journeys, with the wants and means of every nook at cricket was Paradise, the having constantly of the empire. Then he hastens to load those broad- to fag out' in the bottomed junks that you may see crawling up every river and lake, with bamboo-matting sails and gaudy flags, laden gunwale-deep with precious bales, and bound for the dearest market, one may be sure. The Chinaman knows his art and mystery well. He has anticipated the choicest doctrines of political economy.fagged.' Notwithstanding any convictions upon this Save him from Taiping and pirate, from mandarin 'squeezes' and servile wars, and he will pay his way, and pursue his course, fat and content as Dr Pangloss himself, with what is to him the very best of all possible worlds. sun without an innings, was as certainly the other place; and though picnicking under the umbrageous elms might have been very pleasant, a charm was lacking, inasmuch as we had to kindle the fire and boil the eggs for the benefit of others--the boy-tyrants for whom we point, however, it becomes us public-school men, who would be respected by our old companions, to keep them to ourselves. As they say in the melodramas, 'We must dissemble.' We must not foul our own nests by laying a finger upon a single blemish of that hallowed seminary of which we were once an inmate. But esprit de corps of this sort, though admirable in many THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS v. BELVIDERE respects, has also its disadvantages. The blemishes HOUSE. remain; for no old disciple ventures to point out what is amiss; and a stranger who takes upon him the thankless part of reformer, being sure to err in some unimportant matters of detail, is pooh-poohed at once. Here's an ignoramus,' exclaim the Champions of Let-alone: 'he affects to understand all about us, and says that our first school-time is at seven o'clock; when ever since the blessed accession of Edward VI. it has been at half-past six!' All honour, then, be to Sir John Coleridge,* who, public-school man though he be, has ventured to point out-tenderly and apologetically enough-some of the defects of that system. He is himself an Etonian, and feels for Eton almost the affection which a child entertains for his parent; but he is addressing many who have never even seen that beautiful spot. Is there any spectacle at once more touching and more ludicrous than to hear a grown man-and it is always a pretty full-grown one-dilate upon the delights of his old School? He deals, indeed, some what in generalities; he does not dwell upon the domestic care expended upon him at Belvidere House, upon the salubrity of its situation, upon the luxuriance of the foliage about its playground, nor on the excellence and plenty of its repasts-all which were set forth with such engaging minuteness in its prospectus. He contents himself with asserting broadly -with a shake of the head and a sigh-that Pogers's (L. C. P.) was a happy place indeed, where he first knew and loved poor Harry Binks, now dead and buried (as though the latter circumstance was The situation, the buildings, the park-like playpeculiarly deplorable), and Harris, and Moore, and grounds favour the system. On the banks of the a score of others, the like of whom he shall never Thames, where, at least to English eyes, the river is see again. But observe how very little the School of ample magnitude, yet with waters pure as those has really to do with these regretful reminiscences. of the moorland brook, winding round the Home He might just as well bewail the youthful time Park, and beneath the towers of Windsor, the he passed at the Penitentiary, or the revolving College, and its Hall and Library, its Chapel and hours now gone for ever which he spent with Harry School, stand-a group of buildings imposing in size, Binks and the rest of them upon the patent Tread- venerable for antiquity, and singularly appropriate in mill. If, however, we look closely into the matter, it their character to the purposes for which they have will be found that the ancient disciples of Belvidere been erected. I cannot hope to convey to those who House, and other classical and commercial establish- have never seen them a perfect impression of them ments of that limited' nature, are not so addicted in this respect; perhaps I may say that this fitness to glorifying their seminaries, but leave that sort of of character depends on their size, ample, yet not so sentiment, in its more exaggerated form at least, great as to do away with a certain domestic feelto the public-school men. For, as it requires a tolering; on their great simplicity, which yet escapes any ably sized country (such as Scotland or Switzerland) for the inhabitants to get disagreeably patriotic about it, while those of a little strip like the Republic of San Marino do not venture to go about boasting of their ridiculous territory, so it is left to the old Etonian, the Harrovian, the Rugbean, and so on, to bewail themselves about their nursing-places, while the privateschool man holds his tongue, or puts it in his cheek. There is no case in which Distance lends so much enchantment to the view as this of school-enthusiasm. We see our own young ones delighted to come home for the holidays, and averse to go back again; we hear them narrate circumstances connected with 'faggings,' 'switchings,' 'impositions,' and gettingup-upon-cold-mornings, which certainly do not make us envious of becoming subject to them again our selves; we are positively informed upon all hands and indeed take a singularly inconsistent pride in owning so much-that the present drawbacks and inconveniences of School are yet as nothing compared with those of our own time; and still we go maundering on with tears in our eyes about that blissful institution. Our school epoch-the palmy days of trusting friendship, toffy, paper-chases, and the dawn of love was blithe indeed, but to identify it with School itself is to confuse time with place. We do not believe that one of us out of one hundred liked even Eton itself. The bullying other boys may have had some delights for us, but so had not the being bullied by them: if the being in' approach to meanness; on their obvious antiquity, entirely free from decay: all suggests a notion of something beyond a mere school; of rule and order not pedantically stiff; of liberty, yet within the reach of wholesome restraint. The playgrounds skirt the river; and, with ample space for cricket and football, they still have room for venerable trees, solemn avenues, and walks full of studious associations. No stranger of ordinary feeling can see the outside of Eton without a feeling of admiration that has a character of tenderness mixed with it; and when he sees the river thickly studded with skiffs and row-boats the cricket-grounds with their players, fleet and active, quick-eyed and ready-handed, playing the game with the earnestness of youth and the conduct of manhood, hilarious with a winning score, and not dejected with a losing one-while among the intent spectators around he perceives here and there a master, not amongst the least intent, imposing no check on the boys, but animating their exertions he may well confess that he is beholding boyhood under its happiest aspect. Well, then, may the old Etonian feel his bosom glow within him.' Ah, well indeed! Let Tom Brownism be rampant as it will, it moves not us one whit. We need no eulogy from any man's pen to swell our musterroll. At the present writing there are over eight * Public School Education. A Lecture, by the Right Hon. Sir J. T. Coleridge. Murray, Albemarle Street. hundred youths at this boy-university-many of them Ah, happy hills-ah, pleasing shade- Where once my careless childhood strayed, I feel the gales that from ye blow As, waving fresh their gladsome wing, Floreat Etona.* But the Latin, alas! reminds us of has not a word to say against 'fagging,' an institution which has effected far more harm-although kept within more moderate bounds at Eton than elsewhere-than can ever be set right by choral singing; nor against the system of public flogging, practised at Eton, and at Eton only, in a manner disgusting and indecent in a very high degree. Against the present absurdity of electing the masters solely from the body of old Etonians-and not long ago they were chosen out of King's College, Cambridge, only -Sir John is energetic enough; and he is bold in attacking one very crying evil, common to every wellfilled public school-the inadequate number of tutors. Every master at Eton is also a tutor, and receives as many boarders as he can accommodate into his own house. Each master has his separate class in school, and in this there may be few or none of his own pupils-these last may be scattered among every class in the school; but over his own pupils, as their tutor, he is bound to exercise a peculiar care in every branch of their education.' A popular tutor, therefore, like the old woman who lived in her shoe, has often so many pupils that he does not know what to do with them, and of necessity does little or nothing. The present average proportion at Eton of boys to tutors is more than forty to one! Now, what should we say But what miserable couplets we made, and what of Pogers (L. C. P.), if he received forty young gentlemiserable couplets everybody else made, except, men at Belvidere House without keeping a single usher perhaps, Coleridge minor, as Sir John was then, and to help him? Almost all the bad cases of cruelty some half-dozen others. Unhappily, no argument occurring in public schools, and that are made public is possible with these sticklers for Gradus ad Par--and they must be very bad to get that length-are nassum, for they have two ingenious theories, which owing to this paucity of masters, this inadequacy of are both unanswerable. First, they affirm, that by personal superintendence. The system of Monitorsthis borrowing of other people's ideas, and the look- which Eton, however, to her credit, has never adopted ing out for longs and shorts in that big book, in that places excessive power in hands necessarily order to express them in Latin measures, that we unfitted to wield it, arises entirely from this lack. have imperceptibly benefited. It is impossible to Since the constituted authorities are insufficient (and contradict this. It is pleasant to learn that we have since to get more would be unsatisfactory to those been benefited by anything; and one might have existing, for certain pecuniary reasons which it would been worse, perhaps, if it had not been for the Gradus. be vulgar to speak about), amateur masters--Monitors Secondly, they assert that in cultivating Latin verses, --are appointed in many public schools, selected from we have, by some mysterious means, laid the foun- the boys themselves. An increase of tutors is somedations of all learning, and are now fit to educate times denied, even upon the ground that the Statutes ourselves. To the professional student this may be a of the School contemplated no such innovation, but most comforting reflection; but then how very small the sticklers for vested interests must indeed be sore a proportion of the human race do educate them- put to it before they adopt that line of defence. Sir selves, after they have been once emancipated from John's eye must have slyly twinkled when, with relation to this subject, he quotes one of the Eton statutes Then there was the Chapel (the little bell of which by which the Head and Lower Masters are bound used almost continuously to be going), enriched with to teach all who come from any part of England for stained glass,' remarks our author, and many touch-nothing at all: gratis, absque pecuniæ aut alterius ing memorials. To this he attributes an excessive rei exactione.' And it would be a very pleasant sight amount of advantage. The good old judge has to see them at it. surely forgotten his wicked school-days. Many an Eleven-twelfths of the present school-that is to Etonian have we heard ascribe his present disinclina- say, the whole of the Oppidans-were never contemtion for church to his having had so very much of plated in the founder's scheme at all. Only seventy it while at school. What are saints' days to Eton Eton boys-familiarly termed, in our time,Tugs' or boys-what they ought to be is another question into Tugmuttons,' from the circumstance of that food which there is no need to enter that they should being placed, with a too great frequency, upon their attend extra and longer services because of them? common table- -are 'upon the foundation,' or What a nuisance they seemed to be, when we wanted entitled in any way to share its privileges; and to be over the pleasant meadows-trespassing or on these, to say truth, are held socially in some conthe shining river! What an unnatural halo does our tempt by the others, who are, of course, the richer, author behold shimmering around every youthful though not necessarily the better-born. Yet observe head. We were not such very good boys, at least in how these poor young gentlemen win all the educaour time; nor, indeed, very bad boys either, although, tional prizes! The Newcastle scholarship and Medal as for those chorister-lads, I well remember that it has existed thirty-two years, to be contended for by was thought excellent fun to give them nuts, in order the entire school. In the first twelve there were ten that their voices should fail them during the coming Oppidan scholars to two Collegers, and six Medallists performances in the chapel. How a simple fact of this kind-and really not a very distressing onedissipates those misty illusions which even the wisest men, in their old age, are prone to entertain respecting their own youth! And yet Sir John Coleridge their tutors! 6 to six. In the next ten years there were four Oppidan scholars to six, and seven Medallists to five. In the last ten there were three Oppidan scholars to nine, and three Medallists to nine. Considering the immense superiority of numbers of Oppidans to Collegers, and that the former have the advantage of being, if they please, private pupils, which is denied to the latter, * Our esteemed contributor here seems to be himself slightly this difference of numbers is remarkable; but the overcome with that weakness of school fanaticism which he so sternly reprobates in others. gradual decrease of the successful Oppidans, in later. years reaching almost to their extinction, is a still more significant fact.' Sir John Coleridge cannot understand why this should be, and yet it seems to us quite easy of solution. The Collegers work, and the Oppidans don't work; and for the simplest reason. The former know they have need to do so, being poor men's sons; and the latter know they have no need. As to lads, who are as forty to one to their masters, being made to work, it is simple impossibility, nor indeed is it ever attempted; and it must be remembered that at almost all other public schools where Collegers exist at all, a similar disproportion exists between them and the Oppidans as at Eton; while the majority of public schools are composed entirely of Oppidans. The instances of bodily frames not yet matured,' which have broken down under the labour of school-work at Eton, must have happened-if they ever did happen-among the Collegers. We are sceptical about even that matter; although there may have been unpleasantries about Tug' life, even in the way of hard study, as there most certainly were in the experiences of that 'Long Chamber,' where there were about five fags to sixty-five masters, and which was not a place to identify with the Elysian Fields in any respect. We enjoyed ourselves at Eton very much-though by no means so much as at home during the holidays-but we have no recollection of anything approaching hard work, even at that Latin and Greek which was the only literary pabulum in those days set before us. Now, it seems, there are no less than three hours of the week devoted to mathematics; or a full half hour per diem! In a word, whatever may be said about their superiority in other respects, we cannot believe that public schools are the best places for intellectual education. It is scarcely possible, with their small amount of school-hours, their limited supply of masters, and the extent of their actual vacations, that they should compete in this respect with private establishments, where lads work very much harder, and are far more closely looked after. If a boy is to make his own way in the world, and has little beyond his mental faculties to trust to, it certainly seems more reasonable to send him to Belvidere House, if that establishment have a tolerable character, than to an expensive public school. It is true, that lads in such a plight are sometimes sent to Eton and elsewhere to obtain a good connection,' with a view of hitching themselves on, that is, to others in a superior station. But, setting aside the cruelty of thus making boys into toadies and tufthunters before their time, and the 'snobbism' of the whole transaction, such unequal friendships do not stand the wear and tear of life; they rarely last beyond adolescence. 6 fine material they have got to deal with, it is desirable that they should do. They turn out better cricketers, foot-ball players, and oarsmen than private schools can do. They produce healthier and higher-spirited young men. Not only in mere behaviour and deportment' do they turn boys into gentlemen, but their tone is often so high and manly, that it even supplies the gentlemanly feelings that are sometimes lacking. There is generally neither pertness (except in the case of monitors) nor mauvaise honte about public-school men, and they are fitted to mix in any society, with a polite independence, which Belvidere House for the most part fails to impart. These are surely no mean advantages. Let, then, the admirers of public schools be content, even if in addition to ruder health, better manners, and happiness in greater proportion than is found in private seminaries, they fail to impart an education so well fitted for the ordinary walks of life. Each system has its excellences and its faults; each is adapted for its own class of disciples. That would be an evil day for the Upper Ten Thousand of England, on which Eton and her sister-seminaries were abolished; but, on the other hand, science and commerce would languish sadly from the hour when all our middle classes were forced to send their sons to public schools. LOVE AMONG THE LILIES. LIKE a prisoned poet inscribing eloquent odes to Liberty, Maria van Oosterwyck, pent in the centre of grim old frowning Delft, strove passionately to fix upon her canvas the glorious flowers and fruits of a far-off country, from which the town's every canal, lock, street, wall, and rampart combined to sunder her. By aid of memory, scrap-sketches made on hurried visits beyond the gates, and cut flowers sickening and dying as she drew them, the pale earnest-looking lady worked on. With quite a lily's whiteness in her face, and fair waving hair, that seemed sprinkled with the gold-dust from the lily's cup, pushed back carelessly, so as not to hinder her, and in sober dark woollen dress, only relieved by the large plaited-muslin ruff collar, Maria bent her lithe fragile figure before her easel; poring over one of those small cabinet paintings whose transparent colour, refined taste, and delicate mechanism, shall make them, years and years after thou art dust, Maria van Oosterwyck, cherished possessions even in the choicest collections. She loved her flowers; she loved her art; for these she was content to spend her life: it was no toil, at least it was a toil free from irksomeness, and full of joy, to be true to such love as this. Over her canvas, the flowers at her side, studying the wondrous variety of their hues, tracing their every exquisite curve, and change, and diversity, till she could almost deem that in their marvellous separate loveliness dwelt an individual soul, Maria could well forget the gloomy surroundan artist, and least of all for a flower-artist. That murky shadow on the wall is the reflection flung there by the sun, sinking in a Dutch fog, of the church tower which shelters the remains of William Prince of Orange, murdered close by, on a summer's day in 1584, by Balthazar Gerard the Burgundian; that mist upon the window rises from the narrow stagnant poisonous canal below; that smoke beating away in circling clouds comes from the pottery manufactories-for are we not just midway in the seventeenth century-and must not the great demand for Delft earthenware be met in thorough commercial spirit? True, there are trees edging the canals; but no wonder they have lost all charm for Maria; no wonder she can look upon them with eyes of pity only; they are trimmed, and cut, and clipped into fanciful shapes, in execrable Dutch taste! Heartless mutilation of natural loveliness; one might as well It is unfair to Belvidere House to point to the distinguished names at the universities—although it holds its own, and something more, even there-because the great majority of public-school lads go to college as a matter of course, while with those at private schools it is not so; still less justly can we boast of public-ings of her studio. It was not a pleasant abode for school men being stars of parliament, or leading men in power, since, as boys, they were, by birth and position, already half-way to the greatest social prizes; while the lads more humbly educated, in accordance with their humbler station, have to go double the distance and the most difficult part of the road is that first half-to obtain them. If they started fair, we have no doubt but that the young gentleman with his head full of Latin verses would lag behind the other (of equal powers), who has received a more general, although not necessarily a superficial education. We have known an Etonian to be a by no means despicable classic, and yet to be quite unable to spell, or to inform you in what the Reformation in England differed from the Revolution. We are far from intending disrespect either to public schools or classical education. They effect, at Eton at all events, the very things which, considering the battle. look for human beauty in a soldier's hospital after a Through the mist, through the smoke and the shadow, and over the trees, there were eyes searching out the light form of Maria van Oosterwyck in her studio; and these gay, bright, pleasant-looking eyes enough-we were fixed in the head of Wilhelm van Aalst, a painter also, and a denizen of Delft, whose studio is exactly opposite to Maria's, on the other side of the street. He has set up his easel, and has work before him-a clever enough artist, painting still-life subjects dexterously, and in good repute for his dead game, scraps of armour, and gold and silver cups. But not a very sedulous worker; unable to devote himself to his labours, unable to forget-as the genuine student ever does-that there is a world going on outside his studio walls. Half-a-dozen touches, and he looks out of the window, down the street towards the marketplace, or over the way at Maria; then another few touches, and a look in the glass at his own handsome face, and a twirling of his moustache, a pulling at his beard, or a tossing about of his long thick chestnut locks. He makes up his mind at last; and perhaps he hasn't much to operate upon, for that matter. He flings away his pallet and brushes, arrays himself in a handsome velvet doublet, blue with narrow silver edging, dons a hat and feather, buckles on his rapier, and struts from his studio. No more work for to-day. He will pay visits; it is really quite a long time since he has seen his friends-twelve hours or so-he will call on Maria van Oosterwyck, and see how her lilies are getting on, and then he will dine-well, perhaps at the Golden Calf round the corner, and finish the evening there. Absorbed in her lilies, her thin white hand supported by her mahl-stick, with the smallest, finest brush ever seen, defining hair-lines of light upon the outer rims of the flowers, Maria heard not the knock at her door-heard not the step upon the floor-knew not that any one had entered the room-was lost to all but her art, until a hand was laid gently upon her arm, and a voice murmured, accenting tenderly: "Incomparable Maria!' She started up with quite a little scream, paler than ever, and her soft blue eyes open wide with alarm, like flowers beaten by a storm. She was a lovely specimen of the thorough blonde, flaxen even to eyebrows and eyelashes a very human lily herself, so pure, and delicate, and lovable-looking. "You frightened me, Wilhelm,' she said, her first surprise a little passed off, and with just the slightest tone of reproval traceable in her voice. She was about to give her hand with the brush in it, but a glance at Wilhelm's gay doublet, and the thought of however so little a streak of cream-white would soil it, stopped her. Enthusiast!' Wilhelm went on-devotee! you have no thought but for this!' and he pointed to the panel on the easel. Is it a fault?' she asked. No; but it is a reproach to the less devout.' To yourself, then? Wilhelm, when will you work? When will you cleave to your easel, and be loath and sick at heart to leave it? So you have quitted work for to-day, and there remain five more good hours of daylight!' Wilhelm blushed. He was a little crest-fallen at his reception. Had the blue velvet and the silver edging so small effect as this? I have nearly finished the picture of the dead falcon and the jewelled goblet.' Maria shook her head sorrowingly. You have not finished as you should finish it, Wilhelm. You may leave off work-you may let it go from your easel-you may barter it for a good price-but you will yet know in your heart that it is not a work such as should bear the name of Van Aalst. Why will you paint only for to-day, for the present hour, to supply your mere needs, and heed for nothing else? You must wish to live, Wilhelm, to be something in the future, to have your name honoured, and your works cherished. You owe this to yourself. Paint fewer pictures, and work more.' 'I have not your talent, gentle Maria.' 'You have more than my poor talent, Wilhelm, a thousand times. With all my labour, pouring out my life at the foot of my easel, I know I cannot approach the genius you possess, if you would but render it justice.' 'I have not your devotion, Maria.' "You loved your art once, Wilhelm; you had high, grand thoughts about it once.' Boyish dreams.' They might have been the facts of your manhood, had you chosen so, good friend.' It was hard upon him-who had come to create a sensation, to win the admiration of the fair enthusiast -to meet so chilly a welcome, such a lecture upon his shortcomings. Maria herself began to think so at length, and changed the subject. 'Do you like my lilies?' "They are exquisite, they are inimitable-full of your own grace, and subtlety, and expression. You have nearly completed them.' 'No, there remains much to do. See, these leaves are hardly touched; this bud is mere raw colour.' There was a pause. He looked from the panel to her. Standing so humbly and gently before a most marvellous effort of painting, how could he help great admiration and love possessing his heart? How could he hinder them from sparkling in his handsome eyes? His one hand rested on his hip, the other toyed gracefully with the silver tassels of his cloak. He was in his most winning attitude. Maria looked up at him innocently, read something of his thoughts in his face, and then turned away, a little frightened, perhaps. You remember,' he said, at length, in his most musical voice-' you remember, Maria, my first coming here?-my assumed bearing, my affecting to be a dealer, come to purchase your works, when my real aim was to see you, to become acquainted with you?' 'It was a trick, Wilhelm, a shameful trick;' and she moved away from him. 'It was fair, for I loved you.' She put her hand to her heart, as though she had been struck there. She could not speak, but she waved her hand, by her gesture imploring him to desist. 'I loved you then, Maria, and from that day I have loved you more and more. If I have neglected my art, as you say, may not love be my excuse? Let that plead for me. Do not judge me too harshly.' She heard him like one in pain, trembling, and with closed, quivering eyes. He was about to continue; she placed her hand gently upon his. 'Cease, Wilhelm, I entreat of you.' "You don't love me, Maria?' The question was so musically, wilingly, fervidly breathed, it was almost irresistible. For some moments, Maria could not speak. Her breath came and went so hurriedly, and she trembled so. 'I dare not-in a low broken whisper. "You doubt me?' She bowed her head affirm atively, and to hide her blushes and her tears. Wilhelm had had little experience in failure. He was puzzled, amazed. Could it be that his love was rejected? He was about to break out into expostulations, into passionate oaths and entreaties; but a look from Maria stopped him. You, who are false to art, can I hope that you will be true to me?' 'But I love you.' "You loved art once, Wilhelm: you neglect it now? 'But I will never neglect you, dearest. I swear it.' 'False in one, false in all.' 'Maria, this is cruelty.' 'Let it be so, Wilhelm, and let us part. Leave me to my lilies; they can never be to me less good, and pure, and true. I cannot quit them, to give my troth to one who may one day turn from me, his love fallen from him like a withered leaf. If I surrendered them, Wilhelm, for you, and the time should come, as it would, doubt not, when you would cease to love me-when I should be to you a poor frail woman, charmless, lustreless-I could not bear it. Wilhelm, it would be death.' 'But this is a nightmare, darling; it never shall be truth. I love you; I love art; I have never ceased to love art. I will always love you both.' But Maria only shook her head sadly, murmuring: "False in one, false in all.' 'But try me. These are not mere words-idle, vain: test them; they will bear it.' She looked at him earnestly; there seemed honesty in his face and in his speech. First, then: You will be true to art.' 'I swear it.' 'You will work honestly; you will be at your easel for six hours a day at least, continuously; painting scrupulously, rendering faithful account of the objects you paint, as they seem to you; not trickily, or to produce rapidly, or to sell quickly. You will shun low company; you will not be seen with Heil, or Brocken, or Vander Noove. You will avoid the Golden Calf; you will cease to make Delft ring with your dissipations. You hear me, Wilhelm ?' 'I will do all this, Maria.' And for six months-mark that; you will do all this for six months.' I may see you the while, may I not? 'No, Wilhelm; it is better not; it is better not, for both our sakes. At the end of six months, come to me. Tell me you have done all this faithfully; tell me you have been true to yourself to art-to me. Tell me that you love art truly, and as you love art, love me.' And if I do this, you' She gave him a little white hand. He pressed it passionately to his lips. 'You are mine, Maria!' 'Six months have yet to pass, Wilhelm.' He hardly heard her; he was dashing down the stairs mad with joy, and hope, and love. In five minutes, his blue doublet was off, and he was hard at work before his easel. The poor lily-lady, pressing her hands upon her head, was too shaken and bewildered to resume her pencil immediately. Soon, however, she turned towards her flowers, exclaiming with passion: 'True or false, O my lilies, I cannot love you less. I am still yours, and you will still be mine!' There was a thick crust of snow upon all the gableroofs of Delft; the canals were frozen; thick ice blocked up the river. The six months had passed. Maria was still at her easel. There were no lilies to be had now, only those upon her panel, perfected; so close were they to nature, it seemed not possible to carry imitation further. She was employed in painting a folded drapery of stamped puce-coloured velvet, the background of her picture. She seemed paler than ever now, and an air of fatigue and suffering haunted her face; yet she worked on in her old placid, simple, hearty way; the tiny pencils moved to and fro as steadily and perseveringly as ever. on his cloak. There was a triumphant flush upon his face as he walked rapidly towards Maria. 'You have come, then, Wilhelm,' she said. 'To claim fulfilment of your promise, dearest.' She fixed her glance earnestly upon his face, gazing into his eyes, as though to read the truth in them. 'You have fulfilled your promise, Wilhelm; you have been true to art; you have worked sedulously, for six hours a day at least, uninterruptedly without quitting your studio; you have shunned low company and the tavern; you have been true to yourself and to me?' Wilhelm bowed his glossy head affirmatively before her. He looked very superb indeed. Maria turned away her glance; she was shivering with nervous agitation-not cold, as he thought. And I may trust my happiness to your keeping?' she continued, still looking down. 'Dearest Maria, I swear that you shall never repent so doing.' And he twirled the ends of his ample moustache, and dusted his beard with a broidered kerchief, which, tucked in his doublet, had been adding to the curve of his massive chest. Maria started back from him, and an angry light gleamed in the blue eyes wontedly so soft and gentle. It was like forked lightning breaking out suddenly on a calm summer sky. Wilhelm, you would scorn to play with cogged dice; you would beat to the earth any one who said you tricked at cards; you would condescend to dupe no man. Why, then, do you come here to me with a lie upon your lips?-why seek to cheat me? What have I ever done that you should turn against me thus? Is it because I am weak, and a woman, that I am to be treated with falsehoods-won by fraud?' Wilhelm, amazed, puzzled, embarrassed, looked at her. He put forth his hand imploringly; he sought to speak; she waved back his approaches by an angry gesture. You would not have thought such fury could have possessed her. The lily was whirling in a tempest. You know that you have broken every letter of your promise; you know that your every act of late has been a falsehood to me; you know that I dare not confide my happiness in your hands; that you are utterly unworthy such a trust. This is nothing. You have a right to act as you will. To stain your name, your genius, your art, with mire, if you will; it is not for me to call for an account. But to act thus shamefully, and crown that shame by a lie, to me, to me, who, God knows, never would or could have done you wrong-Wilhelm, Wilhelm, it is too much!' There were tears now upon her cheeks, like raindrops on a lily. Wilhelm stood speechless, abashed, and angry. His position was humiliating enough-to cheat, and to be found out too! Yet he tried to pluck up heart; and sturdy lying seemed his safest course-so his weak false mind suggested. You wrong me, indeed, indeed.' 'Stop!' she cried, putting her hands to her ears to shut out his words. No more; you have lied enough. Look here!' and she pointed to the window-post: there were hundreds of streaks of lily white. Each time you have failed in your promise, I have registered the failure here. You have been absent from your studio; you have been idle; you have been gaping at the window, or idling at the door; you have spent days and nights at the Golden Calf. Heil has been with you, and Brocken, and Vander Noove, and-0 Wilhelm a-others who never should have been !'—and a blush crossed her cheek; it was as a sunset on a lilyand you have painted worthless pictures. You know it-none better. Oh, in a thousand ways, you have been false; and here, see, here's the record.' 'Six months to-day,' she murmured once, halting but for a moment, only to resume again with redoubled energy. But a step on the stairs soon set her hand trembling and her heart beating. She was compelled to desist, Wilhelm entered splendidly handsome in green velvet, with a thick studding of small gold buttons, a sweeping white feather in his hat, a glittering sword-belt, and heavy fur-trimming 6 In Wilhelm's culprit face, 'midst all his shame and confusion, yet lingered an interrogative: 'How did |