Didst thou in pure devotion render mine,
To teach me what of earth was most divine.

As a rude heathen who to stock and stone Prostrates his soul in worship-when he knows THE TRUTH that reigns almighty and alone,

He evermore with the true worship bows;
My idols I cast down, and knelt and prayed
Where, I knew well, my hopes of Heaven were laid.

Then bountifully were thy blessings showered;
And I, the sole receptacle they sought,
Have known my grateful spirit overpowered

'Neath the delighting burthens thou hast brought, Oft didst thou say thou could'st love none but me; And much I strived to be worthy thee.

But now unhappy chance that brought this turn!
Thou dost deny me with excuses weak
The fondnesses for which my soul doth yearn,
And dost within another's eyeballs seek
The charm, the spirit, and the joy that shone
In my rapt gaze reflected from thine own!

Nothing thou doest doth my eyes escape;
I know thy purposes-thy thoughts behold:
Alas, that they should often take a shape

Which multiplies my cares a thousand fold!
Alas, that thou art changed!—alas, indeed,
A plant so fair should bear such worthless seed!

But these stern words on thee must never fall;
'Tis my unlucky fortune that's to blame,
In my own heart I censure not at all;

For all thy goodnesses such footing claim,
That thy unkindnesses there find no place—
There is no room for things that seem so base.

Cease I to be of value in thy sight?

The worth I owned hath vanished utterly:
The pebbles upon which thy feet alight

To me more estimable seem than 1;
For as the moon doth borrow all her shine,
My worthiness hath had its source in thine.

Fault none of mine is it that I am not

So precious as thy love hath made me seem;
Thou prized me then for worth I had not got;
And now thou dost my meed too lowly deem:
Yet if thou thinkest me such sort as this,
Am I the very poorest thing that is.

I know not why that thou should'st now prefer
Another to a heart so much thine own:

I'd say no more if it were worthier,

But doubt I much it love like mine hath known. Oh, would I could forget that thou wert kind, Or thou would'st act more truly to my mind!

Remember this-the threat'ning cataract

That loudest roars, is use for no man's hands; And 'mid thy mind's best stores retain this factThe humblest waters may have golden sands: Then scorn not thou the lowliest things that toil.The treasures of the earth are in the soil.

"Flat disobedience and rank atheism !" exclaimed the old man, after he had listened with evident impatience to the perusal of the poem-"Didst ever hear of such heathenish notions? not to say that I understand it-I'd rather be hanged than understand any such villany. But what think you of it, Mistress Joanna? I see the horrible impiety of it hath quite discomposed you."

In truth, what Gregory Vellum had stated, was nigh unto the fact; for Joanna had quickly discovered that the verses she was reading were written for her, and intended for her eye alone; and as the allusions they contained struck upon her mind, her changing colour denoted how much she was moved by them. When she came to the end she was, for a few minutes, utterly disconcerted. She seemed lost in a maze of conflicting thoughts; her brow became dark, and her eyes fixed, and so completely had she given herself up to her own reflections, that she heard not the question that had been put to her.

"What say you, sweetheart?" said he familiarly, laying his hand upon her shoulder. "Doth not your hair stand on end to see how he misuseth me? Why, he costs me a matter of a groat a week for his diet-for he hath the appetite of two carriers-and then -the caitiff! to be robbing me in this monstrous manner, when candles are threepence to the pound-and to be scribbling his preposterous atrocities when stationary is at so high a cost. By my troth he hath no more virtue than an addled egg! But what think you of the verses?"

"Sad stuff, Master Vellum," she replied, having perfectly recovered from her confusion; "but be assured there is no harm in them. I think he ought not to be encouraged in these practices; so. I will e'en take the paper with me, and tear it to pieces as I go along."

"Ah, do, good Joanna! shew upon it proper detestation of such thorough and most inconceivable villany," said he, as he observed her take possession of the poem. "But I must turn the rogue out of doors; he will ruin me straight an I do not; and I would as lief live among savages as exist with a knave who plundereth me by wholesale of such estimable candles' ends, and destroys me so many fair sheets of paper in inditing matters it would be a scandal to understand."

"Nay, good Master Vellum," observed his fair companion, "do not be so harsh with him. He is but young; and boys have a natural tendency for the perpetration of these offences. When he attaineth the becoming gravity of his uncle, he will give over all such primitive delinquencies."

"Dost think so, sweetest?" enquired the old man eagerly, as, with a most preposterous leer, he thrust his ungraceful countenance close to her beautiful face. "You are a woman of admirable discretion, and of a truly excellent fancy. Dost despise these raw youths; and could'st affect a man of more mature years?"

"Ay, marry, and why not?" enquired she very innocently.

"You are a most excellent wench!" exclaimed he with unaffected delight, as he seemed to feast his eyes upon the graces of her countenance-"one of ten thousand. Think you, you could rest content

with an old man-nay, one not so old either-who would never be gadding from you like your young gallants, none of whom are ever to be trusted out of sight, but would nourish you, and cherish you, and fondle you, and make much of you, and none but you; and make you mistress of all his gold, his house, and chattels ?"

"Ay, marry, why should I not?" repeated she in the same

tone.

"Then you shall have me, sweetheart!" cried the old man in an ecstacy; and seeming, by the unsteady movement of his hands, with great difficulty to refrain from throwing his arms round her neck. "I have loved you for some months, sweetest! and all the little gifts I have bestowed upon you, were to shew you how enamoured I was of your most blessed condition. And I will tell you a secret my love! my dove! my angel!--my paragon of womanhood!" continued he, fidgetting about, and gloating upon her with his lack-lustre eyes as if he were bewitched. "Although I seem so poor-yet am I richer than I seem. Ay, am I. I have store of gold-bright yellow gold! Hush, there's no one listening, is there?" he all at once exclaimed, as, fearing he had said too much, he gave a restless glance around the room.

"Not a soul," replied Joanna, still retaining the same unmoved countenance.

"Yes, sweetheart," he continued, every now and then giving a suspicious glance about him, "I have saved, and scraped, and hoarded up a goodly store of wealth, the result of infinite painstaking, and exceeding self-denial; and you shall enjoy it; you, my life, my queen! Oh, how I long to hug you in my most fond embrace." "Softly, softly, Gregory Vellum," exclaimed she, quietly disengaging his arms from her neck; for, unable any longer to resist his impatient wishes, he had endeavoured, as our great dramatist hath it, to suit the action to the word. "Modest maids are not to be won in such boisterous fashion, and it little becometh the respectability of your deportment to exhibit such unseemly violence. As for your love, you must prove it by something besides words. You have professed for some time to be hugely taken with me; but all professions are naught when unaccompanied by that which proveth their value. You are right liberal in promises, but your performance, as yet, hath been but scanty. If you have such store of gold as you talk of”.

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Hush! hush! not so loud, I prythee, sweetheart," whispered the old man, going cautiously to the door, on tiptoe, opening, and looking out, and closing it carefully after him.

"Of a surety you would act more generously towards me than you have yet done," continued Joanna, without attending to the interruption; "your true lovers are always bountiful. Now there is a certain Venetian chain"

"Ay, 'tis of gold, and of most admirable workmanship," exclaimed Gregory Vellum, "it cost me fifty crowns, or I'm a villanous Jew. I did promise it you, I remember well; but if it please you, sweetest," continued the old man, sidling up to her, and leering in her face, "it shall be yours for a kiss.-Accept you the conditions?"

"For your sake, I will say yes, good Gregory Vellum," replied she, without hesitation.

"It shall be yours-it shall be yours," cried the old man, chafing his hands, and every limb of him shaking with excitement. "Now give me the kiss, my heart! my soul! my life! give me the kiss, I prythee."

"The chain first, Gregory Vellum," said the other quietly, as she retreated from his proferred caresses.

"Ay, but wait awhile-wait awhile sweetheart, and I will fetch it," said he, hastening to the door, in an agony of impatience, and immediately returning to her side, before he had got half way; "but when shall be the happy day ?-name it, name it, excellent Joanna, for I do long for the time when we two shall be one."

"We will talk of that anon;-but, the chain," replied she.

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"I fly, sweetest," cried the old man, shuffling off towards the door; but, just as he was about to open it, he came back hastily, with his eyes glistening, and his leaden countenance all of a glow, "we will spend all the yellow gold; we will live a right merry life. I'faith you shall have all that heart can desire, you shall, you shall, you shall, my queen of beauty!"

"The chain, worthy Gregory Vellum," repeated his fair companion, as she eluded his eager advances.

"I am gone," said he, again hastening off; but, before he opened the door, he turned round, clasped his skinny hands together, and turning up the whites of his eyes, exclaimed, "Indeed, I love thee infinitely."

"That for thy love," cried she, spitting on the floor, with every mark of indignation and disgust, as soon as she heard him rapidly ascending the stairs-"that for thy love, thou most abhorred and infamous old dotard: but I will use thee. For the sake of one whose little finger is dearer to me than thy old moth-eaten carcase, I will make thee bring out thy long hoarded gold, and squander it right liberally." Then, hearing a noise at the door which opened into the street, she looked to see who it was. The same modest youth entered to whom the reader hath been introduced, at Master Shakspeare his lodging, on the Bank Side.

"What, Joanna!" he exclaimed, hastening towards her, with a most smiling countenance-" nay, this is a pleasure I dreamt not of."

"Tis I, Francis," she replied, allowing him to take her hand, which he passionately pressed to his lips; "but thy check is flushed, and thine eye unsteady. What ails thee?"

"Nothing, dearest," said he, "I have been detained, and I thought my uncle would be angered with me for stopping; for thou knowest how easy he is of provocation, so I ran all the way home."

"Thou hadst best make haste, and conceal thyself somewhere for the nonce," responded she, "for thy uncle hath just left me, meaning to return straight; and he is out of all temper with thee, for sundry offences which he saith thou hast committed. So go thy ways, and let me see thee soon, for I have much to say to thee."

"I will do thy bidding lovingly; yet it is a most regretful thing

to be obliged to leave thee," he said, as with reluctant steps, and slow, he made towards the door. Then, keeping his eyes upon her till the last moment, eloquent with a most impassioned tenderness, he left the room.

"Poor boy!" murmured she, as with a countenance full of melancholy interest, she watched his departure-"poor boy! he little knoweth how many distasteful things I do for his dear sake."

At this moment Gregory Vellum was heard upon the stairs. There was a marked difference betwixt his going and his returning; for, whereas, in the first instance, he had galloped like an ostrich, now he was heard descending, step by step, so slow that it would not be a great stretch of fancy to say, he might have fallen asleep between whiles. Presently he opened the door, and instead of hastening towards Joanna, with enamoured looks and impatient gestures, as might have been expected from his previous behaviour, he advanced, at a laggard's pace, with his eyes fixed upon a glittering chain of gold, that he kept turning about in his hand, and with a face in which the demon of avarice, had evidently got the better of the demon of sensuality.

"How now!" exclaimed his companion, as she noticed his approach, "you went out as quick of motion as a young colt―you creep in with the preposterous tediousness of a snail."

"It cost me fifty crowns!" remarked he, still keeping his eyes on the precious metal, as if there was a fascination in it he could not withstand.

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Well, and what then?" enquired Joanna; "that is nothing to the store of gold of which you mean to make such generous use, you know."

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Ay, said I so!" said he quickly, and with a monstrous serious look, "no, twas a mistake. Gold! I have no gold; where should I get gold? I am poor, miserably poor, as you see. 'Tis a most admirable chain, and of right delicate workmanship," he continued feasting his eyes upon it, as it glittered in his hand.

"I'faith your love is of a most miserly disposition," responded she, smiling most bewitchingly all the time, "it preferreth a sorry chain to the object of its pretended adoration. By my troth, if I marry you after this, I'll vex myself into fiddle strings.'

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"Ah! talked you of marrying, sweetest?" asked the old man eagerly, as he raised his eyes to her face; and, immediately they rested upon her well-favoured countenance, they again began to twinkle with delight. "Truly have you the softest and most insinuating looks, and your smile is most absolute and irresistible. Your eyes, sweetheart, are as bright as this Venetian gold-but it cost me fifty crowns; and the pouting ripeness of your lips hath as much temptation as the polish upon the links; and, in good truth, 'tis a most rare and costly trinket." And thereupon he continued, now fixing his eyes upon the chain, and gloating upon its brilliance; and anon raising them to the face of his fair companion, as if doating upon its beauty. It was evident that there was a struggle in his soul, about parting with his property. He longed for a caress from the seductive Joanna; but the Venetian trinket had wound itself round