trouble, madam," she called out to me as I was departing; "I know Major - -'s temper better than you do, and you will never alter his determination." "Never, never!" came also in a smothered voice from the sofa; "but bless her, heaven, for the attempt. She will at least see him, tell him of my wretchedness, and receive for me his promised blessing!" I heard no more, but saw her, poor thing, clasping her husband's letter to her bosom, which, I suppose, she must have been recovered enough to have read over, from her last words.

I had an interview with Major at Knightsbridge, and it was a terrible one! I know not what I said;-how I argued in poor Mary's behalf. We were both nearly torn to pieces by our emotions. He had no conception of our relationship, nor did I think at all of my own pride and present situation then. To gain some point for poor Mary was my only thought; and I so far succeeded, that if she became a mother, and had completely separated herself from her own; if I could then assert with truth and honour that I believed she never more would use deception; that she languished to behold the father of her child, her husband; then I had his permission to accompany her myself to India, when he would receive her with affection, and never more mention her past misconduct.

He wrung my hand as we parted; gave me an order on his agent; sprang into the post-chaise that waited for him, with his handkerchief held to his eyes, and his manly bosom convulsed with agony.

I found the major had appointed a person at Knightsbridge to settle all demands upon him with regard to the house at Kensington, and the tradesmen, &c. I had promised to receive Mary into my own, and to get rid of Mrs. Cottrell immediately; and this I was not reluctant

to do.

It seemed to me on my return, that I had achieved very great things in gaining this concession from the major. I drove back to Kensington with a lightened heart; but what was my emotion on perceiving a crowd collected before my own door and that of No. 49: all were gazing in at the windows of the latter. A sickness of heart seized me; I knew that something dreadful had happened, and to my poor godchild. It was even so. After my departure she was seized with the sudden frenzy that she would go also, and intercede for pardon at the feet of her husband. Her mother had intercepted her flight; had followed her up stairs to her bedroom, when she flew thither in a state of utter distraction; and, without attempting to soothe her agonies, had vehemently represented to her that there could be no possible chance for her to find out the major, since the coach which bore me to him, and the messenger who was to guide me to him, were out of sight.

"I will believe nothing more you tell me," shrieked out the unfortunate Mary, losing all her natural gentleness in her high excitement. "Mother, you told me he never would return from India to redeem his promise! You persuaded me that my Forbes was insincere-mother, you have undone me! You have made me purchase an independence for yourself at the price of my own honour; and now, when I would fly to humble myself before the generous being you have caused me to injure so cruelly, you would prevent me. But no, I will defy you. I am

a wife as well as a daughter, and I will go to him. He is at Knightsbridge; I heard that; and I can find him out there!"

But Mrs. Cottrell still opposed her rushing down the stairs in pursuit of her husband, when, maddened by her feelings, the hapless Mary flung open the sash of one of the windows, and before she could be caught hold of, had jumped out into the little garden below, striking herself in her fall against the iron balcony of the drawing room. It broke her fall, or she must have been killed on the spot.

In what a state did I find my poor godchild! Bruised, insensible, bleeding from several wounds, and with a leg and arm fractured. She pitched, it seems, out upon a large laurustine bush in the garden, or death must have immediately supervened. She was lying on the sofa in the drawing room, and two surgeons, living in the immediate neighbourhood, were busily engaged in affording her what relief was in their

power.

By that evening's post I addressed a hasty letter to the husband at Portsmouth, informing him of this fearful accident, and the manner in which Mary had met with it, not omitting her last words before she took this fatal leap, which one of the servants had repeated to me: they were as follows:

"O that I could have had the resolution to do before what I am now doing! O that I had thrown myself headlong from a window to avoid one instead of seeking another."

I rightly calculated; for as soon as four horses could bring him, arrived the almost distracted husband, who, after he had seen his poor Mary, and inquired into the probable chances of her recovery, demanded eagerly of the medical attendants if they thought she could with safety be moved from her present abode to mine over the way, as he wished, he said, to leave her entirely under my care.

This was accomplished according to his wish: he then wrote a laconic note to Mrs. Cottrell, saying he did not wish his wife to be any longer under her influence, and that his house in Kensington would be immediately shut up.

Thus literally turned out, the intriguing mother set off in great dudgeon for Devonshire, to report her wrongs no doubt to the infamous Mr. Carpenter, her coadjutor. I have never seen her since.

The entire pardon and never-ceasing affection of her husband produced the most calming effects upon the mind and injuries of my poor godchild. The major being a military man, could only obtain two months' extended leave of absence; and when he did set off to India, his lady was nearly convalescent, but not well enough to accompany him.

During the twelvemonth Mary resided under my roof, I had full opportunities of witnessing her real disposition when away from the pernicious influence of Mrs. Cottrell: a more amiable, gentle, loving being never existed; and, if I may venture to say, without offending the scrupulous fastidiousness of the virtuous overmuch, she by her latter conduct redeemed the errors of her extreme youth.

Major on account of this early indiscretion of his wife, which, although not publicly known, yet, from the anonymous letter, seemed to have transpired to some brother officer, sold out of the army, and retired to Geneva, where he established himself in one of those enchanting

cottages near the beautiful lake of that name, not far from Vervay, where he is as happy with his Mary as any being in this sublunary state can be.

There are thousands of men who would have thrown this flower for ever from their bosoms, on account of the stain it had received whilst it was in the bud. Every person must act by their own ideas of honour; but I never can believe that my husband's nephew, the gallant and noble Forbes, has tarnished his by his forgiveness of his beautiful and truly penitent Mary.-Did he not take her at the altar "for better and for

worse?"

THE CHARACTER OF GROTIUS.

BY FRANCIS BARHAM, ESQ.

THE late Charles Butler, as learned and worthy a man as ever yet did honour to the English bar, always delighted in biography. The writing of the lives of great characters was his most favourite amusement; and he had both wit and wisdom enough to choose the characters well which he meant to illustrate. For where again shall we find men superior to Bossuet and Fenelon, the noblest lights of France? or dearer than Erasmus and Grotius, the boast and glory of Holland?

All these men were philosophers of the highest class. In the vast and comprehensive circle of their characteristics, we find those of the saint, the sage, the scholar, the politician, the wit, and the poet, all included and bound up. They possessed in an eminent degree that unity and universality of character which wins the admiration of all particular parties, just because it embraces all their varieties, and harmonises all their contradictions.

It is the evident interest of society to set forth the names of Christian philosophers like these, to hold them up to honour and veneration, and to give them as much moral influence in church and state as possible; for we may be sure, that in proportion as that moral influence extends, so true piety, virtue, wisdom, and harmony will prevail, and the discord and buffoonery of parties be swept away.

It is for this reason that we once more bring Grotius on the stage. His life has been written by Burigny, Butler, and others with great fidelity and exactness. It must be owned, however, that his biographers have rather excelled in minuteness of detail than in that philosophical and moral estimate of character which is certainly the most useful part of biography.

We propose, therefore, to take a wider survey and estimate of Grotius, his character, and his works, than has yet been taken. We shall consider him mainly in the religious, political, and philosophical relations he bore to his own age and to ours, and we shall develope his poetical abilities pretty extensively by a translation of the greatest curiosity in modern literature, namely, his ADAMUS

EXUL, the drama which laid the foundation of Milton's Paradise Lost.

The bearings of Grotius's character on the days we live in are very marked and extensive. He was the greatest man of his age, and that age closely resembled our own for ecclesiastical and civil controversies and disturbances. The part that Grotius played in the complicated plot of European politics has been greatly extolled and admired; and we are sure that the illustration of his character and conduct may at present have a very beneficial effect on all who choose to investigate them.

The study of character has always appeared to us the most important and interesting study that can occupy our attention. It is in accordance with this notion that Pope exclaims,

"The proper study of mankind is man."

And this is to be undertaken not merely for the sake of indulging the idle curiosity of a man of the world, who delights in the exhibition of human character in its endless varieties, just as he enjoys the exhibitions of a theatre, but with the serious purpose and design of discovering those characters and characteristics which are in themselves most excellent, and which include the greatest number of moral and intellectual desiderata.

Now, in this pursuit of the perfect character, he will of course turn his first attention to that Eternal Model of all possible perfection, who is the author and finisher of his faith. He will find a noble display of divine characteristics in the evangelical fathers and leaders of our church; and most especially will he know the names of those illustrious men who are fairly entitled to the designation of Christian philosophers.

These, leaving the direct preaching of religion in the hands of faithful ecclesiastics, have in all times endeavoured to realise the perfections of our faith in its application to philosophy, science, literature, and politics, and the general interests of patriotism and philanthropy.

These men have exhibited so true, so full, so beautiful a picture of sound Christian character, illumined with knowledge, refined by affection, and diversified by art, that they have won the admiration of their own age and all posterity. They have succeeded more prosperously than any other class in developing in glorious harmony and symmetrical proportion all the elements of our moral and intellectual nature; they have attained the full and perfect stature of the soul's manhood; their magnanimity has shone out in all their words and actions, and stamped imperishable greatness on their names and their memories.

The Christian philosopher is indisputably the highest style of man, the most absolute and unquestionable specimen of the true dignity of our nature. The men who combine in their own mental realisation all the excellencies of Christian character and faith, with all the excellencies of philosophic research and discipline, are distinctly the intellectual kings of the nations: they share the immortal

sovereignty of Jesus Christ. These are the men whose characters stand the test of all human experience, who come out like refined gold from the fiery trial of ages, while all the rest shrink into comparative insignificance. True and perfect greatness is the unity of the Christian character. This is the sole rock on which lasting fame can be built. Those who build on the fallacious sand of popular applause may wear for a while a false and partial renown, but they are hasting with no tardy steps to ruin and infamy.

Grotius, when once possessed of the philosophic principle of reconciliation, perceived that by its guidance he might do much to reunite churches and states. He saw that the same truth might, nay, must, have different relations in proportion as it was elaborated; and that thus an essential harmony might exist, and might be restored among the very parties who held their opinions as irreconcilable.

Grotius was born at Delft, 1583. He had naturally a sublime genius and most amiable dispositions. He has generally been considered the first man of his age, just because he combined in himself almost all the merits of his predecessors, and displayed a grand harmony of moral and intellectual perfections rarely if ever equalled. The very elevation of Christian philosophy in Grotius-the very amplitude of his views-have hindered no less men than Owen and Baxter from appreciating him judiciously. He endeavoured to re-unite the fragments of truth scattered among all parties, and thus had the honour to displease every party that wished to make him its exclusive proselyte.

It is pleasing to record the fact, that Grotius professed his preference for the conciliatory system of religion, as expounded by Erasmus, his illustrious exemplar. He was disposed to conciliate all the pious Roman Catholics, as well as the Protestants, and the more because others were endeavouring to augment ecclesiastical dissensions. And while he inwardly cherished evangelical truth, he endeavoured, in the majestic liberty with which the truth had made him free, to extend the same liberty of conscience and civil privilege to the Arminians. He only joined the Arminian party in order to reconcile them to the orthodox system of the Church, and establish their national rights, which seemed to be endangered.

But whether Grotius were inclined to Arminianism or not in his earlier or later years, he extended religious toleration so freely to other religious parties, as much to perplex the less philosophic minds of his cotemporaries. Thus the religion of Grotius-became a problem to many, which Baxter endeavoured in vain to solve. Menage wrote an epigram on this occasion, which really conveys a very fine compliment, under the mask of satire, the sense of which is, that as many different sects claimed his religion as there were towns which contended for the birth of Homer.

"Smyrna, Rhodes, Colophon, Salamis, Argos, Athenæ,
Siderei certant vatis de patria Homeri,

Grotiada certant de religione, Socinus,

Arrius, Arminius, Calvinus, Roma, Lutherus."