Bret Harte's New Romance.

IN THE GARQUINEZ WOODS

A TALK OF CALIFORNIA

CHAPTER Til

Out of compliment to Miss Nellio Wyim, Yuba Bill, on vouching Indian Spring, had made a. slight dolour to onablo him to ostentatiously sot down his fair passenger boforo tho door of tho Burnhams.. When it had closed on tho admiring eyes of the passengers and Hie ooaeh had rattled away, Miss Nellie, without any niidno haste or apparent change in lier usniil quiot dc inoanoru,' managed, however, to despatch her business promptly, and leaving an im pression that she would call again before hot return to ICxcelsior, parted from her friends, and slipped away through a .side street to tho (ienural Furnish ing Store of Indian Fipriim'. 1" pfi»s in'n- I.his emporium on the ooaeh, .Miss Nellie's riuiisk eye had discovered a i.-heap brown linen duster hanging in its window. To purchase, it. and put it over her delicate cambric divss, albeit with :i. shivering sense that she looked like a badly-folded brawn jmpor parcel, did nol take long. As she left tho .shop it. won with mixed emotions of chagrin and security that she noticed that her passage thnmgli tho settlement no longer tunic! the heads of its male inhabi tants. She reached tho outskirts of Indian Spring and the high mad at about the time Mr Uraee hud begun his fruitless patrol of tho main street. Far ill tho distance a faint olive green table mountain .■■coined to rise abruptly from the plain. [t was the Ca!'i[iiinc:: woods, (ifithering her spotless skirl* beneath her extemporised brown <lo::mu>, .-he set; oil) briskly toward thorn.

Bnl lior progress was scarcely free or ex hilarating. Mho was not aeouslomod lo walking in .1 country wlicrc " l>u;;;yy viding" was considered llio only genteel young lndy-lika mode oF progression, and its regular provision tho expected courtesy of mankind. Always fastidiously booted, her low-quartered shoe-: were charming t<> the eye, L.iit hardly adnpted to thodust and inequalities of the highroad. It was truu that slio had thought of buying a eoarsor pair at Indian Spring, but once fan: lo face with their uncompromising ujjflino^s, she had faltered and lied. Tho huh was unmis takably hot, but lies;.parasol was to.) well known, and tillered too violent 11 constrnxt to tlic duster for practical n.-u;. Once she H topped with iin exclamation of annoyance, hesitated, and looked back. In half an hour she had twice lost her .shoe and her temper: a pink Hush took possession of her chocks, and her eyes were bright with suppressed rage. Oust began to fonrr grimy circles, around their orbits ; with oat-like shivers .she even felt it, pervade the roots of her blond hair. Gradually her breath grow more rapid and hysterical, hersmartingoyes became humid, and at last, encountering two observant liOHcmon in the rond, sho turned and lied, until, reaching tho wood, .she began to cry.

Nevertheless she waited for the I wo horse men to puss, to satisfy herself that she was not followed ; then pushed on vaguely, until sho reached a fallen tree, where/ with

a gesture of disgust, she tore onhcr hapless duster and Hung it on the ground. She then.*:'1.! down sobbing, but after a moment dried her eyes hurriedly and started to her feet, A few paccw distant, erect, noiseless, with outstretched hand, the young solitary of the CarquiniMi woods advanced towards her. Hi-; hand had almost touched hers when he stopped. " What has happened v" he asked, gravely. " "Nothing," she said, turning half away, and searching the ground with her vyv^, as if she had lost something. '-Only I must be going back now."

" You shall fro back at 01100 if yon wish it," liusaid, flushing slightly. "Butyou have been crying why?"

Frank a-; Misa Nellie wWu'd to be, she couki not brin;; horsclf to say that her feet hurt her, and the dust and heat were ruin ing her nomploxion. It was, therefore, with a half-oonlident belief that her troubles •were really of a moral quality, that she an swered : "Nothing-nothing, but but—its vroii'' to come here."

" But you did not think it was wrong when you agreed to come at ourJast meet ing,1' said the young man, with that per sistent logic which exasperates tliu inconse quent femininu mind. "It cannot be any more wrong to-day.' " But it was not so far off," murmured the young girl, without looking up.

"Oh, the distmico makes it more im proper, then," lie said abstractedly, but after a moment's contemplation of her half averted face, lie asked gravely: " Has any one *«ikcfl tc you about mo?"

Ten minutes before, Nellie had been burning to unburden herself of her father's warning, but now siio felt she would not. " 1 wish you wouldn't call yourself Low," she- said at last. " But it's my name," he replied quietly. "Nonsonso! It's only a stupid transla tion of a stupid nickname. They might as y/ell call you ' Water' at once."

" But you said you liked it." " Well, 80 1 do. But don't you see—l— oh dear! you don't understand." Low did not reply, but turned his head with resigned gravity toward the deeper woods. Grasping the barrel of his rillo with Ids left hand, lie threw his right arm across his left wrist mid leaned slightly upon it with the habitual ease of a Western hunter, doubly picturesque in his own lithe, youth ful symmetry. Miss Nellie looked at him froui imdisi' !xr cyolids, and thrn half de fiantly raised her head and her dark lashes. Gradually an almost magical chango camo over her features, her eyes grow larger and more and more yearning, until they seemed to draw and absorb in their liquid depths the figure of the young man before her ; her cold face bruku into an ecstasy of light and colour ; her humid lips parted in a bright welcoming smile, until with an ivrestible impulse she arose, and, throwing back her head, stretched toward him two hands full of vague and trembling passion. In another moment he had seized them, kissed them, and as he drew her closer to las embrace felt them tighten around his neck. "But what name do you wish to call me V lie asked, looking down into her eyes. Miss Nellie murmured something confi dentially to the third button of his hunting shirt. " Rut-that," he replied, with a faint smile, " that wouldn't be any more practi cal, and you wouldn't want others to call mo dar " Her fingers loosened around his neck, she drew her head back, and a singular expression passed over her face, which, to any calmer observer than a lover, would have seemed, however, to indicate more curiosity than jealousy. "Who else docs call you .so?" she added sharply. " How many, for instaneo ?"

Low's reply was addressed not to her ear, but to her lips. She did not avoid it, but added: "And do you ki.ss them all like that?" Taking him by the shoulders, she held him a little way from her, and gazed fit him from head to foot. Thou drawing him again to her embrace, she said: "I don't

care ; at least no woman has kissed you like that." Happy, dazzled, and ombar rOHßed, he was beginning to stammer the truthful protestation that rose to his lips, but she stopped him. " No, don't protest ; say nothing ! Let me love 1/011— that is all. It is enough." Ho would have caught hoi1 in his arms, but sho drew back. "Wo ni'o near tho road," sho said quietly. " Come, you ] lMinised to show mo where you camped. Lotus make the most of our holiday. In au hour J must leave the woods."

" But I shall accompany you, dearest.' "No, I must go as 1 came —alone."

"But, Nellie " "I toll you no," she said, with an almost harsh practical decision, incompatible with her previous abandonment. "We might be seen together." " Well, suppose wo arc ; we must be seen together eventually," he remonstrated.

Tho young girl made an involuntary Centura (if impatient negation, but chocked herself. " Don't, let \^ talk of that now, Coma, while 1 am here under your own roof "—she pointed to tho high interlaced boughs above them—" you must be hospit able. Show me your homo : tell me, isn't it a little elooiny sometimes V" "It never has been: J never thought it would bo until the moment you leave it to-day." She pressed his hand briefly and in a half perfunctory way, as if her vanity hail ac cepted and dismissed the compliment. "Take me somewhere," sho said inquisi tively, "where you stay most; 1. do not seem to see you here," she added, looking around her with a slight shiver. "itis so big and so high. Have you no place where you eat and rest and sleep?" " Kxcopt in the rainy season, I camp all over the place— at any spot whero 1 may have been shooting or collecting."

"Collecting?" queried Nellie. " Yes, with the herbarium, you know."

"Yes," said Nellie dubiously. "But you told mo onco - the lirst timo wo ever talked together," she added, looking in his. eyes - "something about your kooping your things like a squirrel in a tree. Could we not go there? Is there not room for us to sit and talk without being browbeaten and looked down upon by these supercilious trees '!"

" It's too far away," saiil Low, truth fully, but with a somewhat pronounced emphasis, "much too far for you just now ; and it Lies on another trail that enters the wood beyond. But COlilO, I will show you a spring known only to myself, the wood ducks, and the squirrels, i discovered it tho day I lirst saw you, and gavo it your name." But you shall christen it yourself. it will bo nil yours, and your.-; alone, for it is so hidden and secluded that I defy any feet but my own, or whoso shall keep step with mine, to lind it Shall that foot bo yours, Nellie '!" Her face beamed with a bright assent.

"It may be diilieult to track it from hew," he said, " but stand where you are a moment, and don't move, rustle, or agitate tho air in any way. The woods aro still now."

lie turned at right angles with tho trail, moved a few paces into the ferns and under brush, and then stopped with his finger on his lips. For an instant, both remained motionless ; then with his intent face for ward and both arms extended he began to sink slowly upon ono knee and one Mile, inclining his body with a gentle, perfectly graduated movement, until his ear almost touched the ground. Nellie watched his graceful tiguro breathlessly until, like a bow unbent, he stood suddenly erect again, and beckoned to her without changing the direction of his face.

" What is it

she asked eagerly

"All right: I have found it," lie con tinued, moving forward without turning his bead.

"Hut how? What did you kneel for?" He did not reply, but taking her hand in his, continued to move slowly on through the underbrush, as if obeying some magnetic attraction. "How did you find it ?" again asked the half-awed girl, her voice unconsciously falling to a whisper. Still silent, Low kept his rigid face and forward trend for twenty yards further ; then ho stopped and released the girl's half-impatient hand. " ;fow did you iiml it?" she repeated, sharply.

"With my ears and nose," replied Low gravely. " Witli your nose ?" "Yes; 1 smelt it."

Still fresh with the memory of his picturesque attitude, the young man's reply seemed to involve something more irritating to her feelings than even that absurd anti-climax. She looked at him coldly and critically, and appeared to hesitate whether to proceed. "Is it far?" she asked. "Not more than ten minutes now as I shall go." " And you won't have to smell your way again V" " No : it is quite plain now," ho answered seriously, the young girl's sarcasm slipping harmlessly from liv Indian stolidity. " Don't you smell it yourself?" But Miss Nellie's thin cold nostrils refused to take that vulgar interest. "Nor hear it? Listen!" "You forget I sutler the misfortune of having been brought up under a roof," she replied coldly. "That's true," repeated Low in all seriousness ; " it's not your fault. But do you know I sometimes" think I am pecu liarly sensitive to water? I feel it miles away. At night, though I may not sco it, or even know -where it is, I am conscious of it. It is company to mo when I am alone, and I seem to iiear it in my dreams. There is no music as sweet to mo as its Bong. When you sang with me that day in church 1 seemotl to hear it ripple in your voice. It says to mo more than the birds do, more than the rarest plants I find. It seems to live with me and for me. It is my earliest recollection ; I know it will be my last, for I shall die in its embrace. l)o you think, Nellie—he continued, stopping short and gazing earnestly in her face—do you think that" the chiefs know this when they called me " Bleeping. Water ?"

To JNliss Nellie's several gifts I fear the gods had not added poetry. A slight knowledge of English verse of n select character unfortunately did not assist her in the interpretation of the young man's speech, nor relieve her from the momentary feeling that ho was at times deficient in in tellect. She preferred, however, to take a personal view of the question, and expressed her sarcastic regret that she had not known before that she had been indebted to the great flume and ditch at Excelsior for the pleasure of his acquaintance. This pert remark occasioned some explanation, which ended in the girl's accepting a kiss in lieu of more logical argument. Nevertheless sho was still conscious of an inward irrita tion—always distinct from her singular and perfectly material passion—which found vent as the difficulties of their undeviating progress through tho underbrush increased. At last sho lost her" shoe again, and stopped short. '.'lt's a pity your Indian friends did not christen you 'Wild Mustard' or

'Clover,'" she said satirically, "that you might have had some sympathies and long ings for the open fields instead of theso horrid jungles ! I know we will not get back in time."

Unfortunately, Low accepted this speech literally and with his remorseless gravity:

"If my name annoys you, I can get it changed by the Legislature, you know, and 1 can find out what my father's name was and take that, My mother, who died in giving mo birth, was the daughter of a chief"' "Then your mother was really an Indian?" said Nellie, "and you are " She stopped short. " But J told you all this tho day wo first met," said Low witli grave astonishment. " Don't you remember our long talk coming from church?" "No," said Nellie, coldly, "you didn t tell me." But sho was obliged to drop her eyes before the unwavering, undeniable truthfulness of his. j "You have forgotten," ho said calmly; "but it is only right you should have your own way in disposing of a name that I have cared little for ; and as you're to have a share of it "

" Yes, but it's getting late, and if we are not going forward " interrupted the girl impatiently. " We tire going forward," said Low im perturbably ; " but 1 wanted to tell you, as we were speaking on that subject" (Nellie looked at her watch). " I've been oii'ered the place of botanist and naturalist in I'rof. Grant's Kurvey of Mount Shasta, and if I take it—why, when I come back, darling— well—"

"lint you're not going just yet ?" broke in Nellie, with a new expression in her face. "No."

"Then we need not talk of it now," she said with animation.

Her sudden vivacity reliovod him. "1 see what's the matter," ho suit., gently, looking down at her feet; "these little shoes were not made to keep step with a mocoason. Wo must try another way." Jle stoopesd as if to .securu the erring buskin, but suddenly lifted her like a child to his shoulder. "There," he continued, placing her arm round lii.-i neck, "you are clear of the ferns and brambles now, and we can go on. Are you eomfortablo 1" He looked up, read her answer in her burning eyes and the warm lips pressed to his forehead at the roots of his straight dark hair, and again moved onward as in a mesmeric dream. But lie did not swerve from his direct course, and with a linal dash through the under growth parted the leafy curtain before the

spring. At lirst (lie young girl was dazzled by the strong light that came from a rent in the interwoven arches of the wood. The breach hud bflon caused by the huge bulk of one of the great giants tliut had half fallen, and was lying at a steep angle against one of its mightiest brethren, having borne down a lessor tree in the arc of its downward path. Two of the roots, as large as young tree:, tossed their blackened and bare limbs high in the air. The spring—the in significant cause of this vast disruption— gurgled, Hashed, and sparkled at the base ; the limpid baby finger.-! that laid bare the foundations of that fallen column played with the still clinging rootlets, laved the fractured and twisted limbs, and, widening, filled with sleeping Mater the graves from which thoy had beon torn.

" It had been going on for years down there," said Low, pointing to a cavity from which the fresh water now slowly welled, •' but it hat! been quickened by the rising of tlio subterranean springs and rivers which always occurs at a certain stage of the dry season. I remember that on that very night—for it happened a. little after midnight, when all sounds are more audible—l was troubled and oppressed in my «leep by what you would call a night mare—a feeling as if I was kept down by bonds and pinions that I longed to break. And then 1 heard a crash in this direction, and the lirst xt'e-'k of morning brought mo the sound and scent of water. Six months afterward 1 chanced to Jind my way here, M I told you, and gave it your name. I did not dreamthatl should stand ever beside it with you, and have you christen it your self.

He unloosed the cup from his flask, and filling it at the spring handed it to her, but the young girl leant over the pool, and pouring the water idly back said, "I'd rather put my feet in it. Mayn't I?" "I don't understand you," ho said, wondcringly. '' My fe-jt are so hot and dusty. The water looks deliriously cool. May I '!"

"Certainly." He turned away as Nellie, with apparent unconsciousness, seated herself on the bank and removed her shoes and stockings. When she had dabbled her feet a few moments in the pool, she said over her shoulder: " We can talk just as well—can t we?" " Certainly." " Well, then, why didn't you come to church more often, and why didn't you think of telling father that you were convicted of sin, and wanted to be baptized ?" "I don't know," hesitated the young man. " Well, you lost tho chance of having father convert you, baptizo you, and take you iuio lull church fellowship." "I never thought "ho began. " You never thought. Aren't you a Christian ?" "I suppose so." "Ho supposes so. Have you no convic tions—no professions '!" " But, Nellie, I never thought that you " " Never thought that I—what ? Do you think that I could ever bo anything to a man who did not believe in justification by ; faith, or in the covenant of Church fellow ship? Do you think father would let me ?"

In his eagerness to defend himself he stepped to her side. But seeing her little feet shining through the dark water like outcroppings of delicately veined quartz, he stopped embarrassed. Miss Nellie, how over, leaped to ono foot, and shaking the other over the pool, pul her ham! on his shoulder to steady herself. "You haven't got a towel —or," she said dubiously, look ing at her small handkerchief, " anything to dry them on J" But Low did not, assho perhaps expected, oiler his own handkerchief.

"If you take a bath after our fashion," ho said gravely, " you must loam to dry yourself after our fashion."

Lifting her again lightly in his arms, he carried licr a few stops to the sunny open ing, and bnde her bury her feet in the dried mosses and baked withered grasses that were bleaching in a hollow. The young girl uttered a cry of childish delight as the soft ciliated fibres touched her sensi tive skin.

"It is healing, too," continued Low; " a mocaaon tilled with it after a day on the trail mnkes you nil right again."

But Miss Nellie seemed to be thinking of something else. " Is that the way the squaws bathe and dry themselves ?" "I don't know—you forgot I was a boy when I left them." "And you're sure you never knew any?" " None." The young girl seemed to derive some jdtisfaction in moving her feet up and down for several minutes among tho grasses in the hollow ; then,|after a pause, said, " You are quite certain I am tho first woman that ever touched this spring?" "Not only the first woman, but the first human being, except myself.", " How nice!"

They had taken each other's hands; seated side by side they leaned against a curving elastic root that half Supported, half encompassed them. The girl's capri cous, fitful manner succumbed, as before, to the near contact of her companion. Look ing into her eyes, Low fell into a sweet, selfish lover's monologue, descriptive of Iris past and present feelings toward her, which she accepted with a heightened colour, .1 slight exchange of sentiment, and a strange curiosity. The sun had painted their half embraced silhouettes against the slanting tree trunk, and began to decline unnoticed ; the ripple of the water mingling with their whispers came as one sound to the listening ear; even their eloquent silences were as 1 deep, and, I wot, perhaps as dangerous, as the darkened pool that iilled so noiselessly a dozen yards away. So quiet were they that the tremor of invading wings once or twice shook the silence, or the quick scamper of frightened feet rustled the dead grass. But in the midst of a prolonged stillness the young man sprang up so sud denly that Nellie was still half clinging to his nock as he stood erect. "Hush !" he whispered, "some one is near!" He disengaged her anxious hands gently, leaped upon the planting tree trunk, and running half way up its incline with the agility of a squirrel, stretched himself at full length upon it and listened. To the impatient, inexplicably startled I girl, it seemed an age before he rejoined I her.

"You arc safe," ho said; "ho. is going by the western trail toward Indian Spring." l! Who is hci" she asked, biting her lips with a poorly restrained gesture of morti fication and disappointment. "Homo stranger," replied Low. "As long as he wasn't coming here, why did you give mo such a fright "i" she said pettishly. "Arc you nervous because a (■ingle wayfarer happens to stray here?" " It was no wayfarer, for he tried to keep near the trail," said Low. "He was a stranger to the wood, for he lost his way every now and then. He was seeking or expecting some one, for he stopped fre quently and waited or listened, He had not walked far, for he wore spurs that tinkled and caught in the brush, and yet lie had not ridden here, for no horse's hoofs passed the road since we have been here. He must have come from Indian Spring."

" And you heard all that when you lis toned just now?" asked Nelly, half dis dainfully.

Impervious to her incredulity, Low turned his calm eyes on her face. "Cer tainly, I'll bet my life on what I say. Tell me-Alo you know anybody in Indian Spring who would be likely to spy upon you '!" The young girl was conscious of a certain ill-defined uneasiness, but answered " No."

"Then it was not you he was seeking," said Low, thoughtfully. Miss Nellie had not time to notice the emphasis, for he added: "You must go at once, and lest you have been followed, I will show you another way back to Indian Spring. It is long, and you must hasten. Take your shoos and stockings with you until we are out of the bush."

Ho raised her again in his arms and strode once more nut through the covert into the dim aisles of the wood. Thoy .spoke but little. She could not help feel ing that some other discordant element, affecting him more strongly than it did her, had come between them, and was half per plexed, and half frightened. At the end of ton minutes he seated her upon a fallen branch, and telling her he would return by the time she had resumed her shoes and stockings, glided from her like a shadow. She would have uttered an indignant pro test at being left alone, but he was gone ere she could detain him. For a moment she thought she hated him. But when she had shod herself once more, not without nervous shivers at every falling needle, he. was at her side.

"Do you know any one who wevs a frieze coat like that? he asked, handing her a few torn shreds of wool aflixed to a splinter of bark. Miss Nellie instantly recognised the material of a certain sporting coat worn by Mr Jack Braoe on festive occasions, but a strange yet infallible instinct that was part of her nature made her instantly disclaim all knowledge of it. " No," she said.

"Notany one who scents himself with some doctor's stuff like cologne?" continued Lo«r, with the disgust of keen olfactory sensibilities.

Again Miss Nell'e recognised the perfume with which the gallant Expressman was wont to make redolent her little parlpur, but again she avowed no knowledge of his possessor, "Well," returned Low with some disappointment, " such a man has been here. Be on your guard. Let us go at once."

She required no urging to hasten her steps, but hurried breathlessly at his side. He had taken a now trail by which they left the wood at right angles with the highway two raile3 away. Following an almost effaced mule track along a slight depres sion of the plain, deep enough, however, to hide them from view, he accompanied her until, rising to the level again, she saw they were beginning to ap roach the highway and the distant roofs of Indian Spring. "Nobody meeting you now," he whispered, ■' would suspect where you had been. Good night! until next week-—remember."

They pressed each pother's hands, and, standing on the slight ridge outlined against the paling sky, in full view of the highway, parted carelessly, as if they had been chance-met travellers. But Nellie could not restrain a. parting backward glance as she left the ridge. Low had descended to the deserted trail, and was running swiftly in the direction of the Carquinez woods.

(To be Continued.)

A Sensation in Rome.

There are reports at Rome that many private documents referring to the Papacy have disappeared from the Vatican. It is feared the Italian Government may take under its protection those treasures of the Holy See which have been collected with tho people's money. To these treasures belong libraries containing more than 180,000 codices and 100,000 manuscripts, among them fifty-six Gospels in the Oriental tongues, written on scrolls to meet every emergency of the clergy. There is said to have oeen hidden the first archives of the extraordinary ecclesiastical offices, the sacred archives of the Propaganda, the third archives of the inquisition, and the fourth archives of the congregation- of the "Index Expurgatorius." These documents were once kept in the palace of the Quirinal, but were transferred to the Vatican by a Papal emissary, who persuaded the com mander of the Italian troops that said docu ments were simply baptismal registers without historical value. Some of them are now well guarded in an old tower near Anagi. The letters of Pope Alexander VI, are still in the Vatican, together with other papers which the Pope would never volun tarily place at the disposal of the public. Many of these documents are hidden in secret shelves in the walls and behind other papers.

A PICTURE IN THE AUCKLAND MUSEUM.

Ail Interesting Story,

(To tho Editor.)

Sin, —Visitors to the Museum whilst look ing at the many fine works of art liberally given to the Auckland people, must have been struck with a very highly-fl,,;^^ little picture (a portrait which has always been in the possession of Sir George Grey's' family, until presented by Sir George to the Auckland public.) Thepictureinquesti on is said to be by Gaspard Netscher, apainfer celebrated for his portraits and exqujji^i finished velvet and satin draperies, n appears that Netscher Mas deserted by his father. I have lately been read. ing a very interesting story 0 ; j^ life (the main facts of which I believe to be true), and which will, I think interest those who like to hear about artists, as well as your general readers, p or myself, I can only My that I did oo'tnut down the book until 1 nad finished th story. Whilst on the subject of pictures I may mention that I am often asked when our Art Gallery is to be finished Perhaps some of your readers tan be able to tell us when our pictures ivij be placed in their new home. I believe it is the intention of Sir George Grey and Mr Mclvelvie to present some lino works of art to the inhabitants of Auckland as soon as the latter have built a place to receive i them. If we become tho fortunate posses sors of those treasures, we shall have tho finest collection of a certain class of pictures at present in the colonies.—l am, &c.' Albix JLums. Ellerslie, November 22nd.

THE NIGHT OF ALL SAINTS.

"If Ilembrandt does not come home soon I shall die of terror," exclaimed an old woman, dressed in the picturesque costume of a servant of Cologne, as she cast a terrified glance around the gloomy-looking apartment which, at the moment, tvjb occupied by no one but herself, "What'a dreadful day ! what a fearful storm1!" '

It must be admitted that the room in which these exclamations were uttered was somewhat calculated to give rise to va»ne earsjand apprehensions in any onenaturally timid and superstitious. It was a large miserable attic ; the dim light of the ae clining day was only admitted through a small window in the roof, and all around seemed in obscurity, save when vivid flashes of lightning cast a temporary and fantastic light on the various and singular objects around. On one side, dark and tattered curtains, as they were swayed to and fro by loud gusts of wind, displayed behind their parted folds ancient suits of armour, which, as the light played upon them, almost seemed to move and change their form, as though some mortal being was again en cased in their protecting embrace; further on, rows of old boxes, black with age and smoke, to the excited imagination resembled so many tombs, whilst above them hung large pictures, the figures in which appeared, by the changing and uncertain light, to be starting from their frames ; here and there stood easels with half-printed pictures; instruments of music lay scattered about j two or three chairs, and an old table, com pleted the furniture of this comfortless abode.

"Half-past four," said the old ■woman, looking at a large clock, the loud ticking of which was distinctly heard, even amidst the noise of the storm which raged without; " half -past four ! —what can he be doing?— why should he stay so late ?—another half hour and it will be dark. If I had but my boy here—my poor boy—but no, his father must needs send him to Liege to get money, for his pictures ; and if any harm should befal him ! —But I will try and pray." And taking her string of beads, dame Rembrandt closed her eyes, and sinking on her knees, began her prayers with her face almost bent to the ground. The sound of a harsh voice mode the German start suddenly to her feet, . •,

"Catherine, Catherine I say, what th& plague are you looking for down on the floor ?"

" You are come at last, Rembrandt!" replied Catherine, somewhat reassured by tho appearance of a man, who, though no longer young, could scarcely be called old; he wore an old brown great coat, a hand kerchief tied closely over his head, but which by no means concealed his long beard, his somewhat wrinkled face, and eyes as keen, and scarcely less bright than the light of the small lamp which he carried in his own hand. "I have nearly died of terror iv your absence," added she. •

" Pooh ! pooh ! dame Catherine, women do not die so easily," returned her husband, as he placed his lamp on the table, and then rubbed his hands, as might be supposed, to warm them; "and now for suppr, old woman ; supper, I say ! and rejoice that your husband has just made the best bar gain ever achieved by painter, merchant, or tradesman."

'' Can you think of bargains on All Saints' Night ; and such a night too, sire Rem brandt?'' replied the good woman, as she devoutly crossed herself; "a night when; the dead come to claim the prayers of the living, who too often forget them. If you do not fear God, you should fear the Evil. One. Think of—"

"Think of holding your tongue," in terrupted her husband, " and of getting my supper ; I did not marry a peasant* to preach mo sermons; do you hear?" "For the love of heaven, listen!" ex-, claimed the terrified Catherine. Rembrandt was silent for a moment, then, resumed:—"lt is only the wind; do you not see how it blows about those old cur tains, and even seems to shake the suits of armour; it is the wind, I tell you; what else.; should it bo, old simpleton?" ■■. i ■ y : ■•■■' "I tell you it is the voice of a human being, sire Rembrandt," replied his wife, as she crossed herself repeatedly, "and in distress too, either of soul or body." < " I say it is nothing but the wind ; and it may well make those sounds, for the windowisbut half shut,"ropliedßembrandt, as ho rose to 6hut it, as well as the door which hohadleft open as he entered; "now you can hear nothing—all is quiet; so get supper, and then listen to what I have to tell you ; our son Paul is a clever and intelligent boy, n? you will zee." This last sentence acted as a powerful stimulantto the mother, and as the closing of the door and window had stopped, or at least deadened the sounds that had alarmed her, she now set briskly to work to prepare the meal, and displayed an activity of which before one might have supposed her incapable. She first spread on the table a course blue-and-white checked cloth, on which she nlaced an earthenware dish nnl two plates, also of the commonest desernrj tion. Thedish contained a mess of breadatjd vegetables; on one of the plates was an old

• " Eembrandt married the handsomo daugh ter oCa peasant, who used to sit to him as a model."-Maundcr's Biographical Treasury.

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STAR SATURDAY SUPPLEMENT, DECEMBER I, 1833