t," she replied, interrupting me; "come
a little further with me--what were you going to say?"

"Though I may never see you more, nobody will ever be so glad to hear
that you are happy as I; for I would sooner see you so than any person
I know."

"Thank you, thank you," she replied, rather earnestly, "and I hope we
shall be able--indeed, I am certain I shall see you again somewhere--I
will not," she added, as we approached the circle, "I will not, if you
please, keep your arm before them. Good bye, then; I shall hear of
you, at all events, from my brother."

She then left me, while I reluctantly directed my steps towards the
college, which now appeared unwelcome and obtrusive. She was so
different to everything I had hitherto experienced!--so gentle and
kind--so unassuming, and yet so lovely--and now to be torn away and
severed from such a person! That night I attempted to console myself
in the following effusion; and as they are the first and last lines of
which I was ever guilty, shall be here inserted; for though the
versification is by no means faultless, they were true to my feelings
at the time:--

When 'midst the deepest gloom of night,
While all is still and lone,
A heavenly meteor flashes bright,
But floats away as soon;

Does not the bosom of the moor
Seem doubly dark and drear,
Frowning still sterner than before
Did that false light appear!

So, lady, have you crossed my way,
Brighter than cloudless morn--
So o'er this heart thy piercing ray.
Gleamed--and thou art gone!

CHAPTER V.

My first half-year as an Etonian had now expired. Brief as it was, it
has been to me the most portentous period of my existence. I sometimes
feel that my fate, here and hereafter, has hinged upon it--this world
is globular for the same reason that a woman's tear is. Are we the
creatures of the merest chance, or of eternal predestination through
all time, if there be such a thing as time at all? The question is
idle; for as we have never yet solved it, I begin to think we never
shall. The Almighty has willed this obscurity, and therefore it is for
the best.

I sensitively felt that I was launched amid the crowd of a bustling
world, to steer and shift for myself as I best might. Like other boys,
I had a tutor; but, though a thoroughly conscientious man, he was
worse than useless; for he was to be practised on with such facility,
that I, with his ot