bed on their reflux to the deep-the thought that this always had been, and always would be, till the world should be no more-that the warning ocean still continued thus awfully to count the time to nature, while successive generations of thoughtless mortals passed rapidly away;-these and other solemn musings stole through her mind, and though she could not sleep, the stillness of all the passions was as soothing, and almost as reviving to her spirits as the forgetfulness of repose could have been. She saw by the shadows that the sun was beginning to go down, and heard with pleasure Vashni's approaching step to summon her to depart.

He led her a short way from the house to a chariot he had prepared to fetch her mother in, and seating her in it they drove off. The route they were forced to take, in order to find a way wide enough for the vehicle they travelled in, was much more circuitous than the one she had taken in the morning. They wound round the foot of Mount Carmel, and entered a narrow defile among rocks, whose prodigious height made them look up

with fear and awe, while every turn presented them with some new object to keep alive surprise, and the scenery being all of on bold character, it gave at once the charm o change and of continuance. The goats and an telopes, the free-born denizens of these wilds gazed on the chariot as it moved slowly through their craggy pass, with a look of inquiry rather than of fear, as if they would loftily have demanded who it was that was intruding on their solitary realm. The range of the rugged mountain was their pasture, and they either felt too secure in these inaccessible heights to dread the approach of man, or too unacquainted with his wiles to shun his presence. The rocks, though bare of earth, were not destitute of vegetation, there were many clefts and fissures in them, out of which grew plants of a dark and glossy green.

"I always," said "Vashni, feel a particular kind of admiration as I look on trees growing as those do out of the arid rock, and cheering the desert with their smiles; they are like those contented sons of poverty and labour,

that derive their support and comfort from some hidden source, and seem exempt from feeling the dejecting vicissitudes of life.".

As Sephora approached towards home, and recognised scenes that were familiar to her, her mother again occupied all her mind. Those saddened thoughts with which she had left these objects in the morning, seemed still to hang over them as if waiting her return, that they might again take possession of her soul. As they were now getting near to her habitation, she proposed they should get out and walk, for she thought the appearance of the chariot would alarm her mother. They had not gone far, when they came in front of the house, and saw Pythonissa leaning out of one of the lattices, looking rather wildly first one way and then another, but no sooner did she recognise her daughter's approach, than her eyes were intently fixed on her, and she impatiently held out her arms as if she longed to hold her in them.

Sephora feared that all this was derangement, yet she was moved with something like a sensation of joy at this unusal token of

affection, even though it were but the effect of insanity, and eagerly ran forwards to meet her. Vashni scarcely knew what to think of all he saw, when he compared it with wha he had heard of Pythonissa's usual apathy He hastened on, and when he entered the room, found her with her daughter on her bosom, but heard nothing but convulsive sobs; it was some time before she could in any other way express her feelings. Poor Sephora, during this interval suspended be tween hope and fear, knew not what to think. At length Pythonissa exclaimed," My child, my child, I have never known the blessing of you before, I have never till this day known the kindness of a mother's heart-a mother do I say do not I owe you filial as well as parental affection, since you have rescued me from the pit of destruction, and given me my better life? O Sephora! how shall I tell you of all my wickedness since your poor father's death? It was not griet for him that affected my mind with that gloom which hung over it, it was having communication with the idolatrous worship

pers of Baal, from which I had been restrained during his life by my love towards him-it was a something of conflict that yet remained in my bosom, before I could entirely resolve to give myself up to the whole mystery of iniquity, that rent my heart, and made me the prey of misery. My reason was shook and almost overthrown, and my temper, which was never good, as you must too painfully have experienced, was a thousand times worse than ever. I cannot think of my anger and peevishness towards you without abhorring myself, and I can only wonder how it was that I should be blessed with such a child. I will not shock you by describing scenes of wickedness that would make you shudder; but yet for the ease of my own conscience, and out of the fulness of my heart, that now enlarges towards you in a way it never did before, I must tell you of some of my iniquities, and how I have been going on since Patrobus died.

"Whenever you went out, I constantly either attended some meeting of idolaters, or had their priests here to visit me, and when