The Douglas in red herrings;
And noble name and cultured land,
Palace and park, and vassal band,
Are powerless to the notes of hand
    Of Rothschild or the Barings.

* * * *

You'll ask if yet the Percy lives
    In the armed pomp of feudal state?
The present representatives
    Of Hotspur and his " gentle Kate"
Are some half-dozen serving men
In the drab coat of William Penn;
    A chambermaid, whose lip and eye.
And cheek and brown hair bright and curling,
    Spoke nature's aristocracy;
And one, half groom, half seneschal,
Who bowed me through court, bower, and hall,
From donjon keep to turret wall,
For ten and sixpence sterling.

The society of the author of these lines the
reader will readily believe was much sought, for
his amusing anecdotes and humorous conversation.
In the memoirs of Washington Irving
some glimpses are given of the society in which
Irving and Halleck met and mingled.

THE LATE MISS HOLLINGFORD.

CHAPTER XII.

THE next morning I set off for a solitary
walk to the farm. I was going to ask of Mrs.
Hollingford formal permission for my visit to
London, and to say good-bye to her and the
girls. I cried sadly to myself walking over the
happy moor and through the wood. I felt
unutterably lonely and woebegone. I was going
to part from my only friends, and the separation
was at hand. I knew that Mrs. Hollingford
would blame me, and I felt it hardly worth
my while to defend myself. I had quarrelled
with John, and broken our engagement. I was
going to London with gayer friends. Everything
was against me; all the wrong seemed
mine. I knew that the dear old lady would
say little, only look sad and disappointed,
thinking in her heart that things were turning
out as she had prophesied; would give me full
permission to go where I pleased, and do what
I pleased; would kiss and bless me; and then
I should have the wide world before me.

It was a radiant May day. A saint has said
that " peace is the tranquillity of order;" and
such a peace brooded over the happy farm as I
crossed its sunny meadows, heard the bleating
of its lambs, the lowing of its kine, met its
labourers coming and going. An idler was
piping somewhere in the fields, the rooks were
cawing, the leaves on the boughs just winked
in the breeze, the hall door lay open as usual.
I did not see a soul about, and I walked in
without summoning any one. I opened the
parlour door; the place smelt of May and
myrtle, and there were fresh roses in the jars,
but there was no one there. No one in the
kitchen, dairy, still-room; the maids were
abroad this glorious noon. I went up-stairs,
looking for a face in vain till I came to our
school-room. There was Jane alone, sitting at
the table over some books, her head between
her hands, her hair thrust back from her face,
looking older and paler and thinner since I had
seen her; a stern, sad-looking young student,
with her back to the sun that burned upon the
lattice.

Her face turned scarlet when she saw me,
and then became paler than before. She gave
me her hand coldly, as if she would rather have
held it by her side. Her mother was out, she
said; had gone to visit at a poor house where
there was death and trouble, and would not be
home till evening. Mopsie had taken the dogs
for a ramble. Then we both sat down and were
silent, and Jane's eyes wandered over everything
in the room, but would not meet mine.

"I am going to London, Jane," I said, "and
I came to bid you good-bye."

"I know," she said. " John told me."
And she blushed again fiercely; " I am very
glad. I have thought for a long time that
London was the place that would suit you best.
I knew you would soon tire of the farm."

"I have not tired of the farm," I said, " but
the farm has tired of me."

She glanced up amazed, then smiled bitterly,
and turned aside her head without speaking, as
if such utter nonsense could not be thought
worthy of an answer.

"However," I added, " I did not come here
to talk about that——"

"No," she interrupted, hastily, "it is not
worth your while to make any pretence to us.
We do not expect to have friends; we never
thought of it till you came. In time we shall
get used to the curse our father left upon us."

"Jane, Jane," I said, angrily, " how can you
be so wicked?"

"How can I help being wicked?" she asked.
"I heard that it was prophesied of us that we
should all turn out badly, because ill conduct
runs in the blood."

"You do not deserve to have such a mother,"
I said.

"Oh! my mother!" she said, in an altered
tone. "But she has given all her sweetness
to Mopsie, and—to John," she added, with an
effort, a tear starting in her eye. " But I am
my father's daughter. She would cure me too,
if she knew of my badness; but she is a
saint, and thinks no evil. I work hard at my
books, and she calls me a good industrious girl.
I will never pour out my bitterness on her.
But if my father were here I would let him
know what he has done."

The hopeless hardness of her young voice
smote me with pain, but I could think of
nothing to say to her. I felt that she thought
I had been false to John, and that her
sympathy for him had stirred all the latent
bitterness of her nature.

"And how is the young lady at the hall?"
she asked, suddenly.

"Do you mean Miss Leonard?" I said.

"Oh, yes—Miss Leonard," said Jane, dropping
her eyes on the floor with a strange look.