Beautiful, bewitching May! How shall I describe her? As the fanciful village-poet, her devoted adorer, declared;—“The pencil that would paint her charms should be made of sunbeams and dipped in the dewy heart of a fresh moss-rose.” Whether this same bundle of beams and fragrant rose-dew would have done full justice to her eloquent loveliness, I cannot pretend to say—having never attempted the use of any brush less earthly than are made of hog’s bristles, nor any color more refined than a preparation from cochineal. Her eyes were “blue as Heaven,” the heaven of midsummer—when its warm, intense and glorious hue seems deepening as you gaze, and laughing in the joyous light of day. Her hair, I could never guess its true color; it was always floating in such exquisite disorder over her happy face and round white shoulders—now glistening, glowing in the sunshine, like wreaths of glossy gold, and now, in shadow, bathing her graceful neck with soft brown waves, that looked like silken floss, changing forever and lovely in each change. Blushes and dimples played hide and seek on her face. Her lip—her rich sweet lip was slightly curved—just enough to show that there was pride as well as love in her heart. She was, indeed, a spirited creature. Her form was of fairy moulding, but perfect though “petite!” and her motions graceful as those of the Alpine chamois. Reader, if I have failed in my attempt to convey to you an image of youthful grace, beauty and sweetness, I pray you repair my deficiency from the stores of your own lively imagination, and fancy our dear May Evelyn the loveliest girl in the universe. And now for her history. Her father, of an ancient and noble family, had married, in early life, a beautiful but extravagant woman, who died a few years after their union, leaving him with two lovely children and an all but exhausted fortune. On her death he retired from the gay world, and settled with his infant treasures in Wales, and there, husbanding his scanty means, he contrived to live in comfort if not in luxury. There, too, brooding over the changes of human life—the fallacy of human foresight, and the fickleness of human friendship, he became “a sadder and a wiser man.” His two beautiful children, Lionel and May, were the idols of his heart, and well did they repay his love. May’s first serious trouble arose from hearing her father express one day his desire to purchase for Lionel a commission in the army. The boy was high-spirited and intelligent, and had cherished from childhood an ardent desire for military life; but there was no possibility of raising sufficient money for the purpose, without sacrificing many of their daily comforts.