er loved.

She was, indeed, the sun of my gloom; and, without her, I am as a
captive in a darkened cell, through the gratings of which thoughts of
her stream in, and make a dim twilight--a sad satisfaction. Oh! if I
were to be false to her, my soul would be a void; my memory, a curse; my
heart, a heap of ashes.

I see again, with terrible reality, that graceful form--that regal
face--dead, yet smiling--as I last saw her in that curtained chamber,
with the sun shining in glory through the crimson drapery, and shedding
a warm glow on the inanimate features.

Even now I see her. I see that last look of unsullied purity and fear. I
feel again that warm blood, as it trickled down and fell on my hands and
face, as I knelt before her. It fell on my forehead, and I know that it
is eating in, deeper and deeper, towards my brain.

Her last words ring in my ears; her last smile is my beacon, my only ray
of hope, luring me on towards a happier future.

There is a fire kindled within me that will dry up every thought but
recollection of her; for every circumstance connected with her is
impressed on my memory with a vivid distinctness.

Can it be?--the thought sometimes occurs to me, with a balmy and
consoling power, like that fragrant wind from the Spicy Islands, which
the mariner feels blowing cool upon his brow, as he lies becalmed, in
the still noon, on the wide and desert sea? Can it be, that the devotion
of a lifetime--such as my devotion has been--may be repaid by
association in eternity?

May I dare to hope to live hereafter in the shadow of her glory? Shall
we meet again in that bright land?

No--the vision is too joyous for the poor maniac, her murderer. I shall
see her no more--we are separated for ever!

Hell--deep, deep hell--is the madman's portion; and heaven, that pure
and distant clime, is thy resting-place for ever--thy radiant home--thy
peaceful haven--my lost--my adored--my sainted Julia!

THE BURNS' FESTIVAL.

Scotland has of late years been exposed to perilous influences. Unused,
from its older form of representation, to popular excitement, and
stimulated by example from without, the nation threw itself headlong
into the revolutionary current which swept the whole empire at the
period of Parliamentary Reform, and, with characteristic fervour, seemed
inclined to riot in the novel element. Whenever symptoms of such a
disposition appear in the body politic, there is manifest danger that,
in th