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vidence! When the major was dealing his fatal signals for the prisoner's death, at the last motion of his cane, the soldier, inspired by some superior power, suddenly turned about his piece, and shot the tyrant in a moment through the head. Then throwing down his piece, he exclaimed, "He that can show no mercy, no mercy let him receive. Now I submit; I had rather die this hour, for this death, than live a hundred years, and give my brother his." At this unexpected event nobody seemed to be sorry; and some of the chief citizens, who came to see the execution, and were witnesses of all that passed, prevailed with the next commanding officer to carry both the brothers back to prison, and not to execute the first prisoner until farther orders, promising to indemnify him for the consequences, as far as their whole interest could possibly go with the queen. This request being complied with, the city corporation, that very night, drew up a most pathetic and moving address to their sovereign, humbly setting forth the cruelty of the deceased, and praying her majesty's clemency towards both the prisoners. The queen, upon the perusal of this petition, which was presented to her majesty by one of the city representatives, was pleased to promise that she would inquire a little further into the matter. On doing so, she found the truth of the petition confirmed in all its particulars; and was graciously pleased to pardon both the offending brothers, and discharge them from her service. "For which good mercy in the queen," says a chronicle of that period, "she received the very grateful, and most dutiful address of thanks from her loyal city.".

THE OLD WAISTCOAT.—A TALE.

BY J. D. NEWMAN.

66

CHAPTER I.

Perhaps 'tis pretty to force together
Thoughts so all unlike each other;
To mutter and mock a broken charm,
To dally with wrong that does no harm."

Coleridge's Christabelle.

In the small village of Weasenham there lived an honest hard-working artisan, named Caleb Nicholson, a man rather advanced in years, and whose countenance bore marks of considerable hardship, being in hue not much unlike a copper tea-kettle. Caleb was what is genteelly called a translator;-not, however, of languages, but of shoes, or what is more generally and vulgarly known by the name of cobbler. His family consisted of his wife, Margaret, called for brevity Madge, and a daughter, named after her godmother, Louisa.

Although Caleb had been employed for upwards of forty years in repairing the soles of the good people of Weasenham, he had never acquired more than sufficient property to keep his own body in daily repair, and consequently both his wife and daughter were early taught that neither idleness nor luxury were to be residents or visitors at Caleb's dwelling. Louisa, however, had found a patroness in the wife of the minister, and to this truly good woman was she indebted for gaining a knowledge of reading, writing, and various other useful acquirements, which neither Caleb's means nor ideas would otherwise have provided for her. In fact, her father had been heard to boast that he had got through his years of toil without being able either to form a letter himself, or to read those which others had completed, and

was also often heard to regret, that so much good leather should be wasted in binding what he was pleased to style "a parcel of good-for-nothing little books." Her mother, good soul, what with binding shoes, scrubbing the house, and cooking the dinners, had not the time, even had she possessed the ability, to instruct her daughter in any genteeler accomplishment than cleaning the stairs or polishing the saucepans, and was even illiterate enough to grudge the time which she spent with her patroness, although her fear of offending the great lady prevented her murmurs from proceeding any further than her lips, whence all egress was completely stopped.

Louisa possessed great quickness of apprehension, and the progress of her education afforded much gratification to her instructress. The appearance of Louisa was much in her favour. She was just in her eighteenth year, finely formed, with a pair of sparkling jet eyes, teeth regular and of the purest white, with dark waving hair, which nature had carelessly curled to fall over her shoulders. With such a person it was no wonder that she attracted the notice of the youths of the village. All vied who should pay her the greatest attentions; her looks were watched and her wishes anticipated. Of the group of suitors one had been selected as the chosen of Louisa.

Arthur Harrington, the only child of a small farmer in the neighbourhood of the village of Weasenham, who had come from London at the express desire of his indulgent mother, to receive her expiring blessing, had borne away the heart of the maiden, and plighted to her his affection. Harrington was possessed of great goodness of heart, of a warm, sanguine, and somewhat thoughtless temper; he was one who was more his own enemy than the enemy of others. The suit was approved of by all parties; a place was always reserved for Arthur at Caleb's fire-side; he was a constant visitor at the honest translator's cottage, and every one regarded Louisa as irrevocably engaged to be the wife of Harrington. An

apparently trivial accident however chased away the vision of happiness, and wrung the hearts of the lovers with misery.

.

Among Arthur Harrington's propensities was an irresistible one for practical jokes. Caleb Nicholson, among the other articles of his scanty wardrobe, was possessed of an old cloth waistcoat, which formed, in fact, his working jacket, and it had become proverbial in the village of Weasenham, when it was intended to convey an air of particular antiquity to any object, to say "it is as old as Caleb's waistcoat." What colour the waistcoat had originally been, the oldest villager would not venture to decide. Many had recollected seeing it fifteen, eighteen, and twenty years back; but its colour was then as indiscernible as at the present moment. One presumptuous wight had dared to fix it at a Yorkshire gray; but when it was understood that he had not known it more than two-and-twenty years, his tale was universally discredited.

It was a custom with the youth of the village of Weasenham, on the 5th of November, to commemorate the day by a sort of auto-da-fé, in which a figure, meant to represent that arch-conspirator Guy Fawkes, was offered at the shrine of Vulcan. It chanced, during the period of Arthur's wooing, that this long expected day arrived, and great exertions were made to equip in a creditable manner the traitorous effigy. At the head of the committee for conducting this important ceremony was Arthur Harrington, and all the apparel had been with difficulty collected except a jacket, without which it would be discreditable for even a traitor to be burnt. In an evil moment a thought entered the brain of Harrington, that Caleb's waistcoat would make an excellent outward garment for the rebel figure. He had long intended making Caleb some present, and now thought that, by destroying the old garment, Caleb might accept that as an equivalent which his pride might urge him to refuse as a gift. With this idea he went to honest Caleb's cottage, and found means secretly to obtain possession of the old waistcoat,

which had been carefully put away in Caleb Nicholson's little old-fashioned chest of drawers. The figure was speedily equipped, the fire was piled with faggots, and the devouring element, amidst the cracking of fireworks, soon destroyed all trace of the old waistcoat of Caleb Nicholson and the motley effigy of Guy Fawkes.

CHAPTER II.

"And I to Denham, sir, belong;'

And then, as if the thought would choke
Her very heart, her grief grew strong;
And all was for her tatter'd cloak."

Wordsworth.

On the following day, long before Caleb had risen to resume his daily labours, Arthur went to the nearest town, and having purchased a decent-looking plain brown jacket, he returned in high spirits to the village, and without further delay proceeded to the cottage of Nicholson, with his new purchase. On opening the door, he was surprised and alarmed to find Louisa in tears. Half stifled with sobs, the afflicted girl told the wondering Arthur that, by the command of her father, she must break with him for ever-must see him-love him no more! The destruction of the old waistcoat had been the destruction of the hopes of Arthur. In the lining of the apparently worthless rag had been sewn the hard gained earnings of forty years. Caleb, with the true spirit of illiterate avarice, had been accustomed to deprive himself of almost even the necessaries of life to hoard in private. The fruits of his savings he regularly changed into notes, as soon as the amount permitted, and with a miser's dread, fearing to entrust it to the keeping of others, had concealed it in the much despised old waistcoat, so long the ridicule and contempt of the inhabitants of Weasenham. The rage of Caleb, when he discovered his loss, was that of a madman. He cursed his only child, if ever she again communed with Harrington. It was in vain that the almost frantic youth offered his trifling all-in vain his father sought by the offer of a division of property to calm the

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