ing herself to and fro to the monotonous measure of one of the wild and mournful death-cries of her country, seemed to have determined on remaining there for the night; and Norah, finding her persuasions useless, returned to her home, full of anxiety and apprehension. No sooner had Ansty satisfied herself that she could no longer be perceived, than she ceased her lamentations, and, with a step but slightly impeded by the lameness that distinguished her usual gait, set off in the direction of the city.

The report, which Douglas had taken for a signal of rising, had been occasioned by the explosion of a powder depot belonging to the insurgent party in Patrick Street, and which thus afforded government unequivocal proof of the means of a rebellion being in active preparation within the city. Yet no precautionary measures ensued. The next day, however, Hugh Perring returned home, and a stricter system of espionage on her actions convinced Norah that by some means he had heard of her interview with Douglas. All day long he continued in doors; but as soon as he had assured himself that she had retired for the night, he left the house, and returned no more till morning. Determined to find out whether he went alone, one night Norah followed him silently down stairs. No one was with him; and as with a boding heart she retraced her steps, her foot crushed some papers, and gathering them up, she discovered amongst them a proclamation for a general rising of the United Irishmen on the 23rd of the month. It wanted but a few days of the appointed time. Norah's resolution, therefore, was quickly taken, and as rapidly acted upon.

On the evening of the succeeding day, and an hour after sunset, a covered car drove into the castle yard, and a youth, clad in academical garb, stepped out, and walked on, until challenged by the sentinel on duty.

"Who goes there?" demanded the soldier, in a stern, peremptory voice.

"A friend!" answered the youth, in a low tone.

"Advance, friend!" rejoined the sentry, bringing his musket to the charge," and give the countersign." But, instead of advancing, the action that accompanied the invitation had the effect of sending the collegian several paces back.

"I have no countersign," he answered. "I only want to see Lieutenant Hewitt."

"Devil a Lieutenant Hewitt you'll see, till I hears the countersign," returned the immoveable man-at-arms.

The youth, who had evidently expended his knowledge of military usages, in the customary response to the sentry's challenge, stood crushing the folds of his gown with a nervous and uncertain action; and from the working of his pale and interesting features, it was evident that he suffered much more than the chance of spending an hour in the sentry-box, until the guard came round, would have occasioned, under ordinary circumstances, to any son of Alma Mater. "Pray let me pass," he cried, taking out a purse, and speaking in accents of great distress, "I only want to see Mr. Hewitt. I am his cousin. Here is gold for you. Good, kind sentry, let me pass!"

"That's nothing to me; I must do my duty; and I can't let you pass without the parole," answered the man, doggedly.

"Oh! what shall I do-what shall I do?" cried the youth, in anguish.

"I'll tell you what you'll do," answered the soldier, a little softened by the offer of the gold-" you may walk out; but if you attempt to move an inch nearer this way, you are my prisoner."

"I cannot go till I have seen Mr. Hewitt; my business with him is of life and death. Surely, good soldier, you will let me pass?"

"Not a step," returned the sentry; "either you walk off my post, or into my box, till the guard comes round. And if you give the officer no better account of yourself than you have given me, I promise you you'll pass the night in the guard-house."

At this moment, a gentleman in plain clothes came towards them; and the distress of the youth became even more perceptible.

"Here is some one coming," he said; " pray-pray let me pass! Mr. Hewitt will acquit you of any blame. I will give you all that is in my purse."

"Here

"It is more than I dare do now," returned the man. comes one of the officers." And he turned to repeat to the person approaching the accustomed military challenge, while the collegian drew his robe around him, and shrank close to the side of the building. Presently afterwards the other party drew near, and whispering the talismanic reply, approached the trembling gownsman, and courteously inquired if he should pass him in.. No sooner had the latter uttered his thanks, than the officer drew his arm within his own, and walked on in silence, till out of ear-shot of the sentinel, when the youth inquired, “Will you have the kindness to point out Mr. Hewitt's quarters? It is to see him I have come."

66 ''Pon my word he does not deserve to see you," replied the officer, in a tone of confidence that strangely and painfully affected the youth -"he has not used you well in keeping you waiting for him, and exposing you to so much annoyance."

"Mr. Hewitt is not aware of my being here," replied the other coldly.

"I wish I could persuade you to let him remain in ignorance of your coming," continued the officer. "Or if not," as he felt the fragile arm within his own suddenly withdrawn, come into my room, and I will send for him."

66

"Sir!" said the affected collegian, springing from his side," since something has betrayed my sex to you, pray do not tarnish your kindness by rudeness more insufferable than any annoyance I have previously experienced. However strange my being here, and in this disguise, may appear, I am a lady; and my motive is not only innocent but, I trust, praiseworthy. Add to my sense of gratitude for the favour you have already conferred upon me, by telling me where I shall find Mr. Hewitt. Be assured, neither he nor I will ever forget the obligation."

"I will send him to you," replied the officer, in a tone as respectful as his former manner had been bold. 66 Stand here, out of observation; he shall be with you in an instant."

So saying, he touched his hat and departed, while Norah remained, watching, with nervous anxiety, every shadow that crossed the messroom windows, impatient for, yet dreading Douglas Hewitt's approach. Presently, an officer in full regimentals hastened towards her, and her heart told her it was her lover.

"I have the honour to be the individual you have inquired after,” he said; "may I know to what circumstance I am in"

"Douglas, take me where I may speak to you," faltered Norah; "I had no other way of seeing you, and I could not write what I have to tell."

"Norah, my own love! what has happened?" said Douglas, anxiously, as he drew her arm fondly within his own, and hurried her towards his apartments.

In less than a quarter of an hour after the meeting, accompanied by her cousin, Norah was on her way back to Rathfarnham. On the same night, Hugh Perring, as he entered his own gate, was seized by a party of soldiers, at the head of whom was his cousin Douglas, charged with conspiring against the state, and was conducted a prisoner to the castle garrison. Instead, however, of finding himself incarcerated in a dungeon, or subjected to the cruel privation which had been the fate of other state prisoners, he found himself in excellent quarters, supplied with all sorts of good things, in the shape of edibles, and an equal feast of mental entertainment. His situation was a mystery to himself. The longed-for day of Ireland's struggle for liberty was fast approaching, and he should appear to his friends an apostate to the cause, in its hour of extremest need! He comforted himself, however, with the idea that his arrest was too important an event to be passed over by the government journals; and that, by this means, the self-elected chief of the United Irishmen would attribute his nonappearance to its proper cause.

At length, the evening of the 23rd of July arrived. Not only had Douglas Hewitt contributed his warning voice to his friends in authority, but information had been given to the under-secretary of the intentions of the insurgents, and even of the hour of their meditated outbreak; but, on the precautionary principle of creating no alarm, few preparations were made to withstand them, beyond the strengthening of the guard at the Phoenix Lodge, by an officer and thirty A large dinner-party was given on this evening, by the secretary of the war department, to his military and other friends, at the castle; and amongst the guests was Douglas Hewitt.

men.

The orthodox toasts and loyal sentiments had all been duly honoured and dismissed, and the mercurial spirits of the party were rising in proportion as the contents of cooper after cooper of bright claret disappeared; song succeeded song, and the true Anacreontic feeling was fast diffusing itself around, when a wild and piercing shriek rang through the apartment, arresting each man's hand on its way to his lips, and driving the ruddy colour from his cheek. Every one instinctively arose, as the door was thrown open, and a lady, with her long hair dishevelled, and her white dress stained with blood, rushed madly into the apartment, announcing, incoherently, the horrible catastrophe of her murdered father. It was Miss Wolfe, the daughter of Lord Kilwarden, who was most inhumanly butchered by the pikes of the insurgents. In a moment the revel was over-the military flew to revenge-the civilians to defend themselves; but the horrors of that night are for the historian, and I gladly pass them over, to follow the fortunes of Douglas Hewitt and his cousin.

About five weeks after the occurrence just related, on the afternoon of a day in the early part of September, crowds of persons were to

be met returning along the Rathfarnham road. The low tones in which they conversed-the air of depression and gloom that rested upon all, so different from their national bearing under any ordinary circumstance, was, in itself, sufficient to arouse a painful conviction of the nature of the calamity that could thus strike down their naturally elastic spirits. These persons had been to witness the unfortunate Emmett's execution.

But let us turn from the road, to the residence of the Perrings, at Rathfarnham. The blinds of the windows were closed, as if death was in the house; and on a sofa in the little room previously described, lay Hugh, pale even to ghastliness, from no physical illness, but from the nervous anguish that had preyed upon him since the apprehension of his friend. Norah knelt beside him; her eyes blinded by tears, and her hand was pressed against his pallid brow. The door opened, and Douglas Hewitt entered. Hugh raised his head, and gazed inquiringly at him.

"Is it over?" he asked quickly.

"It is," said Hewitt, mournfully.

"Thank God!" muttered Perring, dropping back on the pillow, and bursting into tears. "And but for you," he continued, when the paroxysm subsided-" but for you, my generous-hearted cousin, and you, my dear-dear sister, I, too, should have paid the penalty of disloyalty and madness with my pure-intentioned but misguided friend."

"He is at rest," interrupted Douglas; "let us hope that the sincerity of his motives may outbalance the crimes his treason has occasioned. Do not dwell upon it; but in return for the mercy so graciously extended to yourself, prove to your king and country that a pardoned rebel can make a useful citizen and a loyal subject."

Little more need be added. Norah soon afterwards became the wife of her cousin; and in the spring of the ensuing year Hugh Perring started for the Continent, to seek Gerald Hewitt, who had quitted Ireland on the day after Sydenham Perring's death, and had sought to heal the anguish of a bruised spirit by successive changes of scene and occupation. The forgiveness and re-union of his family effected what neither time nor travel could accomplish; and the cousins returned to Ireland better and wiser men for the bitter experiences of the memorable year 1803.

NEW SOUTH WALES.*

WHEN a colony is still in its infancy, facts only are wanted,―statements of a simple but important character, which concern soil, climate, natural productions, and resources;-but when the same colony has attained a certain discretionary age, and can boast of its cities, towns, farms, cultivated lands, roads, and navigable rivers (as the creeks or inlets of the sea are always called), it is pleasant to turn from such details, to contemplate, for a moment, the new phases in which society presents itself in such a country-to look at the surface of things, as they pre

*Notes and Sketches of New South Wales, during a residence in that colony from 1839 to 1844. By Mr. Charles Meredith. John Murray. London.

sent themselves to a fresh eye-and glance at the social state, as it appears to a stranger. First impressions, in these cases, are everything; custom wears off the salient points, and familiarity soon effaces the picturesqueness of novelty; so we rejoice when, as, on the present occasion, we meet with a little work, preluded by a sea-voyage, ensuring sympathy with a first arrival; and, still more, on entering into the country itself, to find the author engaged in simple sketches from nature, and turning attention chiefly to the general aspect of things, and to every-day topics.

It is, indeed, delightful and refreshing to enter with so light and agreeable, though not unfastidious, a companion as Mrs. Charles Meredith, into a new field of observation-to pass the mighty gates of New South Wales, and find ourselves, at once, at anchor off Fort Macquarie -steam-boats, sailing, and rowing-boats, moving about in every direction-large emigrant-ships, often lumbering and awkward-looking enough, lying at anchor, low hills rising from the beach, dotted here and there with villas and cottages, and the handsome city of Sydney, only, as yet, in part visible at the bottom of the cove.

And then, making a step in advance, the clean, distinct outline, "so different to the diffused aspect of an English landscape;" the different kinds of gum-trees, some of which bear large and handsome flowers; the English oaks, overtopped by sombre Norfolk Island pines; the shrubbery of tea-tree, and the hedges of geraniums, cactus and acacia, leading the way to bright white villas, "seeming almost to cut into their surrounding trees," with the universal adjunct of veranda or piazza, telling of a sunny climate; the green lawns, sloping to the water's edge; the sentinels pacing to and fro, before Government House; and then the final arrival at the "large busy town," of scarcely half a century's existence.

George Street, it appears, is the Pall Mall of Sydney; and "up and down its hot, dusty, glaring, weary length, go the fair wives and daughters of the citizens, enjoying their daily airing." Long strings of carriages are to be seen traversing it, or waiting near the "fashionable emporiums," that being the term in which Australian shopkeepers especially delight. "No lady' in Sydney (your grocers and butchers' wives included) believes in the possibility of walking;' but the "turn-outs," motley enough in appearance, are often much wanting in well-appointed equipages; boxes are frequently innocent of hammercloths; and the horses are generally undersized, and terribly out of proportion with the carriage behind them.

A strong line of demarcation, as might naturally be expected, exists between the emancipated convicts, and their families and descendants (although sometimes these are the richest men in the colony) and the free emigrants and settlers.

"You may often see," says Mrs. Meredith, "a man of immense property, whose wife and daughters dress in the extreme of fashion and finery, rolling home in his gay carriage from his daily avocations with face, hands, and apparel as dirty and slovenly as any common mechanic. And the son of a similar character has been seen with a dozen costly rings on his coarse fingers, and chains, and shirt-pins glistening with gems, buying yet more expensive jewellery, yet without sock or stocking to his feet, the shoes to which his spurs were attached leaving a debatable ground between them and his trousers! Spurs and shoes