in the company of any one, still seemed to gaze at him, and not at his companion."* All such weird influences apart, a portrait-gallery ever contains frequent matter for musing minds, even though its pictured denizens be but of the common run of Generals, some all in armour, of the old No lack of matter pensive and pathetic, either, in such company. For how big with truth the little couplet, A picture is the past; even ere its frame Be gilt, who sate hath ceased to be the same. On which account, few things are less exhilarating, perhaps, than to study the past and present of family pictures, and draw for oneself the contrast between now and then. Does the reader remember that domestic group on the wall of Mr. Osborne's dining-room, in "Vanity Fair?" There was a picture of the family, we are told, over the mantelpiece,George was on a pony, the elder sister holding him up a bunch of flowers; the younger led by her mother's hand; all with red cheeks and large red mouths, simpering on each other in the approved family-portrait manner. "The mother lay underground now, long since forgotten-the sisters and brother had a hundred different interests of their own, and, familiar still, were utterly estranged from each other. Some few score of years afterwards, when all the parties represented are grown old, what bitter satire there is in those flaunting childish family-portraits, with their farce of sentiment and smiling lies, and innocence so self-conscious and selfsatisfied." A degree of the same feeling may attach to the inspection of individual portraits. But who would be without a faithful one, that could secure it, of any endeared and honoured presence, whom he may not, can not, always have present with him-and whose counterfeit presentment is therefore cherished by him, or one day may be, will be, in the spirit of that gentlest of poets and sons, who could say, as he gazed on what art could yet tell him of his Mother as she looked and lived, sixty years before, that -while the wings of fancy still are free, And I can view this mimic show of thee, Time has but half succeeded in his theft,Thyself removed, thy power to soothe me left.§ But this is a subject to be pursued, if at all, in another and concluding paper. * Dombey and Son, ch. xiv. + Byron. Vanity Fair, ch. xxiv. § Cowper: On the Receipt of My Mother's Picture. THE LAST NIGHT. BY MARY C. F. Münster. MARY, is that the cry of some late crane How the wind Hisses through all the dry leaves of the beech! Poor leaves, that will not fall, though dead and sere! Still clinging to the boughs, as to our hearts That have washed o'er me since, that I could doubt If I was ever cherished by fond hearts, And cared and tended like some precious thing. Ah! Mary, when those tender parents died, I thought the earth had not another joy And would my childish heart's pray'r had been heard! It may be so, For I have heard that in the solemn hour When Time stands trembling between Night and Morn, Death cometh oft'nest to the weary bed Where sickness lies, and taketh thence his own. "Tis a fit hour for death, this dark, still time, And I shall use it, for full well I know I shall not see another sun go down THE LAST NIGHT. Behind the long blue hills; and when the moon And shine into this room to-morrow night, I shall look on her never more again, For where I'm bound to, sun and moon are not, Nor any star, but that unclouded light Whence they draw theirs, and which shall never fade, But shine on, never paling, through all time. Nay! do not weep for me, but rather joy above be green hearts my breast The spring will come again, For the Soul Near-come near to me. Well trodden down, and closely fenced about, Ay, better thus, So deep and long ago, that let it cry When too late to return, I knew I had no power for the task; And when I lost all faith in mine own might, I lost all fitness. Once I was beloved, And spurned the blessing, and, when all too late, What has quenched the light? Where is your hand? cold, cold. Yes, ah! I come CROOKED USAGE; OR, THE ADVENTURES OF LORN LORIOT. BY DUDLEY COSTELLO. CHAPTER XXVII. A CAT'S-PAW. In one of the boxes of the obscure restaurant, of which mention has already been made, sat the soi-disant Comte de la Roquetaillade. It was Sunday, the dullest of all dull days to a Frenchman in London, and as he pored over a weekly newspaper that was spread out before him, it seemed as if he were desirous of prolonging his breakfast to the utmost, in order to dispose of as much of that dull Sunday as possible. But, in truth, this was not the case: other objects were in his thoughts —all of them having reference to what he read, and had London been as gay as Paris, its amusements would not at that moment have claimed his attention. Let us follow his meditations as he soliloquised, but not aloud. "This young fellow, it appears, has shown some reticence. All he knew of me he, naturally, told, and fortunately that was very little; but why did he refuse to say where I lived? He must have had some motive for his silence in that respect! What can it have been? I should imagine not love for me who got him into this scrape! Something else, then. Let me consider!" But consideration on this point was vain, and the Count felt compelled to admit that Lorn's conduct puzzled him. "It was quite as well," he went on, "that the address was not given, though Drakeford has put it out of their power to trace my movements. He has made his first coup, I see, by burning down his house; his second, the question of compensation from the insurance-office, is his affair, not mine. The report of the fire looks very well in print: At an early hour on Wednesday morning the inhabitants of Perceval-street, Clerkenwell, were roused from their slumbers by fearful cries of "Fire!" which, it was speedily ascertained, proceeded from the roof of the house No. 9, situate in that street, where it appears that a young female, who acted as domestic servant to the tenant of the house in question, a most respectable inhabitant of the parish, named Drakeford, had taken refuge, in order to escape from the devouring element which already raged within, and threatened to involve the whole neighbourhood in one vast and destructive conflagration. The shrieks of the affrighted and bewildered girl, as she cowered between the chimney-pots, to one of which she clung in the agony of desperation, were of the most appalling and heartrending character; and when it was observed that the smoke, accompanied every now and then by fierce jets of flame, came pouring out of the windows of the upper story, none of the spectators, who had now assembled in multitudes, entertained for a moment the consolatory idea that anything VOL. L. 2 F |