deserve it now! Misled as he was, he yet did his duty to the utmost of his knowledge and his power-did it valiantly too. And now, it may be, that the right which was on the German side at the commencement may be transferred to the French. No person of unbiassed mind, no one undisturbed by passion, can believe that the destruction of Paris is any necessary security for the safety of Germany in the future. Even our ablest politicians doubt whether any cession of French territory, under the terrible pressure of the moment, will make her more secure in future. It is not at the moment when a nation has reached a higher point of greatness than it had ever before attained, and when it is intoxicated with victory, that it is in a state to make a bond with fate. Let Alsace and Lorraine be given up, let Paris be demolished, yet France will not die. Another generation will arise that will not know Bismarck, or will only know his name to abhor it. War will be renewed, not to add strength to the tottering throne of a despot, but to avenge the wrongs brought on a people by a despot whose name will be recalled with detestation. It is an old saying, that "they fight well who fight for the dead." And for France, vanquished now, the time for such fighting will surely come. As yet, day follows day without the victor's giving any sign of being moved by generous thoughts towards the fallen foe. Christianity is a useless word in war; it is not to be appealed to, but as the idea spreads that terms of peace might be discovered, let us take a little example from pagan times. "If we grant you peace," said the Roman senate to a conquered people, "how will you keep it?" The reply was, "If it be exacted from us on terms too hard, we will break it as soon as possible, but if it be a good peace, we will keep it for ever." Enough of this. Let my thoughts return to the point from which they set out many days ago-to Coblentz, to my friend there who has no newspapers to distract by every day's tidings her mind from her arduous duties in the care of the suffering. Can she, can any German woman, desire the continuance of this war for a day longer? No, a thousand times no! But the voices of wives and mothers are never heard amid the tumult of war, their tears are shed in silence. BLACKLOCK FOREST. XXIV. Since married they will be, why more delay ? They'll take their bridal course o'er sea and land; The doubled sum of both. Old Play. THE effects of Edmund's "parable" were next morning very visible in the faces of the Goldriches, whose increased tenderness of manner evinced their sense of his having truly valued their daughter's love at more than his life, while they eschewed the thought of what had too strongly proved his devotion. No allusion was again made to the subject, or to the dreadful locality. Even the word "forest" seemed to be prohibited, as referring to a kind of Edom under a curse. They knew nothing of the "dwelling in the rock," but were united in regarding the place as a fitting abode for "dragons," and a "court for owls, through which none should pass for ever!" Isabella had passed the night, dreading reflection on the rashness which, in despair of happiness with her on earth, had risked the loss of heaven, and which might have left her in a state of unendurable misery! She had underrated the strength of her own love; and when she again met Edmund in the morning the restraint of her feelings had been impossible, had their exhibition been ever so unbecoming. Her eyes followed him as he moved, or were fixed on him as he reposed; nor were his less vigilant-those eyes that had literally been closed in death for her sake. How she loved, too, the mute brother, and the gentle maiden who was to be her sister! She had an inward conviction of owing to them the life of her lover, for the effect of her father's verses on the latter, and of his "parable" upon his hearers, with other precedent denotements, all but assured her of the fact. Mr. and Mrs. Goldrich were as anxious for the speedy marriage of their daughter as was Edmund himself; and it was at once arranged that on a certain day, within a brief period from that time, the two couples should be respectively united. For reasons, including every consideration for Sir Richard, the ceremony was to be performed in the most private way, "and this," said Mr. Goldrich, "shall be the manner of it. Edmund and Isabella; bridegroom's man, Lawyer Lovell; bridesmaid, her lady's-maid. Frank and Mary; bridegroom's man, Dr. Lovell; bridesmaid, my wife's lady's-maid. I give away-that is, I give-but not away-my girl. William Morgan shall do the same for Mary. We start away in our two carriages or on horseback, as carriageroom falls short, for Carlston, in the next parish, and, as supposed by outer-observers, for a day's excursion of pleasure. Our two pairs of turtle-doves are each made one by the Carlston vicar. We breakfast together at the inn (to which, by the way, the luggage of the married ones shall be sent on the previous day), and then separate-the married, with one man and one maidservant, for Turin by easy movement-and the remainder of us quietly back to our respective abodes, there to await what may occur in the natural course of things. The intervening time 'twixt now and then shall not go idly by, for while the lawyers are at work arranging between Sir Richard and Giacomo Edmund, between the latter and myself, and between Frank and all others concerned, the girls will be busy with their dressmakers, and the whole family industriously employed in learning from Mary, and practising with her Tony the digital mode of colloquy." This last was a happy conception, and it was so heartily carried out by the household, that Belmont House was known in the neighbourhood as "The Deaf and Dumb College." Mary's part was no sinecure; but she had, ere long, much assistance from Isabella and one of the lady's-maids, for the women were quicker than the men in fingering a significant pantomime, and the under tutors were soon profitably employed in drawing-room and servants'-hall. The time, in fact, was so amusingly employed that there was no impatient wish for it to pass. Edmund was of course in full correspondence with his grandfather, to whom he so touchingly related all the late particulars (so far as they were distinctly known to the Goldriches and Lovells) concerning himself and brother, that the replies were everything that could be desired. He had spoken of his approaching marriage with the daughter of a wealthy English gentleman, as in revenge for that which his grandfather had sanctioned between a poor English gentleman and his richly endowed daughter, and had prefaced the account of Frank's recovery by bidding his grandfather "prepare for news not free from sadness-for sad it needs must be to find affliction connected with the joy of discovering a long-lost sonsuch an affliction, for instance, as that of the son's being-though otherwise highly favoured in personal perfection-deaf and dumb! Such," the letter continued to say, "is the living Francesco, who was by most supposed dead, though you, my dear grandfather, had a presentiment of his being only lost to be found Oct.-VOL. CXLVII. NO. DXCVIII. 2 K and restored to us." Then came the particulars of the affliction's cause, and of all the rest, ending in the intended marriage of Frank and Mary; the effect on old Ridotti being "a torturing impatience to see his two most dear boys, with the two girls who should be equally dear to him." The old gentleman was mightily pleased by Giacomo's sense of having conclusively acted-though under circumstances that compelled it-without his previous knowledge and permission; and by his saying that "Frank, at all events, was guiltless of such omission, as he knew not of any authority over him but that of Sir Richard, who had encouraged the affection between Mary and himself—that is, as it was supposed, between a girl deserving of better than a deaf-and-dumb husband, of birth less respectable than her own. Provided for now by the pecuniary means connected with the baronetcy restored to him, his grandfather's first care would be an adequate provision for Francesco, and there might be others of the Ridotti family deserving a share in his consideration." Others there were by mere connexion, but none remaining of blood or near alliance; the death of the third grandson at Genoa, and of his father (who it was supposed had been slain in a tavern brawl, or something worse), having left no claimants on his love or possessions, except his two living grandchildren. 66 Come," wrote the old signore, "delay not, my dear Giacomo and Francesco; but marry your wives, and haste with them hither to receive your grandsire's blessing!" The legal proceedings and other matters confirming Edmund's right and title to the baronetcy and its belongings being concluded, the marriage-day was decided on, but all in secret. The rector of Blackleigh was to receive his fee, or something more than his fee, for keeping out of sight, and allowing the two couples to be respectively united in another parish church, the clerk was also remunerated for having nothing to do, and the ringers for not meddling with their bell-ropes; and soon after, on a sunny morning, in accordance with Mr. Goldrich's prearranged plan, the wedding-party proceeded to Carlston Church, wherein the vicar of the parish did what was required of him, and nothing more. In plain terms, he kindly yielded to Mr. Goldrich's desire that he would abridge the marriage service to what was necessary for men and women coming to be united on the strength of their soulsympathy and mutual heart-affection. Mrs. Goldrich had acquainted her husband with Isabella's dread of again hearing that portion of the minister's address and charge which had so overwhelmed her, to the prevention of her first intended marriage, when she felt not more disgust at the forbidding of purposes out of her conception and abhorrent to her nature, than guilty in having overlooked the moral impediment to vowing love where no love existed. She could now answer with heart and soul the "thirdly" of the address, and the charge following. "But," said Mr. Goldrich, "I have ever thought the 'firstly' of the address, on the purposes of marriage, as at least gratuitous; and the 'secondly' an offence to every pure-minded woman who has to listen to it; but I will appeal for its omission now, if only in consideration of its fearful association with what occurred on the late occasion of her prevented union with Sir Richard Blackleigh." "Sir," replied the vicar, "your request is not uncommon, and I invariably concede it; and if it be thought there are many instances in which the whole of the address ought to be preserved, I am still bold enough to admit that its delivery is ill-timed, and should have preceded the marriage ceremony. Still you may admit that, in the case of Miss Goldrich, it occasioned great temporary distress towards sequent happiness." Of course the marriage could not take place without excitement among the few simple villagers of Carlston, and there the bells merrily sounded their peal of three. Only speculative murmurings varied the silence of Blackleigh and Blackport, till Mr. Goldrich quietly announced the truth, and, with every feeling of respect for Sir Richard, the whole neighbourhood rejoiced in the happiness of Lady and Mrs. Francis Blackleigh. Sincere was the pleasure declared by all in the transfer of Robert and Bessie Rawbold to Wilton's cottage, and the establishment of William Morgan as Sir Edmund's steward under Mr. Lovell's legal advising. Morgan might have had any other appointment more pleasing to him, but as he insisted on remaining attached to the forest, the north lodge was converted into the mere offices of a newly-built and commodious cottage residence for himself, while the southern one was improved for the comfort of others of his family. The perplexities arising from the elevation of one of a family above all the rest operated not here; so that no more need be said on that subject, unless it be that, where the elevated cannot bring the others upward, they have reached a most unenviable position a position resembling that of a showy kite with fluttering wings and no end of tail, claiming altitudinal equality with the birds of the air, but still controlled by the powers below; those of its owners, though the humblest on earth, who can at any time bring it down with a pull, or let it down with a run, as the humour of the moment may incline them. It was a vast delight to Sir Edmund and Isabella to conduct Frank and his wife through the wonders of Paris, Lyons, and the romantic valleys of Savoy to their crowning ascent over Mont |