the beloved friend of the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth, came forward with a proposition, as she had a large reckoning with the deceased: "You know not what to demand," said she, "and I know not what to pay; but, as I have now no child, I will adopt yours, as I have taken a fancy to her give her to me, and I will bring her up as my own, and provide for her when I die."

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The widow could not bear to part with her child; and, on her declining the offer, the countess resented her boldness to such a degree that she would never see her more, and when she died, regardless of the debt she knew she owed the father of Elizabeth, left her large fortune to her chambermaid.

The unfortunate mother retired to the country with her daughter, and at church attracted the attention of an extraordinary character, who might have served as a model for a tale of the Wandering Jew. He is thus described :

"Dr. Glysson was then, in 1684, in his hundredth year: his person was tall, and his bones very large; his hair like snow; a venerable aspect, and a complexion which might shame the bloom of fifteen. His judgment was sound, his memory tenacious and clear, and his company very engaging."

This strange person, at the last visit he paid to Mrs. Thomas, drew on, with much parade, a pair of rich Spanish leather gloves, embossed on the backs,

and covered with rich gold embroidery and gold fringes. They, of course excited curiosity, and their history, which he detailed, made them more remarkable.

"I do respect them," said he; "for the last time I had the honour of approaching my mistress, Queen Elizabeth, she took them from her own royal hands, saying, 'Here, Glysson, wear them for my sake.' I have done so with veneration, and never drew them on but when I had a mind to honour those whom I visit, as I now do you; and, since you love the memory of my royal mistress, take them, and preserve them carefully when I am gone."

A few days after having made this precious deposit, the old man died.

The mother of Elizabeth after this fell into the hands of an alchymist, and was induced to speculate, with the remainder of her little fortune, in his absurd plans, which, of course, she lost.

Elizabeth, meantime, became known to the poets and wits of the day by her talent, and was greatly admired by Dryden, who bestowed on her the name, by which she was afterwards called, of Corinna. Misfortunes, which had persecuted her mother, were continued to her she was on the eve of marriage with a good and wealthy man, when he died suddenly; and the fortune he left to her was disputed by the next heir.

Disease and pain were her portion, as well as poverty; and she fell under the lash of Pope, who was never too tender towards her sex, in consequence of inadvertently allowing some of his correspondence to get into the hands of Curl; and the spiteful little-great man put her into the "Dunciad," without remorse or pity.

JANE LANE.

ONE of the few persons to whom Charles II. showed real gratitude for their devotion to his interests at the risk of their lives and fortunes, was Jane Lane, the sister of Colonel Lane, of Bentley Hall, in Staffordshire.

After the battle of Worcester, during which memorable contention between legitimacy and usurpation young Charles behaved in so gallant a manner, that his friends and his country might reasonably have hoped everything from so brave and fearless a leader, retreat was all that was left to the defeated prince and his followers. Pursued, hunted, and in the utmost peril, Charles reached the city of Worcester, then the scene of carnage and tumult. There he tried to rally his discomfited and harassed troops. Mounting a fresh horse, he rode up to his soldiers, and, with vehement entreaties, conjured them to stand their ground, and support their cause to the last, passionately exclaiming, that he would rather at once fall by their

muskets, than live to see the consequences of their desertion. By the exertions of Colonel Careless and other noble cavaliers, Charles was enabled to make good his escape from Worcester. From that moment the adventures of the fugitive King were as romantic as any that fiction could present; and often, in after days, in the midst of his gay and thoughtless court, would he allude to those moments of peril and distress, when death awaited him at every turn; when he wandered, homeless, penniless, faint, and wretched, fearing in every stranger a betrayer, and in every acquaintance a traitor.

Like a knight of old, bewildered and fatigued, the King and his small party of friends arrived, late on the first evening of their journey, at Boscobel House, a retired mansion on the borders of Staffordshire and Shropshire, belonging to staunch royalists, and then inhabited by a family named Penderell, who received and sheltered their sovereign, whom they disguised in a woodman's dress, and so transformed him, by clipping his hair and staining his face, that his enemies were not likely to recognise him. Although he escaped, some of his faithful followers suffered for him, as the tragedy of Bolton-le-Moors may show, and the prisons in various parts of the country, which enclosed for so many years the unfortunate friends who were true to death.

The Penderells were unwearied and watchful,