I enlisted several persons in the service, appointing them to meet me in front of the Stadtkirche half an hour later. My mother was very much shocked to hear the sad news, and sent our servant to make inquiries, in the hope that some clue might thus be gained as to the course the fugitive had taken.

Veronica was very vexed at my refusing to accompany them, and in her disappointment would not see the stern necessity which bound me to remain in Weimar and render all the aid I could to a family which had treated me so kindly; but Schlosser took my part. How could I have left the old doctor with all his patients on his hands in this time of sorrow and anxiety? I should have been hard-hearted indeed had I done such a thing; besides which, I felt myself in a great measure bound to deliver Margaret up to them.

From all we could gather it was quite evident that Margaret was not in Weimar; she had been seen outside the town, and her name was in the gatekeeper's book. I therefore divided the men I had engaged into separate parties, sending them each in different directions, whilst I determined to search by the river myself. "By the river,”—what a fearful meaning that seemed to imply!

I was in the park, and alone, when I took out Margaret's letter and tore open the seal, in hopes that it might possibly be a guide to me in some way. Two whole pages were filled with close writing, and here and there a blot showed that a tear had fallen upon the paper and smeared the ink. I ran my eye over the letter to see if she mentioned any place or name that could direct me. I did not, could not read all that she had written then, but I saw at one glance my fears were only too well founded. Margaret's letter was a confession of love-of love to me! And she spoke of death as being the only means to free herself from the thraldom of a passion she could not conquer. I was bewildered by the thoughts that came thronging to my brain; but one thing was clear, she meant to commit suicide by drowning. "I must save her!" I cried within myself, and gave an involuntary spring forwards to the little river which ran gurgling on its course so merrily, that such a crime as self-murder seemed impossible in connexion with it. I had not proceeded far along its banks, when a sudden thought flashed across me and I halted. Margaret once said, whilst conversing in her usual grave manner with me, "If I were to be drowned, I should like to be so in the Saal, when its waters are swollen by the rains and come dancing down from our forest hills." Might she not put this wish in execution now? There was nothing but the distance to prevent her, and she had started very early. A voice within me seemed to urge me to go, and I obeyed it almost without questioning the use of such a step.

What is that strange instinct we all feel at times, which guides us, without our reasoning, to the right place? Is it destiny? I cannot say ; but it has often worked very strongly in me, and when I have followed what it dictates, I have invariably found it lead me aright. I hastened along the road to Jena, hoping that I might have the good fortune to be helped on my way by some conveyance that might chance to be passing in the same direction as myself, and in the mean time I strode manfully on with many a conflicting feeling at my heart. "Was it possible that poor girl loved me? How could it happen? Had I been guilty of

deceiving her? Women are not like men; they do not love unless they have strong proof that the affection they bestow is returned. Had I not acted as I should towards her?" My conscience pricked me as I thought thus, and I deserved its upbraidings. I had not erred with my eyes open; I was blind to what was going on, but I could not deny that I had erred in being so much with her, and on such friendly terms. She might easily have misconstrued some of my words, and have been misled for a time; then her eyes would open painfully to the truth, and she would see me as I was, and shame at caring so much for one who did not love her would double her grief, and act terribly on a mind ready, as it were, to receive disappointment and brood over it, till the excess of her misery knew no bounds. Poor Margaret! all her dreams had but prepared her for this doom; she had dug her own grave, and that slowly, surely, and with terrible effect. She, young and happy as she might have been, was destined to be another offering to the Demon of Suicide. Ah, well may we ask, "Why are these things so? Why are poor, weak mortals sent into the world to suffer more than their strength will bear? Oh, let us pray that their sufferings may end here? But what are these words? What am I that I should question God's providence? Nought but a shapen form of clay!"

Away, then, with these thoughts. I must return to my former self, who am striding along the road to Jena, with the rain beating upon me and trickling from my hair, eyebrows, nose, and chin, my boots splashing through the mud and puddles on the road, and my heart beating in wild tumult in my breast. "I must find her, I must save her!" was the burden of my thoughts, whilst I lost no opportunity of inquiring of those I met whether they could give any tidings of a person of Margaret's description, and received for answer a universal shake of the head, as their lips pronounced that most heartrending word of all our language--that little word "No." How bitterly it sounded in my ear! How mercilessly it seemed to tear each chance of success from my willing hands!

Near the town of Jena, I met a light cart coming towards me, and stopping the driver, I asked (more, I think, from custom than with the hope of his aiding me) if he could give me any information. "Let me see," said the man, rubbing his head leisurely; "I think I can tell you something about her, if she was a short, stout person with grey eyes."

"Yes," I said, eagerly, and added a few more characteristics. "That's she," said the man, lowering his hand, and pointing it at me. "She was coming along the road from Weimar this morning, and I gave her a lift; for which she paid me handsomely." He then went on to say he thought her manner somewhat strange, but that was no business of his, and she was a quiet companion, not troubling him with any questions. She did not go into the town, but said she should have some distance farther to walk, and bade him " Good morning" a little nearer Jena than we then were.

I thanked him warmly for his information, but my heart failed me a's I turned my steps in the direction he indicated as the one she had taken. I stood by the flowing waters of the Saal; the heavy rains of the preceding months had swollen the river, making it more rapid than usual, and I wished that its murmur might be formed into the expression of words, that it might tell me if indeed the unfortunate girl I sought had

had time to commit the terrible act she meditated. I was in the outskirts of Jena, and it was about two o'clock in the afternoon. My long walk had not tired me; I was wet through, but felt neither cold nor hunger. In vain I searched up and down the banks; without assistance I could do nothing; so, walking to Jena, I made my story known, and offered a reward to any one who would bring me tidings of her whereabouts. On this a boy came and told me he had seen some one picking wild flowers not far from the river about nine o'clock, or a little later; he was not near enough to tell if the person he saw answered the description I gave, but if I liked he would guide me to the spot. Any clue, however small, was greeted with pleasure by me, and in company with three men, and this boy for our guide, I again turned in the direction of the Saal.

We searched the banks above and below the town without finding any trace of Margaret, and I was beginning to hope she might have repented her original design, or deferred it, and was even now concealed near at hand. The day was wearing on, and I felt justified in preparing to give the order to return. "She cannot have executed her design. Thank Heaven! we may yet find her alive!" was the joyful thought that crossed my mind; when, oh horror! a shout from one of the men, who had prolonged his search a little farther down the river, called our attention, and we hastened to the spot. Resting against a neck of land, one arm caught in a projecting bush, was a human body. My blood seemed to grow stagnant in my veins, and a cold perspiration started to my forehead. I breathed hard as I watched the men drag it from the water, and lay the dripping corpse upon the bank. I leaned over the prostrate form. The features, though rigid in death, were unmistakable: it was MargaretMargaret, whom I had so often watched while living. A little bunch of wild flowers was fastened in her bosom; the water had ruffled and hurt them, but still they were there. She clung to the poetic even in the moment of death.

Strange fancies sometimes fill the mind of men. Perhaps she imagined herself an Ophelia, and thought how beautiful it was to float down the pure stream covered with wild flowers. Do not smile, reader; such fancies do exist and actuate some minds. They might have had their influence on Margaret; we cannot tell.

It is a fearful thing to gaze upon a human body, and to hear that inner voice of conscience whisper with torturing earnestness that you were partly instrumental in causing its death!

We bore the body to an inn in Jena: a crowd gathered round us as we walked. There is something devilish in the curiosity man has to gaze on accident and death. Let it be known that some one has been drowned, and crowds will rush to the spot, breathless lest they should arrive too late to see the appalling spectacle of death. They do not come there for the sake of rendering assistance; it is but for the curiosity of seeing a drowned human being, and that they may gossip about it to all their friends. Many an unkind story was reported of you, poor Margaret, by that merciless crowd, but it mattered not to you, for you were far out of hearing, and reports could not pain you.

Very white and peaceful she looked as she lay on the bed in the little dark room given up for the reception of her body. I crossed her arms upon her breast, and did not remove the little bouquet of wild flowers which she had chosen to be the witnesses of her voluntary doom.

Preservation of life is a natural instinct.

We are assured of this from the fact that animals never commit suicide. But for our intellect, we should be as the animals; suicide, therefore, being peculiar to our race, must be a disease of the intellect, and disease of the intellect is mania. Man, when he is suffering under attacks of mania, is not accountable for his actions; therefore we must not judge those who commit suicide with the harsh, sweeping sentence of the world, but let us pass our verdict on them in mercy, and pity the momentary weakness of so rash an act.

To contemplate the stillness of death is at all times fearful. To see the helpless hand, the closed eye, and the breathless nostril of a once warm, vigorous existence, is very appalling, and we wonder how so great a change can ever take place, how the life once given can cease to be, and we bow our head in wonder before the mystery of an unseen Wisdom, whose actions are above our contemplation. I acknowledged this now; I acknowledged my own incapacity, and recognised God. With what deep thankfulness I welcomed these thoughts; it showed that I was remounting the heights from which I had so easily descended, and that a better spirit was working in my heart.

I could not trust a messenger with such terrible tidings as I had to send to her anxious relatives, so, ordering a conveyance, I started myself for Weimar, though night was fast setting in. The old doctor had not returned, but his wife was sitting rocking herself in the same place where I had left her that morning. On seeing me she rose, and grasping my arm, asked anxiously if I had any news to give her.

"Yes," I replied, "I have much to tell; but calm yourself, and prepare to hear it with resignation."

"I am ready, but do not leave me in suspense; I have suffered agonies from that the whole of this day. Tell me, have you heard that she was seen walking towards Jena? Your looks tell me that

but

you have,

you cannot have seen her, or you would not appear so sad."

I did not know how to break the melancholy tidings to her, it seemed so cruel to quench the hope she had cherished all that day.

"I have been to Jena, and have heard a great deal about poor Margaret, but the news is bad," I said at length.

The old woman turned from me and sank into a chair.

"What has happened to her ?-tell me as quickly as possible. I fear the worst."

66 Alas, you have every reason to do so: I arrived too late-your niece

is dead."

She looked at me for a few moments as if to comprehend the words, and then the muscles of her face relaxed, and her whole frame was convulsed with sobs. This outburst of long pent-up anxiety was balm to her; sorrow, in reaching its climax, gave relief.

I had not been in the house long before the old doctor returned. He looked jaded and dispirited, but bore the sad news with composure; he did not again assume his indifference of the morning, which had been the result of his passionate outburst on first learning Margaret's flight.

Unwilling to intrude upon their sorrow, I took my leave, and sought the solitude of my own room, there to give vent to all the harrowing sensations I had felt since quitting it that morning to view the sunrise from the park.

MILL ON LIBERTY.*

No reader of ours, with whom we have a particle of influence, will, unless hopelessly prejudiced or wilfully unthinking, miss the very first opportunity of perusing Mr. Mill's Essay on Liberty. We say nothing, promise nothing (rather the contrary), about "liking" it, "agreeing with" it, and so forth. But we would have it studied as teeming with suggestive matter, as presenting in candid plainness the sincere convictions of a master mind. Infinitely more is to be gained by honestly pondering the arguments of such a man, be he ever so distant from the conventional standard of received opinions, than by any amount of acquaintance with correct common-place, surface system, and orthodox platitudes, such as every old woman of the one sex will pronounce unimpeachably sound, and of the other, perfectly safe.

Nor let the name of John Stuart Mill on the title-page, which one naturally associates, almost exclusively, with the most abstruse questions of Logic and the most complex laws of Political Economy, deter anybody from a study of this volume. The essay is written in the most lucid style, and is enlivened with illustration throughout. In fact, it costs an effort to put it down unfinished, so genuine is the interest it excites,-if in no other way, at any rate by provoking your dissent, and unsettling your traditionary notions, and pressing on you for a reason why, that may meet and cancel its own reason why not. If any of the "last new novels," for many a month past, possess half as much power to absorb the attention, and dispel drowsiness by the way, we should be thankful to learn its name and history. Till then we shall have the bad taste to account this Essay a stimulant pur et simple in comparison with opiates like the last new novel.

The subject of the Essay, as explained by its author in his introductory chapter, is not the so-called Liberty of the Will, but Civil, or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual:-a question, as he remarks, seldom stated, and hardly ever discussed, in general terms, but which profoundly influences the practical controversies of the age by its latent presence, and is likely soon to make itself recognised as the vital question of the future. "It is so far from being new, that in a certain sense it has divided mankind, almost from the remotest ages; but in the stage of progress into which the more civilised portions of the species have now entered, it presents itself under new conditions, and requires a different and more fundamental treatment."

Elsewhere again Mr. Mill explains the object of this Essay to be, the assertion of one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used be physical force in the form of legal penalties, or the moral coercion of public opinion. That principle is, he says, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or

On Liberty. By John Stuart Mill. London: John W. Parker and Son. 1859.