"If you make the least signal, Measly Mott, you are a dead man. This is the fruit of your contrivance, Ezekiel Varnham. You knew I was coming here to-day," added the merchant, with a reproachful and furious look at his attorney.

The constable trembled from head to foot. "For God's sake, Mr. Manesty," said he, "don't go for to harm me! Consider my wife and her three beauteous babbies at home!"-an appeal which Measly Mott was in the habit of making on all occasions.

"Open that closet, Varnham," said the merchant. "Quick, manquick!"

Varnham could not choose but obey; and Manesty pushed Mott towards the recess, the man faintly ejaculating, "Here's a go! assault and battery, and false imprisonment, and a compounding of felony, Mr. Varnham!"

Measly's further eloquence was stifled, by his being jammed and bolted into the narrow enclosure. All this was accomplished in little more than a minute, when Manesty, springing through the window, gained the stable-yard at the rear, found his mare, vaulted into the saddle, and galloped off as fleetly as if he had been mounted on the back of a race-horse.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE MEETING AT WAVERTREE.-WHAT HAPPENED THEN AND THERE.

HAVING exchanged a few words with Lord Silverstick, Hugh repaired to his own room, where he found Captain Brooksbank.

"Pray be seated, sir," said Hugh; "You come, I believe, from Colonel Stanley."

"I do, sir," replied Brooksbank.

"I can guess the purport of your visit," rejoined Hugh; " and you will oblige me by coming to the point at once."

"In one word, then," said Brooksbank," the colonel demands from you either an unqualified apology, or a meeting at Wavertree, within an hour from the present time; and I am further to intimate, that if you elect the latter alternative, no apology will be received on the ground." Hugh's blood boiled in his veins, but he suppressed any manifestation of resentment, saying, calmly

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Apology, Captain Brooksbank, is quite out of the question. I will meet the colonel."

"But," pursued Brooksbank, " I trust I need not point out to you. the consequences of any other

"I know what you are about to say," interrupted Hugh. "Spare yourself the trouble of speaking, and me the mortification of hearing. Colonel Stanley may rest fully assured I shall not fail him."

"Favour me with your friend's name," said Brooksbank.

"The Earl of Silverstick," replied Hugh, to the evident surprise of Stanley's second. "You will not have to seek him, because, anticipating a message from the colonel, his lordship has been so polite as to accompany me here. Permit me to bring him to you now?"

Hugh left the room, returning immediately with the earl, whom he introduced to Captain Brooksbank. After his lordship had made his most graceful salutations, Hugh left him and the captain together.

Their conference, however, was but short, for in less than ten minutes Lord Silverstick rejoined his young friend, telling him he had stipulated that pistols, not swords, should be the weapons used.

"Have you any affairs of pressing moment to arrange?” asked the earl.

"None," replied Hugh.

6

"That is well," returned Lord Silverstick. "A wise man should always be fully prepared for any and every emergency, as I see you are; and nothing ensures this but method. My Lord Chesterfield insisted strongly on the virtue of method. 'Nothing,' says he, contributes more to dispatch than method. Lay down a method for everything, and stick to it inviolably.' Now I never could impress this on my son, Randy. But you, my dear young friend, are instinctively a gentleman-a gentleman nascitur, non fit; whereas twenty Lord Chesterfields could not have qualified for that appellation such a character as Colonel Stanley. I protest I have an excessive dislike to a man who cannot be brought to apprehend 'the graces, the air, address, politeness, and, in short, the whole tournure and agrémens of a man of fashion. So many little things conspire to form that tournure, that though separately they seem too insignificant to mention, yet, aggregately

"Pardon me, my lord," said Hugh, interrupting the earl, who was gradually getting involved in the metaphysics of Chesterfield and la mode; but time is fast slipping away, and though I have no affairs to arrange, yet, should I fall, perhaps your lordship will not object to be the bearer of a message from me to Miss Stanley, especially as I have given her reason to suppose that all hostilities were at an end between me and her cousin."

"I trust my agency will not be required," said Lord Silverstick; "but, in any case, I will fulfil your wishes."

"Tell her, then," pursued young Manesty," that I was forced into the field. Convince her that I had no choice."

"Nothing more?"

Nothing, my lord, except that my last thoughts rested on her." "I trust that happiness is yet in store for you both," said the goodnatured nobleman. "In the affair now on your hands, firmness is everything, and I see you are firm. Stanley is irascible, and that is a disadvantage. His second, too, seems rash. But, depend on it, nothing shall be done contre les règles. It is time to think of moving. Come. Where are your pistols?"

Hugh handed him the case, and Lord Silverstick inspected its contents. "London-made, I perceive," said he; "and, I protest, in very pretty condition. Come," he added, "we shall be able to drive deliberately to Wavertree. A gentleman should never be in a hurry. My Lord Chesterfield is precise on that point; and it is better to be too early than too late, especially on such an occasion as this."

The carriage was ordered. Lord Silverstick and young Manesty entered it, and proceeded towards Wavertree. Hugh, this time, was first on the ground; but he had not long to wait, as Colonel Stanley and his friend soon appeared. The earl, with a ceremonious bow to Brooksbank, drew him aside, and they conversed for a couple of minutes.

"I think," said Lord Silverstick," as the moon is high, and gives

a pretty equal light, and as the ground appears to be quite level, one position is as good as another."

"Precisely so, my lord," returned Brooksbank.

to do but measure the distance and place our men."

"We have nothing

"Nothing more," assented the earl. "Promptitude is a great excellence."

A pistol was handed to each of the principals, who, at the distance of twelve paces, stood, erect and calm, over against each other, waiting for the word, which Captain Brooksbank was on the point of giving in military style, when the quick tramping of hoofs was heard, and a man on horseback darted into the midst of the group, and, dismounting, stood between Stanley and the young merchant.

"Desist!" vociferated he, in a commanding tone. "Neither of you shall fire at the other, or the ball shall pass first through my body. Oh, Hugh," he added, "I have sought you all day-I have traced you to the Liverpool Arms, and there heard something which convinced me you had come here on this mad purpose. But I have arrived in time. You shall not fight this Stanley. Give me your pistol."

"Mr. Manesty," said the young man, in a low voice, leave the ground, I beseech you. I can take care of my own honour, which such an act as this, on your part, will injure for ever. Leave the ground; this affair with Colonel Stanley shall go on."

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"It shall not, I say," roared Manesty. Consider, dear Hugh, I have now no object to bind me to the world but you. And shall I see your life put in jeopardy on a mere punctilio? You will never behold me again after this night. I have much to say to you. Give over this encounter, or I shall do some deed of desperation."

And pray who may you be, sir?" asked Captain Brooksbank, stepping forward.

Manesty bent a stern brow on his interrogator. "I answer no impertinent questions," said he. "Suffice it, that I am a man who will not be bullied. You will find it dangerous to meddle with me." Then, turning to the earl, who by this time had come close to the other second, he added-"Lord Silverstick, I know you; and I ask if you consider it worthy of your years and station in life to abet these foolish and deadly brawls? If your friend there, Colonel Stanley, should be maimed for life, he'll be apt to think, that with a little less folly on your part, you might have taken care of his limbs and of his honour at the same time."

"You are pleased to be satirical, sir," returned Lord Silverstick, with a bow. "But give me leave to say, that you are in error in supposing Colonel Stanley to be my friend. I come here as the friend of Mr. Hugh Manesty."

"Indeed!" ejaculated Manesty. "As his friend, then, do you desire this affair to go on?"

"Most assuredly," replied the earl, "unless my principal should receive an apology, which is not in the least probable. You must permit me, sir, to add, that I consider your interference most irregular, and contrary to the rules prescribed in the code of honour. Pray do me the favour to stand aside."

"Idiot!" muttered Manesty. Then advancing to the colonel, he said, "George Stanley, will nothing satisfy you but taking this young man's life, or meeting your own death at his hands?"

"You will not succeed in inter

"Nothing," replied the duellist. rupting us. Provoke me not, John Manesty, or you may rue it. What! are we to have whining morality from the lips of a pirate and a murderer? Where was your morality when the sailor was drowned by your deed? Here, Brooksbank, help me to bind this fellow neck and heels to

Manesty did not pause for the conclusion of Stanley's threat. "Scoundrel, black-leg, madman!" shouted he. "Thou wilt make me guilty of more blood. Thy death be on thine own head!" Drawing forth a pistol, Manesty fired, and Stanley fell mortally wounded.

The suddenness of this desperate act struck a momentary panic into the whole party, during which Manesty armed himself with a second pistol, saying, as he cocked it, "Let no man, as he loves his life, venture to lay hands on me."

He then, in a voice not to be heard by the others, told Hugh where he might find him, and supplicated the young man to come to him at night. "I must now," added he, "fly from this place."

The words had no sooner escaped him than a tumult of voices swelled on the wind, among which the most audible was that of Oliver Oglethorpe.

"Come on, my men!" bawled he. "We've caught him at last. There he is. I see him. Mr. Hibblethwaite, secure the horse, while I tackle the man. Quick-quick!"

"Say you so?" ejaculated Manesty. Vaulting into the saddle, and putting spurs to his mare, he flew away like the wind.

LIFE AND POETRY OF SAPHO,

WITH SCENES FROM THE DRAMA OF GRILLPARZER.

BY T. ROSCOE.

"Grillparzer is grand, antique. The tragedy of Sapho is superb and sublime; there is no denying it. The man has done a great thing in writing that play. And who is he? I know him not; but ages will. "Tis a high intellect."

LORD BYRON.

THERE can be no surer test of surpassing excellence in art than the voice of common fame. When a name has become "familiar in men's mouths as household words," and been transmitted to successive ages and the most distant lands, it seems to come to us invested with the halo of immortality. It has been emphatically so with the name of Sapho; the Greeks' "Tenth Muse," of whom the most celebrated writers of antiquity, even her rivals, spoke only in terms of rapture. The most severe and impartial critics, with Longinus himself, do not scruple to hold up her works as perfect models of their kind, fragments only of which, like the proportions of the Venus de' Medici, still suffice to rekindle admiration and regret. Keenly sensitive and ardent, love and passion were the elements of her nature, and seemed to leave her genius no choice. Hence the peculiar fire and tenderness which gave that genius so supreme a command over a refined and imaginative people, and made them worship truth and beauty at the altar of woman's passion-a deity quite as influential as the more sapient one, to whom they attributed a tutelary power.

Sapho painted love as she felt it; and hence her resistless power

"They best can paint it who have felt it most,"

her tenderness and her transports-her perfection, in short, of the sentiments and language of the passion-achieved for her the highest point of erotic fame on the same proud eminence with the few great master-spirits of Greece. A congenial destiny was also hers-she was persecuted-envy and malice prepared her funereal urn, and betrayed, deserted, she perished, a victim of the embodied passion which consumed her. It was in harmony with such a fate, that Mitylene, the queenly head of Lesbos, should have given her birth. Her mother's uame was Cleis; that of her father, Scamandronymus. She had three brothers Larichus, recorded in her poems; Eurigius, of whom we hear nothing; and Charaxus, whom she reproaches for his excessive devotion to the courtezan Rhodope, the same who raised a pyramid out of the prodigal presents of her innumerable lovers.

Sapho, we may add, for the gratification of all dark beauties, was a decided brunette, of middle height; her features could not boast that symmetric beauty and regularity peculiar to the Greeks; but they had a vivacity, sweetness, and fascination, when lit up by the fire of genius and a passion-beaming eye, that bore the palm above her more exactly-featured rivals. Her greatest eulogists admit such a defect, if it be one; and there are some antique heads we have seen that seem to confirm their honesty. But the soul of genius-the passion-the source of her brilliant fame are there; that divine energy which may be called the essence of all beauty-beaming ineffable love. This was the sentiment which filled her heart and life, as it inspired her muse. Disposed of young in marriage to Cercola, one of the wealthiest Greeks of Andros, she had by him a daughter, named Cleis; but an early widowhood exposed her to all the new temptations of youth and liberty, rendered more seductive by a warm poetic temperament. Soon the fame of her first verses, marked by the same magic charm of grace, originality, and impetuosity of soul, drew the eyes of her contemporaries, which the fascination of her manners, and her participation in public pleasures and spectacles, riveted upon her. She was invited, and entered the lists for the palm of fame with the most popular poets of the day. She at first disarmed envy by the dazzling brilliancy, and distanced it by the rapidity, of her poetic career. The most distinguished women became her pupils; and more than one disputed with her the glory of contending against the Grecian laureats of their time. The greatest beauties became peculiarly distinguished as the friends or pupils of Sapho. IIer admirers, at first a small circle, became a whole people; and Archilochus, Alcæus, and Hipponax, the favourite Olympians, began to tremble for their pride of place. The object of homage from both sexes, Sapho's young widowed hours were the happiest to an aspiring and high-souled ambition-combining all that was best of pleasure, admiration, and gratified genius that can be conceived. But they were too short; and to render the change more poignant, the first shaft which reached her was aimed by a man's hand. Women are sufficiently jealous of each other's reputation, of whatever kind; yet men turn upon them, like their natural enemies, the moment they dare to assume an intellectual position, equal or independent. Nothing short of this manly persecution seems to awaken them to a sense of com