One more name lives in my recollection. The old clerk bequeathed his library and his authority to his favourite, Arthur. Arthur!--he had no other name. That of his father was unknown to him, and he was taken from life before his merits had earned one. He was a foundling. He had been left at the old clerk’s door some years before I was born; and Nicholas had relieved the parish of the expense, and had educated him with all the attention of a father. I will not relate the whisper which went about at the time, nor the whispers which succeeded afterwards. Arthur grew in health and beauty, and was quite the pet of the neighbourhood; he had talents too, which seemed designed for brighter days; and patience, which made even his bitter lot endurable. He used to write verses which were the admiration of the synod; and sang his hearers to sleep occasionally with all the good-nature imaginable. At last a critic of distinguished note, who was spending a few months near the hamlet, happened to get a sight of the boy’s poetry, and took a fancy to him. He taught him to read and recite with feeling; pointed out to him the beauties and the errors of the models which he put into his hands; and, on his departure, gave him the works of several of our modern worthies, and promised that he would not forget him. However he did forget him, or gave no symptoms of his remembrance. The old clerk died, and Arthur felt alone in the world. Still he had many friends; and when the first burst of his regret was over, comfortable prospects again began to dawn upon him. He again mingled in the society of the village; and the dictator’s chair in the chimney-corner, which had been vacated during this short interregnum, was given up to him cheerfully. He was beloved, esteemed, looked up to, by every one. Another circumstance, too, seemed likely to add to his happiness: he fixed his affections on a young woman, the daughter of an inhabitant of the place; his passion was returned with interest, and the latter opposed no obstacle to its gratification. On a sudden his whole appearance and behaviour was altered. He seemed as if awaking from a delightful dream; nothing which he had loved or pursued appeared to have charms for him any longer. When he was questioned as to the cause of his depression, he hinted obscurely that “it was no matter; the infamy which his parents had heaped upon him he would bear alone; he would entangle no one else in the misery which was and must be his own portion.” This was all the explanation he gave; but it was enough to show that he had given himself up to the dominion of a morbid sensibility, which must finally be his destruction.