THE USURPER.

BY MRS. J. WEBB.

"CROSS my hand, lady," said a tall, wild-looking man, as he gently seized the bridle of a spirited horse, on which was seated a beautiful girl, who might have seen some nineteen summers; "and perhaps the gipsy may tell you something it may profit you to know."

The lady took from her girdle a purse, saying, as she offered it, "There is money, good man; but I have no faith in your art,”—and beckoning a servant who rode a short distance behind her, prepared to proceed.

The gipsy still gently held the bridle, and while he proudly put aside the offered purse, said, "Daughter of another land! ere that bright sun shall again cross the equator, strange things will befall thee. The rich lands of Ashfield will no longer call thee heir. Another scene awaits thee."

"Oh! would," she exclaimed, as she dropped the reins, and raised her eyes to heaven; "would to God I had never seen them, nor even left dear, sunny France." Then, as if ashamed of having betrayed her feelings, she added, "Allow me to proceed, good Of me and mine you can know nothing."

man.

"Of you and yours, lady," said he, as his lip curled, and his keen eye was bent upon hers, "I know even more than you do. Methinks I see now the cha

teau of Aubry; the green lawn, where you played in childhood; the fountain, near which you sat in riper years; the dark-eyed stranger, who periled his life to save yours; and the alcove, where you first listened to that stranger's tale of love."

“Oh, how, how know you this?" she exclaimed, while the blood crimsoned her cheek and brow, and, receding, left them pale as marble.

A faint smile played for an instant round the mouth of the gipsy, as he replied, "By the same power that I know you nursed him till he recovered from his injuries, and wept when your stern uncle, on learning that he was poor, bade him quit the chateau. And now, lady," he said, "enough of the past. Should you wish hereafter to hear of the future, yonder is our encampment," pointing, as he spoke, to a valley at a short distance, where stood two or three tents, such as are used by those wandering tribes. "Come there, and ask for Philip.”

So saying, he relinquished the reins. The animal, finding itself at liberty, sprung forward; and before Adele de Lacy recovered from her astonishment, she was half-way up the well-shaded avenue that led to Ashfield Hall.

Adele de Lacy was an orphan. Misfortune had early sought her acquaintance. In her fifteenth year she was deprived of her father, whose memory a sudden and awful death rendered doubly dear. The shock proved too much for the delicate frame of her mother, who lingered in sickness a few months, and was then laid at rest with the partner of her joys and sorrows. Poor Adele was thus left alone to buffet with

the storms of life, and learn, by sad experience, that wealth alone cannot confer happiness; that Providence allots to the rich their heart-heavings and cares, as well as to the poor; and that the sun of joy, though it beam brightly on us in life's morning, may, ere noontide, be overcast.

The management of Adele's affairs devolved upon her maternal uncle, Sir Ralph Wilmont, who proposed, as she was his heir, that she should leave the scene of her sorrows, journey with him to merry England, and take up her abode at Ashfield Hall.

It was a few days previous to their intended departure from her childhood's home, that a circumstance occurred which gave a new turn to Adele's thoughts, a new impulse to her feelings. Returning one day from her usual ride, her horse took fright at the report of a gun. Her good horsemanship availed nothing. On flew the animal in wild career; and Adele would undoubtedly have been dashed to pieces, had not a gentleman seized the reins, and, at the peril of his life, stopped the horse; but not before he had been dragged a considerable distance, when other aid came, and Adele, more dead than alive, alighted. The stranger lay senseless on the ground, still holding, as with a dying grasp, the reins in his hand. He was borne to the chateau. Sir Ralph was all gratitude to him, who, under heaven, had been the means of preserving his beloved niece, for whom he felt paternal fondness.

It was many weeks before the stranger was able to leave his room. Adele nursed him with a sister's care; nor dreamed, as she held the cup to his parch