The old boy seems really touched, and makes no reply. Perhaps his fancy, too, is away back in the spring mornings of the long ago, when the arrival of his own cortège on the field was a sensation. Nicoll again silently stuffs the snuff-box into his hand, in token of sympathy, retaining a heaped penful for his own refreshment. Thirty-five ploughs have arrived. The men having picked a lot with as much discrimination as each can exercise with his finger and thumb in the depths of a lucky-bag, congregate round a cart occupied by the clerk, who reads the rules, by order of the committee.' No place too far north for that institution. An outside lot has fallen to us. Braxie unhesitatingly ignoring the rule that no assistance can be given to the competitors, scampers, nimbly as a boy, up the ridge with an armful of red-tipped poles which look like a bundle of Brobdingnagian matches; these he grounds in a line at intervals. All over the field, "seconds' are running to and fro on the same errand, while Cocklea, who is umpire and master of the ceremonies, in vain talks of making examples. What can a government do when the whole nation is traitor? Protest. Meanwhile the work goes on, and the lea is bristling with pikes like a pin-cushion; the ploughs are drawn up in order of starting, and bang goes a gunshot. When you look again, the green has been scored with five-and-thirty black ruts. gutter; but Jess simply whisks her tail, first as a telegraphic signal of receipt, and then again, to realise more distinctly the inexplicable sensation caused by the unwonted assault. The first-rate hands seldom speak to their horses at all. Well, what sort of feerin has the Cork made? 'A pair of pretty ruts, if he ploughs up to them,' my uncle had said at an early stage. He has ploughed up to them that is, he has laid the two first heavy furrows against and over the two first light ruts. That is the feerin (I spell it as well as I can phonographically). Great care is bestowed on these first furrows; sometimes they are lifted and patted from end to end with the hand. 'There's no a better job on the field, and I'm mista'en if you are not far in, Cork,' is Nicoll's judgment, which, besides being premature, is unfair, from the fact, that he has never stirred from the Cork's head-ridge. Then he inquires officially at the Cork how he is off for land. The Cork thinks he could take another nick.' While I am rapidly repeating the mensuration table, in order if possible to find how much a nick of land is, the smith shifts the cleek of the swingle-tree tackling a notch to the right on the muzzle of the plough, and I am to understand that the desired conveyance of land has been effected; that is, the Cork has now greater facilities for taking a broader furrow. Braxie unweariedly trots from one end of the field to the other, detecting every variation from the line, directing the Cork in a whisper where to a portion of fallen furrow, or kick an irregularity into order. The principal does what he is bid, with the air of a man convinced of the vanity of fame, and smokes a deal more than his second thinks consistent with the importance of the issues. On a hint to be like his work, and break that pipe, he puts it out; but shortly stops the team half-way round, and Braxie seeing him deliberately evoke fire by dint of steel and flint, tells me he is a pike-thank veeshun;' the English of which, I believe, is a pick-thank vision.' It is to be observed, as significant of a transitional epoch in these parts, that the old men all snuff, and the young men smoke; and there is the usual amount of disturbance consequent on the conflict of the Old and New. A pretty sight, truly! A faint haze of mist just dense enough to curtain the scene off from infinity-grip in half an inch,' or sending him back to lift up the sun shining with more brightness than warmtha gay crowd in rural finery-these make the accessories of the picture. But the horses! Away with your foppish exquisites of the chase, your airy nothings of the turf, your rash-headed sparks of the war. For genuine examples of contemplative dignity, joined to substantial force, you must look here at these giantlimbed mighty-boned brutes moving slow in pairs. Do you mean to tell me there is no conscious pride in that sweeping arch of neck? that curl of nostril blowing clouds of fume like an engine-funnel? The shaggy fetlock, a gentle stroke of which would settle all our earthly affairs, is laid down as lightly and delicately as the foot of a fay, not to bruise the mould. Art, too, has been called to the assistance of their natural charms this morning. Tail and mane are streaming with red, blue, and yellow ribbons, and a rosette of the same stars the forehead. Little scintillations of light flicker among the colours, for the harness is studded with sparkling bits of brass, while many of the hems are naked steel; the chains, buckles, and other gearing are as bright as much scrubbing with stable-dung will make them. The men themselves, mostly stripped to the shirt and trousers, are worthy of the horses, and that is saying a good deal for them. They work in a great variety of attitudes. One walks upright in the furrow, exerting no visible effort, but holding the stilts as if it were a mere matter of ceremony. Another, with one foot in the furrow, and another on the lea, bobs up and down in a manner painful for me to witness, whatever it be to him. Another holds the plough at arms' length, his feet both on the lea, and stretched far behind, as if he were making experiments anent the laws of gravitation. The variety of facial contortion is indescribable; so is the murmuring confusion of directions. It is a marvel to me that each horse, with its back towards its instructor, can Here, too, the genius of youth expresses itself in so accurately pick out of the Babel exactly what imitation. In a retired corner, I come on three pertains to himself. When things are going normally brothers-smart juveniles in velveteen jackets who smooth, these run low and dispassioned: Veynd-Hi- have smoothed out a sandy surface, and with great Haud aff-Come 'ere-Wo-Hip-Gee.' But a storm gravity, are conducting their miniature affair. The follows an aberration; and you will hear Bob, or Baldy, youngest, a white-haired, blue-eyed Saxon, is objurgated on occasion with some force. One pleads slowly scoring off very neat corduroy in sand with soothingly: Now, lassie, now!' Another, with an one of the foresaid red-tipped poles; pausing occaindignant Jess, WOMAN!' comes smartly down on sionally, he draws his sleeve across his brow, to makeJess's hip with the hard rein. If I were Jess, in such believe that this is a tough job indeed. The second, a case, I would consider that I had got reasonable rather a fantastic, not very clean-nosed genius, is provocation to stammer out of the furrow, and make a | making rough work with a paling stob, and storming Here, as elsewhere, every competitor has his clique of supporters. As elsewhere, here, when a man's domestic influences fail him, he rallies on his party relations. A rivulet splits the district into two great factions. The North and the South, keenly antagonistic, each through the mouth of its partisans, spurs on its men. Then there are the rival masters, for the majority of the competitors are servants. Then there are the rival smiths, who do not speak to each other, far less to Nicoll, who is an interloper: they naturally view the aspect of affairs through a differently coloured medium. In a sphere of so many prejudices, none lack the assurance of merit. I rather calculate that twenty, perhaps, are being simultaneously assured they are far in, and may reckon on the first, second, or third prize, according to the modesty of the speaker. Wives, with incipient ploughmen in their arms, are sneaking about the hedges with little baskets of provisions; and a brood of the same species in various stages of development are in view of Paterfamilias and his work. vehemently at some visionary horses which appear to be refractory. The eldest enacts the judge, his hands folded behind his back, and his head set critically to one side. He, it appears, is too taciturn or slow to appreciate; for the Saxon, inadvertently sloping his plough over his shoulder, looks expectantly at him for some time, and then, with an air of disappointment breaks out: 'Man, Tom, you should be sayin: "What clever little chappie is this?" and again subsides into his ideal, to give Tom another opportunity. You, my young friends, are the future Birnams, and Braxies, and Corks? When your elders up there are singing to their teams in the Elysian fields, doubtless ye shall reign here in their stead, and sleep too, in your turn, with your fathers, under the shadow of the Grampians. At one o'clock, a brown loaf and quart bottle of beer are planted at the end of each lot; shortly after, a disturbing element of unknown origin operates on the crowd, the eddying groups of which gradually set in one current towards the farm. I see a man moving about, whispering right and left, and one after another yields to the spell, whatever it is. He picks me up at the root of a hedge. Will you step up and get a bite o' dinner, sir?' and I, too, submissively drift into the current. Cocklea is operating as host on a magnificent round of beef in a handsome dining-room. Before leaving, Nicoll signs me into the window-recess, for no other purpose, as he says, than 'to have a quiet snuff.' He looks rather more worshipful without his cap, for his crown is bald and shining. Seeing me touch that feature lightly with a glance, he comes over it affectionately with his hand, and tells me, 'There's no a hair between the smith and heaven.' Though he endeavours to give it an impromptu air, I warrant he has been repeating that irreverent joke any time these twenty years. Taking familiar hold of my button-hole: The Cork is far in,' he says in a semi-official tone, and I express a hope that the cork being so far in would not fall into the bottle. One says a man has fallen into the bottle (be it known), when one wishes to avoid the rudeness of saying a man is badly intoxicated. Nicoll, in good faith, assures me 'he will take good care of that;' and to my vexation, seems wholly unaware of the presence of a joke. It is evident to me that he himself is fast falling into the bottle, for he demands abruptly where I could find another man like Braxie. By order of the committee, the field must be blackened by four o'clock. Many lots are finished before then; for there are men who, modestly waiving all claim to merit, almost trot their horses for the sole purpose of coming in for the prize awarded to the first finished. It becomes evident, from the frequent peregrinations of the judges between the lots of Birnam and the Cork, that the supreme honours lie between these two. They consequently absorb most of the spectators. Wonderful are the criticisms. A gray little man-a kirk-elder, I should think-with his thumb in his vest-pocket, deliberately enunciates the opinion, that the Cork has a very excellent bottom. Very good bottoming, this-don't you think, sir?' indicating the bottom of the furrow with his staff. 'Very good, indeed, sir,' I warmly assent, without much sense of what has been accomplished. straight line, regularity, firmness, and a sleek gloss are the main points. "The finish,' that is, the style in which the trench which divides the ridges is dressed up, is only next in importance to the feerin. Braxie has been looking to this for some time, by incessantly applying his foot-rule; for, you see, it sometimes happens that one finds himself in the predicament of having at the last a slice of lea broad enough for three furrows at one end, and with only breadth for two at the other; or though uniform, it may be too narrow for division, and too broad to go all to one side. In either case, the finish is a failure, A and foresight guards against it by measurement and gradual pairings. The clerk is once more in the cart then, surrounded by a crowd anxious to know how much justice is still left in the world. For my own part, I am conscious that this little event has been gradually thrusting its importance close and closer to my eyes, till it has overshadowed the universe. At this moment, it would be hard to convince me that something very terrible would not befall the British nation, if the first name announced by the official there is other than that of our friend the Cork. Whatever would have resulted from that eventuality, will never be known, for the clerk opens his lips, and the Cork's | name slips out, followed hard by Birnam's. My first feeling is exultation of course; but it immediately sinks in another of generous sympathy with the veteran of many fields. As Napoleon went from Waterloo, as Macaulay from the Edinburgh hustings, so will Birnam go to a dreary home this night. Of the dinner-of Nicoll's extraordinary conduct— of my uncle's speeches of how the Cork did fall into the bottle at last-of our drive home-of how Nicoll was placed in the middle this time, as a precautionary measure-it is perhaps best to speak but generally. TOO LATE. SATURDAY, JUNE 21, 1862. Ir is recorded of the late Mr Leigh Hunt, that his procrastination was so excessive that he could never trust himself to rise in time to leave home and take the coach, but was obliged to engage a bed overnight at the inn from which it started. He was a punctual man, however, compared to me. I could never make certain of being a passenger unless I slept in the coach itself. The nicety affected by these vehicles in the matter of time (and particularly if they carried the mail-bags) was simply ridiculous. They would not, I believe, have waited for King George in person, although they carried his very arms upon their sides. How often have I had to engage post-horses at a ruinous expense to overtake those implacable machines! How often have I entered them at the very moment of departure with my waistcoat unbuttoned and my coat and top-boots in my hand! How often have I toiled after their revolving wheels, making fruitless signals of distress, and with my cries for succour drowned in the 'tooting' of the relentless horn! I am quite unable to account for the excessive value the Fancy Price-that is set so generally upon the article Time. I do not ask, in vulgar ridicule, 'What does it matter a hundred years hence ?' but What does it matter to-morrow whether we start to-day at a quarter or at half-past two? The modern expressions 2.15 and 2.30 have such an objectionable accuracy about them that I never use them. I have seen a limited night-mail advertised to arrive at a certain station at 3.48 A.M. Now, only conceive the affectation of such a number of minutes as that at a time of day when the very latest have retired to their couches, and the very earliest are not out of bed! A quarter of an hour either way, they tell me, might produce endless disaster-Up-express into Meat-train, or Fish-train into Parliamentary-to which I reply, that if so, the system must be faulty. The day,' observes a well-known poet, was made for vulgar souls, the night was made for you and me;' and without necessarily assenting to the bard's particular apportionment, we may say generally, that the Day and Night-that is to say, Timewas made for the whole human family, and not the whole human family (as one would imagine from their behaviour) for Time. 6 6 It is the early bird,' observed the late Jemmy PRICE 14d. Wood, of Gloucester, to his apprentice lad, that gets the first worm.' 'True,' returned the boy, but it must be the early worm that gets eaten.' For this epigram (which was a better thing than his master ever said in his life), the poor young fellow was punished, docked, very likely, of a penny out of the sixpence that constituted his weekly wage. He had, indeed, indirectly made a joke upon Time, but I have yet to learn,' as indignant trades-people observe in local newspapers, that to do that is to commit a blasphemy. What is Time, forsooth, that nobody may poke fun at him! It is my opinion that a Gentleman (for he is that, I'll allow) who is understood to go about the world insufficiently clothed, and with an hour-glass and scythe, instead of gloves and an umbrella, is an object of satire rather than reverence. He is old enough, it is true-old enough to know better, I should have thought-but really, from the slavish respect that some people pay to Time, one would suppose he was Eternity. The honest, plain-spoken truth is never written about him except upon Tombstones. indeed, he is only named to be derided, and Time used means Time abused. Time is nought-Time is finished up-Time is Thistledown,' 'Phew, and he's gone'-with many other remarks of a similar depreciatory character. I have even seen infamous caricatures of him upon more than one mausoleum, lying upon his back with his hour-glass broken, and his scythe rusted, as though it had been all over with him, and nobody cared; but defiances of this kind have never been able to gain my approval. It is only deceased persons whose connection with him has ceased, that venture to take these liberties with Time. They have loaded pistols (as Dr Johnson says with reference to a different matter) which they dare not fire off themselves, but leave some beggarly fellow a few shillings to pull the trigger after their death. There, Some very severe things are also occasionally uttered against Time by clergymen in their sermons; concerning his vanity (which, if he piques himself upon his personal appearance, must be monstrous indeed), his hostility to profligate waste, and the worthless yet deceptive character of his ordinary occupations; but when these gentlemen leave their pulpits, they are just as sycophantic in their behaviour to him as any other class of people. I particularly remember that the master of my first school was a clergyman, and exceedingly subservient to Time. If one happened to be a minute or two late in the morning, or for dinner, or for afternoon study, or even for bed (which at that period was entirely my own affair), this man could even proceed to acts of violence. I have known him cane a boy-I am not taking a mere supposititious case, because it happened to myself-I have known him, I say, to strike a fellow-creature several times (and behind, too, the coward!) because the victim had omitted to return from a country ramble in time to take part in a Greek play. Now this, mind, was not any case analogous to that of Private Theatricals, where, if you are not ready to sustain your character when the performance comes off, somebody else has to read your part, and the audience is dissatisfied, and the stage-manager wild -a misfortune of which I myself have been more than once the innocent cause; but in a Greek play everybody reads his part (if he can), and a single person is sufficient to constitute the Chorus. At the University, too, where the educational system is almost entirely in clerical hands, the same inordinate respect is paid to Time, which, it is contended, has hallowed its precincts and solidified its institutions. In a place, indeed, for which Time has done so very much, even to the exclusion, as some people say, of other improving causes, one cannot wonder that it is held in some sort of reverence; yet what can excuse a superstition so gross that it was actually the cause of my losing L.2000 a year, as well as an excellent dwelling-house? The calamity took place in this manner. Upon the morning of my first day's examination for honours (in which I had intended to have taken the highest place) I overslept myself, and was refused permission to make matters straight by a couple of hours' work in the evening. The immediate consequence of this was that I only obtained an ordinary degree, and the final result that I lost my chance of a fellowship (L.250 per annum), of a tutorship (L.150), and (eventually) of the mastership of my college, with L.2000 a year and the Lodge, to which, like the Indian hunter, I might, if I pleased, have invited a wife. However, if I have suffered a loss, so also has the college: if it had been fortunate enough to have secured me as its chief, I should have earned the blessings of unborn generations of its undergraduates. No chapel-gate should have closed with a snap to exclude the surpliced penitent, as he flew to overtake the minute and a half lost in looking for his pocket-handkerchief! No Dean should have frowned reproach because a young man's hunting-watch happened to be a quarter of an hour behind the college clock! No grave question of rustication should have arisen out of the confusion of one small hour with another after midnight! Alma Mater, however, has lost her opportunity, and must get on, orphaned of the present writer, as best she can. I suppose I have had more doors slammed in my face by Railway officials than any man alive, with the accompanying words: "Too late, sir; the bell has rung, and the train is on the move.' On the move! Is it not monstrous that an individual who talks such English as that should have power to bar the passage of a man like me? But the being too late for trains is not the greatest inconvenience that happens to me. I have also a peculiar faculty for being carried past the station at which I have intended to get out. I have in this manner had the opportunity of seeing many remarkable spots which would otherwise have escaped me, and seeing them, as it has generally happened, with plenty of time to spare. On the other hand, to avoid increasing my distance beyond the place already overshot, I have sometimes got out at solitary stations untrodden by foot of ordinary passenger, and only erected, as it would seem, for the benefit of such waifs and strays as myself. I have been disembarked from a coast-line upon a spit of land with water, water everywhere,' and not a drop to mix with it, at which, as I subsequently discovered, the train only called on Fridays, in the desperate hope, I suppose, of picking up on that unlucky day a shipwrecked crew; and I have been set down within the limits of a Druidical circle upon an apparently boundless plain. Once only had I a companion in misfortune in a certain barrister who was going down | to defend some burglars in the Black Country, and was carried with me past the assize town, and 'shunted' off to an obscure locality, which was not so much a station as a coke dépôt. 'Why did you not inform us that we should have to change when we stopped at the Junction?' inquired my legal acquaintance of the terrified guard. Your conduct, sir, is not only scandalous but actionable, and the Company must make good the pecuniary loss incurred by myself and friend through the delay.' I was going to visit an old college friend who happened to be on the grand jury, and all that I was likely to lose by the mistake was a good dinner; but I endeavoured to look becomingly indignant like a man who was quite unused to such misfortunes, and observed that the official's conduct was alike reprehensible and unparalleled. Unfortunately, however, for our chance of living the remainder of our days in affluence at the expense of the Great West Coast Line, the guard chanced to put his head into the carriage we had just quitted, after which his tone changed at once from the conciliatory to the defiant. 'It sarves you nothing more than right,' cried he, for actin' in contempt of the bye-laws. If you had not been smokin' with the winders up, you'd a heard me easy enough when I hollered out your station. And now you'll have to stay here seven hours, and you ought to be thankful as there is no magistrate in the neighbourhood to fine you forty shillings.' There was certainly no magistrate, nor, as I should think, from what came to pass, so much as a policeconstable, within many miles of that coke dépôt. There was not an individual to be seen, although the country round was totally destitute of anything like a tree to obscure him. The whole population lived underground, and only came out upon the surface of the earth at night-like the black-beetles. The landscape was covered, to the depth of three or four inches, with coal-shale, and looked like some mighty fireplace which the housemaid had forgotten to set in order that morning. The attractions towards a country-walk were also diminished by the circumstance of incessant rain. When we had finished send- || ing off our respective telegraphic messages to account to our friends for our non-appearance, the resources of the place in the way of amusement seemed to be exhausted. The refreshment-room, a dingy den, profusely decorated with clay-pipes and pewter-pots, was deficient in literature; its available library consisted of a book of advertisements-a Railway Album, it was called-and a Time-Table; there was an Illustrated News of the week-before-last 'somewheres,' we were told, but it was not recovered during our stay. The barrister and I played draughts-a game which I had not attempted for forty years, but which had been familiar to me in early childhood-from three o'clock to seven, after which we began to feel a little tired: at that hour, however, the room became suddenly inundated with miners, who compelled us to play on for their own amusement. It was but seldom, they said, that clever chaps like us favoured that part of the country with their presence, but, when they did, they always gave an entertainment-conjuring, political lectures, revivals, fireworks, or what not. If we had no other gift, we must play draughts, or else, they hinted, it might be very much the worse for us. So the company surrounded us, and wagered upon our respective skill, with many singular expressions and imprecations; and I do believe that my companion's 2 life would have been sacrificed to his backers had I welcome fly, for the time was as yet early for pleasureseekers. He observed, however, that it was just then his hour for nuncheon'*-having taken his breakfast in the dark, I suppose-after which refreshment he would be delighted to guide my wanderings. 'No,' said I; 'I have no time for that, my friend; guide me first, and you shall have your nuncheon afterwards: and here's half-a-crown to enable you to make it a better one.' But the most interesting and, alas! the most fatal The official took the coin, and after turning it over twice in his hand, and putting it between his teeth, to make sure that it was genuine, expressed his cordial thanks; then mounting the platform from which he is wont to give directions to those within his toils, he It was deep summer-time, and the green walls of the labyrinth rose lofty and full-foliaged, so that only now and then could I catch sight of my mentor and his official pole: I had therefore to trust mainly to his verbal directions, wherein, so contradictory and objectless did they sometimes appear, that I cannot help thinking he must have made occasional mistakes, to the extent at least of saying 'Right,' when he meant 'Left,' and vice versa. When I arrived at last in the very heart of the place, I was glad enough to sit down and take breath upon the bench provided there for successful travellers. I had hardly taken my seat, however, when I heard Hampton Church clock strike a quarter past ten; and although I had plenty of time to spare yet, it made me nervous. 'Now, guide,' cried I, I am quite ready; please to take me out again, for it's later than I thought.' The echo from the distant palace-wall replied, or seemed to reply 'Caught!' but there was no other answer whatsoever. 'Too late for thee?' I rejoined; 'no, indeed, sweetheart! If I am not at the altar before the clock strikes, let it be a sign that I love thee not.' To which she answered: Be it so.' And we laughed together at that ridiculous notion, as we bade one another Good-night,' as softly as the cooing of the cushat. Too late? Why I got up that morning with the lark-if at least that bird of song rises a little after eight and after breakfast strolled into the quiet Court Gardens. Not a human being was there to interrupt the dream of bliss that floated through my soul, and, indeed, after a little while it got to be tedious. There was still an hour before I could make my appearance at the church without any exhibition of indecorous impatience, and I thought I would spend it in the Maze. The keeper or exhibitor of that Rosamond's Bower was as delighted to see me wending towards that labyrinth as spider to 'Guide,' repeated I, jumping up alarmed, 'play me no tricks, I beg. I want to be off,' I screamed. 'My Clementina will be left in the church. And the echo answered: 'Left in the church, or lurch;' for the guide was gone. The half-crown paid beforehand had been too much for his principles, and he had hurried away to drink it with his nuncheon.' How long, I wondered, would it take a man to finish half-a-crown's worth of his favourite liquor! He would probably dilute it with water, and spin it out with police reports and gossip. Finally, he would get intoxicated, and forget that there was an unhappy wretch in his Maze at all. The perspiration gathered on my brow as I thought of my parting words with Clementina: If I am not at the altar before thee, let it be a sign that I love thee not;' and I knew her too well to doubt that she would stick to her own part of the bargain: 'Be it so.' Then a sudden recollection struck upon my brain that to get out of a Maze, you had only persistently to keep to one hand—the left, for instance; and I started off at once upon this scientific principle. The result was, that after threequarters of an hour's hard walking I found myself once more at the bench from which I started-in the very centre of the abominable labyrinthine system. "Why did he not get over?' inquires some indignant lady-reader. Madam, with all respect, and setting your crinoline aside, I should like to have seen you at it yourself. A Maze in July is simply a succession of bullfinchers—a thirtyfold girdle of utterly impracticable hedges-not strong enough to bear one, and not thin enough to permit of one's plunging through. As a delicate-winged bird will fly against wire and wood, upon first finding itself imprisoned, so did I adventure to attack the Maze in my marriage garb; but in attempting the very first leafy barrier, such a terrible accident happened to my connubial does' as at once put an end to any notion of my presenting * I find this, in the dictionary, to be the legitimate luncheon -a refreshment between meals. |