"He should not have said that." "Yes, Edith-if he thinks it. He told me that I should be turning all his friends against him. So I promised him that I would speak to Sir Peregrine, and break it off if it be possible." "He told me that." "And then I spoke to Mr. Furnival, and he told me that I should be blamed by all the world if I were to marry him. I can not tell you all he said, but he said this: that if-if-" "If what, dear?" "If in the court they should say—" "Say what?" "Say that I did this thing-then Sir Peregrine would be crushed, and would die with a broken heart." "But they can not say that; it is impossible. You do not think it possible that they can do so?" And then again she took hold of Lady Mason's arm, and looked up anxiously into her face. She looked up anxiously, not suspecting any thing, not for a moment presuming it possible that such a verdict could be justly given, but in order that she might see how far the fear of a fate so horrible was operating on her friend. Lady Mason's face was pale and woe-worn, but not more so than was now customary with her. "One can not say what may be possible," she answered, slowly. "I suppose they would not go on with it if they did not think they had some chance of success.' "You mean as to the property?" "Yes; as to the property." "But why should they not try that, if they must try it, without dragging you there?" "Ah, I do not understand; or, at least, I can not explain it. Mr. Furnival says that it must be so; and therefore I shall tell Sir Peregrine to-morrow that all this must be given up." And then they sat together silently, holding each other by the hand. "Good-night, Edith," Lady Mason said at last, getting up from her seat. "Good-night, dearest." And yet how different they were, and how dif ferent had been their lives! The prominent thought in Lady Mason's mind as she returned to her own room was this-that Mrs. Orme had said no word to dissuade her from the line of conduct which she had proposed to herself. Mrs. Orme had never spoken against the marriage as Peregrine had spoken, and Mr. Furnival. Her heart had not been stern enough to allow her to do that. But was it not clear that her opinion was the same as theirs? Lady Mason acknowledged to herself that it was clear, and acknowledged to herself also that no one was in favor of the marriage. "I will do it immediately after breakfast," she said to herself. And then she sat down-and sat through the half the night thinking of it. Mrs. Orme, when she was left alone, almost rebuked herself in that she had said no word of counsel against the undertaking which Lady Mason proposed for herself. For Mr. Furnival and his opinion she did not care much. Indeed, she would have been angry with Lady Mason for speaking to Mr. Furnival on the subject, were it not that her pity was too deep to admit of any anger. That the truth must be established at the trial Mrs. Orme felt all but confident. When alone she would feel quite sure on this point, though a doubt would always creep in on her when Lady Mason was with her. But now, as she sat alone, she could not realize the idea that the fear of a verdict against her friend should offer any valid reason against the marriage. The valid reasons, if there were such, must be looked for elsewhere. And were these other reasons so strong in their validity? Sir Peregrine desired the marriage; and so did Lady Mason herself, as regarded her own individual wishes. Mrs. Orme was sure that this was so. And then for her own self, she-Sir Peregrine's daughter-inlaw, the only lady concerned in the matter-she also would have liked it. But her son disliked it, and she had yielded so far to the wishes of her son. Well-was it not right that with her "You will let me be your friend still, will those wishes should be all but paramount? And you not?" said Lady Mason. "My friend! Oh yes; always my friend. Why should this interfere between you and Iae ?" "But he will be very angry-at least I fear that he will. Not that-not that he will have any thing to regret. But the very strength of his generosity and nobleness will make him angry. He will be indignant because I do not let him make this sacrifice for me. And then-and then I fear I must leave this house." thus she endeavored to satisfy her conscience as she retired to rest. On the following morning the four assembled at breakfast. Lady Mason hardly spoke at all to any one. Mrs. Orme, who knew what was about to take place, was almost as silent; but Sir Peregrine had almost more to say than usual to his grandson. He was in good spirits, having firmly made up his mind on a certain point; and he showed this by telling Peregrine that he would ride with him immediately after break"What has made you so slack about your hunting during the last two or three days?" he asked. "Oh no, not that; I will speak to him. He fast. will do any thing for me." "It will be better perhaps that I should go. People will think that I am estranged from Lucius. But if I go, you will come to me? He will let you do that-will he not?" And then there were warm, close promises given, and embraces interchanged. The women did love each other with a hearty, true love, and each longed that they might be left together. "I shall hunt to-morrow?" said Peregrine. "Then you can afford time to ride with me through the woods after breakfast." And so it would have been arranged had not Lady Mason immediately said that she hoped to be able to say a few words to Sir Peregrine in the library after breakfast. "Place aux dames," said he. He got up and opened the door for his guest, and then hurrying across the hall, opened the library door for her also, holding it till she had passed in. Then he took her left hand in his, and passing his right arm round her waist, asked her if any thing disturbed her. "Oh yes," she said, "yes; there is much that disturbs me. I have done very wrong." "How done wrong, Mary?" She could not recollect that he had called her Mary before, and the sound she thought was very sweet-was very sweet, although she was over forty, and he over seventy years of age. "Yes; Peregrine, my grandson." Then he is an ungrateful boy-a very ungrateful boy. I would have done any thing to guard him from wrong in this matter." "Ah; now I see the evil that I have done. Why did I ever come into the house to make quarrels between you?" "I have done very wrong, and I have now come here that I may undo it. Dear Sir Peregrine, you must not be angry with me." "There shall be no quarrel. I will forgive "I do not think that I shall be angry with him even that if you will be guided by me. And, you; but what is it, dearest ?" dearest Mary, you must be guided by me now. This matter has gone too far for you to go back unless, indeed, you will say that personally you have an aversion to the marriage." "Oh no, no; it is not that," she said, eagerShe could not help saying it with eagerness. She could not inflict the wound on his feelings which her silence would then have given. But she did not know how to find words to declare her purpose. It was comparatively an easy task to tell Mrs. Orme that she had made up her mind not to marry Sir Peregrine, but it was by no means easy to tell the baronet him-ly. self. And now she stood there leaning over the fire-place, with his arm round her waist-as it behooved her to stand no longer, seeing the resolution to which she had come. But still she did not speak. "Well, Mary, what is it? I know there is something on your mind or you would not have summoned me in here. Is it about the trial? Have you seen Mr. Furnival again ?" "Under those circumstances I have a right to say that the marriage must go on." "No; no." "But I say it must. Sit down, Mary." And she did sit down, while he stood leaning over her and thus spoke. "You speak of sacrificing me. I am an old man with not many more years be "No, it is not about the trial," she said, fore me. If I did sacrifice what little is left to avoiding the other question. "What is it then?" "Sir Peregrine, it is impossible that we should be married." And thus she brought forth her tidings, as it were at a gasp, speaking at the moment with a voice that was almost indicative of anger. me of life with the object of befriending one whom I really love, there would be no more in it than what a man might do, and still feel that the balance was on the right side. But here there will be no sacrifice. My life will be happier, and so will Edith's. And so indeed will that boy's, if he did but know it. For the **And why not?" said he, releasing her from world's talk, which will last some month or two, his arm and looking at her. "It can not be," she said. "It can not be," she said again, speaking with more emphasis, and with a stronger tone. "And is that all that you intend to tell me? Have I done any thing that has offended you?" "Offended me! No. I do not think that would be possible. The offense is on the other side-" "Then, my dear—" "But listen to me now. It can not be. I know that it is wrong. Every thing tells me that such a marriage on your part would be a sacrifice-a terrible sacrifice. You would be throwing away your great rank—” "No," shouted Sir Peregrine; "not though I married a kitchen-maid, instead of a lady who in social life is my equal." "Ah no; I should not have said rank. You can not lose that; but your station in the world, the respect of all around you, the-the-the-" "Who has been telling you all this?" "I have wanted no one to tell me. Think ing of it has told it me all. My own heart, VOL. XXIV.-No. 142.-II I care nothing. This I will confess, that if I were prompted to this only by my own inclination, only by love for you”—and as he spoke he held out his hand to her, and she could not refuse him hers-"in such a case I should doubt and hesitate and probably keep aloof from such a step. But it is not so. In doing this I shall gratify my own heart, and also serve you in your great troubles. Believe me, I have thought of that." "I know you have, Sir Peregrine, and therefore it can not be." "But therefore it shall be. The world knows it now, and were we to be separated after what has passed, the world would say that I—I had thought you guilty of this crime." "I must bear all that." And now she stood before him, not looking him in the face, but with her face turned down toward the ground, and speaking hardly above her breath. "By Heavens, no! not while I can stand by your side. Not while I have strength left to support you and thrust the lie down the throat of such a wretch as Joseph Mason. No, Mary, go back to Edith and tell her that you have tried it, but that there is no escape for you." And | ture-good is the meaning, and good is eventuthen he smiled at her. His smile at times could be very pleasant! But she did not smile as she answered him. "Sir Peregrine," she said; and she endeavored to raise her face to his but failed. "Well, my love." "Sir Peregrine, I am guilty." "Guilty! Guilty of what ?" he said, startled rather than instructed by her words. "Guilty of all this with which they charge me." And then she threw herself at his feet, and wound her arms round his knees. AN ORTHOPTERIAN DEFENSE. "I will tell it softly; N You crickets shall not hear it." EITHER Juvenal nor Sir Walter Scott were Naturalists, or had the slightest peep into the hidden arcana of Nature. Neither of them saw any thing with eyes, either approximately or afar off; but both with a dim light beheld an Intelligence which, looking at it inwardly, and not outwardly, they considered, though an inexorable law of Providence, somewhat remarkable. Juvenal has nine lines* which Sir Walter Scott, as his friends term it, has "paraphrased:" "Even the tiger fell and sullen bear Their likeness and their lineage spare; ally the result, which we who only see, feel, and understand the present, view neither for our improvement nor benefit; but which, if analyzed in all its bearings, would be found working together for the good of the whole. Self is a shadow, comprehended alone by man, unknown in heaven or in the earth beneath. Man, to himself, is not only a microcosm but a macrocosm; and, unfortunately for himself, he is willing to look on every thing around with a light springing from within, and not from without; which light alone dispels the darkness on truth's troublous path. If this result is reached in great evils, which eventually expand into benefits, how much more so is it discoverable in the agency of those thousand minute beings placed around us to watch and invigorate the earth by constant destruction and renovation; and which, in their turn, would become an evil if they were not sacrificed as food for another race, which in its turn becomes the basis of life in higher orders, until man is reached, the recipient of the result-the good! Suppose, for instance, a plant-an exotictransplanted from a strange region: climate and soil being agreeable it throve, and multiplied, and spread in luxuriance around and about us; suppose now that its natural insects, consumers and destroyers, should not seek it or find it, nor follow man in this new cultivation. How soon this once beautiful or useful exotic would become distasteful to us—utterly abhorrent! With If you will take the trouble to compare these nothing but this one thing obtruding upon us, two, you will wish many translators of the pres- the fig-tree would become a upas for poison, ent day conveyed the meaning of an author's and wheat give us flour bitter, unnourishing, thoughts so emphatically. Many a bright and hateful. Therefore, is this not a wise provision beautiful message, with wings multiplied by lan- that a race should exist which has the power to guages, would be borne to souls, leaving their keep superfluous productions from becoming wealth to germinate, which now come to us gar-positive injuries? bled and betinseled with the translator's constructions, rendering them unintelligible, if not positively injurious. We will not discuss the facts that prove how fallacious both poets are which can be taken from every department of Natural History, but confine ourselves to the one through which we have been so long-and, I trust, pleasantly to you, as it has been to me-journeying together. I think it is a conclusion little disputed among those possessing the faith of the Christian, that in all the evil permitted to reach His creatures by an All-seeing Father-be it spiritually, morally, or through the instrumentality of na Satire xv. 163-171.-Indica tigris agit rabida cum tigride pacem, etc. Literally rendered: "The tigress of India maintains unbroken harmony with each tigress that ravens. Bears, savage to others, are yet at peace among themselves. But for man! he is not content with forging on the ruthless anvil the death-dealing steel! While his progenitors, those primeval smiths, that wont to hammer out naught save rakes and hoes, and wearied out with mattocks and plow-shares, knew not the art of manufacturing swords. Here we behold a people whose brutal passion is not glatted with simple murder, but deem their fellows' breasts and arms and faces a kind of natural food." A great outery is made at the destruction caused by locusts, by ants, by cut-worms, by wire-worms, and a dozen other supposed enemies. But what fields of withered, unpalatable grasses the country would become if not eaten clear of this exuberance, and allowed to be reinvigorated by a new growth! The earth would be uninhabitable for man in tropical climates if ants and termites did not take old timber and fallen trees under their especial protection. The ground would become so baked by the sun, so hardened by evaporation, that all vegetation would soon disappear if those restless, twisting, eating little denizens, cut-worms, wire-worms, and a vast variety of others, did not keep constantly at work tossing, rooting, burrowing amidst, opening Mother Nature's bosom to the genial influences of rain, vapor, and dew. How idle, then-nay, how ungrateful—it is in us to complain that such a thing is "a nuisance," and another "a plague!" Let us look over, beyond the trouble, and we shall see a benefit coming-slowly, perhaps, but still progressing-to ward us. Then, again, the good effects which these insects are performing for us may in time become, from over-increase or preponderance, a decided torment-causing us to suffer, directly or aphides; any variety of insect will serve as or indirectly, a thousand-fold more than the other evils would have entailed. Here, then, we reach the balance of power: a race of insects which, because they perform the mission they are sent upon, are called "cowardly,” “cruel cannibals,” “using Heaven's livery in the Devil's service," and the like. If they could absent themselves for a while, how soon these undeserved epithets would be changed into terms of devotion, and they would be hailed, as they really are, benefactors to their ungrateful and vituperative assailants! I think you will agree with me, when you close this article, that this is not a problematical case, propounded for adjudication, but that they are a decided countercheck, given to us by the Giver of all good, that his great law should be strictly fulfilled: that all things shall pass away, yet be renewed in constant rotation; and that nothing which He has made shall be lost. I have a strange, a singularly odd company to place before you. If their natural habits have been little understood hitherto their appearance has been less appreciated. The beauty of this adaptativeness to the task to be performed is most wonderfully illustrated in this family; and if a sensation of the uncouth, the eccentric, lingers around them, it is all lost when we know them in the appreciation of the useful. Look first at the Mantis Religiosa Americana -the "American Soothsayer." We have here a personage famed in legendary lore; who is said to have conversed with saints and children; who mingles now in the worship of the Hottentots; who adds to the pleasure and amusements of the Chinese by exhibiting his pugilistic propensities; who is, among the Turks, considered worthy of religious honors; and who is famed for possessing magic powers of some kind wherever met with, at home or abroad. You will not wonder at it if you study attentively the quaint and weird creature's face, free, and at liberty to follow her own fancy or instinct, or whatever you may call it. I am fearful that you will think I should be bordering on the marvelous if I should describe many scenes such as this personage and I have passed together; but I shall plead, in return, that you follow my example, and see whether you will not say more than I shall have space to do, by taking one or more as companions the coming season. To obtain them in perfection at the North you can get your friends to look on the pine rail fences inclosing corn-fields any where south of New Jersey, or in the forks of the branches of the young pine, whose resin she enjoys amazingly, and send you the capsule of eggs; keep it in a warm, dry place, and in June, if the weather is fine, hundreds of these creatures will work their way from their odd-looking cradle. Out of this host you may succeed in raising five or ten, if you are very watchful. In the open air they would all come to maturity, but when in confinement the stronger devour the weaker. Feed them as freely as you can with flies, ants, food. They change their skins four times. At the last moulting they obtain their wings, and have reached the imago state. It will be, if a fine specimen, nearly three inches long from the mouth to the tip of the tail-pieces; and the wings will expand nearly the same. They are longer than this in Texas and Mexico. They will be of a soft, pale, silvery apple-green, all over the shades in white, except the eyes and hooks, which are very black. The abdomen is so transparent that its color varies with the food it has been devouring: dark, if the caterpillars were such; a light color if otherwise. After the last moulting tie a long thread or a silken string around the thorax where it joins the body; place her on the cornice of the window, or on the frame of a picture or mirror, and you will be troubled with no insects near you. But you must watch that she does not starve, by placing near her caterpillars, young grasshoppers, and the like. If you take a little pains you can soon approach her, and hold an insect or a piece of raw pigeon flesh, and she will come and take it. "Queen Bess," of famous memory, would alight on my shoulder and take all her food from me half a dozen times a day. When she omitted her visit I knew that she had been hunting on her own account. All night long she would keep watch and guard under the mosquito-net. The silk was fastened to the post of the bed; and woe betide an unfortunate mosquito who fancied for his supper a drop of claret. It was the drollest, the most laughter-moving sensation, to feel one of these trumpeters saluting your nose or forehead, and hear Queen Bess approaching with those long claws, creeping slowly, softly, nearer and nearer; to feel the fine prick of the lancet setting in for a tipple; then you would suppose a dozen fine needles had been suddenly drawn across the part; then, presto! Bess's strong, sabre-like claws had the jolly trumpeter tucked into her capacious jaws before you could open your eyes to ascertain the state of affairs. These creatures very seldom fly far, but walk in a most stately and dignified manner. Queen Bess could not bear to be overlooked or slighted; and so sure as she saw me bending over the magnifier with an insect, and I thought she was ten yards off, the insect would be incontinently snapped out of my fingers. Many a valuable specimen disappeared in this way. I learned to put her at these times in the sounding-board of an Æolian harp, which was generally placed in the window. Her majesty liked music of this kind amazingly; as the vibration was felt though not heard. I presume she fancied she was serenaded by the singing leaves of the forest. I knew she would have remained there spell-bound until driven forth by hunger, if I did not remove her when I was not afraid of her company. As I have begun my "experiences," I will go through with them and confess that I was obliged from circumstances to attach more than accident to her prophetic capacity-her fortune-tell |