A Motion glassed in a Tranquillity.
So triple-rayed, thou mov'st, yet stay'st, serene--
Art's artist, Love's dear woman, Fame's good queen!

SIDNEY LANIER.

CHARLES KINGSLEY: A REMINISCENCE.

The heat of London in the midsummer of 1857, even to my American
apprehension, was intense. The noise of the streets oppressed me,
and perhaps the sight now and again of freshly-watered flowers which
beautify so many of the window-ledges, and which seem to flourish and
bloom whatever the weather, filled me the more with a desire for the
quiet of green fields and the refreshing shade of trees. I had just
returned from Switzerland, and the friends with whom I had been
journeying in that land of all perfections had gone back to their home
among the wealds and woods of Essex. I began to feel that sense of
solitude which weighs heavily on a stranger in the throng of a great
city; so that it was with keen pleasure I looked forward to a visit to
Mr. Kingsley. A most kind invitation had come from him, offering me "a
bed and all hospitality in their plain country fashion."

At four in the afternoon of a hot July day I started for Winchfield,
which is the station on the London and Southampton Railway nearest to
Eversley--a journey of an hour and a half. I took a fly at Winchfield
for Eversley, a distance of six miles. My way lay over wide silent
moors: now and then a quiet farmstead came in view--_moated granges_
they might have been--but these were few and far between, this part of
Hampshire being owned in large tracts. It was a little after six when
I drew near to the church and antique brick dwelling-house adjoining
it which were the church and rectory of Eversley. There were no other
houses near, so that it was evidently a wide and scattered parish.
Old trees shaded the venerable irregularly-shaped parsonage, ivy
and creeping plants covered the walls, and roses peeped out here and
there. Mr. Kingsley himself met me at the open hall-door, and there
was something in his clear and cheerful tone that gave a peculiar
sense of welcome to his greeting. "Very glad to see you," said he.
Then taking my bag from the fly, "Let me show you your room at once,
that you may make yourself comfortable." So, leading the way, he
conducted me up stairs and along a somewhat intricate passage to a
room in the oldest part of the house. It was a quaint apartment, with
leaden casements, a low ceiling, an uneven floor--a room four hundred
years