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and hopes before him, and in a little while it seemed as if he had known them always.

How faithfully he worked. How glad and tired he felt when night came, and the haymow was filled, and the great stacks grew beside the barn! But ah! the haying came to an end, and on the last evening, at supper, everybody was constrained and silent. Even Susan looked grave and thoughtful.

"Jacob," said the farmer, finally, "I wish we could keep you until wheat harvest; but you know we are poor and can't afford it. Perhaps you could—”

He hesitated; but Jacob, catching at the chance and obeying his own unselfish impulse, cried: "Oh, yes, I can; I'll be satisfied with my board, till the wheat's ripe."

Susan looked at him quickly, with a bright, speaking face.

"It's hardly fair to you," said the farmer. "But I like to be here so much!" Jacob eried. "I like-all of you!"

"We do seem to suit," said the farmer, "like as one family. And that reminds me, we've not heard your family name yet."

"Flint."

"Jacob Flint!" exclaimed the farmer's wife, with sudden agitation.

Jacob was scared and troubled. They had heard of him, he thought, and who knew what ridiculous stories? Susan noticed an anxiety on his face which she could not understand, but she unknowingly came to his relief.

"Why, mother," she asked, "do you know Jacob's family?"

| barn with a load. Jacob was working silently and steadily, but when they had reached the end of a row, he stopped, wiped his wet brow, and suddenly said, "Susan, I suppose to-day finishes my work here.'

"Yes," she answered very slowly.
"And yet I'm very sorry to go."

"I-we don't want you to go if we could help it."

Jacob appeared to struggle with himself. He attempted to speak. "If I could-" he brought out, and then paused. "Susan, would you be glad if I came back?"

His eyes implored her to read his meaning. No doubt she read it correctly, for her face flushed, her eyelids fell, and she barely murmured, "Yes, Jacob."

"Then I'll come!" he cried; "I'll come and help you with the oats. Don't talk of pay! Only tell me I'll be welcome! Susan, don't you believe I'll keep my word?"

"I do indeed," said she, looking him firmly in the face.

That was all that was said at the time; but the two understood each other tolerably well.

His

On the afternoon of the second day Jacob saw again the lonely house of his father. journey was made, yet, if any of the neighbours had seen him, they would never have believed that he had come back rich.

Samuel Flint turned away to hide a peculiar smile when he saw his son; but little was said until late that evening, after Harry and Sally had left. Then he required and received an exact account of Jacob's experience during his

"No, I think not," said her mother, "only absence. After hearing the story to the end, somebody of the name, long ago."

His offer, however, was gratefully accepted. The bright, hot, summer days, came and went, but no flower of July ever opened as rapidly and richly and warmly as his chilled, retarded nature. New thoughts and instincts came with every morning's sun, and new conclusions were reached with every evening's twilight. Yet as the wheat harvest drew towards the end, he felt that he must leave the place. The month of absence had gone by, he scarce knew how. He was free to return home, and, though he might offer to bridge over the gap between wheat and oats, as he had already done between hay and wheat, he imagined the family might hesitate to accept such an offer. Moreover, this life at Susan's side was fast growing to be a pain, unless he could assure himself that it would be so for ever.

They were in the wheat-field, busy with the last sheaves, she raking and he binding. The farmer and younger children had gone to the

he said, "And so you love this Susan Meadows?” "I'd—I'd do anything to be with her."

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'Are you afraid of her?"

"No!" Jacob uttered the word so emphati cally that it rang through the house.

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Ah, well!" said the old man, lifting his eyes, and speaking in the air, "all the harm may be mended yet. But there must be another test." Then he was silent for some time.

"I have it!" he finally exclaimed. “Jacob, you must go back for the oats harvest. You must ask Susan to be your wife, and ask her parents to let you have her. But,-pay atten tion to my words!-you must tell her that you are a poor, hired man on this place, and that she can be engaged as housekeeper. Don't speak of me as your father, but as the owner of the farm. Bring her here in that belief, and let me see how honest and willing she is. I can easily arrange matters with Harry and Sally while you are away; and I'll only ask you to keep up the appearance of the thing for a month or so,”

"But, father,"-Jacob began. "Not a word! Are you not willing to do that much for the sake of having her all your life, and this farm after me? Suppose it is covered with a mortgage, if she is all you say, you two can work it off. Not a word more! It is no lie, after all, that you will tell her." "I am afraid," said Jacob, "that she could not leave her home now. She is too useful there, and the family is so poor."

"Tell them that both your wages, for the first year, shall go to them. It'll be my business to rake and scrape the money together somehow. Say, too, that the housekeeper's place can't be kept for her—must be filled at once. Push matters like a man, if you mean to be a complete one, and bring her here, if she carries no more with her than the clothes on her back!"

During the following days Jacob had time to familiarize his mind with this startling proposal. He knew his father's stubborn will too well to suppose that it could be changed; but the inevitable soon converted itself into the possible and desirable. The sweet face of Susan as she had stood before him in the wheat-field was continually present to his eyes, and ere long he began to place her, in his thoughts, in the old rooms at home, in the garden, among the thickets by the brook, and in Ann Pardon's pleasant parlour. Enough; his father's plan became his own long before the time was out. On his second journey everybody seemed to be an old acquaintance and an intimate friend. It was evening as he approached the Meadows farm, but the younger children recognized him in the dusk, and their cry of, "Oh, here's Jacob!" brought out the farmer and his wife and Susan, with the heartiest of welcomes. They had all missed him, they said,- even the horses and oxen had looked for him, and they were wondering how they should get the oats harvested without him.

Jacob looked at Susan as the farmer said this, and her eyes seemed to answer, "I said nothing, but I knew you would come. Then, first, he felt sufficient courage for the task before him.

He rose the next morning, before any one was stirring, and waited until she should come down-stairs. The sun had not risen when she appeared, with a milk-pail in each hand, walking unsuspectingly to the cow-yard. waylaid her, took the pails in his hand and said in nervous haste, "Susan, will you be my wife?"

He

She stopped as if she had received a sudden blow; then a shy, sweet consent seemed to run

through her heart. "O Jacob!" was all she could say.

"But you will, Susan?" he urged; and then (neither of them exactly knew how it happened) all at once his arms were around her, and they had kissed each other.

"Susan," he said, presently, "I am a poor man-only a farm hand, and must work for my living. You could look for a better husband."

"I could never find a better than you, Jacob." "Would you work with me, too, at the same place?"

"You know I am not afraid of work," she answered, “and I could never want any other lot than yours."

Then he told her the story which his father had prompted. Her face grew bright and happy as she listened, and he saw how from her very heart she accepted the humble fortune. Only the thought of her parents threw a cloud over the new and astonishing vision. Jacob, however, grew bolder as he saw fulfilment of his hope so near. They took the pails and seated themselves beside neighbour cows, one raising objections or misgivings which the other manfully combated. Jacob's earnestness unconsciously ran into his hands, as he discovered when the impatient cow began to snort and kick.

The harvesting of the oats was not commenced that morning. The children were sent away, and there was a council of four persons held in the parlour. The result of mutual protestations and much weeping was, that the farmer and his wife agreed to receive Jacob as a sonin-law; the offer of the wages was four times refused by them, and then accepted; and the chance of their being able to live and labour together was finally decided to be too fortunate to let slip. When the shock and surprise was over, all gradually became cheerful, and, as the matter was more calmly discussed, the first conjectured difficulties somehow resolved themselves into trifles.

It was the simplest and quietest wedding, -at home on an August morning. Farmer Meadows then drove the bridal pair half-way on their journey to the old country tavern, where a fresh conveyance had been engaged for them. The same evening they reached the farmhouse in the valley, and Jacob's happy mood gave place to an anxious uncertainty as he remembered the period of deception upon which Susan was entering. He keenly watched his father's face when they arrived, and was a little relieved when he saw that his wife had made a good first impression.

"So, this is my new housekeeper," said the old man. "I hope you will suit me as well as your husband does."

"I'll do my best, sir," said she; "but you must have patience with me for a few days, until I know your ways and wishes."

"Mr. Flint," said Sally, "shall I get supper ready?"

when we have quietly and comfortably talked the matter over.'

They went into the quaint, old-fashioned parlour, which had already been transformed by Susan's care, so that much of its shabbiness was hidden. When all were seated, and Samuel Flint perceived that none of the others knew what to say, he took a resolution which, for a

Susan looked up in astonishment at hearing man of his mood and habit of life, required the name.

"Yes," the old man remarked, "we both have the same name. The fact is, Jacob and I are a sort of relations."

Jacob, in spite of his new happiness, continued ill at ease, although he could not help seeing how his father brightened under Susan's genial influence, how satisfied he was with her quick, neat, exact ways and the cheerfulness with which she fulfilled her duties. At the end of a week the old man counted out the wages agreed upon for both, and his delight culminated at the frank simplicity with which Susan took what she supposed she had fairly earned.

"Jacob," he whispered when she had left the room, "keep quiet one more week, and then I'll let her know."

He had scarcely spoken, when Susan burst into the room again, crying, "Jacob, they are coming, they have come!"

"Who?"

some courage.

It

"Three of us here are old people,” he began, "and the two young ones love each other. was so long ago, Lucy, that it cannot be laid to my blame if I speak of it now. Your husband, I see, has an honest heart, and will not misunderstand either of us. The same thing often turns up in life; it is one of those secrets that everybody knows, and that everybody talks about except the persons concerned. When I was a young man, Lucy, I loved you truly, and I faithfully meant to make you my wife."

"I thought so too, for a while," said she, very calmly.

Farmer Meadows looked at his wife, and no face was ever more beautiful than his, with that expression of generous pity shining through it.

"You know how I acted," Samuel Flint continued, "but our children must also know that I broke off from you without giving any reason. A woman came between us and made all the mischief. I was considered rich then,

"Father and mother; and we didn't expect and she wanted to secure my money for her them, you know, for a week yet."

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daughter. I was an innocent and unsuspecting young man, who believed that everybody else was as good as myself; and the woman never rested until she had turned me from my first love, and fastened me for life to another. Little by little I discovered the truth; I kept the knowledge of the injury to myself; I quickly got rid of the money which had so cursed me, and brought my wife to this, the loneliest and dreariest place in the neighbourhood, where I forced upon her a life of poverty. I thought it was a just revenge, but I was unjust. She really loved me: she was, if not quite without blame in the matter, ignorant of the worst that had been done (I learned all that too late), and she never complained, though the change in me slowly wore out her life. I know now that I was cruel; but at the same time I punished myself, and was innocently punishing my son. But to him there was one way to make amends. 'I will help him to a wife,' I said, 'who will gladly take poverty with him and for his sake.' I forced him, against his will, to say that he was a hired hand on this place, and that Susan must be content to be a hired housekeeper. Now that I know Susan,

"Jacob Flint!"

I see that this proof might have been left out; | and passionate exhortations, the hammer fell, but I guess it has done no harm. The place and the auctioneer, turning to the stranger, is not so heavily mortgaged as people think, asked, "What name?" and it will be Jacob's after I am gone. And now forgive me, all of you,-Lucy first, for she has most cause; Jacob next; and Susan,that will be easier; and you, Friend Meadows, if what I have said has been hard for you to hear."

There was a general cry of surprise. All looked at Jacob, whose eyes and mouth showed that he was as dumbfoundered as the rest.

The stranger walked coolly through the midst of the crowd to Samuel Flint, and said, "When shall I have the papers drawn up?"

The farmer stood up like a man, took Samuel's hand and his wife's, and said in a broken voice: "Lucy, I ask you, too, to forgive him, and I ask you both to be good friends to each other."" Susan, dissolved in tears, kissed all of them in turn; but the happiest heart there was Jacob's.

It was now easy for him to confide to his wife the complete story of his troubles, and to find his growing self-reliance strengthened by her quick, intelligent sympathy. The Pardons were better friends than ever, and the fact, which at first created great astonishment in the neighbourhood, that Jacob Flint had really gone upon a journey and brought home a handsome wife, began to change the attitude of the people towards him. The old place was no longer so lonely; the nearest neighbours began to drop in and insist on return visits. Now that Jacob kept his head up, and they got a fair view of his face, they discovered that he was not lacking, after all, in sense or social qualities.

In October, the Whitney place, which had been leased for several years, was advertised to be sold at public sale. The owner had gone to the city and become a successful merchant, had outlived his local attachments, and now took advantage of a rise in real estate to disburden himself of a property which he could not profitably control.

Everybody from far and wide attended the sale, and, when Jacob Flint and his father arrived, everybody said to the former: "Of course you've come to buy, Jacob." But each man laughed at his own smartness, and considered the remark original with himself.

Jacob was no longer annoyed. He laughed, too, and answered: "I'm afraid I can't do that; but I've kept half my word, which is more than most men do."

"Jake's no fool, after all," was whispered behind him.

The bidding commenced, at first very spirited, and then gradually slacking off, as the price mounted above the means of the neighbouring farmers. The chief aspirant was a stranger, a well-dressed man with a lawyer's air, whom nobody knew. After the usual long pauses

VOL. III.

"As soon as you can," the old man replied; then seizing Jacob by the arm, with the words, Let's go home now!" he hurried him on. The explanation soon leaked out. Samuel Flint had not thrown away his wealth, but had put it out of his own hands. It was given privately to trustees, to be held for his son, and returned when the latter should have married with his father's consent. There was more than enough to buy the Whitney place. Jacob and Susan are happy in their stately home, and good as they are happy. If any person in the neighbourhood ever makes use of the phrase "Jacob Flint's Journey," he intends thereby to symbolize the good fortune which sometimes follows honesty, reticence, and shrewdness.

TO A RICH MAN.

If well thou view'st us with no squinted eye,
No partial judgment, thou wilt quickly rate
Thy wealth no richer than my poverty;
My want no poorer than thy rich estate:

Our ends and births alike; in this, as I;
Poor thou wert born, and poor again shalt die.
My little fills my little-wishing mind;
Thou having more than much, yet seekest more:
Who seeks, still wishes what he seeks to find;
Who wishes, wants; and who so wants, is poor;
Then this must follow of necessity-
Poor are thy riches, rich my poverty.

Though still thou gett'st, yet is thy want not
spent,

But as thy wealth, so grows thy wealthy itch:
But with my little I have much content;
Content hath all, and who hath all is rich:

Then this in reason thou must needs confess-
If I have little, yet that thou hast less.
Whatever man possesses, God hath lent,
And to his audit liable is ever,
To reckon, how, and where, and when he spent:
Then thus thou bragg'st, thou art a great receiver:
Little my debt, when little is my store:
The morethou hast,thydebt still grows the more.
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But seeing God himself descended down
T'enrich the poor by his rich poverty;

His meat, his house, his grave, were not his own,
Yet all is his from all eternity:

Let me be like my Head, whom I adore;
Be thou great, wealthy, I still base and poor.

PHINEAS FLETCHER.

THE RETURN.

Oh! bid him reverence, in his manhood's prime,
His youth's bright morning dream.

DON CARLOS.

"Art thou come with the heart of thy childhood back,

The free, the pure, the kind?"

GIBRALTAR:

A NIGHT AT THE RAGGED-STAFF. [William Leggett, born in New York, 1802; died 1840. He served four years in the United States navy; then became editor of the Critic, and subsequently of other periodicals, winning for himself considerable reputation as a political and miscellaneous writer. In 1840 the then president of the United States appointed him diplomatic agent to the republic of Guatemala; but he died whilst making preparations to enter upon his new duties. His chief collected works are: Leisure Hours at Sea (poems); Naval Stories; Tales by a Country Schoolmaster; and Political Writings, edited by Theodore Sedgwick.]

The first time I ever saw the famous rock of Gibraltar was on a glorious afternoon in the

-So murmur'd the trees in my homeward track, month of October, when the sun diffused just As they played to the mountain wind.

"Hast thou been true to thine early love?" Whispered my native streams,

"Doth the spirit, rear'd amidst hill and grove, Still revere its first high dreams?"

"Hast thou borne in thy bosom the holy prayer
Of the child in his parent halls?"
Thus breathed a voice on the thrilling air
From the old ancestral walls;

"Hast thou kept thy faith with the faithful dead
Whose place of rest is nigh?

With the father's blessing o'er thee shed?
With the mother's trusting eye?"

Then my tears gushed forth in sudden rain,
As I answered-" O ye shades!

I bring not my childhood's heart again

To the freedom of your glades!

"I have turn'd from my first pure love aside, O bright rejoicing streams!

Light after light in my soul hath died,

The early glorious dreams!

sufficient heat to give an agreeable temperature to the air, and shed a soft and mellow light through the somewhat hazy atmosphere, which enabled us to see the scenery of the Straits to the best advantage.

We had a rough and stormy, but uncommonly short passage; for the wind, though and our gallant frigate dashed and bounded tempestuous, had blown from the right quarter;

over the waves, "like a steed that knows his rider." I could not then say, with the poet from whom I have borrowed this quotation, "welcome to their roar!" for I was a novice on the ocean in those days, and had not yet entirely recovered from certain uneasy sensations about the region of the epigastrium, which by no means rendered the noise of rushing waters the most agreeable sound to my ears, or the rolling of the vessel the most pleasant motion for my body. Never did old seadog of a sailor, in the horse latitudes, pray more sincerely for a wind, than I did for a calm during that boisterous passage-and never, I may add, did the selfish prayer of a sinner prove more unavailing. The gale, like Othello's revenge, "kept due on to the Propontic and the Hellespont," and it blew so hard that it sometimes seemed to lift our old craft almost

"And the holy prayer from my thoughts hath out of the water.
pass'd,

The prayer at my mother's knee-
Darken'd and troubled, I come at last,
Thou home of my boyish glee!

"But I bear from my childhood a gift of tears
To soften and atone:

And, O ye scenes of those blessed years!
They shall make me again your own!"

MRS. HEMANS.

When we came out of port, we had our dashy fair-weather spars aloft, with skysail yards athwart, a moonsail to the main, and hoist enough for the broad blue to show itself to good advantage above that. But before the pilot left us, our top-gallant poles were under the boom cover, and storm-stumps in their places; and the first watch was scarcely relieved, when the boatswain's call-repeated by four mates, whose lungs seemed formed on

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