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The toughest sinews will wear out, and David Grainger was verging fast to his last term of existence. He seemed so stern and opposed to Mary, that his wife had forborne talking with him about her. Mary and her children could live with her, and she never doubted her husband's leaving a sufficiency to support them all. The old man had become restless and uneasy-he began to think of death at last, and Gayer Grainger scarcely ever left his bed-side, while his wife was no less attentive to his comforts and wants. He had passed a bad night, was very low and weak during the day, and both Gayer and his aunt, worn out with watching, had, on perceiving a tendency to sleep coming over him, retired to obtain a little rest. It was about seven o'clock when both were summoned to his bed-room-he had become considerably worse. When his wife entered the room, Gayer was supporting him in his arms. The nephew was first in, and his aunt took her husband's handit was cold and clammy.

"Anne," said the dying man, addressing her, "I am about to leave you-I have made every arrangement-Gayer, hold me up."

The

"There, uncle dear," sobbed his nephew, " will that do?" "Gayer, you were always good, and kind, and attentive." nephew sobbed more audibly at this praise. "You will carry on the business as usual, and the floating capital employed in it, will enable you to conduct it with gain— But ah!" He paused-his eyes became fixed and glaring.

"David, David," said his wife, "you forget your daughter."

"Do not annoy him, aunt," exclaimed Gayer, still holding up his head; "dear uncle, how do you feel now ?"

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Silence, boy," said the aunt sternly; "he must not die in ill-will with his only child. Husband, remember Mary, she is your daughter." He raised himself up a little, but the unearthly glare still was visible in his eyes; "I do, Anne-you will find in—in- -"Gayer grew pale as white paper-" in that old—” a shivering ran through his frame, and he pointed to the other side of the chamber where the office books, since he had been unable to look over them, had been piled-" in—in—” Gayer and his wife followed with their eyes the direction of his hand, when they were startled by a rattling noise, his jaw fell-his eyes became glassy, and when they both looked at his face, they saw that he was dead. A month had made a change in David Grainger's house. The old merchant had been carried to his last home amid the real grief of two, his wife and daughter; the apparent grief of his nephew, and the decorous mourning of his city friends. His will had been read, the amount of his property known, and Gayer Grainger became the heir of great wealth, besides the sole proprietor of an immense trade with sufficient floating capital, independent of his late uncle's landed and funded property, to carry it on. The will, as his wife had expected, provided for her, even beyond her wishes, but there was no mention of Mary-not one single word. Mrs. Grainger said nothing but took

her daughter and her children home to reside with her. They would be a comfort in her old age, and also willing to ascribe as good motives as possible to her deceased husband, she thought from the amount of property left her, without any conditions as to its destination after her death, that he had left in her hands what he had determined Mary should inherit. Yet his last words were strange and enigmatical.

There were

It was the same room in which David Grainger had died. few changes in it. The bed stood as before, the old ledgers, folios, and day-books still remained piled in the corner as at his death. The furniture was not much disturbed, but the persons in the room were different. Gayer had left his aunt's dwelling, and taken a splendid house elsewhere, ready for the bride whom report said, he was wooing. The group in the chamber now consisted of the widow, her daughter, and her eldest child. The two first were looking over some papers in a writing desk, the last was playing among the office books.

"Anna, Anna," said Mary to the child, "what on earth are you about? Well, I declare if she hasn't pulled down every one of my father's account books."

"Now, ma, don't be angry, and I will put them all up again quite nicely. Now, ma, sure you're not angry?"

"Never mind her, Mary. Look over those papers before you. Perhaps we may find something of importance amongst them." And both continued the examination.

"How strange," said Mrs. Grainger, after a pause, while her grandchild was opening and reading the books as she piled them up,-“ How strange, that your father should have used such language on his deathbed, and left no possible means to discover its import, since he has not even mentioned you in his will."

"It is," said Mary, looking on through the papers,—

"Oh ma! here's your name,—and to my daughter, Mary Roberts— wife of-oh, dear, such figures,-units,-tens,-hundreds,”—and the child went on.

"What's that, Anna?" asked Mary, turning round to the little girl, who sat on the floor before the window, with an old time-worn ledger lying open beside her,-what's that ?"

"I don't know. Oh! here's cousin Gayer's name, and grandmamma's." "What is it you are about, child," said the old woman. "Do, Mary, see what she has gotten."

Mary obeyed. "It is a will, mother, as I live; a will written on a blank leaf in this old ledger."

"A will!" exclaimed her mother, with tremulous tones. date? What is its date ?"

"The 17th February, 1826."

"And its

"And your father died on the 28th. The will on which your cousin Gayer claims was made five years back, so that whatever be the terms of this one, it is the only true one.".

While her mother spoke, Mary was employed in reading its contents. It made her sole heiress to all her father's property, except what he had settled upon her mother, and the capital employed in his business. Every other farthing was settled on Mary. The will was correctly signed, and Mrs. Grainger's first act, after she had carried the old ledger down to the parlour, was to send for Gayer and the parties whose names were at the bottom of the instrument.

Everything was explained and proven. The gentlemen who signed remembered having done so. The document was in the handwriting of the testator, and grumble as Gayer might, he could not gainsay its correctness, while its discovery proved the meaning of the old merchant on his death bed, for he had remembered his daughter.

Gayer, loath to give up all hope, made an attack upon the young widow's heart, but her affections were buried in her husband's grave, and the American retreated. Her daughter, the discoverer of this incomprehensible document, grew up in beauty that rivalled her mother's early fame, and she has carried out her grandfather's aristocratical views, for a coronet decks her brow.

This is the tale of the OLD Ledger.

STANZAS TO AN ANCIENT CASTLE OF THE ORMONDS.

(AT CARRICK-ON-SUIR, WHERE THE RUINS STILL REMAIN.)

"And in so faire a land, as may be redd,
Not one Parnassus, nor one Helicon

Left, for sweet Muses to be harbored,

Save where thyselfe hast thy brave mansion;

There indeed dwell fair graces many a one,

And gentle nymphes, delighte of learned wits."

Sonnet of Edmund Spencer, to Thomas, Earle of Ormonde, at his Castell of Carrig.

Brave Suirirupes,' faste within thy holde,

Abideth Ormonde still with great plaisaunce,

His thewy bowmen too, those heartes bolde

Who plucked the flower-de-luce from crests of Fraunce;2

Thou still for bravery doste bear the bell,

Strong in thy spears and in thy mangonel;

And all the wights that feast within thy wall

Ne lurkish faitour fear, ne foreign foeman's thrall.

Bold Raymond Crassus,3 when he did essaye

To plant his banners in Mononia's lande,

He did campe here, and sworen by his faye

He wolde therein againste all comers stande;

1 Suirirupes, an ancient name of Carrick-on-Suir.-Sir Richard Coxe.

2 Seven hundred Irish soldiers were raised in the neighbourhood of Waterford and Carrick, in the reign of Henry VIII. (1544), under the command of Captains Poer, Finglass, and Skurlock. They were immediately despatched to the siege of Boulogne, where they did great service as irregular infantry. They were a terror to the French, from their mode of warfare; and as foragers, they were jewels beyond price, as Holingshed thus testifies :-"they had a pretty trick to get a prey, which was, to tie a bull to a stake and set fire about him, and as the fire scorched him the bull would bellow, and thereupon all the cattel within hearing of him would flock that way, and so were taken."

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"After the surrender of Bulloign, a large Frenchman, on the other side of the haven, braved and defied the English army, whereupon one Nicholas Walsh did swim over the river, and cut off the Frenchman's head, and brought it back over the river in his mouth, for which bolde action he was bountifully rewarded."

3 Raymond le Gros.

His men of arms did then around him throng,
And built a keep embattled safe and stronge.
Carrigia he did this castle hight,

And sithen it remains, untainted in its might.

Brave Miles de Cogan shooke his pennons here;
And Hugh de Lacy also did enjoine

With knights, and squires, and ladies in minveere,
To daunce, and jouste, and drink wine of Gascoigne,
And in the lists did feats of chivalrie;

I wot it was a goodlie sighte to see.

Light did they recke of any foeman's foile,

For they were neer forfoughten at a spoile.

Well werte thou armed, stout Fortalice, alwaie;
And eke well harnessed were thy jackmen stronge,
With glaive, and shield, fit for a sturdie fray,

And mace, and tallerace, and haubergeon,

And burnished brand, and bill, and basnet bright,
Axe, partisan, and hauberk for the fight;
And did the strongest dare to bend his bowe

To thy mischaunce, short shrift he had, I trowe.

And many a raide, and many a rude foraie,

Of kerne wilde, and doughtie gallowglasse,

Didst thou sustain withouten aughte dismaie,

Natheless, eftsoons, thy walls were well nigh braste:
And though beleaguers stiffely stood in stowre,

And arrows rained, a stormie iron showere,

Yet thy good warriors manfullie did strive,

And when the slogan rose, they busked themselves belive.

Not faire Rosse Ponte, with its famous fosse,

Whilke now defies bothe battaile and attacke;

Though for the nonce its youths their plumes may toss,
4 It erstwhile feared rough Rapparee's rude wracke;
Could match with thee, to endure the shrewd shock
Of th'enemie, for thou'rte a firme rocke;

And with thy towers so strongly builte aboute,
Of freke or feude thou need'st not stande in doubte.

And thou hast bardes within thy walls, who sing
Of noble actions, aunciently enrolled,
Fulfilled with honour, and which to thee bring

Fame for those deeds, for aye to be extolled.

Where'er faire dames and martial men are founde

Throughout the lande, there shall thy praise resounde;

Minstrels thou linkest with a double chaine,

Who come for largesse, but for love remaine.

"There repaired one of the Irish to this towne on horseback, and espieing a piece of cloth on a merchant's stall, tooke holde thereof, and bet the cloth to the lowest price he could. As the merchant and he stoode dodging, one with the other, cheaping the ware, the horseman considering that he was well mounted, and that the merchant and he had growne to a price, made wise as though he would have drawn to his purse, to have defraied the monie. The cloth, in the meanwhile, being tucked up and placed before, he gave the spur to his horsse and ran away with the cloth, being not imbard from his posting pace, by reason the towne was not perclosed either with ditch or wall. The townsmen being pinched at the heart that one rascal, in such scornful wise, should give them the slampaigne; not so much viewing the slendernesse of the losse, as the shamefulnesse of the foile; they put their heads together, consulting how to prevent either the sudden rushing or the post haste flieing of anie such adventurous rakehell hereafter. In which consultation, a famous Dido, a politike dame called Rose, unfolded the devise how any such future mischance should be prevented, namely that the towne should incontinently be closed with walls, and therewithal promised to defraie the charges."-Stanihurst.

THE NATIVE MUSIC OF IRELAND.

AUGUST.

No. XXV.

We now publish the version of the air of Róisín dub which we promised at No. XII. (p. 39) of the music of the present year. Our readers will readily perceive its identity with the airs previously in circulation, and to which we have already referred. It is manifestly superior to all the others. Perhaps it might suffice to say in its behalf, that it has come to us from the pipes of Paddy Coneely himself. But, in truth, the other settings, in Bunting's as well as in our own collection, seem to have been insufficient to obtain for it that reception to which, from the affection and delight wherewith our peasantry speak of it, it would appear entitled. What we now offer is the simplest and most vocal of all, and we therefore deem it the truest as well as the most beautiful.

When Paddy was in Clare Island, (the time he was in search of Seagan Gaba) he heard this sung in the hospitable cottage of the Morans, by a young woman, in a style of exquisite beauty never to be forgotten. The time was -"slow, slow"-that wonderfully prolonged time, which so much astonishes as it delights all those who have the fortune to hear the slow Irish airs sung by those who know how to sing them to Irish words. The small notes in the second bar of the second part indicate a variation, introduced (amongst others) by that young woman, which Paddy has never ceased to rave of since he heard it, as far and away the most beautiful turn he ever heard in his life.

The name of this air is variously applied, referring either to the name of a flower or of a maiden, as may suit the poet's fancy; and in the latter sense, it is addressed at one time as a love-song, at another as the effusion of affection towards our native country. In the latter sense, the meaning is always covert, as, we have already intimated, was usually the case in so many of our patriotic songs. This has been remarked by Mr. Hardiman, who publishes in his Irish Minstrelsy (vol. 1, p. 254) a remarkable song as belonging to this air. He appends (p. 351) the following note to it.

ROISIN DUBH.

"Roisin Dubh, Little Black Rose, is an allegorical ballad, in which strong political feelings are conveyed, as a personal address from a lover to his fair one. The allegorical meaning has been long since forgotten, and the verses are now remembered

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