ly any one of his age Bernard's superior. He says that Arthur is filling a most important place in the State legislature, and likely soon to be sent to Washington. Bernard has just been telling us, that he has received a unanimous call to our church here. Rose will live at the pretty little parsonage all the year round."

wards granted me appear a separate boon. It has gently broken to me the sentence of death. It has enabled me

to teach many of my habitual thoughts and hopes to make their home in heaven. I endeavored before, indeed, to send them onward to pioneer me there; but it was more difficult until they had the goad of an apparent doom

"O, did I not say? She has the other Temple, of course. As usual, they have everything alike.' My brother has given her a piece of land to build upon, just beyond our hedge. She is to pass her summers here. Are you not quite satisfied now, Katharine ? We have always been on our guard, as you must have seen, against pampering the young people; and the girls have every prospect of an income sufficient, if not for luxury, for every reasonable purpose of health, peace, taste, and charity."

"I will be both satisfied and gratified, dearest mistress, if Mr. Bernard is as good and charming as he looks and seems, and Mr. Arthur as he looks, for I have not yet seen enough of him to know how he seems, — and if they are not too old, after having time to do and learn so much."

"As for that, we are all moving on. Bernard is thirty, and Arthur but thirty-two. Our small children are twenty-one; and Paul encourages them with the assurance that they will soon be older.'" Miss Dudley paused. Her face grew more and more gravely bright, like the sunset, as we walked. She passed her arm round my waist, and spoke again: "Katharine, now, at last, I feel as I have never been able quite to feel before, as if I were prepared, when my time comes, to say, from my full heart to say, 'It is enough; O Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.' It might seem that, as I was not to die in my illness, eight or nine years ago, it was a superfluous hardship to me to be informed of my danger. It was an unspeakable blessing, even if a blessing in disguise! It made every day after

trast between leaving my family situated as I should leave it now, and as I must have done if I had left it then, would be alone enough to warm my death-bed with a glow of thankfulness. Now I should not leave my brother desolate. A band of noble and dutiful young men and women would cluster round him, vying with each other to comfort and cheer him. Rose and Lily have grown up under my own eye, more than to fulfil my fondest hopes. Keeping all her graceful fancy, one of them has safely learned, at length, the difference between fact and fable, and the other changed her natural impetuosity into self-control within and generous energy without. I should, if I died today, leave one of them with her lofty enthusiasm, her grand, high views, and wide sympathies a heroine at a hero's side, and the other a little ministering angel, hovering round a reverent, grateful saint!" She paused again, and smiled half tenderly, half playfully : "My jurisprudent, not otherwise very prudent Paul? Whether he is to be chief-justice, or what he is to be, I do not yet know; but I need not. He is safely over the quicksands of his teens. I can trust Paul. O Katharine, mark my words! It is but a dangerous heresy to believe that youth is the only season in which happiness can find us out. Many lives grow richer and richer, and brighter and brighter, as they go on from youth to age. So it has been with mine. My treasure, so may it be with yours!"

We turned back from the end of the garden at the foot of the hill, and saw the lovers and Paul entering the opposite gate, and coming towards us. As we met the foremost pair, Bernard of

fered his arm to Miss Dudley, saying, "We have been looking everywhere for you, to see if we could not tempt you to join us."

Rose, rosier than ever, falling behind him, put her hand in mine and shyly, brightly said, "Has Aunt Lizzy told you? O Katharine, ought I not to be safe for this world and the other with two St. Bernards to watch over me?"

In a moment more, we met Lily and her Temple, with Paul bringing up the rear. "Cousin Katharine," said he, "allow me the honor of presenting to you Minerva and the Temple of Mi

nerva."

Minerva-like and most goddess-like Lily looked in her fair, stately, perfected, classic beauty, calm even then, though all radiant with an air of divine and immortal joy. She presently, notwithstanding, condescended to speak from her height like a very kindly mortal.

Mr. Temple began, “Miss Morne, I have just been complaining to my lady, that she has afforded me no share yet in what she says is her most delightful friendship." (He had been presented to me long before, but had seen the family chiefly on their yearly visits to Boston, - when I usually remained at Beverly, with Julia, — or with other company at home, when he had naturally not been thrown much in my way.)

"And I have been promising to do penance, my dearest Katharine," said Lily; “therefore I will be so disinterested as to give you both up to walk together."

We did so; and I then and there began to find him one of the most agreeable and interesting persons I have ever seen; but when the party reached the gate nearest the house again, I set him free, and had the self-denial to excuse myself to them all, leave them to themselves and one another, and go and sit alone upon the shore.

Hardly had I had time to settle myself quietly there, to revel in a revery bright with the hopes and happiness of those so near and dear to me, when VOL. XIX. NO. 114. 29

I was startled from it by a loud and peculiar sound. I had never heard it before. It never had been heard since I had been a dweller in the place. But in an instant I was certain that it could be no other than the alarm-horn! I sprang to my feet. It came again— from the hill! I ran through the gate, and looked up as I still ran on through the garden. There was a group of ladies and gentlemen on the side of the hill. It was the party I had left. By the yet clear twilight I saw that they moved about some one who was lying on the ground. Was it?-it was! Miss Dudley. In a moment, Paul shot past me,-going for the doctor, I supposed. He did not speak to me. I did not stop him. The path lengthened and the hill heightened under my flagging feet. I reached the spot at last.

The two Temples made way for me in silence. Lily was sitting on the turf, with Miss Dudley lying half in her arms. Rose fanned her with her hat. Her eyes were closed. I spoke to her. She opened them, and looked at me, and pointed to her heart. Since, of late years, she had no longer thought it necessary to have her opium constantly at hand, I secretly carried it about with me in a little morocco case, which Mr. Dudley had had made to hold the bottle, with a little spoon, which measured exactly her dose. I offered it She took it eagerly, and said: "It does me good. I shall be better soon. I thought I was well. I should not have climbed the hill. Don't be anxious, Charles."

now.

Then I looked up, and for the first time saw the fixed white face - Mr. Dudley's looking on. I believe that he was farther from the place, and got up the hill just after me. He came forward, knelt opposite to me, and took her hand. In the other she was holding mine. She clasped them both for an instant together. I thought she was for the moment unconscious of anything but pain, and gently drew my own away to wipe her forehead.

"Is it death?" she panted.

John Fiske

T seems to be quite generally felt

IT

that the present time is a favorable one for entertaining and discussing various projects for the improvement of the University at Cambridge. To the question of reform, in its general outlines, the attention of our readers has already been directed by able hands. It is here proposed to pursue the subject more into details, and to educe from a few general principles the rudiments of a systematic scheme of reform.

Note, first, that the idea of reform is to be kept distinctly separate from that of revolution, and that, while advocating the former, all encouragement to the latter will here be strictly withheld. The improvements from time to time aimed at should as far as possible be brought about without effacing the distinctive characteristics of the original system. We are unable to sympathize with the radical spirit which would make a bonfire of all churches because the Pentateuch does not teach geology, or which would upset an indigenous and time-honored government because certain social evils coexist with it. And we cannot but think that an attempt to revolutionize our University, by assimilating it to sister institutions in England or Germany, would be productive of at least as much harm as good. If, for instance, in the hope of obtaining a perfect University, we were to abolish our dormitories, obliterate the distinction between classes, abandon the entire system of marking, and transfer the task of maintaining order from the Parietal Committee to the civil police, we should no doubt be as much disappointed as the men of 1789, who attempted to make English institutions grow on French soil, and got a Bonaparte dynasty for their pains. There is a place as well as a time for all things, and a great deal will always have to be con

ceded to the habit which men have of getting used to old institutions and customs, and of disliking to see them too roughly dealt with. A German university is little else than an organized aggregate of lecture-rooms, libraries, laboratories, and other facilities for those who desire to study, - resembling in this respect our scientific and professional schools. Our New England colleges, founded in a Puritan environment, less imbued with the modern spirit, and in many cases even dating from an earlier period, have always combined with their instruction more or less of coercion; and have laid claim to a supervision over the demeanor of their students, in the exercise of which the liberty of the latter is often egregiously interfered with. The freedom of the undergraduate at Harvard is hampered by restrictions, many of which, if once justifiable, have in the lapse of time grown to be quite absurd, and should certainly be removed with all possible promptness: of these we shall speak presently. But to remove all restrictions whatever with one and the same sweep of our reformatory besom, would excite serious and extensive popular distrust. The New England mind, which tolerates Maine liquor-laws and sabbatarian ordinances and protective tariffs, would not regard with favor such a revolutionary measure. So much liberty would bear an uncanny resemblance to license, a resemblance which, we freely admit, might not at first be wholly imaginary. The College would lose much of its popularity; young men would be sent elsewhere to pursue their studies; and thus great injury would be manifestly wrought to the cause of university reform, which must needs be supported to a considerable extent by popular sentiment in order duly to prosper. A large amount of discretion must therefore be used,

even in the removal of those features wherein our colleges compare unfavorably with those of other countries. But there are some respects in which the American university may claim a superiority quite unique, — some cases in which a radical change must ever be earnestly deprecated. That arrangement by virtue of which each student is a member, not only of the University, but of a particular Class, is fraught with such manifold benefits that any advantages to be derived from giving it up must disappear when brought into comparison. No graduate needs to be told what a gap would be made in his social and moral culture, if all the thoughts and emotions resulting from his relations to his classmates were to be stricken from it. For the genial nurture of the sympathetic feelings, the class system affords a host of favorable conditions which can ill be dispensed with. By means of it, the facilities of the University for becoming a centre of social no less than of intellectual development are greatly enhanced. On the other hand, it is not to be denied that, in requiring students of all degrees of mental ability and working power to complete the same course of study in the same length of time, there is much irrationality as well as some injustice. This evil, which is so seriously felt in American colleges, does not afflict the universities of England and Germany, where the class system is not in use. To obviate it, however, it is fortunately not necessary to resign the advantages which that system alone is competent to secure. Partly by allowing greater option in the selection of studies, partly by extending the privilege, at present occasionally granted to students, of taking their degrees one or two years after the termination of the regular course, sufficient recognition can be given to differences of mental capacity, without essentially infringing upon the individuality of the successive classes. then, is a clear case in which a judicious reform might attain all the ends sought by a sweeping revolution, with

Here,

out incurring the grievous detriment which the latter would inevitably entail. We believe that the same principle will apply in nearly every case; that it is possible to secure all the most valuable benefits conferred by European systems, without sacrificing the fundamental elements of our own; and that, by uniformly shaping our ameliorative projects with conscious reference to such an end, the efficiency of our University will be most successfully maintained, and its prosperity most thoroughly insured.

Next, in order to impart to our notions of reform the requisite symmetry and coherence, the legitimate objects of university education must be clearly conceived and steadfastly borne in mind. The whole duty of a university toward those who are sheltered within its walls may be concisely summed up in two propositions. It consists, first, in stimulating the mental faculties of each student to varied and harmonious activity, - in supplying every available instrument for sharpening the perceptive powers, strengthening the judgment, and adding precision and accuracy to the imagination; secondly, in providing for all those students who desire it the means of acquiring a thorough elementary knowledge of any given branch of science, art, or literature. In a word, to teach the student how to think for himself, and then to give him the material to exercise his thought upon,- this is the whole duty of a university. Into that duty the inculcation of doctrines as such does not enter. The professor is not fulfilling his proper function when he incontinently engages in a polemic in behalf of this or that favorite dogma. His business is to see that the pupil is thoroughly prepared and equipped with the implements of intellectual research, that he knows how to deduce a conclusion from its premise, that he properly estimates the value of evidence, and understands the nature of proof; he may then safely leave him to build up his own theory of things. His first crude conclusions may indeed be sadly