I did that the dark grim face at which we looked when a good joke was uttered, did not change more frequently; we went back to the pastry-cook's to supper, and had buns and almond cakes, and weak sherry and water as a parting stimulant; and finally we were walking on tiptoe through dormitory six-absent with-leave fellows-looking down compassionately on boys who had been asleep for hours! It was a great holiday; it was the only one I ever had with Tito. At Christmas, Tito's father came in a hurry to Mr. Price, settled the bill, and then went away again, leaving Tito behind him, after many embraces, and much whispered advice. It began to be understood, after he had departed, that Tito's father was going abroad-going to battle, Tito said, very proudly-and that Tito was to be left at school all through the Christmas holidays. We bade him good-bye, and felt very sorry for him, and my last glimpse of Flatborough-onthe-Sea that "half" was a curve of the embankment, a steep green hill, and Tito jumping about thereon and waving his handkerchief to me. Next "half" Tito's father did not appear, and Mr. Price began to look anxious when Tito spoke of his papa; but at the beginning of the next quarter, when the midsummer holidays were over, a letter came from abroad that appeared to relieve our master's mind, and that contained a second epistle, which Tito used to read to me and to himself, until it became worn out by constant reference, and by being kept along with his marbles, a pocketknife, and a pegtop. It was an English letter, of course, for Tito had been born and bred in England, and had seen no other country; and it was a very kind, fatherly, humorous kind of epistle, full of hope in his return to England before the next quarter was at an end, and of his anticipation of another holiday with his son and his little friend Simmons, if Simmons were still at Belvoir House. I hoped that he would come back soon, and that a circus would be in the town at the time; but the circus came and went away again, and no Colonel Zalez appeared to keep his promise to us. "He can't be fighting all this time, Tit," I said in mild remonstrance at Tito's father's behaviour; but Tito shook his head, and said he wasn't so sure of it. The quarter was past, and the second was approaching its termination. Christmas was upon us again; we were talking evermore of the holidays and home. Tito's father was still absent, and Mr. Price regarded Tito very thoughtfully when the boy said his lessons to him. We went away and left Tito at school --we came back and found Tito there, looking somewhat pale, and his black school suit more than a trifle rusty. Tito told me confidentially, on my return, that he had received no letter from his father, and that he had heard Mrs. Price say at dinner one day to Mr. Price that she thought it strange, and that Mr. Price had answered that he was inclined to think it rather strange himself, and that he, Tito, was sure that they had been talking about his papa, because they had spoken in whispers, and looked very much at him. I said that it must be fancy, and he tried to agree with me, but hoped that his papa would come to see him soon, for he was out of pocketmoney, and his wardrobe was in need of considerable repair. But Colonel Zalez never came, and only Tito his son remained sanguine at last of his return. I know now, what I did not know in all its details then, that the Prices, père et mère, were becoming very anxious concerning the whereabouts of Tito's father-that two quarters were in arrear, that the extra keep during Tito's holiday was added to the account, and that a third quarter had commenced. I knew afterwards that Mr. Price had written to an out-ofthe-way place in Central America, where the colonel had dated his last letter, and that no answer had been returned; that he had written to a British consul and elicited the information that no such person was known within his jurisdiction, and I heard Mr. Price speak once. of civil wars and general political confusion, and of the fear that Colonel Zalez had disappeared in a revolutionary vortex for ever. Lady-day quarter passed, bills were paid, and Tito, waxing shabbier and shabbier, and still wondering why his father never wrote to him, got up every morning with a marvellous confidence in his parent's coming to see him before the day was out. Tito scarcely took into consideration the expense that he was to Mr. Price; he knew nothing of school-bills, and Mr. Price was too tender-hearted a man to show his dissatisfaction to the child himself. Mr. Price was puzzled what to do with him, or how long he was to allow this to last, and he looked more thoughtfully at the small enigma every day, and could not see his way to a solution. One day Mr. Price went to London, to. the old town address of Colonel Zalez, and made many inquiries at his last lodgings, I learned afterwards, and returned baffled at all points. Tito's father had paid his bill and disappeared about nine months since, without "What is it, Tit?" leaving a clue to his whereabouts. A telegram | I was deep in geography, and wrestling with from abroad had led to his sudden departure, "principal towns," and whisperedit was elicited, and Colonel Zalez, packing up "Joe, I want you." his boxes, and putting on his boots, probably more down at heel than ever, had departed on his mission, whatever it was, to a foreign state, wherever that might be. Tito became so very shabby after Lady-day that the master found excuses to leave him at home when the boys went out for their airings or their cricket-matches, and finally, one of our boys spoke positively to a few high words which he had heard exchanged between Mr. and Mrs. Price one evening, with reference to the former's suggestion that he thought he should risk a suit of clothes for Tito. The high words at all events ended in the suit of clothes being provided for poor Tito, who accompanied us in our walks again, and looked for the tall, sun-burnt, gray-mustached man at the corner of every street we passed. Midsummer and the holidays came round, Tito was left at school, and Mr. Price's blank look at the unclaimed one assumed by several degrees more stoniness of aspect. Once more the busy hum of school, old pupils and new ones, and Tito still on the establishment, and Tito's father nowhere. By degrees the story of the boy's forlorn position had found its way amongst the scholars, and Tito was pitied very much by the majority, and laughed at by a few thoughtless ones, who thought it rare fun for a boy to have a father who had run away from him. Tito's position was not an enviable one, but he bore it pretty well, and only fretted to himself a little, and with not half the noise which he had made on the night when he had missed his father for four hours. I was his counsellor and his comforter, and I kept up his hopes at last by strange legends of various fathers and mothers' returns after years of absence from their children, and was continually ransacking story-books for parallel cases to his own. One day, Mrs. Price and her lord and master began to have a few words again concerning the unfortunate Tito, and Wickers, who was the boots of the school by day, and a page radiant in sugar-loaf buttons at night, came to Tito with the news. "There's been a jolly row about you, Master Zalez," he said; "and they've thought it over -only don't you say that I told you, mindand they think your father is a wenturer, and they're going to send you to the workus." Tito stared, and finally walked away, keeping from the playground and his playfellows all day. In the evening he came to me when "You heard Wickers say that they were going to send me to the workhouse?" 66 Yes-but I don't believe it." "I'm going to ask the master now-come with me. "Oh, lor!" "He's at the desk there looking over the 'Themes,' and I want you to hear what he says." "Very well." So I left my place at the imminent risk of getting six bad marks for inattention to my lessons, and went with Tito to Mr. Price's desk. I shall never forget the look of astonishment and discomfiture on the master's face when Tito put the question very straightforwardly, and with wonderful composure. "If you please, sir, is it true that you are going to send me to the workhouse?" "Bless my soul !-who-who told you that, Tito?" "I would rather not say who told me, sir it's all about the school." "Dear me how vexing-how very unfortunate! My poor Tito, I should like to speak to you to-morrow morning, about seven. What are you doing out of your place, Simmons?" he asked, catching sight of me at last. "I came to take care of Tito, sir." "Six bad marks." I knew that I should have them, therefore the promulgation of my sentence did not take me very much by surprise. Tito might have made matters worse by getting himself into a scrape and informing Mr. Price that he had asked me to leave my place with him, had not a look from me silenced one who had quite enough troubles of his own. Tito went the next morning to Mr. Price's room, meeting Wickers by the way, who told him that the master and the missus had been "at it " again, and that Mrs. Price was sick of boys whose fathers never paid. Of the particulars of Tito's conference with Mr. Price, these are the principal, as detailed to me by Tito between twelve and two. It had all been arranged, and Mr. Price broke the news to him in as gentle a manner as he could, and wiped his own eyes once or twice surreptitiously with his pocket-handkerchief. He told Tito that he was not a rich man, that the school was the support of himself and a large family, and that it was beyond his power to keep Tito any longer at his own expense. He had consulted with his solicitor, who had advised him to hand over Tito to the parish authorities of Flatborough, who would pass Tito over to the parish authorities of the district in London where Colonel Zalez had resided for many years. He told Tito that the parish would use every exertion, and take far greater pains to find his father than he could do with a great school on his mind, and that he was taking the best and surest means to put Tito in his father's hands once more. He had no doubt that the parish would treat Tito very well, and that Tito would be very happy; but his auditor having his own opinion on this subject, went away discomfited. His last inquiry Somehow the fate that loomed before Tito became known also to the boys, and was canvassed during play-hours, and generally set down as a "jolly shame," not any of us taking into consideration the ways and means of Mr. Price, and the appetite-always a good oneof Tito Zalez, and the rapid growth upwards and sideways-for Tito kept filling out rapidly -of the unfortunate pupil, who was out of his clothes again before any one knew where he was. Once the bright idea occurred to us of getting up a subscription to pay his arrears amongst ourselves and our parents, but the united contributions only amounting, after all the harass of canvassing, to eight shillings and threepence three farthings, it was thought advisable to return the subscriptions to the Tito fund. The second idea was entirely my own, and consisted in suggesting to my father, in a friendly and persuasive note, that Tito would be worth adopting, being a very nice and amiable boy, whom everybody would like at home. This idea was dashed to the ground by my father's courteous but decisive reply in the negative, and Tito, who had built a little on this letter, said, "Never mind, Joe," and asked whether Michaelmas-day always fell on the 29th of September. On the twenty-eighth, in the dusky evening, which steals upon us so early at this date, and when the boys were strolling about the playground, waiting for the bell to ring them to tea, Tito suddenly came to me with the bottoms of his trowsers tucked up, and his threadbare jacket buttoned to the chin, in a way that looked like business, and said, "Good-bye, Joe-I'm off." "Off!-off where?" "Hush! don't make a noise; but I can't stand the notion of a workhouse-I'm afraid of it; and-ugh!-the skilley! To-morrow's Michaelmas-day, and I'm going to run away." 'You don't mean it?" "Yes, I do." "But what's to become of you?" "I shall enlist for a drummer, perhaps, or turn farmer's boy, or something. I'm off at once, through the school window, over the washhouse tiles, and so into the back lane." Tito's sudden resolution took all my breath away; the novelty of the expedition aroused my love of adventure, and regardless of consequences, future hardships, future punishment from the hands of Mr. Price, and the sin of disobedience to my pastor and master, I said "I'll go a little way with you, Tit, and come back again before they shut up for the night." "But how you will catch it!" "Yes, I know that; but I should not like you to start alone." "Thank you, Joe; it's very kind of you; but I think you had better stop." I thought so also, but I went with Tito; and we succeeded in getting from the school by the way which my small friend had ingeniously sketched out. When we were outside the playground wall, and heard the boys' voices welling to our ears from the other side, our hearts sank a little at the boldness of the step, and we hurried on somewhat crestfallen to the sea-shore, and went on by long low-lying sands, knowing that the tide was out, and that we were not likely to meet anybody at that hour to stop us before we reached the King's Gap. This was a cleft in the cliffs, where I was to part with him, and wish him God-speed on his journey. Tito had a bundle with him, in which he had packed a small great-coat, his socks, one shirt, a cricket-ball, a large bag of marbles-the boys were always giving him marbles, by way of token of their respect for him-a few halfpenny prints which he had coloured, and a volume of fairy-tales that his father had given him. The night was soon upon us, and we grew less stout-hearted in the darkness, and were doubtful if the sea might not come up more quickly than we had bargained for, and cut us off from the King's Gap before our tired legs could wade through the deep sand towards it. gap in safety, crept past the coast-guard house on the station, and then paused to consider the next step. This was the place of parting; but a look back at the dark country road I had to traverse, and a sudden remembrance of all the But we reached the horrible stories I had heard of travellers being assassinated in lonely districts, and of children being stripped by gipsies of their clothes, and turned adrift to die of cold, deterred me from returning to Belvoir House till daylight. I said that I would go on with Tito; and Tito, who had looked dismally in his direction also, said, "Thank you, Joe," and was evidently grateful for my company. We were both becoming very nervous, but we kept up appearances for a while. We took the wrong turning, and found ourselves on the edge of the cliff again. We made a short cut across a field to "try back" for the roadway, and lost ourselves completely. We went wandering about meadows and turnip fields in vain efforts to get off farmers' property, and failed. We were frightened almost to death by a white cow that bellowed suddenly over a hedge at us, and Tito dropped his bundle in his hurry, and we had to creep back cautiously for it, but were never able from that night to set eyes upon it again. We were overtaken by the rain --a heavy, steady down-pour, that washed the last atom of courage from our hearts. "Joe," said Tito suddenly, "I wish I hadn't come." 66 So do I," I assented; and then, with our heads very much bent forward, to keep the rain from our faces, and to allow it more easily to find its way down the backs of our necks, we, two foolish miserable hearts, trudged on, doubtful if we were walking over crosscountry to London, or back again to Flatborough. When it came to thunder and lightning along with the rain, the climax had arrived, and Tito burst into tears, and wished that he was in his comfortable workhouse, and that I was out of trouble; and then the friendly shelter of an old shed, with the doors off, suddenly coming across our path, we darted into it, and huddled together in one corner, praying for the daylight. How the long night passed we never knew. We went to sleep at last, with our arms round each other's neck, and thought of "The Children in the Wood." We were scared once more by the white cow, who came in with stately tread out of the rain also, and snorted and sniffed about us, and finally lay down across the doorway, barring our egress, and pretending to go to sleep. Tito said that it might take us unawares when we followed its example. We did not know that it was a cow till the morning, our impression being that it was a bull of the very maddest description, and one to be especially wary of, if we set any value on our lives. Somehow we dozed off to sleep at last, despite our fears; and when we woke again, hearing the hum of voices near us, we found that it was morning, and raining hard still, and that a red-faced man and a rosy-faced girl with milk-pails were looking down upon us in intense astonishment. "Lawks!" the girl said; "what are you a-doing here? What boys are you?" I looked at Tito, and he returned my glance; our spirits were at zero, and it seemed necessary to give in. "We're from Mr. Price's school at Flatborough, and should be glad to get back," said Tito. "Flatborough-why, that's fifteen miles from here," said the farmer's man. "You don't mean to say that you two little chaps have been a-playing truant-good gracious!" But we did mean it; and Tito said that, if they could put his friend Joe in the right road for the school, they might drop himself at the nearest workhouse, when they went that way, as it was all the same, and he was expected there; a piece of information which gave our listeners the impression that we were from the lunatic asylum five miles off. The farmer was sent for, and as he knew Belvoir House well, and was going to Flatborough on business that morning we were in a fair way towards the end of our adventure, and its unsatisfactory results. We drove to the school after a breakfast which we were not in a fair condition to enjoy; and Mr. Price, his wife, the assistants, half the boys, and Wickers, were in the hall to see our ignominious return. "You dreadful boys," Mr. Price said; "what a terrible fright you have given me, and what a deal of trouble! The county police are looking everywhere for you. What made you go away?" "Please, sir, Tito was afraid of the work. house," I explained; "and as he did not know his way to London, I thought that I would just put him on his road." "I'll talk to you presently, Simmons," said Mr. Price, meaningly; and then he turned to Tito and said "You need not have been afraid of Michaelmas-day, Tito, for I had made up my mind to risk another quarter; but your anxiety of mind was to a certain extent excusable, and I shall not punish you severely." Tito's troubles were ended from that day. The next mail brought a letter from President Zalez, whose political intrigues had thrown him into prison, and then had placed him at the head of a government, and Mr. Price's account was settled in due course. I met President Zalez at an hotel in New York, whither he had gone for a holiday, two years ago, and his son Tito was then a bigger fellow than his father. We laughed over Tito's troubles at a princely banquet which the great man gave us, and, as he smoked his paper cigarettes, we reminded him of our first treat together in the little town of Flatborough-onthe-Sea. "When you were Tito's best friend," he said, holding out his hand to me across the table. "Thank you, Master Simmons!" I was afraid that he would have kissed me again in his gratitude, but he sat down, sighed as though the cares of government were a little in the way of the peace and rest that he had found in England, leaned back in his chair, and lighted another cigarette. FLORA'S HOROLOGE. [Mrs. Charlotte Smith, born in London, 4th May, 1749; died at Tilford, 28th October, 1806. Novelist and miscellaneous writer; author of Ethelinde; Celestina; Desmond; and The Old Manor House, which is considered the best of her novels. Robert Chambers said of her works: "The keen satire and observation evinced in her novels do not appear in her verse; but the same powers of description are displayed."] In every copse and sheltered dell, The green-robed children of the spring Will mark the periods as they pass, Mingle with leaves Time's feathered wing, And bind with flowers his silent glass. Mark where transparent waters glide, Soft flowing o'er their tranquil bed; There, cradled on the dimpling tide, Nymphæa rests her lovely head. But conscious of the earliest beam, The virgin whiteness of her breast. Till the bright day-star to the west See Hieracium's various tribe, Of plumy seed and radiant flowers, The course of Time their blooms describe, And wake or sleep appointed hours. Broad o'er its imbricated cup The goatsbeard spreads its golden rays, But shuts its cautious petals up, Retreating from the noontide blaze. Pale as a pensive cloistered nun, The Bethlem star her face unveils, When o'er the mountain peers the sun, But shades it from the vesper gales. Among the loose and arid sand The humble arenaria creeps; Slowly the purple star expands, But soon within its calyx sleeps. And those small bells so lightly rayed On upland slopes the shepherds mark And thou, "Wee crimson-tipped flower," Unlike silene, who declines The garish noontide's blazing light; But when the evening crescent shines, Gives all her sweetness to the night. Thus in each flower and simple bell, |