my arms were free. While this was going on, the General was filling up a blank in the paper, which I feared would prove my death warrant. I was however agreeably surprised to find that instead of a death warrant it was my pardon, and a pass to Arklow. The General left his seat, and coming up to me presented me with my sword, which upon my first entering the abbey I was deprived of. Returning to his seat at the head of the table, he addressed me as follows:

"You, Captain R, will remain with us till to-morrow, which will be the 29th of May, when we hope to send you back to Arklow with the intelligence of Wexford being ours. Gentlemen, break up the council!" Turning towards me, he said politely, "Sir, you shall be respected, and to-morrow free."

I was now led into another apartment, which I was told was to be mine for the night, and provided with a supper of fried bacon, eggs, and potatoes. The whiskey bottle which was laid on the table remained untouched; and, worn out with fatigue, I soon fell fast asleep. In the morning I awoke; my bones were sore from sleeping on a chair without anything to lay my head upon; and, calling to my guard, was told breakfast was ready in the next room. I walked or rather limped after, and sat down to a breakfast composed of bread, bacon, and milk; and, immediately after, was ordered to join a body of insurgents for Arklow. "What!" said 1, "is Wexford taken?"

"It's put off till to-morrow," answered the sergeant of my guard. We had now emerged from the abbey, and gained the open air. A horse was ready saddled, upon which I was told to jump; and had no sooner obeyed, than I was surrounded by six of the insurgent cavalry, determined-looking fellows, well armed and horsed. We travelled cross country, and in the evening arrived at a place called the Three Rocks, within three miles of Wexford, where the insurgents held their camp preparatory to attacking Wexford on the next day (30th of May). Having good straw to lie on, and being in a comfortable tent, after a hasty supper I lay down to

About two in the morning I was disturbed by a discharge of musketry, and upon inquiring, was informed that the patriots were defeating the garrison, which had advanced to the encampment. Shortly after the town proposed a surrender, and Counsellor Richards and his brother arrived to offer terms, which the General accepted.

The insurgents entered Wexford with green banners flying, and music, as orderly as if they had been soldiers of the line. The contest was severe to the royalists: their bodies were lying about in dreadful disorder. and their red coats saturated with blood, from the mangling of that dreadful weapon, the pike, presented a melancholy and a soul-sickening spectacle. I had enough of carnage for that day, and longed to have my liberty

*

while my body was free from such dreadful gashes. At six o'clock in the evening I was taken before the commander in chief, B. B. Harvey, Esq., who was only just liberated from the jail of Wexford. He was a fine handsome-looking man with a pair of gold epaulets like the General, who sat on the right hand. The General was the only one who addressed, me and he only in a few words. Having had my pardon two days before, he now presented me with a note for Major-General Needham, with his best wishes to Colonel Maxwell. Being escorted by a guard of insurgents to the principal inn, what was my surprise to behold my own soldiers, O'Donnel at their head, waiting my arrival! We refreshed ourselves and set out for Arklow, which we gained early next morning. After delivering the note to General Needham, he laughed aloud, telling me the informer was the General.

THE FADING FLOWER.

(TO AN INDIAN AIR.)

"THE flow'rets bloom may fade,

The leaves drop rustling round the tree;

Chill in the cheerless shade

The little bird cower silently;

But winter shall depart again,

And gay green spring appear,

Fresh flowers anew shall deck the plain,
And wild birds warble clear.

"The heart blooms once-no more,—

Young Hope and Love, twin flow'rets fair,

No spring-time can restore,

Chill'd by thy wintry breath, Despair!"

This pensive lay a maiden young

Breath'd in still evening's hour,

And, drooping, seemed as sad she sung
Herself the fading flower.

Oh! pale pale was her cheek,

And dim the azure of her eye,

Her voice was sad and meek,

Like broken murmurings of a sigh;

She paus'd, look'd up to heaven, and smil'd,
One long sob heav'd her breast,

Then gently, as a wearied child,

She sunk to dreamless rest.

W. M. H.

B. B. Harvey, Esq. was a close prisoner in Wexford jail, but upon the surrender of that town to the Patriots he was immediately liberated; whereupon he was chosen commander-in-chief of the Patriot army.

ELIZA MORDAN T.

A SKETCH.

THE last public duty I performed previous to my leaving Scotland for the East, was one of friendshtp to departed worth,-accompanying the remains of one I warmly esteemed to the narrow house. The day was dark and gloomy, and well accorded with the melancholy state of my feelings on the occasion.

When the clay tenement of my deceased friend had been fairly deposited in the bosom of the cold earth, and the sexton had given with his spade the concluding pat on the new-covered grave, I returned to the late home of him whose remains were now consigned to their kindred dust, in order to perform some offices of humanity to the fatherless daughter-the only child who survived.

Eliza had just entered on her eighteenth year when her father, in the ́inscrutable dispensations of Providence, had been summoned to another world; and having only six months previously been called to the performance of the afflicting duty of closing her mother's eyes in death, and being now almost without a relation in the world, it may well be supposed she was in such a state of grief as eminently to stand in need of all the consolation which sympathising acquaintances could afford her.

I endeavoured by every argument I could employ to assuage her sorrow as much as possible; but the wound which her tender heart had received in the death of an only parent-and one, too, who had loved her with his whole soul, and whose very existence had seemed bound up in hers was too deep to be soon or easily healed.

From the intimacy which subsisted beween her father and myself, as well as on account of the estimation in which I had always held her, I felt an interest in the parentless Eliza Mordant which I had never before felt in any of the sex. In all the circumstances of the case, however, it would have been an abrogation of the laws of prudence to have acquainted her with my sentiments on this point. The only satisfaction I had in parting that evening with her, arose from the circumstance that her father had left her in easy circumstances, having before his death placed the whole of his available property, amounting to three thousand pounds, in the hands of a person of the name of Williams, who had been long known in the neighbourhood, and had been considered on all hands as a gentleman of the highest respectability.

Next day I experienced, to an extent of which those only who have been similarly circumstanced can form an adequate conception, the pangs of separation from friends and country-of that separation which must, in so far as human probabilities were concerned, be eternal to some of those I loved, and which there were strong reasons for appre

hending would be the final separation between myself and a majority, if not the whole, of those friends.

In five months thereafter I was in Bombay. Immediately on my arrival in that presidency, I wrote home to my relatives, apprising them of my having safely reached the place of my destination, and anxiously inquiring into the history of Eliza since I had parted from her. Judge of the horror and indignation with which, in answer, I learned that the executor of her father and her sole guardian had, in two months after I left Scotland, become embarrassed in his pecuniary circumstances, and had absconded-none could tell whither with the entire of Eliza's property. It was further added by my correspondent, that thus thrown on the wide world without resources and without friends, she had been under the necessity of engaging as governess in a gentleman's family.

"Eliza Mordant! Poor unfortunate girl!" I ejaculated with myself on receiving such tidings, "would it were in my power to lessen your woes, and punish him whohas proved the oppressor of the orphan; but, at present, I can only commit you to the care of Him who has promised to be the father of the fatherless; and who can tell but the same Being may even in this world overtake him who has so signally wronged you, with his retributive justice?"

Some months thereafter, circumstances occurred to induce me to remove from Bombay to Calcutta, and much about the same time Eliza removed with the family in which she had engaged, to another part of the country, nearly one hundred miles distant. From this time, therefore, I could learn nothing further of her.

In about five years afterwards, I had occasion to go on board one of our traders an hour or two prior to her sailing for London. There were several Europeans on board who had been resident in the East, and who were now about to sail for their native country. With none of these, however, was I on terms of intimacy: but there was one face -that of a young lady-the features of whom seemed to have been at some time or other somewhat familiar to me. There was a certain something in her look-a pensiveness of air about her, that indicated clearly enough to me that her mind was but ill at ease. The day was fine, and the other ladies on board were perambulating the deck, and seemed to exult in the prospect of again visiting their native shores; but she sat beside a trunk and some luggage, apparently unconscious of what was going on around her. The other passengers seemed all to be on intimate terms with each other; but she appeared as if in the depths of solitude while in the midst of society. All circumstances combined to engender an irrepressible anxiety in my mind to learn something more of the young lady; and therefore I asked of the proper person the favour of a look at the book containing the names of the passengers. My request was complied with; and guess, reader, my surprise, when the very first name on the list was that of Eliza Mordant! I sought no more-I dashed the book out of my hand-I flew to Eliza, and in the overpowering emotions of the moment, so far disregarded the etiquette of society as to seize her in my arms in the presence of several of the passengers. I had no sooner uttered the words Eliza Mordant, than she recognised me, and expressed the con

tending feelings which the unexpected interview generated in her breast, in an ocean of tears. I led her into the cabin, and as soon as her feelings would permit her to give utterance to words, I learned as much of her history in the time that intervened between our parting at home to our meeting in Calcutta under such strange circumstances, as induced me to prevent her sailing that day for England.

I ordered her luggage to be withdrawn from the vessel, and conducted her to my own house. Her existence since I had parted with her in Scotland until now had been nothing but one scene of sorrow—it was not so much as chequered by a day of joy. In the family in which she acted as governess, she met with much bad usage, sometimes, indeed, approaching to rudeness. But what could she do? If she had relinquished her situation, it would perhaps have been difficult to have procured another; and therefore the only alternative to her appeared to be either to remain in it, notwithstanding its miseries, or to perish of hunger and nakedness. Preferring the first as the least of the two evils, she submitted day after day to the indignities and other disagreeable circumstances to which she was subjected, until, at length, a letter reached her from an uncle in Calcutta, in answer to one written by herself announcing her father's death. In this letter, Eliza's uncle pressed her with the utmost apparent affectionate solicitude, to set out, forthwith, for Calcutta, assuring her that on her arrival, every attention should be paid to her, and every exertion made for her happiness.

The poor young creature's heart was absolutely in ecstacies on perusing this letter; and, notwithstanding the nature of the climate, and the distance and danger of the voyage, she resolved, without one moment's hesitation, to repair with all possible expedition to the East. She immediately quitted her situation as governess, and after the little preparation which eight days could afford her, she departed for London, whence she sailed in ten days thereafter for Calcutta.

On her arrival in India, she was met by her uncle, aunt, and three cousins, from all of whom she received every demonstration of affection. But she had not been eight days within her uncle's roof when she thought she recognised in the conduct of all her relatives something of a certain coldness of manner towards her. She afterwards learned she was correct in her conjecture; and the reason of it was, that they had all been quite disappointed on ascertaining that she was in such indifferent pecuniary circumstances. The uncle, in short, had known that her father possessed several thousand pounds at his death, and it was under the impression that the entire sum would fall into his hands, that he had been so urgent in his invitation to his niece to repair to India.

The coldness of manner which Eliza had, at so early a period after her arrival in India, discovered in the conduct of her relatives towards her, gradually became more and more apparent. And what preyed on her sensitive mind with a still greater force was, the circumstance of her having ascertained, beyond the possibility of a doubt, that most of the old gentlemen-and some of them were great libertines-that visited the house, had been invited in the hope of their soliciting her hand in marriage, and by that means easing the uncle of a disagreeable burden. And the stratagem was in part successful. One of these guests, aged sixty-five, withered and deformed in person, and a noto