1 himself on a sofa at the end of the room. They both now took up a book. Mr. Gilfil chose the last number of the Gentleman's Magazine; Captain Wybrow, stretched on an ottoman near the door, opened Faublas; and there was perfect silence in the room which, ten minutes before, was vibrating to the passionate tones of Caterina. She had made her way along the cloistered passages, now lighted here and there by a small oil-lamp, to the grand-staircase, which led directly to a gallery running along the whole eastern side of the building, where it was her habit to walk when she wished to be alone. The bright moonlight was streaming through the windows, throwing into strange light and shadow the heterogeneous objects that lined the long walls. Greek statues and busts of Roman emperors; low cabinets filled with curiosities, natural and antiquarian; tropical birds, and huge horns of beasts; Hindoo gods and strange shells; swords and daggers, and bits of chain-armour; Roman lamps, and tiny models of Greek temples; and above all these, queer old family portraits-of little boys and girls, once the hope of the Cheverels, with closeshaven heads imprisoned in stiff ruffs of faded, pink-faced ladies, with rudimentary features and highly-developed head-dresses- of gal lant gentlemen, with high hips, high shoulders, and red pointed beards. Here, on rainy days, Sir Christopher and his lady took their promenade, and here billiards were played; but, in the evening, it was forsaken by all except Caterina and, sometimes, one other person. She paced up and down in the moonlight, her pale face and thin white-robed form making her look like the ghost of some former Lady Cheverel come to revisit the glimpses of the moon. By-and-by she paused opposite the broad window above the portico, and looked out on the long vista of turf and trees now stretching chill and saddened in the moonlight. Suddenly a breath of warmth and roses seemed to float towards her, and an arm stole gently round her waist, while a soft hand took up her tiny fingers. Caterina felt an electric thrill, and was motionless for one long moment; then she pushed away the arm and hand, and, turning round, lifted up to the face that hung over her, eyes full of tenderness and reproach. The fawnlike unconsciousness was gone, and in that one look were the ground tones of poor little Caterina's nature-intense love and fierce jealousy. Why do you push me away, Catina?" said Captain Wybrow in a half-whisper; are you angry with me for what a hard fate puts upon me? Would you have me cross my uncle-who has done so much for us both-in his dearest wish? You know I have duties--we both have duties before which feeling must be sacrificed." "Yes, yes," said Caterina, stamping her foot, and turning away her head; "don't tell me what I know already." Then There was a voice speaking in Caterina's mind, to which she had never yet given vent. That voice said continually, "Why did he make me love him-why did he let me know he loved me, if he knew all the while that he couldn't brave everything for my sake?" love answered, "He was led on by the feeling of the moment, as you have been, Caterina; and now you ought to help him to do what is right." Then the voice rejoined, "It was a slight matter to him. doesn't much mind giving you up. He will soon love that beautiful woman, and forget a poor little pale thing like you." He Thus love, anger, and jealousy were struggling in that young soul. 'Besides, Catina," continued Captain Wybrow in still gentler tones, "I shall not succeed. Miss Assher very likely prefers some one else; and you know I have the best will in the world to fail. I shall come back a hapless bachelor perhaps to find you already married to the good-looking chaplain, who is over head and ears in love with you. Poor Sir Christopher has made up his mind that you're to have Gilfil." "Why will you speak so? You speak from your own want of feeling. Go away from me.' "Don't let us part in anger, In the Catina. All this may pass away. the figures kneeling there. It's as likely as not that I may desk was Mr. Gilfil, with his face a never marry any one at all. These shade graver than usual. On his palpitations may carry me off, and you may have the satisfaction of knowing that I shall never be anybody's bridegroom. Who knows what may happen? I may be my own master before I get into the bonds of holy matrimony, and be able to choose my little singing-bird. Why should we distress ourselves before the time?" "It is easy to talk so when you are not feeling," said Catina, the tears flowing fast. "It is bad to bear now, whatever may come after. But you don't care about my misery." "Don't I, Tina?" said Anthony in his tenderest tones, again stealing his arm round her waist, and drawing her towards him. Poor Catina was the slave of this voice and touch. Grief and resentment, retrospect and foreboding, vanished-all life before and after melted away in the bliss of that moment, as Anthony pressed his lips to hers. Captain Wybrow thought, "Poor little Tina! it would make her very happy to have me. But she is a mad little thing." At that moment a loud bell startled Catina from her trance of bliss. It was the summons to prayers in the chapel, and she hastened away, leaving Captain Wybrow to follow slowly. It was a pretty sight, that family assembled to worship in the little chapel, where a couple of waxcandles threw a mild faint light on right hand, kneeling on their red velvet cushions, were the master and mistress of the household, in their elderly dignified beauty. On his left, the youthful grace of Anthony and Caterina, in all the striking contrast of their colouringhe, with his exquisite outline and rounded fairness, like an Olympian god; she dark and tiny, like a gypsy changeling. Then there were the domestics kneeling on red-covered forms,-the women headed by Mrs. Bellamy, the natty little old housekeeper, in snowy cap and apron, and Mrs. Sharp, my lady's maid, of somewhat vinegar aspect and flaunting attire; the men, by Mr. Bellamy the butler, and Mr. Warren, Sir Christopher's venerable valet. A few collects from the Evening Service was what Mr. Gilfil habitually read, ending with the simple petition, "Lighten our darkness." And then they all rose, the servants turning to curtsy and bow as they went out. The family returned to the drawing-room, said good-night to each other, and dispersed-all to speedy slumber except two. only cried herself to sleep after the clock had struck twelve. Mr. Gilfil lay awake still longer, thinking that very likely Caterina was crying. Caterina Captain Wybrow, having dismissed his valet at eleven, was soon in a soft slumber, his face looking like a fine cameo in high relief on slightly-indented pillow. the [In the following poem the writer has departed no doubt from the more veracious chronicles of the gods, and the more generally received dogmas of the old Greek faiths. There is no word in classic story of an interview between Bacchus and Apollo, when the latter tended the flocks of King Admetus during his seven years' exile from Olympus, for killing the Cyclops. In fact, according to the more esoteric doctrines of the old mythological divines, Apollo and Bacchus are merely different manifestations of the same deity. Then there is a great heresy, no doubt, in ascribing to any influence of Apollo the agricultural results of the mysterious union of Bacchus and Ceres, although some may see in it "The symbols of a larger sense" even according to mythological principles. Moreover, there is no doubt that the jealous Athenians would have warmly resented any attempt to represent Apollo as interfering in the special department of their tutelar deity, Pallas, and shaken their heads at the classical solecism of regarding Song as a synonym with Wisdom. Upon the whole, however, the old doctors of mythology were very liberal in their views; and provided one spoke respectfully of the Olympic conclave conjunctly and severally, they took little offence at the conduct, humours, and peculiarities ascribed to them. The following poem is intended to represent the two phases in the career of Dionysus,viz. the frolicsome wine-god, wild with the first joy of the grape, and roaming over the world to establish his divinity, with wild beasts and frantic monads in his train,-till, either subdued by some softer influence, or educated by experience, he settled down into a gentlemanly god, and carrying his experiments beyond the wine-vat into the virgin soil, became the parent of Agriculture and Civilisation. If more general ideas be sought, they will be found in the ordinary development of man's life, and in the conquest of the sensual by the spiritual, and that re-union of the spiritual with the sensuous, which constitutes Art to all whose idea of such things are not sublimated beyond earth and nature.] * The ivy and the laurel, the badges of Bacchus and Apollo. At the greater Panathenaic games the principal prizes consisted of vases containing oil from the sacred olives of the Acropolis. There, likewise, the potters of the street called Keramicus, a highly-esteemed class of artists in these days, exhibited their finest works. Wake the dithyrambic strings, From Bacchic Lydia's flowery mountain,† Through forests green, with garlands gay, And care and common things avoiding, With shout and song, The youthful God in glory riding, Raise aloud the Lydian song, Where youth and beauty tread the measure; Where hearts, like wine-cups, brim with pleasure, By board and bower, 'Neath myrtle boughs and skies of azure; For youth is more than golden treasure. With clustering grapes, and flowing hair, With kingly laughter all unheeding— Where roses blow, Where wine-cups flow, And love is leading, Till they reach the valleys fair, Where King Admetus' herds are feeding. Oh the laughter! oh the song! A silent rapture, gathering o'er all, Eyes all glistening, As with careless grace they wore all, Their ivy crowns, and garlands floral. Raise the song to higher themes, Strike the lyre to louder numbers, Lydian measures lapt their dreams, Delphic fires have burst their slumbers, And burst the shroud The fountain where Bacchus was concealed by Jupiter, when he had liberated him from his thigh,-where he was sewed up to be out of Juno's way, after she had burnt the beautiful Semele. As "The flowery Tmolus," as Euripides calls it, where Bacchus was nursed. Lydia was the scene of the wine-god's infancy, the other allusions to that somewhat pleasure-loving region may be left to most people without further explanation. |