While the monk spoke, Fritz glowed, as he had often done before, at the thought of making his art truly missionary; but he soon returned to the results of his experience.

"It is impossible!" he cried. "I can go with you to the abodes of misery,-I can look upon the sin and suffering of earth,—I can sit down amidst it and weep; but it takes from me all power. Did I attempt to portray such scenes, my pencil would fail in my enfeebled hands, and all the artist within me would die, amidst the overwhelming depression."

He paused, looked down on his picture, and thought to himself, "How is it that these pleasant. beautiful things make my existence inspire me with the very breath of life? Am I but a child myself, or is it that we are destined to return to a joy as perfect as childhood's?" Then it seemed as if he was reaching some new truth he had long wished to know, when, as it often happened, he grew weary, and it suddenly faded away, just as he hoped to grasp it.

The monk stood awhile disappointed and dissatisfied. At length he said, "This noble work you will not or cannot, then, accomplish, and the last use to which you turn your gifts will soon go to. When your marriage takes place, the expenses of a household will soon swallow up even this inferior devotion of the profits of your art, and for the sake of a pair of bright eyes and the pleasant friendship of earth, you will give up that higher and diviner privilege of ministering to sickness and poverty."

"At least," said Fritz, "we will make the earth brighter by one more green spot; our hearts will grow even stronger and warmer; and where the heart is warm, the hands will still find something to bestow."

and wrapping round it a handful of soft grass, she had managed to break it off without suffering from the terrible thorns, and now even the bright, shiny, prickling leaves were but a source of admiration.

Then Fritz pretended to steal it, and Berrie hid it away laughing, but could not long keep it out of sight; and she told how she should show it to poor Carlo, who lived in the little cottage at the end of the garden, and to all the old women in the neighbourhood.

Then Fritz, taking a blade of grass, drew it across her throat, and she rolled her little laughing head upon the window-sill in convulsions of delight, until he had to catch her to keep her from falling off the stone. That was more amusing still; and at length, half-rolling, half-stepping from the stone, she ran merrily off with her prize.

Angela, looking on, sadly feared in her heart lest some day Berrie might find that instead of the thorns bearing bright flowers, the flowers themselves would turn only to brambles, as they had done for her; but she had an errand to perform that called her to a distance, and taking her bonnet, she went quietly out.

"I wonder I have never painted Berrie," said Fritz aloud, as if alone. "There was something wondrously charming in the complete joy, the full life of her young face, as she held up her simple, all-sufficient treasures. Childhood alone needs no ideal; the reality itself is sometimes so perfect. Oh that I could paint her as she stands now before me!"

"If you would paint from life," said the monk, "you have a far finer study ever before you. I have often wondered that you have taken no picture of your sister Angela."

full of light as a poet's dream!"

"And this is an artist!" cried the monk, indignantly; "one who cannot discern in the mournful earnestness of that stooping figure, the calm strength, the heavenly purity of that face, faded though it be,-a higher beauty than the shallow, evanescent trace of a material form, or the unthinking, careless happiness of childhood!"

"It is true," said Fritz, "that there is in her face something higher than in her earlier days. The expression has often of late struck me most forcibly. Sometimes in the dusk of the evening it has flashed upon me, like some strange presentiment. But, oh! that the perfection of the outward form might go with that of the inward spirit! I shrink from depicting the wasted features, and the sallow, wrinkled brow, that in life I dare not find fault with, so associated as they are with the loved spirit dwelling within."

"I never see these imperfections," said the monk; "they are swallowed up,-lost in internal

"Then you could not paint," said Fritz. "You could give no outward expression to pure spirit."

The monk went out, but Fritz still continued thoughtful. He sat with his hands before him and his head bent down. Before his eyes floated alternate visions of bright little Berrie, standing at the window, with the gay flowers in her child

ish hand, and of Angela, with that look of patient endurance and mournful knowledge. Suddenly -was it that the two ideas melted together, forming a higher vision, or was it a real spiritual presence that stood before him, scarce out of reach? Was it Berrie that stood there, looking at the flowers in her hand with such wondering joy? No; that form had attained its perfect growth, richer even than Angela's in her loveliest days, and Berrie's childish joy grew dim before the triumphant gladness of that face. Was it Angela that stood there? There was no outward imperfection to mar the perfect spirit. Instead of endurance, there was strength and joy; instead of self-abnegation, there was a universal life. Yet, like Berrie, she stood there, looking upon her new, wonderful treasure, just discovered, the same common weeds, brightened, glorified, and in the centre, among the shining leaves and golden thorns, the large, bright nettle-flower, throwing over all its purple radiance.

"I do but show her one of the realities of this life, that you would represent as a garden of flowers. Of what avail is it, that, shrinking from the sight of the actual, you would, even now, shut yourself up in unreal dreams. Is this earth a world for brightness and pleasant things? Look on yon pale face, and, from the depths of your heart, speak. I would that the child should early learn to face the truth, and consider the world of sin and death in which we live."

"You would destroy the sunshine of the natural world before she can look through the darkness to the brighter spiritual world beyond." And so troubled was he at the terror of the child, who shuddered, and hid her face on his shoulder, to shut out the frightful reality, that he would have reproached the monk bitterly, had he not been struck by the deep woe of his face, and the bend in his usually straight figure, which seemed as if he too was failing, at length, beneath a weight too great for mortal strength to bear.

He carried little Berrie to his room, and the

The vision faded from the dim air, but not from the soul of the painter, as he seized his pencil and his brush.

They knocked at the door. Cries and lamentations resounded through the house. Slow and heavy were the steps of those who carried in the lifeless form. Angela, on her errand, overcome with a sudden faintness, had fallen from the bridge over which she was crossing; and the cold waters had received the weary one to her

rest.

It was no news to Fritz to hear that she was dead, no sorrow then, with that bright vision before him.

away.

But had he no wish to look once more on that worn form, those long-remembered features? No; they were of no moment,-things passed He wished only to be left undisturbed, as he painted on through the short evening and the long night hours. The morning, that extinguished his pale lamp in bright sunlight, found his work uncompleted, but his hand untired; and Fritz worked on.

It was the day of the funeral. The monk, sadder, sterner than ever, superintended all the arrangements.

The house was hushed in silence. Little Berrie stole fearfully up to him.

"Angela is dead," she said, much perplexed. "And we too must die," said he. "What is it?" asked the child. "How do the dead look?"

He lifted her up, and showed her, on the white, solemn bier, the pale, fixed features, like ghastly waxwork, and the cold, fearful form in its shrouded dread.

The child screamed in affrighted agony, struggling to escape.

Fritz hastily opened his door. When was he ever insensible to her cries?-and by their terrified violence he instantly divined their cause.

Much grieved, he hastened to her. She stretched out her arms, and he received her in his own.

He looked reproachfully at the monk. "You are wrong, father, thus to terrify her young spirit!"

completed, and urged the terrified little one to look up. Not until she lifted her fearful face, and welcomed the bright picture with a cry of delight, did he say softly to her, "So look the dead! This is our sister, Berrie!"

"Dead!" cried Berrie. "She is not dead, brother; she is wide awake, and has flowers in her hand like those I gathered the other day, but far prettier than mine,-and yet I saw her in the other room, so cold, so terrible!"

"She slept a moment, darling, and then she arose, more wide awake than ever; and, bright and joyful, she floated away in the blue sky where the sunshine is, and left us this picture, that we might see how beautiful and happy she now is, and what bright flowers she finds."

Then he set her down, and that her pleasant thoughts might remain undisturbed by sad sights, he bade her run through the woods, and follow the yellow butterflies and the little brown rabbits. and see if they could show her where such bright flowers grew.

The monk stood entranced. "It is wonderful!” he said. "It is an inspiration!" And as he looked and looked, the tears rolled over his cheeks.

Fritz had never seen him greatly moved before, and in weariness, loneliness, and disappointment, the monk had never faltered. But Fritz wondered not at his emotion; for, as he looked at the picture now, he did not feel as if it was the work of his hands, or in any way be longed particularly to him. He forgot the touches his hand had given. It seemed as if the vision itself stood before him.

"I have been wrong," said the monk; “I have dwelt so entirely upon the transient wretchedness of the present, that I have forgotten to look forward to the eternal blessedness of the future. In the contemplation of death, I have not truly realized immortality."

"Think you," said Fritz, in a low voice, " that it was the dream of my imagination, or that she really appeared to me at the hour of her death *** "Doubt not its reality," said the monk. It was the artist's true inspiration,-a living spiritual presence."

The funeral was over. The friends had de parted. The monk, even, was gone. Fritz sat

Little Berrie had come back from her chase through the woods so tired, so tired that she could scarcely eat, and fell asleep in Fritz's lap, with her arms round his neck and her supper all unfinished.

Fritz, too, was very weary. All the energy that had buoyed him up to the unfaltering completion of his task was gone, and only the accumulated weariness of an overtasked spirit remained. Existence seemed a dull, heavy dream. He could not realize that he had produced a noble and beautiful work; he could not understand fully that Angela was really gone, but a sad, lonely feeling of depression and fatigue overwhelmed him.

He so feared to awaken the child from her sleep, that he rose carefully, and lay down with her arms still about his neck; and the weary child and the toilworn man rested together. When the morning sun, shining across the floor, awakened them, Fritz rejoiced that little Berrie should be welcomed to a new day by bright sunshine.

The monk came often to the house;-not, as formerly, to advise and assist Angela in works of charity and self-devotion, but to look upon Fritz's picture, and study there, hour after hour, a lesson he had needed to learn.

Berrie long retained a dread of him; but he took more notice of her than formerly, and would take her up on his knee sometimes, and listen to all she had to tell of what she saw in the bright green woods; and he would take down old missals, to show her the beautiful flowers and birds with which the strange black letters were surrounded; and he would tell her, sometimes, that though he now looked so grave and sad, the time would come when he, and every one else, would be as merry and happy as she was.

Berrie looked up wonderingly in his dark, wrinkled face, and she didn't half believe it; but it was a pleasant thing to hear, and he was so kind and gentle that at last she always spoke of him as "the good monk," and day by day his face seemed to grow brighter and less stern, though his features grew ever thinner.

He had been absent longer than usual, when, one evening, as he sat looking up to the picture, the last beams of the departing sun stole into the room, gilding the edge of his dark hood, and lighting up his pale, calm features with a warm, cheerful glow.

It struck Fritz at that moment, how fine and noble his features were; and he wondered he had never noticed it before. But the grim sorrow that had formerly darkened the monk's face had been as a veil before the eyes of the joyfulhearted artist, hiding from him their true beauty. Now it seemed to him that he must undoubtedly draw this fine head, and he besought the monk to give his consent.

He thought it of too little consequence to be worth an objection; and, day after day, Fritz sketched and painted, as he sat beneath the pic

ture.

But the work went on slowly. It was long before he could catch the true expression, for in the living subject it was so variable, and it was

Then, when he had fixed that true expression on the canvass, his constant desire to idealize, and remove all that was harsh or repulsive, led him to alter here and there a sharp line, or fill out a hollow feature, to what seemed to him more in keeping with the beautiful gleam of the eye and curve of the lip; and, almost insensibly, his picture acquired a youthfulness and vigour contrasting strangely with the original.

One day, he had been unusually fortunate. The monk's face had worn unchangingly its brightest expression. The head was completed; and Fritz felt in looking at it that he had nothing more to wish. All was finished but the mere accessories, when, looking up at Angela, it suddenly appeared to him that this face was a perfect counterpart to hers, with the same perfection of form and unearthly brightness of expression; and a desire seized him to paint around this form the same white drapery, softened away into the dim twilight of the background,—yes, even to place in his hands the some gay weeds, and purple nettle-flower.

And he painted rapidly, all absorbed in this new idea. When he had finished, he arose. The two pictures stood before him. There seemed some wondrous connexion between them.

He turned to the monk to show him his work, but he was leaning forward on the arm of his chair. Fritz spoke, but received no answer, and hastening to raise him, he saw that the light had departed. The eye was dim, the features rigid. A lifeless form lay there; while before stood the work of the artist, like the living spirit in all its glory.

And they

Years passed by. The two pictures hung sacredly preserved in Fritz's best room, only opened on great occasions; but Fritz's little children, running in from their rambles with handfuls of wild-wood flowers, would steal in and look wonderingly up at them. could not tell why it was that the flowers in those hands were the same, and yet so much brighter than theirs; while Berrie-thoughtful little Berrie,-standing quietly behind them, with bright things daily fading in her grasp, wondered when she too should wake up to the reality of which they were but the shadow and the type.

ROMAN ROADS.

A SONNET.

BY W. GILMORE SIMMS.

WE cannot see the end which yet we know,
The wondrous end! Thither, our footsteps seek,
The northern countries, by the Emilian way,
Even to the British West. The Appian road,
Could the eye follow, would conduct its flight
Where the East opens the broad gates of Day!—
And this is Empire!-To ascend the peak,
Pierce the great rocks, bid secret waters flow,
Lay bare the desert paths, and send abroad
Swift messengers ;-it may be, with the scourge,
Needful the fiery savage to subdue,
Ere, from the barren of his mental night,
To the great consciousness, he may emerge,
Of what in nature and himself is true!

others are unique in being dressed in disdain of floral ornaments according to nature,-doubtless from a consideration of their colour not being indicative of mourning, and they exhibit specimens of black cut paper, formed (still with some regard to unity) into wreaths, or made up into the shapes of different flowers. Yet another class are hung with a drapery of crape, silk, or velvet, either white or black in colour, and festooned with bows of ribbon to correspond or contrast.

Great rivalry, generally speaking, exists among the owners of the different tombs, in regard to the beauty and expense of these decorations each one being emulous to excel the rest. Sometimes, too, where the circumstances forbid an attempt to compete with a neighbour, envy will watch its opportunity to destroy or deface the more costly surrounding decorations. But this occurrence is rare, for the precincts are guarded with exceeding vigilance.

In addition to their trimming of flowers, the tombs on All Saints' Day are studded with burning candles, tastefully arranged on their fronts. The light of these is of course greatly diminished by the glare of day, but it has nevertheless a singular and imposing effect.

The impression left upon the mind by the whole scene resembles that excited by some pleasing pageant; and it is only on recalling it to mind after this impression has had time to wear away, that it awakens any ideas connected with the grave. On a calm review of the scene, however, you are led to reflect that it was a benefit, as it were, given to the dead; and the idea is gratifying to one who is moulded in the same likeness, and acknowledges kindred clay. It is pleasing to have learned that so much honour can be paid to the departed; and the vague wish is inspired to lie, when you must bid adieu to earth, where, surrounded by decorations and illuminations produced once a year by the hands of those you loved in life, a vast crowd shall assemble to hold an anniversary beside your remains. There, too, is the absence of those "bugbears of a winter's eve, the deep damp vault, the mattock and the worm." No cold earth rests upon the coffin, and only a single slab separates it from the light of day.

There is something unspeakably precious to the mourner, at his first bereavement, in his consciousness that the beloved form from which the soul has fled, lies so ready of access to him; not that he is apt to wish to disturb its repose; but it is a satisfaction to him to feel that he might, if he chose, remove the yielding obstacle, and water it with his tears. The body soon moulders, how ever, owing to the climate and its proximity to the atmosphere-so that, ere long, the conviction arrives that nothing remains within the tomb but dust.

Strangers, who have no friends in the place to purchase or keep up a monument to their memory, are usually placed at their death in the ovens in the walls. One of these may be procured at a cost of fifty dollars, with the understanding that it is only to be occupied for three years-at the expiration of which period it will always be found ready to receive another tenant, the last having some time previous crumbled to ashes.

An instance, notwithstanding, occasionally occurs, in which the body has been preserved in a

perfect condition for a considerable time. A story is told of a Creole mother who had buried her only child, a boy of six years old. She was a widow, at least in heart, for circumstances had separated her from her husband soon after the birth of her son, and her affections had therefore centred in the latter with redoubled energy and fervour. They were of a peculiar character, moreover, uniting a depth that would seem to belong to other blood, with a fervour and impetuousness that sometimes distinguish the French people, from whom she was descended. It was plain that this boy constituted the sole remaining link that bound the mother to earth, and her tenderness for him knew no bounds. Alone or in

society, she never permitted him out of her sight. His childish footfall was but the echo of her tread, and his voice the harbinger of her presence. Even the dark watches of the night witnessed a continuance of her untiring devotion. When he was asleep, and no other eye was near, she hung over him with the gentle caress, the half-uttered prayer, the anxious tear, and the holy kiss of

almost more than maternal affection.

thing around which her heart might well entwine itself more day by day. He evinced an appreciation of her solicitude uncommon for his years. Even at that early age his lisping tongue had begun to speak of the time when he should be old enough to reward her care; and as she listened to those infantile accents of gratitude, she felt already amply repaid for it all. In addition to this, he was fair beyond the ordinary loveliness of childhood, and the young mother's pride was continually gratified by the admiration he never failed to excite in all who saw him. Surpassingly

The child, too, is said to have been every

beautiful herself-for it was from her he inherited

his comeliness-she neglected to cherish her own charms, in her desire to set off her child to advantage. Her happiest employment was to hem ruffles and weave lace to adorn his tiny garments, which were tastefully made also by her own hands and many times in each day she took delight to dress him in these with the greatest care, and to part his golden hair on his forehead, and arrange it in graceful ringlets around his head. He was interesting and precocious, too, as he was beautiful. His impromptu remarks and sallies, made in all the simplicity of his early dawn, were often far beyond his years, and bespoke a thoughtful and original turn that gave rich promise of future distinction.

But alas! the bud was destined to be cut down ere it blossomed. An attack of scarlet fever seized him, and in a few days his young spirit had returned to God who gave it, and the bereaved mother held only the lifeless corpse of her child in her arms. She neither swooned nor grew ill under the blow, but she clung to the remains with a firm tenacity that would not be shaken. Through more than one rising and setting of the sun, her friends vainly endeavoured to urge her away, until at length they began to dread the approach of the hour for the funeral. Contrary, however, to all expectations, when the time arrived, she yielded up the body to the necessity of the moment. After kissing with calmness the marble brow, beautiful in death, she permitted the coffin-lid to close over it, and shut it from her sight. "I have not said farewell to thee yet, my son, but only adieu for a