One Only.

Named softly as the household name of one

Whom God hath taken.—Browning.

"It is a happy world after all," said Paley, extolling the benevolent design of creation; "the earth, the air, the water teem with delighted existence." A happy world for the young, the healthy, the comfortable—yet not always even for these: and what of the aged, the sick, the wretched the hungry? The earth, the air, the water may teem with delighted existence, but its component parts bite and devour one another, the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain.

Nature, red in tooth and claw,

With ravine, shrieks against our creed.

The young, full of life and hope, find it hard to realise that sorrow and disappointment can ever come to disturb the bright picture of the future they have sketched out for themselves; but as years pass on they come to know that even joy, if it is manly and true, has a plaintive undertone of sadness in it—and that imagination and thought cannot be dissociated from a pensive quiet. Alas! there are many shady places, with little or no sunshine in their gloom; and most of us, at one time or another, find it is so in our experience. The bright side has its attractions for the crowd, yet the dark side cannot be ignored by any one who has eyes to see or a heart to feel. It is the contrasting element of evil that makes the world more fair as well as more sad. I propose to say a word on the melancholy aspect of life—not as exhibited in any of its appalling forms either of war, pestilence or famine, murder or suicide,—not the dark side, like Niobe, all tears; but as it may be met with, perchance, in the home of an acquaintance or neighbour—as we encounter it going out and coming in about our every-day business—a quiet sorrow or very ordinary catastrophe. When Sterne wished to bring home the horrors of captivity to the imagination of the reader, he took the case of a single victim and expatiated on his isolated sufferings. And much after the same fashion, instead of indulging in general statements or strong objurgations on the ills that flesh is heir to, I shall follow Sterne's plan, and select out of the long muster-roll an individual case, by way of illustrating what human life may be to many of those among whom we pass our days.

Here it is:—The sketch of a wife and mother lately gone to her rest—much-needed rest—in the grave. No imaginary portrait; simply a life of much the ordinary weft and woof—and yet, as I think of it, sad enough. It does not matter to my purpose where she died. She was so obscure—so little cared for—that I daresay no notice of her death appeared in any newspaper. Save by her children she will not be missed; and yet it strikes me the world was poorer the day she died. This woman had neither wit, nor large culture, nor beauty—that is to say, not beauty after the approved style, although the love-light in her kindly grey eyes was more than beautiful. Every one can "gush" about the charms of girlhood, but few have a word to say of the attractions of feminine middle age, yet they are very genuine. Not only the sweet, thoughtful ways and motherly care of women of forty, but their unstudied dress—their caps (when caps are worn), and cool, dark gowns are a pleasure to look upon. It was so with my friend; but beyond this sweetness there was little more; she brought no gift of genius or eccentricity into the world with which to make a name for herself. She could sing a simple ballad; and, before the fount of melody was quite dried up within her heart, it was very pleasant to hear her softly warbling "The flowers o' the forest" or "The bonnie hills o' Scotland;" but she knew nothing of what is styled your "high-class music"—she did not play the piano, because no such instrument was within her reach; and she could not reign in a drawing-room. She was only a sweet-voiced, gentle lady, full of womanly affection, eager tenderness, yearning human thoughts, and forgetfulness of self, who had kept her pure childish beliefs unchanged to middle age. Latterly she was sickly, and shabbily clothed; she lived in a tawdry house, with glaring paper on the walls, and torn, dirty matting on the floor; the air she breathed was not the purest; her life partook of want, barely escaping vulgarity; she worked as she was able at a machine, sewing dresses for servants and women in the neighbourhood, who bullied her, perhaps not unreasonably; for to them she was only a poor sempstress, if the truth must be told.

This woman's husband, a coarse-grained rather idle fellow, tried this trade and that, became a politician after his kind, canvassed at municipal and parliamentary elections, and "stumped" at public-house bars. He was not an utterly bad person by any means; he did something for his family, but held page 2 that his wife should do something more. If others remembered how tenderly nurtured she had been as a girl, and that he had flung away the little fortune she brought him, he, at least, never chose to remember it; nor did she. Hers was a large capacity for forgetting and forgiving—for remembering too—for loving and working and suffering. Husband and wife were poor, and she felt it only proper that she should work. And work she did, stopping now and then to give birth to another child to be nursed at the tired breast, and watched and prayed over with the loving devotion she gave to all the others. We are assured there can be no tragedy without crime. I take leave to doubt it. Could anything well be more tragic than the simple sketch I am now attempting to give of this unheeded wife and mother? God help us all in our days of sore need, for the heart only knoweth its own bitterness.

Certain moralists lay it down as an axiom that no woman with love, a husband, and children, need ask for more. Reciprocal love is certainly much; but what if it is woefully one-sided? At all events this woman never did ask for more. The loud-talking politician remained her hero to the last. If [unclear: her] life dried up and withered away, as a tree, tapped of all its juices at the root, might wither and die, she thought it was herself that was to blame. This poor lady was blest, or rather cursed, with as finely, wrought an organisation as any favorite of fortune; both body and mind required companions of [unclear: her] own caste, and that intangible nutriment which Nature and Art give but to few; all which were denied to her. Besides scarce even the strongest woman can furnish bread and butter for a houseful of children, make their clothes, keep their souls pure, and their manners refined; and this lady was not [unclear: strong] in any sense; yet she stitched, and nursed and trained the children, as best she could, with the dirty walls about her and the torn matting under foot, while the crowd of little ones grew shabbier and coarser and more vulgar day by day. She paid no visits—sought no amusement—but toiled on with little of either heart or hope. The sewing-machine meant bread for her children; for herself she cared little. As the last morsel from her mouth would have been given up to any one of them without a thought of sacrifice, so she could have let her heart break in silence to save them from a pang. But the day came when she dropped under her intolerable burden. As she lay on the bed day after day, slowly dying husband and children were loud in sorrow and astonishment. "How had she come by such manifold diseases? Machine-work and want of air? It was incredible." She struggled with her work yet sewed as she lay on her back, and drew her children close to her with a hungry, unsatisfied love in her eyes that they could not understand.

To what future recompence the soul of the gentle lady passed, only He knows who took it hence but I believe that this wild rose grows where, after her sweet sleep, she will awake to a satisfying love-the rose of her youth, blended with that other Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Valley. The [unclear: sense] of a needful immortality is strong—strong and irresistible, it seems to me—in the case of those who have longed for and not fully enjoyed human affection, because springing from that intuitive law [unclear: of] compensation which obtains throughout all humanity.

What was to blame? Not the working for bread and butter; not poverty altogether (although poverty is a sad thing amid plenty); not even an unequal marriage, for since the world began [unclear: Kind] Cophetuas have married beggar girls untitled, and found them excellent wives, as if "to the [unclear: manned] born," and Titanias have rejoiced to worship asinine husbands. It was sympathy, love, the [unclear: lady] needed, and this sympathy and love she did not get. For want of these she pined and died. And it [unclear: is] because there are thousands of over-worked women around us on every side, staring blankly at the unconquerable work, and feeling much as she felt—lives wasted unsympathisingly at noon-day—that have told the story of this wife and mother, and reverently held back her memory, for this brief moment, out of the eternal silence.—W. H.

The Mechanism of Man. By Edward W. Cox. Vol I. The Mechanism. (London: Longman [unclear: Co)]—The fact that the present is the third edition of a work professedly an answer to the question "[unclear: What] am I?" and that the book deals boldly with the most momentous problems in Biology, is sufficient evidence that Serjeant Cox has succeeded in clothing subjects, naturally most abstruse and difficult, in a real popular guise. Elucidating to a very great extent, so far as it can he elucidated, the nature of life-[unclear: germs] we have a most interesting section devoted to a consideration of "How we grow." This is succeeded [unclear: by] a chapter entitled "How we live," which naturally lead? to an exposition of "How we sicken," and finally "How we die." Another section is given to a consideration of "What life is," and in logical sequence all the senses and intellectual faculties are discussed until we arrive at the author's conception of the [unclear: see] of man. This is the most important, and, at the same time, the most valuable portion of the [unclear: present] volume. No doubt many will be greatly startled at some of Mr. Serjeant Cox's notions, but even the [unclear: more] sceptical must, in fairness, admit, that he pleads for his views with much argumentative force, and [unclear: the] his reasoning is throughout scientific and always based on a decided substratum of fact and "admitted evidence." The writing throughout is singularly clear, and the views propounded are practical. We [unclear: are] often reminded of Paley by the vigorous common-sense definitions of Mr. Sergeant Cox, and [unclear: commence] his volume heartily to all those whose "spiritual" convictions have been shaken by the convention infidelity of our scientifiic Materialists. The argument for the entity of the soul is cogent and intelligible and should be studied by everyone who has ever asked the question, "What am I?"

A machine has been invented in Germany for dealing cards. The pack is placed in a sort of box from which only one card can issue at a time, expelled by two wheels, which can be turned by the thumb with considerable rapidity. This apparatus, it is said, completely prevents all kinds of cheating.

Luxurious Bathing.—There is no doubt that the comparative immunity that England enjoys from plagues and scourges that from time to time decimate many of the European and Asiatic countries, is in a great measure owing to the exercise of a firm belief in the matutinal "tub." If we delight in epidermal cleanliness in the winter, much more so may we be said to revel in the luxury experienced in the heat of summer when, in the swimming bath, the river, or, best of all, the sea, we swim like frogs or flounder like porpoises. The work, written and published by Mr. Tuer, is a folio volume bound in vellum and parchment, consisting of a descripttve sketch of bathing in the most luxurious forms, illustrated by folio etchings of various water subjects. In the preface "it is hoped that the first 'shock' caused by the incongruity will be followed by a 'reaction' of pleasure and perhaps approval. Anything which tends to the better health of body and mind must increase the capacity for enjoyment both in nature and art." It is chiefly the indoor bath of which Mr. Tuer's work treats, and he lays particular stress upon what he calls the "soap-bath," maintaining that as the whole cuticle is protected with an oily substance, it is necessary to take off this outermost garment, so to speak, with a good soaping before the desired effects of a proper bath can be secured. The work deserves the admiration of all lovers of the ancient style of typography for which Messrs. Field and Tuer have become distinguished, and which they have adopted in its production, while the etchings of Mr. Sharpe, whose works have adorned the walls of the Black and White Exhibition, Albert Hall, &c., are worthy of praise.

Forthcoming English Works.—Messrs Chapman and Hall have in course of publication a work from the pen of Prof. Tanner, which will be of especial interest at a time like the present, when the difficulties associated with agriculture are claiming so much attention. Under the title of "Jack's Education; or How He Learnt Farming," the value of Government aid in promoting the study of the principles of agriculture, and the advantages which farmers may derive from such knowledge, are described in a very interesting but thoroughly practical manner.——Messrs. Hurst and Blackett will shortly issne "Godwyn's Ordeal," a novel by Mrs. John Kent Spender, in three volumes, and also "Records of a Stormy Life," in three volumes, from the pen of the author of "Recommended to Mercy," and other well-known stories.——A new novel by Mr. Wilkie Collins, entitled "Jezebel's Daughter," will be commenced early next month in the Weekly Irish Times, a Dublin Journal.——Messrs. Cassell Petter and Galpin promise several important works for the coming season. Among them, besides those which we have already announced, are "England; Its People, Policy, and Pursuits," by T. H. S. Escott; "Morocco; Its People and Places," by Edmondo de Aminis, translated by C. Rollin-Tilton; "American Painters," by G. W. Sheldon; "Character Sketches from Dickens," consisting of six facsimile reproductions of drawings by Fred. Barnard; "The International Portrait Gallery," containing portraits in colours; "With the Armies of the Balkans and at Gallipoli in 1877-8," by Lieut-Col. Fife-Cookson; "Animal Life," by Dr. E. Percival Wright; "Natural History of the Ancients," by the Rev. W. Houghton; and "Cassell's History of the Russo-Turkish War."——The same publishers announce the first volume of "The Encyclopaedic Dictionary," by Mr, Robert Hunter; the concluding part of "Picturesque Europe."

The levy of the Russian army for this year is to be increased by nearly a quarter of a million of men. This is significant in an empire which is virtually bankrupt.

A man named William Foot has been sentenced by some Dorchester magistrates to three months' hard labour for sleeping under a hayrick near Portland. The poor man had recently been similarly punished for a like heinous offence against civilized conventionalities! Alas for men's inhumanity.

It is among the special signs of the times that the question of emigration is just now occupying the attention of the industrial classes in England in a manner previously unknown to emigration agents. The South Staffordshire miners, for example, have completed a scheme whereby any miner seeking to emigrate pays in weekly to a fund for equipping emigrants completely, and stands the chance of periodic ballot to draw his "lot" for a new home. The mining classes generally are said to be largely adopting the system, and in Sheffield and other large manufacturing towns, similar plans are being formed. The working classes see in this a double advantage, as the process, if developed, will rapidly lessen their numbers and thus tend to check the present depression in wages.

Not to be Confused.—Professor: "Is the intensity of gravity greater at the poles or the equator? Freshman: "Yes, sir," Professor: "Which?" Freshman: "Greater, sir."

Speaking Photographically.—Her Shakespearian education has been neglected, but when she told him, "There were more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your photography," she smiled proudly as one who had said a good thing, and knew it.

The Decisions of the Privy Council on Ritualism.—The Guardian is informed that a memorial from graduates of the Universities and persons learned in history and archæology will shortly be addressed to the Home Secretary, asking him to advise Her Majesty to take no further judicial action on the ritual reports of the Privy Council until certain historical misstatements, misquotations from and interpolations in important documents shall have been examined by learned men appointed by her Majesty for that purpose, the said reports being avowedly based to a large extent on such alleged misstatements, misquotations, and interpolations. Some eight or ten of these are to be specified—such as the assertion that 1549 was the second year of Edward VI; that the Consecration Prayer was omitted in 1552; that mixing wine and water apart from the service was unknown to East and West; that there are such documents in existence as the Advertisements of 1564; the interpretation of the word "only" in the copies quoted in the reports; the assertion that surplices and alb were not worn "concurrently" according to any known use; the assertion that Bishop Cosin held a visitation in 1687, fifteen years after his death &c. Decisions based on such statements, they will urge, only bring the law into contempt.

Competent authorities calculate the losses to English farmers last season, in cereals [unclear: or] amounted to something between twenty-five and twenty-eight millions sterling. If potatoes and [unclear: he] were added it would be full thirty millions more. As food must be imported and paid for to nearly equivalent sum, such a state of things is simply a national calamity, and amply justifies the fears leading manufacturers as to the prospects of the home trade.

A number of Manchester Fenians have met and "protested" against their excommunication the Roman Catholic Church on account of their belonging to a secret society.

The Dress of the Working Classes.—The Judge at the Warrington County Court [unclear: recent] severely remarked upon the tendency of women to overdress. His Honour had to decide a claim making up a satin dress for the daughter of a pavior. The maker said it was adorned with no fewer [unclear: the] "seventy-two" kiltings in front, that it was covered with difficult work, and that it took her a week complete the dress. The bill was 19s. The mother of the girl for whom it was intended thought charge too much; but the Court said that if parents wanted their children dressed in such a [unclear: many] they must pay for it, and gave a verdict for the plaintiff. The Judge added that dress was one of [unclear: the] crying evils of the day, and he thought that in some respects it was only second to drink.

Beauty of the Lady Arabella.—Those who have known not a happy home, if gifted with [unclear: strong] affections, are apt to form high ideas of domestic joy; to them it seems a very haven of peace, a [unclear: his] brighter than any that ambition can offer, nay, ambition to them is but the path which they hope [unclear: and] lead to the desired goal. They long to love and be loved. That this was the predominant [unclear: sentiment] in the heart of Arabella Stuart there can be little doubt; her keen intellect was, as is usually the [unclear: came] accompanied by ardent and sympathetic feelings. Nature had given her a warm, passionate heart, [unclear: this] thinking for affection as a tropical flower thirsts for sunshine and light, and it is probable that now [unclear: been] those dreams of a romance common to women of her temperament, wherein Love reigns triumphant alone. Her face was one a man might look at too often for his peace of mind. There is a portrait her in the Chatsworth collection, which depicts her a vision of grace and delicacy, oval countenance, [unclear: have] blue eyes, arched eyebrows, a dazzling alabaster skin, with hair of golden chestnut, raised back from forehead, and falling in rich curling waves over her shoulders. She wears a black dress bordered [unclear: with] band of sapphires and diamonds, the bodice is cut in square mediaeval fashion, leaving the front of [unclear: the] bosom bare, which is delicately fair, small, and childlike, Pearls encircle her throat, clasp her tiny [unclear: wrist] and are twisted in her hair, while two pear-shaped pendents droop from her pretty ears. It is a face [unclear: they] would go straight to the hearts of most men, so tender and engaging is the expression of the eyes [unclear: a] lips. Her hands are marvels of beauty; the white taper fingers rest on the silken head of a [unclear: favourite] spaniel, whose pert face is half buried in the folds of her magnificent dress. But none of these advantage had any effect on her destiny. None cared too woo and win her for personal or mental charms, all [unclear: some] her as a political tool to further their own selfish schemes. Divers attempts were made to induce [unclear: Arabs] to become the head of a party inimical to Elizabeth, either by marriage with a noble, or by asserting [unclear: he] claim to the English throne, but Bess of Hardwicke, who still lived carefully guarded her [unclear: granddaughter] from the pitfalls of Jane Grey and her sisters. She was, however, pursued by a legion of adorers, [unclear: he] prospects seeming brilliant to those not behind the scenes. Suitors sought her from north to south; [unclear: the] King of Poland, the Duke of Parma, Henri Quatre himself raved of her blue eyes and rippling hair, would not refuse the Princess Arabella of England," he exclaimed to Sully, "if she were once [unclear: declare] heiress presumptive." So far, however, the lady was fancy free. None could boast the least favour [unclear: for] her hand; "her life was fairer than fair, more beautiful than beauteous, truer than truth itself," [unclear: in] Court where she moved the observed of all observers, for the days of its sovereign were now drawing a close, and few knew the secret of Cecil's correspondence with James.—Temple Bar.

A Remarkable Request.—Mr. J. C. Uhthoff, second house-surgeon at Guy's Hospital, relates [unclear: the] following incident in the Lancet:—"A well-dressed and ladylike female, with a strong French [unclear: access] asked to see me, and requested that the interview might be a private one, as the subject upon which [unclear: of] wished to speak was, to use her own words, a ' delicate' one. A young woman, a relative or friend hers, was entitled to inherit some property if married; but, being single, there was a prospect of [unclear: his] losing it. As no suitable husband seemed likely to appear, she was desirous of finding some 'dying' [unclear: me] of what position it mattered not, to whom she might be formally married and so obtain the [unclear: propers] while at the same time the link might be a slender one, and soon broken. This they had not been [unclear: all] to manage in France, where she lived, and they had accordingly sent over to a London hospital, [unclear: what] they hoped for success. I was requested to find such a dying man suitable for the object. If he [unclear: were] widower and had children, they would make some provision for the children. I need not dwell upon [unclear: the] answer given to such a request. It would be curious to know if the same attempt has been made at [unclear: the] other London hospitals."

The Fast Young Man.—How the fast young man gets his name is a question. I apprehend hints at his spending whatever he has in purse, conscience, or health, with equal folly and [unclear: recklessness] It depends somewhat on his position, how he may show himself, for every rank, to the lowest, can [unclear: behind] of him. You find him as readily in the shop, the warehouse, the office, the chambers, the [unclear: universities] or the schools, as in Mayfair or Blackwall. In every rank he lives for amusement alone, but it is [unclear: always] such as other men shun. As a rule he drinks, or will soon do so, to be like his companions. He [unclear: were] commonly bets, honourably or the reverse, as his pocket is still whole, or runs low. If he has the [unclear: moment] he very probably gambles, and, if he has none, he will rather stand and see others do so than lose [unclear: his] excitement. He is nearly always idle or lazy, though there are strange exceptions in this, as with [unclear: Byrn] who was as industrious as he was loose. But, for the most part, his nights leave no energy for his [unclear: day] His reading is greatly restricted to play-bills, sporting lists, and highly-spiced novels, or the issues Holywell Street; his haunts are the streets, taverns, singing-saloons, and casinos, His thoughts by are what exploits he can organise for the night. His money is lavished on vice and folly, but he [unclear: over] for everything else.—Entering on Life. By Dr. Geikie. (Strahan.)

The Mother and the Wolves.—The subjoined story is extracted from "Dramatic Idylls." We fill up the gaps m quotation by a synopsis of the facts. A winter's morning broke over the pines surrounding a Russian hamlet, where a young carpenter, Ivàn Ivànovitch, was hewing a tree-trunk in front of his cottage door; some of his fellow-villagers were looking on. Suddenly a horse dragging a sledge (with a fainting and half frozen woman crouching at the bottom) rushed from out the forest track into the midst of the group, and then stopped, and dropped down dead from exhaustion. The villagers recognised the woman as the wife of Dmitri, the bosom friend of Ivan Ivànovitch. Dmitri, a month before, had gone out on business with his wife and three young children, to another hamlet in the forest. When the woman was brought to consciousness, this was her story:—Unexpected circumstances had suddenly compelled Dmitri to send home his wife and children in the sledge at night. The good horse Droug needed neither whip nor rein, and the sledge glided for hours through the lonely and silent forest track, lighted by the moonlight reflected by the snow. Suddenly the silence was broken by a sound, which she and Droug tried to believe was the wind, but which the guardian senses of both woman and horse were all he while telling them was the most appalling sound the forest knows:—

Still the low sound,—less low, loud, louder, at a rate
There's no mistaking more! Shall I lean out—look—learn
The truth whatever it be? Pad, pad! At last, I turn—
'Tis the regular pad of the wolves in pursuit of the lives in the sledge!
An army they are: close-packed they press like the thrust of a wedge:
They increase as they hunt: for I see, through the pine-trunks ranged each side,
Slip forth new fiend and fiend, make wider and still more wide
The four-footed steady advance. The foremost—none may pass:
They are elders and lead the line, eye and eye—green-glowing brass!
But a long way distant still. Droug save us! He does his best:
Yet they gain on us, gain, till they reach,—one reaches . . . . How utter the rest?

The leader of the pack (such was the woman's story) on getting up to the sledge seized one of the children. The entire pack stopped, after the custom of wolves, to devour it, while Droug tore along with the sledge. On the pursuit being renewed after the dreadful meal, a second child was torn from the mother, and devoured in the same way. When the pursuit was renewed the third time, the wolves (so the mother declared) actually snatched the infant from her breast, and she was spared to reach home alone. During the progress of the woman's story, the ghastly truth had become more and more apparent to the bystanders that, to save her own life, the wretched mother had thrown one child after another to the wolves, and so escaped.

Down she sank. Solemnly
Ivàn rose, raised his axe,—for fitly as she knelt,
Her head lay: well-apart, each side, her arms hung,—dealt
Lightning-swift thunder-strong one blow—no need of more!
Headless she knelt on still: that pine was sound at core
(Neighbours were used to say)—cast-iron-kerneled—which
Taxed for a second stroke Ivàn Iuànovitch.
The man was scant of words as strokes. "It had to be:
I could no other: God it was bade ' Act for me!'"

Ivàn Ivànovitch is tried before the Pomeschik of the village for murder, and convicted, while this Russian mother's crime is decided to be justifiable homicide. But this conviction is reversed by the village Stàrosta, who decides that in a mother's caae her children's lives should be "sweeter" still.

A Romantic Marriage.—Prince Henry XX. of Reuss, who belongs to the Köstritz branch of the family and wae born in 1852, lately landed on the island of Heligoland, bringing with him his betrothed, Madame Clotilde Loissel, whose maiden name was Roux. The lady, who had lost her first husband some time ago, has achieved her reputation or notoriety in Germany as a bold steeple-chase rider in Reux's Circus. She was accompanied by three female relatives and by her father, M. Roux. Prince Henry and his betrothed swore before the Heligoland police-magistrate that there was no lawful impediment to their marriage, and thereupon the pair received from the Governor of the island the so-called King's letter, authorising the marriage, and subsequently the wedding ceremony was performed at church. The newly-married couple, it is added, intend to spend the honeymoon on the island, which is at present full of visitors who have come to enjoy the sea bathing.

The Duke of Somerset said at a recent meeting in England:—" In the study of politics he would give them one hint: When they read the speeches made by different members of the Conservative party, they should look at the speeches of the leaders, because that party was led by those at its head; but when they wanted to know what .the Liberal party was about, they should look at the speeches of some of the followers, because, as Lord Beaconsfield said, the Liberal party was very apt, like a fish, to be propelled by its tail."