"I know there is such an idea with many people, but indeed it is quite a mistake, sir. We all had our health perfectly well there, never found the least inconvenience from the mud, and Mr. Wingfield says it is entirely a mistake to suppose the place unhealthy; and I am sure he may be depended on, for he thoroughly understands the nature of the air, and his own brother and family have been there repeatedly."

"You should have gone to Cromer, my dear, if you went anywhere. Perry was a week at Cromer once, and he holds it to be the best of all the sea-bathing places. A fine open sea, he says, and very pure air. And by what I understand, you might have had lodgings there quite away from the sea-a quarter of a mile off very comfortable. You should have consulted Perry." "But, my dear sir, the difference of the journey only consider how great it would have been. A hundred miles, perhaps, instead of forty."

"Ah, my dear, as Perry says, where health is at stake, nothing else should be considered; and if one is to travel, there is not much to choose between forty miles and a hundred. Better not move at all, better stay in London altogether than travel forty miles to get into a worse air. This is just what Perry said. It seemed to him a very ill-judged measure.'

Emma's attempts to stop her father had been vain; and when he had reached such a point as this, she could not wonder at her brother-in-law's breaking out.

"Mr. Perry," said he, in a voice of very strong displeasure, "would do as well to keep his opinion till it is asked for. Why does he make it any business of his to wonder at what I do? at my taking my family to one part of the coast or another? I may be allowed, I hope, the use of my judgment as well as Mr. Perry. I want his directions no more than his drugs." He paused, and growing cooler in a moment, added, with only sarcastic dryness, "If Mr. Perry can tell me how to convey a wife and five children a distance of a hundred and thirty miles with no greater expense or inconvenience than a distance of forty, I should be as willing to prefer Cromer to South End as he could himself."

"True, true," cried Mr. Knightley, with most ready interposition, "very true. That's a consideration, indeed. But, John, as to what I was telling you of my idea of moving the path to Langham, of turning it more to the right that it may not cut through the home meadows, I cannot conceive any diffi

culty. I should not attempt it, if it were to be the means of inconvenience to the Highbury people, but if you call to mind exactly the present light of the path The only way of proving it, however, will be to turn to our maps. I shall see you at the Abbey to-morrow morning, I hope, and then we will look them over, and you shall give me your opinion."

Mr. Woodhouse was rather agitated by such harsh reflections on his friend Perry, to whom he had in fact, though unconsciously, been attributing many of his own feelings and expressions; but the soothing attentions of his daughters gradually removed the present evil, and the immediate alertness of one brother, and better recollections of the other, prevented any renewal of it.

THE MUSIC OF MAN'S HEART.
SINCE ever the world was fashioned,
Water and air and sod,

A music of divers meaning

Has flowed from the hand of God.
In valley and gorge and upland,
On stormy mountain height,
He makes him a harp of the forest,
He sweeps the chords with might.
He puts forth his hand to the ocean,
He speaks and the waters flow;
Now in a chorus of thunder,

Now in a cadence low.

He touches the waving flower bells,

He plays on the woodland streams,

A tender song like a mother

Sings to her child in dreams.
But the music divinest and dearest,
Since ever the years began,
Is the manifold passionate music
He draws from the heart of man.

Anonymous.

ALFRED AUSTIN.

AUSTIN, ALFRED, an English poet, critic, and journalist, was born in Headingley, near Leeds, May 30, 1835. His parents were Catholics, and he was educated at Stonyhurst College and at St. Mary's College, Oscott. From Oscott he took his degree from the University of London in 1853, and was called to the bar in 1857. His tastes, however, were not for the law, but for literature, and since his father's death, in 1861, he has devoted himself to it. Among his poetical works are: "Randolph," published anonymously (1854); "The Season, a Satire" (1861 and 1869); "The Human Tragedy" (1862, 1876, and 1881); "The Golden Age" (1871); "Interludes" (1872); "Rome or Death" (1873); "Madonna's Child" (1873); "The Tower of Babel" (1874); "Savonarola" (1881); "Soliloquies" (1882); "At the Gate of the Convent" (1885); "Prince Lucifer" (1887); "English Lyrics" (1890); "Fortunatus the Pessimist" (1892); "Conversion of Winckelmann" (1897). He has published novels: "Five Years of It" (1858); "An Artist's Proof" (1864), and "Won by a Head" (1866). Mr. Austin was many years connected with "The Standard" and with "The Quarterly Review," and for a number of years editor of "The National Review." In January, 1896, Mr. Austin was made Poet Laureate, a position which had been vacant since the death of Tennyson in 1892.

PARTING OF GODFRID AND OLYMPIA.

(From "Madonna's Child.")

So once again they fled without delay,

On wings of wind through leagues of dim-seen land;
Night and the stars accompanying their way,

And roar and blackness close on either hand:

Until the dark drew off, and with the day

They saw the sparkling bay and joyous strand,
White sails, brown oars, huge coils of briny ropes,
And fair proud city throned on regal slopes.

And soon the road they came by, which doth run
'Twixt hill and sea, now smooth as woodland pond,
Saw them once more, with all their dreams unspun,
Facing farewell. A little way beyond,

A big brown mule stood blinking in the sun,
For a long march rudely caparisoned;
And at its side a gentle mountaineer,
Who to their grief lent neither eye nor ear.

"Hear me once more, Olympia! Must we part? Is Heaven so stern, and can a gentle breast Inflict and eye endure so keen a smart,

When pity's voice could lull our pain to rest?
Is there no common Eden of the heart,

Where each fond bosom is a welcome guest?
No comprehensive paradise to hold
All loving souls in one celestial fold?

"For Love is older far than all the gods,
And will survive both gods and men, and be
The sovereign ruler still, when Nature nods,
And the scared stars through misty chaos flee.
Take love away, and we are brutish clods,

Blind, spelling out our fate without the key;
Love, love is our immortal part, and they
Who own it not are only walking clay.

"But they who in this cold contentious sphere Deep in their heart cherish love's sacred fire, Can smile at pain, and all that mortals fear,

And tranquil keep when time and death conspire. Though fickle winds should vex, they do not veer;

No threats can daunt them, weary waitings tire: Their feet are planted on the clouds; their eyes Glare cannot blind, scan the eternal skies.

"This is my creed, and that the heaven I seek; Which even here, Olympia! may be ours, Unless my lips, or else thine ears, be weak,

Or we have outraged the supernal powers. Oh, but that cannot be! Would Nature wreak Her wrath on thee, most precious of her flowers? The sin, if sin there be, is mine, is mine; Wrong never was, can pain be ever, thine?

-

"Here 'twixt the mountains and the sea I swear
That I thy faith will reverence as thy soul;
And as on that bright morning when thy fair
Entrancing form upon my senses stole,

Still every dewy dawn fresh gifts will bear
Unto Madonna's shrine, that happy goal
Where our first journey ended, and I fain

Would have this end not snapped, as now, in pain!"

The foam-fringe at their feet was not more white Than her pale cheeks, as downcast she replied: "No, Godfrid! no. Farewell, farewell! You might Have been my star; a star once fell by pride; But since you furl your wings, and veil your light,

I cling to Mary and Christ crucified.
Leave me, nay, leave me, ere it be too late!
Better part here than part at heaven's gate!"

Thereat he kissed her forehead, she his hand,
And on the mule he mounted her, and then,
Along the road that skirts the devious strand,
Watched her, until she vanished from his ken.
Tears all in vain as water upon sand,

Or words of grace to hearts of hardened men,
Coursed down her cheeks, whilst, half her grief divined,
The mountain guide walked sad and mute behind.

But never more as in the simple days

When prayer was all her thought, her heart shall be; For she is burdened with the grief that stays, And by a shadow vexed that will not flee. Pure, but not spared, she passes from our gaze, Victim, not vanquisher, of love. And he? Once more a traveler o'er land and main; Ah! life is sad and scarcely worth the pain!

A QUESTION.

LOVE, wilt thou love me still when wintry streak
Steals on the tresses of autumnal brow;
When the pale rose hath perished in my cheek,
And these are wrinkles, that are dimples now?
Wilt thou, when this fond arm that here I twine
Round thy dear neck, to help thee in thy need,
Drops faint and feeble, and hath need of thine,
Be then my prop, and not a broken reed?
When thou canst only glean along the past,
And garner in thy heart what time doth leave,