It was during the evening; one of those beautiful evenings in autumn, when all nature is quiet and reposed. Not a breath of air murmured through the trees, tinged by the last rays of a setting sun. It was impossible not to give one's self up to a gentle revery in presence of such a lovely prospect; for all, save man, who was awake to think, seemed lulled into sleep upon the bosom of nature! It was one of those moments when the soul is softened, when we become better, and feel that we could weep, yet without regret!

I raised my eyes; from the end of the alley, I perceived Ursule. A parting ray of sun-light was shining on the window, and was reflected on her head, giving her black hair an unaccustomed lustre. A gleam of joy rose in her eyes as she saw me; and she smiled with that sad smile which I loved so much! Her black dress, with long falling folds, entirely precluded the least glimpse of her figure, except as shown by her belt. Her person was very slender and flexible, but not wanting in grace. A few violets, her favorite flower, were fastened in her corsage.

There was something in Ursule's paleness, in her black dress, in the sombre-colored flowers, with the last ray of a setting sun upon them all, that harmonized with the beauty of nature on this lovely autumn evening and the gentle revery we were indulging in.

"There is Ursule!" said I to Maurice d'Erval, calling his attention to the low window in the small house. He looked at her, and then walked with his eyes intently fixed upon her. His look disconcerted the poor girl, who was as timid as a maiden of fifteen; and when we arrived in front of her, her complexion was enlivened by a high color. Maurice d'Urval stopped, exchanged a few words with us, and left. But from that day he often returned to the town by the narrow alley in which Ursule lived. Opportunities chanced to bid her "good day!" Indeed, he once called to see her with me.

There are some minds so unaccustomed to hope, that they no longer know how to understand the good that happens to them. Enveloped in the sadness and the dejection of everything round her, as in an impenetrable veil which concealed from

sympathy which strongly resembled the enjoyments whose existence they denied !

At length, one evening a few months after, on the edge of a forest, while we were walking in the midst of an uncultivated heath, a few paces from our mutual friends, Maurice said to me:

"Is it not the most positive happiness in this world, to make another happy? Is there not, in the joy that we give, an unbounded sweetness? To devote ourselves to one who, without us, would have known nothing of life but its tears. Is this not a happiness preferable to the most brilliant destiny? To infuse new life into a dying soul; better than God, perhaps, who gave it life. Is not this a bright dream ?"

I looked at him anxiously-a tear glistening in my eyes.

"Yes!" said he, "ask Ursule if she will

marry me!"

An exclamation of joy was my response, and I hastened precipitately towards the poor girl's dwelling.

When I reached Ursule, she was seated. as usual, at work, but half asleep. Solitude, the absence of the faintest noise, a want of the slightest interest in things around her, had really lulled her soul to sleep. This was one of the first blessings Providence had bestowed upon her. It relieved her sufferings! There are some who would have pity, even for this immobility of existence. which had not had its part of life and youth. She smiled on seeing me. To smile was the greatest effort her poor paralyzed soul indulged in. I was not fearful of giving a violent shock to an organization which had endured so much, by affecting it with a sudden commotion of happiness; I wished to discover whether its life was absent only, or whether it was definitively extinct!

I seated myself on a chair before her. I took both of her hands in my own, and, fixing my eyes upon hers

"Ursule," said I to her, "Maurice d'Erval has desired me to ask you if you will be his wife!"

The poor girl looked as if she had been struck by a thunderbolt! In an instant tears were streaming from her eyes; her glance gleamed through this misty veil, the circulation of her blood, so long arrested, gushed precipitately through her

color; her breast scarcely affording room for its oppressed respiration, heaved with emotion; her heart beat violently, and her hands closed convulsively in my own. Ursule's soul had been slumbering only; it was now awake. Like the voice of the Lord, which said to the poor dead damknown to herself and to others. Now the veil was torn asunder, and she saw herself in love!

At the end of a few seconds, she passed her hand over her forehead and said, in a low tone of voice, "No, it is impossible !"

present; and by its all-powerful prism, metamorphosed the aspect of all things. The small house still remained sad and gloomy, as it had been for the last twenty years. But one thought, creeping into the innermost depth of a woman's heart, had made it a palace. Oh, dreams of

"His wife!" she repeated with ecstasy, "his wife!" and precipitating herself toward her mother's chair, "My mother, do you hear?" said she, "He asks me to be his wife!"

passing, passing away? Who has never known you is a thousand times poorer than he who has you to regret!

*

*

"My God!" exclaimed Ursule, "what is all this has happened me to-day? "His wife!" "My beloved daughter!"

She threw herself upon her knees; her hands clasped, her face inundated with tears.

At this moment steps were heard in the narrow passage.

"It is he!" exclaimed Ursule. "Oh, my God!" she added, pressing her hands upon her heart, "this, then, is life!"

I went out by a private door, leaving Ursule, beautiful in her tears, in emotion, in happiness, to receive Maurice d'Erval alone.

From this day Ursule was completely meta

"Shall we go far, Maurice?"

"Are you alarmed, then, my dear Ursule, at the idea of seeing a new country, or some other corner of the world? There are many much handsomer places than this!"

"It is not for myself, Maurice, but for my parents. They are very old to undertake a long voyage!"

Maurice remained immovable before Ursule; although the thick veil which happiness had spread before Maurice's eyes had prevented him from reflecting, yet he well knew that Ursule, to partake of his wandering career, would have to separate herself from her parents. He had foreseen her grief; but confident in the love with which he had

mated; she was rejuvenated under the gentle influence of happiness. She even regained more beauty than she ever had possessed. There existed within her an indescribable radiation, which gave her countenance an undefinable expression of joyful coloring. Her happiness partook somewhat of her early nature. It was collected, silent, calm, mysteriously exalted. Thus Maurice, who had found and loved a woman seated in obscurity, pale and weary of living, had now no change to desire in the picture that had pleased him since Ursule was happy.

Long evenings were passed away beside each other, in the small parlor on the ground floor, with no other light than a few beams from the moon, which fell through the opened window. They talked a little, and gazed on each other often, as they dreamed away the hours.

Ursule loved with frankness and simplicity. She would say to Maurice, "I am happy; I love, I thank you."

Their love sought neither the sunshine, nor the open air, nor space. The small gray house was its only witness. Ursule was always working, and remained near her parents. But if her person immovably occupied the same place as formerly, her soul had flown away, was free, resuscitated, radiant; the walls of this narrow dwelling contained it no longer; she had winged her flight. Thus the sweet magic of hope not only embellished the future, but it also pervaded the

would have power to mitigate any distress the separation might occasion. It had become, at last, necessary to enlighten Ursule as to the future; and, sad at the inevitable sorrow which he was about to cause his betrothed, Maurice took her hand, made her be seated in her accustomed place, and said to her, gently

"My love, it is impossible for your father and mother to follow us in our wanderings!— Until now, Ursule, we have loved and wept together; we have made of life a dream, without resorting to any question which might bear a relation with its actual details. The moment for speaking of the future has arrived. My love, I have no fortune; I possess my sword, alone. Moreover, being at the commencement of my career, my allowances amount to only a few hundred francs, which will impose upon both of us many privations. I have relied on your courage! You alone can accompany me. The presence of your parents in our establishment would bring with it calamities that could not be borne. We would not even have enough bread!"

"To leave my father and mother!" cried Ursule.

"Leave them with the little they possess, in this small house; confide them to some careful person, and accompany your husband!"

"To leave my father and mother!" repeated Ursule. "But you do not know, then, that what they possess is insufficient for their existence?

you

"My poor Ursule," replied Maurice, must submit to what is inevitable! You have concealed from them the loss of what little fortune they possessed. Let them be informed of it now, since it has become necessary. Make their wants conform to the little that still remains to them; for, alas! my love, we have nothing to give them !"

"To go away without taking them with us! -It is impossible! I tell you I have to work for them!י

"Ursule, my Ursule!" replied Maurice, press

ing the poor woman's hands in his own, " I beseech you, do not permit yourself to be led away by the impulses of your generous heart. Reflect! Look

Adieu!-Oh! it takes great courage to write that word-I hope your life will be calm. Another, more happy than I, will love you- It is so easy to love you! Yet do not entirely forget poor Ursule! Adieu, my friend! Ah! I well knew that I could not be happy!

URSULE.

I abridge my recital. Ursule saw Maurice again; she saw me again. But all our prayers, our supplications, were useless; she would never leave her parents. "They require my support," said she. In vain, being selfish in her place, I spoke to her of Maurice's love, of his kindness to her. In vain, in a sort of cruelty, I reminded her of her age, of the impossibility of finding another

chance to change her destiny. She wept while listening to me; moistening, with her tears, the work which she did not wish to discontinue.

we have nothing to give. We can barely subsist together; and that only because we have the courage to meet suffering."

"I cannot leave them!"- replied Ursule, in heart-rending grief, looking at the two old people

asleep in their chairs.

"Do you not love me, Ursule?" said Maurice to his betrothed.

The poor girl's only reply was a torrent of

tears.

in a faint voice, "They will die, I must work for them!" She exacted of us that her mother should never be informed of what had passed. Those for whom she sacrificed herself were always ignorant of it. A pious fraud deceived them, as to the causes of the rupture of their daughter's marriage! -Ursule again took her place at the window; recommenced embroidering; worked without relaxation, immovable, pale, broken-hearted!

Alas! Maurice d'Erval possessed one of those rational and circumspect minds that assigns limits even to devotion; that is incapable of comprehending a sublime infatuation. His heart, like his mind, admitted impossibilities. If his marriage to Ursule had taken place without any obher latest breath, in the boundless affection of her

had permitted him to talk on without reply.

Left alone, Ursule remained for hours, her head leaning upon her hand. Alas! The long-coming happiness shone but an instant upon her life, and vanished away! Sweet dreams, the friends of all young hearts, absent from hers so long, reappeared only to depart again! Forgetfulness, silence, darkness, again resumed possession of an existence which happiness had disputed with them but for an instant! The night so passed away! What passed in the poor girl's heart? God alone knows. She has never spoken of it to one on earth!

At the first glimmering of daylight, she started up; closed the window, which had remained open

since the evening before; and, pale and trembling

with cold and emotion, she took some paper, a pen,

and wrote:

Adieu, Maurice! I remain with my father and mother. To abandon them, in their old age, would be to leave them to die. They no longer have anything but me in the world! My sister, when dying, confided them to me, and said, "We will meet again, Ursule!" I shall never see her again, if I do not perform my duty.

stacle, perhaps she might have believed, even to

easy path. But a barrier to be overcome presented itself, like a fatal ordeal, and held up in the light to Maurice's eyes, the love which he felt. He saw the limits of it!

Maurice supplicated, wept for a long time, and at last became offended, discouraged, and left.

It happened, one day, whilst Ursule was seated near the window, she heard the sounds of martial music, as they swept along, and a heavy and measured tread resounded on her ear. It was the regiment departing, preceded by its band. The farewell flourish of trumpets came reëchoing like a sad adieu, and then died away along the narrow alley where Ursule dwelt. Trembling, she listened. The music, at first brilliant and near

her, soon became less distinct, and faded away!

Then, from afar, it only reached her ears, a vague,

uncertain murmur; then, from time to time, an isolated strain came wafted along on the wind; and at last a dull silence succeeded these martial strains, which space engulfed. The last hope in Ursule's life seemed to attach itself to these faint notes, which reached her from afar; with them it fled-departed-died away! The poor The evening of the day of their last separation, of the day when the grand sacrifice was completed, Ursule, after bestowing upon her parents the attentions with which each day was ended, seated herself at the foot of her mother's bed, and bent over towards her, fixing upon her a gaze, which the blind mother could not see was humid with tears. Gently taking her hand, the poor abandoned affianced one murmured, in a voice choked with emotion :

My mother! you love me, do you not? My presence is a comfort to you? My attentions are sweet to you, mother? You would suffer, would you not, should I leave you ?”

The blind woman turned her head towards the wall and said:

"Oh Lord, Ursule, I am so tired; let me go to sleep!"

This one word of tenderness, which she had wished to obtain as the only recompense for her painful devotion, was not pronounced. The blind old woman went to sleep, pushing away from her the hand which her daughter had extended. But, between the two green serge curtains of the alcove, was a wooden image of Christ, embrowned by time. The hands which no friend on earth would press, Ursule extended toward her God, and, kneeling beside her blind parent's bed, she was long engaged in prayer.

Since then, Ursule became more pale, more silent, more immovable than ever. These newly occasioned tears washed away the last traces of her youth and beauty. In a few days she had grown old. She could please no one now; but if she had possessed the power, Ursule had no desire to please! "All is told!" was a phrase she had already pronounced; this time she was sadly correct for her all was told!

Maurice d'Erval was spoken of no more. Ursule had pleased him, as a graceful picture whose melancholy expression had touched his soul. Leaving it, the colors of the picture faded, then became effaced. He forgot!

Oh, my God! how many things are forgotten in this life! Why has not Heaven, who permits some hearts to grow cold from seeing the object of its love too often, at least accorded to those whom fate separates, the power of weeping forever? My God! the life which thou givest is often full of sorrow!

A year after these events, Ursule's mother became sick. Her disease was of that kind for which there exists no remedy. It was the easy, grad

[CHARACTER OF BERKELEY.]

THE editor of Mrs. Carter's Letters to Mrs. Montagu speaks of Dr. Berkeley, in a note, (vol. 2, p. 52,) as "an amiable man, simple, virtuous and primitive. He once dined at the house of a gentleman

66

"In thy turn, Marthe," said Ursule, our mother is now with you. Conduct her toward God!"

She then came to kneel beside the old man, who remained alone. She made him put on his dress of mourning, without his seeming to perceive it; but the second day after the blind woman's death, when they removed the old arm-chair in which she had remained seated for so many years beside her old husband, the old man turned toward the vacant place, and cried-" My wife!" Ursule spoke to him, and endeavored to divert him. He replied: My wife!" and two tears trickled down the old man's cheeks. In the evening they carried him his usual nourishment: but he turned away his head, and with a sad voice, his eyes fixed upon the vacant place, he said again: "My wife !"

Ursule, in despair, essayed everything that grief or affection could suggest. The idiotic old man remained, leaning forward toward the place to which the blind woman's chair had been moved; and, refusing all nutriment, with clasped hands, he regarded Ursule, repeating, like a child begging to obtain something it desired: "My wife!"

A month after, he died.

In his last moments, when the priest, who had been summoned to his bedside, endeavored to divert his thoughts to God, his Creator, the moment came when he believed he had reïllumined the old man's dying mind, for he joined his hands together and raised his eyes to heaven; but for the last time he again cried : "My wife!" as if he had seen her hovering above his head.

As they were bearing away from the small gray house the coffin of her father, Ursule murmured: "My God, I deserved to have them left living a little longer!"

And Ursule remained alone forever.
All this transpired many years ago.

I was compelled to leave the little town of

; to leave Ursule. I have travelled. A thousand events have succeeded each other in my life, without effacing from my memory the poor girl's history. But Ursule, like those hearts which, when broken, refuse all consolation, became tired of writing to me. After many vain efforts to carry her abroad to weep with me, I lost all trace of her.

What has become of her? Is she yet alive ? is she dead?

Alas! the poor girl never had even that good fortune! I believe that she may still be living!

in East Kent, with a well known eccentric Bishop of the sister island. The Bishop drank a bottle of Madeira with his dinner, and swore like a gentleman; the Prebend talked divinity, and drank nothing but water."