served, and many side-tables adorned with rich plate. At these times many of the nobility waited on her at table. She made the greatest displays of her regal magnificence when foreign ambassadors were present. At these times she would also have vocal and instrumental music during dinner; and after dinner, dancing." The queen was for the most part laudably watchful over the morals of her court; and not content with dismissing from her service, or banishing her presence, such of her female attendants as were found offending against the laws of chastity, she was equitable enough to visit with marks of her displeasure the libertinism of the other sex; and in several instances she deferred the promotion of otherwise deserving young men till she saw them reform their manners in this respect. Europe had assuredly never beheld a court so decent, so learned, or so accomplished as hers: and it will not be foreign from the purpose of illustrating the character of the sovereign, to borrow from a contemporary writer a few particulars on this head.

It was rare to find a courtier acquainted with no language but his own. The ladies studied Latin, Greek, Spanish, Italian, and French. The "more ancient" among them exercised themselves, some with the needle, some with "caul-work" (probably netting); "divers in spinning silk; some in continual reading either of the Scriptures or of histories either of their own or foreign countries; divers in writing volumes of their own, or translating the works of others into Latin or English;" while the younger ones applied to their "lutes, citharnes, pricksong, and all kinds of music." Many of the elder sort were also "skilful in surgery and distillation of waters; beside sundry artificial practices pertaining to the ornature and commendations of their bodies."

"This," adds our author, "I will generally say of them all; that as each of them are cunning in something whereby they keep themselves occupied in the court, there is in manner none of them but when they be at home can help to supply the ordinary want of the kitchen with a number of delicate dishes of their own devising, wherein the portingal1 is their chief counsellor; some of them are most commonly with the clerk of the kitchen."

Every office at court had "either a Bible or the book of the Acts and Monuments of the Church of England, or both, besides some histories and chronicles, lying therein, for the exercise of such as come into the same."

The Portuguese; long skilful in the art of confectionary.

DAY BY DAY.

[Mrs. Newton Crosland (Camilla Toulmin), born in London, 9th June, 1812. Poet and novelist. Her chief works are: Lays und Legends of English Life; Partners for Life: Stratagems, a tale for the young: Toil and Trial; Lydia, a Woman's Book; Stray Leaves from Shady Places; Memorable Women; Hildred; Light in the Valley, my Experiences of Spiritualism: Mrs. Blake: The Island of the Rainbow, a fairy tale; Hubert Freeth's Prosperity; &c. Earnest sympathy with the sufferings of the poor, and an elevated tone of thought, distinguish her writings.]

Look at the oak from an acorn sprung,
The oak whose bole is of Titan girth,
The song-birds nestle its boughs among,
And there have the future singers birth!
But a knell is rung, with its sure decree-
When the hour glass shivers the sands are spilt-
Of the wood of the hewn and sapless tree
A rider of crested waves is built:

And there seems to be sung as the ship glides on, "This is what Day by Day has done !"'

The glacier, loosed from the Ice King's hand, Moves on with a solemn march and slow, To a tune that the beating stars command, Shall murmur for ages across the snow: But the wind finds a harp at last to play, And sounds a march that has greater speed, Till the glacier weeping itself away

Is ready a Rhine or a Rhone to feed. But this is the tune, as the wind soughs on, "See you what Day by Day has done!"

A babe at the font; then a gleesome child;
And a bride half-veiled by her amber hair;
A matron wise, and a mother mild;

A grandam bent by many a care;
And the shining hair, grown gray and scant,
Is folded away from touch and sight-
On the form of age do the sunbeams slant,
But the inner heaven brings "evening light!"
And ever the while a lesson runs on,
"This is what Day by Day has done!"

Two hearts that are joined in Love's Eden here,
Thinking leaves ne'er fall, nor chill can come,
And see not the serpent of change is near,
To sting by turns-and by turns to numb:
But at last the hiss is heard, and now

The dreadful crest of the snake appears,
And they fall apart with a broken vow
Whose chasm cannot be filled by tears.
This picture affrights-we its legend shun-
"See you what Day by Day has done!"

everybody with equal distinction. I repeat it, our gardens were altogether ours. The only difference that can be discovered between us and the people who pretend to have gardens, and to be more truly proprie tors of them, is, that we had each one of the richest and most beautiful gardens of Europe, and we had nothing to pay for gardeners, improvements, or repairs.

of which we were liable to no such differ ences of opinion; our menagerie, our mu seum, and our greenhouses in the Jardin des Plantes, for example.

"I will not talk to you about our friendships with some of the animals in our menagerie, of the interest we felt in the preca rious health of the giraffe and of the black bear. We were highly delighted when they made us our famous monkey palace, and this was not without some influence in adding to our good opinion of the minister who then presided in the council.

"Sometimes, however, we had disputes. He was, I must say, rather proud of the beautiful ladies who came to drive in his garden; he even took it into his head one day to be proud, because, from time to time, he saw the king on the balcony of the castle. I proved to him, as clear as day, that my plants were the most carefully cultivated, that his flower-beds were full of the most vulgar flowers. I mentioned, to prove the superiority of my garden, the collection of roses, which is unquestionably the finest in Europe. It is true that he had at the Tuileries more statues and more precious bronzes; but in a garden, I think much more of the trees and the flowers than of bronze and marble. When it rained, we went to see his museum of antiquities on the Place du Louvre; or, in the time of the Exhibition, to the galleries, where the modern painters submitted the products of their labor to his inspection.

"Sometimes it was I who invited him to come and visit my galleries at the Luxembourg, and this, again, occasioned some little disputes on the respective value of our museums, or only because he regulated his watch by his dial at his palace of the Tuileries, which he pretended was infallible; while I often wished to set it right by my sun-dial at my Palace of the Luxembourg.

"But it was seldom that these discussions became bitter. Besides, if our little manias of proprietorship sometimes exasperated us against each other, we had also many undivided possessions in common, on account

except once, five years before, when I let him wait at his Petite Provence, because I had nearly given myself a sprain on my staircase. I could only attribute his absence to an accident of this kind, or, perhaps, worse, and I went to his house. I found him quite well, but strangely affected. He had that morning received a letter which informed him that his cousin had just died, two leagues from Paris, and had left him an income of rather more than 3000 livres.

"He wept as he embraced me, and assured me that his fortune could never make him indifferent to his friends; that I should always find him the same, etc. Nevertheless, it was necessary that he should set out immediately to take possession. It is four months ago, and I had no news of him. I began already to think of him with a bitter. ness, and the newspaper-seller at the Tuileries having asked news of him, 1 replied sharply, 'I do not know-he has made his fortune-I see nothing of him now;' when the day before yesterday I received a letter from him. Here it is:

"MY DEAR OLD FRIEND: I flatter myself that you have not attributed my silence to indifference or forgetfulnessstill less to the increase of my fortune. Many different cares have occupied all my leisure since our last interview. First, I have decided to stay here in my house. I must have some repairs and alterations made.

"As I do not think you have conceived a bad opinion of me, so I like to think of you as I knew you. If it would be foolish on my part to be unmindful of you because I have become rich, it would be but little better if you neglected me in future for

the same reason; it would spoil my happiness, and you would not wish it.

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"I expect you then to-morrow to break fast with me. YOUR FRIEND.'

"Man is a miserable creature. I felt a little envious, and tried to find some disagreeable phrase in my old friend's letter, some sign of vanity at which I might be angry-I found nothing, and set out this morning.

"My friend lives in a dirty, little, ill-built country town. His house, which they readily pointed out to me, is small, white, with green blinds. You go in by a narrow gate, which was far from making such an impression upon me as the iron bars of his garden at the Tuileries. I had from the first a presentiment that my friend was ruined, while he fancied he was making his fortune.

แ No one could have received me better; but everything I saw, added to his kind reception, was not long in changing the envy with which I had started, into a feeling of pity

I shall never forget the pride with which he took me round a garden which could easily have been contained in one of the flower-beds at the Tuileries. Some sticks here and there, some broomsticks which he called trees, and which stood in need of shade themselves, instead of giving any. In the middle of the garden a great cask buried in the ground, was called the fountain. It was half full of green and stagnant water, because they only bring it every other day, and the cask leaks a little.

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him to inherit and become rich, that he might be condemned to see nothing but these frightful daubs. When he was poor, he looked at the most beautiful paintings of all countries and all masters, accumulated in our museums.

"I came back sad, and I wished to see again his old garden, which he is so pleased to have left. A great terror has seized me in consequence; it is that I may, in my turn, by chance become rich,-that I may become proprietor,-may lose my beautiful garden of the Luxembourg, may be forced to live in a square surrounded by walls,— and, what is still worse, may be happy and proud of it.

"I have thought over all my relations, and especially those who are rich, and, among the latter, those whose heir I am. There is only one who makes me anxious; he went to America twenty years ago, and since then nothing has been heard of him. If the bell rings at home, I shall tremble lest I should hear that he has died a million. naire, and that I am his heir. I have seen a letter that we received two months after his departure, nearly twenty years ago. This letter tells us that several vessels had perished, crew and cargo, in a gale of wind. The vessel which bore my uncle was of the number, but as the long boat has not been seen since, they think that part of the crew at least tried to save themselves.

"If only my uncle be not saved!"

AN EXOTIC.

Not in a climate near the sun

Did the cloud with its trailing fringes float,

Fell the snows of her brow and throat.

And the ground had been rich for a thousand years With the blood of heroes, and sages, and kings, Where the rose, that blooms in her exquisite check, Unfolded the flush of its wings.

On a land where the faces are fair though pale, As a moonlit mist, when the winds are still, She breaks, like a morning in paradise, Through the palms of an Orient hill.

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Her beauty, perhaps, were all too bright,
But about her there broods some delicate spell,
Whence the wondrous charm of the girl grows soft
As the light in an English dell.

There is not a story of faith and truth

On the starry scroll of her country's fame,
But has helped to shape her stately mien,
And to touch her soul with flame!

I sometimes forget, as she sweeps me a bow,
That I gaze on a simple English maid,
And I bend my head as if to a queen,
Who is courting my lance and blade.
Once, as we read in a curtained niche,

A poet who sang of her sea-throned isle,
There was something of Albion's mighty Bess
In the flash of her haughty smile.

She seemed to gather from every age

All the greatness of England about her there,
And my fancy wove a royal crown
Of the dusky gold of her hair.

But it was no queen to whom that day

In the dim green shade of a trellised vine, I whispered a hope that had somewhat to do With a small white hand in mine.

The Tudor had vanished, and, as I spoke,

'Twas herself looked out of her frank brown eye, And an answer was burning upon her face, Ere I caught the low reply.

What was it? Nothing the world need knowThe stars saw our parting! Enough that then I walked from the porch with the tread of a king, And she was a queen again!

hedge of the cottage, which is approached by a broad stepping-stone over the rill, and beyond it is a gate made of rough sticks, which leads to the cottage. At a short distance, an excavation has been cut out of the bank, and paved round with rough stones, into which the water finds and then again makes its way clear and sparkling. This is the cottager's well. His garden is gay with flowers. His bees are placed on each side of a window surrounded with honeysuckles, jessamine, or a flourishing vine, and the rustic porch is covered with these or other creepers. Here, also, the gorgeous hollyhock may be seen in perfection, for it delights in the rich red soil of Devonshire. Giant-stocks, carnations, and china-asters, flourish from the same cause, and make the garden appear as though it belonged to Flora herself.

Nor must the little orchard be forgotten. The apple trees slope with the hill, and in the spring are covered with a profusion of the most beautiful blossoms, and in the autumn are generally weighed down with their load of red fruit. Under them may be seen a crop of potatoes, and in another part of the garden those fine Paington cabbages, one of the best vegetables of the county. In a sheltered nook is the thatched pig-sty, partly concealed by the round, yellow-faced sunflower, which serves both as a screen and as an ornament. The mud or cob walls of the cottage add to its picturesque appearance, when partly covered with and surrounded with flowers. creepers

Such is an accurate description of one of the many cottages I have seen in the beautiful and hospitable county of Devon, so celebrated for its illustrious men and the beauty of its women. Those who, like ful lanes, will not think my picture overmyself, have wandered amongst its delightcharged.

But I must introduce my reader to the inside of a Devonshire cottage. On enter ing it, he will see the polished dresser glit tering with bright pewter plates; the flitch of bacon on the rack, with paper bags stored with dried pot-herbs, for winter use, deposited near it; the bright dog-bars, instead of a grate, with the cottrell over them, to hang the pot on, and everything bespeak. ing comfort and cleanliness. The cottager's wife will ask him to sit down, in that hearty Devonshire phrase, which has often been addressed to me, and which I always delighted in "Do y', Sir, pitch yourself,"