No more, my heart! oh! never more
Canst thou those joyous days renew,
When life the form of pleasure wore,

And hope shone smiling on my view!

The cup of joy, dash'd from my lip,
Has fallen untasted; from my grasp
My promis'd hopes elusive slip,

And empty air alone I clasp.
Hopeless, companionless, forlorn,
A lonely thing I wander now;
No heart to cheer me when I mourn,
No hand to bind my aching brow!

Sweet smiles the earth, and sweet the skies,

But, ah! they smile for me no more; For I have done with worldly joys,

And wish my term of life were o'er !

But I will cease my idle moan,

And sternly mock at joy or woe; I'll tread my destin'd path alone, And hopes and loves I will not know. One only pleasure now remains

That I in this dark world can share To soothe the weary mourner's pains, And cheer the heart oppress'd with

care!

I feel deeply grateful for your kind, sympathetic commiseration; but I entreat you never, in your intercourse with me, personally or otherwise, to mention, or in any way allude to what I have here related. You need not attempt to advise me against indulging melancholy and grief; I know all that your kindness would urge upon the subject; I can easily conceive your reasons-but all reasoning would be completely in vain. These feelings of grief and lonely sadness are now become familiar to me; they are, as it were, identified with my soul, and form a part of its constitution. To lay them aside would be attended with more pain than to indulge them. They are all that remain to me of former days, and the only solace of those that now drag wearily along. My fate is fixed, and I need not vainly repine. That yours may be blessed with brighter enjoyments, I most ardently wish. Farewell.

H. M.

ONE of the noblest prospects in France opens on the view as the traveller, advancing from the north, attains the summit of that ridge of the Jura which overlooks the plain of Lyons. Behind, the vine-clad hills and rich champaign of Burgundy extend their varied charms of landscape. In front mingle, in agreeable succession, along the gentler and nearer slopes, cottages, orchards, vineyards, and corn-fields; while on the remoter and less accessible steeps, hanging woods lend a bolder feature to the softness of cultivated Nature,

num, appears its modern representa tive, with white buildings, and lofty, but narrow streets, gleaming through the distance, in diminished, yet improved perspective. Far on the verge of the horizon, in shadowy hues, rising like the fantastic shapes of evening clouds, are descried the distant Alps,

"Disabitati, e d'ombre oscuri e neri."

No two objects of the same kind, and in so close vicinity, ever presented a more striking contrast than the rivers Rhone and Saone, before their union at Lyons. The latter—the Arar of Cæsar-glides away, as described by the conqueror of Gaul, with a motion so gentle," that it leaves the eye uncertain in what direction the current flows." On the contrary, "the rapid Rhone," already a very broad and noble stream, pours its majestic tide with such impetuosity, that, after joining its lagging consort, boats proceeding from Lyons to Avignon, and carried along by the

current only, accomplish this passage, of 150 miles, in twenty-four hours

The economy of these trading boats, as I had an opportunity of examining it, further up the Rhone, on the route to Geneva, is curious. They are of various dimensions, from thirty to eighty or ninety feet long-flat bottomed, without any keel-very wide in the beam-shallow, and slightly tapering towards both extremities, which are square, and, from the curvature of the form, rise very considerably above the surface of the stream. At each end is a long and heavy oar, or rudder, serving for the purpose, not of rowing, but of keeping the bark in the middle of the current, and in order to prevent it from being whirled round, or dashed against the banks. This, from the rapidity of the stream, must be an employment often of hazard, and always of labour; yet women, as frequently as the more robust sex, are seen thus engaged. These boats are constructed of fir, chesnut, or oak, and even in the largest, not a single iron bolt is to be found. The frame-work, rude, but strong, is held together by pins of oak, over which is fixed, by the same means, a thin sheathing of fir, or chesnut deal. This external covering is not made to lap over, according to the regular mode of boat-building; but the different pieces are put edge to edge; nor is any solicitude shewn to render the joints close, which are merely rough hewn with the axe, and bevelled outwards. When the whole fabric is thus finished, the interstices are stuffed, or, if the expression may be allowed, the seams caulked with moss; over which a split of oak, of the thickness of an ordinary hoop, is fixed by small clasps of iron, flat in the middle, and sharpened at both ends. These being driven into the opposite sides of the joint, are bent over the hoop and

stuffing, rendering the whole firm, and perfectly water-tight.

In barks so inartificially constructed, the inhabitants of these parts encounter the fearful rapidity of the Rhone, carrying the produce of the country-grain, wine, raw silk, wool, and honey-to Lyons, to Avignon, and even to the Mediterranean. The boat is generally disposed of at the place where the cargo is discharged. When the neighbouring proprietors, therefore, or villages of a district, have collected the surplus of their annual produce, they build one of these boats, in which the united stock is sent to market, under care of the most experienced, or deepest interested of the joint owners.

Besides the beauty of its situation, the amenity of its climate, and the general urbanity of its citizens,-recommendations which rather point it out as an agreeable place of permanent residence,-Lyons presents little to interest the passing stranger. The Museum contains a large and curious assemblage of Roman antiquities, discovered chiefly in the vicinity, as also a collection of pictures, the best of which were the gift of Napoleon. The Hotel de Ville is a large, but inelegant structure, and only remarkable as associated with the sanguinary events of the Revolution, not one of the least evils of which, to Lyons, was the destruction of numerous monuments of early French art, principally in bronze f. The Hospital d'Antiquaille, formerly, till converted to the present more useful purpose, the seat of a monastic institution, is really a noble establishment, capable of receiving 600 patients; and in its internal arrangements exhibits a regularity, neatness, and comfort, highly pleasing to a benevolent mind.

This is a general asylum for every species of malady; and accordingly the same edifice, perhaps not judi

ciously, contains within itself several distinct hospitals. On visiting that appropriated to lunatics, the appearance of one of the cells particularly struck me; round the walls were inscribed, in charcoal, various passages from the Greek and Roman classics-from the best French writers and also from several of the Italian poets. In a corner of this interesting chamber, the poor inmate was discovered, seated on the bed. He rose as we entered, appearing to be about five and thirty, or perhaps forty; pale and emaciated, but with a countenance which had formerly been handsome, and was even now pleasing, though the expression, to a certain degree, was rendered haggard by the squalidness inseparable from long confinement. A momentary wildness, a rapid unsettling of the eye, were the only indications of mental alienation-effects, however, so evanescent, that they would have escaped notice in one at liberty, and not suspected of labouring under that most fearful of all calamities. Observing my attention arrested by the inscriptions, he seemed gratified, and a feeble smile played for an instant over his pallid features,

"Like moon-light on a marble statue."

It was a smile of conscious triumph, which would have said, "I was not always thus," but the suffusion had fled before it could well be marked! Courteously advancing, he addressed me with an introductory line from a well-known passage in the Æneid ; then paused, as if he waited my reply in that which followed; apparently employing this little artifice, in order to ascertain whether I understood the Latin poet. Satisfied in this particular, he was seemingly much gratified, and continued to converse in that language, which he spoke with tolerable correctness and fluency. Nothing for some time happened, that, to the most attentive observer, could indicate

length the word Libertas occurring in some remark of mine, discovered the latent wound. The human mind, in a state of mild insanity, often presents a striking resemblance to a finely-tuned instrument, of which one chord only is relaxed; in the latter, though the full series of notes remain incomplete, yet, if touched by a delicate and skilful hand, it will, to a certain extent, still "discourse sweet music;" but if these bounds be passed, all harmony is destroyed, and jarring discord succeeds. Thus the poor sufferer enjoys frequent intervals; yet, amid the calmness and collectedness of apparent serenity, a look, a word, is sufficient to awaken those recollections which darken and unhinge the spirit. The effect was instantaneous on the unhappy being at Lyons. Forgetting, in the eager ness of declamation, the idiom which he had hitherto employed, or finding more ready utterance in his native tongue-La Liberté-c'est un motun songe-elle existe peutêtre dans l'idée-mais la realité, où trouvera ton?

-une notion qui perd les hommes! La Libertè!-again exclaimed he, with a wild and demoniacal laugh, casting a hurried glance towards the half-open door, outside of which stood the keeper, and baring at the same time his wrist, on which were still visible, though not recent, the gallings of irons; then pausing, he added in thrilling accents,-En voilà les and pointing to the grated window, fruits!-Allez-vous pouvez-moi!— threw himself in reckless despair on the bed. I could bear it no longer. The result of my inquiries respecting the previous fortunes of one who had so deeply interested me, was, that he had been regarded as a man of great talent, and had been employed in a civil capacity under the imperial administration of France. Being dismissed, with some appearance of harshness, on the present dynasty coming into power, he had supported himself by his pen. He had expressed in his writings sentiments too free, or perhaps too true. He was thrown into prison. During this confinement, his wife died of a broken heart, and her's was soon followed by the death of an only child. The poor man's reason sunk under these

The most distant of these vallies, to which my little excursion extended, surpassed all others in magnificence and loveliness. The uplands, where too steep for culture, were crowned with fine trees;-here thin and scattered, shewing between their tall grey stems the most luxuriant herbage, on which sheep were browsing;-there, closely planted and umbrageous, they shed a delicious coolness. Along the bottom, and irregularly indenting the acclivities, were stretched out, in every variety of shape, patches of the richest cultivation; while a stream of considerable magnitude, pursuing its devious course through these scenes of beauty, by its sound and motion, diffused over the whole an ever-varying charm. Far up the vale, on the summit of a rocky promontory, round whose base swept the stream in dark eddies, stood the ruins of what had once been a feudal mansion. Though of no great extent, and, as usual, very irregular in its plan, yet the high and pointed gables and turreted battlements, the massive walls and corner towers, aided by the commanding situation, gave an air of lofty grandeur to the pile. Behind the castle, extending backwards from the stream, was a level tract of considerable extent, gradually subsiding from the slope of the valley. On the nearer portion of this little plain might still be traced the remains of a garden, its long stone terraces and flights of steps being partly removed, and partly visible among the long withered grass, while all around

"Was clothed in living emerald." In nearly an opposite direction flowed the stream, with the violence of a torrent, being confined in a narrow channel by lofty and precipitous banks. Across this gulf, considerably above the castle, there appeared to have been a bridge, of which a rude

pillar still remained on a mass of rock, rising to some height from the middle of the current. By this means the opposite sides were united, as will appear in the sequel, by a wooden platform.

I had lingered long amid these scenes, and the shades of evening were approaching before an opportunity occurred of making any inquiry respecting their former history. Meeting at length with one whose appearance bespoke the easy circumstances of the small proprietaire, I began to question him on this subject. His information, however, extended no farther, than that the castle and its demains had originally belonged to the family de Monthillier, but were now the property of a nobleman who resided in a distant part of the country. To this account a request was added, couched in the politest terms, such as in France frequently surprises the traveller as above the rank of the speaker, "that Monsieur would honour his humble cottage and plain supper, in which case his niece, Augustine, a very good girl, et qui avoit du sentiment, would doubtless have much pleasure in relating to Monsieur the history of the last baron." The invitation was too agreeable, and too kindly offered, to be refused. On arriving at a large and substantial cottage, the old man led the way into a very neat apartment-the floor of shining tiles, scrupulously cleanthe walls coarsely but not inelegantly painted in arabesques, to imitate paper-hangings-the bed, the principal ornament, white as snow, and the pillows edged with lace. Augustine soon made her appearance, with a supper of bread, milk, and grapes. Augustine was in truth deserving of the praises bestowed by her uncle. She was very pretty, and with that frank and lively naiveté of manner which so peculiarly distinguishes her