hope-but I cannot tell how it is; never before this day did I look with such melancholy forebodings on the Abbey yonder. It seems to me, as it stands there encompassed by the dark woods, as if it were an abode fit neither for the peace of holy monks nor for domestic enjoyment.'

'Nonsense,' said Isabella, laughing. 'You are thinking of your mother-in-law, as if she were the only inhabitant of those old weather-beaten towers; but she is not so fearful a personage as your fancy would represent her. Let us seek your sisters; the dear girls are far more cheerful than yourself. Do shake off this melancholy mood.'

Charles promised to endeavour to be cheerful, and they set off to seek his sisters on the beach.

It was towards evening when these young persons once more joined the festive scene. Many of the neighbouring gentry, most of the opulent farmers, a few of the clergy, and a host of youths and maidens, formed the upper ranks now assembled, who were to partake, at a separate table, of a very excellent supper; whilst one of great abundance and no less

merit in its way was to be served up in the huge old kitchen and in one of the barns, not only for the labourers, and servants, male and female, but for fathers, mothers, and grandfathers, who either worked now or formerly had worked on the farm or in the neighbourhood; for all were welcome on this joyous

night.

The evening was lovely. The wains, laden with corn and surmounted by the reapers, brought home the harvest with great noise and shoutings. Nothing could exceed the boisterous joy of the whole assembly, both within and without the house. A cask of the best cider was set a-broach to drink a good luck to the harvesters. A dewy coolness was in the air, the more refreshing as the day had been intensely hot, and one of those showers, which often fall suddenly in the more hilly parts of Devon, especially near the sea, where they attract every wandering cloud, fell in large drops, and rendered the atmosphere fragrant. The fields and meadows around the house sent forth a delicious perfume of wild thyme and sweet herbs. Everyone seemed

to welcome the shower as peculiarly refreshing after the heats and labours of the day, for all had laboured; even those who came only for pleasure found that, too, was not unmingled with toil.

And now came the hour when the rough but openhearted master of the feast bade all his guests, from the highest to the lowest, be seated at the several tables, with a hearty welcome to such fare as he had to set before them. Ere anyone ventured to take his seat, a blessing was invoked upon the board by good Parson Turnbull, who invariably made it a rule to act as voluntary chaplain to all the harvest-home suppers for as many miles round as his little fat ambling cob could contrive to carry him.

The guests were seated, the dishes uncovered, the viands smoked; but all were silent. The knives and forks had all the noise to themselves, for at no period, either in town or country, were the English, especially of the humbler class, ever a talkative people over good cheer. But this discussed, and the ale, cider, and punch set flowing, it was altogether another thing. Toasts were given, healths were drunk and huzzaed again and

again, bowls were filled, emptied, and replenished; songs were sung, mirth was at its height, and laughter was re-echoed in roaring peals from the hall to the kitchen and the kitchen to the barn. Fiddles were set going, and pipe and tabor; and the young and gay were soon footing it in little parties, according to their rank or their fancy, upon the turf in front of the house, and lighted by no other lamps than those the glowworm with her fairy taper might supply and the sweetly silvered orb of a rising moon. All were animated, all happy; even Charles had forgotten his fears and his low spirits, and was dancing with all his might, and glancing sweet looks at his lively partner, the fair Isabella.

CHAPTER VIII.

O! treach'rous night!

Thou lend'st thy ready veil to ev'ry treason,
And teeming mischiefs thrive beneath thy shade.

Farewell!-God knows when we shall meet again;
I have a faint cold fear thrills through my veins
That almost freezes up the heat of life.

Hill.

Shakespeare.

ON a bench beneath a spreading beech, opposite to where the young party from the Abbey were tripping it away to pipe and tabor, sat Tom Wakeum and an old man who was a hind in the service of the farmer. Tom had his eyes fixed on his young master with a thoughtful and even anxious expression, not at all in harmony either with the place or the hour. His neighbour on the bench remarked his manner, and observing to Tom that he thought he was a peg too low, asked him if he would take a cup of spiced ale or a pottle of cider.