"She is the daughter of an old schoolfellow, to whom I was much attached, but who has now been dead some years. Her father I never liked, so kept up no intercourse with him since that event. It was in Dr. R.'s waiting-room that I resumed my acquaintance with his daughter."

We parted at Hastings-I was going farther, but not to any great distance, and Miss Hayward expressed so cordial a hope that we should soon meet again, that I promised to call upon her the first time I was in that neighbourhood. I did so more than once, but was not fortunate enough to find her at home. The weather—it was in September-was too beautiful to be wasted by remaining in-doors, so she and the young widow were out driving, or sailing, nearly all day.

Months afterwards I met Miss Hayward in society, at Dr. R.'s, she was unaccompanied by any protégée for a wonder; but she told me that our invalid travelling companion was still her guest, quite restored mentally, but too weak and delicate to enter as yet upon the career of governess, the only one left open to her-poor thing, if she persisted in refusing the home offered her by the benevolent lady, who was not related to her, and upon whom therefore she considered she had no claim. Dr. R. and Miss Hayward had a very long confabulation, whilst other guests were amusing themselves with chess, music, &c.; probably they were discussing "cases" intimately known to both, for they gave me no opportunity of joining in their strictly private tête-à-tête. However, I escorted Miss Hayward to her carriage, and, as I shook hands with her, she observed-"If ever you should be in the neighbourhood of the Stonehouse, be sure to call upon me; I am less likely to be absent than when at Hastings; if you want to see me, come before one o'clock, if only to leave a card, afterwards. Good night."

But the neighbourhood of the Stonehouse was long unvisited, my time being taken up by a trip to the Continent and a duty visit to my patrimony of Belvidere, in which it must be confessed I took but little interest, although popularly considered "one of the finest seats in the county."

Dr. R. retired from the profession, so the waiting-room no longer afforded the opportunity for a chance meeting with Miss Hayward.

At length came a certain Christmas-tide, when a recently married friend of mine sent me an invitation, which I all the more gladly accepted, as my own family party was now entirely broken up, and I could not, even had I wished it, have drawn together so many as half-a-dozen tolerably assorted guests to fill the stately, but almost uninhabited, palace of Belvidere.

I had a bitterly cold journey, but a warm welcome awaited me; and as we chatted and laughed away that evening it struck me that Belvidere, as a residence, would be less uninviting, could I find an attraction for my fireside similar to that which my friend had taken home to his. I had not been at all an impressionable person, nor truth to say, despite my pecuniary advantages, one upon whom my few lady acquaintances had wasted much time in attempting to captivate.

I had certainly been on the point of thinking about proposing, merely because it is a sort of thing which it is proper to do once in a life-time, but found out, before I had done more than think about it, that the lady was secretly married, and had been doing the agreeable to me to propitiate a wealthy relative, ere divulging that fact.

I had never again given matrimony a thought, till this particular Christmaseve, when my friend's evident felicity, as a Benedict, momentarily suggested it. By the next morning the idea had vanished-certainly it did not intrude upon me during the service conducted in that prettily-situated little country church.

We discussed the sermon, returned the friendly greetings of my friend's

friends, as we bent our steps homewards, thinking affectionately of the cherrybrandy awaiting us, after the very cold walk.

"Whose residence is that?" I enquired, attracted by an imposing looking family mansion, not very far distant from my friend's territory.

"It is called the Stonehouse, and belongs to a somewhat eccentric, but very benevolent, maiden lady. The curate who preached this morning is one of the protégés staying with her; her name is

"

Hayward!" I broke in, much to the astonishment of my friends, to whom I soon communicated all that I knew about her. I had quite forgotton the whereabouts of the Stonehouse, although I had by no means lost my interest in its mistress. "And what has been the cause of the curate being added to Miss Hayward's list of unfortunates ?"

"Well, he had been overworked in some densely populated parish and came down to recruit his streugth and be idle for awhile. He certainly looked miserably ill when he first arrived, but I should pronounce him convalescent now. I suppose the pretty young widow-Miss Hayward's companion-is the real cause of his remaining so long. People say they are engaged."

"I do not believe that," observed his wife, "I fancy that's a report. When did you ever hear of two eligibles being under the same roof for a few weeks, and not being engaged?"

The next day I called at Miss Hayward's, just about one o'clock, and found her fully occupied with a large party of children, who were spending the Christmas holidays with her. Children left at school, because they had no home to go to children but recently orphaned, perhaps, and some with parents in too much affliction, of one kind or another, to have any heart for Christmas festivities. It was a motley group, but a very merry one, that I saw gathered round the large table in the spacious dining-room, for they had just commenced their early dinner when I was announced.

"Come in, my dear sir, glad to see you; but I make no stranger of you, so we will go on with our work. Perhaps you will assist us."

Which I did most willingly, for there were many mouths to supply. The sight was as pretty as it was unexpected. The curate was the carver at one end, Miss Hayward at the other, the young widow, now looking full of life and spirits, was cutting up meat for the little ones, assisted in that occupation by a lady considerably her senior in age, whom I not incorrectly imagined to be a homeless governess out of employ.

Curiosity had, I own, been the chief incentive to my first visit to the Stonehouse; but other feelings drew me thither again and again. Somehow or other the young curate found his health perfectly established very shortly after I became so frequent a guest, and took his departure from the village altogether. I believe he is now a missionary in a far-off locality, in which hemisphere I have forgotten. I prolonged my visit-I will not say for how many months-perhaps should be there still, but for the unsatisfactory condition of a certain "valuable residence" which requires an immense amount of painting and decorating, before it will be in proper order for the reception of its future mistress. Not Miss Hayward, reader, but her widowed companion; although to the former lady I acknowledge an unpayable amount of gratitude for who knows if ever I should have been fortunate enough to find and secure my "fellow-shell" if I had not first made Miss Hayward's acquaintance in

DR. R.'S WAITING-ROOM.

Y. S. N.

Poems for Recitation.

ADDRESS,

Appropriate to Meetings for the Benefit of Widow and Orphan Funds. *

BY GEORGE FREDERICK PARDON.

SLOWLY the gloom gathered over the West,

And the storm-clouds loomed black in their place of unrest;
And icicles hung from the lone workhouse door,

Where shiveringly cowered the hungry and poor.

Night came swiftly and cold, and the snow-mantled street
Faintly echoed the sound of the wayfarers' feet.
Not a star glimmered forth the bleak midnight to cheer,
But darkness and poverty closed over all,

And enshrouded the city as with a pall,

On that dreariest night, the last night of the year!

A change, a mighty change, in the night's history;—

For dance and song,

And wit and glee,

The hours prolong,

In revelry !

[bells,

And out the bells, the clanging bells, the joyous bells, the midnight
Proclaim a new year born! Another peal, and yet another, tells-
How, blythe and gay,

They ring away

The old year's misery, the new year's mystery!

The portals of the joy-filled house are opened wide,
And all the street is flooded o'er with light.

And one steps forth; and, quickly by his side,
A muffled maiden braves the chilly night.

A word, a look, between them, and they come
Forth to the street from that warm, cheerful home;
And hand in hand, through blinding sleet and snow,
With happy faces on their way they go.

This address was written for, and delivered at, a Drawing-room Entertainment, in aid of the Limehouse Philanthropic Society, March 14th, 1859.

What seek they on this last night of the year?
Want and dread poverty,

Hunger and woe,

Lying in highways,

Doorsteps and byeways,

Cowering in misery,
Sheeted in snow!

Theirs is a mission the wretched to cheer!

And, oh, who shall say,

That, by night or by day,

Such work unrewarded shall be?

Not to us is it given

By our Father in heaven

The full measure of goodness to see!

They speak to the wretched and lighten their sorrow;
They render to misery Pity and Love;

Though downcast to-day, make them happy to-morrow,
And reap their reward in the regions above.

They turn not away from those desolate creatures,

So cheerless and sad in their measureless grief,
But cause smiles to pass over their passionless features,—
Find the exquisite pleasure of giving relief!

Lend a hand, Christian friends, you whose purses are ample,— 'Tis the noblest of aims to diminish distress,—

And you'll never regret having set the example
Of making the sum of life's bitterness less!
Step out of your happy homes, just for a while,

And enter the poor man's cold comfortless cot;
Rest assured if you wake on his features a smile,

'Tis a pledge that your kindness will ne'er be forgot.

'Tis a maxim laid down in the Volume of Truth,

That this is Religion, aye, sterling and pure

To visit the widow and parentless youth

Who have poverty, sorrow, and grief to endure ! Your humble endeavours shall not pass unheeded;

The great Friend of the Fatherless smiles on your scheme; And the lone ones who found the kind aid they so needed, May look back on their past as a terrible dream.

FRIEND CARPENTER AND HIS PEGASUS.

BY EDWIN GOADBY.

CHAPTER I.

"Rooм here, Sir!" said the porter, opening the door of a second-class carriage, and half thrusting me in; and ere I had well settled in my seat, the engine gave a minatory snort, and I was off to town to commence my medical studies. For the first few miles I was too intent on the familiar points in the scenery around Wimbleton to notice my only fellow-traveller; but as we sped away from these, I turned my attention to a slim figure in the far corner, fashionably dressed, and tucked up in a warm travelling rug. He was reading the hospital advertisements in the Lancet, generally inserted prior to the commencement of a session, and ever and anon I got a glimpse of his quaint odd face, dotted with stray silken hairs, and lit up by funny blue eyes from underneath singed-looking eyebrows.

"Here's a curiosity," thought I, sidling gradually up to him, yet almost afraid to break the silence. Then followed a few minutes of that awful suspense when a mutual stock-taking is going on between railway passengers, both of us still seeming intent, he on his paper, I on the scenery with its peeps of pastoral scenes and dim distant hills, until at last our eyes fairly met, and my friend burst into what should have been called a laugh, but what truth compels me to name, a whinny.

"Well, youngster, am I the first man you've seen since you were breeched, that you keep so keen an eye on me? Anything like your Wimbletonians?"

I blushed, and felt ashamed. A youngster, indeed! I was a head taller than he, and certainly more of a man. At last I stammered out, "I thought you might be a medical student, sir, like myself, perhaps, going to London to study, but I didn't like to ask you."

"Ah, my boy, jolly thing too!"

And by the time our train had dragged us to King's Cross, were were fast friends, and sallied out together, and got comfortable and cosy rooms, with a thin cadaverous host, a sleek plump hostess, and a smiling daughter, at a comfortable distance from Guy's Hospital. We read together, smoked together, and were inseparable. Yet two such dissimilars were never blended; he was a precocity, and I, poor fellow, nothing but a plodder. At lectures he was always tally-hoing away into some bye-path after objects of his own, instead of quietly taking notes; and when he should have been dissecting, he generally had some more important study in hand, or would run from the room with the colic for a nip of brandy, and never return any more that day. Nevertheless, for the first session he stood high, carried off several prizes, and made quite a sensation with vivid flashes of mental power. But he was always riding a fresh hobby horse, and had a regular stud of them at hand, each of which he mounted in turn, and rode until they were blown and spavined, and then he found another favourite. I am persuaded he would have made his fortune as a jockey.

Our third session came on, and both of us were reading hard for ex