ass-plots
which sloped away to the dark and unwavering trees that girded the
lawn. That pause of nature which precedes a storm ever had a peculiar
attraction to his mind; and instinctively he sauntered from the house,
wrapped in the dreaming, half-developed thought which belonged to his
temperament. Mechanically he strayed on until he found himself beside
the still lake which the hollows of the dismantled park embedded. There
he paused, gazing unconsciously on the gloomy shadows which fell from
the arches of the Priory and the tall trees around. Not a ripple stirred
the broad expanse of waters; the birds had gone to rest; no sound, save
the voice of the distant brook that fed the lake beside which, on the
first night of his return to his ancestral home, he had wandered with
Constance, broke the universal silence. That voice was never mute. All
else might be dumb; but that living stream, rushing through its rocky
bed, stilled not its repining music. Like the soul of the landscape is
the gush of a fresh stream; it knows no sleep, no pause; it works for
ever--the life, the cause of life to all around. The great frame of
nature may repose, but the spirit of the waters rests not for a moment.
As the soul of the landscape is the soul of man, in our deepest slumbers
its course glides on, and works unsilent, unslumbering, through its
destined channel.

With slow step and folded arms Godolphin moved along. The
well-remembered scenes of his childhood were all before him; the wild
verdure of the fern, the broken ground, with its thousand mimic mounts
and valleys, the deep dell overgrown with matted shrubs and dark as a
wizard's cave; the remains of many a stately vista, where the tender
green of the lime showed forth, even in that dusky light, beneath the
richer leaves of the chestnut; all was familiar and home-breathing
to his mind. Fragments of boyish verse, forgotten for years, rose
hauntingly to his remembrance, telling of wild thoughts, unsatisfied
dreams, disappointed hopes.

"But I am happy at last," said he aloud; "yes, happy. I have passed that
bridge of life which divides us from the follies of youth; and better
prospects, and nobler desires, extend before me. What a world of wisdom
in that one saying of Radclyffe's, 'Benevolence is the sole cure to
idealism;' to live for others draws us from demanding miracles for
ourselves. What duty as yet have I fulfilled? I renounced ambition as
unwise, and with it I renounced wis