exclaimed the mother, at least, is long since gone to her rest. others; each presenting a candle. If so, may a merciful Providence have protected and watched over her orphans! and may the little Emma have escaped the snare laid for beauty like hers, in such a place as London! Better were it, otherwise, that she had always remained (with no worse companion than poverty) in the ruined cottage under the hills; or gone, in her days of innocence, to share the cold grave of the spotless Amelia ! (To be continued.) STANZAS ON MISS CATHERINE BY L. M. MONTAGU. IN Kitty's eye of heavenly blue Round Kitty's mouth the graces play, The glossy ringlets crowning all, And Kitty's heart is like her face, Since nature has so lavish been, A PEDESTRIAN TOUR OF 1347 MILES There was a great deal of trouble in getting the wicks lighted, for they had been so thumbed and fingered, and so pinched and discomposed, that all their phlogiston had been affrighted out of them. But what will not time, patience, and perseverance do? Yet other five minutes were dissipated, ere the glowing wicks of the candles enkindled in our breasts the exhilarating blazes of success. Then did we indeed begin to feel full of the pleasurable hope of confidence; for the thermometers of our anticipation stood at a high degree. A-B-C had been very busy in the contest between the match and his candle-but he had been unobserved during the moment of excitement. Now and then we assembled close round the entrance, and prepared for the strife. "What is the matter with A-B-C?" said one of the party, looking back towards the spot where we had been striking the lights, but which was only a few yards distant. "What is he about-is he crying?" He was kneeling on the ground, with his candle (still burning) lying before him, and which he had dropped: he had placed one hand over his eyes, appearing to thrust his fingers against them with great force: and with the thumb and fore-finger of the other, he was pinching his nose to the utmost of his strength. His face was red, and the tears stood on his cheeks. "He has got the brimstone up his nose," said Gradus. "I thought he would get a whiff of it," observed Hic-hæc-hoc, with an expression of unconcern. "'Twas a wonder he didn't burn the end of his nose off just now, he put it so close." "Confound the little ass!" exclaimed Illeego; "I'm glad of it: I hope he has swallowed enough to satisfy him-he is always poking his officious fingers everywhere but where they should be: 'tis a just judgment against him for blowing all the tinder away!" In a short space of time, by the united exertions of rubbing his eyes and holding his breath, A-B-C had entirely recovered from the suffocating effects of the sulphureous fumes he had unwisely inhaled. Ille-ego, either to delight his bullying propensity over a junior, (than which nothing is so sweet to a BY PEDESTRES, AND SIR CLAVILENO WOODENPEG, schoolboy where he dare do it,) or else to KNIGHT, OF SNOWDON. CHAPTER X. AT the sight of this, our hearts kindled with sympathy, and there arose another cry. * Continued from vol. i. p. 340, annoy and tease him with threats, merely for the pleasure of doing so, now fixed on this youngest of the party to be the first to enter the dungeon. A-B-C, however, young as he was, was not without spirit. He told Ille-ego boldly, he might go to h-ll if he would he was not going to make him go in first: he reminded him that he had come to like Gulliver, crammed into the Brobdignagian marrow-bone. be the guide to all the others that he had hands and knees, because I was not strong promised to do it—and now, (he added with enough in the back to burst up the arch: and a sneer,) he was going to "shirk off.” I now discovered that I woefully wanted some Ille-ego answered this with a laugh; and one outside to afford me a friendly fulcrum it soon appeared that he had had no positive for my feet. But I had politely let them all intention of enforcing his proposition-he go before and I was not yet far enough in had merely bullied him for amusement. (for the wall was very thick) to enable them The archway was so little elevated above to bestow on me an assisting pull. I was the ground, that hands and knees-or all fours-were not low enough to enable any of us to enter in that way; it was indispensable to attempt some other mode more hopeful although less agreeable, in order to accomplish the purpose. The entrance was nearly circular-that is, it was of almost the same dimensions measured across either diameter; consequently reducing it to the equality of a large worm's hold in the earth: and we, as "sinful worms," had to play our parts to the very letter. Ille-ego took the lead, placing himself opposite the opening, down flat on the ground, arms and legs being of little or no use. He, being the first, was to hold his candle between his teeth, like a taffy, or a lollypop; and then by dint of many a fierce thrust from ourselves behind him, and the virtue of a worm-like, or peristaltic motion on his part, he succeeded in passing his whole length entirely under the archway, and rising up inside on his legs. He called out to us to follow. Long ago as it was, I never shall forget the tone of his voice. The low vaulted roof, and the cells and passages around him, gave it such a hollow and sepulchral sound as it issued faintly through the arch-although he appeared to exert all his power to make us hear-that I could have fancied some demon of the place had already snatched his body, and that it was his ghost, and not himself that addressed us. Voluminous is the list of hobgoblin and ghost stories that are circulated, respecting the airy, unearthly, and supernatural tenants of this dismal cave; and, notwithstanding I had until now, been all anxiety to push forward, a sudden thrill of fear passed over me, and and blasted, in an instant, my hardy resolution. The spectral tone of Ille-ego's words seemed to act like an electric shock, and I was no longer solicitous to be the second adventurer: therefore, under the garb of politeness (a quality, forsooth, so homogeneous with the person of a schoolboy!) I considerable receded, and allowed all the others to take precedence. This they were not long in doing: for they had assistance within, to pull them by the ears, as well as help without, to push them by the heels. How does a worm manage to proceed when he finds himself pent up in such close and confined circumstances as these in which I here lay? What does he do to get forward? I think I am very much like a worm just now: and in truth, I never in my existence so much desired to possess the attributes and vermiculocity of the genus vermes as I sincerely do at this moment. Of no arms, no legs, and no feet, can all the tribes boast? yet have I all these and yet (speaking with superlative humility) how far superior are they to me! Would I were a worm at this instant, that I might crawl into the hole! I became impatient-I made several pisaller efforts-I swam with my legs-I elongated myself, (thinking on similitudes,) and then suddenly contracted; acting by a species of vermiculation, or vermicular motion -and finally and happily, by dint of wriggling, sidling, grunting, groaning, throeing, kicking, and sprawling, (all unpoetic words,) I succeeded so far as to bring my head and shoulders within the internal surface of the wall. And then, but pr'ythee allow me to take breath. "But I'm afraid," was the end of a sentence which the now-a-days Pedestres heard Hic-hæc-hoc say in a low tone of voice, in answer to some proposition of his companions within. “Poo, nonsense!" exclaimed Ille-ego, assuming the air of nonchalance: "if there are any, I dare say they are quite hamless. Go down that passage, and perhaps you may discover something. "Will you go with me?" inquired the first speaker: "for I dare not go alone. How do I know but they may attack me, and poison me to death? Will you go before?” "Why-I-eh—I—eh "I thought I heard something creeping over the stones," continued Hic-hæc-hoc, in the greatest trepidation. "No-no-it can't be," rejoined Ille-ego, himself quivering like the tongue of a serpent. "It can't be, I'm sure-but let us go a little way off." "A part of the roof of this passage," observed Gradus, as the two terrified ones approached, "has fallen in, and we cannot pass that way. If we were to take the trouble to clear out the stones-but it would employ too much time for our candles-or, if we were to try some other passage In procrastinating my trial until the last, one great impediment contended to make my progress not only slow, but greviously toilsome and fatiguing. Having, after the precedent of my precursors, (pre-crawlers) prostrated my corpus on the mother earth immediately in front of the aperture, with my head I don't advise you," said Hic-hæc-hoc, as far in as I could put it, I tried to advance. with a faltering voice, and a pale face, though But what a farce, oh, ye gods! My arms the dimness of the lights tended to conceal were useless-my hands were useless-my this from much observation-"I don't advise feet were useless. I could not rise on my you to go far in that passage-for I think-I 66 don't-perhaps you know-for supposing it | were dangerous, you know 66 Supposing you are a great fool," rejoined Gradus, in the same tone of voice. What are you in such a funk about? have you been down the passage? come, let us go.' "I have been partly down, but it was very difficult to find the way, and I was afraid to go alone, for fear of the serpents.” As soon as Pedestres heard that the place was infested with serpents, his heart began to beat at a rapid rate, and the diastole and systole became short and quick. He bethought him of retreating forthwith, fancying in his fear he heard the very serpents close to his proboscis, which was resting on the ground, and which, in his situation, he had no means of raising. But the party within, probably ashamed of their own pusillanimity, were moving into the passage whence had arisen their former misgivings. There had been three candles burning prodigally since they had entered; and their fat had suffered so much from the violence of various pinchings, the heat of the hands in which they had been held without candlesticks, and the effects of the draughts of air that swept around them, that the apprehensions were, if they all were allowed to burn at once, they must inevitably soon be exhausted. Pedestres' candle was comfortably at rest in his pocket: and he, as he was, had not the most remote power of extracting it. He was "Bound more than a madman is." Ille-ego therefore issued orders that all the candles must be extinguished, saving one only: although, at the same time, he said he was very well aware that it was not imprudent not to keep a second, lest the other should be accidentally put out by any unforseen accident. Every one, however, declared there was no apprehension of that; they must be careful; and there appeared no reason why any misfortune should occur. On quenching two of the lights-leaving but one-the gloom was fearful and almost tangible. The flitting ghosts seemed to flock thicker than ever and Pedestres again thought of backing out. "I suppose this is the passage," observed Ille-ego rather gravely, and holding the candle above his head that his eyes should not be dazzled by the rays; "I suppose this is the passage in which the heaps of bones lie -and perhaps the treasures." "What bones and what treasures ?" said Gradus hastily. 66 Why, the bones and treasures that people talk so much about." "Are there any treasures in the dungeon now then?" putting a forcible emphasis on the word "now." "So they say," answered Ille-ego. "I wish we could find them," rejoined Gradus. "What a lot of glorious guttle we would have down at school !" "I should like to know," said Hic-hæc-hoc, "if this is the way that goes all under the town to the Cross Keys in Gold Street? But I should be afraid of going so far underground, for fear I should never come up again, or be able to find my way back." "Confound it all!" exclaimed Ille-ego, "I meant to have brought a piece of chalk with me to mark the walls: for we shall never be able to return by the passages we pass through if we don't note them in some manner. Oh! I say, G. adus, have you got your kite-string in your pocket? We might let that drop behind us as we go: it will show us our way back as well as any thing.' "No," said Gradus, "I left it behind on purpose: I thought there could be no need of kite-string in a dungeon." "I don't know whether it would have been long enough though," observed the other, "even if it were here." "O yes," returned Gradus, "there are nearly four hundred yards: I wound them all off this morning upon th stick we cut yesterday down by Nine-holes." "I've got some string," exclaimed A-B-C, at the same time pulling something like a boot-lace out of his pocket. "Will this do?" said he, holding it up. "Get out, you little fool!" rejoined Illeego, angrily; "what a young ass you must be to think a bit of whip-cord, about a foot long, will do!" "What's it for ?" inquired the youthful butt of the elder bullies. "What the deuce is it to you?" returned his senior. "Be off wi' you!" he added, thrusting him away very ungraciously. "Will you go a little way on ?" said Hichæc-hoc to Gradus; "for I scarcely know whether we shall be able to get over the stones that lie on the ground. I don't know the place at all," he continued, retreating with the hope that the other would not perceive his want of courage. Gradus was perhaps the boldest amongst us-Pedestres will say nothing of his stoutness, who durst not put more than head and shoulders within the wall)—but Gradus himself entertained no disposition to advance ahead. The party, however, pressed forward with a snail's pace at intervals, merely taking a step or two, and then suddenly stopping, either to listen or attempt to look around them. Even the guide himself-the superior in years-the superior in experience and knowledge of the subterranean labyrinthhe, our guide, was not free from the tremblings of a disturbed imagination. Willingly would he have concealed his feelings to his inmost self: and his timid and susceptible crew would as willingly have been ignorant of those sensations, which he found it impossible to conceal. They all looked up to him for information as to their procedure-for courage and confidence-and moreover, for protection. A farcical guide forsooth, he! a farcical emboldener! a farcical protector! yet he was to be the help through all our dangers! "What an old villain that Oliver Crom- Unconsciously and unintentionally Ille-ego, well was!" said the subject of our observa- by his history, commixed with supernatural tions. "What a cursed old villain he must inuendos, was gradually winding both himhave been to have driven people into such a self and his hearers up to that pitch of exciteplace as this to starve, or to die of suffocation! ment and nervous apprehension, that will They might as well have staid outside and sometimes exist in a nursery on the grave been shot at.” narrative of a mysterious ghost story. Himself-although scarcely aware of it-had been quite as much worked on by his own words, as his own words had worked on those others who listened to them. By mutual and tacit consent, they had ceased to proceed onwards, but had stationed themselves against one of the walls in a close knot:-all indeed but Hic-hæc-hoc, who with courage inexplicable, busied himself at a little distance, turning over some large stones. "Who was that Oliver Cromwell?" inquired Gradus, with a cautious deliberation. "I think I never heard any body speak a good word for him yet." "Nor will you," answered Ille-ego, "as long as truth is spoken in the world. He was the d- -t old rascal that ever existed on the face of the earth: I know no more about him-but I think that's quite enough to know of any Old red-nosed Noll, and the rest of the Roundheads, as I believe they used to be called, fought against the king-I think it was king Charles the First-and after fighting a great many battles, they at last caught him and cut his head off." man. "Ah!" interrupted Hic-hæc-hoc, "we were reading about that the other day in the History of England." "He knocked down," continued Ille-ego, "he knocked down all the castles that were ever built, and Tiverton Castle among the number and the people that he wanted to stab or shoot, or something or other, rather than die that way, hid themselves here in the dungeon. There were many hundreds that came in, and took all their money along with them, and all their fortunes, and all the treasures they could find, for fear least that old fool should catch hold of them. When they hid away-I say, give me another candlewhen they hid away-here, light it before this goes out; we must only burn one at a time-when they hid away in the first instance, they were obliged to run for it, and save their lives; they took as much with them as they could carry, and shut themselves up tight to keep the enemy out. But they should have thought that they were at the same instant keeping themselves so close inside, that they were sure to die of hunger. I suppose though they were afraid of going out to fetch food for fear of being caught-so that they were certain of dying either way: but I think I would rather die with a belly full while I was about dying." ("As well to die and go, as die and stay," Ille-ego might have quoted here: but I never heard him mention Shakspeare's name in my life.) "It must have been a shocking thing to have died in here," observed one of them with a tremulous voice. "There are heaps of skeletons somewhere in these passages," rejoined Ille-ego, "of all the people that are said to have perished at that time. What is that whitish looking stuff on the ground just over there?" A-B-C got behind our guide, and hugged the tail of his coat. "Where all the serpents and toads came from" (resuming his observations) "I cannot imagine-but there are lots of them, so I have been told." The incongruity of human nature delights in terrific pleasures. It will tremble with dread; and yet it will cherish and encourage the very fountain that supplies it. A tale of spectres and hobgoblins, however affecting and frightful, will still please in its own peculiar way: it will alarm and create painful feelings, and notwithstanding, it will at the same time be listened to. Ille-ego was frightening himself by talking of skeletons, at the instant he was terrifying his audience no less: and yet we must conclude that the pain he excited was pleasing, as he voluntarily maintained the same topic. Every time the blaze of the candle flared, they fancied that the presence of some wandering ghost had been the immediate cause: for the ghosts of all who perished there are said to flit through the passages, and to reckon in multitudes a sum as great as the number of skeletons tradition declares still lie under the ruins to this very day. Their conversation had become less incessant-they talked almost in a whisper-and often ceased for a few seconds as if to listen acutely. Pedestres (for so we must call him) reclining in so confined a situation, had every now and then unavoidably drew a very deep breath-so deep, indeed, as nearly to approach to the character of a sigh: and these sighs, owing to the now sharpened senses of the adventurers, had found their way to their almost panic-awaiting ears. Several times had they involuntarily started, and looked anxiously in each other's faces, as much as to say, "What was that?" And several times also had they been on the point of making one simultaneous rush towards the carnally blocked-up archway. "What had we better do?" said Gradus, rolling his eyes around him, and speaking in a barely audible accent; "shall we explore any further, or do you think we might as well return?" 66 Perhaps," answered Ille-ego in the same pitch and expression, "we might be able to go a little further-but yet I am afraid that -you know-you see-you see it is very difficult to pass the rubbish." "Yes," returned the former, seconding the last proposition, "there is so much earth, mortar, and stones in the way, that I really believe that we should never be able to get over it if we were to try all day." them." "And perhaps the snakes and toads might| A-B-C and Ille-ego came into violent contact come and bite us in the dark, if we disturbed in a narrow pass of the passage: poor A-B-C was hurled head-over-heels, and projected like a missile into a distant corner and the candle was knocked out of Ille-ego's hand to the ground and instantly extinguished. "I know that there are a great many here of the most venomous kinds always crawling about. What had we better do?" "Let us come away," said A-B-C, in a whining tone of voice; "do let us come away." "Don't be afraid," answered Gradus, terrified out of his wits. "But you know there are so many ghosts too-and supposing they were to attack us in here what would become of us?" added the little boy in a supplicating manner. "I don't suppose they will come," rejoined Ille-ego, doubtingly. Gradus saw no reason why they should not. "I never like to hear much about spectres and phantoms," he said; "and it is very frightful to think of them in such a place as this. I know one fellow who told me he once saw a ghost, and it was the most horrible and ghastly thing he ever saw in his life. It was one night when he was in bed : he was awoke about midnight by a noise at the chair close to his side; and when he looked up, he saw the ghost sitting down, and just going to put its hand upon its face Gradus here stopped short, and turned pale as death. as There was a sudden rattle of the fall of some large stones at a little distance in the dark. A sepulchral silence for a few seconds succeeded; when they all heard the sounds as if some one were struggling. 66 Help! for God's sake, help!" screamed a voice at a distance in the dark. "Help! for God's sake, help!" screamed Hic-hæc-hoc, who had been seated on a rickety foundation, and swallowing with anxiety the conversation he had heard. "Help! murder! help! Oh! what shall I do? what will become of me?" "You d―n little luckless fool!" roared Ille-ego with raging fury. "You cursed young ass! and now you have knocked out the candle, and what the devil are we to do? I'll be d- -d if I don't wring your neck for you "Oh, don't be so wicked!" said Gradus, bursting into tears. "Oh, don't swear till we get safe outside the dungeon." "And there's another fool stuck in the archway!" continued the former, as he approached nearer Pedestres. "Move off your cursed head, and let me pass, or upon my soul I'll kick your brains out!" I needed no second warning: for as soon as I had heard the consternation and uproar within, I exerted the utmost of my powers to push myself backwards and escape. A few minutes brought us all to the outside, wearing the most pitiable appearance. Covered with dirt-crying like infants-staring wild as if we knew not where we were and terrified past expression. We instantly set off to run and retrace our steps; and sped over the ground twenty times quicker than we had done at our coming. We ran as if ten thousand devils and ghosts had been hurrying tag-rag-and-bob-tail at our heels; and stopped not until we arrived at our now welcome school, where we nearly dropped down from exhaustion. OLD STANZA. LY, WHO WAS DROWNED ABROAD. The pile of stones he had been resting on ON A KNIGHT OF JERUSALEM OF THE DEVON FAMI unexpectedly gave way beneath him, and laid him sprawling on the ground: but the bewildered imaginations of us all pictured nothing in the adventure but supernatural agency. "Perhaps it's a serpent, or a ghost that has got him!" exclaimed Ille-ego in consternation; but making no effort towards his FROM AN ANCIENT MANUSCRIPT VOLUME, CON- WHOE'ER thou art, whom chance or pleasure leads |