The rough seaman looked upon him as a being cast in another mould from himself. His brilliant complexion, his clear ruddy cheeks, and the soul-informed expression of his countenance, puzzled the tars amazingly; and yet, with all these rare endowments, Harry had not the least appearance of effeminacy. His laugh was hearty and loud, and his bearing bold and frank. Jem Styles, the captain of the forecastle of the larboard watch, once broke out in the following ejaculation, when he saw Harry Latimer looking down from the foretop-mast rigging.

"Eyes! " said Jem, "now, shipmates, I knows what the words in the song means, when it says,

the Mohawk could not go comfortably without his handsome pet, Henry; so they pushed off from the brig together about ten o'clock at night in very dreadful weather. They were in the gig. The angry gale swept along the bay, and the waves trembled over each other, like breathing monsters in clumsy play. The lightning mocked the pale blaze of the illuminated town, whilst the echoes of the thunder bounded along the waters, and rattled with horrible dissonance among the roofs of the houses.

The close-reefed lug was set, and the lee oars carefully pulled, and yet, with the most scientific seamanship, it seemed hardly possible to fetch the landing-place, at that time only a small wooden jetty. If they did not,

"There's a sweet little cherub that's stuck up as the tide was galloping down the Channel,

aloft,"

for there it is, sure enough."

Now these halcyon days (halcyon is a pretty word, and, as the boatswain assures me, derived from halyards) were soon to be overclouded, and to close upon poor Henry with mental and physical darkness. The captain never felt himself comfortable ashore without Harry. The youth's stipend being liberal, and the captain having private directions always to keep him well supplied in the articles of dress, he was as much pet. ted by the ladies on shore, as he was by his shipmates on board. Invitations were constant whilst the ship was at anchor, and many a good dinner did the hard-a-weather captain attack, for the sake of his entertainers possessing, for a few hours, that "little love of a midshipman."

instead of dancing at the ball, a more boisterous dance awaited them with the demons of the storm, and the fearful ball would assuredly have been opened with a gallopade through the Race of Portland.

Nestled and well cloaked, and hugged up to the side of the tough skipper, sat Henry in the stern-sheets of the gig, whilst the slight and fragile boat actually leaped from wave to wave. The rain fell in a manner as if it strove to quell the rebellion of the sea, whilst the lightning quivered around them, making every object instantaneously brilliant with its blue and livid light. They were now within a short quarter of a mile of the shore, when a ball of vivid fire descended almost perpendicularly over the boat, and, when apparently above it but one hundred yards, it exploded like a shell, and forked and How truly has it been said, that our ac-arrowy flashes streamed from it in every complishments, and even our virtues, some-direction. The instant crash of thunder times turn traitors to us, and seduce us to our was stunning. ruin. Henry Latimer proved, to a dreadful extent, the truth of the observation. On the 4th of June, 1809, he had nearly attained his fifteenth birthday. As a preliminary to his "Nonsense, my dear boy," said the kindoverwhelming misfortune, he received a let-hearted captain; "you will see directly. I ter from the lawyer's office in the King's Bench Walk, that his old friend, Mr. Sotheby, had departed this life, and that the writer, a perfect stranger to Henry, had succeeded him in his multifarious business, and that the future bills that the young midshipman might have to draw were to be directed to him. The letter also mentioned that Mr. Sotheby had left him a considerable sum of money, which his informant acquainted him had been invested, conformably to the orders of his guardian, with Latimer's other property, in the Consols.

This event, little as it would appear to influence our hero's happiness, had, however, a great effect in aggravating his approaching misery.

On this inauspicious 4th of June, his Majesty, George III., still held a palace at Weymouth, and, on the birth-day of the sovereign, a ball there was given to all the officers, naval as well as military, that happened to be in the vicinity. Of course, all the principal inhabitants, and the civil authorities, were present. Captain Lilton of

"I am blinded," said Henry, trembling through every limb, and pressing his hand upon his agonized eye-balls.

am myself dazzled."

"I cannot see now," said the youth, removing his hand from his eyes; "I shall never see again."

"Come, Harry, don't alarm yourself, and frighten me to death-hold up your headdon't you now see the illuminations?"

"Thank God-thank God! I believe I do; but very dimly-but very imperfectly. Yes, they are plainer now, but my eyes ache and smart terribly."

"Cheer up! A glass of grog, and all will be well and see-we have got the jetty well on the lee-beam-we shall not be driven to sea to-night. Hurrah for the ball!"

And the landing-place was fetched, and the gig safely beached and drawn up high and dry, and the grog drunk, and the dress re-adjusted, and to the ball the captain and the midshipman went. That night Henry's large hazel eyes were observed to be unusually brilliant, and wildly restless. With this entertainment we have but little to do. It was enjoyed by the young reefer with all the zest of youthful and physical

excitement. The company separated at four o'clock, the sun then being several degrees above the horizon. The storm of the previous night had settled into a strong and steady gale, dead upon the shore. The brig was riding in the offing, with two cables on end, and all idea of getting on board of her until the gale should have moderated was necessarily abandoned.

Youth loves not sleep, excepting it be in a middle watch-at least midshipman youth. And yet sleep, like death, though it may be sometimes defrauded, will at last conquer. Henry strolled forth among the fields of newly-mown hay, and being at length fairly borne down by fatigue, threw himself upon a haycock, reeking with its own natural moisture, and the deluge of rain of the preceding night. Thus lying sheltered from the gale, with the burning sun of June above him, he slept till past mid-day.

By this time the gale had abated, and the Coxswain having discovered Henry's al fresco couch, aroused him by telling him that the captain was waiting for him to go on

board.

When the poor youth unclosed his eyes, the light of heaven was too much for them. At every attempt to look about him, the scalding tears overflowed his bloodshot orbs, and blistered his ruddy cheeks. He was led to the gig, and no sooner were they on board than it was "All hands up anchor," and away they went for the Mohawk's cruising ground.

preservation of the health of nearly one
hundred persons was entrusted.
As an
oculist, he was totally ignorant.
So great
was the paucity of men of talent and science
in the medical profession in the height of
the war. But the man was honest, and said
at once that he did not know what treatment
to adopt to meet a case so alarming as that of
Henry's eyes.

Such was the case on board the Mohawk. Rapidly, and with excruciating pains, was inflammation followed by absolute blindness to the eyes of poor little Harry Latimer. Not a soul in the little vessel but would have forfeited a year's pay and a week's grog to have relieved the poor boy; yet no one for a moment thought of saying to him, "Go for relief to the ignorant surgeon."

And the honest old captain, what did he do? In the fulness of his kindness he did the very worst thing possible. He loved him and pitied him with an intensity that continually brought the unwonted tears into his eyes; and as, with his large and tanned forefinger he rubbed them off his russet brown cheek, he would look at the damp digit, and shaking his head sorrowfully exclaim, "D-n the boy, he's making a fool of old Lilton at last. Never mind, I'll hang that villain of a 'pothecary; so there's some comfort left yet."

Of course, in Henry's affliction, he was domesticated in the cabin. The captain abandoned to him his own cot, and had a hammock slung for himself. They ate toNow, there were at this time some seven gether, and sorry am I to say, they also or eight French line-of-battle ships blockad-drank together. After supper, old Lilton, ed in Cherbourg by five or six English ves- conscious only that he heard the sweet voice sels of the same description. Frigates and of the boy, forgot that the poor fellow could small craft on the part of the enemy were no longer see, and that a course of half-andnever taken into the account. Jack looked half brandy grog was not the best medical upon capturing them as a matter of course. treatment for an acute inflanimation of the When the pièces de resistance, as the gastro- eyes. nomes call them, struck, the entremets followed in the natural order of things.

It was the duty of the Mohawk, at nightfall, when the squadron stood off, to stand in, and remain as near to the harbour's mouth as was consistent with the safety of the vessel, so that at daybreak the little craft was often found bobbing under the guns of Fort Pelée.

The patience and endurance of bravado by that monster fort was remarkable. We must suppose that, like the stork in the fable, which would not open its beak for so small a matter as a minnow, Pelée never condescended to open her batteries upon so insignificant a thing as a look-out sixteen gun brig, which made the said brig look in the harbour the fort was placed to protect, the more pryingly and the more impudently.

We have now arrived at a point in our little history which we scarcely know how to handle so as to procure for ourselves credence. The surgeon on board the small vessel was so little versed in general professional knowledge, that any discreet barber could have more successfully undertaken a common case than this person, to whom the

At length the poor little lad's once brilliant blue orbs became reticulated with a close net-work of bloodshot veins, the larger vessels being distinctly marked by nobs of angry red, and the pupil of the eyes became dull and clouded. Nothing now was dis tinguishable to him but the difference be tween light and darkness, and scarcely that. When he held up his hand between the sun and his blighted vision, the shadowy outline of his fingers was barely visible, magnified enormously, and seen as it were through the thickest of conceivable fogs. The pain also became daily more intolerable.

Old Lilton, who could not conceive that in a subject so healthy and so young, this state of things would not mend, fed himself with a false hope, and procrastinated.

At length, Henry himself began to seriously ponder upon the misery of blindness to one so young, and to whom God's beautiful creation offered so many pure sources of enjoyment, through the medium of the most useful of the senses. He was not wanting in energy, and finding that, morning after morning, instead of bringing him amendment, brought to him only increased dark

ness, he told his too kind captain of his exceeding misery, and demanded relief.

the rest of the Mohawks, had always used his house.

At length Henry decided upon something. One morning, after breakfast, declining the officious hand of the well-feed waiter, he groped his way down stairs, and reached the stable-yard. When there, he stretched forth his hand, and seized the first person within his reach. He felt that he had laid hold of something extremely greasy; this, however, in his then excited state of mind, made no difference to him. "I am Henry

Lilton did what he should have done long before-made the signal for leave to speak to the commodore, which being obtained, he ran down to the squadron. Henry was led on board the Venerable, and his eyes submitted to the inspection of the surgeon and his assistants. This gentleman found the case so alarming, that he requested a consultation with the other medical officers; they came on board. Henry was conducted into the cabin, and, after many learned things Latimer, a blind reefer;" said the poor had been said on the subject, they all decid-youth; "hear what I have got to say to you." ed to have nothing to do with the patient, The person stopped-indeed he could do and that his only chance of even a partial no otherwise, for Harry held him with the restoration of sight, was being placed on grasp of desperation. When our blind hero shore immediately, and under the experienc- had finished his tale, the unseen of Henry ed care of the most eminent London oculist. vented forth his indignation at the landlord So Henry Latimer was, like damaged in a very sincere oath; after which very goods, returned on board the miserable and necessary relief, changing his voice into a wet little Mohawk, and to all the horrors of most respectful tone, he thus addressed the despair. He now became fully sensible of midshipman :-" Do me the kindness to his dreadful state, and, no longer able to bear come with me. Leave me to settle with that up against his misery, his assumed manhood bloodsucker. I am not a man of wordsforsook him, and the tears of grief mingled but come, my dear sir, come." with those of inflammation, and actually, as And Harry went, and as he was led forth they continually ran down his face, scalded from this den of extortion, he had the pleaoff the skin from his ruddy and beautiful sure of listening to a sort of fugue from his cheeks. conductor-execrations following, in a low We must now suppose ourselves well ad- voice, his cheerful attempts at consolation of vanced in July, and about two hours before his adopted guest. And very soon Henry sunset, a thick, and, for the time of the year, found himself on a comfortable sofa, in a an unusual fog upon the face of the waters. comfortable room; and soft and gentle The opportunity was not to be neglected voices were murmuriug around him, and the temptation not to be resisted. Instead of cool and delicate hands were upon his heatdrawing in close to Cherbourg, old Lilton up ed forehead, and refreshing lotions applied with the helm, clapped on studding sails tenderly to his blood-surcharged eyes-he alow and aloft, and, with a spanking breeze, was in the care of women, God bless them! deserting his post, ran slap over for Wey- And there were conveyed to his lips the most mouth. All that I can say to any animad- refreshing and refrigerating summer fruits; versions upon the probability of this daring and the room was cool-how deliciously violation of duty is, that it is a fact. What cool! And one, by him unseen, sat down to I am relating is true.

A little after midnight, the Mohawk shortened sail, and hove-to off Weymouth. Henry, with his chest, and a fifty-pound bill endorsed by his good captain, was landed on the jetty-the boat shoved off-was hoisted in, and, before day broke, the Mohawk was again on her station, or very nearly so, apparently in chase of a strange sail, and her slipping away had not been noticed.

her instrument, and sang him a sea-song in a low and sweet voice-for they would not allow him to talk much-not much; and Henry, blind and till then deserted as he was, felt himself happy, and unbidden, but now rapturous, tears were in his eyes.

At a very early hour the fragrant breathings of those young females were upon his brow, and their cool kisses, as they wished him "God's blessing and a good night," were But let us turn to Henry. Blind, and al- inexpressibly grateful to his still-heated most alone, once more upon his native shores, face; and one of these kisses-it was the he called to the first passer-by, and caused last lingered a little longer, and was presshimself to be conducted up to one of the ed a little-only a little-more earnestly than principal inns, kept, as will afterwards be the others, and on the spot where the young seen, by one of the most unprincipled rascals lips had been was left a tear not his own. of the not very reverend race of Bonifaces. How fervently, then, Henry longed for his This fellow, imposing upon the supposed sight! He retired to rest, and enjoyed the simplicity, and taking advantage of the ex- most refreshing slumbers. treme youth of Henry, under pretence of Early the next morning his kind host was not being able to get his bill discounted, at his bedside. "I should not be your true kept him for days, to Henry's great expense, friend," said he, in a blunt, but still respect. and still more to the detriment of his sight, ful manner, "if I kept you with me. in his extortionate clutches. This fattening coach will start for London in an hour; so on a poor boy's misery was the more dis- get your breakfast, and let me see you off." graceful, for in Weymouth, Latimer, with Though it was not later than eight, the

VOL. VIII.

19/

The

ladies were up, and were as kind and gentle, | Henry still prized, and had used for a reand considerate to Henry, as they had been ceptacle of cards and papers of minor conseon the previous evening. The parting with quence. them was sad, for Henry had no other course but, when he arrived in town, to repair to the strange lawyer who had succeeded to his old friend Sotheby.

Ah! ever thus we find,
When scenes of gladness perish,
Fond Mem'ry stay behind,
Some relic still to cherish;
Ling'ring o'er happy hours
That flew with winged fleetness,
And, from Joy's faded flowers,
Distilling drops of sweetness
All her own!

A PILGRIMAGE FROM FONTAIN.
BLEAU TO SCOTLAND.

BY MISS HARRIOTT PIGOTT.*

Peninsula ; but amidst these breathings, these acetous descantings, and prognostications of her approaching downfall, was perceptible an olden felt fear of the genuine national patriotism and loyalty of the British population, that if roused by foreign aggression, or by the rebellious virulence of ambitious home democrats, would serve again as an invincible shield to her hereditary monarchy.

Immediately preceding this important English event, a train of fortuitous circumstances made me a spectator of a_royal_marriage in the ancient palace of Fontainbleau, and initiated me into the various novel incidents that occurred on that extraordinary occasion, which congregated an assemblage of speckled characters, showing forth the dissimilitude of national character and courtly scenes, and royal attributes, to those in the land where I was about to cast anchor-historical facts that memory well likes to record, but that merit the blazon of an abler pen.

AN ACCOUNT OF THE CEREMONIES OF THE MARRIAGE OF THE DUC D'ORLEANS WITH THE PRINCESS HELEN OF MECKLENBURG, FONTAINBLEAU, 1837. This long-anticipated marriage, called royal, although unaccompanied by the usual imposing dignities and sacred alliance of religious faith-those three benedictions requisite to render valid, in the opinion of mankind, the connubial union of a Roman Catholic prince of the house of Orleans, the presumptive heir to the throne of France, WHILE projecting an immediate pilgrim. and the Lutheran sister of a German prince, age to my native shores, and onward to Sco- had plunged the habitually peaceable protia, which I had never visited, they came vincial city of Fontainbleau into much bustle under the mild sway of a maiden Queen, and mental agitation. The arrival of fresh the lovely Rose of her native isles, in the troops of military, an encampment formed freshness of her youthful affections,-reign-on the plain at the principal street of ening by the free will of all political parties trance-the regiment of hussars in more over England, that sits the queen of nations —the majesty of her regal station encircled by the ambassadors from every nation, in respectful bearing, and by the assimilating splendours and dignities that are its attributes, and should be inseparable therefrom. This royal maiden, wielding the sceptre in right of her Protestant ancestors, greeting her people with undissembled respectful af fection, not condescending to humiliate herself and them by illusory homages or crafty caresses, such as we had seen lavished by her neighbour monarch, and which are, in verity, an ignoble mockery, insulting to the supposed good common sense of human kind -plebeians and patricians. The English cabinet once influenced all others. That of her present Majesty is supposed to have lessened this olden preponderance. During several months I had listened, in every foreign circle, with wounded feelings, to bitter sarcasms, to derisive criticisms, on the feeble policy of her ministers-to uncontrolled abhorrence of her military misdoings in the

*We give these graphic and amusing sketches, without altogether agreeing with the fair writer's politics.-ED.

than their accustomed stern regularity of garrison discipline, in daily full exercise and complete equipments- their weathercock colonel, an admirer and subtle servitor of the present dynasty, was puzzling his pericranium to invent new fanfaronnades, new theatrical farces, pour se faire prevaloir-the tricolour flag waving from the windows of the municipalities of the town and the partisans of the actual government-beat of the drums summoning to be drilled and disciplined the awkward squads of the national guard,— contributed to give a warlike appearance to the city, rather than that of a pleasurable rendezvous for a royal hymeneal fête.

Amidst all these evidences of an approaching enemy, these warlike symbols came rattling heavily along the streets, les voiteurs de déménagemens, conveying furniture to replenish the apartments in this royal palace for the reception of the numerous invited citizen guests-les fourgons du roi, with provisions expedited from Paris, escorted by the chiefs of the royal kitchens, who had been enjoined to arrange for sale by auction in the town market-place those fragments of each royal repast that their good appetites might spare. -Alas! this sale was not intended for the