This is the Ballad in Breton :

AR BUGEL LAEC'HIET.
'Mari goant azo keuziet
He Laoik ker e deuz kollet
Gand ar Gorrigan e ma eet.

But perhaps some of our readers are not well acquainted with the Breton tongue, so we will try our best to put it into Saxon.* Mary the Fair with grief has gone wild, For the Fairies have stolen her only child.

"When I went to the well he was safe in his cot; Quick as thought I came back, but my Loïk was not. Instead of my sweet one they've left me this fright, A dumb toad, that does nothing but scratch and bite. Seven long years I've nursed this fiend, So craving and hungry, and not yet weaned. Sweet mother! hear from thy snowy throne; Thou art blest with thy Son, I am sad and alone. Thy Son is safe in thy Holy caress; Mother of mercy, relieve my distress!"

"Weep not! thy Loïk is safe and sound; The dumb shall speak, and the lost shall be found. A dinner for ten in an egg-shell prepare, The dumb shall speak, and his race declare. When he speaks, whip him well; at the sound of

his cries

The fairies shall take him-much joy of their prize." "What dost thou, mother? what dost now?" Cried the imp, with surprise, and a voice like a crow, "I'm making, my child, a feast for my men, In the shell of one egg, a dinner for ten."

"For ten in one shell? Come, none of your jokes; Eggs are not chickens, nor acorns oaks. The acorn I've seen grow a mighty tree, But a sight like this is a wonder to me.'

"You've seen too much, my boy. Crick, crack! Take that, old imp; I've caught you, crick, crack!" "Come, give back our child, and stay your hand; Your son is a king in fairy-land."

In the cradle at home she scarce dared to peep, And there lay a little one fast asleep! 'Twas her own sweet Loïk! oh, heavens, what bliss! As he opened his eyes to her ravishing kiss. He stretched out his arms, as o'er him she wept,

"What ails thee, dear mother? How long I've slept!"

But not to dwell longer upon this interesting family, we may record a few more of the popular superstitions of Brittany.

The country is stamped everywhere with the Celtic and feudal character; and as for religion--a thin coating of Christianity ill conceals the religion of nature, and the worship of the elements, which constituted the old Druidical mythology.

With such materials, it is not to be wondered at that the Breton feels all the romance and superstition of the old idolatries. Every grove has its divinity; every fountain its miraculous property; every Druid-stone its legend and its peculiar rites.

These vast monuments, which are scattered throughout Brittany, are particularly the objects of superstitious veneration.

The great Menhir of Plogastel is resorted to by those women who are not blessed with chil

* The Bretons, like the Welsh, call the English Saxons.

dren; but who fully believe that by visiting it at midnight, and rubbing their bosoms against the hard stone, they will become fruitful.

The rocking stones of Pontwig and Huelgoat have another virtue. Husbands who are suspicious of their wives, resort to them; and if their doubts are just, the great stone, which an infant's finger can set rocking, will remain immovable to their hardest efforts.

It is as well, they say, not to pass by the pillar of Noyal too late at night, as you may find yourself in its way when it is going on its nightly promenade to drink at the river.

66

Keep clear, too, of the fairy grotto of Caro. It was Jan Kerloff, of Sulniac, who passed by on Easter-night, and saw the fairies dancing by the light of the moon. They were tall and fair women, clad in white, and so radiant that Jan, in describing them, could only liken them to a candle in a horn lantern; but so frightened was he, that a lock of his hair turned white, as any could see who liked."

The Bretons have a particular horror of travelling at night. Like their Welsh cousins, they think that ghosts and spectral funeral processions, and all kinds of uncanny things, are abroad after nightfall.

"Avoid," say they, "the sunk paths and the narrow bridges at night, at any rate unless you have in your pocket a chapelet blessed by Saint Anne.

"Hervé Carzon was passing over the Are last year, coming back from the fair, and what should he see but a black goat standing on the middle of the bridge, and looking at him as bold as brass!"

Perhaps Hervé had a little too much gwin ardant in his head; so he called out, "Get out of my way, old Rusty-fusty;" and made a poke at him with his penn-baz. But it was no less than the gabino, who ran at Hervé Carzon, and threw him into the river, where he would infallibly have been drowned, if it had not been for his chapelet - and the miller's man, who heard his cries, and came and pulled him out of the water."

At Coat-bian are Druidical barrows, which have been for time out of mind the haunt of elves and gnomes. "They are always playing some pranks upon the poor people around; ringing a sheep-bell in the wood to deceive the little shepherd lads, who are seeking their stray lambs; or when the young girls come home too late from a pardon or an assemblée, catching hold of their two arms behind them, and kissing their plump necks.

"Sometimes, in winter nights, while the fire is crackling, and the resin candle_spluttering, there are heard strange shrieks and moans out of doors. Perhaps you may think it is the old weathercock creaking in the wind, or the clattering of the turn-a-bout, which Jacques put up in the apple tree to frighten the birds. Not a bit of it. It is the shrieking of the old Poulpekans, who are calling to the Korrigans to come and sup under the cromlechs. Shut the doors fast, and place at the foot of the

bed a crock of millet; then, if the fairies come in they will knock down the jar and spill the contents; and as it is their nature to pick it up grain by grain, this will keep them employed, and out of mischief all night.'

(This is something like the preventive against burglars, recommended to Paterfamilias by Mr. Punch, namely: to put the coal-skuttle upon the stair-case for Mr. Sykes to tumble over.) With the shades of night come a troop of vague terrors, and grotesque superstitions, crowding on the untutored Breton mind. The doués, or washing troughs of the villages, are occupied by the Rennezered noz, spectral lavandières, who beat their grave-clothes upon the smooth stones, and all night long they chant this refrain:

"Si Chrétien ne vient nous sauver,
Jusqu'au jugement faut laver,
Au clair de lune, au bruit de vent,
Sous le neige, le linceul blanc."

Every ruined château has its white lady flitting among the ruined corridors, or wailing over some scene of bloodshed.

Those who wander by the sad sea waves, perceive dim shapes of women walking on the sea, or sitting among the rocks. They write listlessly on the sand, or pluck the rosemary and seapink. They are the children of the soil who have died unabsolved in the distant lands, and are come to beseech the prayers of their parents and friends.

Woe to the peasant who meets one of those souls, which are condemned to wander on the Champs des Martyrs at Auray, the scene of the bloody drama of the wars of the De Montforts and De Blois! They hover about the battered armour and mouldering corpses they once animated; and at midnight they march to and

fro about the country, always stalking straight on, grim and stark, without deviating from the straight line. Woe to the traveller who stands in their way! An invisible power strikes him, he is frappé par l'âme, spectre-smitten, and, as the people believe, no earthly power can save him. The priest may absolve him from the penalties beyond the grave, but his days on earth are numbered.

If a Breton is far from his home, and any domestic event requires his presence-the death of his parents, or the sickness of his betrothed

he hears distinctly the bells of his villagechurch pealing out the Angelus, and calling him back to his country. This is called an intersigne, and is an appeal which he may not neglect, on pain of committing sacrilege. The bell calls him: he must go home, or die.

And if he is drowned at sea, the wandering waves carry his soul to the land of his birth, and cast it in light foam upon the much-loved shore where his infant days were spent in happiness; and sometimes may be heard the plaintive cries of these souls, mingling with the murmur of the waves; soft sighs and hoarse moanings, as the souls meet upon the shore-the souls of lovers and messmates and comrades-and recount their histories, and demand the expiatory services of the dead.

"If you hear these plaintive voices by the shore, chiming in with the mellow cadence of the waves, forget not to offer a prayer for the repose of these poor souls," says our Breton host. Or rather, say we, forget not to breathe a prayer for deliverance from all superstition, and blindness, and hardness of heart, with thanksgiving for the light we possess through the love of God, which "passeth all things for illumination." DINAN.

STRONGER

CHAPTER II.

"How long will it be before I can get away from this place?" was my first thought on waking, the morning after Annie's departure. I felt bound for a week at least: I must stay that time, if only to put the best face I could on my disappointment before Frank's sister. And yet, unworthy as Annie's conduct towards me had been-though I felt her absence a relief-had the choice been in my power, I would have spent that week in the same house with her rather than with Edith. My indifference towards Miss Lyne was changed into that feeling which any man, not more than mortal, will, in spite of himself, entertain towards a woman who

has looked on quietly and seen him play the fool. "Well," I soliloquised as I was shaving," she and I will be quits: she despises me; I dislike her-I don't know why exactly, but I do dislike her. We must endure and be endured by each other for the next seven days-that's all. No doubt she was vastly amused at my unlucky affair"-here I made a face, and cut myself. "Never mind; she was welcome to laugh at me as much as she pleased: she might tell Frankanybody-no doubt she had." "Here some instinct stopped me. Let me do her justice. Edith Lyne would never talk over that adventure; my secret was safe in her keeping. I had never tried to read that quiet face but there was something in it which might tell a man so much

at first sight. I heard Frank's voice at my door. "Come in," I cried, while I rummaged for the sticking-plaster. He entered.

"Isn't it a glorious day, Margesson! Bless me, how you've cut yourself! Stay, here's some goldbeater's skin. The ladies have sent down word that we're not to wait breakfast for them this morning; so we'll have ours at once, and then go out. Do you feel at all inclined for work, Arthur?" he said, coming up to me. "Do you know I've a great fancy for a painting as some memorial of this lovely place. I should like you to undertake it for me. Edith pointed out a splendid view yesterday. My plan is to walk after breakfast to the place, and, if it strikes your fancy as much as it did mine, we can't do better than fix upon it."

I listened to Frank with a mixed feeling. On the one hand I now utterly hated Lymrex, and had an aversion to everything which threatened to prolong my stay an hour beyond the time I had fixed. On the other, this commission promised just what I then required-something that would take up my time and thoughts. After all, it would be easy, I thought, to sketch out my picture, get it as forward as I could in a week, and finish it afterwards in town. As I drank in the beauty of the prospect that morning, I felt that into my painting I could throw all my heart. I could escape from myself-forget all my miserable smarts and troubles in the great joy and splendour of nature. I began that very morning. Had I been in town, I should have sought relief in any other shape than work. Now, for the first time in my life, I was to learn what strength and healing lies in honest labour. For once I worked bravely and well. My week of penance soon passed-the next-another still; but my heart was in my painting. Down in Dorsetshire I must stay, till my picture was finished. My daily progress satisfied me the sea rose on my canvass, not in mere painted waves, but with some touch of its own power and passion. I often wished that my old master, who had growled out many a prophecy that my slovenly style would ruin me as an artist, could have watched the patient labour I bestowed on my foreground-how I chiselled out the fragments of rock, and gave each seaworn stone its varied form and water-mark.

As the days went on, a worthy motive prompted me to do my best. I felt more and more certain that the idea of this picture had not originated with Frank. Something told me that the sole witness to that garden scene between Annie and myself had, in womanly pity, devised this cure for my heart-sickness. For this I honoured Edith Lyne, and I honoured her the more for the graceful tact with which she managed to turn the conversation when she thought I might find the subject painful. Beyond this delicacy, and such courtesies as were due to her brother's guest, her conduct bore no reference to me. She seemed to devote herself to Frank every little thought and care-so sweet, so graceful from a woman-were lavished upon him, On his part, almost unconsciously,

he depended much on her: their daily plans, even the most trivial arrangements, were referred to her decision; though she somehow contrived that Frank should seem to have the credit of it all. And, while I speak of Edith, let me try to define the feeling with which I then regarded her. The state of mind, wounded and irritable in the extreme, in which I found myself after Annie's departure, kept me constantly on the alert. I weighed every word and action of Miss Lyne as if she had been my declared enemy: I was always on the qui vive for some speech of scornful significance-some touch destined to make me wince. Something of this sort I looked for from her hands-aye, and I wished for it: I wished to have a good reason for heartily disliking her.

This morbid sensitiveness passed, but not to give place to my former indifference. I did not lay aside the habit I had formed in the last few weeks of watching her. I observed her still with a vague but intense curiosity, mingled, in spite of myself, with admiration. I became by degrees seriously engaged in the contemplation of a character quite new to me: I was like a man who tries to spell out a noble poem written in a language almost unknown to him. And, most strange, cold as I was to her, as she to me, I felt-more and more I felt-every day the powerful influence exercised by her spirit over mine. Watching her industry of hands and brain-not a shade of restlessness in it-there seemed a repose in her very activity: watching this, I say, it became a spur to my endeavour. Edith all the time went on her way, just as the bee and ant go theirs, unconscious how they have been a reproach to sluggards ever since the days of wise King Solomon. But this was only one phase of her influence: in her presence it seemed natural to think only of what was pure and noble. Let me tell you that all the morality that was ever put into proverbs is powerless in comparison with the moral atmosphere of that woman who shall be spontaneously, in her own nature, all that other people take pains to dress up in fine words. Curious, too, it was, that I fell into a habit of painting as if Edith Lyne were always looking over me. That light in the foreground-would it strike her fancy as it did mine? Under what aspect would her favourite cliff, the great Golden Head, please her best?standing out in the sunshine, or half veiled in deep purple shadows?

I was dissatisfied, provoked with myself. Why should this woman-so content to let me perfectly alone-why should she take up my thoughts so much? She was the style of person one must respect and admire. But love? No; that was an impossible thing! I began to say this to myself every day. I hardly understood her; her inward life seemed far apart from mine. How often I had fancied that I knew the sex thoroughly! yet here was a woman, open as day, clear as light, and yet I felt I had not the key of her character.

Looking back on that long past time, I recall the impression of the days as they went by.

My forgiveness of the coquettish Annie grew complete; for I strangely forgot both the offence and the offender. If her name were mentioned by chance, it fell upon my ear like that of any passing acquaintance. It would have been a real effort to think of her for five minutes together. I laughed outright as this thought occurred to me one morning, and gave a great rap of approval on my easel. "I've to thank you for that, old friend!" I said, half aloud. "There's nothing, after all, like honest work to cure a man of such a folly."

Frank came in. He looked over my shoulder. "By Jove," he exclaimed, "I shall be proud of that picture! I suppose it will be finished by the time we leave?"

"Only a week, Frank-I don't know. I thought of finishing it after you were gone, and keeping it for you till your return from the continent. Won't that do?"

"Yes," he said, with a hesitating air, “that will do; only it spoils a little scheme of mine. I'll tell you what it is, Margesson," he went on, with his hand on my shoulder, "and I know you're such a good fellow that if you can humour me you will. Edith always comes and looks at that picture when you are away. I can see it has quite taken her fancy. She asked me yesterday to take it with me, as it is not large. You know how fond she is of Lymrex. Well, Thursday week-the day we get to Paris-will be her birthday, and I should have liked her to find that painting in her trunk as a present from me. "Tis her favourite view, and she would so pleased! The idea of your painting it was hers from the first."

I would do my best-the time was short, I answered, coldly; while the thought raised a strong command within: "Work, work! If eyes grow dim, and fingers fail, that picture must be ready!"

"Never mind my fancy!" said Frank, goodnaturedly. "I came to ask you to put away your brushes for to-day, and we'll have a long ride."

"No, no,” I said, "if this is to be finished, and finished properly, I mustn't waste my time.' Frank looked vexed. "I was a blockhead to

mention my plan. I wouldn't, only I thought the picture wanted just a touch or two morenothing else. It looks so to me, and you've worked hard at it these two months. Come, Arthur, don't think anything more about it. My sister will never know, so she won't be disappointed. I can give it her on her birthday next year. We shall just be back by that time I expect. Come," he went on, taking the brush out of my hand; "I'll have the horses brought round directly."

"Stop, Frank," I said. "Don't ask me to ride this morning. I assure you my work is real pleasure to-day. I'm just in the right mood, and would rather paint than do anything else."

I was glad when he left the room; glad when the clattering of his horse's hoofs died away;

and I knew I should have a long, unbroken morning.

Working, as for my life, through the hours which brought the golden noon-through the hours which changed its sunshine into shadows, I questioned my own heart that day. She herself never sought me-never, by word or glance. How then had her image grown so importunately bold? Why did it rise at every turn, and follow me like Fate? Whence this strange flow and ebb of attraction and repulsion? Whence this restlessness which grew upon me?

these emotions so strong yet indefinite, confused (like a storm at night), which would possess me for hours, till coming into her presence, there was suddenly a great calm." I heard a footstep at the door-my heart cried out with its quickened beat that she was coming-not so; it passed; again it came; again it passed; then, after a long interval, Mrs. Fairbank entered.

"Dear me, Mr. Margesson," she cried, "I had no idea you were painting here; I thought you and Frank had gone out early. De come and take some lunch."

I thanked her, but refused. I was not hungry, I said; I would rather go on painting. So she left me. I listened eagerly for the footstep which came and went, but never entered. A bitter feeling rose. I was a fool to waste a moment's thought on her-a fool to work hard all day long for her pleasure, while she never troubled herself even to look in upon me. Cold, selfish! well, if there is a disagreeable creature in the world, it is your admirable woman! There, that's her step again! surely now-no, just as I thought. I knew she wouldn't. But why trouble myself, or anyone else, with the absurd vexation into which I worked myself that afternoon?

Precisely as the clock struck four, Grey appeared. Grey was an important person in the little ménage. He was everything footman, butler, house-steward-one of those terrible old servants whom, as the saying goes, you might trust with untold gold. He ruled his fellowservants with a rod of iron; domineered in a respectful sort of way over Frank and Mrs. Fairbank-his young mistress was the only person in the house of whom he stood in awe. To me, Grey was polite; perhaps a little condescending. Very likely he knew that he had saved, during his long service with Frank and Colonel Lyne, Frank's father, more money than I was worth in the world. I fancy Grey didn't like me at all at first, but he had become reconciled. He patronised my painting in the most affable manner. "Excuse me, sir," he would say, looking over me, with a silver salver in one hand, and a great flag of wash-leather in the other-" excuse me, sir, but that aint paint, that's natur.'" Then, having delivered this flattering criticism, he would stand looking at it for a few minutes, with his head on one side, rubbing away at the salver. He could not make up his mind if "that pictur' shall 'ang in the 'all, sir, or over the chimney-piece in the diningroom of our 'ouse in London."

Grey was method personified; he regarded the least deviation from the daily routine as a personal injustice to himself. Regularity he considered to be his perquisite. Nothing vexed him half so much as any alteration in the dinner-hour. When, on rare occasions, this happened, he would announce the change with an injured air, never omitting to state its reason, in the tone of counsel pleading against the defendant. Grey stood stiff on the threshold.

"Before the ladies went out walkin,' sir, they desired me to tell you that we dine at five to-day. I was to tell you at four, that you might have time for your walk."

"Dine at five, Grey?" and I took out my watch.

me,

"Yes, sir," he replied, with a vicious look at we dine an hour earlier to-day, sir. Miss Lyne would have it so; she told Mrs. Fairbank as how you'd been paintin' a good many hours without any lunch. So, sir, we dine at five." And Grey departed with the exact expression of an old parrot which longs to bite some one's finger to the bone.

This little incident reconciled me to Edith; but in the evening that sore feeling was more angry than ever. Yet how unreasonable it was! -even then I said to myself it was absurdly unreasonable.

Frank was late. I saw, some time before she said anything, that she was anxious and uneasy. The roads were lonely, the hills steep, her brother's horse spirited-all the phantom army of a woman's fears. They were perfectly groundless. It was moonlight, as light as day; there could be no danger, I assured the ladies, and read quietly on by the lamp. I might break my neck a dozen times, I thought, over my book, before it would trouble her. She had neither thought nor care for any one in the world besides Frank.

It grew really late. How anxious she was! I pretended not to notice. At last she asked downright if I would go to the top of the hill and see if he were coming. Frank and I soon returned together; he had broken his stirrup -been delayed: that was all the accident. Edith's white dress fluttered out in the porch as we came back. What a greeting she gave her brother! he might have come home from the wars. Seeing this, I felt angry with her, and somehow, though not knowing why, angry with Frank. Why should she show him so much affection, and I standing by? She thought no more of me than if I had been her grandmother! "I almost think I could hate her," I said to myself, before I fell asleep that night. It was the last impression of the day. Ah! but in those dreams of mine-those dreams which gave the lie to that false thought-I saw her again. The scene of the previous evening was renewed. Again she came to meet us with all that loving earnestness, with all that tender grace. Then, by that change of person and identity so natural in dreams, my part was strangely altered: I was no longer mere spectator. I awoke next morning with an undisguised,

eager longing to see Edith. I hastened down to the breakfast table; but here I was to be disappointed: she did not appear. Half-sulky at her absence, I think Frank found me a dull companion that morning, and I got off to my painting as soon as possible. After about an hour's work, however, some excuse occurred to me for returning to the room where we had breakfasted. I say an excuse, though at the time I could have sworn it was none-that I really wanted the Review I had left on the side-board.

I found the door half-open; my approach was unnoticed. I stood a few minutes, as a man might do whose eye had fallen on the loveliest picture imaginable. By the table Edith stood, bending over some flowers she had just arranged. The sunshine streamed in through the bow-window; it bathed her figure so completely that half the radiance seemed her own. It gave a fine tint to her morning muslin, deepened the pale gold of her hair, and brought out all her delicate beauty, every subtle charm, as from herself it fell upon the flowers with which her fingers were busied. A rare bouquet was that; not with respect to the flowers themselves, for most were common, many wild; but its beauty lay in this-that all, bud, bell, and blossom, were snowy white. They looked transparent and quite dazzling in the sunshine, heightened as the effect was by the relief of a few dark ivy leaves, and the crimson table-cover, on which floated from the vase, pendants of the large white convolvolus. Poets talk of the language of flowers: never, surely, had any others half the eloquence of these. With their gentle fragrance, with their snowy purity, they seemed to interpret and reflect Edith herself, as they stood before my eyes, all white and fair.

I was conscious that I trembled as I stepped into the room; involuntarily I put my hand on the table to steady myself. She looked up. For the first time her eye fell before mine; the long lash drooped like a shadow over a lovely

blush. On the moment I knew that the most

passionate words of love from any one else would be utterly worthless to me, compared with that slight mark of feeling.

"See,

"They are very beautiful," she said. Frank," she turned to him as he entered, "your

favourite flowers."

"Yes, Edith." He came up to the table and "Somehow they looked affectionately at them. always remind me of you. Curious, that when I was down in that fever at Lyons, I saw you as plain as I do now. You sat in my mother's dressing room, and had a great bunch of white flowers."

"Just as painters give St. Agnes her lilies, and St. Elizabeth her roses," I could not help saying; and I saw the roses of St. Elizabeth flush up in Edith's cheek.

Had a new world been created for me? It seemed so that day, as I wandered among the cliffs alone. On stealthiest foot, with folded wings, had Love found entrance; but now he stood revealed, and shook forth all his splendours,