gregating from all parts of the known world in the city of Dublin. His essay, demonstrating that the globe is a great custard, whipped into coagulation by whirlwinds, and cooked by electricity,—a little too much baked in the Isle of Portland, and a thought underdone about the Bog of Allen,—was highly spoken of, and narrowly escaped obtaining a Bridgewater prize.
Miss Simpkinson and her sister acted as bridesmaids on the occasion; the former wrote an epithalamium, and the latter cried 'Lassy me!' at the clergyman's wig. Some years have since rolled on; the union has been crowned with two or three tidy little off-shoots from the family tree, of whom Master Neddy is 'grandpapa's darling,' and Mary Anne mamma's particular 'Sock.' I shall only add, that Mr. and Mrs. Seaforth are living together quite as happily as two good-hearted, good-tempered bodies, very fond of each other, can possibly do: and that since the day of his marriage Charles has shown no disposition to jump out of bed, or ramble out of doors o' nights,—though, from his entire devotion to every wish and whim of his young wife, Tom insinuates that the fair Caroline does still occasionally take advantage of it so far as to 'slip on the breeches.'
It was not till some years after the events just recorded, that Miss Mary Anne, the 'pet Sock' before alluded to, was made acquainted with the following piece of family biography. It was communicated to her in strict confidence by Nurse Botherby, a maiden niece of the old lady's, then recently promoted from the ranks in the still-room, to be second in command in the nursery department
The story is connected with a dingy wizzen-faced portrait, in an oval frame, generally known by the name of 'Uncle Stephen,' though from the style of his cut-velvet, it is evident that some generations must have passed away since any living being could have stood towards him in that degree of consanguinity.
THE NURSE'S STORY
THE HAND OF GLORY
ON the lone bleak moor,
At the midnight hour,
Beneath the Gallows Tree,
Hand in hand
