wounded spirit as the snow-flakes on the warm ground, melting as they fall." We were now close to my gate, and I invited the lad to enter and refresh himself. This offer he accepted with the warmest thanks; and when seated by the comfortable fire in the kitchen, from which I dismissed for a short time my only servant, he told me the simple tale of his sorrows. I am not enough of a Scotchman to attempt to do justice to his national dialect; so much the better, perhaps, for my English readers; but I fear that what I gain in fluency I shall lose in expression. His name, he said, was Dalzell; he was the son of a respectable and thriving merchant in Kelso, who had given him, in his early years, the best education the place afforded, with the view of preparing him, at a future day, for the ministry; but before he was fifteen years old, his father, who was commonly reputed wealthy, died insolvent, and his mother and he were left in a state of utter destitution. Grief for the loss of her husband, combined with anxiety of mind, occasioned by the unexpected change in her circumstances, shortened the days of his beloved mother, and he was left in the world alone. A neighbouring farmer, pitying his distress, took him into his service, and treated him with the greatest kindness and consideration. In this place he had remained nearly four years, and had every reason to think that his master looked upon him more in the light of a friend than a servant. He had done his duty faithfully and conscientiously, because it _was_ his duty; but he was not happy; his thoughts were constantly reverting to former days, and to his blighted prospects, and he began to feel thoroughly discontented and disgusted with his menial situation, when, all at once, a powerful and absorbing feeling, like Aaron's serpent, swallowed all the rest. He loved! In the moments when his impatient spirit most winced beneath the yoke of servitude, light as it was, one glance at the bright blue eye and winning smile of Grace Douglas was sufficient to chase the cloud from his brow, and to cheer his heart with the thought that he had still something worth living for. She was his master's only daughter, just seventeen, and as bright and beautiful a creature as ever the eye of a lover rested upon. Even her beauty, however, would have failed in making any impression on the senses of the gloomy and discontented youth, had not the better feelings of his heart been excited by her tender sympathy. She knew his story; and, by her silent and unobtrusive attentions, showed her pity for his misfortunes. Her tones of kindness invested her, in his opinion, with a charm beyond mere beauty; his proud heart was melted, and his long-pent-up affections were lavished upon this new object with a violence that alarmed himself. It was not long before he was awakened to the consciousness that his love was returned; but that consciousness, blissful as it seemed at first, only gave